A53704:89
An enquiry into the original, nature, institution, power, order and communion of evangelical churches.…
An enquiry into the original, nature, institution, power, order and communion of evangelical churches. The first part with an answer to the discourse of the unreasonableness of separation written by Dr. Edward Stillingfleet, Dean of Pauls, and in defence of the vindication of non-conformists from the guilt of schism / by John Owen.An enquiry into the original, nature, institution, power, order and communion of evangelical churches. The first part with an answer to the discourse of the unreasonableness of separation written by Dr. Edward Stillingfleet, Dean of Pauls, and in defence of the vindication of non-conformists from the guilt of schisme / by John Owen.
London: printed by J. Richardson for Nath. Ponder, 1681
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
And (2.) Those who did so separate, being not agreed among themselves, as unto all Principles of Church-Order, nor as unto the Measures of their Separation from the Church of England, there fell out differences and disorders among them, accompanied with personal Imprudencies and Miscarriages, in not a few. Neither was it ever scarcely otherwise among them who first attempted any Reformation, unless like the Apostles they were infallibly guided. These mutual Contests which they had among themselves, and with the Nonconformists who abode in their private Stations in England, with their Miscarriages also, were published unto the World, in their own Writings and those of their Enemies.
Hinc omnis pendet Lucilius. These were the things that gave advantage unto, and are the Substance of the History of our Author concerning Separation; wherein all I can find unto our present Instruction is, that Iliacos intra muros peccatur & extra; There are and ever were Sins, Faults, Follies, and Miscarriages among all sorts of Men; which might be farther evidenced by recounting on the other hand, what ⟨p. 43⟩were the Ways, Acts and Deeds at the same time of those by whom the others were cast out and rejected. And whereas it was the Design of the Reverend Author, to load the Cause and Persons of the present Nonconformists with Prejudice and contempt, it is well fallen out, in the Merciful disposal of things towards and amongst us, by the Providence and Grace of God, that he is forced to derive the principal Matter of his Charge, from what was done by a few private Persons, three or fourscore years ago and more, in whose Principles and Practises we are not concerned. And as for the Difference that fell out more lately among the Divines in the Assembly at Westminster, about the Ways, Means, and Measures of Reformation and mutual Forbearance, which he gives us a large account of in a long Transcription out of their Writings, I must have more Health, and Strength and Leisure than now I have, (which I look not for in this World) before I esteem my self concerned to engage in that contest, or to Apologize for the one side or other. The things in Agitation between them, had no Relation unto or present Dissent from the Church of England, being here insisted on merely to fill up the story, with Reference unto the General End designed.