will all cease and sink of Course when once men see we scorn them For Shame Conviction and Reproach of Conscience upon the sense of our magnanimous and meek Patience will naturally quench the Spirit of persecution and open a glorious liberty and venerable Authority to the Church of God But our base fears of worldly greatness on one hand and the baser affectation of it on the other hath universally effaced all the glories of Religion and Piety throughout the world and looks like a gloomy prognostic of Ecclesiastical Ruines and Confusion But that †This is the strain of Dr. Hody's great adversary Clergy men themselves should court and invite an Hierarchical servitude and apply the bowstring to the throat of their holy Mother by Principles contrived to strangle all her Apostolical Powers and Authorities is such a daring presumption as needs a greater than the annual Expiation And if the Dr. should live to see his Principles pursued by either Civil or Tyrannical Powers to the arbitrary Subversions of Gods Priests or if otherwise he shall live to think feelingly of that most holy Authority vested in Bishops by God himself whose Ambassadours Vicegerents and Representatives they are the contempt of whom affronts even Christ himself he will not think every violent Intruder that like a Robber comes not in by the door to be a regular Messenger of the Lord of Hosts and that the most audacious Sacriledge hath entitled him to a Divine Character and consecrated his Authority and Communion He will then with sighs and unappeasable groans of Spirit anathematize the instances and design of his Baroccian Treatise and the ill use of his own infinite reading and diligence to recommend the baseness and villanies of degenerous Churches concerning which at present I leave him and his Adversaries to fight it out at Argument In the mean time I will only note that tho' Civil power or force may put intruding Bishops into the Palaces and Revenues of the Bishopric's by un-canonical Violences yet they cannot be possessed of Spiritual Authorities by any mere secular or incompetent Power or Authority and so we on our part deny the Drs. Intruders the present possessors of the real Episcopacy in the abused Dioceses Eucher If the Dr. should hear you talk at this rate he would not take it very kindly I believe But I will make proof of your prowess against him in the famous instance of Solomon and Abiathar For the Dr. having asserted Abiathar properly deposed by the mere Royal act and power of Solomon refutes five or six principal opinions to the contrary and among them yours of Cession with such a contemptuous turn of hand as exposes it for ridiculous For he utterly baffles you with the bare repetition of the LXXII version on which you seem to lay the greatest stress and force of your opinion And it is no small impeachment of your understanding to take that as an Argument for your Cause which it notoriously condemns Let me therefore clear up your eyes with some of the Doctors Arguments You therefore say that * Sol. Ab. pag. 22. King Solomon did not properly and judicially deprive Abiathar of the high-High-Priesthood but only commanded or required him to quit it on pain of death And to this purpose you quote the words of Solomon to Abiathar according to the Hebrew and the LXXII which latter you paraphrase so as to infer an option in Abiathar whether he would with dishonour retire from his Office or suffer death this latter being in the rightful Power of the King if Abiathar would not yield in the former So that Abiathars Priesthood determined on his own volutary Cession not the Kings Ecclesiastical sure Now how does the Dr. cut off this * Case of Sees pag. 18. In answer to this saith he I need but produce the words of the LXXII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This excepting the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which are removed from the latter Clause to the antecedent agrees exactly with the Hebrew and the natural Sense of these words is no other than what we have in our English Translation with which all Interpreters agree Josephus as is plain * Case of Sees pag. 18. from his words above produced the Chaldee Paraphrast the Syriac and the Arabic and the old Latin Translators who all understand the Texts of a Positive and Authoritative ejectment And that it was a positive command not an Opinion proposed to Abiathar but an absolute Deprivation is yet more plain from the words which immediately follow so Solomon thrust out Abiathar in the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. So the Doctor Dyscher 'T is strange that so Learned a man could fancy this to be an answer especially since I see not how he can clear himself from inconsistency or open error For if it were a positive command to Abiathar as he grants how could it be an absolute Deprivation which he asserts I owned it to be a command as positive and requiring as the Dr. but for that very reason denyed it to be a proper Act of Judicial Deprivation because judicial Sentences are not direct commands on the Offenders to