not for Anti-christian Corruptions And had they really been what they thought as they were not but quite contrary it had been their duty to go on in their Pastoral Cures and Ministrations with Persecutions for all their deprivations And so we our selves should have thought at least we all seem as if we should if by Gods Providence the civil State had gone on to deprive our reformed Bishops for sticking to the worship and doctrines of the Reformation and had set up Popish Bishops in their Places Notwithstanding which I suppose both our faithful Prelates and People instead of silently acquiescing would have gone on ministring and communicating in the reformed worship and doctrine of this Church But whatever they thought of these things or how consonant or disagreeing soever their Actings were to their own Apprehensions in this case it suffices for justification of our Reformed Bishops advancement to their Sees without their being deprived by competent and lawful Synods which is objected as a thing most exceptionable therein and as seeming most to deviate from Ecclesiastical Rule that in reality they were not Orthodox And that for this want of Orthodoxy without any need of recourse to the Authority of mere State Deprivations to take off people from a spiritual Adherence and Communion with their Bishops the People before they could have a Synodical Deprivation were loose from them and at liberty to unite themselves to the Orthodox Reformers in their Room CHAP. IV. Of Deprivations by Synods in the foresaid Cases ANd thus I think it may sufficiently appear how the manifold obligations which are shewn above to lye on Faithful Bishops and Ministers not to suppress but to exercise their spiritual ministrations in the foresaid Cases are not set aside or barr'd by any inhibition or deprivation though of the most Lawful Civil State They will do it with more ease and worldly encouragement when the State tolerates and much more when it fortifies and furthers them therein But they are not at liberty to give it off but must go on exercising the same when it is more troublesome and when the State gain-says and puts them under persecution for so doing And thus it is where the State will Act apart and proceed without a Synod in depriving Bishops and in discharging the Ecclesiastical Communion and dependance of the people Spiritually related and united to them But Deprivation of Bishops who are Spiritual Powers is more ordinarily by a Synod of Bishops who are a Spiritual Judicature Great Reason there is for the Deprivation of Bishops to proceed in this course The Civil-State indeed comes in by Reason of Civil Accessions and Endowments which strengthen and encourage the spiritual ministrations But these Civil Accessions are but Accessaries and Appendages and their spiritual powers are the Principal in their Ministrations and in Church Communion and dependance on them And therefore the removing of their ministrations and of the Communion and dependance of the Church thereupon is never so fitly and fully attempted as by spiritual judicatures who being spiritual persons have more directly to do with Church Communion and spiritual powers And accordingly this has still been the course of the most Pious Princes who have reserved the deliberations about Religion and Church matters and the Depositions of Bishops which so closely affects Church Communion to Convocations and Synods of Bishops and â—lergy And when these proceed to sentence it more directly affects the concerned parties Church Communion and Church Governors being more directly under the Church-mens Cognizance and not only indirectly and by the by as it may ingage the deprived persons when not bound to it otherwise to yield and acquiesce in voluntary complyance for civil interests But suppose a Concurrence of both these powers and that the deprivation of the Rightful State is confirmed by Synodical Concurrence Yet I observe in the last place that this Deprivation by Synods is not sufficient to bar or discharge Bishops or Ministers from the foresaid Exercise of their Spiritual Ministrations in the above mention'd Cases Bishops and Metropolitanes are not more subject and dependant on Synods than Presbyters and people are on their Bishops Our Lord himself and his Holy Apostles having appointed Bishops in his Church and call'd for our subjection and obedience to them But this submission of Priests and people to their Bishops is with a Salvo to their Holy Religion and its Articles and Interests And if any Bishops go against the Truths or Laws of Christ or against the interests of Souls and of True Religion we are not to follow them or to depend on them therein To stick to any necessary Christian Doctrines Worship or Practices Christs Faithful people and Ministers must break even with their own Bishops holding even them Anathema as St. Paul directs when they would lead them contrary to the Doctrine of the Apostles as I noted before and shall shew more fully afterwards And so must they with any other Bishops or Number and Synods of Bishops in like Case All Exercise and Administration of Church Authority and Jurisdiction is tyed to Rules Not only to Rules of the Churches own making or Ecclesiastical Canons but above all and in the first place to the Rules laid down by Christ himself And all the validity of Church Acts in way of external judicature in Synods or otherwise is so far as they go by them or do nothing against them Thus it is in Decreeing Rites and Ceremonies or Determining Controversies of Faith wherein though the Church has Authority yet is it thus limited and has no Authority as our Church Declares to ordain any thing contrary to Gods word Even general Councils are bounded by this Limitation and things ordained by them say the Thirty Nine Articles again as necessary to Salvation have neither strength nor Authority unless it may be declared that are taken out of Holy Scriptures And thus it is also in Matter of Censures or Ecclesiastical Sentences judicially past therein upon persons whether Laicks or Ecclesiasticks We in the Exercise of our Apostolical Power can do nothing against the Truth or in punishing and Censuring any for Faithful observance thereof but all our Power is for the Truth and to be exercised in its behalf by punishing and not sparing not those who stand to but those who defect from it 2 Cor. 13. 8. When the Church speaks to us in External Judicatures we must hear it as our Lord orders But we must hear it speaking under Christ never against him So that if it Excommunicates any for sticking firm to any part of his Holy Religion with whom for that very adherence sake he requires his Faithful Followers to hold Communion Or if it deprives or discharge any Ministers from Administring the same in any case where he has charged them to keep on that ministration Its power here is set up against him and its Acts have no Power to bind those who are concerned in them
Teachers which he gave as Gifts for the edifying or compacting and building up all Christians into this Body of Christ v. 8. 11 12. To these Pastors the Spirit has given different Offices Rom. 12. 4. One having the Office of ministring another of teaching another of ruling v. 6 7 8. Or different Administrations 1 Cor. 12 5. setting some in the Church in the station of Apostles some of Teachers some of Governments v. 28. placing some in higher some in lower stations according to the measure of that Grace or Office the Word Grace being often used to express Ministerial Powers which he saw fit to commit to them Eph. 4. 7. 11. But all those different Offices are set for keeping all Christians in one Body Rom. 12. 4. 5. and all the Diversity of Ministries is to continue them the Body of Christ and to cement the Members who are many into one Body 1 Cor. 12. 27 28. v. 12. 20. and all the variety of Gifts i. e. of Offices v. 11. or distributions of higher or lower stations are for edifying or laying together the Members into this Body and for preserving the Unity thereof Eph. 4. 4 8 12. The Head of this Body is Jesus Christ himself And from Christ the Head all the Body is knit together says St. Paul by those joynts and bands which minister neurishment i. e. by the Pastors who are set to feed it Col. 2. 19. From Christ the Head says he again the whole Body is fitly joyn'd and compacted together by those joynts which make supplies according to their measure or according to their several stations in the work of the Ministry Eph. 4. 15 16. And on account of this use of their uniting all Christians under Christ the Head into this one Body or all the several Societies of Christians into one Church when this one Church is compared to a Natural Body they are represented as the Joynts and as the Bands or Ligaments which unite and compact the Members as they are by St. Paul in these places And thus it was in the Opinion of the Ancient Church who placed the Unity of all Churches in the Unity and Accord of all the Bishops thereof The Catholick Church which is one saith St. Cyprian is cemented or coupled together by the glue or joynt accord of its Bishops adhering mutually to one another All faithful People are joyn'd together into the solid Unity of one Body by the glue of this Concord And to fall from this Concord and separate from the College of Bishops is to separate from the Bond of the Church as he elsewhere says To keep up this Unity in the whole Church they believed all BISHOPS strictly obliged to keep Unity among themselves We Bishops who preside in the Church ought above all Men to keep firmly united that we may maintain the Episcopate it self one and undivided They looked upon the Bishops of all the several independant Churches to be as so many Members of one great Fraternity or College Optatus calls them the College of Bishops And before him St. Cyprian styles them the College and Corporation of Priests and calls all other Bishops his Collegues Particular Bishopricks are all Members one of another and all together as he says are to make but one Great Episcopate And among this Multitude of Bishops as there is but one Church so there is but one Chair And as three Persons in the sacred Trinity make up but one God wherein the power of all three is one and undivided So doth all the great Diversity of Prelates make up but one Priesthood says Symmachus Now this Unity the Bishops and Pastors keep up among several Churches not by the Subjection of all other Bishops to some one or more set up above all the rest Particularly not by the paramount Authority and Jurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome which is neither to be found in Scripture nor is agreeable to the Accounts thereof nor to the Belief and Practice of the Primitive Church nor to the Universal Diffusedness designed for Christs Church under all the Divisions of Kingdoms and Interruptions of secular Accord and Correspondence here on Earth But by maintaining Fraternal Concord and Communion among themselves They cement into one Episcopate concordi mâ—merositate by their Concord under this Numerosity as we are told by St. Cyprian They are bound or coupled into one body by the glue of mutual Concord as he says again Which Ecclesiastical Concord and Fraternal Communion lyes in owning each other and all the Christians of their several Churches as Brethren and Members and in ratifying the great Acts of Society pass'd among them as if they had been pass'd among themselves And in having this Communion not Arbitrary and Discretionary which may be fixt at will upon their own terms and either kept up or rejected as they please But a Communion kept on out of bounden Duty and by Rules being to give account to Christ the chief Bishop for the breach thereof To this it is requisite that they profess the same true Faith and Christian Worship This is the Foundation of all other Communion among them The one Body being made up of those who hold to the one Faith Eph. 4. 4. and the Communion in this Body being required between those who communicate in this one Faith and Worship as shall be shewn more fully afterwards And among all Orthodox Bishops and Churches who profess the true Christian Faith and Worship the Rules of Communion and Correspondence required by Christ for keeping up this Unity of his Body are such as these 1. That all Orthodox Bishops and Churches receive each others Members as if they were their own Members All the Members of Christ's Church are Fellow-Citizens or enfranchised Denizens wheresoever they come and upon any new Change of Place or Christian Country have no need of a new Naturalization They ought to find a home in all Churches and may claim their Baptismal Priviledges or the benefits of the Christian Coporation or Society and can not justly be repulsed or denyed the same as being free of the whole Body For Baptism which makes them Members by the institution of Christ incorporates them all not only into those several Churches or Congregations where they receive it but into the whole Body or Fraternity We are all baptized whether we be Jews or Gentiles into one Body says St. Paul 1 Cor. 12. 13. And accordingly no Church must exclude them as Strangers or Forreigners but own and receive them as Fellow-citizens as Members as Domesticks as Brethren and of the same Family with themselves And this is necessary to maintain that Brotherhood which Christ has constituted among all his Members every Christian being Brother to another so that Brother is usually put to signifie a Christian in the Holy Scripture They must also own and receive their Orders when they have been lawfully call'd
