serve to the being of a particular Church we might be of the same particular Church with men in the several parts of the World 32. Deacons are subordinate Officers or Ministers to Christs Ministers not essential to the Church but only Integral as needful to its well being in such Churches where the number and benefit of the People do require them 33. The necessity of these Individual or particular Churches is founded in the necessity of the foresaid publick worshiping of God and in the use of the mutual assistance of Christian Neighbours in the matters of salvation and in the need of the personal inspection and conduct of the Pastors over all the Flock 34. The difference between this personal Communion and the distant Communion by Letters or Delegates or meerly internal in Faith and Love is so great and notorious as must make those Societies specifically distinct which are associated for such distinct Ends. 35. Yet do we not hold that all true Churches do Assemble together in one place or that they consist of no more than can meet at once For whole Families seldom go all at once to the Assembly Therefore if one part go to day and another the next day they worship God publickly in personal Communion though not all at the same time 2. And many may be sick and many infants and many aged and the great distance of some may make a Chapel or subordinate Meeting often needful And yet 1. they may all come together in one place at several times for Church communion 2. And they may live so near that one may be capable of neighbourly converse with others and of admonishing exhorting and encouraging each other in their Christian Course 36. Where a Church is so small as to need but one Pastor Christ doth not require that they have more And One can neither be superiour or inferiour to himself 37. But it is most desirable that a Church be as numerous or great as will consist with that sort of Communion which is the end of the Society and consequently that they have many Pastors Because this tendeth to their strength and beauty and it is a joyful thing to worship God in full Assemblies 38. The work of a Bishop or Pastor of a single Church is to mention it more particularly to Teach the Church the meaning of the Scriptures especially of all the Articles of Faith and the things to be Desired in Prayer and the matters and order of Obedience to all the commands of Christ To instruct the Children in the Catechistical or Fundamental verities To Baptize to Pray in the Assembly to praise God to celebrate the Lords Supper to visit the Sick and pray for them To visit the several Families or personally instruct those ignorant ones that understand not publick Preaching as far as he hath opportunity To watch over the Conversations of the several Members and to receive informations concerning them To resolve the doubts of those that seek resolutions and to offer help to them that are so sensless as not to seek it when their need appeareth To comfort the sad and afflicted To reprove the scandalous To admonish the obstinate before all To censure and cast out the impenitent that continue to reject such admonition To absolve the penitent To take care of the Poor And to be exemplary in holiness sobriety justice and charity I pass by Marriage Burials and such other particular Offices And I meddle not here with Ordination or any thing that concerneth other Churches but only with the work of a Bishop or Pastor to the People of his proper Flock 39. The ablest Man among us for mind and body may find full and needful employment of this sort among an hundred persons especially such as our common Christians are But if he have five hundred or a thousand he hath so much to do as will constrain him to leave something undone which belongeth to his Office Therefore our Market Towns and large Country Parishes where there are ordinarily two three or four thousand in a Parish have need of many pastors to do that for which the Pastoral Office was ordained Much more our greatest City and Town Parishes that have ten thousand twenty thousand and some above thirty if not forty or fifty thousand in a Parish 40. The office of a Pastor containing the Power of the Keys as subordinate Ministerially to Christ in his Teaching Ruling and priestly work is not by man to be divided and part of it to be given to one sort and part to another though they that have the whole power may variously exercise it as there is cause But every Church must have such as have the whole power as far as concerneth the People of that Church 41. To divide the essential parts of the Sacred Office as to give one the power of Teaching only another of Worshiping only and another of Ruling only or any two of these without the third is to destroy it and change the species as much as in them lieth that do it And as no one is a man without his Animal Vital and Natural parts so no one is a true Pastor without the threefold power forementioned of Teaching Ruleing that Church by Pastoral means and Conducting them in publick Worship He may be a Pastor that is hindered from the exercise of some one of these or more but not he that hath not the Power in his Office Dividers therefore make new Church Offices and destroy the old 42. Churches headed by such a new sort of Officers specifically distinct from the old of Christ's Institution are Churches specifically differing from the Churches which Christ Instituted Because the Society is specified by the species of its Head or Governour 43. To make a new sort of Church-Heads or Rulers as their Constitutive parts is to make a new sort of Churches 44. The three forsaid Essential parts of the Pastoral Office are not to be exercised by any Lay-man nor by any man that hath not that Office Nor may the Pastors do that work per alios or delegate Lay-men or men of another Office to do it as in their stead For the Office is nothing but just Authority and Obligation to do that work And if they convey such Authority and Obligation to another they convey the Office to another And so he is no longer a Lay-man or of another Office only 45. Therefore though many Pastors of the same Office may in a great Church distribute the work among them yet none of them must do it only as the delegate of another not having himself from God the Office which containeth the power of doing it 46. But the Accidentals of the Pastoral Office may be committed to a Lay-man or one that is no Pastor As to summon Assemblies to keep Registers or the Church Books Goods Buildings with many the like And so some think that the Apostles instituting Deacons was but a communicating the Accidentals of their Office to other men Therefore if
