respect to St. Austin as a Bishop and his junior in age yet so far his superiour although St. Austins humility indeed so far Complements with and cools the others heat as to say that although Bishop Austins precedency before Presbyter Jerom was by Ecclesiastical use and custom very old Apostolical and universal yet as to the truth of personal worth and eminency of merit Presbyter Jerom was above Bishop Austin Had Bishops and Presbyters in our days carried this equanimity to each other it had been happyer for both § But if Presbyters were clearly of the same 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 adequate in their holy Orders and Ecclesiastical Power as to the main which is not easily proved nor was of old so judged by the Fathers for even St. Jerom excepts Ordination as a peculiar belonging to Bishops both in fact and in right for ought appears as Successors to the twelve Apostles who were above the Seventy in point of precedency inspection power and jurisdiction yet the fancy of equality as to Bishops and Presbyters was chiefly fomented by some latter Schoolmen who urged this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Bishops and Presbyters to advance the Popes throne and Soveraignty above Bishops from whose authority Monks and Friars coverted exemption as immediately under the Popes visitation who commonly were old men far off and had dim eyes to see the Monastick disorders Besides the Parasites of the Pope were also to magnifie the later device of Transubstantiating and that Mass power of all Presbyters so high as none might or could exceed it if true yet still the eminent degree and exercise of Bishops as to the Polity and government of the Church both for general inspection and chief jurisdiction for Ordination and Discipline for presidency as well as precedency authority as order was never of old questioned much less denied as Antichristian being as rational and suitable to Religious Order yea and as Christian or Evangelical as for one to be Provost or Master of a Colledge over many Fellows possibly as good men and Schollars as himself or for some Commanders to be over fellow-Souldiers or for some Citizens to be Magistrates over other Freemen or for Parents to own their authority or superiority over their children when they are men and women of the same nature and stature with themselves The levelling of mankinde throughout in State and Church Of levellings in Church and State in Civil Military and Ecclesiastical power because in some things they are equal is but a policy and project of the great author of confusion 1 Cor. 14.33 the God of order appointed of old and approves for ever different degrees ranks and stations in his Church according as men are fitted by him with gifts for government in such ways of meet superiority and subordination as preserves order and deserves respect Exod. 6.25 as the Priests of Aarons family so of the whole Tribe of Levi had their ranks and orders their duties degrees and distances there were Heads and Fathers and chief Fathers of their Tribes and Families as well as of others which the Septuagint render 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dâ—â— â— 15 Bishops or Overseers of them and this not onely in age and primogeniture by nature and years but officio praelatura by office and authoritative power so to oversee not as a bare Spectator but as Shepherds or Masters of Assemblies 1 Tim. 5.19 Tit. 2.15 who did rebuke with all Authority yea and reject in cases of demerit And then was it also by St Pauls example and prescription to Timothy and others among the Christian Churches who in the worst times never wanted their good Bishops nor in good time that love honor and obedient regard to them as to their Fathers in the Lord when they were worthy of that name and office The name Father is sanctum suave nomen Of the Name Father its highest sense belongs to God in comparison of whom none is to be called or counted a Father as Christ spake Nemo tam pater Mat. 3.23 nemo tam pius as Tertullian Ambitiosius Patris nomen quam Domini heri exigit God hath an ambition rather to be called Father by us and so treated than Lord and Master Therefore our Saviour begins his and our prayer with Our Father This venerable Name breatheth all comforts this mindeth us of and bindeth us to all filial love this racks us from the sowre dregs of servile fear 1 Iohn 4.18 he that can say this proem or first word Our Father with true faith to God and charity to man need not doubt to go on in that perfect prayer Since men lost their charity to others and their filial regard to God and their reverence to their parents they have avoided to use the saying or praying of the Lords prayer as afraid and ashamed of it because it binds them at the very first word to their good behaviour by the bands of piety to God in Father and of charity to men in Our which no factions or schisms no sinister interests and ends no Pharisaick pride or singularity can endure no more than Witches can the Creed or the unruly Demoniack the presence of Christ § Yet no man is or can