kept from the Sacrament and Communion for a crime till he profess Repentance than to be hanged or banished or ruined for it But especially the Temptation was strongest to the Bishops whose baits were the most alluring And ever since then they that most loved Wealth Power and Honour that is the worst most worldly men have been the most eager desirers and seekers of Bishopricks And while humble holy men must rather be sought to such earnest seekers are like to be the ordinary finders and possessors 11. But yet three things kept up for some time a considerable number of godly Bishops in the Churches which with the humble Presbyters kept up the Interest of sound and practical Religion 1. Those that had been tryed worthy men before Constantines conversion and the Bishop's exaltation kept their Integrity in the main though in the Nicene Council their contentious Libels shewed that we are more beholden to Constantine than to them that they fell not into such strife as their Successors did Good men may be carryed too far in Pride and Strife but they will not be mastered by them and turn against the Power of Godliness 2. The People and Inferiour Clergy had the choice of their Bishops And so though they oft had tumults as in popular Elections it will be yet the worst ambitious men were long kept out and the best oft chosen till the People and Presbyters themselves were corrupted 3. And divers good Emperours arose that took some care to promote the best But alas this had sad and frequent interruptions 12. For the Arians possest Constantine himself with hard thoughts of Athanasius and his Adherents And it could not be expected that Julian should countenance the best when Constantius and Valeus had done so much against them and got most of all the Churches headed by Arian Bishops to say nothing yet of after times 13. But now two things became matter of Contention among the Bishops and their Clergy and increased the strife from time to time The first and chief was the Old Cause greatly strengthened viz. Who should be greatest Who should have the largest fattest and most Ruling Diocess and Seat The other was Who should be taken for the most Orthodox and whose Explications of the Faith should be taken for the soundest especially about the description of the Person and immanent acts of Christ Or briefly 1. Jurisdiction and Greatness 2. Wisdom and hard words 14. Now also Constantinople contended with Rome and being the Seat of the Empire which they judged to be the true Reason of Church-preheminence they at first modestly took the second place And now the Trinity of Patriarchs was turned to five Jerusalem being made the fifth At all this Rome grudged 15. All this while the old Discipline of the Church was tolerably kept up 1. Because though much of the world had got into the Church yet a very great part were tenacious of their Heathenish Customs and prejudiced against Christians by their Contentions odiously described by Am. Marcellinus and many others and prejudiced against Constantine for his Son Crispus and Sopaters death c. and against Constantius for the Murder of Julian's Relations and being taken with the plausible parts of Julian and with the great Learning and highly extolled Lives of Plotinus Porphyrius Jamblichus Aedesius Maximus Proeresius Libanius Chrysanthius and such others described by Eunapius c. so that except Rome and Alexandria for 200 years and some few of the very great Churches for 400 the Churches were no greater than one Bishop and his Consessus might tolerably govern by the Keys 2. And all this while all the Presbyters were Church-Governours as well as the Bishop though he was their Chief and all Excommunications were to be done by joint consent And so many Church-Governours may do more than one 16. Then Councils called General having by the Emperours Grant and the Clergies Desire and Consent the Supreme church-Church-Power it was in these Councils that the Pride Ambition and Domination of all the worldly Prelates that were too soon got in did exercise it self as the valour and wit of Souldiers in a field of War And as 1. The good men yet among them 2. And the Articles of Faith yet retained by them did cause them to do much good against some Heresies and Disorders so the Pride and Turbulency yea ignorance of the rest caused them to become the occasions of the doleful Schisms and Heresies and Enmity of Christians against each other which continue to this day unhealed 17. These hurtful Contentions in Councils at first prevailed but little and that at Nice did much more good I think than harm And after at Constant a little more hurt was done and much good And those that followed did worse and worse till the proud worldly Spirit contracted Malignity and so much prevailed that for a thousand years at least the Bishops with their Prelatical Clergy and their Councils have been the grand Corruption and Plague of the Church which many of the most Learned Expositors of the Revelation take to be the Image of the Beast and Dr. H. Moore calls it a Heathenish Christianity which they have made their Religion 18. In their progress to all this as the Diocesses first grew up from our Parochial Magnitude towards that of the present Diocesan so the very Pastoral Power of all the rest of the Presbyters was by degrees taken away so far as that they had no consenting power in Ordinations or Excommunications unless the Bishop would chuse a few for his Council so that the proper power of the King 's was confined to one Bishop over many hundred Parishes and so Discipline became an impossible thing save as it served the Bishops against some that they disliked And so the Church which was as the Garden of Christ became like the Commons and good and bad were little differenced in Communion 19. Yet because the Power must still be useful to the Bishops ends as he sees cause some shadow of the old exercise must be kept up But the Bishop having not leisure for the tenth part of the labour which this very shadow required Lay-men are made his Chancellours to decree Excommunications and Absolutions and to Govern by the Church Keys like a secular Court And Commissaries Officials Surrogates and other hard names and things are set up instead of the Presbyters and their Antient Office 20. By this time the Antient Species of the Churches was altered and whereas it was long held that a Church and Bishop were Correlates and there were no more Churches than Bishops now many hundred or a thousand Parishes are become no Churches but parts of one Diocesan Church which is the lowest and many score or hundred of the old sort of Bishops all cast out and swallowed up by one Just as if a thousand or some hundred Schools should have but one Governing Schoolmaster and be but one School but each part have an Usher to read to the Boyes
discern and value that Knowledge in another which he is a stranger to himself Experience tells us that young unexperienced men do commonly receive that man's Opinions 1. Who hath by nearness or some accident the greatest advantage in their esteem and love 2. Or his that speaks most for their fleshly Interest and for that which they would have to be true 3. Or his that hath the last word It cannot be expected that they judge of any thing beyond the advantage of their senses and the Notitiae communes according to Evidence of Truth which must be received by long and serious study and by willing honest minds and by the help of antecedent Verities § 5. In this therefore Divine free Election is very manifest As in giving the Gospel to some Nations in the World when most others never have it so in giving some young persons the blessing of good Education and Teachers and chusing for them that were unable to chuse well for themselves as also in blessing the same helps to one which are despised by another And verily when I have been long stalled with the difficulties about Election and Differencing Grace undeniable Experience hath been my chief Conviction If the Gospel be true the common worldly fleshly sort that are for Christ but by Tradition Law and Custom and are religious for worldly ends and no farther than the Interest of the Flesh and World will give them leave have no true Saving Grace at all And the rest that seriously believe and seek a better Life and live above fleshly worldly Interests are in most places few and made the scorn and hatred of the rest And if de facto God do sanctifie only a peculiar People who can deny his differencing Will and Grace § 6. I was my self in my Childhood ignorant what Teachers among such diversity I should prefer And first God had such a witness in my Conscience that Virtue and Holiness were better than Vice and Sin that it made me think that the sort of Teachers who Traded meerly for the World and never spake a serious word of Heaven nor differed from sober Heathens but in Opinion yea that endeavoured to make serious Godliness to seem but Hypocrisie were not like to be the wisest and most trusty men And yet how to judge among the serious which were right was long too hard for me § 7. When I came to consider of the Divisions of the Christian World and â—eard the Papists pretend to Catholicism and call all others Schismaricks or Hereticks it sometime seemed a plausible Opinion that the greatest Power and Dignity of the Clergy was the Interest of Christianity By Riches Honour and Power they may protect the Godly and keep Religion from Contempt among the worldly sort of men or from oppression at the least 2. And I saw that in all Ages and Countries of the World Historians tell us how rare a thing a wise and holy Prince hath been and how commonly by Wealth and Greatness they have been bred up in that Sensuality and Pride which hath made them the Capital Enemies to serious Piety if not the Persecutors of it 3. I thought with myself if such godly Christians as much value the Interest of Religion had lived in such times and places where Rulers were Persecutors of the Truth how glad would they have been to have had the Power of Church-matters put into the hands of their Chosen Pastors what would they have desired more 4. And I read that till Riches and honours were annexed to the Office the People had still the Choice of their own Pastors and therefore could not chuse but wish their Estates and Lives and all as well as their Religion to be as much as might be in their hands And so no doubt when the Bishops were advanced to great Diocesses and Power it was by the desire of the most Religious Christians who valued most the Interest of the Church 5. And I could not but observe that though Christ gave his Apostles no Power of the Sword he set them above other Ministers not only in Miraculous Gifts and Infallible testifying and recording his Commands and works but in some sort of oversight which seemeth a thing appointed for Continuance as well as preaching 6. And I thought that if Church-Grandure were the Interest of Religion and Unity the strength of the Church it lookt very plausibly to reason that as Bishops were over Presbyters so there should be some over Bishops and that National Churches should by such Government be hindered from Schism and Heresie as well as Parochial And that Diocesans and Metropolitans Power should be derived from a Superiour as well as Presbyters And that when poor Subjects dare not reprove a Prince some that are above fearing his Power may 7. And when I read the Popes Claim I thought it seemed not improbable that Petrus primus and pasce oves meas and super hanc Petram were not spoken in vain And these thoughts pleaded thus for Church-Grandeur in Prelates and Popes § 8. On the other side I saw 1. That Christ said His Kingdom was not of this world and comes not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with observable Pomp. And that when they strove who should be greatest he reproved them and Concluded with you it shall not be so and that the most serviceable is to be accounted the greatest that Peter himself accordingly describeth their office 1 Pet. 5. 2. I find that Christ appointed them another sort of work to do even to Preach the Gospel to all Nations through all streights difficulties and sufferings and to baptize and teach Christians to observe the Laws of Christ And that as he never put the Sword into their hand so an official declaring and applying his Word to voluntary Disciples was all their Office as ordinary Pastors to be continued 3. I find that Christ sent them out by two and two as if it had been done on foresight that men would erect a Church-Monarchy And that no Scripture tells us of any division of the Church into Diocesses where ore Apostle was a Monarch or had Power above the rest or was his Peculiar Province Nor that the twelve settled twelve such or any as the seats of their Successors 4. I find not that ever any one Apostle exercised Government over the rest Nor that ever Christ gave the rest any Command or Direction to obey any one Nor that ever the Contending or Schismatical sort of Christians were directed to end their strise by taking any one for the Head who must determine all their Controversies And that they that said I am of Cephas are reproved with the rest And that all are called Members of the Body and only Christ the Head And if it had been his will that One Universal Head or Power should have been set up as the Principium or Center of Unity it is a matter of so great consequence that it is not to be believed that Christ would not have plainly
and tell the one Schoolmaster as a Monitor what they did amiss but might correct none nor put them out 21. By this time they began to live on blood and even as they swelled in the beginning cruelty grew up equally with Pride For Reason and Scripture were not on their side nor would justifie their Cause and them and therefore violence must do it They desired not the bare title of Power but the exercise of it to promote the Issues of their Wit and Will They began with rash silencing ejecting and deposing Dissenters and thence to anathematizing them and thence to banishing till at last it grew up to tormenting in the Inquisition and burning them 22. And whereas notwithstanding the petty Heresies among Christians too early the glory of the Antient persecuted Christians was their entire Love and Concord and the shame of the Philosophers was their discord it came to that pass that whereas a Heresie of old did start up among a few for a small time like our Ranters and Quakers who shame Religion no more than Bedlams shame Reason Now the great Continents of the Earth have been the Seats of the millions of those called Hereticks and Schismaticks by each other about 1400 or 1300 years Eusebius in Praepar Demonstr copiously sheweth that the Philosophers were all confounded in dissention and yet did not persecute each other but that the Christians were all of one Religion cleaving to one Sacred Word of God Of which also see Raym. Breganium in Theol. Gent. de Cogn Dei Enar. 5. cap. 8. To be Lovers of good men was the character of the old Bishops To be dividers and haters and slanderers and silencers and persecutors and murderers of them grew up with corrupters Pride 23. And with these did gradually grow up corruptions of Doctrine even while they pretended a burning Zeal against Heresie and corruption of God's publick Worship till it grew up to all the Mass and Roman Impurities 24. And to secure all this against Reformation ridiculous Legends and falsification of Church-History made it hard for posterity what to believe or whom § 15. Being thus far sure of the matter of fact by what degrees Prelacy grew up to the height that it hath now attained in the World abroad I considered what men thought of it now at home I am speaking yet but of matter of fact and I found great diversity in mens thoughts of it 1. As to the Roman height I found that the Church of England since the Reformation till A. B. Laud's time took the Pope to be the Antichrist It was in their Church-books Many other Bishops as well as Bishop Downam have written for it What Bishop Morton and Hall and Abbot and abundance such have written against Popery I need not name 2. I found that then the stream began to turn and the name of Antichrist was put out and our Reconciliation with Rome was taken to be a hopeful work and actually endeavoured which by their conversion all good men desire 3. I found that many among us of greatest reverence and name had laid down such tearms as these That the Catholick Church is one Visible Society under one humane Governing Soveraignty That this Universal Soveraign hath power of Universal Legislation and Judgment That the Colledge of Bishops through all the World are this one Supreme Universal Soveraign That they exercise it in General Councils when they sit That every Bishop is by Office the Representative of his Diocesan Church and these Bishops may or must have Metropolitans and Patriarchs and by these Patriarchs and Metropolitans per literas formatas and their Nuntii the Universal Supreme Colledge may exercise their Power over all the World And what they do thus the Church or Colledge doth in the intervals of General Councils That the Pope of Rome is to be acknowledged the Principium Unitatis to this Universal Church and Colledge of Bishops and the Ordinary President of General Councils ex Officio That Councils called without the President who hath the sole power are unlawful Assemblies and punishable Routs That the approbation of the President if not of the most of the Patriarchs is the note by which an authoriz'd obliging Council is to be known from others That the Pope is to be obeyed accordingly as Prime Patriarch Principium Unitatis President of General Councils and Patriarch of the West That all that will not unite with the Church of Rome on these tearms are Schismaticks and so to be accounted and used That those that thus unite with the Church of Rome are no Papists But a Papist is only one that holdeth all to be just and good that is done by Popes or at least one that is for the Pope's Absolute Power of Governing above Canon-Laws and Church-Parliaments or Councils And that if they will but abate their last 400 years Innovations or at least not impose them on others we may unite with the Church of Rome though they claim as Peter's Successors the Universal Supremacy at least to be exercised according to the Canons of Councils And that it is not the Church of Rome but the Court of Rome which at present we may not unite with That the Church of Rome is a true Church and hath had an uninterrupted Succession and its Sacraments true Sacraments But none of those Protestant Churches are true Churches that have not Diocesan Bishops nor any of their Pastors true Ministers of Christ who have not Diocesan Episcopal Ordination nor any that have such unless it hath as such been conveyed down from the Apostles by uninterrupted Succession by such Diocesans That such men have no true Sacraments God not owning what is done by any not so ordained That therefore they have no Covenant-promise of or right to Pardon and Salvation because such right is given only by the Sacrament That therefore all such Protestants Sacraments are but nullities and a prophanation of holy things And that the Holy Ghost being the Instituter of these sacred things it is the sin against the Holy Ghost to undertake and exercise the Ministry celebrate Sacraments without such uninterrupted successive Ordination That an Ordained Minister hath no more power than was intended him by his Ordainers That in such Presbyterians or Episcopal Churches which have their power from the Ordainers and so far for want of Succession are nullities it is safe for men as e. g. in France to be rather of the Roman Church than theirs § 16. And as I found this Doctrine in the ascendent in England so I met with such as were for using Protestants accordingly even for the silencing of them by thousands if they would not swear profess promise and do all that And for using the People accordingly And abating neither big nor little an Oath or a Ceremony to unite or save them And I lived in an Age where these things were no idle speculations § 17. Being thus far sure of the Matter of Fact I studied as well as
