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that can be done, it will be in vain to say what other means is there left. If all the means God has appointed, to make men hear and consider, be "exhortation in season and out of season," &c. together with prayer for them, and the example of meekness and a good life; this is all ought to be done, "Whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear."

By these means the Gospel at first made itself to be heard through a great part of the world; and in a crooked and perverse generation, led away by lusts, humours, and prejudice, as well as this you complain of, prevailed with men to hear and embrace the truth, and take care of their own souls; without the assistance of any such force of the magistrate, which you now think needful. But whatever neglect or aversion there is in some men, impartially and thoroughly to be instructed; there will upon a due examination, I fear, be found no less a neglect and aversion in others, impartially and thoroughly to instruct them. It is not the talking even general truths in plain and clear language, much less a man's own fancies in scholastic or uncommon ways of speaking, an hour or two, once a week in public, that is enough to instruct even willing hearers in the way of salvation, and the grounds of their religion. They are not politic discourses which are the means of right information in the foundations of religion. For with such, sometimes venting anti-monarchical principles, sometimes again preaching up nothing but absolute monarchy and passive obedience, as the one or other have been in vogue, and the way to preferment; have our churches rung in their turns, so loudly, that reasons and arguments proper and sufficient to convince men of the truth in the controverted points of religion, and to direct them in the right way to salvation, were scarce any where to be heard. But how many, do you think, by friendly and Christian debates with them at their houses, and by the gentle methods of the Gospel made use of in private conversation, might have been brought into the church; who, by railing from the pulpit, ill and unfriendly treatment out of it, and other neglects and miscarriages of those who claimed to be their teachers,

have been driven from hearing them? Paint the defects and miscarriages frequent on this side, as well as you have done those on the other, and then do you, with all the world, consider whether those whom you so handsomely declaim against, for being misled by "education, passion, humour, prejudice, obstinacy," &c. do deserve all the punishment. Perhaps it will be answered: if there be so much toil in it, that particular persons must be applied to, who then will be a minister? And what if a layman should reply: if there be so much toil in it, that doubts must be cleared, prejudices removed, foundations examined, &c. who then will be a protestant? the excuse will be as good hereafter for the one as for the other.

This new method of yours, which you say "nobody can deny but that indirectly, and at a distance, it does some service towards bringing men to embrace the truth," was never yet thought on by the most refined persecutors. Though indeed it is not altogether unlike the plea made use of to excuse the late barbarous usage of the protestants in France, designed to extirpate the reformed religion there, from being a persecution for religion. The French king requires all his subjects to come to mass: those who do not, are punished with a witness. For what? Not for their religion, say the pleaders for that discipline, but for disobeying the king's laws. So by your rule, the dissenters, for thither you would, and thither you must come, if you mean any thing, must be punished. For what? Not for their religion, say you; not for "following the light of their own reason; not for obeying the dictates of their own consciences." That you think not fit. For what then are they to be punished? "To make them," say you," examine the religion they have embraced, and the religion they have rejected." So that they are punished, not for having offended against a law: for there is no law of the land that requires them to examine. And which now is the fairer plea, pray judge. You ought, indeed, to have the credit of this new invention. All other law-makers have constantly taken this method, that where any thing was to be amended,

