not If they were then what discretion could there be in the people to refer all the Causes within the Bishops Diocess supposing it to be of the same extent and bigness with the Diocesses of Bishops in England to one man their Bishop And what discretion could it be in such a Bishop as among us the Bishop of Norwich the Bishop of London the Bishop of Lincoln c. to take upon him the trouble of hearing and arbitrating all Civil causes controversies and differences of the people inhabiting so vast a compass as his Diocess He must do nothing else but meerly hear civil Causes He must be but a Bishop in name How expensive and very inconvenient would it be for all the Christians in any the least Diocess in England much more in the greatest to travel with their Law-Suits to the Bishop of the Diocess His House then must be a meer Westminster hall and all the days in the year scarce the Lords-day excepted must be term-time with him To think that the Apostle ever meant any such thing when he counsels them to refer their matters to a wise Arbitrator is a gross wresting of his words For he wrote to the Church of Corinth which was but one particular Church Is there not a wise man among you He must be a wise man among them one near at hand easie to be resorted to to whom they might refer their Causes And therefore it could not be that the Christians then referred their Causes to a Diocesan Bishop such as ours And if not then the Cause of our Diocesan Bishops will receive a deep wound and it will make way for an unwelcome truth That the Bishops to whom the people referred their Causes were the Pastors of every Parish the very same with our Parish-Ministers and the Rectors of Parsonages These of the Clergy were the fittest to arbitrate the Causes of all the people within their Parish A Parish-Bishop or Minister may with far more ease arbitrate and compose the dissentions and suits of all in his Parish than the Diocesan Bishop can do of all the Pastors and people in his Diocess 3. It is not the intent and meaning of the foresaid words of the Apostle that Pastors should be imployed in hearing and arbitrating the secular Causes of their own people or of the people of other Parishes I will not say it is absolutely and universally unlawful nor will I say it is expedient in no case at all There may be Cases rarely here and there in Parishes so circumstanced both under Christian and Pagan Magistrates in which it may be both lawful and expedient for the Pastors to arbitrate and compose suits and differences among the people But generally and for the most part it is inexpedient For either he will do right or do wrong If he do right it is well if one side be not displeased and fall out with him and take a grudge against him and either turn from him and not hear him or hear him with prejudice and so by this means the Pastor may be an occasion of much sin and damage and damnation to his Soul which prudence and piety and compassion in a Minister doth forbid and will make him watch against If he do wrong then it is hurtful to his own Soul it is a wronging of the Innocent and a perverting of Justice and a scandal to his Ministry Besides He can scarce do it but with distraction If he do it but a little it will be a hindrance to his other work and distract him much more will it hinder and distract him if he should use it and do it frequently And the words of Christ are considerable and worthy to be thought or Luke 12.14 Man who made me a judge or a divider an Arbitrator between you 4. The words of the Apostle may be well understood in this sense either there is besides your Pastor a wise man among you and one that is able to judge between brethren or there is not If there be refer your contentions and civil causes to him Neither go to Law before the unbelievers nor do you trouble your Pastors and Bishops but single out a wise man among you one that is able to hear and decide your Causes and make him Judge and Arbitrator between you If there be not one such wise and able man among you then it is a shame and reproach to you all What Do you call your selves Saints Do you not know that the Saints shall judge the world even Angels themselves Are they no then fit to judge on earth small matters and to decide a petty controversie about mine and thine between Brethren but Brother goeth to Law with Brother and that before the unbelievers This is to your shame 5. When Constantine came to the Crown and Magistrates became Christians the most expedient way had been to have eased Pastors of all those molestations and avocations and lest the Pastor nothing to do but his own part and the Magistrate his part To make the Clergy worldly Judges and Magistrates is no benefit but a burden it is nothing that a wise man should rejoice in but rather groan under as a pressure and hindrance and pray to God to be eased of it and rejoyce in being free from it and at liberty to imploy all the time which was wont to be spent in such Secular affairs in Religious and Sacred exercises which have a more special tendency to Souls good and are most becoming a Pastor 18. Lastly I will set the worthy Davenant against himself who going about to prove that the Bishop of Rome hath no temporal power over Kings lays down this position Bonum spirituale non postulat ut