gather from Epiphanius And after him all sorts and Sects of Christians still owned it Even the Donatists and Novatians who had their Bishops as well as others 28. In Scripture times we read not of any meer fixed Bishops of particular Churches who Ordained either Bishops or Presbyters but only Apostles and their unfixed Assistants who had an equal charge of many Churches Not that the Office of the Indefinite unfixed Ministry was not the same with the Office of the fixed Bishops in specie For both had power to do all the Ministerial work as they had a call and opportunity to exercise it But because it being the employment of the Indefinite or unfixed Ministers to Gather and plant Churches before they could be Governed the Ordination of Elders over them was part of the planting of them and so fell to their lot as part of their constituting work 29. How it came to pass that the Itinerant or Indefinite exercise of the Ministry for planting Churches so quickly almost ceased after the Apostles days is a matter worthy to be enquired after For whereas some think that de jure obligatione it ceased with the Apostles as being their proper work that cannot be true 1. Because many others were employed in the same work in the Apostles days 2. Because it is Christ's own description of that Ministry to whom he promiseth his presence to the end of the Age or World Mat. 28. 19 20. 3. Because to this day there is still lamentable necessity of such Five parts in six of the World being yet Infidels 30. It is most probable that this service abated and withered gradually by the sloth and selfishness of Pastors And that it was the purpose of the Apostles that the fixed Bishops should do their part of both these works that is Both to preach for the Converting of all the Infidel Countries near them and also Govern their particular Churches yet not but that some others might be deputed to the Gathering of Churches alone And then these Bishops finding so much work at home and finding that the Itinerant work among Infidels was very difficult by reason of Labour Danger and their want of Apostolical gifts hereupon they spared themselves and too much neglected the Itinerant work Yet I must confess that such Evangelists did not yet wholly cease Eusebius Hist lib. 5. cap. 9. saith Pantaenus is said to have shewed such a willing mind towards the publishing of the Doctrine of Christ that he became a Preacher of the Gospel to the Eastern Gentiles and was sent as far as India For there were I say there were then many Evangelists prepared for this purpose to promote and plant the Heavenly Word with Godly Zeal after the manner of the Apostles 31. It was the ordinary custome of the Apostles to preach and plant Churches first in Cities and not in Country Villages Because in Cities there were 1. the greatest number of Auditors and 2. the greatest number of Converts And so there only were found a sufficient number to constitute a Church Not that this was done through any preeminence of the City or ignobility of Villages but for the competent numbers sake And had there been persons enow for a Church in Villages they would have placed Churches and Pastors there also as at Cenchrea it seems they did 32. When there was a Church of Christians in the City and a few Converts in the Country Villages that joyned with them they all made up but one full Assembly or Church fit for personal Communion for a long time after the Apostles days the main body of the people being still Infidels so that the Christian Churches stood among the Infidels as thin as the Churches of the Anabaptists Separatists and Independants did among us here in England in the days when they had greatest Liberty and countenance 33. Though at first the Bishops being men of the same Office with the other Presbyters were not to do a work distinct and of any other kind than the Presbyters might do but only Lead them and Preside among them in the same work as their Conductors as I said before of a chief Justice c. Yet afterward the Bishop for the honour of his calling appropriating certain actions to himself alone the Presbyters not exercising those acts in time the not exercising them seemed to signifie a want of Office or power to exercise them and so subject Presbyters who were never made by the Apostles that can be proved nor by their command were like a distinct Order or Species of Church-Officers and grew from syn-Presbyters or assessours of the same Office in specie to be as much subjects to the Bishops as the Deacons were to the Presbyters 34. All this while the Bishop with his fellow Elders and Deacons dwelt together in the same City and often in the same House and met in the same Church the Bishop sitting in the midst on a higher seat and the Presbyters on each hand him in a semi-circle and the Deacons standing And the Presbyters Preaching and otherwise officiating as the Bishop appointed who ruled the action And the Converts of the Villages came to this City Church as Members of it and joyned with the rest In the days of the Author of the Epistles ascribed to Ignatius every Church had but One Altar and One Bishop with his Fellow Elders and Deacons as the note of its Unity or Individuation For so many people as had personal Communion at One Altar with the Bishop or Elders were the constitutive parts of the Churches 35. Thus it continued also in the days of Justin Tertullian and Cyprian no Bishop having more than one Church or Altar without any other formed self-communicating Church under him but only Oratories in City or Country 36. The first that brake this Order were Alexandria and Rome where Converts soon multiplyed to a greater number than could meet in one place or Communicate at one Altar wherefore sub-assemblies with their particular Presbyters were there first formed who Communicated distinctly by themselves