1. Positions: The Twelve Arguments said to be Dr. Owen's, Impartially Considered.
Positions: The Twelve Arguments said to be Dr. Owen's, Impartially Considered.
O wen:
Position: It is not lawful for us to go to, and join in public worship by the Common-Prayer, because that worship itself, according to the rule of the gospel, is not lawful. 1
Baxter:
1st Answer: I shall use the same method that he has used and first give you my positions, and then the supposed matter of fact, and then consider his arguments.
Position: It is not only lawful, but a duty for (1) those that cannot have better public church-worship without more hurt than benefit, and are near a competent parish minister, to go to and join in public worship performed according to the Liturgy and in sacramental communion; and for (2) those that can have better, to join sometime with such parish churches when their forbearance scandalously seems to signify that they take such communion for unlawful, and so would tempt others to the same accusation and uncharitable separation.
History of Liturgies & Parish-Communion 2 The history of the matter of fact must be premised for the right deciding of the case, which is as follows:
1. God has commanded us to preach, pray, praise Him and administer his sacraments and discipline, and has told us what doctrine we must preach, what things we must pray and give thanks for and what sacraments and discipline we must administer. But He has not told us in what words we must do these, nor in what posture, nor in what particular method, nor whether we must use oftest the same words or various, nor whether they shall be before prepared or spoken immediately without preparation of words, nor whether written or remembered, nor whether prepared and composed by ourselves or by others, with such like.
2. God prescribed diverse forms of prayer [Num. 6:23-27], confession [Dt. 26:5-15] and praise to the Jews in Moses's Law, and a prophetical song, which they were all to learn (Dt. 32). 3
3. The psalms were a chief part of the Jews' liturgy, in which there are many forms of prayer and praise, some made by David, some by Asaph, some by others and some in or after the captivity (no one knows by whom).
And those psalms were not in meter and sung in tunes like ours now, but loudly said over. 4
4. John taught his disciples to pray, not only as to the matter, but as to the words [Lk. 5:33; 11:1]; and so did Christ his disciples at their request, who had not then the after-pouring out of the Spirit (nay, knew not that Christ must die for sin, rise and reign in heaven, etc.): "and He said, 'When ye pray, say, 'Our Father,''" etc. [Lk. 11:2-4] though not tying them only to these words, yet giving them a form of words to be used as they had occasion, as well as a perfect directory for method [Mt. 6:9].
5. Christ Himself joined with the Jews in synagogues [Mt. 4:23; 9:35; 13:54; Mk. 1:21] and temple [Mt. 26:55; Mk. 11:11; Mk. 12:35; Mk. 14:49] when they used forms, and so did the apostles [Acts 2:46; 3:1; 9:20; 13:5,
14-15; 14:1; 18:4, 21; 21:26], and never blamed them for the use of such forms.
6. Christ prescribed a form of words in baptism [Mt. 28:19] 5 and in the administration of the Lord's Supper [Lk. 22:19-20], and used a hymn in form [Mt. 26:30]. 6
7. There are diverse forms of prayer and thanksgiving in the New Testament in Lk. 1 & 2, and the Acts [4:24-30] and Paul's epistles [Rom.
15:5-6, 13, 33; 16:25-27; 2 Cor. 13:14; Eph. 3:20-21; 6:23-24; 1 Thess.
3:11-13; 5:23; 2 Thess. 2:16-17; 1 Tim. 1:17; Heb. 13:20-21; Jude 24-25; etc.], and the Revelations [1:4-6; 4:8, 11; 5:12-13; 7:12; 15:3-4; 22:21; etc.] which it's lawful and laudable to use. 7
8. We are commanded to use "psalms and hymns, and spiritual songs,"
[Eph. 5:18; Col. 3:16] which are forms of prayer and praise (and was not then in rhyme). And it was not everyone in the Church that composed these extempore, but some made them for the rest to use. And if none impose them (by office, authority or persuasion), the churches will never use the same. Christians in the primitive ages of the Church were known to the heathen by their constant use of such hymns sung to Christ and of Christ. 8
9. The churches from Christ's time to this had a creed or form of sound words, or necessary articles of faith, which they used in catechizing and in baptism, which were a great means to keep out heresy; and Church-tyranny and heresy were the introducers of all their alterations.
