Chapter 183

[207]Chamier. De Eccles. p. 376. Parker, part. polit. lib. i. cap. 1.[208][That is, baptism and the Lord’s supper.][209][See Broadmead Records, Introd. pp. xli., lxxxvii.][210][“If a prince should, by covenant and oath, make his whole kingdom a national church, he should do more than he hath any word of Christ to warrant his work.” A Survey of the Sum of Ch. Discipline, &c., part 2, Argument 12.][211][Among the early settlers were two brothers of the name of Brown, who, still attached to the rites of the church of England, set up a separate assembly, and when summoned before the governor, accused the ministers of departing from the usages of that church, adding that they were separatists, and would soon become anabaptists. To this the ministers made reply, “That they were neither separatists nor anabaptists, that they did not separate from the church of England, nor from the ordinances of God there, but only from the corruptions and disorders of that church; they came away from the Common Prayer and ceremonies ... because they judged the imposition of these things to be sinful corruptions of the word of God.” Neal’s Hist. of New England, i. p. 144. The two brothers were sent back to England in the same ship that brought them over.][212][The law concerning heresy stood thus in New England: “Whoever denies the immortality of the soul, the resurrection of the body, or the evil done by the outward man is sin, or that Christ gave himself a ransom for sins, or that we are justified by his righteousness, or the morality of the fourth command, orthe baptizing of infants, or the ordinance of magistracy, or their authority to make war, or punish offenders against the first table; whoever denies any of these, or seduces others to do so, must be banished the jurisdiction.” Neal’s Hist. of New England, ii. p. 344.][213][See note before, p. 164.][214][Diana, in the original copy.][215][“I do not disapprove of the use frequently made of it by St. Augustine against the Donatists, to prove that godly princes may lawfully issue edicts to compel obstinate and rebellious persons to worship the true God, and to maintain the unity of the faith; for although faith is a voluntary thing, yet we see that such means are useful to subdue the obstinacy of those who will not until compelled obey.” Calvin in loc. tom. ii. 43. edit. Tholuck.][216][In the Platform of Church Discipline, agreed upon at Cambridge in New England in 1648, it is provided that not only members of churches, but hearers of the word also, shall contribute to the maintenance of the ministry: if the deacons failed to obtain it, recourse was then to be had to the magistrate, whose duty it was held to be to see that the ministry be duly provided for. C. Mather’s Magnalia, book v. p. 31. Neal’s Hist. of New England, ii. p. 301.][217][Mr. Henry Ainsworth, the most eminent of the Brownists, was the author of a very learned commentary on the Pentateuch and Canticles, as also of several other minor works. “He was,” says Mr. Cotton, “diligently studious of the Hebrew text, hath not been unuseful to the church in his exposition of the Pentateuch, especially of Moses’s rituals.” Way of Cong. Churches, p. 6. Stuart’s edit. of his Two Treatises, p. 55.][218][The composition of the first book of Homilies is generally attributed to Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, Hopkins, and Becon. Jewel is said to have had the largest share in the second, although Archbishop Parker speaks of them as “revised and finished, with a second part, by him and other bishops.” The first edition of the first book appeared in July, 1547, 1 Edward VI. The use of the Apocrypha in the church service was an early complaint of the Puritans. The apocryphal books were commanded to be bound up with the other books of scripture by Archbishop Whitgift. Short’s Hist. of Church of England, p. 239. Strype’s Whitgift, i. 590. Neal, i. 427.][219][A Letter of many Ministers in Old England requesting the judgment of their reverend brethren in New England concerning nine positions: writtenA.D.1637. Together with their answer thereto returned, anno 1639, &c. Published 1643, 4to. pp. 90. For a condensed view of it, see Hanbury’s Hist. Memorials, ii. pp. 18-39.][220][Sentiments precisely similar to the above were embodied in the seventeenth chapter of the Cambridge Platform, and continued to be for many years the ruling principles of the congregational churches of New England. See C. Mather’s Magnalia, book v. p. 37.][221][See Tracts on Lib. of Conscience, Introd. p. xxxii.][222][The Assembly of Divines was at this time engaged in forming a directory of worship for the entire nation.][223][The central part of a target, which anciently was painted white.][224][There are two chapters numbered CXX. in the original copy.][225]Nero and the persecuting emperors were not so injurious to Christianity, as Constantine and others who assumed a power in spiritual things. Under Constantine Christianity fell into corruption, and Christians fell asleep.[226][Martial, De Spectaculis Libellus, Ep. ix.][227][See Neal’s Hist. of Puritans, i. 353, edit. 1837.][228]Is not this too like the pope’s profession of servus servorum Dei, yet holding out his slipper to the lips of princes, kings, and emperors?[229][For elucidations of the references made by Mr. Williams in this preface to his sufferings, and for Mr. Cotton’s reply, see the Biographical Introduction.][230][It is] a monstrous paradox, that God’s children should persecute God’s children, and that they that hope to live eternally together with Christ Jesus in the heavens, should not suffer each other to live in this common air together, &c. I am informed it was the speech of an honourable knight of the parliament: “What! Christ persecute Christ in New England?”