other: When this plainly
appears to be the Consequence of any Indulgence, they allow it to lay
as full a Restraint, as cou'd be set by one or two particular Texts,
which a corrupt understanding wou'd be at less pains to evade.

And yet if it blemishes any opinion to be Earthly and Sensual, or if
_Evil Communications_ are ever the worse for their effect upon
_Manners_: If to cherish a _Mind that is at Enmity with God_, and
declared to be _Death_, be opposing his Will, and endangering the
Souls of them that support the Resistance; Accusations abound against
the Custom that passes for so inoffensive a thing.

If _casting down Imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth it
self against the knowledge of God, and bringing into Captivity every
thought to the Obedience of Christ_, be the Warfare of those that
wou'd go by his Name; If arming themselves against the _Lust of the
Flesh, the Lust of the Eye, and the pride of Life_, be that Task he
has set them to do; If a _chast Conversation coupled with fear_, and
_letting their Light so shine before Men_, that they may see 'em _do
all to the glory of God_, be the duty of Christians; we have places
enough to shew them of what importance it is, to withdraw from those
that walk so very disorderly, as wou'd not have been in the times of a
livelier Faith, allow'd the outward Communion of Saints.

Nor is the Case so mightily altered from what it was then, unless it
be for the worse; as that we shou'd from thinking them wholly unworthy
to come into our _Assemblies_, run flocking to theirs: For what
vileness has ever offended the World, which is not exceeded if
possible there? Can the Burlesquing an absurd Religion, or Mocking it
upon the Stage be so bad as defying one that is reasonable and wise,
or paying Honour to _Gods that were not_, be like the blaspheming him
that is _True_? This cannot sure in reason be thought, whatever
Excuses People may find to palliate that which they cannot find in
their Hearts to condemn.

Nor is that primitive Spirit so wholly extinct, but that some in our
days, and of _that Religion_ which carries more marks of the World,
then God be thanked are met with in ours, have dared to appear
directly against that vain Practice, which notwithstanding sits easie
on many of so much a _stricter Communion_ than theirs. And this
Instance is so far from being the worse for coming from _France_, that
it is a great deal the more fit to be urged in the present deba