10. The lay-Christians of the first ages were so full of zeal that they would have taken it ill to have been forbidden to speak their answering and
consenting parts in the Church 9 (as the Jews before did), and as now we would take it ill for the minister to sing alone and forbid the people: And though the scantness of history in the first two ages [centuries] tell us not what words were then used as a liturgy (and no doubt but praying by habit was used chiefly), yet some few sentences that are recorded tell us that they used some forms.
11. Constantine himself made prayers for his soldiers and every bishop then used what prayers he thought best in his own church, and composed himself the forms which he used constantly, till heresy and weakness of ministers caused a council to decree that everyone should first show his form of prayer to the synods to be examined and approved before he used it.
12. I do not read or hear of many Churches on earth at this day that used not a liturgy, except New England and some nonconformists here. Nor did I ever read that any one Church on earth for a thousand years after Christ's time did ever scruple it or speak against it (to my remembrance), so that it was for many ages the practice of the whole Church on earth. At this day the Greeks, Armenians, Muscovites [Russians], Georgians, Circassians,
Mengrelians, Indian and Persian Christians, the Syrians, Abassines, Egyptians, all the countries that have Nestorians, Jacobites, Maronites, beside the Papists, have a liturgy very far more faulty than ours: even those ascribed to James, Mark, Chrysostom. The Lutherans have one (or diverse in diverse countries). And -these called the Reformed have one, though a shorter and more simple one in France, Geneva, Holland, the Palatinate
[Germany], Helvetia [Switzerland], etc.
13. The nonconformists in England were generally for the lawfulness of a form or liturgy and for communion of the parish churches therein in the days of King Edward VI, Queen Elizabeth, King James and King Charles
I, 10 and wrote more against Separation 11 by far than the bishops did, as is yet visible in their books, especially: Cartwright, Hildersham, Bradshaw,
Paget, Gifford, Brightman, Baynes, Rathband, John Ball, etc. 12
14. Those then counted the fathers of Independency were of the same mind, for parish communion and against Separation: Mr. Jacob, Bradshaw,
Ames, (see his First and Second Manuduction). 13
15. Yea, those called Brownists or Separatists were for communion in the Liturgy in the usual parts and for the truth of those parish churches that had good ministers: I have cited their own words before, though all of them were not of the same mind. 14
16. The martyrs in Queen Mary's days had a chief hand in composing our Liturgy and rejoiced in it, and worshipped God according to it. And none that I read of separated for this from the rest as false worshippers.
17. When before 1639 there were but about one or two nonconformable ministers for each county. If it had been unlawful to communicate in the public churches with the Liturgy, all England must have lived like atheists without any church worship for lack of ministers, except for about thirty or forty [ministers]. Yea, those few kept up no usual church worship, except those of them that by connivence had small chapels or peculiars. And of them most used much of the Liturgy.
18. All the congregations of the nonconformists in England that I have heard (save one now broken, not counting such as Quakers, etc.) have used, and do use, stinted, imposed forms of worship to this day, and therefore judge it not unlawful, merely as forms or as imposed:
1. Parents teach their children a form of words in catechisms, in prayers, in giving thanks for their meat, and impose these on them.
2. Ministers impose on the assemblies their own method and words in prayer, which are a form to the people; yea, and a form which they know not till they hear it, and have no time to examine it while it flows from the speaker. And their sermons are imposed forms of doctrine (sometimes written also, and read).
3. Few men that retain any sobriety in religion are against the [Apostles'] Creed to be used as a form of confession of faith.
4. The Independents drew up at the Savoy about 1658 or 1659 a form of confession of their faith and discipline.
5. They attempted (Dr. Owen, Mr. Nye, Dr. Goodwin, Mr. Sidrach Sampson, Dr. Cheynell and others), by appointment of a committee of parliament, to have drawn up a catalogue of fundamentals to have been imposed for consent on all that should be tolerated in the land in churchworship: they are yet to be seen in print. (But Archbishop Ussher being chosen for one, and refusing, and I being by his consent substituted in his room, broke that attempt, finding that their fundamentals were lamentably composed and that Christianity was not an unknown thing, and that baptism, the Creed, Lord's Prayer and Decalogue were a far better catalogue of fundamentals than theirs).
