all from one and whereof many as much detest the Bishop of Rome as any Protestant in England Among all these I say there are some Elders which being separated to holy things by the laying on of hands are ruled and these are called Priests or Presbyters and some which during their life doe rule and these are called Bishops And no reason can be given why all Churches should agree in this unlesse they received it together with their Christianity So that Episcopacy is supported by these three Props Time Place Persons All Histories confirm it the very Maps of the world beare witnesse to it and the Scriptures themselves are not delivered to us with a more universall unquestioned Tradition than the Order of Bishops is As for the Presbyteriall Discipline we can name the Time the Place and the Person that began it The Time for ought we can finde was within this last Age the Place Geneva the Person Iohn Calvin of whom I will onely say thus much That he was a wise man and knowing what was fit and necessary for that Citie stood not upon Names so he had the things But for my owne part I should be sorry to see any Bishop in this Land have such authority over other Ministers as he had at Geneva or Iohn Knox in Scotland And therefore for any man or Church to say that Episcopacy is A Plant that God had not planted but that it is Antichristian is to condemne all Christians as Antichristian and to say that Christ has not been rightly worshipped upon the earth till this last age which whether it be a sober and charitable opinion I submit to consideration In the meane time wee account these proofes which follow insufficient either against Episcopacy or for the Presbyterie 1 That the Office of a Bishop is not found in Scripture because not in the Epistles to the Romans Corinthians Ephesians for it may bee and is found somewhere else namely in those to Timothy and Titus Secondly though it were not it being a matter of practice discipline and government the universall Tradition of the whole Catholique Church is sufficient to prove it 2 That all Officers of the New Testament are designed and distinguished by Names but by the way then where are Lay-Elders therefore there are no Bishops for we thinke Bishops Presbyters and Deacons are so distinguished and that those who are not properly Bishops are no more called Bishops in Scripture than those are called Apostles who are not properly Apostles Nay this Author sayes so himselfe For he sayes in one place that a Pastor and a Bishop are one thing pag. 4. line 11. and in another that an Apostle is in degree before a Pastor and a Pastor before a Presbyter and Deacon pag. 4. line 20. therefore if a Pastor and a Bishop be but one thing as indeed the words were anciently used and a Pastor be in degree before a Presbyter as is confessed a Bishop also is indeed before a Presbyter which was the thing required to be proved This we take to be as good a Demonstration as any in Euclids Elements That power Ecclesiasticall is not given to one but to many If hee meane any Power Ecclesiasticall wee deny it for a Presbyter may preach and administer the Sacraments alone If hee meane of some onely the sense will be only that a Bishop in the laying on of hands and use of the Keyes ought to bee assisted by Presbyters in the former he is already The other wee shall not much stand upon In Gods name let it bee so and then those places of Scripture which seem to give Presbyters a share in imposing of hands and use of the Keyes will be no objection As for that place of Kings of Nations the sense will bee but this that those who are greater i. e. higher in degree than others ought to doe all things nor for their owne glory and greatnesse but for the good and utility of those whom they governe rather serving them than ruling them according to our Saviours example who though he were greater than his Disciples yet was among them as one that ministred That all incentives causes provocations and beginnings of evill are forbidden wee acknowledge if they bee in themselves so and not by the craft and malice of the Devill for if so the Sacraments and Scriptures themselves the Law and the grace of God must be removed For these by his malice have been made so That the rules of reformation must be taken from the prime times if the pattern be a thing framed by God we grant but Presbyteriall government is not proved such but that all the Fathers and all Christians in all ages throughout the world have agreed to bring forth Antichrist we cannot beleeve Nor that Prelacy and Popery are unsepaable for the former is in many Churches that detest the later Yea according to this Authors sence of Prelacy even in many Churches of Protestants And whereas he sayes that Episcopacie is a step to Popery those who have read Histories with judgement may remember that the abasing of Episcopacie has beene a great and constant designe of the Papacie and that it was so in the Trent Councell no one thing having more exalted that Mother of abominations the See of Rome than the exempting of Presbyters as Jesuits