Though there is no proof that they Communicated there in the Sacrament of a long time after that they met for Preaching and Prayer Yet even in Rome and Alexandria the only places that had more than one stated Assembly for 200 years or more there were not so many Christians then as in the Parish that I now live in See more of my Proof in the beginning of my Church History abridged whos 's first and second Chapters belogn specially to this Treatise and therefore I must refer the Reader to them 37. Even in Epiphanius time about 370 years after Christ it is noted by him as a singularity in Alexandria that they had distinct Assemblies besides the Bishops whereupon Petavius himself largely giveth us notice that in those days except in a few very great Cities there was but one Church-assembly in a Bishops charge 38. After that in Cities or Country Villages the Converts multiplyed into more
have a due and moderate regard of our own reputation as men but much more as Ministers of Christ seeing the doctrine of Christ which we preach or write is usually dishonoured in the Ministers dishonour and the edification of the souls of them that hear us or read our writings is greatly hindered by it 7. While Noblemen Knights Gentlemen conformable Clergy men and many others of all Ranks are possessed with these thoughts of us that we are persons who hypocritically pretend to Godliness while indeed we are so humoursome that we will forbear our Ministry and our Maintenance and suffer any thing and divide the Church rather than yield to indifferent things this is a scandal a grievous scandal either given or taken and tendeth to wrong their souls that are scandalized And if we give them this scandal it is our heinous sin But if they take it by misinformation we are obliged to do our part to heal it Souls are precious and scandal doth endanger them even to distast Religion it self for the sakes of such as they take us to be And we must not stand by and see men perish if we can do any thing to save them 8. The sufferings of many of the Ministers are very great that have not bread for their children nor cloaths to cover them and are ashamed to make known their wants And if with all this we suffer the burden of unreproved calumny to lie on them and keep them not to the necessary comfort which conscience should find in sufferings with innocency we shall be guilty of uncharitableness our selves 9. It is part of our Honouring the King and Parliament and other Magistrates not to despise or slight their censures And the judgment which they have publickly passed on us in an Act of Confinement which imposeth the Oath for Prelacy is so hard and grievous that if we are guilty it is fit we should be made the common reproach of men And if we are not as Non-conformists it is our duty to rectifie the judgment of our superiours where they are misinformed And as Augustine saith that no good Christian should be patient under an imputation of Heresie so I may say that no good Subject should be senslesly patient under an imputation of disloyalty and sedition That better beseemeth the anarchical and truly disloyal and seditious who take it for no crime 10. And we know how pleasantly the Papists insult to hear us stigmatized for Villains and seditious Persons by our brethren and what use they will make of it at present and in future History to the Service of their malice and injury to the truth which we ought not silently still to suffer while we see how hereby they do already multiply 11. And how unlikely soever it be it is not impossible that our Superiours that at once deposed and silenced about 1800. Ministers of Christ when they see what Reasons we have for our Non-conformity may be moved to restore those that yet survive And then how many thousand souls would have the joy and benefit 12. Lastly Truth and the just information of Posterity is a thing exceedingly desirable to ingenuous minds It is a great trouble to think that the Ages to come should be injured by false History Therefore we must do our best that they may but truly know our Case and then let them judge of the Persons and Actions of this our Age as they shall find Cause when Truth is opened to-them Upon all these Reasons though to my own great labour and to the greater contradiction of my natural love of silent quietness and to the probable incurring of mens displeasure I take it to be my duty to give my Superlours Neighbours and Posterity a true Account of the Reasons which have moved my self and others of my mind to refuse to Subscribe and Swear to the present English Diocesan Prelacy Committing my Life and Liberty to the pleasure of God in obedience to whom I have both refused to Conform and written these Reasons of my Non-conformity CHAP. II. The English Diocesan Prelacy and Church-Government truly described that it may be known what it is which we disown IT being not Episcopacy in General but the Popish and the English Species of Prelacy which our Judgments cannot approve and which we cannot swear to as approvers it is necessary that we tell strangers what this Prelacy is that the subject of our Controversie be not unknown or misunderstood But the subject is so large that the very naming of the parts of our Ecclesiastical Government in Tables by Dr. Ri. Cosins maketh up a Volume in 16 Tables and many hundred branches Which being written in Latin I must refer the Foreign Reader to it Not at all for the understanding of our Practice but only of our Rule or Laws with our Church-Constitution seeing it would take up a considerable Volume to open but one half of his Scheme All that I shall now do is to give you this brief Intimation That in England there are 26 or 27 Bishopricks of which two are Archbishops In all these set together there was when Speed numbred them nine thousand seven hundred twenty five Parish