[231][231][“Though God’s children may not persecute God’s children, nor wicked men either, for well-doing: yet if they be found to walk in the way of the wicked—their brethren may justly deprive them in some cases not only of the common air of the country, by banishment, but even of the common air of the world by death, and yet hope to live eternally with them in the heavens.” Master John Cotton’s Answer to Master Roger Williams, p. 14.][232][That is, of the church at Salem, of which Mr. Williams was then the pastor.][233][This should be four hundred and fifty. See 1 Kings xviii. 19-22:—or including the “prophets of the groves,” 850.][234][“The truth is, I did not publish that discourse to the world—A brief discourse in defence of set forms of prayer was penned by Mr. Ball—that a religious knight sent over with desire to hear our judgment of it. At his request I drew up a short answer, and sent one copy to the knight and another to Mr. Ball divers years ago. How it came to be published I do not know.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 23. See Hanbury’s Hist. Mem. ii. 157, for an abstract of it.][235][See alsoBiographical Introductionto this volume.][236][“The scope of my letter was, not to confirm the equity of his banishment, but to convince the iniquity of his separation.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 41.][237][“He that shall withdraw or separate the corn from the people, or the people from the corn; the people have just cause to separate either him from themselves, or themselves from him. And this proportion will hold as well in spiritual corn as bodily.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 44.][238][“If men hinder the enjoyment of spiritual good things, may they not be hindered from the enjoyment of that which is less, carnal good things?” Ib. p. 46.][239][“I spent a great part of the summer in seeking by word and writing to satisfy his scruples, until he rejected both our callings, and our churches. And even then I ceased not to follow him still, ... whereof this very letter is a pregnant and evident demonstration.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 47.][240][“I intended not a cordial of consolation to him, ... but only a conviction, to abate the rigour of his indignation against the dispensation of divine justice.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 48.][241][“I bless the Lord from my soul for his abundant mercy in forcing me out thence, in so fit a season.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 49.][242][Mr. Cotton was at one time much inclined to Antinomianism, which, in the hands of Mrs. Hutchinson, led to no small disturbance in New England. He however denied that he wished to separate on the ground of thelegalteaching of the churches with whom he held communion, but thought of removing to New Haven, “as being better known to the pastor and some others there, than to such as were at that time jealous” of him in Boston. A timely perception of Mrs. Hutchinson’s errors led him to renounce her fellowship, and he remained at Boston. Neal’s Hist. of N. E., i. 183; Mather’s Magnalia, iii. 21; Knowles’s Life of R. Williams, p. 140.][243][“I have been given to understand, that the increase of concourse of people to him on the Lord’s days in private, to the neglect or deserting of public ordinances, and to the spreading of the leaven of his corrupt imaginations, provoked the magistrates, rather than to breed a winter’s spiritual plague in the country, to put him a winter’s journey out of the country.” Notwithstanding, Mr. Cotton asserts that Mr. Williams was treated most tenderly by the officer, James Boone, “who dare not allow that liberty to his tongue, which the examiner often useth in this discourse.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 57.][244][“This Confession may be found in Crosby, but without the ‘story of his life and death,’ which we have never yet been able to find.” Hist. of Eng. Baptists, ii. App. No. 1.][245][“As for Mr. Smith he standeth and falleth to his own master. Whilst he was preacher to the city of Lincoln, he wrought with God then: what temptations befel him after, by the evil workings of evil men, and some good men too, I choose rather to tremble at, than discourse of.” The fault of this “man fearing God,” appears to have been first his becoming a baptist, and then his acceptance of the opinions of certain Dutch baptists, with whom he held communion in Amsterdam. The early baptists held generally opinions which became known after the Synod of Dort as Arminian. In addition to these Mr. Smith held peculiar views on the nature of spiritual worship, which brought him into great disrepute with his fellow exiles, the Brownists and Independents. Cotton’s Answer p. 58, Smith’s Differences of the Ch. of the Separation, part i. edit. 1608.][246][See Smith’s Parallels and Censures, p. 9, &c. edit. 1609.][247][“It is not because I think such persons are not fit matter for church-estate; but because they yet want a fit form, requisite to church estate.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 63.][248][“The answer to that question and to all the other thirty-two questions, were drawn up by Mr. Mader—however, the substance of that answer doth generally suit with all our minds, as I conceive. I have read it, and did readily approve it to be judicious and solid. But his answer ... is notoriously slandered and abused by the examiner.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 63. Lechford, in his “Plain Dealing,” &c., however tells us of a minister, who “standing upon his ministry as of the church of England, and arguing against their covenant, and being elected at Weymouth, was compelled to recant some words.” One of his friends for being active in his election was fined £10, and uttering some cross words, £5 more, “and payed it down.” P. 22.][249][“It was his doctrines and practices which tended to the civil disturbance of the commonwealth, together with his heady and busy pursuit of the same, even to the rejection of all churches here; these they were that made him unfit for enjoying communion in the one state or in the other.