are not only set up but justified 1. In some particular Cases especially of general Concern CHAP. IV. More of the Cases wherein Faithful Bishops and Ministers are bound to stick to their Pastoral Powers and Ministrations THey are still more bound to this Ministration when 2. This Justification of immoral Practices is by eluding and vacating of moral Precepts opposite thereto by Doctrinal Salvo's Instances of these Salvo's How they vacate the respective moral Precepts Such Salvo's make a Change in moral Doctrine though Men still own the Duties under their general Names The Duty of Pastors to defend and bear up moral Duties against such Salvo's by their Ministrations shewn at large And this when such corrupt Salvo's are only the Doctrines of the Pastors not the Determinations of the Church They are more strictly obliged thereto if the immoral Practices justified by such Salvo's are 1. extreamly Scandaelous to Religion 2. Generally Preach'd up by Seducers Or 3. Come strongly recommended to carnal Passions and Interests chiefly if driven on by general Persecutions CHAP. V. Of the Obligations to actual Ministration which lie upon them in the foresaid Cases THese deduced from their Office and Characters as they relate 1. To God and stand in Place 1. Of his Messengers 2. Of his Ministers and Ambassadors The various Obligations laid on them thereto by this 3. Of his Co-workers 2. As they relate to Religion as they are Ministers and Stewards of its Word and Mysteries The Obligations arising hence CHAP. VI. More of the Obligations to actual Ministration which lie upon them in the foresaid Cases 3. AS they relate to the Souls of Men and are set over the Church 1. As Watch-men 2. As Overseers 3. As Guides or Leaders 4. As Pastors or Shepheards 5. As Doctors or standing Teachers of the Church As Lights of the World and the Salt of the Earth Their Obligations to such exercise in the foresaid Cases from all the foresaid Characters Different Degrees in this Obligation A Spirit of Love and Zeal to Christ and his Church which stand not upon strict Terms the Spring and Principle of this Exercise How this clears the Duty of deprived Bishops and Clergy as to this Exercise on such Revolutions Answerable to this Obligation of the Pastors to afford such Ministrations at such Times is the Peoples Obligation to adhere to them and attend on them for Participation thereof PART II. Of Deprivations by Civil States or Ecclesiastical Synods CHAP. I. Of the Force of State Deprivations in the foresaid Cases THE Plea of a Deprivation of State represented in Bar of their Ministrations in the foresaid Cases Concerning which 1. This is to be press'd only under a supposed Legal and Rightful State 2. It s Deprivation is no conscionable Discharge from their Spiritual Ministrations in the foresaid Cases This is meant only of pure Spiritual Ministrations Not 3. of any Temporal Accessions and Inforcements of those Ministrations over which the State has Power because it conferr'd them As also over some other Powers belonging to the Church whilst it kept separate which it gives up to the State during its Incorporation with it These it gives up 1. with a Salvo to the Interests of Religion and of Souls 2. Only whilst it continues protected not when the State puts True Religion under Persecution CHAP. II. Of the Kings Ecclesiastical Supremacy Received and Asserted by our Church It lies not in his being invested with or having a Sovereign Disposal of the Powers of Orders But 1. in retaining his civil Power over all Persons whether Lay-Men or Ecclesiasticks In Virtue of this civil Power over the Persons of Ecclesiasticks he can command them faithfully to discharge their Spiritual Functions 2. In the Subordination of Ecclesiastical Courts and Causes wherein Ecclesiasticks are content to act subordinately on the Score of their secular Mixtures and Jurisdictions And in holding all this 3. in Opposition and Bar of all other Earthly Dependance especially of all Forreign Iurisdiction and Appeals This Supremacy excludes not Spiritual Ministrations of deprived Clergy in the foresaid Cases This may be collected from their Adversaries Concessions CHAP. III. Remarques on the Preceeding Account of the Force of State Deprivations and Instances of Deprivations alledg'd to the contrary considered and cleared up THE preceeding Account of the Force of State Deprivations is not 1. To deny the civil Power the Cognizance of Bishops and Ministers in civil Matters Nor any Iust Power over Ecclesiasticks 2. Nor to set the Church above the State as the Papal Usurpations pretend to do Nor to mistake or overlook the Condition of an incorporate Church The Deprivation of Abiathar by Solomon considered and cleared As also the frequent Depositions of the Jewish High Priests by the Roman Governours And of the Greek Patriarchs by the Turks And of the Popish Bishops by a Commission of State pursuant to an Act of Parliament in Queen Mary's Days CHAP. IV. Of Deprivations by Synods in the foresaid Cases DEprivation of Bishops most fit and pr per for Synods Their Deprivation no Discharge from Ministrations in the foresaid Cases as shown by reasons And by the Practice of the Church This is meant when Synods deprive for the cause of the Truth not of other mere Personal â—rimes where the Injured must acquiesce till relieved by regular Sentence â—hat regard is to be had to the Decisions of Synods in these Cases PART III. Of SCHISM CHAP. I. Of the Nature of Shism And of the Schism of particular Members from their own Church in throwing off Subjection and Dependance on their own Bishops OF the Union of a Society which Schism breaks One way of Uniting Societies is by Uniting them under the same Heads These in Church Societies are the Bishops Union of particular Members to their own Church is in Keeping Subject and Dependant on their own Lawful Bishops And their Schism lies in breaking off from them especially in seting up Opposite or Anti-Bishops against them So 1. in such Oppositions the Anti-Bishop and his Adherents make the Schism if the former Bishop was Orthodox and is still Rightful Bishop of the Church Of George the Cappadocian and Athanasius 2. The Unity of the Church doth not go with the greatest Numbers What distinguisheth Meetings in the Unity of the Church from Schismatical Conventicles Schismaticks too oft the more Numerous Party Much less doth it go with Places of Assemblies 3. Therefore in pressing Ecclesiastical Unity Men must be press'd to keep United to their own Orthodox Rightful Bishop not to any Opposite Bishop The Gospel Precepts of Love and Peace c. all on this Side and not to be urged the other way Such a Schism not to be cared by the Recessions of the Suffering Bishops in the foresaid Cases CHAP. II. Of the Schism of particular Churches from other Sister Churches by rejecting Fraternal Communion therewith UNity of one Body to be kept up among all particular Churches This is chiefly by the Union and Accord
Review from Rome or at Rome for all Matters Ecclesiastical and Temporal Ecclesiastical by his Bishops Temporal by his Judges says Bishop Bramhall So that the Legal Supremacy of our Kings in spiritual Matters lyes in their power of doing them all without any Interposition of Forreign Bishops who are none of their Subjects by their own Bishops and Clergy whom they can command and compel to do their duties therein as their civil Soveraigns And this way the civil Soveraignty doth not drown or swallow up the spiritual powers of Ecclesiasticks but supposes them all the while peculiarly and immediately vested therewith But only retains its own secular power over their Persons as well as others whereby it can oblige them to a due discharge of their sacred powers according to the Rules of their spiritual Functions as occasion requires It lyes moreover 2. Secondly In the Subordination of Ecclesiastical Courts and Causes wherein Ecclesiasticks are content to act subordinately on the score of their secular mixtures and jurisdictions as in Beneficiary Matters Censures and other things of that Cognizance To give more leisure and encouragement to the Ministers of Religion in attending their spiritual Administrations the civil State has endowed their spiritual Cures with temporal Benefices or Preferments And to beget a greater Regard and a more general and aweful Observance of Ecclesiastical Determinations the civil power as I before observed is annexed and mingled with the spiritual in these Causes and a Concurrence is therein made of Temporal and Ecclesiastical Jurisdictions The Matters cognizable