Churches but now many more In the Diocess that I live in Lincoln there is above a 1000 or 1100. In very many of these Parishes besides the Parish-Churches there are Chapels that have Curates in some Parishes one Chapel in some two in some three if not more In these Parishes the number of Inhabitants is various as they are greater or lesser The greatest about London such as Stepny Giles-Cripplegate Sepulchres Martins c. have some about 50000 persons some say much more some about 30000 some about 20000 c. But ordinarily in Cities and Market-Towns through the Country the number is about 2000 or 3000 or 4000 or 5000 at the most except Plimouth and some few great Parishes that have far more And in Villages in some 2000 in some 1000 in some small ones 500 or 300 or in some very small ones fewer There are in England 641 Market-Towns saith Speed which are of the greater sort of Parishes and such as in old times were called Cities though now a few have got that title at least a great number of them are equal and some much greater and richer than some that now are named Cities The Diocess that I live in is about six-score Miles in length By all this you may conjecture how many hundred thousand souls are in some Diocesses and at what a distance from each other and what personal Communion it is that they are capable of I my self who have travelled over most of England never saw the face or heard the name of one Person I think of many thousands in the Diocess that I live in Nor have we any other Communion with the rest of the Diocess even with above a thousand Parishes in it than we have with the People of any other Church or Diocess in the land about us save that One
Office of half-Presbyters began to be invented according to his own Computation That pag. 21. passim his supposition of the 24 Bishops of Judaea sitting about the Throne of James Bishop of Jerusalem and his other supposition of their being so ordinarily there And of the Bishops of Provinces in other Nations being so frequently many score if not hundred Miles off their people in the Metropolitane Cities when the people had no other Priest to Officiate doth tend to an Atheistical conceit that the Ordinary use of Sacred Assemblies and Communion is no very needful thing when in the best times by the best men in whole Countreys at once they were so much forborn Pag. 26. Again you have his full and plain Assertion That there were not in the space within compass of which all the Books of the new Testament were written any Presbyters in our modern Notion of them created in the Church though soon after certainly in Ignatius time which was above 50 years after the Rev. they were Pag. 60. He supposeth that whoever should settle Churches under a Heathen King among Heathens must accordinly make the Churches gathered subordinate to one another as the Cities in which they are gathered were though Heathen subordinate to one another of which more in due place Pag. 76 77. He saith that As Congregations and Parishes are Synonimous in their Style so I yield that Believers in great Cities were not at first divided into Parishes while the number of Christians in a City was so small that they might well assemble in the same place and so needed no Partitions or Divisions But what disadvantage is this to us who affirm that one Bishop not a Colledge of Presbyters presided in that one Congregation and that the Believers in the Regions and Villages about did belong to the care of that single Bishop or City Church A Bishop and his Deacon were sufficient at the first to sow their Plantations For what is a Diocess but a Church in a City with the Suburbs and Territories or Region belonging to it And this certainly might be and remain under the Government of a single Bishop Of any Church so bounded there may be a Bishop and that whole Church shall be his Diocess and so he a Diocesan Bishop though as yet this Church be not subdivided into more several Assemblies So that you see now what a Diocess is And that you may know that we contend not about Names while they call the Bishop of one Congreation a Diocesane we say nothing against him A Diocesan in our sense is such as we live under that have made one Church of many hundred or a thousand But Reader be not abused by words when it is visible Countreys that we talk of As every Market-Town or Corporation is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a City in the old sense so the Diocess of Lincoln which I live in at this reckoning hath three or fourscore Diocesses in it and the Diocess of Norwich about 50 Diocesses in it c. That is such Cities with the interjacent Villages Pag. 78. He saith When they add these Angels were Congregational not Diocesan they were every of them Angels of a Church in a City having authority over the Regions adjacent and pertaining to that City and so as CHURCH and CONGREGATION ARE ALL ONE AS IN ORDINARY USE IN ALL LANGUAGES THEY ARE Thus were Congregational and Diocesan also What follows of the paucity of Believers in the greatest Cities and their meeting in one place is willingly granted by us I must desire the Reader to remember all this when we come to use it in due place And you may modestly smile to observe how by this and the foregoing words the Dr. forgetfully hath cast out all the English Diocesans While he maketh it needful that the Cities be Ecclesiastically subordinate as they are Civilly and maketh it the very definition of a Diocesan Bishop to be a Bishop of a City with the Country or Suburbs belonging to it But in England no lesser Cities ordinarily at least nor Corporation-Towns are at all Subject to the great Cities Nor are any Considerable part of the Countrey Subject to them nor do the Liberties of Cities or Corporations reach far from the Walls or Towns So that by this Rule the Bishop of London York Norwich and Bristow would have indeed large Cities with narrow liberties But the rest would have Diocesses little bigger than we could allow to conscionable Faithful Pastors But he yet addeth more p. 79. he will do more for our cause than the Presbyterians themselves who in their disputes against the Independents-say that Jerusalem had more Christians belonging to the Church than could conveniently meet in one place But saith the Dr. This is contrary to the Evidence of the Text which saith expresty v. 44. that all the Believers were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 meeting in one and the same place The like may be said of the other places Act. 4. 