and defended it against the Jesuite Petavius whom D. M. would patronize against both Protestants and Fathers The second of the Homilies ascribed to Augustine in Apocalypsin informs us that under the name of Angel not only Bishops but other Church-Rulers are likewise understood And again seeing Angel signifies a Messenger whosoever whether Bishop Presbyter or Laick frequently speaketh of God and declares how we may obtain eternal Life deservedly gets the name of an Angel of God And Aretas saith he calleth the Church it self the Angel And Primasius saith by these Angels of the Church are to be understood the Guides and Rectors of the People who ruling in particular Churches Preach the Word of Life to all Men for the name of Angel signifies a Messenger And again both Church and Angel is comprehended under the Person of the Angel And thus their main Scripture-Argument even the Fathers being Judges goes to ruine § 13. Yea the more sagacious of our Adversaries well perceive that neither this Scripture nor any other supports their Doctrine Wherefore Petavius never attempts to bring his Proofs from Scripture but only from Ecclesiastick Traditions Add hereto the words of Dr. Burnet As for the Notion saith he of the distinct Offices of Bishop and Presbyter I confess it is not so clear to me and therefore since I look upon the Sacramental Actions as the highest of sacred Performances I cannot but acknowledge these who are empower'd for them must be of the highest Office in the Church So I do not alledge a Bishop to be a distinct Office from a Presbyter but a different degree in the same Office to whom for Order and Vnities sake the chief inspection and care of Ecclesiastical Matters ought to be referred and who shall have Authority to curb the Insolencies of some factious and turbulent Spirits His Work should be to feed the Flock by the Word and Sacraments as well as other Presbyters and especially to try and ordain Entrants and to Oversee Direct and Admonish such as bear Office And I more willingly incline to believe Bishops and Presbyters to be the several degrees of the same Office since the names of Bishop and Presbyter are used for the same thing in Scripture and are also used promiscuously by the Writers of the two first Centuries Where he plainly contradicts Dr. Pearson who in favour of his Ignatius largely pleads for the accurat distinction of Bishop and Presbyter in the second Century denies Bishop and Presbyter to be distinct Orders and finally acknowledges that in the chiefest parts of the Ministerial Function they are equal and so really denudes the Bishop of all the degree he left him But more clearly elsewhere I acknowledged saith he Bishop and Presbyter to be one and the same Office and so I plead for no New Office-Bearers in the Church Next in our second Conference the Power giv'n to Church-men was proved to be double The first Branch of it is their Authority to publish the Gospel to manage the Worship and to dispence the Sacraments And this is all that is of Divine-Right in the Ministry in which Bishops and Presbyters are equal sharers both being vested with this Power But beside this the Church claims a Power of Jurisdiction of making Rules for Discipline and of appointing and executing the same all which is indeed suitable to the common Laws of Societies and to the general Rules of Scripture but hath no positive Warrant from any Scripture-Precept And all these Constitutions of Churches into Synods and the Canons of Discipline taking their rise from the Divisions of the World into the several Provinces and beginning in the end of the second and beginning of the third Century do clearly shew they can be derived from no Divine Original and so were as to their particular Form but of humane Constitution therefore as to the management of this Jurisdiction it is in the Churches Power to cast it in what mould she will A Presbyter acknowledges even Cornelius à Lapide is equal to a Bishop in the chiefest Order which is the Order of the Priest-hood § 14. To which add the Judgement of Dr. Hammond a Man so distemper'd with extreme Passion for the Hierarchy that he makes him that sat on the Throne Rev. 4. God the Father and the four and twenty Elders with their Golden Crowns an Image and Representation of the Metropolitan Bishop of Hierusalem and the four and twenty Bishops of Judaea in Council for Golden Crowns or Mitres he makes the Characters of the Episcopal Dignity Yet even he asserts on Acts 11. 30. Philip. 1. 1. that the Title of Presbyter in Scripture times belonged principally if not only to Bishops There being saith he no evidence that any of that second Order were then instituted but Bishops only and Deacons This he at large confirms and so really overthrows Prelacy when he would fainest establish it joining with the Presbyterians in their grand Antiprelatick Principle viz. that simple Presbyter as the Hierarchicks phrase it without Power of Ordination or Government or a distinction between Bishop and preaching Presbyter is a meer stranger without all Foundation in the Holy Scriptures From all which 't is clear that these Bishops or which is all one preaching Presbyters in Scriptures and during the Apostolick age were nothing save Pastors of particular Congregations Section VI. Our meaning of Ignatius confirmed from the Writings of the Apostles his immediat Ancestors MOreover nothing can be more clear for the Idenity of Bishop and preaching Presbyter than that known Scripture Acts 20. 17 28. They Answer that the Bishops of Asia not the Pastors of Ephesus were by Paul sent for which some would support from the 18 ver From the first day that I came into Asia c. But since as is clear ch 19. verse 10. from his coming into Asia he had been most in Ephesus he might truly say so much tho' the Ephesians only had been present but suppose he spoke to others beside we are at no loss the Question is if he gave not tho' amongst others the Title of Overseers or Bishops to these he sent for verse 17. And if these were not the Elders of Ephesus They yet object the words of Irenaeus viz. That Paul called together to Miletum the Bishops and Presbyters of Ephesus and the neighbouring Towns But as for his seeming here to distinguish Bishops from Presbyters this Scripture where they get both Names and which Iraeneus had then in his view and his frequent promiscuous using of these Names perswade me that he only respected the 17 and 28 verses and so took Bishop and Presbyter Synonimically for one and the same His adding of the neighbour Towns to Ephesus might flow from his inadvertency whereat no attentive Reader of Irenaeus will marvel and yet this is as likely to have crept into the Version for the Original of Iraeneus we have not because these Elders their belonging to
one Ordination for both of them are Priests but the Bishop is first so that every Bishop is a Presbyter not every Presbyter a Bishop for he 's the Bishop who is first among the Presbyters Finally the Apostle shews that Timothy was ordain'd a Presbyter but because he had no other Presbyter before him he was a Bishop And from thence he shews how Timothy can Ordain a Bishop for 't was not lawfull for the Inferiour to Ordain a Superiour § 2. Hence appears the perverseness of Bellarmine affirming that Hilary says only there was no need of a new Election but denies not saith he the necessity of a Consecration or Episcopal Ordination A flat Contradiction of Hilary's express saying that there 's but one Ordination of both Bishop and Presbyter and that even Timothy was of no higher Order than that of a Presbyter whose whole primacy consisted in his meer being the first Presbyter in respect of age or time of his Ordination as Hilary hath taught us And so as he doth also all-along thro' the fore-cited Passages explains fully his calling the Bishop Prince of Priests which the Cardinal also objects and shews that thereby we 're to understand only such a Dignity as either meer priority of Ordination or Seniority yeelds Thus Hierome also understands this Title who calls Peter Prince of the Apostles and yet asserts that any Priority Peter had was given to his Age only which in that very place he makes as good as nothing Informing us that the Church was equally founded on all the Apostles and that the rest no less than Peter received the Keys Take but another place of Hilary By Angels saith he the Apostle means the Bishops as we learn in the Revelation of John who being Men are challeng'd for not reproving the people or commended for their Vertues And because Sin entred by the Woman she ought to have this token that in the Church for the reverence to the Bishop her head ought not to be free but cover'd with a vail and she has not power to speak because the Bishop represents Christ's person she ought therefore because of the Original of Transgression appear subject before the Bishop as before the Judge because he is the Lord's Vice-gerent Here we see that according to Hilary there was a Bishop over every Congregation and in every place of publick Worship frequented by Men and Women and that the Apocalyptick Angels were only such Congregational Pastors From which we may well gather that when any in these early times had the name Bishop more peculiarly giv'n them yet the Primacy could be but only of Order and nominal which is fitly illustrated by the Athenian Archons Petavius therefore to shield his Cause from so deadly blows does his outmost to discredite these Commentaries and make their Author some obscure fellow and to prove they belong not to Hilary the Luciferian he brings two passages thereof that shew their Author to have been of the Roman Communion which Hilary deserted But might he not have been of that Communion when he wrote the commentaries and yet deserted it afterward This the Jesuit attempts not to disprove But whosoever this Author was or by whatsoever name known neither are we hurt nor the Hierarchicks helped thereby his Authority is unquestionably great being cited by the Councils of Paris and Ayx no mean Conventicles under the name of Ambrose afterward the learn'd as Bellarmine and the Divines of Lovain gave these Commentaries to Hilarie a Roman Deacon and stout Opposer of the Arrians the Foundation of which Opinion is strong For Augustine oftner than once attributes these Commentaries to Hilarie And it 's likely that Petavius knew that the Authority of this Writer was not to be shaken with all his Cavills but only at that time he had found nothing else to say wherefore he afterwards excogitats more Quibbles to darken and deprave this Author and chiefly strives to make Hilary speak nothing for the Right of Seniority and against the Election of a Successor to any deceasing Bishop He says therefore that when Hilary tells us that one dying the next or following succeeded we must not understand it in respect of Years or Ordination but any of 'em indefinitly taken who was notwithstanding afterward to be elected by the Clergy but all the Presbyters in time becoming unworthie of the Episcopal Honour the Method was altered and another not out of the Colledge of Presbyters but out of some other Order according to their desert was admitted unto that Office To support which Gloss he brings Hierome's saying that the Presbyters of Alexandria named one elected from among themselves Bishop as if Hierome were not speaking of Alexandria alone and to instance therein that Prelacy came not soon to any growth or as if Hierome and Hilary could not agree in its being of humane Original and yet differ in the circumstances of its rise The rest of his prolix Discourse on this Theme is only a train of meer Cavills and Clouds too thin and airy to feed a very Chamaeleon all which are quite dissolv'd and disappear if we but look into one small parcell of Hilary's words where he tells us that after the Method was altered then the Bishop whose desert raised him was constitute by the Judgement or Votes of many Priests or Presbyters For this Clause being of design inserted by Hilarie to shew the Opposition between the latter and the former Method of coming to the Primacy proclaims that as after the Change Suffrages and Election were used so before this Change there had been no such Custome With this the Jesuite darrs not ingage nor with Hilary's making the Ordination of both Bishop and Presbyter the same his making Timothy only a Presbyter his placing all the Essence or Constitutive of a Bishop in being the first Presbyter of the Colledge his giving a Bishop to every Congregation c. These I say he never adventures once in the least to handle wherefore surely he was conscious to himself that he spent both Pains and Brains for the sole production of a bulkish nothing § 3. To Hilary I add Chrysostome which Theoplylact his real Epitomator transcribes After saith he the Apostle had discoursed concerning the Bishops and described them declaring what they ought to have and from what they ought to abstain omitting the order of Presbyters he descends to the Deacons and why so But because between Bishop and Presbyter in a manner there is no difference seeing that also to the Presbyters the Care or Government the Church is committed and whatsoever he said of Bishops agrees also to the Presbyters in Ordination alone they are Superiour and they seem to have this onlie more than the others Where he clearly overthrows all their Distinction between Bishop and Presbyter notwithstanding that to some he may seem to give the Power of Ordination to Bishops above Presbyters For First The words are most
allowing Church-men to climb unto the highest Places of State be most opposite to Monarchy let any Man judge And although the Prelats acknowledge dependance upon their Prince they but only do what the Popes did who for a long time acknowledged their dependance upon the Emperour and sought◠their Election or the Confirmation thereof from him untill by little and little they got to stand upon their own Legs to almost the overthrow and ruine of their Soveraign and Benefactor Now Prelacy and Popery being really one and the same Government Princes ought to fear no less Mischief from the one than from the other Section III. Their Argument taken from Order weighed ANother Achillean Argument they bring from the Nature of Order which they say is wholly inconsistent with Parity Hence one of their Coryphaei brandishing it to the end he might compleat the Demonstration cited Aristotle himself for the Definition of Order which saith he is secundum quem aliquid altero prius aut posterius dicitur For that unhappy word simul would have spoil'd the whole Business and therefore must be left out And certain it is that none of them can improve this Argument any more than he has done seeing according to the express Definition of Order a Parity is no less consistent therewith than Superioty and Inferiority § 2. Moreover if this Topick do them any service it shal at length establish a Pope over them all seeing a Parity of superior Officers as Bishops or Arch-bishops is no less Cyclopick and Monstrous for with these names they calumniat Presbytry than a Parity of Pastors Yea by this their Argument it is manifest how they reproach most of the reformed Churches as if there were nothing there but a Babylonish Confusion and the Apostles themselves none of whom I think took the Oath of Canonical Obedience to another Moreover whosoever denies a Parity in a plurality of Governours tho' the chiefest in a Society as if 't were unwarranted by Example and tending to Confusion discovers either his Ignorance or what is worse seeing it is well known that at the same time there was a plurality of Kings in Sparta of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Princes in Athens and of Consuls in Rome during which Governments there was I am sure as little Disorder as when they were in the Hands of one single Man So much is really affirmed by their own learned Sutlivius who brings store of such Examples and irrefragably evinces our Purpose so true it is that none can smartly oppose the Pope's Crown but must eâdem operâ were he as indeed Sutlivius is the greatest Friend to Prelats ruffle also their Mytres Section IV. The Plea for Prelacy drawn from Unity discuss'd NO less fiercely do they argue that Episcopacy is altogether necessary on the account of Vnity Without which say they there can be nothing but Schism and Dtvision and therefore the Ancient Church sustain'd it But altho' this might have deceiv'd some of the Ancients whose ends were good though this mean fell out ineffectual yea unhappy whereby to obtain them yet it is strange that any now if at all they reflect on past times can place any confidence in such Church-policy in order to procure Peace and Unity seeing it is of all things most undeniable that notwithstanding hereof the primitive Church was opprest and rent with innumerable Schisms hatch'd and sustain'd by Bishops in opposition to Bishops no less at least than by Presbyters in opposition to Presbyters Yea it is certain that these whom they contend to be Diocesans were either the Inventers or at least the main Propagators and Abettors thereof Were not Victor of Rome and Polycrates of Ephesus the Authors of that great Schism and Controversie anent the Celebration of Easter Were not Stephen Bishop of Rome and Cyprian of Carthage Authors of another Schism about Rebaptizing of the lapsed Was not Paulus Bishop of Samosata Author of that non-such Schism and Heresie of the Samosatenians Did not the mighty Schism of the Donatists fall out because Sicilianus Competitor with Donatus was preferr'd And when the Heresie of the Bishop of Samosata was varnish'd by a Presbyter Arrius how was it hugg'd and propagated by the bulk of the Oriental Bishops Was not Macedonius Bishop of Constantinople the Author of that most damnable Heresie known by his Name Again Nestorius Bishop of that same City gave both Being and Name to another Schism no less dangerous than the former Time would fail me to reckon up Berillus Bostrensis Nepos an Egytian Bishop Fidus in Africk Photinus of Syrmium with many others And in short few Heresies or Schisms sprang up in these Times but they had either Bishops for their Authors or else for their great Abettors without whose influence they were likely shortly to have starved or else they were raised through the Pride and Competition of men aspiring to the Episcopal Dignity which to name no others is clear in the Instance of Donatus Yea that all the blackest Schisms and most pestilent Heresies had Bishops for their Authors Sutlivius expresly affirms But take one Instance further in respect of which the rest are but Grasshopers in the Person of the Romish Bishop or Bishops who have been the great Authors and Fomenters of the most damnable Heresies and mighty Schisms that the Christian World hath hitherto seen Certainly had the Church contented Herself with the Apostolick Parity we plead for the Man of Sin could not have mounted the Throne of Iniquity on which for many Ages he hath continued to the most pestiferous Infection and distracting Division of the Church that ever Satan did excogitat or Man behold § 2. Moreover suppose they could with the greatest plausibility conclude the inconsistancy of Unity and Parity they were yet to be neglected it being certain that in the choisest Assembly the World ever saw both of 'em were harmoniously lodged and that there are Christian Churches enjoying no less Harmony without Diocesans than those who have ' em Section V. The Argument Prelatists bring from Antiquity canvass'd THeir next Plea is from Antiquity but for us it may be enough to say from the Beginning it was not so Thus Christ answer'd the Pharisees thus the Christians answer'd the Heathens alledging the Antiquity of Gentilism They can give few or no Proofs for their Proposition from the first and best part of the second Century They pretend indeed to the Epistles of Ignatius which to say the best are in divers places spurious carrying Self-contradictions vain Boastings and Flattery all along but of this more afterward Other Catalogues and Memorials of the Bishops of the ancientest Times were written long after when Prelacy had got a higher ascendant and the Mystery of Iniquity was more palpably working therefore these Authors spoke according to and in the Style of their own times and not in the Style of the times wherein these Pastors lived And here I say nothing but what is vouch'd by Dr.
All Men agree that this Nation viz. Scotland had Palladius their first Bishop from Pope Coelestine And again thus you are instructed how to refuse these who alledge that Sedulius the Christian Poet whom Pope Gelasius so much extolls had for his Master Hildebert the Arch-bishop of the Scots for seeing even Sedulius himself lav'd in the time of Theodosius the Emperor how could he have had for his Master Hildebert the Arch-bishop of the Scots seeing there was no Arch-bishop yet ordain'd in Scotland and Palladius is without debate affirm'd to have been the first Bishop of that Nation This is yet more plainly express'd by the most learn'd Antiquaries of our Country all of them agree in this that before Palladius the Church was rul'd and guided without any Diocesan Bishops For as Fordun hath it before the coming of Palladius the Scots following the Custom of the primitive Church had Teachers of the Faith and Dispensers of the Sacraments who were only Presbyters or Monks And Iohannes Major saith the Scots were instructed in the Faith by Priests and Monks without Bishops And Hector Boethius Palladius was the first of all who exercis'd any Hierarchical Power among the Scots being ordain'd their Bishop by the Pope whereas before their Priests were by the suffrages of the People chosen out of the Monks and Culdees Add hereto the known Testimony of Buchanan and of Sir Thomas Craig To pass over saith he that most silly ' Fable of the three Archflamins and the twenty eight Flamins it 's plain that there was no Bishop in Britain before Palladius who is by the English themselves call'd the Bishop of the Scots or if either the Brittons or English have any let them name them and at what time they flourish'd § 3. Yea so clear is this Truth that the most learn'd of our Adversaries have found no better way to elude when they cannot clide it than as Torniellus in another case said of Bellarmine to endeavour the penetrating of a most firm wall and cast the History about fourty of our ancient Scotish Kings as a forg'd legend Among these is Loyd Bishop of St. Asaph but both he and Dr. Stillingfleet are nervously refuted by the learn'd Sir George Mâ—kenzie Advocat and that their main purpose and undertaking was utterly desperat he makes soon appear And tho' saith he this Author could prove that we were not settl'd here before the year 503 yet that could not answer the Argument viz. that is brought against Episcopacy from the Scotish primitive Church-government for the Culdees might have been settl'd before that time And thus in a few syllables he demonstrats that the Bishop as to his ultimat design had only his labour for his cost But Sir George being too sagacious not to foresee that from the mutual strugglings between himself and the Bishop any man might easily conclude that Presbytry was the primitive Government of the Church of Scotland and having been one of the prime Instruments to put in execution the prelatical Fury judg'd himself concern'd in credit to say somewhat in favours of Episcopacy and attempt the stoping of such an Inference Wherefore to this purpose in a Letter to the Earl of Perth prefix'd to the defence of the Antiquity of the Royal Line of Scotland He makes several assayes The first whereof is That this is one of the meanest Arguments that ever were us'd by a Presbytâ—rian And that it is a weak Argument saith he appears from this that I have met with very few Laicks in all our Countrey who had heard of it nor with one even of these few who had valu'd it But be it so that the Argument seem mean we gain notwithstanding a most sufficient Argumentum ad hominem seeing our ablest Adversaries value it so much yea Sir George himself clearly acknowledges this while he saith and what can the Presbyterians think of their other Arguments which they value much since this which they valu'd so little is thought of such force by a learn'd Bishop as to deserve a whole book the cutting off of 44 Kings and the offending a Nation of Friends But it 's nothing tho' the Laicks had neither valu'd nor heard it seeing as himself grants Blondel with whom join the rest of the Presbyterian Writers urg'd it Hence appears that this Argument is by both Parties judg'd to be of great force and consequence for the solution whereof the Advocat brings nothing save what is altogether unworthy of any ingenous man As for example since saith he it cannot be deni'd but that these who ordain'd our Presbyters were Bishops it necessarly follows that Episcopacy was settl'd in the Christian Church before we had Presbyters or Culdees Wherein as to the solution of our Argument which was the scope of his Letter he only begs the Question and gives us what is impertinent thereto and contradicts moreover these our Historians whose credit he so excellently vindicats seeing as we heard they plainly tell us that our ancient Anti-diocesan practice was the very custom of the primitive Church And when our Historians say that the Abbots of Icolm-kill had Jurisdiction over all the Bishops of the Province that is to be understood as Beda observes more inusitato after an unusual manner And yet he compares this practice of the Abbot to that of a King who makes one a Bishop and to the practice of a Mother who makes her Son a Church-man now if it be any strange or surprising thing for a King by his Congé d'eslire to make one a Bishop or for a Mother to educate her Son in order to be a Church-man and procure some place for him let any man judge And later Historians saith the Advocat meeting with these ambigous words in our Annals Designatus Electus Ordinatus were by a mistake induc'd to appropriat these words to the formal Ceremony of Ordination and Imposition of hands As if any man in his wit could take these words to mean any other thing than Ordination providing they be as they are in our Annals spoken of one Church-man in relation to another Moreover he knew sufficiently that the best Records of our Country expresly say that our Church was rul'd by Presbyters without Bishops and so leave not the least room for tergiversation Bede is one of these Authors who creat them so much vexation for speaking of Icolm-kill the Isle saith he still uses to have for its Rector an Abbot who is a Presbyter to whose Jurisdiction the whole Province and even the Bishops themselves after an unusual manner ought to be subject according to the example of their first Teacher who was no Bishop but a Presbyter Hence it 's clear that even in Bede's time Bishops were but of smal note here and their power much less than in other Churches They are therefore much pain'd with Bede's words and chiefly St. Asaph who amongst other odd things he excogitats tells us that the Superiority this Presbyter had
and other places no small number of excellent Men to Scotland who doubtless did no small service to God therein and especially in the time of Fincormachus when as all observe a great many fled hither who were famous both for Life and Doctrine yea long before this even in the time of Tertullian our Church was well known to much of the Christian World as appears from his clear Testimony The places of Britain saith he to which the Romans could not yet pass are notwithstanding subject to Christ. And if any have called Scotland barbarous or not well reform'd before the coming of Palladius Sir George learn'dly refutes them and names severals and among them even Stannihurst otherways an enemy to our Nation who have done it and he well observes that the reason why some speak of us as then not well enough reform'd was because of our want of agreement with the Church of Rome § 6. As to the last part of the Bishop's discourse saying that it was not permitted to Monks to meddle with the matters of the Church c. And wherein he is seconded by St. Asaph who falls foul on Presbyterians on this account as if they were darkners of all Church History c. They should know that as our Historians call'd these Monks they also call'd them Priests sometimes Presbyters or Bishops or Doctors and frequently Culdees Our people saith Boeth also began most seriously at that time to embrace the Doctrine of Christ by the guidance and exhortation of some Monks who because they were most diligent in Preaching and frequent in Prayer were call'd by the Inhabitants Worshippers of God which name took such deep root with the common People that all the Priests even to our time were commonly without difference call'd Culdees i. e. Worshippers of God Elsewhere this Author call'd these Teachers and Guides indifferently Priests Monks and Culdees Thus also speaks the best of our Historians some of whom we have heard calling them Presbyters and Admistrators of the Sacraments Hence 't is clear that when they call them Monks the word is not to be taken in the later Popish sense for a Layhermite for these our primitive Pastors were only call'd Monks by reason of their strictness of life and frequent retirement to Devotion when the publick work of the Ministry did permit it and perhaps also divers of them abstain'd from Marriage that they might keep themselves free from the World and its care without urging this on others as was the practice of the famous Paphnutius in the council of Nice From all which I conclude that before the coming of Palladius we had a settl'd Church without the least umbrage of their Hierarchy § 7. I add that long after that it had but very slender footing here seeing according to Spotswood they had no distinct Titles or Dioceses whose words are neither had our Bishops auy other Title then that of Scotorum Episcopi or Scotish Bishops whereby they were distinguish'd before the days of Malcomb the III who first divided the Country into Dioceses appointing to every Bishop the limits c. Yea after most strict search for a long time posterior to Palladius he can scarce find the least footsteps of Episcopacy And again long it was after the distinction of Dioceses before they were admitted to any civil Places or Votes in Parliament Hence nothing is more certain than that for many Ages the Church of Scotland knew nothing of their Hierarchy the first Rudiments whereof were bronght from Rome which was sent packing thither again when we renounc'd our obedience to Anti-christ § 8. Take but one other particular and I take leave of the Advocat he 's much displeas'd with St. Asâ—ph terming him a Caresser of Fanaticks for affirming that in consequence of this our Argument taken from the confess'd Practice of our primitive Church we might reasonably conclude that when we covenanted against Episcopacy we had only us'd our own right and thrown out that which was a confess'd Innovation in order to the restoring of that which was our primitive Government A notable and never to be forgotten Concession of so learn'd an Adversary as is this Bishop Let 's hear what the Advocat returns him It will not follow saith he that because our Church in its infancy and necessity was without Bishops for some years therefore it was reasonable for Subjects to enter into a solemn League and Covenant without and against the Consent ef their Monarch and to extirpat Episcopacy settl'd then by Law and by an Old Prescription of 1200 years at least But this most unfair Representation of our Arguments antecedent is I trust now sufficiently discover'd wherefore I have nothing to do here with it not yet am oblig'd to evince the consequence he denies seeing 't is not to be accounted ours but his own who made the antecedent Of the Grounds why the Nation entred into a Covenant I also discours'd already In the mean while I can't but take notice of his settling Episcopacy by Prescription a Romish Argument which whatever it may do in Law has no place here His Prescription I 'm sure essentially differs from that of Tertullian against the Heresies of his time seeing he liv'd in a very early Age when especially if ever Prescription could have place in the Church and the Doctrines which he defended were generally and uninterruptedly held by the Pastors even from the Apostles times and more ancient than the Heresies against which he prescribes whereas in the present case all things are clean contrary For as the Advocat himself here supposes the original of Scotish Episcopacy is several Ages posterior to that of the Apostles so that if the Argument could militat for either Party it serv'd well the Church of Scotland against Prelacy and not at all e contra But tho' things had been quite otherwise there had been no fear of harm from their Prescriptions seeing as Vincentius Lerinensis admonishes In refutation of inveterat Errors we must recurr to the sole authority of the Scriptures And Optatus Milevit plainly asserts that Christ's Testament abundantly suffices to determine all and every particular Controversie among Christians Thus we see how pleasant a spectacle these two Champions afford us the Bishop forms the Major Proposition and asserts on supposition of the Antiquity of our Royal Line and veracity of our Historians that our Church acted with reason enough and was only recovering her own Right when she cashier'd Prelacy The Advocat in attempting to disprove this the Bishop's Proposition has only giv'n such prevarications and elusions as most strongly confirm all the dis-interested of the truth thereof As for the Minor Proposition that our ancient Royal Line is not forg'd but real and our historical Monuments most true and credible the Advocat himself to the conviction of all the unbyass'd in both his Books makes appear It remains therefore as a conclusion of undoubted verity that our Church was
Office for which they were separated was neither new nor perpetual § 17. Having overthrown the Reasons of his Gloss it must yeeld to the Text expresly telling us they were erected only for that time and that for the paucity of Ministers endowed with singular Graces But this reason says he is nought For suppose we 20 30 40 Men in the Kingdom qualifi'd for the Office of the Ministry could not these have divided the Kingdom into a proportionable number of large Parishes And still as more Men turn'd qualifi'd could they not have lessen'd these greater Parishes But he with whom our Reformers were all most contemptible Idiots and more especially in Church-policy needs not wonder tho' they had fall'n into a much greater Solecism But he forgets that many in these most dark times were made Ministers who yet needed the Assistance and Direction of the better qualifi'd for a while in Church-policy and matters of such importance till they should be able to go hand in hand with them and that the main end of Superintendents was the perpetual Travelling Preaching and Instructing where there were no Pastors and planting of Churches As well continues he as our Presbyterian Brethren now unite Presbytries A strange mistake as if where Presbytries are united any Minister took for his proper Charge a multitude of Parishes He here insinuats that in the Superintendents there was established a Prelacy But the present Question is only about the sentiments of our Reformers and that they never thought the use of Superintendents croffed the Doctrine of Parity is most clear were there no more from their using Superintendent-commissioners even after they had declar'd Episcopacy unlawfull in it self But all this their jangle is the fruit of meer prejudice or worse for none near these times look'd on Superintendency as perpetual Not the Court Party seeing they endeavour'd to change Superintendents for Tulchan Bishops not the rest of the Church who as the necessity of them decreased suffer'd them to wear out And after that in an unanimous Assembly they had ordain'd that the whole Church should be divided in a competent number of Presbytries declar'd that Superintendents were no longer expedient And good ground had they even from that very Book of Policy so to do for if the whole tenor of that Head of Superintendents appointing them almost constantly to Travel to Preach thrice a week at least and beside that to examine the Life c. of the Ministers the Orders of the Kirks the manners of the People care how the Poor be provided how the Youth be instructed admonish where it 's needfull by good Counsel compose Differences note and delate to the Kirk hainous Crimes and all this because of the paucity of qualifi'd Ministers evidently proclaims not that this Superintendent was a kind of Evangelist expedient only at that juncture of the re-entry of the Gospel into Scotland I appeal to the candid Judgement of the impartial Moreover if 't were otherwise why should they not as punctually have described his Duties after the time of his perpetual Travels his Preaching thrice a week and other such vast Labours were ended for he grants these were to indure but for a time after which he insinuats that the Superintendents were to remain quiet in their chief Towns but no word in all the account we have of them of such distinctions of times of such perpetual rest not a word therefore of their perpetuity Lastly which he wisely i. e. sutably to his purpose omitted for like the Council ask'd at Abel it ends the matter see this Head of Superintendents Because say they we have appointed a larger Stipend to them that shall be Superintendents than to the rest of the Ministers we have thought good to signifie to your Honours such Reasons as moved us to make difference betwixt Preachers at this time Now pray may not he that runs read here that had it not been for some forcing Circumstances and Exigencies of the then present time they had made no difference at all between one Minister and another And then after a few lines they laid down their Reasons in the very words the sense whereof is now under Debate If the Ministers c. § 18. In the mean while we need not be much concern'd whether these Superintendents were to be temporary or perpetual there being nothing therein that made any real difference between the Church-government which was then and that which is now And indeed these vast Travels and Pains in preaching thrice a week c. are sure enough Tokens that the Superintendent could not be much distinguish'd from an ordinary Pastor save in these extraordinary Labours and was far from the Episcopal Eminency and Grandour seeing he was so far from the Episcopal ease and idleness without which the former but rarely obtains This and other such Proofs of the vast difference between the Superintendents and their Diocesans and of the likeness between the Government under the Reformers and that which is now our Author slides over with rallry saying it may be as well told them that Bishops wore black Hats and silk Superintendents blew Bonets and tartan as if most constant and hard labour in the Gospel were no more valuable for distinguishing one Minister from another than highland Plydes and blew Bonnets He meets you with the like Drollery if you mind him that the Superintendents had no Metrapolitan and Episcopal Consecration or Ordination but it 's risus sardonius And his Questions What is this to Parity or Imparity amongst the Governours of the Church Do these differences distinguish between Bishops and Superintendents as to preheminence of Power flow from deep dissimulation of the mortal Wound giv'n to his Cause seeing without Episcopal Ordination which was never requir'd to a Superintendent For Knox as for example who with our Author was only a Presbyter ordain'd or admitted as they then spoke Spotswood Superintendent there can be no Episcopal Power no not so much as the very essentials of a Bishop These Superintendents were also without any Civil Places power or emoluments that way which make up the far greater part of the Episcopal greatness and still subject and accountable to the General Assemblies And there was reason for it saith our Author supposing that General Assemblies as then constituted were sit to be supream Judicatories of the National Church For there was no reason that Superintendents should have been Popes Then surely either were our Prelats Popes or most vehemently covetted a papal Power seeing above all things they fear'd abhorr'd and studi'd the ruine of these our General Assemblies And no wonder if they did so and that our Author intimats his dislike of these our Assemblies For if this one thing viz. the subjection of the Superintendents to these Assemblies as they were then constituted be duely weigh'd it 's fair to â—et them on the very same levell with their Brethren For give him never so great a Power in the Province where
