Ch. lxxi. 2. 392 Festival Duties require Exercise at Intervals. BOOK V. not to keep our Easter as the Jews did for certain days, but in the unleavened bread of sincerity and of truth to feast continually, whereas this restraint of Easter to a certain numbér of days causeth us to rest for a short space in that near consideration of our duties which should be extended throughout the course of our whole lives, and so pulleth out of our minds the doctrine of Christ's gospel ere we be aware 1. [2.] The doctrine of the gospel which here they mean or should mean is, that Christ having finished the law there is no Jewish paschal solemnity nor abstinence from sour bread now required at our hands, there is no leaven which we are bound to cast out but malice, sin, and wickedness, no bread but the food of sincere truth wherewith we are tied to celebrate our passover. And seeing no time of sin is granted us, neither any intermission of sound belief, it followeth that this kind of feasting ought to endure always. But how are standing festival solemnities against this? That which the gospel of Christ requireth is the perpetuity of virtuous duties; not perpetuity of exercise or action, but disposition perpetual, and practice as oft as times and opportunities require. Just, valiant, liberal, temperate and holy men are they which can whensoever they will, and will when 66 4 [Whitg. Def. 539. "What? do you condemn the feast of Easter " also? would you have it abrogated because it hath been abused? "do you not know that the Apo"stles themselves observed it, and "the Church ever sithence their "time? read Euseb. v. 23. and you "shall find it to be a tradition of "the Apostles: peruse the 24th "and 25th ch. of the same book, "and you shall understand by the testimony of Polycrates and all "the other bishops in Asia, that Philip the Apostle, John the Evangelist, Polycarpus his scholar, and "other bishops likewise of great"est antiquity kept solemnly the "feast of Easter. But why should "I labour to prove that that all his "tories, all ancient Fathers, all late "writers, all learned men confess? "... Surely you may as well reason "that the Scriptures are not to be "read, because that heretics have 66 Festival Duties, a good Beginning of Holiness. 393 Ch. lxxi. 2. soever they ought execute what their several perfections im- BOOK V. port. If virtues did always cease to be when they cease to work, there should be nothing more pernicious to virtue than sleep neither were it possible that men as Zachary and Elizabeth should in all the commandments of God walk unreprovable, or that the chain of our conversation should contain so many links of divine virtues as the Apostles in divers places have reckoned up, if in the exercise of each virtue perpetual continuance were exacted at our hands. Seeing therefore all things are done in time, and many offices are not possible at one and the same time to be discharged, duties of all sorts must have necessarily their several successions and seasons, in which respect the schoolmen have well and soundly determined that God's affirmative laws and precepts, the laws that enjoin any actual duty, as prayer, alms, and the like, do bind us ad semper velle, but not ad semper agere; we are tied to iterate and resume them when need is, howbeit not to continue them without any intermission. Feasts whether God himself hath ordained them, or the Church by that authority which God hath given, they are of religion such public services as neither can nor ought to be continued otherwise than only by iteration. Which iteration is a most effectual mean to bring unto full maturity and growth those seeds of godliness that these very men themselves do grant to be sown in the hearts of many thousands, during the while that such feasts are present. The constant habit of well doing is not gotten without the custom of doing well, neither can virtue be made perfect but by the manifold works of virtue often practised. Before the powers of our minds be brought unto some perfection our first essays and offers towards virtue must needs be raw, yet commendable because they tend unto ripeness. For which cause the wisdom of God hath commended especially this circumstance amongst others in solemn feasts, that to children and novices in religion they minister the first Ch. lxxi. 3. 