be further happy than he hath and owns God for his Father 1. in creation and providence Father of the whole Family in heaven and earth Eph. 5.3 2. In Christ as sending his Son into the world a Redeemer for all men without exception in the value merit and offer of his sufferings and in that conditionate capacity into which every one is by Christ put upon his faith and repentance to be saved and owned as the brother of Christ and Son of God 3. And lastly God is a Father by those special effects of regeneration and grace which follow that immortal seed of his Word and motions of his Spirit where they fall upon broken and contrite spirits not upon hard hearts Mat. 13.5 or fallow and stony ground which refuse the reception and damp the operation of those holy means that are both able and apt to work the life of faith repentance and love in a reasonable soul This highest account of the name Father is only to shew how much it imports of honor love merit and duty being a branch rooted in God and from his goodness springing to his creatures § Why God communicates to men the name of Father But this relative name of Father is none of the incommunicable ones God is pleased to lend the graving or character of it to mankinde and to stamp this paternal honor and Majesty upon some men in natural civil and ecclesiastical respects Hence the first command of the Second Table or the last of the first is that caution to honor father and mother a duty of piety and religion as well as of morality civility humanity and polity God is concerned as despised and injured in any indignities offered to
any Parents It was stoning to death Deut. 21.20 by which God would have the honor of the meanest Parents though poor and old weak and simple asserted against their sturdy and proud children while yet under their roof and discipline § Next these Princes and Magistrates have the name as of Gods and Lords so of Fathers Patres Patriae and of nursing Mothers after these the Priests and Prophets of old were called Fathers So the King of Israel returns the very same compellation to Elisha dying which he gives here to Eliah thus in the Gospel St. 1 Cor 4.15 Paul owns his merit so far though you have had many teachers or instructers yet not many Fathers for he had first begotten them to the faith by his preaching the Gospel to them so in the antient Christian-Churches though they had many Presbyters as Instructers or Consecrators yet the Bishops were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by a special honor as Successors to the Apostles in paternal inspection and authority as begetting Sons to the Church by instruction and patres minores lesser Fathers or Presbyters by Ordination called Patres then also Patriarchs were Patres patrum which by way of gemination brought in the two first syllables Pa Pa not from the Syriack Abba transposed but from the first syllables of Pater and Patriarcha or Pater Patrum into the Church as before into the Imperial State from Pater Patriae to make up Papa which title the Bishop of Rome hath monopolized when of old it was given to other Patriarchs and Bishops § This is certain The duty as well as dâ—gnity implyed in the name Father God that communicates the name of Father to Magistrates in State or Pastors or Bishops in the Church doth withal teach and exact the duties imported in the name Father First Father in Magâ—stracy Both Governors in Church and State should delight rather in that exercise which is Paternal than despotical fatherly than imperious or Lordly much less tyrannick to remember they govern sons not slaves and for Gods glory not for their own profit pomp and pleasure their design and work must be to glorifie God and by doing good with a fatherly freedom and indulgence to deserve the love of others Although they cannot have it from ingrate and ungracious children yet they shall finde God a Father to them when they have carried themselves as Fathers to others Specially Church Governors which were of old in England Fathers in the ministry of the Church and in all Christian Churches Bishops as chief Fathers chosen by the Presbyters approved by the people and endowed with estate and civil honor by Christian Princes these as such must not in their greatest eminency affect 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Pet. 5.3 to exercise dominion after the way of the secular sword and severity over Ministers or people but only as Fathers and Spiritual Lords for edification not destruction with gravity not austerity with meekness of wisdom not rigidness of passion yea and as to that civil Dominion which is consistent with spiritual jurisdiction when any are both Bishops and Soveraign Princes which may very well meet in one man for what hinders a Prince as George of Anhalt to be a Bishop or Preacher of his Gospel who is Prince and Priest of his Church here they must the more make the world to see they bear the double name of Father to their people such paternal Bishops we had heretofore in England and such indeed was this worthy Prelate and such Fathers we might have had still