And The Apostles retain'd the Phraseology of the Jews who spoke of Priests and Levites as two distinct Orders without mentioning the High Priest And When the Ancients Dichotomiz'd the Clergy they in other places plainly reckon up three distinct Orders of Bishop Presbyter and Deacon But is there never in all the Scriptures any Title Distinction or Marks of Eminence giv'n to one Priest which were not communicable to all of ' em Got ever all of 'em promiscuously the Title of High Priest or such distinctive Appellations Did the Apostles so retian the Phraseology of the Jews as that they sometimes make a Bipartite and sometimes a Tripartite Division of ordinary Church-Officers and give to any one ordinary Pastor sometimes at least a distinguishing Title and Marks of Eminence which are at no time communicable to all ordinary Pastors promiscuously As to the Ancients their sometimes Dichotomizing sometimes Trichotomizing the Clergy it 's most certain that in their Dichotomies they ey'd the prime primitive Church and in their Trichotomies their own times But Christ saith D. M. is call'd an Apostle a Bishop the Apostles Presbyters and Deacons But was Christ so call'd an Apostle that he had no other peculiar titles or marks of Eminence or that on the other hand the name Christ was giv'n promiscuously to all Apostles or ever giv'n to any of ' em Lastly was the Apellation of Apostle equally communicable to all Presbyters or ordinary Pastors as to the twelve and some few else extraordinary Officers All which he must swallow else he gives no relief to his Friend Bellarmine We Argue that seeing to no ordinary Pastor is giv'n any peculiar Appellation Character or Description but what is equally common to all there must be an Equality and Parity amongst all of 'em and this they can never get over Moreover among the Evangelists yea and among the Apostles Officers superior to ordinary Pastors the reformed Churches being Judges there was a compleat Parity as was also among the Deacons their Inferiours notwithstanding of all which the Hierarchicks must plead for certain Stories of Preheminence among the ordinary Pastors in favours whereof ne gry quidem they can bring from the Word of God the only Rule of Faith and Doctrine § 6. Add hereto Tit. chap. 1. where we not only find the Apostle using indifferently and promiscuously the two words Bishop and Elder but also he alledgeth the necessity of fit Qualifications in the one to prove that the same are required in the other the Presbyters that were to be Ordain'd must be blameless c. because a Bishop must be so wherein either we have an ocular Demonstration of the Identity of these two Officers or else which I abhorr to think the Apostles reasoning is more pitifull than the most equivocant Paralogism their being not so much as a nominal Connexion betwixt the Antecedent and Consequent and no less ridiculous than if one should reason that every Captain of a single Company must be able to guide and manage a whole Army because such Qualifications are required in a General Now seeing these Scriptures already vindicated to name no others evidently declare that there was no such thing as a Diocesan Bishop that there 's a compleat Identity of Bishop and preaching Presbyter and consequently a Parity of all ordinary Pastors they of necessity condemn the Hierarchick and Diocesan Imparity for I 'm perswaded these who alledge that they find in Scripture a Distinction between these Offices will judge that they may with reason enough conclude the Divine Right of Episcopacy Hence judge of D. M's fifth Query where and in what places of Scripture the superiority and jurisdiction of one Priest above another is forbidden And if it be not plainly forbidden then the Fancy of a Jus Divinum in favours of Presbytry such as is exclusive of all other Forms of Ecclesiastical Government is groundless and Chimerical From all which I conclude that if the Ignatian Bishop and Presbyter most be understood in the Notion of our Adversaries he then quite crosses the Apostles so his Doctrine is stark nought or which is a far more charitable Sentiment his Epistles have suffer'd no small interpolation Section VII The grand Objection taken from the Commentaries of the Ancients remov'd BUT the Fathers as our Adversaries pretend glossing on these Texts went quite cross to our Doctrine To the Bishops and Deacons saith Chrysostome What means that What was there a Plurality of Bishops in one City Not at all for at that time the Name was yet common so that a Bishop was also nam'd a Deacon that is a Servant And adds that both Timothy and Titus were Bishops Of the same mind say they were Hilary Epiphanius Theodoret OEcumenius and others which harmonius Consent of Ancients cann't but be the true meaning of the places in Controversie But as these and such Fathers confess and their Works proclaim they were like others subject to humane Weakness and Corruption fell into compliance with the growing Errors into immoderat heat prevarication and self-repugnancy and negligence to search for the Scriptures their meaning How loudly sounded the debate concerning rebaptizing between Stephen and Cyprian which â—ore almost the whole body of Christians into a pair of Factions With what heat was it prosecuted And which is most lamentable how pitifully was the truth on both hands deserted For altho' it be commonly believ'd that Stephen only held the truth and Cyprian and his fail'd yet Stephen and the Romans did no less betray it On the other extream while they asserted the sufficiency of Baptism altho' administred by the grossest Hereticks and capital Enemies of the Fundamentals of Christianity How great both before and after that time were the Contests about Easter How scandalous were the Contests between Chrysostome Epiphanius and Theophilus and between Hierome and Ruffine Not to name others in all which it is apparent how little they believed one another and how much many of 'em prevaricated in favours of their particular Fancies § 2. But their Contradictions to one another are less to be admired when we clearly perceive that one and the self same Author either out of negligence or some other weakness hath given us quite contrary Doctrines Justine Martyr which Sculteâ— observes in one place ascribes the whole Work of Regeneration to free Grace and in another destroyes what he had builded and places free Will in the room thereof And Clemens Alexandrinus as the same Scultet observes following Justine Martyr delivers the like inconsistencies about the same Theme he sometimes ascribes our Salvation wholly to Faith and again tells us that we may purchase it with the Treasure of our Works § 3. Of the same kind are their polemick Discourses wherein their study was much more directed to bespatte their Antagonists and alure the vulgar Auditor than solidly to support the Truth I shall never believe that Optatus believed himself when he maintain'd that all
Feet ye onght also to Wash one anothers Feet that every Apostle yea and every Believer is Lord and Master of the rest § 8. And writing to Euagrius I hear saith Hierome there is one so mad as to preferr the Deacons to the Presbyters that is to the Bishops For seeing the Apostle clearly teaches that Bishops and Presbyters are one and the same how can a Server of Tables and Widows proudly preferr himself to these at whose Prayers the Sacrament of Christ's Body and Blood is consecrated you will require a Proof hear a Testimony Paul and Timothy to all the Saints in Philippi with the Bishops and Deacons would you have another Example in the Acts of of the Apostles Paul thus speaks to the Presbyters of one Church Take heed to your Selves and the whole Flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you Bishops to Rule the Church c. And that none may contentiously plead that in one City there were many Bishops here also another Testimony wherein it 's most evidently proved that both Presbyter and Bishop were one and the same and then produces the 1 to Titus and 1 to Timothy 4. 8. 14. neglect not with the laying on of the Hands of the Presbytry And 1 Peter 4 and 1. 2 John 1. 3 John 1. And all these to prove that he had undertaken viz that both Bishop and Presbyter were one and the same Now it 's most observable that that he inferrs this Conclusion not only from Scriptures written long after the first Epistle to the Corinthians where it 's said I am of Paul c. but even from the last Epistle of John the longest Liver of all the Apostles And therefore no less notticeable is D. M's extream stubborness and aversion from Truth who would force Hierome to introduce Bishops presently after that Schism mention'd 1 Cor. 1. And accordingly as his bad Cause oblig'd him to do with this and the rest of Hierome's Testimonies wholly smuther'd it And indeed all hitherto who have adventur'd to graple therewith have been conquer'd thereby yea even Bellarmine himself is compell'd to give up the Cause Hierome indeavours saith the Jesuite to conclude the equality of Bishops and Presbyters from the Epistle to Titus to the Philippians and from the Epistles of Peter and John which were written after the first Epistle to the Corinthians Neither can the Jesuite find another way to be even with Hierome but by arraigning him as fraughted with self-repugnancy levity and instability in this Matter and all the Arguments he brings to prove Hierome a Favourer of Episcopacy are only so many fruitless Attempts to make that appear But let us go on with Hierome But saith he the reason why after this viz. the writing of both the Epistles of John one was chosen and set over the rest was that there might be a remedy of Schism least every one drawing the Church of Christ to himself should divide it For in Alexandria from Mark the Evangelist even to Heraclas and Dionysius the Presbyters still gave to one elected from amongst themselves and placed in a higher seat the Name of Bishop as if an Army should creat a General or the Deacons should chuse one of themselves whom they know to be industrious and name him Arch-Deacon On these words D. M. triumphs The Custome was saith he even from the days of St. Mark the Evangelist that a Presbyter was chosen who Governed the whole Society this in the Opinion of St. Hierome cuts off that imaginary Interval wherein the Chruch is said to have been Governed by a Parity of Presbyters Where he forgeth a Gloss no way contain'd in the words of Hierome whose Example of an Army and Deacons are only adduc'd to shew the manner of that Presbyter or nominat'd Bishop's entrance and not at all the measure of his Power over his Collegues And that no Power over the rest can be collected from this place is beyond Scruple clear from Hierome's present Scope who introduces this Ancient Alexandrian Practice to clear and prove the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter which according to him remain'd in the Church for a while after the Writings of John the longest Liver of all the Apostles Had D. M. perused Dr. Stillingfleet he had taught him that both Election and Ordination of this Alexandrian Bishop was only performed by his Fellow Presbyters that the Original of Hierome ' s exsors potestas any Power he mentions in Bishops over Presbyters is by Hierome attributed not to any Episcopal Institution but to the free choice of the Presbyters themselves for what doth a Bishop continues Hierome except Ordination which a Presbyter may not do Here the Jesuites and their Follower D. M. dream they find a fine Distinction made by Hierome between Bishop and Presbyter but first they must make an unseasonable Antiptosis and compell Hierome to speak contrary to the express words of this place which are in the present Tense contrary to the scope and design of this Epistle which is professedly to shew the great Dignity of Presbyters yea even their Identity with Bishops and thereby to reach a sharper reproof to the petulant Deacon And contrary finally to Hierome's most clear and most frequently repeated Doctrine of the Scriptural Identity of both Offices Were it not madness then to dream with the Jesuits that in these words Hierome makes any Distinction between the Scripture Bishop and Presbyter who is here only asserting that in all places Rome excepted where the Presbyters were more depressed and the Deacons more raised than in other Churches even then in his time a Presbyter was allow'd by the Canons and Constitutions of the Churches to do ought that a Bishop might do save Ordination alone This his Design of holding forth the most great dignity of Presbyters yea even their equality with Bishops which Bellarmine acknowledges that he may the better compesce the Insolency of the Deacons Hierome all along this Epistle prosecutes and having again cited the Epistles to Timothy and Titus to prove that a Presbyter is contain'd in i. e. is one and the same with a Bishop otherwayes a Deacon is also in a Bishop and so Hierome had crossed his own Design by the very Argument wherewith he minded to compass it and having added some other Topicks to the same purpose thus concludes his Epistle And that we may know that the Apostolick Traditions are brought from the Old Testament that which Aaron and his Sons and the Levites were in the Temple the Bishops Presbyters and Deacons claim in the Church Nunc animis opus Aenaeae nunc pectore firmo All the Jesuites and their Complices will presently be about our Ears But Solamen nobis Soeios habuisse malorum Their Attaques are no less on Hierome than us wherefore this is one of the chief places brought by Bellarmine to involve Hierome in a maze of self-contradiction and make him propugn Prelacy who is followed by others of the Hierarchicks but
