A BRIEF APPLICATION

OF

THE PRINCIPLES

Asserted in my Pamphlet to the refutation of all the arguments by which I used to vindicate my former connection with the Establishment.

A. (page 192.)

To exercise Christian acts, conduct Christian worship, and observe Christian ordinances, according to rules prescribed by human laws, is directly contrary to the nature of Christ's kingdom and to his authority as its king. To engage to do this is a term of admission, which must make connection with any Establishment intrinsically unlawful; even if the rules prescribed by the human laws were in the matter of them perfectly scriptural. A Christian acting scripturally must, even in that case, decline acknowledging the interference of earthly legislators in the things of Christ's kingdom, and therefore must decline all connection with the religious Establishment of the country; even though he should be called to do in the Church of Christ the very same things in the very same way, which the laws of the land prescribed to be done in their churches. At the same time, this case, the most favourable that can be supposed for an Establishment-is one purely imaginary; one that neither ever has been realized, nor ever can in as much as the national religion, which is nationally regulated, must necessarily require rules, not only different from the laws of Christ's kingdom, but in direct opposition to them.

B. (page 193.)

According to Scripture, the corruptions of any, in doctrine or in practice, render religious connection with them unlawful to the believer. And to say, that in compliance with the laws of the land I should join in all the most solemn ordinances of Christ's kingdom with those, whom his word commands me to reject as heretics-to be separated from as unbelievers-to withdraw from as disorderly walkers-and not so much as to eat with;-this is to say, that the laws of men are superior to the laws of Christ.-An Establishment is indeed a merely political institution,-a thing of this world; but it is a political institution about religion, and professedly about the religion of Christ. Therefore its being merely political marks it as essentially Antichristian. I have no religious connection with Irishmen, merely by living in the same country with them, or by being engaged with them in any of the civil intercourse of life. There is therefore no real analogy between the two cases.

C. (page 193.)

And there is certainly no more mischief done by an Establishment, than so far as the disciples of Christ are ensnared into connection with it. They then become partakers of its sins, unequally yoked with those who are not of them; and the distinctive glory of the Christian character and of Christ's Church is obscured from the view of the world.

D. (page 194.)

To have quitted the Establishment upon the grounds that are at issue between Church-men and the mass of Dissenters, might have had this tendency. But what is now presented to the attention of those who observe my conduct, is the whole of that walk of Christ's disciples which is essentially connected with the great truths of the Gospel, as resulting from the belief of them, and immediately calculated to illustrate and exhibit them to the world.

E. (page 194.)

If the heathen Emperor offered this support and sanction to Paul, on condition of his doing any kind of religious acts different from what he did and taught, or of his observing any forms in his religious exercises different from those which he observed and taught; it is certain that Paul would have rejected his offer, and that it would have been unlawful for him to accept it. If he were required to observe nothing different from the precepts and institutions of Christ, -to do nothing in his religious conduct different from what he did already; he might certainly receive the Emperor's bounty. And if Nero be supposed to have issued an edict for the protection and pecuniary support of Christians, on condition of their walking as the Apostles taught them to walk,—it would be a law, (however strange the supposition) the benefits of which they might no doubt lawfully enjoy but no farther than they did not, in order to enjoy them, admit the smallest interference of the Emperor with their religious practices. And if any choose to say that the Christians would thus have been in an Establishment, I shall not dispute about the word; but it is plain it would not have been the thing: no more than I am now in an Establishment, because the law of the land protects me— conducting myself as I do.

F. (page 195.)

If he be instructed perfectly in the laws of Christ's kingdom, he will see that such a conduct as I contended for his adopting, is among the ways of pursuing that object which those laws forbid. He will see that any attempt to act in Christ's kingdom in his political capacity, is contrary to the essential nature of that kingdom, and of his supposed character as a subject of it. He will see that he is called to adorn the Gospel which he professes, by a faithful and beneficial discharge of the duties which belong to his kingly office, within the province of action to which that extends; and by manifesting his subjection to the laws of Christ's kingdom, walking with his fellow disciples according to them; and by abounding in all those good

works, which his many talents afford him the means of performing. But he will see that the work which I contended for his engaging in is a bad work; and alike unsuitable either to him or to a private Christian. If a private Christian build a place of Christian worship, he can scripturally design it only as the place where a Christian Church shall assemble; and he cannot scripturally prescribe any regulations to that Church which he allows to make use of his house: and the Church that would accept any regulations prescribed by him, in its worship or religious practices, in order to obtain the use of that house, would act contrary to the duty of a Christian Church.

G. (page 195.)

It has been shewn that a Christian cannot lawfully enter into that situation and every hour that he continues in it, he is doing what is unlawful.