4. and 5. 14. For certainly as yet though the number of believers increased yet they were not distributed into several Congregations Will you yet have more p. 80 81. When the London Ministers say that the Believers of one City made but one Church in the Apostles days he answereth This observation I acknowledge to have perfect truth in it and not to be confutable in any part And therefore instead of rejecting I shall imbrace it and from thence conclude that there is no manner of incongruity in assigning of one Bishop to one Church and so one Bishop in the Church of Jerusalem because it is a Church not Churches BEING FORECED TO ACKNOWLEDGE THAT WHERE THERE WERE MORE CHURCHES THERE WERE MORE BISHOPS I am almost in doubt by this whether the Dr. were not against the English Prelacy and he and I were not of a mind especially remembring that he said nothing against my disputations of Church Government written against himself when I lived near him Observe Reader 1. That even now he confessed that a Church and Congregation is all one 2. And here he confesseth that where there were more Churches there were more Bishops and his words Because it is a Church not Churches seem to import that de jure he supposeth it is no Church without a Bishop and that there should be no fewer Bishops than Churches And then I ask 1. Where and when do all the Christians in this Diocess of above an hundred miles long Congregate who meet but in above a thousand several Temples and never know one of a thousand of the Diocess 2. Doth not this grant to the Brownists that the Parish Churches are no Churches but onely parts of the Diocesane Church 3. And then if it be proved that the Diocesane Church form is but of humane invention what Church in England will they leave us that is of divine institution This is the unhappiness of overdoing to undo all and of aspiring too high to fall down into nothing And doth he not speak
the Apostles there must be but just 13 or 14 in the whole world if they succeed them fully in the accidentals of their office But if not than their residence in Cities will not prove that they must succeed them in that accident any more than in the number 2. Because as is shewed the Apostles tyed not themselves to Cities only and what they did in preferring Cities was occasional as is said before 3. Nor is there the least proof beyond an ostentation of vain words and confidence that ever the Apostles setled Churches according to the civil form and put the Bishops of lesser Cities under the Metropolitans No more than that among themselves that Apostle was Ruler of the rest who had the Metropolis for his Seat The Papists themselves not pretending that Peter was Ruler of the rest because Rome was his Seat but that Rome must have the ruling Universal Bishop because it was the Seat of Peter And if the Metropolis made not one Apostle Ruler of the rest why should it do so by their successors And I never heard any attempt to prove that Mathew Bartholomew Lebbeus James the Apostle Thomas Philip and every one of the Apostles had a distinct independent Metropolis for his Episcopal Seat 4. Indeed it s but vain words of them that pretend that the Apostles fixed themselves in any Seat at all but it is certain by their Office and by History that they oft removed from place to place in order to call as much of the world as they were capable and were somtimes in Metropoles and sometimes in other places and though the ancients make them the first Bishops of Churches they do not say that they were Bishops of any particular Churches only exclusively to all others But the same Apostle that Planted ten or twenty Churches was the first Bishop of them all pro tempore setling fixed Bishops to succeed them 5. And whoever dreamed that Mark who was no Apostle was the Ruler of other Apostles at least that came into his Province because Alexandria was the second Metropolis 4. This pretended forming of the Churches as aforesaid is contrary to the Ends of Church institution and Communion which are the publick worshipping of God and personal Communion of Parochians or Cohabitants in that worship Sacraments and holy living in mutual assistance Whereas in a great part of the world Country Villages are so far from any Cities that if they must travel to them for this publick Communion they must spend all the Lords day in travaile and yet miss their Ends and come too late Nor can Women Children and aged ones possibly do it at all But if they are to have no such personal Communion with the City Churches but have it ordinarily among themselves then whatever men may say that strive about the Name they are not of that particular City Church as such but are of another Church at home which must have a BishopÌ„ because it is a Church 5. Their Civil and City or Diocesan frame contradicteth the plain institution or Law of Christ and of his Spirit For 1. Math. 28. 19. 