to be sought for say no such thing but for any thing which appeares there to the contrary Titus and Timothy were at their first Ordination made Bishops without ever being admitted into the Inferiour Orders at all but receiv'd all the power of them included in that of Episcopacy And in all probability many such Ordinations were at first made For in the Beginning things could not be so settled in the Church that the Regular method of calling men always from the inferiour Offices to the higher should then be observ'd but without all doubt in that state of the first planting of the Gospel either as the extraordinary Gifts of the Holy Ghost then given to some men recommended them or the necessities of the Church required there were frequent reasons of conferring the Episcopal Office at first where no other had been received in order thereto And if you will have any regard to the opinion of Petavius one of the Learnedest Men which the Society of the Jesuites ever had he tells us that in the first times of the Church there were none or very few simple Presbyters at all but that all or the most part of those that then Officiated in Churches were Ordained Bishops His words are Primis illis Ecclesia temporibus existimo Presbyteros vel omnes vel eorum plerosque sic ordinatos esse ut Episcopi pariter ac Presbyteri gradum obtinerent i. e. In those first times of the Church I am of opinion that Presbyters either all or the most part of them were so Ordain'd that they obtain'd both the degree of a Bishop and Presbyter together But whatsoever was done at first afterward I allow when Churches increased and in each of them there was the subordination of many Presbyters and Deacons assisting under the Bishop for the performance of the Divine Offices and the Discipline and outward Policy of the Church was brought to a settled order Then that which is the usual practice of most other bodies became also to be the Rule of Christians in constituting the Ministers and Officers of the Church that is to advance them by degrees from one Order to another and not to place men in the highest Order till they had approv'd themselves worthy by the well discharge of their Duty in those inferiour thereto and accordingly thenceforth on Vacancies Bishops were made out of the Presbyters and the Presbyters out of the Deacons and although this method might be introduced even in the times of the Apostles themselves yet it was not by any Divine Institution so as to make it absolutely necessary a man be a Deacon before he can be a Presbyter or a Presbyter before he can be a Bishop but only by Ecclesiastical appointment for the well regulating the Order of the Church and the better providing for the benefit of it those in all reason being presumed to be the most fitting for the Superiour Orders that had been prepared for them by long exercising themselves in and faithfully discharging the duties of the Inferiour But however this Rule was not always observed but often when the benefit of the Church required and the extraordinary qualifications of men recommended them Bishops were made not only out of Deacons but also out of Lay-men too and that by one Ordination the giving of the Superiour Order being alwayes then understood to include therein all the power of the inferiour Thus several of the first Ages of the Church were made Bishops from Laymen and those Histories which tell us of it acquaint us but with one Ordination whereby they were advanced thereto And Pontius the Writer of the Life of St. Cyprian tells us of him that he was made a Presbyter without ever being a Deacon and so was also Paulinus of Nola as he himself tells us in his Epistles And from Optatus it is manifest that Caecilianus Bishop of Carthage was made so from a Deacon without ever being Ordain'd a Presbyter in order thereto For there arising a disturbance in the Church of Carthage about Caecilianus's being made Bishop there and the main objection lying against his Ordination because Ordain'd Bishop by Faelix Bishop of Aptungitum whom they looked on as a Traditor and one that had deserted the Faith in time of Persecution Optatus tells us Iterum à Caeciliano mandatum est ut si Faelix in se sicut illi arbitrabantur nihil contulisset ipsi tanquam adhuc Diaconum ordinarent Caecilianum i. e. Caecilianus again commanded that if Faelix conferr'd nothing on him as they imagin'd then let them speaking to the Bishops of the adverse party then met together again ordain Caecilanus as if he were as yet only a Deacon Which plainly inferrs that before Faelix ordain'd him Bishop he was no more than a Deacon And Photius the learned Patriarch of Constantinople in his Epistle to Pope Nicolas acknowledgeth that even in his time some Ordained Bishops from Deacons without ever making them Presbyters and that with several it was then looked on as the same thing to make a Bishop from a Deacon as from a Presbyter without at all admitting to the intermediate Order And a while after the same thing is also objected to the Latines by the Greeks and although their heats then ran very high about the aforesaid Photius yet on both sides this is only mention'd as a breach of the Ecclesiastical Canons and that those were to be condemn'd that did the thing not that the Ordination was void which was thus administred Regularly I do acknowledge it ought to be otherwise and that none be made Presbyters before they have been Deacons or Bishops before they have been Presbyters and that it is always best for the Church to observe this Order And so also must it be acknowledged that in all formed bodies of men regularly none ought to be advanc'd to the highest Office but those that have first gone through the inferiour as is manifest in all Corporations and that it is ever best for the publick good of those Societies and the well governing of them that this Order should be alwayes observ'd But however if at first dash one should be plac'd in the highest Office without going through the inferiour this doth not vacate his Commission receiv'd from a lawful Authority but he is to all intents and purposes as fully invested with the whole Power and Authority of that Office as if he had regularly ascended thereto by the usual degrees through all the subordinate Offices and in the power of this one Office only hath the powers of all the others conferr'd on him because it eminently includes them all And the same is to be said as to those that are Ordained Bishops without going through the inferiour Orders Although this be done contrary to the Rule of the Church yet this doth not vacate their Commission which they have receiv'd by a lawful Authority at their Ordinations but by vertue thereof they are made true Bishops of
the Church of Christ and have receiv'd full power to all the Duties incumbent on them as such not only that which is peculiar to the Order of a Bishop but also the powers of all other inferiour Offices included therein For the Orders of the Church do so include one the other that the same Act of Ordination which gives the power of the higher Order doth therein also give the powers of all other Orders inferiour thereto as for Example when a man is made a Presbyter or Priest though he had never been a Deacon yet he hath full power to all the Acts and Duties of a Deacon as being included in his Priesthood and so when a man is made a Bishop though he had never been either Priest or Deacon yet he hath full power to all the Acts and Duties of both these Offices as being included in that of his Episcopacy And this is no more than may be made good by Instances from all the subordinations of power in the World in which this is alwayes most certain that the higher degree of power ever includes all the other Degrees inferiour thereto and that Act which gives that one superiour degree gives all the others therewith as included in it And all the Argument which the Romanists bring against this to prove it must be otherwise as to those several degrees of power in the Church which make the Offices of Bishop Priest and Deacon therein is drawn from a similitude they make between them and the three sorts of Souls which distinguish between the three several sorts of living Creatures in this World that is the Vegetative Soul the Sensitive and the Rational For as the Vegetative is necessarily presuppos'd to the Sensitive and the Sensitive to the Rational in such manner as nothing can be a Rational Creature which is not a Sensitive or a Sensitive which is not a Vegetative so say they the order of a Deacon is necessarily presuppos'd to the order of Priesthood and the order of Priesthood to that of Episcopacy and no one can be a Bishop which is not first a Presbyter or a Presbyter which is not first a Deacon But this Argument if it makes any thing to the purpose must infer a very ridiculous thing that is that God cannot make a Man unless by giving him first the Vegetative Soul he makes him a Tree or a plant and then secondly by giving him the Sensitive Soul he makes him a Brute and then thirdly and lastly by giving him the Rational Soul he makes him a Man whereas nothing is more certain than that by that one Act whereby he gives the Rational Soul he gives all the powers of the other two included therein And therefore if this similitude were to decide the Controversie between us instead of making out any thing for them it will most manifestly give the whole on my side it being one of the fullest and clearest that can be thought on most plainly to illustrate unto you the whole state of what I have said in this particular For although the Vegetative Soul as in Vegetables is distinct from the Sensitive and the Sensitive as in Brutes is distinct from the Rational yet the Sensitive doth so include the Vegetative and the Rational the Sensitive that the very same act which gives the Sensitive Soul gives also the Vegetative and the very same act which gives the Rational gives both Sensitive and Vegetative also included therein And just so is it of the three Orders of Deacon Priest and Bishop in the Church of Christ For although the Order of a Deacon in a simple Deacon is distinct from the Order of Priesthood and the Priesthood as in a simple Priest distinct from the Order of Episcopacy yet the Order of Priesthood doth so include the Order of a Deacon and the Order of Episcopacy both that of Priest and Deacon that the very same act of Ordination which gives a man the Order of Priesthood gives him also that of a Deacon and that very same act which gives him the Order of Episcopacy gives him also both that of Deacon and Priest included in it and consequently that it is no more necessary a man should be a Deacon before he can be a Priest or a Priest before he can be a Bishop than that he must be made a Vegetable before he can be an Animal and an Animal before he can be a Rational Creature than which nothing is more absurd And thus far having shown you that the inferiour Orders of the Church are not so essentially necessary to qualifie for the superiour as you imagine but that a man may validly be ordain'd a Bishop though he was afore neither Priest nor Deacon it will infer that although that should be true which you object against us that our first form of Ordination of Priests till the Addition inserted in the year 1662. was defective and that by reason of this defect all the Priestly Ordinations conferr'd by it were null and void yet our Episcopal Ordination may be still good as being administred by no such defective Form but by one which includes all that and in the very same words which the Romanists themselves say is the alone essential Form of their Episcopal Ordination as is afore taken notice of and therefore though we had no true Priests all the while this defective Form was used yet we still had true Bishops fully invested with the power of Ordaining others and consequently now at least since the Form whereby they Ordain is mended according to your mind we must have true Priests also and therefore whatsoever defect according to your opinion might be formerly in our Priestly Ordination by reason of our Forms yet now this defect is fully mended and supplied you have no reason on this account to forsake our Communion But Thirdly That there was never any such defect in our Forms the main mistake which you go upon is that which in the last place I am to convince you of For although before the addition inserted in the Form of our Priestly Ordination it might not be so well fenced against all the unreasonable Cavils of Adversaries as now it is yet it was altogether as full in the expression of what was done and totally sufficient for the end design'd which I doubt not I shall fully and evidently make appear unto you by these following Reasons I. Because these words Receive the Holy Ghost whose sins thou dost forgive they are forgiven and whose sins thou dost retain they are retained are as full and comprehensive an expression of the whole Priestly power as possibly can be devised For what are Priests but the Ministers of Jesus Christ to lead men to that Reconciliation with God and that Forgiveness of Transgression from him which he hath purchased for us And what are the appointed means whereby they do this but the Administring the Sacraments the preaching of the Word the declaring Gods Promises and Threats the exhorting to Repentance