our Reformers believed it to be an indispensible part of the Christian Religion positively and expresly commanded in the Scriptures Do not therefore his saying establishing however no such thing as Parity c and the rest of his Discourse mutually give the lie and flee in the face of one another And indeed he here at once overthrows whatsoever he said on this Subject and now for ever to silence all reasonable men and stop them from such desperat adventures as this of our Authors take the following Argument Whatsoever our Reformers believed to be without the express and positive Testimony of the Scriptures that they believed to be a damnable Corruption in Religion and as such to be avoided This the major is put beyond scruple by what we have brought from the first Book of Discipline Knox and the Confessions of our Author Now I subjoin But they believed that Episcopacy was altogether without any express or positive Testimony yea or any Warrant or Ground from the Word of God the Books of the Old and New Testament Ergo c. The minor is no less evident from what is already adduc'd and moreover from the latter Helvetian Confession which was all save the allowance of the remembrance of some Holy Days which they expresly disprov'd approv'd and subscribed by our whole General Assembly at Edinburgh December 25. 1566. For in that Confession mark it pray carefully and by no means forget that our Church and Reformers who approv'd and subscrib'd this Confession firmly believ'd that whatsoever is without the express Commandment of God's Word is damnable to Man's Salvation they say There 's giv'n to all Ministers in the Church one and the same Power or Function And indeed in the beginning Bishops and Presbyters ruled the Church in common none preferr'd himself to another or usurped any more honourable Power or Dominion to himself over his fellow Bishops But according to the words of the Lord who will be first among you let him be your Servant they persevered in Humility and helped one another by their mutual Duties in Defending and Governing the Church In the meantime for preserving Order some one of the Ministers did call the Assembly and proposed these things that were to be consulted in the Meeting He did also receive the Opinions of others and finally according to his Power he took care that no confusion should arise so S. Peter is said to have done in the Acts of the Apostles who notwithstanding was never set over the rest nor indu'd with greater power and honour but the beginning took its rise from Vnity that the Church might be declared to be one And having related Hierome's Doctrine of the Idenity of Bishop Presbyier thus they conclude Therefore none may lawfully hinder to return to the ancient Constitution of the Church of God and embrace it before human Custome Thus far the Authors of that most famous Confession who both in the Title page and after the Preface expresly assert that our Church of Scotland together with the Churches of Poland Hungary Geneve Neocome Myllhusium and Wiend approved and subscribed this their Confession From all which it 's easie to gather and perceive with how black a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our first Reformers and whole primitive Church Protestant branded Prelacy or Imparity amongst Pastors Section IX The Forraign reform'd Churches truly Presbyerian BUT let 's hear the Judgement of the rest of the Reformers and Reform'd transmarine Churches Gerard a famous Lutheran divine altho' for Orders sake he admit of some kind of Episcopacy which really he makes as good as nothing above a Moderator-ship yet even for that umbrage allows nothing but humane Institution and will acknowledge no distinction by Divine Right between Bishop and Presbyter The Papists saith he especially place that superiour Power of Jurisdiction which they make to agree to Bishops in this that the Bishops can Ordain Ministers but the Presbyters cannot And all along this Question he strongly proves that during the Apostolick age there was no such thing as a distinction between a Bishop and a preaching Presbyter and enervats all the Arguments that both Romanists and other Prelatists commonly bring to the contrary But we need not insist on the Testimonies of particular Men we have the joint suffrages of the body of Lutheran Divines Luther himself being the mouth to the rest in the Articles of Smalcald It 's clear say they even from the Confession of our Adversaries that this Power to wit of preaching dispensing the Sacraments Excommunication and Absolution is common to all that are set over the Churches whither they be called Pastors Presbyters or Bishops Wherefore Hierome plainly affirms that there is no difference between Bishop and Presbyter but that every Pastor was a Bishop Here Hierome teaches that the distinction of degrees between a Bishop and a Presbyter or Pastor was only appointed by humane Authority And the matter it self continues Luther and his Associats declares no less for on both Bishop and Presbyter is laid the same Duty and the same Injunction And only Ordination in after times made the difference between Bishop and Pastor And by Divine Right there is no difference between Bishop and Pastor § 2. As for Calvin his judgement in this matter was altogether conform to his practice which by the very Adversaries themselves is made the very Patern of Presbytry for he asserts the Idenity of Bishop Presbyter Pastor and Minister and this Idenity of Bishop and Presbyter he founds on Titus 1. and 5. compared with the 7 as Hierome had done long before him and Presbyterians do now And when he descends to after times succeeding these of the Apostles he tells us that then the Bishop had no Dominion over his Collegues sc. the Presbyters but was among them what the Consul was in the Senat and his Office was to propone Matters enquire the Votes preside in Admonition and moderat the Action and put in Execution what was decreed by the whole Consistory All which exceeded little or nothing the Office of a Moderator And that even this saith he was introduced through the necessity of the time by humane consent is acknowledged by the Ancients themselves But I shall not insist in citing Calvine nor Beza who every where is full sufficiently to our purpose both of 'em being aboundantly vindicated and evinc'd to be Presbyterian in a singular tractat by the most judicious Author of Rectius Instruendum from the attempts of one who pretended to be Mathematico-Theologus but was in reality Sophistico-Micrologus And were there any doubt concerning these as indeed there 's none their Practice and that of the Church wherein they liv'd our very Adversaries being Judges sufficiently discuss it and prove them to be truly Presbyterian and to them subscribes the stream of transmarine Writers Systematicks Controvertists and Commentators As for Example the famous and learn'd Musculus asserts and proves from
secular Clergy who were indeed become too secular and these were the Popes Agents and Emissaries who brought the World to receive the Mark of the Beast and wonder at her For before that time the Popes found more difficulty to carry on their Pretensions both from secular Princes and Bishops but these Regulars being warranted to Preach and Administer the Sacraments without the Bishops licence or being subject and accountable to him as they brought the Bishops under great contempt so they were the Popes chief Confidents in all their treasonable Plots against the Princes of Europe And when at the Council of Trent the Bishops of Spain being weary of the insolencies of the Regulars and of the Papal Yoke design'd to get free from it The great Mean they proposed was to get Episcopacy declared to be of Divine Right which would have struck out both the one and the other But the Papal Party fore-saw this well and opposed it with all the Artifice imaginable and Lainez the Jesuit did at large discourse against it and they carried it so that it was not permitted to be declared of Divine Right And by this judge if it be likely that the Papacy owes its rise to Episcopacy The emptiness of which discourse is apparent For First The tendency and nature of Prelacy and the Topicks whereon they Found it aiming no less at one Head over all then at one Prelat over a few Churches make evident that he touches not the Argument in hand only giving out that some time by one accident or other the humbling and depression of the Prelats prov'd the Popes exaltation Secondly Strange I 'm sure and most demonstrative must the Reasons be that make null clear Matters of Fact or perswade Men that such things have never been and 't is undeniable that the Councils and other Caballs which from time to time rais'd the Pope gradually to his present hight were all consisting of or manag'd by Bishops and if any hapen'd to spurn at his rising the Pope got still far more then a plurality to crush them and indeed 't was impossible the Pope should have risen by any other means the whole sway of Church Affairs and guidance thereof being then in the hands of Bishops wherefore if the Pope was rais'd to despotick Soveraignity whereby he might absolutely dispense of Church Affairs and trample at pleasure on the fairest mitres they only are to be blamed having themselves advanc'd him to this transcendental Preheminency Thirdly Neither are the Bishops less guilty of this the Popes exaltation upon the account of their profound sloth and negligence the Author well observes that they were become too secular and indeed they were so immers'd in Luxury and Ambition that providing they might wallow in their Lusts and obtain from the Pope a Domination over other Churches they little valued any thing else Fourthly But 't is yet more admirable how he can alledge that the Regulars brought the World to receive the Mark of the Beast as if the Bishops for this he must intimat or he says nothing had been innocent he 's too learn'd not to know that gross Papal Darkness had over-spread the World ere ever any such Exemptions were giv'n or the Regulars distinguished from Seculars 'T is true indeed that the swarms of Friers were amongst the most pestiferous Locusts the World hath been pestered withall but to lay all or the greatest share of this Guilt of exalting the Pope on their shoulders is a shrewd evidence of partiality nothing being more notour then that as the Bishops were the main Assistants and Supporters in every Innovation he decreed so they with the greatest care rigour and fury press'd them on both Clergy and People Fifthly That the wicked fraternities in the several Orders of Regulars were the Popes Agents in contriving and sometimes effecting the ruine of Kings and Princes is but too well known and evident enough yet that the Prelats were no less guilty and far more efficacious herein is no less deniable Were there no Bishops supporting the Pope in his War against the Emperour Barbarossa Did not a crew of the same Cattel join him in Dethroning Henry the IV And at a word where did ever the Pope make his impresses but he was strengthn'd by their arm and support Sixthly But tho' Episcopacy at the Council of Trent had been declar'd of Divine Right what great relief had this been either from the Papal Yoak or insolencies of the Regulars it might perhaps for the time have procur'd some more Honour to the Bishops for the Pope's Italians of other Orders but might not the Pope notwithstanding by his boundless Authority and Supremacy he pretends over all Bishops have continued to gall and oppress their Order and also send especially where the negligence of Prelats invited him his Missionaries through the World yea thus the Pope's power paramount had not once been touch'd at that Council or hurt by such a Declaration Was his infallibility ever there question'd by the Bishops Did they at all endeavour the removal of the unsupportable Burdens and Slavery the Church groan'd under And should it not have been a great benefite to the Church or diminishing the Pope's power tho' his Holiness had pleased to declare the Divine Right of their Office Seventhly But whatever it was the Bishops aim'd at in the Council of Trent I 'm not much concern'd only I would gladly know how from this their Action it follows that Bishops had never been the Men or Episcopacy one of the means whereby the Papacy had been brought into the World which is the Author's Inference and is just as one should reason thus some of Alexander's Macedonian Souldiers vex'd with his tyranny and insolence and his preferring of Strangers attempted his down-throw the like may be said of some of the Souldiers of Julius Caesar Galba Didius Julianus Maximinus and others therefore they had not contributed to the raising and absolute Supremacy of these Princes And should not such an one be reckon'd an admirable Logician And yet this Inference should be far more pardonable than the former in so much as the thing the Bishops aim'd at against the Papacy if it can be call'd any thing came infinitely short of what these Conspirators attempted upon the powers they deem'd unsupportable And by this judge if the most earnest efforts of their chiefest Authors make it in the least improbable that the Papacy owes its rise to Episcopacy and if such pitifull paralogisms proclaim not that they can really find nothing wherewith to cover Prelacy from the heavy but just imputation of being the certain introductive of Popery § 6. This odd reasoning of the Doctor minds me of another of his of his Essayes or Retorsions which is of Kin to this Argumentation May not one saith he that quarrells a standing Ministry argue on the same Grounds a Ministers Authority over the People gave the rise to the Authority Bishops pretend over Ministers and so the Minister will
arte perire sua Section V. The Objections they pretend to bring from Scripture against the Doctrine now deduc'd from Ignatius removed ANd indeed Ignatius is encompast with so thick a Cloud of Witnesses who not only deny all support to but give most evident Depositions against the Diocesan Prelat that his Testimony in favours thereof should be a firm demonstration of the Bastardy of these Epistles The time of the Apostles was not far above that of Ignatius Now if we consult these we shall not only find our Adversaries destitute of their Suffrages but also overwhelm'd with their plain Testimonies against the Hierarchy 'T is true they alledge several things out of the Apostolick Writings for establishing their Cause as that Timothy and Titus as also the Angels of the Asiatick Caeurches were Diocesan Bishops The grounds wherein tâ—ey establish the Episcopacy of Timothy and Titus are that they are enjoined to Ordain Elders which in after Ages was the peculiar Province of Diocesan Bishops and that in the Postscrâ—pts of these Epistles they are both called Bishops But their later Topick is by the profound silence of the ancient Commentaries and many other tokens of Forgery and Novelty so baffl'd that Prelacy's present Agents and amongst others D. M are so wise as to suppress it And yet D. M. adventures to conclude Timothy his being made Bishop of Ephesus from Acts 20. 3 4 5. which Inference few I think beside the Author can gather compared with 1 Tim. 1. 3. I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other Doctrine From which even tho' it be compared with the other Scripture any Man in his Wit would much rather with Chrysostome inferr the very contrary and conclude that Timothy's stay at Ephesus was only temporary to expede the Business there mention'd but not to fix therein But saith he 1 Tim. 3. 14. 15. These things I write unto thee c. plainly insinuat his particular Relation to the Church of Ephesus But the many Scriptures informing us of Timothy's almost perpetual absence from Ephesus perswade that there was no such Relation neither does this place in the least insinuat it but only that Timothy if not sent for was to stay till Paul's return wherefore he begs the Question while he tells us that after he was in a particular manner established Bishop of the Church of Ephesus he might wait upon Paul Moreover this was an odd Attendance that scarce ever suffer'd Timothy to stay with his Flock and this shift too like that of the Romanists who in Answer to the Argument from Scripture-silence against Peter's being Bishop of Rome tell us that he was frequently abroad But here we have not only Scripture-silence but Scripture Testimony shewing Timothy's almost perpetual absence from Ephesus He essays also to bring Timothy's Episcopal Power and particular Relation to Ephesus from 1 Tim. 5. 9. 1 Tim. 2. 1. and 1 Tim. 5. 21. And that this was not temporary or transient but successive and perpetual he would prove from 1 Tim. 6. 13. 20. and 2 Tim. 2. 2. and adds that his Adversaries grant that the Power he pleads for to Bishops was exercised by Timothy But as for the particular Relation he speaks of he should have proved it seeing he knows it will not be granted except he bring more than the bare recitall of the places from which his fancy collects it and without such a particular Relation the Power Timothy exercised be what it will makes nothing for his purpose seeing it might be lodged in him alone as an Evangelist and thus most of his postulata prove useless Yet I will handle them particularly of which the first two are that the Power which Timothy exercised was in it self lawfull and that he practised it in Ephesus And 't is true none denies it but what then untill he first prove Timothy's particular Relation to the Church of Ephesus The third and fourth are that it was committed to him alone and not to a Colledge of Presbyters acting among themselves in Parity And that there 's no mention of any spiritual Power lodged in a Colledge of Presbyters to which Timothy was accountable But Willet an approved Divine of the Church of England shall answer for us Neither saith he can it be gathered by these words of the Apostle lay Hands suddenly upon no Man c. That Timothy had this sole Power in himself for the Apostle would not give that to him which he did not take to himself who associated unto him the rest of the Presbytry in Ordaining of Timothy I add that there 's no less mention of a spiritual Power in a Colledge of Presbyters c. than of Timothy's being fixed Bishop of Ephesus Hence his 5. postulatum viz. That the great and most eminent Branches of the Episcopal Power were lodged in Timothy ' s Person the ordination of such as were admitted unto the sacred Function the care of Widows the Censuring of Elders and his autoritative preventing of Heresies becomes unserviceable His VI is that this Authority was not in it self of temporary duration transient or extraordinary but such as the constant Necessities of the Church do make necessary in all Ages for he was commanded to commit it unto faithfull Men such as should be able to teach others and if there be nothing in it extraordinary why do they say that in the discharging of an ordinary trust there was need of an extraordinary Officer But First he corrupts the Apostles words 2 Tim. 2. 2. substituting it in stead of them that thereby he may force the Text to speak of a Power equal to that of Timothy which was to be derived unto succeeding Teachers when yet it plainly speaks of the Transmission of the Doctrine or things Timothy had heard and others were to teach but nothing of an equality of Timothy's Power to be derived in solidum to every subsequent Bishop or Teacher Now except this be proved D. M. saith nothing Yea Hammond expresly contradicts him Appoint them saith he as Bishops under thee Moreover Christ committed the things Paul here speaks of to his Apostles yet will D. M. say their Power was equall to Christ's Secondly In this his last postulatum there appears a strange kind of reasoning viz. the Things or Actions wherein Timothy and Titus were employed are perpetual and ordinary therefore they were not extraordinary Officers just as if one would Reason It 's ordinary for a skillfull Physitian to relieve a Febricitant therefore our Saviour relieving Peter's Wife's Mother was no extraordinary Physitian For their Method and Way of performing these Actions was extraordinary and temporary they having no special Power over or Relation to any one particular Congregation but such a Power and Relation as equally were extended over all the places whither they were sent Moreover others of their Actions and these which were properly Evangelistick were extraordinary such
and the Chair yet they succeeded him not in his Apostle-ship but the latter Bishops in neither c. And Lightfoot a renown'd Divine of the Church of England proves that the Apostle-ship was an Order for ever unimitable in the Church The Apostles saith the same Author could not ordain as Apostle by Imposition of Hands as they could ordain Elders but they are forced to use a Divine Lot which was as the immediate Hand of Christ imposed on him that was to be ordained that Opinion took little notice of this circumstance that hath placed Bishops in the Place of the Apostles by a common and successive Ordination Dr. Barrow whose Works are publish'd by Bishop Tillotson and therefore are to be lookt on as his is copious on this Subject Apostles also saith he did Govern in an absolute manner according to Discretion as being guided by infallible assistance to the which they might on occasion appeal and affirm it hath seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us Neither did the Apostles pretend to communicat it They did indeed appoint standing Pastors and Teachers in each Church they did assume fellow Labourers or Assistents in the Work of Preaching and Governance but they did not constitute Apostles equal to themselves in Authority Priviledges or Gifts for who knoweth not saith St. Austine that Principate of Apostle-ship to be preferr'd before any Episcopacy And the Bishops saith Bellarmine have no part of the true Apostolical Authority And now judge of the Spirit of these Men who are glad most falsly to brand these famous Bishops and others the most eminent Doctors of that Perswasion as being guilty of the most abominable Crime of Socinianism providing they can thereby bespatter and make odious the Presbyterians Judge also of D. M's Query whether the Apostolical Power as to it 's permanent necessary and essential Branches was not in its nature Perpetual and Successive and by them transmitted in solidum as they receiv'd it from our blessed Saviour to single Successors in particular Sees and not to a Colledge of Presbytsrs in the modern Notion As to the last part of his Query and his Presbyters in the modern Notion I know none such if 't be not these of the Hierarchicks their half Ministers for which there is no ground in Scripture And accordingly it's certain that the Apostles left the managing of the Church to neither Bishops nor Presbyters in his sense both of them being Chimera's but to Colledges of Bishops who are also Presbyters both being one in Scripture during the Apostolick age But tho' we should grant them all the Query seeks supposing which all the Ancients affirm the equality of all Bishops who at the beginning were reciprocated with Congregations he 's yet but where he was and has really done nothing for the establishing of his Hierarchy Judge lastly of that doughty Argument of the Papists and our Hierarchicks for Prelacy to wit that Bishops succeed to the Apostles and Presbyters to the 70 Disciples which has been generally reckon'd by Protestants among Rome's dotages and as such refuted in their Popish Controversies and to name no others by Iunius and Willet who answers that not only Bishops but all faithfull Pastors are the Apostles Successors and that even according to the Pope's Decrees not Bishop but Priests succeed the Apostles and Deacons not Presbyters succeed the 70 Disciples And now to go on with D. M. and his Fellows all their cavilling to make Timothy and Titus Hierarchick Bishops is but the product of a late Popish Dream For the Fathers when they so called them or the Apostles mean'd not of Bishops in this sense § 3. Wherefore Willet Answers that it is most like Timothy had the Place and Calling of an Evangelist and that the Calling of Evangelists and Bishops which were Pastors was diverse This Answer which so approv'd a Divine of the Church of England gave the Papists D. M. calls a ridiculous subterfuge For saith he the Work of an Evangelist has nothing in it opposite to or inconsistent with the Dignity of a Bishop c. A most disingenuous tergiversation and sliding from the Office of the opponent or probant to that of the defendent seeing this was one of his special Scripture-Arguments whereby to establish his Hierarchy and it 's sure that if Timothy and Titus might do what they did under another Notion and Capacity than that of a Diocesan Prelate his Argument goes to wrack As does also his perversion of 2 Tim. 4 5. for he insinuats that from Timothy's being injoined to do the Work of an Evangelist it will no more follow that he deserved the Name than Daniel's saying Ch. 8. 27. that he did the King's Work will prove him a King But had he ever considered the rest of the Epistle the context of the place and the Signification and Notation of the Word Evangelist he had clearly seen that the Apostle so adapts this Work of an Evangelist to Timothy that the Name and Character properly belongs unto him He adds That any who now convert Jews or Pagans are as properly Evangelists as any so called in the primitive Church and thus insinuats that Evangelists such as Timothy and Titus were no extraordinary Officers which except a few Novelists wedded to their Fancies is condemned by all Men. § 4. And that there was such a Function by which some in the days of the Apostles were raised far above the rank of ordinar Pastors or Doctors and placed in the very next degree to the Apostles themselves whose Office was mostly ambulatory going from Church to Church in the exercise thereof is in part intimated by Sedulius and Theodoret and others upon Ephes. 4. 11. but more fully by Eusebius who informs us that even after the Death of the Apostles divers remained who were in a far higher rank than the rest of their Successors who being saith he the admirable and divine Disciples of so great Men built up the Churches the Apostles had founded promoving the preaching of the Gospel and sowing Seed of the Kingdom of Heaven far and wide thro' the whole World for many of these Disciples that were yet living whose Minds the Divine Word had inflammed with a vehement desire of Wisdom fullfilling our Saviour's Command and dividing their Goods among the Poor and thus leaving their Country exercised the Office of Evangelists among these who had not yet heard the Doctrine of Faith by most diligent preaching of the Gospel and furnishing their Hearers with the Holy Scriptures these so soon as in any remot and barbarous Country they had laid the Foundations of Faith and ordained Pastors and had committed to these Pastors the care of this New Plantation being content therewith and accompanied by the Grace and Power of God hast'ned to other Countries for even to that time the Divine Power of God's Spirit wrought Miracles by these Men so that at the first hearing of the Gospel
in Philippi there had been a Bishop superior to the plurality of Bishops saluted by the Apostle Yet on Acts 20. and 17. gives this Paraphrase Because many are ignorant of the Manner especially of the New Testament whereby Bishops are call'd Presbyters and Presbyters Bishops This much may be observed both from this place and from the Epistle to Titus and to the Philippians and 1. to Timothy From this place therefore of the Acts we may arrive at the certainty of this Matter For thus it is written from Miletus he sent and called the Elders of the Church it is not said the Bishops And afterwards he subjoins over which the Holy Ghost hath made you Bishops to Feed or Rule the Church and from the Epistle to Titus that thou mightest appoint Elders in every City as I ordain'd thee and from the Epistle to the Philippians to all that are at Philippi with Bishops and Deacons and as I believe the same may be gather'd from the frist to Timothy If any Man saith he desires the Office of a Bishop he desires a good Work a Bishop therefore should be blameless And shortly after let not a Widow be taken into the number under threescore years which the Transcriber of OEcumenius hath out of negligence inserted from the 5. Chap. and 9. ver in stead of the 8. verse of the 3. Likewise let the Deacons be grave c. For this is the Church Canon directing what manner of Man such an one viz. the Deacon ought to be Thus far OEcumenius and not a word more to this purpose where having really proposed the now much tossed Question mustres up four of the chief Places from which the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter is commonly inferr'd and directs us to learn the Solution of this Doubt therefrom Hence 't is certain that OEcumenius no less than Hierome and Aërius of old and Presbyterians now believ'd the Scriptural Identity of Bishop and Presbyter seeing he having brought up these Scriptures which even in the Judgement of our Adversaries creat to the Hierarchicks a vexatious Scruple and pungent Objection is so far from glossing them as thereby to leave any room for a Diocesan Bishop that he plainly informs us that these Scriptures only suffice to dissolve all our Scruples and period the Dispute 'T is evident then that OEcumenius commenting on Philip. 1. 1. or wherever he seems to say nothing against a superiority of Diocesans spoke only out of compliance with the Custom of his time or some such weakness Neither is the matter less clear of Theodoret who altho' he ascribes an Episcopal Dispensation over the Philippians to Epaphroditus yet even then he looks on him as no ordinary or fixed Officer which is really yeelded by Petavius and is plain from Theodoret himself The Apostle saith he calls a Presbyter a Bishop as we shewed when we expon'd the Epistle to the Philippians Which may be also learn'd from this Place For after the Precepts proper to Bishops he describes the things that agree to Deacons omitting the Presbyters But as I said of old they call'd the same Men both Bishops and Presbyters but these who are now call'd Bishops they then call'd Apostles But afterward the name of Apostle was left to the real Apostles And the name Bishop giv'n to these that were of old call'd Apostles Thus Epaphroditus was the Apostle of the Philippians Thus was Titus the Apostle of the Cretians Timothy of the Asians Thus the Apostles and Presbyters at Hierusalem write to the Antiochians And on 1 Cor. 12. 28. first Apostles The Apostle saith not God hath sent onlie Twelve Apostles but also the Seventy And these who also received the like Grace For Paul himself after his Calling was of the same Order and Barnabas and many others And again he calls Epaphroditus the Apostle of the Philippians Where 't is clear as the Sun that Theodoret by these his Bishops or Apostles understands only the real Apostles themselves together with Timothy and Titus and other such Evangelists and extraordinary Officers who never had any fixed Station And this was well perceiv'd by the Jesuite Medina who therefore really yeelds Theodoret with Hierome Aërius Augustine c. to the Presbyterians and warmly recented by Petavius who besides many other places spends at once near a whole Chapter to prove Theodoret a self repugnant blunderer Hence it 's clear that they cann't rent Theodoret from us untill Tullus-like they first rent him from himself Wherever therefore these Ancients so spoke as that they seemed not to oppose the Divine Right of Episcopacy 't is clear they did so out of carelesness or unwarrantable Compliance but mostly as may be gather'd from the handling Aërius mett with out of fear least they had derived on their Heads the hate of much of the then degenerating Church and secularizing Clergy Section VIII Moe clear Testimonies of the primitive Doctors against the Divine Right of Diocesan Episcopacy and for the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter produc'd and vindicated THE Bishop saith Ambrose or rather Hilary the ancientest Commentator save some Fragments of Origen now extant because he opens the hidden sense of the Scriptures is said to Prophecy chiefly because he dispenses the words of future hope Behold the very Idea the Ancients still retain'd of a Bishop and yet it 's nothing but the real Notion of every true Pastor or Dispenser of the Word and Sacraments Which Order may now be that of the Presbyters For in the Bishop are all Orders for he is the first Priest that is the Prince of Priests and Prophet and Evangelist And whatsoever else is for fullfilling the Office of the Church and Service of the Faithfull And The Apostle calls Timothy a Presbyter whom he had instituted a Bishop for the first Presbyters were called Bishops so that one Dying the next succeeded And lastly in Aegypt the Presbyters ordain in the Bishop's absence where we see what he means by the Prince of Priests and that with him a Bishop was nothing but the first either in Age or in respect of Ordination amongst the Colledge of Presbyters without any other Preheminence or Power over the rest but what these respects gave them Which I 'm sure exceeds not the Dignity of a Moderator of a Synod or Presbyter But because the following Presbyters were not found worthy of the first place this way was changed by a Council that none by his being first in order but by his desert might be made a Bishop and that by the Votes of many Priests least an unworthy Man should rashly usurp the Office to the offence of many There were born Priests under the Law of the Race of Aaron the Levite but now all are Priests according to the Apostle Peter and therefore Priests may be chosen out of the People And on 1 to Timothy 3. But after the Bishop he straight way subjoins the Ordination of a Deacon and why But because of Bishop and Presbyter there 's but
mannerly Complement to Augustine A piece of immodesty proper to D. M. not arriv'd at by the Jesuite Augustine then was only some frenchisi'd Spark that intended not to speak as he thought but I reply with Junius that this their Answer is clean contrary to Augustine ' s mind and intention for he was not so mad as to compare things so hetrogeneous as were the Rites and Customes of the Gentiles and these of the Church if it be said that he spoke of the Church of the Jews where pray is there any mention of Bishops in all the Old Testament and History of the Jewish Church I add that if this had been Augustine's meaning he had too much drepress'd and in too unworthy Terms express'd Christ's Institution to busk a Complement for Hierome But Augustine saith D. M. reasons from the Succession of Bishops This Romish Cavill is a 1000 times baffl'd and by none more sufficiently than by Dr. Stillingfleet who shews that from such Reasonings of the Fathers and their mentioning of Successions of Bishops it can never be proved that Bishops were of a higher Order or had any other Power over Presbyters nor that in all places there was so much as any Difference at all between them nor that they mean'd ought save a Succession of Doctrine and that no less is said of Presbyters Lastly Bishop Jewel advanceth this very passage of Augustine and thereby proves the Identity of Bishop and Priest or Presbyter And he thus Englishes Augustine's words The Office of a Bishop is above the Office of a Priest not by Authority of the Scriptures but after the Names of Honour which the Custome of the Church hath now obtain'd § 7. Let us saith Hierome attend diligently to the words of the Apostle saying that thou should'st Ordain Elders in every City as I appointed thee and what kind of Presbyter ought to be ordain'd he declares in the following Discourse If any saith he be blameless the Husband of one Wife c. and after he Inferrs For a Bishop must be blameless as the Steward of God Therefore both Bishop and Presbyter is one and the same And before that by Sathan's instigation there were Divisions about Religion and it was said in the Churches I am of Paul I of Apollo and I of Cephas the Church was govern'd by a common Council of Presbyters But after that whomsoever any had baptized were by them counted their own not Christs it was Decreed thro' the whole World that one Chosen out of the Presbyters should be set over the rest to whom all care of the Church should belong and the Seeds of Division be removed But you may think that this is our Mind and not the Mind of the Scriptures that a Bishop and a Presbyter is one and the same thing and that the one is a Name of Age and the other of Office Let them read over the words of the Apostle to the Philippians where as Hierome professedly asserts the Presbyterian Thesis so he clearly proves it by the Presbyterian Arguments And I would fain learn wherein as touching the Scriptural Identity of Bishop and Presbyter he differ'd from Aërius They differ'd as much answers Bellarmine as Heaven and Hell For Hierome still held that a Bishop was greater than a Presbyter as to the point of Ordination and that doubtless by Divine Right Bellarmine is herein follow'd only by some of the more impudent of his Brethren as Bayly the Jesuite and Petavius and last of all appears their perpetual shadow D. M. with whom Hierome is a grand Asserter of the Episcopal Hierarchy and Aërius a grand Heretick But Junius answers to both the Jesuites and their Genuine Issue that Hierome when he said what doth the Bishop except Ordination which a Presbyter does not understood it only of his oun time But Bellarmine saith Junius confounds the time as doth D. M. that he more easily may deceive the Simple We have heard already that many of the greatest Lights of the Church of England yea and of the Romanists have exploded this shamefull and Jesuitical Attempt of making Hierome for the Divine Right of Prelacy or for any Difference between Bishop and Presbyter To which add Dr. Stillingfleet For saith he as to the Matter it self I believe upon the strickest Enquiry Medina ' s Judgement will prove true that Hierome Austine Ambrose Sedulius Primasius Chrysostome Theodoret Theophylact were all of Aërius ' s Judgement as to the Identity of both Name and Order of Bishops and Presbyters in the primitive Church c. Of what Church then shall we count D. M. and his Brethren who only scrape together these most dishonest and a thousand times baffl'd depravations and perversions of the Jesuites and being plum'd with the feathers of so unlucky Birds can appear without any more shame and blushing than as if they were the innocent penns of a Dove But Hierome subjoins Bellarmine who is transcrib'd by D. M. acknowledges that the Difference between Bishop and Presbyter as also the Princely Prerogatives of Bishops was introduc'd by the very Apostles when 't was said I am of Paul c. But it 's answer'd by Junius that the former of these can never be prov'd from Hierome and the latter Hierome denies while he saith when these whom any baptiz'd were counted their own c. Where saith Junius Hierome shews that 't was not when this Evil was at Corinth only but when 't was spread thro' the whole Churches And the latter of these continues Junius Paul denies while he reproves this Evil in the Corinthians and yet neither in the first nor in the second Epistle makes ever the least mention of setting up a Bishop over them They who use this Argument saith Dr. Stillingfleet among many other Answers far better than ever such a Cavill deserv'd are greater Strangers to St. Hierome ' s Language then they would seem to be whose Custome it is upon incidental Occasions to accommodat the Phrase and Language of Scripture to them as when he speaks of Chrysostome ' s Fall cecidit Babylon cecidit of the Bishops of Palestine multi utroque claudicant pede All which Instances saith the Doctor are produc'd by Blondel but have the good fortune to be pass'd over without being taken nottice of And now judge whether there was more Ignorance or Impudence in D. M's following Query Whether the Opinion of St. Hierome be not disingenuously represented by the Presbyterians since he never acknowledg'd nor affirm'd any intervall after the Death of the Apostles in which Ecclesiastical Affairs were govern'd communi Presbyterorum consilio Bellarmine objects also as doth his Epe D. M. that Hierome says James was made Bishop of Jerusalem presently after the Death of our Saviour But both are repell'd by Iunius who shews that the common reading of that place of Hierome ' s Catalogue is corrupted And Answers that James was only left while the Apostles
went thro' the World for the Commodity of that Church and was never absolutely ordain'd a Bishop by the Apostles for James himself was an Apostle Of the same Mind is Salmasius that James resided not at Jerusalem as one of their Hierarchick Bishops but as an Apostle And yet D. M. is not asham'd to tell his Reader as the Concession of Salmasius that we have a Diocesan Bishop establish'd in the person of St. James the Just in the City of Jerusalem Now that Hierome understood James's Episcopacy in the sense giv'n by Junius and Salmasius against the Jesuites is most apparent especially if we consider how the Ancients us'd to speak of the Apostles and Apostolick extraordinary Church-Officers in the Stile of their own times and how positive Hierome was for the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter during the Apostolick age and first primitive Church Add hereto that Hierome as he shews in his Preamble to Dexter was altogether uncertain of much of what he wrote in his Catalogue of Writers which is yet more clear from his account of Paul for the writes that he was a Native of Gischalis and during the Wars between the Jews and Romans sted with his Parents to Tarsus when Gischalis was taken Which I 'm sure Hierome a Man so well acquaint with the Affairs of the Jews who had no Wars with the Romans for many years after the time wherein the Fabler whom Hierome transcribes suppos'd these Wars to have been commens'd and Gischalis taken could never believe but only because he could light on no better transcrib'd things as he found ' em Which removes tho' no more could be said D. M's Objection from Hierome's mentioning of Ignatius his Epistles whereon D. M. with no small Ostentation insists He follows also Bellarmine objecting that Hierome makes Bishops the Apostles Successors But Junius Replies that Hierome denies not this to be also the priviledge of Presbyters It 's also objected by Dr. Pearson that Hierome in his Epistle to Heliodorus speaks of the Deacons as the third Order And seeing this of all the passages of Hierome produc'd by the Papists to involve him in self-repugnancy is most plausible take it at full length If a Man saith Hierome desires the Office of a Bishop he desires a good Work These things we know but add what follows A Bishop then must be blameless c. and having express'd the rest of the things which there follow concerning a Bishop the Apostle uses no less diligence in setting forth the Duties of the third Degree saying Likewise let the Deacons be grave c. But passing that he was scarce more than a Child when he wrote that Epistle and wrote clearly for the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter in his riper years it 's certain he pretends no Divine Warrant for this Tripartition Yea from the very words they would now detort it 's most evident that tho' Hierome following the Custome of his Age mentions a third Degree he notwithstanding takes both Paul's Bishop and Presbyter for one and the same thing Moreover in this same Epistle Hierome makes all who had the Power of Dispensing the Sacraments Successor to the Apostles which the Jesuites and their Supporters appropriat to Bishops hence they are baffl'd with the very places of Hierome they endeavour to abuse § 7. But I return to Hierome Philippi continues he is a single Town of Macedonia and truly in one City there could not be called are they as moe Bishops But because at that time they called the same Men both Bishops and Presbyters therefore he spoke indifferently concerning both Bishops and Presbyters From these words saith Petavius It can be evidently demonstrated that Hierome believed that Bishops and Presbyters were not one and the same Order yea even in the Age of the Apostles For had he so believ'd he had never said that there could not be a plurality of Bishops in one City when surely there was a plurality of Presbyters As if Jerome's whole discourse scope and conclusion were not directly opposite to what the Jesuite impudently fathers on him who in the words Petavius abuses only meets with some Wranglers as he elsewere terms them who to elude the proof Jerome brought for the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter from Philippians 1. 1. absurdly contended that in the City of Philippi alone there were a multitude of Bishops distinguish d from and superior to other Pastors But yet this may seem doubtfull continous Jerome to some except it be confirmed by another Testimony It is written in the Acts of the Apostles that when the Apostle was come to Miletum he sent to Ephesus and called for the Elders of that Church to whom amongst other things he said take heed to your selves and to the Flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you Bishops to feed the Church of Christ. And observe this diligently how the Apostle calling the Elders of Ephesus which was but one City afterwards names them Bishops if any receive the Epistle which under Paul's Name is written to the Hebrews there also the care of the Church is equally divided amongst a plurality For he writes to the People Obey your Governours and be subject to them for they watch And Peter who received his Name from the strength of his Faith saith in his Epistle The Elders which are among you I exhort who am also an Elder We have enlarged on these things that we might shew that among the Ancients Bishops were all one with Presbyters Hierome then never as Petavius and his Followers impudently pretend thought that there had hapned no alteration or that Bishops bore greater bulk in his time than they had done in the Age of the Apostles but by little and little to the end the seeds of Schism might be remov'd the whole care was devolv'd upon one wherefore as the Presbyters know that by the Custome of the Church they are subject to their prefect so let Bishops know that rather by Custome than by the Truth of Christ's Institution they are greater than Presbyters and ought to Rule the Church in common with them imitating Moses who when he alone had Power to Rule the Israelites chused other Seventy with whom he might judge the People Here say they is a proof of Superiority of Bishops by Divine Right but they should remember that Hierome here undertook to prove the quite contrary And it 's most injust to fish and search for self-contradictions in any Author when with ease he may be understood otherways as the Matter is here Hierome is arguing a majori ad minus from Moses his Practice who tho' he had sole Authority by Divine Right yet shar'd it with others to that which ought to have been done by the Bishops of his time whom only Church Custome not Christ's Appointment had raised over other Pastors And indeed they might on equal grounds inferr from John 13. 14. If I then your Lord and Master have washed your
