given him;" that is the effect of his power and his | ministry. But concerning this some few things are to be considered. 1. It is the office of the presbyters and ministers of religion to declare public criminals and scandalous persons to be such, that, when the leprosy is declared, the flock may avoid the infection; and then the man is excommunicate, when the people are warned to avoid the danger of the man, or the reproach of the crime, to withdraw from his society, | and not to bid him God speed, not to eat and celebrate synaxes and church-meetings with such, who are declared criminal and dangerous. And therefore excommunication is, in a very great part, the act of the congregation and communities of the faithful; and St. Paul said to the church of the Corinthians, that they had inflicted the evil upon the incestuous person, that is, by excommunicating him: all the acts of which are, as they are subjected in the people, acts of caution and liberty; but no more acts of direct proper power, or jurisdiction, than it was when the scholars of Simon Magus left his chair, and went to hear St. Peter: but as they are actions of the rulers of the church, so they are declarative, ministerial, and effective too by moral causality, that is, by persuasion and discourse, by argument and prayer, by homily and material representment, by reasonableness of order and the superinduced necessities of men; though not by any real change of state as to the person, nor by diminution of his right, or violence to his condition. 2. He that baptizes, and he that ministers the holy sacrament, and he that prays, does holy offices of great advantage; but in these also, just as in the former, he exercises no jurisdiction or pre-eminence after the manner of secular authority; and the same is also true, if he should deny them. He that refuseth to baptize an indisposed person, hath, by the consent of all men, no power or jurisdiction over the unbaptized man: and he that, for the like reason, refuseth to give him the communion, preserves the sacredness of the mysteries, and does charity to the undisposed man, to deny that to him which will do him mischief: and this is an act of separation, just as it is for a friend or physician to deny water to an hydropic person, or Italian wines to a hectic fever, or as if Cato should deny to salute Bibulus, or the censor of manners to do countenance to a wanton and a vicious person. And though this thing was expressed by words of power, such as separation, abstention, excommunication, deposition; yet these words we understand by the thing itself, which was notorious and evident to be matter of prudence, security, and a free, unconstrained discipline and they passed into power by consent and voluntary submission; having the same effect of constraint, fear, and authority, which we see in secular jurisdiction; not because ecclesiastical discipline hath a natural, proper coercion, as laytribunals have, but because men have submitted to 9 James v. 14, 15. 1 Cor. v. 5, 12, 13. 2 Cor. ii. 6. Homines in remissione peccatorum ministerium suum exhibent, non jus alicujus potestatis exercent: Neque enim it, and are bound to do so upon the interest of two or three christian graces. 3. In pursuance of this caution and provision, the church superinduced times and manners of abstention, and expressions of sorrow, and canonical punishments, which they tied the delinquent people to suffer, before they would admit them to the holy table of the Lord. For the criminal having obliged himself by his sin, and the church having declared it, when she should take notice of it, he is bound to repent, to make him capable of pardon with God; and to prove that he is penitent, he is to do such actions, which the church, in the virtue and pursuance of repentance, shall accept as a testimony of it, sufficient to inform her: for as she could not bind at all (in this sense) till the crime was public, though the man had bound himself in secret; so neither can she set him free, till the repentance be as public as the sin, or so as she can note it and approve it. Though the man be free, as to God, by his internal act; yet, as the publication of the sin was accidental to it, and the church-censure consequent to it, so is the publication of repentance and consequent absolution extrinsical to the pardon, but accidentally and in the present circumstances necessary. This was the same that the Jews did, (though in other instances and expressions,) and do to this day to their prevaricating people; and the Essenes in their assemblies, and private colleges of scholars, and public universities. For all these being assemblies of voluntary persons, and such as seek for advantage, are bound to make an artificial authority in their superiors, and so to secure order and government by their own obedience and voluntary subordination, which is not essential and of proper jurisdiction in the superior; and the band of it is not any coercitive power, but the denying to communicate such benefits, which they seek in that communion and fellowship. 