6. We all constantly use an English form of translation of the Scripture where all the English words, the division of chapters and verses are man's invention, imposed on all.
7. We all use constantly forms of confession, prayer, thanksgiving and praise in the singing of psalms, where, when David's and the Jews' psalms are used, the translation (or rather paraphrase), the rhyme or meters and the tune are human and imposed: and the Separatists themselves make no question of it; but other psalms (such as that of Ambrose, etc.) more suited
to the state of the gospel-Church, may be fitly used, as Paul requires, which must be composed by man and imposed on the Churches or never unanimously used. Our common use of singing psalms and hymns is the use of stinted, imposed forms.
8. He that does not celebrate baptism and the Lord's Supper often in words of the same signification shall corrupt those sacraments by his affectation of variety of words, the matter being the same.
9. No man knows beforehand whether a minister has studied and sore composed his prayer or sermon, and yet all join with him.
10. Many affect to compose all their prayer in Scripture sentences, 15 which do but make up one form of many.
19. When the King [Charles II] came in [1660], the ministers of London were invited to attempt a concord with the bishops, and they offered to join in the use of the Liturgy if it were corrected. And they offered additional forms, or a Reformed liturgy, which they would have used. I know it will be objected that I plead in this but for my own works, but I answer: 1. The exceptions and emendations of the old Liturgy offered 16 were none of my work; 2. and the new one which I drew up by their appointment 17 had their common review and consent.
It will be said that these were not all the then nonconformists. I answer it was the main body of the London ministers and it was as many as would meet about it when they were desired to come to Zion College; and after they printed a thanksgiving to the King for his declaration, so that then they were not against all imposed liturgies so [long as] that the imposition had no unmercifulness in it.
20. The foreign Churches (in Holland, France, Germany, etc.) are so much used to praying in the same form of words that if they were put to do all ex
tempore, it would be lamentably done by most even far worse than it is [now].
21. I have formerly told the world that many of the most noted nonconformists in London met and concluded for communicating in the parish-churches about 1664; and two things done by the conformists stopped them: One was a storm then arising against those that could not do it, which they feared to seem to countenance by their compliance; and plague and fire interrupting the purposes of some. The Oxford Act of Confinement made it inpracticable, because to be seen in a church would have cast them six months in the gaol [prison] with malefactors. 18
22. Being thus hindered and delayed, the King's Declaration, after giving them liberty to have assemblies otherwise, they were then kept from the parish-churches by their labors with their own flocks, as the parishministers be kept from hearing one another.
23. Some in the city, and more in the countries, all this while went constantly to the parish-churches before this liberty, and as oft as they could after, lest they should by their practice draw the people to think that they took it for unlawful.
24. Others that thought it lawful, judge it not necessary when they might do that which they judged better. And finding many hearers offended at it, were loath to displease them and bear their censures till at last, by long disuse [of parish-communion], the people thought their judgment was against it: And when necessity drives them to declare their judgments and change their practice, their [own] hearers (and their adversaries) call them unconscionable temporizers.
25. Though Mr. Tombes wrote for parish-communion, 19 few Anabaptists 20 followed him; and though Mr. Nye wrote for hearing the
parish-ministers, 21 few Independents consented. But some of their ministers took the advantage of the foresaid forbearance of others and so brought Separation [by their propagandizing] to pass for a common duty with many. And renewed sufferings made it easier to draw men from the communion of those that they so much suffered by, following the example of St. Martin 22 and saying that persecutors obtruded without their consent were none of their pastors; 23 and that it's no schism not to communicate with the Church which causelessly has, ipso facto, excommunicated them in [the Anglican] canons six, seven, eight, etc.
This is the true premised history.
Owen's Confirmations of his Position Owen:
Some things must be premised to the confirmation of this position:
1. The whole system of Liturgical worship, with all its inseparable dependences, are intended; For as such it is established by Law, and not in any part of it only; as such it is required that we receive it and attend unto it. 24 It is not in our power, it is not left to our judgment or liberty to close with, or make use of any part of it as we shall think fit.
There are in the mass-book many prayers directed to God only by Jesus Christ, yet it is not lawful for us thereon to go to mass under a pretense only of joining in such lawful prayers.
