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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A39854	Two sermons the first preached in Christ-Church, Dublin, Feb. 19, 1681, at the consecration of the Right Reverend Fathers in God, William Lord Bishop of Kildare, William Lord Bishop of Kilmore, and Richard Lord Bishop of Kilalla : the other, preached in the Cathedral Church of St. Patrick, at the primary visitation of the most Reverend Father in God, Francis Lord Arch-bishop of Dublin, Apr. 24, 1682 / by S. Foley ...	Foley, Samuel, 1655-1695.; Moreton, William, 1641-1715.; Sheridan, William, 1636-1711.; Tenison, Richard, 1640?-1705.; Marsh, Francis, 1627-1693.	1683 (1683)	Wing F1400; ESTC R2994	25,191	58

Cyprian's Observation (c) Neque enim aliunde Haereses abortae sunt aut nata sunt Schismata quam inde quod Sacerdoti Dei non obtemperatur nec unus in Ecclesiâ ad tempus Sacerdos ad tempus Judex vice Christi cogitatur 'T is the 59th Epist in the New Edition Pag. 121. in his 55th Epistle That most of the Schisms which have harass'd and disgrac'd the Church have proceeded from disobedience to the Bishop And Epist 69. (d) Inde Schismata haereses obortae sunt oriuntur dum Episcopus qui unus est Ecclesiae praeest Superbâ quorundam praesumptione contemnitur homo dignatione Dei honoratus indignus ab Hominibus judicatur He says That the Contempt of the Bishop will naturally end in Schism and Heresy And Calvin (e) Calvin Inst Cap. 8. Sect. 53. as he supposes Episcopacy to be of human institution so he says it was Established Ne ex aequalitate ut fieri solet dissidia nascerentur To prevent those Contentions which are commonly occasion'd by Equality And our late Experience tells us how the Church was divided and subdivided among us in the Late Unhappy Times when the Bishops were by the prevailing Party by force driven from their Charges the evil effects of which we are yet too sensible of In short a Bishop cannot have any design in disturbing the Peace of the Church and in occasioning Separations he can have no Advantage by it and consequently no Temptation to it which I need not say Others may have Secondly In reference to the Civil Government happiness of the State and ease of the Subject When other Forms of Church Government were in the Ascendant in England it cannot yet be forgotten what Diminution and Prejudice to the Royal Honour and Prosperity attended them I need not put your in mind how Seditious Insolent Turbulent and Ungovernable (f) See the Character the King gives of them in his Basilicon Doron King James to his great Grief found the Presbyteries in Scotland for many Years together and what usage his Son since Martyr'd did many Years after receive from them It may be demonstrated that They who speak severely against the Bishops for being as they pretend Enemies to the Civil Magistrate in claiming their Authority from God do the same themselves only with far less reason and with much greater injury to their Prince Thus the Presbyterian Model and Discipline though never heard of the World till within these last Two Hundred Years is declared by them to be the very Scepter of Christ's Kingdom to which all must submit even Princes their Thrones and Scepters The Independents pretend the Holy Scripture for theirs that any Society of men Combining together by common consent in a Church-way and Membership is by Divine Right Free and Absolute within it self to Govern its self by such Rules as it shall judge agreeable to Gods Word without dependance or subjection in Spiritual Concerns to any Human Person or Society whatsoever 'T is notorious that the Presbyters do Claim to their Consistories Full and Absolute Spiritual Power and Jurisdiction over Princes themselves with Power to Excommunicate them when they see Cause And the Independents do exempt their Congregations from all Spiritual Subjection to the Civil Powers But our Bishops do neither pretend to Jurisdiction over our King nor do withdraw their due Subjection from him whom God has made Supream upon Earth over all Persons in all Causes Spiritual as well as Temporal within his Dominions And as to the good of the Subject 'T is not so long since Presbytery was Established and found Intolerable in England and we are not Ignorant how all Parties did contribute to throw it down 't was so very uneasie As for Independency few now know what it is (g) Dr. A. Stuart a Presbyterian sayd He verily believed that Independency cannot but prove the root of all Schisms and Heresies and by consequence much worse than Popery Duply to M. S. Pag. 53. See the Papers for Accommodation and fewer do desire it And as for other Sects