and others from the power and government of Bishops And I pray God that as villifying of Bishops on the one side by setting up the Presbyters and Deacons of Rome above them has begot an Antichristian Monarchie and tyrannie so the casting them off on the other and setting up Presbyters without Bishops over them doe not produce the greatest confusion Anarchy and Schisme that ever was yet in the Church of Christ Which lest it may bee thought I speake more out of interest than reason I shall desire this Author to looke over his owne principles once againe which are these That whatsoever God has not established in his Church is unlawfull but God has not established that some Pastors should be over others therefore this is unlawfull Now to say nothing of the weaknesse of either proposition I desire him to consider whether the Divines of New England doe not hence rationally conclude that since no Pastors by Gods Word have authority over others therefore no Classes nor no Synods have authoritie over others for that every Minister has his power both of Order and jurisdiction immediately from Christ Jesus and therefore to him onely he is responsable for the doctrine that hee teaches the discipline that hee exercises and the censures that hee inflicts and therefore though it may sometimes bee usefull for Ministers to meet in Synods to consult yet the Decrees they make being but of humane authority doe binde none but those who assent to them and those also no longer than till they alter their opinions and that therefore for any number of Ministers in a Synod to take to themselves authoritie over others who are equall to them
A MODEST ADVERTISEMENT CONCERNING The present CONTROVERSIE about Church-Government Wherein the maine Grounds of that Booke intituled The Vnlawfulnesse and Danger of Limited Prelacie Are calmly examined LONDON Printed for Robert Bostock Anno 1641. A MODEST ADVERTISEMENT CONCERNING The present CONTROVERSIE about Church-Government THe blessed Apostle Saint Paul writing to Timothy Bishop of the Church of Ephesus as is confessed by all Writers though in this last age of the world it is at length disputed what the meaning of that word Bishop is among many instructions that hee gives him concerning the direction of the Presbyters and People committed to his care begins first with this Exhortation that Supplications Prayers Intercessions and giving of thankes be made for all men for Kings and for all that are in authority that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godlinesse and honesty Teaching us thereby both that all Government is the Ordinance of God and that it is an effect of his great love to his children to be placed in such a State where temporall peace and true Religion are so joyned together that they are not put upon the fiery Triall to lose the contentment of this life to attaine the happinesse of that which is to come Neither is this onely a great blessing of Almighty God but a duty also that belongs both to our care and wisedome and even to our Piety and Devotion it selfe to indevour as much as in us lies to preserve a quiet and a peaceable life together with all godlinesse and honesty This therefore seemes to me to be the end that all religious Prudence ought to aime at that men be not in their consultations so mis-led either by some appearances of godlinesse and faire colours of extraordinary zeale as thereby to hazzard the disturbance of the publick quiet nor on the other side so wedded to the enjoying of their temporall good as to neglect the attaining of that which is eternall This foundation being laid let us apply it to the Controversie now in hand and so eagerly pursued by those who are swayed by different Interests and Opinions concerning the retaining or amending or totall changing of Ecclesiasticall Government And first let mee have leave to propose a few Questions to those who so earnestly desire a totall change and to bring a new face of things into the Church of England Of which I humbly desire them that they will as in the presence of the Lord consider with all godly Wisedome Passion and Prejudice being laid aside and then make answer with truth and sobriety First therefore Is the Discipline already established so ill that they who live under it are not capable of salvation May they not enjoy the vertues of Faith and Hope and Charity and Humility and repentance from dead works May they not be justified and sanctified in this Church of ours Are they inforced by it to any Action which is in it selfe a sin or to omit any work in it selfe very good If so certainely those great Lights of our Reformation have beene in a great darknesse and those our Episcopall Martyrs who have laid downe their lives for the love of Truth have beene exceeding miserable Secondly the Discipline they so much desire in stead of it are they all agreed of it what it shall be Or if they be is it of Divine or Humane institution If of Divine can this be plainly proved out of the holy Scriptures And shall the sense of the places thence alledged be made