Timothy of of his Epistle to Titus though they are found in the ancient Copies of the Greek Testament are of no Credit or Authority or that such an Impeachment and Discredit laid upon them is not very prejudicial to the Books and Writings of the Holy Ghost or that it is not great presumption for Men in these days to take upon them to know better Whether Timothy and Titus were Bishops than the Churches and godly Fathers did which were planted and lived either in the Apostle's times or presently after them except they have some especial Revelations from God or that whilst Men do labour to bring into discredit the ancient Fathers and Primitive Churches they do not derogate from themselves such credit as they hunt after and as much as in them lieth bring many parts of Religion into a wonderful uncertainty or that it is probable or was possible for Timothy to have observ'd those Rules that St. Paul gave him unto the coming of Christ except as the Fathers expound some of them he meant to have them first observed by himself and other Bishops in that Age and that afterward they should so likewise be observed by all Bishops for ever or that the ancient Fathers and Ecclesiastical Histories when they Record it to all Posterity that these Men and those Men were made by the Apostles Bishops of such and such places are not to be held to be of more credit than any other Historiographers or Writers or that when the ancient Fathers did collect out of the Scriptures and practice of the Apostles the continuance for ever of that Form of Church-Government which was then in use they were not so throughly illuminated with the Holy Ghost as divers Men of late have been or that it was an idle course held by the Primitive Churches and ancient Fathers to keep the Catalogues of their Bishops or to ground Arguments in some Cases upon their Succession in that they were able to deduce their beginnings either from the Apostles or from some Apostolical Persons or that the Form of Government used in the Apostle's times for the planting and ordering of Churches was not in many respects as necessary to be continued in the Church afterward especially considering that many Churches were not left fully ordered nor in some places were at all planted when the Apostles died or that true and perfect Order grounded upon the very Laws of Nature and Reason and established by the Holy Ghost in the Apostles times was not fit for the Churches of God afterward to embrace and observe or that any Church since the Apostles time till of late years when it received the Gospel had not likewise Archbishops and Bishops for the Government of it or that divers of the ancient Fathers did not hold and that very truly for ought that appeareth to the contrary that our Saviour Christ and his Apostles in establishing the Form of Church-Government amongst the Gentiles had an especial respect to that Form which God had setled amongst the Jews and did no way purpose to abrogate or abolish it or that any since the Apostles times till of late days was ever held to be a lawful Minister of the Word and Sacraments who was not Ordain'd Priest or Minister by the Imposition of the hands of some Bishop or that it is with any probability to be imagin'd that all the Churches of Christ and ancient Fathers from the beginning would ever have held it for an Apostolical Rule That none but Bishops had any Authority to make Priests had they not thought and judged that the same Authority had been derived unto them the said Bishops from the same Apostolical Ordination that was committed unto Timothy and Titus their Predecessors or that the Apostles and all the ancient Fathers were deceived when they judged the Authority of Bishops necessary at all times for the suppressing of Schisms and that without Bishops there would be in the Churches as many Sects as Ministers or that when Men find themselves in regard of their disobedience to their Bishops so fully and notably described and censured by all the ancient Fathers for Schismaticks and contentious Persons they have not just cause to fear their own Estates if they continue in such their willfulness and obstinacy or that the Church-Government by us above treated of is truly to be said to savour of Judaism more than the observation by godly Kings and Princes of the Equity of the Iudicial Law given to the Jews may truly be said to savour thereof or that it doth proceed from any other than the wicked Spirit for any sort of Men what godly shew soever they can pretend to seek to discredit as much as in them lieth that Form of Church-Government which was established by the Apostles and left by them to continue in the Church to the end of the World under Archbishops and Bishops such as were Timothy and Titus and some others then called to those Offices by the said Apostles and ever since held by the Primitive Churches and all the ancient Fathers to be Apostolical Functions or to term the same or any part of it to be Anti-Christian He doth greatly Erre CAP. IX The Sum of the Chapter following That our Saviour Christ upon his Ascension into Heaven did not commit the Temporal Government of the whole World unto St. Peter That the Apostles and whole Ministry did succeed Christ not as he was a Person immortal and glorious after his Resurrection but as he was a Mortal Man here upon the Earth before his Passion That Christ left neither to St. Peter nor to