they are not yet agreed what Government they would have nor is it likely that ever they will be Some indeed do fancy Independency to be a pretty easy sweet gentle thing But certainly for men to cry out against the Yoke of Bishops as intolerable and yet to make every Parish-Minister a Bishop an Absolute Sovereign Independent Bishop owning no Superiour under Heaven to whom Appeal may be made is as Ridiculous as 't would be to Cry out against Monarchy as unsupportable and to desire in lieu of it that every Constable be made a King To conclude this point Many and great Advantages hath the Church of God in all Ages enjoyed and we do now enjoy by this Government and of many of them like one of the greatest Blessings of this Life the Health of our Bodies whilst we are constantly well we are almost insensible But still they are not the less for it though we understand them more by their absence and can then put the truest value on them when we see others in Feavers and Frenzies and it may be for their Comfort in the hands of Empericks too And so I come to the Third Enquiry What may be reasonably expected from Persons intrusted with that Sacred Power and Authority It was not only St. Paul's Charge to Titus after he had made him a Bishop To shew himself in all things a Pattern of good works but he also makes it a necessary qualification to every Bishop that he be Blameless And with great reason For we know that for one in that Dignity to be wicked is the boldest Affront and Dishonour to God himself and one of the most fatal mischiefs to his Church imaginable so dreadful that a vicious Bishop would not be looked on so much as a Governour as a publick Judgment over our heads Besides Vice hath this property that it renders all men contemptible most of all Clergy-men because 't is their business and profession to make men good and among them They who are of the highest Rank shall be the more signally despised and thereby made clearly unserviceable It will therefore be justly expected that they do not contradict their Divine and Holy Doctrines and make useless their Authority by their loose and unsanctified Lives Farther 'T was St. Paul's Charge That they should speak the things that become sound Doctrine exhort and convince Gainsayers and rebuke with all Authority And indeed men will suppose that Power was committed to them to the intent that they should make some use of it and that we are made subject to them that they may compel us if there be occasion to do our duties And now that there is so miserable a decay of all Devotion and Piety that men are so loose in ther Principles and so corrupt in their Lives that the Church is so despised and Religion it self so commonly suppos'd a Cheat or

in the Commission which Christ gave his Apostles (e) Mat. xxviii 18 20. Go and teach or make Disciples in all Nations and lo I am with you alway even unto the end of the World Now they themselves were not to live so long and therefore this special Presence and Assistance must be understood to have been promised to their Successors also Farther Christ sent them as his Father sent him that is with such Authority to Ordain others and to Institute Ecclesiastical Discipline and so to make Successors and to communicate to them of that Spirit which he breathed on them as Moses did to Joshua (f) Deut. xxxiv 9. the Spirit of Wisdom by laying their hands upon them And hence it was that St. Paul told the Bishops of Asia upon whom he had lay'd his hands when upon his Summons They met him at Miletus (g) Acts xx 28. That the Holy Ghost had made them Overseers or Bishops over the Church of God I may add that all Disputers in this Cause and all Pretenders to different Forms of Church-Government do Acknowledge some Form to be always necessary and consequently Authority to Rule and Govern for ever to reside in some Persons or other 4. That Bishops be the true extent of their Authority what it will are declar'd to be in Scripture and were look'd upon in the first Ages h of the Church as Successors to the Apostles and so Authoriz'd by Christ to Govern this Society Thus far we have but little Controversie with the main Opposers of Episcopacy For they cannot deny but that our Bishops are Presbyters and therefore if as they will have it Presbyters were the Antient Bishops and are Successors to the Apostles our Bishops upon that account are so If therefore we be satisfied that Our Saviour gave some Power and Authority to his Apostles with a design that They should leave it to others to be transmitted through all Ages (h) St. Cyprian Epist 75. p. 225. Edit Oxon. Potestas peccatorum remittendorum Apostolis data