valid which is a thing our Adversaries will never yet grant us For you say that a Bishop at his Ordination doth not receive any new Character but hath only the same Power and Character which he had before as a Priest further extended in him and it is well known that Arch-Bishop Parker and most of the others that were made Bishops in the beginning of Queen Elizabeths Reign if not all for I will not be positive in a thing where I am not certain were made Priests by the Roman Ordinal and therefore if the words of our Form be sufficient to extend the Character and Power of a Priest as you phrase it to the Office of Episcopacy those that you will allow to have been before good Priests you must also allow to have been made good Bishops by our Form. But here I must beg leave to tell you that our Church holds a Bishop to be as much essentially distinct from a Priest as a Priest is from a Deacon For that which makes the distinction of Orders is the distinct Powers which belong unto them For as a Priest hath a distinct Power from a Deacon which makes his Office to be essentially distinct from the Office of the other so hath a Bishop also a distinct Power from a Priest which makes his Office essentially distinct from the Office of Priesthood that is the Power of Ordaining which a Priest hath not and this you must allow or else fall in with the opinion of the Presbyterians and grant that a Priest hath as much power to Ordain as a Bishop And this is all which at present I shall think fit to take notice of in your Answer to my first Paper I have now also by me your Answer to my second Paper and must beg your pardon that my Business this Week hath been such at our Audit as you well know that I could not have leasure sooner to send you a Reply For as I take it very kindly of you that you will apply to me concerning any doubt which you may have as to your Religion so shall I think my self obliged to do all that lyes in me for your satisfaction And as to your Answer to my second Paper nothing is more easie than to show you how much you have been imposed on by them which tell you those things you write me therein As to Bishop Ridleys Consecration by the Popish Ordinal I thought I had given you demonstration for that by showing unto you in the last Paper that I sent you that Bishop Ridley was Consecrated as it appears by the Arch-Bishop of Canterburies Register Sept. 5 th Anno Dom. 1547. in the First Year of King Edwards Reign whereas it is evident by the publick Records of the Kingdom that the Act of Parliament which prescribed the making of the New Ordinal was not Enacted till February 1. Anno Dom. 1549. in the Fourth Year of King Edwards Reign and concerning this you may receive satisfaction by consulting Kebles Collection of the Statutes of this Kingdom Pag. 674. at the top of the Page But you urge against this Mr. Masons and Dr. Burnets Authority who you tell me say the contrary But that you may see how much you are abused by those who impose on you such things I will set down in words at length what both these Authors say as to this matter And first Mr. Masons words are Page 209. at the bottom of the page as followeth Primo leges de antiquis Ordinalibus abrogandis de novis stabiliendis latae sunt Annis Edwardi Tertio Quarto ut patet ex Statutis Ridleius autem Primo Edwardi Ferrarus ejusdem Regni anno secundo est sacratus uterque ante veterum Ordinalium abdicationem per consequens uterque secundum vestram Formam i. e. The Statute for abrogating the Old Ordinal and making a New was first Enacted in the Third and Fourth of Edward the Sixth as is apparent from the Statute Book but Ridley was Consecrated the First Year of King Edwards Reign and Ferrar in the Second Year both before the abrogating of the Old Ordinal and by consequence both according to your Form. So far Mr. Mason and as to Dr. Burnet if you please to consult him in his Second Part of his History of the Reformation Page 290. you will there find him saying these words So they did not esteem Hooper and Ridley Bishops and therefore only degraded them from Priesthood though they had been Ordained by their own Forms saving only the Oath to the Pope And this I hope will fully convince you that I have told you nothing but truth in this matter and that you have been most grosly abused by those that have informed you the contrary As to what you say concerning evil mens being of the true Religion you very much mistake my meaning if you think that I did infer in mine the illness of the Popish Religion from the ill actions of those that professed it for to do this would be to argue against all Religion there being abundance of wicked men of all Religions whatever and all Arguments of this nature are very foolish unless the sins and iniquities of such men as we find fault with proceed from the allowed Doctrines of the Church of which they are and on this account I must tell you I think the Romish Church abundantly culpable But this was not at all the thing I referred to in telling you of their Cruelties and Persecutions against us but only to let you know that then they were in such a rage against us that all they did in reference to the disallowing of our Orders may very well be construed rather to proceed from the violence of that alone then any rational judgment which they made of this matter it being a thing very usual between contending parties for men to be carried so high in their animosities as rather to act by their Passions then their Reason in what they do and alledge against each other And this I take to be the case of the Church of Rome in most of its proceedings with us but in none more manifestly then in the denying of the validity of our Orders which even according to their own Doctrines and positions are more defensible then those which even they themselves administer by their own Ordinal As to other things in your two Letters which I have omitted to speak to they are either such as need not answer or else such as I shall more fully examine on the other occasion which I have mentioned and therefore at present have nothing more to add but my most hearty prayers to Almighty God that he would be pleased so to direct and assist you in your inquisitions concerning this matter that after having fully tryed it you may hold fast that which is good I am SIR Your most Affectionate Friend H. Prideaux Thursday Dec. 1. 1687. On my having concluded this Letter to Mr. Norris I received another from him
is of the Church of England and was an Auditor at the said Conference but neither side advised with in the drawing up this Account The Question was About the validity of the Church of Englands Orders THe two former Gentlemen took upon them to prove them to be good and laid down this Rule That for making of Orders valid there were necessarily required these four things Authority Form Matter and Capacity The other Gentlemen did agree all of them to be necessary but because they would shorten the dispute would except against only that of our Form for that it was altered from the ancient and although they confessed their own had been altered yet never was in the essentials Then Mr. Earbury laid down this Proposition or Argument that if our Saviours Form were good by which he made Priests then was ours good but our Saviours was good therefore ours was Mr. Acton distinguisht upon his Major and said that though with us nothing could be a true Form that did not express the power given yet with our Saviour it was sufficient though it did not who being God could do that which none other could and therefore with him any thing which he should please to make use of that did not express the power given was a good and sufficient Form though the same would not be so with us The distinction was allowed and so Mr. Earbury proceeded to prove that our Form did express the power and accordingly produced his Common-Prayer-Book to show how it was therein expressed in the Form. Mr. Acton did allow it so to be in that Book but alledged that in all our Prayer-Books from Edward the 6th until 1662. the word Priest was not expressed in the Form of those This Mr. Earbury granted and said that though it did not yet it was sufficient because it was intended and then used several other Arguments to prove that it was intended Mr. Acton then would know of him whether he would maintain that the intention was sufficient who did assert it was but Mr. Kipping would not agree to it Then upon Mr. Actons asking Mr. Earbury that though it were expressed in the Prayers and not in the Form if all were cut off but the Form and Matter whether that were sufficient to make a good Priest upon which Mr. Earbury would not then abide by his assertion that the intention is sufficient The two former Gentlemen proceeded then to another Argument to prove our Orders good because they were allowed to be good by the Romish Church by Cardinal Pool who allowed of the Orders given in Edward the 6th days in the time of Queen Mary Mr. Acton replyed that now they come to offer another medium which was not to be allowed of unless they would agree first that they had no more to say as to the Form or were content to give that over But they said it was nothing but what was still depending upon the former Mr. Acton said That though it was against the Rules of the Schools yet he should go on and proceed to give his answer unto their new medium and so denyed that they were ever owned to be good by Cardinal Pool upon which the other Gentlemen told him they had not the Books present to prove it but should do it in writing to him the next day with citations of the Authors that they would send to his Lodgings Mr. Acton said he was sure they never could do it and though it belonged not to him to prove the contrary yet he produced to them a Protestant Book setting forth the manner of the burning of Bishop Ridley I think it was that Bishop who being made Priest by the Popish Form they first degraded him of his Priesthood but not of his Episcopal Orders telling him they would not degrade him of these for that they never lookt upon him for a Bishop who was such by the Form of Edward the 6th which did clearly prove they never allowed of the Orders to be good in Edward the 6th days The two former