As we must not affect their drink-offerings of blood, so we must not take up their names in our lips (Ps. 16:4). Have no communion with them. 25
Baxter:
§2. I shall now examine the doctor's premises. To the first I answer:
1. If he will include all that is in the Liturgy, the nonconformists confess that there is somewhat in it which they dissent from as unjustifiable: and so
there is in all men's worship of God.
2. He intimates that it is not in our power to close with some and not withal. This is his first error.
Though man give us no such power, God does: as it is in my power to believe all that one speaks truly and well, and not that which he speaks amiss. I am not bound to own all that any preacher or priest shall say in the church. God put it in the disciples' power to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees [Mt. 16:6], and yet to hear them [Mt. 23:1-3]. Proving all things
[1 Thess. 5:21] is not approving all things.
2. Though the mass have many good prayers, the corruption by twisted idolatry and heresy makes communion there unlawful: [just as] heathens and Turks have good prayers. Prove any such heresy or idolatry in the Church-worship by the Liturgy and we will avoid it. 26 But if I may join with your own good prayers and preaching, notwithstanding your many failings, and such errors as are here pleaded for, why not with others?
3. Ps. 16:4 is too sadly abused, which speaks only of sacrificing to and worshipping false gods [and not worship of the true God].
Owen:
2. It is to be considered as armed with laws: (1) such as declare and enjoin it as the only true worship of the Church; (2) such as prohibit, condemn and punish all other ways of the worship of God in church-assemblies. By our communion and conjunction in it we justify those laws.
Baxter:
§3. That our communion justifies all the laws that impose the Liturgy, yea, the penal severities, is too gross an error to be written with any show of proof. What if the Creed or Lord's Prayer were too rigorously imposed, or presbytery or Independency, must we forbear them or justify the law? I can
prove episcopacy to be excluded too severely by the [Solemn League and] Covenant: 27 But everyone that is against it justifies not the imposition of that Covenant in that rigor. What if rigorous laws should make it imprisonment or death not to use our translation of the Scriptures, our approved catechisms, our meter and tunes of the psalms, not to put off the hat at prayer, 28 not to meet at the appointed place and hour, etc. Does every man justify the rigor of the imposition who obeys the law? Then a rigorous lawmaker may take away our Christian liberty by commanding us to use such things too strictly: yea, he may turn duty, by too strict commanding it, into sin. These are your unproved premises.
Owen:
3. This conjunction in communion by the worship of the Liturgy is the symbol, pledge and token of an ecclesiastical incorporation with the Church of England in its present constitution: it is so in the law of the land; it is so in the canons of the Church; it is so in the common understanding of all men. And by these rules must our profession and practice be judged and not by any reserves of our own, which neither God nor good men will allow of.
Wherefore.
Baxter:
§4. To the third premise I answer:
1. The "Church of England" is an ambiguous word:
1. As it signifies a part of the universal Church, agreeing in Faith, one God, one Christ and all essential to the Church, so we desire the honor of being parts of it.
2. And also as it is a Christian kingdom under one [civil] king.
3. And as it is a confederacy of many churches to keep concord in lawful circumstantials as well as integrals. 29 In all these senses it is a lawful
association.
4. But if any church go beyond these bounds, and on good pretenses shall agree upon any error or evil, it is a mistake to hold that all that incorporate with them in the three foresaid lawful respects do therefore confederate with them in their error.
This is your fourth error. I will give you a general instance and a particular one:
1. You cannot name me one combined company of churches from the apostles' days till now that had no error. You take episcopacy to be an error in the very constitution. Name one Church from the 3rd or 4th century, for a thousand years, that was without it, either catholics or heretics, that were indeed a Church. And must Christians have forborne associating with any of them? Or might not own the good in their associations without owning the evil?
2. The Independents gathered a synod at the Savoy [1658], and there among their doctrinals or articles of faith laid down two points expressly contrary to Scripture… 30 Now does it follow that everyone that there confederated with you owned these errors?
The Churches of Helvetia are a very honorable part of the Reformed Churches. They are commonly such as we call Erastian for having no discipline but the magistrate's. Are all that confederate with them as Churches guilty of this error?