there are not only mere spiritual but some of them of a temporal Nature Such are all Causes Testamentary or about Wills the Causes of Matrimony and Divorces and those about Right of Tythes Oblations and Obventions the Knowledge whereof by the goodness of Princes of this Realm says the Statute for Restraint of Appeals and by the Laws and Customs of the same appertaineth to the spiritual Jurisdiction of this Realm And the Canons and Rubricks which are to rule all Proceedings are not only the Prescriptions of Bishops and Priests but Royal and civil Injunctions Like as also the Antient Canons were by the piety of the Primitive Emperors We decree that the holy Ecclesiastical Canons either those passed in the four General Councils or those confirmed by them be in place of Laws says the Emperor Justinian Our own Laws will have the Divine Canons not to be of less force or effect than Laws and what the sacred Canons forbid that also do our Laws coerce and abolish says the Code And as it was in the case of those Antient Canons under those Emperors so in case of ours too under our Kings the Judgments and Sentences upon them rest not in mere spiritual but draw on temporal Effects and Incapacites which effect the Sufferers in their Persons and Estates as well as in their spiritual Concerns As subjecting them to a Writ of Imprisonment rendring them uncapable to commence or carry on a Suit at Law or the like Now for the favour of this State-Concurrence in all these Causes that under the Union of two such different Powers there may be no clashing the Church submits to act in subordination and the King in all these Causes and mixt Jurisdictions is supreme That is no Synod of Ecclesiasticks is to meet for making Canons or Constitutions but when by his Writ he convenes them Nor are any Agreements of theirs when assembled to be publish'd as Canons or Ordinances till he approves or ratifies them Nor any of those introduced formerly to be executed and put in use further than they consist with the Kings prerogative Royal and with the Laws Customs and Statutes of the Realm All which are provided for in the Statute of Submission And when Canons are thus made by his Ratification it submits also that in certain Cases which are declared by other Acts they may be relaxed by his Royal Dispensation and that as in making Canons so also in granting Dispensations from them he shall be supreme That no Persons shall be elected Bishops of beneficed and temporally endowed Churches but who have the Kings Letters missive as is provided in another Statute or who are of his Nomination That when Ecclesiasticks sit to judge in their Courts by those Laws all their Proceedings in that Judicature shall be subject to the Kings Prohibition to stop their further hearing of a Cause which by Allowance or Custom is of another Cognizance or to his Commission of Review upon Appeals made to him after they have given sentence So that in these Courts there is a subjection and subordination to the King both as to the Laws they proceed by which are the Kings Laws as not passing or being introduced without his Approbation or Sufferance and as to the Judgments there passed according to them And because of this subordination of the Bishops and Clergy in their pure spiritual Jurisdictions for the Civil Soveraigns addition of such Temporal or State Concurrence the King is declared supream in all these Causes Thus much is declared in the Passages already mention'd from the Statutes settling the Kings supremacy And thus 't is said in another Statute of the Review of the Institution of a Christian Man that King Henry 8th set it forth as supream Head of the Church of England because he call'd the Convocation together to frame and publish â—â— by his Consent And thus in his Declaration prefix'd to the 39 Articles of Religion King Charles the First sets forth his supremacy over the Church by this subordination of the Church-men and because in making any Canons or Constitutions they must have his License for their Assembling and their Orders and Agreements confirmed by his Approbation and executed all with subordination to the Laws and Customs of the Land for preservation whereof they are subject to the Temporal Prohibition And in respect of both these parts of civil power viz Both in having this civil command of spiritual persons and this civil power over spiritual causes by reason of such secular mixtures it lyes moreover in having the same 3. Thirdly in opposition and bar of all other earthly dependance especially of all Foreign jurisdiction and appeals He is the one Supream Head of all both Spiritual and Temporal next under God saith the Statute for Restraint of Appeals And the claim of Supremacy in the Queens injunctions is so as no other Foreign Power shall or ought to have any Superiority over them And the Thirty Seventh Article of Religion the first of King James the Firsts Canons and especially the Oath of Supremacy doth most fully disclaim and exclude all Foreign jurisdiction herein And the extending of the Kings Power of Judicature over all Persons Ecclesiasticks as well as others thereby is for excluding all Foreign Powers from being Judges in our Kings Dominions as we heard from King James's Apology for the Oath of Allegiance The Foreign jurisdiction and
Appeals particularly aimed at is that which was claimed here by the Popes of Rome They had wrested from the Crown the foresaid Soveraignty both over Ecclesiastical Persons and Causes For as to Ecclesiastical Persons they claimed an exemption for them as not answerable in Civil Courts but Cognizable only by themselves And as to Ecclesiastical Ministrations as back'd by secular benefices and Ecclesiastical Causes as mixt in the Ecclesiastical Courts with Civil Priviledges and Jurisdiction they disclaimed subordination to the Crown and asserted a supremacy to themselves therein For they made themselves supream here in investitures into benefices and preferments and to have the chief power by their Legates of calling our convecations of passing and ratifying all our Decrees Canons and Constitutions of granting dispensations from them of having their decrees take place of the Prerogatives of the Crown or of the Customs of the Realm of holding courts and of receiving Appeals from any of our spiritual courts and judicatures and the like All which civil powers over Ecclesiastical Persons and subordination of Ecclesiastical causes proceeding by the foresaid mixture of secular fortifications benefices and jurisdictions the statutes Articles injunctions and Canons of this Church and Realm about Supremacy abolish in the Popes and assert to the Crown to which they Anciently did and of right should belong So that this Soveraign Civil Power over all Ecclesiastical Persons as their subjects and this Subordination of all Ecclesiastical Causes to it because of the Concurrence and intermixture of the foresaid civil priviledges and juridictions therewith and that in opposition to the papal pretences in these points is the Ecclesiastical supremacy vested in the King by our Church and Laws The Popes spiritual Usurpation upon this Church was shaken off by asserting to the Arch-bishop of Canterbury the Brittish Churches Ancient and independant Primacy Which did Right to the King too it being against his Prerogative that any Foreigner who doth not own himself to be one of his Subjects should have any Power in his Dominions And his Civil Usurpation on the Crown in respect to Ecclesiastical Persons and Causes among its Subjects was thrown out by asserting of the Kings Supremacy But when the Supremacy speaks such a civil power over the persons of Ecclesiasticks as they are its subjects and such subordination of Ecclesiastical causes thereto as they are united to secular benefices and jurisdictions Yet at the same time as I have shewn doth it disclaim all pretence to meer spiritual powers or to the Soveraign Disposal of the Powers of Orders Of it self it can neither give nor recall them Nor stop the Ministrations thereof in any of those Cases where Christ requires them All it can do there is to withdraw its Civil incorporation from those who have these mere spiritual powers and are bound for the sake of Religion and of the Souls of Men to proceed in the exercise thereof But still that exercise and administration which hangs on anothers Commission will go on upon its own bottom and must be discharged as it can under the opposition instead of the former incorporation of state or under a civil Persecution And this continuance of such Ministrations in such