A survey of the Survey of that summe of church-discipline penned by Mr. Thomas Hooker ... wherein the way of the churches of N. England is now re-examined ... / by Samuel Rutherfurd ...

CHAP. XVIII.

Answer to Mr. Hookers Arguments, That the invisible Church is not the first subject of the Seals.

Me. H. Ar. 1. If those who were graceless, and had no * 1.1 interest in Christ, had yet a command from Christ to re∣ceive the Seals, had warrant from his Word to require them; then they had a right (outward and visible in foro Ecclesiae) to partake of them: for there is no better right than Gods Command to enjoyn, and his Word to warrant us to challenge any priviledge. But many graceless, who were no invisible members, Ishmael, Esau, and all the males were enjoyned to be circumcised, and all the houses of Israel to eat the Passover.

Ans. 1. What is in question is not proved, to wit, That the priviledges of special note in the Mediator Christ, i. e. saving priviledges, as Mr. R. often teacheth, pag. 244, 245. belong * 1.2 not to the invisible Church as to the proper and first subject. But Mr. H. proves, That external signs, and external right to the Seals, in foro Ecclesiae, are bestowed upon rotten Members, Ma∣gus and others.

2. He ought to prove the visible Church is the onely prin∣cipal subject of the seals, as he elswhere asserts. But this Ar∣gument proves it not.

3. He frames the Argument of Infants, who have right to be circumcised, who have no command of Christ (for Infants are not capable of commands or threatnings) and brings not instances of these come to age under the New Testament.

4. A graceless man, as Magus, hath thus far right to de∣mand the Seals, that he may say to the Church, You sin in with∣holding the Seals, and therefore I require you baptize me, as Christ hath commanded you: but he cannot say, I have right even ex∣ternal to receive Baptism, and I sin not in receiving it. And Mr.

H. Argument to prove it is naught: Why, saith he, Graceless men have the command of God to challenge the Seals; Magus hath the command of God to challenge, and to receive the Lords Supper. A command absolute he hath none: shew me such a command, Magus, Iudas, eat and drink at the Lords Supper, challenge, claim and receive Baptism; All Israel eat the Passover, be ye real believers or hypocrites, be ye self-triers, and prepared or not, be ye clean or unclean: I confess there were no better right to challenge the Seals, than such a command, if any such were; but if Mr. H. or any of his reade such a command, I pray I may see, and reade also. But Magus hath onely a conditional command, which gives him no true and real right, save onely conditionally, to wit, Magus, receive the Seals and the Lords Supper, so thou believe, and examine thy self; if not, thou hast no right to the seals, but eatest and drinkest thine own damnation: And because these graceless men fulfil not the condition, and believe not, Mr. H. his Argument is wa••••ry; They have right from the command of God, which is the b•…•… right: that is, they have no right at all from a conditional command, they not ful∣filling the condition, but such right as Robbers have to the Travellers purse; yea, they have no command of God, but the contrary a severe discharge, Isa. 1. 13. Bring no more vain obla∣tions. Matth. 22. 12. Friend, how camest thou in hither, not ha∣ving a wedding garment? He that eateth and drinketh unworthi∣ly, * 1.3 eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, 1 Cor. 11. 29.

Mr. H. p. 42. Iob and his godly friends were invisible Mem∣bers, but being strangers they are forbidden to eat the Passover: Ergo, the seals belong not to invisible Members.

Ans. 1. The thing denied is not concluded. Iob and his god∣ly friends had the marrow of the Seals, and wanted some ex∣ternal signs, which are not saving priviledges, as I alledge pag. 244. That Iob was not circumcised, possibly is said, not proved by Mr. H.

2. My minde is not to deny that the visible acts of eating, drinking, being washed in Baptism, belong not to visible belie∣vers as visible, taking visible as coincident with real believers; for invisible men can no more visibly partake of Ordinances, than Spirits can be baptized, and eat the Lords Supper.

3. Iob and his godly friends were not forbidden to be cir∣cumcised, * 1.4 nor to sacrifice; Iob sacrificed warrantably, Iob 1. c. 42. Iob professeth he was visibly in Covenant, Iob 13. 16. and 19. 25. I know that my Redeemer liveth. And so they were neither invisible Members onely, nor debarred from the seals. Nay, Proselytes were admitted to the seals.

