your Younger years were seasoned with such kind of Authors as they appear to have been I 'll instance only in two Irenaeus Philadelphus and Robert Parker unless Martin Mar-Prelate be adjoyned Men so unplacably seditious and revengeful against our Church especially since you are to this day of an Opinion That you served the Church of England in writing your Irenicum An Erynnicum is more likely to be an effect of such studies And I wish that Book had made less heart-burnings and contentions among us and you had less promoted them by so many Impressions In fine if such a procedure as I have in part made yours already appear to be and shall more fully declare in this Epistle be the way to re-establish the Church of England and your Zeal and Affections be thus only indicated then they were for the Succession of the Crown who still attended the Earl of Shaftsbury and dined twice a Week with the Lord Russel making the rest of that Conspiracy their daily Associates and Confidents who kept the Green-Ribbon Clubb sided all along with Ignoramus Jury-men and abhorr'd all Mankind besides That supplyed Johnson's courses that he might with more Dispatch answer Dr. Hicks and defend his Julian lest the Party complain and grow weary of their tedious carryings on or be discouraged and beat off by the Strength of the Doctors reasonings and demonstrations against it who had West for their standing Council and Rumball for their Malt-Man and bought their Tables and Wainscot of the Protestant Joiner as we know he declared at the Gallows at Oxford of whom he had some of his Doctrines Thirdly You take all Power out of the hands of the Church Officers for determining Indifferencies and making occasional Laws for the better Ruling and Governing their Body and ending Controversies as they arise and place it wholly and solely in the Magistrate or Secular Governor as the only Power and Person that can make Church-Laws binding the Conscience And this you have done deliberately upon full thoughts and after a thorow enquiry and debate in order as you tell us to the laying a Foundation for Peace and Vnion Part I. c. 2. § 6 7. and c. 6. § 7. pag. 106 127 131. I 'll recite these principal passages for the satisfaction of the Reader You place in him the external Imperative Power of Jurisdiction concerning matters of the Church or as you explain your self the Nomothetical Legislative Power as it is distinguished from that which is properly called Politicial And you say the same again in matters undetermined by the word concerning the external Polity of the Church of God the Magistrate hath Power of determining things so they be agreeable to the Word of God. That no other Persons have power to make Laws binding Men to obedience but only the Civil Magistrate with-holding nothing from him but Preaching the Gospel and Administring the Sacraments in which two things you say consists the Authoritative Exercise of the Ministerial Function derived by Christ unto his Ministers making the Magistrate his own Guide according to the Word of God in the Administration of his Function and by consequence his own Preacher not subject to the Power of the Ministers that is he is to interpret the Scriptures to himself which comes very near to that of Mr. Hobbs in his Leviathan Part III. c. 4. p. 252. No Man ought in the Interpretation of Scripture to proceed farther than the bounds that are set by their several Sovereigns As also p. 295. c. 42. That the right of judging what Doctrines are fit for Peace and to be taught by Subjects is in all Commonwealths inseparably annexed to the Sovereign Power Civil whether it be in one Man or in one Assembly of Men. You go on at the same rate and say The Power of declaring the Obligation of former Laws and of consulting and advising the Magistrate for setling of new Laws for the Polity of the Church belongs to the Pastors and Governors of the Church of God but they have no more Authority to make any new Laws or Constitutions binding Mens Consciences than a command from the Supreme Authority that inferior Magistrates should be obeyed doth imply in them any Power to make new Laws to bind them Power arising from mutual compact and consent of parties is most agreeable to the nature of Church-Power being not coactive but directive And such was the confederate discipline of the Primitive Church before they had any Christian Magistrate thence the decrees of Councils were called Canons and not Laws The great use of Synods and Assemblies of Pastors of Churches is to be as the Council of the Church to the King in matters belonging to the Church as the Parliament is in matters of Civil Concernment Elective Synods substituted in the place of Authoritative Power to determine Controversies are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 will never be soveraign enough to cure the distemper it is brought for that is reserved for your Weapon-Salve and bind no farther than the party concern'd doth judge the Sentence equal and just So that they help us with no ways to end Controversies in the Church any farther than the Persons engaged are willing to account that just which shall be judged in their Case they having no juridical Power The Church Power as to divine Law is only directive and declarative but being confirmed by a Civil Sanction is juridical and obligatory As for that time when the Church was without Magistrates ruling in it in those things undetermined by the Word of God they acted out of principles of Christian Prudence and from the principles of the Law of Nature And the reasons that you give for all this are many I 'll instance in but two First Because Church-men have no Authority but are bound up to the commands of Christ already laid down in his Word and why may not the same be said of the Magistrates and that they are equally tied up to the Laws of Christ For a Power to bind Mens Consciences to their determinations lodged in the Officers of the Church must be derived either from a Law of God giving them this Right or else from consent of Parties For any Law of God there is none produced with probability of reason but that Obey those that are over you in the Lord. But that implies no more than submitting to the Doctrine and Discipline of the Gospel and to those whom Christ hath constituted as Pastors of his Church wherein the Law of Christ doth require Obedience to them that is looking upon them and owning them in their Relations to them as Pastors but that gives no Authority to make Laws c. Secondly He who can null and declare all other Obligations void done without his Power hath the only Power to oblige for whatsoever destroys a former Obligation must of necessity imply a Power to oblige because I am bound to obey him in the abstaining from that I was formerly obliged to But this Power belongs
