Selected quad for the lemma: authority_n
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A31175
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A scholasticall discourse demonstrating this conclusion, that ... neither the Pope, nor those called bishops in the church of Romes, are bishops either in order or jurisdiction ... / by R.C.
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R. C.
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1663
(1663)
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Wing C114; ESTC R24124
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11,034
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32
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A SCHOLASTICALL DISCOURSE Demonstrating this Conclusion That admitting Erastus Senior's Reasons for true neither the Pope nor those called Bishops in the Church of Rome are Bishops either in Order or Jurisdiction Wherein is answered All which is alledged by Erastus Senior against the Order and Jurisdiction of the Bishops of the Church of ENGLAND ALSO A Defence of the Order and Jurisdiction of the Bishops in the Church of ENGLAND By R. C. LONDON Printed by J. G. for R. Royston Bookseller to His most SACRED MAjESTY 1663. PREFACE to the READER MEn in avoiding Scylla usually fall upon Charybdis But the Nation is wiser I hope having avoided the Irreligion Profaneness of the late times then now to run into Popery although many fear there is more then an ordinary designe tending thereunto To facilitate which is newly crept abroad a Champion of the Roman-Catholick Cause under the title of Erastus Senior who in charity to others will not allow so much charity to our Bishops in the Church of England as to be so much as Legal But if his zeal the Roman Cause or charity to other men hath so far dilated his reasons that they conclude as much against the Pope and Bishops in the Church of Rome as he intended them against ours in the Church of England he shall have no great cause to triumph nor his Church much reason to thank him in that he has made himself and Church as very Heathens as he designed us of the Church of England Imprimatur M. Franck S.T.P. R.D. Ep. Lond. à Sac. Dom. Nov. 27. 1662. CHAP. I. Proving from Erastus Senior's Reasons that neither those called Bishops in the Church of Rome nor the Pope himself are Bishops Ordine TO the perfection of all powers whether Spiritual Natural or Legal these two things are necessary Jus Exercitium these I think Erastus Senior calls Order and Jurisdiction or Office the former may be without the latter nay it must be afore the latter can be Therefore a King must be by right or order before he can rightfully exercise any Regal Authority or Power so must a Bishop or Priest be by right or order before he can justly exercise any Episcopal or Sacerdotal Jurisdiction and so Parents Husbands Magistrates and Masters of Families are endued with a right or power before they can exercise any Jurisdiction over their Children Wives Fellow-subjects or Servants That Kings Husbands and Parents are endued with a right or power from the Law of Nature and Magistrates and Masters of Families from the Municipal Lawes of every place where they do exercise them hath been asserted by us elsewhere That Episcopal Order or right is a Divine Institution and founded by our Saviour and not by Nature or any Temporal or Civil Sanction is affirmed as well by Erastus Senior as us of the Church of England in the 9. chap. A Bishop then Ordine or by Right is he who is so made or ordained by such form and means as our Saviour hath instituted and by no other unless Erastus Senior will grant another a Divine Power which is Blasphemy A Bishop Jurisdictione or by Office we will call him who is possess'd of a Bishoprick So that Erastus and I will not differ who is a Bishop Ordine and who Jurisdictione Ours in the Church of England are no Bishops Ordine Erastus Senior sayes because the form of Ordination wants fit words to signifie the Order given The words are these Take thou the Holy Ghost and remember that thou stir up the Grace of God which is in thee by Imposition of Hands for God hath not given us the spirit of fear but of power and love and soberness If this form be insufficient to the Ordination of Bishops in the Church of England then were not the Apostles Bishops by order for our Saviour used no other in their Ordination Nor were they made Bishops by these or any other Sacramental words with much confidence c. 3. p. 10. and no reason Erastus Senior sayes but onely S. Peter and that by these words Pasce oves meas What