Gentlemen said they could stay no longer and so took their leaves If any other can say more then hath been in defence of our Orders the Author hereof will be very thankful to receive it from them in Writing which may come to him by the same hand by which he sends this and desires this may be sent him back again The Messenger that brought me the letter telling me that he had it from Mr. Anthony Norris though his name was not to it I supposed it to be his and therefore sending to Mr Earbury concerning it he brought me that account of the Conference which begins this Book and that with this follovving ansvver from my self vvas sent him the next day after LAst Night a nameless Paper vvas brought me containing a relation of a certain discourse that hapned betvveen one Mr. Acton a Gentleman of the Romish Communion and tvvo Divines of our Church concerning the validity of our Orders and as far as I find by that paper the grand objection brought against them was from the alteration made in our Ordinal Anno 1662. as if that were a tacit consent on our side that before this alteration was made our Ordinal was not sufficient and therefore no Orders could be conferred thereby and consequently that neither they which were ordained by it or we that have derived our Orders from them have received any legal and sufficient Ordination thereby To which I answer 1. That the putting in of Explanatory words to make things clearer and render them more free from cavil and objection cannot be well termed an alteration 2. That supposing really there had been any such alteration made as to the whole substance of the Form yet this is no more then what the Church of Rome hath often done there being scarce an age in which she hath not considerably varyed from her self herein as may be seen by comparing those many different Forms of Ordination used in the Church of Rome which are collected together by Morinus a Learned Priest of that Church in his book de Ordinationibus 3. The alterations or rather explanatory Additions made in our Ordinal in the Year 1662. were not inserted out of any respect to the controversie we have with the Church of Rome but only to silence a cavil of the Presbyterians who from the old Ordinal drew an Argument to prove that there was no difference between a Bishop and a Priest because as they say their Offices were not at all distinguished in the words whereby they were conferred on them when ordained or any new power given a Bishop which he had not afore as a Priest For the words of Ordination in King Edward's Ordinal are for a Priest as followeth Receive the Holy Ghost whose sins thou dost forgive they are forgiven and whose sins thou dost retain they are retained and be thou a faithful dispencer of the Word of God and of his Sacraments in the Name of the Father and
of the Son and of the Holy Ghost And for a Bishop Take the Holy Ghost and remember that thou stir up the Grace of God which is in thee by imposition of hands For God hath not given thee the Spirit of Fear but of Power and Love and Soberness And they so continued till the review of our Liturgy Anno 1662. and then to obviate the above-mentioned cavil of the Presbyterians those explanatory words were inserted whereby the distinction between a Bishop and a Priest is more clearly and unexceptionably expressed So that now the words of Ordination for a Priest are Receive the Holy Ghost for the office and work of a Priest in the Church of God now committed to thee by imposition of our hands Whose sins thou dost forgive c. And for a Bishop Receive the Holy Ghost for the office and work of a Bishop now committed to thee by the imposition of our hands in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost and remember that thou c. But 4. Having thus stated the Case and laid before you the differences between the new Ordinal and the Old Now to come to the main of the objection I assert that had the old Ordinal been continued without any such Addition although it might not so clearly have obviated the cavils of Adversaries yet the Orders conferred by it would have been altogether as valid And as to the Objection made by the Gentlemen of the Church of Rome that the words of our old Ordinal do not sufficiently express the Office conferred thereby this must be understood either in reference to the Priestly Ordination or the Episcopal or both And 1. As to the Priestly Ordination there seems not to be the least ground for it because the Form in the old Ordinal doth as fully expresse the Office Power and Authority of a Priest as need be required in these words Whose sins thou dost forgive they are forgiven and whose sins thou dost retain they are retained And be thou a faithful dispenser of the Word of God and of his Sacraments Wherein the whole of the Priestly Office is expressed But 2. As to the Episcopal Ordination the whole pinch of the Argument seems to lye there because in the old Form of the words spoken at the imposition of hands the Office and Authority of a Bishop they say is not so particularly specifyed To this I answer first That I think this sufficiently done in the words of the Form Remember that thou stir up the Grace of God which is in thee by imposition of hands for God hath not given us the Spirit of Fear but of Power and Love and Soberness For they are the very words of St. Paul to Timothy Bishop of Ephesus Epist 2. c. 1. ver 6 7. Whereby he exhorts and stirs him up to the Execution of his Episcopal office and they have alvvays been understood to refer thereto and therefore I think they may be also allovved sufficient to express the same Episcopal office when spoken to any other and fully determine to what Office the Holy Ghost is given by imposition of hands in the Form mentioned and properer for this purpose than any other because of the greater Authority which they must have in that they are taken out of the Holy Scripture But if men vvill cavil on and still object that the Name of Bishop is not expressed in the Form or the duties and povver of that Office vvith sufficient clearness specified in the vvords mentioned the objection lies much more against the Roman Ordinal than ours as being much more defective herein For the vvhole Form used therein at the Consecration of a Bishop is no more than this Receive the Holy Ghost that being all that is said at the imposition of hands and asserted by them to be the vvhole Form of Episcopal Ordination And therefore Vasques a Learned Jesuit and most Eminent School-man makes the same objection against the Roman Ordinal that the Romanists do against ours For in Tertiam Thomae Disp 240. c. 5. N. 57. His words are Illa verba accipe Spiritum Sanctum quae a tribus Episcopis simul cum impositione manuum dicuntur super Ordinandum usque adeo generalia videntur ut proprium munus aut gradum Episcopi non exprimant quod tamen necessarium videbatur pro formâ i. e. These words Receive the Holy Ghost which are spoken by three Bishops together with imposition of hands over the person to be Ordained seem to be so general that they do not express the proper office and degree of a Bishop which yet did seem necessary for the Form of his Ordination But to this he himself gives a solution N. 60. of the same chapter in these following words Neque obstat id quod supra dicebamus verba illa accipe Spiritum Sanctum admodum generalia esse nam quamvis in illis secundum se consideratis non denotetur munus aut gradus peculiaris Episcopi pro quocunque alio ordine dici possent tamen prout proferuntur adhibitâ a tribus Episcopis in unum Congregatis manuum impositione pro materia recte quidem denotant gradum Episcopi ad quem electus ordinatur Sic enim simul imponentes per verba illa denotant se eum in suum consortium admittere ad hoc Spiritum sanctum tribuere ac proinde in eodem ordine Episcopali secum ipsum constituere Cum tamen manuum impositio ab uno tantum Episcopo adhibita eadem verba accipe Spiritum Sanctum paucis aliis additis ab eodem in ordinatione Diaconi prolata neque secundum se neque prout ab ipso Episcopo dicta huic materiae applicata peculiare munus aut gradum Diaconi denotent neque enim prout dicta a uno Episcopo cum tali materia denotare possunt ordinatum admitti ad consortium Episcopi in hoc potius ordine quam in alio cum unus Episcopus tam sit minister ordinis Sacerdotii Subdiaconatus quam Diaconatus e contrario vero tres Episcopi solius ordinis Episcopalis ministri sint ideo autem existimo Christum voluisse ut Ecclesia illius tantum verbis quae secundum se Generalia sunt in hac ordinatione uteretur ut denotaret abundantiam gratiae Spiritus Sancti quae Episcopis in Ordinatione confertur Plus enim videtur esse dari Spiritum Sanctum absolutè quam dari ad hunc vel illum effectum peculiarem i. e. Neither doth that hinder which I have said before that these words Receive the Holy Ghost were too general For although by these words considered in themselves the Office or peculiar degree of a Bishop cannot be denoted and they may be also said for any other Order but as they are pronounced the imposition of hands of three Bishops joyned together being also had therewith for the matter of Ordination they do truly denote the degree of a Bishop to
to perform all the offices of it without expresly giving the Title But our Ordinal did not express the whole power given either by name or equivalency For it did not give power to Consecrate the Eucharist though it did to be dispencers and faithful Ministers of it which amounts to no more than distributers which every Deacon is as capable of as a Priest And if dispensing should import to be Stewards of the Mysterys of God that also imports no more then to be Conservators or Trustees of what should be committed to them not that they are thereby the makers of it That because I am intrusted or made Steward it should therefore necessarily follow that I have power to make that with which I am intrusted I hope our case depends not upon such a forced and unnatural a consequence If it should be objected that our Saviour did not then give the power to Consecrate the Eucharist when he said to his Apostles Do this in remembrance of me but was only a command to continue the Rite and Custom of it in the Church and therefore were compleat Priests from those words only by which he gave them power to remit sins To this I answer That if our Church had thought any sufficiently impowred to Consecrate the Eucharist by virtue only of those words to remit sins we then must make her highly guilty of notorious idle Tautology in her Form of Ordination when after she hath given power to remit sins should also at the same time distinctly give power to dispence the Sacraments But by her giving such distinct power to dispence the Sacraments after she had given power to remit sins she could not think that to be the sense of our Saviours words but the other that by bidding them do this in Remembrance of him that he did then give them power to Consecrate the Eucharist which I take clearly to be the sense of the Church whose Authority I shall preferre before any single persons whatsoever Besides that our Saviour should then command them to do that which they had power for to do is more like to a cruel Tyrant than a most Merciful and Compassionate Master To your Third and last I say That the Romanists making alteration in their Ordinals signifie nothing unless you can shew me where they have done it in such an essential part of it as we have Although they have added that to theirs of offering sacrifice for the living and the dead yet in regard they do before in their Ordinal expresly give all Priestly power which we did not the other is but an instruction to let them know what power they had received and for what they were to make use of it by virtue of that all Priestly power expresly given