Chancellors did only these accidental works or Lay Elder either and meddled not with the sacred power of the Keys we should not be so quarrelsome as to condemn their undertaking unless it were for the abuse 47. We doubt not but in a Church that hath many Pastors those that are young and weak should much submit to the elder and more able and be as far ruled by them as the difference of age experience and abilities without a difference of Office doth require 48. And we doubt not but where Temples and Church-maintenance are at the dispose of Patrons People or Magistrates they may give them to some one Pastor as the present possessor so that no other shall have part but by his concession And this difference there is between the Parson and his Curates in our Parishes and an accidental superiority and inferiority thereby without a difference of Office 49. If Magistrates or Councils or Custome should in each particular Church that hath many Pastors give one a Governing that is a negative voice among the rest in the management of the affairs of that Church so that the rest should not go against him or without him as Archbishops now are over Bishops and Archpresbyters were formerly over Presbyters and Archdeacons over Deacons and Presidents over Colleges and Courts of Justice without claiming a distinct Office though the sad experience of Mens inclination to Church-tyranny make us doubtful whether we should wish for such an inequality yet would we not unpeaceably disturb or quarrel with such an Order when it is settled Our Parish Order aforesaid being indeed but such 50. Whether God himself hath appointed another sort of Bishops who may be better called Archbishops as Successors of the Apostles in the Ruling part of their Office and whether these have not a Power above particular Church Pastors in Ordinations and in the oversight of the Pastors themselves and in the Care of many Churches I have long ago confessed is a Case of too much difficulty for me to determine On the one side though the Apostles have no Successors in the extraordinary and temporary part of their Office yet Church-government being an ordinary and permanent part as doctrine is I can hardly think that when we find one Form of Church-government instituted by Christ himself and continuing till the end of that Age that we should presume to say that this Form then ceased and another must succeed it without good proof What we find enacted and setled must stand till we can prove it abrogate And unless it were a thing which in the nature of it were temporary it seemeth a harsh imputation of mutability to feign Christ to set up a Church-government which should be in force but for an hundred years And on the other side it puzleth me 1. to find it so hard to prove that the Apostles themselves did indeed exercise any Office power over other Pastors which one may not do towards another over and above that which accrewed to them from the meer extraordinary advantage of their gifts and Apostolical proper work 2. And to find it so obscure whether they settled any as their Successors in that superiority of power which they had 51. But being in such doubt and being uncertain whether such Arch-Bishops or Apostolical Successors in the points of Ordination and oversight of many Churches be of Divine right or not I resolve not to contend against any such Order nor to disobey any just commands of such nor to reproach the custome of the Churches 52. And though I know that Pastors should not unnecessarily be diverted by any aliene works yet if it please the Magistrate to commit some of his power of Church-government by the Sword about things extrinsick to the Pastoral Office into the hands of some Ministers as his Officers and if he call them Bishops and command us to obey them and if he make them Barons and endow them with Lordships and great revenues though I see the great peril to the Church from hence by reason of mens pride and worldliness yet will I not reproach this Order nor deny any just obedience to any such Officers of the King 53. If any acknowledging the Pastors of each Church to have the whole Pastoral Office and power of the Keys of that Church which he overseeth shall yet affirm that the aforesaid superiour General Bishops or Arch-Bishops have a superiour power of the Keys and therefore shall have the decision of controversies that arise in particular Churches between the Pastors and the People and that appeals may be made by the people to them and that they may visit the particular Churches at their pleasure and have power to censure the particular Bishops or Pastors when they deserve it or to Ordain Ministers remove them and depose them as there is just cause by bare sentence and the peoples consent and all this jure divino as Successors to the Apostles in their Government or to such Archbishops or General Bishops as Timothy and Titus I shall not contend against any of this for the reasons aforesaid being uncertain of the thing in question But if I must be put to subscribe that I believe all this to be true as if it were an Article of my Faith the