H. (page 196.)

Certainly it is a superstitious view of the Lord's Supper, that leads any to scruple mixed communion in it, more than in the observance of the other ordinances of Christ, in which believers have fellowship one with another. But a scriptural view of them all will lead the believer to abstain from mixed communion in any of them,-from outward fellowship in them with those from whom they are bound to be outwardly separate. That it is such an outward separation the Apostle enjoins in 2 Cor. vi. 14 and 17, is certain; because he enforces the injunction by urging this fact that there is no real fellowship communion or concord between the disciples and those with whom he exhorts them not to be unequally yoked. The fact, therefore, upon the certainty of which he grounds the injunction, cannot be the same with the duty which he enforces by the consideration of it. It is not the presence of unbelievers under the same roof, where believers have fellowship with each other, that renders communion mixed; nor even any attempt of the former to imitate the same outward acts. It is rendered mixed by that want of outward and visible separation of the believers in their fellowship with each other, in consequence of which they appear to the unbelievers present and to the world to join with them in Christian acts; and by this bear a pernicious testimony in their conduct against the truths which they at times testify with their lips. Nor is it any wonder that the world should give more ready credence to what they do, than to what they say; and be much irritated when any disciples, by the consistency of their conduct with their oral declarations, shew that they are indeed in earnest. You testify to unbelievers that their sacrifices are an abomination to the Lord, that they have never called upon his name, that they are of their father the devil: and then you bow the knee with them, and by all that you do, profess to join them in saying, our Father which art in heaven.' The laws of the land bid you do this, and you shall be sanctioned by the state the laws of God prohibit your doing it. Let the disciple, before whom the subject is fairly laid, look to it which he will obey.

I. (page 196.)

But when that ordinance is professedly open to all who choose to partake of it, believers cannot lawfully partake of it :-no more than the first Christians could have lawfully sat down to the Lord's table along with heathen idolaters. And the man who now administers it under such circumstances does give a sanction to the profession, which all the communicants make of being Christians ;-though not certainly to the profession of any one more than of another. But he does contribute to give currency to that most deadly sentiment, which is prevalent in the world, that they are all Christians—all believers ;-only some of them not as good Christians as they ought to be. In that ordinance indeed, especially, the Clergyman not only joins with all who communicate, but is the great instrument of their As to the superstitious forms joining with him and with each other. which he uses in connection with this ordinance of Christ, it is but an additional sin that he should thus help to obscure the nature, simplicity, and glory of Christ's institutions.

K. (page 198.)

It may be needful to observe, that in the patience of which I speak, I never meant to include the countenancing of their sin, by continuing to walk with them if they continue to reject the apostolic rule; though, I think, some time ought to be taken for calling their attenNor do I think that a tion to that rule, and laying it before them. man who refuses to communicate with a brother upon the subject, gives in this any evidence of being a disciple.

L. (page 199.)

It is obvious that the laws of Christ's kingdom are not to be given up even to disciples, who will not walk by them with their brethren. The object of Church-fellowship is certainly not that narrow one, which I was afraid of countenancing. But whatever be its object, the ordinances in which the members have fellowship with one another, are ordinances peculiar to the Church: and it is contrary both to the nature of the ordinances and the nature of their mutual fellowship, to extend it or them to those who are without. And among the most important objects of the outward union of believers in a Church, is that of exhibiting to the world that unity which the common faith of the Gospel produces in those who believe, and their consequent separation from others. With the whole of this object, the line of conduct which I pursued was utterly inconsistent.

THOUGHTS ON BAPTISM;

IN WHICH THE

PRINCIPLES OF THE PERSONS

CALLING THEMSELVES

BAPTISTS

ARE SHEWN TO BE INCONSISTENT WITH

THE NATURE OF THE RITE,

AND CONTRADICTED BY

THE APOSTOLIC PRACTICE AND PRECEPTS.

And they all brought us on our way, with wives and children, till we were out of the city: and we kneeled down on the shore, and prayed. - Acts xxi. 5.

[First Published 1805.]

BAPTISM was a religious rite familiar to the Jews, and practised among them before the coming of Christ. Accordingly, when John baptized, there was no question among the Jews what he meant by that rite. Some of them indeed questioned why he baptized, if he were not Christ, nor Elias, nor that Prophet: but they all appear to have been acquainted with the import of the rite. And it appears

from their very question to have been a form, by which those who were baptized acknowledged-for the first time-the divine commis. sion of him whose baptism they received; and by which he who baptized claimed authority from God to make disciples or proselytes to his doctrine.

In this view we may understand our Lord's submitting to the baptism of John. He thus acknowledged John to be sent of God, and (though greater than he) stooped for the time to become his disciple; even as it became him to fulfil all righteousness in the form of the Servant of JEHOVAH.

In like manner we know that when Heathens became proselytes to the Jews' religion, or became disciples of Moses, they and their households were baptized (previous to their circumcision); and thus professed to acknowledge the divine mission of the Jewish Legislator.