if that had not been fulfilled among us Filius ante diem c. some Sons are impatient not to antidate their Fathers death and destinies or longer to expect the reversion of their estates § It is true that double honor which the piety and munificence of Christian Princes and States had bestowed on Bishops as Fathers in chief and other Ministers of the same relation though a lower station in the Church both as to ample revenues and some secular jurisdiction or dignity to give them greater advantages to improve their spiritual and paternal authority more to the glory of God and the good of Christian people as to instruction protection and relief these ought not in any sort to leaven or overlay those condescending Graces and paternal tendernessse which are the greatest eminencies of any Church-man and which may with all pious industry humility charity and hospitality be maintained and exercised by them without any diminution of their civil dignity or ecclesiastical authority as was frequently evidenced by our learned religious hospitable charitable and honorable Bishops in England when they lived both as Lords and as Fathers governing and doing good § Of civil honour added the Fathers the Church So that it cannot be other than a most partial and sinister perverseness in men of evil eyes and envious hearts to fancy that no learning study devotion diligence and prudence in any Minister or Clergyman is capable to merit or enjoy either such honorable estates and salaries or such eminent places and dignities as Counsellors and Senators as Lords and Peers in Parliament to which we see many mens meer riches and worthless money or their lower abilities and industries in legal and civil affairs or their military hardiness and prowess may actually advance them yea and this in a civil intestine War where victory it self is sad and untriumphant yet we have lived to see many short-lived Gourd-Lords created in a chaos of times from very small principles or preexistency of birth estates breeding or worth and this in one day by a kinde of superfetation of honor and these to sit as right honorable ones in another House and to supply the vacant Seats of the antient Barons of England which were Peers in Parliament and consisted of Lords Spiritual and Temporal who had not either forfeited their honor or deserted their places and duties but were driven out by such power as they could not withstand § But not to touch that harsh string too hard we see the Bishops of England have had no great cause to envy those that cast them out as to that honor of having a place in Parliaments since from that time the Nation hath scarce enjoyed one good day nor themselves that fulness and freedom that honor and happiness which of old belonged to the majesty of English Parliaments § This is certain that the name of Lord did not as it ought not to make a venerable Bishop of the Church forget his former name and softer relation of a Father the first is now confined much to denote civil order and secular dignity but the second implies not only natural temporal and humane but spiritual divine and eternal endearments importing that plentitude of paternal love and goodness as is never to be exhausted scarce obstructed for what such unworthiness was ever in children which the benignity and bowels of a Father is not ready to forgive and
to be cloathed So our Saviour breathed on the Apostles Ioh. 20.21 22. when he said Receive the Holy Ghost So the Apostles used imposition of hands to denote their ordained Successors 1 Tim. 5.22 and 4.14 Heb. 6.6 which ceremony the Church of Christ in all ages hath observed in the successive Ordinations of Bishops Presbyters and Deacons as one of the fundamentals of the Churches polity order and power Not that these outward Rites and Ceremonies are of the essence of the duty of the divine power but for the evidence of that order and authority which is necessary that there may be nothing dubious or doubtful or confused or upon bare presumptions and conjectures in the Churches sacred Ministry but such an authority as is both powerful in its efficacy and pregnant and signal in its derivation and execution that none might undertake the work who is not constituted to be a Workman nor any withdraw from it who is rightly furnished for so worthy a Work as the Apostle calls the work of a Bishop either the minores Episcopi which are orderly Presbyters or the majores Presbyteri which are the paternal Bishops We see Eliahs spirit falls on none but his annointed Successor The spirit and power follows the lawful succession nor was any so fit for the appointment and succession as Elisha a man indeed of plain breeding of a country yet honest way of living which is no prejudice or impediment when God intended to furnish him with Eliahs spirit 1 Kings 19.19 with extraordinary gifts and endowments with the power from on high as Christ did his fishermen when he made them fishers of men Luk. 5.10 This was in one hour more to their improvement than all Schools and Vniversities all literature and education all languages arts sciences