erroneous LXXXVI The Council at Trull was one of the best that ever they had yet shewed the Core of the Churches Plague by decreeing That whatever alteration the Imperial Power maketh on any City the Ecclesiastical Order shall follow it This Clergy ambition nurst up Anti-Christ LXXXVII A Council at Aquileia condemned the 5th General Council for condemning the Tria capitula LXXXVIII Pope Sergius condemning the Trullane Council the Emperour commanded him to be a Prisoner and the Souldiers bribed rescued him LXXXIX Bardanes Philippicus being made Emperor he calleth a General Council at C. P. where saith Binius out of the East there were innumerable Bishops which is not said of any other Council who all condemned the 6th General Council and their Decrees of Two Wills and Operations Here not I but Baronius and Binius say Thus at the Beck of an Emperour and the Will of a Monothelite Patriarch the holy 6th Synod is condemned and what they said of Two Wills with Christ and two Operations and all retracted by the Decree and Subscription of very many Oriental Bishops that were in one moment turned from being Catholick to be Monothelites But do they forget the 100 Year that even the West made a head against the 5th Council and the Pope XC Next all the World is set together by the Ears about Images for which the Pope rebelled against and rejected the Emperour for Charles Martel of France And Pope Zachary bid Bonisace call a Council to eject the Astors of Antipodes CXI In a General Council at C. P. 338 Bishops condemned the worshipping of Images and swear men not to adore them and destroyed reliques c. and decreed that Christ's Body is not flesh in Heaven But the Pope and Western Bishops of his Party condemn this Council XCII The Greek Bishops condemn the Roman Bishops for adding Filioque to the Creed and so another occasion of Schism is raised XCIII The Schisms in Italy and Rome itself now grew so great and the Effects in Blood and Confusions so dismal that I must not number them one by one XCIV Constantine and Leo Isaur Emperours being dead a Woman Irene and her Infant Son are for Images and call a General Council for them at Nice where Tharasius Bishop of C. P. got the Bishops to carry it for Images and Reliques and the Chief Bishops that had condemned them before now cryed peccavimus and condemned those that were against adoration of Images c. If Mr. Morrice call me an Enemy to Repentance for reciting this I cannot help it XCV Yet more Schism Two Bishops Foelix and Elipandus say That Christ as the eternal Word was Gods natural Son but as Man he was but his adopted Son thinking that duo fundamenta viz. Generatio aeterna temporalis duas-faciunt Relationes filiationis in una persona But Councils condemned them as making two Sons And the great Council at Frankford condemning the second Council of Nice and Image-worship condemn also these two Bishops 1. For saying Christ was God's Adopted Son 2. And that by Grace 3. And that he was a Servant Is any of this false not excluding a higher title The Council concludeth that Christ was not a Servant subjected to God by penal servitude Sure it was part of his suffering for our sins to be in the form of a Servant Phil. 2. 7. XCVI Binius saith the Filioque was added to the Creed by the Spanish and French Bishops without the Pope XCVII One Council at C. P. restored him that married the Emperour adulterously to another wife And another condemned Theod. Studita and Plato for being against it XCVIII The most excellent Emperour Ludov. Pius was so zealous to reform the Bishops that they hated him and in a Council at Compendium Compeigne most perfidiously deposed him and after basely abused him even without the Pope XCIX As to please his Son Lotharius they deposed the Father so when he was beaten by his Brethren they after in a Council at Aquisgrane Aken deposed Lotharius accusing him as they did his Father C. At C. P. a Council was called by the power of another Woman Theodora and the Bishops that had under divers Emperours condemned Image-worship now turn to it again and anathematize on a sudden the opposers CI. The Bishops own Lotharius Adulterous marriage with Waldrada CII The Councils that set up and pull'd down Ignatius and Photius at C. P. and the woful stir that they made as Emperours changed were lamentable CIII Many contrary Councils were between the French Bishops that were for Lotharius divorce and the Pope CIV Basil the Emperour writes to the Pope to pardon all his Bishops or else they should be without because all had miscarried and turned with the times CV A General Council at Const called by the Papists The Eighth General Council condemned Photius again and set up Ignatius and the Changers cryed peccavimus and make extreme Decrees for Images But they well condemn subscribing to be true to their Patriarchs and Bishops but decree that all Princes and Subjects worship the Bishops who must not fall down to them Other horrid Elevations of Prelates above Princes they decreed saying A Bishop though it be manifest that he is destitute of all Virtue of Religion yet is a Pastor and the Sheep must not resist the Shepherd CVI. A dangerous Rent between Rome and C. P. what Bishop should have the Bulgarians CVII A Council at Metz called Praedaetorium gave the Kingdom to Car. Calv. unjustly CVIII A Council at Pavia falsly make Charles Emperour CIX Another Pontigonense confirmed it the Pope claiming the Power CX A Roman Council unjustly made Ludov. 3. Emperour CXI A General Council at C. P. again set up Photius and cast out Filioque CXII The Roman actions for and against P. Formosus are odious to all sober Christians Ears CXIII A Council at Soysons confirm the A. Bishoprick of Rhemes to a Child of five years old Son to the E. of Aquitane Divers other Councils do and undo about the same Cause CXIV The History of the Bishops of Rome and their Councils from hence forward is so lamentable that even the most flattering Papist Historians mention them with detestation So that I must not stay to name many particulars CXV An. 1049. A Roman Council was fain to pardon Simoniacal Bishops and Priests because the Cry was that else none would be left to officiate CXVI Being come into the Roman sink I will pass above an hundred more of the Councils of this woful sort of Bishops lest Mr. Morrice think that I suppose him to vindicate them or not to abhor them Only remembering my Reader of a few General or notable things viz. I. The multitude of Schisms and long vacancies at Rome and the horrid incapacity of very many Popes which prove an interrupted succession II. The horrid wars that long infested Italy by the Popes means III. The dismal wars with many Emperours and the Bishops and Councils half on one side and half
begun The Scots Commissioners by degrees acquainted them with Presbytery and Mr. Burton's Protestation Protested and the five Dissenters with Independency Two or three Independents were in the House of Lords and some few in the House of Commons It was Episcopal-men that made up the main Body These were of two sorts The one sort thought Episcopacy of Divine Institution but not Chancellors Deans and Chapters Arch-Deacons Officials c. The other sort thought that Episcopacy not rampant was the best Government Jure humano But that the Magistrate being Chief might set it up or take it down as he see most for the common good These were called by some Erastians And that these at first were inconsiderable is History written in despight of Evidence Let any man 1. Read what Parliaments formerly said 2. And what many English Divines wrote for the Jus humanum against the Jus Divinum and what Testimony Prin hath given of it 3. And what Dr. Stillingfleet hath produced for it in his Irenicon 4. And how commonly it was owned by Conformists then in Conserence 5. And how commonly the Lawyers were for the Humane Right 6. Yea and the Civilians themselves and then let him take this Historian's word if he tell Posterity that the Parliament and Army were not English men IV. These Historians candidly tell the world that the Nonconformists who offered their Desires for Concord 1660. were Presbyterians and so are most of the Nonconformists now Whereas they never made one motion for Presbytery for Lay-Elders for Ruling Classes or Assemblies nor against Episcopacy but only offered the Paper called A. Bishop Usher's Reduction of Episcopacy to the Primitive Form wherein neither A. Bishops nor Bishops nor Deans and Chapters Archdeacons were taken down or any of their Revenues Lordships or parliament-Parliament-Power This is Presbytery with these Historians V. They make the world believe that the main Body of the Conformists are such as suffered for the King or complied not with the Directory and Times of Usurpation Whereas it 's publickly notorious that there are about 9000 Parish-Churches in England besides many hundred Chappels many Churches that had more than one Minister And almost all these complied with the Times or Directory as the Nonconformists did And of all these it was but about 2000 that Conformed not so that 7000 or 8000 of them that had kept in did on a sudden turn Conformists And divers that had been in Arms for the Parliament Yea some that had written for the Engagement when I wrote against it yea some that had spoken or written tantum non a Justification of the Killing of the King And of those that joyned with us in our Proposals for Concord Dr. Worth and Dr. Reignolds were made Bishops and divers others did Conform VI. These Historians would make the world believe that the Present Church and such as they did more than the Parliamentarians and Presbyterians and Nonconformists to restore the King when it is notoriously known how oft their Attempts were defeated and what the Scots Army under Hamilton underwent to say nothing of the next and of the Lord Delamore's Attempt and what the Restored Parliament did But sure I am that the Old Parliament Souldiers and Presbyterian Commanders and Souldiers in General Monk's Army with those in England and Ireland that joyned with him and Sir Thomas Allen Lord Mayor with the Londoners at the persuasion of the Presbyterian Ministers drawing General Monk to joyn with them did the main work which the Council and Parliament after finished When most of these men that will not endure the oblivion of Discords nor the Reconciling and Union of the King's Subjects do but start up to revile others and blow the Coals again and reap the fruit of other mens labours that desire but to live in Peace VII That there are able worthy men that Conform we are far from denying and we earnestly desire their Concord and the success of their Labour and I hope love them as our selves But whereas the History of this Party doth proclaim how much better and abler Ministers than the Nonconformists are generally put into their Places that are no Novices or Ignorant Youths no Drunkards nor scandalous but more laborious skilful Labourers I will say nothing but let the Countries judge VIII And whether it be true that there is no need of the Nonconformists Ministry but the Churches are sufficiently supplied without them both as to the number and quality of their Teachers I have in my Apology enquired and with godly men it 's easily judged IX And whether it be true that it was only for the Kings or Bishops cause that the Parliament put out all or most of them that were heretofore removed I leave to the Witnesses and Articles against them I am sure I and my neighbour Ministers petitioned that none that were tolerable pious Ministers might be put out for being for the King or Bishops X. It is commonly now recorded and reported that the Presbyterians and those that now conform not put down Catechizing and turned the Creed Lords prayer and Decalogue out of the Church Service Whereas if some few Independents did any of this it is more than I know but in all our Countrey and where I came I remember no Churches that did not use the Creed openly at their baptizing any and the Decalogue frequently read out of Exod. 20. or Deut. 5. and the Lords prayer frequently as we did constantly But some thought that we were not bound to use it every time they prayed And the Directory commendeth all these to them And all our Countrey agreed not only to Catechize publickly but to take larger time on the week daies to Catechize every family XI These Historians say that I and such others take the things which we conform not to to be but inconveniences and not sins And that we keep the Nation in Schisme while we confess the things to be but Indifferent And our writings are visible in which we profest the contrary and laboured by many arguments to prove it and protested that we would conform if we took them not to be sins And we gave in a Catalogue of what we judged to be sins And this before the New Conformity was imposed And since the fiercest displeasure is against us for telling them what we account Sin and how great When many years together our Rulers and the People were told that we confessed them indifferent and refused them but to avoid offending our followers XII We frequently hear from them that we oppose Episcopacy because we cannot be Bishops our selves When it s known that nothing could more put men out of all such hopes than the Presbyterians Endeavours that both their power and wealth should be taken down And he that hath any desires of a Bishoprick should sure be for the keeping of them up And the same men reprove us for refusing Bishopricks and Deanries and say we did it to please the People XIV The
new Historians would make us believe that the Reformed Church of England before Bishop Lauds time were of their mind that now call themselves Bishops and Doctors of the Church of England in holding as they do that there is an Universal humane Soveraignty with Legislative and Judicial power over all the Churches on earth and that this is in Councils or an Universal Colledge of Bishops of which the Pope may be allowed to be president and Principium Unitatis c. and that he must be obeyed as Patriarch of the West and so we must be under a forreign Jurisdiction Whereas it is notoriousy known that before Bishop Lauds time the doctrine of this Church was quite Contrary as may be seen at large in the Apology the Articles of Religion the writings of the Bishops and Doctors Yea they writ copiously to prove that the Pope is Antichrist and put it into their Liturgy And Dr. Heylin tells us that the Reason why Bishop Laud got it out was that it might not offend the Papists and hinder our reconciliation with them And the Oath of Supremacy sweareth us against all forreign Jurisdiction XV. The same Historians would make us believe that these mens doctrine is now the doctrine of the Church of England or agreeable to it Whereas the Oath of Allegiance is still in force and so are the Homilies and the Articles of Religion and the Laws and Canons for the Kings Supremacy against all forreign Jurisdiction And there is no change made which alloweth of their doctrine And the Church doctrine must be known by its publick writings and not by the opinions of new risen men XVI The new Historians make the Nonconforming Ministers to be men grosly ignorant preachingfalse doctrine of wicked principles and lives and not fit to be suffered out of Gaols And yet these 19. or 20. years how few of them have been convict of any false doctrine And I have not heard of four in England that have ever been convict since they were cast out of being once drunk or fornicating cheating swearing or any immorality unless preaching and not swearing Subscribing c. be such nor for false doctrine XVII The new Historians have made thousands believe that the doctrine or opinions of the Nonconformists is for sedition and rebellion And that it is for this that they refuse to renounce the obligation of the Covenant as to all men besides themselves and that they refuse to subscribe that it is not lawful on any pretence whatsoever to take Arms against any Commissioned by the King Whereas we have at large in a second Plea for peace opened our judgments about Loyalty and obedience and none of them will tell us what they would have more nor where our profession is too short or faulty Nor have they convict any of my acquaintance of preaching any disloyal doctrine XVIII Yea they have by writing preaching and talking made multitudes believe that the Nonconformists or Presbyterians have been long hatching a rebellion against the King and have a Plot to take down Monarchy under pretence of opposing Poperty And how far these Historians are to be believed true Protestants by this time partly understand XIX Yea these Historians have made multitudes believe that the Parliaments that have been disolved here of late years have been designing to change the Government of Church and state under pretence of opposing Popery As if that Parliament that did that for them and against us which is done and made all the Acts which are for the Renunciation of the Covenant and for all the Declarations Subscriptions and Practices Imposed and for Fining us 20 l. and 40 l. a Sermon and laying us in Gaols had been for Nonconformists and against Episcopacy and they that made the Militia Act and such other had been against the King or his Prerogative Or the other following had not been of the same Religion XX. But the boldest part of their History is their description of the two sorts of the People in England those that are for the present Nonconformists and those that are against them Those that are against them they account the most Religious Temperate Chast Loyal Credible and in a word the best people through the Land for of our Rulers I am not speaking And those that are for the Nonconforming Ministers they defame as the most proud hypocritical treacherous disloyal covetous false and in a word the worst people in the Land or as Fowlis saith the worst of all mankind and unfit to live in humane Society How long will it be ere the sober people of this Land believe this Character One would think that the quality of the common Inhabitants of the Land should not be a Controversie or unknown thing All that I will say to this History is to tell the Reader the utmost of my observation and experience from my Youth up concerning these two sorts of men Where I was bred before 1640. which was in divers places I knew not one Presbyterian Clergy man nor Lay and but three or four Nonconforming Ministers Nay till Mr. Ball wrote for the Liturgy and against Can and Allen c. and till Mr. Burton Published his Protestation protested I never thought what Presbytery or Independency were nor ever spake with a man that seemed to know it And that was in 1641. when the War was brewing In the place where I first lived and the Country about the People were of two sorts The generality seemed to mind nothing seriously but the body and the world They went to Church and would answer the Parson in Responds and thence go to dinner and then to play They never prayed in their families but some of them going to bed would say over the Creed and the Lord's Prayer some of them the Hail Mary All the year long not a serious word of holy things or the Life to come that I could hear of proceeded from them They read not the Scripture nor any good Book or Catechism Few of them could read or had a Bible They were of two ranks the greater part were good Husbands as they called them and savoured of nothing but their business or Interest in the World the rest were Drunkards Most were Swearers but not equally Both sorts seemed utter strangers to any more of Religion than I have named and loved not to hear any serious talk of God or Duty or Sin or the Gospel or Judgment or the Life to come But some more hated it than others The other sort were such as had their Consciences awakened to some regard of God and their Everlasting State and according to the various measures of their understanding did speak and live as serious in the Christian Faith and would much enquire what was Duty and what was Sin and how to please God and to make sure of Salvation and made this their Business and Interest as the rest did the world They read the Scripture and such Books as The Practice of Piety and Deut