the Bishops of Rome nor to any other Archbishops or Bishops any temporal Possessions all that since any of them have gotten being bestowed upon them by Emperours Kings and Princes and other their good Benefactors And that the Imagination of St. Peter's Temporal Sovereignty is very idle the same being never known unto himself for ought that appeareth and argueth great Ignorance of the true nature of the Spiritual Kingdom of Christ for the erecting whereof the spiritual working of the Holy Ghost with the Apostles and the rest of the Ministry of the Gospel was and is only necessary IT hath been shewed by us before that our Saviour Christ after his Resurrection and Ascension became actually in the State of the Heir of all things Governour of all the World and King of kings even as he was Man his divine Nature working more gloriously in his Humanity than formerly it had done Howbeit although we also made it plain that notwithstanding the said Glory Power Rule Dominion and Majesty wherewith Christ is really possest sitting in Heaven at the right hand of his Father he made no alteration in the Form and manner of Temporal Government but left the whole World to be ruled by Kings and Soveraign Princes under him as it had been before himself retaining still in his own hands the Scepter and chiefest Ensigns of Royal and highest Majesty to direct and
Vniversal Kingdom of Christ are not of as great validity to prove that there ought to be one temporal King under him to govern his Vniversal Kingdom over all the World as are the other Vnities touching the Church to prove that there must be one Bishop under him to govern all the particular Churches in the World or that because Kings when they have occasion to be absent from their Kingdoms do commonly appoint some Vice-Roy to Rule their People until their return it thereupon followeth that Christ supplying his corporal absence from his Spiritual Kingdom the Church by the comfortable presence of the Holy Ghost was of necessity to leave one carnal Man to be his Vicar-General over his said Spiritual Kingdom or that seeing our Saviour Christ held it expedient for his Catholick Church that he should deprive her of his corporal presence that she might be ruled by the Holy Ghost it is not to be thought great presumption for any Man to tell us that his corporal presence is necessary for the Government of the said Catholick Church as if he meant to put the Holy Ghost out of Possession or that either the said one Vniversal Kingdom of Christ the King and Creator of it is otherwise visible upon the Earth than by the particular Kingdoms and several kinds of Governments in it and perhaps in a sort and by Representation when some Neighbour Kings either in Person or by their Ambassadours may be met together for the good of their several Kingdoms or that the said one Catholick Church of Christ as he is the chief Bishop over all is otherwise visible on the Earth than by the several and particular Churches in it and sometimes by general and free Councils lawfully assembled or that it is a better consequent that if the Catholick Church have no visible Head all other Bishops Doctors Pastors and Ministers are needless than if one should say because there is no one King to govern all the World therefore there is no use of Emperours Kings and Soveraign Princes or civil Magistrates or that it doth more follow that Christ should have left his Faithful People in a confused Anarchy except he had left St. Peter and his Successors to govern the whole Church than it doth that the whole World hath been left by him in a Confusion without any Government in it in that he hath not left one Vniversal Emperour or that the intolerable Pride of the Bishop of Rome for the time still being through the advancement of himself by many sleights stratagems and false Miracles over the Catholick Church the Temple of God as if he were God himself doth not argue him plainly to be the Man of Sin mentioned by the Apostle or that every National Church planted according to the Apostle's Platform may not by the means which Christ hath ordained as well subsist of it self without one Vniversal Bishop as every Kingdom may do under the Government of their several Kings without one general Monarch He doth greatly Erre The End of the Second Book LIB III. CAP. I. IN pursuing our intended Course through the Old Testament and until the destruction of Jerusalem we overslipt and passed by the fulness of that time wherein the Son of God the Maker and Governour of all the World our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was conceived by the Holy Ghost and born of the Virgin Mary So as now we are to return back and prosecute our said Course as we find the true grounds thereof are laid down confirmed and practised in the New Testament At our Entrance into which Course We confess our selves to be indeed greatly astonished considering the strange impediments and mighty stumbling blocks which through long practice and incredible Ambition are cast in our way in that we find the Estate of that Church which would rule over all to be degenerated in our days as far in effect from her primary and Apostolical Institution and Rules as we have shewed before the Estate of the Jewish Church to have swerved through the like Pride and Ambition from that excellent Condition wherein she was first established and afterward preserved and beautified