same uncertainty would forbid me 54. And here I must take occasion to say that I take unnecessary Subscriptions Declarations Promises and Oaths to be one of the chiefest of the Devil's Engines to divide Christ's Churches and to fish out those Ministers that make conscience of perjury and lying and to turn them out of the work of Christ and to leave in those that do not when Conscience can find but any shifting pretence And how fit such are for the Sacred Ministry and whose servants really they are and how they are like to do Christ's work and what a Case the Churches will be in that have such and what the effects will be with the common people and how the lovers of Godliness will resent all this and what else will follow hereupon I leave to the Reader that hath the brains of a man or ever opened his eyes to mark what is done abroad in the World or that ever read with observation the things that in other Ages have befallen the Churches or that knoweth what relation light hath to darkness good to evil and Christ to Belial I think that the Articles of our Faith and the matters of our practice are so to be distinguished as that there is a necessity of Believing the former and therefore we may be called to profess that we do Believe them And for the other the Agenda we must be called to Do them and if they be plain and necessary duties of our Religion being to be Believed to be Duties before we do them we may sometime be put to profess that Belief But duties of humane imposition or of doubtful nature may be done as things lawful by thousands of peaceable men that cannot say or
that were abroad among these new Converts or scatered Christians made them know that every Church should have a Bishop and that they might choose one of their own And few Presbyters being then Learned able men in Comparison of the Bishops by this advantage of presence among them many raw and schismatical Presbyters crept into the Peoples affections and perswaded them to choose them for their Bishops when they were chosen and ordained they encroached on the rest of the old Bishops Diocess and also refused to come to the Synods lest their failings should be known pretending that they must stay with their own People Now the Bishops that complained of this did not alledge 1. That no Bishop should be made but in a City 2. Nor that when Christians multiplyed they must not multiply Bishops accordingly but all be under their first Bishop only 3. Nor that a new Congregation had not as good right to have and chuse a Bishop of their own as the first City Congregation had But only to keep ignorant Schismatical Presbyters from deceiving the People for their own exaltation and from hindering Synodical Concord they Decreed that none in their Diocesses should have Bishops without the first Bishops consent And that being so Consecrated they should frequent Synods and should be Bishops only of that People that first chose them and not encroach on the rest of the Diocess And whereas he hence gathereth that the Country Churches ever from the beginning belonged to the City Bishops There were no such things as Appendant Country Churches from the beginning of the City Churches But it 's true that from the beginning of the Country Peoples Conversion when they were not enow to make Churches themselves they belonged to the City Churches as Members Even as now the Anabaptists and Independent Churches consist of the People of Market-Towns and the adjoyning Country Associated into one Assembly After that the Country Meetings were but as Oratories or Chappels And when they came to be enow to make dinstinct Churches of some good Bishops had the Wit and Grace to help them to Chorepiscopi Bishops of their own but most did choose rather to enlarge their own Possessions or Powers and set Subject Presbyters only over the People And that these new Bishopricks must be by the old Bishops consent is apparently a point of Order to avoid inconveniences if not of Usurpation For what power had the old Bishop to keep any Church of Christ without a Bishop of their own when it was for there good That he hath some countenance from Leo for the New Church-Form without Bishops I wonder not when Leo was one of the hottest that betimes maintained the Roman Primacy if not Universal Soveraignty And as the Care against placing Bishops in small places ne vilescat nomen Episcopi came in late so 1. It intimateth that it was otherwise done at least by some before 2. And it is but the Prelatical grandure which Constantine had pufft up which is then alledged as the Reason of this Restraint His Argument is That which was judged unlawful by the Canons of approved Councils and Decrees of Godly Bishops was never lawfully regularly and ordinarily practised But c. I deny the Major Kneeling at Prayer or Sacrament on the Lords day the Marriage of Priests the Reading of the Heathens Writings and abundance such-like were forbidden by such approved Councils especially a multitude of things depending on the new Imperial shape of the Churches which are now lawful and were lawful and ordinarily practised before Paul Kneeled and Prayed on the Lord's day Acts 20. c. Therefore the placing of Bishops in Country Parishes was not unlawful before because the Councils of Bishops afterward forbad it nor was it ever unlawful by Gods Law Methinks a Bishop that subscribeth to the 39 Articles of the Church of England which mentioneth General Councils erring even in matters of Faith should never have asserted that they cannot erre in matter of Government nor retract and alter that which was well practised before them His next Argument is this If there were any Parish Bishops then they were the Chorepiscopi But the Chorepiscopi were not such Ans 1. I deny the Major There were then many City Bishops that were but Parish Bishops or had but one Church as shall be further proved 2. Yet as to a