as if what any man either by Fraud or Force is made seemingly to yeeld to were to be taken for his true and genuine Sentiments I thought this kind of reasoning had been peculiar to a Spanish Inquisitor or French Converter Or that they were bad Men continues he a hard construction For then Hierome of Prague who was forc'd and so many of the choice Fathers of the Council of Arminum who were trick'd to admit in appearance something contrary to their true Sentiments shall all be bad men That the Ministers at this Convention at Leith dealt most unwarily and some of 'em also with too little integrity is beyond scruple But that all of 'em or most of 'em were poor covetous Rogues c. neither Petrie nor any of his Perswasion ever affirmed He adds that the Courts Arguments for the Leith-establiment were mainly Politick for they turn'd not Theologues to perswade Episcopacy's Divine Institution from Scripture c. Well then there was little true Piety no consulting of Conscience or the Word of God in the Matter And if some of the Ministry as he says were taken with these politick and state Reasons they in so far fell from their own Principle viz. That in the Books of the Old and New Testament all things necessary for the instruction of the Church and to make the Man of God perfect are contain'd and sufficiently express'd But the Clergy saith he had found that the new Scheme of the first Book of Discipline had done much hurt to the Church As if the old Popish Scheme under which the Churches goods by God's Law destinated for the promoval of piety and learning and sustaining of the poor were consum'd and debauch'd in upholding the grandour and luxury of a spurious ecclesiastick Nobility could have been really more profitable to the Church than that of the Book of Discipline on of the prime designs whereof was the bestowing of the Church Revenues for these their true uses to which God's Law had appointed them Or as if Pastors Schools and Poor can in no place be provided for where the Romish Church-policy is wanting But The six Commissioners saith he that treated with the State at Leith were sensible Men and far from being Parity-men Just so far from being Parity-men that most of 'em in an Assembly 1580. July 12. deliberately found and declared Episcopacy unlawfull in it self He intimats that the Courts motive for the Leith-establishment could not be their desire to possess the Churches Patrimony An untruth as we have now seen too bare fac'd to need more refutation His proof hereof is of the same stamp viz. Had the Clergy fall'n so suddenly from their constant claim to the Churches Revenues did that which moved them to be so earnest for this meeting with the State miraculously slip out of their minds Seeing not the Church but the Court-politicians as is evident with desire to circumveen her chiefly procur'd that meeting and if these Delegates were either the only or first men who by sinistrous Artifices fell into a bad Compact then let him exclaim with admiration of this matter what follows is yet odder viz. Was it not as easy for the Court to have possessed themselves of a Bishoprick an Abbacy a Priory c. when there were no Bishops as when there were For he 's to be pitied if he be ignorant that the Courtiers having no Law-title thereto had no hope save under covert of their own Creatours these titular Bishops of any peaceable and secure possession of the Churches Revenues But an undoubted Assembly saith he own'd the Leith convention as an Assembly and its Authority as the Authority of an Assembly and for several years after that establishment at Leith beside which there was no other fond for owning them for Bishops Bishops were present and as such were obliged to sit and vote in general Assemblies and many Acts of subsequent Assemblies put this matter beyond all probability of ever being controverted as the Assembly in August 1574. which petitioneth the Regent that Stipends be granted to Superintendents in all time coming in all Countries destitute thereof whether it be where there is no Bishop or where there are Bishops who cannot discharge their Office as the Bishop of St. Andrews and Glasgow And that his Grace would provide qualified Persons for vacant Bishopricks But this tho' it be his prime Argument is soon removed our Church knew that divers Ministers and others had been allur'd or aw'd to that agreement She knew that 't was only made for the Interim and for the Interim only did she tolerate it with a full resolution to have a more perfect Order And as for the words In all time coming there 's not a syllabe of them in the Act he cites Nor indeed any where else of all the Acts of these Assemblies She knew also that during that Interim 't was impossible to get that which had been the Revenues of Popish Bishops other Church Rents out of the Regent and other Courtiers their hands In the mean while the vast number of unplanted Churches weakness of the Ministry in divers parts and unsettlement even unto that time of the Churches Affairs allow'd for a space the continuance of Evangelistick Superintendents or Commissioners who were to be in almost perpetual motion and travels and therefore needed much larger maintainance then did fixed Pastors which large maintainance the Church being thus strip'd of her Patrimony could not afford to the number that was needfull On these and such Grounds the Church indulged to that Convention the name of an Assembly tolerated in these Tulchans the name of Bishops And seeing they had got more Rent then was giv'n to ordinary Ministers allowed them to exercise the Labour and Travel of Superintendents or Commissioners And thus the Church made the best she might of that their unlawfull Bargain And tho' which he also objects some Assemblies allow Bishops to conveen and proceed against delinquents command Ministers by their Letters to admonish concerning persons to be excommunicated it helps him nothing seeing the very Acts he cites give no less power to Superintendents yea to Commissioners whom yet the Church used even after she had declared Episcopacy unlawfull in it self So far is our Churches tolerating for a space these Tulchans from being any Argument that she believ'd not the Divine Right of Parity But how appears't saith he that our Church receiv'd the Leith Articles only for an Interim out of a dislike to Episcopacy And there were other things in the Articles which required amendment But sure these Articles were without any exception receiv'd and tolerated only for the Interim and how well these Court-bishops were liked is already made manifest and our Churches subseqnent actings declare which never rested but still wrestled against the storms of both Power and Policy untill they were sent packing 'T is true as he says the Church met with Opposition but that this was
Acts 20. Philip. 1. and the like Texts which we now use that Bishop Pastor and Presbyter are all one and the same and that in one Church there were at one time conjunctly many Bishops Of the same mind are all the Systematick Divines yea even Tilen himself while Orthodox We judge saith he not only with Hierome but also with Lombard Gratian Card. Cusan and others that the preferring one out of the Colledge of Pastors to the rest and giving him the name of Bishop was a humane Invention This Author indeed alter'd his mind concerning Church Government when he pelagianiz'd for then he turns altogether tho' to his cost a Hectorer of the Zelots of the Genevan Discipline Time would fail me in collecting Testimonies of this kind seeing there were ever few I may say none save a small handfull in Britain who have not asserted that during the Apostolick age there was no such thing as any distinction between Bishop and Pastor or preaching Presbyter and that among these there was an intire equality To these we may add the Testimonies of the most and famousest of the reformed Churches in their Confessions whereof we have seen not a few already while we related the Testimony of the Helvetian Confession together with the approbations thereof no less illustrious and pregnant is the Testimony of the French Consession We believe say they that all true Pastors where ever they be are endu'd with equal and the same power under that one Head Christ the Chief and Vniversal Bishop To the same purpose also speaks the Dutch Confession We believe say they that this true Church ought to be governed by that spiritual Policy so that there be in it Pastors or Ministers that may purely dispense the Word and Sacraments that there be also Elders and Deacons c. § 3. The harmonius and Catholick Testimony of all the reformed Churches are to some like pricks in their eyes and thorns in their sides and therefore most various and hetrogeneous means are used to render it unserviceable And amongst other things we are told that many forraign Divines and Churches have a great likeing for their Diocesan Way and Zanchius say they counts all its Opposers Schismaticks But Maresius answers that Zanchius never allow'd of a Lord Bishop but only of such a one who is like a Rector of a Colledge whose Power I 'm sure is little or nothing above that of a Moderator Maresius adds that he can find in no place of Zanchius the words Prideaux had alledg'd And lastly as Maresius tells us Zanchius professes that he cannot but love the zeal of such as hate the names of Bishop and Arch-Bishop fearing least with these Names the ancient Ambition and Tyranny together with the destruction of the Churches should return Prideaux also alledges that Calvin writing to the King of Poland advises him to establish Bishops and Arch-bishops But has the same return from Maresius viz. that this is the Bishop's own Dream and that there is no such thing to be found in Calvin This dealing is not very laudable Neither are Means wanting to procure Advocats from Abroad one whereof brings many things either to defend or excuse the Hierarchy and to shew that it 's not ill link'd abroad and amongst other things saith that notwithstanding of what is in the Helvetian Confession its Authors condemn not the Liberty of other Churches as they manifest in their Preface protesting that in all this Confession they agreed with the Church of England But this Author cann't be ignorant that seeing according to that Confession Christ gave equal Power to all Pastors and according to what is alledg'd to be the Judgement of the present Church of England he did the quite contrary Their Preface can by no means prove that they allow of the Sentiments and Practice of the present English Church except he would have the Preface to contradict the Confession But all this he says is only to darken an evident Truth the meaning of the Preface being that between the Helvetians and the English there was no such fundamental Difference as prohibited mutual Charity one to another which many have given and may give to these who as they judge retain'd many Errors tho' not Fundamental The same Author objects that many Churches and amongst others that of the Helvetians have either Bishops over their Pastors or which is really the same Superintendents But to instance in the Helvetians they in their Confession saying that Christ gave a like Power to all Pastors c. and therefrom concluding that none may hinder to return to Christ's primitive Institution make most apparent that they intended no continuation of any Superiority amongst Pastors and consequently of no Bistops or their equivalent Superintendents but all this work he makes is dicis gratia for the fashion only for if in Helvetia or else where there be any umbrage of Bishops or Superintendents it 's really an Obtrusion and Erastian Usurpation and this we may learn from himself freely acknowledging that the chief legislative Power in the Church matters is in the hands of the supream Magistrat Otherways he confesses that the choisest of Writers and amongst others Hoornbeck make the Discipline of the Scots French Dutch and Helvetian Churches to be one and the same Moreover he sufficiently answers himself while he expresly grants that between the Superintendents or Bishops through Germany and these of England there is an infinit difference and that these in Germany have only a simple prerogative of Order but not at all of any Jurisdiction or any thing that can be properly term'd Power Thus he And I 'm sure that any Pâ—aeses of an Assembly hath no less Superiority than he here ascribes to these transmarine Superintendents or Bishops and indeed shortly to give an account of this Author besides as we have now seen he is oblig'd to pull back with the one hand what he had bestow'd on the Hierarchicks with the other his whole Discourse leans upon this Supposition that there is no certain Form of Church Government left by Christ in his Word on this depend his Glosses upon the passages we produced of the French and Dutch Confessions Vide inter alia part spec a pag. 171 ad pag. 189 where he all along presupposes and inculcats that tho' according to the Authors of the Confessions Christ gave equal Power c. to all Pastors yet in their Judgement if the Church will she may alter this kind of Government and change that Equality which Christ gave for an Inequality and give some Pastors a Power over the rest Which if it be not a Contradiction to these Confessions in stead of an Explication it looks as like it is one Crow can be like another For who can believe but that if the Authors of these Confessions had believ'd an indifferency of Equality or Inequality of Pastors they had either intimated