Cases notwithstanding the deposition of state I think may fairly be concluded from the Concessions of those who have undertaken to plead for the Authority of state deprivations and to press them on the suffering Clergy at such times We are told by one from Mr. Mason that a state deposition of a Bishop is not by way of Degradation from his orders as if he had them not but of exclusion from the exercise thereof And that not absolutely as if he could exercise his office no where but after a sort that he should not do it as to their subjects nor in their dominions And by another that a state deprivation doth not concern the Character or Ecclesiastical Communion as an Ecclesiastical Deprivation doth but only concerns the exercise of his Episcopal Authority in any Diocess within the Dominions of that State or enjoying any Ecclesiastical Benefice in it Now since such state deprivation neither concerns the Character nor the Communion of the Church 't is plain he is a Bishop still notwithstanding their deprivation and such a Bishop as without any fault in Church Communion all good Christians may Communicate with And since his exercise of Episcopal Powers is thereby excluded only from the Dioceses and subjects of their dominions it is still the same it was as to all other places And what is the hinderance of exercising the same still in those dioceses and among that Kings Subjects One reason already cited is because he cannot exercise them in the incorporate way or in injoyment of any Ecclesiastical Benefice But besides another I conceive is suggested viz. Regard to state Authority or civil obedience Though neither the Faith nor the Communion of the Church is here concerned yet says the Learned Author last mention'd the Authority of the State is which obliges both the Clergy and Laity in these Cases So that although neither his powers are thereby vacated nor their dependance and communion with him is broken off on other accounts yet in Civil Obedience it seems by his account both Bishops and People on such state deprivation are bound to acquiesce But now if they are left in full Possession of their spiritual powers and of the communion of the Church 't is plain they cannot be debarr'd of their Ministrations in the foresaid Cases nor the people of their attendance on them in any regard to secular inhibitions or to shew Civil Obedience For we must never hear Kings against Christ or obey them when they bar us of doing what he bids us do And these Ministrations he requires and calls for in the aforesaid Cases as I have shewn and also for the peoples communion with and attendance on them And it matters not that they cannot Minister any longer in the incorporate way or under shelter of Civil Laws and enjoyment of benefices For true Ministers of Christ and of Souls must depise benefices and secular incorporations when they come in competition with his service and Minister his word and worship at their hazard and under persecutions Besides if as he owns such deprivation doth not affect the Communion of the Church it leaves the subjects of those dioceses still under the same Religious and Church Principles of dependance and communion with their Bishops as they were before it For though the state should not meddle therein the Church has Principles of this dependance and communion of its own Christ requires his Church should be one and that is by ahhereing to their Bishops whom he has made the Heads of Union And these it seems the deprivation of state doth not at all Cancel only the Authority of state as is said but not Church Communion being concerned therein So that such Bishops deprived by the state continue still to be Christs
Episcopal Throne and giving the other Possession thereof and barbarously enforcing submission and adherence to them from the Clergy and People as was done by Philagrius Syrianus and Heraclius to omit others But these Stateinhibitions and deprivations coming on him his Adherents not for any other Crimes alledged which were shameless Falshoods and assumed meerly as pretences but in reality only for his being a stout Asserter of the Orthodox Faith he still went on preaching and ministring the same and for all these State-ejections was stuck to therein by the faithful Aegyptians and by the Orthodox in all other places And thus also our own Ancestors continued to do on the States turning upon them and under Forfeiture of Incorporation and all the Penalties of a Bloody Persecution forbidding them to go on administring the Word and Worship of God according to the Reformation thereof made by King Edward in Queen Maries time For being to administer this Word and Worship in duty to God and in care of Souls they set light by the Benefits of Incorporation and civil Advantages and paid no regard to State-deprivations or inhibitions but went on faithfully to administer the same though at the â—eril of their Lives I Grant the desire of keeping on the publick benefits of incorporation may many times be a Reason for Bishops and Ministers voluntarily to rest under State-deprivations and inhibitions when 't is a Case only of personal rights and priviledges Such deprivations and inhibitions often affect persons only and not things when on the deprivation of one the same Ministrations would be kept up by others As was done in the depositions of High-Priests so common in later times among the Jews and of Patriarks so ordinary at present among the Greeks and may happen in other places In all which there is only a change of persons but no change in ministrations the Church being lead on in the same necessary Worship Doctrine and Practice under both And here to prevent a breach with the state and to keep on the way of spiritual ministrations with the benefit of Secular Accessions the Bishops and Pastors of an incorporate Church where it is not like to do the Church more hurt by an utter loss of its liberty in these points than the incorporation desired will compensate may think there is more cause for the Churches sake to rest under state-deprivations They may esteem it their parts to quit their own particular interests to advance the Churches and believe that the keeping on the publick benefits of incorporation will abundantly compensate for the wrongful encroachment made by such deprivation on a private person But in Cases which concern not only the personal rights and priviledges of Pastors but the substance of Religion or the safety of Souls and where Christ requires they should exercise their ministrations as I have shewn he doth in the foresaid Cases They must not let them fall in regard to any inhibitions or deprivations even of their Lawful Princes They must here slight all worldly benefit of protection and be willing if need require to undergo a persecution And go on faithfully in their ministrations as their bounden duty requires and as in these Cases Gods Faithful Ministers have done in all times 2. Secondly what is so given up by the Church for abridgement of its own power in spiritual ministrations is only whilst it keeps united to the state and receives protection not when it is separated from it again or falls under persecution Its recessions as I noted were on consideration of State benefits and as a grateful return for them whilst it was suffer'd to enjoy them They are all upon the score of its union and so cease when the State breaks off and turns it up to it self again For being made separate it is no longer under any former tyes of incorporation but acts again with the powers of a separate condition And thus it is when instead of protecting the State puts any necessary points of Doctrine or Worship or part of their ministration under persecution When it separates its protection it separates it self It drives out the Church when it drives out any of those things which the Church must stick to at all perils and when instead of incorporating or civilly protecting the ministrations thereof it falls to incorporate and to protect the ministration of error and wickedness in their place It disfranchises pure Worship and Doctrine when it enfranchises errors and corruptions contrary to them And by turning to persecute the necessary ministrations of pure Religion it breaks it self from them and thence forward they are no longer one but become two again So that whatever regard and complyance the Bishops and Ministers of Christ may shew to such deprivations and inhibitions of the State whereinto they are incorporated whilst it inhibits no necessary Ministrations to Religion or to the Souls of Men but in discharging all those