them before as appears by the words in their Ordinal which in ours was neither given in general nor in particular to Consecrate or make present Christs body and blood in the Holy Eucharist as was observed before If we had then as now but said be thou a Priest I grant it had been sufficient for all the offices of it although none of them had been particularly expressed in our Ordinal As to what Morinus hath said about the Greek and Roman Ordinals not giving distinct power expresly to Consecrate makes nothing at all so long as they gave them all Priestly power Unless you can prove any of their Ordinals do not expresly give them Priesthood the exceptions out of him of not giving power to Consecrate is nothing at all to the true state of the Question between us Sir As to what you say from Vasquez relates only to a Bishop who doth not thereby receive any new character then what he had afore as a Priest and is only the same power and character further extended which was before virtually in him from his Priesthood and therefore those words Receive the Holy Ghost and stir up the grace c. may be sufficient alone for that though not for a Priest who doth receive a new power and character Besides the same Author in the same Tome which you quote doth expresly say that by the words Receive the Holy Ghost and whose sins you remit c. doth not alone make an intire Priest and that he hath not power to Consecrate by virtue of them and you know Sir the point between us now is only that of Priesthood As to that Sir vvhich you say That they vvould not degrade Bishop Ridley of his Episcopal office vvas not upon account that they thought him no Bishop but for the benefit of the Leases to his Successor Bonner But why then did they at the same time degrade Latimer of his Episcopal office who was made such by the Roman Ordinal which Ridley was not by which Sir you may plainly see what the true reason was of both which I take not at all to be what Sir you were pleased for to surmise Finally whereas you were pleased to say our Priests were owned for good by the Romanists themselves when you shall be pleased Sir to make proof thereof I shall think it then time and not before to take it into my consideration in the mean time Sir if you please to look into Mr. Fox and do believe what he says you shall find what complaints he makes of the Roman Clergy against the Protestant Clergy in Queen Mary days what havock they made with the latter in that they would force them all to be Re-Ordained again Sir I am still in the same Communion which if I should ever change it can be imputed to nothing more then from some of our own Clergy-men of whom I do expresly exempt your self SIR I am your most humble Servant A. N. Three days after I had also this following paper sent me by the same Gentleman in answer to the last I sent him SIR I Could not conveniently before yesterday read over your second Paper supplemental to your first As to Bishop Ridley you may find by Mr. Mason's Vindication of him by the reasons he urg'd that he did account him to be Consecrated not by the Old but by the New Ordinal and the Popes Commissioners refusing to degrade him as to that Office and yet did Bishop Latimer in both is a clear Testimony that they would not do it to the one because they thought him consecrated by the New Ordinal Besides Dr. Burnet hath expresly declared that Ridley was made Bishop by the New Ordinal in King Edward's time Besides other Bishops they did not degrade As to their coming to our Churches until the 10th of Queen Elizabeth so to my knowledge did most of the Prebendarys of your Cathedral with the rest of the Episcopal party constantly frequent the Presbyterian Churches all along in the late times and yet they did not think those mens Orders to be good who officiated that took them not from the Bishop As to the Persecutions and Cruelties of our Adversaries they were much to blame for them but as it
Calumnies of our Adversaries in this particular might stick upon us then to receive that satisfaction herein which you pretend to desire Now for the more evidencing of this matter I shall lay down my words and your Quotation of them together that so by comparing of them it may appear how unfaithfully you have dealt with me herein My words in my first Paper The alterations or rather explanatory additions made in our Ordinal in the year 1662 were not inserted out of any respect to the Controversie we have with the Church of Rome but only to silence a cavil of the Presbyterians who from the Old Ordinal drew an Argument to prove that there was no difference between a Bishop and a Priest because as they say their offices were not distinguished in the words whereby they were conferred on them when Ordained or any power given a Bishop which he had not afore as a Priest Your Quotation of them That the Presbyterians objected that in the Ordinal there was no difference between a Bishop and a Priest because their offices were not at all distinguished in the words by which they were conferred on them when Ordained and that to obviate the above mentioned cavil of the Presbyterians the explanatory words were inserted Now Sir be you your own Judge whether you have fairly recited what I have said or whether my words can at all bear that meaning which you will needs put upon them Do I mention any thing of the Presbyterians objecting against the sufficiency of the Ordinal or urging this reason for it that the offices of Priest and Bishop were not sufficiently distinguished in the words by which they were conferred or that the explanatory words were inserted to give them satisfaction herein as you would have me say Or can any man that is not grosly deficient either in his understanding or his integrity put this sense upon my words Do you think I am ignorant that it is the Fundamental Doctrine of the Presbyterian Sect that there is no difference at all between a Bishop and a Presbyter or Priest Or that I could possibly say that they should urge it for a defect in our Ordinal that those offices are not sufficiently distinguished therein when it is their main principle that there is no distinction at all between them but that they are only two names signifying the same Function Or can any thing which I said have any other reference but to an Argument which I told you they drew from our Ordinal to prove this against us That the Presbyterians hated the name of Priest I freely grant and so do we too as it means a Sacrificing Priest in the sense of the Romanists But that the name of Bishop was so odious to them I deny For it is found in Scripture it is found in all the Antient Writers of the Church and therefore they could not be so impious as to hate a name which had the stamp of such Authority upon it All the Controversie was about the signification of this name whether it did import an Order distinct from the Order of Priesthood and this they denyed and in their disputes against us in the late times concerning it made use of an Argument against us as I told you which was drawn from our own Ordinal and from the Form of Consecrating a Bishop urged that according to the Doctrine of our own Church the Office of a Bishop could not be distinct from the Office of a Presbyter or Priest because no new Authority was given him in that Form as they would have it which he had not afore as a Presbyter or Priest and therefore to make a more clear distinction between the two Functions and take away all occasions for their urging of this against us for the future in the defence of that Error the explanatory words were inserted and on no other account When I wrote you my former Paper I confess I quoted no other Authority for this but that I had been told so But since looking into Dr. Burnets History of the Reformation I there find him saying the same thing in these words So they agreed on a Form of Ordaining Deacons Priests and Bishops which is the same we yet use except in some few words that have been added since in the Ordination of a Priest or Bishop for there was then no express mention made in the words of Ordaining them that it was for the one or the other Office in both it was said Receive thou the Holy Ghost in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost But that having been since made use of to prove both Functions the same it was of late years altered as it is now Nor were these words being the same in giving both Orders any ground to infer that the Church esteemed them one Order the rest of the office shewing the contrary very plainly Thus far Dr. Burnet and he having published it within twenty years after the thing was done when so many were alive that were Members of Convocation when the alteration was made and especially Dr. Gunning and Dr. Peirson who I understand were the prime advisers of it it is impossible he could want true information in this particular or be so impudent as to impose it on the World if otherwise then he relates when there were so many in being who from their own knowledge could convince him of falsity herein And therefore the thing being so plain I hope you will rest satisfied in this particular But I must not let you go yet for you are not only contented to wrest and misrecite what I have wrote you for your satisfaction but also charge me with whole sentences of which I never said one word or any thing like it For in which of my Papers I beseech you do I ever say that the Presbyterians vindicated their Form to be as good as ours or what the least Foundation is there given you in any of them to forge my name to such a saying I very well know those men were against all Forms as well as you and therefore need not your information in this particular But it seems by your so great intimacy with our Adversaries which you so often tell me of you have learnt their tricks to wrest falsifie and misrecite the only methods they have to support so bad a cause But that there may in this matter be no more room for this I shall distinctly lay down what I hope may obviate all further cavils concerning it in these following particulars First That the Objection of the Presbyterians was not against the Ordinal but against Episcopacy Secondly That it being the Doctrine of the Presbyterians that the Office of a Bishop and a Presbyter or Priest is one and the same and not at all distinct but that both names equally belong to every Presbyter to prove this they made use of an Argument against us from our Ordinal urging that the Form of Episcopal
