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    Remote corner of the world on purpose that that they might injoy the or

    =dinances of God according to his word for themselves & theirs heer alone

    in peace: And accordingly they have heer Erected churches & setled

    Religion in the way of pædobaptisme & secured the same by lawes esta

    =blished: other contrary ways therfor cannot be heer set up without

    Reall injury to the body of this people, who still cleave to the princi

    pells & ends of their first comming, neither should they be constrayned to

    receive or retayne amongst them such a troublsome & dangerous In

    -mate as an Anabaptistical Society is ; or to leave their posterity to be a

    prey into such temptation, seduction & confusion as this will expose them to

    8: God having given us soe many warnings by other places wher Anabapti

    =sme getting head hath proved an incendiary & vexation to church

    and state: It would be too great an Imprudence not to take war

    =ning therby prov: 22.3.

         The Question now before us not being what forbearance the

         Churches heer have used, or may use towards particular persons

         Amongst them who onely scruple infant baptisme, & doe not spred

         their scruples, & are otherwise orderly & peaceable: But what is to

         be done as to such who set up an assembly heer in the way of

         Anabaptisme we speak not to the foremar but to the latter Question

      To the Revered Mr Cobbet Mr Hubbert Mr Phillips & Mr Gerish[28]

    Reverend & beloved in ye lord Jesus

    Since it hath pleased the lord, even the Lord against whom we have sinned

    to bring a day of calamity upon his pp, inhabiting this wilderness, we

    have thought that it doth (in a more peculiar manner) concern those

    whom God hath set as watchmen, to doe their uttmost that present judg

    =ments may be removed, Impending wrath diverted, & feared desolation pre

    vented: accordingly the Elders who are wont to meet at the Lecture in

    Boston, have at times been discoursing about thes things; & they doe

    unanimously conceive, that if a Solemn renewall of the Covenant in

    the Several Churches of Christ amongst us were dewly attended, it might

    (by the blessing of God) be a means to obtain the mercy we all desire

    & pray for: We know from the Scripture that the lords pp in the days

    of old were wont to renew their covenant when ther had been any

    great defection from the good ways of the lord, either in respect of doctrin

    2 Chr 15 12 17 & 23 16: & 29 10 & 37 30. or of conversation Ezra 10

    3.4 5. Neh. 9. 37 38. & 10 29 30 &c.

    And whatever may be sayd in the foremar respect (considering that Spirit

    of indulgence towards men of corrupt mindes in the things of God, which of

    late time hath prevailed in this land) the visible decay of the power of

    godliness in the present generation, The sensuality, pride worldliness &c. of

    Too many professors doth sadly evidence that the latter respect mentioned

    is too much our case: Yea moreover we find it sometime that the lords

    people (even ye 2d generation of them that were brought out of Egypt being

    born in ye wilderness & in other respects their case & state to be parrelleld wth

    ours) haveing a difficult undertaking before them, being to ingage with

    thoe Heathen enemise most solemnly renewed their covenant with god deut

                                                                        29

     

    [28] Thomas Cobbet and Wiliam Hubbard, pastors of Ipswich, Phillips of Rowley, and Joseph Gerrish of Wenham.