they injoy the priviledges and protection thereof Yet are they not to be discharged thereby from ministring to the same in all the foresaid or other like Cases nor to be debarr'd of any of their spiritual powers after once the state breaks with them and instead of yielding them the benefits of incorporation puts them under persecution But then they must exercise these ministrations only according to what they have Received from Christ and from the Canons of the Church so far as they do not interfere with any innocent State Laws which restrain them as Good Subjects Not with any Civil fortifications and State Accessions CHAP. II. Of the Kings Ecclesiastical Supremacy Received and Asserted by our Church ANd all this agrees well with the Ecclesiastical Supremacy own'd by our Church and claimed by our Princes conformable to what was ascribed to and claimed by the Godly Kings among the Jews and the Godly Emperors in the Primitive Church Whose Ecclesiastical Soveraignty lyes not in their being invested with or in their having a Soveraign Disposal of the Powers of Orders But in retaining their Civil Soveraignty over all persons whether Laymen or Ecclesiasticks And in the subordination of Ecclesiastical courts and causes which are content to act in subordination on the score of their secular mixtures as in beneficiary matters censures c. And for Cognizance of either of these either of persons or causes in barring all Foreign Appeals 1. First It lyes not I say in their being invested with or having a Soveraign Disposal of the powers of orders For these our Kings do not pretend to have in their power or to be powers subjected and inherent in themselves But to be proper and Peculiar to spiritual persons Thus King Henry the eighth when he asserts his own Regal Supremacy over the Church leaves all proper spiritual powers and Functions to spiritual persons and in the statute for restraint of Appeals declares the spiritualty sufficient and meet to declare and determine all such doubts and to administer all such
Bishops and Heads of Union in those dioceses according to his Rules and Principles of Union And then how shall a mere command of state dissolve the tye made by him or break communion betwixt their Bishop and them Whilst Christ by conscionable obligations of Church Unity bids them adhere to their Bishop and keep one with him must they give ear to the state that bids them divide from him I think on second thoughts he will not make Church Union or the dependance of people on their Bishops so unsettled or precarious a thing as either to have no fixt and conscionable principles ingaging and holding all good Members thereto of its own or to have it in the power of a secular state when it pleases to set them aside and over-rule them CHAP. III. Remarques on the Preceding Account of the Force of State-Deprivations and instances of Deprivations alledg'd to the contrary consider'd and clear'd up FRom what I have said in the foregoing Chapters about the power of the Civil State and the effect of its Deprivations I think it may appear that the Bishops and Ministers of Christ continue still invested with their Ministerial Powers and can receive no discharge from the exercise thereof in the formention'd Cases by any State Deprivations And of this I observe from what has been hitherto discoursed 1. First That this is not to deny the Civil Power the Cognizance of Bishops and Ministers in Civil matters Allegiance 't is true is a civil matter and most nearly concerns the civil peace Indeed it is not only Civil but also Religious For when men are requir'd to Swear it and in all Churches to pray conformably to it Solemn Oaths and Prayers are most sacred and Religious Acts. And Allegiance in it self is a moral duty for due payment whereof all stand answerable to God in the last judgment as well as a civil or state-duty for which they are answerable to the state in judicatures of this world But it is such a matter of Religion I say as is also a civil matter subject to civil Cognizance or a point of State too And if this is refused to a Rightful state it is not only an offence against Morality and Religion which spiritual Judicatures and Synods may punish with Canonical Depositions But also an offence against the state which such Rightful state may punish by state punishments as it may all other state offences and in Ecclesiasticks when they are guilty thereof as in all other persons And among these punishments by Deprivation though not of mere spiritual powers the state having no Authority to take away those mere spiritual powers which it never gave yet of all that is Temporal in Church-Ministrations so as that such refusers shall no longer hold benefices and preferments or state endowments Yea and even as to those mere spiritual powers it may make them of themselves to forbear any further exercise thereof to keep state-favors and endowments to the Church when their deprivation is in a case that concerns only their own personal rights and priviledges but not the Truths or cause of Christ as was before observed But if at any time or in any Kingdom this should be refused to an Usurping State which has no Legal Right but which calls for this Allegiance Oaths and solemn Prayers and Religious services conformable thereto against him who has the Right Then such refusal is neither a Religious nor a Civil offence neither against God nor Gods Vicegerent Divine or Humane Laws but a due obedience to both And this brings on the Case of all the foresaid immoralities Damnifying Religion and endangering Souls wherein faithful Bishops and Clergy whatever they incur by standing to their Spiritual Ministrations must not let them fall â—n regard to any Deprivation of Usurping Powers Nay nor in regard to the most rightful States should they issue out against them state-deprivations to stop their Ministrations against any such like immoralities or other irreligious and endangering ways And this Limitation of the regard they ought to have to his deprivation is not to deny the Rightful Civil Soveraign any part of his just power over Ecclesiasticks But only to deny him such a power as would leave our Saviour Christ himself who is his Master as well as theirs â—o have no power over them Or such a power as should enable him to discharge them of what Christ has given in charge to them to take away what powers he confers or to loose what he has tyed on But under all this discharge of their foresaid Ministrations notwithstanding his inhibitions and deprivations it allows the Civil Magistrate as much Power over their persons to mulct banish or put them to death on just cause as they are his Subjects as over any others And to have power also over the mixt way of administrations so as to be able to deprive them though not of all exercise of their spiritual powers yet from holding or exercising them with Temporal jurisdictions effects and priviledges after the way of an incorporate Church And to have those other foremention'd Prerogatives of conveneing Synods passing Canons sending prohibitions to stop any process in prejudice of the Prerogative or of the Laws c. Which for the favor and continuance of those secular mixtures have accrued by incorporation and belong to Christian Kings And these things which are allow'd are as much as any of them can claim of Ecclesiasticks as they are Kings And on the other side those things which are denyed are such as they would abhor to challenge or desire who would own any subjection to Christ or bound their pretensions as Christian Kings 2. Secondly nor is it to set the Church above the State as the Papal Usurpation pretended to do But only to set Almighty God and his blessed Son Jesus Christ above it Not leaving subjects whether Laicks or Ecclesiasticks in complyance with any the most rightful state to disobey God Nor Ministers to let fall any Services and Ministrations of Religion or cure of Souls which Christ calls them to exercise yea not only when the state is consenting but when it gain-says it and doth all it can either to disable or discourage them from it he not having thought fit to stand to the courtesy of any civil state whether or no the Ministry of saving Souls should be prosecuted and whether he should be served and have a Church on Earth But at the same time it sets God and Religion above their Power it subjects all both Laicks and Ecclesiasticks to the same in other things Allowing every rightful civil state the chief civil power over all Ecclesiastical Persons And the chief civil power over all Ecclesiastical Causes so far forth and so long as they are mixed and compounded with civil benefices and jurisdictions And a civil power to compel Church Men by civil penalties to do the duty of their Spiritual Ministrations and to hold them under a necessity of not resisting by Arms but of