LICENSED July 19. 1686. A LETTER TO Edw. Stillingfleet D. D. c. In ANSWER to the Epistle Dedicatory before his SERMON Preached at a Publick Ordination at St. Peter's Cornhil March 15. 1684 / 5. TOGETHER WITH Some Reflections upon certain LETTERS which Dr. Burnet wrote on the same occasion By SIMON LOWTH Vicar of Cosmus Blene in the Diocess of Canterbury Sed non idcirco frater charissime relinquenda est Ecclesiastica disciplina aut sacerdotalis solvenda est censura quoniam convitiis infestamur aut erroribus quatimur B. Cyprianus Ep. 55. ad Cornelium Impp. Honorius Theodos A. A. Anthemio P. F. P. Hirenarcharum vocabula quae adsimulata provincialium tutela quietis ac pacis per singula territoria haud sinunt stare concordiam radicitùs amputanda sunt Cesset igitur genus perniciosum reipublicae Cesset rescriptorum Hirenarchas circiter inconsulta simplicitas celsitudinis tuae sedes provinciarum defendenda suscipiat pacis hujusmodi locupletioribus commissura praesidia 12. Cod. Theodos Tit. 14. LONDON Printed by J. L. and are to be Sold by Randal Taylor near Stationers-Hall in Amen-Corner MDCLXXXVII A LETTER TO Dr. Stillingfleet In ANSWER to his Epistle Dedicatory prefixed to his SERMON Preached at a Publick Ordination in the Church of St. Peter's Cornhil March 15. 1684 / 5 Reverend Sir HAVING perused your angry Epistle I am now abundantly satisfied that after all the clamorous Objections and riotous Noises against my Book of Church-Power raised and kept up by Men of your Party and Complexion and all the endeavours of such Champions as your self and that renowned Hero the famous Dr. Burnett you have been able to say nothing in reply to it besides personal remarks and accusations I might add choice Epithets and embellishments of Wit that might have become a Tripas Exercise in the Sophister's Schools but by no means the Gravity of an old exercised Master of Polemicks If you can reap any satisfaction from loading me with the general Titles of a Plagiary ridiculous fool malicious unskillful maker of Controversies a barbarous and rude Disputer with his Brethren an accuser of his Brethren an implacable man uncharitable unjust slanderer proud void of prudence and common discretion the usual Complements you are pleased to bestow upon me you may be happy in the enjoyment of your humor though it hath not an Irenical Complexion But I that design nothing but the pursuit of Truth and Honesty shall only endeavour in an easie method and plain words to come to the true state of the Controversie between us and my reply you may be pleased to take in this order First I shall presume to make some return to those little Pleas and Excuses that you give in for your self and those Accusations of any weight that you are pleased to bring in against me and withal take the liberty to reflect a little upon the Treatment I have received from your Friend and Advocate Dr. Burnett upon the same occasion For I foresee that opportunity will be offer'd Secondly I shall make it appear That the account you give of your Irenicum is not fair nor true and that you conceal your Crime in the very confession of it The whole design and plot being meerly laid against the Re-establishment of the Church of England Thirdly I shall enquire more particularly how far you have recall'd and recanted the principal Errors of it and particularly the Imposture of your Manuscript not doubting to make it appear That you still owe a publick Recantation for it not to the poor Vicar of Cosmus Blene but to the Church of England First I shall consider herein the little pleas you make use of for your self and your trifling Accusations against me together with your Characters of me and also take the liberty of some Reflections upon Dr. Burnet And here your failure is so evident and notorious at the very entrance and your conclusion so inconsequential that it plainly appears you began your Epistle in a passion and without a due consideration of those things which in course follow upon one another Otherwise how could you say to your most Reverend Diocesan That as you have the satisfaction of doing your duty in obeying his Lordship's command for Printing the Sermon you Preached at his last solemn Ordination so you hope others will have so much at least in Reading of it as to be convinced how unjustly you have been not long since represented to the world as an enemy to the very being of Churches in general and to the constitution of this Church in particular Pray how does it follow because you Preached sound and orthodox Divinity at that one time that you had never Preached or Printed any thing Erroneous or Heretical before Or what connexion is there in this such a one is now a sound Divine and therefore he was so always Had you in that Sermon made it appear that my Accusation was not True or that I had said you would never retract those unsound tenents that I accused you of then you might have depended with some tolerable assurance upon the Reader 's conviction of the injustice I had done you But since so it is that you neither attempted to clear your self concerning those things I accused you of neither did I say you would never retract them to infer injustice on my part because some years after that I had accused you you Preached a Sermon which was Orthodox in those points wherein I said you were once defective is a conclusion he alone can be guilty of whose common perceptions are choaked with Choler No Man could suspect that Dr. Stillingfleet made it had not the following part of the Epistle been of his Composure also consisting mostly of the like undecencies I said you were guilty of such Doctrines at the time when I Printed my Book but I did not say you would never retract them It was part of my design in writing that Book to inform you better and that you might come to a sense of those Errors which I apprehended at that time you were not sensible of I told you I judged a retractation necessary and that you ought to make one which was my crime in that I spake so plainly and boldly to you and no Man rejoyces more or thanks you more than I do for what you have performed of that nature in your Sermon You argue on at the same rate and say That my Calumny as you are pleased to call it is groundless and ridiculous because you have since proved the Church a distinct Society and vindicated her power in general and the particular constitution of this Church Now this supposes the truth of my accusation and that you once had asserted the contrary only I am so disingenuous that I take no notice of your retractation but still urge that first Error against you and this is the full of all that you can be interpreted to plead for your self The conclusion indeed seems larger
and finished my first part Secondly I shall make it appear that the account you give of your Irenicum is not fair nor true and that you conceal your crime as much as in you lies in the representation the Design and Plot of it being mostly laid if not altogether against the Church of England And this I undertake to make good in these following Particulars 1. The main subject of your present debate you say is this Whether any one particular Form of Church-Government be setled upon an unalterable divine Right by Virtue whereof all Churches are bound to observe that individual Form or Whether it be left to the prudence of every particular Church to agree upon that Form of Government which it judgeth most conduceable within it self to attain the end of Government the Peace Order Tranquillity Setlement of the Church as is to be seen in the latter end of your Preface and Part 1. c. 1. Sect. 1. pag. 4. The first you determine in the Negative the second in the Affirmative the issue of both is this That God by his own Laws hath given Men a Power and Liberty to determine the particular Form of Church-Government among them you had done well if you had produced this Law of God and what the express words of it are none other being sufficient for a lasting divine institution by your own Rules but this is your 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That tho' one Form of Government be agreeable to the word it doth not follow that another is not or because one is lawful another is unlawful but one Form may be more agreeable to some parts places people and time than others are That the case is the same as to Church Government whether by many joyn'd together in an equality or by subordination of some persons unto others as it is to dipping or sprinkling in Baptism whether thrice or once As to attending the Lords Table whether at Supper time or in the Morning fasting or after meat You add whether kneeling or sitting or leaning and as to preaching the word you mean doubtless Whether by an Hour-glass or not Vid. Part I. Cap. 1. Sect. 1. pag. 3. § 2. p. 9 10. Part. II. Cap. 4. § 2. c. And hence it is as plain and obvious as words and consequences can make it That by the Law of