and fees, if exacted or established, unjust and scandalous; we may hope, with them removed, to remove hirelings in some good measure, whom these tempting baits, by law especially to be recovered, allure into the church.

The next thing to be considered in the maintenance of ministers, is by whom it should be given. Wherein though the light of reason might sufficiently inform us, it will be best to consult the scripture; Gal. vi. 6, 'Let him that is taught in the word, communicate to him that teacheth, in all good things;' that is to say, in all manner of gratitude, to his ability. 1 Cor. ix. 'If we have sown unto you spiritual things, is it a great matter if we reap your carnal things?' To whom therefore hath not been sown, from him wherefore should be reaped? 1 Tim. v. 17, 'Let the elders that rule well, be counted worthy of double honor; especially they who labor in word and doctrine.'

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By these places we see, that recompense was given either by every one in particular who had been instructed, or by them all in common, brought into the church treasury, and distributed to the ministers according to their several labors; and that was judged either by some extraordinary person, as Timothy, who by the apostle was then left evangelist at Ephesus, 2 Tim. iv. 5, or by some to whom the church deputed that care. This is so agreeable to reason, and so clear, that any one may perceive what iniquity and violence hath prevailed since in the church, whereby it hath been so ordered that they also shall be compelled to recompense the parochial minister, who neither chose him for their teacher, nor have received instruction from him, as being either insufficient, or not resident, or inferior to whom they follow; where

in to bar them their choice, is to violate christian liberty.

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But here it will be readily objected, What if they who are to be instructed be not able to maintain a minister, as in many villages? I answer, that the scripture shows in many places what ought to be done herein. First I offer it to the reason of any man, whether he think the knowledge of christian religion harder than any other art or science to attain. I suppose he will grant that it is far easier, both of itself, and in regard of God's assisting spirit, not particularly promised us to the attainment of any other knowledge, but of this only, since it was preached as well to the shepherds of Bethlehem by Angels, as to the eastern wise men by that star; and our Saviour declares himself anointed to preach the gospel to the poor, Luke IV. 18, then surely to their capacity. They who after him first taught it, were otherwise unlearned men. They who before Huss and Luther first reformed it, were for the meanness of their condition called, poor men of Lyons; and in Flanders at this day, 'les gueus,' which is to say, beggars. Therefore are the scriptures translated into every vulgar tongue, as being held, in main matters of belief and salvation, plain and easy to the poorest; and such no less than their teachers, have the Spirit to guide them in all truth, John xiv. 26, and xvi. 13.

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Hence we may conclude, if men be not all their lifetime under a teacher to learn logic, natural philosophy, ethics, or mathematics, which are more difficult, that certainly it is not necessary to the attainment of christian knowledge that men should sit all their life long at the feet of a pulpited divine, while he, a lollard indeed over his elbow cushion, in almost the seventh part of forty or fifty years teaches them

scarce half the principles of religion; and his sheep ofttimes sit the while to as little purpose of benefiting, as the sheep in their pews at Smithfield, and for the most part, by some simony or other, bought and sold like them; or if this comparison be too low, like those women, 1 Tim. III. 7, 'Ever learning and never attaining;' yet not so much through their own fault, as through the unskilful and immethodical teaching of their pastor, teaching here and there at random out of this or that text, as his ease or fancy, and ofttimes as his stealth guides him.

Seeing then that christian religion may be so easily attained, and by meanest capacities, it cannot be much difficult to find ways, both how the poor, yea, all men, may be soon taught what is to be known of Christianity, and they who teach them, recompensed; first, if ministers of their own accord, who pretend that they are called and sent to preach the gospel, those especially who have no particular flock, would imitate our Saviour and his disciples who went preaching through the villages, not only through the cities, Math. 1x. 35, Mark vi. 6, Luke XIII. 22, Acts VIII. 25, and there preached to the poor as well as to the rich, looking for no recompense but in heaven; John Iv. 35, 36, 'Look on the fields, for they are white already to harvest; and he that reapeth, receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto life eternal.' This was their wages.

But they will soon reply, we ourselves have not wherewithal; who shall bear the charges of our journey? To whom it may as soon be answered, that in likelihood they are not poorer than they who did thus; and if they have not the same faith which those disciples had to trust in God and the promise of Christ for their maintenance as they did, and yet intrude into the ministry without any livelihood of their own, they

cast themselves into miserable hazard or temptation, and ofttimes into a more miserable necessity, either to starve, or to please their paymasters rather than God; and give men just cause to suspect, that they came neither called nor sent from above to preach the word, but from below, by the instinct of their own hunger, to feed upon the church.

Yet grant it needful to allow them both the charges of their journey and the hire of their labor; it will belong, next, to the charity of richer congregations, where most commonly they abound with teachers, to send some of their number to the villages round, as the apostles from Jerusalem sent Peter and John to the city and villages of Samaria, Acts vi. 14, 25, or as the church at Jerusalem sent Barnabas to Antioch, chap. XI. 22, and other churches joining sent Luke to travel with Paul, 2 Cor. VIII. 19, though whether they had their charges borne by the church or no, it be not recorded.

If it be objected that this itinerary preaching will not serve to plant the gospel in those places, unless they who are sent, abide there some competent time, I answer, that if they stay there a year or two, which was the longest time usually staid by the apostles in one place, it may suffice to teach them, who will attend and learn, all the points of religion necessary to salvation; then sorting them into several congregations of a moderate number, out of the ablest and zealousest among them to create elders, who, exercising and requiring from themselves what they have learned, for no learning is retained without constant exercise and methodical repetition, may teach and govern the rest; and so exhorted to continue faithful and steadfast, they may securely be committed to the providence of God and the guidance of his Holy Spirit, till God may offer some opportunity to visit them again,

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and to confirm them; which when they have done, they have done as much as the apostles were wont to do in propagating the gospel. To these I might add other helps, which we enjoy now, to make more easy the attainment of Christian religion by the meanest; the entire scripture translated into English with plenty of notes; and somewhere or other, I trust, may be found some wholesome body of divinity, as they call it, without school terms and metaphysical notions, which have obscured rather than explained our religion, and made it seem difficult without cause. Thus taught once for all, and thus now and then visited and confirmed, in the most destitute and poorest places of the land, under the government of their own elders performing all ministerial offices among them, they may be trusted to meet and edify one another whether in church or chapel, or, to save them the trudging of many miles thither, nearer home, though in a house or barn. For notwithstanding the gaudy superstition of some devoted still ignorantly to temples, we may be well assured that he who disdained not to be laid in a manger, disdains not to be preached in a barn; and that by such meetings as these, being indeed most apostolical and primitive, they will in a short time advance more in christian knowledge and reformation of life, than by the many years' preaching of such an incumbent, I may say such an incubus ofttimes, as will be meanly hired to abide long in those places.

They have this left perhaps to object further; that to send thus, and to maintain, though but for a year or two, ministers and teachers in several places, would prove chargeable to the churches, though in towns and cities round about. To whom again I answer, that it was not thought so by them who first thus propagated the gospel, though but few in num