est Ecclesiis quas illi à Christo missi Constituerunt Episcopis qui eis Ordinatione Vicariâ successerunt successively to some fit persons for the Exigencies of the Church and that our Bishops are Successors to those Apostles which one Party of our Churches Adversaries are obliged to own by virtue of their being Presbyters and which the other have no pretence to deny here in Ireland whatever Fables (i) For Confutation of which See Mason's Vindiciae Ecclesiae Anglicanae Primate Bramhali's Works and the Second Part of Dr. Burnet's History of the Reformation they have invented to disparage the English Consecrations we being able to prove That our present Bishops of Ireland were Consecrated by (k) For Instance His Grace the Most-Reverend Father in God Michael Boyle the present Lord Arch-Bishop of Armagh and Primate of all Ireland together with Dr. Margetson the Late Primate of Ireland the truly Learned and Pious Dr. John Parker late Lord Arch-Bishop of Dublin Dr. Pullen then Arch-Bishop of Tuam and the present Lord Arch-Bishop of Cashell and Seven other Bishops who died since were Consecrated Jan. 27. 1660. By Dr. John Bramhall Arch-Bishop of Armagh who was Consecrated May 26. 1634. by Primate Vsher who was Consecrated Anno 1621. by Primate Hampton who was Consecrated May 5. 1613. by Dr. Thomas Jones who was Consecrated by Adam Lostus Arch-Bishop of Dublin 12. May 1584. who was Consecrated by Hugh Curwin Anno 1562. who was Consecrated Arch-Bishop of Dublin Septemb. 8. 1555. being the Third Year of Queen Mary together with James Turberville Bishop of Exceter and William Glin Bishop of Bangor This appears out of our Records and by this may any of the present Lords Bishops of Ireland Justifie their Consecration such Bishops as receiv'd their Consecration from other Consecrated Bishops and so on to before the Reformation from Records never in the least question'd or suspected we must Acknowledge that what Authority our present Bishops have They have from Christ Jesus The way being thus far clear'd before I proceed to the main thing behind to wit To demonstrate that Bishops are a distinct Order from and above Presbyters by that Authority They have receiv'd from Christ I shall deduce some few Corollaries from what has been said such as 1. 'T is evident from hence That when the Apostles Ordained Bishops they did it by Authority given them by our Saviour and not only in pursuance of a Jewish Custom of creating Elders which the famous Mr. Selden so much contends (l) Selden de Synedriis Lib. 1. Cap. 14. for Had they not done it upon an Account peculiar to Christianity St. Paul when a Jew and a most violent Persecutor of Christs Church had had as full Authority to make Bishops as when a Apostle and must have deriv'd it not from the Holy Ghost as he constantly Affirms but from his Master Gamaliel 2. Hence it follows That Bishops have not their Authority from the Civil Magistrate There is a great difference between the designation of a Person to an Office and the giving him Authority in it Thus a Mayor of a Corporation is Chosen by the Burgesses of it but receives his Authority from the King alone and so in many other instances And therefore this Assertion of ours cannot be suspected as any way prejudicial to our Princes Antient Right of Electing Bishops The Church is a Society and Body Politick distinct from that of the Common-wealth which appears from hence That it did subsist when separated from and persecuted by all Civil-Powers it is founded upon Principles different from the Law of Nature and common Notions of Mankind and settled by Divine Positive Laws and consequently the Government of it must be proportionable And they who resolve to hold the contrary Opinion may take its Foundation along with it and believe the Gospel it self to be no Law but as Enacted by the Civil Magistrate 3. We may hence infer that all other Bishops are not merely Substitutes of the Bishop of Rome and that he in the Right of St. Peter is not the Only Bishop who hath his Authority from Christ so that all must receive theirs from him This was with much Vehemence and equal Applause defended in the (m) Hist Council of Trent Lib. 7. pag. 574. of the last Edition Engl. Council of Trent by Father Laynez General of the Jesuits and Friar Simon a Florentine did there likewise maintain That the Institution of Bishops in the Apostles was only Personal and ended with them But this as the good Bishop of Paris then said is a Novel Doctrine first invented by Cajetane to gain a Cardinalship and as such was Censured by the Doctors of the Sorbonne and Richerius a (n) Richerius Cap. 10. Sect. 11. Sorbonne Doctor in his History of General Councills lately Printed has made it out That in Antient Times the very Italian Bishops themselves did subscribe Bishops Dei Gratia