and Scriptures But when these special gifts which were miraculous are not given nor needful in the ordinary ministration propagation and preservation of Religion there reading and study and diligence and education and Schools of the Prophets are the conduits of Gods good and perfect gifts conveyed by holy industry and prayer to those that study to shew themselves workmen that need not to be ashamed 2 Tim 2 15. when once they are sanctified or set apart by God and the Church as here Elisha was In whom doubtless God and Eliah had seen something that expressed a very gracious and sincere heart by an humble holy Elisha's fitness to succeed Eliah and unblameable life We never finde that men of leud or scandalous lives are called to be Prophets of God or allowed to be made Preachers and Bishops of the Church wherein the antient Canons of the Affrican and other Churches were very strict and circumspect whom when and how they were ordained Bishops Presbyters or Deacons St. Paul requires that they should be not only unblameable but of good report even among the Heathens and unbeleivers as to matters of Justice Morality and common honesty as well as sound and orthodox in the Christian faith § Elisha discovers an excellent spirit and fit for a Prophet of God 2 Kings 2.2 4 6 not only by his individual adherency to Eliah three times piously disobeying his commands when he bade him leave him As the Lord liveth and as thy soul liveth I will not leave thee The love of good company is a good sign of a good conscience a very good way to a good life and a ready means to make us partakers of spiritual gifts but further Elisha shews a most devout and divine soul in him fit to make a Prophet to succeed Eliah when first he doth not preposterously and presumptuously obtrude himself upon the holy Office and Succession but attends Gods call and the Prophets appointment of him Secondly When he sees it is the will of God and his father Eliah he doth not morosely refuse or deprecate and wave the imployment as some had done Moses and Jeremiah after though he knew it would be heavy and hot service in so bad times but submits to that onus no less than honos burthen as well as honor God imposeth on him Thirdly In order to his support and encouragement in the work he doth not covetously or ambitiously look to the preferment or honor or profit which might easily follow such an imployment especially if merchandise might be made of miracles as Gehazi designed and of the Gospel if Ministers turned Sucklers and Hucksters of the word of God as the Apostle taxeth some who were greedy of filthy lucre no but his earnest and only desire is for a double portion of Eliahs spirit to be upon him not that he might have more glory but be able to do more good 1 Kings 9. â—4 Iames 17 with more courage and constancy with less dejection and melancholy despondency than Eliah who was a man subject to like human passions and sometimes prone to fall not only into despiciencies and weariness of life but even to despair as to the cause of God and true Religion It is as Chrysologus calls it a commendable emulation to imitate the best men and a pious ambition to desire to excel them in spiritual gifts and graces which the Apostle St. Paul excites all to covet in their places which the more bright and excelling they are like the light of the sun the more they dispel all the vapors mists and fogs of humane passions or pride which by fits darken the souls of holy men I cannot here but own my desires The defective and dubious succession of Evangelical Ministers very deplorable and deplore the state of our times which forbids me almost to hope their accomplishment as to any orderly and meet succession of Evangelical Prophets and Pastors Bishops and Presbyters in this Church our Eliah's dayly drop away I do not see any care taken for Elisha's to suceed them in such compleat clear and indisputable ways of holy Ordination and Succession as may most avoid any shew of faction novelty and schism and be most uniform to the Antient Catholick primitive Apostolick and uniform pattern which never wanted in any setled Church either Presbyters to chuse and assist the Bishops or Bishops after the Apostles to try ordain oversee and govern with the Counsel of Presbyters and all other degrees and orders in the Church Darkness disputes divisions distractions dissatisfactions and confusions must needs follow that Army or City that knows not who are its Commission officers or lawful and authorised Magistrates so must it needs be in the Church when Christians know not who are their Fathers their Stewards their Shepherds their Bishops or their Presbyters There is nothing next the fundamentals of faith in which the Church should be more clear and confidently ascertained than in this the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 10.15 Ordination and succession of their Evangelical Prophets for how shall they preach or rule unless they be lawfully sent and set over the houshold of faith Christs