2. But I further distinguish between the many parish-churches and the diocesan, and the Church of England as constituted of such diocesan churches. The old nonconformists commonly owned the parish-churches
(and the Church of England as made up of such), but not the diocesan. This they openly professed. It is therefore another of your mistakes that owning
the parish-churches and worship is an owning of the present diocesan constitution.
Also it is your mistake to say that communion by the Liturgy is the symbol and pledge of the foresaid incorporation in the Church of England in its present constitution: It is only a part of the communion commanded, but no such symbol, for:
1. The rulers openly declare that they take multitudes to be none of their Church who join in the Liturgy. And it is subscribing, declaring and swearing obedience which is the symbol: yea, they excommunicate many that come to the Liturgy-service.
2. And many come to it who openly disown the diocesan present constitution: so did, as I said, the old nonconformists, and many foreigners,
French, Dutch, etc. that come over hither.
3. If one may join in communion of worship with a presbyterian, Independent or Anabaptist church without owning the errors of their constitution, then so one may with a parish-church: but, etc.
You mistake when you say, "It is so by the law of the land." You mistake again when you say, "It is so by the canon." You mistake again when you say, "It is so in the common understanding of all." I formerly instanced in one of the sharpest nonconformists, old Mr. Humphrey Fen of Coventry, 31 who would say aloud, "Amen," to all the Common-Prayer, save that for the bishops, by which all there knew his mind. Whether it were right or wrong,
I now determine not. So here are three more of your mistakes.
4. You make all other reserves of our own to be allowed neither by God or good men. Here are two more mistakes:
1. God makes it our great duty to hold communion with most, or almost all, Churches on earth with such reserves; that is, to own them in all that is
good and disown all their evil, though their laws command the owning of them. Without this reserve I would not join with yours or any church on earth, that is, if my communion were an owning of all their faultiness.
2. And it's an immodest error to say that none are "good men" that in this are not of your mind. Is there any spotless Church on earth? or must we renounce the communion with them all, or reserve exception against their faults and mis-performances?
Owen:
4. He that joins in the worship of the Common-Prayer does by his practice make profession that it is the true worship of God, accepted with Him, 32 approved of Him and wholly agreeable to his mind and will. To do it with other reserves is hypocrisy and worse than the thing itself without them.
"Happy is he that condemneth not himself in the thing which he alloweth."
(Rom. 14:12).
Baxter:
§5. This is your twelfth mistake and one that has dreadful consequents:
1. It contradicts the express profession of the communicants who openly tell the world that they take not all in the Liturgy to be "wholly agreeable to God's mind and will," and you are not to fain a profession of men contrary to their open protestation.
2. It is most direful to your own separating followers who by this are supposed to profess all your worship to be "wholly agreeable to God's mind and will," and so the honest well-meaning people are made guilty of all the errors which you put into your worship.
3. It is contrary to your own former profession that you could in charity communicate with presbyterians or Anabaptists, etc.; and so you approved of all the errors of their worship.
4. It makes it a down-right sin to communicate with any church on earth:
For all have their faults and errors, even in worship, which you fain all that communicate with them to justify as "wholly agreeable to God's will." And to justify sin and teach men so to do and to father it on God are sad aggravations: such shall be called least in the Kingdom of God [Mt. 5:19].
By this rule you would have separated from every Church on earth that we have notice of for a thousand years, yea, and to this day; and is not that near separating from Christ? And when no man knows before you speak in prayer what you will say, how shall any man that joins with you know but he may be guilty of your sin at the next sentence.
5. It is a breach of the Ninth Commandment thus to charge all the ancient Churches and reformers, and the nonconformists with hypocrisy and worse than open sinning who have all communicated on the contrary supposition.
6. It is no friendly act to the Church to lay down such a principle of perpetual Separation and condemning of each other's communion, and so to make the communion and concord of the churches impossible.
7. It is self-condemnation to judge the present bishops to be Churchtyrants for excommunicating good Christians according to the canons for professed dissent about their governing offices, liturgies and ceremonies, and for imposing assent and consent to all things, etc., and yet to go much further than they by making it sin against God to communicate where the worship is not "wholly agreeable to God's will." Prove that ever the bishops went so far from concord.