removed from the Honour of the Priesthood and Clerical Orders Accordingly Basilides the Bishop after he had denyed and cursed Christ was very thankful as he says and looked upon it as a great Favour to him that he could be received to communicate as a Lay-man And likewise Trophimus the Bishop when he had sacrificed to Idols was admitted as he tells Antotianus only to communicate as a Lay-man not to usurp the Priests Office any more as some malicious persons had inform'd him which made Antonianus complain of the same to Cyprian as a Violation of this known Rule of Discipline And in Vertue of this being the known and received Rule of the Church the Donatists sought to invalidate and overthrow the Ordination of Caecilian against whom they had set up their Anti-bishop Majorinus at Carthage pretending that Caecilians Ordainers particularly Faelix of Aptisng had been Traditors in the precedeing Persecution or had faln from Christ and deliver'd up their Bibles to be burnt by their persecutors Which Charge had it been true as it was false would have been received and owned for a just Exception on both sides And the Catholicks would have rejected Caecilian till he could make out some better Ordination as well as the Council of Nice did these Egyptian Anti-bishops that had no better Ordainer than Meletius who stood guilty of the like Offence But it was rejected in Caecilians Case as being a malicious Forgery the Donatists thereby impudently laying their own Crimes on others hoping that would hinder men from inquiring after the same in themselves Indeed as Epiphanius relates this Matter Meletius made this Schism and Ordained these Anti-bishops not after he had sacrificed to Idols and had been Synodically condemned by Peter for the same but whilst he as well as Peter was a stout Confessor for the Faith against Idols and in his Zeal for the Discipline of the Church against Peters easiness in admitting the Lapsers who sought to them whilst they were together in Prison for the peace of the Church But Athanasius who was nearer to this Transaction and who after some others was chosen to suâ—ceed Peter in the same Church is more like to understand the Truth of this Affair than Epiphanius was Whom Baronius and Petavius look upon as mislead into this account by some false Acts or Histories of the Meletians who dealt injuriously with Peter and the Catholicks in Egypt like as the Donatists did with Caecilian and those Catholicks in Africk on whom they labour'd to fix the Crime of being Traditors whereof the Catholicks were free but they themselves were notoriously guilty Thus though their Orders were valid in themselves without which they could have been received at no time yet have they not always availed to Claim and obtain the Churches Communion without which the persons could not be received by the Faithful to exercise the same And this has been when the Church saw fit and expedient to insist upon the Rules of Unity in Ordinations and more vigorously to assert Ecclesiastical Law and Discipline And this it might assert or relax as it saw Cause Ecclesiastical Law and Discipline is not a Rule of indispensible Obligation to the Church but such as it may and oft-times has receded from on great reason and necessity What Rules the Church makes the Church may alter and go off from in particular Cases as need shall require and as may best serve those ends for which it made them Accordingly Rules of Discipline have not been one and the same in all Ages For to omit others the ancient Councils asserted the free Election of Bishops nominated here by the Prince to the Bishops of the Province And for bid the Translation of Bishops from poorer to richer Sees And the Attendance of Bishops about Courts of Princes the Council of Antioch confirmed afterwards at Chalcedon and in Trullo forbidding them to go to the Emperor without the approbation and Letters of the Metropolitane And excluded both Bishops and Clergy from intermealing and incumbring themselves with Secular Trusts and Administrations All which are otherwise in these latter Ages And such Rules of Discipline as have been observed more strictly have not had one equal and uniform Tenor of Observation but have been sometimes remitted and sometimes exacted and stood upon as the Church was driven thereto by prudential Reason Thus it has been with the Canons or Rules of Discipline about Ordinations Which as the Church has sometimes insisted on as I noted to vacate the Ordinations which any Bishops made against them I mean to deny the Persons its Communion without which whatever powers of Orders they had received they could not be received in any Assemblies of the Faithful to exercise the same So were they at other times relaxed and over-ruled by the necessities of the Church and the Persons on their reconciliation admitted to officiate in vertue of such Orders as I think may abundantly appear by the fore-cited instances And this very Reason is given for it by the African Fathers in the Synod of Carthage when they admit of the Ordinations of the Donatists which the Transmarine or Italian Synod had rejected telling Pope Anastasius that this Reception of them to the same Orders was for the great necessity of Africk for a †better provision for Catholick Unity and for the benefit and peace of the Church These instances and proofs I think may be sufficient to shew that Anti-bishops and others of their Ordination have Orders though being in a Schism the Faithful ought not to joyn with them in their use thereof Their Schism makes them Sinners in receiving and in using their Orders and shuts out others from communicating therewith But it doth not utterly destroy and null their Orders nor must it be said I conceive that by such sinful Ordination they receive nothing or that whatever they had formerly received they lose by falling into Schism so as that thenceforward they have no Orders nor are Bishops or Priests at all The Donatists indeed as St. Austin reports asserted this and taught that by breaking off from the Church though men did not lose the Baptism which they had received before yet they lost their Orders or the Authority and Power of Baptizing And on pretence thereof they re-baptized those who since the Breach had been baptized by any of the Catholick Clergy As to which he owns that whilst they continue in their Schism they sin in exercising their Orders They do not do right saith he in giving Baptism to others whilst they themselves are broken off from the Church And it is to their own destruction so long as they have not the Charity of Union The having Baptism themselves and confering it on others are both pernicious whilst they continue out of the Bond of Peace But though they ought not to use these powers till they have amended their Schism yet as he
Which made them more sensible of the advantage of having these powers quietly and uncontestedly lodged in their own Hands These it might safely part withall during the incorporation as retaining still what it could not part with viz a Power of standing by all Necessary Points of worship and Doctrine and of doing what is necessary for the Souls of Men and as being also fitted all the time in the main with what is needful in Point of Discipline And its parting with them was in way of Compromise and Bargain as a grateful Return for the benefits and priviledges of its Enfranchisement and Incorporation or on consideration of its enjoying a Freedom not only of exercising spiritual ministrations but of exercising them in the way of an incorporate Church viz. in holding Benefices and in being back'd therein by secular Jurisdiction Laws and Priviledges And whilst these benefits of Incorporation are held on in favour of the Truth the cession of the Church in these Points is to be held on too and not to be resumed back again Protected and incorporate Bishops and Pastors must be content to claim Episcopal and Pastoral powers under the recessions and limitations of an incorporate Church Thus our Articles and Canons receive and assert the Ecclesiastical Supremacy of our Kings which contains the foresaid Church-Recessions And denounce Excommunication ipso Facto to those that Deny any part of our King 's Legal Supremacy in Ecclesiastical Causes or his having the same Authority therein as the Godly Kings had among