were none of the Apostles Bishops but onely S. Peter how then I pray came the Colledge of Apostles not Saint Peter to chuse S. Matthias to the Bishoprick of Judas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if Judas had no Episcopal right or order Acts 1.20 how came all the Apostles not S. Peter to ordain S. Stephen Acts 6.5 and six other Deacons and how is it that S. Paul and Barnabas and not S. Peter Act. 14.23 did ordain Elders in every Church which without all contradiction were acts of Episcopal power Nay can any man believe Acts 8. that when S. Philip the Deacon had converted and baptized Samaria and given notice thereof to the Colledge of Apostles at Jerusalem that they being inferiour Apostles should upon Canonical Record send their superiour and only Bishop among them viz. S. Peter to administer their Decrees and joyn S. John in equal power with him Ver. 14. for sayes the Text They sent Peter and John to confirm them Ver. 17. and they laid their hands upon them and they received the holy Ghost or that S. Paul should publickly withstand S. Peter to his face in that wherein he was to be blamed if he had been any wayes inferiour to him either in Order or Power for however men may privately advise their Superiours yet no man can without Arrogance and contempt of Authority publickly withstand his Superiour Nor had alwayes S. Peter the precedency of name with the other Apostles for we read of James Gal. 2.9 Cephas and John which seemed c. Nay S. * The Lords brother B. B. of Ierusalem James though none of the twelve Apostles did preside in the Council of Jerusalem although Saint Peter and the other Apostles were members of it Well but if the form by which our Saviour did ordain the Apostles did not give them Episcopal order as Erastus Senior sayes let us see whether upon his own grounds Pasce oves meas could endue S. Peter with it I say it could not For if the form by which our Saviour did ordain his Apostles which was a form of Ordination viz. Receive the holy Ghost P. 2. c. were insufficient to confer Episcopal Order for want of fit words to signifie it as he sayes then much less can Pasce oves meas which not onely do not signifie the order given but are no form of Ordination at all but onely imperative and refer to Jurisdiction confer any upon S. Peter If our Saviour had ordained S. Peter in this sense it must have been by these or like words Accipe potestatem pascendi oves meas and that this is not my single sense but of Erastus Senior he sayes c. 2. p. 9. the exhortation to the Bishop consecrated to behave himself as a good Pastor does not give this Order and I pray what is the difference between I exhort thee
to be a Pastor and Feed my sheep He sayes moreover c. 6. p. 28. Be thou a faithfull dispenser of the word of God and his holy Sacraments do not give any power to this or any other Sacrament but onely to dispense them Now to dispense a Sacrament is not to consecrate it for it must be consecrated before it can be dispensed by like reason cannot Pasce oves meas give any Episcopal Order to S. Peter for to command to feed is not to consecrate and S. Peter must have a power to feed before he can be commanded to feed my sheep P. 28. Again he sayes be thou a faithfull dispenser c. give no power c. and have thou authority c. give no power of Order but of Jurisdiction and therefore Pasce oves meas give none for they onely command and refer to Jurisdiction not Order or Consecration The Pope therefore nor any Bishop in the Church of Rome are Bishops Ordine from Pasce oves meas nor from the form by which our Saviour ordained the Apostles he sayes and thefore no Bishops Ordine which was the thing propounded Well but suppose Pasce oves meas did endue S. Peter with Episcopal Order yet cannot the Pope nor any Bishop in the Church of Rome from hence derive it for being a Divine Institution it cannot be conferred or ordained but by such means as God did institute and ordain it but neither the Pope nor any Bishops in the Church of Rome are consecrated or ordained by this form and therefore are not Bishops Ordine by virtue of it So then take Pasce oves meas to be essential or not essential to the conferring of Episcopal Order yet hence cannot the Pope nor any Bishops in the Church of Rome derive any Episcopal Order CHAP. II. Asserting the Order of Bishops in the Church of England BUt though Erastus Senior out of his charity to others hath argued himself and party into a Heathenish state and reduced them into the same condition he intended us of the Church of England in his Preface yet will not I grant the form used in