chiefly the Jesuites And lastly in the rear comes D. M. concluding that the Hierarchy of the Christian Church is founded upon Apostolick Tradition and that the Apostles had the Modell of the Temple in their view when they erected this Plat-form But Junius Answers that their Conclusion is a non sequitur For saith he this comparison is not particular between each of these particular Officers under the Old Testament and these under the New but in common shewing that as they are all obliged to serve the Church of the Jews so all the Church-Officers under the New Testament ought to serve the Christian Church Moreover continues Junius tho' we should give that the Comparison were particular yet their Conclusion would not follow seeing Hierome speaks only of the Church Polity of his own time and the Question now is about Hierome's Sentiments of the Church Government and Polity in the Apostolick Age and first primitive Church And that this in Hierome's Mind was not Hierarchick but a meer Parity of Pastors Junius already evinced and Dr. Stillingfleet at more length overthrows this their Jesuitical Doctrine and Demonstrats that by Apostolical Tradition in Hierome only Ecclesiastick Custome of some Antiquity is mean'd asserts that it 's not imaginable that Jerome who had been proving all along the Superiority of a Presbyter above a Deacon because of his Identity with a Bishop in the Apostles times should at the same time say that a Bishop was above a Presbyter by the Apostles Institution and so directly overthrow all he had been saying before The plain meaning continues Dr. Stillingfleet then of Jerome is no more but this that as Aaron and his Sons in the Order of Priesthood were above the Levites under the Law So the Bishops and Presbyters in the Order of the Evangelical Priesthood are above the Deacons under the Gospel For the Comparison runs not between Aaron and his Sons under the Law and Bishops and Presbyters under the Gospel but between Aaron and his Sons as one part of the Comparison under the Law and the Levites under them as the other so under the Gospel Bishops and Presbyters make one part of the Comparison answering to Aaron and his Sons in that wherein they all agree viz. the Order of Priesthood and the other part under the Gospel is that of Deacons answering to the Levites under the Law The Opposition is not then in the Power of Jurisdiction between Bishops and Priests but between the same Power of Order which is alike both in Bishops and Presbyters according to the acknowledgement of all to the Office of Deacons which stood in Competition with them Hereby we see how unhappyly those Arguments succeed which are brought from the Analogy between the Aaronical Priesthood to endeavour the setting up of a Jus Divinum of a paralell Superiority under the Gospel All which Arguments are taken off by this one thing we 're now upon viz that the Orders and Degrees under the Gospel were not taken up from Analogy to the Temple Other passages of Jerome they also study to abuse but these now handl'd are the most specious But of such Allegatâ—ons out of Jerome hear the same Dr. And among all these fifteen Testimonies produced by a learned Writer out of Jerome for the Superiority of Bishops above Presbyters I cannot find one that doth found it upon any Divine Right but only upon the conveniency of such an Order for the Peace and Unity of the Church of God But granting some passages may have a more favourable aspect towards the Superiority of Bishops over Presbyters in his other Writings I would fain know whether a Man's Judgement must be taken from occasional and accidental Passages or from designed and set Discourses which is as much as to ask whether the lively Representation of a man by picture may be best taken when in hast of other business he passeth by us giving only a glance of his countenance or when he purposely and designedly sits in order to that end that his countenance may be truly represented He adds that Jerome in his Commentaries where he expresly declares not his own mind transcribes often out of others without setting down their names c. § 9. Most dishonest therefore is the conduct of the Loyolites and of others of the Prelatists their Associats in this Matter but above all men that of D. M. who beside all this his foul dealling following Bayly the Iesuite has scarce adventur'd to lay before his Reader in â—nglish so much as one scrape or particle of what the Reform'd bring from Jerome against the Romanists and such Hierarchick Advocats which in D. M. is the most certain product of both extream Disingenuity Diffidence But so great is the power of prejudice that they stick not to sacrifice both their Credit and whatsoever else they should reckon most estimable to such Dreams as even most of the Church of England yea and of the Romanists either acted by the love of the Truth or compell'd by its Power had condemn'd We have heard how Bishop Jewel Dr. Morton the Bishop of Spalato and Dr. Stillingfleet renounce and explode so palpable an untruth And Dr. Forbes is of the same Mind yeelding that Hierome is all one with Aërius in this that Bishops by Divine Right are not at all Superior to Presbyters And that these two are intirely of one and the same Mind we have heard also granted by the most learn'd of the Romanists as Alphonsus de Castro and Medina some whereof acknowledge that none could be of another Opinion concerning them And Benedictus Justinianus and other Romanists are of the same Mind How then were all these Doctors sitting in Council to determine of this very Matter should they chastise and brand these most partial and disingenuous Dealers we have now to do with Other Hierarchicks who would not confess so much in plain Terms yet sometimes discover both their disingenuity and true Sentiments so palpably as if they had expresly made the same Confession Dr. Pearson tho' he says nothing in his own Name yet acknowledges that Hierome hath said so much for the Authority of Presbytry and endeavoured so much to establish it that he is judged to make it well nigh equal to the Episcopal Order And Bellarmine tells us that Hierome was self repugnant and knew not what he said And Petavius tho' the most pertinacious wrangler of all the Society grants that Hierome makes Presbyters well nigh all one with Bishops but not the very same saith the Jesuite or intirely their Equalls being Inferior in so much as they want the Power of Ordination And that according to Hierome's Mind meer Custome and not the Lord 's Appointment gave to the Bishops above Presbyters any Power they have either in Ruling the Church or external Government And were things brought to this pass I 'm sure they should make but small account of the sory remainder Petavius makes
a profitable departure for they are not afrai'd least any thrust them out of their places into others For we see that you have cast some from their Charge which they perform'd with honour It 's base Beloved yea very base and unworthy of a Conversation that is in Christ Jesus to hear that the most stable and ancient Church of Corinth for the sake of one or two should raise sedition against the Presbyters And If I be the Cause of Contention schism and sedition I 'le depart and be gone whithersoever ye will and do what the People shall command providing only that the sheepfold of Christ with the Presbyters appointed over it may have peace And And you therefore who were the Authors of this Division subject your selves to your Presbyters Hence Observe First that he never names or so much as insinuats that in Corinth there was any Bishop Superintendent over the rest of the Pastors But as the Apostle to the Hebrews had done before him honours equally all their Pastors with the Title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 these that bear Rule over them Secondly That in imitation of the same Apostle Paul he names only Bishops and Deacons as the only Orders of Divine Institution by whom the whole Gospel-Service was to be perform'd Therefore afterward when he names Presbyters in distinction from the Flock and as Rulers over it he cann't be understood as Petavius and Pearson would force him to speak of Presbyters with Relation and Respect only of their Age but to give them this Demonstration as a peculiar Designation of a Church-Office and so the word Presbyter most of necessity with Clement coincide in its meaning with the word Bishop and both of 'em become Synonymous Terms to hold forth but one and the same thing Thirdly That the Apostles did not as we find afterward Decreed by the Synod of Sardica and admonish'd by Pope Leo chuse out only the greater Cities and neglect and forbear to place Bishops in lesser Villages that the name of Bishop hereby might not fall into Contempt but indifferently and without distinction of places every where settled them according as there was a probability they might serve the great end of their calling therein Fourthly That to found the Distinction and number of these Orders if we believe Clement the Apostles had no eye unto the Jewish Church-Polity so as to make it a Pattern for that of the Christian but only to what was prophecied and foretold by the Prophets concerning a new frame of the New Testament Church and thus Clement really contradicts all the Patrons of the Hierarchy who would still found their triple Orders on that of the High-Priest Priests and Levites of the Temple Fifthly That in Corinth it was attempted to throw out a plurality of real Bishops and cast them from their Charge and that the Sedition was not moved against one only but divers Bishops in that Church Many other things might be observed but these serve sufficiently to prove that there was a plurality of true Bishops of Corinth who were in nothing distinguished from Pastors of particular Flocks or preaching Presbyters § 2. Petavius notwithstanding cann't abide any such Inference from the words of Clement Wherefore he scrapes together several things whereby to ward off the force of these Passages and alledges that Clemens his silence of the Bishop of Corinth makes nothing for us For Pope Siricius saith he in his Epistle to the Church of Millain maketh no mention of their Bishop altho' in that mean time Ambrose occupied the Chair But the vast Difference between the Cases and the Circumstances of the Churches of Corinth and Millain quite nullifies the Jesuites Instance The People of Millain jointly both Clergy and Laity had thrust out Jovinian few or none of them for ought we hear being prosylited to his Doctrine wherefore Siricius had nothing to do but shew them in General that he had excommunicated Jovinian with two or three others who had fled to Rome for Sanctuary So there was no special Ground or Cause why particular mention should be made of Ambrose the Bishop or any other whether of the Clergy or Laity the whole Body thereof for ought now known being without any Schism earnest enough for the expulsion of Jovinian and only expecting what the Bishop of Rome which they acknowledged as the first See and whether Jovinian had fled would do in this Matter Whereas one the other hand Clemens writes to a Church cut in pieces with a Schism in their own Bowels infected with Sedition of no small part of the People against their Pastors broken with as appears plain a division of the very Pastors themselves and this grown to such a hight that some of the Pastors were thrust from their places and driv'n out now in this Case the Bishop had either the best of it and so the seditious part merited a severe and special reprimand on the account of their Opposition to and Separation from their Bishop and thus he should certainly have been mentioned or else he was the Cause of the Division or at least joined with the injurious and therefore should have been particularly reproved or admonished Clement it 's true names none but the influence which the good or evil Carriage the Bishop had and could not but have in such a Matter had certainly obliged Clement either to mention his name of give some signification of him if there had been any Diocesan Bishop existent in Corinth Clemens speaks of several Pastors of Flocks which I think none will deny intimats the diversity of their Carriage in that Business and gives Directions accordingly How can it be apprehended that he should pass over the chief Pastor and go to the rest without so much as the least Direction unto him the least mention of him yea or the least insinuation that there was in Corinth any such thing Petavius's next Attempt is on these words of Clement where he tells that the Apostles instituted Bishops and Deacons And the Jesuite contends that two distinct Orders are not here mean'd but that the word Deacon is only explicative of the former word Bishop and cites several places where the word Deacon is taken in a signification of Honour and applied to the Apostles and Civil Magistrates And afterward terms Salmasius ridiculous for saying that Clemens nam'd only Bishops and Deacons without mention of Presbyters For saith the Jesuite Presbyters are more frequently mention'd by Clement than either Bishops or Deacons But certainly these Orders are again and again mention'd by Clement without adding any thereto ordetracting therefrom when he appears to reckon up all the Church-Officers that are of Divine Institution And altho' the word Deacon be sometimes taken for the Designation of a higher Office Yet as Petavius himself else where observes It is with the addition of such a word or phrase as guides our Judgement and gives us to learn that by it is not understood this
hatefull Hypothesis of some giddy Papaturiants which as we have heard even the more candide of the Episcopalls disclaim and explode I shall shut up all concerning Clement with the Suffrages of two illustrious Names neither whereof I 'm sure did ever favour Presbytry I mean Grotius and Stillingfleet Had Episcopacy saith the Doctor been instituted on the occasion of the Schism at Corinth certainly of all places we should the soonest have heard of a Bishop at Corinth for the remedying of it and yet almost of all places these Heralds that derive the Succession of Bishops from the Apostles times are the most plunged whom to six on at Corinth And they that can find any one single Bishop at Corinth at the time when Clemens writ his Epistle to them about another Schism as great as the former which certainly had not been according to their Opinion if a Bishop had been there before must have better Eyes and Judgement than the deservedly admired Grotius who brings this in his Epistle to Bignonius as an Argument of the undoubted Antiquity of that Epistle quod nusquam meminit exsortis c. that Clement no where mentions that singular Authority of Bishops which by Church custome after the Death of Mark at Alexandria and by its Example in other places began to be introduced but Clemens clearly shews as did the Apostle Paul that then by the common Council of the Presbyters who both by Paul and Clement are called Bishops the Churches were governed § 4. I proceed next to the Vindication of Polycarp Subject your selves saith he to the Presbyters and Deacons as to God and Christ and as Virgins walk with a pure Conscience let the Presbyters be simple or innocent mercifull in all things turning all Men from their Errors visiting all who are weak not neglecting Widows Orphans and those that are Poor but alwayes providing such things as are good in the sight of God and Men. Here we learn that the highest Office then in the Church of Philippi was that of a Presbyter and that there was a Plurality to whom the Philippians were to be subjected without the least mention of a particular Bishop governing those Presbyters And which deserves no overly Consideration we here see that as when Clement gives an account of Church Orders he named two only so we have the same number expressed by Polycarp but they altered their Denomination of the former Order and they whom Clement calls sometimes Bishops sometimes Presbyters Polycarp calls still Presbyters It 's most observable also how both Paul and Polycarp subject the Church of one single City Philippi to a Plurality or Multitude of Pastors whom Paul calls Bishops and Polycarp Presbyters From all which the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter most inevitably results § 5. And indeed this Passage of Polycarp so much gravells the Hierarchicks that Dr. Pearson is driven to his last Leggs and compelled to present us with a shift unworthy of its Author Who can prove saith he that the Bishop of Philippi was then alive who can shew us that the Philippians asked not Counsel at Polycarp for this cause that they then enjoyed not a Bishop for thus Polycarp bespeaks them These things Brethren I write not of my self to you concerning righteousness but you have moved me thereunto Thus Pearson and indeed it 's enough here to return the Question inverted who is able to prove if there had been a Bishop in Philippi that he was not alive For seeing he affirms it he or his Advocats are obliged to instruct what they say That which he pretends to from these words of the Epistle wherein Polycarp saith he was moved thereto by the Philippians themselves affords him not the least support there not being therein one syllable concerning the vacancy of the Bishops Seat or the Church Government during this Defect or how to fill the Chair Of all or any of these nec vol◠nec vestigium but only as is evident from Polycarp they seem to have desir'd of him some Direction concerning the blameless walk of any Christian. And indeed the Bishop within a very few lines fairly yeelds the Cause really acknowledging that he had said nothing to the purpose But seeing saith he these things are uncertain we have no certainty from the Discourse of Polycarp Well then it must follow for ought he knew that Polycarp knew no Diocesan Bishop in Philippi that he had never heard of his Death seeing nothing hereof can be gathered from him And that he had never heard of his Life or Being we may well conclude from this that he devolves the whole Church-Affairs upon a Plurality of Presbyters But once again Is it at all credible but that if Polycarp had written to the Philippians after the death of their Bishop and during the vacancy of the Chair he had comforted them after this so considerable a Loss and giv'n them Directions for chusing of a worthy Successor especially if as Pearson would have they had ask'd his counsell concerning this very Matter Had ever a Pastor like Polycarp neglected so seasonable an Office His profound silence therefore of the Death of any such Bishop in Philippi sufficiently demonstrats that this Dr. Pearson's Invention was only the product of a desperate Cause and that there was left here no doore of Escape And here let me observe that Philippi is no less fatal to the Episcopals than its neighbouring plains were to the Pompeians for they are stung and confounded with the very first words of Paul to that Church and as we have heard amongst their other wild shifts they answer that the Bishop was often absent But there was a good number of years between the writing of Paul and that of Polycarp to the Philippians and yet we see the Bishop is never come home Why taryeth the wheel of his Lordship's Chariot Hath he not sped at Court And having supplanted some of the Nobility made a prey of the Office of Chancellour or Treasourer that after so long absence there is no news of his return Nor are we ever like to hear any more of him for now say they he 's dead I had perhaps believ'd them were 't not impossible for one to die who was never alive But enough of this for such Answers would really tempt one to think that their Authors studi'd nothing more than to ridicule their oun Cause and afford Game to their Reader § 6. And here I cann't but nottice the ill-grounded vapouring of D. M. who from the inscription of the Epistle Polycarp and the Presbyters that are with him concludes that he was vested with Episcopal jurisdiction and eminency amongst these Presbyters And so much he pretends to bring out of Blondel as as his forc'd Confession which is so far from being true that it 's brought in by Blondel as an Objection and silly Conjecture of the Episcopals which he diverse ways overthrows And indeed never was there a more wretch'd deduction fram'd
seeing as Blondel at large shews the phrase natively yealds only this sense viz. Polycarp and the rest of the Presbyters of that Colleage And thus D. M. may as well inferr Peter's Superiority and Power over the rest of the Apostles from Acts 2. 37. To Peter and to the rest of the Apostles Moreover Blondel demonstrats how on diverse accounts Polycarp without any Eminency and Power over the rest may be particularly nominated rather than others as because he was first in Order and Years But I insist not herein but referr to Blondel who hath nervously baffl'd this their pitifull Coujecture D. M. adventures to ingage with nothing of what he saith and yet is not asham'd to bring to the Field so blunted a weapon I pass also D. M.'s two Arguments for Polycarp's Diocesan Episcopacy drawn from the pretended Succession of Diocesan Bishops in Smyrna and the Epistles of Ignatius mention'd by Polycarp having overthrown both of 'em already and proceed to the Testimony of Hermas who thus speaks Thou shalt write two Books thou shalt send one to Clement and one to Graptes and Clement shall send it to foraign Cities for to him this is permitted and Graptes shall admonish the Widows and Orphans but thou shalt read it with or relate it unto the Presbyters in this City who govern the Church Where we see that not any one Bishop but a Colledge of Presbyters call'd doubtless afterward by the same Author Bishops govern'd the Church of one City Yet D. M. pretends to find here a palpable Evidence of Episcopacy For saith he the sending of the Encyclical Epistle to foraign Cities is insinuated to be the peculiar Priviledge of Clement then Bishop of Rome But if he conclude from this place of Hermas that Clement had any Power over these to whom he was to send that Book or Epistle as for Clement's being Bishop of Rome it 's so far from being insinuated here that the quite contary is from this very place most evident he may as well inferr from Col. 4. 16. that they had Power over the Laodiceans whither they were to send and cause to be read the Apostle's Letter Secondly D. M. ascribing to the Bishop of Rome Power over foraign Cities erects a Pope rather than a Bishop But I 'll assure him he came not in so early for seeing there was undoubtedly one Bishop at least in every particular City so soon as there were any in the World this place of Hermas if it bear D. M's Inference and give a Power to Clement over foraign Cities insinuats nothing of a Bishop's Dignity above Presbyters but of the power of one Bishop over another or rather of a Pope over other Churches A falshood most unanimously exploded by Cyprian Jerome Augustine and the rest of the Ancients D. M. seeks also for his Prelacy in these words of Hermas viz. The Earthly Spirit exalts it self and seeks the first seat Some contend for Principality and Dignity But what if Hermas had said that some contended to get an Empire and Popedome over the whole Church would D. M. hence conclude that it was lawfull or then practised in the Church or when the Apostles contended who should be the greatest Had Christ before that time assured them of the lawfulness of such an Office and told them that they were to have one to be a Prince over the rest By no Logick therefore can it be inferred for Hermas his words that a chief Seat or Principality for both are one and the same with Hermas was then either exercised or held lawfull Again tho' both had been then in Custome no Power of one over the rest can be hence concluded seeing the chief Seats are given to the Moderators of Synods and other Presidents of Assemblies who have no primacy of Power but only of Order And again The polished and white Stones saith Hermas are the Apostles and Bishops and Doctors and Deacons who walked in the Clemency of God aâ—d exercised the Office of a Bishop and taught and served And Such are some Bishops that is Governours of the Churches and these who have the Charâ—e of the Services § 7. In both places saith Blondel he makes only two Degrees that of the Bishops who governed the Churches and that of the Deacons who had the charge of the Services for it 's acknowledged by all that the Doctors are all one with the Bishops when they are said to have performed the Office of a Bishop and that the Apostles as they are opposed to Bishops were placed above the whole Clergy This repons D. M. is Tergiversation with a Witness and a fraudulent Trick in Blondel since Presbyters in the primitive Church are frequently distinguished by the Name of Doctors and Blondel's Commentary is a manifest violence offered to the Text for Doctors are not said to have performed the Office of a Bishop but to have taught and this is very agreeable to their Character being so much imploy'd by their respective Bishops in teaching the Catechumeni and the natural position of these words will allow of no other meaning Which Answer D. M. hath learned from the Practice of our late Bishops during whose Epocha the Buffund might have hid himself well nigh the whole year from the Bishop's fury in the Bishop's pulpit seeing he scarce ever came thither to play the Doctor or ought else As for the Ancient and true primitive Bishops they perpetually preach'd or taught saith Le Moyn Moreover the Fathers generally take Pastor Bishop and Doctor for one and the same as Chrysostome Theophylact Theodoret Sedulius and after them Aquinas Haymo Benedictus Justinianus with others on Ephes. 4. 11. Of the same mind are Hierome Augustine and Anselm and the pretended Clemens Romanus cited by Gratian and Benedictus Justinianus and the Fathers of the Council of Carthage Of the same Mind are the ablest of our Episcopals as Field Hammond and Heylen So truly did Blondel say that Bishop and Doctor is universally taken for one and the same Neither was ever the Presbyter either in Cyprian or any other Ancient called Doctor in opposition to the Bishop but to other Ecclesiastick Presbyters who taught not of whose existence as was before touched we have most sufficient assurance But D. M. in contradiction to the Apostle would have a Bishop who is no Teacher or Preacher like the Droll who said he mett with Priests who were no Clerks And seeing with Hermas there are but two Orders of Church-men and Bishops and praesides Ecclesiarum Church Governours are reciprocal Terms taken for one and the same and seeing that his Presbyters are expresly term'd Church-Governours it 's most evident that he takes Bishop and Presbyter for one and the same and that the word Doctor is purely exegetick or explicative of the word Bishop and that both of them which I 'm sure is not unfrequent in all sorts of Authors evidently signifie one and the same thing § 8. I now
the very same Officers the very same Men that he means by the name Bishops rather than e contra see Pray the Letter it self apud Flav. Vopis in Saturnino § 11. 'T were easie to shew divers succeeding Fathers to have been of Justine's Mind and Strangers to Diocesan Episcopacy ignoring all Discrimination between Bishop and preaching Presbyter or Pastor I shall only here with one Chamier against Bellarmine and the rest of the Jesuites assert against their Successors and Defenders under whatever Name they be known that according to Irenaeus the Churches were committed to the Presbyters no less than to the Bishops that these who are now reckoned Popes High-Priests universal Bishops are only Presbyters in the Judgement of Irenaeus and that in him Presbyters are not so much as once distinguished and far less separated from Bishops From what is said appears the vanity of D. M's Popish Query Whether all things duly considered a more evident and universal Tradition for the Superiority and Jurisdiction of a Bishop above a Presbyter can be reasonably demanded and whether the Argument from universal Tradition be not in this Case the most proper and most necessary And whether the Tradition for the Superiority of a Bishop above a Presbyter be not more universal unanimous and uncontradicted in the Primitive Ages than many other Traditions that are unquestionably received What these his other Traditions are we are not ignorant The Doctrine certainly of the morality of the Sabbath of Baptism and of the Holy Trinity and the like these they think lean only on Tradition and that the Institution of their Diocesan Prelats Metrapolitans and Arch-Prelats and other such Effects and Inventions of a degenerating and apostatizing Church are better founded than these most Scriptural Catholick and necessary Doctrines Section X. Other Observations and Arguments eversive of Diocesan Prelacy AND now in the next place I would gladly learn how they will describe or whereon they can found their Romish or which is all one their Hierarchick Diocesan Bishop For as Augustine well observes it is a name of Labour and Travel not of Honour and Dignity and indeed it imports only Watchfullness Labour and Care as its most native and proper Signification and on this account only the King gets the name of Bishop in Hesychius as he gets the name of Pastor in Homer And Hesychius gives it no less to every Watchman Thus the word Bishop denotes a vigilant Watchman in Suidas where he tells us that some bearing this Name were sent by the Athenians to observe the Affairs of their subject Cities who were called Watchmen So is the same word understood to denote only Care and Labour by Jullius Pollux whereas on the other hand the word Presbyter when taken for a Function or Office natively imports Rule and Honour A Presbyter acknowledges even Saravia is a Name of Honour and was given to the more honourable and to the Magistrats among the Jews in the Old Testament and was thence transferred to signifie the Governours of the Churches of Christ in the New Testament but they are called Bishops from their watchfull Care which is a Name of Work and Labour The name Presbyter saith Dr. Stillingfleet as the Hebrew ZAKEN tho' it originally import Age yet by way of connotation it hath been looked on as a Name both of Dignity and Power among the Jews in the times of the Apostles it is most evident that the Name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imported not only Dignity but Power the Presbyters among the Jews having Power both of Judging and Teaching given them by their Semicha or Ordination Now under the Gospel the Apostles retaining the Name and the manner of Ordination but not conferring that judiciary Power by it which was in use among the Jews to shew the Difference between the Law and the Gospel it was requisite some other Name should be given to the Governours of the Church which should qualifie the importance of the word Presbyters to a sense proper to a Gospel state which was the Original of giving the Name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the Governours of the Church under the Gospel a Name importing Duty more than Honour and not a title above Presbyter but rather used by way of Diminution and Qualification of the Power imply'd in the name of Presbyter c. The Hierarchicks therefore should act much more rationally if they turn'd the Tables and gave the name of Presbyter to their Diocesan and that of the Bishop to their inferiour Curats who usually do most of the Pastoral Work In the mean while it 's sure from what we just now learned out of these Authors that during sounder Antiquity before men equally abused Names and Things a Bishop could never be either ane Order or Degree or any thing else above a Prsbyter But from Names if we pass to things and look into Scripture and sounder Antiquity we shall find the ancient Bishop so different from the present Diocesan that the very Idea's and notions of the two are diametrically opposite one to another The Apostles themselves Acts 6. 2 4. following the Commandment of their Master found it their Duty so assiduously to labour in Preaching and Prayer that they thought it unreasonable to be diverted even by the Distribution of the Collections and Care of the Poor which otherwayes was a Work both lawfull and pious And to Timothy who if we believe the Hierarchicks was ane Arch-Bishop of a vast Diocess it 's injoyn'd as his proper Task to Preach the Word to be instant in season and out of season to reprove to rebuke exhort with all Long-suffering and Doctrine I need not here multiply Texts read and read over again the whole New Testament and you shall find that the Exercise of Prayer Dispensing the Word and Sacraments was the main Duty and perpetual Imployment of every Pastor or Minister of Christ. Look on the other hand to the bulk of the Hierarchick Lord-Bishops they haue a quite different Work and Exercice and if any of 'em happen to spend some time in the Ministerial Duties how are they commonly gaz'd on and depredicated as Men of extraordinary Condescension superlatively stuping to a piece of Service far below the Episcopal Grandeur and unusual to the Order Are they not then quite another thing than the Apostolick and Scripturall Bishops This Apostolick Example the Conscientious Primitive Bishops or Pastors clossly follow'd not so much as once dreaming that any who was ordain'd a Minister of the Gospell and intrusted with a Flock might on whatsoever pretext neglect to exercise himself perpetually in Prayer and Dispensing the Word and Sacraments This they judg'd his constant Imployment and this was the Practice of all the sincere Bishops even after the Distinction of Degrees was introduc'd as appears in the weekly and sometimes the dayly Homilies and Lectures of Chrysostome and Augustine which are yet extant And it 's already
the Fundamental Charter c. the far more considerale part yea the very substance of both which Books I examine and exartuat I discuss moreover the Plea they bring from Ignatius's Epistles as also detect most of the foremention'd Artifices together with many such ungenerous Methods not hitherto so fully discovered Hence I hope I cannot be justly accounted an Aggressor or Provocker nor yet my Papers superfluous I don't notwithstanding impeach as guilty of these Deallings all Episcopall men for of these there have been and doubtless now are both good men and stout Protestants and such I know will never be offended if I lay open open the Weakness and unworthy Deallings of such as anathematize whosoever preferr the Model of the prime ptimitive Church-Government the Apostolick Humility and Simplicity to their Diocesan Hierarchy the secular Grandeur of subsequent and more degenerat Times if I among many other Demonstrations hereof bring a Cloud of most competent and unsuspected Witnesses who depone that during the Apostolick Age and the prime Primitive Church there was a Bishop for each Congregation an Identity of Bishop and preaching Presbyter and finally a compleat Parity of ordinary Pastors if I make appear that the greatest Enemies to this Truth and Adorers of the Hierarchy are maugre all their Cunning compell'd to subscribe and seall it If yet some hesitat and admire how then so many of the Learn'd can give their Hierarchy a divine Sanction or set it so high as the times of the Apostles such wowld remember that to fewer at least and these of no less Learning no less confidently pretend a Divine Origen for many things the Foundation whereof notwithstanding is undenyably in the dust of humane Corruption How many Torrents of Wormwood hide their little heads in sources in that Christian 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the space of about an hundred years after the Canon of the Scriptures was sealled whereof so few genuine Monuments now remain and wherein Christians as they were also for a good many yeares after that time being astonish'd at these more prodigious Heresies and wholly imployed in quelling these Hydra's were kept from watching against more fly and subtile Assaults of the Enemy the Danger of whose Tares was scarce discernable till they were hardly to be eradicated Again 't is to be remembred that there are vast Ods between the Cases of the Contending Parties many things tempt and invite men to patronize the Hierarchy whereto the other side is not obnoxious for whosoever confides in his own Parts and Abilities may probably promise to himself a graduall Ascent even to the satiety of worldly Ease Riches and Honour Did not these and such Motives byass too many men together with the Liberty Prelacy gives to Heterodox Principles and to licentious Practices how few should there be found to agent its Cause On the other hand Preâ—hâ—â—â—erian Discipline they think too rigid against both these Enormites and as to worldly Encouragements there 's nothing in Presbytry but a mediocrity of Stipend with a hard and perpetuall Labour without any Hope of Ease Grandor or more opulent Fortune I should now have doon only I can not but express how desirable 't were that haying aside our own unscripturall Fancies the Grounds of these most lamentable Contentions all of us followed after the things which make for Peace aâ—d things wherewith one may edifie another Who would have thought not many years heâ—ce when all true Protestants were at the very briâ—k of Destruction but that the admirable Deliveraâ—ce God give us should have had this most desirable Consequent How amazing is it that a number call'd Protestants should vent their Spite Malice and Treason against the most happy Instrument of this our Delivery in Peace His Majesty King WILLIAM who is under God the main Stay of Protestants whom yet God protects and I pray may protect maugre all the malicious Machinations of wicked Men. God yet continues to call us to the same Duty of Christian Concord to name no others by terrible Monitors for at one Quarter we are besieg'd by nominal Theists but real Atheists who ridicule God's Sacred Word as the product of Rogues or Sots and explode the Doctrine of the Existence of Angels and Spirits and consequently of the Beeing of God the Father of Spirits as the Dream of some Brainsick Weaklings and below a man of sence and at another Quarter by a direfull Combination of Infernal Fiends and wretch'd Mortals It 's pleasant notwithstanding to observe how the latter of these Satanical Machines split and undoe the former for the well known and confess'd Compacts and Commerce between these wicked Spirits and Miscreants of human Race and Operations of Demons and such Effects undenyably proceeding from preternatural and incorporeal Causes are sure Proofs of such immaterial Beeings and so demonstrat the Falshood of what is broach'd by these abominable Saducees aliquisque malo fuit usus in illo O how clossly ought all of us to joyn in Weeping Sighing and Crying not only for our oun Guilt but also for these such horrible Abominations that be doon in the midst of the Land In the mean while these and a thousand such Mischiefs mostly owe themselves to this Controversy our Divisions Ignorance want of Church-Discipline and other such its odious Effects How many thro' God's Blessing should that Zeal Learning and Industry spent for the support of mens unscripturall Conceits have brought to the Obedience of Christ from both Romanists and open Infidels Heu quantum potuit Terrae pelagique parari Hoc quem Civiles hauserunt sanguine dextrae Bless'd then in this Case should be the Peace-Maker wherefore let all of us Pray for our Jerusalem that Peace may be within her Walls and Prosperity within her Palaces Let us also with Tertullian adore the fullness of the Scriptures which as Augustine teaches contain all things needfull either for Faith or Life The Books saith Constantine the Great of the Evangelists Apostles and ancient Prophets clearly teach us the Mind of God wherefore laying aside hostile Discords let us seek from these the Determination of our Controversies Surely this is a Catholick Principle Good had it been if the Fathers had as cloâ—ly stuck to 't in Practice as they firmly believ'd it You assert saith Optatus to the Donatists We deny between your Assertion and our Denyal the Peoples minds Waver let none believe either you or us we are all contentious Men Judges must be sought if these be sought for among Christians they can be found among neither of the Parties because the Truth is impeded thro' Partiality we must seek for Judges from without if the Judge be a Pagan he cannot know the Mysteries of Christians if a Jew he is an Enemy to Christian Baptism on Earth therefore there cann't be rouâ—d a Determination of this Controversie a Judge must be sought from Heaven but why should we knock at Heavens Gates when hearing the Gospel we