the Jews or Christian Emperors had in the Primitive Church And accordingly in our Form of Ordaining Bishops they profess to think themselves call'd to this Ministration according to the Will of Jesus Christ and the Order of this Realm and promise to censure and punish the unquiet and disobedient within their Diocesses according to such Authority as they have by God's Word and as to them shall be committed by the Ordinance of this Realm But now all this giving up these or the like powers to the State for the sake of this Incorporation and in way of bargain and compromise or other abridgement of its own ministrations is 1. With a Salvo to the Interests of Religion and of the Souls of Men. They cannot give away any thing to make themselves wanting in any necessary service unto them nor part with their powers of ministring to Souls to build and nurse them up in pure Worship Doctrin and Practice These Powers are a Sacred Depositum which if they imbezzle or yield up in complyance they are false to God and to mens Souls and thereby betray both them and their own Holy Fâ—â—ction And their Acts also are nullities wherein they offer or promise to do the same For they are Acts against an antecedent Obligation which are wicked in the making as Herods Oath was to gratifie Herodias in the Baptists Death and the Jews Conspiracy and Oath to kill St. Paul But they are null as to the Obligation of performance as is agreed in the case of all contracts and promises to do unlawful things or things evil or forbidden in themselves They can neither discharge themselves I say nor receive any discharge from Princes of exercising these Powers where Christ requires they should exercise them for the Service of Religion of Souls as I have shewn he doth in the fore mentioned cases In Stewards it is required that they be found faithful in dispensing out these Ministrations as he orders not in suppressing them contrary to Order 1 Cor. 4 2. Necessity is laid upon me and woe be to me is here the Scripture denunciation if they preach not the Gospel or fail trustily to discharge that Ministry they have undertaken 1 Cor. 9. 16. No earthly Powers by confering on them the benefits of Incorporation get any Authority over Christs Ministers to discharge them of Ministring to their Master in these matters For this would be to give the civil power which ought to keep under Christ a power over him It would turn them from Nursing Fathers who by giving it a civil enfranchisement undertake to protect the true Religion into devouring Wolves who seek to make a prey of it It is expresly declared against by the Apostles who appeal to the common sense of mankind Whether they are not bound to obey God rather than men Act. 4. 19. 20. And would leave no ministrations of true Gospel Worship and Doctrin under any Christian state which should fall from any necessary parts thereof and begin to persecute them as the Arian Emperors did in the Persecutions they rais'd against the Orthodox and as Popish Princes did in like violences used by them at any time against our Protestant Brethren or Ancestors Than which nothing can be worse calculated for any Church of God but especially for the Christian Church which is to continue a Church in persecution and to bear up Christian Worship and Doctrin by due ministrations of both when any powers of this World fall from protecting most violently to bear them down And this in all times has been the Opinion and Practice of God's faithful Ministers when the State which by Incorporation should have back'd and strengthned them therein fell to discharge and bar them of their ministrations in these cases Thus God's Faithful Prophets and Ministers did in the Jewish Church who approved themselves glorious Confessors and Martyrs in administring God's Word and true Worship when the State fell to break in upon them and instead of backing and protecting them in those ministrations according to the purport of incorporation fell violently to discharge and drive them from officiating any longer therein Thus likewise Athanasius Bishop of Alexandria Paulus of Constantinople and other Bishops did in the Arian Persecution The civil State had then received the Church into it self endowed it with civil Edicts and enfranchisements And the deprivation and ejection of these Bishops out of their Churches particularly of the Great Athanasius was with State-Concurrence and for State-Causes or Pretences Among other Articles Athanasius was charged with Contumacy against the Emperour in refusing to appear upon his Edict at the Synod of Caesarea And with a Treasonable Design to stop the yearly Transport of Corn from Alexandria to Constantinople on which suggestion he was banish'd to Tryers by Constantine Not to mention the Accusation of his having impos'd on the Aegyptians a Tribute of Linnen Cloath and having conspired with one Philumenus against the Emperour and having Treasonably corresponded with the Traytor Magnentius and usurped the Imperial Prerogative by holding the Festival Dedication of the great Church of Alexandria without the Emperours Warrant and the like And his Deposition and Gregories and Georges Advancement to his See by Synods were seconded by Acts of State having the Approbation and Justification of the Emperors and the Assistance of Prefects as well as the ‖ Imperial Letters violently forcing one out of the
under the Cognizance of their civil Courts as others are And this civil Subjection of Ecclesiastical Persons against the Papal Exemptions thereof is the main thing in the Ecclesiastical Supremacy claimed by our Kings In the Injunctions of Queen Elizabeth and in the Canons of King James this Supremacy is called the highest Power under God whereto all Men within the same Realms by God's Law owe most Loyalty and Obedience afore and above all other Powers and Potentates in Earth Her Majesty say the Injunctions again thereby neither doth nor ever will challenge any other Authority than was lately used and was of antient time due to the Imperial Crown of this Realm that is under God to have the soveraignty and rule over all manner of Persons born within her Dominions of what Estate either Ecclesiastical or Temporal soever they be so as no other Foreign Power shall or ought to have any superiority over them By Supremacy or chief Government says the 37th Article of Religion we give only that prerogative which we see to have been always given to all godly Princes in Holy Scriptures by God himself that is that they should rule all States and Degrees committed to their Charge by God whether they be Ecclesiastical or Temporal and restrain with the civil Sword the Stubborn and Evil-doers And the Oath of Supremacy as King James the First declared only extended to the Kings Power of Judicature over all Persons as well Civil as Ecclesiastical excluding all foreign Powers and Potentates to be Iudges within his Dominions All which plainly make the Ecclesiastical Supremacy to lye mainly in having Bishops and Ministers or the Ecclesiastical State who were broke off from it by the Papal Exemption under the same common Obligation to the civil Soveraign with other Subjects or under the Tye of civil Subjection In vertue of this civil power over their Persons as his Subjects he can command them faithfully to discharge their Duties and Functions And that not only as Subjects in civil Matters but as Ministers in divine Offices For as he is the civil Soveraign the Temporal Magistrate is the Keeper of both Tables being to keep his Subjects in Godliness as well as in Honesty as St. Paul says And is to use the civil Sword for sins against Religion as well as for sins against the State and in his way to punish Ministers for Neglect or Abuse of their spiritual Functions as well as for Breach of the civil Peace Thus good Kings as Hezekiah and Josiah employed their temporal power to cut off corrupt administrations and to reform Abuses of Worship and Religious Offices in the Jewish Church As Constantine and other good Christian Kings and Emperors did afterwards in other Nations And the 37th Article of our Church declares That by his Supremacy the King with the civil Sword may restrain the stubborn and evil-doers whether Laicks or Ecclesiasticks And on this Account Constantine calls himself the Minister of God for the Coercion and Punishment of wicked Bishops And at his Entertainment of the Bishops tells them That God has appointed them the Bishops of things within the Church and him the Bishop of things without it and that it belongs to him as Bishop of Bishops to see they discharge