Selected quad for the lemma: power_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A32851
|
The apostolical institution of episcopacy demonstrated by Will. Chillingworth ...
|
Chillingworth, William, 1602-1644.
|
1664
(1664)
|
Wing C3884A; ESTC R20665
|
3,807
|
8
|
THE Apostolical Institution OF EPISCOPACY DEMONSTRATED BY WILL. CHILLINGWORTH Master of Arts of the UNIVERSITY of OXFORD LONDON Printed by E. Cotes dwelling in Aldersgate-street Anno Dom. M.DC.LXIV THE Apostolical Institution OF EPISCOPACY DEMONSTRATED SECT I. IF we abstract from Episcopal Government all accidentals and consider only what is essential and necessary to it we shall finde in it no more but this An appointment of one man of eminent sanctity and sufficiency to have the care of all the Churches within a certain Precinct or Diocess and furnishing him with authority not absolute or arbitrary but regulated and bounded by Laws and moderated by joyning to him a convenient number of assistants to the intent that all the Churches under him may be provided of good and able Pastors and that both of Pastors and people conformity to Laws and performance of their duties may be required under penalties not left to discretion but by Law appointed SECT II. To this kind of Government I am not by any particular interest so devoted as to think it ought to be maintained either in opposition to Apostolick Institution or to the much desired reformation of mens lives and restauration of Primitive discipline or to any Law or Precept of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ for that were to maintain a means contrary to the end for Obedience to our Saviour is the end for which Church-Government is appointed But if it may be demonstrated or made much more probable than the contrary as I verily think it may I. That it is not repugnant to the government setled in and for the Church by the Apostles II. That it is as complyable with the Reformation of any evill which we desire to reform either in Church or State or the introduction of any good which we desire to introduce as any other kind of Government And III. That there is no Law no Record of our Saviour against it Then I hope it will not be thought an unreasonable Motion if we humbly desire those that are in Authority especially the High Court of Parliament That it may not be sacrificed to Clamour or over-born by Violence and though which God forbid the greater part of the Multitude should cry Crucifie Crucifie yet our Governours would be so full of Justice and Courage as not to give it up until they perfectly understand concerning Episcopacy it self Quid mali fecit SECT III. I shall speak at this time only of the first of these three points That Episcopacy is not repugnant to the Government setled in the Church for perpetuity by the Apostles Whereof I conceive this which follows is as clear a Demonstration as any thing of this nature is capable of That this Government was received universally in the Church either in the Apostles time or presently after is so evident and unquestionable that the most learned adversaries of this Government do themselves confess it SECT IV. Petrus Molinaeus in his Book De munere pastorali purposely written in defence of the Presbyterial-government acknowledgeth That presently after the Apostles times or even in their time as Ecclesiastical story witnesseth it was ordained That in every City one of the Presbytery should be called a Bishop who should have pre-eminence over his Colleagues to avoid confusion which oft times ariseth out of equality And truly this form of Government all Churches every where received SECT V. Theodorus Beza in his Tract De triplici Episcopatûs genere confesseth in effect the same thing For having distinguished Episcopacy into three kinds Divine Humane and Satanical and attributing to the second which he calls Humane but we maintain and conceive to be Apostolical not only a priority of Order but a superiority of Power and Authority over other Presbyters bounded yet by Laws and Canons provided against Tyranny he clearly professeth that of this kind of Episcopacy is to be understood whatsoever we read concerning the authority of Bishops or Presidents as Iustin Martyr calls them in Ignatius and other more ancient Writers SECT VI. Certainly from these two great Defenders of the Presbytery we should never have had this free acknowledgement so prejudicial to their own 〈◊〉 and so advantagious to their adversaries purpose had not the evidence of clear and undeniable truth enforced them to it It will not therefore be necessary to spend any time in confuting that uningenuous assertion of the anonymous Author of the Catalogue of Testimonies for the equality of Bishops and Presbyters who affirms That their disparity began long after the Apostles times But we may safely take for granted that which these two learned Adversaries have confessed and see whether upon this foundation laid by them we may not by unanswerable reason raise this superstructure That seeing Episcopal Government is confessedly so Ancient and so Catholique it cannot with reason be denyed to be Apostolique SECT VII For so great a change as between Presbyterial Government and Episcopal could not possibly have prevailed all the world over in a little time Had Episcopal Government been an aberration from or a corruption of the Government left in the Churches by the Apostles it had been very strange that it