of Albemarle to expect to be at last called to account for his original sin § 11. But his passion makes him say he knows not what P. 142 I need not call Mr. B. to rememberance who compared Cromwel to David and his Son to Solomon But this has transported me a little too far Ans He saith this plainly of me afterward to shew the credibility of his History Did he know it to be false If so there 's no disputing with him If not why did he not cite my words Yea he after transcribes the Epistle meant where he saw there were no such words But others had told that tale before him and that was Enough Even as one of his tribe hath written that I have written in my Holy Common-wealth that any one Peer may judge the King If these Episcopal Historians tell forreigners that we have all Cloven Feet and Horns and go on four legs yea and if some swear it we have no remedy They can prove our noses horns and our hands Feet I again tell them If Martins Angel and Miracles be credible woe to those Prelatists that are for ruining violence and silences against men better than the Gnosticks If they be not true let them not trust too much to the best Historians § 12. Of the Council at Capua I said that they decreed that the two Bishops and their People should live in loving Communion Mr. M. finds me mistaken here The words in Binnius are Ut tam Flaviani quam Evagrii fautores in Communionem Catholicam admittantur modo Catholicae fidei assertores inveniantur I thought Catholick Communion had been Loving Communion And I thought if their fautors were to be received so were they And I thought Antioch had been a part of the Catholick Church and Catholick Communion had extended to Antioch But if Mr. M. deny these I will not contend with him § 13. He tells us that No man with his Eyes open ever saw the Condemnation of Bonosus by the Council of Capua for denying the Virgin Mary's perpetual Virginity Answ It is Criticism and not History that the man is best at They did it mediately while they referred it to them that did it Saith Binnius Causa Bonosi cujusdam in Macedonia Episcopi haeretici negantis delibatam Dei genitricis Mariae Virginitatem post partum in judicium deducta est Synodus cognitionem causae Anysio Thessaloniensi cum Episcopis ipsi subjectis aelegavit Ab Anysio Bonosum damnatum eorumque quos ordinasset communione privatum esse testatur Innoc. P. And he knows it's a Heresie now Yet this Council condemned Reordinations § 14. That Jovinian a Monk was called a Heretick for Doctrines judged sound by Protestants is no strange thing That one not a Bishop was the Head of a Heresie was somewhat strange then but not before they got too high As to the Question Whether Bishops were the Chief Heads and Fomenters of Heresie I crave his impartial Answer to these Questions 1. Do not your selves maintain that all Churches in the world had Bishops and that the Bishops were the Rulers and of Chief Power If so can you imagine that after they had such Power Churches could be usually made Hereticks without them Q. 2. Do not Councils and all Church-History tell us how many Councils of Hereticks there have been that were Bishops Q. 3. If any Presbyter broke from his Bishop to set up a Heresie was it not one that sought to be a Bishop Or did they not make presently him or some other their Bishop and Head Heresie or Popery had made but small progress had it not been for Bishops § 15. When I commend the Novatians Canon which allowed all men Liberty for the Time of Easter as better than burning men as Hereticks he takes it for an Immoderate Transport that I say as loud as I can speak If all the Proud Ambitious Hereticating part of the Bishops had been of this mind O what sin what scandal and what shame what cruelties confusions and miseries had the Christian world escaped That is had they left such Indifferent things as Indifferent And is this against Moderation I would such Zeal of God's House had more eaten me up Dare you deny but that this course would have saved the Lives of all those thousands of Albigenses Waldenses and Bohemians that the Papists killed And the death and torment of multitudes by the Inquisition And the burning of our Smithfield Martyrs And it 's like most of the Wars between the Old Popes and Emperours about Investitures And the blood of many thousand more And it would have saved more Nations than ours from the Tearing and Division of Churches by the Ejecting and Silencing of hundreds or thousands of their Pastors as the case of the Germane Interim and other such actions prove And is it Immoderate Transport to wish all this Blood Schism Hatred and Confusion and weakning and shaming of the Church had been prevented at the rate of Tolerating Indifferent things No wonder if you had rather England still suffered what it doth and is in danger of by Schism than such things Indifferent shall be tolerated It is not for nothing that Christ and Paul repeat that some have Eyes and see not Ears and hear not c. § 16. And here he again would make his Reader think it's true that the Nonconformists pretend that their Silencing is for not keeping Easter Day at the due Time as if this man that liveth among us did not know that it is the avoiding of deliberate Lying by subscribing to a known untruth which is the thing that they refuse and they mention it only as an appurtenance of the Imposition ad homines that it would bind them to two different times Whether as he saith our disease be a wantonness sed by concession and we are most violent when we know not what we would have those men are no credible Judges that for seventeen years would not endure us to speak out our Case and when before we debated part of it would not vouchsafe to answer us and at last when we tell it them do but accuse us with a sharper storm instead of giving any thing that a man can call an Answer that ever knew the Case e. g. to our Pleas for Peace and my Treatise of Episcopacy § 17. He confesseth that I praise the African Bishops as the best in the world though it contradict his former charge As to the Magnitude of Diocesses when he hath answered my Treat of Episcopacy some body may be edified by him I agree with him that Good men will do much Good in a great Diocess But 1. Worldly Bishops are so far bad And worldly Wealth and Honour will ever be most sought by the most worldly men And usually he that seeks shall find Ergo And 2. A good man cannot do Impossibilities The best cannot do the work of many hundred Forty two years ago some wisht for the Restoring of Confession Theophilus
in Christian Love and Peace and we offer them as unquestionable security for our Peaceableness Loyalty and Orthodoxness as the said Oaths Promises or Professions can be 6. They tell us Nothing is to be abated us and we must cease preaching the Rule must not be altered we will do more harm in the Church than out Projects for Moderation most distract the Church There is no Concord or Liberty to be expected but by our total obedience to the Bishops It is obeying the Church yea the Universal Church of Bishops that is the only way to Concord 7. To confute this Supposition which is the root of our Calamities I transcribe out of History and the Acts of Councils how great a hand in the Schisms and Heresies and Confusions of Christians those Bishops have had who have swelled up above the primitive species by vast Diocesses Wealth and claim of Government over other Churches and Bishops and that it is notorious that this Grandeur and exorbitant power of Bishops singly or in Councils hath been so far from keeping the Church from Schisms that it hath been one of the greatest causes of the Schisms of most Ages since such a sort of Prelacy sprung up and that Popery came not up in a day but rose from that Juniority to its present Maturity This was my work § 13. He truly tells you that the Original of all mischiefs is the Lusts that war in our Members and not this or that Order of Men. When the World had a good Pope if God would bless that Order of men some think he might do more good than any other man But he hath toucht the Core of the Churches Malady Verily the grand Strife is between the Flesh and Spirit the seed of the Serpent and of the Woman And if Patriarchs and Diocesans were but as much set on the promoting of a holy and heavenly Life as those Ministers are whom they silence and imprison they might do much good though the largeness of their Diocess render them uncapable of performing the 40th part of a true Bishops Work No doubt but Bishop Hall and Potter and Usher c. did much good by such preaching writing and good living as others use that are no Bishops But will fire burn without fewel And will it not burn if combustible fewel be contiguous Do not the Lusts that war in our Members live upon that food which we are forbidden to provide Do you think that the Lust of the Flesh doth not more desire Riches than Poverty Honour than a low Estate Domination over others to have our Will on all than humble Subjection Where the Carkass is there will the Eagles be gathered Do not you your self say that the Bishops and Church grew more corrupt after the third Century Do you believe that when a Bishops Power was made equal to a great Lords or more and all his Pomp and Riches answerable that the Lust of the Flesh would not more greedily desire it than it would desire a meer mediocrity Or that a worldly proud man would not seek more for Lordship and Greatness than a Synesius and such others as you say fled from it If the poor retired Monks were as bad as you make them what wonder if great Lordly Bishops were much worse Will not the fire of Lust grow greater as the fewel is greater I am satisfied that Riches and Power well used may greatly serve the Interest of Religion But two things must be considered 1. That the greatest Power and Wealth being far more desired by carnal Worldlings that is by bad men than by mortified heavenly minded men the more men desire them the more eagerly they will seek them by Friends Flattery or any means and therefore the liker they are to attain them except when the choosers are some resolved godly men And so which way can a Succession of the worst men be avoided But a mediocrity that doth not to the Flesh overweigh the labours and difficulties of the sacred Office will encourage the good and not much tempt the bad Or if good men will be never so bountiful to pious uses their bounty and Church-Lands may better maintain Labourers enough for the work than be made a snare to one 2. And that Power which depopulateth and destroys its end is unlawful in its very state as well as in its use The Power of one man to be sole Physician to the City and to have none but Apothecaries under him or of one man to be the only School-Master in the County and have none but Ushers under him is rather to be called Destruction than Power It is Bishops casting out Power that I am against that is the necessary Power of the Keys in the Parish Ministers or putting down necessary Bishops and also a Power to silence Christs faithful Ministers and deprive Souls of the necessary means by imposing things needless in themselves and sinful in the receiver that after his best search believes them such Seeing then that we are agreed that it is the Lust that warreth in men that is the corrupter of the Church let but the face of the whole Romane Clergy these 1000 Years at least tell us whether it be not the swelling of the Power and Wealth of Bishops that hath caused so long a Succession of a worldly lustful tyranical Clergy § 14. And he truly saith p. 306. that the generality of men when they have gained Wealth and Honour are commonly willing to secure the enjoyment of those Possessions by letting things run in their ordinary course The Spanish Proverb is The World is a Carryon and they are Dogs that love it and they will snarle at any that would take it from them and if it lie in the Ditch Dogs rather than Men will gather about it and its pitty such men should by such a Bait be tempted into the sacred Chair And he truly adds that Repulse and Disappointment will end such mens Patience For really as the man is such are his desires It is not only turgent Prelacy but a Prelatical Spirit that troublerh the Church And If Novatianus or Arius would fain be a Prelate it is in his heart and no wonder if he be a Schismatick Trahit sua quemque voluptas Appetite is the Spring of Action All the Popes Clergy are much of his mind for they participate of his worldly Interest and depend on him and therefore participate of the Papal Spirit The Interest of the General and Army are conjunct § 15. And its true that he saith that the Bishops Interest obligeth him to maintain Peace and Unity And so no doubt from that sense of Interest it is endeavoured in Italy Spain France Germany c. when a strong man armed keeps his house the things which he possesseth are in Peace But whether therefore the People did ill that forsook the Bishops and followed Luther or are all bound to cleave to the Bishops Unity is the doubt § 16. Whether it be true p. 310 that
THE TRUE HISTORY OF COUNCILS Enlarged and Defended Against the Deceits of a pretended Vindicator of the Primitive-Church but indeed of the Tympanite Tyranny of some Prelates many hundred years after Christ With a Detection of the false History of Edward Lord Bishop of Corke and Rosse in Ireland And a Specimen of the way by which this Generation confuteth their Adversaries in several Instances And a Preface abbreviating much of Ludolphus's History of Habassia Written to shew their dangerous Errour who think that a general Council or Colledge of Bishops is a supream Governour of all the Christian World with power of Universal Legislation Judgment and Execution and that Christs Laws without their Universal Laws are not sufficient for the Churches Unity and Concord By RICHARD BAXTER a Lover of Truth Love and Peace and a Hater of Lying Malignity and Persecution To which is added by another Hand a Defence of a Book Entituled No Evidence for Diocesan Churches Wherein what is further produced out of Scripture and ancient Authors for Diocesan Churches is discussed London Printed for Tho. Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns at the lower end of Cheapside near Mercers Chappel 1682. To the Pious and Peaceable Protestant-Conforming Ministers who are against our Subjection to a Foreign Jurisdiction The notice of the Reason of this Book with a Breviate of Ludolphus's Habassian History Reverend Brethren WHen after the effects of our calamitous divisions the rejoycing Nation supposed they had been united in our King newly restored by a General and Army which had been fighting against him invited strengthned by the City many others an Act of Oblivion seemed to have prepared for future amity some little thought that men were about going further from each other than they were before But the Malady was evident to such of us as were called to attempt a Cure and neither the Causes nor the Prognosticks hard to be known A certain and cheap Remedy was obvious but no Pleas no Petitions could get men to accept it The Symptomes then threatned far worse than yet hath come to pass God being more merciful to us than mistaken men We were then judged criminal for foreseeing and foretelling what Fruit the Seed then sown would bring forth And since then the Sowers say the Foretellers are the cause of all We quickly saw that instead of hoping for any Concord and healing of the Bones which then were broken it would become our Care and too hard work to endeavour to prevent a greater breach Though we thought Two Thousand such Ministers as were silenced would be mist when others thought it a blessing to be rid of them we then feared and some hoped that no small number more would follow them It was not you that cast such out nor is it you that wish the continuance and increase of the Causes We agree with you in all points of the Christian Reformed Religion and concerning the evil of all the sins which we fear by Conforming to commit though we agree not of the meaning of those Oaths Promises Professions and Practices which are the matter feared We live in unfeigned Love and Communion with those that love Truth Holiness and Peace notwithstanding such differences as these God hath not laid our Salvation or Communion upon our agreeing about the meaning of every word or Sentence in the Bible much less on our agreeing of the sense of every word in all the Laws and Canons of men Two things we earnestly request of you for the sake of the Christian Religion this trembling Nation and your own and others Souls 1. That you will in your Parish Relations seriously use your best endeavours to promote true Godliness and Brotherly Love and to heal the sad Divisions of the Churches We believe that it must be much by the Parochial Ministers and Assemblies that Piety and Protestant Verity must be kept up And what we may not do we pray that you may do it who are allowed 2. That you will join with us against all Foreign Jurisdiction Ecclesiastical or Civil The Party which we dread I have given you some account of in my Reply to Mr. Dodwell By their Fruits you may know them 1. They are such as labour to make our Breaches wider by rendring those that they dissent from odious which commonly is by false accusations They call out for Execution by the Sword against those that dare not do as they do and cry Go on abate nothing they are factious Schismaticks rebellious They might easily have learnt this Language without staying long in the Universities and without all the Brimstone Books that teach it them An invisible Tutor can soon teach it them without Book He that hateth his Brother is a murtherer and hath not eternal Life abiding in him 2. They are for an universal humane Government with power of Legislation and Judgment over the whole Christian World How to call it they are not yet agreed whether Aristocratical or Monarchical or mixt Some of them say that it is in the Collegium Episcoporum governing per Literas formatas for fear lest if they say It is in Councils they should presently be confuted by the copious Evidence which we produce against them And yet they may well think that men will ask them When did all the Bishops on Earth make Laws for all the Christian World or pass Sentences on Offenders without ever meeting together And how came they to know each others minds and which way the major Vote went And what and where are those Laws which we must all be governed by which neither God nor Councils made The Canons were all made by Councils If you say that I describe men so mad as that I must be thought to wrong them I now only ask you whether our Case be not dismal when such men as you call mad have power to bring us and keep us in our ` Divisions or to do much towards it without much contradiction But others who know that such palpable darkness will not serve their cause do openly say that it is General Councils which are the Legislative and judging Governours to the whole Church on Earth as one Political Body For they know that we have no other Laws besides Gods and theirs pretended to be made for all the World But when the Cases opened by me in the Second part of my Key for Catholicks and else where do silence them this Fort also is deserted by them Even Albert. Pighius hath rendred it ridiculous 1. If this be the specifying or unifying Head or summa Potestas of the Universal Church then it is not monarchical but Aristocratical 2. Then the Church is no Church when for hundreds of Years there are no General Councils an essential part being wanting And they that own but the 4 or 6 first General Councils make the Church no Church or to have been without its essentiating Government these Thousand Years And by what proof besides their incredible Word
Stile or Passion and also tells me that if making odious Gods servants silencing and persecuting faithful Ministers and Perjury should prove as great a guilt and danger of Destruction to the Land as is feared I cannot justifie my long Silence nor that I use no more plainness and fervency in calling the guilty to Repent The CONTENTS I. A Specimen of the Way by which this Generation confuteth their Adversaries in several Instances II. In the General Part § 1. Hard for young men to know what Teachers or History to believe § 7. Tempting Reasons for Papacy § 8. Evident against it § 9. The Steps by which Bishops ascended to Papacy § 15. The different Opinions of Popery in the English § 18. The Case of Fact discerned what Judgment I settled in about church-Church-Power § 20. For what Mr. M. hath wrote with so much displeasure against me § 22. Instances of above an Hundred Councils besides particular Bishops all before An. 1050. of whom I appeal to the Consciences of all sober Men whether they have not been the Tearers of the Church General Instances of the greater Schisms since then by popish Bps. Some Questions put to Mr. M. and some Reasons to abate his displeasure § 22. Of a late Book of the History of my Life to prove me the worst of men § 24. Whether I be guilty of falsifying History III. The particular Answer to Mr. M's Vindication Ch. 1. The Reason and Design of my History of the Schisms of Bishops and Councils Ch. 2. Whether we ought to tell of the Bishops and Councils Church-corrupting Ways Ch. 3. Of Mr. M's Industry to shew me to be unlearned Ch. 4. Whether I vainly name Historians which I never read Ch. 5. Of my use of Translations and following Binnius Ch. 6. His charge of my own mistranslations and mistakes Ch. 7. His false Supposition that I am only for a Church of one Congregation Ch. 8. His false Supposition that I am against Diocesanes when it 's only the ill species Ch. 9. And that I am a Independent and yet plead for Presbyterians Ch. 10. His false Accusation that I make the Bishops the cause of all Heresies and Schisms Ch. 11. And that I mention all the Bishops Faults and none of their Goodness Ch. 12. His Accusation of Spite Malice and Railing examined Dr. Burnet satisfied Ch. 13. His Supposition that I speak against all Bishops Councils Ch. 14. Some mens Credit about ancient History tried by their History of this Age. Twenty Instances of the History of our times My own experience of it Whether I hate compliance with Superiours or to preach by Licence Ch. 15. Mr. M. Magisterial authorising or rejecting what Historians he pleases His Accusation of Socrates and Sozomene and valuing Valesius Simond c. Ch. 16. His Observation on my Notes of credible and incredible History His Instances of my Railing particularly considered Whether the word Hereticating be railing or causeless An Instance of Fifty five of Bp. St. Philastrius's accused Heresses by which I desire any sober man to judge Other Instances Whether St. Theophilus or Socrates and Sozomene were the Criminals Even Pope Honorius and Vigilius hereticated for being wiser than other Popes Ch. 17. Of his Censure of my Design and Church Principles Whether I be guilty of exposing Christianity more than Julian Lucian Ch. 18. Of his 2d Chap. Who is most against Discipline Of Anathematising Whether Novatus was a Bishop or an ordaining Presbyter Councils for rebaptising His Self-contradictions Some Questions to him Whether the Diocesane Party as Mr. Dodwel who nullifie our Sacraments are Hereticks if the Re-baptisers were such The old qu. was not of Rebaptising Hereticks but of such as Hereticks had baptised Of the Donatists and many Councils Of our Liturgy's Rule to find Easter-day What the Novatians held Petavius and Albaspineus Testimony of them His quarrels about Epiphanius the Arians the Audians divers Synods Antioch Of the Circumcellians Optatus of the Donatists as Brethren His Excuse of the Bishops Ch. 19. Of the 1st General Council at C. P. Whether Bishops followed Emperours Their usage of Greg. Nazianz. Of the Priscillianists the Bishops and Martin Of my Letter to Dr. Hill Of the Council at Capua Jovinian Easter African Bps. Donatists Theophilus Aliars Ch. 20. His 5 Chap. Of the 1st Ephes Council His reviling Socrates and Sozomene as against Cyril Cyrils Story Of the Presbyterians Cruelty Nestorius Case His cavils against my Translations The effects of that Council at this day considered Ch. 21. Of the 2d Ephes Council Of Cyril the Eutychians and Dioscorus Ch. 22. Of the Calcedon Council Pulcheria and Eudocia What one sound man can do in a Council Whether our late Conciliatory Endeavours about Arminianism have been as vain as these Councils Of Theodos 2. and the Eutychians The whole story of that Council Luther as well as I makes the Controversie verbal Of the Bishops Peccavimus Many Accusations refelled More of the Councils Successes and late Conciliators The Westminster Synod Mr. M's way of Concord Of the old Conformity and ours Mr. Edwards Gangrena and the late Sects and Heresies Ch. 24. Of his 7th Chapter Of the old Heresies Whether Projects for Moderation have been the chief distracters of the Church He ost falsly saith that I charge the Bishops with all the heresies in the world What it is that I say of them The true cause of Schism confessed His misreports of the cause and Bishops His false saying of me that I compared Oliver and his son to David and Solomon My profest Repentance which he seigneth me an Enemy to What Nonconformity is and what his misreports of it An explitatory profession of the meaning of this Book against Misinterpreters THE Ready Way OF Confuting Mr. Baxter A SPECIMEN OF THE PRESENT MODE OF Controversie in England Joh. 8. 44. 1 King 22. 22. Prov. 29. 12. 19. 5 9. Rev. 21. 8. 22. 15. IN 1662. Dr. Boreman of Trinity-Colledge in Cambridge Published a Book against me as having written to Dr. Hill against Physical-Predetermination to Sin and in it saith That it is reported That I kill'd a Man with my own Hand in cold Blood and if it be not true I am not the first that have been wronged The Man though promoted to the Charge of this Parish St. Giles in the Fields was accounted so weak forbearing his Ministry and saying he was suspended some Years before he died that I thought it vain to take publick Notice of his Words neither imagining whence he had them nor ever hearing of them before But a few Weeks before the late Plot was reported one Mr. P. came to me and told me That at the Coffee-House in Fullers-Rents where Papists and Protectants used familiarly to meet he provoking the Papists to Answer my Books or to Dispute with me was answered by a Gentleman of this Parish said to be of the Church of England That Mr. Baxter had kill'd a Man in cold Blood with his