their duties and be pious Thus the Emperors Theodosius and Valentinian say That God by setting them to reign had made them the Bond both of the piety and of the external welfare and security of those who are subject to them the connexion betwixt which two their study was to preserve inviolable And in this Kings saith St. Austin according as God commands them do serve the Lord as they are Kings when they enjoyn good things and prohibit evil things in their Kingdoms And that not only in Matters pertaining to humane society but also in Matters pertaining to our Holy Religion And thus by means of his civil Power over Spiritual Persons has the King the like Power over Spiritual Acts Functions viz. as he can require and by the civil Sword compel them whom Christ has empowered thereto in his Dominions to exercise the same I mean to exercise them according to the Rules of God's Word and of their own Spiritual Function his Power lying in calling them to do their duties not to any Neglect or Breach thereof As we see was observed not only by the Godly Jewish Kings but also by the Primitive Emperors whose civil Laws and Edicts in these Matters still followed the spiritual Rules and Duties and were a secular Enforcement to drive all Ecclesiasticks to keep them not to Transgress them Our Laws do not disdain to follow the Sacred and Divine Canons the civil power in these Matters enforcing that which the Church had first prescribed says the Emperor Justinian And accordingly in the Civil Law for Restraint of Excommunications we forbid our Bishops saith he to Excommunicate any without a just Cause be shewn for it We forbid all Bishops and Presbyters saith another Law to exclude any from the Communion before Proof of such a Cause for which this is commanded to be done by the Ecclesiastical Canons So by his Imperial Power over their Persons commanding their Ministrations and limitting them therein to their own Rules And thus the King like as the Jewish Kings and Primitive Emperors were is supreme in these spiritual Acts and Administrations as in his Dominions they are all to be sped and administer'd not by independant Forreigners but by his own Subjects or as having the supream earthly Command of Bishops and Priests who are bound in civil Obedience to him as their Temporal Soveraign to exercise them when he requires it And this way he can give Final Justice to all his Subjects in all spiritual as well as temporal Matters having Authority to command his Bishops and Clergy to do it in the one as well as his Judges and temporal Ministers to do it in the other And by this power of doing it by their Means or Ministrations is his Supremacy set off Thus in the Statute for the Restraint of Appeals the King is declared to be the one supream Head endowed with plenary Power and Authority to render Final Justice in all Causes because the spirituality or his Bishops and Clergy can administer and determine all that belongs to their spiritual Offices and the Judges and other his temporal Ministers can do the like for Tryal of Property and Conservation of civil Peace The Kings Supremacy in Ecclesiastical Matters doth not imply the power of the Keys which he has not but he may command those who have them to use them rightly says Mr. Mason This Supremacy is preserved if he take care that those who have the power of Ecclesiastical Censures do exercise them says Dr. Burhil He has plenary power to render final Justice that is to receive the last Appeal of his own Subjects without any fear of any
Thus it is when it sha Excommunicate any for adhereing to any necessary Christian Doctrines Worship or Practices For all who would hold to Christ must Neglect such Censures and though any Church or Synod throws such persons out of its Communion they are joyfully to well come and receive them into theirs For when our Lord Arthorizes and gives validity to Church Censures saying they shall be bound in Heaven and bidding us look on all who will not hear the Church as Heathâ—ns and Publicans He limits this validity to those censures which pass upon men not for any parts of righteousness but for real offences If thy Brother Trespass against thee and will not hear thee tell it unto the Church So that some real offence or Trespass must still be the ground of the process Mat. 18. 15. 17. It must be for not hearing the Church when it calls us to his Truths and Precepts not when it sets up to carry us from them For there if it use censures it acts of it self and not by his Commission It opens or shuts by an Erring Key and must not expect that what is so bound or loosed on earth shall be Ratifyed in Heaven By such perverse Censures the Church only deprives it self of the Communion of Faithful Christians but doth not deprive them of Communion with Christ or with one another The unjust Excommunications of the Jewish Sinhedrim when they cast Christs Disciples out of their Synagogues only estranged or cut off themselves says Photius but brought those Disciples so much nearer to their Lord and Master And so now says he when the imitators of the Jews Excommunicate the Followers of the Apostles they thereby only Conjoyn and Unite them the more to those Divine Apostles to whom they are more closely and exactly knit both in Faith and Life by the Communion of sufferings But they miserably cut off themselves both from their Doctrine and from our Orthodox Faith And therefore instead of bemoaning themselves under such Excommunications and seeking to have them take off by Complying with the Church our Blessed Saviour fortifies his â—râ—â— followers against them and bids them not only patiently to rest under tâ—em but triumphaâ—â—ly to re oyce therein They shall put you out â— the 〈◊〉 ues says he to â—â—em and Cautions them not be offended thereat when it should happen or not to fall off from him or his ways to recover the Liberty of the Sâ—nagogues again Joh. 16. 1. 2. When they shall seperate you from their company by Excommunications and Anathema's and shall reproach you and cast out your name as evil for the Son of Mans sake rejoyce ye in that day and leap for joy for behold Great is your Reward in Heaven for in the like manner did their Fathers unto the Prophets Luk. 6. 22 23. And thus the Holy Apostles and Faithful Adherers to Gods Truth and Worship and good Christian Practices did in all times when for such Adherence they fell under the Anathema's of Synods or the Excommunication of Churches during the Papal or any other former or later Persecutions They joyfully received such sentences and always owned one another and held Communion in Adherence to Gods word and ways among themselves when they were cast out of the communion of such corrupt and Apostatizing Synods or Churches And 't is the same when it shall deprive or discharge any Faithful Bishops and Ministers from supporting such necessary Doctrines worship and practices by their Ministrations as Christ requires For then notwithstanding such deprivations and discharge by Churches and Synods CHRIST'S Faithful Ministers must hold on Ministring and his faithful People must hold on Communicating and Adhereing to them therein Thus as our LORD Notes their Fathers had Separated and cast out the Old Prophets from Prophesying in their Company or Assemblies Who still went on Preaching and Ministring the Word which they were sent out to publish And thus the Sanhedrim that great Synod of the Jewish Church discharged the Apostles from Ministring Christianity or Preaching any more in Christs Name who told them they could by no means desist thereupon but must hold on their Ministration being to Ovey God rather than men Act. 4. 