but commendable and imitable in parallel occasions when they are real unwonted and wonderful in whch Good men do not deserve blame if they seem to forget themselves while they remember God a great and terrible Majesty it is meet for us to hear the voyce or rod of God and who hath appointed it Secondly 2 The matter or words of Elisha But passions alone and their expressions by crying out or any outward emotion disorder which signifie no more than interjections or broken and inarticulate sounds but as the leaves of the barren figtree without fruit Of rational and religious exstasies or as clouds without water these are neither the intents nor usual effects of divine manifestations and extraordinary impressions for however they may give some exstatick terror and amazement at first by the newness suddenness and wonder of them so as to discompose a while both Reason and Religions clearness yet they are not considerable further than God is discernable in them and glorified by them as that vision of Moses and Elias on the mount with Christ at his transfiguration Luke 9.8 9 10 which gave St. Peter such a present shake and astonishment that though he spake of making three Tabernacles and staying there yet he knew not what he said that is he did not well consider the unseasonableness and unreasonableness of his proposals yet afterward upon composed reflections and calmer thoughts 2 Pet. 1.17 he makes a very holy and excellent use of that vision to confirm the faith of Christians in Christ as in the beloved Son of God which voyce we heard saith he in the holy mount coming from the excellent glory of God the Father § Why Elisha thus cryed after Eliab Elisha's cry is not vox praeterea nihil a bare clamor insignificant as one scared and forehared but his wisdom remained with him he cries out as still importune and eager for the blessing of the doubled spirit that Eliah might see he saw him crying now at the instant of his departing which was the compact and agreement and he now laid claim to the accomplishment using this potent Charm of My Father my Father as begging his last blessing that he might be heir of his spirit Here we may observe Observ That divine manifestations or extasies in whatever way they are applied to our discomposure Oâ— holy transports and impressions still preserve the good man as to grace and the man as to right reason they do not speak either evilly or uncivilly or senselesly or unadvisedly with their lips whilst heart and senses divine Creeds or impulses do affect either they pray or praise God either they fear or rejoyce before him either they admire or adore and set forth the glory of God as Balaam himself did when he was in his Prophetick trances and was over-byassed by Gods Spirit against his own covetousness and ambition So the poor Shepherds at the Angelick Quire and Hymn Luke 2.9 10 11 12. visibly appearing and speaking audibly to them of Christs birth went away believing and rejoycing wondering and reporting the truth they first heard of and then found true in the birth of Christ It is an opinion worthy of the Mahometan blindness to fancy that mad men are inspired and see Angels when they rave and talk wildely Insani esse hominis non sanus juret Orestes They are the madder of the two that do think these harsh strings to be touched with Gods holy Spirit § Of fanatick and frantick deliâ—ancies Certainly all extasies of delirancy and dotage that bring men first to strange fancies or to fits of quaking and convulsion then to vent either nonsense or blasphemous and scurrillous extravagancies these must be imputed as learned Dr. Merick Causabon observes either to natural distempers of disease and melancholy or to jugling affectations or to Diabolical delusions and possessions to which some of the Montanists Maniches Circumcellians and others of the Energumeni of old and of late have pretended who made first popular ostentations of special inspirations and correptions or raptures of the Spirit of God but afterwards the leaves and trash the toys and impertinencies they vented by words together with the pernicious extravagancies of their actions proclaimed as loud as the Devil of Mascon to all hearers and spectators that their troubles or tempests with the following dirt and mud arose not from the flowings or emanations of the pure spring of Gods Spirit but either from the Devils filthy injections or from the foul puddle of their own perturbed fancy and corrupt hearts or over-heated brains possibly intoxicated with the fumes of some new opinions and the gallant advantages they fancy to make by them § Of demoniac correptions It is an observation which St. Chrysostom makes that Demoniac correptions as those of the Sybils and other Oracles of old were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with such shakings and transports as dispossessed the possessed for a time of themselves both as to their reason and senses but divine Oracles and inspirations greater or lesse like loud or still musick preserve the harmony of the soul though they make for a time quick and smart strokes upon the strings of holy mens constitutions understandings passions and affections