great number it is granted that their Diocesses had many Churches at the time of Concil Eliber Sardic c. which he mentioneth But it followeth not that therefore it was so with any in the time of Ignatius or with many in Cyprian's time 3. If it were all granted de facto it will not follow that de jure it was well done and that the old Form was not sinfully changed 4. The Chorepiscopi themselves might have many Congregations under them like our Chapels and yet be Parish Bishops And it 's most probable that at first they had no more than one of our Country Parishes though afterwards they had many Churches under them as City Bishops had His next Argument is Churches endued with Power Ecclesiastical sufficient for the Government of themselves having also a Bishop and Presbytery had the power of Ordination But Country Parishes had not the Power of Ordination Ergo c. Ans 1. Government is Inferiour or Superiour They might have sufficient Inferiour power of Government though they had none of the Superiour power such as belongeth to Archbishops to whom Appeals were made As a Corporation that hath a Mayor and Assistants hath sufficient Inferiour power but not Regal nor such as Judges Lord Lieutenants c. have And if it were proved as some hold that only General or unfixed Ministers like the Apostles and Evangelists or Archbishops that were over many Churches had the power of Ordination and not the Inferiour Bishops of single Churches it would not follow that these Inferiour Bishops had not the power of Governing their own Churches with assisting Presbyters And if he will prove for us that every fixed Bishop hath the power of Ordination who hath but the Inferiour power of Governing his single Church by Admonitions Excommunications and Absolutions he will but do our work for us 2. I deny his Minor Propos If by Country Parishes he mean the Bishops of Country Parishes they had the Power of Ordination And all that he saith against it is only to prove that de facto they had not the Exercise of it in the times he mentioneth and that de jure humano it was not allowed them by Canons But 3. We grant so much of the Conclusion as that de facto few Country Parishes had a Bishop and Presbytery Because there were but few Country Parishes in the World till the third Century that were really Christian Churches or fixed Societies of Christians that had ordinary Church-communion together in the Sacrament or had an Altar But our Case is About single Churches now called Parish Churches and not about Country
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.
Presbyter and so must be of a distinct Order from the Bishops that give him his second power And who giveth them theirs And if you rise to a Patriarch or Pope what Superiour of another Order giveth them their second Power 2. That institution or fixing a man before Ordained to a particular Flock doth not make him of another Order or Office nor is a new Ordination nor is he as oft Ordained and made of another Office as he changeth his Flock or receiveth a new License from the Bishop or the King from whom I had rather have it 3. That the People as well as the Bishop if not much more do give the Minister this opportunity for the exercise of his Office as the Patient chooseth his Physician And yet it is my Opinion that this will not prove that the People are his Governours much less that they give him a new Order or Office And of old the People chose their Bishops themselves It will be as much honour for you Learnedly to prove that there were no Kings in the World till Bishops made them as to confute D. Blondels Historical proof of the Peoples ancient choice of their Bishops 2. And as to a General License I will thank the King for it yea or any man that hath power to hinder me that he will give me leave to Preach and Exercise my Office But I do not think that every man that doth not hinder me when he can doth give me power And if a Bishop be so extraordinary good as not to silence nor hinder a Minister from Preaching Christ I do not think that this man is an Usurper in Preaching the Gospel for want of a License or second Power Nor yet in exercising the rest of his Office where he and the People do consent These things seem plain to us and they that whether by Learning or the Love of Riches and Honour and Domination are made wiser than we may suffer such Fools gladly while themselves are in re vel spe Rich Honourable and wise 3. And what is Ordination but a General Investiture in the power of performing the Ministerial Office And why may not the General Power or License be given at once as at twice I think Take thou Authority to Preach the Word of God and Administer the Holy Sacraments and the Discipline of the Church when thou art thereto lawfully called that is hast opportunity and fit Objects is a General License And a Man may presently Exercise this Office on Consenters Unless the sence be Take thee power when it shall be given thee 3. But if it be a Particular License that is here meant by the grant of second power I confess that there is somewhat considerable in it and that in old time the Bishop and his Clergy living together and meeting in the same Church the Presbyters like our Parish Curates now were in all the Worship of the day and in their privater Ministry to the People to be ruled by the Bishop and to Modifie and Circumstantiate all as he directed them And so may it be again But sure a Minister is not to travel an hundred miles to the Bishop to know whether he shall visit this sick man or give the Sacrament to the other and to know what Chapter he shall read and such like If it be not a General License that is meant it must needs suppose the Bishops presence 9. And seeing the Bishops may License a Presbyter to use the Keys the opening of this will help our understandings about the nature of the Bishops Office There is no act of Jurisdiction