secular Clergy who were indeed become too secular and these were the Popes Agents and Emissaries who brought the World to receive the Mark of the Beast and wonder at her For before that time the Popes found more difficulty to carry on their Pretensions both from secular Princes and Bishops but these Regulars being warranted to Preach and Administer the Sacraments without the Bishops licence or being subject and accountable to him as they brought the Bishops under great contempt so they were the Popes chief Confidents in all their treasonable Plots against the Princes of Europe And when at the Council of Trent the Bishops of Spain being weary of the insolencies of the Regulars and of the Papal Yoke design'd to get free from it The great Mean they proposed was to get Episcopacy declared to be of Divine Right which would have struck out both the one and the other But the Papal Party fore-saw this well and opposed it with all the Artifice imaginable and Lainez the Jesuit did at large discourse against it and they carried it so that it was not permitted to be declared of Divine Right And by this judge if it be likely that the Papacy owes its rise to Episcopacy The emptiness of which discourse is apparent For First The tendency and nature of Prelacy and the Topicks whereon they Found it aiming no less at one Head over all then at one Prelat over a few Churches make evident that he touches not the Argument in hand only giving out that some time by one accident or other the humbling and depression of the Prelats prov'd the Popes exaltation Secondly Strange I 'm sure and most demonstrative must the Reasons be that make null clear Matters of Fact or perswade Men that such things have never been and 't is undeniable that the Councils and other Caballs which from time to time rais'd the Pope gradually to his present hight were all consisting of or manag'd by Bishops and if any hapen'd to spurn at his rising the Pope got still far more then a plurality to crush them and indeed 't was impossible the Pope should have risen by any other means the whole sway of Church Affairs and guidance thereof being then in the hands of Bishops wherefore if the Pope was rais'd to despotick Soveraignity whereby he might absolutely dispense of Church Affairs and trample at pleasure on the fairest mitres they only are to be blamed having themselves advanc'd him to this transcendental Preheminency Thirdly Neither are the Bishops less guilty of this the Popes exaltation upon the account of their profound sloth and negligence the Author well observes that they were become too secular and indeed they were so immers'd in Luxury and Ambition that providing they might wallow in their Lusts and obtain from the Pope a Domination over other Churches they little valued any thing else Fourthly But 't is yet more admirable how he can alledge that the Regulars brought the World to receive the Mark of the Beast as if the Bishops for this he must intimat or he says nothing had been innocent he 's too learn'd not to know that gross Papal Darkness had over-spread the World ere ever any such Exemptions were giv'n or the Regulars distinguished from Seculars 'T is true indeed that the swarms of Friers were amongst the most pestiferous Locusts the World hath been pestered withall but to lay all or the greatest share of this Guilt of exalting the Pope on their shoulders is a shrewd evidence of partiality nothing being more notour then that as the Bishops were the main Assistants and Supporters in every Innovation he decreed so they with the greatest care rigour and fury press'd them on both Clergy and People Fifthly That the wicked fraternities in the several Orders of Regulars were the Popes Agents in contriving and sometimes effecting the ruine of Kings and Princes is but too well known and evident enough yet that the Prelats were no less guilty and far more efficacious herein is no less deniable Were there no Bishops supporting the Pope in his War against the Emperour Barbarossa Did not a crew of the same Cattel join him in Dethroning Henry the IV And at a word where did ever the Pope make his impresses but he was strengthn'd by their arm and support Sixthly But tho' Episcopacy at the Council of Trent had been declar'd of Divine Right what great relief had this been either from the Papal Yoak or insolencies of the Regulars it might perhaps for the time have procur'd some more Honour to the Bishops for the Pope's Italians of other Orders but might not the Pope notwithstanding by his boundless Authority and Supremacy he pretends over all Bishops have continued to gall and oppress their Order and also send especially where the negligence of Prelats invited him his Missionaries through the World yea thus the Pope's power paramount had not once been touch'd at that Council or hurt by such a Declaration Was his infallibility ever there question'd by the Bishops Did they at all endeavour the removal of the unsupportable Burdens and Slavery the Church groan'd under And should it not have been a great benefite to the Church or diminishing the Pope's power tho' his Holiness had pleased to declare the Divine Right of their Office Seventhly But whatever it was the Bishops aim'd at in the Council of Trent I 'm not much concern'd only I would gladly know how from this their Action it follows that Bishops had never been the Men or Episcopacy one of the means whereby the Papacy had been brought into the World which is the Author's Inference and is just as one should reason thus some of Alexander's Macedonian Souldiers vex'd with his tyranny and insolence and his preferring of Strangers attempted his down-throw the like may be said of some of the Souldiers of Julius Caesar Galba Didius Julianus Maximinus and others therefore they had not contributed to the raising and absolute Supremacy of these Princes And should not such an one be reckon'd an admirable Logician And yet this Inference should be far more pardonable than the former in so much as the thing the Bishops aim'd at against the Papacy if it can be call'd any thing came infinitely short of what these Conspirators attempted upon the powers they deem'd unsupportable And by this judge if the most earnest efforts of their chiefest Authors make it in the least improbable that the Papacy owes its rise to Episcopacy and if such pitifull paralogisms proclaim not that they can really find nothing wherewith to cover Prelacy from the heavy but just imputation of being the certain introductive of Popery § 6. This odd reasoning of the Doctor minds me of another of his of his Essayes or Retorsions which is of Kin to this Argumentation May not one saith he that quarrells a standing Ministry argue on the same Grounds a Ministers Authority over the People gave the rise to the Authority Bishops pretend over Ministers and so the Minister will
and the Chair yet they succeeded him not in his Apostle-ship but the latter Bishops in neither c. And Lightfoot a renown'd Divine of the Church of England proves that the Apostle-ship was an Order for ever unimitable in the Church The Apostles saith the same Author could not ordain as Apostle by Imposition of Hands as they could ordain Elders but they are forced to use a Divine Lot which was as the immediate Hand of Christ imposed on him that was to be ordained that Opinion took little notice of this circumstance that hath placed Bishops in the Place of the Apostles by a common and successive Ordination Dr. Barrow whose Works are publish'd by Bishop Tillotson and therefore are to be lookt on as his is copious on this Subject Apostles also saith he did Govern in an absolute manner according to Discretion as being guided by infallible assistance to the which they might on occasion appeal and affirm it hath seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us Neither did the Apostles pretend to communicat it They did indeed appoint standing Pastors and Teachers in each Church they did assume fellow Labourers or Assistents in the Work of Preaching and Governance but they did not constitute Apostles equal to themselves in Authority Priviledges or Gifts for who knoweth not saith St. Austine that Principate of Apostle-ship to be preferr'd before any Episcopacy And the Bishops saith Bellarmine have no part of the true Apostolical Authority And now judge of the Spirit of these Men who are glad most falsly to brand these famous Bishops and others the most eminent Doctors of that Perswasion as being guilty of the most abominable Crime of Socinianism providing they can thereby bespatter and make odious the Presbyterians Judge also of D. M's Query whether the Apostolical Power as to it 's permanent necessary and essential Branches was not in its nature Perpetual and Successive and by them transmitted in solidum as they receiv'd it from our blessed Saviour to single Successors in particular Sees and not to a Colledge of Presbytsrs in the modern Notion As to the last part of his Query and his Presbyters in the modern Notion I know none such if 't be not these of the Hierarchicks their half Ministers for which there is no ground in Scripture And accordingly it's certain that the Apostles left the managing of the Church to neither Bishops nor Presbyters in his sense both of them being Chimera's but to Colledges of Bishops who are also Presbyters both being one in Scripture during the Apostolick age But tho' we should grant them all the Query seeks supposing which all the Ancients affirm the equality of all Bishops who at the beginning were reciprocated with Congregations he 's yet but where he was and has really done nothing for the establishing of his Hierarchy Judge lastly of that doughty Argument of the Papists and our Hierarchicks for Prelacy to wit that Bishops succeed to the Apostles and Presbyters to the 70 Disciples which has been generally reckon'd by Protestants among Rome's dotages and as such refuted in their Popish Controversies and to name no others by Iunius and Willet who answers that not only Bishops but all faithfull Pastors are the Apostles Successors and that even according to the Pope's Decrees not Bishop but Priests succeed the Apostles and Deacons not Presbyters succeed the 70 Disciples And now to go on with D. M. and his Fellows all their cavilling to make Timothy and Titus Hierarchick Bishops is but the product of a late Popish Dream For the Fathers when they so called them or the Apostles mean'd not of Bishops in this sense § 3. Wherefore Willet Answers that it is most like Timothy had the Place and Calling of an Evangelist and that the Calling of Evangelists and Bishops which were Pastors was diverse This Answer which so approv'd a Divine of the Church of England gave the Papists D. M. calls a ridiculous subterfuge For saith he the Work of an Evangelist has nothing in it opposite to or inconsistent with the Dignity of a Bishop c. A most disingenuous tergiversation and sliding from the Office of the opponent or probant to that of the defendent seeing this was one of his special Scripture-Arguments whereby to establish his Hierarchy and it 's sure that if Timothy and Titus might do what they did under another Notion and Capacity than that of a Diocesan Prelate his Argument goes to wrack As does also his perversion of 2 Tim. 4 5. for he insinuats that from Timothy's being injoined to do the Work of an Evangelist it will no more follow that he deserved the Name than Daniel's saying Ch. 8. 27. that he did the King's Work will prove him a King But had he ever considered the rest of the Epistle the context of the place and the Signification and Notation of the Word Evangelist he had clearly seen that the Apostle so adapts this Work of an Evangelist to Timothy that the Name and Character properly belongs unto him He adds That any who now convert Jews or Pagans are as properly Evangelists as any so called in the primitive Church and thus insinuats that Evangelists such as Timothy and Titus were no extraordinary Officers which except a few Novelists wedded to their Fancies is condemned by all Men. § 4. And that there was such a Function by which some in the days of the Apostles were raised far above the rank of ordinar Pastors or Doctors and placed in the very next degree to the Apostles themselves whose Office was mostly ambulatory going from Church to Church in the exercise thereof is in part intimated by Sedulius and Theodoret and others upon Ephes. 4. 11. but more fully by Eusebius who informs us that even after the Death of the Apostles divers remained who were in a far higher rank than the rest of their Successors who being saith he the admirable and divine Disciples of so great Men built up the Churches the Apostles had founded promoving the preaching of the Gospel and sowing Seed of the Kingdom of Heaven far and wide thro' the whole World for many of these Disciples that were yet living whose Minds the Divine Word had inflammed with a vehement desire of Wisdom fullfilling our Saviour's Command and dividing their Goods among the Poor and thus leaving their Country exercised the Office of Evangelists among these who had not yet heard the Doctrine of Faith by most diligent preaching of the Gospel and furnishing their Hearers with the Holy Scriptures these so soon as in any remot and barbarous Country they had laid the Foundations of Faith and ordained Pastors and had committed to these Pastors the care of this New Plantation being content therewith and accompanied by the Grace and Power of God hast'ned to other Countries for even to that time the Divine Power of God's Spirit wrought Miracles by these Men so that at the first hearing of the Gospel