evident and necessary by true Logicall inference not to perverse gain-sayers but to such as seeke for truth with indifferency and sincerity Or if the sense be probable only is it such a sense as is countenanced by all holy and learned Writers through all ages of the Church Or is it a late sense acknowledged by all Protestant Churches Or by some onely and by others accounted to have little probability Or is there any place of Scripture that will not admit of a sense which to some men will appeare probable especially if they bee ingaged by Faction or interest Lastly is their Discipline commanded plainly by God upon paine of Damnation or the contrary plainly forbidden For so it must be if it be unlawfull as is pretended for nothing is unlawfull in Divinity but what is against some Divine Law And the Episcopall Discipline being already in possession is it not just and equall that the arguments brought against it be much more convincing than those that are brought for it seeing Possession it selfe is one reason why it should continue For though those Principles which are laid for proving the unlawfulnesse of limited Episcopacy were granted namely that All Officers in Gods House must be of Gods institution That man can no more make the Office than give the Grace but That the Institution of the Office must proceed from Him that gives the blessing to the work For these are the maine grounds of that Booke concerning the unlawfulnesse of limited Prelacy which is written with much Art Eloquence to insinuate into unwary Readers I say if these Propositions were granted the sense of them will be but this That none may administer the Sacraments impose hands preach the Word nor use the Keyes but such as Christ himselfe hath appointed to doe so And that it is otherwise practised in the Church of England is not yet proved and when it is proved may easily be amended without noise or scandall But that among these who are by Christ enabled to execute Duties some may not be higher and some lower during life is the thing that is required to be proved out of plaine Texts of Scripture or sound grounds of uncontroverted Divinity when this is done this Controversie will be ended But it will be required also that the same proofes be brought for the whole Discipline and every part of it which shall be established In the meane time many places of Scripture are alledged by those who maintaine Episcopacie and these places are interpreted not by a few late Writers in a little spot of the World here in the West but by all Christian Writers since the time of the Apostles for fifteene hundred yeeres and by the agreeable concurrent practice of all Churches in Europe Asia and Africa though flowing from different fountaines and having beene founded by severall Apostles which alone shewes the Order to be Apostolicall and that as the Creed for Doctrine so this for Practice was delivered from the beginning So that the proofes of it are all Ages of the Church divers Empires very many Kingdomes in which there are many Provinces whereof some one is bigger than Scotland and the Netherlands and those parts of France in which the Presbyteriall Discipline is accepted and above a thousand Bishopricks many of which were the Chaires of the Apostles Disciples and other Saints in Scripture among different Sects of Christians that are of severall Communions and received this Order from severall beginnings not
in Dignitie have their commission from Christ as well as they and partake of the Spirit as much or perhaps more than they for the Spirit is not tyed to any number is to set up a humane authoritie that Christ never instituted and to exercise a tyrannie and Poperie of the Presbyterie as bad nay worse than that of the Bishops For the Apostles indeed whose successors the Bishops pretend to be did meet in a Synod and make Decrees to binde the Church but that the Disciples onely or Presbyters ever did so cannot be proved out of Scripture Thus this Author may see what is concluded out of his principles by those who have very logically driven them home to the conclusion they naturally produce that is not from one tyrannie to an other but to an absolute libertie But as for us I pray him to remember that the state of the question between him and us is not as hee pretends whether in the prime times a Bishop were without a Presbyterie under him but whether down from the Apostles a Presbyterie was ever heard of without a Bishop over it This is the thing we desire to see solidly proved That no limitations are sufficient because those of the Assemblies in Scotland were not so is a weake argument Where Assemblies will not tie Parliaments may Whether Prelacy be a cause or a cure of Schismes look but into New England and the divisions that are there among Ministers and their Churches That it is easier to root up the tree than to lop off the branches is perhaps true So it is easier to pull down a House than to repaire it but wee consider not what is easiest but what is best to doe That that government of the Church is most usefull