the Church For when they fill'd all places they would be met with in all places and intermix in all dealings And then not to have any Company or Dealings with such they must needs go out of the World which St. Paul gives as one Reason of Relaxation and Allowance in this Case 1 Cor. 5. 10. So that continuing still to shun Spiritual or Ecclesiastical Communion with such Makers of Schisms especially for the setting up of a sinful Worship and Unchristian Doctrines and Practices is so far from being a defection from the Apostolical and Primitive Charity that it is a keeping up to it and is only a retaining of their first Love which ought in all times faithfully to be kept on in all true Churches Now as to the Persons whom this will affect and whose Communion by this Rule is to be shuned in such Cases it barrs this Communion with those who set up and make the Anti-Bishops or who side and take part with them 1. It affects the Electors who chose the Men and their Ordainers and Consecrators who laid hands on them For these give Heads to the New Bodies and create the Schism Others may seditiously call for it or come in to it when once 't is form'd but their part is to give it a Head which formally constitutes and sets it up so that they are Principals therein 2. And those who own subjection and dependance on these anti-Anti-Bishops in opposition to their Old Ones and as Members unite and incorporate under them Thus it is among the Pastors by whom their Authority is received and who thereby all break off from the rightful Bishop to whom in all their Ministrations they ought to keep subject and dependant The Rule of Communion for Priests and Deacons towards their Bishop is to do all Publick Ministrations according to his Allowance and Consent Let the Presbyters or Deacons do nothing without the Consent of the Bishop say the Apostolical Canons and the Council of Laodicea afterwards for 't is the Bishop to whose Trust the Lords People is committed and from whom an Account of their Souls will be required And If any will be for having the Offices of the Church without the Concurrence of a fitting Presbyter who officiates according to the Bishops approbation and allowance let him be Anathema says the Council of Gangra And If any Clergy celebrate Divine Offices in private Oratories or baptize not according to the Mind and Allowance of the Bishop but besides or contrariant to it let them incur Deposition say the Council in Trullo and the Council of Constantinople The Church is settled upon the Bishops and every Act of the Church â—ught to be governed by them saith St. Cyprian Let none do any of those things which concern the Church or publick Service without the Bishop says St. Ignatins that Holy Martyr and Contemporary of the Apostles But let that he reputed a valid Eucharist which is celebrated by those who keep under him or which is administer'd with his Leave And that a due Baptism which is with his consent or approbation 'T is necessary says he that ye should do nothing without the Bishop like as also ye do The Spirit adds he in another place hath preached this saying Do nothing without the Bishop Love Unity fly Divisions And they who continue to call him Bishop but yet do all things without him I think are not men of good Conscience because they do not celebrate their solemn Assemblies according to Christs Precept And to like purpose Tertullian St. Jerome and others And this way of administring all Offices with his approbation and allowance St. Ignatius declares is the way for them to keep Unity with their Bishops For says he as our Lord doth nothing without his Father being united to him not acting without him either by himself or by his Apostles So neither do you any thing without your Bishop and his Presbyters But when the Priests and Deacons of a Diocess turn over from their rightful Bishop to the Anti-Bishop they live in a slagrant Breach of these Rules of Communion They do all their Ministrations then without their Bishop putting in some things into Divine offices and putting out others and observing Days and other things belonging to their Ministrations not only without but quite against his consent and approbation and altogether by the Authority and jurisdiction of another who is set up against him Which is to separate as far as they can from him who ought to be their Principle of Union and to minister in a state of full and Flaming Schism And thus it is also in the Assemblies over which those Rightful Bishops ought to Preside or in the Churches of their own Dâ—oceses If they would keep in the state of Unity they should keep united to their Rightful Bishops who are the Heads of Union to their several Flocks and should stick to them and the Clergy of their Communion for Divine Offices Where their Bishop appears there let the multitude be with them Like as where Jesus Christ goes there the Catholick Church goes too says St. Ignatius But if they break away from all Dependance on them and from all recourse to their ministrations to Depend on the Anti-Bishops and to resort to theirs that makes them all Schismaticks For all these Assemblies of People and Pastors make the Schismatical Bodys whereof the Anti-Bishops are the Heads As the Bishops set up for the Schismatical Heads So the Pastors and People who turn over to them and assemble under them come in to be their Schismatical Members They Form themselves into one Church by erecting an Ecclesiastical Union and Communion among themselves And this is a Schismatical Church as Consisting all of a Party of Members broke off from their True Heads or lawful Bishops 3. Further it may also affect other Bishops and Churches who will take their Part and Communicate with them For Catholick Unity is to be preserved in the Church i. e. Unity and Communion is to be kept up among all Churches And this is by Rules of Accord and Correspondence which give the same Church Acts or matters the same effects in all places Of which Rules I have before discoursed more at large And these Rules will keep up Catholick Unity and the Communion of Saints between all Bishops and Churches since this way they all Communicate or all in Common refuse to do it with the same Persons And therefore if any Bishop of one Church would side and have Communion with Anti-Bishops or with the Schismaticks or Hereticks of other Churches He thereby broke the Rules of Union as well as they and became involved in Schism like one of them For he was as much obliged as others in care of maintaining Unity to keep off from the Communion of such Schismaticks Yea in care of Catholick Unity and Communion to keep off from the Communion of those who make
so not in a state of Persecution when the secular Power sets it self to root out the Church and all Church-Powers and Ministrations Whereas these Powers were given to the Church bearing Christ's Cross and labouring under Persecutions and to continue in it always even to the end of the World under whatever circumstances as well when secularly Oppressed as when Protected Accordingly these spiritual Powers were held on by the Apostles when the secular Rulers declared against their Apostolical Authority and forbid them to Preach any more iâ— the Name of Jesus And by the Bishops and Clergy in all the succeeding Persecutions For all Persecutions of the Church were Persecutions of all Church Administrations and of Bishops and Priests in a more especial manner who were chief Actors and at the Head thereof Yea especiall Edicts and Prosecutions were made against them for being vested with these Authorities as the Title of St. Cyprian 's Proscription was for being Episcopus Christianorum or a Christian Bishop which Authorities therefore would no longer have belonged to them could a Persecuting Power have deprived or bereaved them thereof And this retaining their spiritual Powers will be allowed by their Adversaries who acknowledge that the deprivation of State is no Degradation to divest them of their Character or spiritual Powers conferr'd in Orders but only a debaring them of exercise thereof in their Dominions and in way of an incorporate Church under State Encouragements So that if they do exercise their Ministry there will be no want of Spiritual Powers to render their Acts Nullities or of no effect and validity before Christ. But only want of secular Benefices and enforcements to them and of submission as they alledge to the secular Power or of secular Obedience And having still their Episcopal and Ministerial Powers 't is next to be considered whether they stand bound to exercise and make use thereof 'T is not to be brought into this Question what is to be done herein on Worldly Arguments as they stand deprived of their Livelihoods and way of Maintenance how hard soever this may fall either upon themselves or their Families Which however it may abate or excuse especially to compassionate Natures yet is no justification of things that are otherwise unjustifiable on principles of Religion and Conscience But what is to be done on conscionable Arguments that are to rule their Determinations as Christians especially as Divines or that they may faithfully discharge their duty What is to be done by spiritually minded and mortified Men who are raised above this World and prefer God and Religion before themselves Nor is the Dispute Whether the Ministerial Powers be such a burthen that Men must be always pressing and obtruding the exercise thereof without any regard to the wants of the Place or the needs of the Church Necessity is laid upon me and woe be to me if I preach not the Gospel was spoke in the want of true Preachers when the Harvest was Great but the Labourers were Few It spoke a necessity introduced not merely by the Power of Orders but also by the circumstances of Times and Persons when the exercise thereof was necessary in want of Preachers for the use of the Church But in plenty of true Preachers there would not have been the same necessity nor would they have been bound to this exercise in place where there was no need of their Gifts but the same were exercised by others In this surplusage of Supplies for Church-uses and necessities the Spirits of the Prophets are subject to the Prophets and their Powers must either be exercised or forborn and suspended as makes most for Order and Edification and the Peace of the Church But this exercise the deprived Bishops and Clergy are bound to in Duty and Conscience at such times If there is a need of their Ministrations then to provide for Religion and the Souls of Men or to prevent Men from being nursed up in destructive Ways as Immoral Practices and Immoral Worship and Devotions must be confessed to be To clear this it may not be amiss to consider First What Immoralities come in by a wrong payment of Allegiance to corrupt Religion and to endanger Souls Secondly What Provision good and faithful Pastors ought to make against such Dangers and Corruptions by the exercise of their Ministry First I shall briefly consider what Immoralities come in by a wrong Payment of Allegiance to corrupt Religion and to endanger Souls Whether this is actually the case of any Kingdom and the Allegiance required of them by their New Governors be directed and paid wrong I do not here discuss That makes another dispute viz. about the Right to the Crown contested betwixt the two Competitors in those Countries and the Lawfulness or Unlawfulness of the New Oaths of Allegiance consequent thereupon which is exacted on such changes And this it is no part of the design of these Papers to argue or meddle with But when this really is the case in any Revolution as in this World God knows it is too often or among those Subjects who believe this is their case and that their Allegiance is call'd for to the Wrong against the Right Person Such as these are the Immoralities that will every-where corrupt Religion and endanger Souls whilst such wrong Payment lasts and which should be thought to do so among them viz. Then all that time whilst they are violently transferring their Allegiance from him to whom it still Remains rightfully due would Men in the general Practice of those Nations be wickedly disobeying and forceably resisting Gods Authority or the Father of the Fifth Commandment which extends to civil as well as natural Parents Then would they all that while be most openly and horribly breaking through all former Oaths of Allegiance Then would all who have promised and pay their Allegiance to drive out their ejected Prince out of any part of his Right or to keep him out thereof be actors of bare faced Iniquity and heinously unrighteous coveting and invading their Neighbours Goods And all force used against him or any other Persons for their adhering to his Cause would in Gods Account be oppression and unjust Violence all Spoils and Seisures of their Goods would be Thefts and Robberies and all shedding of their Blood all Cries and Clamours for it or rejoycing in it would be horrible Murders which not only they who acted but they who Wish'd or Prayed for or gave Thanks for when accomplished would be Guilty of All which are most dangerous and destructive ways and amount to a general Breach of Gods Commandments and to an open wast of Moral Honesty and Justice And all these would be the Dangers to Mens Souls in any Kingdom were the Translation of Allegiance such an unrighteous Perversion really and in it self Or they would be met with like Pastoral Provisions as if they were so Dangerous should the deprived Pastors believe and apprehend it to be such
Which made them more sensible of the advantage of having these powers quietly and uncontestedly lodged in their own Hands These it might safely part withall during the incorporation as retaining still what it could not part with viz a Power of standing by all Necessary Points of worship and Doctrine and of doing what is necessary for the Souls of Men and as being also fitted all the time in the main with what is needful in Point of Discipline And its parting with them was in way of Compromise and Bargain as a grateful Return for the benefits and priviledges of its Enfranchisement and Incorporation or on consideration of its enjoying a Freedom not only of exercising spiritual ministrations but of exercising them in the way of an incorporate Church viz. in holding Benefices and in being back'd therein by secular Jurisdiction Laws and Priviledges And whilst these benefits of Incorporation are held on in favour of the Truth the cession of the Church in these Points is to be held on too and not to be resumed back again Protected and incorporate Bishops and Pastors must be content to claim Episcopal and Pastoral powers under the recessions and limitations of an incorporate Church Thus our Articles and Canons receive and assert the Ecclesiastical Supremacy of our Kings which contains the foresaid Church-Recessions And denounce Excommunication ipso Facto to those that Deny any part of our King 's Legal Supremacy in Ecclesiastical Causes or his having the same Authority therein as the Godly Kings had among the Jews or Christian Emperors had in the Primitive Church And accordingly in our Form of Ordaining Bishops they profess to think themselves call'd to this Ministration according to the Will of Jesus Christ and the Order of this Realm and promise to censure and punish the unquiet and disobedient within their Diocesses according to such Authority as they have by God's Word and as to them shall be committed by the Ordinance of this Realm But now all this giving up these or the like powers to the State for the sake of this Incorporation and in way of bargain and compromise or other abridgement of its own ministrations is 1. With a Salvo to the Interests of Religion and of the Souls of Men. They cannot give away any thing to make themselves wanting in any necessary service unto them nor part with their powers of ministring to Souls to build and nurse them up in pure Worship Doctrin and Practice These Powers are a Sacred Depositum which if they imbezzle or yield up in complyance they are false to God and to mens Souls and thereby betray both them and their own Holy Fâ—â—ction And their Acts also are nullities wherein they offer or promise to do the same For they are Acts against an antecedent Obligation which are wicked in the making as Herods Oath was to gratifie Herodias in the Baptists Death and the Jews Conspiracy and Oath to kill St. Paul But they are null as to the Obligation of performance as is agreed in the case of all contracts and promises to do unlawful things or things evil or forbidden in themselves They can neither discharge themselves I say nor receive any discharge from Princes of exercising these Powers where Christ requires they should exercise them for the Service of Religion of Souls as I have shewn he doth in the fore mentioned cases In Stewards it is required that they be found faithful in dispensing out these Ministrations as he orders not in suppressing them contrary to Order 1 Cor. 4 2. Necessity is laid upon me and woe be to me is here the Scripture denunciation if they preach not the Gospel or fail trustily to discharge that Ministry they have undertaken 1 Cor. 9. 