frequenti famulitio cingatur So Tostat Tirin Bonfrer Serrar And thou shalt put some of thine Honour upon him that all the Congregation of the Children of Israel may he Obedient Some of thine Honour This many Learned Commentators suppose to be Ensigns of Authority Attendants extraordinary and other Circumstances that usually procure Respect which we see God himself thought necessary in order to gain their Obedience So that it cannot be Religion which labours to make those Persons Low and Sordid and Mean and Contemptible and Useless whose Contempt and Meanness renders Religion it self so Besides were not Religion were not the publick good so much concerned in their Usage to deal ingenuously and to speak it out plainly it cannot but be thought a hard Case that Men who came into the World with perhaps as good Parts and as fit for Honour and for great Actions as their Neighbours after they have had an Education Liberal and Ingenuous and all the Improvements of Wit and Judgment Reason and Eloquence after many Years exhausting their Spirits and wasting their Vigour in publick Services as our Blessed Saviour after going about and doing good was arrayed in Purple that he might be set nought by Herod and his Men of War should be condemned to a Sacred Station of pretended Dignity and Authority only that they may be the more exposed to Envy and Malice Hatred and Contempt be the more eminently despised and more augustly ridiculous And has this Order deserv'd such usages at our hands How many of it have we had even in this last Century in these Kingdoms who have been of Primitive Piety and True Learning an Honour to their Country and Examples for future Ages Able and Couragious Defenders of the Truth Zealous Opposers of Romish Superstition that I say not the very Bulwarks of Protestancie most admirable Writers and incomparable Preachers And by which one may judge of the unreasonableness of our present Clamours against them I may add That no Anti-Episcopal man of what denomination soever hath in the judgment of unprejudiced Persons written so Learnedly and Solidly against the Romanists though Aspers'd themselves with Popish Inclinations and Designs as the Late Murdered Primate of England in his Book against Fisher the Late Primate of Ireland in several of his Treatises and the Late Bishop of Durham concerning the Canon of the Scripture and Transubstantiation to name no others But we have a sort of men among us from whose Scorn and Reproaches no Innocence no Vertue no Learning no Prudence or Caution can Protect either the Fathers or the Sons of the Church Be they what they will they are all become abominable and gone out of the way there is none that does good no not one As if a man must of necessity be forsaken of God and of all Goodness as soon as he is ingaged in his more immediate Service and lose his Wits at least part with all sense of Piety and Religion as soon as he enters upon any Spiritual Office so it be by Law Established I wish there were no reason for this Complaint But the Injury extends farther than to the present Clergy A Leading-Man among the Dissenters has lately added to his great number of Books with which he had favoured the World One which he calls a Church-History or History of Bishops which the Learned Answerer justly Stiles An Account of all the faults which Bishops have committed in the several Ages of the Church and I may add a great many of their Vertues made Faults And what can be the design of such a Work as this but to supply what is wanting in the Prelates now Living to make the Order odious by relating all the defects of those in former Ages But alass this is a Melancholy Consideration and must needs make a sad impression on any Pious Soul For though we cannot think it strange that Men who are professed Enemies of God and of all Religion and would feign laugh them both out of the World do endeavour to expose and to make ridiculous and odious those persons whose work and study it is to keep up a sense of Religion upon mens hearts yet that men who pretend to be Piously disposed and heartily concerned for the Honour of God and of the Gospel should take much pains to disgrace and to render such vile and abominable this this is a lamentable indication of a degenerate Age of an Age ready to be over-run with Profaneness and Impiety and industrious to force God to take away the Light of the Gospel from among them It must be Acknowledged that the best of men are still but men and therefore liable to