The words of Eliah are as St. Godâ— Spirit suggests and utters only words of soberness and truth Acts 26.24 Acts 2.4 Paul refuted Festus his supposal of his madness words of soberness and truth they that should then have heard them as now we read them must confess that God was in him of a truth 1 Pet. 1.2 he spake which St. Peter gives as the character of a true Prophet and Apostle as the Spirit gave him utterance and guidance as intentive to the last object the fatal signal token of his obtaining the desired Spirit and blessing This affected him so highly as the ingemination imports twice crying out My Father My Father § Expressing first a genuine and great sense of his private love respect duty and honor to Eliah whose relation and merit was to him as a father so he had found him so he valued him so he shall misse him remaining without him as an Orphan in minority desolate and exposed to injuries as well as indiscretions We may observe the great ingenuity and humility of Elisha Observ 1 The filial respects of Elisha to Eliah as his Father though anointed a Prophet and thought meet to succeed Eliah though now of the same order yet he doth not disdain to count and call Eliah his father because first his elder secondly his better and ordainer thirdly his superiour in merits graces no less than in degree and authority in his power or place in the Church Thus the antient Christian people yea and the antient Christian Presbyters owned their Bishops as Fathers The father of the Christian Churches in a precedency and presidency of place degree dignity and authority Ecclesiastical Thus did St. Jerom write with
were not likely to have made a Liturgy of straw and stubble 2. For its excellent matter which is divine sound and holy besides its method which is prudent and good 3. For the very great good he saw it did as to all sober Christians so to the common sort of plain people who what ever other provision they had of their Ministers private abilities yet they were sure every Lords Day at least to have a wholesom and compleat form not only of Prayers but of all other necessaries to salvavation set before them for faith holy life and devotion in the Creeds Commandments Lords Prayer with Confessions and Supplications admirably linked together and fitted to the meanest capacities the want of which he saw was not supplied by any Ministers private way of praying or preaching which in very deed are but small pittances of piety or fragments compared to the latitude of religious fundamentals and varieties contained in the Liturgie the want of which he judged would induce a great ignorance as he saw and said to me a little before his death it had done already among the ordinary sort of people in Countrey and City whose souls are as precious to God as others of greater parts and capacities whose appetites were not to be flattered and deceived with novelties but fitted and fed with wonted solidities by which they would thrive look better as by the use of plain and repeated food which is as their daily bread than those that delight in greater varieties and dainties which may seem more toothsom to wanton palates but are not more wholesom or nourishing to honest hearts who are commonly less licorous in Religion and best content with what is best for them § Not that he was such a Formalist Verbalist and Sententiolist as could not endure any alteration of words or phrases or method or manner of expressions in the Liturgie to which either change of times or of language or things may invite he well knew there had been variety of Liturgies in Churches and variations in the same Church he made very much but not too much of the English Liturgie not as the Scriptures unalterable but yet he judged that all alterations in such publick and settled concerns of Religion ought to be done by the publick spirit counsel and consent of the Prophets Prince and People However this was a concluded Maxim with him That the solemnity and sacredness of consecrating those Christian mysteries of the blessed Sacraments were not to be adventured upon Ministers private abilities tenuities or distempers but by a publick and uniform spirit among Preachers and people all should say Amen to the same Prayers and receive the same mysteries under one form of consecration in which nothing should be defective or superfluous § His personal and occasional abilities for prayer were answerable to his other gifts and graces both for matter method utterance discretion and devotion full fervent and pathetick upon his own and others spirits not coldly formal and stark nor yet wildly rambling loose and broken but judicious apt grave and of so moderate an extent as suited the weight of the occasion the capacity of the auditors and the intensiveness of his own heart his prayers were not the labor and product only of lips lungs and tongue but of his spirit and understanding he minded not the glory but grace of prayer As to the Government of the Church by Episcopal Presidency His judgment of Church government by Episcopacy to which Prince and Presbyters agree he was