16. No earthly Powers by confering on them the benefits of Incorporation get any Authority over Christs Ministers to discharge them of Ministring to their Master in these matters For this would be to give the civil power which ought to keep under Christ a power over him It would turn them from Nursing Fathers who by giving it a civil enfranchisement undertake to protect the true Religion into devouring Wolves who seek to make a prey of it It is expresly declared against by the Apostles who appeal to the common sense of mankind Whether they are not bound to obey God rather than men Act. 4. 19. 20. And would leave no ministrations of true Gospel Worship and Doctrin under any Christian state which should fall from any necessary parts thereof and begin to persecute them as the Arian Emperors did in the Persecutions they rais'd against the Orthodox and as Popish Princes did in like violences used by them at any time against our Protestant Brethren or Ancestors Than which nothing can be worse calculated for any Church of God but especially for the Christian Church which is to continue a Church in persecution and to bear up Christian Worship and Doctrin by due ministrations of both when any powers of this World fall from protecting most violently to bear them down And this in all times has been the Opinion and Practice of God's faithful Ministers when the State which by Incorporation should have back'd and strengthned them therein fell to discharge and bar them of their ministrations in these cases Thus God's Faithful Prophets and Ministers did in the Jewish Church who approved themselves glorious Confessors and Martyrs in administring God's Word and true Worship when the State fell to break in upon them and instead of backing and protecting them in those ministrations according to the purport of incorporation fell violently to discharge and drive them from officiating any longer therein Thus likewise Athanasius Bishop of Alexandria Paulus of Constantinople and other Bishops did in the Arian Persecution The civil State had then received the Church into it self endowed it with civil Edicts and enfranchisements And the deprivation and ejection of these Bishops out of their Churches particularly of the Great Athanasius was with State-Concurrence and for State-Causes or Pretences Among other Articles Athanasius was charged with Contumacy against the Emperour in refusing to appear upon his Edict at the Synod of Caesarea And with a Treasonable Design to stop the yearly Transport of Corn from Alexandria to Constantinople on which suggestion he was banish'd to Tryers by Constantine Not to mention the Accusation of his having impos'd on the Aegyptians a Tribute of Linnen Cloath and having conspired with one Philumenus against the Emperour and having Treasonably corresponded with the Traytor Magnentius and usurped the Imperial Prerogative by holding the Festival Dedication of the great Church of Alexandria without the Emperours Warrant and the like And his Deposition and Gregories and Georges Advancement to his See by Synods were seconded by Acts of State having the Approbation and Justification of the Emperors and the Assistance of Prefects as well as the ‖ Imperial Letters violently forcing one out of the
Appeals particularly aimed at is that which was claimed here by the Popes of Rome They had wrested from the Crown the foresaid Soveraignty both over Ecclesiastical Persons and Causes For as to Ecclesiastical Persons they claimed an exemption for them as not answerable in Civil Courts but Cognizable only by themselves And as to Ecclesiastical Ministrations as back'd by secular benefices and Ecclesiastical Causes as mixt in the Ecclesiastical Courts with Civil Priviledges and Jurisdiction they disclaimed subordination to the Crown and asserted a supremacy to themselves therein For they made themselves supream here in investitures into benefices and preferments and to have the chief power by their Legates of calling our convecations of passing and ratifying all our Decrees Canons and Constitutions of granting dispensations from them of having their decrees take place of the Prerogatives of the Crown or of the Customs of the Realm of holding courts and of receiving Appeals from any of our spiritual courts and judicatures and the like All which civil powers over Ecclesiastical Persons and subordination of Ecclesiastical causes proceeding by the foresaid mixture of secular fortifications benefices and jurisdictions the statutes Articles injunctions and Canons of this Church and Realm about Supremacy abolish in the Popes and assert to the Crown to which they Anciently did and of right should belong So that this Soveraign Civil Power over all Ecclesiastical Persons as their subjects and this Subordination of all Ecclesiastical Causes to it because of the Concurrence and intermixture of the foresaid civil priviledges and juridictions therewith and that in opposition to the papal pretences in these points is the Ecclesiastical supremacy vested in the King by our Church and Laws The Popes spiritual Usurpation upon this Church was shaken off by asserting to the Arch-bishop of Canterbury the Brittish Churches Ancient and independant Primacy Which did Right to the King too it being against his Prerogative that any Foreigner who doth not own himself to be one of his Subjects should have any Power in his Dominions And his Civil Usurpation on the Crown in respect to Ecclesiastical Persons and Causes among its Subjects was thrown out by asserting of the Kings Supremacy But when the Supremacy speaks such a civil power over the persons of Ecclesiasticks as they are its subjects and such subordination of Ecclesiastical causes thereto as they are united to secular benefices and jurisdictions Yet at the same time as I have shewn doth it disclaim all pretence to meer spiritual powers or to the Soveraign Disposal of the Powers of Orders Of it self it can neither give nor recall them Nor stop the Ministrations thereof in any of those Cases where Christ requires them All it can do there is to withdraw its Civil incorporation from those who have these mere spiritual powers and are bound for the sake of Religion and of the Souls of Men to proceed in the exercise thereof But still that exercise and administration which hangs on anothers Commission will go on upon its own bottom and must be discharged as it can under the opposition instead of the former incorporation of state or under a civil Persecution And this continuance of such Ministrations in such Cases notwithstanding the deposition of state I think may fairly be concluded from the Concessions of those who have undertaken to plead for the Authority of state deprivations and to press them on the suffering Clergy at such times We are told by one from Mr. Mason that a state deposition of a Bishop is not by way of Degradation from his orders as if he had them not but of exclusion from the exercise thereof And that not absolutely as if he could exercise his office no where but after a sort that he should not do it as to their subjects nor in their dominions And by another that a state deprivation doth not concern the Character or Ecclesiastical Communion as an Ecclesiastical Deprivation doth but only concerns the exercise of his Episcopal Authority in any Diocess within the Dominions of that State or enjoying any Ecclesiastical Benefice in it Now since such state deprivation neither concerns the Character nor the Communion of the Church 't is plain he is a Bishop still notwithstanding their deprivation and such a Bishop as without any fault in Church Communion all good Christians may Communicate with And since his exercise of Episcopal Powers is thereby excluded only from the Dioceses and subjects of their dominions it is still the same it was as to all other places And what is the hinderance of exercising the same still in those dioceses and among that Kings Subjects One reason already cited is because he cannot exercise them in the incorporate way or in injoyment of any Ecclesiastical Benefice But besides another I conceive is suggested viz. Regard to state Authority or civil obedience Though neither the Faith nor the Communion of the Church is here concerned yet says the Learned Author last mention'd the Authority of the State is which obliges both the Clergy and Laity in these Cases So that although neither his powers are thereby vacated nor their dependance and communion with him is broken off on other accounts yet in Civil Obedience it seems by his account both Bishops and People on such state deprivation are bound to acquiesce But now if they are left in full Possession of their spiritual powers and of the communion of the Church 't is plain they cannot be debarr'd of their Ministrations in the foresaid Cases nor the people of their attendance on them in any regard to secular inhibitions or to shew Civil Obedience For we must never hear Kings against Christ or obey them when they bar us of doing what he bids us do And these Ministrations he requires and calls for in the aforesaid Cases as I have shewn and also for the peoples communion with and attendance on them And it matters not that they cannot Minister any longer in the incorporate way or under shelter of Civil Laws and enjoyment of benefices For true Ministers of Christ and of Souls must depise benefices and secular incorporations when they come in competition with his service and Minister his word and worship at their hazard and under persecutions Besides if as he owns such deprivation doth not affect the Communion of the Church it leaves the subjects of those dioceses still under the same Religious and Church Principles of dependance and communion with their Bishops as they were before it For though the state should not meddle therein the Church has Principles of this dependance and communion of its own Christ requires his Church should be one and that is by ahhereing to their Bishops whom he has made the Heads of Union And these it seems the deprivation of state doth not at all Cancel only the Authority of state as is said but not Church Communion being concerned therein So that such Bishops deprived by the state continue still to be Christs
a Wrong to Religion And there they must go on for the sake of Gospel-worship and doctrines which are Christs Cause though they would be content to suffer and sit still so far as it is their own And accordingly the Council of Constantinople entituled Prima Secunda excepts the Case of Heretical Prelates promoting or pushing on any Heresies when it requires Inferiors to stay for a synodical Cognizance before they break off dependance from their Prelates in all other Cases Though Synods therefore are the most Venerable Ecclesiastical Judicature here on Earth yet is all the Obligation and Authority of their decisions or sentences within this Compass They have no Effect or Force against the Truth as St. Paul says or against any for adhering to it So that they are to affect none who have Christ and his Truth plainly on their side Nor do their judgments and definitions bar those who are concerned to take Notice of them from examining and judging for themselves whether they strike at any part of Christian Truth and Religion before they pay Obedience to them I grant there ought to be great deference to their determination and all private Persons are to use great modesty and care in judging after them and need to look that the blow and destruction thereby made to any necessary Truth or Practice of our holy Religion be very plain before they over-look and disregard what they order But still judge they must because in all their belief and practice in these things it is not any implicit dependance on men or a blind obedience to any humane sentence or decision but observance of the Truth it self or of what Christ has appointed in his Word that must justifie them And therefore if on an humble and diligent examination and by plain evidence it appear that in their definitions of Articles or censure of Persons they strike at the Truth and seek the overthrow of any part of Religion their Acts are to be esteemed as of no effect and all concerned Parties both Clergy and People are to go on doing the same in Religious Ministration and Communion as if there were no such thing More just and authoritative Synods they will be like to seek and appeal from these in a regular way to others more general which in external way of humane judicature shall reverse their unjust sentences But suffering all in the Cause of Truth and Religion they will not desist in the mean time but go on notwithstanding any such synodical Anathema or Deprivation in true spiritual Ministrations and Communion PART III. Of Schism CHAP. I. Of the Nature of Schism And of the Schism of Particular Members from their own Church in throwing off Subjection and Dependance on their own Bishops BY what I have offer'd about the Authority and effect of State-deprivations yea or even of the depositions of Synods too I think it may appear how the faithful Ministers of Christ are not disabled or discharged by any such deprivations from the exercise of their spiritual Ministrations whereto they stand bound by so many Obligations in the forementioned Cases But besides the deprivation of State some think the maintenance of Unity in the Church when that is like to be broken thereby ought to stop them of that Exercise And therefore for a further clearing of their duty in those Cases I shall procede 2. Secondly to shew That the preservation of external Communion and Peace in the Church ought not to debar or put by their due discharge thereof Admit say some that it were their duty to go on in their Ministrations for the service of Religion and of Souls in those cases where this can be done in maintenance of Unity and whilst the Church continues one Yet what will you say if such Ministration must unavoidably make or keep up a Schism Do not we all own that to be one of the greatest Banes to Religion and a most sinful and mischievous thing And if otherwise they ought to be held on ought not such Ministrations to be let fall rather than a Schism shall be made or kept up in the Church thereby That there will be a Schism in the Church in such cases is most apparent And that Schism is most dreadful to the Church full of Guilt as it is both the Breach of Unity and the Bane of Charity and an In-let of continual miseries and disturbances is no less apparent But in pressing the consideration thereof upon particular persons or parties for prevention or redress it is to be enquired first who makes it That will shew who ought to mend it but if they will not it may be enquired next who else can cure it Or what the sufferers in love of peace and preferring the Publick before themselves should give up for the Cure thereof that they may duly prize external Unity but not over-value it Or if through the Error or inflexibleness which God avert of those who are the Authors thereof it be already made and cannot be remedyed all are to consider lastly how they are to carry themselves towards the Makers of it and with whom they are to hold Communion To Clear these Points I shall say something I. To the Nature of Schism to shew when a Schism is made and by whom II. To those things which may be a just ground to disunite and break off either from any Persons or Churches without blame of Schism some things not being to be born nor others to be parted with for the love of external Peaâ—e and Union III. To the Communion of good Christians under a Schism and how they are to carry it towards Schismaticks 1. First I shall say something to the Nature of Schism to shew when a Schism is made and by whom Schism lyes in Breach of Union or in Making two or many out of one Schisms says St. Cyprian which cut or break the Unity or tear and divide that which should be kept together as one Body By Schism as St. Chrysostom notes One Church is broken into many Churches and the Unity thereof is abolish'd Accordingly the Members are call'd upon to be joyn'd together in the same mind and in speaking the same things that there be no Schisms 1 Cor. 1. 10. Not to set up an Independance among themselves and act separately but with mutual dependance and conjunction that there be no schism in the body 1 Cor. 12. 25. And 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 schisms are usually render'd divisions as 1 Cor. 10. and c. 11. 18. This Union which Schism breaks is the union of a society For the Church is a society of men Associated and incorporated together for the work and purposes of Religion 'T is call'd a Family or †Household or City which are all words Expressive of Society St Paul Styles it the City of the living God Heb. 12. 22. And tells the Christians at Ephesus that they are Fellow-Citizens with the Saints Eph. 2. 19. This