ulla temporalis potestas a Romano pontifice exerceatur And if not by him then by no other Bishop or Pastor whatsoever Non est enim in ordine ad hunc finem aut necessarium medium aut accommodatum aut licitum aut denique cum spirituali censura excommunicationis ullo jure connexum Spiritual good doth not require that any temporal power be exercised by the Bishop of Rome for it is not in order to this end either a necessary mean or fit or lawful or lastly by any right knit with the spiritual censure of excommunication Determ quest 4. And he gives very substantial proofs I am at a loss how to reconcile him to himself But whether he be consistent to himself or not I lay not my cause upon that the other proofs and evidences do overpower my understanding 19 Now if it be manifestly inexpedient to make Clergy-men Magistrates and grant them civil jurisdiction then it must needs be manifestly inexpedient to make them supream Magistrates and to confer upon them the highest jurisdiction which Subjects be capable of as to be Lords in Parliament and to have equal votes with the Peers and Nobility of the Realm and sit as Princes there to be many days and weeks and months from their Flock and to be
to be supream Magistrates and Judges under and with the King in the House of Lords and to have jurisdiction and lordship proper to Magistrates and supream coercive Judges and to the Nobility Peers and Princes in Parliament this I hold to be extra episcopal to be a swerving from the simplicity that is in Christ and an undue prelation of Pastors above Pastors and a deformity added to the beauty and lustre of simple Episcopacy and it is a cause of more evil than good and upon a just computation of all both conveniences and inconveniences it will be found a truth that Church and State have been both losers that Bishops and Arch-bishops themselves who have had such external honours preeminences and authorities have been losers in their Souls by them and that it had been better for all sides that they had kept in the station and quality of simple Bishops and Divines 36. The Arch-bishops and Bishops with us have three Ordinations first they are ordained Presbyters then they are ordained Bishops then they are ordained Arch-bishops Now these two last Ordinations are rather nullities and corruptions and do suppose that there is a majority and superiority of power in Bishops over Presbyters and in Arch-bishops over Bishops and the next step must be in the Pope over all For to be a Bishop and Shepherd over all the Souls and Shepherds which be in England is a vice of the very same kind with that of the Popes who says he is Christs Vicar upon Earth and Bishop over all the Bishops and Souls which be in the world which is to claim and usurp the office of Jesus Christ and to attempt the doing of that which is absolutely impossible It is indeed more impossible for one man to be Bishop and Pastor over all the Souls and Bishops which be in the world than it is for one man to be Bishop and Pastor over all the Souls and Pastors which be in England Both be alike simply impossible though the one is more impossible than the other And they do both savour of proud self ignorance and gross affectation and self-seeking as though one man could be in a thousand places at once Baptizing Preaching giving the Lords-supper visiting the sick instructing souls and doing all other the acts and offices of a Scripture-Bishop and Spiritual Overseer of Souls Act. 20.28 To the creating of a Bishop or Arch bishop there needs no more but an election and nomination of him to the place as is done by the House of Commons when they chuse a Speaker His office is no more but to be as the Foreman of the Quest If he have not wisdom holiness and Ministerial worth and usefulness answerable to his name he is but an Arch-bishop in name he is rather a post or cypher than a man 37. Also our Prelates do take upon them to be Ecclesiastical Legislators and Canon-makers to all the Churches and to all other Pastors and they constitute them a Lay-Chancellour and require of all the Clergy an Oath or solemn promise of Canonical obedience to them and their Chancellors They call their Chancellor their Vicar in spirituals and unto him is committed the power of discipline and jurisdiction ecclesiastical over all both Clergy and Laity and the Church-Canons are his Law and Rule which being too crooked for honest men to conform to he spares not to excommunicate them and upon a significavit made by him into the Chancery out comes an Excommunicato capiendo and the party must either go to Prison all his days without Bail or make his composition much to his shame or damage or both And Excommunications and Absolutions in the Bishops Court are bought and sold for money and the worst men are spared and countenanced while the best men are harassed and anathematized and accursed from Christ and his Kingdom 38. Now the Bishops being conscious to themselves that this kind of prelacy and domination and jurisdiction is not good and equal but rather like the Popes supremacy over all and those whom the Holy Ghost brands Nehem. 