too learned a man to doubt and too honest to deny the universal custom and practice of the Church of Christ in all ages and places for Fifteen hundred years according to the pattern at least received from the Apostles who without doubt followed as they best knew the mind of Christ This Catholick prescription he he thought so sacred that as it did sufficiently prejudge all novel presumptions so nothing but importune and grand necessities put upon any Church could excuse much less justifie the cutting off those pipes or the turning of that primitive and perpetual course of Ecclesiastical Ordination subordination and Government into another channel Nor did he understand the method of those new Vitruviusses who would seem Master-builders though they are yet but destroyers when they affect to have all timber and stones in the Churches building of the same shape size and bigness when the Church of Christ is compared to a body which hath members of different forms use and honor 1 Cor. 12. § Yet this worthy man had nothing of secular pomp or vain ambition in his thoughts meerly to bear up or bolster out a formal and titular Episcopacy with Goats hair like Michols image No he exacted worth and work And where true Bishops did the duties and good works belonging to the principal Pastors of the flock he thought they deserved double honor as Fathers and Governors among good Christians both of revenue and reverence § Yet he did not judge the principal dignity or authority of Episcopacy to depend upon its Secular advantages but on its Ecclesiastical custom and Apostolick institution and however no man was more ready to condescend to any external diminutions and comely moderations that might stand with a good conscience and prudence as tending to the peace and unity of the Church yet no man was more firm resolute and immovable from gratifying any Sacrilegious Projectors or proud Factionists or peevish Novellers to the reproach of the Church of England yea and of the Catholick Church in all the world which had its Bishops every where before it had its Bible or its Scriptures compleated In the matter of Episcopacy he differed little from Bishop Vshers moddel of the ancient Synodical Government only he thought the petulancy of mens spirit in these times beyond the primitive simplicity did require all prudent advantages of Order and authority which might consist with piety and true policy as antidotes ought to be heightned to the measure of the poison they are to encounter § He approved not a leveling party among Ministers Only he could never be induced so far to forsake the principle of all Reason Order and Government in humane societies or to disown the remarkable differences which God and Nature age and education experience and studies industry and grace did make between Ministers no less than other men as to think that neither work nor rewards of honor and estate may be proportioned to their different worths but that the youngest Schollar yea the meanest Schoolmaster if they can but now and then appear in a Pulpit and take Orders as they best fancy shall presently in all things of publick honor and Ecclesiastick authority run parallel to the greatest Schollars and gravest Divines so that either a beardless and juvenile petulancy or more aged but empty gravity shall in all points be level and justle with the most venerable worth and accomplished learning of those that are capable to
than others according as they were settled by civil compacts and politick agreements or constitutions of State where the Laws of the Land give any stop restraint or limit to Princes power and proceedings by putting some co-ordinate and cautionary power into some orderly way and legal procedure whereby to vindicate or assert the rights of Subjects there he judged the great Arbitrator of just and unjust lawful and unlawful was the Law of the Nation as Mans and Gods Ordinance which who so brake Prince or People was a transgressor against God and Man who so pursued was unblameable in which case the Lawyer was to go before and the Divine to follow as to resolution of conscience § But for Subjects who were once by publick consent of Laws and many oaths bound to the limits and inclosures of obedience and legal subjection for these to affect a liberty under pretence of Religion as Christians or of any common priciples and natural freedoms as men beyond the established rules and boundaries of the Laws this he thought such a fanatick fetch as would undo and overthrow all Government for where is there any Christian State so setled in which some men will not quarrel with the Laws as too strait-laced for their either spiritual or natural liberties their consciences or conveniencies that is for their lusts and licenciousness their ambition or covetousness or their revenge and discontents § People ungoverned their own greatest oppressors He found by reading and experience that no Tyrannies and Oppressions of any lawful Prince were ever so heavy upon any Nation as when it turns its own Tyrant and fals under a popular self-oppression by inordinate