whatever views fome may have in reforming what is amifs, it can never be too soon to amend whatever difhonours God, and the holy religion he has inftituted, and which we profefs. As to the laft queftion you afk me, viz. Whether I think this is a proper time to addrefs for an amendment of this law, which has kept fo many out of our churches, and embittered their spirits against us for treating them, as we should not like to be treated by by them, if the tables were turned. I anfwer, That in my confcience I think it a proper, and the moft proper time, for the following reafons. 1. That none but the prefent time can properly be called our own: the time paft is not, nor will it ever be ours again; the future is not, and never may be ours: and we are commanded to work while it is day; and whatever our hands find us to do, to do it with all our might. 2. We have now a moft excellent king on the throne, and, bleffed be God, he is happy in a faithful miniftry and it muft certainly be a very pleasant thing to him to make all his dutiful and loving fubjects easy, by be ftowing ftowing favours with an impartial hand to thofe who equally, or moft, deserve them, and are fitteft for them. And we have no reafon to doubt that fuch a prince will, with pleasure, ftrengthen the hands of his truest friends of the established church, who have been found, ever fince the happy revolution, to be too powerful for all his majesty's enemies among us, (though very numerous and mighty too) when we are joined by the hearts, purfes, counfels, and hands of our proteftant diffenting friends. We are not fo vain as to imagine that we, who are his majefty's best friends of the established church, are (by ourselves) numerous, rich, and strong enough to gain a majority of hearty friends to his majesty, in our approaching elections, if our enemies have art enough to breed a. misunderstanding between us, by making our only friends believe, that we of the established church, who are true friends to his majesty, would fain continue the greatest blemish in our church, on purpofe to keep them out of their natural and civil rights, who chearfully and equally contribute, by their perfons, purfes, and labours with us, to fupport that happy establishment in the ftate, that God has bleffed us with, and to render his facred majefly eafy in the administration of juftice. And And therefore, if we had no other motive, but our own true intereft and preservation, we ought to do our utmost to enable and oblige our brethren, the proteftant diffenters, to join us in our common defence against our common enemies, which I have before-named. I wish there were no other names or diftinctions among chriflians than that of Proteftants and Papists; but then there would not be fo many exercifes for charity or love, and mutual forbearance, as there are: and if we have not thofe graces, and fhew (on all proper occafions) that we have them, whatever we call ourfelves, and whatever other angelic qualifications we may be possessed of, we are nothing, but as founding brafs, or a tinkling cymbal. I believe, there is not a true churchman in Great-Britain, either clergyman or layman, that foberly confiders the mifchief and difhonour the mifconftruction (or mifapplication) of the faid Teft-act has done, and will do, to the church of England, but heartily wishes (as I do) that it were reftrained to what was faid to be the true intention of it, when first enacted; (or rather exchanged for a much better teft; whereby no man will be allowed to witness for himfelf, as he does by the pre-, fent fent teft) I mean, to keep out of places of truft and profit, only those who are enemies to the protestant religion. POSTSCRIPT. BEFORE any of my brethren or adversaries undertake to reply to what I have faid on this fubject, I defire they will will duly confider and answer the following queries. 1. Is our Almighty Saviour (the Lord Jefus Chrift) fupreme head of his church, or not? 2. Will he at last most righteously judge the world in his united nature, as true God and true Man, and punish all the obftinate. tranfgreffors of his laws, or no? 3. Has he wisdom and authority fufficient to inftitute ordinances and facraments in his church, and to declare the facred ends for which he institutes them, or does he stand in need of the affiftance of any mere creature, to add any thing to his appointments, or defigns, and to make those, their additions, effential thereto. 4 4. Will 4. Will he not feverely reprove, and add all the plagues that are written in the Book of God, to them that fhall add any thing of their own to his word? 5. Has not our Lord, in his last fupper, told us the end of our facramental eating and drinking his body and blood, viz. that we are to do it in remembrance of him? 6. If we receive that facrament once, twice, thrice, or oftner, in a year, to qualify us for any civil or military employment, or to fave 500 1. that may otherwife (if we have it) be torn from us, for any one omiffion, and to preserve our natural and civil rights, of being capable of fuing for our just dues, of receiving and enjoying a legacy, and the like. Are not these additional ends to the only end our Lord has told us we ought to regard, when we come to eat and drink with him at his table? Or can it be a fufficient excufe to tell the great judge of the world, in the last day, that notwithstanding we made bold to prostitute his inftitutions to ferve our fecular purposes, when men commanded us fo to do, yet we did not wholly forget him at fuch times, though we cannot deny but that the chief defign we then had was to serve our temporal interests? 7. Is |