4. These, I say, were introduced in the special manners and instances by positive authority, and have not a divine authority commanding them; but there is a divine power, that verifies them, and makes these separations effectual and formidable : for because they are declarative and ministerial in the spiritual man, and suppose a delinquency and demerit in the other, and a sin against God, our blessed Saviour hath declared, that " what they bind on earth shall be bound in heaven;" that is, in plain signification, the same sins and sinners, which the clergy condemn in the face of their assemblies, the same are condemned in heaven before the face of God, and for the same reason too. God's law hath sentenced it, and these are the preachers and publishers of his law, by which they stand condemned; and these laws are they that condemn the sin, or acquit the penitent, there and here; whatsoever they bind here, shall be bound there, that is, the sentence of God at the day of judgment shall sentence the same men, whom the in suo, sed in nomine Patris, Filii, et Spiritus Sancti, peccata dimittuntur: Isti rogant, Divinitas donat.-ST. AMB. de Spir. S. 1. iii. c. 10. Summum futuri judicii præjudicium est, si quis ità The time of separation may be lengthened and shortened, the condition made lighter or heavier, and for the same offence the clergyman is deposed, but yet admitted to the communion, for which one of the people, who hath no office to lose, is denied the benefit of communicating; and this sometimes when he might lawfully receive it: and a private man is separate, when a multitude or a prince is not, cannot, ought not: and at last, when the case of sickness and danger of death did occur, they admitted all men that desired it; sometimes without scruple or difficulty, sometimes with some little restraint in great or insolent cases, (as in the case of apostacy, in which the council of Arles denied absolution," unless they received and gave public satisfaction by acts of repentance; and some other councils denied, at any time, to do it to such persons,) according as seemed fitting to the present necessities of the church. All which particulars declare it to be no part of a divine commandment, that any man should be denied to receive the communion, if he desires it, and if he be in any probable capacity of receiving it. church does rightly sentence here. It is spoken | altered. 5. The execution of this ministry being an act of prudence and charity, and therefore relative to changing circumstances, it hath been, and in many cases may, and in some must be, rescinded and deliquerit ut à communicatione orationis et cenventûs et omnis sancti commercii relegetur.-TERT. Ap. c 39. Atque hoc idem innuitur per summam Apostoli censuram in reos maximi criminis: sit avázeμa papaváva, id est, excommunicatus majori excommunicatione; Dominus veniet, 6. Since the separation was an act of liberty and a direct negative, it follows that the restitution was a mere doing that, which they refused formerly, and to give the holy communion was the formality of absolution, and all the instrument and the whole matter of reconcilement; the taking off the punishment is the pardoning of the sin: for this without the other is but a word; and if this be done, I care not whether any thing be said or no. Vinum Dominicum ministratoris gratia est, is also true in this sense; to give the chalice and cup is the grace and indulgence of the minister: and when that is done, the man hath obtained the peace of the church; and to do that is all the absolution the church can give. And they were vain disputes, which were commenced, some few ages since, concerning the forms of absolution, whether they were indicative or optative, by way of declaration or by way of sentence: for at first they had no forms at all, but they said a prayer, and after the manner of the Jews, laid hands upon the penitent, when they prayed over him, and so admitted him to the holy communion: for since the church had no power over her children, but of excommunicating and denying them to attend upon holy offices and ministries respectively, neither could they have any absolution, but to admit them thither from whence formerly they were forbidden: whatsoever ceremony or forms did signify, this was superinduced and arbitrary, alterable and accidental; it had variety, but no necessity. 7. The practice consequent to this is, that if the penitent be bound by the positive censures of the church, he is to be reconciled upon those conditions which the laws of the church tie him to, in case he can perform them: if he cannot, he can no longer be prejudiced by the censure of the church," which had no relation but to the people, with whom the dying man is no longer to converse: for whatsoever relates to God is to be transacted in spiritual ways, by contrition and internal graces; and the mercy of the church is such, as to give him her peace and her blessing, upon his undertaking to obey her injunctions if he shall be able; which injunctions, if they be declared by public sentence, he minister hath nothing to do in the affairs, but to remind him of his obligation, and reconcile him, that is, give him the holy sacrament. 