and immoderate affectations of liberty and oppositions to legal and setled Soveraignty as was evident in the passionate Apostacy of the Ten Tribes from Davids house pretending Solomons exactions when it is better to be oppressed by one wise Prince than to be left to popular liberties which ruine Church and State § He judged as one true God is beyond ten thousand Idols so was one Lawful Soveraign with a wise Council and a settled Law beyond all the many headed and many handed Hydra's of any popular parity or other forms of Government whatsoever § For he had observed that warlike and populous Nations are much more crushed and bruised with their own weight like heavy bodies when they fall from an higher station or posture then when they are only bastonadoed with a cudgel or not mortally wounded with a sword which blows have as far less pain and expence of blood or spirits so greater possibility and speed of recovery § Though he was a very learned and well-read Schollar yet he had not studied Marianas or other Jesuitish Catechisms as to those reserves in point of civil subjection and obedience by which they allow either one great Pope or many little ones to dominier over Soveraign Princes or chief Magistrates upon any account of Christs Kingdom and spiritual power § He was more versed in the Bible of the Bishops translation than in any Papal glosses or others Annotations § However being a Father of the Church he thought it became him to be a very dutiful and obedient Son to the King as Father of his Country in England who was under God Grandfather of Church and State by a Law that invested him in a Soveraignty or Monarchy subject to no power on earth § This he judged the safest way as to inward and outward peace in conscience and prudence for men and Christians for Church and State Accordingly when O. P. with some shew of respect to him demanded his judgment in some publick affairs then at a nonplus his Lordship with his wonted gravity and freedom replied My Lord The best counsel I can give you is that of our Saviour Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesars and unto God the things that are Gods with which free answer O. P. rested rather silenced than satisfied When he had accepted to be a Bishop I think he had sinned if he refused Gods call to that Office and honor being so able so worthy What damps and distances he found from some Ministers after they saw he was an eclipsed Bishop and so willing to have done good as in all times so in such a time as that was the Amphibian Ministers who could live in Presbytery or Episcopacy as their interest led them when they saw the Northern tempest strong the tide to turn and this good Bishop with others not likely to enjoy the estates and honors of their Bishopricks Then O then began some of those Preachers whose Darling Crown and Triumph whose almost adoration and Idol Dr. Brounrig had sometimes been now they began to withdraw from him to keep a loof and at distance to look as strangers on him and to be either afraid or ashamed to appear before him such a reproach and maul his very presence constancy and gravity were to their popular and time-serving inconstancies that many became his enemies because he persevered in the truth they once asserted and had now deserted by the confutation and conversion which tumults and arms had made on their spirits more than any new reasons and arguments § Others were so peevish and spiteful against him not as Dr. Brounrig but as an unfortunate Bishops that to revenge their own sin and folly on their betters they after the Lystrian levity Act. 14.18 19. endeavored to stone him and other Bishops whom they once had reverenced as Gods consenting to and applauding his expulsion out of the House of Lords out of the Colledge and University yea and to his deposition as much as humane power and malice could from his Episcopal Office and Authority which yet he failed not while he lived as he had power and opportunity to discharge § If he had as a Bishop met with better times as to Christianity or worse as to Heathenish barbarity so as to have shined fully and steadily in one of those golden Candlesticks of the Church for which he was fitted I make no doubt but the most benign influence of so able so affable so amiable so consciencious so compleat a Bishop would have wrought as great effects in any Diocess where he lived as Gregorius Thaumaturgus is said to have done in his Scythian Bishoprick where when he came first to them he found but fifteen Christians when he left them he left but so many Heathens or Infidels amonst them Bishop Brounrig was as likely as any man to have been a Thaumaturgus to have wrought miracles in this age if they had been so just moderate and wise as to have made use of his oracular wisdom in grand and publick concerns or to have trusted to the counsels of such Schollars as much as of Soldiers § His publick prudential ability Possibly other men and Bishops might have as much learning but few that ever I knew had his incomparable clearness candor solidness sweetness dexterity eloquence and great