8. I only humbly ask whether this make not Christ and all his apostles hypocrites and worse than professed sinners: Did Christ by his usual joining in the synagogue and temple-worship and commanding men to go to the priests [Mt. 8:4; Mk. 1:44], to hear the scribes and Pharisees [Mt. 23:1-3],
etc. profess that He took their worship to be wholly agreeable to God's will?
33 Or did the apostles so, while they long joined in the synagogues with the Jews?
Owen:
5. There may be a false worship of the true God as well as a worship of a false god. Such was the worship of Jehovah the Lord by the calf in the wilderness (Ex. 33:5-6). Such was the feast unto the Lord ordained by Jeroboam in the eighth month, the fifteenth day of the month, which he had devised of his own heart (1 Kn. 12:32-33).
Baxter:
§6. Your fifth premise is unquestionable, but if you distinguish not of false worship, you will make but false work about it:
1. There is that which is the corrupting of God's own necessary worshipordinances in so gross a manner, either outwardly in the matter or inwardly in the mind, as that God will not own or accept the worship and worshippers. 34
2. There is that which is false in integrals, accidents or degrees by pardoned failings and infirmities. 35
To be "false" is to be disagreeable to the rule; such in some measure is every prayer, sermon or sacrament that ever you administered. 36 He that says he has no sin is a liar [1 Jn. 1:10]. All sinful worship is so far false worship, which the best of men are guilty of: If you put all the errors that are in this paper of yours in a sermon or prayer, will not so many falsehoods make it false worship?
1. Contra Owen, see https://reformedbooksonline.com/on-impurities-in-worship/#vs , https://reformedbooksonline.com/on-impurities-in-worship/#abstain and https://reformedbooksonline.com/on-impurities-in-worship/#others at 'On Impurities in Worship'
(RBO).
2. Owen had given his own history of liturgies in A Discourse concerning Liturgies, and their
Imposition (London: 1662), https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/A53684.0001.001/1:6? rgn=div1;view=fulltext & https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/A53684.0001.001/1:7? rgn=div1;view=fulltext , pp. 24-38.
3. Besides these cited texts, there are not more forms of prayer, confession or praise in Moses's Law.
4. Baxter understates this, which lends support to his framework of understanding worship. It is likely in the synagogues the psalms were loudly, rhythmically said over, that is, in a chanting way, being distinguished from other things merely read or recited. In the temple, with the instruments and Levitical choirs, it is more likely the rehearsing of the psalms was done in a way more corresponding with our singing.
5. That Christ did not prescribe a form of words in baptism, see https://reformedbooksonline.com/topics/topics-by-subject/baptism/#formula at 'Baptism' (RBO).
6. Given the Talmudic evidence, this "hymn" was likely the Great Hallel (Ps. 113-118) or a part of it.
Baxter's numerous reasons mentioned below for singing hymns in public worship do not constitute necessary warrant for so doing. See Michael Bushell, Songs of Zion: the Biblical Basis for Exclusive
Psalmody, 4th ed. (Norfolk Press, 2011).
7. Note there is no evidence any of these prayers were composed aforehand or were intended to be set forms for prayer in public worship, though it is very true they may be used.
8. This refers to Pliny the Younger (c. 112), Letters, bk. 10, https://www.attalus.org/old/pliny10b.html#96 : "on a stated day they had been accustomed to meet before daybreak and to recite a hymn among themselves to Christ, as though he were a god
[carmenque Christo quasi deo dicere secum invicem]…" The Latin does not necessarily speak of singing, but of saying, and carmen is not necessarily a hymn, but may be (1) a song generally, such as one of the messianic psalms (Ps. 2, 45, 110, etc.), (2) a regular psalm, or (3) it could be a prose response of praise or prayer (see https://logeion.uchicago.edu/carmen ). There is nothing in the passage which specifies singing a man-composed hymn.
9. On the absence or paucity of any responsive readings, responsive exhortations or responsive prayers in the first two centuries of the early Church, see
https://reformedbooksonline.com/topics/topics-by-subject/worship/responsive-readings/#early at 'Responsive Readings in Worship' (RBO).