Mr. H. 〈◊〉〈◊〉. 41. If the invisible Church be the first subject of the seals, the invisible Church must have the seals firstly, and the visible Church secondarily; as heat is first in the element of fire, and secondarily in things hot by participation, as iron.

Ans. It is no Logick: If the invisible and real believer, for example, Peter, be the first subject of the seals, including Christ signified in them, then to receive the seals worthily, agree first to Peter and to invisible real believers, and secondarily to these same invisible believers, as they do visibly declare by their sa∣voury conversation, that they are really believers: but there is no real transmigration of accidents out of one subject to ano∣ther; * 1.5 that is cold Logick: but such real and internal right to the seals, and to Christ and his grace signified by the seals, do neither firstly nor secondarily belong to such visible Saints as Magus and Iudas, yea neither per se, nor per participationem; as the Sun and Stars are neither hot nor cold, either firstly or secondarily, for they are, Aristotle saith, Corpora quintae essentiae, bodies of a fifth essence, different from the elements and all mixed bodies.

Mr. H. p. 42, 43. The Olive tree is the prime subject of the fat∣ness that issues from it, and appertains to it, and of all the Ordi∣nances. But the visible Church, Rom. 11. is the Olive, the seals and other priviledges are part of the fatness which pertains there∣unto: Therefore the visible Church is the prime subject of them. That the Olive is the visible Church, see Beza, Pareus, Wil∣let.

Ans. 1. Will Mr. H. bide by this Conclusion, That the visible Church, including rotten Magus, trayterous Iudas, is

the prime subject of all saving priviledges, of the new heart, * 1.6 Gods inward heart-teaching, perseverance, &c? Then by his own argument, Magus, and the visible body whereof he is a graceless member, as visible, must be first qualified inherently with all these saving priviledges, as heat is firstly (saith he) in the fire; and then Justification, Perseverance in grace, must be transferred from such an ugly body as Magus, Iudas, &c. to real and invisible believers.

2. The Assumption is false: Reade again Calvin, Beza, Pa∣reus; adde Pet. Martyr, The English Notes, Diodati, they ex∣pound not the Olive of the visible Church onely as contra∣distinguished from the invisible, as Mr. H. takes the visible Church in this dispute, as it includes the whole visible Israel, even Idolaters, who slew the Prophets and the Heir: But the Church visible including the Election, Rom. 11. 7. and also the invisible and really justified, and by fatness, they mean not onely external priviledges, which the rotten hypocrites wanted not, but the juyce and sap of saving grace, by which, saith Pet. Martyr, They that are far off are made nigh, Ephes. 2. 12, 14. and were engrafted in the Head and Body, saith Pareus; yea, Willet citeth Gorham, and Lyra, who expound the fatness of habitual grace.

Mr. H. Let Mr. R. remember he said, lib. 2. pag. 260. None * 1.7 are to be cast out for non-regeneration known to be such. But if ye give them the seals (saith Mr. H.) the Church shall give the seals to such whom she knows have no right to them.

Ans. Mr. H. himself is alike burthened with this as I am: A * 1.8 toleration there must be of some, until the scandals be exami∣ned, and Censures applied, and the Church knows men to be unregenerated, many dayes before they can know it juridicè. Let Mr. H. then answer, whether they should be debarred from the seals or not.

2. If such were admitted being free of scandal, it follows not (its a poor begging of the question) that the Church should admit to the seals such as she knows hath no right. Why? be∣cause they are not in the judgement of charity real converts; that is, non causa pro causa, no cause.

Mr. H. Mr. R. puts the formalis ratio, the essential reason

of Offices and Officers in another subject, besides the visible Church, in the invisible Catholick Church, convertibly, or reciprocally and universally. Whatsoever hath these priviledges, to wit, Offices, Officers, Seals, right to the Seals, &c. is the invisible Catholick Church. And onely the invisible Catholick Church (Ergo, not the visible) hath all these priviledges. If Mr. R. rid his hands, &c. its good.