by Moses and King David with the rest of his most worthy and godly Successors For except we should condemn the Old Testament as many ancient Hereticks have done and thereupon overthrow all which hitherto we have built and not that only but should furthermore either approve of their gross Impiety who read the Scriptures of the New Testament as if they were falsified and corrupted and by receiving and rejecting as much of them as they list do prefer before them as not containing in them all necessary Truth for Man's Salvation certain obscure and Apocryphal Writings Or should our selves impiously imagine that the New Testament as now we have it was but a rough Draught and a fit project compiled for the time by the Apostles to be afterward better order'd polished and supplied with certain humane Traditions and Doctrines by some of their Successors We can see no sufficient Warrant or probable reason why the Bishop of Rome should take upon him as he doth so eminent and supream Authority over all the Kingdoms and Churches in the World to rule them direct them bestow them and chop and change them under pretence of Religion as he from time to time shall think fit Sure we are if the Scriptures may retain their ancient Authority and continue to be true Rulers and principal Directors to all Apostolical Bishops that in them there will not be found any shadows or steps of those so high and lofty conceits To the proof whereof before we address our selves We have thought it very expedient for the carriage of our course more perspicuously and clearly to make it apparent by what degrees and practices the Bishops of Rome have proceeded in aspiring to that Soveraignty and Greatness which now they have attained Placet eis John Overall Prolocutor CAP. II. AS it was said long since Religion brought forth Riches and the Daughter devoured the Mother So may it very truly be said in these days The Empire begat the Papacy and the Son hath devoured his Father For as we suppose by the Effects no sooner did the Bishops of Rome even in the first times of Persecution get any rest and courage but they began to think with themselves That they were as able to govern all the Churches in the Empire as the Emperours themselves were to govern all the Kingdoms and Nations then subject unto them and that Rome was as fit a Seat for such a Bishop as it was for so great an Emperour Some Seeds of this Ambition began to sprout there when Victor presumed to threaten the Greek Churches concerning the Feast of Easter although Irenaeus then living did greatly dislike it and the Bishops of Asia little regarding him in that behalf said They nothing cared for such his threats And it was not we suppose an idle conceit of one who writing
Imprimatur Junii 24. 1689. W. CANT Bishop OVERALL's convocation-Convocation-Book MDC VI. Concerning the GOVERNMENT OF God's CATHOLICK CHVRCH AND THE KINGDOMS OF THE Whole WORLD LONDON Printed for Walter Kettilby at the Bishop's Head in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1690. AN Advertisement TO THE READER THat Convocation in which the Acts and Canons now Printed pass'd was first call'd An. 1603. 1 mo Jac. and continued by Adjournments and Prorogations to 1610. The Three following Books are publish'd from a Copy carefully and faithfully transcribed from the Original MS. which was Bishop Overall's and drawn up by him after whose Decease it came into the Possession of D r John Cosin sometime his Secretary and after Lord Bishop of Duresm who bequeathed it with other his Books both Printed and Manuscript to the Publick Library by him founded at Duresm for the use of that Church where it is suppos'd it is yet to be seen The First of these Three Books was also heedfully compar'd and in some casual defects supply'd from another MS which from the Attestation of Archbishop Bancroft who there presided at the end thereof under his own hand seems to have been the Original that then pass'd the Upper-House of Convocation And after his Decease it came to his Successors the Archbishops of Canterbury And among them to Archbishop Laud as appears under his own hand-writing in the last Page of it And is now or was lately in the Possession of D r Barlow the present Lord Bishop of Lincoln In the First and Second of these Books there were several Amendments made by the Upper-House of Convocation all placed at the end of Bishop Overall's MS. and according to such Amendments inserted in their proper places is the following Book Printed NOte That the Numeral Letters in the Margin throughout the First Book refer to the Pages in Bishop Overall's Original MS. at Duresm as in the second Page following ii p. in MS. means the second Page in that MS. sic de caeteris In the first Book of that MS. Placet is set at the bottom of every Page and in the Printed Copy that word is sometimes misplaced by a line or two as on the Margin p. 10. Placet is set against l. 8. which should have been against l. 10. ERRATA PAge 3. line 8. it be called read it be not called p. 15. marg r. Deut. 33. p. 17. marg r. Num. 27. p. 21. l. 26. expelled r. repelled p. 25. marg 1 K. 2. 9. p. 60. l. 25. our pleasure r. their pleasure p. 63. marg Joseph Antiq. l. 11. r. l. 2. p. 65. Artic. l. 7. of their r. other p. 75. marg Jos Ant. l. 15. r. l. 18. p. 77. l. 5. quia r. qui p. 88. l. 19. Priest r. Priests p. 103. marg r. Luc. 2. 