excuse their own punishments but decrees of punishments to be executed by other hands as in Joabs Case which so apparently differs in Form from this of Abiathar Besides a command of self-execution as it may actually so may it lawfully be disobeyed and rendred ineffectual and it is in any such mans choice whether he will submit to it or no and the truth is no man will yield thereto but for fear of greater Danger Now if there had been no other prospect of Danger Abiathar would not have obeyed this so positive command of Solomon and if he had not actually obeyed the mere command being frustrate by his neglect had not been an absolute Deprivation that then which in it self was no absolute Deprivation without Abiathars consent and obedience which was not alone so as the Dr. contends and his office became void by Cession not mere Deprivation For it is a great mistake in the Dr. to imagine that positive commands destroy Option For tho' the commands of God upon our Practices are all as absolute as possible yet are they proposed to our option Thus saith God in his * Deuteronomy Ch. 30. v. 19. I set before you life and death blessing and cursing therefore choose life that thou and thy seed may live The Law and Gospel though in the preceptive part they are most properly Laws yet have also the nature and form of a Covenant in them and the punishments inflicted by vertue of them are justified not only from the nature of the crimes but our own option But let us see whether this command were so positive as these Laws whether it were so much the declaration of the Kings own will as a concessive indulgence to the will of Abiathar It is plain then herein K. Solomon offered him an easier condition than his
valid yet because of their actual Omission it wanted an Ecclesiastical Effect Lev. 10. So when a Statute of Deprivation requires the Church to eject Recusants from their Stations if the cause be necessary or just the Statute is valid to oblige the Conscience of the Church to an executive and concurrent obedience yet if the Church will by no means yield to such command of the State whether just or unjust valid or invalid in its obligatory intentions it cannot actually pass into an Ecclesiastical Effect and Issue and all that the Civil Powers can do on the refusal is to subject the Church to temporal Punishments Nay in the same Genus of Civil Government the Decrees and Judgments of the Kings Courts notwithstanding their perfect justice and validity cannot have their Civil Effect if the subordinate officers neglect or refuse to execute them T is true there is a difference between the Civil obligations of Under-Officers to their Superiors in Secular Authorities and those of the Church to the Civil Powers in matters Ecclesiastical For that Civil Officers are obliged only to observe the Legal forms of process in the Orders of their Superiors and are not tied to enquire into the inner justice of those Orders But the Church when under any Laws or Commands of the State may and ought to judge for her self and her conscience toward God Whether the matters enjoyned her by the Laws be consistent with the Laws and Principles of Christianity and the Churches fundamental Constitution against which she is never to admit them to an Ecclesiastical Effect but must bear the penal Consequences with all meeknes and resignation And this is not only the Right and Duty of all Churches as sacred Corporations toward all humane laws in matters moral or Religious but of every single Christian also And if this be not admitted up goes Hobbism and the Civil Powers may enact Deprivations Excommunications and Anathema's for mens refusing the Alcoran Paganism Socinianisme and even Atheism it self and for owning the Scriptures Creeds and Sacraments But you that think us such a soft and waxen generation would have found this Right asserted even unto Martyrdom against all such deprivations had they been enacted upon causes apparently injurious or imposed on the Church For in the late Reign not only you but others also opposed the growth and menaces of Popery with a burning zeal when we had no present prospect of any thing but Fagots Dragons and most Christian Bridles And that all these Armies of Worthies should all of a sudden grow base abject and irreligious cannot easily I am sure not fairly be presumed But in cases which the Church judges equal she may concur and submitt and when she may so do it can be neither religious or prudential to provoke or incur a persecution by a needles and obstinate refusal which is our Sense upon the Causes and Law of the present Deprivations But is it not a pretty exception against this Concurrence because it is yielded by Submission not Authority For did I ever assert of an Authority in the Church to refuse her Duty against which certainly there lies no Authority And I told you †Sol. and Ab. pag. 28. that the Church here concurs by Submission as judging it her duty herein to yield to the State But in such Cases if you will needs require the Churches Authority I will remind you what I told you †Sol. and