Selected quad for the lemma: book_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
book_n	church_n	divine_a	scripture_n	3,472	5	5.9670	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A50915	Of prelatical episcopacy, and vvhither it may be deduc'd from the apostolical times by vertue of those testimonies which are alledg'd to that purpose in some late treatises one whereof goes under the name of Iames, Arch-bishop of Armagh.	Milton, John, 1608-1674.	1641 (1641)	Wing M2133; ESTC R23425	13,884	28

OF PRELATICAL EPISCOPACY AND VVhither it may be deduc'd from the Apostolical times by vertue of those Testimonies which are alledg'd to that purpose in some late Treatises One whereof goes under the Name of IAMES ARCH-BISHOP OF ARMAGH London Printed by R. O. G. D. for Thomas Underhill and are to be sold at the signe of the Bible in Wood-Street 1641. OF PRELATICALL EPISCOPACY EPYSCOPACY as it is taken for an Order in the Church above a Presbyter or as wee commonly name him the Minister of a Congregation is either of Divine constitution or of humane If onely of humane we have the same humane priviledge that all men have ever had since Adam being borne free and in the Mistresse Iland of all the British to retaine this Episcopacy or to remove it consulting with our owne occasions and conveniences and for the prevention of our owne dangers and disquiets in what best manner we can devise without running at a losse as wee must needs in those stale and uselesse records of either uncertaine or unsound antiquity which if we hold fast to the grounds of the reformed Church can neither skill of us nor we of it so oft as it would lead us to the broken reed of tradition If it bee of Divine constitution to satisfie us fully in that the Scripture onely is able it being the onely Book left us of Divine authority not in any thing more Divine then in the all-sufficiency it hath to furnish us as with all other spirituall knowledge so with this in particular setting out to us a perfect man of God accomplish't to all the good workes of his charge Through all which Booke can be no where either by plaine Text or solid reasoning found any difference betweene a Bishop and a Presbyter save that they be two names to signify the same order Notwithstanding this clearnesse and that by all evidence of argument Timothy and Titus whom our Prelates claim to imitate onely in the controuling part of their office had rather the vice-gerency of an Apostleship committed to them then the ordinary charge of a Bishoprick as being men of an extraordinary calling yet to verify that which Saint Paul foretold of succeeding times when men began to have itching eares then not contented with the plentifull and wholsom fountaines of the Gospell they began after their owne lusts to heap to themselvs teachers and as if the divine Scripture wanted a supplement and were to be eek't out they cannot think any doubt resolv'd and any doctrine confirm'd unlesse they run to that indigested heap and frie of Authors which they call Antiquity Whatsoever time or the heedlesse hand of blind chance hath drawne down from of old to this present in her huge dragnet whether Fish or Sea-weed Shells or Shrubbs unpickt unchosen those are the Fathers Seeing therefore some men deeply conversant in Bookes have had so little care of late to give the world a better account of their reading then by divulging needlesse tractats stuff't with specious names of Ignatius and Polycarpus with fragments of old Martyrologies and legends to distract and stagger the multitude of credulous readers mislead them from their strong guards and places of safety under the tuition of holy writ it came into my thoughts to perswade my selfe setting all distances and nice respects aside that I could do Religion and my Country no better service for the time then doing my utmost endeavour to recall the people of GOD from this vaine forraging after straw and to reduce them to their firme stations under the standard of the Gospell by making appeare to them first the insufficiency next the inconvenience and lastly the impiety of these gay testimonies that their great Doctors would bring them to dote on And in performing this I shall not strive to be more exact in Methode then as their citations lead mee First therefore concerning Ignatius shall be treated fully when the Author shall come to insist upon some places in his Epistles Next to prove a succession of 27. Bishops from Timothy he cites one Leontius Bishop of Magnesia out of the 11. act of the Chalcedonian Councell this is but an obscure and single witnesse and for his faithfull dealing who shall commend him to us with this his Catalogue of Bishops what know wee further of him but that he might be as factious and false a Bishop as Leontius of Antioch that was a hunderd yeares his predecessor for neither the praise of his wisedome or his vertue hath left him memorable to posterity but onely this doubtfull relation which wee must take at his word and how shall this testimony receive credit from his word whose very name had scarse been thought on but for this bare Testimony But they will say hee was a member of the Councell and that may deserve to gaine him credit with us I will not stand to argue as yet with faire allowance I might that wee may as justly suspect there were some bad and slippery men in that councell as we know there are wont to be in our Convocations Nor shall I neede to plead at this time that nothing hath been more attempted nor with more subtilty brought about both anciently by other Heretiks and modernly by Papists then to falsifie the Editions of the Councels of which wee have none but from our Adversaries hands whence Canons Acts and whole spurious Councels are thrust upon us and hard it would be to prove in all which are legitimat against the lawfull rejection of an urgent and free disputer but this I purpose not to take advantage of for what availes it to wrangle about the corrupt editions of Councells when as we know that many yeares ere this time which was almost 500. years after Christ the Councels themselves were fouly corrupted with ungodly Prelatisme and so farre plung'd into worldly ambition as that it stood them upon long ere this to uphold their now well-tasted Hierarchy by what faire pretext soever they could in like manner as they had now learnt to defend many other grosse corruptions by as ancient and suppos'd authentick tradition as Episcopacie And what hope can we have of this whole Councell to warrant us a matter 400. years at least above their time concerning the distinction of Bishop and Presbyter whenas we find them such blind Judges of things before their eyes in their decrees of precedencie between Bishop and Bishop acknowledging Rome for the Apostolick throne and Peter in that See for the rock the basis and the foundation of the Catholick Church and Faith contrary to the interpretation of more ancient Fathers and therfore from a mistaken text did they give to Leo as Peters successor a kind of preheminence above the whole Councel as Euagrius expresses for now the Pope was come to that height as to arrogate to himselfe by his Vicars incompetible honours and yet having thus yeilded to Rome the universall Primacie for spirituall reasons as they thought they conclude their