some mistakes and defects So that it does not appear fair and equitable that they who it may take no Notice of Great and Extravagant Faults among their own Party should most severely Censure and Aggravate the least Miscarriage in a Prelate as if they disliked the Cause and the Persons and not the Crimes or thought that they stricter Piety of the Bishops like the Offering of the High Priest among the Jews were to make Attonement for the Sins of the People I come not here to flatter any man or to make Apologies for their Vices and think I have not as far as became me spoken too favourably of Vicious Prelates if any happen to be so But 't is absolutely necessary though it will not please all that the People be told their duty plainly in this point and I know not a more proper occasion and therefore omitting to speak of the Zeal and Diligence of some and of the Hastiness Credulity and Uncharitableness of others I shall in a word or two shew how easie a thing it is to slur a false colour on then most innocent Actions of the best men and consequently how little Notice Sober Persons should take of the Invectives we daily hear against our Spiritual Governours How easie a thing is it if they will not by servile compliances Fawn upon and vilely Court those whom they should Command to call them Proud If they will not let their Honour lie in the dust and allow that their Office is as Contemptible as their Enemies would have it be to represent them as Ambitious and how natural is it for those who pretend that making them poor would make them humble to make them look as if they were proud that it may be thought necessary to humble them Be they ever so Charitable to the Poor ever so Just and Generous in their dealings if they will not part with the Churches Right to any litigious Person can they forbear calling them Covetous And which is a very fashionable Calumnie now and almost in the mouth of every one of one sort if they do but perswade the People to Obey Magistrates as Christianity obliges them and will not joyn with the discontented in their unreasonable jealousies of their Prince how easie is it to say that They are for Tyranny and Arbitrary Government As if they had not as true a Property in their Estates and as good a Title in Law as any Freeholder in the Kingdom which all must Acknowledge unless they will have Property so highly magnified to be a word that signifies nothing but in the concerns of a Lay-man and they who stand up for it so warmly mean only their own If they be for a grave and regular devotion is it difficult to say They are Popish and if they would have men reverent in Divine Offices to revile them as Superstitious and if any one venture to say these dealings are not fair and honest to vote him Ambitious and a Flatterer But if these be the Crimes of our Bishops may they ever be guilty of them and if they be under the most invidious Character and with ever so much dis-ingenuity represented to the World upon these Accounts and be ever so much hated and contemned for them They have this Comfort that God from whom they expect their Reward seeth not as man sees and that whilst we regard only the outward appearance he views the heart To make an End of all May I not be allowed to beseech you with some earnestness that if you have any Love for the Truth any Zeal for the Gospel and any Concern for the Peace and Prosperity of the Church That you will not suffer your selves to be prejudiced by the heat and importunities of none of the most knowing and peaceable men against a Government built upon a foundation of Christ's own Institution Exercised by the Holy Apostles and continued from them to us the only Government used in all Ages by the whole Christian Worlds honoured and reverenced by all and administred by many of the Holy Fathers Martyrs and Confessors acknowledged by all Councils honoured by all the worthy English and Learnedest nf the Forreign Reformers and highly Respected and Advanced by all Christian Kings and Princes and never opposed in the Antient Church by any but by one desperate man immediately branded for a Heretick upon that Attempt And let us not be drawn unaccountably into a Kindness for any Novel Uncertain and Arbitrary Form one thing to day and we know not what to morrow to the disturbance of our quiet and for ought as we can tell to the Ruin and Desolation of these three Flourishing Kingdoms to the Eternal Shame and Disgrace of the Protestant nay of the Christian Religion and the great Joy and Triumph of the Enemies of all Religion and of God himself Consider what hath been said and the Lord give You understanding in all things Amen THE END