8. If the penitent be not bound by public sentence, the minister is to make his repentance as great, and his heart as contrite, as he can; to dispose him by the repetition of acts of grace in the way of prayer, and in real and exterior instances, where he can; and then to give him the holy communion in all the same cases, in which he ought not to have denied it to him in his health; that is, even in the beginnings of such a repentance, which, by human signs, he believes to be real and holy; and after this, the event must be left to God. The reason of the rule depends upon this; because there is no divine commandment directly forbidding the rulers of the church to give the communion to any christian that desires it, and professes repentance of his sins. And all church-discipline in every instance, and to every single person, was imposed upon him by men, who did it according to the necessities of this state and constitution of our affairs below: but we, who are but ministers and delegates of pardon and condemnation, must resign and give up our judgment, when the man is no more to be judged by the sentences of man, and by the proportions of this world, but of the other: to which if our reconciliation does advantage, we ought in charity to send him forth with all the advantages he can receive; for he will need them all. And therefore the Nicene council commands, that no man be deprived of this necessary passport in the article of his death, and calls this the ancient and canonical law of the church; and to minister it, only supposes the man in the communion of the church, not always in the state, but ever in the possibilities of sanctification. They who in the article and danger of death were admitted to the communion, and tied to penance if they recovered, (which was ever the custom of the ancient church, unless in very few cases,) were but in the threshold of repentance, in the commencement and first introductions to a devout life and indeed then it is a fit ministry, that it be given in all the periods of time, in which the pardon of sins is working, since it is the sacrament of that great mystery, and the exhibition of that blood, which is shed for the remission of sins. a 9. The minister of religion ought not to give the communion to a sick person, if he retains the affection to any sin, and refuses to disavow it, or profess repentance of all sins whatsoever, if he be required to do it. The reason is, because it is a certain death to him, and an increase of his misery, if he shall so profane the body and blood of Christ, as to take it into so unholy a breast, where Satan reigns, and sin is principal, and the Spirit is extinguished, and Christ loves not to enter, because he is not suffered to inhabit. But when he professes repentance, and does such acts of it as his present condition permits, he is to be presumed to intend heartily what he professes solemnly; and the minister is only the judge of outward act, and by that only he is to take information concerning the inward. But whether he be so or no, or if he be, whether that be timely, and effectual and sufficient toward the pardon of sins before God, is another consideration, of which we may conjecture here, but we shall know it at doomsday. The spiritual man is to do his ministry by the rules of Christ, and as the customs of the church appoint him, and after the manner of men: the event is in the hands of God, and is to be expected, not directly and wholly according to his ministry, but to the former life, or the timely internal repentance and amendment, of which I have already given accounts. These ministries are acts of order and great assistances, but the sum of affairs does not rely upon them. And if any man puts his whole repentance upon this time, or all his hopes upon these ministries, he will find them and himself to fail. b 10. It is the minister's office to invite sick and dying persons to the holy sacrament; such, whose lives were fair and laudable, and yet their sickness sad and violent, making them listless and of slow desires, and slower apprehensions: that such persons, who are in the state of grace, may lose no accidental advantages of spiritual improvement, but may receive into their dying bodies the symbols and great consignations of the resurrection, and into their souls the pledges of immortality; and may appear before God their Father in the union and with the impresses and likeness of their elder Brother. But if the persons be of ill report, and have lived wickedly, they are not to be invited; because their case is hugely suspicious, though they then repent and call for mercy but if they demand it, they are not to be denied: only let the minister, in general, represent the evil consequence of an unworthy participation; and if the penitent will judge himself unworthy, let him stand candidate for pardon at the hands of God, and stand or fall by that unerring and merciful sentence; to which his severity of condemning himself before men will make ne, quod remisero, patiar. Tryphæna dixit apud Petronium, 106. 3. a Sævi quoque et implacabiles domini crudelitatem suam impediunt, si, quando pœnitentia fugitivos reduxit, dedititiis hostibus parcimus. b Quæcunque ergò de poenitentiâ jubendo dicta sunt, non ad exteriorem, sed ad interiorem referenda sunt, sine quâ nullus unquam Deo reconciliari poterit.-GRATIAN. De Poenit. d. 1. Quis aliquando. the easier and more hopeful address. And the strictest among the christians, who denied to reconcile lapsed persons after baptism, yet acknowledged, that there were hopes reserved in the court of heaven for them, though not here: since we, who are easily deceived by the pretences of a real return, are tied to dispense God's graces as he hath given us commission, with fear and trembling, and without too forward confidences; and God has mercies which we know not of; and therefore, because we know them not, such persons were referred to God's tribunal, where he would find them, if they were to be had at all. с 11. When the holy sacrament is to be administered, let the exhortation be made proper to the mystery, but fitted to the man; that is, that it be used for the advantages of faith, or love, or contrition