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 64.][250][“His distinction, in the general I do approve it, and do willingly acknowledge that a godly person may be, through ignorance or negligence, so far enthralled to anti-christ, as to be separate from Christ, taking Christ as head of the visible church.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 66.][251][“What if ecclesiastical stories be deficient in telling us the times and places of their church assemblies? Is therefore the word of God deficient, or the church deficient, because human stories are deficient?... Yet sometimes their own inquisitors confess, that the churches of the Waldenses, or men of that way, have been extanta tempore apostolorum.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 69.][252][“My words are misreported: and the contradiction ariseth from his misreport. For God’s people and godly persons are not all one. Any church members may be called God’s people, as being in external covenant with him, and yet they are not always godly persons. God’s people may be so enthralled to anti-christ, as to separate them utterly from Christ, both as head of the visible and invisible church; but godly persons cannot be so enthralled.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 71.][253][“He requireth that we should cut off ourselves from hearing the ministry of the parishes in England, as being the ministry of a national, or parishional church, whereof both the church estate is falsely constituted, and all the ministry, worship, and government thereof false also. If he speak of the national church government, we must confess the truth, there indeed is truth fallen and falsehood hath prevailed much.—All of them are forsaken of Truth, and can challenge no warrant of truth but falsely.” Cotton’s Answer, pp. 77, 84.][254][“If the examiner had been pleased to have read Mr. Brightman on Rev. xviii. 4, he might find I was not the first that interpreted either that place in Isaiah, or this in Revelation, of a local separation.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 87.][255][“The two causes of God’s indignation against England—I would rather say Amen to them, than weaken the weight of them. Only I should so assent to the latter, as not to move for a toleration of all dissenters, dissenters in fundamentals.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 89.][256][“Our joining with the ministers of England in hearing of the word and prayer, doth not argue our church-communion with the parish churches in England, much less with the national church.” Mr. Cotton then proceeds to deny that Mr. Williams was persecuted, or that he admonished them humbly and faithfully. His banishment was no persecution; his statement of his opinions no admonition. Cotton’s Answer, p. 101.][257][“Who seeth not, that in these words I express not mine own reasoning or meaning, but his; and that I expressly say, the true meaning of the text will nothing more reach to his purpose; and so bring in his reason in form of an enthymeme, which he draws from it?” Cotton’s Answer, p. 105.][258][“Sure I am, we look at infants as members of our church, as being federally holy, but I am slow to believe that all of them are regenerate, or truly godly.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 108.][259][“These are palpable mistakes of those words of mine, which I expressed as the sum of his words, which he through haste conceived to be mine.” Ib. p. 108.][260][“We wholly avoid national, provincial, and diocesan government of the churches by episcopal authority; we avoid their prescript liturgies, and communion with open scandalous persons in any church order; ... it is a continual sorrow of heart, and mourning of our souls that there is yet so much of those notorious evils which he nameth ... suffered to thrust themselves into the fellowship of the churches, and to sit down with the saints at the Lord’s table. But yet I count all these but remnants of pollution, when as the substance of the true estate of churches abideth in their congregational assemblies.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 108.][261][“Mr. Williams probably refers to the refusal by the General Court to listen to a petition from Salem relative to a piece of land which was claimed as belonging to that town. But according to Winthrop, ‘because they had chosen Mr. Williams their teacher, while he stood under question of authority, and so offered contempt to the magistrates, their petition was refused,” &c. Knowles, p. 70.][262][“His banishment proceeded not against him or his for his own refusal of any worship, but for seditious opposition against the patent, and against the oath of fidelity offered to the people; ... he also wrote letters of admonition to all the churches whereof the magistrates were members, for deferring to give present answer to a petition of Salem, who had refused to hearken to a lawful motion of theirs.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 113.][263][“It seemeth he never read the story of the classes in Northamptonshire, Suffolk, Essex, London, Cambridge, discovered by a false brother to Doctor Bancroft.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 116, Neal’s Puritans, i. 226, 319.][264][Udall had been a tutor to Queen Elizabeth in the learned languages, yet for writing a little book against Diocesan Church Government and Ceremonies he was condemned to die, and would have been executed but for the queen’s feelings of respect to her aged tutor. A copy of this exceedingly rare book is in Mr. Offor’s library.][265][“He died by the annoyance of the prison: when the coroner’s jury came to survey the dead body of Mr. Udall in prison, he bled freshly, though cold before, as a testimony against the murderous illegal proceedings of the state against him.