form of words whatever unless it hath a Divine Institution whereto to refer and bears with it an exact conformity thereto can ever arrive to the true nature and essence of a Sacrament and therefore supposing Orders to be a Sacrament of the new Law as our Adversaries would have and that there was a Divine Institution not only for the outward sign but also for the form of words made use of in the conferring of them yet it can never be said that the form of words only without any further respect can give that determinate essence to the Sacrament as actually and ultimately to constitute it to be a Sacrament which is the nature of every essential form to do in respect of the thing to which it belongs and consequently can never be the essential form thereof And from hence you may plainly see that all which our Adversaries say of the essential form of Orders and on which from them you so much insist on hath neither Scripture Antiquity or Reason for its support but is totally grounded on no other foundation then the Philosophy of Aristotle and the mistakes and dotages of the Schoolmen built thereon As to what you say concerning the essential form being contained in the Prayers of the Roman Ordinal and that therefore before the imperative forms were added Imposition of Hands and Prayers were sufficient with them for the conferring of Orders but cannot be with us because in none of the Prayers of our Ordinal this essential Form is contained I Answer If by the essential Form you mean those very same words spoken by the Bishop at the administring of the outward Rite or Matter as they call it which the generality of the Romish Church call the form of Orders I deny that they are contained in any of their Prayers and if you think they are you should have told me in which But Secondly If by the essential Form you mean no more than words in the Prayers signifying the Office conferr'd which I suppose must be all that you mean thereby if you mean any thing that is sense then I answer that the prayers in our Ordinal do as fully contain that which you call the essential Form of Orders as any in the Roman Ordinal can be said to do And although you will not allow this of the Prayer immediately before imposition of hands or of that which follows immediately after in the Ordination of a Priest yet you cannot deny it of the Collect for the occasion where it is most proper to be looked for for that is as followeth Almighty God Giver of all good things who by thy Holy Spirit hast appointed divers Orders of Ministers in the Church mercifully behold these thy Servants now called to the Office of Priesthood and replenish them so with the truth of thy Doctrine and adorn them with innocency of Life that both by word and good Example they may faithfully serve thee in this Office to the glory of thy Name and the Edification of thy Church through the merits of Jesus Christ And if you look over all the prayers of the Roman Ordinal I think you cannot find in any of them the Office of a Priest more expresly mention'd than in this And therefore I hold still to my Inference that if the Prayers with imposition of hands may be sufficient for the conferring of the order of Priesthood in the Roman ordinal this must be also sufficient in ours And I cannot possibly see what farther you can object against this unless it be that the Prayer I have mention'd goeth before the Rite of imposition of Hands in our Ordinal whereas you may perchance think that it ought to come after rightly to answer the end for which I urge it But if you please to consider those passages of Scripture which tell us of the manner of ordaining practiced by the Holy Apostles as it is alwayes expressed in them to be done by Prayer and Imposition of hands so also shall you find that Prayer was first and Imposition of hands after So Acts 6. v. 6. in their Ordaining of the seven Deacons it is said that when they had prayed they laid their hands on them and so Acts 13. v. 3 of the Ordination of Paul and Barnabas to be the Apostles of the Gentiles When they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands upon them they sent them away which passages plainly evidence unto us that their method of Ordaining was first by Prayer in the name of the Church to Consecrate the person unto God for the Office to which he was set apart and then as in Gods stead according to the authority they had received from him in order hereunto by Imposition of hands to receive him to this Office and confer the power thereof upon him and that this was the completion of the whole administration made use of in this matter And although Acts 14. v. 23. it is said of Paul and Barnabas when they had Ordained them Elders or Presbyters in every City and had prayed with fasting yet we are to understand what is here last placed to have been first done it being a thing very usual with the Sacred as well as other Writers while they relate matters of fact not always to observe the exact order in which they were done as from many instances in Scripture may be made appear unto you and that this place is so to be understood we have the Rhemists themselves on our side who in their notes on this place plainly tell us that the Fasting and Prayers here mentioned were preparatives to Holy Orders In the next place you quarrel with me for misreciting your words which I confess is a great fault if I am guilty of it and would be contrary to that exact sincerity with which I ever desire to deal with all men especially in matters of Religion But having carefully reviewed both mine own and your Papers I can see no reason for this charge upon me In my Answer to your first Paper I observed that the grand defect which our Adversaries charge our Orders with is for omitting this Form in the Priestly Ordination Receive thou Authority to offer Sacrifice unto God and to Celebrate Mass both for the Living and the Dead which I told you could not be an essential defect because this Form it self was a novel addition and not used in the Church of Rome it self for near a thousand years after Christ To this you Answer in your second Paper in these words Although they have added that to theirs of offering Sacrifice for the Living and the Dead yet in regard they do before in their Ordinal expresly give all Priestly power which we did not the other is but an instruction to let them know what power they had received and for what they were to make use of it by vertue of that all Priestly power expresly given them before From which words in Answer to what you charge me with I have these things to say
First That this being designed to Answer what I before said in reference to the Form Receive power to offer Sacrifice to God and celebrate Mass both for the Living and the Dead I suppose no one that should read your Paper but would understand your abovementioned words therein to be a concession of the whole of it to be a novel additional in the Roman Ordinal and if it be not so your Answer will by no means seem pertinent to the thing objected Secondly Whereas you limit your concession to the later part of the abovementioned Form only and say you did only grant for the Celebrating of Mass for the Living and the Dead that it was within these five hundred years first expressed in the Roman Ordinal but not for offering Sacrifice to God your own words above recited show this to be most false for there you say Although they had added that to theirs of offering Sacrifice for the Living and the Dead c. which plainly expresseth the novel addition to be of offering Sacrifice for the Living and the Dead and not of Celebrating Mass only And this I think is sufficient not only to clear my self from being guilty of that misreciting which you charge me with but also to retort it upon your self who it is plain to fix this charge upon me have falsified and basely prevaricated about your own words And whereas you say you are assured that the offering of Sacrifice to God was ever expressed in the Roman Ordinal and that the Celebrating Mass for the Living and the Dead was all along before the practice of the Church I Answer First That if by Sacrifice you mean a true proper and propitiatory Sacrifice as the Church of Rome now holds whoever it was that hath assured you that the Ordinals of the first Ages of Christianity ever gave a Priest power of offering any such hath abused you with a most gross falsity and basely slandered the Primitive Church in charging such an impiety upon them And Secondly As to Celebrating Mass for the Living and the Dead it is a cheat which the innocent and pure times of Christianity could never be guilty of for it is an imposture of their own invention cunningly devised by them to get Money and of no earlier date then their new found Regions of Purgatory on which it depends the one being a Brat of the other and both without any the least right or title to give them a Legitimation among the true and genuine Doctrines of Jesus Christ But thoroughly to handle these particulars would be to desert the subject in hand to run into other Questions and therefore I shall say no more of them at present but that I shall be ready to make them out unto you whensoever you shall desire And whereas you put me upon the proof of what I said that the Learnedest of the Roman Communion hold that the last imperative words spoken at the last Imposition of hands Receive the Holy Ghost c. are the alone essential Form whereby the Orders of Priesthood are conferred and express your self in a manner concerning it implying as if I had told you more than I can make out it lies upon me to do my self right as well as to give you satisfaction in making good what I have said in this particular and I assure you I want not Authorities enough in order hereunto For Bonaventure in his 4th Book on the Sentences plainly saith it And so doth also Petrus Sotus in his Book de Institutione Sacerdotum both of them making Imposition of Hands with these words Receive the Holy Ghost c. the only essential Matter and Form of Priestly Ordination And Vasquez thus understands them as excluding all other Matter and Form to be essential thereto And most express to this purpose are the words of Becanus an eminent Jesuit and one that particularly bent his Fury against the Church of England For speaking of the twofold Ceremony made use of in Priestly Ordination the Delivery of the Sacred Vessels with this form of words Receive power to offer Sacrifice c. and Imposition of Hands with this form Receive the Holy Ghost c. he concludes that the later only is essential to the Sacrament as he calls it and that the former is no more than an accidental Rite belonging thereto And that this must necessarily follow from such other Doctrines as they hold I shall hereafter have a more particular occasion to make out unto you when I come to treat of that which I have in my former papers promised you and which you so much call upon me to give you satisfaction in that is the sufficiency of our Forms to confer all Priestly Power on the Persons ordained by them And to this also I shall refer the consideration of what you say in the two next Paragraphs as being the place most proper for it What you tell me in the next place after concerning Episcopal Ordination is all prevarication In my first paper to you I proved the validity of our Form for Episcopal Ordination by the same reason by which Vasquez proves it for the Church of Rome and in your answer you plainly allow it to be good and fully grant that this Form Take the Holy Ghost c. made use of in our old Ordinal for Episcopal Ordination may be sufficient alone for that purpose and assign this reason for it because a Bishop in his Ordination doth not receive any new Character but hath only that power and character further extended which was afore virtually in him from his Priesthood But then you tell me This is nothing to the Point between us that being not of the Episcopal Office but of the Priesthood only which you think our Forms not sufficient to confer But now in your answer to what I replyed thereto you deny all this which you have said For you tell me First That you did not allow our Form of Episcopal Ordination to be sufficiently perfect And Secondly That you did not say that a Bishop did not receive a new character but only in the person of Vasquez and that this is not your opinion but how much you falsify and prevaricate in saying this your own words to which I refer you are an undeniable evidence against you be who will judge between us in this matter But be it so as you will have it this will not however serve your turn For though you will not allow the Form of our Episcopal Ordination to be good yet there is no Roman Catholick but must and what you pretend to say in the person of Vasquez is not Vasquez's opinion but plain the contrary And First I say All Roman Catholicks must allow the form of our Episcopal Ordination to be good because it contains therein the whole of theirs and therefore if theirs be good ours must be so also For the Form of Episcopal Ordination in the Roman Ordinal is Accipe Spiritum Sanctum i.