18 19 20. Thus also several Synods Deprived Athanasius and the other Orthodox Bishops who were the stout Asserters and Maintainers of the Divinity of our Lord against the Arians Such was the Synod of Tyre And such also was the Synod of Antioch whose Deprivations of Athanasius and the other Orthodox Bishops were a Blow made at the Nicene Faith though their Canons being good and according to Primitive Usage were by Orthodox Councils afterwards taken into the Book of Ecclesiastical Canons out of which several of them are repeated verbatim in the great Council of Chalcedon and are there among the Canons of others Synods taken in to be Canons of the Universal Church And such likewise were the deprivations of other Synods assembled in that Cause afterwards Now under these Synodical deprivations the great Business of those suffering Bishops was to shew that whatever other Immoralities or Personal Crimes were pretended against them as several were most impudently pretended against all Ground and Reason yet in reality and truth their deprivations were for the Cause of the Faith or for their firmness in maintaining the Divinity and Consubstantiality of Christ with the Father This Athanasius and Paulus plead for themselves teaching That their Depositions were not for any other Cause but for the subversion of the Orthodox Faith as is related by Socrates and Sozomen And what they made appear to the Emperor Constans was That they suffered not for the Crimes or ill Lives they were accused of as the sentence of Deposition did contain but for their thinking and teaching differently from the Synods their Dâ—posers about the Faith And when it was once clear to any Persons or Churches that they were deprived for the cause of the Faith they were not hindred by any Authority of external Judicature in the Synods their deposers but readily received and communicated with them as Christs true Bishops still in those places For notwithstanding these Synodical Deprivations Athanasius was all the while own'd and adher'd to by the Faithful Aegyptians as Paulus also was by the Faithful Constantinopolitanes And when they came to Rome on their giving full satisfaction in this Point Julius the Bishop of Rome received them to Communion Hearing the Cause of each says Sozomen and finding them all to agree in the Nicene Faith which he saw undermined and struck at by their Deprivers he received them to Communion as being of the same Belief with himself This Reception of Athanasius and others who stood deprived by the Synods of Tyre and Antioch c. to his Communion was before the Synod of Rome wherein the Orientals should have justified their Proceedings had acquitted and received them For before the Synod was held at Rome in
Truths or Commands of Christ he is Christs true Bishop still in that Church and his faithful Peoples spiritual Head for all that unjust sentence For Christ stands by him who stands by his Doctrines and Precepts and unjust Depositions on these Accounts have no more validity in his sight than unjust Excommunications for the same Accounts have as has been already shew'd But if there is no Interposition of Synods but a mere Deprivation of State that will much less do it For there is a spiritual Subjection and Dependance of People to their Bishops especially to such as suffer for adhering to Christian Truths or Precepts which the civil State cannot break or dissolve Christ himself by his Institution has made a spiritual Relation between them and antecedently obliged his People to this Union and Adherence to them as they are vice Christi his Ministers and Vice-gerents as St. Cyprian says Kings and Civil States may come afterwards and tye this spiritual Union and Adherence faster on by temporal Dependances and Enforcements And what they lay on they may take off again But the spiritual Relation and Obligations do not depend on them but on Christ himself Religion lays them on and leaves it not in the Power of any Prince to cancel or discharge them They stood fixed whilst the Church was separate from the State before any secular Powers came in to protect it and will still continue if they turn all their Power to persecute and oppress it Nor has our Lord left it to their courtesy whether there shall be any spiritual Relation betwixt his People and their Pastors whether they shall keep up their spiritual Relation and Dependance and he shall have a Church on Earth or no as is before discoursed more at large The Learned Author of the Vindication of Their Majesties Authority in filling the vacant Sees owns the Advancement of George the Cappadocean into the place of Athanasius to have been Schismatical and an Usurpation and Breach of Catholick Communion The setting up of this Anti Bishop was by a Deprivation of State For Constantius took away the Churches from Athanasius and his Adherents which is the State-way of depriving Bishops and gave them to George the Anti-Bishop and his Adherents Nay he sends an Edict to the Senate and People of Alexandria requiring them on their Allegiance instead of sticking to him as their spiritual Head with the Affection and Dependance of Members with their united Force to persecute Athanasius And made it criminal in any Persons as Sozomen relates to harbour or conceal him And accordingly the Imperial Ministers and Praefects violently drove him and the Orthodox out of the Churches and by extream Force put George and the Arians in possession thereof And having placed this Anti-Bishop upon his Throne with all secular Cruelties and barbarous Usage compell'd the Clergy and People to acknowledge and submit to him It was also brought about by Deprivation of Synods For after the Sardican Synod which restored him Athanasius had been again deposed both by the Synod of Arles and afterwards by the Synod of Milan wherein besides a few from the East above three hundred Bishops of the West met as Sozomen says and condemned him And the setting up of George against him after this was in a Synod viz. the Synod of Antioch which declared the Uncanonicalness of his Restitution and Ordained George as a former Synod at that place had Ordained Gregory before to be Bishop of Alexandria in his Room These indeed as the Author of the Vindication suggests were Heretical Synods And Dionysius of Alba Eusebius of Vercelles Paulinus of Tryers and Rhodanus and Lucifer who at Milan protested against their Proceedings declared that thro' Athanasius the Emperor and the Arians his Enemies were striking at the Catholick Faith which the event of things and the Proceedings afterwards in the Synods of Ariminum and Seleucia verified as Sozomen observes But in way of external Judicature the Deprivation tho' of Heretical Synods must at least carry with it as much Plea as Deposition by no Synods can pretend to there being more shew of Ecclesiastical Authority in Acts of Heretical Synods than in none at all But for all this Deposition both by the Imperial Edicts and Synodical Sentences since the true Cause thereof was his firmness and constancy to the Catholick Faith Athanasius as the foresaid Author owns still kept on his spiritual Relation and the People their spiritual and Religious Obligations to and Dependance on him So that George as he says was an usurping Invader a breaker of Catholick Communion and a Ring-leader of a Schism in the Catholick Church when he set up against him And the same it would be in the case of any other Bishop deprived by the like Authority for his Fidelity and fixt Adherence to any other Truths or Laws of Christ. For his faithful Bishops must stick to him in all other Points of Christian Truth and Practice as well as in the Orthodoxy of the Nicene Faith And that against the Deprivations of all other States and Synods as well as of the Arians And their sticking to Christ in these Points can give no liberty to their Clergy and People to break off from them Their stedfastness therein must tye all faithful Members faster to them but can never be expounded as a conscionable discharge of their spiritual Obligations and Dependance on them If a Schism is made in a Church then by a defection from the rightful Orthodox Bishop thereof laid aside either by a Civil State or Ecclesiastical Synod only for his faithful Adherence to the Doctrines or Laws of Christ or by turning over to an Anti-Bishop set up against him 'T is plain the Anti-Bishops with their Makers and Adherents make the Schism They were all Members of the one Body whilst they kept subject and united to the Rightful Bishop who is the Head of it But when they broke off from him they divided themselves from the Body and formed themselves under an opposite Head into a new and opposite Body But he and his Adherents still preserve the Unity of the true Body The breakers off make the Division but they preserve their Union As those Branches do which still grow to the Tree when others are broke off from it and those Streams which still communicate with the Fountain when others are stopt and those Rays which keep connected to the Sun when others are interrupted Which Similitudes St. Cyprian makes choice of to set off the Unity of the Church and to shew that they preserve this Union who keep to the same Head and Origine What they do therefore in these Cases by sticking to each other as they did before when others break off is not to make the Schism but only not to follow and run into it And they are no more chargeable with the division for this than the General and his faithful Souldiers would be in an Army for