Bishop in Rome that other in Ephesus but to shew when they alterd their owne decree set downe by St. Paul and made all the Presbyters underlings to one Bishop But suppose Tertullian had made an imparity where none was originally should hee move us that goes about to prove an imparity betweene God the Father and God the Sonne as these words import in his Booke against Praxeas The Father is the whole substance but the Son a derivation and portion of the whole as he himselfe professes because the Father is greater then me Beleeve him now for a faithfull relater of tradition whom you see such an unfaithfull expounder of the Scripture besides in his time all allowable tradition was now lost For this same Author whom you bring to testifie the ordination of Clement to the Bishoprick of Rome by Peter testifies also in the beginning of his treatise concerning Chastity that the Bishop of Rome did then use to send forth his edicts by the name of Pontifex Maximus and Episcopus Episcoporum chief Priest and Bishop of Bishops For shame then doe not urge that authority to keepe up a Bishop that will necessarily ingage you to set up a Pope As little can your advantage bee from Hegesippus an Historian of the same time not extant but cited by Eusebius his words are that in every City all things so stood in his time as the Law and the Prophets and our Lord did preach If they stood so then stood not Bishops above Presbyters for what our Lord and his Disciples taught God be thanked we have no need to goe learne of him and you may as well hope to perswade us out of the same Author that James the brother of our Lord was a Nazarite and that to him only it was lawfull to enter into the holy of Holies that his food was not upon any thing that had life fish or flesh that he us'd no wollen garments but onely linnen and so as he trifles on If therefore the tradition of the Church were now grown so ridiculous disconsenting from the Doctrine of the Apostles even in those points which were of lest moment to mens particular ends how well may we be assur'd it was much more degenerated in point of Episcopacy and precedency things which could affor'd such plausible pretenses such commodious traverses for ambition and Avarice to lvrke behind As for those Brittaine Bishops which you cite take heed what you doe for our Brittaine Bishops lesse ancient then these were remarkable for nothing more then their poverty as Sulp Severus and Beda can remember you of examples good store Lastly for the fabulous Metaphrastes is not worth an answer that authority of Clemens Alexandrinus is not to be found in all his workes and wherever it be extant it is in controversie whether it be Clements or no or if it were it sayes onely that Saint Iohn in some places constituted Bishops questionlesse he did but where does Clement say he set them above Presbyters no man will gaine-say the constitution of Bishops but the raising them to a superiour and distinct order above Presbyters seeing the Gospell makes them one and the same thing a thousand such allegations as these will not give Prelaticall Episcopacy one Chapell of ease above a Parish Church And thus much for this cloud I cannot say rather then petty-fog of witnesses with which Episcopall men would cast a mist before us to deduce their exalted Episcopacy from Apostolick times Now although as all men well know it be the wonted shift of errour and fond Opinion when they find themselves outlaw'd by the Bible and forsaken of sound reason to betake them with all speed to their old starting hole of tradition and that wild and overgrowne Covert of antiquity thinking to farme there at large roome and find good stabling yet thus much their owne dêify'de antiquity betrayes them to informe us that Tradition hath had very seldome or never the gift of perswasion as that which Church Histories report of those East and Western Paschalists formerly spoken of will declare who would have thought that Polycarpus on the one side could have err'd in what he saw Saint Iohn doe or Anicetus Bishop of Rome on the other side in what he or some of his friends might pretend to have seene Saint Peter or Saint Paul doe and yet neither of these could perswade either when to keep E●ster The like frivolous contention troubled the Primitive English Churches while Colmanus 〈◊〉 Wilfride on either side deducing their opinion 〈◊〉 the one from the undeniable example of Saint Iohn and the learned Bishop Anatolius and la●●● the miraculous Columba the other from Saint Peter and the Nicene Councell could gaine no ground each of other till King Oswy perceiving no likelihood of ending the Controversie that way was faine to decide it himselfe good King with that small knowledge wherewith those times had furnisht him So when those pious Greek Emperours began as Cedrenus relates to put downe Monks and abolish Images the old Idolaters finding themselves blasted and driven back by the prevailing light of the Scripture sent out their sturdy Monks call'd the Abramites to alledge for images the ancient Fathers Dionysius and this our objected Irenaus nay they were so high flowne in their antiquity that they undertooke to bring the Apostles and Luke the Evangelist yea Christ himselfe from certaine records that were then current to patronize their Idolatry yet for all this the worthy Emperour Theophilus even in those darke times chose rather to nourish himselfe and his people with the sincere milke of the Gospell then to drinke from the mixt confluence of so many corrupt and poysonous waters as tradition would have perswaded him to by most ancient seeming authorities In like manner all the reformed Churches abroad unthroning Episcopacy doubtlesse were not ignorant of these testimonies alledg'd to draw it in a line from the Apostles dayes for surely the Author will not thinke he hath brought us now any new authorities or considerations into the world which the Reformers in other places were not advis'd of and yet we see the intercession of all these Apostolick Fathers could not prevaile with them to alter their resolved decree of reducing into Order their usurping and over provender'd Episcopants and God hath blest their worke this hunder'd yeares with a prosperous and stedfast and still happy successe And this may serve to prove the insufficiency of these present Episcopall Testimonies not only in themselves but in the account of those ever that have beene the followers of truth It will next behoove us to consider the inconvenience we fall into by using our selves to bee guided by these kind of Testimonies He that thinks it the part of a well learned man to have read diligently the ancient stories of the Church and to be no stranger in the volumes of the Fathers shall have all judicious men consenting with him not hereby to controule and new fangle