e. Take the Holy Ghost which very words are also in ours and although there are other words added after yet these cannot be said to detract from the perfection of the Form but abundantly to add thereto as expressing an Exhortation to the duties of the office for which the ordained receives the Holy Ghost in the very words of the Holy Apostle St. Paul to Timothy whom he had afore by like giving of the Holy Ghost ordained a Bishop Hallier I confess makes mention also of the delivery of the Book of the Gospels in Episcopal Ordination to be an essential Matter and these words spoken at the doing of it Receive the Gospel and go preach to the people committed to thy Charge for God is able to encrease unto thee his Grace who liveth and reigneth to all Eternity to be an essential Form that is a partial essential Form which with the other as a partial essential Form also makes up the whole essence of that Ordination but he proposeth this only as an opinion which may seem probable without citing any Authority to make it out or naming any other Writer on his side to back him herein and in truth I know not of any that do there being none that I have met with who assign the Matter and Form of this Administration but agree with Armilla Major and Vasquez herein who say That Imposition of Hands is the alone Matter of Episcopal Ordination and these words Receive the Holy Ghost the alone Form and that in the applying this Matter and this Form together the Sacrament doth consist But allow it to be as Hallier proposeth that the delivery of the Book of the Gospels is a partial essential Matter and the words spoken at the doing of it in the Roman Ordinal a partial essential Form and that this Rite as well as the other must concur to make up the true essence and perfection of Episcopal Ordination yet even as to this our Ordinal will be as perfect as theirs for with us also not only the Book of the Gospels but the whole Bible is delivered by the Ordainers to the Bishop Ordained And although our form spoken at the doing of it be not exactly the same with that in the Roman Ordinal yet it includes the whole sum and substance of it in other words which is all that they themselves require to make a form sufficient and not only this but also in a much more perfect and fuller manner expresseth the whole intent of that Ceremony than the other doth And therefore after all that can be said in this matter whatsoever cavil an Adversary may make against the form of our Priestly Ordination there is none the least pretence or colour in our Episcopal Ordination on this account as much as to suggest an exception And Secondly As to the opinion of Vasquez in whose person you pretend it was that you said that a Bishop in his Ordination doth not receive any new Character but hath only that Power and Character further extended which was afore virtually in him as a Priest it is plain he says no such thing but asserts quite the contrary For his words are in Tertiam Thomae Disput 240. c. 5. N. 54. that in the Ordination of a Bishop there is no such thing as the extension of the Priestly Power and Character but that a new power is conferr'd And although he says this is done the Sacerdotal character still remaining yet since he allows Episcopal Ordination to be a Sacrament he must allow it also to imprint a new character as well as give a new power or else contradict the general Doctrine of his Church which universally holds that the Sacrament of Orders always imprints a Character and besides to say that Episcopal Ordination gives a new power and not a new Character is a thing inconceivable the new Character being nothing else according to their own definitions but a new power but however it sufficiently obviates all that you say that he plainly declares his opinion to be that there is no such thing as the extension of the former Character and Power in Episcopal Ordination but that a new power is conferr'd thereby and therefore it is most evident that you say not this in the person of Vasquez but as a Doctrine which you have picked up from our Adversaries among whom it is generally asserted that the Episcopal Office doth not constitute a new order or confer a new power different from the Sacerdotal but is only the Sacerdotal farther extended as you express it but this is a Doctrine which I could easily show you involves so many absurdities as to be no better than down-right nonsense as Bellarmine himself in a manner confesseth it to be but since you say this is not your opinion there is no occasion for it As to Bishop Ridleys not being consecrated by the Roman ordinal although you have run into so many demonstrable mistakes about it already and have been so often told that this is a thing on which the cause doth not at all depend yet I perceive you will not forget it but tell me that you are fully satisfied that it was so as you say but if what you mention in your paper is all you have to urge for it I perceive you are one that can very easily be satisfied in any thing which you think may make for the Cause of Rome against us For to deal plainly with you there is neither Truth Sense nor Reason in that which you write on this particular You say that you find in the Statutes of the first of King Edward the 6th that they meaning I suppose the Protestants took upon them to Administer Sacraments in new ways after their own inventions and that for this reason an Act was made that year prohibiting of them and from hence you infer that new ways were also made use of in ordination and consequently that Bishop Ridley was ordained by some such new way and not by the Roman ordinal and this seems to be the last refuge you have to make out what you would have allowed you in this point But in truth you having been mir'd amongst abundance of Absurdities concerning it already the more you strive to get out the deeper you get in For 1. Granting what you say to be true that there was such a Statute in the first year of King Edward prohibiting the Administration of Sacraments and among them that of orders according to new ways yet certainly after this Statute was made and those new ways prohibited as you say none durst ordain but by the old way of the Roman ordinal till the other which was afterwards used was Established by Law in the fourth year of that Kings Reign and therefore if not Ridley who was consecrated in the first year of King Edward before any Parliament sate yet certainly Farrer who was made Bishop in the second year of his Reign after the time when you will have this prohibiting
to the Pope which no Bishop took at his Ordination after the Supremacy of the Church was vested in the Crown And therefore Ridley and Farrer being made Bishops before that Act must necessarily be ordained by no other but the Roman Ordinal And therefore although in the beginning of King Edward's Reign before the Liturgy was establish'd some zealous Protestants taking encouragement from the favour they receiv'd from the Government might of their own heads in those Churches as were in their power make such alterations in the publick Worship and the Administration of the two Sacraments of Baptisme and the Lords Supper and other holy Rites as you call new ways of their own Invention yet as to your Question Why might they not also as well Consecrate and Ordain according to their own Inventions I hope what I have said is a full answer that there could be no such thing At best you propose it only as a Conjecture which you inferr'd without any Reason or Argument in the least to enforce it And what I have said I hope may be sufficient to assure you that there can be none for it As to Mr. Acton's Paper to which you refer me I know nothing of it having never seen it or any thing else which came from him to the Gentleman you mention and therefore can give you no answer thereto In the last place you seem so taken with those Conceptions of yours which you have vented in the paper you sent me that you would perswade me not to attempt any further Answer but that tamely yielding this Question I should proceed to another which you propose concerning the consistency of the validity of our Orders with the sixth Canon of the Council of Nice But I must beg your pardon for not observing the first part of your Command in tamely yielding the Cause to those weak suggestions which you sent me I hope whatsoever your opinion might be of them before I have by this time shown you that there is nothing unanswerable in them and if I have transgressed in doing so I will endeavour to make amends for it in giving you full satisfaction to what is the second part of your Command in reference to the sixth Canon of the Council of Nice The Question which you propose concerning it is this Whether any Bishop or Arch-bishop can validly be made such without the Consent of his Superior or by faculty from him for his Consecration In order to the giving you full satisfaction as to this I will first set down the words of the Canon it self and then endeavour to Answer your Question concerning it And First The words of the sixth Canon of the Council of Nice are as followeth Let ancient Customs still take place those that are in Egypt Libya and Pentapolis that the Bishop of Alexandria have power over all these because such also is the Custom of the Bishop of Rome And accordingly in Antioch and other Provinces let the Priviledges be preserved to the Churches This also is altogether evident that if any man be made a Bishop without the consent of the Metropolitan this great Synod Decrees such an one to be no Bishop And if two or three out of a contentious humour shall oppose the Common Election duely and regularly made according to the Canon of the Church let the Majority of voices in this Case prevail Thus far the words of the Canon and the Argument which you deduce from hence is I suppose because Archbishop Parker was consecrated without the Popes Bulls therefore his Consecration must be void and null and he being for this reason no Bishop consequently could make none else so And therefore all the Bishops that have been since in the English Church deriving their Orders from him are in truth and reality no Bishops or invested