Page:The Leveller movement; a study in the history and political theory of the English Great Civil War (IA levellermovement01peas).djvu/72

 complete and perfect law that Christ had laid down for his church.

The Independents based their whole ecclesiastical procedure on the words of Matthew, xviii: 15–17, “Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone; if he shall hear thee thou hast gained thy brother. But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established. And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church; but if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican.” In these few lines, the Independents said, Christ had bequeathed his church a supreme law for its form and government; and they claimed that the congregational system was the necessary consequence of the dictates of that law.

Since Christ’s law required that the congregation have a part in censures and excommunication, the Independents were necessarily forced into narrower church membership than the Presbyterians. The Presbyterian system admitted to membership