Catholic communion defended against both extremes, and unnecessary division confuted in five parts ...…Catholick communion defended against both extreams, and unnecessary division confuted in five parts ...…

Perhaps they will say, that God forbids adding or diminishing: I answer, He doth so: Therefore let them take heed of it, who say his Law forbids that which it never forbade, but in general commandeth. If we must not add to the Laws of the Land, yet the Bookbinder that covereth them, and the Lawyers and Judges that expound them, do not add thereby to the Law. When the Hearers bowed, and prostrated themselves in reverence to God, they did not by this add to the Law; nor yet when they made a Vow uncommanded, or a Free-Will Offering: And I think it was no sinful addition to the Law, for the Publican to smite his Breast, and look downward; and when Jeremiah said, No man smiteth on his thigh, and saith, what evil have I done? The meaning is not, No man idolatrously giveth God false worship. And I think, that they that rent their clothes to express their repentance, did not add to God's Word, nor yet do it as necessary worship, tho Joel says, Rent your hearts, and not your garments.

Perhaps they will say, that God forbids adding or diminishing: I answer, He doth so: Therefore let them take heeed of it, who say his Law forbids that which it never forbad, but in general commandeth. If we must not add to the Laws of the Land, yet the Bookbinder that covereth them, and the Lawyers and Judges that expound them, do not add thereby to the Law. When the Hearers bowed, and prostrated themselves in reverence to God, they did not by this add to the Law; nor yet when they made a Vow uncommanded, or a Free-Will Offering: And I think it was no sinful addition to the Law, for the Publican to smite his Breast, and look downward; and when Ieremy said, No man smiteth on his thigh, and saith, what evil have I done? The meaning is not, No man idolatrously giveth God false worship. And I think, that they that rent their clothes to express their repentance, did not add to God's Word, nor yet do it as necessary worship, tho Ioel says, Rent your hearts, and not your garments.

Some Object, That Christ's sitting at the Sacramental Supper, is a Law to us, forbidding any other gesture. But this Author professeth, that all the actions of Christ, or his Apostles, are not Laws binding us to do the like: If they be, we break many such Laws; as when we do not eat a full Meal before the Sacrament, when we do it not without women, only to a Family, or to Twelve, only to Teachers, in an upper Room, in an Inn, or Private House, and that we do not lie along, leaning, as they did; especially when we take it not at Supper-time, and turn the Lord's Supper to a Breakfast or Dinner. The Apostles brake no Law when they differed from any of these, which were but occasional Circumstances.