20. it is the very Commission of the Apostles and their successors with whom Christ will be to the end of the world to Teach or Disciple all Nations and then to Baptizc them and so gather them into the Church Universal and then Teach them as Disciples all his Laws which includeth Congregating them in perticular Churches where they must be so taught Now as it is all Nations even the whole Countryes and not the Cities only that must be Discipled or convicted and Baptized so it is the whole Nations Villages and all of Baptized persons that must thus be Congregated into particular Churches and taught 2. To which add Act. 14. 23. the positive exemplary and so obliging ordinary practice of the Apostles They ordained them Elders in every Church so that 1. It is Gods will that Villages have Churches 2. And it is Gods will that every Church have a Bishop at least therefore it is Gods will that every Village have a Bishop which have a Church or that some Villages have Bishops And though every City be mentioned Tit. 1. 5. that only sheweth that de facto then and there Village Churches were rare or none but not de jure they must not be gathered nor doth he say ordain Elders in Cities only much less give them Rule according to the City power And as Ceuchrea had a Church which was no City so Act. 14. 23. will prove that they should have a Bishop For every Church is to have a Bishop And Ceuchrea was not a family-Church and so the name not used equivocally And Bishop Downams assertion that it was a Church with a mean Presbyter under the Bishop of Corinth is a naked unproved saying that deserveth no credit and is contradicted by Doctor Hammond who saith there was there no meer Presbyter in being 6. Had this form been setled as they Pretend in Cities only and Diocesses there would have been uncertainty and contentions what places should have Bishops and Churches and what places should have none For it is uncertain and litigious what place is to be taken for a City and what not For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sometimes signifieth any great Town and some times strictly Towns incorprate and sometimes more strictly eminent Corporations now called Cities with us here in England And how great would the difficulty have been to determine when a Town was big enough to pass for a City or when it had privileges enow for that title If it be said that the account and name then and thus used was the directory they will then make Gods Church to depend for being upon a Name with heathen people If they will call Ceucbrea a City it shall have a Church otherwise it shall have none But there was no such controversie in those times 7. According to their model Churches shall be mutable and dissolvible at the will of the Magistrate yea of every Heathen Magistrate For if he will but change the priviledges and title of a Town and make it no City it must have no Church or Bishop And if he will remove the privileges and title the Church and Bishop must remove And if he will endow a big Village or Town with City privileges and name a Church and Bishop must be then made anew But who can believe that Christ thus modled his Churches in his institution 8. Yea after their model an infidel or Christian King aâ—iud agenâ— that never thinketh on it or intendeth it shall change the Churches and destroy them If by war a City be turned into no City or if the King for other reasons un-city it or if change of Government put it into another Princes power that shall for his convenience un city it the Church in City and Country is at an end though there remain people enow to constitute a Church 9. Yea a fire or an Earthquake by this Rule
brought And much he hath elsewhere which granteth that the Presbyters are Church governours though not in equality with the Bishops V. Dr. Field lib. 5. c. 27. shewing how the Apostles first limiting and fixing of Pastors to particular Churches was a giving them Jurisdiction saith this assigning to men having the power of order the persons to whom they were to minister holy things and of whom they were to take the care and the subjecting of such persons to them gave them the power of Jurisdiction which they had not before And As another of my Rank cannot have that Jurisdiction within my Church as I have but if he will have any thing to do there he must be inferiour in degree to me so we read in the Revelation of the Angel of the Church of Ephesus c. So that with him a Bishop is but one of the Presbyters of the same Rank having the first charge of the Church as every Incumbent in respect to his Curates and so above his Curates in Degree And As the Presbyters may do nothing without the Bishop so he may do nothing in matters of greatest moment without their presence and advice Conc. Carthag 4. c. 23. It is therefore most false that Bellarmine saith that Presbyters have no power of Jurisdiction For it is most clear and evident that in all Provincial Synods Presbyters did sit give voices and subscribe as well as Bishops And the Bishops that were present in General Councils bringing the resolution and consent of the provincial Synods of those Churches from whence they came in which Synods Presbyters had their voices they had a kind of consent to the decrees of General Councils also and nothing was passed in them without their concurrence And Chap. 49. The Papists think that this is the peculiar right of Bishops But they are clearly refuted by the universal practice of the whole Church from the beginning For in all Provincial and National Synods Presbyters did ever give voice and subscribe in the very same sort that Bishops did whether they were assembled to make Canons of Discipline to hear Causes or to define doubtful points of doctrine And that they did not anciently sit and give decisive voices in General Councils the reason was not because they have no interest in such deliberations and resolutions but because seeing all cannot meet in Councils that have interest in such business â—but some must be deputed for and authorized by the rest it was thought fit that the Bishops So here are Bishops authorized by Presbyters as their Deputies in the greatest affairs in General Councils He proceedeth to prove this by instances Concil Later sub Innoc. 