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 116, Neal, i. 339.][266][Mr. Cotton says, that Penry confessed that he deserved death for having seduced many to separation from hearing the word in the parish churches, so that their souls were justly required at his hand. Ibid. p. 117. This can scarcely be correct if we judge from the general tenor of Penry’s character. See Hanbury’s Hist. Memorials, i. 79, notee.][267][See Broadmead Records, Intro. p. xxxviii. Hanbury, i. 35, 62. Mr. Cotton endeavours to throw no little obloquy and discredit on these two witnesses to the truth; but most unjustly. Answer p. 117.][268][In “A Necessitie of Separation from the Church of England proved by Nonconformist Principles, &c.” By John Canne, pastor of the Ancient English Church at Amsterdam, 1634, 4to. pp. 264.][269][“Mr. Ainsworth’s name is of best esteem, without all exception, in that way who refused communion with hearing in England. And if his people suffered him to live on ninepence a week, with roots boiled, surely either the people were grown to a very extreme low estate, or else the growth of their godliness was grown to a very low ebb.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 122. The remarks of Mr. Hanbury, with the quotation he produces from the preface, by a friend of Ainsworth, to his Annotations on Solomon’s Song, do not appear in the least to invalidate the statement of Williams. In the earlier part of his exile, in common with Johnson and the other separatists, he was exposed to great straits and difficulties, and it may be to that period that Mr. Williams refers. See Hanbury, i. 433.][270][“This I speak with respect to Mr. Robinson and to his church, who grew to acknowledge, and in a judicious and godly discourse to approve and defend, the lawful liberty of hearing the word from the godly preachers of the parishes in England.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 123.][271][Mr. Robinson’s book was published nine years after his death. It was entitled, “Of the Lawfulness of Hearing of the Ministers in the Church of England: penned by that Learned and Reverend Divine, Mr. John Robinson, late pastor to the English Church of God in Leyden, and Printed Anno 1634.” Mr. Canne’s work in reply was entitled “A Stay against Straying,” 4to. 1639.][272][“If this be all the conclusion he striveth for, I shall never contend with him about it. But this is that I deny, a man to participate in a church-estate, where he partaketh only in hearing and prayer, before and after sermon; and joineth not with them, neither in their covenant, nor in the seals of the covenant.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 129.][273][That is, as Mr. Cotton explains it, because “being cast out by the usurping power of the prelacy, and dismissed, though against their wills, by our congregations, we looked at ourselves as private members, and not officers to any church here, until one or other church might call us unto office.” Any other sense is either a mistake, or a “fraudulent expression of our minds.” Answer p. 131.][274][“We are not so masterly and peremptory in our apprehensions; and yet the more plainly and exactly all church-actions are carried on according to the letter of the rule, the more glory shall we give unto the Lord Jesus, and procure the more peace to our consciences and to our churches, and reserve more purity and power to all our administrations.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 132.][275][See Broadmead Records, Intro. p. lxxix.][276][“The world is taken in scripture more ways than one, and so is separation; as when the apostle exhorteth the Romans, not to conform their church-bodies according to the platform of the Roman monarchy, into œcumenical, national, provincial, diocesan bodies, Rom. xii. 2. From the world, as taken for civil government of it, we are to separate our church-bodies, and the government thereof in frame and constitution.” Cotton’s Answer, pp. 135, 136.][277][“Our not receiving all comers unto the communion of the Lord’s table, and other parts of church fellowship, saving only unto the public hearing of the word and presence at other duties, it argueth indeed that such persons either think themselves unfit materials for church fellowship, or else that we conceive them to be as stones standing in need of a little more hewing and squaring before they be laid as living stones in the walls of the Lord’s house.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 139.][278][“Our practice in suppressing such as have attempted to set up a parishional way, I never heard of such a thing here to this day. And if any such thing were done before my coming into the country, I do not think it was done by forcible compulsion, but by rational conviction.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 139. It is difficult to reconcile this disclaimer with facts, unless we attribute ignorance to Mr. Cotton. See before, p.233, note 8.][279][Mr. Cotton calls this an untruth, yet he adds, “I hold that the receiving all the inhabitants in the parish into the full fellowship of the church, and the admitting of them all unto the liberty of all the ordinances, is an human corruption, and so if he will, an human invention.” Answer, p. 140.][280][“The answer is near at hand....Those mine enemies which would not that I should reign over them, bring them hither, and slay them before my face, Luke xix. 27. And yet I would not be so understood as if Christ did allow his vicegerents to practise all that himself would practise in his own person. For not all the practices or acts of Christ, but the laws of Christ, are the rules of man’s administrations.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 144.]