Office not upon Jus Dominicum the Law of God in the Scriptures but Ecclesiasticam consuetudinem the practice of the Church Add hereto that both Fathers and Councils equally in Opinion and Practice stuck no less to the lawfulness of Patriarchat than that of simple Episcopacy and yet I believe few among real Protestants will either assert the Divine Right of this Office of Patriarchat i. e. that it had any Warrant for it in the Word of God or yet that those Fathers and Councils so believed Which present Consideration furnisheth us with another Argument sufficient to evince that the ancient Châ—rch founded this Office only upon Custom and as they thought Christian Prudence and not at all upon the Books of the Old and New Testament § 2. Neither do the most Learned of the Modern Episcopals in the least swerve from this Opinion amongst whom I reckon D. Forbes who having for a while with the greatest tenderness and fear handled this Matter propones at length the Question If Episcopacy be of Divine Right And yet declares himself highly difficultated what to Answer for absolutly deny it he will not and positively assert it he dares not he therefore confounds it with a Synodical Moderatourship and then fairly tells us that it is of Divine Right because of the general Scripture-Precepts of Church-Order and Decency And indeed he carries himself all along in this Matter with so much nice Caution Ambiguity and Fear that he evinces the desperation of the Episcopal Cause to which so learned a Man could afford no better Defence than really to destroy what he pretends to vindicat Neither is the most Learned Bishop Vsser of another mind who has reduced it to a meer shadow and nonentity And Willet though he says that a difference is needfull for Church-Policy yet affirms that this cannot be proved by the Word of God and that in the Apostles times a Bishop and Presbyter were neither in Name nor Office distinguished And he at large answers all Bellarmine's Arguments to the Contrary See the Appendix to the second part of the forecited Question Of this same Judgement is their applauded Hooker viz. that there is no ground for their Hierarchy in the word of God while he declares himself against all particular Forms of Church-government and acknowledges that nothing for Diocesan Prelacy can be brought therefrom The necessity of Policy saith he and regimen in all Churches may be held without holding any one certain Form to be necessary in them all And the general Principles are such as do not particularly prescribe any one but sundry Forms of Discipline may be equally consonant unto the general Axioms of Scripture It hath been told them that Matters of Faith and in general Matters necessarie unto Salvation are of a different Nature from Ceremonies Order and the kind of Church-Government that the one are necessar to be expresly contained in the Word of God or else manifestly collected out of the same the other not so that it is necessarie not to receive the one unless there be something in Scripture for them the other free if nothing be alledged against them And the Learned D. Stilling fleet is at no smal pains to cashier and expunge among the rest of peculiar Forms of Government This Diocesan Prelacy out of Scriptural-Articles and not only acknowledges but also musters not a few Arguments whereby to Prove that it hath no Ground in Holy Scripture And Dr. Morton Though a zealous Defender of Episcopacy Asserts that Hierome made not the Difference between Bishop and Presbiter of Divine Institution he assâ—nts to Medina the Jesuite and asserts that there was no Difference in the matter of Episcopacy betwixt Hierome and Aerius He averres further that not only the Protestants but also all the primitive Doctors were of Hierome ' s mind And finally he concludes that according to the Harmonious Consent of all Men in the Apostolick Age there was no Difference between Bishop and Pesbyter but was afterward introduced for the removal of Schism And Jewel Bishop of Sarisburie a Man for Piety and Ability Second I am sure to few that ever filled an Episcopal Chair most expresly asserts the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter Here saith he Mr. Harding findeth great fault for that I have translated these words ejusdem Sacerdotii of the same Bishoprick and not as he would have it of one Priesthood God wott a very simple Quarrel Let him take whether he listeth best if either-other of these words shall serve his turn Erasmus saith id temporis idem erat Episcopus Sacerdos Presbyter these three Names viz. Bishop Priest and Presbyter at that time were all one And but what meant Mr. Harding here to come in with the Difference between Priests or Presbyters and Bishops Thinketh he that Priests and Bishops hold only by Tradition Or is it so horrible an Heresie as he maketh it to say that by the Scriptures of God a Bishop and a Priest are all one Or knoweth he how far and unto whom he reacheth the Name of an Heretick Verily Chrysostom saith Inter Episcopum Presbyterum interest ferme nihil between a Bishop and a Priest which is all one with Presbyter in a manner there is no difference St. Hierome saith somewhat in a rougher sort Audio Quendam c. I hear say there is one become so Peevish that he setteth Deacons before Priests that is to say before Bishops whereas the Apostle plainly teacheth us that Priests and Bishops be all one Thus far Jewel The Bishops and Priests saith the famous Bishop Cranmer were at one time and were not two things but both one Office in the beginning of Christ's Religion And In the New Testament he that is appointed to be a Bishop or a Priest needeth no Consecration by the Scripture for Election or Appointing thereto sufficient In the same MS. saith Dr. Stillingfleet it appears that the Bishop of St. Asaph Therleby Redman and Cox were all of the same Opinion with the Arch-Bishop that at first Bishops and Presbyters were the same and the two latter expresly cite the Opinion of Jerome with Approbation Thus we see by the Testimony chiefly of him who was Instrumental in Our Reformation that he owned not Episcopacy as a distinct Order from Presbytry but only as a prudent Constitution of the Civil Magistrat for the better governing in the Church And having proved that Whitgift and with him the whole Body of the English Episcopal Divines were of the same Judgement thus concludes By which Principles the Divine Right of Episcopacy as founded upon Apostolical Practice is quite subverted and destroyed Now judge if Dr. Sandersone spoke not without the allowance ye acontrary to the express Mind of his Brethren when he says that the Difference among the Advocats for Episcopacy is only Verbal and that all of them even those who yeeld that it is not of Divine Right no less
Stilling fleet And amongst many others these his wâ—ords are most observable for having taken notice that Eusebius makes it a most hard Matter to know who succeeded the Apostles in the Churches they planted adds say you so is it so hard a Matter to find out who succeeded the Apostles in the Churches planted by them unless it be mention'd the Writings of Paul What becomes then of our unquestionable Line of Succession of the Bishops of several Churches and the large Diagrams made of the Apostolick Churches with every one's Name set down in his Order as if the Writer had been Clarenceaulx to the Apostles themselves Is it come to this at last that we having nothing certain but what we have in Scriptures And must then the Tradition of the Church be our Rule to interpret Scriptures by An excellent way to find out the Truth doubtless to bend the Rule to the croocked stick c. Again it 's certain that for divers Centuries Bishops were nothing like what they are now either in exercising Civil Power or Jurisdiction over other Pastors or yet in the largeness of Dioceses so that the Term Bishop in respect of the two is little better than an equivocal It 's certain also that the ancient Church wanted not her own Blemishes which was well perceived by her Doctors who still look'd on the Word of God only as the Rule of Faith and Manners on which they never founded the Episcopal Superiority Hence this their Argument carries nothing of Cogency Section VI. The Instance of Aërius condemn'd by Epiphanius prov'd to be unserviceable to our Antagonists TO Illustrat and Corroborat this their Argument from Antiquity they adduce the Instance of Aërius who was for this his Judgement of Presbytry as well as for Arrianism condemn'd and counted Heretick by Epiphanius But it is certain that Epiphanius censur'd Aërius not only for his being Anti-episcopal and as he believ'd because Arrian but also for his rejecting of Lents set and Anniversary Fasts and for denial of Prayer and Sacrifice for the Dead Now either purer Antiquity join'd with Epiphanius in asserting of the necessity of Prayer and Sacrifice for the Dead and other such Fopperies or they did not and if they join'd with him therein then our Prelatists if they be Protestants are concern'd to reflect better of how little weight their Argument from the Ancients pressing their unwarrantable Additions can be unto them But if they say that sounder Antiquity consented not to Epiphanius while he urged Prayer and Sacrifice for the Dead and such Anti-scriptural Fictions we return that neither did the choicest of the Ancients agree with him in his Plea for Prelacy The Judgement of Hierom is so well known herein that the Bishop of Spalato acknowledges that Hierom can by no means yea not byforce be reconcil'd to their Cause Hierome's Judgement saith Saravia was private all one with that of Aërius and contrary to the Word of GOD wherefore we shall examine his Arguments And on this account he is much offended with Hierome accusing him of Vanity Self-contradiction and Prevarication And Alphonsus de Castro sharply reproveth Thomas Waldensis another Papist who had intended to pervert the Testimonies which are commonly alledg'd for Presbytry out of Hierome There De Castro having prov'd out of divers places of Hierome that he was truly for the Scriptural and Apostolick Idenity of Bishop and preaching Presbyter concludes against Waldensis that of necessity there must be another way taken to Answer the Passages alledg'd out of Hierome for Presbytry And at length flatly opposes himself to Hierome in this Matter and saith that we ought rather to believe the Decrees of Popes and Councils than the Doctrine of Hierome though both very Holy and Learn'd And Medina another Champion of the Hierarchy cited by Bellarmine asserts the same of Hierome saying He was of the same Judgement with Aërius in this Matter Bellarmine is very displeas'd with his Brother for his Ingenuity and therefore attempts to bring Hierome over to the Episcopal Party but instead of performing this Task he only fruitlesly endeavours to set Hierome at variance with himself The like success had another of the same Fraternity who like Bellarmine attempted to draw Hierome to his Faction Bayly the Jesuit And yet with these the most disingenous of the whole fry of Loyolites some called Protestants stick not warmly to join themselves and plead for a Patrociny to their Cause from Hierome § 3. Yea not only was Hierome of the same Judgement anent Episcopacy with Aërius but also as even the Jesuite Medina acknowledges the most of the Greek and Latine primitive Doctors and in special Ambrosius Augustinus Sedulius Primasius Chrysostomus Theodoretus Oecumenius Theophilactus This their Opinion saith Medina was first condemned in Aërius then in the Waldenses and lastly in Wicklef but this Doctrine was either dissembled or tolerated by the Church in them for the Honour that was had to them while on the other hand it was always condemn'd in these Men as Heretical because in many other things they swerv'd from the Church Many Papists and other Prelatists cannot away with this Medina's free dealing and use many shifts to refute him and draw these Fathers to their Party But to use the Words of Rivet Whosoever shall consider their Answers collested by Sixtus Senensis Biblioth lib. 6. annot 319 323 324. they shall presently perceive that all their Distinctions are most pitifull Elusions and that indeed all these Fathers were no less Presbyterian than Aërius although they accommodat themselves to the Custom then received least for a Matter not contrary to the Foundations of Religion they should have broken the Vnity of the Church What do our Opposits herein but espouse what the Romanists in whom any ingenuity remains have long since disowned § 4. But tho' Epiphanius were the mouth of all Antiquity and the only fit Judge in this Controversie the Triumph of our Adversaries should be very small for Aërius to Prove the Idenity of the two having adduced a parallel of many particulars Epiphanius denieth nothing of these to belong to Presbyters except only Imposition of Hands he yeelds therefore that both of them equally have Power to Baptize to occupy the Chair and finally to perform all Divine Worship Our Antagonists therefore offering to vouch the Prelacy they plead for by the Authority of Epiphanius promise much more then they can perform for what pray is this Power of Imposition of Hands or Ordination compared with what they covet and pretend to support by Epiphanius his Authority I mean the both great and many Differences between Bishop and Presbyter § 5. In the mean while Epiphanius his unjust dealing towards Aërius is most palpable for he sticks not to give out that Aërius his Judgement of the Identity of Bishop Presbyter was look'd on by the whole Church as an intolerable Heresie condemned by the Word of God when
over the Bishops was only in respect of the royalty of the Isle which the King gave the Abbot As if ever Bede or any man else could have mark'd such a Superiority as strange and unusual it being nothing but what every Prince or Lord of any place still practises who altho' he subject himself to a Bishop in Spirituals yet in respect of Temporals and the Royalty uses to retain the Superiority But which ' utterly spoils the Bishop's comment Bede tells that all Columbanus got was the possession of a little Isle able to sustain about five Families for building of a Monastry without the least mention of his being invested with the Royalty thereof or any other Island and yet to him were all the Bishops of the whole Province all the Bishops of Scotland saith the Saxon Chronicle cited by the Bishop himself subjected so that this pretended Royalty of Columban over the Island becomes a vain dream tho' 't were real could do him no kindness the whole Prouince being certainly a far other thing than any such Island wherefore the Superiority this Presbyter had over these Bishops must needs have been in Ecclesiastick affairs and this was really remarkable and unusual But of this enough for whosoever believes that the errand of this most ancient Preacher and Propagator of Christ's Kingdom was to win an earthly Kingdom to himself and that the King shar'd with him his Soveraignity and Realm may as soon swallow the whole legend of Constantine's Donation to Sylvester But to return to the Advocat as in the things that he touches he wholly prevaricats so he never handles our main Argument which is taken from what is related of our Churches practice preceeding the coming of Palladius He only refers to Spotswood who says Buchanan is of opinion that before Palladius his coming there was no Bishop in this Church what warrant he had to write so I know not except he did build upon that which Joannes Major saith speaking of the same Palladius The Scots he says were instructed in the Christian Faith by Priests and Monks without any Bishops But from the instruction of the Scots in the Faith to conclude that the Church after it was gathered had no other form of Government will not stand with any reason For be it as they speak that by the Travels of fome pious Monks the Scots were first converted unto Christ it cannot be said that the Church was ruled by Monks seeing long after these times it was not permitted to Monks to meddle with matters of the Church nor were they reckon'd among the Clergy But it 's strange how he can alledge Buchanan to be supported by no Authors except Major for Palladius his being Scotland's first Bishop he could not but know that not only Major but also Fordun Bede with many others within the Isle Prosper Bergumensis and among the later Historians the Magdeburgenses Baron with many other Transmarines assert it And this last affirms that none can deny it § 4. It 's true Spotswood says that Boeth out of ancient Annals reports that these Priests were wont for their better Government to elect some one of their number by common suffrage to be Chief and Principal among them without whose knowledge and consent nothing was done in any matter of importance and that the person so elected was called Scotorum Episcopus a Scots Bishop or a Bishop of Scotland But they reap little advantage here for in Boeth's words y there is no mention as the Bishop without book affirms whether these Annals were ancient or modern But whatever they be Hector gives ground to believe that he had Annals declaring the contrary as appears by his words above cited where he homologated that common sentiment of Christians and told us that Palladius was our first Bishop and that none before him had any Hierarchical Power in Scotland To alledge therefore Boethius as espousing their cause here is ony to set him at variance with all Christians and by the ears with himself But grant it were as Spotswood says yet there should no small dammage accreu to their Cause seeing on supposition hereof it follows that the Episcopal Ordination was altogether wanting in the primitive Church of Scotland it not being supposeable that this one man could Ordain all the Pastors in Scotland yea that even this their great Bishop had no other Ordination himself but what he receiv'd from Presbyters § 5. The Bishop's following words from the instruction of the Scots in the Faith c. are altogether void of reason For it 's granted that after the coming of Palladius which is the time whereunto he must refer the gathering of the Church she then indeed began to have another Government and never man yet pleaded that because the Church of Scotland was not govern'd by Bishops before Palladius therefore 't was not really govern'd by them after his coming which is the Inference the Bishop's words seem to deny But I believe there is more in them for they are abstruse and judge their meaning to be that tho' we had no Bishops before Palladius yet this can be no ground to conclude that we ought to have none afterward our Church being then rude and in her infant state The Advocat is of the same mind saying that before Palladius his time our Church was constituenda or unsettl'd But who can believe it For first it 's generally suppos'd that Palladius came to free this Church from Pelagianism and not to establish Church-government Secondly Is 't credible that the Church of Scotland after so long a continuation and flourishing of Christianity had been rather than any other Churches without any certain form of Government This is certainly a thing unparalellable even according to our Adversaries who tell us that every Church very soon after its beginning had its Diocesan Bishops and so a certain form of Government Thirdly Yea altho' many other Churches had been without all Government for such a tract of time there is ground to believe that Scotland could not they lying most of this time under the persecuting Sword whereas we read of no persecution in our Church even while our Kings were Pagan and our King Donald the I the first crown'd Head in the World that ever subject'd it self to Jesus Christ very much encourag'd the Christians and was seconded herein by severals of his Successors And altho' some of 'em were vitious and their Reigns short or vex'd with Wars yet such trouble never struck directly against Christianity like the fury of the Pagans throngh the rest of the World and others were both excellent Men and had longer and peaceable Reigns as Findochus and Cratilinthus but especially Fincormachus an excellent man and a great promoter of Religion and therefore as is most presumable was a great Instrument under God for the settlement of our Church-affairs Add to all this Fourthly That the terrible Storm of Persecution through the Roman World drove then from the Brittons
most learn'd of the Episcopal Perswasion acknowledg'd the truth of our Assertion on supposition that any credit is to be given to our Historians with whom also joins the learn'd Dr Stillingfleet So saith he if we may believe the great Antiquaries of the Church of Scotland that Church was governed by their Culdei as they called their Presbyters without any Bishop over them for a long time He gives also instances of other ancient Churches without Diocesan Bishops § 13. It had been more manly therefore and honest for D. M. to have at least attempted a refutation of Dr. Stillingfleet than to have dar'd his Adversaries to bring but one example of Churches without Diocesan Bishops seeing he knew there were store already giv'n even by Episcopals no less than Presbyterians which hitherto stand unanswered Let them also chaw their cude on that famous and well known Distinction of a first and second primitive Church acknowledged by Semeca and others even Popish Divines notic'd by Vsher and embrac'd by Stillingfleet in the former whereof Diocesan Episcopacy was not yet come in fashion nor was any such thing as a Difference either in Name or Office between Bishops and Priests or preaching Presbyters then in Being From all which judge with what brow D. M compares the account of our ancient Church-government to a supposed Fiction of the King of China and his Presbyterian Lady And by this dealling of D. M. I am put in mind of another piece of his Art who averres that all brought by Salmasius and Blondel to prove that Hierome was for the Scriptural and Apostolick Identity of of Bishop Presbyter and whatsoever is said by them for Presbytry is refuted by D. Pearson in his Vindicâ—ae Ignatianae I must not saith D. M. transcribe the acurat and unanswerable Dissertations of several learned Men who have sufficiently exposed the Writings of Blondel and Salmasius on this head particularly the incomparable Bishop of Chester vind St. Ignat. But no where did ever Dr. Pearson ingage with these Authors on this subject nor does he any such thing only he has some few excursions which touch not the marrow of the Controversie and therefore is nothing to D. M's purpose whether the advantage be yeelded to Salmasius and Blondel or to Dr. Pearson He abuses also some passages of Hierome to prove him self-repugnant but all such depravations had been by Iunius and others against the Papists and by Stillingfleet in his Irenicum clearly discover'd the places unanswerably vindicated even before he wrote his Vindiciae which their vindications of Hierome as also many other defences of the same Author brought by Salmasius and Blondel he scarce once adventures to handle But he has vindicated Ignatius they will say and this is enough But suppose that he had as really evinced these Epistles to be the genuine Work of Ignatius as he 's groundlesly pretended to have don 't yet so far is their inference from being good that as we shall hear the quite contrary follows viz. that in the Ignatian age Bishops were all one with the Pastors of single Congregations Hence it appears that this was one of D. M's pious Frauds to skarr his vulgar Reader for others he could not hope to catch thereby from the New Doctrine of Presbytry Section VIII Prelacy opposite to the Principles of our Reformers I Said when we renounc'd our Obedience to Anti-christ we sent amongst the rest of the Romish leaven Prelacy packing thither which tho' we had no more Arguments our Confession of Faith compil'd by our Reformers clearly evinces We detest say they Antichrist's worldly Monarchy with his wicked Hierarchy Of which Hierarchy as is acknowledg'd by the Council of Trent Bellarmine the Bishops make a principal part And the Episcopal Office with its distinction belong solely to their Hierarchy otherwise they confess there 's no Difference between Bishop and Presbyter At them therefore these words of the Confession must especially level And his subtility who would save the Prelats from this blow by seeking the foundation of a distinction where 't is not as if by the word Wicked the Confession pointed at another Hierarchy which is Pious must be reckon'd by all the disinterested to nigh of kin to his pericranium who to save another part of Romanism made a fair distinction between Lawfull and Vnlawfull Idolatry I say it can be no otherwise here for to speak truth their Hierarchy is nothing save the Corruption of Church-government and pride of her Governours rais'd by certain stories and tending towards the Papacy as its highest pinacle whereof both name and notion owe their Original to one who indeed was not the Father of lies yet in lying came so near him as readily any copy to its Original I mean the false Areopagite whose whole Book may really be term'd a fardel of Fictions Moreover this Confession was compil'd in the year 1581. when Prelacy had been unanimously by the whole Assembly in the preceeding year cast out of the Church And for many succeeding Assemblies their Declaration of their dislike and hatred of Prelacy and approbation of this Confession went hand in hand with whom then in both of these the King's Majesty join'd For the Assembly at Glasgow 1581. consisting for the most part of such as voted and were present in the Assembly at Dundie in the preceeding year when Prelacy had in terminis been renounc'd and ejected declares that they meaned wholly to condemn the whole estate of Bishops as they are now in Scotland and that this was the meaning of the Assembly at that time The King's Commissioner presented to this Assembly the Confession of Faith subscribed by the King and his houshold not long before together with a plot of the Presbytries to be erected which is registrat in the Books of the Assembly with a Letter to be directed from his Majesty to the Noble-men and Gentle-men of the Country for the erection of the Presbytries consisting of Pastors and Elders and dissolution of Prelacies and with an offer to set forward the Policy untill 't were establish'd by Parliament The King's Letter subscribed by his hand to the Noble-men and Gentle-men was read in open audience of the whole Assembly This Assembly ordain'd also that the Confession of Faith be subscribed as being true Christian and faithfull And in the Assembly 1595. amongst other things of the same tendency it was cleared that Episcopacy was condemn'd in these words of the Confession His Wicked Hierarchy See store of irrefragable proofs of this our Assertion in the Acts of the Assembly at Glasgow 1638. Sess. 16. § 2. They only bewray their ignorance if not worse while they give out that our Church in her first Reformation had Bishops as the word is now taken under the name of Superintendents For tho' this were true all they shall gain hereby would only be the fastening of a self-contradiction on Mr. Knox and the rest of these most honourable Instruments
a number for the whole Kingdom yet at that time they thought it expedient to establish no more and tho' when the Church should be sufficiently provided with Ministers it would be highly reasonable that the Superintendents should have Places appointed them for their continual residence yet in that juncture 't was necessary that they should be constantly travelling throw their districts to Preach and Plant Churches c. To establish his gloss he says the Compilers of the first Book of Discipline viz. Mr. J. Winrame John Spotswood J Willock J. Douglas J. Row and J. Knox were still of prelatical Principles But tho' this were as true as 't is false the quite contrary would rather follow viz. that they had resolv'd to change afterward the Superintendents for Diocesan Bishops To prove they were Prelatists he says three of them were Superintendents begging the Question as if Superintendent and Bishop were one and the same But Douglas died Arch-bishop of St. Andrews But is 't strange that he who in favours of a Tulchan Bishoprick had a stomach able to deject Simoniacal Pactions and durty Bargains made no bones of sacrificing his former Principles to his interest But Spotswood was a constant Enemy to Parity as appears from his Son's account of him But his Son says not so much Moreover which quite spoils our Author's Cause he makes without naming any other John Knox the Author of that Book of Policy yea he averrs that in his Father's Judgement the Old Policy was undoubtedly the better than the New John Row defended the lawfulness of Episcopacy at the Conference appointed by the General Assembly 1575. But J. Row no less then the other Collocutors in their Report to that Assembly tho' for the iniquity of the time not in so many words yet really condemn'd Prelacy and was also a Member of that Assembly which with one voice found and declar'd the Office unlawfull in it self Judge then of his confidence who yet adventures hence to conclude that he was a Prelatist He adds out of Knox that Superintendents and Overseers were nominated that all things in the Church might be carried with Order and well which reason for establishing Superintendents saith our Author will continue to hold so long as the Church continues But let him once prove that Knox speaks of the constant and ordinary Church regimen and guidance and not of the settling and ordering of a Church little more then in fieri and as yet not all sufficiently constitute otherwise we have a meer Paralogism At the Admission of Spotswood continues he John Knox asserted the necessity of Superintendents and Overseers as well as Ministers the necessity I say not the bare expediency in the juncture The words are first was made a Sermon in the which these Heads were handled first the necessity of Ministers and Superintendents or Overseers c. We have indeed here the necessity of Superintendents mention'd but that it arose above an expediency we do not hence learn That Knox asserted the necessity of Superintendents as well as Ministers or an equal necessity of the one and the other can by no means be inferr'd Yea who can with our Author believe that tho' any People had aboundance of sufficient and lawfully ordain'd Ministers yet in Knox's Judgement if Superintendents were wanting such a People could no more be counted a Church than if they had no Minister at all He brings also some Expressions out of the first Book of Discpiline as After the Church shall be established and three years are past no Man shall be called to the Office of a Superintendent who hath not two years given a Proof of his faithfull Labours in the Ministry of some Church Such passages indeed suppose some continuance of Superintendents tho' no perpetuity For our Reformers could never think that within three years or thereabout the Church should be fully established few or no Churches to be planted unto which full settlement the forecited passage of the Book of Policy allows the use of Superintendents This Book of Discipline saith our Author supposeth that Superintendents and Colledges were to be of equal continuance for the Superintendent was still to be at the choosing and installment of Principalls and Rectors c. But this his Argument he himself overthrows The Assembly saith he May 27. 1561. addresseth to the Council that special and certain Provision might be made for the maintainance of the Superintendents Ministers Exhorters and Readers c. Now who sees not that this Address speaks after the same manner concerning all these so that using our Author's way of arguing we should inferr that our Reformers thought the Exhorter which confessedly was a kind of Function purely temporary was no less to be perpetual than the Superintendent yea or the Minister And the Assembly at Edinburgh December 25. 1565. appointed Mr. Knox to pen a comfortable Letter in their Name to encourage Ministers Exhorters and Readers to continue in their Vocation c. From these and the like Acts he may as well conclude the equal duration of Exhorters and Ministers as he inferrs from the Book of Policy the equal duration of Superintendents and Colledges He would next prove from the account of the Election and Admission of Superintendents prefix'd to the old Psalms that according to our Reformers this was an Office distinct from that of other Pastors of Divine Institution and so perpetual The Order and Form saith he for admitting a Superintendent and a Minister was all one and there was nothing in it importing the one Office to be temporary more than the other But therefore there 's nothing elsewhere importing so much is a clear non sequitur In the mean while from what he grants 't is plain that the Superintendent wanted the very specific difference of a Diocesan Bishop wherefore tho' they us'd this Phrase The Office to which God call'd him and this Question to the People Will ye not acknowledge this your Brother for the Minister of Christ Jesus your Overseer and Pastor Will ye not maintain and comfort him against all such as wickedly would rebell against God and his Holy Ordinance And that Petition Send unto this our Brother whom in thy name we have charged with the chief care of thy Church within the bounds of L. c. They can thereby mean no other Office no other Ordinance of God and for kind no other Charge than what 's giv'n to every particular Pastor For we find mention'd the chief of the Apostles in Labour viz and Care who yet were all equal Neither is it strange that they thus set apart him who was for the time found needfull in these dark times and places to plant and erect Churches preach perpetually where there were none and in a word in several things compleatly to imitate the ancient Evangelist Thus Paul and Barnabas were separated with a solemnity of Fasting Prayer and Imposition of Hands And yet the Work or
Kirks is quite stiffled and the whole sense of the Act perverted For what sense is it I pray to say that the Ministers were Chosen by Consent of the rest of the Ministers when you tell not who was to choose or who they were to whose choice or nomination the rest of the Ministers were to give that Consent But to stiffle the Power he pleads for to Superintendents was a Work impossible either to Calderwood or any man else the very Act it self most irrefragbly shewing they could have none save such as is in any meer Moderator of our Synods or Presbytries For be it which yet the Assembly expresses not that the Superintendents were to nominate Ministers for the Assembly yet they could do no more but only as the Synod by their Votes assented or choosed the nominated Persons whom if the Synod or its major part rejected these could not go to the Assembly yet some behov'd to go and consequently the Superintendent or Commissioner was to make a new Lite and name again and if these did not yet please another Lite and so on untill the Synod was satisfi'd and choosed some Persons or other according to their pleasure for the Assembly This much is undeniably contain'd in the Act and I 'm sure no Moderator of any Synod or Presbytry injoyes any less Power providing it deserve the name Seeing then Brought with them cannot possibly mean any peculiar Power I see not wherein Calderwood by ommitting them can be culpable Neither can he be accused of nonsense seing 't is sufficiently intelligible and plain how these Ministers and Commissioners could be chosen by the consent of the rest of his Brethren the Ministers and Gentle-men members of the Synod who by joynt and mutual consent chused them after the Superintendent or Commissioners nominating or liting which by a fraud too palpable he confounds with Election And here it 's observable in how much torment and perplexity this so clear an Act involves all of ' em Spotswood adduc'd it in his latine Pamphlet but is so soundly chastis'd by the Vindicator of Philadelphus that our Author finds not a syllable to say in his defence He pretends also to relate it in his History but with an essential Depravation for he leaves out these words Ministers and Commissirners of Shires shall be chosen at the Synodal Convention of the Diocy with consent of the rest of the Ministers and Gentlemen that shall conveen at the said Synodal Convention For he saw it quite spoil'd his Cause and really left the Superintendent no Power but what was equally in any of the rest and foists into the Text these such Ministers as the Superintendents should chuse in their Diocesan Synods Neither can our Author be blameless in suppressing the following words Commissioners of Burghs shall be appointed by the Council and Kirk of their own Towns none shall be admitted without sufficient Commission in write And least this should turn to perpetual Election of a few and certain Persons it is concluded Ministers and other Commissioners be changed from Assembly to Assembly Whereby appears the Churches great care that neither Superintendent nor any other might have ought like an Episcopal Power and that all fit Persons might have equal priviledge of Voting at the Assemblies There yet remain many of his pretended Disparities but are no more significative of eminency or superiour Office no less communicable to the rest of the Ministers when Commissioners than were the former as will be evident to any who reads the Acts of the Assemblies among which he reckons the Superintendent 's modifying to Ministers their Stipends as if because Judas had the Bagg and bare what was put therein he had been Bishop over the rest of the Apostles In the mean while the Superintendents could do nothing of this but only as Moderator of the provincial Synod Another Deduction of no better metall is that the Laird of Dun Superintendent of Angus not as such but by vertue of a particular Commission giv'n by the Assembly to him and others join'd with him deposed a Regent of Aberdeen a place intirely without the bounds of his Superintendency therefore Superintendents as such had a Power Paramount and Episcopal And was not such an arguer a man of sense I pass the rest of his thirty Disparities not without admiration that such a fertile brain could not invent one other for one and thirty used to carry the Game Add to all this that tho' some that had been Popish Bishops in Scotland and imbrac'd the Gospel as Mr. Gordon of Galloway a man of no contemptible Gifts were by our Reformers allow'd without any new Admission to dispence the Word aud Sacraments yet they were never allow'd to exercise what they counted their Episcopal Function or looked on as Bishops of these Dioceses yea Mr. Gordon tho' he earnestly sought for it could never be admitted to Superintend in Galloway which is a clear Demonstration that our Reformers looked on the Episcopal preheminence as a meer Popish Corruption otherways why did not Mr. Gordon verbi causâ remain in the Power and Character he had enjoyed while Romanist It 's most clear also from all the accounts we have of the Tulchan Bishops that all men of all parties look'd on a Bishop as a thing altogether diverse from a Superintendent § 20. And now at length hear him yeelding the whole Plea There was saith he a Principle had then got too much footing among some Protestant Divines viz. That the best way to reform a Church was to recede as far from the Papists as they could to have nothing in common with them but the essentials the necessary and indispensable Articles and Parts of Christian Religion whatever was in its Nature indifferent and not positively and expresly commanded in the Scriptures if it was in fashion in the Popish Churches was therefore to be laid aside and avoided as a Corruption as having been abused and made subservient to Superstition and Idolatry This Principle John Knox was fond of and maintain'd zealously and the rest of our reforming Preachers were much acted by his influences In pursuance of this Principle therefore when they compil'd the first Book of Discipline they would not Reform the old Polity and purge it of such Corruptions as had crept into it keeping still by the main draughts and lineaments of it But they laid it quite aside and in stead thereof hammer'd out a new Scheme keeping at as great a distance from the old one as they could and as the essentials of Polity would allow them establishing no such thing however as Parity as I have fully proven And no wonder for as Imparity has obviously more of Order beauty and usefulness in its aspect so it had never so much as by dreaming entred their tboughts that it was a limb of Antichrist or a relict of Popery But was not Episcopacy in fashion in the Popish Churches And dare he yea or any mortal say that ever