3. c. VI. Even Archbishop Whitgift maintaineth as Doctor Stillingfleet hath collected Iren. pag. 394. that No kind of Government is expressed in the word or can necessarily be concluded thence No form of Church Government is by the Scriptures commanded to the Church of God or prescribed And Doctor Stillingfleet there citeth many testimonies to prove this the judgment of the Church of England And if so it must be only men and not God who make any difference between a Presbyter and a Bishop in the point of Jurisdiction VII Bishop Bilson Perpet Govern p. 16. c. 391. saith The Synod of Antioch which deposed Paulus Samosat as Eusebius sheweth lib. 7. c. 38. in Concil Eliber about the time of the first Nicene Council sate Bishops and Presbyters even 36. In the second Concil Arelat About the same time subscribed twelve Presbyters besides Deacons So in Concil Rom. sub Hilario Gregor where 34 Presbyters subscribed after 22 Bishops And in the first sub Symmach where after 72 Bishops subscribed 67 Presbyters So in the third fifth and sixth under the same Symmachus Felix had a council of 43 Bishops and 74 Presbyters The Concil Antisiod c 7. saith Let all the Presbyters being called come to the Synod in the City Concil Tolet. 4. c. 3. saith Let the Bishops assembled go to the Church together and sit according to the time of their Ordination After all the Bishops are entred and set let the Presbyters be called and the Bishops sitting in a compass let the Presbyters sit behind them and the Deacons stand before them Even in the General Council at Lateran sub Innoc. 3. were 482 Bishops and 800 Abbots and Priors conventual saith Platina Thus Bilson and more VIII To the same purpose writeth the Greatest Defender of Prelacy Bishop Downam Def. lib. 1. c. 2. sect 11. pag. 43 44. and the places before cited out of him professing that the Bishop hath but a chief and not sole jurisdiction IX Bishop Ushers judgment is fully opened in his Model which we offered to the King and Bishops in vain and which he owned to me with his own mouth X. Because the citing of mens words is tedious I add that All those whom I cited Christ Concord p. 57 c. to shew that they judge the Presbyters Ordination may be lawful and valid do much more thereby infer that they are not void of a Governing power over their own flocks viz. 1. Dr. Field lib. 3. c. 32. 2. Bishop Downam Def. lib. 3. c. 4. p. 108. 3. Bishop Jewel Def. of Apol. Part 2. p. 131. 4. Saravia De divers Min. Grad cap. p. 10 11. 5. Bishop Alley Poor mans Libr. Prelect 3. 6. p. 95 96. 6. Bishop Pilkington 7. Bishop Bridges 8. Bishop Bilson Of Subject p. 540 541 542 233 234 c. 9. Alex. Nowel 10. Grotius de imper 11. Mr. Chisenhall 12. Lord Digby then a Protestant 13. Bishop Davenant Determ Q. 42. p. 191 192. 14. Bishop Prideaux cont de Disciplin Eccles p. 249. 15. Bishop Andrews 16. Chillingworth To which I add 17. Bishop Bramhall in his Answer to Mileterius's Epistle to the King 18. Dr. Steward's Answer to Fountains Letter 19. Dr. Fern. 20. Mason at large 21. Bishop Morton Apolog. XI Spalatensis is large to prove the power of the Keys to belong in common to Presbyters as such I cited the words before Lib. 5. c. 9. n. 2. c. 2. n. 48 c. XII Even Gropperus the Papist pleadeth in the Council of Trent for the restoring of Synods of Presbyters instead of Officials the thing so much detested in England as that all we undergo must rather be endured yet saith Gropperus Restore the Synodals which are not subject to so great corruption removing those Officers by whom the world is so much scandalized because it is not possible that Germany should endure them The Spaniards and Dutch men willingly heard this but not the rest Hist p. 334. lib. 4. XIII The opinion of Paulus himself the author of that History is so fully and excellently laid down of the Original of the Bishops grandeur and of the manner of introducing the Ecclesiastical Courts by the occasion of Pacifications Arbitrations and Constantines Edict as that I intreat the Reader to turn to and peruse p. 330 331
honour especially they that labour in the word and doctrine doth plainly imply that there were fewer who were thus Labourers in the word and doctrine than that Ruled well For indeed the following practices of the Churches expoundeth this Text when the Churches having few Learned or able Speakers he that could speak or preach best did preach ordinarily and was made Chief or Bishop and the rest helped him in Government and other offices and taught the people more privately and preached seldomer when the Bishop bid them and there was need Being yet of the same office Obj. Why then may they not now be forbidden publick Government in foro Ecclesiae exteriore Answ 1. Our question is not chiefly what part of the exercise of their proper office may be restrained on just occasion But what it is which truly belongeth to their office 2. It is one thing to forbid it them pro tempore and another statedly for this changeth the Office 3. It is one thing to forbid a man Preaching Praying or Exercise of Discipline in a Church where there are many and all cannot speak at once and his restraint is for the better doing of the work and the avoiding of confusion And another thing to forbid a single Pastor of a Parish Church with all his Curates to do it when there is no other there nor near the place that knoweth the people to do it but it must be undone 4. And indeed the case of Discipline in this differeth from Preaching and officiating in Worship Two men cannot do the later at once in the same Congregation without confusion and hinderance of Edification But ten men or twenty may consult and consent to the acts of Discipline So that by Reason Scripture and Antiquity