[207]Chamier. De Eccles. p. 376. Parker, part. polit. lib. i. cap. 1.

[208][That is, baptism and the Lord’s supper.]

[209][See Broadmead Records, Introd. pp. xli., lxxxvii.]

[210][“If a prince should, by covenant and oath, make his whole kingdom a national church, he should do more than he hath any word of Christ to warrant his work.” A Survey of the Sum of Ch. Discipline, &c., part 2, Argument 12.]

[211][Among the early settlers were two brothers of the name of Brown, who, still attached to the rites of the church of England, set up a separate assembly, and when summoned before the governor, accused the ministers of departing from the usages of that church, adding that they were separatists, and would soon become anabaptists. To this the ministers made reply, “That they were neither separatists nor anabaptists, that they did not separate from the church of England, nor from the ordinances of God there, but only from the corruptions and disorders of that church; they came away from the Common Prayer and ceremonies ... because they judged the imposition of these things to be sinful corruptions of the word of God.” Neal’s Hist. of New England, i. p. 144. The two brothers were sent back to England in the same ship that brought them over.]

[212][The law concerning heresy stood thus in New England: “Whoever denies the immortality of the soul, the resurrection of the body, or the evil done by the outward man is sin, or that Christ gave himself a ransom for sins, or that we are justified by his righteousness, or the morality of the fourth command, orthe baptizing of infants, or the ordinance of magistracy, or their authority to make war, or punish offenders against the first table; whoever denies any of these, or seduces others to do so, must be banished the jurisdiction.” Neal’s Hist. of New England, ii. p. 344.]

[213][See note before, p. 164.]

[214][Diana, in the original copy.]

[215][“I do not disapprove of the use frequently made of it by St. Augustine against the Donatists, to prove that godly princes may lawfully issue edicts to compel obstinate and rebellious persons to worship the true God, and to maintain the unity of the faith; for although faith is a voluntary thing, yet we see that such means are useful to subdue the obstinacy of those who will not until compelled obey.” Calvin in loc. tom. ii. 43. edit. Tholuck.]

[216][In the Platform of Church Discipline, agreed upon at Cambridge in New England in 1648, it is provided that not only members of churches, but hearers of the word also, shall contribute to the maintenance of the ministry: if the deacons failed to obtain it, recourse was then to be had to the magistrate, whose duty it was held to be to see that the ministry be duly provided for. C. Mather’s Magnalia, book v. p. 31. Neal’s Hist. of New England, ii. p. 301.]

[217][Mr. Henry Ainsworth, the most eminent of the Brownists, was the author of a very learned commentary on the Pentateuch and Canticles, as also of several other minor works. “He was,” says Mr. Cotton, “diligently studious of the Hebrew text, hath not been unuseful to the church in his exposition of the Pentateuch, especially of Moses’s rituals.” Way of Cong. Churches, p. 6. Stuart’s edit. of his Two Treatises, p. 55.]

[218][The composition of the first book of Homilies is generally attributed to Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, Hopkins, and Becon. Jewel is said to have had the largest share in the second, although Archbishop Parker speaks of them as “revised and finished, with a second part, by him and other bishops.” The first edition of the first book appeared in July, 1547, 1 Edward VI. The use of the Apocrypha in the church service was an early complaint of the Puritans. The apocryphal books were commanded to be bound up with the other books of scripture by Archbishop Whitgift. Short’s Hist. of Church of England, p. 239. Strype’s Whitgift, i. 590. Neal, i. 427.]

[219][A Letter of many Ministers in Old England requesting the judgment of their reverend brethren in New England concerning nine positions: writtenA.D.1637. Together with their answer thereto returned, anno 1639, &c. Published 1643, 4to. pp. 90. For a condensed view of it, see Hanbury’s Hist. Memorials, ii. pp. 18-39.]

[220][Sentiments precisely similar to the above were embodied in the seventeenth chapter of the Cambridge Platform, and continued to be for many years the ruling principles of the congregational churches of New England. See C. Mather’s Magnalia, book v. p. 37.]

[221][See Tracts on Lib. of Conscience, Introd. p. xxxii.]

[222][The Assembly of Divines was at this time engaged in forming a directory of worship for the entire nation.]

[223][The central part of a target, which anciently was painted white.]

[224][There are two chapters numbered CXX. in the original copy.]

[225]Nero and the persecuting emperors were not so injurious to Christianity, as Constantine and others who assumed a power in spiritual things. Under Constantine Christianity fell into corruption, and Christians fell asleep.

[226][Martial, De Spectaculis Libellus, Ep. ix.]

[227][See Neal’s Hist. of Puritans, i. 353, edit. 1837.]

[228]Is not this too like the pope’s profession of servus servorum Dei, yet holding out his slipper to the lips of princes, kings, and emperors?

[229][For elucidations of the references made by Mr. Williams in this preface to his sufferings, and for Mr. Cotton’s reply, see the Biographical Introduction.]