let all the circumstances and parts of the Divine love be represented, all the mysterious advantages of the blessed sacrament be declared; that it is the bread which came from heaven, that it is the representation of Christ's death to all the purposes and capacities of faith, and the real exhibition of Christ's body and blood to all the purposes of the Spirit that it is the earnest of the resurrection, and the seed of a glorious immortality; that as, by our cognation to the body of the first Adam, we took in death, so, by our union with the body of the second Adam, we shall have the inheritance of life; (for as by Adam came death, so by Christ cometh the resurrection of the dead; d) that if we, being worthy communicants of these sacred pledges, be presented to God with Christ within us, our being accepted of God is certain, even for the sake of his Well-beloved, that dwells within us; that this is the sacrament of that body, which was broken for our sins, of that blood, which purifies our souls, by which we are presented to God pure and holy in the Beloved; that now we may ascertain our hopes, and make our faith confident; "for he that hath given us his Son, how should not he, with him, give us all things else ?"e Upon these or the like considerations, the sick may be assisted in his address, and his faith strengthened, and his hope confirmed, and his charity be enlarged. 12. The manner of the sick man's reception of the holy sacrament, hath in it nothing differing from the ordinary solemnities of the sacrament,f save only that abatement is to be made of such accidental circumstances, as by the laws and customs of the church healthful persons are obliged to; such as fasting, kneeling, &c. Though I remember, that it was noted for great devotion in the legate that died at Trent, that he caused himself to be sustained upon his knees, when he received the viaticum or the holy sacrament before his death; and it was greater in Huniades, that he caused himself to be carried to the church, that there he might receive his Lord, in his Lord's house; and it was recorded for honour, that William, the pious archbishop of Bourges, a small time before his last agony, sprang out of his bed at the presence of the holy sacrament, and, upon his knees and his face, recommended his soul to his Saviour. But in these things, no man is to be prejudiced or censured. 13. Let not the holy sacrament be administered to dying persons, when they have no use of reason to make that duty acceptable, and the mysteries effective to the purposes of the soul. For the sacraments and ceremonies of the gospel operate not without the concurrent actions and moral influences of the suscipient. To infuse the chalice into the cold lips of the clinic may disturb his agony; but cannot relieve the soul, which only receives improvement by acts of grace and choice, to which the external rites are apt and appointed to minister in a capable person. All other persons, as fools, children, distracted persons, lethargical, apoplectical, or any way senseless and incapable of human and reasonable acts, are to be assisted only by prayers: for they may prevail even for the absent, and for enemies, and for all those who join not in the office. SECTION V. Of ministering to the sick Person by the spiritual Man, as he is the Physician of Souls. 1. In all cases of receiving confessions of sick men, and the assisting to the advancement of repentance, the minister is to apportion to every kind of sin such spiritual remedies which are apt to mortify and cure the sin; such as abstinence from their occasions and opportunities, to avoid temptations, to resist their beginnings, to punish the crime by acts of indignation against the person, fastings and prayer, alms and all the instances of charity, asking forgiveness, restitution of wrongs, satisfaction of injuries, acts of virtue contrary to the crimes. And although, in great and dangerous sicknesses, they are not directly to be imposed, unless they are direct matters of duty; yet where they are medicinal, they are to be insinuated, and in general signification remarked to him, and undertaken accordingly concerning which, when he returns to health, he is to receive particular advices. And this advice was inserted into the Penitential of England, in the time of Theodore, archbishop of Canterbury, and afterwards adopted into the canon of the western churches. 2. The proper temptations of sick men, for which a remedy is not yet provided, are unreasonable fears and unreasonable confidences, which the minister is to cure by the following considerations. Considerations against unreasonable Fears of not having our Sins pardoned. Many good men, especially such who have tender consciences, impatient of the least sin, to which they are arrived by a long grace, and a continual observation of their actions, and the parts of a last f Vide Rule of Holy Living, chap. iv. sect. 10; and Hist. of the Life of Jesus, Part 3 Disc 18. * Caus. 26. Q. 7. ab infirmis. ing repentance, many times overact their tenderness, and turn their caution into scruple, and care of their duty into inquiries after the event, and askings after the counsels of God, and the sentences of doomsday. He that asks of the standers-by, or of the minister, whether they think he shall be saved or damned, is to be answered with the words of pity and reproof. Seek not after new light for the searching into the private records of God: look as much as you list into the pages of