threatning Emulation Hatred and mutual Enmity proudly usurping Principalities or Prelacys as so many places of Tyrannicall Domination To this time doubtless did the Nicene Fathers look in their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ancient Customes that they mention which will be denyed by none who remember that even things of a very late date used then to be called ancient and which is yet more they were wont to pretend Apostolick Authority and Tradition for every one of their Innovations For this their Pride and Superstition and such Vices God sent a long and most grievous Persecution after which it might have been reasonably thought they would have returned to the Humility and Simplicity of the Gospell and Apostolick Age. But so far were they from this that the Gangren began faster than ever to consume the Vitals of Chrsitianity and having got a Christian Emperor to indulge and enrich them they quickened their Pace and in the gadiness of Pride and giddiness of Superstition extravaging without bounds in this Declension they piece and piece laid aside the Scripture and in the model of their Government and Worship eyed and followed three patterns the Jewish Policy Ceremonies and Temple where there was one High-Priest the magnificent and splendid Government of the Roman Empire over which there was one Head one Emperor And lastly the way of the Roman Pagan Priests in which there was also at Rome a Pontifex Maximus or High-Priest over all the many Degrees of Priests in the Empire and so in process of time it came to pass that he who by his first Institution was design'd to be a Pastor of a Flock or Congregation and to imitate the Apostolick Simplicity and Humility turned to be the great Antichrist the son of Perdition and grand Emissary and Lieutennant of the red Dragon and these who were ordain'd to be his Fellow-Pastors and Ministers of the Gospel became his Underlings and Slaves in that Apostacy and being martial'd into a thousand Ranks and Orders proved so many Squadrons of hellish Locusts so that scarce in any part of the Creation of God was there ever a more sad and direfull Depravation if it were not when our first Parents fell into the Cloutches of the old Serpent or when the Sons of God became his greatest Enemies and those morning Stars the beautifull Angels turned into infernal Firebrands black and abominable Devils Most observable notwithstanding yea and adorable is Divine Providence in this that even in the growth and increase of this black Apostacy the Church in Opinion and Doctrine at least still held fast the great and capital Articles of Christianity as the sufficiency of the Canonicall Books of Scripture the Doctrine of the holy Trinity of free Grace of Justification by Faith in Christ's Blood c. Their great sin lay not in the Defect but in the Excess by superadding to these golden Foundations a heap of hay and stuble the wild Fancies of Apostatising Brains And in process of time equalizing yea and preferring them to these Divine and most necessary Truths comprehended in the Books of the Old and New Testament Then it was when tho' they still acknowledged the Identity of Bishop and preaching Presbyter or Pastor of a Congregation they must among'st the rest of their novell Foppereis raise one Bishop or High-Priest as they spoke over a number of other Pastors and Churches whose Ordination and Consecration must be accompani'd with a dale of Alloy suitable to this their humane and unwarrantable Institution He must have a Cudgell put in his hand to signifie his Rule and Authority over the People and a Ring to signifie his Pontifical Honour and the hidden Mysiereis wherewithall he is intrusted The Bishop being consecrated shaven and anointed it was his proper Work and Office to erect and consecrate Churches to make their Chrism or Holy Oyl For the Art of Besmearing was pretty early in the Church no later at least than their Diocesan and therewith to anoint the forehead Eyes and Ears of the Baptized to receive the Penitents and perform such greasy businesses about them These and the like Actions were reserved as the special Ornament and Badges of the High-Priest's Honour And indeed hitherto they acted congruouly for 't was but meet that their own Antichristian Inventions the Institution whereof never came into God's mind should be appropriated to their own Church-Officer whom God never appointed Caetera conveniunt sed non levis error in uno est For they debased and polluted God's Ordinance I mean the Ordination of Pastors which they threw in among their Trash and left likewise to their Bishop or High-Priest as a part of his peculiar Province Superstitionists sometimes for such Fooleries deprave the Scripture which Dr. Lightfoot one of the learn'd est of the Church-of England Divines observes and baffles Here saith he Episcopacy thinketh it hath an undenyable Argument for Proof of its Hierarchy and of the strange Rite of Confirmation c. And this is very like another Practice for Antiquity also not a white lower than their Diocesan they made another fixed Church-Officer whom they called an Exorcist His Office was to dispossess and cast out Devils Now surely such an ordinary Church-Officer was never appointed by God and therefore 't is most likely that some of those Exorcists needed some to have casten the Devils out of themselves or at least to have giv'n them a a round doze of Hellebore no less then did any of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their Patients But seeing they made such a Church-Officer and the dispossessing of Devils was among'st the greatest and most miraculous Works that ever was practis'd even by the greatest Apostles It may be thought that this Exorcist was one of their highest Church-Officers a Metropolitan certainly Arch-Bishop or Patriarch but he was none of these yea he was no Bishop no Presbyter no Deacon no Sub-Deacon yea not so much as an Acolyth that is a Candle-carier for they us'd in fair-day-light and Sun-shine to light Candles in the Church to obey and fulfill as they said that Scripture John 1. 9. That was the true Light which lighteneth every Man that cometh into the World This Exorcist was yet a degree lower than their Candle-Carier and therefore was plac'd in the very rear and tail of all their Clergy So dangerous yea and unaccountable were many of their Actings but especially in the matter of Church-Office-bearing Moreover I appeal to all the judicious and conscientious if out of a conscientious desire of conforming to the primitive Church our Adversareis make such a horride noise bussle and Schism for their Hierarchy For suppose it to be as true as I hope by this time to all the unbyassed it 's manifested to be false that in all points they could vouch their Hierarchy to be warranted by the true primitive Church and the Government of the one intirely like that of the other yet do they not desert her in many other things
subordinate Brethren A sturdy argument forsooth as if our most blessed Master to quell his Disciples their ambition of aspiring to a preheminence over one another and to render them more content with a humble and brotherly parity could not adduce and urge his own most holy and meek example of his most wonderful condescending to take upon him the form of a Servant and do the works of a Servant among his Apostles and that so humblie as if he had been only their Companion and nothing above them but he must anone be concluded to degrade and throw down himself into a meer equality with his Disciples Can any in the exercise of his wit make such a Collection Neither can better befall him for as is his constant practice this wretched Paralogism he also borrows from another Jebusite Cornelius a Lapide who at the same rate depraves this Text of Matthew to save from a mortal blow Peter's fictitious Primacy But in the next place which is little better D. M. turns Jew on our hand Let it be further considered saith he that the Hierarchy and Subordination of Priests was established by Divine Authority in the Jewish Church and if our Saviour had pulled down that ancient Polity and commanded an equality among the Presbyters of the New Testament he would not have stated the Opposition between his own Disciples and the Lords of the Gentiles but rather between the Priests of the Mosaic Oeconomy and the Disciples of the New Testament And agian fearing least his Jâ—daism and also his self-repugnancy should not have otherways been apparent enough We do not saith he now plead as some ignorant People may pretend that there ought to be a Bishop above Presbyters because that there was a High-Priest among the Jews but rather thus that the Hierarchy that obtained in the Patriarchal and Jewish Oeconomy was never abrogated in the new Well then is there on Earth a visible High-Priest over the whole Church the Levitical Orders Rites Temple-service the very things wherein the Jewish Hierarchy consisted and shadows of Christ to come now allowable But to come to his cavill and quiet this child of Ignorance D. M. should know that beside the Disciples ambition to get up over one another according to the carnal apprehension they then entertained of Christ kingdome wherein our Hierarchick Lord Bishops are the Apostles successors indeed and all Hierarchicks men of Apostolick principles they looked also for a great worldly and civil power and dominion which was not at all comprehended in the Jewish Priesthood nor was then possessed by any of the Priests and so our Lord 's stateing the opposition between his Disciples and the Lords of the Gentiles is by far more apt for his purpose than if he had stated it between them and the Priests of the old Oeconomy which had been altogether lame and doon scarce the half of his bussiness In a word the Romishness and Falshood of all these his Cavills is manifest were there no more from this only that if they do any thing they make for the defence of that new Romish Doctrine of Peter's Supremacy which both the Fathers and all sound Protestants not only Presbyterians but also Episcopals yea some that otherwise deserve not the name of Protestants as Dr. Heylen explode prove that there was a compleat Equality Parity amongst the Apostles And they deduce their Conclusion especially from this text of Matthew's Gospel and its parallels And indeed if there be as doubtless there are any places of Scripture fit to prove it these texts deservedly hold the first place The Author of the Opus imperfectum thought by some to be Chrysostome saith on this place of Matthew Quicunque autem desiderat primatum in terrâ inveniet confusionem in coelo Whosoever desires a primacy on Earth shall find Confusion in Heaven Now suppose the truth of these words and compare them with the words of the Apostle 1 Tim. 3. 1. If a man desires the Office of a Bishop he desires a good work And it 's clear the Office of a Bishop is quite another thing than a Primacy for to desire the former is lawfull and laudable but to desire the latter is dangerous and damnable and so much by the way for I love not to transcribe the labours of others And so angry is D. M. at New Opinions and for their sake at every thing that 's New that he scarce ever advances any Argument Vindication or Defence but what is so frequently and soundly baffl'd so bare and worn as to vy even with the old ancient Garments of the Gibeonites These Texts as I said prohibite also all Pastors of Flocks to exercise Dominion Secular or State Dignities which is irrefragably made out by our Writers against Bellarmine de Pontifice and other Romanists However 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 either the Possession or Hope of such Emoluments and Dignities as also the glistering gayetie of gorgious and theatrick Ceremonies close mens mouths and keep them from acknowledging the Truth for which even a Pagan may come in to reprove them O curvae interris animae coelestium inanes Quid juvat hoc templis nostros immittere mores Et bona Dijs ex hac scelerata ducere pulpa Dull earthy minds who know no heavenly thing What profites it into the Church to bring Our own Inventions or to dream that we Can with Lust's fewel please the Deity Dicite Pontifices in sancto quid facit aurum Speak out your minds ye Priests and do not lie Can gold your holy places sanctifie It 's an old saying that the Church brought forth Riches but the Daugter devoured the Mother who when she had wooden Cups she had golden Priests but afterward she got golden Cups and wooden Priests Even their Pseudo-Clement is prolix on this subject exhorting the Bishop to be dis-engaged of all worldly cares and affairs and perpetually imploy'd in Preaching and Prayer and the like Ministerial duties And indeed all Pastors of Flocks would carefully abstain from secular and state Offices and every thing else that may abstract them from their Charges and Flocks least their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 procure them Functius's reward But if our Hierarchicks will not hear our blessed Lord and his Apostles if they will not hear the genuine writtings of the Ancients nor yet these spurious pieces whose Authros were otherwayes sufficiently Hierarchick and Ceremonious I think they might listen to the Bishop af Aiace for he was a Member of the Council of Trent John Baptista Bernard saith Suave Bishop of Aiace who thâ— he believed that residencie was de jure Divino yet thought it not fit to speak of that question delivered a singular speech saying that not aiming to establish one Opinion more then another but only so to inforce residency as that it may be really executed he thought it vain to declare from whence the obligation came or whatsoever else and