it is clear that if any one part were more essential to the Presbyters office than the rest it would be the Authority and Obligation to Rule the flock by the word of God and exercise the Church Keys of Discipline II. Now that this power is here taken from them notwithstanding all the forecited Concessions or Confessions that it is due to them I prove I. I might premise that Ubi non est idem fundamentum non est eadem relatio At c. There is not the same foundation therefore not the same Relation For 1. Here is not the same Election no nor Consent I opened this before Though all Antiquity gave the Church the Election of her own Pastors yet we make not that necessary to the being of the office or relation to them So there be but Consent But we take Consent of the Church to be necessary to any mans Pastoral Relation to that Church though not to the Ministery in general as unfixed For seeing it is not possible to Exercise the office without the peoples Consent it cannot be assumed as over them without their Consent Because that which cannot be Exercised should not be undertaken to be exercised But with us commonly the Patron chooseth and the Bishop approveth instituteth and giveth him induction and so he is fully setled in title and possession in their way without any of the peoples knowledge or consent Obj. You choose Parliament men who make these laws and your Ancestours consented to Patrons power Therefore you consent Answ This seemeth a jest but that the business and execution make it a serious matter to us 1. It cannot be proved that all the Churches or people gave the Patrons that power 2. We never intended to consent that Parliaments should do what they list and dispose of our Souls or of that which is necessary to the saving of our Souls 3. Else you may as well say that we consent to be Baptized and to receive the Sacraments because the Parliament whom we chose consenteth to it And so we may baptize Infidels because their great grandfathers consented that all their posterity should be Christians And you need no discipline to keep men from the Sacrament if Noah consented that all his posterity should fear God and serve him and so be saved Many men are jested out of their saith and salvation but none are thus jested into it Sin is a mockery but so is not piety 4. Our forefathers had no power to represent us by such consenting If they could oblige us to Duty by their Authority they cannot be our substitutes for the performance of duty any more than for the possession of the reward 5. What God himself hath laid upon the Person or existent Church they cannot commit to another if they would themselves because the obligation was personal and they have not Gods consent for the transmutation We cannot serve God by proxy nor be happy by proxy Obj. But how unfit are the common people to choose their Pastors They are ignorant and partial and tumultuous Do the children beget their own father or the sheep choose their own shepherd Answ 1. No but wives choose their own husbands and Patients choose their own Physicians and Clients their own Advocates and servants their own masters c. Similitudes run not on four feet If all the Church of Christ besides the Prelates and their Curates be as brutish as sheep and as silly as infants in comparison of them then they have talkt reason in their similitude Else 2. Is it not notorious in England that no Congregations have had more Learned and holy Pastors than where the People have had their choice I desire London but to consider it nay they know it by great experience what men hath Aldermanbury had Mr. Calamy Dr. Stoughton Dr. Taylor and so before What men hath Blackfryers had Mr. Gibbons Dr. Gouge and many formerly So also Antholins Lincolns-Inn Greys-Inn the Temple c. But the truth is that is an excellent person to us who is an odious or contemptible person to the high Prelatists If he will preach as Heylin writeth and make the people believe that Presbyterians are Rebels and Disciplinarians are seditious brainsick fellows and strict living is hypocrisie and praying without book and much preaching is Fanaticism and that none are worthy to preach the Gospel who will not swear to be true to this Prelatical interest that drunkenness in a Conformable man is a tolerable infirmity and their ignorantest nonsence is fitter to save souls or Edifie the Church than the labours of a Learned Holy Nonconformist that Calvin was a Rogue and Cartwright Amesius and all such as they discontented factious Schismaticks unworthy to preach or to be endured This is a son of the Church and an excellent person with the men in question But it is the man that Learnedly and Judiciously openeth the word of life that closely and skilfully and seriously applyeth it that is an example of Holiness Sobriety Love Meekness Humility and Patience to the flock who spareth no labour or cost or suffering for the saving of mens souls who is for the wisdom which is first pure and then peaceable c. This is the Pastor that is excellent