commanded it 5. I find that Christ hath himself done the work for which the necessity of Universal Humane Government by Pope or Councils is pretended viz. He hath made and caused his Apostles peculiarly qualified for it to record Universal Church-Laws even as many as are Universally necessary And if so I cannot but think 1. That he hath done it better than Man can do 2. And that to add more unnecessarily must needs be a snare and burden to the Church 3. And that it must be an usurping the Power of Christ For if there be no other Universal Governour there is no other that hath Authority to make Universal Laws Therefore this is Treason against Christ and a making Man a Vice-Christ 6. I found that there is not so much as a Natural Capacity in any one or many for an Universal Government Church-Government being of such a nature as maketh it far more impossible than for one Monarch or Aristocracy to Govern all the Earth And to do it by a truly General Council or by the Diffused Bishops of all the World is further from possibility than to do it by a Pope 7. I searcht the Councils pretended to be General to see whether they had made any better Laws than Christ's or made any desirable addition And I found 1. That while they were not wholly Papists they never pretended to make Canons for any Christians but only those in the Roman Empire 2. And that it had been much happier for the Churches if they had made no more Laws than Christ had made them for holy Doctrine Worship and Church-Discipline and had only as Teachers expounded and applied the Laws of Christ 8. I considered the Present State of the Church Universal and I find it such as no Party of Christians in the World doth own The Pope pleadeth for an Universal Soveraignty and all his Clergy do the same some saying it is in Councils some in the Pope and most in both together or Councils approved by the Pope And Protestants Greeks Nestorians Jacobites and almost all other Christians in the World accuse this Roman Church and Claim The Papists condemn the rest The Greeks Arminians and almost all the rest accuse each other 9. I considered what Popery is that is Clergy-Power in its height and what it hath done in the World And I found 1. A woful description of the lives of multitudes of Popes recorded by their own most credited Historians And 2. I found multitudes of vicious Canons obtruded by them as Laws on the Universal Church 3. I found most doleful Histories of the Wars and Rebellions that they have caused from Age to Age. 4. I found that they have corrupted the Doctrine of Christ in abundance of particulars 5. And that they have lockt up the Sacred Scriptures from the Vulgar as they have not done their Canons 6. And that they have turned God's Spiritual Worship into a multitude of Superstitious Rites and scenical Ceremonies and Shews 7. And that they have turned Spiritual Church-Discipline into a secular sort of Tyranny 8. And that they have most schismatically unchurched the rest of the Churches because they are not Subjects of the Pope 9. And that they have branded the soundest Churches with the name of Hereticks while they are the grand Heresie of the World 10. And that they have been and are the greatest Silencers of sound Preachers and hinderers of true Piety and Reformation in the Church 11. And that they have wofully vitiated the People that are their Subjects so that odious wickedness fed by Ignorance abounds among them and it is their Votaries that are called Religious and a few Canonized persons Saints as if Religion and Sanctity were rarities or any could be saved without them 12. Lastly I find that they have lived upon Blood like Leeches and have been the cruellest Persecutors of holy men on pretence of killing Hereticks And that it is this to which they trust 10. I took not this notice of them upon meer prejudice but have read I think as many Papists Books as Protestants or any other against them Nor have I taken it upon dark Scripture Prophecies suspecting my understanding of them But 1. The matter of fact from themselves 2. Against their Papal Supremacy from such Arguments as are fully collected by Dr. Barrow 3. Against their heinous Church-corruptions from such Moral Evidence as Dr. H. Moore hath fully gathered in his Mystery of Iniquity 4. Against their pretences of Tradition and Antiquity I fetcht my Arguments from the Histories and Authors which they themselves alledge and especially their Councils with the Fathers Writings § 9. Seeing the Church in this sad Condition and the Papal part so greatly vitiated I considered how long it had so been And I found that the Pope and his Bishops grew not up like a Mushroom in a day but had been long in thriving to maturity And I met with no man that could just tell what Year or what Age the disease or tumor did begin Bishop Bromhall thinks if they will abate their last 400 years Innovations we may have hope of agreeing with them Bishop Gunning will own no General Councils but the first six some will receive eight some but four Mr. Morrice here goeth no further in his defence of them whatever he think Some begin Popery with Leo the great some with Gregory's Successour But it is most certain that it was first an Embrio and next an Infant and so grew up from Childhood to maturity by degrees And the first Church-corruption was not that which we now call Popery And it is as certain that the tumor did neither begin nor grow up in the Bishop of Rome alone but in other Bishops who grew up with him were his strength and Councils and he their Head § 10. It is known when the Greeks and Romans began most notably to strive which should be greatest and how the division increased and when and how it came to an anathematizing or excommunicating each other § 11. It 's notorious that it was from the Councils of Calcedon and Ephesus that the great separated bodies of Nestorians and Eutychians now called Jacobites that possess the East and South were broken off with Nestorius and Dioscorus and so continue to this day § 12. I considered who were the Chief Authors of all these lamentable Schisms and Church-corruptions in the several Ages when they rose and who continue them to this day And I found that many Princes were much to be blamed and the People not Innocent no not the Religious Monks But the Bishops that had the main church-Church-power by abusing it were with their Clergy the principal Causes and so are to this day The breaches might yet be healed in East West and South were it not for them § 13. Finding this in History of undoubted Truth I next considered what was the Cause that the Bishops and their Clergy should become such Church-corrupters and Dividers and still continue the Churches miseries And
by the way of Arbitration and took the Bishop with the Consent of his Clergy to be an Authorized Arbitrator and thus the affairs of all the Christians being cast upon him and he having no power to force any but only to govern Volunteers the Bishops were constrained to make their Rules of Discipline so much the stricter that all that would not renounce Christianity and Church-Communion might be brought to Obedience to escape Excommunication 7. God having made the Great Power and Extent of the Roman Empire so great a means for the propagation of Christianity the Christians thought that the Greater they grew themselves the more it would tend to the Churches deliverance from contempt and persecution And their advancement lay in that advancement of the Bishops which private men could not expect save only by subsequent participation Hereupon the Bishops by the Peoples consent endeavoured to form the Government of the Church within the Empire into a conformity to the Government of the Empire And they contrived that those Cities whose Governours had the chief Civil Power their Bishops should have answerable church-Church-Power the Glory of the Empire drawing them for seeming Interest into imitation 8. From the like Principles they desired greatly the enlargement of the Churches of which they were Overseers And whereas Christ had made single Churches like Schools and every stated Worshipping Church was also a Governed Church as every School hath its School-Masters one or moâ—â— by degrees these Churches were by degeneration quite altered 〈…〉 o other things First They were like a Parochial Church 〈◊〉 addeth Chappels They thought not so contemptibly of the Pâ—â—â—â—ral work as we do but found enough as is said for many me 〈…〉 a Church of a few hundred or thousand souls And when by Persecution or Numbers or Distance they could not all meet ordinarily in one place they appointed them to meet under several Presbyters in several places but without appropriating a particular Presbyter to each Assembly 2. After they appropriated them to their distinct charges and distinguished a stated Worshipping company from a Governed Church the Bishop and his Consistory ruling all in common and the People tyed to communicate only at the Bishops Altar and elsewhere to be but Hearers and Worshippers 3. After that they set up Altars up and down for Monuments and Memorials of Martyrs and then in the Presbyters Chappels yet so that the People were at Easter Whitsuntide and the Nativity to communicate with the Bishop in the Mother Church or Cathedral 4. Then when Country-Villages distant had a great increase of Christians they allowed Country-Bishops Chorepiscopos proved by Petavius to be true Bishops if they were not Presbyters ordained But they must be subject to the City Bishop 5. After this they decreed that very little Cities should have no Bishops ne vilescat nomen Episcopi whenas before that every City had a Bishop and Elders that had Christians enow And every Town like our Corporations or Market-Towns were called Cities 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 did not signifie only such as we now call Cities distinct from such Towns were they no bigger than Cenchrea Majuma and such others close to greater Cities they had Bishops Yea every Church was to have their Elders and consequently Bishops saith Dr. Hammond where ever it was by the Rule of the Holy Ghost Acts 14. 23. And God never said Let there be no Churches but in Cities Else when an Emperour would put down all the Cities or many he should put down as many Churches 6. After this they set up Patriarks as before they had done Metropolitans And it was three that they first set up but no where out of the Empire And the Papists find in the Institution the mystery of Trinity in Unity For they could not find any where Twelve Seats Successors to the Twelve Apostles and so they feigned that Peter being the Center of Unity The Trinity flowed from him 1. He as Bishop erected the Antiochian Patriarchate 2. By St. Mark his Disciple the Alexandriau And 3. By his final Episcopacy the Roman saith Joh. Dartis de statu Eccles tempore Apostoli pag. 23 24. Imitatur Ecclesia Deum ut trinum in Personis unum in essentia quatenus scilicet una eadem Ecclesia est multiplex ratione locorum nam distributio prima generalis omnium Ecclesiarum fuit in tres Patriarchatus Romanum Alexandrinum Antiochenum ut unum esset per tres Antistites Sacerdotium ad Trinitatis instar cui una est atque individua potestas ut recte interpretatur Symmachus Pap. ad Eonium Dicendum est quod sicut in Trinitate una existente essentia tamen personae differentes existunt it a Ecclesia una est essentia licet plures particulares existant Et sicut omnes Trinitatis personae originem sumunt à Patre qui est origo Filii uterque Sp. Sancti ita Ecclesia origo est Romana aliarum 7. At the same time they began to describe Churches or Bishops Provinces by the Measures of Land which before were described by the Persons of Volunteers inhabiting near each other saith the aforesaid Dartis p. 128. Et sane diu duravit ille mos tanquam Apostolicus in Ecclesiis ut non essent alii termini Episcopatus quam multitudo eorum quos ad fidem convertissent baptizassent which he proveth out of the Canons 8. Rome being the imperial Seat the Bishop of Rome was nearest the Emperour and subordinate Rulers and so most capable to make Friends for Christians under any Accusations and Persecutions by which advantage all Christians through the Empire needing and being glad of such help did willingly give the Primacy to the Romane Patriark 9. The Emperor Constantine turning Christian and taking them for his surest Souldiers resolved to raise them as high as he well could for the interest of Christianity and his own and thereby to work down the Heathens by degrees and accordingly gave them chief Countenance and chief Power and their Bishops being their chief men it must be done by exalting them He made them the authorized Judges of all Christians that desired it even in criminal cases He yet gave not the Bishops the power of the Sword but if any Christians had committed Fornication Adultery Perjury yea Murder the Bishop was to punish them by Pennance and Suspension from the Sacrament Besides which Christians had the chief Preferments as they were capable of in the Armies and Civil Government So that they triumphed over their late Persecutors And now Honour Power and Wealth were most on the Christians side but especially the Bishops 10. Worldly Interest being now on the Churches side much of the World by such Motives crowded into the Church and no man can imagine that it could be otherwise who considers which way the Vulgar go and how apt to be of the Prince's mind and how much nature inclineth to fleshly Interest Who had not rather be
on the other IV. The Council that called the Emperours and others Princes power of investing Bishops the Henrician Heresie and judg'd the Bishops that had been for it to be dig'd out of their graves and burnt V. The Subjecting and debasing of all Christian Princes making them but as the Body and the Moon and the Bishops to be as the soul and the sun Especially the General Lateran Council which decreed Transubstantiation and all to be Hereticks that denied it And oblige all temporal Lords to exterminate all such Hereticks on pain of Excommunication deposition damnation VI. The Councils of Constance and Basils that were for Reformation how falsly and cruelly they dealt with Hus and Jerome and rejected the four great requests of the Bohemians and fixed their pollutions VII The Councils of Florence and that of Trent which had more Learned men who yet more obstinately managed the Enmity to Reformation VIII The present State of the Universal Church throughout the World as it is divided into Papists Protestants Greeks Moscovites Georgians with the Circassians and Mengrelians Armenians Nestorians Jacobites Cophtis Abasines Maronites Melchites And what thoughts these have of one another And I would desire Mr. Morrice to tell us 1. Whether he believes not verily that all these Instances prove that the Bishops have been the chief cause and that by Ambition Pride and Worldliness 2. Whether it be not the Bishops that in the Roman and other Parties now are the greatest hinderers of Reformation and of Concord and it would not be soon done were it not through them 3. Where it is that he will stop in his Vindication of the Bishops and their Councils and go no further and by what cogent reason 4. Whether he thought he had well defended the Church-Tyranny which I accused 1. By vindicating the first Ages and others whom I praised and accused not 2. And by letting fall his Vindication save a few consequent quibbles at the fourth General Council which was in 451. And so seems to vindicate the Bishops and Councils but for the space of 150 years of the time that I mentioned their degeneration 5. Whether if the Bishops had been willing when they had the King's Commission to make necessary alteration or were but to this day willing to prefer things necessary before things hurtful or indifferent we might not live in happy and holy Love and Peace in England 6. Whether he can blame a man that believes in Christ for lamenting the doleful corruption and division of the Christian world and for enquiring of and lamenting the sinful causes 7. If that Church Prelacy which they justly call the best in all the world can endure no more Parish Discipline than we have nor can endure such a Ministry as are silenced by hundreds or thousands than whom no Nation on Earth abroad that I can hear of hath better can you blame us for suspecting that somewhat is amiss with them and more with others 8. I hope you will yet remember that I did not appear as an accuser of Prelacy or Conformity but as importuned by your selves to give the reasons why I dare not take your Covenant and Oath never to endeavour any alteration of your Church Government and that after seventeen years silence My prayers to God shall be my endeavour for these following Alterations 1. That the Primitive Discipline may be exercised in the Parish Churches as Bucer importuned the King and Bishops de Regno Dei c. 2. That to that end we may either have so many Bishops under the Diocesan as be capable to do it or the Presbyters enabled allowed and obliged to do it 3. And that we may not instead of it have only a distant Court of men that know not the Parishioners where a Lay Chancellour decreeth Excommunication and Absolution which the Parish Priest must publish though his conscience be against it 4. And that Diocesans may not silence faithful Ministers without such cause as Christ will allow nor set up ignorant bad ones and bind the Parishioners to hear and communicate with no other I am so far from precise expectations from Diocesans or from reviling them that I do constantly praise them as very good Bishops who do no harm or but a little and if they should never preach themselves so they will not hinder others 9. And as for my calling Things and Persons as they are I hope you will not say that it was out of Malice that Anastasius Platina Massonius Stella Sigibert Baronius Genebrard Binnius c. have recorded such horrid crimes of Popes and others also of Prelates And is it malice in me to transcribe their History I am of Dr. Henry Moore 's mind who saith Mystery of Iniq. p. 388. Hence it is plain that they are the truest friends to Christendom even to Rome it self that do not sooth them up in their sins by mitigating and hiding their soul miscarriages but deal apertly and plainly with them for their own safety that neither admit nor invent subterfuges to countenance or palliate their Idolatrous and superstitious practices but tell them plainly how much they are apostatized from the true Worship of God and Christ into Paganism and Idolatry Better are the rebukes of a faithful friend than the hired flatteries of a glozing mercenary I pray mark this well 10. I take two things to be the degenerating and corruption of Episcopacy 1. When they became so bad that they were not willing to do good according to their undertaken Office Bad men will do ill in any place 2. When they had put themselves into a state of incapacity that they could not do the Good undertaken were they never so willing 1. Since great Baits of Wealth and Domination have tempted the worst men to be the Seekers Bishops have rarely been good except under a Saint-like Prince or People that had the Choice nor are ever like to be And what work the Enemies of Holiness will make by abusing Christ's Name against himself is easie to know such will take the best men for the worst and call them all that 's naught that they may quiet their Consciences in destroying them 2. And since a Diocess of many hundred or score Parishes hath had but one Bishop for Discipline the work is become impossible to the best But when a few Bad men will mercinarily undertake Impossibilities and so Badness and Impossibility go together alas what hope but of a better world above Saith Luther de Concil Eccles p. 300. Sed quam sunt intenti hanc crassam asininam â—atuitatem Unus Episcopus nonnunquam habet tres Episcopatus vel Dioceses tamen vocatur Unius Uxoris maritus cum habet tantum unum Episcopatum tamen interdum habet centum ducentas quingentas Parochias aut etiam plures vocatur tamen Sponsus unius Ecclesiae Hi non sunt digami Tam insulsas ineptissimas naenias recipit mens humana it a permittente Deo cum a