God enstating Mankind with this perpetual indefectible Power the Independant Congregational Form of Government is equally to be received as the Presbyterian and Classical and either of them as the Episcopal and the Papal hath as firm a bottom as any of them all any one of them ought to be called and really is the Church of England and of God within this Dominion if the Pastors or the Magistrate or when these are knockt o' th' head the People or any one prevailing interest or faction shall appoint and setle it among us So that now you are for a Toleration of several Forms of Government by the Authority of the Church of England And it is plain whence our Sects had it when with so much confidence they said upon each occasion having obtained an indulgence from his late Majesty That they were the Church of England they meant according to Dr. Stilling fleet 's Irenicum And indeed according to this Principle of yours Richard Baxter's Conventicle in St. Martin's Parish in the Fields was once as much of the Church of England as Dr. Stilling fleet 's Church in St. Andrew's Holborn Neither is this the only Case that they use your Authority in thereby to rend in pieces this Church and I did not speak improperly nor without reason when I called that Treatise an unlucky Book This issue is plainly and clearly set down by Mr. Hobbs in his Leviathan Part III. Cap. 42. pag. 299 300. and upon your very Principles to whom you had an Ear no doubt From this consolidation of the Rights Politick and Ecclesiastick in Christian Sovereigns it is evident they have all manner of Power over their Subjects that can be given to Man for the Government of Mens external Actions both in Policy and Religion and may make such Laws as themselves shall judge fittest for the Government of their own Subjects both as they are the Common-Wealth and as they are the Church For both Church and State are the same Men which is your very notion as will appear anon If they please therefore they may as many Christian Kings now do commit the Government of their Subjects in matters of Religion to the Pope but then the Pope is in that point subordinate to them and exercises that charge in anothers Dominion jure civili in the right of the civil Sovereign not jure divino in God's right and may therefore be discharged of that office when the Sovereign for the good of his Subjects shall think it necessary They may also if they please commit the care of Religion to one supreme Pastor or to an Assembly of Pastors and give them what power over the Church or over one another they think most convenient and what Titles of Honour as of Bishops Archbishops Priests or Presbyters they will and these Rights are incident to all Severeigns whether Monarchs or Assemblies For they that are representants of a Christian People are representants of the Church for a Church and a Commonwealth of Christian People are the same thing The inconsistences and most pernicious insufferable consequents of this Principle are abundantly represented to the World by a most judicious Hand in the Case of the Church of England Part III. more particularly pag. 246 247 c. 2. You deny Episcopacy in particular or a Disparity of Power in the Ministry to be by the Laws of Christ always binding and immutable wherein you oppose to be sure the Church of England And further the overthrowing the immutable Right of Episcopacy seems to be the main thing you aim at throughout the whole Discourse tho' you pretend more for the management of which you all along mingle Fire and Water together urging any thing that will give a varnish or make a shew of Argument in order to it tho' really destructive to the common Christianity we all profess but either lightly touch or designedly pass by the most credible motives even demonstrations to the contrary even those which have been own'd for such by your self in the like cases This will appear to him that weighs these following Considerations To avoid this prelatical Power or Superiority of our Bishops you tell us That tho' it be proved that the Apostles had a Superiority of Order and Jurisdiction over the Pastors of the Church by an Act of Christ yet it must be farther proved That it was Christ's intention that Superiority should continue in their Successors or it makes nothing to the purpose Part I. Cap. 1. § 8. pag. 25. Where you do not consider That tho' it be proved that St. Peter and the other Apostles had by an Act of Christ the power of the
is You make Bishops for her as the Common-wealth-men make Kings by Accumulation not Deprivation in your Expressions just now mention'd and consequently retaining the Power entire to themselves they unmake them again when they please or to express it farther in your own words which are the aptest I have met withal When Persons and Circumstances Prudence and Discretion or the Interest of the Government requires it And so the Bishop like those inferior Officers of old as Sub-Deacons Acolouthi Door-keepers c. may be outed as the Perpetual Presbyter shall see occasion Mr. Prolocutor to the Assembly-men at Westminster never spake more bravely to the point And to fix all this surely on the less wary and inconsiderate Reader as a Nail driven by the Masters of our Assembly also you bring in several of our own Bishops for evidence against themselves and their Order in the days of Edward VI. and our whole Church establish'd by Law in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth As is to be seen in your Manuscripts and those other Citations throughout your last Chapter And when you had with so much ease and scorn rejected the Doctrines of all the Primitive Bishops in the case it was no small piece of confidence to think to carry your Cause by the testimony whether true or false of our own Prelates of the last Age. But you are not content to overthrow their Order unless you may fix such a Scandal upon their Persons as the Betrayers of it And indeed your stating this case of the mutability of Episcopacy can be only a design to fool and baffle it and thereby render it a very Babel or Idol in the language of its madder Adversaries and in the conception of every one else so trivially accidental a thing that it cannot be really contended for upon a Church account every accident giving occasion though Prudence will always be pretended for its abolition And it is observable That there are not any of your judgment that conclude themselves under an obligation to adhere unto it any longer than it supports and serves them by the advantage of the secular Power As the Church is that Tree in the Psalmist so Episcopacy is one of its bearing Boughs in which you can be content to sit and sing so long as you fill your Pockets but when the gathering time is over it is to be cut down as that which cumbereth the ground And you plead the same express directions for it our Saviour once gave concerning the Fig-tree in the Gospel I 'll state it together with the Presbyterian and Episcopal Hypotheses thereby to make it obvious upon the naked prospect The Presbyterian asserts That each Presbyter hath the whole Power of the Ministry and is enabled to discharge every Church-Office and that a restraint or enlargement is sinful The Episcoparian asserts That this Power is placed in the Bishop and Presbyter but unequally And that the Bishop hath some instances of it peculiar to his Order as Prerogatives and Incommunicable which if laid aside will be Sacrilege in him as also if assumed by the Presbyter You assert all that in the Presbyter and lose all that from the Bishop that the Presbyter desires and contends for only here is the difference You allow the Presbytery upon some occasions and in some instances of their Office to make a Deputy with a reserved Power to recal the Deputation at pleasure or upon each suspicion of his undue behaviour And this is the honour and service