Truths or Commands of Christ he is Christs true Bishop still in that Church and his faithful Peoples spiritual Head for all that unjust sentence For Christ stands by him who stands by his Doctrines and Precepts and unjust Depositions on these Accounts have no more validity in his sight than unjust Excommunications for the same Accounts have as has been already shew'd But if there is no Interposition of Synods but a mere Deprivation of State that will much less do it For there is a spiritual Subjection and Dependance of People to their Bishops especially to such as suffer for adhering to Christian Truths or Precepts which the civil State cannot break or dissolve Christ himself by his Institution has made a spiritual Relation between them and antecedently obliged his People to this Union and Adherence to them as they are vice Christi his Ministers and Vice-gerents as St. Cyprian says Kings and Civil States may come afterwards and tye this spiritual Union and Adherence faster on by temporal Dependances and Enforcements And what they lay on they may take off again But the spiritual Relation and Obligations do not depend on them but on Christ himself Religion lays them on and leaves it not in the Power of any Prince to cancel or discharge them They stood fixed whilst the Church was separate from the State before any secular Powers came in to protect it and will still continue if they turn all their Power to persecute and oppress it Nor has our Lord left it to their courtesy whether there shall be any spiritual Relation betwixt his People and their Pastors whether they shall keep up their spiritual Relation and Dependance and he shall have a Church on Earth or no as is before discoursed more at large The Learned Author of the Vindication of Their Majesties Authority in filling the vacant Sees owns the Advancement of George the Cappadocean into the place of Athanasius to have been Schismatical and an Usurpation and Breach of Catholick Communion The setting up of this Anti Bishop was by a Deprivation of State For Constantius took away the Churches from Athanasius and his Adherents which is the State-way of depriving Bishops and gave them to George the Anti-Bishop and his Adherents Nay he sends an Edict to the Senate and People of Alexandria requiring them on their Allegiance instead of sticking to him as their spiritual Head with the Affection and Dependance of Members with their united Force to persecute Athanasius And made it criminal in any Persons as Sozomen relates to harbour or conceal him And accordingly the Imperial Ministers and Praefects violently drove him and the Orthodox out of the Churches and by extream Force put George and the Arians in possession thereof And having placed this Anti-Bishop upon his Throne with all secular Cruelties and barbarous Usage compell'd the Clergy and People to acknowledge and submit to him It was also brought about by Deprivation of Synods For after the Sardican Synod which restored him Athanasius had been again deposed both by the Synod of Arles and afterwards by the Synod of Milan wherein besides a few from the East above three hundred Bishops of the West met as Sozomen says and condemned him And the setting up of George against him after this was in a Synod viz. the Synod of Antioch which declared the Uncanonicalness of his Restitution and Ordained George as a former Synod at that place had Ordained Gregory before to be Bishop of Alexandria in his Room These indeed as the Author of the Vindication suggests were Heretical Synods And Dionysius of Alba Eusebius of Vercelles Paulinus of Tryers and Rhodanus and Lucifer who at Milan protested against their Proceedings declared that thro' Athanasius the Emperor and the Arians his Enemies were striking at the Catholick Faith which the event of things and the Proceedings afterwards in the Synods of Ariminum and Seleucia verified as Sozomen observes But in way of external Judicature the Deprivation tho' of Heretical Synods must at least carry with it as much Plea as Deposition by no Synods can pretend to there being more shew of Ecclesiastical Authority in Acts of Heretical Synods than in none at all But for all this Deposition both by the Imperial Edicts and Synodical Sentences since the true Cause thereof was his firmness and constancy to the Catholick Faith Athanasius as the foresaid Author owns still kept on his spiritual Relation and the People their spiritual and Religious Obligations to and Dependance on him So that George as he says was an usurping Invader a breaker of Catholick Communion and a Ring-leader of a Schism in the Catholick Church when he set up against him And the same it would be in the case of any other Bishop deprived by the like Authority for his Fidelity and fixt Adherence to any other Truths or Laws of Christ. For his faithful Bishops must stick to him in all other Points of Christian Truth and Practice as well as in the Orthodoxy of the Nicene Faith And that against the Deprivations of all other States and Synods as well as of the Arians And their sticking to Christ in these Points can give no liberty to their Clergy and People to break off from them Their stedfastness therein must tye all faithful Members faster to them but can never be expounded as a conscionable discharge of their spiritual Obligations and Dependance on them If a Schism is made in a Church then by a defection from the rightful Orthodox Bishop thereof laid aside either by a Civil State or Ecclesiastical Synod only for his faithful Adherence to the Doctrines or Laws of Christ or by turning over to an Anti-Bishop set up against him 'T is plain the Anti-Bishops with their Makers and Adherents make the Schism They were all Members of the one Body whilst they kept subject and united to the Rightful Bishop who is the Head of it But when they broke off from him they divided themselves from the Body and formed themselves under an opposite Head into a new and opposite Body But he and his Adherents still preserve the Unity of the true Body The breakers off make the Division but they preserve their Union As those Branches do which still grow to the Tree when others are broke off from it and those Streams which still communicate with the Fountain when others are stopt and those Rays which keep connected to the Sun when others are interrupted Which Similitudes St. Cyprian makes choice of to set off the Unity of the Church and to shew that they preserve this Union who keep to the same Head and Origine What they do therefore in these Cases by sticking to each other as they did before when others break off is not to make the Schism but only not to follow and run into it And they are no more chargeable with the division for this than the General and his faithful Souldiers would be in an Army for
a Schism from other Catholick Bishops as if they made it from himself And if still he will Communicate and joyn himself to them he violates Unity and joyns in a Schism as any other Man would do who should do the same And being found in the Schism with them he would have been treated as they were and have fallen from the Communion of all other Orthodox and Catholick Bishops whose Rule was to refuse and shun the Communion of Schismaticks and of their adherents and partakers Communicating with men out of Communion he himself would be put out of Communion as the aforecited Councils say And thus it was with Marcianus Bishop of Arles when he fell to Communicate and joyn himself to Novatian who was set up as a Schismatical Anti-Bishop against Cornelius the Rightful and Canonical Bishop of Rome Thereby says St. Cyprian he himself became separate from our Communion and from the Fraternity of Catholick Bishops because Novatian was so to whom he joyned himself The Bishops met in Council in Africk answering him when he sought their Communion that not one of them could communicate with him since he had set up Altar against Altar at Rome and made a Schism from Cornelius who before was Legally Ordained the Bishop of that Church 4. Besides for surer maintenance of Union and to compact several Churches together into a closer dependance there are other Heads of Union among the Bishops themselves Such are Metropolitanes and Primates as Titus I conceive was left by St. Paul at Crete where he was to ordain Elders or Bishops in every City and Timothy at Ephesus where he is Directed how he shall exercise jurisdiction and receive accusations against Bishops which Metropolitanes and Primates are to Unite and incorporate many Bishops and their Dioceses into one Province or several Provinces by their Concurrence into one National Church And such an Head of Union the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury is among the Bishops in the English Church And the Ecclesiastical Union to be kept up among us is a Provincial yea a National Union We are to stand united by our Articles and Homilies Liturgy and Canons And these unite not only the Christians of each Diocess or District to their respective Bishops as so many Diocesan Churches but likewise the Bishops and People of all Diocesses into the Provinces of Canterbury and York and those two Provinces into one National Church Accordingly those Articles and Homilies Liturgy and Canons which are the Rules of keeping Unity among us are Provincial and National Acts pass'd by concurrence of Convocations of both Provinces where the Bishops and Clergy meet in Union with and dependance on their respective Metropolitanes who are the respective Heads thereof Now in care of Unity and the Communion of Saints the respective Bishops of each Province or Country are to keep dependant and united to their Metropolitanes The Bishops of every Nation ought to know him who is their Primate and to account him as their Head say the Apostolical Canons It behoves every Man to know his own proper measure say the Fathers in the Council of Constantinople and that neither a Presbyter contemn his own Bishop nor a Bishop contemn his own Metropolitane And bating the case of Heresie if any Bishop on pretence of other personal Crimes shall depart from the Communion of his Metropolitane before Synodical Sentence pass'd upon him he is guilty of Schism and though there is nothing else against him the Holy Synod decrees him to incur a Deposition And so strict was this dependance upon the Alexandrian Patriark or Metropolitane of Egypt binding them in all things to wait for his Sentence to do nothing without him nor beside or against his Approbation that on the deposition of their Metropolitane Dioscorus in the Council of Chaliedon the Egyptian Bishops pray they may not be compell'd to subscribe Pope Leo 's Epistles before they had a New Metropolitane to head them and accordingly their subscription was respitted by the Council till they should have got one And for maintenance of this Union of several Diocesses into one Province by a joynt-dependance of the several Bishops on their Metropolitane and adherence to him it has been the great Rule of the Catholick Church that none shall be made a Bishop of the Province without him In Consecration of Bishops the validity of all that is done shall be reserved to the Metropolitane says the great Council of Nice and if any one is Ordained a Bishop without his consent it determines and calls it a thing altogether manifest that he ought to be no Bishop It has likewise been another Rule thereof for the same purpose that no Synods for the common Concern of the Province be held without them The Metropolitanes being to summon the Bishops of the Province and it not being lawful for any to make Synods of themselves without them who have the Metropoles committed to them as the Council of Antioch declares Yea that no matters of common concern to the Church in any Country or Nation be transacted without him The Bishops of every Country and Nation being in duty bound to own him who is the chief among them c. and to do nothing that looks beyond their own Precincts or Diocesses or referring to the common state of the Church without his sentence as is Ordained in the Apostolical Canons and repeated in the Council of Antioch And the more firmly to secure this regard and dependance which for maintenance of this Provincial Union is due from Bishops to their Metroplitanes they make solemn Oath at their Ordination to pay all due Riverence and Obedience to him as in our own Office of Consecration And as there is this Provincial and National Union of Churches which is thus secured by the dependance of Bishops on their Meropolitanes so may there be National and Provincial Schisms or Breaches thereof And such there are when Bishops and their Clergy and People break off from their Metropolitane not falling or receding from his Ecclesiastical Authority over them and create to themselves an opposite Primate whom they set up against him For then they will make ordinations and hold Provincial or National Synods and dispatch matters of common or National concern without him so breaking all the Rules Provincial or National Union and dividing themselves from their Head as he is call'd in the Apostolical Canons And when once an Anti-Primate or Metropolitane is made the Head of a Schism it spreads it into all Dioceses which will own him and profess to bear Canonical Obedience and Subjection or adhere to him So that in such a Schism all Dioceses of the Province come in who do not disclaim the Schismatical Head and stand off from him 5. Lastly when there is not only a setting up of Schismatical and opposite Heads but moreover this is done in opposition to pure worship and Doctrine and to support unchristian