which they do not Ordinarily commit to others The sentence of Excommunication and Absolution is ordinarily decreed by a Lay-Chancellor And Spalatensis saith that Episcopal Jurisdiction may be done by a Lay Delegate The same sentence is Pronounced in Court by a Lay-Man or a meer Presbyter The same sentence is published in the Church by a Presbyter or Deacon And a Prince may give a License to exercise the Ministry to which we were Ordained I enquire then 1. Whether the granting of this Episcopal Power be a making that Man a Bishop that it 's granted to If so a Bishop a Presbyter and a Chancellor are all of one Office when thus impowred If not so then a Lay-man or one of another Office may have power to do the Work of the Bishops Office And what is the Office tell me if you can beside Authority and Obligation to do the Work A Lay-man and Presbyter may by the Bishop be Authorized and Obliged to do the Work of a Bishop and this ordinarily as an Office For so they do Ergo a Chancellor and a Presbyter may be made really a Bishop and yet in their esteem remain a Lay-man and a Presbyter still And is not that a Lay Office which a Lay-man may be Commissioned to do If a Lay-man were but Commissioned to do the Work of a Presbyter to Teach a Church ordinarily to Administer the Sacraments and to Excommunicate and Absolve in foro internae poenitentialis either it would make the Man a Presbyter or it would be a Nullity And if it be not so with the Bishops Office what is the Reason Is it not because it is not of Divine Specification and Institution but Humane and therefore mutable or such as Men may parcel out and commit to Lay-men by pieces as they please So much to Dr. Hammond's Appropriation of the Power of the Keys in that Treatise As to his Annotations I shall have occasion to recite them hereafter among those that give up the Diocesan Cause as opposed by us and therefore shall here pass them by His Dissertations against Blondel have a Premonition about Ordination which though most confident I shall manifest when I come to the point of Ordination to be most weak and indeed have done it before his death in my Disput of Ordin His first Preliminary Dissertation of Antichrist of the Mystery of Iniquity and of Diotrephes I will not be so needlesly tedious as to meddle with any further then to say that I will believe Dr. Hammond here and in his Annot. on 2 Thes 2. when I am fallen into so deep a sleep as to dream 1. That the famous Coming of Christ and our gathering together to him which is a great Article of the Christian Faith is but Titus his Destruction of Jerusalem and that the reward promised to all that love his appearing is meant to all that love the said Destruction of Jerusalem 2. And that this Destruction was not to be called nigh or at hand which fell out so few Years after 3. And that the Gentiles of remote Countries were so shaken in mind and moved about a Question of a few Years distance of the Destruction of the Jews more than about Christ's coming to the Common Judgment 4. And that the Gnosticks were indeed such terrible Persecutors of the Church who were dispersed Subjects when their Doctrine was but that they
them go without Christianity rather than Baptize them without this Image of a Cross unless he will be suspended from preaching Christs Gospel to the ignorant that they may be saved But if he will bear that he may do what he will that so poor souls may be the losers 19. If the commonest whore or wicked woman come to be Churched as they call it after child-bearing the Priest must use all the Office of thanksgiving without first expecting her repentance as if she were the chastest person And must give her the Sacrament 20. To conclude no Priest as such till Licensed hath power to take upon them to expound in his own Cure or elsewhere and therefore not to his family or any one of his ignorant neighbours any Scripture or matter or Doctrine But shall only study to Read plainly and aptly without glossing or adding the Homilies c. Are these Authorized Priests that may not so much as tell a Child the meaning of his Catechism or any Article of the Faith No though an ignorant person ask him The Priests lips should preserve knowledge and the Law should be enquired of at his mouth for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts But an English Priest may not expound any Matter Scripture or Doctrine but barely Read till the Bishop License him Obj. If they be not able it will do more harm than good Answ Will the righteous God be always mocked and suffer men to make merchandice of Souls and to vilifie them and set them at cheaper rates than they would do a goose a pig or a dog Is this a fit answer for those that are their Ordainers under whose examination and hands all men enter into the Ministery Will they say that they can get no better What not when they have made so many Canonical Engines to keep out better What not when such as Cartwright Hildersham Amesius Parker Dod Ball c. are cast out as unworthy When so many hundred were silenced in Queen Elizabeth and King James's days and Eighteen Hundred of us now When the Bishops have got so many Laws to hinder us from Preaching in publick and private and to banish us five miles from all Cities Corporations and places where we have preached When none but their sworn Curates Subscribers Declarers c. may preach yet can they get no better Will they keep up a Ministry whom they will themselves so ignominiously stigmatize as to tell the world that none of them all as Presbyters may be endured to expound any Scripture Doctrine or Matter but barely to Read Yea as if they would disswade them from all Learning of Humanity or Divinity as needless or hurtful things they say he shall only study to Read plainly and aptly So that he that studieth for any more than to Read doth break the Canons of the Prelatical Church Also a Priest