5.15 who ruled over Gods people by their Servants as now the Bishops do by their Vicars Substitutes and Chancellors but so did not good Nehemiah because of the fear of God They I say being sensible hereof do get to be Princes and Lords and Statesmen in Parliament and thereby insinuate themselves with the Soveraign and with such of the Nobles and Gentry as love to be flatter'd and smoothly dealt with and by this means establish to themselves and to their Chancellors worldly and carnal jurisdiction and dominate over their Brethren and become the Authors of Sects and Factions and hinder the holiness the unity and concord of the Churches and rather than they shall not be Lord-bishop and partial and factious and busie bodies in Parliament Church and State must suffer and the common quiet be indangered They will not endure to be upon equal ground with their Brethren as wise and good as themselves as the Pope will not abide to be touch'd in his supremacy 39. I shall add this one word of caution Though it be not expedient that Bishops be made Magistrates and Pastors trusted with the Sword yet it is fit that Magistrates be Magistrates and not Cyphers and that they do not bear the Sword in vain and that they do back the power and authority of the Ministry and countenance and uphold the sacred Office by being a terror to evil doers and a praise and defence to them that do well There ought to be a due temperament of Magistracy and Ministry that we might lead a peaceable and quiet life in all godliness and honesty Though the Sword is not Goâ—s Ordinance for the conversion of souls yet it is Gods Ordinance for the punishing of vice and protection of vertue outwardly and for the just encouragement of worthy Pastors and the discouragement of the unworthy Anciently God did lead his people by the hand of Moses and Aaron they both made but one hand And it is a Law of universal equity binding all Christian Commonwealths Judges and magistrates shalt thou make thee in all thy gates which the Lord thy God giveth thee throughout thy tribes and they shall judg thy people with just judgment Deut. 16.18 And as there ought to be a sufficient Ministry in every Parish so also there ought to be a due proportion and contemperament of coercive Judges and revenging Magistrates in Cities Towns and Parishes that the people might have both Law and Gospel means for their Souls and means for their outward peace and safety nigh at hand It was the custom in England anciently for the Bishop and the Sheriff who was then called Earl of the County and was supream Magistrate under the King in the County to go in Circuit all over the County the one to teach the people Religion and the way of good living and to visit all the Churches and the other to decide civil Causes and to chastise and correct
all that while taken up in State-matters Civil and Secular affairs If the other Arguments be good against granting any temporal authority and jurisdiction at all to Pastors and Clâ—rgy men and the Reasons for it be exceeding weak and but shews and shadows of Reason then it must needs be much more inconvenient to heap secular honours dignities greatness preeminence and authority upon Clergy-men and betrust them with the highest jurisdiction by making them Lords in Parâ—iament 20. They that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare and into many foolish and hurtful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition 1 Tim. 6.9 It holds good most strongly of those that seek both worldly wealth and outward height grandure and state that would be great and sit in the highest Seat and be accounted Lords and Princes and have dominion over the lives the liberties the estates yea and souls of men and would have wealth and riches to support their grandure and preferment It is this which hath let many evils into the Church and given occasion to the Roman-Bishop to lift up himself above all other Bishops yea above Kings and Emperors themselves and to assume the title of Universal Bishop and Christs Vicar-general upon earth and to usurp authority dominion and supremacy above all that is called God 2 Thess 2.4 Constantine the Christian Emperor thought he did the Church a kindness in heaping Civil honours upon Clergy men and putting them into places of state and preferment but in truth he did them and the Church no kindness It had been well for the Church of God that Bishops and Clergy-men had continued meer Bishops and Clergy-men without any worldly honours preferments in Parliament outward greatness and jurisdiction 21. Nor is there any hope that the Church of God should enjoy true rest and be setled in happy and lasting concord and flourish as it should in holiness and Peace till its Bishops and Pastors be reduced to the Primitive and Apostolick pattern One would think the words of our Saviour were plain enough in this case when there was a strife among the Twelve Apostles which should be greatest our Saviour quickly ends the controversie by telling them The Princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them and they that are great exercise authority upon them But it shall not be so among you but whosoever will be great and chief among you let him be lâ—west and servant of all Mat. 20.25 26 27. Luk 22.25 26. It shall not be so among you and consequently it shall not be so among your successours But so it hath been and so it is to this day God grant it may be so no longer There is a striving which