[230][It is] a monstrous paradox, that God’s children should persecute God’s children, and that they that hope to live eternally together with Christ Jesus in the heavens, should not suffer each other to live in this common air together, &c. I am informed it was the speech of an honourable knight of the parliament: “What! Christ persecute Christ in New England?”[231]

[231][“Though God’s children may not persecute God’s children, nor wicked men either, for well-doing: yet if they be found to walk in the way of the wicked—their brethren may justly deprive them in some cases not only of the common air of the country, by banishment, but even of the common air of the world by death, and yet hope to live eternally with them in the heavens.” Master John Cotton’s Answer to Master Roger Williams, p. 14.]

[232][That is, of the church at Salem, of which Mr. Williams was then the pastor.]

[233][This should be four hundred and fifty. See 1 Kings xviii. 19-22:—or including the “prophets of the groves,” 850.]

[234][“The truth is, I did not publish that discourse to the world—A brief discourse in defence of set forms of prayer was penned by Mr. Ball—that a religious knight sent over with desire to hear our judgment of it. At his request I drew up a short answer, and sent one copy to the knight and another to Mr. Ball divers years ago. How it came to be published I do not know.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 23. See Hanbury’s Hist. Mem. ii. 157, for an abstract of it.]

[235][See alsoBiographical Introductionto this volume.]

[236][“The scope of my letter was, not to confirm the equity of his banishment, but to convince the iniquity of his separation.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 41.]

[237][“He that shall withdraw or separate the corn from the people, or the people from the corn; the people have just cause to separate either him from themselves, or themselves from him. And this proportion will hold as well in spiritual corn as bodily.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 44.]

[238][“If men hinder the enjoyment of spiritual good things, may they not be hindered from the enjoyment of that which is less, carnal good things?” Ib. p. 46.]

[239][“I spent a great part of the summer in seeking by word and writing to satisfy his scruples, until he rejected both our callings, and our churches. And even then I ceased not to follow him still, ... whereof this very letter is a pregnant and evident demonstration.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 47.]

[240][“I intended not a cordial of consolation to him, ... but only a conviction, to abate the rigour of his indignation against the dispensation of divine justice.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 48.]

[241][“I bless the Lord from my soul for his abundant mercy in forcing me out thence, in so fit a season.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 49.]

[242][Mr. Cotton was at one time much inclined to Antinomianism, which, in the hands of Mrs. Hutchinson, led to no small disturbance in New England. He however denied that he wished to separate on the ground of thelegalteaching of the churches with whom he held communion, but thought of removing to New Haven, “as being better known to the pastor and some others there, than to such as were at that time jealous” of him in Boston. A timely perception of Mrs. Hutchinson’s errors led him to renounce her fellowship, and he remained at Boston. Neal’s Hist. of N. E., i. 183; Mather’s Magnalia, iii. 21; Knowles’s Life of R. Williams, p. 140.]

[243][“I have been given to understand, that the increase of concourse of people to him on the Lord’s days in private, to the neglect or deserting of public ordinances, and to the spreading of the leaven of his corrupt imaginations, provoked the magistrates, rather than to breed a winter’s spiritual plague in the country, to put him a winter’s journey out of the country.” Notwithstanding, Mr. Cotton asserts that Mr. Williams was treated most tenderly by the officer, James Boone, “who dare not allow that liberty to his tongue, which the examiner often useth in this discourse.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 57.]

[244][“This Confession may be found in Crosby, but without the ‘story of his life and death,’ which we have never yet been able to find.” Hist. of Eng. Baptists, ii. App. No. 1.]

[245][“As for Mr. Smith he standeth and falleth to his own master. Whilst he was preacher to the city of Lincoln, he wrought with God then: what temptations befel him after, by the evil workings of evil men, and some good men too, I choose rather to tremble at, than discourse of.” The fault of this “man fearing God,” appears to have been first his becoming a baptist, and then his acceptance of the opinions of certain Dutch baptists, with whom he held communion in Amsterdam. The early baptists held generally opinions which became known after the Synod of Dort as Arminian. In addition to these Mr. Smith held peculiar views on the nature of spiritual worship, which brought him into great disrepute with his fellow exiles, the Brownists and Independents. Cotton’s Answer p. 58, Smith’s Differences of the Ch. of the Separation, part i. edit. 1608.]

[246][See Smith’s Parallels and Censures, p. 9, &c. edit. 1609.]

[247][“It is not because I think such persons are not fit matter for church-estate; but because they yet want a fit form, requisite to church estate.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 63.]

[248][“The answer to that question and to all the other thirty-two questions, were drawn up by Mr. Mader—however, the substance of that answer doth generally suit with all our minds, as I conceive. I have read it, and did readily approve it to be judicious and solid. But his answer ... is notoriously slandered and abused by the examiner.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 63. Lechford, in his “Plain Dealing,” &c., however tells us of a minister, who “standing upon his ministry as of the church of England, and arguing against their covenant, and being elected at Weymouth, was compelled to recant some words.” One of his friends for being active in his election was fined £10, and uttering some cross words, £5 more, “and payed it down.” P. 22.]