you do the Church of England These the Dissenters you tell us you design'd to gain upon and that your design did not want success both here and in a neighbouring Kingdom If you mean our Northern Neighbours I hope Episcopacy is setled there upon better grounds if it be not some of the thanks for it are due to you If you mean our Neighbours in the South they came over indeed but it is with their own Presbyterian Orders which they still adhere to as their commission from Christ The Episcopal Ordination which they receive here only enabling them for the Loaves to which they could have no right otherways by the Laws of our Kingdom And accordingly D. Blondel first offer'd his assistance to Archbishop Laud to write in defence of our Episcopacy whilst it was uppermost but upon the ensuing Rebellion he deserted it nay he turn'd his weapons against it Witness his Apologia pro Hieronymo which he Dedicated to the Rebellious Parliament and Schismatical Assembly at Westminster owning thereby the Vsurpation of the Regal Power in one and of the Episcopal in the other Salmasius did in effect the same and within the space of four Years both applauds and condemns Episcopacy and the Rump Parliament for removing it according to his present subject and design and John Milton the worst of Men takes from thence a just occasion to harangue and vilifie him in the Preface to his worst of Books Entituled Pro Populo Anglicano Defensio And the reasons for it are plain as themselves state the case the Bishop's Consecration being only an humane Rite performed at his Deputation and Enlargment to the execution of that Power which he had before when he was made a Presbyter by virtue of which there is no farther power conferr'd but only a Church Blessing with Imposition of Hands a legally qualifying him for possession according to the particular custom of that Kingdom in which he is to exercise his Episcopal Function And lastly for our own Country-men it may be wished some of them have not on this score also received Episcopal Ordination and then they may be bound to thank you because they kept their Benefices thereby and had farther accession of Church Dignities upon his late Majesty's blessed return But I cannot think it is for this that your Superiors in the Church have for so long a time been pleased to treat you with that kindness you seem to boast of Sure I am all the kindness you have done hereby to the Church of England and her Bishops may be put in their Eyes and they see never the worse for it Tho' I will not say so of the unkindness she hath received from you Besides it will farther appear with what affection and byass you wrote this Treatise if we consider your different behaviour to the Bishops and Doctors of the Church of England and the Presbyterians Independents even Anabaptists and Quakers upon each occasion It is but a little to reflect upon those slender civilities which you shew all along to that great and eminent Divine Dr. Henry Hammond one that was every ways great and considerable provoking reverence and respect from his Adversaries that were in any measure civilized Such was his Learning Integrity Courage in those perillous times he lived in the Ark it self rested peculiarly upon his Shoulders But I say your unhandsom behaviour to him may easier be passed by because he was but one single Doctor in our Church you seem to treat him with
disdain tho' all things consider'd there was then as great a distance betwixt him and the Rector of Sutton as there is now betwixt the Vicar of Cosmus Blene and the Dean of St. Paul's you reject at once his Five and thirty Testimonies produced out of St. Ignatius in the behalf of Episcopacy as inconluding Even that one which seems to have some Semblance you say is clearly mistaken and your proof is so precarious and inconsistent that there needs no other evidence of your partiality and that your Plot was only to expose Him and the Cause Part. II. c. 6. § 17. p. 309. And no wonder when you have rejected Ignatius himself as Spurious and Counterfeit and the story of him as much as it is defended with his Epistles as not to seem any of the most probable placing it among the uncertain fabulous narrations of Antiquity § 16. p. 298. When you have derided all Antiquity at once you go on against our most worthy Doctor rejecting what is offer'd by him as that which hath neither evidence nor pertinency enough to stop the passage of one who is returning to his former matter that is in plain English it is not worth the consideration of your pondering self imployed on a more pertinent and advantageous subject and which hath better motives of credibility Sect. 9. pag. 260. You farther yet represent him if possible more contemptible and as one that betrays the Reformation by his infirm Hypothesis which was built upon reasons of greater strength and evidence than what he hath pleaded § 9. p. 258. Once more and which may go for all You represent him as a Rattle Head without any shew or appearance of Reason and his performance with the embellishment of your rare Similitude is thus expressed Only the Wind-Egg of a working Fancy that wants a shell of Reason to cover it When all may be true that he there asserts notwithstanding your Eight Reasons that are brought against it Cap. 6. § 3. However your Metaphor is to be admired especially for the great humility of it It is not like that lofty Similitude some have used borrowed from a Crowned Head but from an Egg shell and nothing but another of your own can parallel it only the strain is a little higher and you strike at all Mankind therewith which doth not think opine reason in the words of the Leviathan and with the same haughtiness as you do Which prejudice being the Yellow-Jaundice of the Soul leaves such a Tincture upon the Eyes of the understanding that till it be cured of that Icterism it cannot see things in their proper colours Sect. 2. c. 5. p. 200. You go on from Dr. Hammond to the whole Church of England which you hit at one blow and enquiring more strictly into the causes of the great Distances and Animosities which have risen upon this Controversie you fix upon the Episcopal Men as the Troublers of Israel whom you thus divide Those whom the prevalency of Faction and Interest over-ruled their Revenues having come from the Rents of the Church which is the odious old way of Characterizing for scorn and contempt to the People the ancient and zealous Bishops and Clergy of our Church and others of greater Integrity you mean that were less Covetous and Rapacious and believed their Order to be more than their Revenues but descend also with this false Principle or Hypothesis which Men are apt to take for granted without proving it viz. That it is in no case lawful to vary from that Form which by obscure and uncertain Conjectures they conceive to have been the Primitive Practice Part I. c. 1. § 1. p. 4. And as you begin so you end fixing this farther Character upon them in your last Chapter I know it is the last Asylum which many run to meaning such as found all things upon a Divine Right when they are beaten off from their Imaginary Fancies by pregnant testimonies of Scripture and Reason to shelter themselves under the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of some particular persons to which their understandings are bored in perpetual Slavery But if Men would once think their understandings at age to judge for themselves and not make them live under a perpetual Pupillage c. rendering hereby our most eminent Clergy as such Ignaro's that they understand not the State of their own Church which they have Subscribed and Sworn unto and as she determined in the days of Edward VI. and Queen Elizabeth from pag. 384. to p. 394. And the greatest part of that Chapter is spent in representing our Bishops and Doctors to be against themselves to their manifest injury