General Pastors And therefore it they say It is not the Presbyters but the Diocesane that is the cheif Pastor of your Parish Church I answer there is none above the Resident or incumbent Presbyters that take the particular charge and oversight The Bishop takes but the general charge as a general Officer in an Army If they do indeed take the particular Pastoral charge of every Soul which belongs to the Bishops infimi gradus then woe to that man that voluntary takes such a charge upon him and hath such a charge to answer for before the Lord. If they say that the Presbyters have the particular charge for teaching and Sacraments but the Bishops for ruling I answer 1. It is Government that we are speaking of if they are Bishops infimi gradus then there are no Bishops or Governours under them And if so then it is they that must perform and answer for Government of every particular Soul And then woe to them 2. Governing and teaching are acts of the same Office by Christs institution as appears in 1 Tim. 5 17. Acts 20. 28. c. And indeed they are much the same thing For Government in our Church sense is nothing but the explication of Gods Word and the application of it to particular Cases And this is Teaching Let them that would divide prove that Christ hath allowed a division If one man would be the general Schoolmaster of a whole Diocess only to oversee the particular School-masters and give them rules we might bear with them But if he will say to all the particular Schoolmasters you are but to teach and I only must govern all your Scholars when governing them is necessarily the act of him that is upon the place conjunct with teaching this man would need no words for the manifestation of the vanity of his ambition The same I may say of the Masters of every Science whose government is such as our Church Government is not Imperial but Doctoral yea of the Army or the Navy where the government is most imperial Now for the Argument 1. The consequence of the Major is undeniable because every such Society is essentially constituted of the Ruling and Ruled parts as every Common-wealth of the pars imperans and the pars subdita So every organized Church of the Pastor and the Flock 2. And for the Minor if they denyed both our Parish Churches and our City Churches that is those in Towns Corporate to be true Churches they then confess the shame and open the ulcer and leprosic of their way of governing that to build up one Diocesane Church which is not of Christs institution but destructive of his institution they destroy and pull down five hundred or a thousand Parish Churches and many City Churches If they will also feign a specifique difference of Churches as they do of Pastors and say that Parish Churches are Ecclesiae dociae but Diocesan Churches are only Ecclesiae gubernatae of which the Parish Churches are but parts I answer 1. The Scripture knoweth no such distinction of stated Churches All stated Churches for worship are to be governed Churches and the government is but guidance and therefore to be by them that are their Guides 2. I have before proved that every worshipping Church that had unum altare was to have a Bishop or Government by Presbyters at least Arg. III. That Ordination which is much better than the ordination of the Church of Rome or of any Diocesane Bishops of the same sort with theirs is valid The Ordination now questioned by some in England is much better then the Ordination of the Church of Rome or of any Diocesane Bishops of the same sort with theirs Ergo the Ordination now questioned by some in England is valid The Major will not be denied by those which we plead with because they hold the Ordination of the Church of Rome to be valid and their Priests not to be re-ordained The Minor I prove If the Ordination that hath no Reason of its validity alledged but that it is not done by Diocesane Bishops be much better than the Ordination of such as derive their power from a meer Usurper of Headship over the universal Church whose succession hath been oft interrupted and of such as profess themselves Pastors of a false Church as having a Head and form of divine Institution and that ordain into that false Church and cause the ordained to swear to be obedient to the Pope to swear to false Doctrine as Articles of Faith and ordain him to the Office of making a peice of Bread to be accounted no Bread but the Body of Christ which being Bread still is to be worshipped as God by himself and others to pass by the rest than the Ordination now questioned in England is much better than the Ordination of the Church of Rome But the Antecedent is true Ergo so is the consequent And for the other part of the Minor I further prove it If the Office and government of the Romish Bishops and of any Diocesanes of the same sort with them be destructive of that form of Episcopacy and Church Government which was instituted by Christ and used in the Primitive Church then the Ordination now questioned by some in England is much better than that which is done by such Diocesanes But the Office and Covernment of the Romish Bishops and of any Diocesanes of the same sort with them is destructive of that form of Episcopacy and Church Government which was instituted by Christ and used in the Primitive Church Ergo The Ordination now questioned by some in England is much better than that which is done by such Diocesanes The Reason of the consequence is because the Ordination of Presbyters now in question is not destructive of the Episcopacy and Government instituted by Christ and used in the Primitive Church Or if it were that 's the worst that can be said of it And therefore if other Ordination may be valid notwithstanding that fault so may it N. B. 1. I here suppose the Reader to understand what that Ordination is now questioned in England viz. Such as we affirm to be by Bishops not only as Presbyters as such are called Bishops but as the cheif Presbyters of particular Churches especially City Churches having Curates under them and also as the Presidents of Synods are called Bishops 2. Note that all I say hereafter about Diocesanes is to be understood only of those Bishops of a Diocess of many hundred or score Churches which are infimi gradus having no Bishops under them who are only Priests who are denied to have any proper Church Government And not at all of those Diocesane Bishops who are Arch-Bishops having many Bishops under them or under whom each Parish Pastor is Episcopus Gregis having the true Church Government of his particular Flock And thus because the Major is of great moment I shall handle it the more largely The Viciousnes of the Romish Ordinations appeareth thus 1.