Selected quad for the lemma: city_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
city_n	call_v	chief_a	province_n	5,625	4	8.4072	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A70471	A treatise of the episcopacy, liturgies, and ecclesiastical ceremonies of the primitive times and of the mutations which happened to them in the succeeding ages gathered out of the works of the ancient fathers and doctors of the church / by John Lloyd, B.D., presbyter of the church of North-Mimmes in Hertfordshire.	Lloyd, John, Presbyter of the Church of North-Mimmes.	1660 (1660)	Wing L2655A; ESTC R21763	79,334	101

twelfth successor of Peter Polycrates who was 65 years in the Lord when he wrote his Epistle unto Victor Bishop of Rome concerning the time of the celebration of the Pàsche which was about the year of our Lord 197 whereby it appeareth that he began to flourish about 50 years after the death of John the Apostle if not much sooner if he was come to years of discretion before his Baptism Polycrates I say who was so near the times of the Apostles saith that he was the eighth Bishop of Ephesus Now it is acknowledged by all that in the time of Victor a Bishop had the preheminence over the Presbyters in every Church and therefore it is consequent that Polycrates by the seven Bishops preceding him in Ephesus meaneth not single Presbyters but such Bishops as were in the Church at the time of his writing that Epistle to Victor If the principality of the Ecclesiastical regiment had been in the Colledge of Presbyters until the death of the Apostles and after their decease the principality of that government was committed to one and not before surely Polycrates Irenaeus and Hegesippus had egregiously prevaticated in attributing the principality of one to some part of the time of the Apostles which they living with thousands who must have seen and consented to that change made after the Apostles decease if any such had been then first made could not be ignorant of But that these holy men were not unfaithful in their relation doth evidently appear by this namely that all the Fathers none contradicting agree with them affirming Bishops having in an ordinary way a superiority over Presbyters to have been ordained in the times of the Apostles Concerning Arch-bishops Sect 6. omitting the guesses of some ancient Doctors concerning the Archiepiscopacy of Mark Timothy and Titus we may find some intimation of their being in the end of the second century partly by the act of Victor Bishop of Rome in his attempt to excommunicate the Churches of the East and partly by a passage in Tertullian where he saith the Bishop of Bishops hath made a decree c. but certain it is that before the year of our Lord 250 wherein Cyprian Bishop of Carthage flourished l. de pudicitia c. 1. Arch-bishops were ordained in the Church For Cyprian writeth that there were many years and a long age since many Bishops convening under Agryppinus Bishop of Carthage decreed Epist ad Jub●in ad Cornel. l. 4. Epist 8. c. and in one of his Epistles to Cornelius Bishop of Rome he saith that his adversaries boasted saying that twenty five Bishops of Numidia would come to Carthage who would make unto themselves a Bishop there Among these Arch-bishops who were such indeed but not yet in name that we can find in any approved auctor of that age were some more eminent then other each of which had some Arch-bishops subordinate to them which in following times were called primates for in a province was one chief City under which were divers mother Cities which had lesser Cities under them In these were the Bishops in the Mother-cities were the Metropolitans or Arch-bishops in the first the Primates priviledges made some variations Of Primates and Metropolitans the Council of Nice saith it is manifest that if any be ordained without the will and conscience of the Metropolitane Bishop this great and holy Council hath decreed he ought not to be a Bishop And in another Canon the ancient manner or custome doth last in Egypt Lybia and Pentapolis that the Bishop of Alexandria have the power of all these for the Bishop of Rome hath a like custome in like manner also at Antioch and other provinces let the due honour proper to every Church be preserved to it These Primates and Arch-bishops had no power in things proper to the cognizance of a Bishop in his own Diocess but onely in those things whereof the Canons of the Church had committed to them the hearing and Judgement or which were of concernment to many Diocesses And this is it which Cyprian meaneth where he saith Epist ad Quintium none of us Bishops doth constitute himself to be a Bishop of Bishops or doth compell this Colledge by tyrannical terror to the necessity of obeying seeing every Bishop hath according to his own liberty and free will that he may not be judged by another Adrian the Emperour Apud Vopisum in Saturnino who reigned from the year of our Lord 117 to the year 135 writeth in a certain Epistle horrible untruths against Christians as that there was never a Presbyter of the Christians which was not a Mathematician a Southsayer c. that the very Patriarch when he came to Egypt was by some compelled to adore Serapis by others to adore Christ that they which said themselves to be Bishops of Christ were devoted to Serapis It seems this Emperour had taken notice that Christians had Ecclesiastical officers whereof some were-called Presbyters some called Bishops and perhaps that the Bishop of Alexandria was over all Egypt c. and Bishops thereof and therefore calls him by the name of a like civil Magistrate Patriarch which was afterward used by Christians in a like sense but too much hath been said to shew that it was ordained in the times of the Apostles that the principal authority in every Church should be in one Presbyter advanced above and over the rest unto whom in a short time after the name of Bishop was made proper This truth is so clear and written as it were with capital or uncial letters in the writings of all the ancients that he that runneth may read it in them In the next place it should be considered whether that Ordinance constituting Episcopacy made in the Apostolical times was not in proper sense an Apostolical constitution Sect. 7. and if so whether therefore it be unalterable But that this matter may be better understood it is convenient first to speak of the Authority and Power given to the Bishop what it was and how ample in those times De baptisme c. 17. Tertullian gives us some information in this point when he saith that the chief Priest which is the Bishop hath the right or power of giving Baptism then the Presbyters and Deacons but not without the authority of the Bishop for the preservation of the honour of the Church which remaining safe peace is safe maintained For the understanding of this we must consider that where the exercise of the power of preaching baptising c. in such place and among such persons was not by some ordinance of the Church determined to this or that particular Presbyter there it pertained to the Bishop to do it and not to any other without his leave yea the very Ordinances and Canons could not be made without his consent and authority as their principal author under Christ In Epist ad Titum c. 1. For as Hierom saith the whole care of the Church