so much or been altogether silent thereof neither of which they did but gave to the World solemnly as the Confession of their Belief that Christ gave to to all Pastors equal and the same power and yet if we believe this Interpreter this that Christ gave may according to the Authors of that Confession be relinquish'd when Men will and Inequality it 's quite contrary introduced in the place thereof Is not this too like the dealing of the Romanists who when they are compell'd to acknowledge that the Apostles gave the Cup to the People yet pretend that they may deprive them of what Christ and his Apostles gave them Divers indeed have said that Church Government was among the Adiaphora and things indifferent But these were more wary then to say as he would have the Authors of these Confessions to say that Christ gave equal and the same Power to all Pastors yea such used not to grant that Christ gave either Equality or Inequality of Power but left all to the Churches management Moreover as he does us no dammage so I 'm sure he does the present Hierarchicks as little service for if this Hypothesis that no kind of Church Government is juris divini stand then the jus divinum of Episcopacy is lost and therefore I 'm sure they shall give him as little thanks as we 'T is also observable that when ever the Authors of these Confessions or other Divines of their Perswasion said that Communion with Churches of a different Government was not to be broken or any thing of that kind he presently inferrs that they judg'd any other form no less agreeable to the word of God than their own And here I cann't but take nottice of what I have met with somewhere in M. Claude's historical defence of the Reformation for at present I have not the book viz. that Diocesan Episcopacy is no less condemnable than Pilgrimages Purgatories or some such Romish dotages which he there names and how averse he was from Diocesan Episcopacy is observed by the Prefacer to the English Translation and yet if we believe some he gave large Testimonies of his great affection to the Diocesan cause And this brings to mind another Artifice for when any Protestant Divines considering the great Power of Popish Bishops and vehemently desiring Peace for the free Preaching and Propagation of the Gospel strain'd their Judgement and seem'd at any time to do or say somewhat that appear'd to comply with Episcopacy our Prelatists anone Infer that such Divines were great Lovers of their Hierarchy Thus for Example they abuse the Words and Actions of Melancton but they should remember that sometimes driving the same Design some of these Divines seem'd no less to comply with the Papacy it self as appear'd at the pressing of the Interim The same end drove Melancton when in a Conference at Ausburg as Osiander relates he seem'd to yeeld somewhat of Jurisdiction to Bishops for be hop'd that if Jurisdiction were granted them they would not so much oppose the Gospel But Philip consider'd not continues Osiander that the Fox may change his hair not his Temper Melancton granted also to the Pope provided he would admit the Gospel a superiority over other Bishops founded only on humane right and yeelded for procuring of the Peace of Christendom Thus Melancton through his extream desire of Peace forc'd his own Judgement for with Luther and the rest he subscribes the Smalkaldick Articles wherein as we have heard the Scriptural Idenity of Bishop and Presbyter is most clearly asserted But what ever they say to perswade us that these or other such Divines favour them we are little oblig'd to believe it for they believe it not themselves and these of our Adversaries that speak out their mind freely tell us that all the transmarine reformed Churches are really Presbyterian It were too much I 'm sure to transcribe what D. Heylin says of this for he freely grants it and then through a whole large Folio as such bespatters with the blackest of Railings and Calumnies every one of the reformed Churches in particular No less positive is Howell who makes Calvin the first Broacher of the Presbyterian Religion And a little after Thus saith he Geneva Lake swallowed up the Episcopal See and Church Lands were made secular which was the white they levell'd at This Geneva Bird flew thence io France and hatch'd the Huguenots which make about the tenth part of that People it took wing also to Bohemia and Germany high and loe as the Palatinate the land of Hesse and the confederat Provinces of the States of Holland Yea Bellarmine being to write against Presbytry lays down in the entry as undeniable that ' t is the common doctrine of both Calvinists and Lutherans § 5. To these may be added all such as were valiant for the truths of God and stoutly oppos'd themselves to Antichrist before Luther as the Waldenses and Albigenses of whom Alphonsus de Castro relates that they deny'd any difference between Bishop and Presbyter and herein differ'd nothing from Aërius This same may be learn'd from Thuan who compares them with the English Non-conformists So far from truth was D M. when he says that these only declaimed against the corrupt Manners of the Church of Rome but never declaim'd against the subordination of one Priest unto another This same doctrine held Wicklef and his followers denying that there is any difference between Bishop and Presbyter The Waldenses and Wicklef were in this as in the rest of their Articles follow'd by J. Huss and his Adherents who also asserted that there ought to be no difference between Bishop and Presbyter or among Priests Yea so Catholick and universall hath this doctrine of the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter still been that it hath all along by the Romanists been justly reck'n'd a prime doctrine of Romes Opposers Nor shall yow readily find one before Luther for of such I now speak of Truth 's Witnesses who condemn'd not all distinction between Bishop and Presbyter § 6. And even in England it self after the Reformation the famousest Bishops and lights of that Church as Hooper Latimer and others could not without great difficulty and reluctancy admitt the exercing of the Episcopal Office the using of their Priestly vestments c to be in any sense lawfull so far were they from believing a Divine Right of Diocesan Episcopacy But as Voëtius observes the use of it was excus'd rather than defended The first or at least the Standard-bearer among the first that either in England or any where else in the reform'd World had the brow to assert its Divine Right appear'd in the latter part of Queen Elizabeths Reign neither was he a Native of Britain but a Flemming I mean Hadrian Saravia once a Pastor in the reform'd Netherlands but as Maresius witnesses reject'd by them as being an Enemy to both their Church and State Neither was
he better look'd on as himself acknowledges by the rest of the reform'd Churches abroad And I think every true Protestant will yeeld that they had reason so to do seeing he dares make not only Bishops but also Arch-Bishops Metropolitans yea and Patriarchs to be of Divine Right And over all these he places the Bishop of Rome as the Supream in Order and Honour He contends moreover that one Man may be lawfully enough both a Bishop and a Civil Magistrat and exerce one of these Offices by himself and another by his Substitutes The vast Rents of Prelates the external Pomp of Honours Titles and train like that of the greatest secular Nobles agree well enough with the simplicity of a Gospel-Ministry They may lawfully enough in their Grandor and multitude of Servants imitat the greatest Earls and Dukes All this is sufficiently warranted by Christ while he chus'd twelve Apostles and seventy Disciples If you tell him that Christ riding to Jerusalem had no train of Servants no Noble-men attending him adorn'd with golden Chains and riding on trapped Horses he answers that Christ did so throw the necessity of that time least he had been suspected as affecting an earthly Kingdom and that his want of such Splendor was the fault of Herod and such Princes as knew him not This Argument continues Saravia that they make against the Popish Prelats and ours is frivolous for it 's deduc'd from the Deeds of the Infidels and hath no place among Christians Tho' Bishops have Bands of arm'd Men to guard 'em and Noble-men adorn'd with golden Chains constantly to Page and attend them this ought to offend no Body And whatsoever he says for covering this Scandal that such superlative Grandour Pomp and Vanity give to every sober Beholder his Reader shall find to be nothing else save what 's commonly brought to palliat the Offence which the World so justly takes at the Luciferian Pride and Arrogance of the great Antichrist yea even long after that time notwithstanding of all the endeavours of Saravia and his Complices so great a Stranger was this Doctrine even there that T. Holland the King's Professor at Oxford branded Laud with publick infamy for asserting the divine right of Episcopacy Section X. Some of the manifold inconveniences and noxious Qualities of Prelacy briefly mention'd I Might in the next place enlarge on its Concomitants and Qualities a few whereof I shall only name One of these was a direfull Spirit of Persecution which still rag'd during the Prelatical Government the sad effects whereof through no small part of this Kingdom on both Bodies and Consciences of the best part of Protestants therein and that for their refusal of the very things which many of the Urgers acknowledg'd to be altogether indifferent are but too well known § 2. Another of its Qualities little better than the former is their Schismatical Practice and Principles as for instance at the last return of Prelats the Church of Scotland whatsoever Differences might have been therein yet was but one and not Altar against Altar did they not then become the Authors of a compleat National Schism while they broke the whole Church into Parties to the end only they might establish such things as many of themselves acknowledg'd to be indifferent Again their re-entry into Scotland was so far from being Legal that it wanted the very colour of all Order Law for no General Assembly of whatsoever kind introduc'd them Seeing then this Church has ever since her return from Rome held General and National Assemblies for her supream Judicatory and Prelats were extruded by full National Assemblies they ought for their re-entry without the like Authority to be accounted by all true Members of the Church of Scotland manifest Violators of all her Laws and Authority And while they upbraid us with the Crime of Separation are exactly like these who having overturn'd all fundamental Laws of a Society and ruin'd all both Officers and Members cleaving thereto should moreover reproach them upon this very account that they would not subscribe to the overthrow of their fundamental Laws and Constitution But marvel not tho' they made so wide a Breach here for they give but too much ground to judge that they have separated themselves from the Body of the reform'd Churches as appears amongst other things in their Doctrine and Practice of Re-ordaining all who come over unto them from these Churches Some indeed would perswade us that they hold this but as a small Ceremony but yet it 's such an one as for ought I can learn they will never quite with notwithstanding of all the Scandals giv'n or taken thereby And the most earnest Asserters of Episcopacy have their Episcopal Ordination in such esteem that they account none true Ministers without it and so look on most of the Reform'd Churches as being without all true Ministers consequently without either true Preaching or true Sacraments And is not this too like a Donatistick Schism And is it strange then that our Church did still with greatest care and vigor tho' on this account only oppose Prelacy and Prelatists they being generally leaven'd with such dangerous Principles And here observe that all the Heats and Debates that were in our Church since her Reformation from Popery owe their Original either more directly to Prelacy while she strove to keep or drive it out of Scotland or more indirectly while some if on good ground or otherwise I determine not greatly feared that some Persons or Practices would prove introductive thereof and therefore against the mind of others sought to have them laid aside And thus Prelacy whither present or absent hath still been the bane of this Church And there 's little doubt but that they were so wise in their Generation as both to kindle and blow at the fire of any Division that happen'd § 3. And as they give but too evident signs of their separating from the Body of the reform'd Churches so in too many things they but too nigh approach the Romanists Their Government and Hierarchick Scale is one and the same save one roundle with that of Rome All their Arguments they bring either from Scripture or Antiquity are learn'd from Bellarmine and such Romanists and admit no less improvement for the evincing a papal Authority than the Episcopals have made thereof for the establishing of their prelatical Power The Romanists affirm that the Apostles and Evangelists were Prelats of particular Diocesses and that a power properly Apostolick still remains in the Church In these and other such Positions too many of our Episcopal Men are ready to follow them But leaving the Apostolick times descend to the subsequent Ages call'd Antiquity there they 're Pylades and Orestes mutual Supporters of one another and have in arguing from this Fountain so great a resemblace that you shall scarce know with whither of the two ye are dealing Neither as we have already touch'd in the
Topicks they pretend to draw from Reason as that of Order and the like is there between them any less Consanguinity § 4. The Practice also of our Prelats both former and latter bore no small resemblance to that of the Romanists while they affected so earnestly a secular Grandour and the sullying the purity and simplicity of the Gospel with a mass of Superstition and Romish Ceremonies The affection of too many of that Party to Rome was also visible in their earnestness to get and keep a zealous Papist upon the Throne and in their melancholick and Pannick-fears at any appearance of our Relief from Slavery and imminent danger of Popery And lastly in their excessive Joy when any hope of our Delivery seem to have been crush'd and blasted All this was most legible in their Practice at the appearance of the Duke of Monmouth and the Earl of Argyle and the failing of their Designs They were no less gall'd and vex'd at the most noble and happy Design of his present Majesty praying in the chief Churches of this Kingdom that he might be sunk as a Stone in the mighty Waters And after his entry that as his Army came in one way it might be scatter'd seven ways § 5. Add to all this their either more indirect or down-right calumniating and maligning of the reform'd Churches and first Reformers placing them in the same Category with Papists Take for instance the frontispicial Lines of Nalson's Collections Like Bifrons Janus next does court your eye Rome and Geneva in Epitome They squint two ways in the main Point agree And indeed this is but their kindest dealing Neither do they then speak as they think for their Love and Charity is by many degrees greater toward the Romanists than to the reform'd Churches They will admit none of the latter to a pastoral Office if they refuse Re-Ordination but kindly receive a Romish Priest without it Of the most learn'd and godly Protestant Dissenters from them they speak most contemptuously terming them Arch-schismaticks But the Jesuit Bellarmine and Baron the Popish grand Legendarie they with greatest deference call most eminent Cardinals Yea even in the chief Churches of this Kingdom they repeated their invectives against our first Reformers and Reformation and in some Churches thereof they were not asham'd to say that our Reformation was Deformation Knox deserved knocks On the other hand not a few of 'em all along shew'd no little warmth of affection to Papists intitulating them to the same God and Heaven with themselves and asserting their neighbourhood and conjunction to be infinitely more eligible than that of these whom they-call'd Phanaticks as appears for instance in a printed Sermon of Mr Mcqueen And Heylin says that the Genevan Discipline was begotten in Rebellion born in Sedition and nursed up by Faction And indeed this Author is an Enemy so open and implacable to all the reform'd Churches that Strada Gretser Becan Campian or the like most fiery and venemous Loyolites could scarce with all their impudent slanders and infernal rage out-do yea or equal him With such stuff most of his Works and especially his History of the Presbyterians are wholly cramm'd Yea he doubts not to call both Luther and Calvin Maniches i. e. such as hold two infinite Beings or two Gods Others of the Faction as Dodwell are ready to pronounce all who dislike Diocesan Episcopacy guilty of the Sin against the Holy Ghost But the World hath now seen that the most fiery of such Zelots at length threw off the Mask and profess'd themselves Romanists as for instance L' Estrange or else which their own Dr. Burnet observes of Heylin one would think they had been secretly set on by these of the Church of Rome And so they were in their profession of Protestancy hatefull Hypocrites that they might the more easily bespatter and gore the protestant Religion through the sides of Presbytry Others of 'em are yet more down-right Atheists who if they hear the wrath of God and Hells torments denounc'd against impenitent Sinners will tell you that such a Doctctrine came from a Winter-Preacher so that if a Schytian or Groenlander who are habituated to such extream cold had heard him they would have thought he preach'd of Paradice And some call the Doctrine of Communion with God and Faith in Jesus Christ fine Fables and Stories Behold the Men who make it their chief Work to adore the Hierarchy and inveigh against Presbytry which brings to mind the saying of Tertullian that Christianity must needs be some excellent thing seeing only Nero and such Monsters were its prime Persecuters Some there are also as their own Edwards relates even of their Reverend Divines who turn all the Mosaick History concerning Adam and Eve the Serpent Paradice eating the forbidden Fruit and all the passages relating to them into Parable yea into Ridicule saying that Moses only so talked in complyance with the blockish and thick skull'd Israelites but not a syllable of truth is in all that he saith This is very strange language subjoins Edwards from a Reverend Divine who thereby destroyes the whole system of Theology and of Christianity it self And yet for such black and hainous Crimes we cann't hear that they undergoe the least degree of Censure In my Judgement saith Edwards if there be no publick Censure pass'd upon such a daring Attempt as this by a Member of our Church Athiests will have just ground to laugh at our Discipline And here in Scotland all along during their Reign how closely did they connive at such Irreligion as also at all the growth and progress then made by the active Spirit of Popery and in stead of being providers against such Pests some of our Prelats at Court prov'd Mediators in their behalf saying that there was less to be fear'd from Papists than from Phanaticks And in answer to some imputing gross Enormities to the Church of Rome said that such things were only to be ascrib'd to the Court of Rome not to the Church of Rome Add hereto the great love of not a few of 'em to the Pelagian Jesuitick or Arminian Doctrines Hypotheses clean contrary to the belief of all the reform'd Churches and more especially to that of the Church of Scotland They pretend notwithstanding as if the establishing of Prelacy were the debarring of Popery Episcopacy say they was so far from being judg'd a step to it that the ruine of the Episcopal Authority over Presbyters and the granting them exemptions from the jurisdiction of their Ordinary was the greatest advance the Roman Bishop ever made in his tyrannical Vsurpation over Churches I need not here tell so known a matter as is that of the exemption of the Regulars who being subject to their own Superiours and Generals and by them to the Pope were sent through the World in swarms and with great shows of Piety Devotion and Poverty carried away all the esteem and following from the
be concluded the first step of the Beast's Throne But this retorsion being once handl'd shall hurt us no more then what we have already removed for take a Gospel Ministry unconfounded with a papal Hierarchy and then there is not the least colour or pretext for any Man 's ascribing to it the first rise of Popery the parity we plead for among Pastors of Flocks secures a Gospel-Ministry from any force or appearance of reason in any such assault whereas on which I 'm not now to dwell the Topicks establishing Prelacy tend no less to assert a Papacy But again the belief of a Gospel-Ministry as a thing altogether necessary for the Being of a Church is so well and so universally rooted in the hearts of all Christians that they compar'd with the rest have scarce amounted to a handfull who had the holdness to deny it and so there 's little hazard to be fear'd from these few contemptible Objectors and tho' there seem'd to be and the Objection should appear never so pungent yet it could be really of no weight against so necessary and indispensible an Ordinance Whereas on the other hand there 's so little necessity of Prelacy that the far greatest and best part of its Abettors and in these the Author himself as in due time shall appear grants that 't is no different Order from Presbytry has no footing in the Word of God and in a word to the overthrow of his Principles confounds a Prelat with a parochial Pastor Another grand but just prejudice against the Hierarchy is the looseness and prophanity most frequently cleaving thereto how prophane and scandalous they and theirs were during former Prelacy has already appear'd of the latter the matter is no less evident for at such a height growth during their Government yea under their wings did prophanity abusing of God's blessed Name and such gross immoralities arrive that to abstain from such vices and follow piety was a Crime well nigh able to make a Man pass for a Whig and Phanatick and what hazard did enshew these Sir-names none is ignorant All this and much more was not only evident to the body of this Kingdom but was also notic'd abroad and amongst others by their Friend R. Coke Yea his Majesty whom Divine Mercy sent for our Relief well knew 't and accordingly in his Declaration for Scotland has amongst many others this most memorable Sentence Although saith He the Dissenters have just cause of distrust when they call to mind how some hundreds of their Ministers were driven out of their Churches without either Accusation or Citation the filling of many of whose Places with Ignorant and Scandalous Persons hath been one great occasion of all those Miseries which that Country for a long time hath groaned under They may pretend that such Enormities were only accidental to Prelacy which may fall out under any Government but none versant in Church Story is ignorant how much mischief and scandal this Hierarchy hath cast upon Christianity Let them read Socrates and other Records of these more ancient times and they shall find that the Prelats tho' but beginning to appear and by far not so degenerat from the simplicity of the Gospel as afterward by their swelling tympany and aspiring to Domination induc'd the People to commit the most lewd and vile Pranks readily imaginable to the doolfull scandalizing of Jew and Gentile and their utter abominating of Christianity it self as is clear from the miserable Havock Destruction and Slaughter the contrary Factions of Bishops in the Plea for the Episcopal See between Damasus and Vrsinus prompted the People to commit from the most scandalous Pranks of Theophilus Bishop of Alexandria the most unhumane and barbarous concomitants and consequents of the Deposition of Chrysostome with many other such open Impieties all caus'd and occasion'd by the Prelatick pride and insolency which publick and most scandalous Enormities had the Christian World retain'd the truly Primitive and Apostolick Parity we plead for could never have hapned for had the Superiority Riches and Grandour the very aples of these most unchristian Contentions been wanting and had every Pastor been kept at the earnest labour of Teaching Exhorting and Catechising a particular Flock or Congregation with only such a competent Stipend as suffic'd to secure him from the contempt of Poverty not to feed Luxury Grandour and such like Vices there had been no occasion of such lamentable Broyls This was observ'd by Nazianzen who himself was Bishop of Constantinople and therefore he earnestly wish'd that there had been no primacy of Place no Prelacy no Prerogative no Superiour or Inferiour Degrees of Pastors The marrow of Saravia's Answer to this most cogent place of Nazianzen is that he finds no fault with the Order of Degrees themselves but with Men and with the times wherein the ambition of the Arrians troubl'd the Church The common and blunt shift of the Romanists whereby to palliat the unlawfullness of their Papacy and a real and clear contradiction of Nazianzen's plain words And was not afterward the Papal and Prelatical pride and affectation of secular rule the prime source of the unspeakable Evils that reign'd all along before the Reformation and yet continue in the Papacy Is not that Kingdom where Prelacy is of most account fill'd with the most idle naughty and profain Clergy-men that are to be found at least in the Protestant World And how can it be otherwise seeing things or Offices retaining litle or nothing of what did primitively constitute them produce quite contrary effects to these design'd by the Authors thereof But nothing is more plain than that the simplicity of the Gospel-Ministry is alter'd into a secular Grandour more by far resembling the Princes of the Gentiles than the Apostles of our Meek and Lowly Jesus who came not to be ministred to but to Minister Now the best of things once degenerat become most noxious what can therefore be expected from such but that they should suit their Government and Policy change the Spirit of a Gospel-Ministry for that of Pomp and Secularity grow intirely Carnal and so become the source of Prophanity in stead of Holiness Part II. Wherein the Epistles of Ignatius are more particularly consider'd and the Plea of the Hierarchicks therefrom examin'd Section I. Of the Author and his Work IT is evident and clear to the more thinking and ingenuous part of the Christian World how Rome's Advocats while they Agent her Cause from the truly Canonical Writings of the Apostles and Prophets after some few struglings sorry evasions and feeble resistance are compell'd to give back and in reality abandon their Posts but were they permitted to use Apocryphal Writings which they say are Ancient enough and written not long after the Holy Scriptures were not these also pull'd out of their hands by demonstrating the spuriousness thereof they should perhaps make a greater appearance and keep the fields somewhat longer The same also is the fate
the better be believ'd in this Matter viz. Jos. Walker Translator of L'arroque's History of the Eucharist who describing the Life of L'arroque which he prefixes to his Translation tells us that at the request of some Persons favouring Episcopacy he did not finish this his second Piece From these Authors it 's sufficiently evident that the issue of this Debate concerning Ignatius his Epistles was neither advantagious nor honourable to the Favourers of Episcopacy seeing by such doings they acknowledg'd their Adversary so formidable that except by powerfull Sollicitations and charms the Storm were diverted nothing less than the utter ruine of their Cause was to be feared Now by these their dealings so dishonest both first and last judge if such Men don't at once bewray extream want of candour and diffidence in their Cause And this much was meet here to be premis'd in favours of many who may have been â—â—umbled at the great Name of Ignatius and yet altogether Strangers to the thoughts of the more learn'd and ingenuous concerning the Epistles that bear his Name § 8. In this Ignatius the Patrons of the Hierarchy wonderfully please themselves and triumph as if from thence Prelacy receiv'd a most sufficient support and proof well nigh infallible of its divine Institution and that if these Epistles be his Presbytrie's undone For if we believe them Ignatius is for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or genuinness of these Epistles above the smallest suspicion of Forgery for Antiquity and Vicinity to the Apostles above possibility of being mistaken and finally for clearness in the Episcopal Cause above doubt or scruple Now seeing so far as I know little or nothing of this Subject is yet in English and the ears of many who know no other Tongue are perpetually beaten deafned with a mighty noise as if all the lofty Titles and Honours of Prelacy were adopted by a genuine and Apostolick Ignatius it shall neither be improfitable nor unacceptable if with a convenient brevity we ouerthrow the principal Pillars of so proud a Structure and render the Weapons in the estimat of our Adversaries so keen and weighty compleatly unserviceable to their Cause § 9. I therefore with no less confidence deny what they so boldly affirm I deny that the Epistles ascribed to Ignatius whether of the elder or later Editions are throughly genuine and so free of Forgeries that no chaff hath been thrown into and hudl'd amongst the grains of Wheat that may remain therein I deny that the Antiquity of the true Ignatius was able to secure him from all Lapses and Mistakes or that in his time some Churches might not be itching after several Novelties I deny finally that he is so clear and positive in the Matter of Episcopacy as to denude Presbyterians of all rational Defence should they acquiesce in his Judgement and herein join with their Adversaries who still appeal to Ignatius his Bar. But I shall not rest in Denials but shall turn them to so many contrary Positions and demonstrat each of 'em in particular Section II. The first Hypothesis viz that Ignatius is interpolated MY first Assertion therefore is that the Epistles ascrib'd to Ignatius whether of the Elder or Later Editions are not throughly genuine nor so free of Forgeries that no Chaff hath been thrown into and hudl'd amongst the grains of Wheat that may remain therein As the Writings pretended to come nearest in time to the Scriptures of the Old Testament carry notwithstanding evident Characters of a quite other time and Parent than these whereto they are falsly ascrib'd so also the Pieces that pretend greatest proximity to these of these New Testament afford no less just ground of suspicion Of this kind are Barnabas Hermas and others all which are generally either shroudly suspected as meer Forgeries or at least as not being without manifest corruption and interpolation Yea Clemens Romanus who doubtless is by far the most choice and virgin Monument of Antiquity has nothwithstanding fall'n into the like adulterous hands as the story of the Daughters of Danaus and Dirce there recounted among the Christian Sufferers makes manifest And herein Divine Providence is to be ador'd and extoll'd For had such Writings as plead for the first place after these of either Old or New Testament not under-ly'n such impeachments the great proximity thereof to the Prophetick and Apostolick Writings had certainly allur'd many to take these for Canonical whereas now they serve in some measure for a rampier and hedge about the Holy Scriptures and by the manifest corruption of the Apocryphal Writings we are taught to distinguish betwixt divine and humane Letters wherefore it should be a Paradox and a Wonder had Ignatius escap'd all such infectious Touches But there 's no ground for such admiration For that Ignatius whither of the Elder or Later Edition is not throughly genuine and so free of Forgery and Interpolation a few Examples shall make evident § 2. For in his Epistle to the Smyrneans he thus discourseth them All of you follow after the Bishop as Jesus Christ follows the Father and the Presbytry as the Apostles Reverence the Deacons as the Commandment of God Let no Man without the Bishop do any of these things that ought to be done in the Church Let that Worship or Thanks be accounted lawfull which is either perform'd by the Bishop himself or permitted by him Wheresoever the Bishop appears let there also the Multitude be present even as where Christ is there is also the Catholick Church Without the Bishop it 's neither lawfull to Baptize nor Celebrate the Lord's Supper or Love-feasts but whatsoever he approves is acceptable to God And again in his Epistles to Polycarp Attend to the Bishop as God doth to you my Soul for such as obey the Bishop Presbyters and Deacons and with such let me have my Portion in God And in his Epistle to the Ephesians I write not to you as if I were of any account For altho' I be bound in the Name of Christ yet I am not perfect in Christ Jesus For now I begin to learn and speak to you as my Teachers And again in the same Epistle If I in so short a time have had such familiarity with your Bishop not Humane I say but Spiritual how much more do I pronounce you blessed being join'd together as the Church to Jesus Christ as Christ to the Father so that all things are in a harmonis Vnity Let none be deceiv'd whosoever is not within the Altar is deprived of the Bread of God For if the Prayers of one or two be of much weight how much more these put up by the Bishop and the whole Church Whosoever therefore cometh not into the same place he is proud and hath condemn'd himself for it 's written God resisteth the Proud Let us make hast therefore not to resist the Bishop to the end that we may obey God And the more silent any Man perceive the Bishop let him
The same saith a Ms. Author cited by Valesius of Mark the Evangelist viz. that Mark was of the Priestly Race and according to the Custome of the carnal Sacrifice carried publickly a Golden Crown as the Badge of his Priestly Dignity There is indeed nothing more certian than that the primitive Doctors who are ordinarly known by the name of Orthodox Fathers stuck with a due preciseness to the great and capital Doctrines of the Christian Religion without any swerving therefrom but it 's no less demonstrable as we have now made evident that the same Leaders and these next the Apostles of greatest Antiquity in many other things strayed exceedingly from the true Apostolick Simplicity § 8. Nothing was more frequent to them than relying upon their Vicinity to the Apostles to neglect a more accurate search of the Scriptures relate things otherways than they were transacted alledge the Apostles for Practices to which they never gave Patrociny which beside what we have said already may be sufficiently vouch'd from the Relation of Hegesippus in Eusebius The Administration saith he was undertaken by James the Lord's Brother together with the rest of the Apostles who from the time of Christ even unto our Age is sirnamed Just for there were many others of that Name beside but as for him he was sanctifi'd from the Womb neither did he ever drink Wine or strong Drink and did altogether abstain from the Flesh of any living Creature neither ever came there a Razour on his Head nor did he ever use to anoint or wash and he only of all Men had free liberty to enter into the innermost Sanctuary of the Temple for he was not wont to wear a woollen but a linnen Garment he used to enter alone into the Temple and with bended knees to pray for the People And in the sequel of this discourse he tells us that in the Martyrdome of this James he was both thrown from the pinacle of the Temple and also beaten to Death with a Fuller's Club a certain Priest one of the Sons of Rechab mention'd in Jeremiah exhorting the People to milder Counsels and that all this was done in a tumultuous way without the least appearance of any judicial Process against this Martyr But this Relation of Hegesippus is not only contrare the Holy Scripture where we are assured that the High-Priest alone entred into the Holy of Holies and that the Rechabites were not of the Priestly Race and to Josephus who informs us that James being sisted before the High-Priest's Council and by a kind of judicial Process condemn'd was stoned to Death but also a most insulfe Rapsody savouring more of a Legendary than a primitive Doctor Yet the Author thereof lived contemporary with Justin Martyr a few years only below the Apostles § 9. But of this enough and indeed with me it had been highly Sacrilegious to have said so much but buried in a perpetual silence the Escapes of these whose memory is otherways to me more precious than the ashes of Mausolus to his Artemisia and in fragrancy far surpassing the choicest of Oriental Spices did not the injustice and importunity of these who prefer the Escapes yea and Extravagancies of Men and the blemishes of these great Lights yet but terrene Lights to the unspotted Beams of the Father of all Lights compell me hereto And herein I 'm a true Son of the primitive Church whose Doctors have taught me that when the Dictats of God and these of Men whosoever they be interfer and thro' humane Corruption are set in Competition I ought to hold to the first and in comparison herewith despise the latter § 10. Add hereto that seeing Antichristianism the Mystery of Iniquity was working even in the Apostles days seeing this Defection was mysteriously promoted and seeing as experience hath proved it arrived at its hight and Antichrist was brought to his Throne by the exorbitant elevation of Clergy-men it 's much less to be wondred at if the most frequent Escapes and Lapses of the Primitive and otherways Orthodox Fathers chanced to be of this nature and tend to the establishing an unwarrantable Supremacy and Dignity which only these who were of such Repute in the Church were capable to effect And in all this I have said nothing but what has been asserted by the most approved Divines especially in their Writings against the Romanists Yea the most judicious learned Bishop Vsher is of the same mind Altho' saith he it be undeniable that the first Successors of the Apostles excell'd in Piety and Holiness it 's certain notwithstanding that they neither attained to the Vertue nor simplicity of Doctrine that wee in their Ancestors and Teachers as is well observed by Nicephorus And now judge if D. M's Romish Querie whether the Ecclesiastical Government could be changed from Parity to Prelacy as is pretended in those early Ages of the Church especially since some Apostles and several Apostolical Men surviv'd the Period sixt by some Presbyterians but no Presbyterian did ever yeeld that this Change was made during the Life of any of the Apostles for the beginning of this pretended Change and if the Change was in it self impossible then Prelacy must needs be acknowledged Apostolical I therefore turn my Assertion into a Conclusion and from what is said with confidence Inferr that the Antiquity even of the true Ignatius was not able to secure him from all Lapses and Mistakes and that in his time some Churches not only might but actually were itching after several Novelties Section IV. The third Hypothesis that there is no real Disagreement but a true Concord betwixt the Doctrine of Ignatius and that of the present Presbyterians I Now come to the third Hypothesis and assert that Ignatius is not so clear and positive in the Matter of Episcopacy as to denude Presbyterians of all rational Defence should they acquiesce in his Judgement and therein join with their Antagonists who still appeal to his Determination For all he speaks of Presbyters as distinguished from Bishops may well be mean'd of these who are call'd Ruling Elders and that there was such an Office in the primitive Church is made evident by what is commonly brought from Origen Tertullian Optatus the African Code and Augustine frequently distinguishing them from preaching Presbyters And Purpurius expresly terms them Ecclesiasticos Viros Ecclesiastick Men In vain therefore object Petavius and others that these were only Church-Wardens not properly Ecclesiasticks And indeed the Ancients not only tell us there was such an Office but also plainly assert that through pride and haughtiness of the Church Doctors this Custom was abolished as Ambrose or rather Hilary sufficiently witnesses The Synagogue saith he and afterward the Church had Elders without whose Counsel nothing was to be done in the Church which by what negligence was abolished I know not except perchance it were through the sloth or rather the pride of the Church-Doctors while they desired to carry