as such hath no power to judge what Garments he shall wear nor of what colour at home or abroad He hath no power to judge in what house he may instruct or pray with any of his flock nor when so much as with his Church in publick or with any sick or afflicted neighbour in private to Fast and Pray But they are all straitly forbidden to preach or administer the Sacraments except to the sick in private houses To preach or officiate in any room save a Consecrated Chappel even in a Noblemans house To keep publick or private fasts To give the Sacrament to any that are not of their own Parish at least if they go from their own Priest because he never studied more than to Read They have not power to admit any other how Learned and Holy soever to preach in their Churches as Presbyters without Licence All these shew their Priestly power Obj. But a Surrogate may Excommunicate Answ 1. That is but ludicrous pro forma 2. Or else it is but their self-condemnations while they allow one Presbyter of a thousand to do that which all the rest are forbidden The same I say of Arch-deacons and peculiar Ordinaries Object They make Canons in Convocations and choose Convocation Priests Answ 1. It is but two Priests of many hundred that are in a Convocation And what 's that to all the rest 2. Choosing is not a Governing act Where the people choose Kings and Parliament men it proveth not that they have any Government themselves The Laity ever formerly chose their Bishops and yet were no Bishops nor Church Rulers 3. It is in the Bishops power to frustrate their choice For when they have chosen four he may put by two of them In this great Convocation which hath new moulded our Liturgy which hath formed the Engines that have done what is done the great and famous City of London had not one chosen Clerk in the Convocation No wonder then if they Conform not as not being bound by their own Consent For when they chose Mr. Calamy and my self the Bishop refused us both which I am so far from mentioning in discontent that I take it to have been a greater Mercy than I can well express 4. I take not Canon-making to be any considerable part of the Pastoral Office If two of many hundred have power to please the Plural Number of Prelates Deans and other Dignitaries whom they cannot over-vote by serving them against the Church and their Brethren doth that prove that Presbyters as such have the Governing power of their flocks I am not striving for a power of Ruling one another much less of Excommunicating Kings and Magistrates nor a power of making Laws or Ruling Neighbour Churches But only a power of Guiding their own flocks and judging of their own actions Yea and that not as Ungoverned or without Appeals But as Ruled by Magistrates consociated for Concord with other Pastors and Ruling Volunteers And if Archbishops also Rule them by Gods Laws we shall submit CHAP. XVII That the great change of Government hitherto described the making of new species of Churches a new Episcopacy and a new sort of half-sub-presbyters with the Deposition of the old was sinfully done and not according to the intent of the Apostles THere are two pretences and no more that I know of made to justifie all this foredescribed change The first is by Dr. Hammond when he was hard put to it at last in answer to the London Ministers which is That Subpresbyters were Ordained in Saint John's time and therefore by him The second is ordinary that though de facto the Apostles setled but single Pastors without Sub-presbyters at least over single Churches or Assemblies yet this was not done with an Obligatory purpose for the so fixing of it But only de facto pro tempore as a State of immaturity with a purpose and intent that it should grow up to the change of this at maturity I. To the first Pretence I answer 1. What probability is there that one Apostle when all the rest were dead should make so great a
of the first rank afore-described must govern it statedly as present by himself and not absent by others Chap. 12. The just opening and understanding of the true nature of the Pastoral Office and Church Government would end these Controversies about Prelacy Chap. 13. That there is no need of such as our Diocesâ—nes for the Unity or the Government of the particular Ministers nor for the silencing of the unworthy Chap. 14. The true original of the warrantable sort of Episcopacy in particular Churches was the notorious disparity of abilities in the Pastors And tho original of that tyrannical Prelacy into which it did degenerate was the worldly Spirit in the Pastors and people which with the World came by prosperity into the Church Quaere Whether the thing cease not when the Reason of it ceaseth PART II. Chap. 1. THe clearing of the State of the Question Chap. 2. The first Argument against the aforedescribed Diocesanes that their form quantum in se destroyeth the particular Church form of Gods institution and setteth up a humane form in its stead Chap. 3. That the Primitive Episcopal Churches of the Holy Ghosts Institution were but such Congregations as I before described Proved by Scripture Chap. 4. The same proved by the Concessions of the most learned Defenders of Prelacy Chap. 5. The same proved by the full Testimony of Antiquity Chap. 6. The same further confirmed by the Ancients Chap. 7. More proof of the aforesaid Ancient Church limits from the Ancient Customs Chap. 8. That the Diocesanes cause the Error of the Separatists who avoid our Churches as false in their Constitution and would disable us to confute them Chap. 9. The second Argument from the deposition of the Primitive species of Bishops and the erecting of a humane inconsiâ—tent species in their stead A specifi k difference proved Chap. 10. Whether any form of Church Government be instituted by God as necessary or all be left to humane prudence and choice Chap. 11. Argument third from the