senex ad illorum adspectum etiam corpore commoveretur Dignitatum magnarum divitiarum contumax contemptor neque quicquam prius otio habuit ac libertate And I think as it is said of Cuspinian Ratus se satisfacturum ingenuo Lectori siquae verissima esse comperisset simplicissima oratione mandaret posteritati satis enim est historico ut praeclare dixit apud Ciceronem Catullus non esse Mendacem And as to my ends and expectations I am not so vain as to write with any great hope of persuading many if any who are possest of large Diocess Wealth and Power to forsake them much less to cure the common Thirst that corrupted Nature is possest with and to be the means of a Publick Reformation If I may satisfie my Conscience and save some from being deceived by false History about the Causes of the Antient Schisms it 's all that I can hope for Had I lived in Alb. Crantzius daies I might perhaps have said as he of Luther Frater Frater abi in cellam tuam dic Miserere mei Deus Et de Canonicis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dictis Nunquam posse eos reduci ad meliorem srugem nisi prius a viris doctis expugnata arce i. e. Papatu And for my self none of the Interested mens reproaches are unexpected to me Anger will speak I know what the Papists say of the Reformers and all the Protestants And yet I expect that all at last will turn to the disgrace of falshood by putting men to search Church-History for the Truth The case of Capnio is worth a brief recital A covetous Jew pretending Conversion contrived with the Fryers and Inquisitors to get a great deal of money from the Jews by procuring an Edict from the Emperour to burn all the Jews Books that so they might purchase them of the Fryers The Emperour will first hear what Capnio a great Hebrician saith Capnio adviseth to spare all that only promoted the Hebrew Literature and burn only those that were written against Christ Hockstrate and the Fryers were vext thus to lose the prey and accused Capnio of Heresie The cause is oft tryed especially at Rome All the Learned Hebricians were for Capnio The Fryers raged the more This awakened many Learned men to search into the Cause and armed them against the Fryers Galatinus Hutten Erasmus c. are for Capnio The Fryers accuse them also of Heresie But by this they stirred up such a Party of the most Learned men against them that when Tezelius came to vend his Indulgencies Luther had so many ready to joyn against the Inquisitors and Mercenary cheating Fryers as greatly furthered the Reformation And two or three ingenuous Conformists who have lately written against the violent battering Canoneers do tell us that some are like to be excited by the Overdoing of the Accusing silencing Party to search better into the matter of Fact and Right till they can distinguish between an Eucrasie and a Tympanite Or if this world be incurable they cannot keep us out of the heavenly Jerusalem where there is no Errour Schism nor Persecution because no Ignorance Malignity or Pride but the General Assembly of perfect Spirits are united in one perfect Head in perfect Life and Light and Love The particular Defence of the History of Councils and Schisms An Account to Mr. Morrice why my mentioning the Church-distracting sins of the Clergy when worldly grandeur corrupted them is not a Dishonouring but a Honouring of the Primitive Church And to vindicate those sins is no Vindicat ion of the Primitive Church CHAP. I. The Reason and Design of my History of Bishops and Councils § 1. THEY that know the men with whom I have to do and the Cause which I have in Controversie with them will easily understand my purpose The Persons with whom I am to deal are such as hold 1. That a General Council of Bishops or the Colledge of Bishops Governing per Literas formatas out of Council are the Supreme Governing Power over the Universal Church on Earth having the Power of Universal Legislation and Judgment 2. That among these the Pope is justly the Patriarch of the West and the Principium unitatis to the whole and the ordinary President in such Councils And say some It belongs only to the President to call them and they are but rebellious Routs that assemble without a just call 3. That there is no concord to be had but in the Obedience to this Universal Governing Church But all Persons and all National Churches are Schismaticks who live not in such Subjection and obedience 4. That such as the Diocesan Episcopacy which is over one lowest Church containing hundreds or multitudes of Parishes and Altars without any other Bishop but the said Diocesan is that Episcopacy which all must be subject to while it is subject to the Universal supreme 5. That every Christian must hold subjective Communion with the Bishop of the place where he liveth And say some must not practise contrary to his Commands nor appeal for such practice to Scripture or to God 6. That if this supreme Power silence the Diocesans or these Diocesans silence all the Ministers in City or Country they must Cease their Ministry and forsake the Flocks 7. And say divers of them They are no true Churches or Ministers that have not ordination from such Diocesans yea by an uninterrupted succession from the Apostles And for want of this the Forein reformed Churches are no true Churches but the Church of Rome is Much more of this Nature I have already transcribed and confuted out of A. Bishop Bromhall Dr. Heylins Life of A. Bishop Laud Mr Thorndike Mr Dodwell and divers others § 2. The first thing then in my intention is to shew that the Roman Grandeur which is thought to be the Glory of the Church on Earth and the necessary means of its Unity safety and true prosperity hath proved clean contrary even the means of Church corruption in Doctrine Worship Discipline Conversation the Soil of the most odious crimes the means of tyranny suppression of true piety and persecution of Gods faithful Servants and of rebellious War and cruel bloodshed § 3. To this end I described the steps by which the Clergy ascended to the Papal height For as all Protestants justly maintain that their Corruption of Doctrine Worship came not in at once but by slow degrees so do they also of the Papal Government and discipline And they commonly shew the vanity of the Papists demand who ask us who was the man and which was the year as if the world had gone to bed in simple Christianity and awaked Papists the next morning Whereas it is most evident in all Church history that the Clergy leaving the Christian Purity Simplicity and Love did climb the ladder step by step till they ascended to the Papal height And it 's a meer dream of them that think it was the Bp. of Rome alone
or absent Much less that Classes and other Assemblies are the stated Church-Government which all must obey And are the Presbyterians of any of the three forementioned Opinions § 5. I ever held a necessity of manifold dependance of all Christians and Churches As all depend on Christ as their Head so do all the People on the Pastors as their authorized Guides whom they must not Rule but be Ruled by 1 Thes 5. 12 13. Heb. 13. 17 24. And all these Churches depend on each other for Communion and Mutual Help as many Corporations in one Kingdom And frequent Synods well used are greatly helpful to these ends And the Command of doing as much as we can in Love and Concord doth bind all the particular persons to concur with the Synods in all things that tend to the Peace and Edification of the Church or are not against it And more than so if the general Visitors or Bishops that take care of many Churches do by God's Word direct instruct reprove admonish the particular Bishops and Churches they ought with reverence to hear them and obey them And if Independents really are for all this why do these Accusers represent them odiously as if it were no such matter but they were meerly for Church-Democracy Either you are not to believed in what you say of them or of me § 6. I know we have men that say that on pretence of acknowledging all this Episcopacy I put down all because I take from them the power of the Sword and leave all to despise them if they please Ans This indeed is the power that under the name of Episcopacy now too many mean Bishop Bilson knew no Power but Magistrates by the Sword and Ministers by the Word But why name I one man It is the common Opinion of Protestants and most sober Papists that Bishops as such have no power of force on Body or Purse But we deny not the forcing Power of the Magistrate 3. But we heartily wish that they would keep it in their own hands and never use it to force unwilling men into the Church or to Church-Communion high Priviledges which no unwilling person hath any right to This is my Independency CHAP. X. Of his Accusation That I make the Bishops the Authors of all Heresies and Schisms as distinct from Presbyters Monks and People § 1. THis also runs throughout his Book and must such Books be answered or believed I never denyed the guilt and concurrence of others with them I only say That as Bishops were the Chief so they had the chief hand as far as I can yet learn in Heresies and Schisms since they came to their height of Power and specially in those grand Heresies and Schisms which have broken and keep the Churches in those great Sects and Parties which in East and West it consisteth of to this day I never doubted or denyed but that 1. The Heresies that were raised before the Church had any Patriarchs or the turgent sort of Bishops were certainly raised without them 2. And afterward sometime a Presbyter began a Heresie 3. And the Bishops were but as the Generals of the Army in all the Church Civil Wars But I never denyed but the Prelatical Priests Monks and multitude were their obsequiâ—us Army § 2. Mr. M. saith That those Bishops that were Hereticks were mostly such or inclined to it before Answ 1. Was there then a good Succession of Ordination when the World groaned to find it self Arian Were all these Arians before their Consecration Answ 2. Were they not all Prelatical Presbyters that aspired to be Bishops and so as they say had a Pope or Bishop in their bellies I never thought that Prelatical Priests that studied Preserment and longed to be Bishops had no hand in Heresies nor Schisms no more than that the Roman Clergy are innocent herein and the fault is in the Pope alone What a deal then of this man's Book is lost and worse on such suppositions CHAP. XI Of his confident Accusation that I mention all the faults of the Bishops and none of their Goodness or Good Deeds § 1. THis also is a chief part of the Warp or Stamen of his Book In his Preface he saith This History of Bishops is nothing else but an Account of all the faults that Bishops have committed in the several Ages of the Church without Any Mention of their Good Actions of their Piety and Severity of their Lives of their Zeal for the Faith c. Answ 1. Whether this Fundamental Accusation be true or false let the Reader who loveth Truth see 1. In the very first Chapt. from § 41. to the end 2. Through all the Book where I oft praise good Bishops good Councels and good Canons and good Books and Deeds 3. In the two last Chapters of the Book written purposely to hinder an ill use of the Bishops faults In the first Chapter Very many of the Bishops themselves were humble holâ— faithful men that grieved for the miscarriages of the rest Though such excellent persons as Gregory of Neocaesarea Greg. Nazianz. Greg. Nyssen Basil Chrysostom Augustine Hillary Prosper Fulgentius c. were not very common no doubt but there were many that wrote not Books nor came so much into the notice of the World but avoided contentions and factious stirs that quietly and honestly conducted the Flocks in the waies of Piety Love and Justice And some of them as St. Martin separated from the Councils and Communion of the prevailing turbulent sort of the Prelates to signifie the disowning of their sins Of the Antients before the world crowded into the Church I never made question Such as Clemens Polycarp Ignatius Irenaeus and the rest How oft I have praised holy Cyprian and the African Bishops and Councils he sometime confesseth What I say of Atticus Proclus and other peaceable Bishops you may see p. 17. and very oft Yea of the Bishops of many Sects much of the Albigenses c. p. 17 18. Yea of the good that was done by the very worldly sort p. 18 19 20. Yea of the Papists Bishops that were pious p. 20. § 46. And § 47. I vindicate the excellency of the Sacred Office And § 53 58 59 60. I plead for Episcopacy it self in the justifiable species of it § 2. But perhaps he will say that at least I say more of their faults than their 〈◊〉 I answer of such good Bishops as Cyprian Basil Greg. Nazianzen Chrysostom Augustin Hillary Martin c. I speak of their virtues and nothing at all that I remember of their faults Of such as Theophilus and Cyril Alexandri and Epiphanius c. I speak of their virtues and some of their faults as the scripture doth of many good mens Of the more ambitious turbulent sort I speak only or mostly of their faults For I profess not to write a History of their lives but to inform the ignorant what Spirit it is that brought in Church tyranny and divisions I denyed
their Officers and Curates against the aforesaid exercises of Religion occasioned this sad Division so did the sense of this in the minds of those called Puritanes continue too long Many a time have I seen abundance in great Perplexity saying We believed them that professed that they took not Arms against the King but to execute the Law on Delinquents and defend themselves and the Kingdom from them We abhor the Regicides and Usurpers We would restore the King if we were stronger than the Army And yet we are in doubt how far we should actively contribute to our own calamity For though the King deserve more than we can do we doubt not but the Bishops will increase our Burdens and make greater havock in the Church than heretofore And many sate still on this account and as far as ever I could discern next the Power of the Army the fear of the Bishops was the chief delay of the Kings return I knew not all England but according to the Extent of my acquaintance I have truly told you the quality of those then called Puritans and of their Common adversaries And on which side now proportionably are most of the most understanding sober charitable conscionable and seriously religious Persons and on which most of the contrary not speaking of any Magistrates I think it neither my work nor our New Historians to tell For people that live among their neighbours will believe their senses and experience what ever either he or I shall say And I am well assured that this argument which I think was not found We cannot believe that God will suffer the Generality of the Religious to be deceived in so great a case and the most of the debauched ignorant haters of serious Godliness to be in the right did prevail with very many that could not try the Cause by the Laws and constitution of the Kingdom § 2. If I should recite the particular unjust reports of multitudes of these Writers it would be tiresome and loathsome Yea all the mistakes of this Eminent Historian are too many to be named But I will here name one which seems at once to smite and smile Pag. 2â—7 There is a temper which Mr. B. is acquainted with that is not to be prevailed on either by threats or promises from the Magistrate and seems to hate nothing so much as compliance with Superiors There are some that scorn to preach by the Licence of the Government and place the Kingdom of Christ purely in opposition to Law and Magistrates Answ. Note the credibility of this Historian 1. Doth their accusation of my flattering the Usurpers whom I more openly disowned than most of his Fraternity agree with this 2. Did my long and earnest Petitioning to be accepted but in a poor Curates place though I Preacht for nothing yea if it were but in some ignorant obscure Village and only to preach over the Catechism agree with this 3. Doth my large profession of Subjection in my Second Plea for Peace not yet blamed by them herein agree with this 4. I willingly took the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and an Oath to be true to the King as his Chaplain in ordinary and had this any such signification 5. Did my begging in vain a License from Bishop Morley and craving and obtaining one of Bishop Sheldon signifie this 6. But the smile is that one would think by these words I might have preached by the Governours License and would not And is that true Did I not preach by the Kings License and the Clergy blame me for it And as for the Bishops License I do profess that it 's yet in force and I do preach by it If I mistake it is not my refusing it If he intimate as he seems that by the Bishops License I might have had leave to preach in the Parish Churches it 's now too late But I would I had known how to get it I confess one Summer in the Countrey about 25 miles off I did venture upon the Credit of my License at Amersham Chesham Rickmersworth c. But it was too pleasing work to me to be continued One Church in Southwark I was once let into but no more in or near London I once craved leave of the moderate Bishop that now is that without putting down the meeting where I was in that great Parish of St. Martin's I might preach sometime there and once a day at the Chappel which I built which the Parish Incumbent useth and that he would quiet the Justices to that end and thought I had had his consent But the Constables and other Officers stood from that day about a quarter of a year together every Lord's Day at the door of the former place of Assembly to have apprehended me by the Justices warrant if I had gone And never could I hear of a man in London that was willing I should come into his Pulpit but the best have refused it Nor did I much desire it here For it is not to preach to them that have no need that is my request but to such as cannot come into the Parish Church or otherwise truely need our help Once I did try to have got leave two miles out of the City to have preacht a Kinswomans Funerall Sermon on the right of my License But the Minister said He must first ask the Bishop and then denyed me Reader these are the Historians that Charge me with misreport of ancient History visible in the most partial Authors on the other side Judge of them by their Report of the History of our Place and Age. CHAP. XV. Mr. M's way of getting belief by a Magisterial condemning the most credible Historians and authorizing whom he please § 1. IF we had not Eusebius Socrates and Sozomen how naked should we be left and much unacquainted with the case of the Church from the Apostles Besides Theodorets History till 440. And what a shake is given to the Credit of all these by Mr. M. and others of greater name Though Eusebius himself be by Petavius and many other Papists accounted an Arian yea and seemingly proved such and by Bellarmine de Script Eccles it s said that Athanasius so calls him and Jerom calls him the Arian Signifer and Prince and the 7th General Council so judgeth him yet Socrates vindicateth him and thinks he is wronged And indeed though his own Epistle written to his Flock be not justifyable incautelous and unjustifyable words were too Common before his daies as Petavius hath too fully proved with those that we must not yet call Arians But while Bellarmine and Mr. M. charge Socrates and Sozomen as Novatians that is Hereticks themselves they deprive Eusebius of much of their defence and render his History the more suspicious § 2. And though I know Mr. M. hath more partners herein I never saw yet any credible proof that either of them were Novatians Good Christians are not ashamed nor afraid to make profession of their Religion And