all the esteem their alone § 2. Doctor Field tells us That these were not Lay-Elders Neither as they themselves well know do we so term them but did as the Ancients reckon them among the Ecclesiasticks And we assert that these very Lay-Elders as he calls them are understood by Hilary For first this Practice of the Christian Church is by Hilary deduced from the Synagogue wherein there were Elders distinct from the Doctors or Pastors Secondly He attributes to the Elders as their Office only the Power of Consulting and Deciding as being Assessors to the Doctors in the management of Church-Affairs without intimating ought of their Power to dispense the Word and Sacraments Thirdly He expresly distinguishes them from all Doctors or Teachers of the Church and therefore excludes them from all Power of Preaching or Administration of the Sacraments But Doctor Field saith that Ambrose by the name of Teachers whose sloth and pride he condemneth in this place might fitly understand the Bishop seeing none but Bishops have Power to preach in their own Right and others but only by Permission from them But this Answer supposes that the time was when Bishop Teacher and Doctor were reciprocal Terms and that whoever had the Charge of never so small a Flock was the Bishop thereof for who can believe that ever any receiv'd the Charge of a Flock to whom he was only to preach and dispense the Sacraments as a Journey-man to another Lastly When Hilary speaks in the preterit Tense that the Church had such tells that their Office consisted in being Assessors to the Teachers and says that the use of these was laid aside he clearly intimats that the Elders he speaks of were well nigh abolished and then scarce in Being Which by no means can be said of the preaching Presbyters For let Bishops be not only as proud as Dr. Field would have them but even as Lucifer himself yet most certain it is that long after Hilarie's time the Bishops in all weighty Affairs used at least to consult the Presbyters and that both then and still afterward preaching Presbyters were existent But herein I will not inlarge See their Glosses of both Scriptures Fathers whereby we vouch this Matter removed to name no others by Didoclavius to which I find nothing replyed This clear Proof that there were in the primitive Church other Elders distinct from those preaching Presbyters who in the time of the Apostles not much distant from that of Ignatius were dignifi'd with the name of Bishop furnisheth us with an Answer sufficient alone to solve whatsoever they can deduce from these Epistles Their only Argument is that Ignatius distinguishes between Bishop and Presbyter why then by Bishop may we not understand a Pastor of one Congregation and under the name of Presbyter a Ruling Elder They can only repone that Ignatius mentions but one Bishop of any City he wrote to which yet required more than one Pastor But one Man may be called the Bishop or Pastor of such a place altho' he be placed in a Colledge where a Plurality equally participats of the pastoral Charge and Honour and that this Answer may please them the better I shall give them Ignatius for my Patron herein who writing to the Romans expresly termeth himself Bishop of Syria to whose Charge even our Adversaries being Judges Antioch only one City thereof was committed 'T is moreover certain and granted by our Adversaries that there was even in one City frequently a Plurality of Bishops But tho' 't were yeelded that neither Scripture nor Antiquity favour these Ruling Elders and therefore that these Ignatian Presbyters must be something else we are yet where we were § 3. Our inquiry is after a Diocesan Bishop we 're sent to Ignatius to find him but all after the strickest search we meet with is only a Bishop or Pastor of one single Congregation as these ensuing Places proclaim Let none saith he do any of these things that ought to be practised in the Church without the Bishop let that Worship be counted Lawfull that is performed by him or which he at least has permitted wheresoever the Bishop is there let also the Multitude be present even as where Christ is there is also the Church it is not lawfull either to Baptize or Celebrate the Lord's Supper without the Bishop but whatsoever he alloweth that is acceptahle to God that whatsoever is done may be established From which Passage it 's evident that Ignatius supposes and allowes one of these Bishops to each particular Flock or Congregation without whose Presence the Word and Sacraments were not to be dispensed and altho' he adds that in some Case his Allowance or Approbation did warrant the practising thereof yet I 'm sure none can Infer any thing therefrom except that at some rare times when the Bishop happen'd to be absent from his particular Flock which uses to fall out to every particular Pastor another approved by him might untill his return to his Congregation discharge his Office And again Let there be saith he frequent Gatherings of your selves together or Congregations Inquire thou speaking to Polycarp Bishop of Smyrna or seek after every Man by his Name neglect neither servants nor hand-maids From whence it 's clear that this Ignatian Bâ—shop was particularly to be acquainted with and have particular Inspection of every one who was under his Charge which I'm sure cannot be easily performed by a Diocesan Bishop but is proper only to a Pastor of a particular Congregation or who can forbear to conclude as much from another Passage of the same Author where he saith Whosoever is not within the Altar is deprived of the Bread of God for if the Prayers of one or two have so much efficacy of how much weight must these be that are put up by the Bishop and the whole Church Sure I am the genius and ayr of this Passage proclaims Ignatius speaking of such a Bishop or Pastor as is under a Tye reciprocal between him and one particular Flock or Congregation And again In obedience to the Bishop break-Bread which is the Medicine of Immortality Neither is he a greater Friend to Diocesan Prelacy while he admonisheth the Church of Philadelphia in these words Children of the Light and of the Truth fly Divisions and Corrupt Doctrines and wherever the Pastor viz. the Bishop is thither you as Sheep follow him And again One Flesh of our Lord Iesus Christ and one Cup in the Vnion of his Blood one Altar and one Bishop Add to all this that Ignatius every where in these Epistles speaks to and of the Bishop as a correlative of and with respect unto the People or Flock and not Presbyters or inferiour Pastors as the proper Object of his Episcopal Office Seeing then all the Pastors of any Church he writes to might equally be term'd Bishop or Pastor of such a place seeing whatsoever he saith to or of Bishops hath
a particular reference to the Flock or People and seeing finally so many things spoken by Ignatius of these Bishops can agree only to Congregational Pastors I conclude that by these Ignatian Bishops not Diocesan Prelats but Pastors of particular Flocks not only may but of necessity must be understood And it 's further observable that Preaching Visiting of particular Persons and the rest of the Pastoral Work is either injoin'd unto or clearly intimated to belong to the Bishop only but nothing to the Presbyters save sitting in Council with him Now if our Opposites insist on their contrary Argument from the largeness of the Cities and from this that Ignatius still speaks but of one Bishop therein and hence conclude that he must be Diocesan the result of all must be a sharper Conflict between Ignatius and himself and so a fuller proof of the spuriousness of these Epistles it being evident from what is adduc'd that this Bishop was only a Pastor of a single Congregation yea so evident that it hath puzl'd the learn'dest of our Opposites § 4. Of this mind is Joseph Mede For speaking of these Ignatian Epistles It should seem saith he that in these first times before Dioceses were divided into those lesser and subordinate Churches we now call Parishes and Presbyters assigned to them they had not only one Altar in one Church or Dominicum but one Altar to a Church taking Church for the Company or Corporation of the Faithfull united under one Bishop or Pastor and that was in the City and Place where the Bishop had his See and Residence like as the Jews had but one Altar and one Temple for the whole Nation united under one High-Priest And yet as the Jews had their Synagogues so perhaps might they have more Oratories than one tho' their Altar were but one there namely where the Bishop was On Sunday saith Justin Martyr all that live in Towns or in the Country meet together in one Place namely as he there tells us to celebrate and participate the Holy Eucharist Why was this but because they had not many places to celebrate in And unless this were so whence came it else that a schismatical Bishop was said to set up another Altar and that a Bishop and an Altar are made Correlatives See St. Cyprian Ep. 40. 72. 73. Et de unitate Ecclesiae And thus perhaps is Ignatius also to be understood in that forequoted Passage of his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Where 't is clear that Mr. Mede well perceived the thing we now plead for in Ignatius viz. that this Bishop was only the Pastor of a single Flock Indeed fear to offend his Friends or something else made him say so little as he could and something that he ought not to have said while he would parallel this Altar with that of the Jews yet he 's express enough that all subject to the Bishop met in one place for Participation of the Sacraments and consequently for hearing of the Word and moreover really acknowledgeth that Dioceses then were only what Parishes are now and if so tho' they had other Oratories 't is nothing to the purpose of our Opposits which yet his perhaps proves him afraid to assert For he knew well enough that seeing as he grants all under his Charge took their Communion with the Bishop at his Church which as every one knows was then Celebrated at least every Lord's day any other Oratories for publick Worship had been altogether unnecessary with which superfluities the Church in these early and tempestuous days was not at all acquainted In vain therefore Dr. Maurice that he may at once abuse both Mede and Ignatius tells us that Altar in the primitive sense signified not only the Communion Table but the whole Place where the Chair of the Bishop and the Seats of the Presbyters were placed and in this sense there was but one Altar in one Diocess as there is now but one Consistory as is clear from Ignatius and Usher And to be in one Altar which is Ignatius his Phrase is only to be in Communion with the Bishop And this Dr. Maurice would have to be Mede's meaning thereof But the falshood of this is not only evident from Ignatius who all along as we have seen reciprocats his Bishop with the Pastor of a particular Flock but also from Mede's express words as we have already observed from them I pass as scarce good sense Dr. Maurice his saying that Altar not only signified the Communion Table but the whole place of the Bishop's Chair c. The Dispute not being what place or thing in a Church Altar signifi'd but if thereby in Ignatius one or more places for publick Worship be meaned yea this my sense of Ignatius Doctor Wake seems to grant while he says speaking of these Ignatian times that none officiated but either the Bishop himself or he who was appointed or allow'd by him and that they had in every such Place of their Assembling one Table or Altar at which they performed this Service We have heard already Mede rightly observing out of Ignatius that the Altar or Communion Table was only at the Bishop's Residence and where he officiated And we see from Dr. Wake that in every place of solemn Worship they had an Altar or Communion Table The Conclusion then is which we also already heard Mede acknowledging that there were then no fewer Bishops than Places of publick Worship which is the Truth and what we conclude from Ignatius And to these add the words of one who is neither unskillfull in these Matters nor yet Partial in favours of Presbytry In the beginning saith he the Bishops whole Charge was called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and by the strain of Ignatius his Epistles especially that to Smyrna it would appear that there was but one Church at least but one Place where there was one Altar and Communion in each of these Parishes for he saith there was one Bishop one Church and one Altar And now judge of the symphony of this Assertion with the Principles of the Author or how he could averr that if these Epistles be Genuine the Cause of Presbytry will be undone But of all things most strange and unaccountable is Dr. Pearson's Conduct in the Dispute who with indefatigable pains and vast learning wrote his Defence of Ignatius to the end as he pretends he might well nigh infallibly establish a Diocesan Bishop and yet has proved so far from hitting the white at which he ultimately levell'd that on supposition of the sufficiency of his Vindiciae he most sufficiently demonstrats the Identity of Bishop and parochial Pastor during the time of Ignatius and thus inavoidably ruines what he most earnestly intended to repair And now behold the vast Fabrick and Engine wherewith they threaten the utter Ruine of Presbytry turning upon and shattering to pieces their Dio cesan Hierarchy Nec enim Lex justior ulla Quam necis Artifices
some whole Peoples readily imbraced the Christian Religion Behold Reader how plainly and fully Eusebius relates the thing we plead for viz. that those Officers were altogether extraordinary unfixed and temporary § 5. Wretch'dly therefore does D. M. castrat this full and plain discourse while he only says that an Evangelist in the Notion of Eusebius was a Person that preached the Gospel to those that had not heard of it or resisted it and thus dissembles the whole matter in question which Eusebius clearly determines And according to this Relation of Eusebius 2 Timothy 4. 5. he is enjoined to do the Work of an Evangelist and never made a long stay at one place for even after the time of his pretended Ordination to the Bishoprick we find him not rarely with the Apostle Paul as his Attendant or Fellow Labourer which not only his joint Superscriptions to the second Epistle to the Corinthians and these to the Philippians Colossians both his Epistles to the Thessalonians and to Philemon but also the long Journeys and Peregrinations wherein we find Timothy still imployed irrefragably make manifest for after he is supposed to have been Bishop of Ephesus he was accompanying Paul in his Voyages Acts 20. 4. and was with him Prisoner at Rome as is probable from Philippians 1. and 1. Heb. 13. 23. as also frequently imployed in long Voyages to several Churches and that in Businesses which could not be expeded in a day as is evident 1 Cor. 4. 17. 1 Cor. 16. 10. Philip. 2. 19. Heb. 13. 23. 2 Tim. 4. 21. So that if he was Bishop of Ephesus he will prove a sufficient Patern for non-residence Most of which things may be supposed of Titus whose frequent long Journeys are mentioned by the same Apostle Yea they have just as good ground in 2 Tim. 4. 10. to fix Titus his Episcopal Chair in Dalmatia which was the Fancy of Aquinas and others as they can ever shew for their dream of its being among the Cretians And indeed the very Phrase from which they gather the Prelacy of Titus as we have already observed of Timothy gives real ground to conclude the contrary For this Cause saith he I left thee in Crete that thou shouldest set in Order the things that are wanting and ordain Elders From which place any ingenuous Man shall be compell'd to inferr that Titus was only left there to supply some present want and to return again much rather than that he was the fixed Arch-Bishop of Crete § 6. It 's amazing then that in defiance of so clear Antiquity yea and so clear and full Scripture evidence some dare to transform Timothy and Titus unto ordinary and fixed Officers why they see that among the ordinary and fixed Church-Officers they cannot find what they covet the Scriptures making Bishop Pastor and Presbyter one and the same but yeelding no place to their Diocesan Bishop a Lord and Ruler over other Bishops or Pastors They are compell'd therefore in imitation of the Romanists who degrade the Apostle to find the Bishop of Rome and Antioch just so to handle the Evangelists that Peter be not alone but may find other degraded Companions if he shall by chance in his Journey from one of his Sees to another visit Crete or Ephesus § 7. But more strange is that most precarious Assertion of D. M. that Philip the Evangelist had no Power of Ordination But it 's yet more admirable how to establish Timothy a Bishop he can adduce the eleventh Act of the Council of Chalcedon surely had he read the learned Stillingfleet who hath for ever baffl'd them in this their Allegation he had blush'd at the very mentioning thereof And we learn from Hierome that Titus after he had given some Instruction to the Churches of Cret◠was to return again to the Apostles and to be succeeded by Artemas or Tychicus for comforting of these Churches in the absence of the Apostle Judge Reader if Hierome thought Titus was fix'd Arch-Bishop of Crete It 's questionable saith Chrysostome if the Apostle had then constituted Timothy Bishop there for he saith that thou might'st charge some that they teach no other Doctrine Thus he without a word more for solution of this his Doubt Judge therefore if from the very Scripture whereon alone they would found Timothy's being Bishop of Ephesus he really concludes not the quite contrary Doctrine It 's doubtfull saith a most earnest Prelatist Salmeron the Jesuit if Timothy was Bishop of Ephesus for altho' he preach'd and ordain'd some to the Ministry there it follows not that he was the Bishop of that place for Paul preach'd also there above two years and absolv'd the Penitents and yet he was no Bishop Add that now and then the Apostle call'd him away unto himself and sent him from Rome to the Hebrews with his Epistle And in the second Epistle he commands him to come to him shortly Timothy was also an Evangelist of that Order Eph. 4. He gave some Apostles c. So that Dorotheus says in his Synopsis that Timothy preach'd through all Grecee but he stayed at Ephesus not to be Bishop but that in the constitute Church of Ephesus he might oppose the false Apostles c. It appears therefore that he was more than a Bishop altho' for a time he preached in that City as a Pastor and ordain'd some to the Ministry Hence it is that some call him Bishop of Ephesus And to conclude this matter the celebrated Stilling fleet ingenuously grants that Timothy and Titus were no fixed Bishops or Pastors but Evangelists notwithstanding saith he all the opposition made against it as will appear to any who will take an impartial survey of the Arguments on both sides § 8. As for the Apocalyptick Angels tho' with Beza we should affirm that by one of 'em one single Moderator is mean'd we yeeld them nothing but e contra cut the sinews of their Argument With this D. M. ingages not only he calls the Alterableness of the Moderator which Beza holds as defensible ridiculous which is said without proof and tho' it were so touches not the marrow of our Answer But they shall find their Foundation yet weaker for such a structure so soon as they shall with attention read over the contexts of the place now in Controversie The seven Stars which are the seven Angels are said to be held in God's right hand whereby without peradventure is signified the great care our Lord had of the Pastors of these Flocks in order to the promoting of the great Gospel-Design the gaining of Souls to himself But Bishops I mean Diocesans as such and distinct from other Pastors are not at all Dispensers of the Word and Sacraments by whom mostly this Gospel-design is effected Moreover how few should they be to whom this care was extended and how small comfort should the bulk of the Labourers in the Word and Doctrine be able to reap from the
Ephesus alone is not only so clear from the 17 verse that the repeating of the word Ephesus would really prove a redundancy wherefore the Syriack omits it in the former part of the verse and expresses it in the latter and called for the Elders of the Church of Ephesus but also all the Ancients either affirm as Hierome or suppose that these Elders belonged only to Ephesus which even Dr. Maurice yeelds against Dr. Hammond and says that then properly speaking there might not be a Bishop amongst them all for they are Presbyters belonging not to several Congregations but to one Church and might have a Bishop But not only the promiscuous attributing to them the Names Bishop and Presbyter their being and that without any insinuation of their Subjection to a superiour Bishop enjoin'd by the Apostle to Oversee and feed the Flock and finally the very Repetition of this Fiction of their Hierarchy in the Apostolick Age sufficiently refute it Who continues he the Ancients thought was Timothy And thus all resolves into the fictitious Episcopacy of Timothy already overthrown Now 't is observable how they contradict one another and by halfs acknowledge to be false all they plead for for some as Dr. Maurice perceiving that the Ancients affirm and the Scriptures proclaim all these Elders to belong to the Church or City of Ephesus acknowledge these could be no Diocesan Bishops Others as Dr. Hammond in locum alibi and Petavius seeing that these are not only dignifi'd with the name of Bishop but intrusted with the care of the Flock and that without Paul ' s mentioning of any superiour Bishop when if ever there was ground to have mention'd him yeeld that of necessity these Elders must be Bishops or more than simple Presbyters Whence is all this Contradiction and Confusion of Tongues but from the force of Truth before which Men must either bow or break and be compell'd tho' after never so much interpolation and disguise to express what they would fainest conceal The matter is their Diocesan Bishop their simple Presbyter their distinction between Bishop and Presbyter are meer Antiscriptural Figments in the sustaining of which against this and the like Scriptures they are obliged to confront one another and in the throng of their blunderings intirely yeeld the Controversie § 2. The same line of confusion runs along their Answer to Philip. 1. 1. with the Bishops and Deacons c. whence 't is clear that there were in one City many Bishops who were no other thing than Presbyters and that these were no distinct Orders the Deacons being immediatly subjoin'd these were the Bishops of the several Cities of Macedonia under Philippi the Metropolis saith Dr. Hammond in locum 't is denied by Dr. Maurice I could never find reason saith he to believe them any other thing than Presbyters Philippi was a Metropolis because a Colonie saith Dr. Hammond but that this will not follow is acknowledged by Dr. Maurice Thus they are still by the ears But saith Dr. Hammond the Apostle might retain the Episcopal Power in his own hands and tho' absent might exercise it by Letters but they can give no ground why the like may not be said of the Apostle in reference to the rest of the Churches and so Timothy and Titus shall be dethron'd and our Adversaries endeavouring to Answer one of our Arguments loss two of their own yea all of them for it being no less presumable that John would keep the Episcopal Power over the Churches of Asia in his own hand then that Paul kept that of Philippi there shall be no ground nor colour to Metamorphose the Apocalyptick Angels into Diocesan Bishops Or it 's possible continues Dr. H. that then the Bishop's Chair was vacant But if so and a Diocesan so necessary as they pretend without peradventure the Apostle had not only mention'd it but also spent some part of his Epistle in directing and giving them Rules in order to their choice of a fit Successour Or the Bishop saith he might be absent and Epaphroditus by the Ancients judged Bishop of Philippi appears to have been then with Paul But this Dream of Epaphroditus his being Bishop of Philippi the Doctor in that very place condemns and overthrows and so frees us of further trouble about it § 3. Yea in none of these Answers does Dr. H. rest but as is said in this pretext that Philippi was a Metropolis over many subject Bishops leaning mainly on Acts 16. 12. whose Arguments were examined by Dr. Stillingfleet and Mr. Clerkson Dr. Maurice tho' a grand Enemy to Hammond's grand Principle undertakes notwithstanding the defence of some of these Arguments against the latter but medles not with the former and saith that Beza ' s Manuscript hath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as hath also the Syriack and Arabick But OEcumenius and Theophilact and even Chrysostome yea and the received Greek Copy which Translators generally follow read 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But seeing as the learned Stillingfleet demonstrats Philippi was not then a Metropolis in the Civil sence which is the Foundation of all their Structure 't is impossible that it can be call'd by Luke 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or first in respect of Dignity but only either must be mean'd as Luke may well be understood that it was the first Colony they mett with coming from Samothrace or in respect of Situation it being scarce within the Bounds of the proper Macedonia but on the Thracian side of the River Strymon the Boundary between Thrace and Macedonia yet it might be nearer to the proper Macedonia than was Neapolis and therefore is rather to be reckon'd a part of that Country than Neapolis could be wherefore on both at least certainly on one of these accounts appears the nullity of Dr. Maurice his Answer while he says that not Philippi but Neapolis was the first in Situation Of the same kidney is his saying that Philippi might be more considerable in Luke ' s time than in the time of P. Aemilius seeing this is a mean begging of the Question for he brings nothing from any Records which a Matter of this kind requires to make in the least probable the growth of Philippi between the time of Aemilius and Luke and Chrysostome speaking of Luke's time tells us that it was no great City Moreover Dr. Stilling fleet ex abundanti clearly shews through the several periods of time that Philippi was of no greater Dignity in the time of Luke than in the time of P. Aemilius Dr. Maurice adds as a proof of Philippi's Metropolitan-ship in Luke's time that the Bishop of Philippi is mention'd as Metropolitan in Liberatus the Council of Ephesus Sedulius and in an old Notitia To which I Answer with Dr. Stillingfleet in the like Case But what validity there is in such Subscriptions or Allegations in the latter end of the
fourth or the time of the fifth Century to prove a Metropolis in the first let any-one judge that doth but consider how common a thing it was to alter Metropoles especially after the new Disposition of the Roman Impire by Constantine Yea Carolus à sancto Paulo who was most versant in these Matters and with him Dr. Stillingfleet believe that for the first six Centuries Philippi was no Metropolis § 4. But I will not enlarge in overthrowing a Fancy so wild and gross But in the end of the second Century saith Dr. Burnet the Churches were framed in another mould from the Division of the Empire and the Bishops of the Cities did according to the several Divisions of the Empire associat in Synods with the chief Bishop of that Division or Province who was call'd the Metropolitan from the Dignity of the City where he was Bishop And hence sprang Provincial Synods and the Superiorities and Precedencies of Bishopricks You see how the chiefest of Prelatists disown and disclaim this Metropolitan Fiction but none more fully than Dr. Stillingfleet who has nervously baffl'd all their Pretences prevented whatsoever Dr. Maurice advanced for I speak not of Mr. Clerkson who has also sufficiently done it and finally more particularly ruined all their Pretexts for Philippi's Metropolitan-ship either in a Civil or Ecclesiastick sense during the first Century or Apostolick age Judge therefore of Dr. Maurice his Candor which minds me of another piece of his Legerdemain to evite the force of Philippians 1. 1. For if saith he in Mr. Clerkson ' s Opinion the Bishops mention'd Philip. 1. 1. be no other than Presbyters then this place is impertinently alledged since many Presbyters are by all sides acknowledg'd to have belong'd to one Church but if he speak of Bishops in the common Ecclesiastical sense and then conclude from this Passage that there were many in the Church of Philippi his Opinion is as singular as that of Dr. Hammond which he endeavours to refute for my part I must profess I am not concern'd in this Dispute and I could never find reason to believe them any other thing than Presbyters Or were these Bishops only Presbyters ruling the Church of Philippi with common and equal Authority Then our Author must give up the Question and in stead of making many Bishops must own that there was none at all there but Presbyters only if he thus contend he will abuse his Reader with the ambiguity of a word which he takes in one sense and the Church in another That many Presbyters might belong to one Congregation none ever deni'd that many Bishops in the allowed and Ecclesiastical sense of the word had the oversight of one City sounds strange and incredible to the ancient Christians Where he sleely supposes as granted that Bishops in Philip. 1. 1. must either be understood of their simple Presbyters or of Diocesan Bishops and then equipps his horn'd Argument no other ways than if he had professedly declined all Dispute till once his Adversary had out of kindness yeelded the Question which is only about the Scriptural and Apostolick sense of the word and notion of the Office of a Bishop if that and the Office of a preaching Presbyter be not in Scripture one and the same and consequently if these at Philippi were not Scriptural Bishops no less than they were Presbyters Now that he concern'd not himself in this Dispute nor was in earnest in it I deny not his slippery dealings make it but too too apparent his simple intimation that these were only their simple Presbyters I pass having already blown off all their noticeable Depravations of Philip. 1. 1. I have yet mett with and observe that he following the Romanists insinuats that we cann't understand the Scripture's meaning untill we have their Churches Commentary His ambiguous and unhandsome conduct is no less apparent in these his Phrases common Ecclesiastical sense which he takes in one sense and the Church in another For either he may mean that the Church when she speaks of Bishops who were in after times understands by this Name only Diocesans and so touches not in the least contrary to what he insinuats the Churches received sense of this Text nor what Notion she had of Scriptural-Bishops Or his sense may be that when she speaks of Apostolick and Scriptural Bishops she then still means Diocesans and Rulers over their simple Presbyters and this he must mean if he speak to the Purpose And then I inquire what Church was of this mind Surely neither Primitive nor reformed Churches I except not that of England whose greatest Lights we have already heard disclaiming all Divine Right of Diocesan Episcopacy and identifying Bishop and Presbyter Yea many even of the Romanists are forc'd to confess so much There are Catholicks saith the Jesuite Justinianus who have stuck in the mud of Aërianism The Church then he means must be only a few factious Novelists who in despite of both Divine and Humane Records and the common Sentiment of Christians dare to obtrude on the World as a Fundamental of Religion their privat and wild Fancies Neither is it strange that so few imbrace this conceit of denying the Scripture-Identity of Bishop and Presbyter § 5. For beside these Scriptures now adduc'd let them but look unto 1 Tim. 1. 3. where they shall find a transition from Bishop to Deacons without any mention of intermediant Presbyters and consequently the Identity of these Offices Bellarmine Answers that the Apostle gives a general Instruction to the Clergy that under the name of Bishops Presbyters all the superior Clergy is comprehended But seeing they make a Distinction of these Offices so necessary it was requisite they had been handl'd in particular and not hudl'd up in a general seeing no where in Scripture there 's any more particular Distinction of Bishop and preaching Presbyter assigned but Bellarmine's main Answer to this and all such Scriptures is that the Names Bishop and Presbyter were then common to both Orders which Answer all the Hierarchicks and more particularly D. M. borrow from the Jesuite But I answer and argue with Junius against Bellarmine that seeing the Names were then common and a real community of Names imports a community of things which by these names are signifi'd it necessarily then follows that as the Names were then common so were the Offices design'd by these Names But to see the Reform'd conquering and the Jesuites foil'd some are much pain'd and in special D. M. who spends about 17 pages for the support of Bellarmine's Answer the substance whereof and of his first three Queries is that Still in the Pentateuch the High Priest is nam'd by the same Appellative without any distinction of Order or Jurisdiction that the other Priests were nam'd by and the title of a Priest was promiscuously apply'd without any distinction or marks of Eminence to the High Priest as well as to the Subordinat
And The Apostles retain'd the Phraseology of the Jews who spoke of Priests and Levites as two distinct Orders without mentioning the High Priest And When the Ancients Dichotomiz'd the Clergy they in other places plainly reckon up three distinct Orders of Bishop Presbyter and Deacon But is there never in all the Scriptures any Title Distinction or Marks of Eminence giv'n to one Priest which were not communicable to all of ' em Got ever all of 'em promiscuously the Title of High Priest or such distinctive Appellations Did the Apostles so retian the Phraseology of the Jews as that they sometimes make a Bipartite and sometimes a Tripartite Division of ordinary Church-Officers and give to any one ordinary Pastor sometimes at least a distinguishing Title and Marks of Eminence which are at no time communicable to all ordinary Pastors promiscuously As to the Ancients their sometimes Dichotomizing sometimes Trichotomizing the Clergy it 's most certain that in their Dichotomies they ey'd the prime primitive Church and in their Trichotomies their own times But Christ saith D. M. is call'd an Apostle a Bishop the Apostles Presbyters and Deacons But was Christ so call'd an Apostle that he had no other peculiar titles or marks of Eminence or that on the other hand the name Christ was giv'n promiscuously to all Apostles or ever giv'n to any of ' em Lastly was the Apellation of Apostle equally communicable to all Presbyters or ordinary Pastors as to the twelve and some few else extraordinary Officers All which he must swallow else he gives no relief to his Friend Bellarmine We Argue that seeing to no ordinary Pastor is giv'n any peculiar Appellation Character or Description but what is equally common to all there must be an Equality and Parity amongst all of 'em and this they can never get over Moreover among the Evangelists yea and among the Apostles Officers superior to ordinary Pastors the reformed Churches being Judges there was a compleat Parity as was also among the Deacons their Inferiours notwithstanding of all which the Hierarchicks must plead for certain Stories of Preheminence among the ordinary Pastors in favours whereof ne gry quidem they can bring from the Word of God the only Rule of Faith and Doctrine § 6. Add hereto Tit. chap. 1. where we not only find the Apostle using indifferently and promiscuously the two words Bishop and Elder but also he alledgeth the necessity of fit Qualifications in the one to prove that the same are required in the other the Presbyters that were to be Ordain'd must be blameless c. because a Bishop must be so wherein either we have an ocular Demonstration of the Identity of these two Officers or else which I abhorr to think the Apostles reasoning is more pitifull than the most equivocant Paralogism their being not so much as a nominal Connexion betwixt the Antecedent and Consequent and no less ridiculous than if one should reason that every Captain of a single Company must be able to guide and manage a whole Army because such Qualifications are required in a General Now seeing these Scriptures already vindicated to name no others evidently declare that there was no such thing as a Diocesan Bishop that there 's a compleat Identity of Bishop and preaching Presbyter and consequently a Parity of all ordinary Pastors they of necessity condemn the Hierarchick and Diocesan Imparity for I 'm perswaded these who alledge that they find in Scripture a Distinction between these Offices will judge that they may with reason enough conclude the Divine Right of Episcopacy Hence judge of D. M's fifth Query where and in what places of Scripture the superiority and jurisdiction of one Priest above another is forbidden And if it be not plainly forbidden then the Fancy of a Jus Divinum in favours of Presbytry such as is exclusive of all other Forms of Ecclesiastical Government is groundless and Chimerical From all which I conclude that if the Ignatian Bishop and Presbyter most be understood in the Notion of our Adversaries he then quite crosses the Apostles so his Doctrine is stark nought or which is a far more charitable Sentiment his Epistles have suffer'd no small interpolation Section VII The grand Objection taken from the Commentaries of the Ancients remov'd BUT the Fathers as our Adversaries pretend glossing on these Texts went quite cross to our Doctrine To the Bishops and Deacons saith Chrysostome What means that What was there a Plurality of Bishops in one City Not at all for at that time the Name was yet common so that a Bishop was also nam'd a Deacon that is a Servant And adds that both Timothy and Titus were Bishops Of the same mind say they were Hilary Epiphanius Theodoret OEcumenius and others which harmonius Consent of Ancients cann't but be the true meaning of the places in Controversie But as these and such Fathers confess and their Works proclaim they were like others subject to humane Weakness and Corruption fell into compliance with the growing Errors into immoderat heat prevarication and self-repugnancy and negligence to search for the Scriptures their meaning How loudly sounded the debate concerning rebaptizing between Stephen and Cyprian which â—ore almost the whole body of Christians into a pair of Factions With what heat was it prosecuted And which is most lamentable how pitifully was the truth on both hands deserted For altho' it be commonly believ'd that Stephen only held the truth and Cyprian and his fail'd yet Stephen and the Romans did no less betray it On the other extream while they asserted the sufficiency of Baptism altho' administred by the grossest Hereticks and capital Enemies of the Fundamentals of Christianity How great both before and after that time were the Contests about Easter How scandalous were the Contests between Chrysostome Epiphanius and Theophilus and between Hierome and Ruffine Not to name others in all which it is apparent how little they believed one another and how much many of 'em prevaricated in favours of their particular Fancies § 2. But their Contradictions to one another are less to be admired when we clearly perceive that one and the self same Author either out of negligence or some other weakness hath given us quite contrary Doctrines Justine Martyr which Sculteâ— observes in one place ascribes the whole Work of Regeneration to free Grace and in another destroyes what he had builded and places free Will in the room thereof And Clemens Alexandrinus as the same Scultet observes following Justine Martyr delivers the like inconsistencies about the same Theme he sometimes ascribes our Salvation wholly to Faith and again tells us that we may purchase it with the Treasure of our Works § 3. Of the same kind are their polemick Discourses wherein their study was much more directed to bespatte their Antagonists and alure the vulgar Auditor than solidly to support the Truth I shall never believe that Optatus believed himself when he maintain'd that all
the Menaces utter'd in the Old Testament against Tyre and her King had for their Object Parmenianus the schismatical Bishop of the Donatists who lived at Carthage that had once been a Tyrian Colony but in the time of Parmenianus was inhabited by Romans who had either quite extirpated or expelled thence the whole Race of the Tyrians With no less lightness but more danger did Justine Martyr long before Optatus endeavour to perswade the Gentiles that all Mankind were Partakers of Christ because they were Partakers of Reason and Christ is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which also signifies Reason Where we see that Justine leans only on a pitifull Equivocation the deceit of which could not be unknown to him who natively spoke Greek Neither were Origenes Methodius and others as Hierome witnesseth more solide in their Writings Yea Hierome himself distinguisheth between Progymnasticks and Dogmaticks alledging that in the former of these a Disputant hath liberty to muster up many Arguments in which he hath no confidence § 4. To these we may add both their Homilies and Expositions wherein it 's not easily determined when they spoke their own minds or when they gave us only Transcripts of others to believe and defend which they held themselves but little obliged Yea Hierome oftner than once tells us that it was the common Practice of the Writers of these times to give the Expositions of others and yet conceal the names of the Authors and so involve the Reader and make him take for their judgement the things they never believ'd § 5. If we search into the causes of so strange dealing we have heard out of Hierome that one of 'em was meer sloath and neglect See much more to this purpose in Dallaeus de usu Patrum Another Cause why they both spoke wrote and practised otherways than they knew could be warranted by Scripture was their unjustifiable Compliance with both Jews and Pagans good perhaps intentionally being out of design the better to Proselyte them but eventually proved as unhappy as its Practice was unwarrantable and destitute of Scripture ground Hence their Deacons were named Levites their Bishops Priests and High-Priests the Lord's Table the Altar and the Lord's Supper a Sacrifice and at length Diocesan Bishops and Arch-Bishops were instituted in imitation of the Pagan Flamines and Protoflamines Another Cause thereof which especially takes place in their Homiles and Expositions was the multitude of Alterations and Corruptions well grown before any of these Homilies and Commentaries we now enjoy were extant these were too deeply rooted to be opposed and therefore they believed themselves under a kind of necessity to accommodat their Comments and Declamations thereto at least so to temper and compose them that they should not thwart therewith Of this sort of Conduct we have a clear instance in Augustine who sometimes commends and praises several unscriptural Ceremonies But elsewhere speaking his Mind more freely disapproves them as both unwrantable and burdensome He indeed there intimats that some things commonly observ'd throw the World tho' they were not written yet might be kept as having come from the Apostles or general Councils such as was the Observation of the Lord's Passion Resurrection and Ascension But even this as is most probable he yeelded out of humane Weakness and Fear to oppose the then prevailing Innovations for the needlesness of such preterscriptural Observations he evidently declares elsewhere saying that all things which belong either to Faith and Manners are plainly contain'd in Scripture From all which is clear that we cannot at all be sure if the Fathers Commenting on the places in hand either knew their true meaning or if they did sincerely gave us what themselves believed § 6. And that in their Explications of these Texts we have not their genuine Sentiments is to me evident First because they gave such Reasons of their Exposition as the greatest Prelatists count stark nought Thus Bellarmine rejects and overturns the Grounds of every one of these Expositors in particular except these of Chrysostome only who yet hath nothing of any moment above the rest for Chrysostome exponing Philip. 1. 1. alledges only in defence of his Exposition that the sole Title and Name of Bishop was common to both Orders but this is refused by Dr. Hammond and others and as we shall hear by Chrysostome himself But the Jesuite intending to retain that Exposition thought himself obliged to embrace some of their Defences whereas in truth they themselves never believ'd them to be solide but only the growing Corruptions being too strong to be opposed and some of 'em having got an Episcopacy which was then creeping in and which they depending on the Churches Authority thought they might retain they believ'd that for the fashion they might so gloss the Scriptures whereby Episcopacy is wounded that the People should not perceive the unwarrantableness thereof Secondly The main ground common to all these Expositions why they expone any of these Texts as if they condemn'd not a Diocesan Bishop is a sufficient evidence that they were far from being in earnest in their Glosses for they still alledge that there behoved to be a Bishop above these Bishops in Philippi whom Paul salutes because there might not be Plurality of Bishops in one City This Practice indeed was for the most part current in this time tho' not universal as we learn from Epiphanius informing us that even in these times there used to be a Plurality of Bishops in one City Yet quite contrary to this Text which they either carelesly or timourously shuffl'd They judged saith Dr. Stillingfleet the Practice of the Apostles by that of their own times as is evident by Theodoret and the rest of the Greek Commentators assigning that as the reason why the Presbyters spoken of in the Epistles to Timothy and Titus were not Bishops in the sense of their Age because their could be but one Bishop in a City And Petavius grants that many true Bishops were sometimes at once in one City And altho' the Episcopal Order be of Divine Right yet at 's not of Divine Right that there should be only one Bishop in one City this was only brought in by the Authority of the Church and Councils and accordingly Hierome and Ambrose are to be understood By what Law saith J. Taylor speaking of Philippi and that not as a Metropolis may there not be more Bishops than one in a proper sense in one Diocess Where 't is not unpleasant to hear so great a Prelatist by one Interrogation overthrowing the whole Episcopal Cause and propugning the main Plea of the Presbyterians viz. that in Philippi alone there were many who had not only the power of dispensing the Word and Sacraments but also of Ordination and Jurisdiction and were every way Bishops in a proper sense Thirdly Some of these Expositors proclaim what we alledge for OEcumenius who like the rest intimats as if
