The Covenants And The Covenanters / Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation

by Unknown

In the faithful and impartial search and pursuit whereof, if Scotland, or any of the reformed churches, can hold us forth any clearer light than our own, we receive it not as our rule, but as such an help to expound our rule, as Christ Himself hath allowed us. In which case, we are bound to kiss not the lips only, but the very feet of them that shall be able to shew us "the way to Zion."

So that still, it is not the voice of the churches but of Christ in the churches, that we covenant to listen to, in this pursuit; that is to say, that we will follow them, as they follow Christ: and when all is done, and a reformation (through the assistance and blessing of the Lord Jesus Christ, that great king and prophet of His church) resolved on according to this rule thus interpreted, under what notion or obligation the observation of it shall be commended to us, sub judice lis est, it is yet in the bosom and breast of authority; we are as yet called to swear to nothing in this kind. So much in reference to the instances.

Answ. 3. I answer further to the satisfying of this second doubt, that by this covenant, we are bound no more to conform to Scotland, than Scotland to us: the stipulation being mutual, and this stipulation binding us not so much to conform one to another, as both of us to the Word; wherein, if we can meet, who would not look upon it, as upon the precious fruit of Christ's prayer: "That they might be one, as we are one?" and the beauty and safety of both nations, and of as many of the churches as the Lord our God shall persuade to come into this holy and blessed association?

Object. 3. A third objection falls upon the second article or branch of this covenant; wherein it is feared by some, that we swear to extirpate that which, for ought we know, upon due inquiry, may be found the way to Zion, the way of evangelical government, which Christ and His apostles have set up in the church.

Answ. Where lies that, think you? In what clause or word of the article? Who can tell? Surely not in popery; or if there be any that think that the way, I would wish their persons in Rome, since their hearts are there already. Is it in superstition? Nay, superstition properly consisteth in will-worship, "teaching for doctrine the traditions of men;" this cannot be the way to Zion, which Christ hath chalked out to us in His word. No more can heresy, which is the opposition to sound doctrine; nor schism, which is the rent of the church's peace; nor profaneness, the poison of her conversation. None but superstitious heretics, schismatics, profane persons, will call these the way to Zion; nor these neither, under the name and notion of superstition, heresy, schism, profaneness; for the heretic will not call his doctrine heresy; nor the superstitious, his innovation superstition; nor the schismatic, his turbulent practices schism; nor lastly, the profane person, his lewdness profaneness; tho' they love the thing, they hate the name.

And this, before we go further, occasions another objection, which you must give me leave both to make and answer in a parenthesis, and then I will return.

Object. How can we swear the extirpation of these, since, who shall be judge? While some will be ready to call that schism and superstition, which is not; and others deny that to be heresy, superstition, schism, which is?

Answ. 1. To which I answer, By the same argument, we ought not to covenant against popery and drunkenness, sabbath-breaking, nor any other sin whatsoever, there being nothing so gross but it will find some friends to justify, and plead for it; which if we shall not condemn till all parties be agreed on the verdict, we shall never proceed to judgment, while the world stands. 2. The word must be the rule and the judge, say men what they please, pro or con. 3. And if the matter be indeed so disputable, that it lies not in my faculty to pronounce sentence, I have my dispensation to suspend, till the world determine the controversy.

I now return; if then in none of these, the doubt must of necessity lie in that word prelacy. And is that indeed the way of gospel government? Is that it indeed which bears away the bell of jure divino? What is it then that hath destroyed all gospel order, and government and worship, in these kingdoms, as in other places of the Christian world, even down to the ground? Hath it not been prelacy? What is it that hath taken down a teaching ministry, and set up in the room a teaching-ceremony? Is it not prelacy? What is it that hath silenced, suspended, imprisoned, deprived, banished, so many godly, learned, able ministers of the gospel; yea, and killed some of them with their unheard of cruelties, and thrust into their places idol, idle shepherds; dumb dogs that cannot bark (unless it were at the flock of Christ; so they learned of their masters, both to bark and bite too) greedy dogs that could never have enough, that did tear out the loins and bowels of their own people for gain, heap living upon living, preferment upon preferment; swearing, drunken, unclean priests, that taught nothing but rebellion in Israel, and caused people to abhor the sacrifice of the Lord: Arminian, popish, idolatrous, vile wretches, such as, had Job been alive, he would not have set with the dogs of his flock; who, I say, brought in these? Did not prelacy? What hath hindered the reformation of religion all this while in doctrine, government, and worship? Prelacy, a generation of men they were, that never had a vote for Jesus Christ; yea, what hath poisoned and adulterated religion in all these branches, and hath let in popery and profaneness upon the kingdom like a flood, for the raising of their own pomp and greatness, but prelacy? In a word, prelacy it is, that hath set its impure and imperious feet, one upon the church, the other upon the state, and hath made both serve as Pharaoh did the Israelites, with rigour. Surely, their government hath been a yoke which neither we nor our fathers were able to bear.

Now, that which hath done this, and a thousand times more violence and mischief to Christ and His people, than the tongue or pen of man is able to express; can that be the way of or to Zion? Can that be the government of Christ and His Church?