with them know them all better and that infallibly by sense it self § 2. II. Because I say the History of the Gospel is certainly credible it is ground enough to say That All is not Gospel that I write as if I had said it is § 3. III. Because I say Prophets were sure of their Revelation he saith It may be Mr. B. heard a Bene scripsisti As if I had pretended to be a Prophet § 4. IV. I said that History is certain even by Natural Evidence when it is the common Agreement of all men of most contrary Interests c. in a matter of fact and sense to all that knew it To which he saith The Superiority of Bishops over Presbyters is acknowledged by Catholicks and Schismaticks and Hereticks men of very contrary minds dispositions and interests and yet this Church-History would have us believe the contrary Answ This is our credible Historian 1. He doth not tell us in what Ages it was so acknowledged when those who doubt of the matter of fact doubt but some of 100 some of 150 or 200 years Doth any doubt whether it be so now 2. He tells us not either what Species of Bishops the question is of nor what Species of Presbyters nor what the Superiority was 3. He speaks without distinction or Exception and so must be understood to say that this Church history would have us to believe that even President Bishops Ejusdem Ordinis had de facto no Superiority at all over Presbyters in the same Churches and of the same order with them which is an untruth so gross as is no Credit to our Historian I have named both more than one ranck of Bishops whose Superiority de Jure I deny not Popes Patriarchs Primates Diocesans who deposed the Bishops of single Churches whose Superiority de facto I fully enough affirm in the ages and degrees in which they did ascend If he say that he meant it Even from the Apostles time and that of such Diocesans as have scores or hundreds of true Churches and Altars without their particular Bishops or any Presbyters that were Ejusdem Ordinis with the Bishops and were Episcopi Gregis and that had such Power of the Keys over their flocks as ours have not or that had so many such Assemblies that were no true Churches if he will be proved a Historian worthy Credit Let him give us any proof that all men described by him agreed de facto that there was so long such a superiority of such Bishops But these men deride distinguishing and banish Logick that is Reason from their History § 5. V. The next Evidence of certainty which I mentioned was from continued Existent visible Effects which prove their Causes And here this undistinguishing Historian is at it again The Superiority of Bishops over Presbyters is proved by the Laws and Customs of all Churches This hath the same answer which I will not repeat Either it falsly reporteth my denyal or it falsly affirmeth that all Churches in all ages have left us visible Effects of the foresaid species And I would he would help us that are ignorant therein with such History and Evidence from the begining of the Churches in Scotland and in the Southern and Eastern Countries that were without the Empire § 6. VI. I said that History is credible which speaketh consentingly against the known interest of the authors and therefore I named few testimonies of the sins of Popes and Councils but of those that are their most Zealous Friends To this he saith that my Characters of ancient Bishops are taken from their professed Enemies as my account of Athanasius Theophylus Cyril and divers others Ans 1. My account of Athanasius is almost all if not all in his praise and is not an enemies testimony there valid If I mention the displeasure of Constantine against him it is not any Character of him but of Constantine the Agent Nor do I think Constantine or Eusebius Caesar meet to be numbred with his Enemies why did he not instance in some words of mine As to Theophylus and Cyril I do not believe that he can prove that Socrates and Sozomen and the Historians that Concur with them were their Enemies And if in reciting the Acts of the Councils I recite their Enemies words so doth Surius Nicholinus Binnius Baronius and all just writers of those acts And I do not find that Chrysostom himself or Isidore Pelusiota had any Enmity to them nor Pope Innocent neither Of the rest before § 7. VII The next degree of credibility that I mentioned is that which dependeth on the Veracity and fitness of the reporter Of which I named nine things requisite Here he supposeth me one that is unfit and particularly saith Whether any hath â—ailed with greater intemperance and less provocation Ans 1. I am not the Author of the History of the mentioned Councils or Popes or Bishops but the Transcriber Let me be as bad as you or any of your tribe have made me that proveth not that Socrates Sozomen Theodorite Nitephorus c. or Binnius Baronius c. have misreported what they write If I have misreported these authors in any material point prove it and I will soon retract it As for my railing I expect that title from all such whose faults I name and call them to repentance He that calls men to Repent calleth them sinners and that is Railing he it never so great His first instanced railing is Pag. 19. A few turbulent Prelates Persecute good men He saith thus I call the present Bishops of the Church of England Doth he mean All or some If All he is an untrue Historian He may see many named before my Apology whom I except And if I have named two I have annexed the proof The next is Pag. 46. silencing destroying Prelates Ans Are there none such Were not about 2000 here silenced Do we not continue so and impoverished almost 20 years Have none perished in prisons or with want Do men call out for the execution of the Law and plead for our Silencing as a good work and take it for railing to have it named Doth not Conscience recoil in these men when in Pulpits press and Conference they maintain it to be a good work and tell the world how sinful a thing it is for rulers to suffer us out of Gaols What are you now ashamed of your meritorious works Sure they are sâ—ant good if it be railing to name them You will not say I rail if I call you Preachers And why do you say so if I call you Silencers if that be as good The next railing is Pag. 73 If all the proud Contentious ambitious Hereticating part of the Bishops had been of this Christian mind to endure each other in small tollerable Differences What sins Scandal and shame what Crimes confusion and miseries had the Christian world escaped And is this railing Hath the Christian world had no such Bishops these 1000 years
Have not whole Kingdoms been forbidden all Gods Publick worship by such even France and England among the rest Is it railing to tell for what little things they not only Silenced men but burned and murdered many thousands Were they not proud ambitious Prelates that deposed and abused Lud. Pius and those that in Council decreed the digging all the dead Bishops out of their graves to be burâ—t as Hereticks who were for the Emperours power of Investitures Do I rail if I say that Greg. 7. was Proud and ambitious when he threatened the Prince of Calaris with the loss of his dominions unless he made his Bishop shave his beard Do not Jewel and all Protestant writers say worse than this of Papist Bishops Is there any such thing as pride silencing burning c. If yea must it never be known reproved repented of and so forgiven to the penitent And if yea than how shall it be known without proper names By what name should I have called Silencing but its own and so of the rest Gods power over Conscience is marvellous that sin cannot endure its own name The next railing is the word Hereticating And how could I have known if he had not told me that this word is railing Did not the Bishops take it for a great service of God and is it railing to name it It 's true I used one word instead of a Sentence for brevity to signifie the Bishops culpable over doing in proclaiming men Hereticks He that doth not believe that they did not well nor do not to this day in Cutting off from the Church of Christ all those whole Countreys of Christians called Nestorians Jacobites Melchites and the Monothelites and many such I cannot save him from himself who will own all such sin and contract the guilt of it Hath not Bishop Epiphanius made us more Hereticks than he needed Hath not Bishop Philastrius made many more than the Devil himself made Lest this pass for railing once more I will name some of them 1. His 11th sort of Hereticks are those that kept Easter-day at a wrong time as our Brittains and Scots did 2. The Millenaries are the 12th such as many of the antient fathers and our Mr. Mede Dr. Twiss c. 3. The 27th Offered Bread and Cheese at the oblation 4. The 28th put New Wine in New Vessels in the Church 5. The 29th Put their fingers on their mouths for Silence 6. The 30th thought that all Prophets ended not with Christ 7. The 33d went without shooes 8. The Novatians are the 34th 9. The 41th thought the Epistle to the Hebrews was not written by Paul but by Barnabas or Clemens and the Epistle to Laodicea by Luke 10. The 42th are the Orthodox Miletians that Communicated with the Orthodox and some Arians too 11. The 46th doubted of the diversity of Heavens 12. The 47th being ignorant that there is another Common Earth invisible which is the Matrix of all things do think that there is no Earth but this one 13. The 48th thought that water was the common matter and was alwaies and not made with the Earth 14. The 49th Heresie denyed that the soul was made before the body and the body after joyned to it and believed that Gods making them Male and Female first was to be understood of the bodily Sexes Whereas saith he it was the Soul that was made Male and Female And the Soul was made the Sixth day and the body the 7th 15. The 50th Heresie thought that not only Grace but also the Soul itself was by God breathed into man 6. The 51st is Origens that thought our Souls were first celestical Intellects before incorporate as Mr. Glanvile and many now 17. The 52d thought that brutes had some reason as Mr. Chambre 18. The 54th thought that Earthquakes have a natural Cause 19. The 55th Heresie learned of Trismegistus to call the Stars by the names of Living Creatures as all Astronomers do 20. The 56th thought that there were not many languages before the confusion of Babel 21. The 57th Heresie thought that the name of a Tongue proceeded first of the Jews or of the Pagans 22. The 58th Heresie doubted of the years and time of Christ 23. The 59th thought as many Fathers that Angels begat Giants of women before the flood 24. The 61st was that Christians were after Jews and Pagans 25. The 62d Heresie saith that Pagans are born naturally but not Christians that is that the Soul and body of men are not daily Created by Christ but by Nature 26. The 63d saith that the number of years from the Creation was uncertain and unknown 27. The 64 thought that the names of the daies of the week Sunday Monday c. were made by God first and not by Pagans and were named from the Planets 28. The 66th was that Adam and Eve were blind till God opened their Eyes to see their nakedness 29. The 67th Heresie imputeth the Sins of Parents to their Children 30. The 68 Heresie was of some troubled about the Book called Deuteronomy 31. The 69 thought that those sanctified in the Womb wore yet conceived in sin 32. The 70th Heresie thought that the World had been first divided by the Greeks Egyptians and Persians 33. The 71 thought there was a former Flood under Deucalion and Pyrrha 34. The 72 saith that men are according to or under the 12 signs of the Zodiack not knowing that those 12 signs are divers Climates and habitable Regions of the Earth 35 The 74 Heresie is that Christ descended into Hell to offer Repentance there to sinners 36. The 75 doubted of the nature of the Soul thinking it was made of Fire c. as many Greek Fathers did 37. The 77 is of Gods hardening Pharaoh c. where he describeth the Dominicans 38. The 79 is that the Psalms were not all made by David and it denieth the equality of the Psalms as if they were not all written and placed in the order that the things were done 39. The 80 Heresie thought that Gods words to Cain Thou shalt rule over him were properly to be understood whereas the meaning was Thou shalt rule over thy own evil Thoughts that are in thy own free Will 40. The 81 Heresie did not well understand the reason of Gods Words to Cain giving him Life 41. The 82 Heresie thought that the Stars had their fixed place in Heaven and their course not understanding that the Stars are every night brought out of some secret place and set up for use and at morning return to their secret place again Angels being Presidents and Disposers of them that is as servants bring Candles into the room at night and take them out again 42. The 83 doubted as some Episcopal Commentators of the Book of Caâ—ticles lest it had a carnal Sense 43. The 85 Heresie thought that the Soul of man was naturally Gâ—ds Image â—efore Grace 44. The 87 Heresie thought that really four living Creatures mentioned in the Pâ—â—pheâ—s
them Excommunicated I could never learn yet how to know who are Members of your Churches Is it all that dwell in the Parishes Then all these aforesaid with Jews and Papists are in it And then why are ten parts of some Parishes suffered without Discipline to shun the Parish Church-Communion Is it all that hear you Then 1. Ten parts in some Parishes and two or three or half in others are not of your Church and hear you not and many Nonconformists hear you 2. And any Infidel may hear Bare hearing was never made a sufficient note of a Church-Member 3. And how can you tell who all be that hear you in an uncertain crowd 4. And why doth not your Discipline meddle with constant Non-Communicants 3. Is it only all that Communicate with you 1. These are yet fewer and so the far greatest part of many or most Parishes here are let alone to be no Church members at all when they have been long Baptized and no censure by discipline past on them 2. How know you your stated Communicants when any stranger may come unquestioned The truth is it is Parish discipline which you will not endure No wonder if you named it Issachars burden Bucer in scrip Anglic. and all the Nonconformists after him long strove for it in vain It is the hated thing Were it possible to prevail with you for this we should have little disagreement about Church Government But the Popes that have been the greatest enemies of it have yet gloried in a Discipline to set up their power over Princes and Peoples and to have their own wills and tread down all that are against them § 2. To extenuate Anathematizing so very Common with Councils he tells us P. 81. that Let him be Anathema imports no more than that we declare our abhorrence of such doctrines and will have nothing Common with those that profess them Ans 1. We may declare our abhorrence of every known sin and Errour in such as must not be anathematized 2. By nothing I suppose you mean not not the same King Countrey Earth Air c. but not the same Church the same Christian Communion familiarity love c Whether you mean not the same God Christ c. I know not But do you think the Anathematizing Bishops so unreasonable as to renounce all Christian Communion with men and not tell why Or to give no better Reason than We abhor their doctrine How few Churches or men have nothing worthy to be abhorred that is No Errour or sin And must we renounce Communion with all the Christian world No they were not so bad You use them hardlier than I. They took them to be no true Christians as wanting somewhat of that faith which is necessary to Salvation and Essential to a Christian and so to have made themselves no Church-Members and therefore are to be sentenced avoided accordingly And how ordinarily do they expound Let him be Anathema that is Cut off from Christ Not only Hildebrand so expounds it often but many before him Whereupon they commonly agree that an Anathematized Heretick is none of the Church nor can be saved without repentance And indeed to renounce all Communion with Christs true members not Cut off from the Church is a greater sin than I charge on them Though familiarity and specially Communion may be suspended while delay of repentance makes the Case of a sinner doubtful § 3. Pag. 82 He begins himself with blaming Bishop Victor for Endangering the Peace of the whole Church upon so light occasion Valesius is of opinion that it was but by letters of accusation Answ I think it could be but by Letters of Accusation Renunciation and persuading others to renounce them For Bishops were not then come up to their Commanding Power over one another But doth not Mr. M's here rail upon a Bishop in saying the same of him that I did if my words were Railing Thus you shall have him all along confessing much of that faultiness by them which he takes the mention of by me to be so bad § 4. He nameth many Councils which he saith I pass lightly over then sure I say no harm of them He thinks it is because I could not as if he knew it were my will And so I am never blameless § 5. But he hath a notable Controversie against Baronius who thought Novatus had been a Bishop such Errours as Baronius was guilty of by Ignorance are excusable in one so far below him in History as I am But I congratulate Mr. M's discovery that he was but a Presbyter But all confess that he Ordained Felicissimus Deacon And here is a Presbyter Ordaining But it was irregularly Let it be so He saith that he ought not to have Ordained but with Cyprian or by his permission I grant it But 1. If Cyprian's permission would serve then it was not a work alien to a Presbyter If a permitted Presbyter may Ordain a Bishop's Ordination is not necessary ad esse Officii and so that which is a disorder is no Nullity 2. And it seems by Novatus's Act that the Necessity of Episcopal Ordination was not universally received And I have not yet met with any that make it more necessary ad esse Presbyteratus quam Diaconatus § 6. Next he mentions another Carthage Council where one Victor dead is condemned for making a Priest Guardian of his Child and so entangling him in worldly Affairs And he tells you that all that I can say against this is the rigour of the Sentence but he dissembleth and takes no notice that I mention it in praise of the Bishops of those Times who were so much against Clergy-mens medling with Secular Affairs What odious Puritanism would this have been with us What I cite in praise our Historian cannot understand § 7. And that you may need no Confuter of much of his Accusation of me but himself who so oft saith I say nothing of Bishops and Councils but of their faults c. he here saith as followeth After this he gives a short Account of Councils called on the Subject of Rebaptization of Hereticks And here to do him right he is just enough in his Remarks The generality of the World was for Rebaptizing Hereticks And considering what manner of men the first Hereticks were it is probable they had Tradition as well as Reason on their side However Mr. Baxter endeavours fairly to excuse these Differences and speaks of the Bishops with honour and respect allowing them to be men of eminent Piety and Worth Had he used the same Candour towards others c. Answ 1. If this be true a great deal contradictory is untrue 2. He greatly misreporteth the Controversie It was not whether Hereticks should be Rebaptized but those that were Baptized by Hereticks and taken into their Churches If a Heretick had been Baptized when found by a sound Minister and after turned to Heresie he was to be restored by Repentance without Rebaptizing and I