[249][“It was his doctrines and practices which tended to the civil disturbance of the commonwealth, together with his heady and busy pursuit of the same, even to the rejection of all churches here; these they were that made him unfit for enjoying communion in the one state or in the other.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 64.]

[250][“His distinction, in the general I do approve it, and do willingly acknowledge that a godly person may be, through ignorance or negligence, so far enthralled to anti-christ, as to be separate from Christ, taking Christ as head of the visible church.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 66.]

[251][“What if ecclesiastical stories be deficient in telling us the times and places of their church assemblies? Is therefore the word of God deficient, or the church deficient, because human stories are deficient?... Yet sometimes their own inquisitors confess, that the churches of the Waldenses, or men of that way, have been extanta tempore apostolorum.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 69.]

[252][“My words are misreported: and the contradiction ariseth from his misreport. For God’s people and godly persons are not all one. Any church members may be called God’s people, as being in external covenant with him, and yet they are not always godly persons. God’s people may be so enthralled to anti-christ, as to separate them utterly from Christ, both as head of the visible and invisible church; but godly persons cannot be so enthralled.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 71.]

[253][“He requireth that we should cut off ourselves from hearing the ministry of the parishes in England, as being the ministry of a national, or parishional church, whereof both the church estate is falsely constituted, and all the ministry, worship, and government thereof false also. If he speak of the national church government, we must confess the truth, there indeed is truth fallen and falsehood hath prevailed much.—All of them are forsaken of Truth, and can challenge no warrant of truth but falsely.” Cotton’s Answer, pp. 77, 84.]

[254][“If the examiner had been pleased to have read Mr. Brightman on Rev. xviii. 4, he might find I was not the first that interpreted either that place in Isaiah, or this in Revelation, of a local separation.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 87.]

[255][“The two causes of God’s indignation against England—I would rather say Amen to them, than weaken the weight of them. Only I should so assent to the latter, as not to move for a toleration of all dissenters, dissenters in fundamentals.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 89.]

[256][“Our joining with the ministers of England in hearing of the word and prayer, doth not argue our church-communion with the parish churches in England, much less with the national church.” Mr. Cotton then proceeds to deny that Mr. Williams was persecuted, or that he admonished them humbly and faithfully. His banishment was no persecution; his statement of his opinions no admonition. Cotton’s Answer, p. 101.]

[257][“Who seeth not, that in these words I express not mine own reasoning or meaning, but his; and that I expressly say, the true meaning of the text will nothing more reach to his purpose; and so bring in his reason in form of an enthymeme, which he draws from it?” Cotton’s Answer, p. 105.]

[258][“Sure I am, we look at infants as members of our church, as being federally holy, but I am slow to believe that all of them are regenerate, or truly godly.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 108.]

[259][“These are palpable mistakes of those words of mine, which I expressed as the sum of his words, which he through haste conceived to be mine.” Ib. p. 108.]

[260][“We wholly avoid national, provincial, and diocesan government of the churches by episcopal authority; we avoid their prescript liturgies, and communion with open scandalous persons in any church order; ... it is a continual sorrow of heart, and mourning of our souls that there is yet so much of those notorious evils which he nameth ... suffered to thrust themselves into the fellowship of the churches, and to sit down with the saints at the Lord’s table. But yet I count all these but remnants of pollution, when as the substance of the true estate of churches abideth in their congregational assemblies.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 108.]

[261][“Mr. Williams probably refers to the refusal by the General Court to listen to a petition from Salem relative to a piece of land which was claimed as belonging to that town. But according to Winthrop, ‘because they had chosen Mr. Williams their teacher, while he stood under question of authority, and so offered contempt to the magistrates, their petition was refused,” &c. Knowles, p. 70.]

[262][“His banishment proceeded not against him or his for his own refusal of any worship, but for seditious opposition against the patent, and against the oath of fidelity offered to the people; ... he also wrote letters of admonition to all the churches whereof the magistrates were members, for deferring to give present answer to a petition of Salem, who had refused to hearken to a lawful motion of theirs.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 113.]

[263][“It seemeth he never read the story of the classes in Northamptonshire, Suffolk, Essex, London, Cambridge, discovered by a false brother to Doctor Bancroft.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 116, Neal’s Puritans, i. 226, 319.]

[264][Udall had been a tutor to Queen Elizabeth in the learned languages, yet for writing a little book against Diocesan Church Government and Ceremonies he was condemned to die, and would have been executed but for the queen’s feelings of respect to her aged tutor. A copy of this exceedingly rare book is in Mr. Offor’s library.]