reproach and dishonour as I shall make it appear in publick in a very little time if God continue me Life and Health And if at any time you give a Church of England Man his due or a favourable Character it is when he is on your side or the question of Divine Right is not under debate or you design thereby to advance your own cause and you range him with our Reverend and Learned Mr. Baxter in his Christian Concord and then he must be a pure Church of England Man in your conceptions of him But when you have to deal with any of the other Parties even to Anabaptists and Quakers your behaviour towards them is after another rate you argue as one that is evidently biassed and with apparent shews of tenderness and affection the same hand and at the same time grants their pardon that contends with and opposes them They are not represented to be the Men that are over-ruled by Faction and Interest or their Church Rents with understandings bored in perpetual slavery but as Men of great Moderation whose Errors are the Religious weakness of well-meaning but less knowing People Part I. c. 2. § 11. pag. 63. to 70. c. 6. § 4.7 pag. 122 128 c. Part II. c. 7. § 2. pag. 339 348 c. In short in the very first Chapter of your Book you appear particularly cautious of preserving your reputation entire with the Presbyterian Party at least the mobile of them and confess so much in your Epistle Dedicatory to my Lord of London acquainting his Lordship That when you set your self to answer their Arguments for a Perpetual Right of Presbyterian Parity you did it without mentioning their Books The meaning of which can only be this That it was done with as little disadvantage to the Party as you could That you made no such signal Remarks Exclamations and Excursions against the Divine Right of Presbytery and its Maintainers as you did against the Divine Right of Episcopacy and those that asserted it Nay you state the case and apply it directly and solely against Episcopacy or a Superiority of Order and Jurisdiction over the Pastors of the Church Sect. 8. p. 25. which was not fair nor consequently a due means to bring those over to a compliance to the Church of England then likely to be re-established
who stood upon the supposition That Christ had appointed a Presbyterian Government to be always continued in his Church And it is easily observable that you have omitted nothing that was pleaded by them whereby Prelacy might be rendered detestable as an unlawful Vsurpation but whether you have done the same thereby to render Presbytery as such I appeal to that very Chapter You are so far from it that the same design is managed throughout the whole Book where your Plea is against the Divine Right of any one individual Form of Government but the instance is mostly against Episcopacy Presbytery is seldom mentioned with any mark of disrespect or if it be it is accidentally I do not remember any one set discourse particularly levelled against it as there is sometimes against the Independents but all along against the Church of England both in this and several other of her most considerable Tenents and Articles Nay you expresly and in so many words give the precedency to Presbytery founding it upon one of your necessary and unalterable Divine Rights Part I. c. 1. § 7 8. pag. 23 26. and say That the Presbyterians seem more generally to own the use of General Rules and the light of Nature in order to the Form of Church-Government as in the Subordination of Courts Classical Assemblies and the more moderate sort as to Lay-Elders And to the Independents in the next place who plead the general Rules of Scripture and evidence of natural Reason Now all this you must be supposed to remove from the Episcoparians because therein you place the opposition if you do any thing And besides you say further The Episcopal Men will hardly find any evidence in Scripture or the Practice of the Apostles for Churches consisting of many Congregations for Worship under the charge of one Person in the Primitive Church for the Ordination of a Bishop without the preceeding Election of the Clergy and at least consent and approbation of the People and neither in Scripture nor Antiquity the least Footstep of a delegation of Church-Power and leave them no other Foundation but the Principles of humane Prudence and those not very well observed Pag. 416 417. So then upon the winding up of your Book the Church of England is represented without evidence of natural Reason and the Rules of the Light of Nature with little evidence from Scripture or the Practice of the Apostles in some instances of her Worship and Discipline but with none in others neither is Prudence her constant Guide And was not this a hopeful way and delicate means to bring over Dissenters to a compliance with the Church of England then likely to be established But none of it is to be wonder'd at if we consider the account you have given of the Government of our Church in the name of the Foreign Divines a little before pag. 409. and the inconveniencies it is liable unto as a step to Pride and Ambition and an occasion whereby Men might do the Church injury by the excess of their Power if they were not Men of excellent Temper and Moderation insomuch that our Bishops are begg'd rather to lay down their Power than to transmit that Power to those after them who it may be were not like to succeed them in their Meekness and Moderation and at last they are left to the Judgment of those who have the Power not only to redress but prevent abuses incroaching by an irregular Power And yet you have not left her barely to her Judges or the Civil Magistrate for such you can be interpreted only to mean to stand and fall at their discretion your self appear as Council against her prepossessing them with new fears and jealousies to which purpose you produce a ridiculous Prediction of Padre Paulo viz. That the Church of England would then find the inconveniencies of Episcopacy when an high Spirited Bishop should come once to rule the Church A Prophecy that in all likelihood was forged in the Brain of some Puritan and my reason for it is Because I find it placed in the front of a Latin Treatise writ by one of great intemperance and violence against the Church of England the Title whereof is Irenaei Philadelphi Epistola ad Renatum Virideum in qua aperitur mysterium iniquitatis novissimè in Anglia redivivum excutitur liber Josephi Hall quo asseritur Episcopatum esse Juris Divini Eleutheropoli 1641. The design of it is to inveigh against the praetorian Authority of Bishops with their Pride and Usurpation over the Clergy and he states the case just as you have done in your Irenicum viz. against their Solitary appropriated Power by Divine Right allowing a Ministry by the Law of Christ and that general Rules are given in Scripture for the great ends of Peace and Order But the particular Form depends upon the choice of the Presbyters and as they do judge it best agreeing with that Kingdom or Common-Wealth in which it is setled So then it seems the Presbyterians first instructed and brought over you not you them as you told my Lord of London And this also confirms what I said before viz. That you come up to the principles of them all excepting some of the rigider Scots who believe that no Church is duly administred where there are Bishops from whom my Worshipful Author declares his dissent tho' he is never the nearer to the Church of England for it that is purely your mistake and he notwithstanding follows on his design against our Church with all manner of indecency and dirty Language He begins with Arch-Bishop Land and takes occasion to vilifie him by reason of his Book against Fisher as worth no Man's reading and that it is unsaleable (a) Quis enim operam perdere voluerit in evolvendo hoc libro quem audio fidum esse custodem officinae bibliopolaâ—um thence he goes on to Richard Montacute Bishop of Norwich upon whom he empties his Spleen calling him a Chief Coal-blower (b) 〈◊〉 ciniflones Archiepiscopalis culinae primas tenet in the Archbishop's Kitchin reviling him as wise in his (c) 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 own Eyes swelled with Pride and Malice with a little learning but more of self-conceit Bishop Andrews is his next Man whom he accuses of Plagiarism and for stealing his determination against Vsury out of Rivette upbraiding him for his ill stile (d) De ferreo stilo per scabra decurrente adding that Du Moulin and Rivette are as much before him in Learning as he thinks a Bishop to be above a Presbyter and placeth him at length amongst the Men mediocris Doctrinae of mean Learning The last I shall produce tho' there be many more against whom he raves at the same rate is Bishop Hall and he impleads him for want of Prudence in that he wrote his Book of Episcopacy carried on to it with an unseasonable itch of Scribbling casting Oyl thereby on that pyle in which the