Ans. Mr. H. hath two pages near by of this, of which whether * 1.9 I have rid my hands, let the judicious Reader determine. Know, Reader, that Mr. H. will have all priviledges, external Offices, Officers, Seals, and right Ecclesiastick (which is formally a painted bastard right) in the visible Church, onely as its first subject: I rid my hands of this, by granting it; take the visible Church in a good sense, as including good and bad, nor said I ever any thing to the contrary. But these are not the saving priviledges of special note, such as to be taught of God, to persevere in saving grace, &c. as I oft say, p. 244, 245, &c. And though Mr. H. his priviledges, to be an Apostle, or ano∣ther Officer, to have right external to the seals (a bastard right) agree to the visible Church, yea to Iudas and Magus, they be∣ing gratiae gratis datae: yet saving priviledges, the anointing; the new heart, Justification, Perseverance; the styles of Spouse, Sister, Love, Dove, &c. are such as I desire Mr. H. to rid his hands, and to clear the coasts to us, by his answer to my words. Due right, par. 1. pag. 244, 245. divers pages; how these agree reciprocally to his visible Church. I take but some few. The single Congregatinn of such as Magus and Peter, &c. is the first and reciprocal, and proper subject of the anointing, of justifica∣tion, and perseverance.

And convertibly, All that have the anointing, are justi∣fied, persevere, are onely the single independent Congregation of such as Magus and Peter, &c.

What then will Mr H. do with his own, that are both visibly and invisibly justified, regenerate, who by persecution or pesti∣lence are broken from the Independent Church? Shall they not share of the anointing, because they are not Members of the single Congregation? This is hard measure to the godly, and bad Divinity. This is not good Logick, that therefore

Mr. R. must shew some other essential causes of Offices and Officers besides the invisible Church: He must mean the visible Church of which Magus is a Member. I know in Logick, that the sub∣ject is an essential cause of an accident; Subjectum sumitur in d••finitione per additamentum, I learned long ago.

And for the close, the society, the saving priviledges, of the new heart, perseverance, is the invisible Church; and all that have these, the anointing, perseverance, &c. is the invisible my∣stical true Church. I own this reciprocation, as new Logick; though let not the Reader mistake, I take invisible as opposed to visible in its latitude, as it takes in both believing Peter, and the hypocrite Magus; yet so, as the visible Church is so named, to wit, a true visible Church, from the choicest part, but not as invisible is opposed to visible, tali modo, both visible and sin∣cere: for the Catholick Church invisible, is also the Catholick Church visible, to wit, tali modo, in a sincere profession vi∣sible.

Notes

• * 1.1

  Par. 1. pag. 41, 42.
• * 1.2

  Hypocrites have not any Ecclesiasticall right to the seals from the command of God, as a com∣mand, but from the com∣mand as it in∣cludes the ful∣filling of the condition.
• * 1.3

  Iob had right to the seals. Aug. de Civ. Dei l. 12. c. 47. Nec ipsos Iudaeos existimo audere contendere, ne∣minem pe••tinu∣isse ad Deum praeter Israelitas—Iob nec indigena, nec proselyta, id est, Adven•• populi Israel fuit, sed ex gente Idum••a genus ducens; ibi ortus, ibidem mortuus est.
• * 1.4

  Genebrard. in Chron. an. Mun. 1239. tempore Patriarcharum vixisse ejus tempore pleros{que} Ch••nanaeo••um, ad Ecclesiam Catholicam perti••uisse existimat. Pineda in Iob cap. 1. ver. 1. Nu. 75. c. 4. Ecce docuisti multos fuisse regem & publicum doctorem populi sibi subjecti; When Iob lived even before the Law, and before Moses. See Theodoret Epitom. Divinorum decretorum, l. 5. de crea∣tione. Origen. Homil. 4. super Ezek. Euseb. l. 1. Demonst. Evang. cap. 3. Moses videtur se∣ptimus ab Abrahamo, Iob quintus.
• * 1.5

  The visible Church as vi∣sible, is not the first and prin∣cipal subject of the seals, ac∣cording to their substance of the new heart, perseve∣rance, &c.
• * 1.6

  The olive tree Rom. 16. 15. not the visible Congregation as visible, but as it includeth the Elect; and the fatness is not the out∣ward signs on∣ly, of which Magus parta∣keth.
• * 1.7

  Pag. 45.
• * 1.8

  Ch 2. p. 27. Non-regene∣ration ex∣cludes not men from Church-right to the seals, as M. H. imagin∣eth.
• * 1.9

  Mr. R. places not the formal reason of offi∣ces, officers, seals in the vi∣sible Church, as Mr. H. saith.