[265][“He died by the annoyance of the prison: when the coroner’s jury came to survey the dead body of Mr. Udall in prison, he bled freshly, though cold before, as a testimony against the murderous illegal proceedings of the state against him.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 116, Neal, i. 339.]

[266][Mr. Cotton says, that Penry confessed that he deserved death for having seduced many to separation from hearing the word in the parish churches, so that their souls were justly required at his hand. Ibid. p. 117. This can scarcely be correct if we judge from the general tenor of Penry’s character. See Hanbury’s Hist. Memorials, i. 79, notee.]

[267][See Broadmead Records, Intro. p. xxxviii. Hanbury, i. 35, 62. Mr. Cotton endeavours to throw no little obloquy and discredit on these two witnesses to the truth; but most unjustly. Answer p. 117.]

[268][In “A Necessitie of Separation from the Church of England proved by Nonconformist Principles, &c.” By John Canne, pastor of the Ancient English Church at Amsterdam, 1634, 4to. pp. 264.]

[269][“Mr. Ainsworth’s name is of best esteem, without all exception, in that way who refused communion with hearing in England. And if his people suffered him to live on ninepence a week, with roots boiled, surely either the people were grown to a very extreme low estate, or else the growth of their godliness was grown to a very low ebb.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 122. The remarks of Mr. Hanbury, with the quotation he produces from the preface, by a friend of Ainsworth, to his Annotations on Solomon’s Song, do not appear in the least to invalidate the statement of Williams. In the earlier part of his exile, in common with Johnson and the other separatists, he was exposed to great straits and difficulties, and it may be to that period that Mr. Williams refers. See Hanbury, i. 433.]

[270][“This I speak with respect to Mr. Robinson and to his church, who grew to acknowledge, and in a judicious and godly discourse to approve and defend, the lawful liberty of hearing the word from the godly preachers of the parishes in England.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 123.]

[271][Mr. Robinson’s book was published nine years after his death. It was entitled, “Of the Lawfulness of Hearing of the Ministers in the Church of England: penned by that Learned and Reverend Divine, Mr. John Robinson, late pastor to the English Church of God in Leyden, and Printed Anno 1634.” Mr. Canne’s work in reply was entitled “A Stay against Straying,” 4to. 1639.]

[272][“If this be all the conclusion he striveth for, I shall never contend with him about it. But this is that I deny, a man to participate in a church-estate, where he partaketh only in hearing and prayer, before and after sermon; and joineth not with them, neither in their covenant, nor in the seals of the covenant.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 129.]

[273][That is, as Mr. Cotton explains it, because “being cast out by the usurping power of the prelacy, and dismissed, though against their wills, by our congregations, we looked at ourselves as private members, and not officers to any church here, until one or other church might call us unto office.” Any other sense is either a mistake, or a “fraudulent expression of our minds.” Answer p. 131.]

[274][“We are not so masterly and peremptory in our apprehensions; and yet the more plainly and exactly all church-actions are carried on according to the letter of the rule, the more glory shall we give unto the Lord Jesus, and procure the more peace to our consciences and to our churches, and reserve more purity and power to all our administrations.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 132.]

[275][See Broadmead Records, Intro. p. lxxix.]

[276][“The world is taken in scripture more ways than one, and so is separation; as when the apostle exhorteth the Romans, not to conform their church-bodies according to the platform of the Roman monarchy, into œcumenical, national, provincial, diocesan bodies, Rom. xii. 2. From the world, as taken for civil government of it, we are to separate our church-bodies, and the government thereof in frame and constitution.” Cotton’s Answer, pp. 135, 136.]

[277][“Our not receiving all comers unto the communion of the Lord’s table, and other parts of church fellowship, saving only unto the public hearing of the word and presence at other duties, it argueth indeed that such persons either think themselves unfit materials for church fellowship, or else that we conceive them to be as stones standing in need of a little more hewing and squaring before they be laid as living stones in the walls of the Lord’s house.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 139.]

[278][“Our practice in suppressing such as have attempted to set up a parishional way, I never heard of such a thing here to this day. And if any such thing were done before my coming into the country, I do not think it was done by forcible compulsion, but by rational conviction.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 139. It is difficult to reconcile this disclaimer with facts, unless we attribute ignorance to Mr. Cotton. See before, p.233, note 8.]

[279][Mr. Cotton calls this an untruth, yet he adds, “I hold that the receiving all the inhabitants in the parish into the full fellowship of the church, and the admitting of them all unto the liberty of all the ordinances, is an human corruption, and so if he will, an human invention.” Answer, p. 140.]

[280][“The answer is near at hand....Those mine enemies which would not that I should reign over them, bring them hither, and slay them before my face, Luke xix. 27. And yet I would not be so understood as if Christ did allow his vicegerents to practise all that himself would practise in his own person. For not all the practices or acts of Christ, but the laws of Christ, are the rules of man’s administrations.” Cotton’s Answer, p. 144.]

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