10. See Baxter, Nonconformists' Plea for Peace, 7. https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/A26965.0001.001/1:9?rgn=div1;view=fulltext , sect. 3, pp. 12122; James Owen, Moderation Still a Virtue, https://books.google.com/books? id=wBQVAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA42#v=onepage&q&f=false ; John
Williams, https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo2/A33791.0001.001/1:13?rgn=div1;view=fulltext in A Collection of Cases & other Discourses, vol. 1.
11. See https://reformedbooksonline.com/topics/church/against-separatism/ (RBO).
12. For the works of all these authors except Baynes, see https://reformedbooksonline.com/topics/church/against-separatism/ (RBO). For Baynes, see his quote under https://reformedbooksonline.com/on-impurities-in-worship/#cant at 'On Impurities of Worship' (RBO).
13. The works of Bradshaw and Ames can be found at https://reformedbooksonline.com/topics/church/against-separatism/ (RBO). Henry Jacob's works are at https://www.prdl.org/author_view.php?a_id=5963 .
14. See https://reformedbooksonline.com/topics/topics-by-subject/churchgovernment/congregationalism-and-independency/#separatists at 'Congregationalism &
Independency' (RBO).
15. The later, presbyterian Matthew Henry's https://books.google.com/books? id=XLFVAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=true (London, 1710) is a notable example of this.
16. Appendix II, https://archive.org/details/bookofcommonpray00shie/page/n811/mode/2up? view=theater in "Liturgia Expurgata; or, The Prayer-Book Amended according to the Presbyterian
Revisions of 1661" in The Book of Common Prayer… ed. Charles Shields (Philadelphia: James
Claxton, 1867), separately paginated. Despite the title, only half of those that drew up the exceptions were presbyterians, the other half were congregationalists. Congregationalists were sometimes known as "presbyterians" in that era as they held to sessions of elders, or presbyters.
17. Richard Baxter, https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=eebo;idno=A26983.0001.001
(London, 1661).
18. That is by the Act the non-conformists would have been put in prison thereby for publicly professing dissent, holding or attending separate worship assemblies, or for some similar matter related to nonconformity.
19. John Tombes (c. 1603-1676) was a leading, English baptist minister, though he is said to have been presbyterian in his views of Church government. His book is learned and much of it is good:
Tombes, https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=eebo;idno=A62876.0001.001
https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=eebo;idno=A62876.0001.001 (London: E. Cotes,
1667).
20. Baxter regularly called the baptists "Anabaptists". This was not without reason, as he and other writers of the day (e.g. the presbyterians Thomas Edwards, Samuel Rutherford et al.) documented and traced the lineage of the baptists of their day (post-1640) to the previous Anabaptists, contra the claims of many "reformed baptists" today.
21. Philip Nye (c. 1595–1672) was a Westminster divine. See his work at https://reformedbooksonline.com/topics/church/against-separatism/#occasional at 'On Schism &
Separatism' (RBO).
22. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_of_Tours (316/336 – 397) 23. The presbyterians argued that ordinarily a minister may not be imposed apart from the congregation's consent, and that any such minister, not coming to have the congregation's consent, was not the congregation's minister. However, this is significantly different than the case Baxter is speaking to with Separatists, that where a minister is received by the congregation, yet individual persons not consenting, thereby are not church members under the minister. Rutherford (rightly, according to Scripture) allows pastors to be imposed on people not willing in righteous, extraordinary circumstances; see https://reformedbooksonline.com/on-an-extraordinary-calling/#wholly at 'On Extraordinary Calling' (RBO).
24. So Owen, Enquiry, https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/A53704.0001.001/1:14? rgn=div1;view=fulltext , pp. 227-29.
25. Contra Owen, see https://reformedbooksonline.com/on-impurities-in-worship/#vs at 'On Impurities in Worship' (RBO). Owen's employment of Ps. 16:4 evidences not just a withdrawing, or even separation, but is equivalent to excommunication. Baxter on a separation which does not imply excommunication versus that which does: "To hold that any congregations are such whose worship is faulty, but such as God forgives and accepts, but that it is unlawful for us to join with them, lest it make us guilty of their sin, this (though it should be erroneous, and uncharitable and sinful) yet is not to excommunicate that congregation as no Church or no Christians. But to say of any congregation that they want [lack] anything essential to Christianity or [that they lack anything] to make them capable to be loved as Christians, or that their worship of God is idolatry, or so bad as that God accepts it not, the evil of it being greater than the good (as poison in our food), and on this reason to declare that no good Christian should communicate with them, this is to excommunicate such [a] congregation, as far as one Church may excommunicate another, which is but by such renouncing their communion." Catholic Communion Doubly
Defended, https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/A26882.0001.001/1:5?rgn=div1;view=fulltext , p. 14.