perswade Men to submit to that Society It is yielded that Believers in some sense are antecedent to the Church viz. as the Church is a Society vested by God with Power to oblige the whole because this Power cannot be received and vouched as true and not an imposture but upon a presumption of the Scriptures being God's revealed Word approved as such by Signs and Wonders to the Sense and Reason of all Men there being no other way whereby the truth of any Power pretending from Heaven can be tried and vouched That by which a thing is tried and made manifest must be before that which is tried by it We must first believe that God hath erected such a Society or incorporation ere we can be satisfied that it is our duty and interest to enter into it But surely no Man was ever reputed a Christian or Society of Men a Church till actually enter'd into that Church Communion and Combination nothing less can be interpreted believing in Christ and walking in Christ in the ordinary way and of extraordinary or exempt cases you cannot be understood for that would be no answer to this Adversary who was disputing of what was or ought to be ordinarily nor is there any coming to Heaven in a personal capacity i. e. not a Church Member And that Doctrine which maintains otherwise is the center of all Enthusiastical Fanatick madness to talk of a true Church with all things necessary to the being of a Church antecedent to this Church-Membership and not in relation to visible Communion and visible Duties under visible Officers and Persons is an Eutopian Scheme or building of Castles in the air Those that expect any benefit by the Redemption of Jesus out of the visible Church would do well to plead with those Gnosticks in Irenaeus That they are rendred invisible to their Judge also at the last day Adv. Haeres lib. 4. c. 9. You are so ingenuous in your Irenicum Pag. 32. as to caution the Reader That all the Rules and Practicks you there draw from the Laws of Nature were but the fictions of your own Brain and a Scheme of Nothings Your words are these A State of Nature I look upon as an Imaginary State for it is confessed by the great asserters of it That the Relations of Parents and Children cannot be conceived in a State of natural Liberty because Children so soon as Born are actually under the Power and Authority of their Parents And it is some ingagement in order to the obtaining his pardon for the impertinence and extravagances in that nature he was to meet with I think the same caution would have been equally seasonable here also for your State of Nature is not more Imaginary than your State of Grace And it will be as difficult to meet with a Christian out of the Church and independent to his Spiritual Father and Governor as to find a Child without a Father or in no tye of Duty to him Christianity is a Body by God's institution and command and not purely by after voluntary Acts of Men it can neither suppose nor leave Men at Liberty no Man lays limits to the Power and Mercy of God those that have no Law he may save without the Law and those Christians whose unhappy circumstances and harder necessity have cast them into that dry Land where no Water is or out of Church Privileges and it was not in their choice to obviate and prevent it will be saved by the Mercy of God. But then no Man ought to enlarge that which God by his Revealed Will hath bound up and limited or where his Church in her Offices and Administrations is in actual being and setled give to any the promise and assurance of Salvation out of it and take upon them the confidence to prescribe what things are necessary to the Salvation of Men as such or considered in their single and private capacities or out of the Church Society and Ecclesiastical Communion It is your own observation from Father Layne the Jesuite at the Council of Trent Iren. p. 133. That it is not with the Church as with other Societies which are first themselves and then constitute the Governors But the Governor of this Society was first himself and he appointed what Orders Rules and Laws should govern this Society And wherein he hath determined any thing we are bound to look upon that as necessary to the maintaining that Society And as our Saviour had all Power in Heaven and Earth committed to him of the Father and to him alone it was confined to his person as Mediator so he transmitted it to a certain Succession of Men only viz. the Apostles who were Governors of his Church in his absence and derived the same Power to their Successors to be continued till his coming again for the governing and guiding Mankind into all truth that brings Salvation And so far were the first Propagaters and Planters of Christianity from consenting to your methods of Salvation antecedent to this Ministry or Government that they pitcht upon the quite contrary Rules and Church combination under its Officers and in its Ordinances seems to be the first Christian Principle they taught those Candidates to whom they were sent and their first work was to setle a Ministry So St. Clemens in his Epistle to the Corinthians tells us That they constituted approved Men to be Bishops and Deacons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 over those Regions and Persons that had submitted to the truth of the Gospel upon its general motives and designed to go on to perfection unto which they could alone attain i. e. to a believing in Christ and walking in him by the help and co-operation of their Ministry And when St. John returned out of Patmos it is said That he betook himself to the Neighbouring Provinces and constituted Bishops setting whole Churches in order Euseb Eccl. Hist l. 3. c. 23. And the only notion that the Ancients have of a Church is as made up of Pastor and People Ecclesia in Episcopo Clero omnibus stantibus Cypr. Ep. 27. Ecclesiam esse plebem Sacerdoti suo adunatam gregem suo pastori adhaerentem Ep. 69. Ecclesiam non esse quae non habet Sacerdotem Hieron Adv. Lucifer Ecclesia sumitur pro coetu fidelium cum Episcopo sine quibus privatim congregare Anathema esse Conc. Gangr Can. 6. An Essential Church that is not organical appear'd not in these Coasts I confess your unusual improvement of this Argument against the Church of Rome with so much disadvantage to the Church of England was so surprizing unto me that I was inclinable to perswade my self the Fairies had changed these particular Sheets as some talk they do Children at Nurse or else that some unlucky Jesuite had Transubstantiated them But reading on I met with Reasons that made me believe it might be the Genuine Product of your own Brain you having farther declared your self with the like Liberty in these following