Corruptions of both Then the way of worship and Tenets themselves are Formed into Parties Men are divided then in opinion and devotion and each way has a distinct body or society visibly to bear them up and profess them And when opposite Communions are thus set up for opposite Worship and Articles mens Communion must go according to their Opinion of the worship and Doctrine For in a breach made for these it will not be expected that men should Unite themselves to those of a contrary minde and keep off from those of the same minde but take part with those who agree with themselves We must Chuse the Church for the sake of the Religion and Unite to that as Christs True Church which sticks to the True Religion Church-Unity and Association always supposing and following True Christian worship and Doctrine but never tying any to go off and separate themselves from the same as I shew'd †before Such will be the effect of the preceding Apostolical and Ecclesiastical Rules for keeping the Unity of the Church and for avoiding Communion with the Schismatical breakers thereof and their Assemblies when a Schism is made by setting up Anti-Bishops to Head immoral or otherwise sinful worship Doctrines or Practices as in the foremention'd Cases The meeting or Communicating in a Schism has a Guilt and Criminalness of its own tho' the matter of all the Prayers were Good and the Preaching Orthodox which they were call'd to communicate in â—â— It alone were a Bar to Communion and would have the forecited Effects as I have shewn But 't is stronger when 't is set up for the Maintenance of Error and corrupt Devotion and when Men are 〈◊〉 into Schism to be drawn on to other Wickedness viz. to make 〈◊〉 of Moral Conscience and to prophane God by immoral-Prayers as they are in the above-named Cases CHAP. VI. Of Ordinations of Anti-Bishops which though always Schismatical are not always Nullities WHat I have said in the foregoing Chapter I think may be sufficient as to the Point of Communion with Anti-Bishops and then Adherents But I conceive it may not be amiss to add something further concerning their Orders since the validity or invalidity thereof â—â— of greatest Consequence and Importance to the Church at such Times One thing indeed is said by St. Cyprian about the Ordaining an opposite or Anti-Bishop against another in a Church already fill'd as when Novatiâ—n was set up at Rome against Cornelius viz. That the Anti-Bishop is no Bishop whence some conclude that in reality he has not the Episcopal Powers conferr'd on him Since after the first there cannot be a second Bishop says he or two Bishops at once in the same Church whosoever is Ordain'd after one is already in who ought to preside alone he is not really a second Bishop but no Bishop at all And if such opposite or Anti-Bishops receive or retain no Episcopal Powers 't is sure they can confer none And then they are really neither Bishops not Priests who are Ordained by them And so neither good Baptisms at least according to the Opinion of the Africanes nor good Sacraments which are of their administring As St. Cyprian and the Africanes answerable to this nulling of the Ordinations null also the Baptisms made by Schismaticks And then on every Ordination of anti-Anti-Bishops against them there would be a new and indispensible Necessity for all the suffering and oppugned Bishops to insist upon their own Powers and Claims lest otherwise the Church should neither have Bishops nor Priests nor the People any valid Sacraments and Church Administrations For the Anti Bishops receiving no Power or Authority for these Administrations from their Ordainers their Ordination being null as he says They can not be impowered according to the Christian Rules of conferring Powers without a New Ordination The conferring of Orders or of Ministerial Powers is tyed by our Lord himself to a particular way viz. Imposition of hands by impowered Persons In point of Orders as of Baptism and the Holy Eucharist the effect is affixed to the Rite of God's Institution So that such Imposition of Hands must give them And if the former Imposition of Hands was null in these Competitions they can not have these Powers of Orders but by a New one The receding of the former Bishop or his ceasing to make any further Competition were they already vested with these Powers by their own Ordination would give the Anti-Bishops scope to exercise the same and to do it alone without any Rent or Division But such Recession is no Ordination nor gives them the Episcopal Powers if they had them not before Yea I add nor would any mere Allowance or after-Ratification of Synods confer the same as I conceive without such New and Valid Imposition of hands When Men pretend they have already received these Spiritual Powers meet Allowance admits of their Pretences But I see not how that alone should confer the Powers if before they wanted them Nor doth mere saying I allow thee to be a Bishop or a Priest without Words not only pre-supposing but actually and from that time conferring Authority upon the Persons seem enough to make them such Which in my Apprehension would make little of the Power of Orders and would be a very lax and cheap Salvo to make good the Usurpations which either now or at any time heretofore have been made by Sectaries upon the Priests Office Besides when they would empower Persons even Synods themselves or Bishops met there can not confer Orders as I say more than Sacraments by what way they please but are bound up as I apprehend to Divine Institutions and are not left to dispose of Ministerial or Episcopal Powers by way of Sentence or of Legislation but only by Imposition of Episcopal Hands But however it might be in the Opinion of St. Cyprian and the African Church of that Age the Africans carrying the effect of Schism farther than others to the Nulling of their Baptisms and Ordinations I think this nulling of all Ordinations of Opposite or Anti-Bishops or making them null in themselves is no Catholick Doctrine nor did the Church tye it self thereto or procede thereby in other Ages The two most Famous Schisms headed by opposite or Anti-Bishops in the Primitive Times and consisting of Men who retain'd the same Faith with the Catholick Church were those of the Novatians and Donaâ—ists But the Ordinations of Anti-Bishops were allow'd to make Men Bishops and Priests in both these Cases One was the Schism of the Novatians which I think presents us with the first setting up of Anti-Bishops in the Christian Church against other Bishops keeping to the same Faith that was profess'd by themselves and which is of the more Account in this Case because of this St. â—yprian himself speaks saying on Account of Novatian when he set up as an Anti-Bishop against Cornelius that the second Bishop is not really secundus but nullus not a second
those who had been Ordained by them Besides all this instead of anti-Anti-bishops being absolutely null and in reality no Bishops to heal and compose the differences of a miserably harassed and divided Church on such Competitions it has been sometimes agreed that whichsoever of them were the Right on the death of either the Survivor should be owned and the Church should have no other Bishop and so all the Ordinations and Episcopal Acts therein should pass through his hands and stand on his Authority whilst he lived Thus it was at Antioch where the Church was divided into Two Parts 〈◊〉 for the cause of the Faith which was common to them both but of the Bishops as Socrates says some owning and adhering to Meleâ—ius and others to Paulinus For to heal and close this lamentable Schism it was agreed which Sozomen calls an admirable Counsel and expedient that on the death of either the survivor should hold the See alone for his Life without being confronted and opposed by the Ordination of any other Person To prevent which an Oath was exacted of all in that Church who seemed to stand fairest for the Episcopate and of Flavianus among the rest that on the death of either of the Bishops they would not be Ordain'd Bishop of Antioch whilst the other survived Which Agreement and Oath being afterwards broke by Flavianus when on the death of Meletius he was Ordained Bishop against Paulinus cost him so much trouble and difficulty as he found to get himself received for the Bishop thereof both in Egypt Arabia and Cyprus and at Rome and among the Western Bishops afterwards Thus though Men in a Schism did ill in Ordaining others yet were not those Ordinations null in themselves but really conferred the powers of Orders which the Persons might exercise if the Church pleased And when once the Persons were reconciled and had satisfied the Church for their Schism they have often been allow'd to officiate in Virtue of that Ordination without being Ordained over again by the greatest Councils and through the early and later Ages of the Church And this shews that their Ordinations were not null in themselves For if such Persons had never received any Spiritual powers in their Ordinations they had none to exercise And had the Church been of this perswasion it would never have admitted them to exercise those POWERS which it believed were never Conferred on them But though these Men even after they had faln into a Schism or others who were Ordained therein had Orders yet was it in the power of the Church to deny them the Ministerial Exercise of their Orders Men must have the Communion of the Church as well as Orders before they can exercise their Orders and minister to the Faithful in any Religious Assemblies And though their Schism doth not utterly devest or exclude them from the Powers of Orders yet it doth from the Communion of the Church without which the Faithful who are not to seek but to shun the Ministrations of Schismaticks and Excommunicate persons must not partake with them in any Exercise of Orders And to this Communion after once they have justly lost and faln from it they are to be restored again in Degree more or less and to be received to the Communion either only of Lay-members or else of Clergy and to officiate according to their former Honors as the Church pleaseth And as to this Admission and Allowance to exercise their Orders in its Communion the Church has acted variously according as it saw cause When Ordinations have been made against the Rules of Unity though the Offenders thereby received Orders yet in care of these Rules and to assert and keep up Discipline it has at some times denyed as well as at other times granted its Communion to them for their Exercise of the same Where it judged that Rigor expedient on their submission it would receive them to communicate as Lay-men But they should not be allow'd the Priviledges nor permitted to act and officiate as Bishops and Priests in her Communion nor should other Churches receive them and joyn with them as such till moreover satisfaction had been first given to those Rules of Unity in Ordinations which had been broken in theirs And this it has done not only in case of this great Rule of not Ordaining a Bishop into a full Church but also in case of other Rules which are of less Account than it is Thus of Ordination into a Church already vacant if it is made without the Metropolitanes consent the Council of Nice and afterwards the Council of Antioch Deâ—rce That the Church shall not receive such an one for a Bishop And of Ordinations at large without declaring the appropriate Church or Place wherein the Person Ordained is to officiate the Council of Chalcedon decrees that they shall be invalid Not to mention or insist also on the Council of Nice's rejecting of the Anti-bishops Ordained by the Schismatick Meletius till they were confirmed by a more holy imposition of hands as their Synodical Epistle says because there was an incapacity more than ordinary for giving Orders not only to Anti-bishops but to any others in his Case which because it may be of use in this Argument I shall give an Account of Meletius was Bishop of Lycus in Egypt under the See of Alexandria and as Epiphanius relates was next in dignity and power to Peter the Bishop of Alexandria himself And he with his Adherents broke off from the Unity of the Church and set up a Schism separating from Peter the Bishop of Alexandria and assembling for Prayers and other Divine Offices by themselves and Ordaining opposite Bishops Priests and Deacons for the erection of opposite Churches in several places as Eleutheropolis Gaza and Aelia as Epiphanius says And these separate erections of Churches and opposite Ordinations he made after he had been justly deposed by Peter in a Synod as we are assured by Athanasius who had the best Opportunities to understand the Truth of these Matters and the most cause to inquire into them and also by Socrates afterwards And that too among other Crimes for his having faln in the Persecution to deny the Faith and to sacrifice to Idols Which Crimes when any Bishop or Clergy were once convicted of by the great Rule of Church-Discipline they were never afterwards to exercise any Clerical Powers or to officiate as Bishops and Clergy but upon their Reconciliation were to be received only to Lay-Communion After such Falls says St. Cyprian 't is in vain for any to seek to usurp the Episcopacy since 't is manifest such Men can neither preside in the Church of Christ nor ought to offer Sacrifice to God Chiefly since it has been Decreed by Cornelius and by Us and by all the Bishops of the whole World concerning them that after such Offence they may be admitted to Penance and the Peace of the Church but must stand