with any power to ordain others and consequently that all Ordinations administred since in the Church of England being through this defect null and void we have no such thing as true Orders among us And thus far having urged your Argument for you with all the strength that the thing can bear in Answer thereto I shall lay down these following particulars 1. That you could not have lighted on any Canon of the Church more unluckily for the Cause of Rome which you are so zealous for than this you have mention'd it being that which directly overthrows the Supremacy of the Pope and puts him upon the level with all other Metropolitans of the Christian Church 2. That allowing this Canon to have all the force you will give it yet if Orders be an Institution of Jesus Christ they cannot be annull'd by any breach thereof for Ecclesiastical Canons are only the Ordinances of Men and therefore cannot annul or invalidate that which hath a Divine appointment for the original of its Institution and therefore in this case the saying of Becanus the Jesuit falls in very pat to answer your Objection Prohibitio Ecclesiae solum facit ut Ordinatio sit illicita non autem ut sit irrita The prohibition of the Church only makes that an Ordination may be illegal not that it can be null For the power which is given by God cannot be taken away by the prohibition of the Church But since a Bishop hath received power to ordain others according to Divine Institution although he lye under all the Canonical Impediments that possibly he can be liable unto to hinder him from the Execution of his Office yet if he will notwithstanding proceed therein to the conferring of Orders the Character is as fully given by him as he himself received it And in this case the old Rule I have afore mention'd must again take place quod fieri non debet factum valet although the thing ought not to be done yet is valid when done And therefore allowing what you say to be true that the Bishops who ordained Arch-bishop Parker without the Popes Bull as well as he himself that was thus ordained by them were guilty of the breach of this Canon yet at the most it can only be an uncanonical not an invalid Ordination 3. Therefore as to the words of the Canon this great Synod decrees such an one to be no Bishop can respect only his Benefice not his Office and Character that is that such an one as should be thus Ordained a Bishop of any place without the Consent of his Metropolitan should not be allowed to be Bishop of that place so as there to execute the Office or any where enjoy the Honour and Priviledges belonging thereto not that his Ordination should be looked on as invalid as to the Character and Office of a Bishop conferred on him thereby Because if that be given according to Christs Institution it cannot be taken away again by any Institutions of men whatever but according to the Doctrine of the Church of Rome the Character being indelebly imprinted on him it is no more in the power of the Church to deprive him
of that than to deprive him of his Baptisme 4. You must not look on Ecclesiastical Canons in how solemn a manner soever made to be such Sacred and immutable things as to put a necessary obligation upon the Church indispensably to observe them through all times after For they are no more than other humane Laws made to obviate the present Grievances and regulate the disorders of the Body for which they are made and in the same manner also as the Circumstances of Time Place and Things alter frequently grow into disuse and become obsolete thereby and that this particularly was the case of that Canon of the Council of Nice which you insist on will plainly appear for it was never designed as a Law to reach the whole Church of Christ through all times and places of its Establishment so as for ever to lay an obligation upon all that are Christians to observe it Neither was it ever in the power of any Council to make any such but as most other Canons so especially this was made upon a particular occasion and that occasion was this During the Maximian Persecution there was one Meletias Bishop of Lycopolis in Egypt who in the heat of that Persecution having sacrificed to Idols to save his Life was for this reason by Peter Bishop of Alexandria his Metropolitan in a Synod of the Bishops of the Province deposed from his Bishoprick but he not acquiesceing in this Sentence became the Head of a Sect and in a Schismatical way in opposition to the Metropolitan not only retained his Bishoprick which he was deposed from but also took upon him to act as Metropolitan himself and ordained Bishops throughout all Egypt which by ancient Custom was the Right of the Bishop of Alexandria only in that Province of which Alexander one of the Successors of Peter in the See of Alexandria complaining at the Council of Nice the 4th and 6th Canons of that Council were framed on purpose for the redress hereof and the prevention of all other such like disorders for the future thereby it was decreed that all Bishops for the future should be ordained in the provincial Synods where all the Bishops of the Province mett together but if this could not be so conveniently done it might be performed by any three of them with the Consent of the rest signified by letters and the allowance and confirmation of the Metropolitan but that if any one should be ordained without the Consent of the Metropolitan he should not be allowed to be a Bishop And that as this was practiced in Rome so should it be also in Alexandria Antioch and other Provinces according to the ancient Custom already receiv'd concerning that matter And so the Nicene Fathers themselves give an account thereof in their Synodical Epistle to the Church of Alexandria written concerning it But as this was ordained upon that particular occasion so also was it with respect to the then present state and circumstances of the Church which at that time stood totally independent of it self alone and was altogether govern'd by its own Rules without the interposition of Princes Constantine the first Christian Emperor being but newly Converted to the Faith But afterwards when whole States became Christian and Bishops were made temporal Barons of Kingdoms and had vast Priviledges and Revenues given them by the Secular Power the Elections were for the most part made according to the Commands of the Prince and instead of that Judicial Approbation which is in this Canon given the Metropolitan nothing afterwards was left him but the Vassallage of necessarily obeying the Mandate of the Prince in Consecrating whomsoever he should appoint to the Benefice For when Bishops became thus great in the State as well as in the Church Princes might well think themselves concerned who the persons should be that should be advanced to those Dignities and therefore seldom suffered any to be invested in them but such as they had first approv'd and this they had a great Right to do as being for the most part the Founders and Patrons of the Benefices Although afterwards the Quarrel about investitures between the Western Princes and the Church of Rome made some alterations in this matter yet the Metropolitan was not at all helped thereby as to the right of Confirmation given him by this Canon at Nice but what was taken from Princes was swallowed by the Pope who by this Canon can claim no Right at all to interpose in this matter but is utterly excluded from it except in his own Province only For from thenceforth his Bulls were always thought requisite to all Consecrations and Confirmations of Bishops which put an absolute force upon the Metropolitan or whom else he should command in this matter which cannot be resisted However Princes found another way to salve themselves after those Investitures were wrested from them that is by not allowing any Election to be made without their License and by sending whensoever they thought fit with the License a Mandate to the Electors to chuse the person they nominated which is at present the General practice of all Popish States So that instead of the Election of the people and the Confirmation of the Metropolitan which by the Nicene Canons and ancient practice of the Church were the only ways of making Bishops now Princes have the Elections and the Pope the Confirmations and the Metropolitan is utterly excluded from all that which by virtue of this Canon was his ancient Right herein And having thus laid matters before you I hope Sir by this time you may see how little reason you have to infer any thing against us as to the Legality of our Ordinations from the Canon you have mention'd it being that which hath so long since grown obsolete and totally out of use even amongst Papists themselves And if any of those Gentlemen whom you converse so much with and whose Learning and Merits you so highly applaud shall tell you that it is otherwise and that all those ancient Canons must be still in their primitive force and every thing be called uncanonical and illegal which is not agreeable to them I desire you would ask them these following Questions First That whereas the 4th Canon of the Council of Nice Decrees that there shall be three Bishops at least at the Ordination of a Bishop whence comes it to pass that now a days in the Church of Rome it is allowed as Bellarmine and Binnius confess to be performed by one only Secondly That whereas the 9th Canon of the said Council of Nice Decrees that none shall be made Presbyter without being examin'd and found worthy And the 10th that those that are rashly admitted shall be again degraded And the 11th Canon of the Council of Neo Caesarea which was ancienter than that of Nice that none shall be ordained a Presbyter till the age of Thirty How comes it to pass that so many in the Church of Rome are made not