it self Pag. 134. you seem at least too unwary in your Expression asserting That if the whole Nation in Parliament consent to the passing a Law for removal of Pastors and putting in of others this is sufficient for the satisfaction of that People to whom they are appointed as Pastors by virtue of that Power or for the making them true Pastors I yield that the right of Investiture is originally in the Secular hand and by consequence the right of deprivation upon the breach of those terms on which the Investiture is made Thus Abiathar was removed and Zadok put in his room But the question is supposing Zadok had not been of the Priestly Line Whether Solomon's placing him in the High-Priest's Chair did by virtue of his Kingly Power alone create him High-Priest and the People were thereupon bound to own and submit to his Ministry Or to bring an instance nearer home supposing an Act of Parliament appoint a certain Person to be Minister in such a Parish when he is really no Minister because without Ordination from a Bishop Whether by virtue of that Law he is made a true Minister and ought to be received as such by that People to whom by Act of Parliament he is sent No understanding Christian will own him as his Minister upon such terms We have a great instance of this nature in the Church of Scotland about Fourteen Years since The Secular Power commanded Dr. Burnet Archbishop of St. Andrews to admit into particular Churches and in the relation of Ministers certain Men that had no Episcopal Orders and by consequence were not of the Gospel Priesthood the most excellent and exemplary Prelate refused for this reason Because the Prince may promote to what temporal Possessions he please but he cannot promote to the Authority which is Spiritual as to the former he must be submitted to but not as to the latter And his Lordship was a great example of the last case for denying their Institution he was Suspended from his Bishoprick and sustained it with a due resignation tho' the Government upon second thoughts restored him with greater honour and estimation in which he died But as to the more immediate question and which occasioned this Section you ought to have urged That the consent of the People did not constitute a Minister neither was it any necessary qualification in order to it as Mr. Baxter and his Combination pretended But instead of doing this you reply That an Act of Parliament is sufficient to constitute him such which savours too much of the old Vessel I confess the consequents would be really evil in the Government both of Church and State if he be an Usurper in a Parish to whom the People do not consent the disorders thereby must become intolerable and the consequents would be as noxious on the other hand if the Parliament had the Power of qualifying for it For then the Ministry will be quite swallowed up in the State and every Usurper be his Religion what it will may alter the Priesthood or as in the days of Jeroboam make Priests of whom he please But thus it fares with your Arguments and it is their usual fault That they prove too much You take away Infallibility and the Ministry at once in other places and maintain here the Secular Power to the destruction of the Spiritual I 'll receive him in Seculars whom my Prince is pleased to set over me but none in Spirituals who hath not an Authority which the Secular hand cannot derive unto him 5. But that which crowns all is Pag. 300. when you scatter those mists which some pretend to have before their Eyes that they cannot clearly see what we mean by the Church of England and tell us it is so called because it was received by the common consent of the whole Nation in Parliament Surely if now we be not a Parliament Church we never were in the opinion of any nor ever shall be Should any Man ask me what the Church of England is I would tell him It is that due Succession of Authority Doctrine Worship and Discipline which are now made Law in the Kingdom of England but if that Law ceaseth to own and protest them I should not thereby think it to become less the Church of England For certain there was a Church of England when there was no Parliaments in England according to those who carry their aera or date to the highest pitch And we say There was the very Church of England that now is and neither Parliament nor Pope had appeared in our Coast Besides What if the Parliament of England pass a Bill of Abjuration against the present Church as they did the other day against the Crown of England The Rump Parliament did it Why then your definition of the Church of England is much at the same as Socrates defined a Man Homo est Animal bipes implume A Man is a living Creature with two Feet and without Feathers Diogenes's Jackdaw was as good a Man when he had pluckt his Feathers off The being of the Church of England does not depend upon any such outward advantages or upon the Votes of the People whether in Parliament or out of it We thankfully own the outward advantages she has had and now enjoys by Parliaments but we own withal her separate Being abstracted from them the Church of God here in England is antecedent to them all One while I was willing to think That this Book was wrote by you at a time when the general design was on Foot for enlarging the Privileges of Parliaments or rather of the House of Commons by the Men of Shaftsbury and you might think your self engaged to cast in something and if so you add that which is very considerable making the Being of the Church of England to depend upon their owning and acceptance of it The Kingdom must have Parliaments once a Year at least only for this for otherwise we may have no Church once a Year But then again this seems not to be the reason because I find you to have been of the same Judgment some years before and you reckon up this among the Encroachments and Usurpations of the Bishop of Rome and spoil thereby a good cause viz. That Acts of Parliament were no certain indications of the Judgment of the Church or the generality of the People in that time Answer to Mr. Cressy's Epistle Apologetical c. pag. 448. I must therefore conclude that you were somewhat discomposed neither is this the only unwary expression you have let fall within the distance of one or two Pages For you there mix the Pastors and People together as of the same Church diffusive You say farther That to assert in every Church a constitutive regent part as essential to it is the same as the Pope's universal Pastorship And again That the Acts of the Convocation are to be allow'd and enacted by the King and the three States of the Kingdom Flatly against the King's Prerogative in making Church-Laws by the Convocation alone As also your term National Church is as incongruous as any National Congregational Classical are Relatives and give life to one another 6. It doth not appear why you Reprinted that scandalous Manuscript which so immediately opposeth all Church-Power in the utmost latitude of it and by the Authority of so many of our most eminent Reformers Nay farther with an artifice to conceal Archbishop Cranmer's Retraction unless it be to give all the seeming Authority you could to the Doctrines there asserted There is not one Note in the Margent by which it appears that you had then altered your first conceptions of it as Printed in the Irenicum Nay you have own'd and justified it in part in your Epistle to my Lord of London or if there be any alteration made it is least there might be occasion to suspect that Cranmer had deserted you 3. And in the last place you have made no satisfaction at all to the Church of God for that Irenicum Doctrine which equals the Presbyter with the Bishop There is not any thing like amends for it in all your writings that I have met with It is true you often speak of Episcopacy as the most ancient Government derivable from the Apostles But you have not any where asserted it in the number of those Institutions and Practices Apostolical which are perpetual and immutable And until you say this all you can say besides is to no purpose The Bishop is notwithstanding at the mercy of your Prince or your Presbyters when their prudence sees fit to degrade and depose him There is no more Obligation to continue the distinct order of Bishops than that order of Widows in the Epistle to Timothy And thus Sir I have shew'd that you have not made due satisfaction for those errors in your Irenicum concerning the Power of the Church in general and the constitution of our Church in particular of which I accused you in my Letter dated May 1. 