capable of another Translation Thus only in the Matter of Ordination they have got up or set themselves above them Secondlie Of the Power of Ordination it 's being proper to Bishops he speaks most doubtfully 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they seem c. saith he Thirdly Had he believ'd that the Power of Ordination by Divine Right belong'd to Bishops above Presbyters he had never said that there 's notwithstanding in a manner nothing between them surely Epiphanius thought the Power of Ordination made a most large and notable Difference Once again I shall with our Adversaries suppose that Chrysostome allows that Power of Ordination by Divine Appointment was appropriated to Bishops they cann't with reason deny but that in all other things to a hair he asserts the Equality yea the Identity of Presbyters with Bishops Now will they stand to Chrysostome herein Surely they will not for thus they should be oblig'd to let go all the Prerogatives and Priviledges Bishops both claim and exerce over their Pastors all their Power Paramount of Governing the Church and her Pastors all their exorbitant Wealth Grandeur Pomp and Splendor and in a word whatsoever renders to them the Hierarchie amiable or desireable and so should be really reduc'd to the condition of an ordinary Parish-pastor And were things so little I 'm sure would they care or stickel for upholding of any Distinction between these Officers hence let them blush any more to pretend to Chrysostome's Patrociny seeing all they can with the least colour plead for being giv'n not granted he really subverts their Cause and levells their Diocesan Prelat with a parochial Pastor § 4. Bellarmine Answers that Chrysostome and others while they say that onlie in Ordination a Bishop is above a Presbyter speak onlie of such things which no way agree to Presbyters for Iurisdiction and Confirmation may be performed by Presbyters by vertue of Commission from the Bishop But thus he really makes Chrysostome contradict himself Chrysostome said they differ'd nothing save in Ordination Bellarmine compells him to say that they have another Difference no less conspicuous than is between the King and his Commissioner who can do many regall Acts being warranted by him thereto Does such a Power lodg'd in the Bishop which agrees to none of the Presbyters make no Distinction between him and them Or rather does it not make up the far greater and more conspicuous part of the prelatical Eminency above the rest of the Clergy Add hereto Chrysostome's Books of the Priest-hood wherein altho' he expresly professes he was to treat of the Office of a Bishop yet in these Books there 's nothing but what concerns a congregational Pastor nothing but what concerns publick prayer dispensing of the Word and Sacraments and such Duties that terminat on the People alone but not a word of the Duties of the Bishop or Prelat over inferiour congregational Pastors as their Object which is a sure Demonstration that with Chrysostome Bishop Priest and Pastor were Synonymous Terms § 5. To these add Pelagius a grand Heretick indeed but never branded as such for ought he said of Church-Government who restricts all Church-Officers to Priest and Deacon And asserts that Priest without any Discrimination or Restriction are the Successors of the Apostles And Here saith he by Bishops we understand Presbyters for there could not have been more Bishops in one Citie but we have this Matter also in the Acts of the Apostles Where it 's clear that Pelagius altho' in conformity to the introduc'd Custome of distinguishing Bishops from preaching Presbyters he endeavour'd accordingly to expone this place with as little dammage thereto as is possible deduceth nothwithstanding the Ground of the Difference between Bishop and Presbyter from the Churches latter Custome of having but one Bishop in one City and not from any Scripture-Warrant and indeed when he brings to clear his Comment the 20. of the Acts 17. and 28. he plainly intimats that even when he and others of that Age seem most clearly to hold forth a Difference betwixt Bishop and preaching Presbyter they then believ'd no such thing to flow from Divine Institution And There is a Question saith he why the Apostle made no mention of Presbyters but comprehended them under the Name of Bishops because answers he this is the second yea in a manner the very same Degree with that of Bishops as the Apostle writes in the Epistle to the Philippians To the Bishops and Deacons when yet one City cann't have more Bishops than one and in the Acts of the Apostles Paul being to go to Hierusalem and having gathered the Elders of the Church saith among other things take heed to the Flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you Bishops Hence it 's most evident that he believed both Offices to be by Scripture-Warrant one and the same and not a meer Communication of Names only But the thing most observable here is that to prove the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter he brings Philip. 1. and hereby shews us that some of the Ancients from whose accustom'd Phrases he departed not while he exponed it when they seem to inferr from that place only a Community of Names did really believe no such thing but were perswaded that Philip. 1. 1. quite overthrows all Distinction betwixt Bishop and preaching Presbyter And Sedulius asserts and proves the Identity of Bishops and Presbyters and concludes from the Example of the Ephesian Elders or Bishops that there were many Bishops in one City contrary to the Practice of his Age and that among the Ancients Bishop and Presbyter was one and the same And Primasius proposeth the Question why the Apostle comes to the Deacons without any mention of the Presbyters And Answers in the very words of Pelagius Thus it 's clear even these whom the Hierarchicks take for the prime Pillars of Prelacy being Judges that there 's no Divine Warrant for Diocesan Episcopacy and that a Bishop and Presbyter in Scripture in Apostolick times are one and the same For saith Augustine with whom I begin tho' Younger than Hierome being longer to insist on the other tho' according to these Names of Honour which the Custome of the Church hath now brought in fashion the Office of a Bishop be greater than that of a Presbyter yet in many things Augustine is below Hierome where we see that the whole Difference was in Expression rather than reality and that even that was only by Custome not by Divine Appointment These words hath now brought in fashion answers Bellarmine are not opposed to the ancient time of the Church but to the time before the Christian Church so that the sense is before the times of the Christian Church these Names Bishop and Presbyter were not Titles of Honour but of Office and Age but now they are Names of Honour and Dignity D. M. follows his Master Bellarmine in this wretch'd Detortion and adds that this was but a
Feet ye onght also to Wash one anothers Feet that every Apostle yea and every Believer is Lord and Master of the rest § 8. And writing to Euagrius I hear saith Hierome there is one so mad as to preferr the Deacons to the Presbyters that is to the Bishops For seeing the Apostle clearly teaches that Bishops and Presbyters are one and the same how can a Server of Tables and Widows proudly preferr himself to these at whose Prayers the Sacrament of Christ's Body and Blood is consecrated you will require a Proof hear a Testimony Paul and Timothy to all the Saints in Philippi with the Bishops and Deacons would you have another Example in the Acts of of the Apostles Paul thus speaks to the Presbyters of one Church Take heed to your Selves and the whole Flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you Bishops to Rule the Church c. And that none may contentiously plead that in one City there were many Bishops here also another Testimony wherein it 's most evidently proved that both Presbyter and Bishop were one and the same and then produces the 1 to Titus and 1 to Timothy 4. 8. 14. neglect not with the laying on of the Hands of the Presbytry And 1 Peter 4 and 1. 2 John 1. 3 John 1. And all these to prove that he had undertaken viz that both Bishop and Presbyter were one and the same Now it 's most observable that that he inferrs this Conclusion not only from Scriptures written long after the first Epistle to the Corinthians where it 's said I am of Paul c. but even from the last Epistle of John the longest Liver of all the Apostles And therefore no less notticeable is D. M's extream stubborness and aversion from Truth who would force Hierome to introduce Bishops presently after that Schism mention'd 1 Cor. 1. And accordingly as his bad Cause oblig'd him to do with this and the rest of Hierome's Testimonies wholly smuther'd it And indeed all hitherto who have adventur'd to graple therewith have been conquer'd thereby yea even Bellarmine himself is compell'd to give up the Cause Hierome indeavours saith the Jesuite to conclude the equality of Bishops and Presbyters from the Epistle to Titus to the Philippians and from the Epistles of Peter and John which were written after the first Epistle to the Corinthians Neither can the Jesuite find another way to be even with Hierome but by arraigning him as fraughted with self-repugnancy levity and instability in this Matter and all the Arguments he brings to prove Hierome a Favourer of Episcopacy are only so many fruitless Attempts to make that appear But let us go on with Hierome But saith he the reason why after this viz. the writing of both the Epistles of John one was chosen and set over the rest was that there might be a remedy of Schism least every one drawing the Church of Christ to himself should divide it For in Alexandria from Mark the Evangelist even to Heraclas and Dionysius the Presbyters still gave to one elected from amongst themselves and placed in a higher seat the Name of Bishop as if an Army should creat a General or the Deacons should chuse one of themselves whom they know to be industrious and name him Arch-Deacon On these words D. M. triumphs The Custome was saith he even from the days of St. Mark the Evangelist that a Presbyter was chosen who Governed the whole Society this in the Opinion of St. Hierome cuts off that imaginary Interval wherein the Chruch is said to have been Governed by a Parity of Presbyters Where he forgeth a Gloss no way contain'd in the words of Hierome whose Example of an Army and Deacons are only adduc'd to shew the manner of that Presbyter or nominat'd Bishop's entrance and not at all the measure of his Power over his Collegues And that no Power over the rest can be collected from this place is beyond Scruple clear from Hierome's present Scope who introduces this Ancient Alexandrian Practice to clear and prove the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter which according to him remain'd in the Church for a while after the Writings of John the longest Liver of all the Apostles Had D. M. perused Dr. Stillingfleet he had taught him that both Election and Ordination of this Alexandrian Bishop was only performed by his Fellow Presbyters that the Original of Hierome ' s exsors potestas any Power he mentions in Bishops over Presbyters is by Hierome attributed not to any Episcopal Institution but to the free choice of the Presbyters themselves for what doth a Bishop continues Hierome except Ordination which a Presbyter may not do Here the Jesuites and their Follower D. M. dream they find a fine Distinction made by Hierome between Bishop and Presbyter but first they must make an unseasonable Antiptosis and compell Hierome to speak contrary to the express words of this place which are in the present Tense contrary to the scope and design of this Epistle which is professedly to shew the great Dignity of Presbyters yea even their Identity with Bishops and thereby to reach a sharper reproof to the petulant Deacon And contrary finally to Hierome's most clear and most frequently repeated Doctrine of the Scriptural Identity of both Offices Were it not madness then to dream with the Jesuits that in these words Hierome makes any Distinction between the Scripture Bishop and Presbyter who is here only asserting that in all places Rome excepted where the Presbyters were more depressed and the Deacons more raised than in other Churches even then in his time a Presbyter was allow'd by the Canons and Constitutions of the Churches to do ought that a Bishop might do save Ordination alone This his Design of holding forth the most great dignity of Presbyters yea even their equality with Bishops which Bellarmine acknowledges that he may the better compesce the Insolency of the Deacons Hierome all along this Epistle prosecutes and having again cited the Epistles to Timothy and Titus to prove that a Presbyter is contain'd in i. e. is one and the same with a Bishop otherwayes a Deacon is also in a Bishop and so Hierome had crossed his own Design by the very Argument wherewith he minded to compass it and having added some other Topicks to the same purpose thus concludes his Epistle And that we may know that the Apostolick Traditions are brought from the Old Testament that which Aaron and his Sons and the Levites were in the Temple the Bishops Presbyters and Deacons claim in the Church Nunc animis opus Aenaeae nunc pectore firmo All the Jesuites and their Complices will presently be about our Ears But Solamen nobis Soeios habuisse malorum Their Attaques are no less on Hierome than us wherefore this is one of the chief places brought by Bellarmine to involve Hierome in a maze of self-contradiction and make him propugn Prelacy who is followed by others of the Hierarchicks but
Hierome leave them as being altogether useless for support of the Pomp and Splendor of their Hierarchy To these add the Jesuite Celâ—otius who after a thousand Meanders and serpentine windings to elude and deprave these clear Testimonies of Hierome at length seeing all would not do rejects them all as the Forgeries of unlucky Aërian hands never written by Hierome For which Cellotius is chastised even by Petavius and others of the Loyolites themselves Into such Discord Confusion and Torment do Men usually throw themselves so soon as they obstinatly resolve to wage War with so clear and irradiant Verities And here it 's observable that in all times and in all Churches the Authority of Hierome has been exceeding great and above most of the primitive Writers which came not to pass without a special Divine Providence that he and in him the whole primitive Church whose Judgement in these Matters he most clearly delivers might remain as an unsuspected and an uncontroverted witness against some of latter Ages pretendedly Catholick but really Sectarian Novelists Among the great Services he did to the Church two Pieces are more especially notticeable viz. his most clear asserting and acurat distinguishing the Canonical Books from the Apocryphal above all who handled or wrote of that great and most necessary Article and which is the Matter in hand his Antiprelatick Doctrine of the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter these not only Hieronymian but also truly Catholick Doctrines are with equall fierceness impugn'd by the Romanists and I appeal to the impartial Reader if their Exceptions against this latter be a whit more solide than these which are advanced against the former viz. Hierome's Judgement of the Canonical Scriptures which are to be found collected and learn'dly refuted by Dr. Cosin And indeed these Sophisters endeavouring to subvert these Catholick Doctrines of Hierome dash only on an Adamantine Rock for as never any Articles were better founded so notwithstanding of whatsoever practical Aberrations therefrom were fall'n into none were more universally imbrac'd receiv'd and handed down for to speak of the Matter of our present concern this Hieronymian Doctrine all following Church Writers ratifie and approve the bulk of subsequent Commentators Writers of Offices and of other Treatises as Salvianus Isidorus Hispalensis Amalarius Rabanus Maurus yea and intire Councils as that 2 of Sevil which ascribes the whole Difference and Sâ—periority only to Church-Canons and late Constitutions and after them Gratian and Lombard who affirm that in the primitive Church there was only Presbyters and Deacons and his Expositors among whom is Aestius who very fairly quites the Scriptures and tells us that this Superiority is not very clear from Scripture which is nothing but a Confession of the Truth of Hierome's Doctrine forced from this great Prelatist and School-man Yet adds Aestius this may be sufficiently proved another way To which words Dr. Stillingfleet occurrs Ingenuously said saith he however but all the difficulty is how a Jus Divinum should be prov'd when Men leave the Scriptures But in the recounting and transcribing of such Confessions or Testimonies I will not inlarge And now having rescued the principal Scriptures our Antagonists detort in favours of their Distinction between Bishop and Presbyters and vindicated some places commonly adduc'd for the Identity thereof as also evinced that the most celebrated of the Ancients did no otherways understand these Scriptures nor derive the Original of Prelacy from Divine Institution I may with confidence conclude that Ignatius had none before him of the Judgement that he if we believe the Hierarchicks so passionately favour'd Section IX The Testimonies of Ignatius's contemporaries disproving what our Adversaries would force him to speak and confirming what we have prov'd to be his mind viz. that he cashiers a Diocesan Prelacy HAving viewed the Apostolick Writings and dived into their most ancient Commentators and primitive Doctors and having found that in the time of the Apostles the immediat Ancestors of Ignatius there was in the Church no such thing as a Diocesan Prelate Let us next look unto what remains of his Contemporaries or these who lived near Ignatius's time and we shall have ground to deduce the same Inference And first it's observable that these Writers such as Clemens Romanus in his Epistle to the Corinthians for the rest that bear his Name are undoubtedly spurious Polycarp to the Philippians Hermas or Pastor Justine Martyr tho' they as occasion offers frequently mention Pastors Doctors Bishops Presbyters indifferently taking all of 'em for on and the same Office yet of a Diocesan Prelat or one set over other Pastors or over these that had Power of Dispensing the Word and Sacraments in all their Writings have not a syllable Which Argument against a Diocesan Prelat tho' negative is not to be slighted if we consider these Authors their closs Vicinity to the Apostles the occasion they had to have mention'd him had he been then existent their more than a Pythagorick silence concerning him Yea the same kind of negative Argumentation Eusebius uses while he disproves and explodes some Writings forg'd in the Name of John Andrew and other Apostles because saith he no ancient Ecclesiastick Writers mention these Books We shall find moreover that they positively disclaim Diocesan Prelacy I begin with Clemens Romanus who writing to the Corinthians commends their former carriage in these words Ye walked in the commands of God and being obedient to these that had the rule over you and giving your Elders due honour ye were wont to admonish the younger with Moderation to seek after things that are honest And again Wherefore the Apostles preaching the Word thro' the severall regions and proving by the Spirit the first fruits thereof ordain'd Bishops and Deacons for these who should believe neither was this a new Ordinance for many ages before it was written concerning Bishops for so in a certain place saith the Scripture I will appoint their Bishops in Righteousness and their Deacons in Faith And Our Apostles by Jesus Christ our Lord knew that there would arise Contention concerning the Name of a Bishop and therefore being endew'd with a perfect Fore-knowledge they ordain'd the fore-said Officers and left unto us describ'd the particular services of both Ministers and Offices to the end that approv'd Men might succeed in the place of the defunct and execute their Office These therefore who are ordain'd by them or by other famous men with the Consent of the whole Church who blamelesly serv'd the Sheepfold of Christ with humility and quietness without baseness and who for a long time had a good Testimony from all These I say cann't be justly thrust out of their Office for we commit no light sin if we cast out these from the Bishops Office who holyly and blamelesly perform'd it Blessed are these Presbyters or Pastors who have perfited their journey and are dead and who have obtain'd
lower Order of Church-Officers as Rom. 13. the Magistrate is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Minister of God But there is no such explicative word or particle in Clement to alter the common Signification thereof on which account we 're not lightly to resile therefrom But that which utterly overthrows the Jesuite's Cause is Clement's closs Conformity to the Apostle in his account of Church-Orders who 1 Tim. 1. 3. beyond all Scruple of any Party takes these words in the sense we plead for to Clement and makes not at all the word Deacon exegetick and explicative of the word Bishop but by it designs a distinct Order of Church-Officers from what is signifi'd by the other For doubtless Clement Paul's Fellow-Labourer took the words in the same signification and meaning wherein the Apostle had understood them And accordingly Clement for Confirmation hereof adduces the words of Isaiah 60. 17. which place as he then certainly found it in the Septuagint contains the words Bishops Deacons exactly as Paul expresseth distinguisheth Church-Officers and on this Ground Clement goes when he intimats that the Apostles in their Institution of Church-Officers had an eye to these words of the Prophet In vain therefore labours Petavius to disprove the Copy of Isaiah used by Clement and brings the Hebrew Hierome and others taking the word in a different signification for thus he hath not Salmasius or any other modern Defender of Presbytry but Clement himself whom he pretends to vindicate for his Adversary seeing we Dispute not concerning the Greek Copy Clement used but of the thing he inferr'd from these words of Isaiah according to the Copy he then cited Neither is it more to the Jesuite's advantage that the word Presbyter is several times found in Clement For seeing as is plain yea and the Jesuite himself not only grants but proves that it frequently there denotes not a degree of Age but a Church-Officer it must of necessity be a Term altogether Synonymous with the word Bishop For they themselves plead not for the Equipolency thereof with the word Deacon wherein Petavius himself shall afford us no small assistance who having but to no purpose seeing never Man denied it shewed that with Clement the word Presbyter is sometimes taken appellatively to denote old Age but no Church-Officer subjoins these remarkable words At other times Clement so uses the word Presbyter as thereby to signifie a certain Function and publick Office in the Ministry and a certain Dignity in the Church which he calls an Episcopacy or the Office of a Bishop From this plain Testimony of a Man in learning and love to Prelacy second to none that ever undertook its Defence it 's clear as the Light it self that with Clement the word Bishop and the word Presbyter when he takes it for a Church-Function are Terms altogether Synonymous For if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Episcopacy or the Office of a Bishop be competent to Clement's Presbyter and things as they ought receive Denominations from Forms wherewith they 're cloathed then this Presbyter in the Judgement of Clement is really a Bishop and indeed this is superlatively clear to any who but with an open and unprepossess'd Mind reads the places of Clement we have already produced Howbeit the Testimony of such an Adversary gives no small additional Confirmation to the Truth thereof Yea the same Adversary in the same place acknowledges that even then the Title of Bishop was also common and in after times only appropriated to one And again It 's clear saith Petavius from this place that there was a Council or Ecclesiastick Senate ordain'd by the Apostles at Corinth whose Dignity and Office Clemens calls Episcopacy and the chiefest of the Clergy he names Presbyters as also from this which Clement afterward writes It 's base Beloved yea most base c. And he names the same Presbyters Pastors and Church-Governours of the Christian Sheepsold And now judge how the Jesuite after these Concessions could yet say that it follows not from hence that in Corinth or at other Cities there was no peculiar Bishop § 3. And here again we find D. M. at his old filching Trade transcribing Petavius his Perversions of Clement or bringing what is no more serviceable to either Cause or Credit as that Clement comprehends all the Jewish Clergy under the name of Priests and Levites Therefore Inferrs D. M. It follows not from Clement his naming only Bishops and Deacons that Bishops and Presbyters are not in Clement distinct Offices But D. M. should remember that Clement not only Dichotomizes but Trichotomizes the Jewish Clergy into three Parts But does he any where so divide the Christian Clergy He not only names the two Kinds of Offices but so names them as to identifie and take for one and the same Bishop and Presbyter which Petavius and D. M. and their Brethren by all means labour to make him distinguish But St. Clement saith D. M. exhorting the Corinthians to order sets before them the subordination under the Temple-Service how the High-Priest Priests and Levites were distinguish'd by their proper Service and immediatly recommends to them that every one of them should continue in his proper Order Now continues D. M. when we consider the primitive Method of reasoning from Jewish precedents St. Clement had never talked at this rate if the Jurisdiction of one over many Priests had been abolished under the New Testament But why does he mutter for it if he can bring ought for his purpose he must also Inferr from this passage of Clement that as there was a High-Priest over all the Jewish Church so there must be another High-Priest over all Christians And that all Christians must bring Oblations and Sacrifices to the Temple at Hierusalem for from these Topick does Clement exhort the Corinthians to Harmony Whether then D. M. be a Romanist or a Jew may be a Question for unquestionably his way of reasoning symbolizes with both of them The Truth is nothing can be inferr'd from this place of Clement but that as under the Old Testament every one whether Church-man or Laick was to abide in his own Order without raising Schism or Confusion so it ought to be under the New Testament St. Clement himself continues D. M. distinguishes the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 An express untruth and I challenge D. M. and his Complices to prove it Nor can it be adds D. M. an Objection of any weight that the first who were their Spiritual Governours are mention'd in the plural number since this was an Encyclical Epistle addressed to Corinth as the principal City and from thence transmitted to its dependencies c. By which words if he speaks sense he intimats that there were in the Apostolick age Metropolitan Cities in an Ecclesiastick sense whose Bishops according to the Civil Dignity of these Cities were Metropolitan and had their numbers of inferiour and dependent Bishops A most nauseous and
proceed to Justine Martyr who thus gives an account of the state of the Churches their particular and weekly Assemblies for receiving the Word and Sacraments After this Bread and Wine tempered with Water is brought to the Ruler or Governour of the Brethren which when he hath received he gives praise and glory to the Parent of all The Deacons give to all present Bread and Wine tempered with Water after they are Consecrated by Thanks-giving and carry them to such as are absent And on Snnday all who live either in Cities or in the Country come together into one place And when the Reader has ceas'd the Governour makes an exhortatory Sermon The voluntary Contribution is laid up with the Governour who distributes it to the Orphans c. Where it 's not only observable that Justine following not the pretended Ignatius but the Apostle Clement Polycarp Hermas mentions only two Orders of Church-men viz. Governours and Deacons but also that he gives a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Bishop to every Congregation and that Justine's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is all one with the Bishop who was then in being is yealded by the fiercest Hierarchicks Heylen who yeelds his whole Plea and says that Justine's President of the Congregation or Bishop ordinarily celebrated the Eucharist and Preach'd God's holy Word and Maurice Well then 't is all one how this ancient Church-Ruler be named whither Presbyter Governour or Bishop seeing there was one for every Congregation that mett for receiving the word and Sacraments the Controversy between us and the Hierarchicks which is not about Names but Things is fully ended if they stand to Justine's Decision § 9. Dr. Maurice would have Justine to be understood as speaking only of the Diocesan Bishops Church For saith he to carry the Bread and Wine to all absents in their severall Duellings was not convenient nor easy in numerous Congregations and they knew not well who were absent But this Perversion is too wretch'd palpable to wheedle any in in his right wit out of Justine's plain Meaning Dr. Maurice knew well enough that in these times of such Fervor and Love among Christians and such Veneration for the Lord's Supper they doubtless most exactly observ'd the Ordinances and absented not without speciall and weighty Causes And seeing the Custome of receiving the Elements at home when they could not come to Church was then in vigour and believed to be their Duty if these Elements were given to Absents as their proper Communion or were only the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the last remains of the Custume of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Love Feasts I now dispute not they took special care to signifie their Absence and Causes thereof by their Relations or Christian Brethren to their Deacons and such as were concerned to know it Neither if we consider the Church-Discipline of these times is it to be doubted that the Deacons had an exact List of all to whom they were each Lords Day to give the Sacrament and consequently by no means could be ignorant who were either absent or present Wherefore tho' the Deacons had been fewer than they were they could easily tho' the whole Congregation had been never so numerous carry the Elements to these very few whom sickness or other lawfull and weighty Reasons had confined to their Habitations all which Dr. Maurice well enough perceived and therefore he 's here no less feeble in his Actings than a man breathing his last and advances only such triffles as may make his Friends ashamed and confirm his Adversaries Neither do I wonder hereat seeing he undertook the Defence of a palpable untruth for not only speaks Justine of the Christian Assemblies in common without the least exception but clearly tells us that he speaks of the meatings of all the Christians for receiving the Word and Sacraments not only in Cities but in the Country a place too base for the Cathedral and Diocesan Bishops Chair and of all such Congregations as in the first day of the Week as the Apostle speaks made Collections or had Deacons for that end which belongs to every Congregation where the Word and Sacraments are dispensed Neither is this ought but what we have discover'd to be the Mind of their Ignatius himself and seconded with the Suffrages of the greatest Friends to Prelacy § 10. Wherefore most vain is D. M's Labour to prove that it follows not from Justine that there were then only two Orders of Church-men Seeing Justine giving a Governour or Bishop to every Congregation quite overturns Diocesan Episcopacy And more vain yet is this that as what he undertakes tho' proved is nothing to his purpose so the Reasons he brings prove nothing of what he undertakes For his first Reason viz. That Justine intended only to give a true account of what was ordinarly performed in the Christian Meetings in opposition to the abominable Stories propagated against them by their Enemies so that he had no occasion to reckon up the several Gradations of the Hterarchy is equally favourable to Prelatists and Papists who may as well use it for a Sanctuary to their Pope as they to their Prelats And indeed had there then either been a Pope over all or a Prelate with Princely Power as D. M. pleads for over a multitude of Churches the Christians seeing they were frequently reproached with an intended Rebellion had found themselves obliged in a special manner to apologize for their Princes and absolute Lords who would have been looked on as little less than the Emperour's Rivalls and Arch-Promoters and Heads of the supposed Insurrection Moreover which we have already noted and fully shews the nullity of D. M's Reason not only Justine but all the genuine Writings of them that went before him mention only like Justine these two Orders of Church-men D. M's second Reason viz. That the Christians were most shy to publish any thing relating either to the Mysteries of their Religion or the Constitution of the Church more than was absolutely necessary in their own Defence c. is another lurking place for Romanists when urg'd to shew the Antiquity of their Innovations and indeed if it do any thing it tends to prove that no Party can make any Advantage of ought spoken or written by the Fathers and if so have att the Foundation of Diocesan Prelacy its prime Advocats acknowledging that no Argument for it can be draun from Scripture but only from the writings of the Fathers His third Reason is that as the Offices so the names of Bishop and Presbyter were not only known to be distinguished in his days among the Christians but he brings no genuine Writer of that Age to prove this and that it is most false is already evinced but even the Heathens knew so much and cites Adrian's Epistle to Servianus but it 's highly probable that the Emperour if we allow him any knowledge of these Affairs understands under the name of Presbyters
observed how Hilary makes the Bishop a sedulous Dispenser of the Words of suture Life And indeed all the Hierarchick Grandeur and Domination whereby a Bishop was intirely Metamorphosed into a quite other thing than what he had once been could never notwithstanding obliterate and blot out of thinking Mens Minds the true Scriptural Notion and Idea thereof The Episcopal Dignity consists in Teaching saith Balsamon And the fourth Council of Carthage decrees that a Bishop shall not be imployed in caring for his houshold Affairs but shall wholly occupy himself in Reading and Praying aud Preaching the Word § 12. 'T were endless to alledge all that may be produc'd to this purpose neither could any Man who ever seriously read the Bible have any other Notion of a true Bishop than what is common to every Pastor of a Congregation seeing the Apostle's Description of a Bishop 1 Tim. 3. and Tit. 1. agrees equally to all of them And here it 's observable that still where Bishops are spoken of in Scripture not only is the Work and Office which is injoin'd them that of Teaching and Feeding but also the Name is correlative to the Flock and not to a Company of Clergy-men as Acts 20. 28. Take heed to your selves and to all the Flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you Overseers or Bishops 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to Feed the Church of God 1 Pet. 5. 2. Feed the Flock of God which is among you taking the oversight thereof or Bishoping it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and accordingly as we have oftner than once demonstrated over every particular Congregation there was a Bishop This Assertion may be strongly confirmed from the undoubted Practice of the Church in the fourth Century even when she was fall'n into no small Declension from the Primitive Purity For the Council of Sardica Decrees that a Bishop may not be placed in a Village or small Town where one Presbyter may suffice Dr. Maurice says that this Canon is justified by the Arrians their great multiplication of Bishops to strengthen their Party But the Council it self assigns a quite different Ground that moved them to make this Decree viz. that the Name and Authority of a Bishop fall not into Contempt Where we see the Design of abolishing the Primitive and Apostolick Custome of giving a Bishop indifferently to every Congregation whether in City or in Countrey was the Introduction of a secular Pomp and Grandeur into the Church which finally resolv'd into a Papal Slavery However this Sardican Canon had not so good effect but that about twenty years after a new Sanction thereto was found needfull for the Council of Laodicea Decrees that it shall not be lawfull to place Bishops in little Villages or Countrey Places but only Visitors and that the Bishops who were already placed in these little Villages and Countrey Places should for the future do nothing without the knowledge of the Bishop of the City Mark how a pace the mild and fraternal Church Regimen is turn'd into a Worldly Domination and Dignity to pave the way for a papal Tyranny These rural Bishops or Countrey-parish Pastors for they can be call'd nothing else whom Dr. Beverige acknowledges for real and true Bishops were also assaulted and the subjecting and inslaving of them to the Prelates and Clergy in the greater Cities design'd by other Councils as that of Ancyrum and of Neocesaria and of Antioch there they are called Chorepiscopi i. e. Countrey Bishops And it has been disputed if these were real true Bishops But the same Dr. Beverige not only yeelds but at large pleads for the Affirmative He pretends in the mean while that anciently Bishops were ordained in Cities only many whereof had according to the model of the Empire such ample Territories that 't was impossible for the Bishop of the City his alone to visit and sufficiently to guide them and so it seem'd needfull for such Bishops to have according to the amplitude of their Bishopricks one or two Coajutors in some Region without the City who might disburden them of some parts of the Episcopal Function which could not be done but by some consecrated Bishops Hence 't was that some of these great Bishops Ordain'd in some part of their large Provinces these Bishops but with this provision that these without their leave should do nothing of moment seeing these Regions also belonged to the Care of the City Bishop which we learn continues he from the tenth Canon of the Council of Antioch where it 's expresly Decreed that no Country Bishop Ordain Presbyter or Deacon without the Bishop of the City to which he and his Region is subject But indeed there 's no such thing to be learn'd from that Canon it only says that the Chorepiscopus and his Region was subject to the City as they really were in a Civil Sense not to the Bishop of the City and tho they had said so it 's no proof of his Conclusion seeing they usually pretended Antiquity for the greatest Innovations How far either in or nigh to the Time of the Apostles the Church was from giving to the Bishop such a Princely Dignity as he pretends or from allowing him to do the Work proper to himself by substitute Vassals none acquainted with what remains of these Ancient times can be ignorant and is already oftner then once evinc'd And now I 'm sorry to find a Protestant of sence and Learning lean on that shamefull and most exploded Falshood viz. that the Apostles took the Government of the Empire for their Pattern of Church-Government and darring to publish such gross Falshoods whereof even the more ingenuous Romanists are ashamed The Ecclesiastical Degrees saith Suave were not Originally Instituted as Dignities Preheminencies Rewards or Honours as now they are and have been many hundred years but with Ministery and Charges otherwise called by St. Paul Works and those that exercise them are called by Christ our Lord in the Gospel Workmen and therefore no Man could then enter into cogitation to absent himself from the Execution thereof in his own Person and if any one which seldom happend retired from the Work 't was not thought reasonable he should have either Title or Profit And tho' the Ministeries were of two sorts some Anciently called as now they are with care of Souls others of temporal things for the sustenance and service of the Poor and Sick as were the Deaconries and other inferiour Works all held themselves equally bound to that Service in Person neither did any think of a substitute but for a short time and for great Impediments much less to take another Charge which might hinder that § 13. Bnd now to go on these Countrey Bishops or Pastors could not yet by all these Councils be Un-bishoped And therefore Pope Damasus must next fall on them and authoratively define that they were stark nought in the Church their Institution wicked and