Ab. Pag. 29. last time that the Church has an Authoritative Right to judge in such Cases whether she may or must concur or no. And hence a Right essentially belongs to it to examin all the Causes of the Secular Demands so that if she finds there be no grave Reasons to move the Church to the required Severities she ought to disobey as my Lord Bishop of London well did when required to suspend Dr. Sharp indictâ Causâ c. And for this I alledged out of Nazianzen one of the Noblest Instances in all Antiquity wherein the Bishops of Cappadocia refused to depose or reject the canonically settled Bishop of Cesarea notwithstanding all Julians terrors and commands of which I wonder Dr. Hody took no notice But I add also that if the Church finds those Causes sufficient she may if necessary she must admit the Laws enforcing them and not wantonly pretend Authority against duty nor use her liberty for a cloak of maliciousness And I can never imagine that this Right of the Church was ever suspected much less opposed by any Powers or Legislators truly Christian But if Civil Powers will make irreligious Laws in maters Spiritual will you immediatly oblige the Christian Councils to invade the Senate House or Courts of Civil Judicature with Protestations against their Procedures before the Laws come home upon us and press us to actual Concurrence Surely the Primitive Christians did not so against the Edicts of Heathen Powers For tho' Christianity will warrant meek and petitionary Apologies yet will it not justifie sawcy Remonstrances and Prohibitions upon Legislators who must pass undisturbed and unaffronted in their measures and we must with all meekness of behaviour wait the eventual prosecution of the Laws if we cannot divert it by fair atonement and when it comes refusing calmly the required Sins commit our selves and Cause to him that judgeth righteously So that all your Harangues about running into Parliament House with Proclamations or Protestations for our against their Authority are injudicious immodest and seditious proposals tho' we had known the demands of the State to have been unlawful which we yet acknowledge to be otherwise And that we should cease to be a Church because we are not officiously rude to the Legislators who may sometimes happen to be causelesly unkind or hard hearted to us We are neither to precipitate our zeal manners confession or sufferings but let the will of God be done upon us when his own time comes Since even the vilest Laws of men have this obligation and validity upon the Consciences of Subjects to restrain all indecencies and disturbances against them and the Legislative For if the Senate has not Authority to oblige us to evil it has to modesty and abstinence from their Presence and Consultations But the Parliament thought their Authority alone sufficient to deprive the Bishops and did not ask nor think they wanted the concurrence of the Clergy to make their Act valid very well they did not think so And if you confine this sufficiency to a valid Obligation on the Church to submit and concur this opinion of the Parliament is very true tho' I believe they ground it not upon any mere pretended Arbitrary Despotick Power but upon the Weight and Sanctity of the Causes on which they founded the Law But if you think it the opinion of the Parliament that their Acts can actually pass into an Ecclesiastical Effect without Ecclesiastical Concurrence you fix an opinion on them rather to be charged with Non-sense than Falshood
remind me of your own Principles and Senses I fear I shall fall into the Spirit of T. B. again and not use you very partially in some of my Reflexions Eucher I am sensible by experience of your infirmity And since good natur'd Men are sometimes passionate I know how to bear as well as to correct a little rudeness I pray good Brother let me know what 't is now that begins to provoke your choler Dyscher When you had spent a great many Arguments drawn out with much Pomp and Ostentation being basted in them you grow weary with strugling and fairly give up all and acknowledg that †Sol. ab pag. 27.29 an Act of State Christian cannot alone vacate a Spiritual Charge Charge by any Divine Law primitive Canon or Prescription This is as full as can be worded against the Power of the State to deprive Bishops Now see how you come about again in the very next words Yet such an Act received and admitted by the Church may from her concurrence have a just and legal Effect And then upon this Notion the Statute of Deprivation ipso facto must be taken as a Law upon the Church to reject the Recusants totally from their Stations Here you will not have the Deprivation to proceed from the Act of the State alone but to save some Honour to the Clergy you make their Deprivation valid by their Concurrence to the Act of Deprivation But I pray how did they concur Was it otherwise than by submitting to the Act when it was made And is such Submission any Authority I thought they had been quite different things Did the Clergy shew any signs or make any protestations for their Right viz. that