destruction of the Order of Presbyters of divine Institution and the invention of a new Order of half Sub-presbyters in their stead Chap. 12. That God instituted such Presbyters as had the foresaid power of the Keyes in doctrine worship and discipline and no other proved by the Scriptures Chap. 13. The same confirmed by the Ancients Chap. 14. And by the Confessions of the greatest and learnedest Prelatists Chap. 15. Whether this Government belonging to the Presbyters be in foro Ecclesiastico exteriore or only in foro Conscientiae vel interiore Chap. 16. That the English Diocesane Government doth change this Office of a Presbyter of God's institution quantum in se into another of humane invention The difference opened Twenty instances of taking away the Presbyters power from them Chap. 17. That the great change of Government hitherto described the making of a new species of Churches Bishops and Presbyters and deposing the old was sinfully done and not according to the intent of the Apostles Chap. 18. Argument fourth from the impossibility of their performance of the Episcopal Office in a Diocesane Church And the certain exclusion and destruction of the perticular Church Government while one man only will undertake a work too great for many hundreds when their work is further opened in perticulars Chap 19. The same impossibility proved by experience 1. Of the ancient Church 2. Of the Foreign Churches 3. Of the Church of England 4. Of our selves Chap. 20. Objections against Parish discipline answered The need of it proved Chap. 21. The Magistrates sword 1. Is neither the strength of Church discipline 2. Nor will serve instead of it 3. Nor should be too much used to second and enforce it The mischeifs of enforcing men to Sacramental Communion opened in twenty instances Chap. 22. An Answer to the Objections 1. No Bishop no King 2. Of the Rebellions and Seditions of them that have been against Bishops Chah 23. Certain brief consectaries Chap. 24. Some Testinonies of Prelatists themselves of the late state of the Church of England its Bishops and Clergy lest we be thought to wrong them in our description of them and their fruits Chap. 25. The Ordination lately exercised by the Presbyters in England when the Bishops were put down by the Parliament is valid and Re ordination not to be required jure divino as supposing it null A TREATISE OF EPISCOPACY Confuting by SCRIPTURE REASON And the CHURCHES TESTIMONY That sort of Diocesan Churches Prelacy and Government which casteth out the Primitive Church-species Episcopacy Ministry and Discipline and confoundeth the Christian world by Corruption Usurpation Schismes and Persecution Meditated 1640 when the c. Oath was imposed Written 1671 and cast by Published 1680 by the Call of Mr. H. Dodwel and the Importunity of our Superiors who demand the Reasons of our Nonconformity The designe of this book is not to weaken the Church of England its Government Riches Honour or Unity But to strengthen and secure it 1. By the concord of all true Protestants who can never unite in the present Impositions 2. And by the necessary reformation of Parish-Churches and those abuses which else will in all ages keep up a succession of Nonconformists As an Account why we dare not Covenant by Oath or Subscription never to endeavour any amending alteration of the Church Government by lawful meanes as Subjects nor make our selves the justifying vouchers for all the unknown persons in the Kingdom who vowed and swore it that none of them are obliged to such lawful endeavour by their vow By RICHARD BAXTER a Catholick Christian for love concord and peace of all true Christians and obedience to all lawful commands of Rulers but made called and used as a Nonconformist London Printed for Nevil Simmons at the three Cocks at the West end of Saint Pauls and Thomas Simmons at the Prince's Armes in Ludgate-street MDCLXXXI These Books following are printed for and sold by Nevil Simmons at the three Golden Cocks at the west end of St. Pauls A Christian Directory or sum of practical Theology and cases of Conscience directing Christians how to use their Knowledge and Faith how to improve all helps and meanes and to performe all duties how to overcome temptations and to escape or mortifie every sin in four parts 1. Christian Ethicks or private Duties 2. Christian Oeconomicks or Family Duties 3. Christian Ecclesiasticks or Church Duties 4. Christian Politicks or Duties to Our selves and Neighbours in Folio Catholick Theology Plain Pure Peaceable for Pacification in three Books 1. Pacifying Principles c. 2. Pacifying Praxis c. 3. Pacifying Disputations c. in Folio The Life of Faith in three Parts The first Sermon preached before his Majesty c. The Second Instructions for confirming believers in the Christian faith The third directions how to live by faith or how to exercise it in all occasions in Quarto Naked Popery or the naked Falshood of a book called the Catholick naked Truth
or the Puritan convert to Apostolical Christianity written by W. H. opening their fundamental errours of unwritten tradition and their unjust description of the Puritan the Prelatical Protestant and the Papist and their differences c. To which is added an examination of Roman Tradition as it is urged as infallible c. In answer to a book called A rational discourse of Transubstantiation in Quarto A Key for Catholicks to open the Jugling of the Jesuits and satisfie all that are but truely willing to understand whether the cause of the Roman or reformed Churches be of God and to leave the readerutterly unexcusable that will after this be a Papist in Octavo A Treatise of Justifying Righteousness in two books in Octavo There are lately published of this Authors these two Books following and sold by Thomas Simmons at the Princes Armes in Ludgate-street CHurch-History of the Government of Bishops and their Councils