is principally the Papists from Infancy to Hildebrands Maturity against whom I write § 21. He next comes to the Novatians as my Favourite sect And Favourite may signifie to the Reader a truth or a Falshood 1. Doth not every Christian Favour them that have lesser Errours more than them that have greater 2. Do I not as oft as he profess my great dislike of every sect as a sect 3. Do I not disclaim this Novatian sect and their opinion and own the Contrary 4. It seems he taketh me to be too Favourable to some Bishops and their followers The question is but who they be that must be favoured I may come to be taken for a Novatian by such men as well as Socrates and Sozomen § 22. Here wiâ—hout railing he bedawbs Novatus and Novatian to the purpose with horrid Crimes a Pharisaical Saint Perjured and what not But what Were they not Episcopal Yes he doubts it not It was for to be a Bishop that Novatian wrought his Villanies what if I had thus bedawbed the Episcopal But yet the very word Puritan is of use to him This saith he of Novatus was the tender Conscience of the author of the Ancient sect of the Puritanes Can you tell who the man aimeth at Is it Nonconformists Novatus Novatian were Prelatists and never scrupled more Ceremonies than our Prelates impose Who then can it be but men that in general though Episcopal do profess Tenderness of Conscience And there I leave them without the application § 23. But this Defender of Surgent Prelacy sticks not to disgrace those whom he seemeth to defend It was three of the Catholick Bishops that Consecrated Novatian and without railing he calls them Three plain ignorant Bishops These good men suspecting no trick and overcome with his good entertainment with too much Wine and perswasions were forced at last to lay their hands on him and Consecrate him Bishop 1. Ignorant Bishops 2. Overcome with too much Wine and entertainment 3. And with perswasion 4. To do such an Act as to Consecrate so bad a Bishop that in such a city as Rome and that without the Churches choice or Consent How much worse have I said of Bishops But yet they were good men But if they had been Nonconformists what names had been bad enough for them No doubt if they had been sequestred and cast out for their too much wine and such ordination how odiously might the agents have been described as enemies to the Church and Persecutors of good men § 24. Yet further this New Bishop engageth men to him by Oaths enough to strike a horror in the minds of the Reader saith he See what a man may do for a Bishoprick It reminds me of many good Canons that forbid Bishops swearing their Clergy to them And of our Et Caetera Oath in 1640 never to Consent to any alteration to say nothing of our times and the old Oath of Canonical obedience It strikes horror into mens minds now that we scruple these § 25. He maketh the Novatian doctrine blasphemous without railing and me too Favourable in representing it As to that I suppose he is not ignorant how great a Controversie it is what they held even among the greatest Antiquaries and Enemies of Schism and Heresie And I use in accusations to meet with most truth in the most Favourable interpretations And here I will tell our Historian that while I take leave to dissent from his accusation it shall be but by the authority of those whom I judge as well acquainted with Church Writers and Customes as any that ever Mr. M. or any of his Masters read not excepting more knowing men than Valesius The first is D. Petavius in Epiphan de Cath. Where first he tells us that no less nor later men than most of the ancient Fathers and Specially the Greeks mistook Novatus and Novatian for one or thought the sect had a single Author naming Euseb Theodoret Epiphan Nazian Ambrose Austin Philastrius yea and Socrates Yet half as great a mistake in me would have been scorned 2. Against Epiph. and Theodoret he saith Non ea Novatiani Opinio fuit eos qui gravioris peccati noxam contraherent ab omni spe consequendae salutis excludi Nam illos ad capessendam poenitentiam hortari solebant Et ut Divinam clementiam lachâ—ymis ac sordibus elicerent identidem admonebant Sed hoc unum negabant ad Ecclesiae fidelium Communionem recipi amplius oportere Neque penes Ecclesiam reconciliandi jus ullum ac potestatem esse Quippe unicam illam peccatorum indulgentiam in illius arbitrio versari quae per Baptismum obtinetur which he proveth out of Socrates Ambrose And he saith that they were not counted Hereticks for wronging the lapsed by denying them Communion but for wronging the Church Power by denying the Power of the Keyes for their Restitution Like enough The other shall be that excellent Bishop Albaspineus Observ lib. 2. Observ 20 21. p. mihi 130 131. Advertant Novatianorum errorem non in eo positum quod dicerent neque lapsum neque excommunicatum in morte à peccatis liberandum sed haereticos ideo habitos quod opinarentur Deum ipsum Ecclesiae neque remittendorum neque retinendorum peccatorum capitalium potestatem copiamque fecisse Atque haec in eo fuit viguitque eorum haeresis qui quanquam illud consequeretur ex-eorum falsa Opinione ut absolutionem non largirentur tamen hoc eorum factum non haeresis nomine afficiendum erat neque ad haeresin accedebat ob aliam causam quam quod à fonte illo quasi capite haresin olente dimanârat eo maxime quod Novatiani crederent id Ecclesiae a Deo non fuisse praestitum concessum quae causa sola fuit cur praxis illa ceâ— disciplinae Novatianorum ratio haeresis nomen notionemque non effugeret The Clergy felt their own Interest and the Novatians denied their Power to retain as well as forgive capital Crimes and thought their Keyes extended not so far And that the Case of the lapsed was it that they began with Epiphanius himself and others agree And Observ 19. he shews that Novatianus did this against his former Judgment in Envy and Faction against the Bishop because he mist of being Bishop himself A Bishoprick was it that provoked him to deny this Pardoning Power in Bishops And Albaspineus hath in many antecedent Observations shewed how little if any thing at all the Novatians differed else from the Antient Church in the strictness of their Communion and avoiding sinners So that he thus begins his fifth Observation Incredibilia prope sunt quae his capitibus dicturi sumus sed tamen ita vera certa quae cujusque animam summam in admirationem rapiant Ecclesiam primis temporibus nulla vel levissima labe inquinatam fuisse quin ita illibatam intactamque ut omni ratione curâ solicitudine prospexerit filii ut sui
Parochialis brings copious Reasons and Orders of Princes Popes and Prelates that all should confess to the Parish-Priest If you had set this up here how many men must have gone to it in the Parishes of St. Martin Giles Cripplegate Stepney c But how much greater work hath Dr. Hammond and Old Councils cut out for him that will be the sole Bishop of many hundred Parishes I have named it elsewhere And if any man of consideration think I have not proved against Mr. Dodwell that Bishops Government is not like a King 's who may make what Officers under him he please but depends more as a Physician 's or School-master's on Personal Ability I will now add but this Question to him Why is it that Monarchy may be hereditary and a Child or Infant may be King but an Infant may not be Bishop nor any one not qualified with Essential Ability I have at large told you how sharply Baronius and Binnius condemn that odious Nullity of making a Child by his Father's Power A. Bishop of Rhemes If I heard twenty men say and swear that one man is sufficient to be the only Master of many hundred Schools or Physician to many hundred Hospitals or that one Carpenter or Mason may alone build and rear all the Houses in the City after the Fire or one man be the sole Master of an hundred thousand Families what can I say to him but that he never tryed or knows the work § 18. When I note that the Donatists took themselves for the Catholicks and the Adversaries for Schismaticks because they were the greater number he very honestly saith that Multitude may render a Sect formidable but it 's no Argument of Right Very true nor Secular Power neither But what better Argument have the Papists and many others that talk against Schism § 19. He thinks the Donatists Bishops Churches were not so small as our Parishes Answ Not as some But if as I said before Constantinople in the height of all it's Glory in Chrysostom's daies had but 100000 Christians as many as three London Parishes have judge then what the Donatists had § 20. His double quarrel with Binnius and Baronius let who will mind What I gathered out of those and other Canons of the smalness of Churches then I have elsewhere made good His Reviling Accusations of Envy to their Wealth deserveth no Answer § 21. He comes to St. Theophilus's Case of which we spake before The Monks that reported evil of him were it may be saith he downright Knaves The Reviling is blameless when applied to such Doubtless they were ignorant rash Zealots But one that reads what the Egyptian Monks were in Anthony's daies and after and what Miracles and Holiness Sulpitius Severus reporteth of them and why Basil retired into his Monastery c. may conjecture that they had much less worldliness than the Bishops and not greater faults § 22. I think it not desirable or pleasant work to vindicate the credit of Socrates and Sozomen accusing Theophilus But if his Conjectures in this case may serve against express History of such men and so near let him leave other Histories as loose to our Conjectures Postâ—umianus Narrative in Sulpitius is but of one piece of the Tragedy He thinks it improbable that Origen should be accused for making God Incorporeal and such Conjectures are his Consutation of History But Origen had two sort of Accusers the Bishops such as Theophilus and Epiphanius had worse charges against him But the Anthropomorphite Monks were they that brought that Charge against him that God had no face hands eyes And Theophilus before them cryed down Origen in general to save his life by deceiving them that they might think he did it on the same account as they did This is Socrates his Report of the Case He saith that the Impudent Mutinous Monks were not ashamed to tell all the world that all that were against them were Anthropophites Answ It was other Monks that I here talk not of that he means It was these Monks that were Anthropomorphites themselves and would have killed Theophilus for not being so till he said to them Methinks I see your faces as the Face of God And the name of the Face of God did quiet them Hierom was a Party against Chrysostom it was for not passing that Sentence on Origen that Epiphanius would by masterly Usurpation have imposed on him that Chrysostom was by him accused § 23. Could any Sobriety excuse that man Epiphanius that would come to the Imperial City and there purposely intrude into the Cathedral of one of the best Bishops in the world for Parts and Piety and there play the Bishop over an A. Bishop in his own Church and seek to set all the Auditory in a flame at the time of Publick Worship and require him to say that of Origen which he there without any Authority imposed on him I know not what is Pride Usurpation Turbulency if not Malignity if this be not But at last he saith I do not intend to excuso Theophilus in this particular Thank Pope Innocent He did certainly prosecute his Resentment too far But he was not the only man Epiphanius a person of great Holiness Hierom and several other persons renowned for their Piety were concerned in the persecution of this Great man as well as he And to say the truth this is their weakness for that Severity which gives men generally a Reputation of Holiness though it mortifie some irregular heats yet is apt to dispose men to pâ—evishness But true Holiness ever sincerely loveth holy men and specially such as are publick Blessings to the Church And though I censure not their main State your Holy Persecutors of the best of Christ's Servants will never by Christ be judged small Offenders Alas it's too true that Theophilus was not alone A Council of Bishops were the Persecutors And it 's hard to think that they loved Chrysostom as themselves When the forementioned Council at Constantinople had turned out Nazianzen even the great magnifiers of General Councils Baronius and Binnius thus reproach them that they drove away a holy excellent man that a man was set up in his stead that was no Christian that it was the Episcopi Nundinarii that did it the Oriental Bishops first leaving them and going away with Gregory And if the Major Vote of that General Council were Episcopi Nundinarii what Châ—ysostom's Persecutors were may be conjectured Do not these Papists here say worse of them than I do § 24. Yet though he confess as much as is aforesaid and bring but his Conjectures mixt with palpable omissions against the express words of Socrates and Sozomen he hath the face to make up his failing with this Calumny I have dwelt so long on this not only to vindicate Theophilus but to shew once for all the manner of our Author's dealing with his Reader in his Church-History Any scandalous Story though it be as false and improbable as
take any impressions and upon false information chargeth Cyril with prosecuting his private quarrells with Nestorius under pretence of zeal for the faith I leave all men to believe our Accuser as they see cause And the same I say of that which is so great a Controversie among the Critical Historians whether Theodorets Epistle to Job Aut. against Cyril be Counterfeit or were written on a false rumour of Cyrils death Their 5th General Council hath it Baronius and Binnius say some Eutychian knave hath corrupted the Acts of that Council Must Councils be the Laws of all the world and hath the Church and Tradition kept them no better that we know not when we have them truly Leave us then to the universal Laws of God § 14. He saith truly that the Council of Ephesus was chiefly directed by the authority of Cyril Ans And so was that at Trent by the authority of the Pope And when he hath confuted the credible History wich tells us of the womens and Courtiers hatred of Nestorius and proved that the Emperour and Pulcheria the Empress were but one I will grant that the authority of the Court directed not Cyril and that then and now Bishops neither were nor are directed by the Civil powers § 15. When I spake against Nestorius his cruelty to Sectaries he asketh What Hereticaters were hotter than the Presbyterians in 1646. The inquisition is not more severe than their ordinance against Heresies which they desired should be made felony and punished by death c. Ans Reader Judge of the mans Credit as to ancient History still by his truth about the Present age 1. The Inquisition he saith is not more severe Do I need to answer this to any man of 50 years of age It 's Capable of no answer but what he will call by some name deserved by his own 2. I can find no such ordinance He saith It was offered Is that all And by whom Was it the body of the Presbterians or who 3. What were the Heresies named by them Were they not down right Blasphemy 4. Who and how many were ever either tormented or put to death for Heresie from 1641 till 1660 I remember not one save that James Nayler was imprisoned and whipt and had his Tongue bored for blasphemous Personating Christ and that not by the Presbyterians 5. Why are they so ordinarily reproached by the Prelatists for tolerating all Sects here in England 6. What if all this had been true What is it to me or any of my mind I never had a hand in persecuting one man to my remembrance How few can you name of all the Nonconformists now in England that had any hand in the Severities you mention I know not four in England that I remember And what 's this to us any more than to you 7. And was it well done or ill If well why do you liken them to the Inquisition Are you for it If ill why do you plead for it in others Imitate it not if you dislike it For my part as I am against all Sects as such I am much more against the cruelty of any I stick no more at the disgracing the Presbyterians sins than yours And I am readier to disgrace my own than either if I can know them I would cherish Errours no more than you but I would not ruine or imprison even such of your selves as have too many Heresie must have its proper cure I thank God I had once an Orthodox agreeing Flock But again I say the Presbyterians were too impatient with Dissenters and it 's better have variety of Fish in the Pond than by the Pikes to reduce them to special unity § 16. He saith that Nestorius consequentially denyed the God-Head of Christ p. 192. Next he hath found a contradiction in my words that the Emperor was weary of this stir And yet that Cyril did it to please the Court These critical men can make their two hands enemies to each other How came he waking to dream that this was a contradiction when Historians tell us that the Women and Courtiers hated both Chrysostome and Nestorius He implyeth that the Emperor and the Court were all one or of one mind But I am not bound to believe him no more than of many other Emperours whose Wives kept up one party and they another And I pray you why should we be confident that Theodosius 2. himself called an Eutychian by the hereticating Bishops was not against Nestorius when he called that Council at first Condemned both him and Cyril and after him alone I did but recite the Historians words and was that forgetfulness § 17. His many words about this controversie with Nestorius are the most unworthy of any answer of all his Books sometime he saith as I as p. 193. It had been happy for the Church if the mysteries of our Religion had never been curiously disputed sometime he confesseth that Nestorius spake the same thing with Cyril that Christ had two natures in one Person ibid. And that he expresseth himself one would think very orthodoxly p. 202. But the Heretick dissembled and hid his sence And so this man after above 1000 years knew the mans mind to be contrary to his words whereas it's palpable to him that readeth the Histories that the man was so far from hiding and dissembling that he was sowrly and morosely addicted to stick to the words and Notions he had espoused and too little to regard a peaceable complyance to mollifie his accusers His fault lay on the clean contrary side But he proveth him a Heretick that meant Christ was two Persons though he said the contrary 1. Because he saith that the Humane Nature was united in dignity and honour to the Divine Ans As if either the hypostatical union were denyed by those words or he knew that Nestorius meant not to include it in those terms But he saith he useth the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ans As if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 never signifyed more than a Relative or official Person when besides the many places cited by Derodon Nestorius oft explaineth himself in the common orthodox sence But the foulest charge is that he seems once or twice to distinguish Christ from the Divine Nature Ans By Christ he expresseth himself to mean the humane nature anointed to his Office And the man thought that the Divine Nature was not so anointed and distinguishing is not dividing It is not his Nay and my Yea that can inform any Reader what Nestorius said and meant without reading his own words rather than Cyrils of him And if such as Mr. M. will pretend Charity and contrary to plain evidence face down the world that a Man denyeth consequentially Christs God-Head and the Unity of his Person while he profest the contrary no mans innocency is sufficient to escape the fangs of such hereticaters And let him call me what his list inclineth him to call me
but the Man can write another Book to justifie this for what is it that some cannot talk for Yea he is at if again p. 230. that Eutyches held Christ not to be true Man § 2. He confesseth again that Cyril affirmeth but one Nature and meant but one Person and that Eutyches used the same words but saith sure they cannot be so mad as to fall out so violently when they say the same thing words Flavian could not be so foolish or so wicked c. Ans I justifie not the words of Eutyches or Cyril but if I have great reason to believe that as he confesseth Cyril so gross as to use 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so Eutyches who had far less Learning than Cyril did word amiss the conceptions which were the same with Cyrils I leave it to this mild Censurer to call them Fools and mad and wicked It 's taken for railing in me to blame them § 3. He saith Cyril never said there were two Natures in Christ before the Union Ans I have twice cited his words Find a true difference between them and those of Eutyches if you can I believe they both meant better than they spake § 4. But the Spirit of detraction useth to fetch Accusations from Hearts Thoughts and secret Actions and so doth he against Eutyches and he saith this hath been done of late times To deliver that in select Meetings which they will not in publick promiscuous Assemblies as evil Spirits are under restraint in consecrated places Ans Therefore it is that the Nonconformists have 20 or 19 years so earnestly beg'd for leave to preach in publick consecrated places to promiscuous Assemblies that they might be out of suspicion but could never obtain it of this sort of Masters Ex ore tuo Thus they that cast the stone at others oft find it hit themselves Mr. Edwards Gangrena is here commended to those that are for Toleration As if all differences were equally intolerable or tolerable And he that saith Tolerate not those that preach Blasphemy or intolerable errour said no worse than he that saith Silence Two Thousand Preachers unless they will Profess Promise and Swear and do all that is oft described imposed on them § 5. In his Narrative he is no more tender of the honour of Bishops it seems than I am nor so much of Emperours for when he had said the Emperour was too much addicted to this kind of Vermine Eunuchs and shews his bitterness against Flavian he saith that the Letters which called this Council suggested sufficiently what it was to do and that their business was to condemn a Bishop the Emperour did not care for though without any just ground nay for his honesty I deny none of this But were the Bishops of the Catholick Church in a good case then that when they knew before that they were called to such a work as this would meet in a General Council and do it No he accuseth them himself I need not do it The Emperour he saith knew how to choose Bishops and yet his Summons was general to all to come and the President if half be true that is said of him and if that be a doubt how credible are your Historians was one of the most wicked profligate Wretches in the World yet he was one of the Patriarchs and all the Council Bishops and till they met were not thus accused You see the man is a far greater railer than I even against Bishops But it is but against those that are against his Interest and side § 6. He describes those Bishops as using violence forgetting that it is it his Party trusteth to continually just with the front as Baronius and Binnius and many other Papists justifie Martin for being against putting Hereticks to death and condemn Ithacius while their Kingdom is upheld by that which they condemn and worse even the burning of true Christians as Hereticks and it 's Heretical with them to imitate Martin just as those Matth. 23. Your Fathers killed the Prophets and you build their Sepulchers and say if we had lived in the days of our Fathers we would not c. § 7. But in the passage I find our Historian in a more charitable mood to this Ephesine Council of Bishops than his Brethren How bad soever Dioscorus and this Council were yet they are in my judgment to be looked on rather as favourers of Heresie than Hereticks they followed the meaning I believe as well as the Words of Cyril Ans And now I may hope I am Orthodox and Charitable when I have no less than his Judgment to justifie mine And Anatolius justifieth us both § 8. But Sir now you are in a good Mood will you consider 1. Whether those Bishops and Councils that set the Christian World in that Flame that burneth dreadfully to this day after above 1200 Years were not guilty at least of a peccadillo or venial sin 2. Whether they are imitable 3. Whether this General Council had a supream Legislative and Judicial power over all the Church on Earth which all must obey and none must appeal from No saith Bishop Gunning It was a meeting of violent Robbers Ans But it was a General Council which it seems then may be such CHAP. XXIII Of the 4th General Council at Calcedon § 1. HE begins his Chapter comically and notably derideth me for saying Pulcheria was the same that before at Ephesus had set the Bishops against Nestorius Is this so ridiculous It 's well known that Historians make her very powerful with her Brother she chose his Wife Eudocia They were long of two minds It 's no wonder that she that got him condemned at Ephesus got the same further done at Calcedon when she was Empress her self having made Martian Emperour and her nominal Husband for they were not conjugally to know each other Is there any thing in this that deserveth the stage Though Theodosius be reproached by Popish Historians as an Eutychian or a favourer of them if credible honest Socrates may be believed there have been few such Princes in the World for Piety his House was a Church for Patience never seen angry for Compassion would never let a man die for Treason-against himself But his Sister a Woman eminent for Wit and Piety was thought to govern him very much specially in the severities against Nestorius Evagrius who bitterly reproacheth Nestorius tells us of some writings of his that fell into his hand in which he saith that the Emperour was his friend and would not sign his banishment and laies the cruelties that he underwent on his Officer and considering the case of a suffering man I see nothing unseemly in the Letter to him which Evagrius chargeth with contempt § 2. My wish for the Churches Peace that the unskilful words of Nestorius and Eutyches had been silenced by neglect rather than the flame blown up by honouring them with two General Councils disputation
