Page:The reason of church-governement urg'd against prelaty - Milton (1641).djvu/53

Rh corporeal resemblances of inward holinesse & beauty are now past; he that will cloath the Gospel now, intimates plainly, that the Gospel is naked, uncomely, that I may not say reproachfull. Do not, ye Church-maskers, while Christ is cloathing upon our barenes with his righteous garment to make us acceptable in his fathers sight, doe not, as ye do, cover and hide his righteous verity with the polluted cloathing of your ceremonies to make it seem more decent in your own eyes. How beautifull, saith Isaiah, are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth salvation! Are the feet so beautifull, and is the very bringing of these tidings so decent of it self? what new decency then can be added to this by your spinstry? ye think by these gaudy glisterings to stirre up the devotion of the rude multitude; ye think so, because ye forsake the heavenly teaching of S. Paul for the hellish Sophistry of Papism. If the multitude be rude, the lips of the Preacher must give knowledge, and not ceremonies. And although some Christians be new born babes comparatively to some that are stronger, yet in respect of ceremony which is but a rudiment of the Law, the weakest Christian hath thrown off the robes of his minority, and is a perfect man as to legal rites. What childrens food there is in the Gospel we know to be no other then the sincerity of the word that they may grow thereby. But is heer the utmost of your outbraving the service of God? No. Ye have bin bold, not to set your threshold by his threshold, or your posts by his posts, but your Sacrament, your signe, call it what you will, by his Sacrament, baptizing the Christian infant with a solemne sprinkle, and unbaptizing for your own part with a profane and impious forefinger: as if when ye had layd the purifying element upon his forehead, ye meant to cancel and crosse it out again with a caracter not of Gods bidding. O but the innocence of these ceremonies! O rather the sottish absurdity of this excuse! what could be more innocent then the washing of a cup, a glasse, or hands before meat, and that under the Law when so many washings were commanded, and by long tradition, yet our Saviour detested their customes, though never so seeming harmlesse, and charges them severely that they had transgrest the Commandments of God by their traditions and worshipt him in vain. How much more then must these, and much grosser ceremonies now in force delude the end of Christs comming in the flesh against the flesh, and stifle the sincerity of our new cov'nant which hath bound us to forsake all carnall pride and wisdom especially in matters of Rh