Abbreviated Including the chief part of the Government of Christian Princes and Popes and a true account of the most troubling Controversies and Heresies till the Reformation Written for the use especially of them I. Who are ignorant or misinformed of the state of the Antient Churches II. Who cannot read many and great Volumes III. Who think that the Universal Church must have one Visible Soveraign Personal or Collective Pope or General Councils IV. Who would know whether Patriarchs Diocesans and their Councils have been or must be the cure of Heresies and Schismes V. Who would know the truth about the great Heresies which have divided the Christian World especially the Donatists Novatians Arrians Macedonians Nestorians Eutychians Monothelites c. By Richard Baxter a Hater of False History A Moral Prognostication I. What shall befal the Churches on Earth till their Concord by the Restitution of their Primitive Purity Simplicity and Charity II. How that Restitution is like to be made if ever and what shall befal them thenceforth unto the End in that Golden Age of LOVE Written by Richard Baxter when by the Kings Commission we in vain treated for Concord 1661. And now published not to instruct the Proud that scorn to learn nor to make them Wise who will not be made Wise But to Instruct the Sons of Love and Peace in their Duties and Expectations And to tell Posterity That the Things which befall them were Fore-told And that the Evil might have been prevented and Blessed Peace on Earth attained if Men had been but willing and had not shut their Eyes and hardened their Hearts against the Beams of Light and Love THE English Diocesan AND PRIESTHOOD TRYED c. CHAP. I. The Reasons of this Writing I Am not ignorant how displeasing it will be to the Prelates that I publish these Reasons of my Nonconformity to the Subscriptions and Oaths by which they would have me become an obliged Approver of their Function Nor am I ignorant what Power Wit and Will they have to express and exercise their displeasure And consequently how probable it is that I shall suffer by them for this work And I well know that peaceable subjects should not unnecessarily say any thing against that which is required by their Rulers Laws nor cherish the Peoples discontents but do all that is lawful for the common Peace And I am not of so pugnacious or self-hating a disposition as to be willing of mens displeasure especially my Superiours or to be ruined in this World and all that I may but vent my Opinion in a case wherein I have published already so much that is still unanswered as in my Disputations of Church-Government is to be seen And upon such Reasons but above all that I might not cast away my opportunity for some more useful writings nor put an end to my own labours before God put an end to them I have been silent in this Cause since our publick debates in 1661 above ten years I have lived peaceably I have endeavoured to preserve the due reputation of the publick Ministry and to perswade all others to due subjection love and quietness I have by Word and Writing opposed the Principles of such as are exasperated by their sufferings into the Dividing and Separating extream Though I knew that by so doing I was like to incur the displeasur and bâ—tter cenâ—â—â—e of the Separatists as much as I had before of the Prelates though not to suffer so much by them And I thought that the Prelates themselves who would not understand the true state of the People nor the tendency of their way by our informations and evident Reasons might yet come in time to know all by experience and so to amend what they have done amiss But now I dare be no longer silent for the Reasons given Apol. ch 1. which I will â—tay the Râ—â—der bâ—ieâ—y to sum up 1. I find that experience it self doth not Teach some men but Harden them 2. I perceive that those that are now convinced by experience and wish they had taken another course and rather have united the Ministry than silenced them are not able to undo what they have done nor to amend what is done amiss much less to retrieve all the doleful consequents but the matter is gone out of their hands and beyond their power 3. I see that while we wait the Devil's work goeth on by the silence and by the Divisions of the Ministers Popery greatly increaseth Quakers multiply Atheism and Infidelity go baâ—e faced among those that are accounted men of reputation Malice and bitter hatred of each other with common backbitings censurings and slanders instead of sweet Love and Concord do notoriously encrease Thousands are every day committing these sins to the increase of their guilt and the hastening of Gods judgments on the Land The sufferers call the Prelates persecuters and wolves in sheeps cloathings who are known by their fruits their teeth and â—laws The Prelatists still say that the Nonconformists are unreasonable discontented peevish factious unpeaceable unruly schismaticks that will rather see all confounded than they will yield to things indifferent And shall we still stand by and silently see this work go on 4. And to love and defend Truth Honesty and Innocency is to be like to God It is pity that those that Christ hath done so much to justifie and will so gloriously justifie at the last should have nothing said on their behalf by men But we are much more obliged to justifie a righteous cause than righteous men For all men have somewhat that is unjustifiable but so hath not the truth of God 5. And he that in his Baptismal Covenant is engaged against the Flesh the World and the Devil should be loath to see all their work go on and not oppose it and to see that which he taketh to be no better than deliberate Lying or Justifying sin and Perjury it self and covenanting never to obey God in lawful and necessary Church-reformation to be all called Things indifferent 6. Nature and Scripture teach us to