1682. I have also shew'd more at large the grounds of my Accusation I beg only this Favour of you That if you think fit to return an Answer you will do it in a Scholar-like way i. e. by Argument and Matter of Fact not Raylings and Nick-names it is really below your quality in the Church to Act Andrew Marvel It was thought by J. O. to be a thing below him And therefore we know on whom he set that Buffoon when his case was much at one with yours and he wanted argument Besides tho' Dr. Burnet was pleased to assign me the Province yet I am not at leasure to catch Flies But if you keep to these terms I shall certainly make a reply and you will thereby oblige Novemb. 6. 1685. Reverend Sir Your Humble Servant SIMON LOWTH FINIS
Church of England was burning and thereby had cut off all hope of a Reconciliation your Plot then it seems was not like to have Success and that the Bishop of Exon had not duly consulted the Reputation of Joseph Hall. And tho' it is really sad to consider That such eminent Professors are thus rudely treated yet there is some pleasure in reflecting with what sort of Arguments our Episcopacy was encountred in 1641. and the multitude thereby incensed and enraged against it and to me there is something peculiar in it because that your Advocate Dr. Burnet and your self have treated and opposed me at the same rate and upon the same occasion viz. Because I wrote as Bishop Hall did all the other concurring with him in defence of the Divine Right of Church-Power and Episcopacy How frequently do you upbraid me also in the same manner As that I am wanting of Prudence and common Discretion That few read my Book It can hurt no body but the Bookseller and my self but mostly the Bookseller because you have not heard that the Chancery ever gave Equity against an Author for an unsaleable Book That I and my Book are under great neglect That I discharge my spleen on two such eminent Men whose Works as well as their Persons will be had in honour long after both I and my Book shall be forgotten That I am indeed proud of assaulting two such eminent Men. My stile is unintelligible barbarous whose embellishments are not to be envied It is indeed hairy all over And so rough is the shag that it will not submit to the Discipline of a Comb. It is overgrown with Hair. In short I write neither True English nor Good Sense I do not produce one considerable Argument which you had not made use of to that purpose in a Discourse published above twenty years since But the Malice and Rage of Philadelphus doth not rest here in that he hath thus revileâ—â—he Persons of so many of our most eminent Church men and represented them in their Offices as Tyrants and Usurpers over their fellow Brethren the Pastors of the Church but he goes on raving and running mad upon them as dangerous in respect of the State also to Kings and Secular Governours out of whose hands the Scepter will be wrested by them with the first opportunity as they have already snatch'd the Government of the Church from their fellow Presbyters so that the Kings of England are in danger by reason of the Episcopal Power here among us The Horse is already equipped and the Rider hath one foot in the stirrup And for proof of which he produces the very same impertinent Prophecy of Padre Paulo which you thought so considerable that it is in effect translated in the Irenicum and urged for the same purpose and withal to let the World know that it was the Opinion of wiser heads than your own That the Episcopacy in England was dangerous to the Monarchy of it as a step to that Pride and Ambition which at length would get the upper hand of it And all the difference betwixt you and him seems to be but this He had more discretion than to put his right Name to it I will here transcribe the whole Prophecy as it is placed in the Wast-page of his Book and leave it to others to judge how far thereby you have served the Church of England or rather Faction and Sedition and Schism and the Opposer of it tho' you pretend quite otherwise in your Epistle Dedicatory Anglis ego timeo Episcoporum magna illa potestas licet sub Rege prorsus mihi suspecta est ubi vel Regem facilem nacti fuerint vel magni spiritus Archiepiscopum habuerint Regia autoritas pessundabitur Episcopi ad absolutam Dominationem aspirabunt Ego equum ephippiatum in Anglia videre videor ascensurum propediem equitem antiquum divino Verum omma Divinae Providentiae subsunt But there is no wind that blows not some profit and I have hereby another advantage as to my own particular for nothing is more certain than that I did not take all those considerable Arguments which you allow to be in my Book out of the Irenicum it being my design and business there for several Sections to make it evident That Kings are in no danger by the Episcopal Power but on the contrary Episcopacy and Monarchy are every ways compitable and consistent they strengthen and support one another and were own'd so to be and to do by the Empire it self Dr. Burnet seems the honestest Man of the three because speaking out his mind and plainly unless he speak your sense too in that Paragraph and that he may easily be supposed to have done to be sure you approve of it in the Epistle Dedicatory and 't is very likely he was but your Journey-man for in his last Letter he tells us whose the Horse is thus fatal to our Troy and who equipped him and the particular Place and Person that our Bishops are riding whip and spur unto As for the Zeal that all this sort of Men pretend for the Crown the Book that is the foundation of this stir is a good indication of it There is another Sect besides Presbytery that has first wholly degraded Kings from their Ecclesiastical Supremacy and after that point was gain'd made them Reign at the mercy of the Church and at the Pope's courtesie It were too bold to attempt both at once and it is ingeniously enough done to seem to yield up the one wholly till the other is gain'd Pure Irenaeus Philadelphus who together with Doctor Burnet and the Rector of Sutton are the Triumvirate in the cause But as long as Archbishop Laud Bishop Montacute Bishop Andrews and Bishop Hall ride along with us we are well enough there is no true Church of England man will be ashamed of their company but will repute it his greatest honour and triumph And as to that which the Doctor adds here viz. That I fall so evidently under a Praemunire as he hears an honourable person has observed That I owe my not being questioned for it to his Majesty's Clemency I could Cap it with that I heard an honourable person observe upon him That for Six Pence Barbara a noted Scold in the neighborhood would answer my Book better than he hath done But I am not now inclined to so much mirth Tho' it may not be in raillery to consider what black guilt and worser malignancy Dr. Burnet's Crimes were made up of which Charles the Merciful could not forgive but banished him his Royal Palaces of Whitehal and St. James's many years since and a little before his death by his own Royal Edict silenced him at the Rolls and since England is become too hot for him But what can be expected from Men of this complexion who answer Books made up of matter of Fact and Argument with only Revilings and personal Defamations Or indeed from your self in particular when