no Inhabitant there no place for my L. Bishop's grace nothing whereon to exercise the Episcopal power save rubbish and desolation In none of the Churches saith Dr. Stilling fleet most spoken of is the succession so clear as is necessary For at Jerusalem it seems somewhat strange how fifteen Bishops of the Circumcision should be crouded into so narrow a room as they are so that many of them could not have above two years time to rule in the Church And it would bear an inquiry where the seat of the Bishops of Jerusalem was from the time of the destruction of the City by Titus when the walls were laid even with the ground by Musonius till the time of Adrian I shall yet in the last place adduce a few passages and I intreat my Reader seriously to weigh them and from whom they came for I am sure they will give great light and satisfaction to all the truly conscientious and disinterested The sixt Anathematism saith a Romanist was much noted in Germany in which an Article of Faith was made of HIERARCHY which word and signification thereof is aliene not to say contrary to the holy Scrsptures and tho' 't was somewhat antiently invented yet the Author is not known and in case he were yet he is an Hyperbolicall Writer not imitated in the use of that Word nor of others of his Invention by any of the Ancients and following the Stile of Christ our Lord and the Holy Apostles and primitive Church it ought to be named not Hierarchy but Hierodiaconia or Hierodoulia And Dr. Heylen who like to Balaam blessing Israel when he would fainest have cursed them uses to establish a Presbyterian Parity of Pastors while he is most desirous to destroy it makes the Bishop in Justine Martyr ' s time all one with the President of the Congregation and ordinary Preacher of God's Word and Celebrator of the Eucharist therein And pleads that in Tertullian's mind Baptism was a work most proper to the Bishop in regard of his Episcopacy or particular Office And the Doctor contends out of Tertullian that in his time Christians receiv'd the Eucharist only from the Bishop's hands and so there were no fewer Bishops than Congregations who mett for hearing of the Word and Celebration of the Sacraments What shew of reason can be given saith Dr. Stilling-fleet why the Apostles should slight the Constitution of the Jewish Synagogues which had no dependance on the Jewish Hierarchy and subsisted not by any Command of the Ceremonial Law The Work of the Synagogue not belonging to the Priests as such but as Persons qualifi'd for instructing others And We are to take nottice that the Rulers of the Church under the Gospell do not properly succeed the Priests and Levites under the Law whose Office was Ceremonial and who were not admitted by any solemn Ordination into their Function It is then a common Mistake to think that the Ministers of the Gospell succeeded by way of Correspondence and Analogy to the Priests under the Law which Mistake hath been the Foundation and Originall of many Errors For when in the primitive Church the name of Priests came to be attributed to Gospell-Ministers from a fair Complyance as was thought then of the Christians only to the name used both among Jews and Gentiles in process of time corruptions increasing in the Church those names that were used by the Christians by way of Analogy and Accommodation brought in the things themselves primarily intended by these names so by the metaphoricall names of Priests and Altars at last came up the Sacrifice of the Mass without which they thought the names of Priests and Altars were insignificant This Mâ—stake we see run all along thro' the Writers of the Church as soon as the name Priests was apply'd to the Elders of the Church that they derived their Succession from the Priests of Aaroâ—'s Order In short he still contends that the model of Governing the Christian Church was an exact imitation of that of the Synagogues which were no other thing than the particular parish Churches among the Jews and in every one of which there was a a Bishop paralell to him who in the Apocalypse is the Angel of the Church And Dr. Lightfoot is of the same mind The Apostle saith he calleth the Minister Episâ—opus from the common and known title of the CHAZAN or Overseer in the Synagogue And Besides these there was the publick Minister of the Synagogue who pray'd publickly and took care about reading the Law and sometimes preached if there were not some other to discharge this Office This person was called SHELIACH TSIBBOR the Angel of the Church and CHAZAN HAKENESETH the Chazan or Bishop of the Congregation The Aruch gives the reason of the name The Chazan saith he is SHELIACH TSIBBOR the Angel of the Church or the publick Minister and the Targum renders the word ROVEH by the word HOSE one that oversees For it 's incumbent on him to oversee how the Reader reads and whom he may call cut to read in the Law The publick Minister of the Synagogue himself read not the Law publickly but every Sabbath he called out seven of the synagogue on other days fewer whom he judged fit to read He stood by him that read with great care observing that he read nothing either falsly or improperly and calling him back and correcting him if he had failed in any thing and hence he was called CHAZAN that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Bishop or Overseer Certainly the signification of the word Bishop and Angel of the Church had been determined with less noise if recourse had been made to the proper fountains and men had not vainly disputed about the signification of words taken I know not whence The service and worship of the Temple being abolished as being Ceremonial God transplanted the worship and publick adoration of God used in the synagogues which was moral into the Christian Church to wit the publick Ministry publick prayers reading God's Word and preaching c. Hence the names of the Ministers of the Gospel were the very same the Angel of the Church the Bishop which belonged to the Ministers in the synagogues There were also three Deacons or Almoners on whom was the care of the poor c. Among the Jews saith Dr. Burnet he who was the chief of the synagogue was called CHAZAN HAKENSETH the Bishop of the Congregation and SHELIACH TSIBBOR the Angel of the Church And the Christian Church being modelled as near the form of the synagogue as they could be as they retained many of the Rites so the form of the government was continued and the names remained the same And In the synagogues there was first one that was called the Bishop of the Congregation Next the three Orderers and Judges of every thing about the synagogue who were called TSEKENIM and by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
that is Elders These ordered and determined every thing that concern'd the synagogues or the persons in it Next them were the three PARNASSIN or Deacons whose charge was to gather the Collections of the rich and to distribute them to the poor All the Presbyters saith the Learned Le Moyne took not on them the burden of preaching and exponing the scriptures some were taken up in serving at the administration of the Sacraments searching into scandals visiting the sick strengthning the weak and providing for the Churches profit but the business of preaching belonged only to the Apostles the Bishops and the first Presbyters Hence in times of the ancient Church the Bishops perpetually preached which the inferior Presbyters did not except they were admitted thereto by the Bishops and chief Presbyters Most memorable to this purpose are the words of the learned Jesuite Sirmundus Anciently saith he the Bishops only and no others preached the word of God for this was their proper province and work 't was afterwards tho' not alike soon every where allowed to the Presbyters to preach this was soonest begun in the East as is clear from the practice of Pierius Chrysostome and others who preached while they were only Presbyters And now judge tho' nothing else had been adduced but what is just now brought from these profoundly learn'd and most unsuspected Arbiters if the Regimen and Way of the true primitive Church was not according to the Gospell Humility and Simplicity most opposite to a terrene Domination Prelaticall Grandor and Power over other Pastors and the vanity of preterscripturall and superstitious Ceremonies if she then enjoy'd not Bishops or Pastors Ruling Elders and Deacons if then whosoever had power to dispense the Word and Sacraments with the Charge of any particular Flock or Congregation was not reciprocally one and the same with a Bishop and finally if the primitive Way was not entirely one with that of our Church of Scotland and others of the reformed Churches which is now known by the name of Presbytry Hence it 's carefully to be noted how odd and grievous Alterations were made both as to the use of Terms and in the Offices they had primitively signifi'd in Scripture In yea even after the Apostolick Age we find that the word Bishop whereever it holds forth an ordinary Church-Officer alwayes signifying a Labourer in the Word and Doctrine and Dispenser of the Srcraments Pastor of a Flock or Congregation We find also the Word Presbyter taken as its equivalent denoting this very thing elsewhere as is now made evident the word Presbyter signifies no Pastor of a Flock but only one who was to assist him in Ruling and Guidance thereof some also of this latter kind of Presbyters designing the Ministry there beeing then few or no Theological Schools were trained up for the Office under the Inspection of Bishops or Parochial Pastors and accordingly whiles assisted them therein But this was only accidental to the Office of a ruling Presbyter Afterward there was a new kind of Church Office invented whose chief work was not to feed any Flock or Congregation and yet was reputed the Pastor of many Flocks which was a compleat Contradiction His Province was mainly to rule and domineer over a multitude of both Pastors and Flocks him they called the Bishop Another Office epually new and unknown to Scripture and prime Antiquity was a kind of semipastor or half Minister who was to do all the Ministeriall Work and yet was so far from having any Pastorall Power that on the contrary he was only the subject and substitute of another and him they called the Presbyter As for the other sort of Presbyters they came in time to be well nigh intirely abolished and forgotten The like Chrysostome observes of the Deacons saying that in his time such Deacons as the Apostles ordained were not in the Church Hence it 's not strange if the Ancients while sometimes they violent the Scriptures to make them favour what in their oun times was obtaining and at other times while either out of design and freedome or casually they light on the true Meaning of the Scriptures speak most perplexedly of Bishops and Presbyters and afford no small ground of Wrangling and Disputation to all that are exercised in this Controversy In the mean while such Immutation was not made in a day 't was sloe and apparently plausible like the weed which at lenth you may see that it is groun up yet its act of growing ye shall never perceive This Alteration as even Spanhemius F. no enemy to the Hierarchy observes began first in great Cities and beside the generall occasions or rather pretexts for it which we already noted there was this colour more peculiar to great Cities in Rome for example tho there were Christians sufficient to make up severall ordinary Congregations yet at some special times all or most of these used to meet at one place and accordingly were accounted but one Church This might occasion the making of a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or one particular Moderator among the Pastors who got some primacy of Order and at these more solemn meetings of the People appeared spake most and in time got the appropriation of the name Bishop all this was notwithstanding only a meer prostasy he must nixt have a power over his Collegues in the City the Bishops the parochial Pastors of the Country and lesser Cities are next to be invaded This Fermentation which had small beginnings and still grew untill all was soured suelled especially and was most operative in a time of peace whereof in the third Century they had a good space even from the Death of Valerian untill Dioclesian's Persecution The Emperors themselves saith Eusebius then so much favoured them that they not only gave them Liberty of the publick Exercise of their Religion but also made some of them their Chamberlains and Governours of Provinces In this time the alteration of both Government and Worship was certainly not a litle promoved For nothing then reign'd among the Christians but contention ambition They were not content continous he with the former Edifices but builded large Churches from the foundation But when thro' too much liberty we fell into sloath and negligence when every one began to envy and backbite another when we managed as 't were an intestine warr amongst our selves with Words as with Swords Pastors against Pastors and People against People being dashed one on another exercised flrife and tumult when deceit and Guile had grown to the highest pitch of wickedness When being void of all sense we did not so much as once think how to please God yea rather on the other hand impiously we imagined that human Affairs are not at all guided by Divine Providence we dayly added Crimes to Crimes when our Pastors having despised the Rule of Religion strove mutually with one another studying nothing more then how to outdoe one another in strife
Did the primitive Church use Organs in Divine Worship Were they not first introduced in the seventh Century by Pope Vitalian And yet it is doubtfull if they were so soon received For Aquinas dislikes and condemns them Or where pray in the true primitive Church shall they find the Surplice Corner-Cap and Tippet Or where to name no more shall they find the Bishop allowed to involve himself in secular cares Civil and State Offices or Imployments Some used indeed when they pleased the Christian Emperor allowing it to make the Bishops Arbiters of their private Debates but to all the good Bishops as Augustine complains this was a most weighty Grievance But in more early times even this was not permitted for Cyprian condemns as altogether unlawfull that any Church-man should be so much as a testamentary Tutor to any Pupil And mark the ground he goes on For saith he whosoever are honoured with the Divine Priest-Hood or have a place in the Clergy ought only to serve at the Altar and spend their time in Prayer and Supplication For 't is written no Man that warreth intangleth himself with the Affairs of this Life that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a souldier Thâ—â— is such a clear and inevitable Condemnation of the Practice of the Hierarchicks that the Learned Annotators Pamelius and the Bishop of Oxford finding nothing wherewith to elude it skipp it over with deep silence And now judge if Cyprian was of one mind with the Bishop of Five Churches who will have the meaning of Paul's words cited by Cyprian to be that every Christian ought to abstain from those things which are repugnant to Christian Profession which are sins only and will not have the Apostle to speak any thing of Church-men in particular or if Cyprian would have expon'd the sixth of the Canons ascribed to the Apostles as doth Heylyn who makes the Canon only to mean that Bishops or inferiour Clergy-Men might not be Consuls Praetors Generals or undergoe such publick Offices in the State of Rome as were most sought for and esteemed by the Gentiles there Heylen is here somewhat intricat and his cause required it However the sum of his drift is that the exercising of these or the like Offices is allowed to any Pastor by the Canon Now altho' ' tallowed it not when the Empire was Pagan and he would prove something of this kind from 1 Cor. 6. where he must count all Magistrats thro' the Christian World Pagans and Unbelievers for otherways none shall ever prove from this Scripture so much as the lawfullness of a Bishop or Pastors judging and determining any difference between any two that referr themselves to his Arbitration And tho' he should prove it pray what is this to the exercising the Office of Consul General Praetor Chancellour Treasurer or the like pieces of such temporal Power and Grandor Judge moreover were there no more but Paul his words to Timothy 1. 4 13 14 15. And 2 Tim. 4. 2 5. If there be Leasure left any Pastor to be either Consul General or ought else of this nature and consequently if all the shifts they use on this head be not sufficiently overthrown by these Scriptures only But I had almost forgotten to notice how they torment themselves that they may torment and detort Cyprian For Saravia says that the Canon Cyprian speaks off was but particular and provincial only for the Church of Carthage But Heylen refutes Saravia his comment and says Cyprian spoke so because the Church was then almost destitute and unprovided of Presbyters As if Cyprian had not spoken of Chruch-men absolutely and without the least intimation of any such restriction and grounded his saying on a Scripture which whatsoever it speaks of Church-men confessedly says it of the mall be they many or few or in whatsoever time and place they live Moreover it 's most certain that in Matthew 20. 25 26 27 28. The Princes of the Gentiles c. And Mark 10. 42 43 44 45. And Luke 22. 25 26 27. All Pastors of Flocks are prohibited to exercise Dominion secular and state Dignity and a parity of the Apostles amongst themselves and in them a parity of all ordinary Pastors or Ministers of the Gospell among themselves is enjoyned D. M. pretends to engage with the latter part of this Inference but first he mis-states the question as if from these Texts we pleaded for a perfect equality of all the Officers of Christs house without distinction between extraordinary and ordinary Ministers or between Pastors and other Officers and so his saying that the Apostles exercised Jurisdiction over other Ecclesiasticks whether true or false is nothing to the purpose But saith D. M. Our blessed Saviour supposeth degrees of Subordination amongst his own Disciples as well as other societies and therefore he directs the Ecclesiasticks who would climb up to the highest places in the Church to take other methods then these that are most usual amongst the Grandees of the World He that deserved preferment in the Church was to be the servant of all Which answer he steals from the Jesuite Bellarmine who answers that Christ only directs ecclesiastick Princes teaches that as such they ought to rule their subjects not as do Kings and Lords but as Fathers and Pastors To whom Junius replyes that all this is quite contrarie to both Christs words and scope The sons of Zebedie saith he desired a Dominion this Christ rejects and refuses to give them again the falshood of this answer is demonstrated positively by Christs following words who in stead of this Dominion which they desired enjoyns them a humble Ministry and Service Wherefore there is a clear opposition between Dominion and Ministry the former belonging the World the latter to the Church Bishops are not saith Bellarmine here forbidden to exercise a dominion like that of godly Kings but only like that of Tyrranical Kings who know not God We deny replyes Junius that there is any such restriction neither can it be proved And accordingly Junius refutes and bafles all the Sophistrie that Bellarmine and after him our Prelatists ordinarly bring to prove that only tyrrany and not all sort of principality or superiority is by our Saviour in these Texts prohibited And with Junius joyns the whole stream of Protestant Writers But our Saviour saith D. M. did that himself among them which he now commanded them to do to one another and therefore the doing of this towards one another in obedience to the command now under consideration could not inferr a Parity unless that they blasphemously infer that Christ and his Apostles were equal For our Saviour recomends what he enjoyns from his own constant and visible practice among them viz that he himself who was their Lord and Master was their sevant and therefore it becomes the greatest among them in imitation of him to be modest calm and humble towards all their
subordinate Brethren A sturdy argument forsooth as if our most blessed Master to quell his Disciples their ambition of aspiring to a preheminence over one another and to render them more content with a humble and brotherly parity could not adduce and urge his own most holy and meek example of his most wonderful condescending to take upon him the form of a Servant and do the works of a Servant among his Apostles and that so humblie as if he had been only their Companion and nothing above them but he must anone be concluded to degrade and throw down himself into a meer equality with his Disciples Can any in the exercise of his wit make such a Collection Neither can better befall him for as is his constant practice this wretched Paralogism he also borrows from another Jebusite Cornelius a Lapide who at the same rate depraves this Text of Matthew to save from a mortal blow Peter's fictitious Primacy But in the next place which is little better D. M. turns Jew on our hand Let it be further considered saith he that the Hierarchy and Subordination of Priests was established by Divine Authority in the Jewish Church and if our Saviour had pulled down that ancient Polity and commanded an equality among the Presbyters of the New Testament he would not have stated the Opposition between his own Disciples and the Lords of the Gentiles but rather between the Priests of the Mosaic Oeconomy and the Disciples of the New Testament And agian fearing least his Jâ—daism and also his self-repugnancy should not have otherways been apparent enough We do not saith he now plead as some ignorant People may pretend that there ought to be a Bishop above Presbyters because that there was a High-Priest among the Jews but rather thus that the Hierarchy that obtained in the Patriarchal and Jewish Oeconomy was never abrogated in the new Well then is there on Earth a visible High-Priest over the whole Church the Levitical Orders Rites Temple-service the very things wherein the Jewish Hierarchy consisted and shadows of Christ to come now allowable But to come to his cavill and quiet this child of Ignorance D. M. should know that beside the Disciples ambition to get up over one another according to the carnal apprehension they then entertained of Christ kingdome wherein our Hierarchick Lord Bishops are the Apostles successors indeed and all Hierarchicks men of Apostolick principles they looked also for a great worldly and civil power and dominion which was not at all comprehended in the Jewish Priesthood nor was then possessed by any of the Priests and so our Lord 's stateing the opposition between his Disciples and the Lords of the Gentiles is by far more apt for his purpose than if he had stated it between them and the Priests of the old Oeconomy which had been altogether lame and doon scarce the half of his bussiness In a word the Romishness and Falshood of all these his Cavills is manifest were there no more from this only that if they do any thing they make for the defence of that new Romish Doctrine of Peter's Supremacy which both the Fathers and all sound Protestants not only Presbyterians but also Episcopals yea some that otherwise deserve not the name of Protestants as Dr. Heylen explode prove that there was a compleat Equality Parity amongst the Apostles And they deduce their Conclusion especially from this text of Matthew's Gospel and its parallels And indeed if there be as doubtless there are any places of Scripture fit to prove it these texts deservedly hold the first place The Author of the Opus imperfectum thought by some to be Chrysostome saith on this place of Matthew Quicunque autem desiderat primatum in terrâ inveniet confusionem in coelo Whosoever desires a primacy on Earth shall find Confusion in Heaven Now suppose the truth of these words and compare them with the words of the Apostle 1 Tim. 3. 1. If a man desires the Office of a Bishop he desires a good work And it 's clear the Office of a Bishop is quite another thing than a Primacy for to desire the former is lawfull and laudable but to desire the latter is dangerous and damnable and so much by the way for I love not to transcribe the labours of others And so angry is D. M. at New Opinions and for their sake at every thing that 's New that he scarce ever advances any Argument Vindication or Defence but what is so frequently and soundly baffl'd so bare and worn as to vy even with the old ancient Garments of the Gibeonites These Texts as I said prohibite also all Pastors of Flocks to exercise Dominion Secular or State Dignities which is irrefragably made out by our Writers against Bellarmine de Pontifice and other Romanists However 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 either the Possession or Hope of such Emoluments and Dignities as also the glistering gayetie of gorgious and theatrick Ceremonies close mens mouths and keep them from acknowledging the Truth for which even a Pagan may come in to reprove them O curvae interris animae coelestium inanes Quid juvat hoc templis nostros immittere mores Et bona Dijs ex hac scelerata ducere pulpa Dull earthy minds who know no heavenly thing What profites it into the Church to bring Our own Inventions or to dream that we Can with Lust's fewel please the Deity Dicite Pontifices in sancto quid facit aurum Speak out your minds ye Priests and do not lie Can gold your holy places sanctifie It 's an old saying that the Church brought forth Riches but the Daugter devoured the Mother who when she had wooden Cups she had golden Priests but afterward she got golden Cups and wooden Priests Even their Pseudo-Clement is prolix on this subject exhorting the Bishop to be dis-engaged of all worldly cares and affairs and perpetually imploy'd in Preaching and Prayer and the like Ministerial duties And indeed all Pastors of Flocks would carefully abstain from secular and state Offices and every thing else that may abstract them from their Charges and Flocks least their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 procure them Functius's reward But if our Hierarchicks will not hear our blessed Lord and his Apostles if they will not hear the genuine writtings of the Ancients nor yet these spurious pieces whose Authros were otherwayes sufficiently Hierarchick and Ceremonious I think they might listen to the Bishop af Aiace for he was a Member of the Council of Trent John Baptista Bernard saith Suave Bishop of Aiace who thâ— he believed that residencie was de jure Divino yet thought it not fit to speak of that question delivered a singular speech saying that not aiming to establish one Opinion more then another but only so to inforce residency as that it may be really executed he thought it vain to declare from whence the obligation came or whatsoever else and
of our Freedom from Mystical Babylon our Adversaries acknowledging that Mr. Knox and his Fellow-labourers in the Church-policy did exactly follow the Genevan Model which these men use to make the Original of Presbytry It 's confess'd also that John Knox refus'd a Bishoprick in England on this account that it had Quid commune cum Antichristo Whereby tho' nothing else could be brought 't is clear as the Sun that Knox I may say the same of most of his Fellow-labourers in the Reformation was intirely averse from their Hierarchick Domination § 3. Wherefore the Author of a late Book call'd The Fundamental Charter of Presbytry examin'd and disprov'd quite skips over these Evidences of Knox's being Antiprelatick notwithstanding that the only design of the far greater part of his Book was directly to prove these out Reformers and Knox in special to have been of the prelatical Perswasion However let 's hear the chief of the Answers he gives to such other Proofs hereof as he adventures to engage with § 4. The first is a passage of Knox's letter to the Assembly viz. Vnfaithfull and Traitors to the Flock shall ye be before the Lord Jesus if that with your consent directly or indirectly ye suffer unworthy men to be thrust in within the Ministry of the Kirk under wâ—at pretence that ever it be Remember the Judge before whom ye must make an account and resist that Tyranny as ye would avoid Hell-fire To which our Author answers denying that Knox by Tyranny here means Episcopacy and saith that 't is impossible to make more of the Letter than that Knox deem'd it a pernicious and tyrannical thing for any Person whatsoever to thrust unworthy Men into the Ministry of the Church Which Answer evanishes so soon as we shall understand the occasion of Knox's Letter Some powerfull Courtiers had then sacrilegiously invaded a great part of the Churches Revenues and were greedily grasping the remainder to the great grief of all good Men and detriment of the Church which both in her Assemblies and otherways vehemently urged that these Revenues should be imploy'd on sustentation of Ministers many of whom being unprovided were ready to starve and on maintaining of Schools relieving the Poor and other such pious Uses These Courtiers therefore to free themselves of such unacceptable Monitors and secure them of what they had gotten plot the reduction of a kind of Diocesan Bishops Abbots Priors and other such Popish Orders with whom they were to make a sacrilegious Compact and to give these titular Church-men some small pittance of the Revenues the rest being possessed in their name by these Courtiers Now at the very time of the writing of Knox's Letter this was in agitation and a design laid to practise upon some of the Assembly as shortly thereafter at the Meeting in Leith appear'd at which and elsewhere in these times there were not wanting among the Ministers who moved with hope of Domination over their Brethren and some small augmentation of Rent made no bones of such simoniacal Pactions or to use the express words of the Confessions of their best Friends such durtâ— and vile Bargains And now judge what Knox mean'd by his Exhortation to keep out unworthy Men and resist Tyranny And 't is most presumable that Spotswood sufficiently saw that Knox's Letter goares Prelacy otherwise he had not mangl'd the same and wholly omitted all mention of Tyranny § 5. And that this Knox's Letter levell'd at the Bishops then about to be introduc'd is further evident from his refusal to inaugurat John Douglas Bishop of St. Andrews his denouncing an Anathema to the Giver and Receiver of the Bishoprick and his open professing his dislike of the whole Order At this our Author takes exception saying The certain Manuscript from which Calderwood says he had this relation is uncertain But he should have look'd into Petrie who names the Author William Scot that eminent Minister at Couper Now that 't is like enough that Knox who was then at St. Andrews said so and express'd suitable resentments of the durty Bargain between Morton and Douglas who by a simoniacal Paction got into the See is by our Author expresly acknowledg'd And indeed if we consider the indignity of the Crime and the Lyon-like boldness of Mr. Knox against such Vices 't is altogether incredible but that he vented his resentments with a Witness and to the noticing of all thinking Men then present yet all this is skipp'd over by Spotswood For he knew well enough that this Relation should have shew'd how little kindness Knox bore to their Hierarchy Moreover which is most noticeable in this matter these who then favour'd Prelacy being generally such simoniacal Pedlers were so far from writing the several Actions and Church-transactions of these times that they made it their care to suppress and destroy the publick Monuments of the Church Witness B. Adamsone one of the Articles of whose Confession to which as is acknowledg'd by Spotswood he subscrib'd was that not without his special allowance some leaves of the Books of the Assemblies were rent out and such things as made against the Bishops their estate were destroyed in Falkland before the Books were deliver'd to the King's Majesty Which considerations suffice to prove the truth of that historical Relation He alledges next that tho' we had reason to believe that Knox said and did so yet it follows not that he was for the Divine Right of Parity Adding That 't is like enough Knox said so for dreadfull Invasions were made upon the Patrimony of the Church But this Invasion was so linked with the introduction of Prelacy that they had both common Friends and Enemies so that Knox declaring against either must be judg'd equally averse from both And indeed the introduction of Prelacy was consequentially this very destruction and consumption of the Churches Goods against which Knox inveigh'd Or dare he say that it had satisfi'd him if they had been consum'd in sustaining the Luxury and Grandour of Bishops Abbots and Priors whom the Court was about then to introduce providing only these Church Revenues had been kept from the secular Nobility Moreover 't is evident to whosoever reads Knox's words that the Invasion of the Church-patrimony was far from being the sole Ground of the dislike he shew'd to Episcopacy The Matter in short is when John Douglas was made Tulchan Bishop of St. Andrews Mr. Knox refused to Ordain him denouncing Anathemaes to the Giver and to the Receiver and when John Rutherford Provest of the old Colledge had said that Mr. John Knox ' s repining had proceeded from male-contentment the next Lora's-day John Knox said in Sermon I have refus'd greater Bishoprick than ever 't was and might have had it with the favour of greater Men than he hath this but I did and do repine for discharge of my Conscience that the Church of Scotland be not subject to that Order This last Clause viz.
that the Church of Scotland be not subject to that Order he adventures not once to mention which yet is a reason of Knox's repining and so gives the meaning of his whole Discourse And seeing 't is of equal credit with his foregoing words being not only with the rest taken by Petrie out of that Historical Relation but related also by Calderwood fully scatters all his fogg and clearly determines the present Question somewhat else he hath here but of small moment As Knox when Douglas who was already Rector of the Vniversity and Provest of the old Colledge was made Bishop regrated that so many Offices were laid on an old Man which scarcely twenty of the best Gifts were able to bear Thence he Infers that Knox ' s resentment of Douglas his advance was not from any Perswasion he had of the unlawfulness of Prelacy As if Knox might not assert the unlawfulness of Prelacy and yet say so much for a a Superpondium to his other Grievances And to shew even on Supposition as they pretended of the allowableness of Episcopacy how little sence of Duty or Conscience was in either Givers or Receivers § 6. There was at this time saith M. D. Hume no small Contest and Debate betwixt the Court and the Church about Bishops and Prelats concerning their Office and Jurisdiction The Ministers laboured to have them quite abolished and taken away and the Court thought that form of Government to be agreeable and compatible with a Monarchical Estate and more conform to the Rules of Policy and Civil Government of a Kingdom Besides the Courtiers had tasted the sweetness of their Rents and Revenues putting in titular Bishops who were only their Receivers and had a certain Pension or Stipend for discharging and executing the Ecclesiastical part of their Office but the main profit was taken up by Courtiers for their own use Wherefore they laboured to retain at least these shadows of Bishops for letting of leases and such other things which they thought were not good in Law otherways There was none more forward to keep them up than the Earl of Morton for he had gone Ambassadour to England on his own privat Charges and to recompence his great Expenses in that Journey the Bishoprick of St. Andrews being then vacant was conferr'd upon him He put in Mr. John Douglass who was Provost of the New Colledge in St. Andrews to bear the Name of Bishop and to gather the Rents till such time as the Solemnity of Inauguration could be obtain'd for which he was countable to him This he did immediatly after he came home out of England Now he will have him to sit in Parliament and to vote there as Arch-bishop The Superintendent of Fyfe did inhibit him to sit there or to Vote under pain of Excommunication Morton commanded him to do it under pain of Treason and Rebellion The Petition giv'n in to the Parliament desiring a competent Provision for the maintaince of Preachers in which they complained of the wrong done unto them by the Courtiers who intercepted their means was cast over the Bare and rejected and by the most common report Morton was the first cause thereof Afterward Morton in a Meeting of some Delegats and Commissioners of the Church at Leith by the Superintendent Dune's means used the matter so that he obtain'd their Consent to have his Bishop admitted and install'd Wherefore the third of February he caus'd affix a schedul on the Church door of St Andrews wherein he charged the Ministers to conveen and admit him to the Place which they did accordingly but not without great Opposition For Mr. Patrick Adamson then a Preacher but afterward Arch-bishop there himself in a Sermon which he preached against the Order and Office of Bishops said there were three sorts of Bishops 1. The Lords Bishop to wit Christ's and such was every Pastor 2. My Lord Bishop that is such as Bishop as is a Lord who sits and Votes in Parliament and exercises Jurisdiction over his Brethren 3. And the third sort was my Lord's Bishop that is one whom some Lord or Nobleman at Court did put into the place to be his Receiver to gather the Rents and let Leases for his Lordship's behoofe but had neither the Means nor Power of a Bishop This last sort he called a Tulchan Bishop because as the Tulchan which is a Calves skin stuff'd with straw is set up to make the Cow give down her milk so are such Bishops set up that their Lords by them may milk the Bishopricks Likewise Mr. Knox preached against it the tenth of February and in both their hearings Morton's and his Arch-bishop to their Faces pronunced Athathema danti Anathema accipienti And We shewed before how in matters of Church-government he ever inclined as the most politique Course to the state of Bishops The Name was yet retained by Custom◠the Rents were lifted also by them as we have said more for other Mens use and profit than their own They had also place and vote in Parliament after the old manner and he would gladly have had them to have keeped their Power and Jurisdiction over their Brethren Master John Douglass being dead he fill'd the place by putting in Mr. Patrick Adamson his domestick Chaplain who then followed that Course tho before he had preach'd against it Many were displeas'd herewith all the Ministers especially they of the greatest Authority and all Men of Estates that were best affected to Religion And which he cites out of an English Historian Francis Botevill As touching his viz. Morton's setting up and maintaining the estate of Bishops whereof there had ensued great debate and contention betwixt him and the Ministry he said it did not proceed of an ill mind of any malice or contempt of them or their Callings but meerly out of want of better knowledge thinking that Form of Government to be most conform to the Rules of Policy and to be fittest for the times That if he had then known better he would have done otherways And He viz. Morton was also calm this appeared in his carriage toward Mr. Knox who had used him roughly and rebuk'd him sharply for divers things but especially for his labouring to set up and maintain the estate of Bishops Hence 't is most manifest how not only Knox but also the whole body of our Church disliked and hated the very first bud and likeness of Prelacy and how by meer force and fraud of the voracious Court-politicians upon the dishonesty of some but the unwariness and faintness of many moe of the Ministry These monstrous Tulchans for all men even our present Prelatists are ashamed of them got that minot's harbour in Scotland § 7. Our Author Answers for he insists long on this matter That the Question is not now how this was done but if it was done For if it was done it is an Argument that the Clergy then thought little on the iudispensibility of Parity Just