fured? and yet their crime is taking a lawful thing to be unlawful. If you would not produce it againit the lawfulness of preferibing this, tho' fome fhould be fo weak as to think it unlawful; how can you produce it against prescribing Kneeling merely because fome think it unlawful? Once more, fuppofe our Governours had prefcribed a Liturgy to your Minds, and amongst others a Form of Prayer to be used at the Communion. Some, you know, and no inconfiderable number, have fcrupled joining with a Form as unlawful. Now fuch as thefe are as effectually excluded from the Communion by this prefcription, as if it were faid in exprefs terms, that none shall be admitted, who will not join in this Form. Yet in the impofing this, you were ready to join. I ask, therefore, If this chapter command you to receive all whofe crime is only the fcrupling a thing lawful as unlawful; with what confcience could you have complied with this prefcription, which, according to you, must be flatly finful, and contrary to God's word becaufe it doth as effectually exclude thofe whom you ought to receive, as any other prefcription? If it do not, why could you not comply with other

pre

prefcriptions as well as this? Why is it produced against others, and not against this? Is a Form of Prayer necessary to the due celebration of that religious rite? Your practice fhews you think it not fo. Is a ftated Form of Prayer not only lawful but decent? fo is Kneeling. But I will urge no more on this Head. I cannot but think I have fhewn both from St. Paul's example, and your own conceffions, that this chapter fays nothing against those prescriptions which concern the publick Worship; and that by the weak in faith here is not to be underftood every one who is fo weak as to take a lawful thing for unlawful, unless in cafes parallel to Meat and Drink. I shall now add,

Thirdly, That Mr. Baxter's practice, and the practice of the Independents, is for, and not against fuch impofitions as are the foundation of your heaviest charge against the Church. For the Independents, Abridgment take Mr. Baxter's word, who represents them as ftricter about the qualifications of Church-members, than Scripture, Reafon, or the Practice of the univerfal Church will allow. And if this be not to make new unneceffary Terms of Communion, and to refuse

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those whom Chrift has commanded them to receive, what is? Yet we obferve with what brotherly affection you court them; with what caution you open your mouths against this in them, and with what heat you can inveigh against any thing like it in the Church of England; with what zeal you join with them, and with what zeal you Separate from us. But Mr. Baxter

hath not only given us this account of the Independents, but hath left upon record fomething of himself fo like what he cenfures fo feverely in the Church of England, that, with all the niceness I am Master of, I cannot fee any difference between them, unless what ferves to make Mr. Baxter much more liable to cenfure than the Church. We have it related for his honour, as it seems, in his life. A Gentle- Abridgment man against whom he had no objection P. 36. on any other account (as far as it appears) defired to communicate with Him; only He defired to receive Kneeling, and at a diftinct time from thofe others, whom He thought fo guilty on fome account or other, that he scrupled to join with them. Suppofing this to be a weakness; one would hardly think it consistent with Mr. Baxter's way of arguing, that he should be H denied

denied the Communion for it. But let us fee how Mr. Baxter dealt with him. First, He would not give it him at all, unless he would fubmit to difcipline, and take him for his Paftour: fo that his Baptifm and profeffion of Chriftianity, it seems, were not fufficient to entitle him to the Privileges of a Chriftian, unless he would fubmit to what Mr. Baxter call'd Difcipline, and take him for his Paftour. Perhaps the Gentleman was perfuaded in his confcience that the ejected Bishop was his Paftour; tho' Mr. Baxter had authority to adminifter the Sacrament to him. However, what reason was here from his fcrupling this, why he should not be acknowleg'd a Chriftian? What was there in this errour fo contrary to any great defign of the Gospel, or the nature of the Sacrament, that he might not be admitted to it? Secondly, As to the Pofture, He would not give it him kneeling, unless He would first hear his reafons against it, and then profefs, after he had heard them, that he thought it a fin against God to receive it in any other pofture: both which an honeft man might fcruple, and yet be fit to be admitted to the Communion. From hence it appears of what moment Mr.

Baxter thought an Uniformity in the poftures of the Receivers, and how willing they ought to be to hear reasons to bring them to it. But, Thirdly, As to the Time, He abfolutely refused to give it him at a diftinct Time from others, tho' he fcrupled to receive it at the fame time with them. Now here, if I be not mistaken, are to be found the very crimes which are laid by you at the door of the Church of England; and fomewhat more. In the first place, Here is an honeft Chriftian denied the Communion on the account of fome fcruples he might have, about fubmitting to Mr. Baxter as his Paftour, and to bis difcipline: fuch fcruples as affected not his Christianity, or his behaviour at the publick worship; which feems to come very near the cafe determined by St. Paul in the fourteenth chapter to the Romans. In the Second place, He is denied the recep tion of the Holy Sacrament in the manner which feems best to him unless He will hear reafons against it, and profess he cannot honestly take it otherwife. That is, he is denied it, if he should be fo weak, and prepoffefs'd, as to fcruple what a man might fcruple out of a great regard to the prescriptions of his ejected Bishop, and

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yet