removed from the Honour of the Priesthood and Clerical Orders Accordingly Basilides the Bishop after he had denyed and cursed Christ was very thankful as he says and looked upon it as a great Favour to him that he could be received to communicate as a Lay-man And likewise Trophimus the Bishop when he had sacrificed to Idols was admitted as he tells Antotianus only to communicate as a Lay-man not to usurp the Priests Office any more as some malicious persons had inform'd him which made Antonianus complain of the same to Cyprian as a Violation of this known Rule of Discipline And in Vertue of this being the known and received Rule of the Church the Donatists sought to invalidate and overthrow the Ordination of Caecilian against whom they had set up their Anti-bishop Majorinus at Carthage pretending that Caecilians Ordainers particularly Faelix of Aptisng had been Traditors in the precedeing Persecution or had faln from Christ and deliver'd up their Bibles to be burnt by their persecutors Which Charge had it been true as it was false would have been received and owned for a just Exception on both sides And the Catholicks would have rejected Caecilian till he could make out some better Ordination as well as the Council of Nice did these Egyptian Anti-bishops that had no better Ordainer than Meletius who stood guilty of the like Offence But it was rejected in Caecilians Case as being a malicious Forgery the Donatists thereby impudently laying their own Crimes on others hoping that would hinder men from inquiring after the same in themselves Indeed as Epiphanius relates this Matter Meletius made this Schism and Ordained these Anti-bishops not after he had sacrificed to Idols and had been Synodically condemned by Peter for the same but whilst he as well as Peter was a stout Confessor for the Faith against Idols and in his Zeal for the Discipline of the Church against Peters easiness in admitting the Lapsers who sought to them whilst they were together in Prison for the peace of the Church But Athanasius who was nearer to this Transaction and who after some others was chosen to suâ—ceed Peter in the same Church is more like to understand the Truth of this Affair than Epiphanius was Whom Baronius and Petavius look upon as mislead into this account by some false Acts or Histories of the Meletians who dealt injuriously with Peter and the Catholicks in Egypt like as the Donatists did with Caecilian and those Catholicks in Africk on whom they labour'd to fix the Crime of being Traditors whereof the Catholicks were free but they themselves were notoriously guilty Thus though their Orders were valid in themselves without which they could have been received at no time yet have they not always availed to Claim and obtain the Churches Communion without which the persons could not be received by the Faithful to exercise the same And this has been when the Church saw fit and expedient to insist upon the Rules of Unity in Ordinations and more vigorously to assert Ecclesiastical Law and Discipline And this it might assert or relax as it saw Cause Ecclesiastical Law and Discipline is not a Rule of indispensible Obligation to the Church but such as it may and oft-times has receded from on great reason and necessity What Rules the Church makes the Church may alter and go off from in particular Cases as need shall require and as may best serve those ends for which it made them Accordingly Rules of Discipline have not been one and the same in all Ages For to omit others the ancient Councils asserted the free Election of Bishops nominated here by the Prince to the Bishops of the Province And for bid the Translation of Bishops from poorer to richer Sees And the Attendance of Bishops about Courts of Princes the Council of Antioch confirmed afterwards at Chalcedon and in Trullo forbidding them to go to the Emperor without the approbation and Letters of the Metropolitane And excluded both Bishops and Clergy from intermealing and incumbring themselves with Secular Trusts and Administrations All which are otherwise in these latter Ages And such Rules of Discipline as have been observed more strictly have not had one equal and uniform Tenor of Observation but have been sometimes remitted and sometimes exacted and stood upon as the Church was driven thereto by prudential Reason Thus it has been with the Canons or Rules of Discipline about Ordinations Which as the Church has sometimes insisted on as I noted to vacate the Ordinations which any Bishops made against them I mean to deny the Persons its Communion without which whatever powers of Orders they had received they could not be received in any Assemblies of the Faithful to exercise the same So were they at other times relaxed and over-ruled by the necessities of the Church and the Persons on their reconciliation admitted to officiate in vertue of such Orders as I think may abundantly appear by the fore-cited instances And this very Reason is given for it by the African Fathers in the Synod of Carthage when they admit of the Ordinations of the Donatists which the Transmarine or Italian Synod had rejected telling Pope Anastasius that this Reception of them to the same Orders was for the great necessity of Africk for a †better provision for Catholick Unity and for the benefit and peace of the Church These instances and proofs I think may be sufficient to shew that Anti-bishops and others of their Ordination have Orders though being in a Schism the Faithful ought not to joyn with them in their use thereof Their Schism makes them Sinners in receiving and in using their Orders and shuts out others from communicating therewith But it doth not utterly destroy and null their Orders nor must it be said I conceive that by such sinful Ordination they receive nothing or that whatever they had formerly received they lose by falling into Schism so as that thenceforward they have no Orders nor are Bishops or Priests at all The Donatists indeed as St. Austin reports asserted this and taught that by breaking off from the Church though men did not lose the Baptism which they had received before yet they lost their Orders or the Authority and Power of Baptizing And on pretence thereof they re-baptized those who since the Breach had been baptized by any of the Catholick Clergy As to which he owns that whilst they continue in their Schism they sin in exercising their Orders They do not do right saith he in giving Baptism to others whilst they themselves are broken off from the Church And it is to their own destruction so long as they have not the Charity of Union The having Baptism themselves and confering it on others are both pernicious whilst they continue out of the Bond of Peace But though they ought not to use these powers till they have amended their Schism yet as he
Church can not oblige or hold all the Members thereof to himself as the principle of Unity yet may he have all that is of the essence of Episcopacy For to be an Head of Union in the Church is not of the essence of a Bishop It may be separate from the Episcopal powers as it is in all Bishops falling into Heresie or Schism For they are no longer Heads of Union since none are bound to follow them but all are to break Communion with them But yet they are Bishops still and do not thereby fall from the powers of Ordination nor on their Re-union to the Church need to be Ordained again 'T is true one main use of Episcopacy is to be a means of Unity But yet it is not so for this use as to be nnll or cease when it misses or fails thereof Even as Baptism or the Eucharist are for Unity We being all baptized into one Body and being one Body as partaking all of one Bread as the Apostle says But yet they do not always cease or fail of their effects when administred in breach thereof and Baptism as was held by the ancient Church and as we all hold now is still valid though performed by Schismaticks When they miss of this they have other uses As the Sacraments besides keeping Unity among the Members enter and ratifie the Covenant of Grace And Episcopacy besides the use of keeping the Church one and unbroken is for administration of the Word of Prayers and Sacraments and for Ordaining others to do the same And though all these ought to be exercised in the Unity of the Church and 't is a great Sin when 't is otherwise yet such sinful Exercises are no Nullities as if the Persons had no powers or as if the Administrations had no effect at all In the State Monarchy I grant that the Regal Powers and this use of their being a principle of State-Unity are more closely and constantly connected And that as he who has the Regal Powers is the principle of State-Union so he who is no such principle and to whom the People are not bound to unite has truly no Regal Authority or Powers And in Elective Kingdoms if whilst the Throne is full the Electors whose power of choosing is only in Vacancies pretend to choose another they really confer no Regal power nor make a King but an Usurper This is because secular powers are more limited to Territories and Precincts and because no King can be a King at large but must only be a King of such or such a Place or Countries But in the Spiritual Monarchy 't is otherwise For the Collation and Reception of the Episcopal Powers is not with precise Limitation to such a particular place or Diocess but indefinite or with respect to the Church at large Or expressed as it is in our Form of Ordination by receiving of the Holy Ghost for the Office of a Bishop for the Church of God Which makes any person not a meer Local but a Catholick Bishop or one vested with Episcopal powers and under no want of inherent Authority to exercise Episcopal Acts if as a Conscientious Lover of Unity he be not otherwise restrained by Rules of maintaining Unity and Order in any part of the World The first Bishops being chosen from among the first Converts were first vested with powers and then by gathering more Profelites were to get Subjects and inlarge Territories being Ordain'd Bishops of those who should afterwards believe as St. Clement says And the Holy Apostles who stood vested with all the Episcopal powers were not tyed to any place but by Christs Commission were left equally and indefinitely to the whole Church And till the great Council of Chalcedon which was held about the Year of Christ 451. were the Periodeutai or Circuitors so called as Zonoras observes because they were to go about hither and thither to keep the Faithful in their Duty not having any fixt Place or Chair of their own At the Synod of Laodicea about the Year of Christ 36â— 't is left to these Periodeutas to supply the want of Fixt Bishops in those places and Countries that were not thought considerable enough to have a Bishop fixed among them And afterwards at the time of the Council of Chalcedon mention is again made of them As of one Balentius whom being a scandalous Liver Ibaâ— is accused in the Council to have Ordained Presbyter and Periodeutes And of one Alexander who in the same Council is styled the most Reverend Presbyter and Periodeutes This great Council of Chalcedon indeed forbids any Presbyter or Deacon to be Ordain'd absolutely or at large i. e. without having and declaring the appropriate place or seat wherein he is to officiate and vacates the Ordinations which shall be made otherwise And the same has been done since by the Canons of other Councils forbidding any to be Ordain'd sine Titulo without a Title to some certain Place or Benefice But these Local Limitations or Appropriations of place in giving Orders come not in for the necessity and essence of Ordination And therefore some are excepted therein and allowed still to be Ordain'd without them whose Ordinations are notwithstanding as valid as theirs who are Ordain'd with them Thus Fellows and Chaplains of Colleges and Masters of Arts who have been able to live five years of themselves in the Universities c. are excepted by our own Canon and they who have Patrimony and Provision of Maintenance of their own other ways are excepted by the Canon of the Council of Lateran And if such Limitation of place were of the essence of Ordination they could be but once placed as they are once Ordain'd and not remove from place to place without a new Ordination But they were brought in for a prudent provision to keep the Clergy from being burthensome or to prevent more entring into Orders than are requisite for the Churches Needs or can live upon its maintenance as appears by the Canons themselves Moreover Bishops when for this purpose and for maintenance of Unity and Order they are tyed up to places in their Administrations besides the local relation of Bishops of such a place who are to have a more special regard for their own proper Division they stand also as I have already shewed under another relation of Cathalik Bishops or of Bishops of the Church at large who as there is need of it and as occasion is offered are to have a general inspection and regard too for all the rest The collection of all Churches as St. Cyprian says is but one Episcopate and those many People who are fed and inspected by so many Pastors make all but one Flock Whereof particular Dividends are so intrusted to every single Bishop as to make them stand obliged and accountable not only for their own rata pars that is their proper share or division but as Partners in
which were to show themselves Silly Sâ—eâ—p indeed and prepared for Destruction but to run away from them not to give Ear to False-Teachers and False-Propâ—â—â—s but to keep-out of their Hearing and shut their Eaâ—â— against theâ— and lastly not to strike in with those that cause Divisions but to 〈◊〉 them as St. Paul teaches and as the Rules of the Church have still required Faithful Christians to do by the Makers of Schism Bid him not God speed nor receive the Briâ—gâ—â— of False Doctrine into your Houses 2 Jo. 10 11. Beware of False-Prophets as of Ravening Wolves Mat. 7. 15. Keep not Company with Disorderly VValkers who â—dhere not to the Tradition they received of us 2 Thes. 3. 6 14. Mark â—â—â—m which Cause Divisions and Offences in breaking off and going Contrary to the Doctrinâ— which ye have learned and avoid them Ro. 16. 