394 The Objection to Feasts, as restraining Gospel Liberty, 66 66 66 BOOK V. Occasions to ask and inquire of God. Whereupon if there follow but so much piety as hath been mentioned, let the Church learn to further imbecility with prayer, “Preserve "Lord these good and gracious beginnings that they suddenly dry not up like the morning dew, but may prosper and grow as the trees which rivers of waters keep always flourishing;" let all men's acclamations be "Grace, grace "unto it," as to that first-laid corner-stone in Zerubbabel's buildings. For who hath despised the day of those things which are small?? Or how dare we take upon us to condemn that very thing which voluntarily we grant maketh us of nothing somewhat, seeing all we pretend against it is only that as yet this somewhat is not much? The days of solemnity which are but few cannot choose but soon finish that outward exercise of godliness which properly appertaineth to such times, howbeit men's inward disposition to virtue they both augment for the present, and by their often returns bring also the same at the length unto that perfection which we most desire. So that although by their necessary short continuance they abridge the present exercise of piety in some kind, yet because by repetition they enlarge, strengthen and confirm the habits of all virtue, it remaineth that we honour, observe and keep them as ordinances many ways singularly profitable in God's Church. [3] This exception being taken against holidays, for that they restrain the praises of God unto certain times, another followeth condemning restraint of men from their ordinary trades and labours at those times. It is not they say in the power of the Church to command rest 8, because God hath 6 [Zech. iv. 7.] 7 [Ver. 10.] 66 bodily labour, that they may "not intermit the same to labour if allowed, would overthrow all Government. 395 Ch. lxxi. 4. left it to all men at liberty that if they think good to bestow BOOK V. six whole days in labour they may, neither is it more lawful for the Church to abridge any man of that liberty which God hath granted, than to take away the yoke which God hath laid upon them and to countermand what he doth expressly enjoin. They deny not but in times of public calamity, that men may the better assemble themselves to fast and pray, the Church "because it hath received commandment" from God to proclaim a prohibition from ordinary works, standeth bound to do it, as the Jews afflicted did in Babylon. But without some express commandment from God there is no power they say under heaven which may presume by any decree to restrain the liberty that God had given. [4] Which opinion, albeit applied here no further than to this present cause, shaketh universally the fabric of government, tendeth to anarchy and mere confusion, dissolveth families, dissipateth colleges, corporations, armies, overthrow. "cising their handicrafts, that I "deny to be in the power of the "Church. For proof whereof I will "take the fourth commandment, "and no other interpretation of it "than Mr. Doctor alloweth of, "which is that God licenseth and "leaveth it at the liberty of every 66 man to work six days in the week, "so that he rest the seventh day. "Seeing therefore that the Lord "hath left it to all men at liberty "that they might labour if they "think good six days, I say the "Church nor no man can take this "liberty away from them and drive "them to a necessary rest of the "body. And if it be lawful to "abridge the liberty of the Church "in this point, and instead that the "Lord saith, Six days thou mayest "labour if thou wilt,' to say, 'Thou "shalt not labour six days:' I do "not see why the Church may not 86 as well, whereas the Lord saith "Thou shalt rest the seventh day,' "command that thou shalt not "rest the seventh day. For if the "Church may restrain the liberty "which God hath given them it may take away the yoke also “which God hath put upon them. 66 66 Ch. lxxi. 4. 396 Feasts as well as Fasts may be ordained by the Church: BOOK V. eth kingdoms, churches, and whatsoever is now through the providence of God by authority and power upheld. For whereas God hath foreprized things of the greatest weight, and hath therein precisely defined as well that which every man must perform, as that which no man may attempt, leaving all sorts of men in the rest either to be guided by their own good discretion if they be free from subjection to others, or else to be ordered by such commandments and laws as proceed from those superiors under whom they live; the patrons of liberty have here made solemn proclamation that all such laws and commandments are void, inasmuch as every man is left to the freedom of his own mind in such things as are not either exacted or prohibited by the Law of God; and because only in these things the positive precepts of men have place, which precepts cannot possibly be given without some abridgment of their liberty to whom they are given, therefore if the father command the son, or the husband the wife, or the lord the servant, or the leader the soldier, or the prince the subject to go or stand, sleep or wake at such times as God himself in particular commandeth neither, they are to stand in defence of the freedom which God hath granted and to do as themselves list, knowing that men may as lawfully command them things utterly forbidden by the law of God, as tie them to any thing which the law of God leaveth free. The plain contradictory whereunto is unfallibly certain. Those 66 66 "of God and humbling themselves 66 |