51. p. 122. l. 21. unless r. and least p. 149. l. 13. were assured r. we are assured p. 165. l. 25. after did not add only p. 252. l. 27. But r. that p. 278. l. 19. Rulers r. rules p. 282. l. 14. Vrsinus r. Vrsicinus p. 296. l. 7. above r. about p. 297. l. 22. Charls's r. Charles p. 302. l. 21. deprived r. depraved p. 324. marg Cassan in catalog pro censid 28. r. consid 29. p. 332. l. 4. revenge our r. revenge thy p. 337. l. 7. ridiculous Joyes r. ridiculous Toies Bishop OVERALL's convocation-CONVOCATION-BOOK 1606. CONCERNING The Government of God's Catholick Church and the Kingdoms of the whole WORLD LIB I. CAP. I. AMongst those Attributes and Names of God which are common in the Scripture to all the blessed Trinity are these To be the Creator and Governour of the World the Lord of lords and King of kings which be there applied as well to the Son of God our Lord Jesus Christ the second Person in the sacred Trinity as to God the Father and God the Holy Ghost Agreeably whereunto and not otherwise our chief purpose being to imitate the Scriptures in setting out and describing the Deity and Dignity of our Saviour Christ by his Almighty Power and universal Government of all the World as Heir of all things and Head of his Church we hold it fit to begin with his Divine Power of Creation and thereupon in the sense aforesaid do affirm That He in the beginning did create both Heaven and Earth and that amongst the rest of the Creatures which he then made he Created our first Parents Adam and Eve from whose Loins Mankind is descended CANON I. IF any Man therefore shall affirm with any Pagan Heretick Atheist or any other profane Persons which know not or believe not the Scriptures either that Heaven and Earth had no beginning or that the World was made by Angels or the Devil that the World was not otherwise made by Christ than as he was an Instrument of God the Father for the making of it or that he did not as God create our said Parents Adam and Eve he doth greatly Erre Placet eis CAP. II. TO him that shall duly read the Scripture it will be plain and evident That the Son of God having created our first Parents and purposing to multiply their Seed into many Generations for the replenishing of the World with their Posterity did give to Adam for his time and to the rest of the Patriarchs and chief Fathers successively before the Flood Authority Power and Dominion over their Children and Off-spring to rule and govern them Ordaining by the very Law of Nature That their said Children and Off-spring begotten and brought up by them should fear reverence honour and obey them Which power and Authority before the Flood resting in the Patriarchs and in the chief Fathers because it had a very large extent not only for the Education of their said Children and Off-spring whilst they were young but likewise for the ordering ruling and governing of them afterwards when they came to Mens Estate And for that also it had no superiour Authority or power over or above it on Earth appearing in the Scriptures although it be called either Patriarchal Regal or Imperial and that we only term it Potestas Patria yet being well considered how far it did reach we may truly say that it was in a sort Potestas Regia as now in a right and true construction Potestas Regia may justly be called Potestas Patria CAN. II. IF any Man shall therefore affirm that Men at the first without all good Education or Civility ran up and down in Woods and Fields as wild Creatures resting themselves in Caves and Dens and acknowledging no superiority one over another until they were taught by Experience the necessity of Government and that thereupon they chose some among themselves to order and rule the rest giving them power and authority so to do and that consequently all civil Power Iurisdiction and Authority was first derived from the people and disorder'd multitude or either is originally still in them or else is deduced by their consents naturally
it and as all the particular Kingdoms in the World are called but one Kingdom as he is the Only King and Monarch of it or that our Saviour Christ hath not appointed under him several Ecclesiastical Governours to rule and direct the said particular Churches as he hath appointed several Kings and Sovereign Princes to rule and govern their several Kingdoms or that by his Death he did not abolish the Ceremonial Law and the Levitical Priesthood so far forth as it was Typical and had the Execution of the said Ceremonial Law annexed unto it or that he did any more abrogate by his Death Passion Resurrection and Ascension the Power and Authority of Church-Government than either he did the other two Essential parts of the said Priesthood or Ministry or the Power and Authority of Kings and Sovereign Princes or that he did more appoint any one chief Bishop to rule all the particular Churches which should be planted throughout all Kingdoms than he did appoint any one King to rule and govern all the particular Kingdoms in the World or that it was more reasonable or necessary as hereafter it shall be further shewed to have one Bishop to govern all the Churches in the World than it was to have one King to govern all the Kingdoms in the World or that it was more necessary or convenient to have every Parish with their Presbyteries absolute Churches independent upon any but Christ himself than that every such Parish should be an absolute Temporal Kingdom independent