26. See https://reformedbooksonline.com/on-impurities-in-worship/#abstain at 'On Impurities of Worship' (RBO). Note that, as some of the reformed affirm from Scripture on the same page, not
every instance or degree of idolatry warrants separation from a worship service.
27. The https://thewestminsterstandard.org/the-solemn-league-and-covenant/ (1643), between Scotland and the English parliament, did not forbid episcopacy in name, but rather "prelacy", and bishops only necessarily as a part of the prelatic system (as the Covenant's wording may be so interpreted). Baxter wrote previous to this: "The Assembly of divines at Westminster were men that… received the Covenant, but were divided about the sense of the word 'prelacy,' many professing their judgment to be for moderate episcopacy, whereupon the describing additions
'archbishops, bishops, deans, archdeacons' were added. And upon such a profession that it disclaimed not all episcopacy, Mr. [Thomas] Coleman is said to have given the Covenant to the House of Lord's…" The Nonconformists' Plea for Peace (London,
1679), https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/A26965.0001.001/1:9?rgn=div1;view=fulltext , p. 127.
Baxter here, though, to make his point, appears to say the SL&C did exclude episcopacy, and that too severely. Baxter had proposed a compromise platform for English Church government of qualified, low, episcopacy, where bishops were not of divine right, but only of a temporal ecclesiastical right, with other qualifying factors, which numerous of his day were willing to materially accommodate, though the plan was rejected by the English authorities.
28. English male puritans typically wore their hats (which was a cultural, public sign of honor) for much of the worship service, but took them off (as a sign of subservience) at prayer, as they held prayer, in speaking directly to God, was to convey more natural reverence than other parts of worship. On English puritan, cultural head covering practices, both outside of church and in it, see
"Reformation History: Preaching with Caps on" and Digression 4, "Reformation: Men Wearing Hats during Worship" in Travis Fentiman, https://reformedbooksonline.com/wpcontent/uploads/2022/11/Fentiman-Travis-1-Corinthians-Head-Coverings-are-Not-Perpetual-andthey-were-Hair-Buns-with-or-without-Material-Proven.pdf (RBO, 2022), pp. 65-68 & 176-78, as well as https://reformedbooksonline.com/the-history-of-head-coverings/head-coverings-in-the-postreformation-era/#english at 'Head Coverings in the Post-Reformation Era' (RBO). See also below.
29. "Integrals" is here being used of things not necessary to the essence of the Church, but rather are necessary to the whole well-being of the Church.
30. Baxter's enumeration of these two points regarding the interpretation of the Savoy Declaration, ch. 11 on faith in justification and the believer's righteousness in light of Christ's righteousness has been omitted. Owen was a leader at Savoy.
31. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humphrey_Fenn (d. 1634) was an English, puritan divine.
32. See https://reformedbooksonline.com/on-impurities-in-worship/#bible at 'On Impurities of Worship' (RBO).
33. The answer is no: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=mt.%2012%3A18&version=KJV ; https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=mt.%2015%3A1-
14&version=KJV ; https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/? search=mt.%2016%3A12&version=KJV ; https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/? search=mt.%2023%3A1-5&version=KJV , https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/? search=mt.%2023%3A14&version=KJV , https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/? search=mt.%2023%3A16-28&version=KJV ; see the material pertaining to above.
34. On this distinction see especially the presbyterian Zachary Crofton at https://reformedbooksonline.com/on-impurities-in-worship/#quotesidol at 'On Impurities in Worship'.
35. See https://reformedbooksonline.com/on-impurities-in-worship/#bible at 'On Impurities of Worship' (RBO).
36. See https://reformedbooksonline.com/on-impurities-in-worship/#all at 'On Impurities in Worship'.