I. First, I shall inquire into the causes of this great want of brotherly love among us.

This nation of ours hath, for a hundred years past, been infested by two enemies, the papists and fanatics; who, each in their turns, filled it with blood and slaughter, and, for a time, destroyed both the church and government. The memory of these events hath put all true protestants equally upon their guard against both these adversaries, who, by consequence, do equally hate us. The fanatics revile us, as too nearly approaching to popery; and the papists condemn us, as bordering too much on fanaticism. The papists, God be praised, are, by the wisdom of our laws, put out of all visible possibility of hurting us; besides their religion is so generally abhorred, that they have no advocates or abettors among protestants to assist them. But the fanatics are to be considered in another light; they have had of late years the power, the luck, or the cunning, to divide us among ourselves; they have endeavoured to represent all those who have been so bold as to oppose their errors and designs, under the character of persons disaffected to the government; and they have so far succeeded, that now-a-days, if a clergyman happens to preach with any zeal and vehemence against the sin and danger of schism, there will not want too many, in his congregation, ready enough to censure him as hot and high-flying, an inflamer of men's minds, an enemy to moderation, and disloyal to his prince. This hath produced a formed and settled division between those who profess the same doctrine and discipline; while they who call themselves moderate, are forced to widen their bottom, by sacrificing their principles and their brethren to the encroachments and insolence of dissenters;

who are therefore answerable, as a principal cause of all that hatred and animosity now reigning among us.

Another cause of the great want of brotherly love is, the weakness and folly of too many among you of the lower sort, who are made the tools and instruments of your betters to work their designs, wherein you have no concern. Your numbers make you of use, and cunning men take the advantage, by putting words into your mouths which you do not understand; then they fix good or ill characters to those words, as it best serves their purposes: and thus you are taught to love or hate, you know not what or why; you often suspect your best friends, and nearest neighbours, even your teacher himself, without any reason, if your leaders once taught you to call him by a name which they tell you signifieth some very bad thing.

A third cause of our great want of brotherly love seemeth to be, that this duty is not so often insisted on from the pulpit, as it ought to be in such times as these; on the contrary, it is to be doubted, whether doctrines are not sometimes delivered by an ungoverned zeal, a desire to be distinguished, or a view of interest, which produce quite different effects; when upon occasions set apart to return thanks to God for some public blessing, the time is employed in stirring up one part of the congregation against the other, by representations of things and persons, which God, in his mercy, forgive those who are guilty of.

The last cause I shall mention of the want of brotherly love is, that unhappy disposition towards politics among the trading people, which hath been industriously instilled into them. In

former times the middle and lower sort of mankind seldom gained or lost by the factions of the kingdom, and therefore were little concerned in them, farther than as matter of talk and amusement but now the meanest dealer will expect to turn the penny, by the merits of his party. He can represent his neighbour as a man of dangerous principles, can bring a railing accusation against him, perhaps a criminal one; and so rob him of his livelihood, and find his own account by that, much more than if he had disparaged his neighbour's goods, or defamed him as a cheat. For so it happens, that instead of inquiring into the skill or honesty of those kind of people, the manner is now to inquire into their party, and to reject or encourage them accordingly; which proceeding hath made our people, in general, such able politicians, that all the artifice, flattery, dissimulation, diligence, and dexterity, in undermining each other, which the satirical wit of men hath charged upon courts; together with all the rage and violence, cruelty and injustice, which have been ever imputed to public assemblies; are with us (so polite are we grown) to be seen among our meanest traders and artificers in the greatest perfection. All which, as it may be matter of some humiliation to the wise and mighty of this world, so the effects thereof may perhaps, in time, prove very different from what, I hope, in charity, were ever foreseen or intended.

II. I will therefore now, in the second place, lay open some of the sad effects and consequences which our animosities and mutual hatred have produced.

And the first ill consequence is, that our want of brotherly love hath almost driven out all sense of religion from among us, which cannot well be otherwise; for, since our Saviour laid so much weight upon his disciples loving one another, that he gave it among his last instructions; and since the primitive Christians are allowed to have chiefly propagated the faith by their strict observance of that instruction; it must follow, that in proportion as brotherly love declineth, Christianity will do so too. The little religion there is in the world hath been observed to reside chiefly among the middle and lower sorts of people, who are neither tempted to pride nor luxury by great riches, nor to desperate courses by extreme poverty; and truly I, upon that account, have thought it a happiness that those who are under my immediate care are generally of that condition: but where party hath once made entrance, with all its consequences of hatred, envy, partiality, and virulence, religion cannot long keep its hold in any state or degree of life whatsoever. For, if the great men of the world have been censured in all ages for mingling too little religion with their politics, what a havock of principles must they needs make in unlearned and irregular heads; of which, indeed, the effects are already too visible and melancholy all over the kingdom?

Another ill consequence from our want of brotherly love is, that it increaseth the insolence of the fanatics; and this partly ariseth from a mistaken meaning of the word moderation; a word which hath been much abused, and bandied about for several years past. There are too many people indifferent enough to all religion; there are many others, who dislike the clergy, and would

have them live in poverty and dependence: both these sorts are much commended by the fanatics for moderate men, ready to put an end to our divisions, and to make a general union among protestants. Many ignorant well-meaning people are deceived by these appearances, strengthened with great pretences to loyalty; and these occasions the fanatics lay hold on to revile the doctrine and discipline of the church, and even insult and oppress the clergy wherever their numbers or favourers will bear them out; insomuch that one wilful refractory fanatic hath been able to disturb a whole parish for many years together. But the most moderate and favoured divines dare not own that the word moderation, with respect to the dissenters, can be at all applied to their religion, but is purely personal or prudential. No good man repineth at the liberty of conscience they enjoy; and perhaps a very moderate divine may think better of their loyalty than others do; or, to speak after the manner of men, may think it necessary that all protestants should be united against the common enemy; or out of discretion, or other reasons best known to himself, be tender of mentioning them at all. But still the errors of the dissenters are all fixed and determined, and must, upon demand, be acknowledged by all the divines of our church, whether they be called, in party phrase, high or low, moderate or violent. And further, I believe it would be hard to find many moderate divines, who, if their opinion were asked whether dissenters should be trusted with power, could, according to their consciences, answer in the affirmative; from whence it is plain, that all the stir which the fanatics have made with this word moderation, was only meant to increase our divi