shall be high and great striving for worldly honours preferment and votes and authority in Parliament There is not a striving who shall be most humble and self-denying and do the work of God faithfully There is a striving who shall be like the Pope rather than Jesus Christ who shall have worldly lordship wealth and preferment and exercise domination not who shall be most good and holy most faithful and diligent in the work of the Ministry 22. Ambition and domination is not good in any but it is worst and most odious in Bishops and Clergy-men By seeking themselves and their own honour rather than the honour of God they lose themselves and do but prepare themselves for a fall Is it not a most sad thing to read in Church-history the contentions and strivings of Bishops and Patriarchs and Clergy-men about names and places and dignities and worldly greatness and authority and all the doleful evils which Clergy-domination and worldly-Prelacy hath produced And to see Christian Emperors Kings Princes States and Parliaments to enslave themselves to a dominating Clergy This is it which makes wise and good men to think it were much better to let Bishops and Clergy-men be meer and simple Bishops and Clergy-men and no more and for the Magistrate to keep the Sword in his own hands For if once you take up this for a principle that the example of Christ and of his Apostles and of the Pastors and Bishops of the Churches for the first Three hundred years is not a sufficient pattern yea and the very best pattern for all Christian Pastors and Churches to conform to if once you leave this you depart from the simplicity that is in Christ 2 Cor. 11.3 It is not possible to keep out pride contention and domination these will be and they will prove the scab yea the plague of the Church and danger to eat out its vitals or so weaken and consume it that it will want much of its strength and beauty 23. Sound prudence is always to go by a sure and stedfast Rule Christs pattern the way and practice of the Apostles and first and most pure Churches is a sure rule to go by Keep to this and we are safe God will not find fault with us for holding us to his Rules and seeking to be no more wise no more holy no more great and honourable and good than his Rule and Standard requires But if you alter your rule and once think and say the Clergy must have some more honour and jurisdiction than so you let in confusion contention domination and a troop of evils and mischiefs not to be told As in the case of Ceremonies and namely that of the Cross in Baptism if it be prudent and advisable to add unto Gods institution of Baptism a dedicating symbolical sign and say that Baptism without it is not best as Christ ordained it you may by the same reason add Cream and Salt and Spittle and a multitude of vain and foolish things no just bounds can be set 24. And therefore Bishops Pastors and Clergy-men in Parliament should make their humble address to the King the Nobility and Commons in Parliament to this effect Our office is to be Bishops and Shepherds of Souls to give our selves continually to Prayer and to the ministry of the Word and to take heed to our selves and to all the flock over which the Holy-Ghost hath made us overseers Had we more time than we have had we more wisdom and goodness in our Souls could every one of us do the work of ten of the best and ablest and most godly Bishops and Pastors that ever the Church of God had the Souls in England and Wales would find us all work enough We may not leave our work and calling unto which we are separated without injuring you and us and the souls of our people and procuring far more damage to all sides than the benefit can countervail These honours that you put upon us these places of dignity and jurisdiction that you put us in are a snare and a burden to us they are no priviledg but a let To strive for them were to strive to bring Fire and Gun-powder together All the while we be here we tread as upon Coals of Fire We are as
4.1 2. Acts 20.28 31. Col. 1.28 2 Thes 2.11 Gen. 31.40 Act. 15.6 Mat. 18.17 he is personally to instruct and catechise and confer with all of his charge he is to visit the sick he is to admonish reprove comfort counsel warn and charge every one night and day with tears as a Father his Children he is to assist in neighbour-meetings and Church-associations of Pastors and Brethren for concord and communion he is to hear all such Causes as need due and regular discipline And is any one man able to do all this as it should be done to any of those Parishes in City o◠Country which abound with multitudes of Souls that would find work for many Minsters to do it faithfully as it should be done Whereas if there be one in a Parish and in some one with a Reader or Curate that is thought enough I confess at that rate that many do the work of the Ministry it is an easie matter for one man to be a Pastour to a Parish of a dozen Miles compass in the Countrey and St. Giles's in the Fields St. Martins Stepney and Cripple-gate in the City of London But to do the work of a Pastour faithfully and entirely to all the Souls within any one of these and such like Parishes would require a whole Colledg and combination of Ministers We see in a Troop of Horse of but some fourty or fifty men there is a Captain and a Lieutenant besides other Officers In a Regiment of Fifteen hundred much more of fifteen thousand what a vast number of Officers are there Captains over thousands Captains over hundreds Captains over fifties and Captains 〈◊〉 tens Deut. 1. 