Stilling fleet And amongst many others these his wâ—ords are most observable for having taken notice that Eusebius makes it a most hard Matter to know who succeeded the Apostles in the Churches they planted adds say you so is it so hard a Matter to find out who succeeded the Apostles in the Churches planted by them unless it be mention'd the Writings of Paul What becomes then of our unquestionable Line of Succession of the Bishops of several Churches and the large Diagrams made of the Apostolick Churches with every one's Name set down in his Order as if the Writer had been Clarenceaulx to the Apostles themselves Is it come to this at last that we having nothing certain but what we have in Scriptures And must then the Tradition of the Church be our Rule to interpret Scriptures by An excellent way to find out the Truth doubtless to bend the Rule to the croocked stick c. Again it 's certain that for divers Centuries Bishops were nothing like what they are now either in exercising Civil Power or Jurisdiction over other Pastors or yet in the largeness of Dioceses so that the Term Bishop in respect of the two is little better than an equivocal It 's certain also that the ancient Church wanted not her own Blemishes which was well perceived by her Doctors who still look'd on the Word of God only as the Rule of Faith and Manners on which they never founded the Episcopal Superiority Hence this their Argument carries nothing of Cogency Section VI. The Instance of Aërius condemn'd by Epiphanius prov'd to be unserviceable to our Antagonists TO Illustrat and Corroborat this their Argument from Antiquity they adduce the Instance of Aërius who was for this his Judgement of Presbytry as well as for Arrianism condemn'd and counted Heretick by Epiphanius But it is certain that Epiphanius censur'd Aërius not only for his being Anti-episcopal and as he believ'd because Arrian but also for his rejecting of Lents set and Anniversary Fasts and for denial of Prayer and Sacrifice for the Dead Now either purer Antiquity join'd with Epiphanius in asserting of the necessity of Prayer and Sacrifice for the Dead and other such Fopperies or they did not and if they join'd with him therein then our Prelatists if they be Protestants are concern'd to reflect better of how little weight their Argument from the Ancients pressing their unwarrantable Additions can be unto them But if they say that sounder Antiquity consented not to Epiphanius while he urged Prayer and Sacrifice for the Dead and such Anti-scriptural Fictions we return that neither did the choicest of the Ancients agree with him in his Plea for Prelacy The Judgement of Hierom is so well known herein that the Bishop of Spalato acknowledges that Hierom can by no means yea not byforce be reconcil'd to their Cause Hierome's Judgement saith Saravia was private all one with that of Aërius and contrary to the Word of GOD wherefore we shall examine his Arguments And on this account he is much offended with Hierome accusing him of Vanity Self-contradiction and Prevarication And Alphonsus de Castro sharply reproveth Thomas Waldensis another Papist who had intended to pervert the Testimonies which are commonly alledg'd for Presbytry out of Hierome There De Castro having prov'd out of divers places of Hierome that he was truly for the Scriptural and Apostolick Idenity of Bishop and preaching Presbyter concludes against Waldensis that of necessity there must be another way taken to Answer the Passages alledg'd out of Hierome for Presbytry And at length flatly opposes himself to Hierome in this Matter and saith that we ought rather to believe the Decrees of Popes and Councils than the Doctrine of Hierome though both very Holy and Learn'd And Medina another Champion of the Hierarchy cited by Bellarmine asserts the same of Hierome saying He was of the same Judgement with Aërius in this Matter Bellarmine is very displeas'd with his Brother for his Ingenuity and therefore attempts to bring Hierome over to the Episcopal Party but instead of performing this Task he only fruitlesly endeavours to set Hierome at variance with himself The like success had another of the same Fraternity who like Bellarmine attempted to draw Hierome to his Faction Bayly the Jesuit And yet with these the most disingenous of the whole fry of Loyolites some called Protestants stick not warmly to join themselves and plead for a Patrociny to their Cause from Hierome § 3. Yea not only was Hierome of the same Judgement anent Episcopacy with Aërius but also as even the Jesuite Medina acknowledges the most of the Greek and Latine primitive Doctors and in special Ambrosius Augustinus Sedulius Primasius Chrysostomus Theodoretus Oecumenius Theophilactus This their Opinion saith Medina was first condemned in Aërius then in the Waldenses and lastly in Wicklef but this Doctrine was either dissembled or tolerated by the Church in them for the Honour that was had to them while on the other hand it was always condemn'd in these Men as Heretical because in many other things they swerv'd from the Church Many Papists and other Prelatists cannot away with this Medina's free dealing and use many shifts to refute him and draw these Fathers to their Party But to use the Words of Rivet Whosoever shall consider their Answers collested by Sixtus Senensis Biblioth lib. 6. annot 319 323 324. they shall presently perceive that all their Distinctions are most pitifull Elusions and that indeed all these Fathers were no less Presbyterian than Aërius although they accommodat themselves to the Custom then received least for a Matter not contrary to the Foundations of Religion they should have broken the Vnity of the Church What do our Opposits herein but espouse what the Romanists in whom any ingenuity remains have long since disowned § 4. But tho' Epiphanius were the mouth of all Antiquity and the only fit Judge in this Controversie the Triumph of our Adversaries should be very small for Aërius to Prove the Idenity of the two having adduced a parallel of many particulars Epiphanius denieth nothing of these to belong to Presbyters except only Imposition of Hands he yeelds therefore that both of them equally have Power to Baptize to occupy the Chair and finally to perform all Divine Worship Our Antagonists therefore offering to vouch the Prelacy they plead for by the Authority of Epiphanius promise much more then they can perform for what pray is this Power of Imposition of Hands or Ordination compared with what they covet and pretend to support by Epiphanius his Authority I mean the both great and many Differences between Bishop and Presbyter § 5. In the mean while Epiphanius his unjust dealing towards Aërius is most palpable for he sticks not to give out that Aërius his Judgement of the Identity of Bishop Presbyter was look'd on by the whole Church as an intolerable Heresie condemned by the Word of God when
what not our Author must sustain that Knox reckon'd up whatsoever he judg'd to be Sins and Abuses in that Church otherwise he does nothing But dare he say that Knox there did so Spoke he ever a word of the Tippet Corner-cap and Surplice there being Badges of Idolaters and Marks of the odious Beast Hath he one syllable of Christmas Feasts and such holy Days which he also judged superstitious and sinfull Or of the Faults of their Service-book about which as all Men know fell out the Controversie at Francfort or the depriving Ministers of Power to separate the Lepers from the whole at which our Author grants Knox to have been offended But Knox calls Cranmer that reverend Father in God Ergo. Bellè As if forsooth Knox might not use a Phrase of the common stile of the times but he must be presently concluded a propugner of the Hierarchy Was not at the Assembly in Edinburgh March 1570. whereof John Knox was a Member one of the Heads of Adam Bishop of Orknay ' s Accusation which by the Assembly he was desir'd to redress that he stileth himself with Roman Titles as Reverend Father in God which pertaineth to no Ministers of Christ Jesus nor is giv'n them in Scriptures John Knox continues our Author said the false Religion of Mahomet is more ancient than Papistry yea Mahomet had established his Alcoran before any Pope of Rome was crown'd with a triple Crown c. Can any Man think subjoins our Author John Knox was so very unlearn'd as to imagine Episcopacy was not much Older than Mahomet Or knowing it to be Older that yet he could have been so ridiculous as to have thought it a relict of Popery which he himself affirm'd to be Younger than Mahometism But was Knox so very unlearn'd as not to know that divers Popish Errors and Dotages had generally obtain'd and got good footing before the time of Mahomet Do not these who know any thing know so much Have we not heard how he rejected as unwarrantable and unlawfull Christmas Feasts and such holy Days Will our Author acknowledge they obtain'd not before the rise of Mahomet or the Pope's triple Mitre I think he will not Have we not seen how good space before these times other Innovations as unction of Poenitents and Caelibacy of Church-men were coming in fashion and countenanc'd by the most famous Councils Knox had been unlearn'd indeed if he had not known so much he spoke therefore only of the maturity and more open appearance of the Man of Sin and as he expresses of his coming to his triple Crown and meant not at all that before Mahomet's time no Popish Doctrines were generally broach'd and imbrac'd yet so our Author otherwise he 's quite beside his purpose makes him to speak then which nothing more false and injurious to Mr. Knox can be express'd Hitherto we have been intertain'd with Sophistry so silly and Paralogisms so palpable that 't were unjustice done to this Gentle-man's Intellectuals not to believe that he sufficiently discern'd the Fallacies But he promiseth to make a mends for the future as yet he has only brought up his Rorarios and Velites but now the case is quite alter'd Ecce ferunt Troes ferrumque Ignesque Jovemque § 11. He has yet more to say yes more with a Witness Knox says in his Exhoatation to England Let no man be charg'd in preaching of Jesus Christ above that a man may do I mean that your Bishopricks be so divided that of every one as they are now for the most part may be ten and so in every City and great Town there may be plac'd a godly learned Man with so many join'd with him for Preaching and Instruction as shall be thought sufficient for the bounds committed to their Charge But the Reader impartially weighing what we have adduced must yeeld that 't is impossible either from this or any other place to make Knox a Prelatist except we involve him in manifest self-repugnancy which there is no necessity to do for any thing here said For tho' Knox considering how the English were wedded to something of a hierarchick Splendor had indulged them in a good deal thereof it had been only a parallel Action to that of his Friend Calvin who tho' sufficiently Anti-ceremonial yeelds notwithstanding for a time and for Peace's sake to that Nation some of their Ceremonies which he calls tolerable Fooleries unprofitable Triffles c. Yet I have met with none who on this score has taxed Calvin of Self-contradiction But this ex abundanti for they cannot from these Knox's words conclude that he favoured so much as the least grain of the substance of Prelacy of each of their Bishopricks he makes ten which I think will bring his Lordship comparatively consider'd to a very narrow compass But to shew that he put a definit number for an indefinit he gives not only to every City but to every great Town a Bishop Now of Cities and Mercat-towns in England which there are not inconsiderable there are odds of 600 But that none may justly cavill let 's make a large abatement of the number where they may be smaller and yet I 'm sure so many remain as there should be ordinary Presbytries in England providing it were so divided Moreover the great End and Work of this Bishop Knox makes to be the preaching of the Gospel and instructing of the People of his Dominion and Power over the Clergy not a syllable yea he gives not to him alone the Charge of the Flock 't is their Charge the Charge of the rest no less than the Bishop they are join'd with him not his Curats under him And we have heard him already making the Office of a Bishop nothing else but what is common to all Pastors And if his Doctrine and Practice in Scotland may be allow'd as an Explication of his Exhortation to England this Bishop was subject to the Admonition and Correction of the Presbytry wherein he was Bishop Nothing therefore can necessarily be drawn from Knox's words except that this Bishop was to have if Temporary or continued I dispute not for it touches not the present Question a meer presidency of Order or Moderator-ship nothing of Dominion or Power to Knox's Bishop Nothing therefore of imparity amongst Pastors can from the words in hand with any good consequence be deduced Lastly whatever 't was it appears clear from these words that he allow'd this only for a time during the rarity of Preachers § 12. But hear somewhat more of the same Exhortation Touching the Reformation of Religion saith he ye must at once so purge and expell all dregs of Papistry Superstition and Idolatry that thou O England must judge and hold execrable and accursed whatsoever God hath not sanctifi'd to thee by his blessed Word or by the Action of our Master Jesus Christ. The glistering beauty of vain Ceremonies the heaps of things pertaining nothing to Edification by whomsoever