of any Earthly King or Sovereign Magistrate or that the Government of every National Church under Christian Kings and Sovereign Princes by Archbishops and Bishops is not more suitable and correspondent to the Government of the National Church of the Jews under their Soveraign Princes and Kings than is either the Government of one over all the Churches of the World or the setling of the Form of that National Church-Government in every particular Church He doth greatly Erre CAP. VII The Sum of the Chapter following That the Form of Church-Government which was ordained by Christ in the New Testament did consist upon divers degrees of Ministers one above another Apostles in Preeminence and Authority superiour to the Evangelists and the Evangelists superiour to Pastors and Doctours And that the Apostles knowing themselves to be mortal did in their own Days by the Direction of the Holy Ghost as the numbers of Christians grew establish the said form of Government in other Persons appointing several Ministers in sundry Cities and over them Bishops as also over such Bishops certain worthy Persons such as Titus was who were afterward termed Arch-Bishops to whom they did commit so much of their Apostolical Authority as they held then necessary and was to be continued for the Government of the Church WE had in our former Book the Scriptures at large containing the Histories and Doctrine both of the Law and the Gospel after the manner that was then prescribed from the time of the Creation until the days of the Prophet Malachy that is for above 3500. years Whereupon we did ground the particular Points by us therein handled concerning the Government as well Ecclesiastical as Temporal And for the Supply of the other years following till the Incarnation of our Saviour Christ we observed some things to the same purpose out of the Apocryphal Books second to the Scriptures and to be preferr'd before all other Writers of those times But now forasmuch as the New Testament is but in effect a more ample Declaration the Old shewing withal how the same was most throughly fulfilled by our Saviour Christ without the impeachment of any kind of Government by himself ordain'd as before we have exprest and because the Books of the Evangelists and Apostles do only contain the Acts and Doctrine of our Saviour Christ and his Apostles with the Form and Use both of the Temporal and Ecclesiastical Government during the time whilst they lived here upon the Earth St. John who lived the longest of them all dying about sixty six Years after Christ's Passion although the Holy Ghost did judge the said Books and Writings sufficient for the Church and all that profess Christianity to teach and direct them in those things which should appertain either to their Temporal or Ecclesiastical Government or should be necessary unto their Salvation Yet for the said Reasons we were induced for the upholding of the Temporal and Ecclesiastical Government in the New Testament to insist so much as we have done upon the Precedents and Platforms of both those kinds of Governments established in the Old Testament albeit we want no sufficient Testimonies in the New to ratify and confirm as well the one as the other First therefore we do verily think That if our Saviour Christ or his Apostles had meant to have erected in the Churches amongst the Gentiles any other Form of Ecclesiastical Government than God himself had set up amongst the Jew they would have done it assuredly in very solemn manner that all the World might have taken publick notice of it considering with what Majesty and Authority the said Form was erected at God's Commandment by his Servant Moses But in that they well knew how the Form of the Old Ecclesiastical Government in substance was still to continue and to be in time establish'd in every National Kingdom and Soveraign Principality amongst Christians as soon as they should become for number sufficient Bodies and ample Churches to receive the same as before the like opportunity it was not established amongst the Israelites they did in the mean while and as the time did serve them attempt the erecting of it in such sort and by such fit and convenient Degrees as by the direction of the Holy Ghost they held it most expedient without intermission till such time as the work was in effect accomplished It hath been before touched how our Saviour Christ here upon Earth did not only chuse to himself for the business he had in hand twelve Apostles who were then design'd in time to come to be the Patriarchs and chief Fathers of all Christians with some Resemblance as it hath been ever held of the twelve Sons of Jacob who had been in their days the Patriarchs and chief Fathers of all the Israelites But likewise he took unto him over and besides his said Apostles 70 or as some read 72 Disciples to be in the same manner his Assistants in imitation of Moses when he chose 70. Elders to be helpers unto him for the better Government of the People committed to his charge None of these either Apostles or Disciples had then any other Duties committed to them but only of Preaching and Baptizing for the Power of Ecclesiastical Regiment they might not then intermeddle with because it did appertain to the Priests and Courts of the Jews But afterward that want and some other defects in them were throughly supplied when our Saviour Christ upon his Resurrection and a little