15. Every tenth man was to have a Captain or Officer But there is many a Parish in England that may have Ten thousand Souls in it and but one or two Pastours appointed to look to all these fouls When King Solomon built his Temple He set threescore and ten thousand to be bearers of burdens and fourscore thousand to be hewers in the mountains and three thousand and six hundred to be overseers to set the people a work 2 Chron. 2.18 But in the building of the Lords spiritual Temple there is not one Pastour to a thousand Souls in many Parishes of England I know many will think there are too many Ministers I think there are to many bad ones but I never read or heard of any Kingdom or place or people to this day that had too many faithful Ministers And I shall think it a holy and happy time when such a thing is but I despair to see it in this world Were it not that there are not Ministers enough to do all the pastoral work of each Congregation I should think most of the godly Ministers in England notoriously guilty before God of gross neglect and unfaithfulness for want of personal and private oversight of all their people though I think a great deal more might be done by many than ordinarily is Well then there being so great a want of Ministers and no want of Magistrates would you have Ministers to turn Magistrates too must those few that are be hindered and distracted by calling them off to worldly and secular businesses Is it not enough that Ministers have more work upon their hands than they can do and would you make them more and that too diverting and alien work extra Episcopal and almost if not altogether pragmatical work What is this but to serve Satan in the name of Christ and under pretence of Order to pull down Order and make the Church more low and weak by much than it is The holy Apostles of our Lord were of another mind when they saw they could not both look to the corporal necessities of the poor and the spiritual necessities of Souls too they contrived an expedient for both They appointed a new office of Deacons in the Church to see to the bodily necessities of the poor but say they We will give our selves continually to prayer and to the ministry of Gods word Act. 6.2 4. Far unlike to those that leave the Word of God and Prayer and give themselves to the doing of worldly matters and secular businesses and teach men so and plead for it as their priviledg and a means of advantaging the Church and of promoting holiness and peace Non tali auxilis nec defensoribus istis tempus eget 15. Arg. 8. Those who maintain it to be good to have Clergy-men armed with secular jurisdiction do urge for reason the practise of the ancient Bishops and Churches for the first three hundred years while the Church was without Christian Princes and Magistrates It was usual in those times for the people to refer their dissentions about worldly things to the decision and arbitration of their Bishops who to prevent going to Law before Heathen Magistrates and to prevent and compose differences and strifes and keep peace among their people would give themselves the trouble to hear and arbitrate Causes and Pleas and worldly differences referred to them And hence it is argued that if it was lawful for Clergy-men to be Arbitrators and elected Judges to decide between brethren it is lawful for Clergy-men to be Judges made and constituted by authority and commission from the higer powers 16. As to this I take it to be true as to matter of fact that it was usual for the Bishops of those times to hear and arbitrate civil Causes and Rights And it grew by occasion I was a saying by a misconstruction of the Apostles words 1 Cor. 6.5 I speak to your shame Is it so that there is not a wise man amongst you no not one that shall be able to judge between his brethren Thinking none more wise and consequently more fit to arbitrate and decide their Causes than their Bishops And this continuing to the time of Constantine and he finding them in possession thereof continued it to them and confirmed it in their hands by Law which was the beginning of Clergy-mens lordliness and domination the fruits and consequents whereof have been very calamitous to the Church ever since 17. I have many things to say as to this As 1. That it is very likely the ancient Bishops who took upon them this trouble of hearing and arbitrating the civil Rights and Causes of their people did it with no joy they were not fond of it they thought it a burden and if they might have had their choice would rather have been free from all such trouble So much is intimated in a passage which Davenant in his Determ quest 11. aforenamed quoteth out of Augustine They did not esteem them priviledges or easements but molestias for so are Augustines words as cited molestations and troubles But the Bishops and Clergy of our times seek them contend for them and are tenacious of such things as priviledges 2. Either the Bishops imployed in the hearing and arbitrating those Causes were the same with our Diocesan Bishop or they were