fear him the more for whomsoever the Lord of the House sends to Govern it we ought to receive him as him that sends him Let us manifest that we ought to receive the Bishop as the Lord. And again in the same Epistle thus I know who I am and to whom I write I 'm condemn'd ye live in Peace I 'm in danger ye sure ye are a Passage to these who are slain in the Lord The Condisciples of Paul sanctifi'd and made Martyrs worthy blessed under whose footsteps let me be found when I enjoy God And to the Magnesians Because I was found worthy to see you in your Bishop Damas and your worthy Presbyters Bassus and Apollonius and my Fellow servant the Deacon Sotion whom let me enjoy because he 's subject to the Bishop as to the Grace of God and to the Presbyters as to the Law of Christ. And again Study to do all things in the Concord of God the Bishop presiding in the Place of God the Presbyters in the Place of the Confession of the Apostles and my most sweet Deacons having committed to their Charge the Service of Christ. And within a few lines Therefore as the Lord did nothing without the Father being one with him neither by himself nor by his Apostles so do ye nothing without the Bishop and Presbyters And to the Philadelphians So many as belong to God in Christ Jesus these remain with the Bishop And in the same Epistle I cryed in the midst of the Congregration I spoke with a loud voice take heed to the Bishop the Presbytry and the Deacons Some-body thought that I spoke these things foreseeing a Division but he in whom I am bound bears me witness that I had this knowledge from no Man bnt the spirit preached saying without the Bishop see ye do nothing And in his Epistle to the Trallesians Whom I Salute in fullness and an Apostolick Character And again For when ye are subject to the Bishop ye seem not to Walk according to Men but according to Jesus Christ. And in an other place of the same Epistle And in like manner let all Men reverence the Deacons as the command of Jesus Christ and the Bishop as Jesus Christ who is the Son of the Father and the Presbytry as the Council of God and Senat of the Apostles without which there is not a Church and thus I counsel you to esteem of them for I have gotten an Example of your Charity and retain the same with me in your Bishop whose very composition is a great deal of Discipline and his mansuetude Power whom I believe the very wicked reverence And afterward in the same Epistle Can I not write unto you Heavenly Things But I sear that I should thereby endammage you being but Children and forgive me least not being able to comprehend them you be strangl'd For I am not bound in every respect but can be able to know things Heavenly the Orders of Angels their Constitutions Principalities things visible and things invisible And again Thus shall it be unto you if ye be not Proud and remain unseparable from God the Bishop and Apostolick Orders And again in the same Epistle Farewell in Christ Jesus if ye be subject to the Bishop as to the command of God and in like manner to the Presbytry But I 'm weary and did never translate more of any Author with less delight or pleasure not because I 'm in the least gravell'd by what is here said concerning Bishops altho' the whole strength of what the Episcopals deduce from Ignatius be wrapt up in these Passages yea I 'm perswaded that from these very Places the Hierarchy's wounded under the fifth Rib. But because the most part of what we have quoted as also no small part of what is behind is altogether insulfe putide and more tasteless than the white of an Egg and the Reader may easily perceive by these Examples that the Spirit and genius of this Author is quite different from what can be looked for in Ignatius a prime Martyr of the primitive Church In all these Epistles 't is clear as the Noon-sun that a head-strong Passion and a furious Zeal of enslaving all Christians under an illimited and blind Obedience to all Church-men as so many Romish Holinesses did intirely possess and reign in the Author of these Epistles The Apostle indeed sometimes admonishes the Churches of the Duties and Esteem Christians should pay to Church-Officers but withall uses but rarely to handle that Subject and with the brevity and modesty that became him ascribing to them only the Titles of Watch-men and Labourers Bishops or Pastors and the like which best became the simplicity of the Gospel whereas on the other hand the pretended Ignatius so far swerves from this humble and Apostolick strain that none tho' they search the Writings of the most corrupt Ages shall be able to find any that in exaltation of the Clergy and depressing and subjecting of the Laity out did him How secure should Basilides and Martial two Spanish laps'd Bishops have been had their Flocks believed this Ignatian Doctrine who having consulted Cyprian If they might not desert these and chuse new Bishops were by him resolved in the affirmative and admonish'd to chuse other Pastors but had they believ'd this pretended Ignatius it had been with them the blackest impiety to have separated from their Bishop or attempted so to do on whatsoever account The Apostles frequently both to Pastors and Churches inculcat the diligent perusal and understanding of the Holy Scriptures as a special Duty that by them as a sure Rule all Mens Doctrines and Injunctions without any exception may be tryed but in liew hereof this their Ignatius has only Mens Persons in admiration perpetually deafening his Hearers or at least wearying his Readers with Injunctions of absolute and blind Obedience as if all and every one of his Bishops Dictats were to be receiv'd without the least Examination a Priviledge that even Christ and his Apostles tho' they might have done it never assumed to themselues but still remitted their Hearers to the Scriptures for the tryal thereof this cann't but in the estimat of all the judicious be a Fault altogether unworthy of the True Ignatius I hope that all honest Men shall give more Charity to this choice Martyr than to believe that he 's guilty of so gross Idolatry for I can call it no better and fantastick and impious doting on the person of any Man whatsoever in which unworthy Work this Author I will not say Ignatius spends no smal part of these Epistles Therefore altho' the asserting of all therein to be genuine be so far from assisting our Adversaries that their Cause is by the very Passages they alledge for its confirmation mortally wounded I can never perswade my self but they have fall'n into the wicked hands of Forgers who tainted with the common Vice of the Ages subsequent
Hierome leave them as being altogether useless for support of the Pomp and Splendor of their Hierarchy To these add the Jesuite Celâ—otius who after a thousand Meanders and serpentine windings to elude and deprave these clear Testimonies of Hierome at length seeing all would not do rejects them all as the Forgeries of unlucky Aërian hands never written by Hierome For which Cellotius is chastised even by Petavius and others of the Loyolites themselves Into such Discord Confusion and Torment do Men usually throw themselves so soon as they obstinatly resolve to wage War with so clear and irradiant Verities And here it 's observable that in all times and in all Churches the Authority of Hierome has been exceeding great and above most of the primitive Writers which came not to pass without a special Divine Providence that he and in him the whole primitive Church whose Judgement in these Matters he most clearly delivers might remain as an unsuspected and an uncontroverted witness against some of latter Ages pretendedly Catholick but really Sectarian Novelists Among the great Services he did to the Church two Pieces are more especially notticeable viz. his most clear asserting and acurat distinguishing the Canonical Books from the Apocryphal above all who handled or wrote of that great and most necessary Article and which is the Matter in hand his Antiprelatick Doctrine of the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter these not only Hieronymian but also truly Catholick Doctrines are with equall fierceness impugn'd by the Romanists and I appeal to the impartial Reader if their Exceptions against this latter be a whit more solide than these which are advanced against the former viz. Hierome's Judgement of the Canonical Scriptures which are to be found collected and learn'dly refuted by Dr. Cosin And indeed these Sophisters endeavouring to subvert these Catholick Doctrines of Hierome dash only on an Adamantine Rock for as never any Articles were better founded so notwithstanding of whatsoever practical Aberrations therefrom were fall'n into none were more universally imbrac'd receiv'd and handed down for to speak of the Matter of our present concern this Hieronymian Doctrine all following Church Writers ratifie and approve the bulk of subsequent Commentators Writers of Offices and of other Treatises as Salvianus Isidorus Hispalensis Amalarius Rabanus Maurus yea and intire Councils as that 2 of Sevil which ascribes the whole Difference and Sâ—periority only to Church-Canons and late Constitutions and after them Gratian and Lombard who affirm that in the primitive Church there was only Presbyters and Deacons and his Expositors among whom is Aestius who very fairly quites the Scriptures and tells us that this Superiority is not very clear from Scripture which is nothing but a Confession of the Truth of Hierome's Doctrine forced from this great Prelatist and School-man Yet adds Aestius this may be sufficiently proved another way To which words Dr. Stillingfleet occurrs Ingenuously said saith he however but all the difficulty is how a Jus Divinum should be prov'd when Men leave the Scriptures But in the recounting and transcribing of such Confessions or Testimonies I will not inlarge And now having rescued the principal Scriptures our Antagonists detort in favours of their Distinction between Bishop and Presbyters and vindicated some places commonly adduc'd for the Identity thereof as also evinced that the most celebrated of the Ancients did no otherways understand these Scriptures nor derive the Original of Prelacy from Divine Institution I may with confidence conclude that Ignatius had none before him of the Judgement that he if we believe the Hierarchicks so passionately favour'd Section IX The Testimonies of Ignatius's contemporaries disproving what our Adversaries would force him to speak and confirming what we have prov'd to be his mind viz. that he cashiers a Diocesan Prelacy HAving viewed the Apostolick Writings and dived into their most ancient Commentators and primitive Doctors and having found that in the time of the Apostles the immediat Ancestors of Ignatius there was in the Church no such thing as a Diocesan Prelate Let us next look unto what remains of his Contemporaries or these who lived near Ignatius's time and we shall have ground to deduce the same Inference And first it's observable that these Writers such as Clemens Romanus in his Epistle to the Corinthians for the rest that bear his Name are undoubtedly spurious Polycarp to the Philippians Hermas or Pastor Justine Martyr tho' they as occasion offers frequently mention Pastors Doctors Bishops Presbyters indifferently taking all of 'em for on and the same Office yet of a Diocesan Prelat or one set over other Pastors or over these that had Power of Dispensing the Word and Sacraments in all their Writings have not a syllable Which Argument against a Diocesan Prelat tho' negative is not to be slighted if we consider these Authors their closs Vicinity to the Apostles the occasion they had to have mention'd him had he been then existent their more than a Pythagorick silence concerning him Yea the same kind of negative Argumentation Eusebius uses while he disproves and explodes some Writings forg'd in the Name of John Andrew and other Apostles because saith he no ancient Ecclesiastick Writers mention these Books We shall find moreover that they positively disclaim Diocesan Prelacy I begin with Clemens Romanus who writing to the Corinthians commends their former carriage in these words Ye walked in the commands of God and being obedient to these that had the rule over you and giving your Elders due honour ye were wont to admonish the younger with Moderation to seek after things that are honest And again Wherefore the Apostles preaching the Word thro' the severall regions and proving by the Spirit the first fruits thereof ordain'd Bishops and Deacons for these who should believe neither was this a new Ordinance for many ages before it was written concerning Bishops for so in a certain place saith the Scripture I will appoint their Bishops in Righteousness and their Deacons in Faith And Our Apostles by Jesus Christ our Lord knew that there would arise Contention concerning the Name of a Bishop and therefore being endew'd with a perfect Fore-knowledge they ordain'd the fore-said Officers and left unto us describ'd the particular services of both Ministers and Offices to the end that approv'd Men might succeed in the place of the defunct and execute their Office These therefore who are ordain'd by them or by other famous men with the Consent of the whole Church who blamelesly serv'd the Sheepfold of Christ with humility and quietness without baseness and who for a long time had a good Testimony from all These I say cann't be justly thrust out of their Office for we commit no light sin if we cast out these from the Bishops Office who holyly and blamelesly perform'd it Blessed are these Presbyters or Pastors who have perfited their journey and are dead and who have obtain'd
