A LETTER CONCERNING EXCOMMUNICATION. 213
he may, by force, be debarred from some advantages that belong thereunto. Neither is the communion of any church to be valued from which a man may be really and effectually expelled by such means; for this excommunication is not only null as to the efficacy of its sentence, on the account of its maladministration, but it is not in any sense that which it is called, and which it pretends to be. Idols are called "gods," but we know they are "nothing in the world ;" so is this proceeding called " excommunication," but is no such thing at all. If a man should paint a rat or hedge-hog, and write over it that it is a lion, no man would believe it so to be because of its magnificent title. All that it can pretend unto is a political engine, used to apply the displeasure of some, upon an accidental advantage, unto them whose ruin they design ; and therein a satisfaction unto re- venge, for discountenancing their supposed interest. That there is any acting in it of the authority of Christ, any representation of his love, care, and tenderness towards his church, any thing that is instructive in his mind or will, any "prseludium^of the future judgment, no man, I suppose, does pretend ; nor, I am sure, can do so, without reflecting the highest dishonour imaginable on Christ himself and the gospel. To make these things yet more evident, and to show how remote the present excommunications are from all possibility of affecting the consciences of any, I shall briefly pass through the consideration of those things which principally belong unto them, and whereinto all their efficacy is resolved. And that which first offereth itself is the persons by whom they are administered. The truth is, there is such a variety of scenes in this tragedy, and such different actors in it, — from [the] apparitor with Avhom it begins, unto the jailer with whom it ends, — that it seems not easy whom to ascribe the animating power and authority that is in it unto ; but yet, on a little consideration, the matter is plain enough. The ministers of the parishes wherein the excommunicated persons are supposed to dwell, by whom the sen- tence of excommunication is rehearsed out of a paper from the court, have no concernment herein; for they know nothing of the causes or reasons of it, nor of the process therein, nor do pretend unto any right for the cognizance of them, nor do, for the most part, know the persons at all on whose qualifications alone the validity or invalidity of the sentence doth depend, nor can give an account to God or man of what is done, as to right and equity : and therefore I no way doubt but that those who are learned and pious among them do hardly bear the yoke of being made such properties^ in those acts and duties which appertain unto their ministerial function. But it is known who they are who begin the work, and carry on the process of it
1 Articles and machinery necessary for the stage; used here in a sense equivalent to "puppets." — Ed.
214 A LETTER CONCERNING EXCOMMUNICATION.
until its final execution} and I shall say no more concerning them but this alone, that how meet soever they may be for the transaction of civil affairs, or for the skilful managing of that work herein which they suppose committed unto them, yet as unto any thing wherein conscience may be affected with the authority of Jesus Christ, they can be of no consideration in it. If any man can but pretend to believe that our Lord Jesus, by an act, grant, law, or institution of his, by any signification of his mind or will, hath committed, or doth commit, the keys of the kingdom of heaven, the power of binding and loosing, of expelling out of and admitting into his church, unto these or such persons, he hath assuredly confidence enough to pre- tend unto a persuasion of whatever he pleases. They do not believe it themselves, nor among themselves pretend unto any such thing, but only a power to execute their own laws or canons. They do not judge that any personal, moral, or spiritual qualifications are required unto ecclesiastical administrations, which yet to deny is to under- mine all religion; without which they may be fit for all church-duties who are no better than that archdeacon of Oxford, who, being charged with immoralities in his conversation, justified himself by the sound- ness of his faith, affirming that he believed three Gods in one person, and, besides, he believed all that God himself did believe ! Let a man out of interest, or fear, or ignorant superstition, strive never so much to affect his conscience with the excommunications of such men, he will never be able to effect it.
But be the personal qualifications of those intended what they please, the question is, how they came by that power and authority herein which they pretend unto? They are chancellors, archdea- cons, commissaries, officials, with their court attendants, of whom we speak. I confess these horrid names, with the reports concern- ing them and their power, are enough to terrify poor harmless men, and make them fear some evil from them. But excommunication is that which no man knows on what grounds to fear from these names, titles, and offices : for that is the name of a divine ordinance instituted by Christ in the gospel, to be administered according to the rule and law thereof ; but these names, and those unto whom they do belong, are utterly foreign unto the Scriptures, and, as unto the work, to the practice of the church for a thousand years. What, therefore, is done by them of this kind must of necessity be utterly null, seeing that, as such, they have no place in the church them- selves by the authority of Christ. But however it be undeniably evident that they have no relation unto the Scripture, nor can have any authority from Christ by virtue of any law or institution of his, nor countenance given unto them by any practice of the primitive church, yet what they do in this kind being pretended acts of power