Peter and St.Paul,though their controversy were great,as we may read in Galatians,2.11,yet they did not cast one another out of the Church.Nevertheless,during the Apostles'times,there were other pastors that observed it not;as Diotrephes who cast out of the Church such as St.John himself thought fit to be received into it,out of a pride he took in pre-eminence:so early it was that vainglory and ambition had found entrance into the Church of Christ.
That a man be liable to excommunication,there be many conditions requisite;as first,that he be a member of some commonalty,that is to say,of some lawful assembly,that is to say,of some Christian Church that hath power to judge of the cause for which he is to be excommunicated.For where there is no community,there can be no excommunication;nor where there is no power to judge,can there be any power to give sentence.
From hence it followeth that one Church cannot be excommunicated by another:for either they have equal power to excommunicate each other,in which case excommunication is not discipline,nor an act of authority,but schism,and dissolution of charity;or one is so subordinate to the other as that they both have but one voice,and then they be but one Church;and the part excommunicated is no more a Church,but a dissolute number of individual persons.
And because the sentence of excommunication importeth an advice not to keep company nor so much as to eat with him that is excommunicate,if a sovereign prince or assembly be excommunicate,the sentence is of no effect.For all subjects are bound to be in the company and presence of their own sovereign,when he requireth it,by the law of nature;nor can they lawfully either expel him from any place of his own dominion,whether profane or holy;nor go out of his dominion without his leave;much less,if he call them to that honour,refuse to eat with him.And as to other princes and states,because they are not parts of one and the same congregation,they need not any other sentence to keep them from keeping company with the state excommunicate:for the very institution,as it uniteth many men into one community,so it dissociateth one community from another:so that excommunication is not needful for keeping kings and states asunder;nor has any further effect than is in the nature of policy itself,unless it be to instigate princes to war upon one another.
Nor is the excommunication of a Christian subject that obeyeth the laws of his own sovereign,whether Christian or heathen,of any effect.For if he believe that "Jesus is the Christ,he hath the Spirit of God,""and God dwelleth in him,and he in God."But he that hath the Spirit of God;he that dwelleth in God;he in whom God dwelleth,can receive no harm by the excommunication of men.
Therefore,he that believeth Jesus to be the Christ is free from all the dangers threatened to persons excommunicate.He that believeth it not is no Christian.Therefore a true and unfeigned Christian is not liable to excommunication:nor he also that is a professed Christian,till his hypocrisy appear in his manners;that is,till his behaviour be contrary to the law of his sovereign,which is the rule of manners,and which Christ and his Apostles have commanded us to be subject to.For the Church cannot judge of manners but by external actions,which actions can never be unlawful but when they are against the law of the Commonwealth.
If a man's father,or mother,or master be excommunicate,yet are not the children forbidden to keep them company,nor to eat with them;for that were,for the most part,to oblige them not to eat at all,for want of means to get food;and to authorize them to disobey their parents and masters,contrary to the precept of the Apostles.
In sum,the power of excommunication cannot be extended further than to the end for which the Apostles and pastors of the Church have their commission from our Saviour;which is not to rule by command and coercion,but by teaching and direction of men in the way of salvation in the world to come.And as a master in any science may abandon his scholar when he obstinately neglecteth the practice of his rules,but not accuse him of injustice,because he was never bound to obey him:so a teacher of Christian doctrine may abandon his disciples that obstinately continue in an unchristian life;but he cannot say they do him wrong,because they are not obliged to obey him:for to a teacher that shall so complain may be applied the answer of God to Samuel in the like place,"They have not rejected thee,but me."Excommunication therefore,when it wanteth the assistance of the civil power,as it doth when a Christian state or prince is excommunicate by a foreign authority,is without effect,and consequently ought to be without terror.The name of fulmen excommunicationis (that is,the thunderbolt of excommunication)proceeded from an imagination of the Bishop of Rome,which first used it,that he was king of kings,as the heathen made Jupiter king of the gods;and assigned him,in their poems and pictures,a thunderbolt wherewith to subdue and punish the giants that should dare to deny his power:which imagination was grounded on two errors;one,that the kingdom of Christ is of this world,contrary to our Saviour's own words,"My kingdom is not of this world";the other,that he is Christ's vicar,not only over his own subjects,but over all the Christians of the world;whereof there is no ground in Scripture,and the contrary shall be proved in its due place.
St.Paul coming to Thessalonica,where was a synagogue of the Jews,"as his manner was,went in unto them,and three Sabbath days reasoned with them out of the Scriptures,opening and alleging,that Christ must needs have suffered,and risen again from the dead;and that this Jesus whom he preached was the Christ."The Scriptures here mentioned were the Scriptures of the Jews,that is,the Old Testament.