a profitable departure for they are not afrai'd least any thrust them out of their places into others For we see that you have cast some from their Charge which they perform'd with honour It 's base Beloved yea very base and unworthy of a Conversation that is in Christ Jesus to hear that the most stable and ancient Church of Corinth for the sake of one or two should raise sedition against the Presbyters And If I be the Cause of Contention schism and sedition I 'le depart and be gone whithersoever ye will and do what the People shall command providing only that the sheepfold of Christ with the Presbyters appointed over it may have peace And And you therefore who were the Authors of this Division subject your selves to your Presbyters Hence Observe First that he never names or so much as insinuats that in Corinth there was any Bishop Superintendent over the rest of the Pastors But as the Apostle to the Hebrews had done before him honours equally all their Pastors with the Title of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 these that bear Rule over them Secondly That in imitation of the same Apostle Paul he names only Bishops and Deacons as the only Orders of Divine Institution by whom the whole Gospel-Service was to be perform'd Therefore afterward when he names Presbyters in distinction from the Flock and as Rulers over it he cann't be understood as Petavius and Pearson would force him to speak of Presbyters with Relation and Respect only of their Age but to give them this Demonstration as a peculiar Designation of a Church-Office and so the word Presbyter most of necessity with Clement coincide in its meaning with the word Bishop and both of 'em become Synonymous Terms to hold forth but one and the same thing Thirdly That the Apostles did not as we find afterward Decreed by the Synod of Sardica and admonish'd by Pope Leo chuse out only the greater Cities and neglect and forbear to place Bishops in lesser Villages that the name of Bishop hereby might not fall into Contempt but indifferently and without distinction of places every where settled them according as there was a probability they might serve the great end of their calling therein Fourthly That to found the Distinction and number of these Orders if we believe Clement the Apostles had no eye unto the Jewish Church-Polity so as to make it a Pattern for that of the Christian but only to what was prophecied and foretold by the Prophets concerning a new frame of the New Testament Church and thus Clement really contradicts all the Patrons of the Hierarchy who would still found their triple Orders on that of the High-Priest Priests and Levites of the Temple Fifthly That in Corinth it was attempted to throw out a plurality of real Bishops and cast them from their Charge and that the Sedition was not moved against one only but divers Bishops in that Church Many other things might be observed but these serve sufficiently to prove that there was a plurality of true Bishops of Corinth who were in nothing distinguished from Pastors of particular Flocks or preaching Presbyters § 2. Petavius notwithstanding cann't abide any such Inference from the words of Clement Wherefore he scrapes together several things whereby to ward off the force of these Passages and alledges that Clemens his silence of the Bishop of Corinth makes nothing for us For Pope Siricius saith he in his Epistle to the Church of Millain maketh no mention of their Bishop altho' in that mean time Ambrose occupied the Chair But the vast Difference between the Cases and the Circumstances of the Churches of Corinth and Millain quite nullifies the Jesuites Instance The People of Millain jointly both Clergy and Laity had thrust out Jovinian few or none of them for ought we hear being prosylited to his Doctrine wherefore Siricius had nothing to do but shew them in General that he had excommunicated Jovinian with two or three others who had fled to Rome for Sanctuary So there was no special Ground or Cause why particular mention should be made of Ambrose the Bishop or any other whether of the Clergy or Laity the whole Body thereof for ought now known being without any Schism earnest enough for the expulsion of Jovinian and only expecting what the Bishop of Rome which they acknowledged as the first See and whether Jovinian had fled would do in this Matter Whereas one the other hand Clemens writes to a Church cut in pieces with a Schism in their own Bowels infected with Sedition of no small part of the People against their Pastors broken with as appears plain a division of the very Pastors themselves and this grown to such a hight that some of the Pastors were thrust from their places and driv'n out now in this Case the Bishop had either the best of it and so the seditious part merited a severe and special reprimand on the account of their Opposition to and Separation from their Bishop and thus he should certainly have been mentioned or else he was the Cause of the Division or at least joined with the injurious and therefore should have been particularly reproved or admonished Clement it 's true names none but the influence which the good or evil Carriage the Bishop had and could not but have in such a Matter had certainly obliged Clement either to mention his name of give some signification of him if there had been any Diocesan Bishop existent in Corinth Clemens speaks of several Pastors of Flocks which I think none will deny intimats the diversity of their Carriage in that Business and gives Directions accordingly How can it be apprehended that he should pass over the chief Pastor and go to the rest without so much as the least Direction unto him the least mention of him yea or the least insinuation that there was in Corinth any such thing Petavius's next Attempt is on these words of Clement where he tells that the Apostles instituted Bishops and Deacons And the Jesuite contends that two distinct Orders are not here mean'd but that the word Deacon is only explicative of the former word Bishop and cites several places where the word Deacon is taken in a signification of Honour and applied to the Apostles and Civil Magistrates And afterward terms Salmasius ridiculous for saying that Clemens nam'd only Bishops and Deacons without mention of Presbyters For saith the Jesuite Presbyters are more frequently mention'd by Clement than either Bishops or Deacons But certainly these Orders are again and again mention'd by Clement without adding any thereto ordetracting therefrom when he appears to reckon up all the Church-Officers that are of Divine Institution And altho' the word Deacon be sometimes taken for the Designation of a higher Office Yet as Petavius himself else where observes It is with the addition of such a word or phrase as guides our Judgement and gives us to learn that by it is not understood this
the very same Officers the very same Men that he means by the name Bishops rather than e contra see Pray the Letter it self apud Flav. Vopis in Saturnino § 11. 'T were easie to shew divers succeeding Fathers to have been of Justine's Mind and Strangers to Diocesan Episcopacy ignoring all Discrimination between Bishop and preaching Presbyter or Pastor I shall only here with one Chamier against Bellarmine and the rest of the Jesuites assert against their Successors and Defenders under whatever Name they be known that according to Irenaeus the Churches were committed to the Presbyters no less than to the Bishops that these who are now reckoned Popes High-Priests universal Bishops are only Presbyters in the Judgement of Irenaeus and that in him Presbyters are not so much as once distinguished and far less separated from Bishops From what is said appears the vanity of D. M's Popish Query Whether all things duly considered a more evident and universal Tradition for the Superiority and Jurisdiction of a Bishop above a Presbyter can be reasonably demanded and whether the Argument from universal Tradition be not in this Case the most proper and most necessary And whether the Tradition for the Superiority of a Bishop above a Presbyter be not more universal unanimous and uncontradicted in the Primitive Ages than many other Traditions that are unquestionably received What these his other Traditions are we are not ignorant The Doctrine certainly of the morality of the Sabbath of Baptism and of the Holy Trinity and the like these they think lean only on Tradition and that the Institution of their Diocesan Prelats Metrapolitans and Arch-Prelats and other such Effects and Inventions of a degenerating and apostatizing Church are better founded than these most Scriptural Catholick and necessary Doctrines Section X. Other Observations and Arguments eversive of Diocesan Prelacy AND now in the next place I would gladly learn how they will describe or whereon they can found their Romish or which is all one their Hierarchick Diocesan Bishop For as Augustine well observes it is a name of Labour and Travel not of Honour and Dignity and indeed it imports only Watchfullness Labour and Care as its most native and proper Signification and on this account only the King gets the name of Bishop in Hesychius as he gets the name of Pastor in Homer And Hesychius gives it no less to every Watchman Thus the word Bishop denotes a vigilant Watchman in Suidas where he tells us that some bearing this Name were sent by the Athenians to observe the Affairs of their subject Cities who were called Watchmen So is the same word understood to denote only Care and Labour by Jullius Pollux whereas on the other hand the word Presbyter when taken for a Function or Office natively imports Rule and Honour A Presbyter acknowledges even Saravia is a Name of Honour and was given to the more honourable and to the Magistrats among the Jews in the Old Testament and was thence transferred to signifie the Governours of the Churches of Christ in the New Testament but they are called Bishops from their watchfull Care which is a Name of Work and Labour The name Presbyter saith Dr. Stillingfleet as the Hebrew ZAKEN tho' it originally import Age yet by way of connotation it hath been looked on as a Name both of Dignity and Power among the Jews in the times of the Apostles it is most evident that the Name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imported not only Dignity but Power the Presbyters among the Jews having Power both of Judging and Teaching given them by their Semicha or Ordination Now under the Gospel the Apostles retaining the Name and the manner of Ordination but not conferring that judiciary Power by it which was in use among the Jews to shew the Difference between the Law and the Gospel it was requisite some other Name should be given to the Governours of the Church which should qualifie the importance of the word Presbyters to a sense proper to a Gospel state which was the Original of giving the Name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the Governours of the Church under the Gospel a Name importing Duty more than Honour and not a title above Presbyter but rather used by way of Diminution and Qualification of the Power imply'd in the name of Presbyter c. The Hierarchicks therefore should act much more rationally if they turn'd the Tables and gave the name of Presbyter to their Diocesan and that of the Bishop to their inferiour Curats who usually do most of the Pastoral Work In the mean while it 's sure from what we just now learned out of these Authors that during sounder Antiquity before men equally abused Names and Things a Bishop could never be either ane Order or Degree or any thing else above a Prsbyter But from Names if we pass to things and look into Scripture and sounder Antiquity we shall find the ancient Bishop so different from the present Diocesan that the very Idea's and notions of the two are diametrically opposite one to another The Apostles themselves Acts 6. 2 4. following the Commandment of their Master found it their Duty so assiduously to labour in Preaching and Prayer that they thought it unreasonable to be diverted even by the Distribution of the Collections and Care of the Poor which otherwayes was a Work both lawfull and pious And to Timothy who if we believe the Hierarchicks was ane Arch-Bishop of a vast Diocess it 's injoyn'd as his proper Task to Preach the Word to be instant in season and out of season to reprove to rebuke exhort with all Long-suffering and Doctrine I need not here multiply Texts read and read over again the whole New Testament and you shall find that the Exercise of Prayer Dispensing the Word and Sacraments was the main Duty and perpetual Imployment of every Pastor or Minister of Christ. Look on the other hand to the bulk of the Hierarchick Lord-Bishops they haue a quite different Work and Exercice and if any of 'em happen to spend some time in the Ministerial Duties how are they commonly gaz'd on and depredicated as Men of extraordinary Condescension superlatively stuping to a piece of Service far below the Episcopal Grandeur and unusual to the Order Are they not then quite another thing than the Apostolick and Scripturall Bishops This Apostolick Example the Conscientious Primitive Bishops or Pastors clossly follow'd not so much as once dreaming that any who was ordain'd a Minister of the Gospell and intrusted with a Flock might on whatsoever pretext neglect to exercise himself perpetually in Prayer and Dispensing the Word and Sacraments This they judg'd his constant Imployment and this was the Practice of all the sincere Bishops even after the Distinction of Degrees was introduc'd as appears in the weekly and sometimes the dayly Homilies and Lectures of Chrysostome and Augustine which are yet extant And it 's already