very few if any one were Bishops when they turned Hereticks I have enquired in the Preface though if they ascended from Heresie to Prelacy it 's all one to me But by this I conjecture that he taketh fewer for Hereticks than others do and that he pretends acquaintance with their minds in that antecedent part of their Lives which no History mentioneth I confess I think that for the most part men are Papists before they are Popes or Papist Bishops And yet I think that it is first the desire of Papal and Prelatical Grandeur and next the Exercise of it which is the cause of Schism and Persecution § 17. I verily believe as he doth that Platonick Philosophy and a willingness to win the Heathens by compliance had a great hand in corrupting many Doctrines and not only Monks but others of the most religious Christians had a great hand in many of the ancient Superstitions especially those that tended to the over-honouring of their Martyrs and too much advancement of their Bishops when they came newly from under the Persecution of the Heathens But it came not to be universal nor the Engine of great Corruption and cruelty till the Bishops turned all into a Law Who could make any of all this necessary but Pope Prelates or Princes who pretended a Legislative Power hereto Even Luther and Melancthon were indifferent to diverse Ceremonies so they were made to be indifferently used But when they are made necessary by a Law specially more necessary to a Minister than his Ministry and to a private Christian than his Church Communion who doth more vehemently condemn them than they § 18. That Paschasius Radbertus was the first that broached the Doctrine of Transubstantiation is a doubtful expression Either he meaneth the Name or only the Thing under another Name If the latter he will do more than Edm. Albertinus or Bp. Consius have done if he prove it If it be the name that he meaneth I think by my Memory for I will not for that go read him all over that he will not find the name in Radbertus nor any where before Stephanus Eduensis about 130 years after him and that all that he can truly say is but as Bellarmine doth Hic Author primus suit qui seriò copiosè scripsit de veritate Corporis Sanguinis Domini in Eucharistia contra Bertramum Presbyterum § 19. That the Bishops charged by me with these Corruptions were the only Opposers of them that we find in antiquity as we may see in the Canons of Africk and Spain is a saying very near kin to much of his History I confess that so few Presbyters in comparison of Bishops were publick Actors whose Judgments were notified to the World that it 's no wonder after Constantine's time if there be more proofs of their words and deeds than of other mens But there are a great number of excellent men here slandered against the credit of all Church-History and their own Writings yet in our hands Would it be worth the Readers Price and Labour I could swell my Book with the proof that what he speaketh is untrue Did he think that I could not prove that Justin Martyr Athenagoras Tatianus Tertullian Clemens Alexandrinus Origene Arnobius Lactantius Macarius Maternus Firmicus Ephrem Syrus Faustinus Hierome Ruffinus Prudentius Sulpitius Severus Sedulius Mammertus Cassianus Vincent Lirinensis Socrates Sozomen Isodore Pelusiota c. did something in opposition to some Church-Corruptions Though some of them promoted some others Yea Antonie and abundance of Monks that furthered some opposed others no less dangerous Though many of them may be accused as Bellarmine doth Sulpit. Severus for saying Ecclesiam auro non strui sed destrui Judge of time past by what we see Is it only the Bishops that are against the Popes Church-Corrupting Usurpation in Italy Spain France c. Is it only the Bishops that are against the Mass Corruptions and against all their corrupt Doctrines of Indulgences Purgatory Images c. and against all their Ceremonies and prophane abuse of holy things Was it only the Bishops at Constance and Basil that were against suppressing the Bohemian and Moravian Reformation In the end of Lydius upon Prateolus you may read a Letter subscribed by so great a number of Lords and great men for John Hus and Hierome and the Reformation which yet prevailed not with the Bishops as will tell you who was then the greatest Opposers of Church-Corruption And I think Princes and Drs. opposed it more than Bps. in Luther's time Is it only the Bishops that have opposed warping towards Rome for Church-Unity Have none but Bishops been against corrupting the Churches by silencing good Ministers and ordaining bad ones The things that are have been I confess our difference is great on the case what is to be accounted Church-Corruption For that which in one Country goeth for Corruption in another yea the same goeth for Church-Glory Strength and Beauty Our main difference is about what 's good and what 's bad what 's Virtue and what 's Vice § 20. He next comes to Sedition and asketh What Reign have they disturbed here with their Sedition And because he knoweth that I can refer him to the large Volume of their Treasons written by Prin and abroad to the many Volumes in Goldastus and the many Histories of the Wars of Popes and Councils against Emperours he prevents all my Proof with a downright Untruth that If a man be not blind he may see that my History is only designed against Protestant Bishops under a general name Ans Was it not enough so grosly to write this Untruth of me but he must also reproach all the Readers as blind that will not judge falsly of what they read Doth he know my meaning better than my self He knoweth that I plead for the Primitive Episcopacy and that I profess to intend this History most to discover the Rise Growth and Maturity of the Popish destructive sort of Prelacy Readers can you believe this man that I wrote the case of the Bishops before and under Popery and of the Popes and of above Five hundred Councils and all these before the name of a Protestant Bishop was known in the World and as he saith gathered their faults and all this only against the Protestant Bishops and not against Popes or Prelates or any of the Councils that I named Perhaps he would tempt me to refer him to the History of Bishop Laua's Trial or to what Bishop Abbot George and Robert Bishop Hall and others said against him Or to tell him of A. Bp. Williams Arms for the Parliament But these are not Subjects fit for our Debates § 21. P. 318. When I say that where Prelacy with the Papists is at the highest Princes are at the lowest He asketh Is it the Bishop or the Papist that is here to blame Is this the effect of their Order Ans 1. I thought the Pope of Rome and the Bishop of Rome had been
it But we are mistaken No doubt men can write learned Volumes to defend any of these and if one do but say They please not God men may be found that can say I believe in my Conscience that you are mistaken and speak unpeaceably God is pleased with it all Sure the day of Judgment will be much to justifie God himself who is thus slandered as the Friend of every mans Sin What wonder is it if there be numerous Religions in the World when every selfish man maketh a God and a Religion of his own fitted to his Interest and Mind But when all men center onely in one God and bring their Minds to his and not conceitedly his to theirs we may yet be One. And if we could make men know that God is not for them and accepteth not of a Sacrifice of Innocent Blood however men think that they do him good Service yet they would not have this known It 's long since unhumbled Sinners turned Church-Confession into Auricular If Saul do say at last I have sinned he would yet be honoured before the People But the time is near when those that honour God he will honour and those that despise him shall be lightly esteemed Few men living can easier bear with others for different forms and Ceremonies than I but I take not the silencing and ruining of 2000 Ministers for Ceremonies were that the worst of it to be a Ceremony § 6. Pag. 69. You say We are not all of one mind yet A sad word from a Bishop Do you think that any two Men on Earth are of one mind in all things Were those agreed whom Paul persuadeth Rom. 14. to receive each other but not to doubtful Disputations and not to judge or despise each other much less to silence imprison and destroy We are agreed in all that is constitutive of Christianity and agreed that all Christians should love others as themselves and do as they would be done by I confess if you have such eminent Self-denial as to be willing if ever you differ from the publick Impositions about the lawfulness of any one thing to be not only cast out of your Lordship and Bishoprick but to be silenced imprisoned and destroyed I cannot accuse you of Partiality but of Errour I have known too many Conformists who needed no Bishop to silence them they never preached But that will not justifie their desires that others be silenced I have oft enough told you in how many things the Conformists are disagreed I now say the Bishops themselves are not agreed of the very Species of the Church of England To say nothing of their disagreement of the Constitutive national Head or Governour they are not agreed whether it be only a part of an universal humane political Church subject to an universal humane supream Power who hath the right of Legislation and judgment over them or whether it be a compleat national Church of it self a part only of the universal as Headed by Christ but not as by Man or as humane Politie having no foreign Governour Monarchical or Aristocratical Pope or Council Overdoing is illdoing and undoing He that would make such a Law of Concord as that none shall live out of Prison who are not of the same Age Complexion Appetite and Opinion would depose the King by leaving him no Subjects The Inquisition is set up in Love of Unity But we know that we shall differ while we know but in part Only the perfect World hath perfect Concord I greatly rejoice in that Concord which is among all that truly love God They love one another and agree in all that is necessary to Salvation The Church of the Conformists is all agreed for Crossing and the Surplice and for the Imposed Oaths Professions and Covenants Oh that all our Parishioners who plead for the Church were agreed that the Gospel is true and that Christ is not a Deceiver and that Man dyeth not as Dogs but hath a Life of future Retribution § 7. P. 69. Asking Were not almost all the Westminster Assembly Episcopal Conformable men when they came thither He can say No not in their hearts as appeared by their fruits And he cites some words of the sense of the Parliament Jun. 12. 1643. Ans 1. See here a Bishop that knew the hearts of hundreds of men whom he never saw to be contrary to their Profession and constant Practice 2. And he can prove by their reporting the Parliaments words what was these Ministers own Judgment 3. And he can prove by those words in Jun. 1643. what was their Judgment a Year or two before and is sure that the Scots Arguments did not change them 4. And he can prove that those are no Episcopal Conformists who are for the ancient Episcopacy only described by Bishop Usher and take the English frame to be only lawful but not unalterable or best And if really he do take him to be no Episcopal Conformist who is for enduring any way but their own it is he and not I that gave them so bad a Character It is he and not I that intimateth that those moderate Conformists who had rather Church-Government were reformed than such Confusion made by silencing and hunting Christians are at the Heart no Episcopal Conformists Their Hearts I confess much differ from the Silencers and Hunters § 8. He maketh me a false Historian for fixing the War on the Erastian Party in Parliament Ans Did I lay it only on the Erastians Have I not undeniably proved that the War here began between two Episcopal Parties Of which one part were of A. Bp. Abbots Mr. Hookers and the generality of the Bishops and Parliaments mind and the other of Bp. Lauds Sibthorps Maynwarings Heylins A. Bp. Bromhalls c. mind And the first sort some of them thought Episcopacy Jure Divino but the English Frame not unreformable And the other sort thought it was but Jure humano and these were called by some Erastians Let him give me leave to produce my Historical proofs even to single men by name that the English War began between these two Parties and I defie all his false Contradiction Only supposing 1. That I speak not of the King nor of the War in Ireland or Scotland 2. That I grant that the Nonconformists were most for the Parliament and the Papists most against them But when I have said so much to Mr. Hinkley already to prove this did this Lord Bishop think to be believed without confuting it § 9. But it transcendeth all bounds of Historical credibility that he answereth this by saying He and all his Abettors must know the Catalogues of that Parliament and that Assembly are still in our hands the Copies of their Speeches and Journals of their Votes c. Ans They are so to the Shame of such Historians You have many of them in Whitlocks Memorials I knew so great a number my self of the Parliament Assembly and Army as makes me pitty the
I found as followeth 1. That none are able to do so much hurt as those that have the greatest Parts Power Interest and Trust None kill so many except Souldiers as those Physicians who are entrusted to heal and save them If five hundred neighbours mistake a man's Disease whom he never trusted it hurts him not But an unskilful Nurse or Parent may kill a sick Child and an unskilful or unfaithful Physician may kill multitudes 2. And there goeth so much to make a man a skilful faithful Pastor as that such are rare As a Physician is like to kill his Patient if he mistake but some one thing in his Disease or some Ingredient in his Medicine though he were right in all the rest So if a Guide of Souls were excellent in all other things what work one Opinion yea or unskilful word may make not only the case of the Nestorians Eutychians Monothelites c. tell us but even the strife that arose in the Church about Hypostasis and Persona which had almost hereticated Jerom himself for all his skill in the Languages And the case of the Greeks and Latines about Filioque and abundance such 3. And Pride is the Heart of the Old Man first living and last dying And great Power great Parts and great Esteem do feed it if true Grace do not mortifie it Knowledge puffeth up and especially when men live among the ignorant and unlearned and are but half Learned themselves and are thought by the people and themselves to be much wiser than they are Inter coecos luscus Rex 4. And Selfishness is the very sum of all positive iniquity And Pride and Selfishness make men desirous to be the Idols of the World and to seem as Gods knowing good and evil and to have their will of all that they have to do with 5. And the strongest temptations use to cause the greatest sins § 14. These Generals presupposed it is most clear 1. That the remnant of these sins even in Christ's Apostles set them on striving who should be greatest and made James and John desire preheminence and also to have called for Fire from Heaven and made them after Christ's Resurrection hope that he would have restored the Earthly Kingdom unto Israel And it put Paul to vindicate his Apostleship against many that disparaged him As it made Diotrephes who loved to have the preheminence to cast out the Brethren and speak evil of John It gave Peter occasion to warn the Bishops not to Lord it over God's Heritage but to be Examples to the Flock overseeing them not by constraint but willingly 2. Even in good men this fault though not in a reigning degree did live more in others afterwards that had not that measure of the Spirit as the Apostles had to overcome it And if even in Paul's daies he had none like-minded to Timothy who naturally cared for the good of all for all too much sought their own and not the things that are Jesus Christ's as Demas forsook him for some worldly Interest what wonder is it if afterward Pride and Worldliness grew greater and Heresies and Strifes increased 3. Yet while Christianity was a suffering and laborious State the Pastors of the Churches were commonly the best men that had more Knowledge Holiness and Love than others and the Churches prospered under the Cross They that spared not their labours but imitated the pattern set by Paul Acts 20. did not strive who should have the largest Diocess and undertake that which they could not do but they strove to do as much as they were able and to increase and edifie the Flock 4. But when extraordinary Gifts abated and acquired Ones became more necessary and few Philosophers turned Christians able Taking Preachers or Orators grew fewer and those few that were eminent in Knowledge and Speech were justly preferred before the rest And usually some one man had the chief hand in converting men and gathering a Church in each particular Town and then he rightfully was taken for their Pastor And it being found that the publick and private care of Souls required in each Church where were fit men more than one Pastor It was not meet that more should be brought to â—im that was there before without his approbation and consent but that he were to the Juniors as a Father And because the rest were usualiy below him in Gifts and Worth it was thought but meet that they should do what they did by his consent And also to avoid Divisions to which they were over-prone it was judged fit that one should have the preheminence and a negative and partly ruling Vote 5. The Churches which in the beginning had these Bishops and Fellow-Presbyters were single Congregations And shortly they grew to be more than could meet together in some few great Cities Persecution hindering them from very large Assemblies besides their want of large capacious Temples Dr. Hammond thinks that there is no evidence that in Scripture-time there were any other Presbyters than Bishops and consequently a Bishop had but one Congregation unless he went one hour to one and another to another which was not their use But doubtless in this he is mistaken as the many Speakers as Corinth shew 6. The Greatness of the Roman Empire was prepared by God to be then an exceeding great fortherance of the Gospel For under the same Civil Laws and Powers where one or two Languages were understood by most Christians had the far greater advantage for Communication Want of forreign Languages is now our great hinderance from Preaching the Gospel to other Nations of the World And the Confusion at Babel was an unspeakable Judgment But as Ships yea Navies can sail on the Ocean when small Barks or Boats only can pass on Rivers so the vastness of the Roman Empire was a great help to the Church by Communication Language and Accesses But especially when the Emperour became Christian the advantage was exceeding great Whereas now the Greatness of the Turkish Tartarian Indostan Empire are great Impediments to the Gospel because the Barbarians are more cruel Enemies than the Civil Romans notwithstanding the ten Persecutions were and their opposition is the more extensive by the extent of their Dominions and the Christian Churches having now more scandalized the Infidels by their corruptions While they were not corrupted by worldly power and wealth the great holiness of the Churches convinced the sober part of the Empire Albaspineus shews us clearly that their strictness was so great that they endured no notable scandalous sin among them yea and came very near to the Novatians in their Discipline And that it was not for greater strictness that the Novatians were condemned but for denying the Power of the Church to absolve men penitent that sinned after Baptism And their Canons shew it And it is certain that Christians obeying Paul avoided the Heathen Judicatures as much as might be and censured those that did not and ended their Differences