should have been received in any one Church so suddainly or that it should have prevailed in all for many Ages after Variâsse debuerat error Ecclesiarum quod autem apud omnes unum est non est erratum sed traditum Had the Churches err'd they would have varied What therefore is one and the same amongst all came not sure by error but tradition Thus Tertullian argues very probably from the consent of the Churches of his time not long after the Apostles and that in matter of opinion much more subject to unobserv'd alteration But that in the frame and substance of the necessary Government of the Church a thing alwayes in use and practice there should be so suddain a change as presently after the Apostles times and so universal as received in all the Churches this is clearly impossible SECT VIII For What universal cause can be assigned or faigned of this universal Apostasie You will not imagine that the Apostles all or any of them made any decree for this change when they were living or left order for it in any Will or Testament when they were dying This were to grant the question to wit That the Apostles being to leave the Government of the Churches themselves and either seeing by experience or foreseeing by the Spirit of God the distractions and disorders which would arise from a multitude of equals substituted Episcopal Government instead of their own General Councels to make a Law for a general change for many ages there was none There was no Christian Emperour no coercive power over the Church to enforce it Or if there had been any we know no force was equal to the courage of the Christians of those times Their lives were then at command for they had not then learnt to fight for Christ but their obedience
to any thing against his Law was not to be commanded for they had perfectly learn't to die for him Therefore there was no power then to command this change or if there had been any it had been in vain SECT IX What device then shall we study or to what fountain shall we reduce this strange pretended alteration Can it enter into our hearts to think that all the Presbyters and other Christians then being the Apostles Schollers could be generally ignorant of the Will of Christ touching the necessity of a Presbyterial Government Or dare we adventure to think them so strangely wicked all the World over as against knowledge and conscience to conspire against it Imagine the spirit of Diâ—trephes had entred into some or a great many of the Presbyters and possessed them with an ambitious desire of a forbidden superiority was it possible they should attempt and atchieve it once without any opposition or contradiction and besides that the contagion of this ambition should spread it self and prevail without stop or controul nay without any noise or notice taken of it through all the Churches in the World all the watchmen in the mean time being so fast asleep and all the dogs so dumb that not so much as one should open his mouth against it SECT X. But let us suppose though it be a horrible untruth that the Presbyters and people then were not so good Christians as the Presbyterians are now that they were generally so negligent to retain the government of Christ's Church commanded by Christ which we now are so zealous to restore yet certainly we must not forget nor deny that they were men as we are And if we look upon them but as meer natural men yet knowing by experience how hard a thing it is even for Policy arm'd with Power by many attempts and contrivances and in a long time to gain upon the liberty of any one people undoubtedly we shall never entertain so wild an imagination as that among all the Christian Presbyteries in the World neither conscience of duty nor love of liberty nor aversness from pride and usurpation of others over them should prevail so much with any one as to oppose this pretended universal invasion of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ and the liberty of Christians SECT XI When I shall see therefore all the Fables in the Metamorphosis acted and prove Stories when I shall see all the Democracies and Aristocracies in the World lye down and sleep and awake into Monarchies then will I begin to believe that Presbyterial Government having continued in the Church during the Apostles times should presently after against the Apostles doctrine and the will of Christ be whirl'd about like a scene in a masque and transformed into Episcopacy In the mean time while these things remain thus incredible and in humane reason impossible I hope I shall have leave to conclude thus Episcopal Government is acknowledged to have been universally received in the Church presently after the Apostles times Between the Apostles times and this presently after there was not time enough for nor possibility of so great an alteration And therefore there was no such alteration as is pretended And therefore Episcopacy being confessed to be so Ancient and Catholique must be granted also to be Apostolique Quod erat demonstrandum FINIS * To whom two others also from Geneva may be added Daniel Chamierus in Panstratia tom 2. lib. 10. cap. 6. Sect. 24. and Nicol. Vedelius Exercitat 3. in epist. Ignatii ad Philadelph cap. 14. Exercit. 8. in Epist. ad Mariam cap. 3. which is fully also demonstrated in D. Hammond's Dissertations against Blondel which never were answered and never will by the 〈◊〉 of those who wrote in the very next Age after the Apostles