the Church of England to be insufficient for the consecrating of Bishops of giving Episcopal Order for since it is evident the Apostles did exercise this Order or Power yet were endued with it by no other form then that used in our Church how much better is it to apply this form being instituted by our Saviour to one presented to the Consecrators as a Bishop elect and after examination and prayers as for a Bishop elect and as called to the office of a Bishop and after Consecration to exhort him as a Pastor or Bishop then to alter it into any other thereby making it doubtfull whether it be done or not as if any Creature were wiser then God and would dare to mend what God has made But certainly it is most abominably done of Erastus Senior P. 11. equivocally and cantingly to deny this form of our Saviour used in his Church as well as ours to be any essential part of their form which I believe no ingenuous man besides himself in his Church will doe and to affirm that the prayers of Propitiare Domine c. anciently called the Benediction and used ever since S. Peter's time in their Consecration Physicè non moralitèr loquendo and no wayes essential to the Consecration but of later time altered by his Church should give that which onely God could do unless he will make himself or Church equal to God to abrogate or make what God has made a vain thing and set up what himself and his party think fit above it or instead of it If there be any defect in our Ordination Erastus with much more ingenuity might have charged it upon our Saviour for instituting it then upon our Church for imitating it CHAP. III. Proving that neither the Pope nor any Bishop in the Church of Rome granting Erastus Senior's Reasons for true are Bishops Jurisdictione ERastus Senior sayes P. 3◠none can give a Jurisdiction which he hath not hence he sayes it is that no number of Bishops can validly confirm or consecrate the Bishop of any Diocese but the Metropolitane of the Province must be one nor the Metropolitane of a Province but the Primate of a Nation nor the Primate of a Nation but the Patriarch of that part of the World or some person having faculty from him and in the next page he sayes the Bishop of Rome is Patriarch of the West and the undoubted rightfull Metropolitane to the Primate of this Nation and therefore no Bishop can validly confirm or consecrate the Primate of this Nation but the Bishop of Rome If it be true which Erastus Senior sayes that none can give a Jurisdiction which he hath not then if he cannot shew in the intervals of the Papacy some who may give this supreme Patriarchal power or Headship of the Church to the Pope then can neither the Pope have it nor any Primate Metropolitane or Bishop derive any Jurisdiction from him and by consequence neither the Pope nor any Bishop in the Church of Rome are Bishops Jurisdictione I say it is impossible any such Primacy as is pretended by Erastus Senior can be in the Pope for admitting that our Saviour did endue S. Peter with a Primacy above the other Apostles and that he was Bishop of Rome and the Popes his rightful Successors yet cannot this Primacy be transferred to any of them for Extraordinaria potestas non transit in successorem After S. Peter's death none of the Apostles having this Primacy could give it to another for as Erastus sayes None can give a Jurisdiction to another which he hath not The Pope of Rome therefore not having this Primacy no Primate of a Nation can receive Jurisdiction from him nor the Metropolitane any from the Primate nor any Bishop from the Metropolitane and therefore from Erastus Senior's Reasons neither the Pope nor any Bishop in the Church of Rome are Bishops Jurisdictione Although at first I designed no more then to shew from Erastus Senior's Reasons there is neither Order nor Jurisdiction in the Church of Rome and to assert the Order and Jurisdiction of our Bishops in the Church of England yet cannot I but take notice how ignorantly I will say no more he affirms Bishops to be consecrated to their Bishopricks and that the Pope was Founder of the See of Canterbury For no Bishop is consecrated into his Bishoprick but invested or installed and originally Bishopricks with us in England were donative per traditionem baculi i.e. the Crosier which was the Pastoral staff annuli the Ring whereby he was married to the Church Coke com Lit. 344. Sect. 648. and therefore if the meanest Bishop of Jurisdiction in the world be elected to the Papacy he is no more consecrated nay though he be one sine titulo yet he is never more consecrated though made Primate Patriarch or Pope