revelation, for they concern your duty: but the event is registered in heaven, and we can expect no other certain notices of it, but that it shall be given to them for whom it is prepared by the Father of mercies. We have light enough to tell our duty; and if we do that, we need not fear what the issue will be; and if we do not, let us never look for more light, or inquire after God's pleasure concerning our souls, since we so little serve his ends in those things, where he hath given us light. But yet this I add, that as pardon of sins, in the Old Testament, was nothing but removing the punishment, which then was temporal, and therefore many times they could tell if their sins were pardoned; and concerning pardon of sins they then had no fears of conscience, but while the punishment was on them, for so long indeed it was unpardoned, and how long it would so remain, it was matter of fear, and of present sorrow: besides this, in the gospel, pardon of sins is another thing; pardon of sins is a sanctification; Christ came to take away our sins, by turning every one of us from our iniquities; and there is not in the nature of the thing any expectation of pardon, or sign or signification of it, but so far as the thing itself discovers itself. As we hate sin, and grow in grace, and arrive at the state of holiness, which is also a state of repentance and imperfection, but yet of sincerity of heart and diligent endeavour; in the same degree we are to judge concerning the forgiveness of sins for indeed that is the evangelical forgiveness, and it signifies our pardon, because it effects it, or rather it is in the nature of the thing; so that we are to inquire into no hidden records: forgiveness of sins is not a secret sentence, a word or a record; but it is a state of change, and effected upon us; and upon ourselves we are to look for it, to read it, and understand it. We are only to be curious of our duty, and confident of the article of remission of sins; and the conclusion of these premises will be, that we shall be full of hopes of a prosperous resurrection; and our fear and trembling are no instances of our calamity, but parts of duty; we shall sure enough be wafted to the shore, although we be tossed with the winds of our sighs, and the unevenness of our fears, and the ebbings and flowings of our passions, if we sail in a right channel, and steer by a perfect compass, and look up to God, and call for his help, and do our own endeavour. There are very many reasons why men ought not to despair; and there are not very many men, that ever go beyond a hope, till they pass into possession. If our fears have any mixture of hope, that is enough to enable and to excite our duty; and if we have a strong hope, when we cast about we shall find reason enough to have many fears. Let not this fear weaken our hands; and if it allay our gaieties and our confidences, it is no harm. In this uncertainty we must abide, if we have committed sins after baptism: and those confidences, which some men glory in, are not real supports or good foundations. The fearing man is the safest; and if he fears on his death-bed, it is but what happens to most considering men, and what was to be looked for all his life-time: he talked of the terrors of death, and death is the king of terrors; and therefore it is no strange thing, if then he be hugely afraid : if he be not, it is either a great felicity, or a great presumption. But if he wants some degree of comfort, or a greater degree of hope, let him be refreshed by considering, 1. That Christ came into the world to save sinners.m 2. That God delights not in the confusion and death of sinners." 3. That in heaven there is great joy at the conversion of a sinner. 4. That Christ is a perpetual advocate, daily interceding with his Father for our pardon.P 5. That God uses infinite arts, instruments, and devices, to reconcile us to himself. 6. That he prays us to be in charity with him, and to be forgiven. 7. That he sends angels to keep us from violence and evil company, from temptations and surprises, and his Holy Spirit to guide us in holy ways, and his servants to warn us and remind us perpetually : and therefore since certainly he is so desirous to save us, as appears by his word, by his oaths, by his very nature, and his daily artifices of mercy; it is not likely that he will condemn us without great provocations of his majesty, and perseverance in them. 8. That the covenant of the gospel is a covenant of grace and of repentance, and being established with so many great solemnities and miracles from heaven, must signify a huge favour and a mighty change of things; and therefore that repentance, which is the great condition of it, is a grace, that does not expire in little accents and minutes, but hath a great latitude of signification and large extension of parts, under the protection of all which persons are safe, even when they fear exceedingly. 9. That there are great degrees and differences of glory in heaven; and therefore, if we estimate our piety by proportions to the more eminent persons and devouter people, we are not to conclude we shall not enter into the same state of glory, but that we shall not go into the same degrees. 10. That although forgiveness of sins is consigned to us in baptism, and that this baptism is but once, and cannot be repeated; yet forgiveness of sins is the grace of the gospel, which is perpetually remanent upon us, and secured unto us so long as we have not renounced |