17. These and such like are the Scripture Riâ—â—es in these Cases Which call the Servants of Christ to withdraw themselves from those who have first seperated and withdrawn themselves from his Worship and Doctrines and instead of them to Adhere to others who as his true Ministers and faithful Pastors stick true to the same and Administer them Pure and Uncorrupt to his Church whereof I shall give a further Account afterwards PART II. Of Deprivations by Civil States or Ecclesiastical Synods Chap. 1. Of the Force of State Deprivations in the foresaid Cases HItherto I have endeavoured to mark out the cases wherein the Bishops and Pastors of Christs Church are bound to exercise their Ministerial Powers and to proceed on duly in their Administrations And to set forth the great and manifold Obligations which are incumbent on them in those Cases And having thus laid out their Obligations I shall next consider the Restraints which at such times are most pleadable in these cases by shewing 2. Secondly of what force a deprivation of state or the Preservation of External Communion and Peace in the Church ought to be in Dâ—barring them thereof 1. First One great thing that may be alledged to silence Faithful Bishops and Ministers of Gods pure worship and Righteousness and to stop the course of their Ministrations in the foresaid Cases is a Deprivation of state when the secular Power by its Laws and interdicts forbids those Ministrations and removes them from their Sees putting others into their places For Bishops and Pastors as they are Ministers of Christ so are they also Subjects of the state And therefore as some think ought not to exercise their Ministry at least not among their Subjects nor in any Diocess of their Dominions in opposition to it And in Christian Kingdoms the Church is incorporated into the state And by the Benefit of this incorporation Bishops and Pastors have their spiritual Ministrations back'd with secular Effects and Censures as Excommunication among us makes lyable to Temporal imprisonment and incapacitates from carrying on any civil suit or Action in the civil courts They have also their jurisdiction extended thereby to some secular matters as the Bishops courts are to matters of Wills Marriages Benefices c. And are encouraged therein by Secular Benefices Honours and Freeholds Now all these secular Fortifications jurisdictions and encouragements in their Ministrations conferr'd on the Bishops and Pastors of an incorporate Church are the gifts of the state and are secular additions to what Spiritual Powers they received from Jesus Christ. And what the state gives the state when it sees cause may deprive them of So that incorporate Ministrations or Administring these Spiritual Powers in the mixt and fortifyed way of an incorporate Church may seem as some will argue more subject to the state to take out of some and to put into other hands Especially considering that in grateful return and commutation for the benefit of incorporation or for being made free of the state and having the secular accessions the Church by Compromise has parted with some of its priviledges to the Civil Power Thus since the incorporation has it in compliance given up to the state the Nomination of Bishops and Metropolitanes belonging anciently to the other Bishops of the Province or to the Clergy and People of the Church And that Rules agreed on in Synods shall be no Canons till they be approved and ratified by the Prince And that there shall be no Admission or Refusal of Clerks to Cures or use of Discipline but in consistence with and under Regulation of the Kings Pâ—erogative and the Laws of the Land and the like And by these Cessions they may seem as some think to have Cut off all Power of Contesting the States Nomination or Advancement to Churches or its Deprivation and Removal from them as having by their account given up these Priviledges in way of bargain and exchange to keep on the benefits and State enjoyments of an incorporate Church But as to this Regard which they ought to have to State deprivations in bar of the foresaid Ministrations I observe 1. First that this Regard is to be press'd only under a supposed Legal and Rightful State For 't is to their Rightful Prince that as good and faithful subjects they owe all their Obedience which is call'd for in these cases What Regard they are to pay as subjects must be to his Deprivation But not if they are deprived by an Usurper set up against him who really has no Regal Authority over them but only pretends to it and assumes a Power which is none of his own Especially if he should deprive them for their Adherence to their Lawful King As if Athaliah had deprived Jehojadah for adhereing to Joash his true Soveraign or as the Reâ—ellious Parliament did depose not only the Bishops and Episcopal Clergy those Faithful Adherers to the Crown but Episcopacy it self in King Charles the First 's time For then as there is no real Authority to bind on so neither would there be any Equity or Colour of Law to back such a deprivation or to oblige the sufferers to acquiesce therein The Law which still supports the Right of the Lawful King against his Usurpation must needs support the Rights of all his Adherents against the same And as still he would be the Legal King so would they not only be the real but in Eye of Law the Legal pastors not withstanding his Forcible Removal of them And therefore there is no room for this regard to a deprivation of State on the Plea of a King de Facto or on supposal of unrighteous usurpation The Legal Right asserted still by the Publick Acts on such Revolutions will give it place to go as far as it can But as for all those who give up the Legal Right 't is not for any of them and 't is well known how considerable a part they make among the writers as well as among the practicers in this point to urge the Authority of a deprivation of State in this question 2. Secondly a Deprivation of a Lawful
state if supposed to pass on Bishops and Ministers would be no conscionable discharge from keepeng on their spiritual Ministrations against such immoralities as are set down in the aforesaid cases For Jesus Christ who gave them their Ministerial Powers requires them as his Ministers and as Pastors of his Church to exercise them for him and for the Souls of Men as I have shewn when those Cases happen And if the State forbids what he commands they are to hear or obey no state or Power on earth against him But must answer as the Apostles did to the Jewish Rulers in this Case whether it be lawful in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God judge ye Act. 4. 18. 19. 20. And thus it must needs be in men who are call'd to be his Ministers under persecuting States and to be Ministers of a Religion which is a Doctrine of the Cross and bids them expect and prepare to bear Crosses under oppressive powers as is plainly the Case of Gospel-Ministers For if they must be his Ministers and administer this Religion in persecutions they must hold on Ministring when the state where they live breaks with them and both most strictly forbids and most cruelly persecutes them for so doing And thus the First Ministers did who were to plant Christianity against all the Edicts and Oppositions of the Heathen or Jewish Magistrates And so did all the Faithful Bishops and pastors thereof who in all the succeeding persecutions of the Church stuck firm to their Ministrations against all the inhibitions and oppressive force of secular Rulers or else our holy Religion had perish'd long since and had never descended pure and perfect as it is to our days And so must all others do in any present or succeeding Tryals which as they always have done so always will seek to suppress Christs worship and Truth by suppressing the pastoral administrations thereof that by their Ministry it may not fail in the Church but be held on the same and continued down to the worlds end But this I say as to their pure spirtual Powers and Ministrations which they neither did nor could receive from the Civil State on which he never conferr'd it but which they hold independantly of Christ Jesus That is what spiritual powers they have received from Christ by imposition of Hands continued down from the Apostles for the feeding and governing of his Church by Administration of the Word of Prayers and Sacraments by leting into the Church and excluding out of it and for providing a constant succession of the same Ministrations by Empowering or Ordaining others These mere spiritual powers they must exercise as his Ministers without regard to any deprivation or inhibition of Worldly Princes For Earthly Kings cannot deprive them of these mere spiritual powers because they have them not from them but Minister therein not by theirs but by Christs Commission If Secular Princes gave them their Commissions to exercise their spiritual Authorities they might recall them If they were the fountain of these powers and could make or ordain Bishops they might have more plea to unmake and deprive them But not originally proceeding from them but from Christ himself by a way of his own prescribing in a succession of Apostolical imposition of Hands through all Ages of the Church They cannot be reversed by their deprivation Nor are the Bishops and Pastors to be debarr'd the exercise thereof in any Case where Christ requires it at their inhibition because they are Christs Servants more than theirs and must obey God rather than man But 3. Thirdly as for any Temporal accessions and enforcements of these mere spiritual Ministrations which the Church receives when once it is shone upon by earthly powers and made incorporate or free of the State These Accessions are borrowed Powers and the Gift of Princes and under the deposition of a Lawful state the Bishops and Ministers of Christ must not challenge or pretend to them As to these I observe 1. That the civil state hath Power over these Temporal Accessions secular endowments because it confer'd them When Kings and Queens turn Christians they come not in only as members to partake in these mere spiritual Ministrations but as Patrons by their secular power to back and Promote them They must shew themselves Nursing-Fathers and Nursing-Mothers as was foretold by the Prophet and serve the Lord as Kings that is by employing their Kingly Power to encourage and advance his service doing him those services which none can do but themselves as St. Austin tells them Thus to give encouragement and leisure for the Ministers to attend on these Ministrations without distraction the civil State endows them with benefices or worldly freeholds Honors and priviledges It also allots them publick and Authorized places for these Ministrations and makes Civil Laws requiring people duly to resort to them and punishing all disturbers of them and such as carry themselves indecently thereat It likewise adds a secular jurisdiction to the spiritual extending the spiritual jurisdiction to the Cognizance of Wills Marriages Benefices c. which are Civil matters and backing it by Temporal Accessions in the spiritual parts thereof making a mixture and Concurrence of Religious and civil powers in the spiritual Courts For thus the Ruâ—ricks it passes into Laws and the Canons also which are the Rules of exercising that jurisdiction it binds on the Subjects with the Kings Approbation and Ratification or with a Civil strengthing And the Spiritual censures or judgements according to these Rules it backs with civil penalties as imprisonment or with putting men under civil incapacities as to plead in an Action at Law or the like Now all these Temporal Helps and Accessions come not to the Bishops and Ministers immediately from Christ or as they are Ministers of Religion For His Kingdom is not of this world Nor was he whilst on earth any judge in civil matters Nor doth he confer any such worldly powers or grant any such commissions But all these secular benefices and fortifications in all the parts of the spiritual Ministry are the gifts of Princes They flow from their favour to the Church or from their taking upon them to be its Temporal Patrons or it's Nursing Fathers and Nursing Mothers And as the Bishops and Ministers of Christ hold them only by their commission So may they lose them by their recalling it So that although the state has no power either to give or to deprive the Ministers of Christ of their mere spiritual powers Yet has it a direct Authority to grant or deprive them of these Temporal Additionals And therefore the Bishops and Ministers of Christ in an incorporate Church when they are deprived by their Rightful Prince or by a Legal State must exercise their mere spiritual powers in the foresaid Cases without any of these civil effects or mixtures That is they can only Administer the Word and prayers and Sacraments
offices and dutys as to their Rooms Spiritual doth appertain And Queen Elizabeths injunctions disclaim all challenging of any Authority and Power of Ministry of Divine Service in the Church by Vertue of the Supremacy And the 37th Article of Religion declares That thereby we give not our Princes the ministring either of God's Word or of the Sacraments And the Statute of Queen Elizabeth says The Oath of Supremacy shall be taken and expounded in such form as is set forth in the Queens Admonition annexed to her Injunctions They are the Ministers of God in their Dominions as St. Paul says But that is as Kings not as Priests So that the Kings Supremacy in Ecclesiastical Matters doth not imply the Power of the Keys which the King has not says Mr. Mason And by the Supremacy we do not attribute to the King the power of the Keys or Ecclesiastical Censures as Bishop Andrews observes We never gave our Kings the power of the Keys or any part of either the Key of Order or the Key of Jurisdiction purely spiritual says Bishop Bramhall And this bounding of their Claims and Pretences of Power is suitable to what we find among those Godly Jewish Kings and Christian Emperors to whom our Churches Articles and Canons about Supremacy refer As to the Jews it appertaineth not unto thee O Uzziah to burn incense unto the Lord but to the Priests that are consecrated thereto say the Priests to King Uzziah when he would assume to himself the Priests Office for which God miraculously smote him with a Leprosie upon the place 2 Chron. 26. 16 18 19 20. And the Lord hath chosen you to stand before him to serve and minister unto him and to burn incense says King Hezekiah to the Levites 2 Chron. 29. 11. And the like appears of the godly Christian Emperors who were told by their Holy Bishops and profess'd of themselves That they were no Priests and that their power of Empire did not swallow up the Sacerdotal powers God hath intrusted the Affairs of the Kingdom in your hands but those of the Church in ours And as we may not lawfully take upon us to act as Kings so neither have you Authority O Emperor to burn incense or usurp the Priests Office said the Great Hosius in his Epistle to the Emperor Constantius To you it appertains externally to punish but to us to judge and determine what is Heretical and impious say Elusius and Sylvanus and the other Bishops to the same Constantius The Royal Purple makes men Emperors but it doth not make them Priests says St. Ambrose to the Emperor Theodosius As Christians and Godly Emperors they used their Imperial Power and Soveraignty about Church-Matters But that was not privative to deny the Pastors of the Church or to bereave them of their Power but Cumulative to add the Imperial Power which was of another kind to the Spiritual thereby to back their Acts and to make them bind the faster Thus when they sent Count Candidianus to the Great Council of Ephesus the Emperors Theodosius and Valentinian declare in their Letter to the Council That it was to keep good Order and to see fair Debates but with Orders not to intermeddle in determining Questions of Faith and Ecclesiastical Matters which say they is lawful only for the Bishops And when the Emperor Marcian came in person at the passing the Definitions of the Great Council of Chalcedon it was not as he tells them in his Speech to the Council to make Demonstration of his own Power therein but to give greater firmness to what they had done in the Exercise of theirs Which he doth by Ratifying the same by secular Penalties as by Banishment of Citizens Disbanding of Souldiers and Deposition of Clery and by other Punishments after the Determinations of the Council had been read and the Bishops had owned and subscribed the same before him When the Imperial Purple came to confirm a Pastoral Act it gave a new Authority to that which had Authority in it self before or as Justinian speaks in his Confirmation of the Episcopal Sentence or Anathemaon Zoaras which says he having a validity from it self or Authenticalness of its own the Crown makes yet more valid or of more Authority by adding to it a secular Penalty The Episcopal or Spiritual Authority is by too many unjustly slighted and therefore the Secular Authority is both humbly call'd in and piously comes in to its help since those irreligious Contemners of the Spiritual Power will stand more in awe of the Secular Coming in by their Secular Authority to help and back the Church in those things wherein men would otherwise contemn the Authority of the Bishops as the Fathers express it in the Council of Carthage So that the Imperial Power even whilst employ'd about Church-Ministrations all the time supposes but doth not swallow up the Pastoral Powers nor doth its Ecclesiastical Supremacy lye nor was ever thought so to do either by our Church or by those Times whereto it refers in their being vested with or having a soveraign Disposal of the Powers of Orders But 2. Secondly it lyes 1. First In retaining their civil Power over all Persons whether Lay-men or Ecclesiasticks The Civil State was first in Being and men were Subjects of the State when Christianity came to be proposed to them and planted among them The Church is in the Common-wealth not the Common-wealth in the Church as Optatus says And when men became Members or Ministers of the Church they did not thereby cease to be Subjects of the State or owe ever the less Duty unto it Let every Soul be subject unto the Higher Power is meant of Ecclesiasticks as well as others It takes in all tho' an Apostle tho' an Evangelist tho' a Prophet or whosoever else as St. Chrysostom notes And therefore Princes may lay their civil Commands and inflict their civil Punishments upon Ecclesiasticks as well as upon their other Subjects They may put them under Fines or Imprisonments or banish them out of their Dominions or any parts thereof as Claudius did the Jews from Rome or as Domitian did St. John into Patmos where he wrote his Revelations and as Constantius and Valence did the Orthodox Bishops in the Arian Persecutions And true Pastors are bound to submit to this like as other Subjects are either from Heathen or Heretical Emperors and even in hard and unjust Cases as in the foresaid Instances And if any under sentence of Banishment inflicted on certain Persons not on the whole Cause return into his own Country without Leave of the civil Power if being caught he suffer for it he dies not as a Christian but as a Malefactor says St. Cyprian So that Bishops and Ministers are no exempt Persons but are to own their Kings as their civil Soveraigns and are as much bound to pay Obedience to their civil Laws and are