the Act of Parliament for the Deprivation of the Bishops was not valid without their Concurrence No not a word but when it is done they submit to it and acknowledg it And you would make a Protestation against Fact that their Concurrence was necessary to it that themselves did not pretend nor dare they do it to this day It is certain the Parliament thought their own Authority sufficient to deprive the Bishops and did not ask or think they needed the Concurrence of the Clergy to make their Act valid On the contrary no Clergy-men have dared to dispute it but those who are deprived And for others to imagin to come in by their Concurrence into a share of the Authority is like the fly on a Wheel of the Chariot that thought he contributed to the dust that was raised for he too gave his concurrence It is possible such Men as you should not see how contemptible it renders them to pretend to an Authority they dare not avow And upon this Foundation to raise Arguments to justify their proceedings which they cannot maintain any other way For these Men to deny themselves to be Erastians or ever to name any Ecclesiastical Authority I had almost said to call them a Church Or to speak as †Sol. c. Ab. Pag. 29. you do that the Church ought not to admit Deprivations on improper or unreasonable Demands As if the Parliament did request it from the Convocation or left it to their admitting or not admitting As if they durst dispute the validity of an Act of Parliament for want of their Concurrence As if any of them durst let such a word come out of their Mouth Behold the Ghost the Echo of a Church c. M. S. Reflex and that the consent publick and actual Concurrence of the Church is necessary to give an Ecclesiastical Effect to Civil Ordinances in Matters of the Church Now this Concession overthrows your whole Cause and being placed after the main Body of your Arguments is it self an Argument that you had little faith in them So then our Bishops being never Canonically Deprived are the yet proper Bishops of their Sees But you come like a Spiritual Jugler and perswade us that this hath been Canonically done For the Church say you ought to empty the Sees of such Incumbents that are dangerous to the Civil State But Sir must the Church cast out her Bishops as oft as they will not comply with Vsurpers c. But you say this was done by Acts of Separation properly Ecclesiastical the Dean and Chapter of the Metropolitical Church taking the Jurisdiction till the Chapter elect and Bishops consecrate another But Sir you cannot but know that the Dean and Chapter have no Jurisdiction over their Metropolitane and the See must be vacant before they can proceed to Election T. B. Sect. Pag. 37.38 Eucher I have heard with much patience yea pleasure all your Noble strains of Rhetoric and need only say If I have spoken evil bare witness to the evil but if well why smitest thou me For if the Deprived assert the Churches Concurrence necessary to give Acts of State an Ecclesiastical Effect and I grant it what Cause have you to fly in my face for even that very Concession But for you to upbraid me with my Candour who are so heedless in attending to my words as to take or set them off in other Senses than rationally can be fixed on them in their clear account of this Concurrence is neither very courteous nor prudential Let us therefore again look over these oversights and see whether we can come again to our selves First then I never said that the Concurrence of the Church was necessary either to make an Act of Parliament or to make it valid in Ecclesiasticals and particularly in Acts of Deprivation But I admitted your Principle so far and no further that her Concurrence is necessary to give Statutes an Ecclesiastical Effect and Issue For an Act of Parliament may justly require of the Church some certain Ecclesiastical proceedings without any joynt Session or Consultation of the Church And such Acts shall be just and valid of themselves to oblige the Conscience of the Church to obedience or executive Concurrence As suppose an Act of Parliament repealing all the Statutes of Premunire which cramp the liberties of the Church in the Episcopal Successions and Synodical Consultations for a perfect reformation to a Primitive purity should consequently require our Bishops or Convocations to proceed upon such relaxation to provide and execute better rules of Discipline on the morals and duties of the Christian Church under their care and to renew the Commercium formatarum with foreign Churches for a general Restitution of Piety and Order to its Primitive State such a Law I think would valioly oblige the Church to Concurrence without which however actually given it could not have its Ecclesiastical Effect When King Joash commanded the Priests to employ the sacred Money to the reparation of the Lords House it was a valid command to oblige but while the Priests neglected it it had no Sacred effect 2 King 12. So when Moses spake unto Aaron Eleazar and Ithamar to eat the meat offering and heave shoulder according to set Rules the precept was very