men to imagine, that they can prevent such controverfies; and cftablish confent touching true religion, by decreeing their own opinions to be the effential doctrines of true religion, and endeavouring to impose and force them on the confciences of others. 'Tis true, as the forementioned noble author obferves, the church never wants a kind of perfons, who love the falutation of R A BBI, MASTER, not in ceremony or compliment, but from an inward authority which they affect over mens minds, in drawing them to depend upon their opinions, and to Seek knowledge at their lips. But thefe men are the true fucceffors of Diotrephes, the lovers of prebeminence.

THE project to promote an uniformity in opinion in matters of religion, efpecially in thofe parts of which are of a fpeculative nature, is true Spiritual knight errantry. 'Tis an impracticable attempt in the very nature of the thing, upon any other foundation, but that of fpreading an univerfal ignorance throughout all mankind, or abfolutely extirpating out of the world all that fhall dare oppofe or contradict the arbitrary decrees and fovereign dictates of these ecclefiaftical projectors, who are weak enough to form this hopeful fcheme of uniformity, and wicked enough to perfue and promote it by all the unchristian methods of violence and perfecution.

WERE

WERE it indeed poffible that this end could be accomplished, and that the impofing fubfcriptions to church articles of faith was a proper means for the avoiding diverfity of opinions; yet what is the neceffity, and where is the advantage of it, could it be obtained?

CAN it be pretended, that the christian revelation hath made this the characteristic of a christian, or an effential to falvation? I shall be immediately ask'd, doth not the apostle affirm there is one faith, and that we must not be as children tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine, by the flight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive? Allowed. But what hath this one faith to do with the creed of the English convocation in 1562? The true christian doctrine is unqueftionably an uniform, determinate, fixed fcheme of truth; and the diftinguishing faith of a christian is, the belief of one God the Father, of whom are all things, and of one Lord Jefus Chrift, by whom are all things, in oppofition to all other Gods and Lords; and if there be any other article upon which the being and practice of the christian religion depends. The one faith required is the belief only of the doctrine of Christ and his apoftles; the belief only of those plain and important articles, which the christian revelation hath made neceffary; and about which there would have been little or no

difpute, had it not been for the flight of men, and that cunning craftiness whereby they have ever been deceiving the chriftian world. But, how doth this unity of faith, recommended by the fcriptures, prove the neceffity of an unity of faith in the thirtynine articles, in Dr. Waterland's metaphyfical scheme of the trinity, or the predeftinarian scheme of John Calvin?

DOTH this unity of faith, in articles that have their foundation of truth only in convocations and fynods, in the least tend to promote the fubftantial virtues of the chriftian life? To believe in one God the creator and governor of all things, and in one Jefus Chrift the faviour and the judge of all men, are principles that have an immediate and powerful influence on the mind, and that directly tend to promote a religious and virtuous life. But is it of any real confequence to religion and morality, whether or no I believe that three almighties are one almighty, or whether I can split the differ ence between begotten and not made; or whether I am of opinion or not, that we have no power to do good works by our own natural strength; that works done before infpiration have the nature of fin; that predeftination is full of feet comfort; that the church hath power to decree rites or ceremonies, and authority in controverfies of faith, that the book of homilies contain a godly and whole fome doctrine,

aud

and that the book of confecration of archbishops, &c. fet forth in the time of Edward VI. hath not any thing fuperftitious aud ungodly? All thefe, and many other things like them, are ftiled ARTICLES OF RELIGION, and our clergy are obliged to fubfcribe them under this character. And yet these two things are as plain as the clergy can make them; that the generality of them do not believe them to be articles of religion; and that tho' they must all subscribe them upon almoft every new spiritual preferment, yet that it hath no influence to promote amongst them a virtuous, religious, and christian behaviour.

CHRISTIANITY is a religion addressed to the reason and confciences of men, that abhors compulfion of any fort, and that countenances nothing of the ungodly practice of forcing men to believe creeds without conviction; or to fubfcribe them without believing them. It offers its doctrines to mens confideration and judgment, and leaves them at liberty to receive or reject them, juft as they difcern or not the evidence for them, and are hereby convinced or not of the truth or importance of them. It fupposes and provides for differences of opinions, and commands us not to receive men to doubtful difputations, to maintain the unity of Spirit in the bond of peace, not to judge the fervants of another mafter, but to fuffer every man to be fully perfuaded in his A a 4

own

own mind, and those that are strong to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to pleafe themfelves.

THE reasonable powers and faculties are not in all men equal and alike. The great God of nature hath formed them with dif fernt capacities. They don't perceive things in the fame light, and can't all fee the fame force or defect in the fame arguments. This is the conftitution of human nature, and a conftitution that owes its original to the God of nature. Differences therefore of opinion, even in religious matters, is abfolutely unavoidable, where men have any reafonable faculties, and will impartially use them; And to imagine that these differences, thefe unavoidable differences can be difpleafing to God, or that a forced uniformity in fentiment and opinion can be effential to his favour, where there is an honeft defire to know the truth, and a care to please him by the virtues of a chriftian life, is to degrade the greatest and best of beings, and reprefent him to the world as a weak, ill-natur'd, irrational being, yea as an arbitrary, tyrannical and unjust one; forming creatures with different capacities, and punishing them for the neceffary confequences of these different capacities; a thing as unrighteous in its nature, and as contradictory to all the laws of equity and juftice, as tho' he fhould be difpleafed with and punish men for the different features of their faces, or the different

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