under the Cognizance of their civil Courts as others are And this civil Subjection of Ecclesiastical Persons against the Papal Exemptions thereof is the main thing in the Ecclesiastical Supremacy claimed by our Kings In the Injunctions of Queen Elizabeth and in the Canons of King James this Supremacy is called the highest Power under God whereto all Men within the same Realms by God's Law owe most Loyalty and Obedience afore and above all other Powers and Potentates in Earth Her Majesty say the Injunctions again thereby neither doth nor ever will challenge any other Authority than was lately used and was of antient time due to the Imperial Crown of this Realm that is under God to have the soveraignty and rule over all manner of Persons born within her Dominions of what Estate either Ecclesiastical or Temporal soever they be so as no other Foreign Power shall or ought to have any superiority over them By Supremacy or chief Government says the 37th Article of Religion we give only that prerogative which we see to have been always given to all godly Princes in Holy Scriptures by God himself that is that they should rule all States and Degrees committed to their Charge by God whether they be Ecclesiastical or Temporal and restrain with the civil Sword the Stubborn and Evil-doers And the Oath of Supremacy as King James the First declared only extended to the Kings Power of Judicature over all Persons as well Civil as Ecclesiastical excluding all foreign Powers and Potentates to be Iudges within his Dominions All which plainly make the Ecclesiastical Supremacy to lye mainly in having Bishops and Ministers or the Ecclesiastical State who were broke off from it by the Papal Exemption under the same common Obligation to the civil Soveraign with other Subjects or under the Tye of civil Subjection In vertue of this civil power over their Persons as his Subjects he can command them faithfully to discharge their Duties and Functions And that not only as Subjects in civil Matters but as Ministers in divine Offices For as he is the civil Soveraign the Temporal Magistrate is the Keeper of both Tables being to keep his Subjects in Godliness as well as in Honesty as St. Paul says And is to use the civil Sword for sins against Religion as well as for sins against the State and in his way to punish Ministers for Neglect or Abuse of their spiritual Functions as well as for Breach of the civil Peace Thus good Kings as Hezekiah and Josiah employed their temporal power to cut off corrupt administrations and to reform Abuses of Worship and Religious Offices in the Jewish Church As Constantine and other good Christian Kings and Emperors did afterwards in other Nations And the 37th Article of our Church declares That by his Supremacy the King with the civil Sword may restrain the stubborn and evil-doers whether Laicks or Ecclesiasticks And on this Account Constantine calls himself the Minister of God for the Coercion and Punishment of wicked Bishops And at his Entertainment of the Bishops tells them That God has appointed them the Bishops of things within the Church and him the Bishop of things without it and that it belongs to him as Bishop of Bishops to see they discharge their duties and be pious Thus the Emperors Theodosius and Valentinian say That God by setting them to reign had made them the Bond both of the piety and of the external welfare and security of those who are subject to them the connexion betwixt which two their study was to preserve inviolable And in this Kings saith St. Austin according as God commands them do serve the Lord as they are Kings when they enjoyn good things and prohibit evil things in their Kingdoms And that not only in Matters pertaining to humane society but also in Matters pertaining to our Holy Religion And thus by means of his civil Power over Spiritual Persons has the King the like Power over Spiritual Acts Functions viz. as he can require and by the civil Sword compel them whom Christ has empowered thereto in his Dominions to exercise the same I mean to exercise them according to the Rules of God's Word and of their own Spiritual Function his Power lying in calling them to do their duties not to any Neglect or Breach thereof As we see was observed not only by the Godly Jewish Kings but also by the Primitive Emperors whose civil Laws and Edicts in these Matters still followed the spiritual Rules and Duties and were a secular Enforcement to drive all Ecclesiasticks to keep them not to Transgress them Our Laws do not disdain to follow the Sacred and Divine Canons the civil power in these Matters enforcing that which the Church had first prescribed says the Emperor Justinian And accordingly in the Civil Law for Restraint of Excommunications we forbid our Bishops saith he to Excommunicate any without a just Cause be shewn for it We forbid all Bishops and Presbyters saith another Law to exclude any from the Communion before Proof of such a Cause for which this is commanded to be done by the Ecclesiastical Canons So by his Imperial Power over their Persons commanding their Ministrations and limitting them therein to their own Rules And thus the King like as the Jewish Kings and Primitive Emperors were is supreme in these spiritual Acts and Administrations as in his Dominions they are all to be sped and administer'd not by independant Forreigners but by his own Subjects or as having the supream earthly Command of Bishops and Priests who are bound in civil Obedience to him as their Temporal Soveraign to exercise them when he requires it And this way he can give Final Justice to all his Subjects in all spiritual as well as temporal Matters having Authority to command his Bishops and Clergy to do it in the one as well as his Judges and temporal Ministers to do it in the other And by this power of doing it by their Means or Ministrations is his Supremacy set off Thus in the Statute for the Restraint of Appeals the King is declared to be the one supream Head endowed with plenary Power and Authority to render Final Justice in all Causes because the spirituality or his Bishops and Clergy can administer and determine all that belongs to their spiritual Offices and the Judges and other his temporal Ministers can do the like for Tryal of Property and Conservation of civil Peace The Kings Supremacy in Ecclesiastical Matters doth not imply the power of the Keys which he has not but he may command those who have them to use them rightly says Mr. Mason This Supremacy is preserved if he take care that those who have the power of Ecclesiastical Censures do exercise them says Dr. Burhil He has plenary power to render final Justice that is to receive the last Appeal of his own Subjects without any fear of any
Carthag Can. 70. * Non enim Respublica est in Ecclesia sed Ecclesia in Republica id est in Imperio Romano Optat. l. 3. p. 64. Ed. Par. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Chrysost. in loc * Act. 18. 2. †Rev. 1. 9. * Alius in eam Patriam unde extorris factus est regreditur ut deprehensus non jam quasi Christianus sed quasi nocens pereat Cyp. Ep. â—3 p. 29. 30. Ed. Ox. * Injun ◠†Caâ— 1. * In the Admonition * King James's Apology for the Oath of Alleg. p. 263. * 1 Tim. 2. 2. ‖ 2 King 18. 4. * 2 Kin. 23. 4 5 6 7 8 11. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ap. The. od Hist. Eccl. l. 1. c. 20. †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Euseb. de vita Constant. l. 4. c. 24. ‖ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Concil Ephes. Part 1. c. 32. p. 225. Tom. 2. Con. Ed. Bin. * In hoc enim Reges sicut eis divinitus praecipitur Deo serviunt in quantum Reges sunt si in suo Regno bona jubeant mala prohibeant non solum quae pertinent ad humanam societatem verum etiam quae ad divinam Religionem Aug. contra Crescon Grammat l. 3. c. 5. Tom. 7. Ed. Col. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Justin Novel 83. †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cod. Justin. l. 1. Tit. 3. L. 30. ‖ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Justin. Novel 123. c. 11. * 24. H. 8. c. 12. 1. * Rex â—as claves non habet habentibus tamâ—n ut eis recte utantur pro suo jure imperare pâ—test Mas. de Minist Angl. l. 3. 3. 3. p. 271. †Of the Kings Supremacy in his Answer to Becanus p. 22. p. 244. ‖ Bishop Bramhall's Just Vindication c. p. Op. 63. vid. p. 230. * Stat. 24. H. 8. c. 12. 2. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Justin. Novel 131. c. 1. ‖ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cod. Justin. l. 1. tit 3. L. 45. * Stat. 25. H. 8. â— 19. * Stat. 25 Eliz. e. 29. * Stat. 32. H. 8. c. 26. * That We are supream Governour of the Ch. of Engl. and that if any difference arise about the External Policy concerning the Injunctions Canons or other Constitutions whatsoever thereto belonging the Clergy in their Convocation is to order and settle them having first obtained Leave under our Broad Seal so to do and we approving their said Ordinances and Constitutions providing that none be made contrary to the Laws and Customs of the Land His Majesties Declaration before the 39 Articles of Religion * 24. H. 8. c. 12. * Vindication of a Discourse against the New separation p. 11. ‖ A Vindication of their Majesties Authority to fill the Sees of the Deprived Bishops p. 18 19 20. or as they should be marked p. 22 23 24. * P. 20. * P. 20. * P. 17. Vindication of their Majesties Authority to fill c. p. 23. 24. 25 26. †1 Kin. 2. 26 27. and Joseph Antiqui l. 8. c. 1. * Heb. 9. 7. * 1 Kin. 2. 26. * Antiq. l. 8. c. 1. * In 2 Sam. 15 27. 1 King 1. 34. ‖ In 1 King 4. 4. * Vid. Dr. Light Temple Serv. c. 3. p. 905. Tom. 1. Op. * Antiq. l. 18. c. 3. * Dr. Smith de Ecclesiae Graecae statu hodierno p. 52 53. And Sir George Wheelers Travels l. 2 p. 195. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * Rom. 9. 3. vid. Theod. in loc Chrysost †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Soc. Hist Eccl l. 7. c. 34. p. 377. ‖ Chap. 3. 4 Part 3. * Gal. 1. 8. * Part 3. c. 3. 4. * Article 20. * Article 21. * Ver. 2. †Mat. â—0 â—7 * Mat. 18. 17 11. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. ‖ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Photius Pats Constant. Epist. Michaeli Metropol Mitylenes Epist. Photii 116 p. 157. * Luk. 6. 22 23. * As Can. Antioch 4 5 16. vid. Con. Chalced. Part 2. Act. 4. p. 324. p. 319. Part 2. Act. 11. p. 406. Tom. 3. Conc. Ed. Bin. †Concil Chalced. Can. 1. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 †L. 2. c. 20. ‖ L. 3. c. 11. †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Soz. l. 3. c. 10. p. 511. * Hist. Eccl. l. 3. c. 8. p. 507. * Apol. 2. adv Arian sub â—it †â—â— p. 739. ‖ 〈◊〉 ad Solit. p. 816 * l. 3. c. 8. p. 597. * Soz. ib. p. 508 * Ep. ad Solit. p. 818. * L. 1. c. 28 * L. 3. c. 5. p. 501. * Ap. Soc. Hist. Ecc. l. 2. c. 23. p. 109. 110 111. * Held An. 419. ‖ Held An. 347. †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Bals. ad Can. 12. Concil Sardic * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Concil Sardic Can. 14. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Conc. Carth. Can. 32. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Conc. Const. 1 2 Dict. Can. 15. * 2 Cor. 13. 8. * Schismata quibus scinderet unitatem Cyp. de unit Eccl. p. 105. 119. In Schismatis Partes Christi Membra distrahere Catholicae Ecclesiae Corpus unum scindere ac laniare nituntur id Ep. 44. p. 86. †Homil. 3. in 1 ad Cor. c. 1. v. 10. on 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ‖ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * Eph. 3. 15. ‖ Eph. 2. 19. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ‖ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * Chrysos Hom. 10. in Ep ad Eph. c. 2. * Eph. 4. 6. c. 3. 15 †Eph. 2. 19. ‖ Eph. 4. 5. * Eph. 2. 19. ‖ Eph. 4. 4. * Eph. 4. 5. * Eph. 4. 4 15 16 ‖ Ad quam unitatem redigens Ecclesiam Suam denuo dicit erit â—nus Grex unus Pastor Cyp. Eâ— 69. p. 182. * Hom. 10. in Ep. ad Eph. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Zon. in Can. 55. 56. Ap. vid. Can. Ap. 34. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ‖ Rev. 1. 20. * 2 Cor. 2. 10. ‖ Ep. 59. p. 129. †〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ignat. Epist. ad Eph. pag. 21. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ignatius Epist. ad Philad pag. 43. Ed. Voss. * Illi sunt Ecclesia Plebs Sacerdoti adunata Pastori suo Grex adherens Unde scire debes Episcopum in Ecclesia esse Ecclesiam in Episcopo Cyp. Ep. 66. p 168. Ecclesia super Episcopos constituatur Id. Ep. 33. p. 66. ‖ Et si qui cum Episcopo non sint in Ecclesia non esse Cyp. ubi supra Ep 66. p. 168. †Vos-alium Episcopum fieri consensisse id est quod nec fas est nec licet fieri Ecclesiam aliam constitui Cyp. Ep. 46. p. 89. So of Novitianus setting up his Pseudo-Bishops in other Churches he says Humanam conatur Ecclesiam sacere post Dei Traditionem viz. After those Ordain'd in the Churches by Apostolical