for Kings and Kingdomes which is warranted by Gods Word which is most for preservation of piety righteousnesse and sobriety which makes the face of the Church and Religion glorious not with outward pomp like Kings of Nations but with sound Faith pure worship holy life which conduceth most for truth and peace against schisme and heresie wee heartily confesse and together with all the Christians upon the face of the earth except a few in the West of Europe wee esteem the government by Bishops to be that government That it is no good government which a wise man would not indure in his owne house wee acknowledge and wee know who applyed that saying first against a Democracie and thinke it very fit to be retorted upon those who desire a parity of Ministers for no wise man would indure a parity in his Family As for other arguments that if wee admit not the Presbyterie there will bee jealousies between us and Scotland that there will bee changes and Periods of States of Families and Kingdomes for these are insinuated in this Book and some are reported to have said that the Bishops must downe or much blood will bee shed these we think not proofes but threatnings and fitter for the mouth of a Turkish Dervise who plants Religion by the sword than for a Minister of the Gospel of Christ the summe whereof is Love and therefore cannot be forced but perswaded In the meane time we desire men seriously to consider whether it bee not true and proper Popery to persecute Christians not for publishing but for holding Opinions onely and in what degree the Presbyteriall government uses to bee guilty of this pressure and tyrannie upon the soules and consciences of men As for that Objection that otherwise there will be a schisme betweene us and the reformed Churches though we are heartily grieved at the name only of such a thing we answer that there may bee mutuall charity in those that have a different Discipline and therefore this argument has no good consequence Secondly that the Church of England has hitherto had that prudent Moderation to desire the esteeme and affection not onely of the reformed but of all the Protestant Churches who are more in number and equall in learning and piety to the Reformed Thirdly that it is better for us if it bee Gods will that the reformed doe continue as they are to bee divided from them in this particular onely than from all other Christians of the first three hundred yeeres under persecution of the Heathen Emperours to which ancient Church we desire to be excused if we account the late reformation of Scotland to bee much inferiour in learning in Piety in Patience in Humility in Charity and many other Christian vertues That though the Parliament be for Bishops yet all the godly and religious will be against it we cannot beleeve till it be made plain to us that to resist lawfull authority is a matter of godlinesse or that there is any humility in those that think no Christians are godly and religious but those who are for the Presbytery That the reforming abuses in Episcopall govenment will take long time that we are apt to beleeve but we think this to be no objection But that it being a great and a weighty work and likely to have great influence upon the civill estate it ought to be a businesse of much debate and long deliberation and that it imports not so much to be quickly done as well done Lastly we think the time of perswasion to bee not when men by fraud or force shall effect their ends but when all parties having beene first heard and their Reasons maturely weighed things are setled according to Justice and Piety and this only will produce a setled and well grounded peace not only for the present but for future times And is a consideration well worthy the wisedome and greatnesse of the English Parliaments Thus much be said to those who pretend the necessity the profitablenesse and the divine institution of the Presbyteriall government which they pretend to introduce and of the unlawfulnesse of Episcopall government which they so eagerly oppose Now to those who desire a change and yet confesse their discipline to be a humane institution I shall humbly desire them briefly to consider of this whether they can demonstrate the advantage of that they would introduce to be so exceeding great above this already received the abuses being reformed that it will make abundant amends not only in the present but in all times to come for the danger the Change will produce This that wee have is rooted in the lawes the people are inured to it It has so long agreed with the constitutions of this Monarchy Nay it is agreeable even to that in other states as in Venice to a Republick It is the same that almost all Christians are governed by It has produced men of as great learning and piety and as able oppugnors of the Romane Church as any the Christian world affords and has made our Church so reverenced by the Churches abroad that in the last Archbishops time even as farre as from Alexandria the Patriarch sent a Greek to be educated in our Church to be thereby better