the fault was first declared, and then penalties denounced against all those, who, after a time set, should be found guilty of it. This the common sense of mankind, and the very reason of laws, which are intended not for pu nishment, but correction, has made so plain, that the subtilest and most refined law-makers have not got out of this course; nor have the most ignorant and barbarous nations missed it. But you have outdone Solon and Lycurgus, Moses and our Saviour, and are resolved to be a law-maker of a way by yourself. It is an old and obsolete way, and will not serve your turn, to begin with warnings and threats of penalties to be inflicted on those who do not reform, but continue to do that which you think they fail in. To allow of impunity to the innocent, or the opportunity of amendment to those who would avoid the penalties, are formalities not worth your notice. You are for a shorter and surer way. Take a whole tribe, and punish them at all adventures; whether guilty or no of the miscarriage which you would have amended; or without so much as telling them what it is you would have them do, but leaving them to find it out if they can. All these absurdities are contained in your way of proceeding; and are impossible to be avoided by any one who will punish dissenters, and only dissenters, to make them "consider and weigh the grounds of their religion, and impartially examine whether it be true or no; and upon what grounds they took it up, that so they may find and embrace the truth that must save them." But that this new sort of discipline may have all fair play, let us inquire first, who it is you would have be punished. In the place above cited, they are "those who are got into a wrong way, and are deaf to all persuasions." If these are the men to be punished, let a law be made against them: you have my consent; and that is the proper course to have offenders punished. For you do not, I hope, intend to punish any fault by a law, which you do not name in the law; nor make a law against any fault you would not have punished. And now, if you are sincere, and in earnest, and are, as a fair man should be, for what your words plainly signify, and nothing else;

what will such a law serve for? Men in the wrong way are to be punished: but who are in the wrong way is the question. You have no more reason to determine it against one who differs from you, than he has to conclude against you, who differ from him: no, not though you have the magistrate and the national church on your side. For, if to differ from them be to be in the wrong way, you, who are in the right way in England, will be in the wrong way in France. Every one here must be judge for himself; and your law will reach nobody till you have convinced him he is in the wrong way. And then there will be no need of punishment to make him consider; unless you will affirm again, what you have denied, and have men punished for embracing the religion they believe to be true, when it differs from yours or the public.

Besides being in the wrong way, those whom you would have punished must be such as are deaf to all persuasions. But any such, I suppose, you will hardly find, who hearken to nobody, not to those of their own way. If you mean by deaf to all persuasions, all persuasions of a contrary party, or of a different church, such, I suppose, you may abundantly find in your own church, as well as elsewhere; and I presume to them you are so charitable, that you would not have them punished for not lending an ear to seducers. For constancy in the truth, and perseverance in the faith, is, I hope, rather to be encouraged, than by any penalties checked in the orthodox. And your church, doubtless, as well as all others, is orthodox to itself in all its tenets. If you mean by all persuasion, all your persuasion, or all persuasion of those of your communion; you do but beg the question, and suppose you have a right to punish those who differ from, and will not comply with you.

Your next words are, "When men fly from the means of a right information, and will not so much as consider how reasonable it is thoroughly and impartially to examine a religion which they embraced upon such inducements as ought to have no sway at all in the matter; and therefore with little or no examination

of the proper grounds of it; what human method can be used to bring them to act like men, in an affair of such consequence, and to make a wiser and more rational choice, but that of laying such penalties upon them, as may balance the weight of those prejudices which inclined them to prefer a false way before the true; and recover them to so much sobriety and reflection as seriously to put the question to themselves, whether it be really worth the while to undergo such inconveniencies, for adhering to a religion, which, for any thing they know, may be false, or for rejecting another (if that be the case), which, for any thing they know, may be true, till they have brought it to the bar of reason, and given it a fair trial there?" Here you again bring in such as prefer a false way before a true: to which having answered already, I shall here say no more, but that, since our church will not allow those to be in a false way who are out of the church of Rome, because the church of Rome, which pretends infallibility, declares hers to be the only true way; certainly no one of our church, nor any other, which claims not infallibility, can require any one to take the testimony of any church, as a sufficient proof of the truth of her own doctrine. So that true and false, as it commonly happens, when we suppose them for ourselves, or our party, in effect, signify just nothing, or nothing to the purpose; unless we can think that true or false in England, which will not be so at Rome, or Geneva: and vice versa. As for the rest of the description of those on whom you are here laying penalties; I beseech you consider whether it will not belong to any of your church, let it be what it will. Consider, I say, if there be none in your church "who have embraced her religion upon such inducements as ought to have no sway at all in the matter, and therefore with little or no examination of the proper grounds of it; who have not been inclined by prejudices; who do not adhere to a religion, which, for any thing they know, may be false, and who have rejected another which, for any thing they know, may be true." If you have any such in your communion, and it will be an admirable, though

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