called who are called at all The High-Priest dips him thrice The High-Priest himself having made a holy Prayer at the Divine Altar and beginning to Offer goes round about the whole Chore and the High-Priest praising the Holy Divine Actions sacrifices the most Divine Thing and taking and delivering the Divine Communion he ends with a Holy Thanksgiving Do nothing saith the Pseudo-Ignatius to Hero a Deacon of Antioch without the Bishops for they are Priests thou their Deacon they Baptize Sacrifice or Dispense the Lord's Supper impose Hands thou serves them as St. Stephen in Jerusalem administred to James and the Elders From which place it 's most evident that all Pastors or Priests as the Author speaks are true Bishops that on the account of such things as are common to all Pastors they receive the prime Episcopal Honour and Deference that there was a Colledge of true Bishops in the single City of Antioch accordingly that the rest of the Elders with James at Jerusalem were really true Bishops no less than he I don't say that Bishops and Congregations were reciprocal every-where in the fourth or fifth Century when these Impostors wrote only being to personat Apostolick Men they saw themselves obliged to mix into their Legends some shreds of true Antiquity The stuff they invented themselves was of a far different and contrary Mettal and far from being so conform and like to the Apostolick and prime Primitive Church § 14 And here it 's to be added that as every Bishop had once which continued in very many places for a good space one Congregation only so all Bishops whatsoever are of the same Dignity and Equal with one another For Cyprian calls all Bishops Collegues adding we force none we give Laws to none seeing every Governour in the Administration of the Church hath Power to do according to his own Will for which he is to give God an Acconnt And for none of us is a Bishop of Bishops or by a Tyrannical Power can force his Collegues to Obedience c. And Hierome saith wheresoever Bishops be at Rome or Eugubium Constantinople Rhegium Alexandria or Tanis they are all of the same Dignity and Priest-hood Riches and Poverty make not a Bishop either higher or lower they are all the Successors of the Apostles Which is also Augustine's Mind and must be granted by all who acknowledge the Equality of the Apostles and that Bishops were their Successors Now the Truth of these two Things viz. the allowableness of a Bishop to every Congregation yea the primitive Reciprocalness of a Bishop and a Congregation and the Equality of Bishops among themselves being supposed which indeed is undoubtable to all the Ingenuous their whole Hierarchy turns to nothing And now I hope that which some pretend to be a mighty Prejudice viz. that Episcopacy still de facto has been and from the earliest times of Christianity we hear of Bishops is many ways removed and that by this time it has clearly appeared that either profound Ignorance Osscitancy or the masly beam of Interest in Mens Eyes has been the true Source of this Prejudice Moreover suppose that it could not be easily told when this Corruption which is like the Tares sown during the sleeping of the Husband-man crept into the Church Can they tell when all other Corruptions made their first Entry As for Example can they give a distinct account when the use of Oyl in Baptism whereof Tertullian speaks as of a thing constantly practised among Christians came first in Fashion The like I may say of Exorcization and many other things altogether uncertain as to their Beginning and yet by all Lovers of the Truth of Christianity to be Corruptions whereof see store in Chamier's Panstratia Secondly I trust also that by the foregoing Discourses the Weapon the Papists and other Hierarchicks use against the Reformed Churches to prove that they have no Ministers because of the want of a Succession of Bishops is sufficiently blunted And this minds me of an Objection I was assaulted with from a Gentleman of that Perswasion 't was that these Episcopal Men who ordained our Pastors gave them the Power of Ordination neither in express Terms nor yet intentionally Ergo not at all I Repon'd that tho' they did not give it them intentione Operantis yet notwithstanding intentione Operis in so much as they ordain'd the Ministers of the Gospel all whom we sustain to be true Bishops I add this is to a hair like Becan the Jebusites arguing against Luther's Call to be a Protestant-Minister Luther saith he had no lawfull Calling to the Ministry he exercised after his Defection for then he began to oppugn the Catholick Church abolish Feasts Monastick Vows and Prayers for the Dead these things he could not do by the Power which he had received in the Catholick Church for the Bishop who ordained him gave him no Power for the Destruction of the Church § 15. But there yet remains a great Prejudice and no wonder for it comes from a great City Rome say they and other such vast Cities which certainly contain'd many Congregations have been always ruled by their particular Bishops as the Catalogues yet extant evinc◠But tho' 't were so seeing it 's at least no less certain that in other places Bishops and Congregations were Reciprocal we are even with them and their Argument quite evanishes and Antiquity allows us to give a Bishop to every Congregation no less than it warrands their giving a multitude of Parishes to any one Bishop And Dr. Maurice acknowledges he never yet heard of any Man who made it essential to a Bishop to have many Congregations under him And he 's so far in the right herein that during prime Antiquity 't was never so much as dream'd that 't was either essential or any way requisite for a Bishop to have a plurality of Congregations It 's not saith he the being Pastor of one or many Congregations that makes one a Bishop but the Order There are saith Saravia and have been Bishopricks so small that their Bishops had only one or two Presbyters for we measure not a Bishoprick by the number of the Clergy or by the amplitude of the City or Diocess the magnitude of Riches but by the Authority of the Episcopal Degree altho' the Bishoprick be included in one small Parish alone And some of the most Episcopal amongst them acknowledge that any of our Ministers tho' they have but one Parish want nothing to make them Bishops but only the Episcopal Consecration whereby they at once yeeld the whole Plea destroy their Hierarchy and withall discover their preterscriptural and therefore antiscriptural Superstition And now seeing there is all the warrant and allowance that either can be desir'd or thought on that a Bishop and a Pastor of one single Flock or Congregation is one and the same and that every Congregation may have its own proper Bishop their
no Inhabitant there no place for my L. Bishop's grace nothing whereon to exercise the Episcopal power save rubbish and desolation In none of the Churches saith Dr. Stilling fleet most spoken of is the succession so clear as is necessary For at Jerusalem it seems somewhat strange how fifteen Bishops of the Circumcision should be crouded into so narrow a room as they are so that many of them could not have above two years time to rule in the Church And it would bear an inquiry where the seat of the Bishops of Jerusalem was from the time of the destruction of the City by Titus when the walls were laid even with the ground by Musonius till the time of Adrian I shall yet in the last place adduce a few passages and I intreat my Reader seriously to weigh them and from whom they came for I am sure they will give great light and satisfaction to all the truly conscientious and disinterested The sixt Anathematism saith a Romanist was much noted in Germany in which an Article of Faith was made of HIERARCHY which word and signification thereof is aliene not to say contrary to the holy Scrsptures and tho' 't was somewhat antiently invented yet the Author is not known and in case he were yet he is an Hyperbolicall Writer not imitated in the use of that Word nor of others of his Invention by any of the Ancients and following the Stile of Christ our Lord and the Holy Apostles and primitive Church it ought to be named not Hierarchy but Hierodiaconia or Hierodoulia And Dr. Heylen who like to Balaam blessing Israel when he would fainest have cursed them uses to establish a Presbyterian Parity of Pastors while he is most desirous to destroy it makes the Bishop in Justine Martyr ' s time all one with the President of the Congregation and ordinary Preacher of God's Word and Celebrator of the Eucharist therein And pleads that in Tertullian's mind Baptism was a work most proper to the Bishop in regard of his Episcopacy or particular Office And the Doctor contends out of Tertullian that in his time Christians receiv'd the Eucharist only from the Bishop's hands and so there were no fewer Bishops than Congregations who mett for hearing of the Word and Celebration of the Sacraments What shew of reason can be given saith Dr. Stilling-fleet why the Apostles should slight the Constitution of the Jewish Synagogues which had no dependance on the Jewish Hierarchy and subsisted not by any Command of the Ceremonial Law The Work of the Synagogue not belonging to the Priests as such but as Persons qualifi'd for instructing others And We are to take nottice that the Rulers of the Church under the Gospell do not properly succeed the Priests and Levites under the Law whose Office was Ceremonial and who were not admitted by any solemn Ordination into their Function It is then a common Mistake to think that the Ministers of the Gospell succeeded by way of Correspondence and Analogy to the Priests under the Law which Mistake hath been the Foundation and Originall of many Errors For when in the primitive Church the name of Priests came to be attributed to Gospell-Ministers from a fair Complyance as was thought then of the Christians only to the name used both among Jews and Gentiles in process of time corruptions increasing in the Church those names that were used by the Christians by way of Analogy and Accommodation brought in the things themselves primarily intended by these names so by the metaphoricall names of Priests and Altars at last came up the Sacrifice of the Mass without which they thought the names of Priests and Altars were insignificant This Mâ—stake we see run all along thro' the Writers of the Church as soon as the name Priests was apply'd to the Elders of the Church that they derived their Succession from the Priests of Aaroâ—'s Order In short he still contends that the model of Governing the Christian Church was an exact imitation of that of the Synagogues which were no other thing than the particular parish Churches among the Jews and in every one of which there was a a Bishop paralell to him who in the Apocalypse is the Angel of the Church And Dr. Lightfoot is of the same mind The Apostle saith he calleth the Minister Episâ—opus from the common and known title of the CHAZAN or Overseer in the Synagogue And Besides these there was the publick Minister of the Synagogue who pray'd publickly and took care about reading the Law and sometimes preached if there were not some other to discharge this Office This person was called SHELIACH TSIBBOR the Angel of the Church and CHAZAN HAKENESETH the Chazan or Bishop of the Congregation The Aruch gives the reason of the name The Chazan saith he is SHELIACH TSIBBOR the Angel of the Church or the publick Minister and the Targum renders the word ROVEH by the word HOSE one that oversees For it 's incumbent on him to oversee how the Reader reads and whom he may call cut to read in the Law The publick Minister of the Synagogue himself read not the Law publickly but every Sabbath he called out seven of the synagogue on other days fewer whom he judged fit to read He stood by him that read with great care observing that he read nothing either falsly or improperly and calling him back and correcting him if he had failed in any thing and hence he was called CHAZAN that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Bishop or Overseer Certainly the signification of the word Bishop and Angel of the Church had been determined with less noise if recourse had been made to the proper fountains and men had not vainly disputed about the signification of words taken I know not whence The service and worship of the Temple being abolished as being Ceremonial God transplanted the worship and publick adoration of God used in the synagogues which was moral into the Christian Church to wit the publick Ministry publick prayers reading God's Word and preaching c. Hence the names of the Ministers of the Gospel were the very same the Angel of the Church the Bishop which belonged to the Ministers in the synagogues There were also three Deacons or Almoners on whom was the care of the poor c. Among the Jews saith Dr. Burnet he who was the chief of the synagogue was called CHAZAN HAKENSETH the Bishop of the Congregation and SHELIACH TSIBBOR the Angel of the Church And the Christian Church being modelled as near the form of the synagogue as they could be as they retained many of the Rites so the form of the government was continued and the names remained the same And In the synagogues there was first one that was called the Bishop of the Congregation Next the three Orderers and Judges of every thing about the synagogue who were called TSEKENIM and by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