only Presbyters but also Bishops and Cardinals not only before Thirty but also before they have been of an age capable of any of those Qualifications which Examination is appointed to enquire about For Ferdinando de Medices was made Cardinal by Sextus quintus before he was thirteen years old and John de Medices before him who was afterwards Pope by the name of Leo the 10th was made Bishop at the 8th and Cardinal at the 13th year of his age and Cosmus Bishop of Fano who died by an act of Sodomy committed upon him by one of the Bastards of Paul the third the Pope who call'd the Council of Trent was not then above eighteen years old and Odell Chatillion and Alphonso of Portugal were both Bishops and Cardinals the former at the 11th and the later at the 7th year of his age And Glaber Rodolphus tells us also that Benedict the 9th was but twelve years old when he was created Pope and he could not be well mistaken herein since he lived in his time Thirdly You may ask them further That whereas the 18th Canon of the Council of Nice doth Ordain that no Deacon shall sit among the Presbyters but that a Presbyter shall be always above a Deacon and a Bishop above a Presbyters how comes it now to be lawful for Deacons when made Cardinals to take place not only of Presbyters but also of Bishops Archbishops and Patriarchs too whereas they being no more than the Pope's Deacons can according to the ancient Orders of the Church claim no higher place thereby than the Deacons of any other Bishop And Fourthly I desire it may be also asked them that since the 6th Canon of the Council of Calcedon so severely prohibits all absolute Ordinations that is such as are made without a Title as utterly to exclude all from the Office to which they are so Ordain'd How comes it to pass that it is so Common a practice of the Church of Rome to ordain Bishops without Bishopricks such as the Bishop of Calcedon the Bishop of Adramytium and the Bishop of Amasia and abundance of those nulla tenentes men And if the Titles they bear be urged to excuse them from the breach of this Canon it is a mockage which will not serve their turn For the Title is only an empty name which they assume without any intent of ever being in reality Bishops of those places from whence they take them or of at all executing any pastoral charge in them And if it were otherwise without this mockage in the thing yet since this very 6th Canon of the Council of Nice which you insist on saith that all Bishops are to be ordained by their own Metropolitan what hath the Pope to do to Ordain Bishops for those places where he hath no Jurisdiction at all either as Metropolitan or Patriarch as it is certain he hath not in any of those Bishopricks from whence those Titles are usually assum'd For they take them almost always from the Bishopricks of the Eastern Empire which never acknowledged the Jurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome but had always Patriarchs of their own at Constantinople Antioch and Alexandria whose Jurisdiction continues even to this day And under them those very Bishopricks being always provided of Bishops of their own Legally Ordained and Legally Invested with them I ask further how comes it to pass that contrary to the 8th Canon of the Council of Nice the Pope makes Bishops of those places where there are Bishops already And therefore if the Breach of ancient Canons must void Ordinations certainly these can be no Bishops To go over all the rest of the Ancient Canons of the Church and shew how in the most wholsom things they ordained the Church of Rome hath now totally deviated from them would be too long a Task what I have already said is sufficient to let you see that they have no regard to them themselves and therefore nothing can be more unreasonable then to exact the observance of them from others especially in such things as the alteration of Circumstances and the necessity of the times have made unpracticable as it is plain what you require from us in the point of Ordaining at our Reformation then totally was For Fifthly To have the Popes consent to the Ordination of those Bishops that were made at the Reformation was a thing impossible to be had and in that case all Laws as well Ecclesiasticall as civil necessarily lose their force For the Lawes of the Land had made it Treason to ask it of him and if they had not to be sure the Pope would never grant it to those who would not conform with him to all the Erroneous Doctrins and corrupt practices of his Church Must we therefore have no Bishops and no Ministers because he would not give his consent we should or must we still have retained all those corruptions and errours which he would impose upon us to obtain it If the latter be said and I suppose this is what our adversary would have it would put a necessity upon us to receive even the Alcoran or the Talmud with all the impieties and absurdities of them for necessary Doctrines of Faith and manners whensoever the Pope should please and we durst not trust his Infallibility to secure us from this since we know the time when a Pope of Rome was in Conspiracy with the Mendicant Fryers to have imposed a new Gospel on the World in opposition to the Gospel of Jesus Christ which if received would have made us worse than Turks or Jews Now put the case the plot had taken and this Gospel by his Authority had been received in the same manner as Transubstantiation the Sacrifice of the Mass half Communion Purgatory praying to Saints Image Worship and other like Impostures of that Church now are by the same Authority only for Infallible Truth must we have received it too to gain his consent to our Ordinations or else must we have had no Orders at all because he would not give it unto us unless we renounce our Christianity to obtain it from him I thank God our Condition is not such for the Laws of Christ give every Bishop equal Authority to Ordain and although some restrictions and limitations as to the Exercise of this power may have been put by the Laws of the Church for the better Order and more regular Government of it yet all those Laws according to the Doctrine of the Romanists themselves must alwayes give place whenever the necessity of times or things require it And therefore though the Consent of the Pope to our Ordinations had been required by the firmest Laws which the whole Universal Church could have established yet when such a necessity is put upon us as that we cannot have his Consent without submitting to those Errors and Corruptions as would make all our Orders an abomination in the presence of him for whose Service they were Ordained as was the
Case of our first Reformers it would become absolutely necessary to Ordain without it But Sixthly Allowing the Nicene Canon you insist on still to retain the utmost force you can give it yet there is nothing in it which requires what you would have in reference to us For all that is there said is that in all Provinces the Bishops should be Ordained by the consent of the Metropolitan which was very well provided for the preservance of peace and good Order in the Church But the Bishop of Rome is not our Metropolitan and in truth in the beginning of Queen Elizabeth's Reign the time to which your Objection refers we had no Metropolitan at all in this Province Cardinal Pool the last Metropolitan being then newly dead and the Metropolitical see of Canterbury vacant thereby and into his place it was that Archbishop Parker was Ordained But here you will say that as the provincial Bishops were to be Ordained by the Metropolitan so the Metropolitans were to be Ordained by the Patriarch and the Bishop of Rome being our Patriarch for this Reason Arch-bishop Parker ought not to have been Ordain'd without his Consent and that his Ordination was illegal for want thereof But to this I say 1. That this is not at all said in the Canon you insist on that extending no farther than to Metropolitans in respect of their Com-provincials as it is also plainly expressed in the Fourth Canon of that Council For in truth Patriarchs were not then in being neither could be that Division of the Empire into Diocesses consisting each of many Provinces which gave occasion for the first constituting of Patriarchs being but just then made and therefore it must be some time after before there could be any Birth given to that Institution and in the Council of Chalcedon which was held 126 years after that of Nice is the first time we find any mention of it no ancient Records of the Church before that time in the least giving us any account thereof 2. Supposing Patriarchs should have been then meant yet Brittain was never of the Patriarchate of the Bishop of Rome which is sufficiently made out not only by our Learned Dean of Pauls in his Origines Brittanicae cap. 3. but also by several of the Roman Communion also and especially by Father Barns a Benedictine Monk who wrote a Book particularly to that purpose 3. I deny that it was the ancient practice of the Church for Metropolitans to be Ordained by the approbation of the Patriarch or that his consent was at all thought requisite hereto For the Custom was when a new Metropolitan was chosen that he should be Ordained by his own Comprovincials And so was Arch-bishop Parker he having been Consecrated by four Bishops of his own Province and that this was a practice not only introduced by ancient usage but also establish'd by many Decrees and Canons of the Church not only Petrus de Marca Arch-bishop of Paris but also Hallier another eminent Doctor of the French Church do give us a large Account And it is but of late date that the Bishops of Rome interposed herein as is told you in a Pamphlet just now come from France concerning the proceedings of the Parliament of Paris upon the Popes Bull for therein the Kings Advocate tells that Parliament that for the four first Ages of that Monarchy there was no such thing as suing to Rome for Benefices And Petrus de Marca tells you the same thing And having said thus much I know not any thing which can be further urged for the support of your last Objection requiring the Popes consent to our Ordinations unless you fly to that Paramount Supremacy challenged to him by so many which makes him the only Supream Pastor of the Church under Christ and all other Bishops as his Delegates which act only by his Auâ—hority and have no other but what is derived from him And if you say this all the Answer I shall give you thereto is that this is a pretension so extravagant and so totally void of all manner of ground for its support that not only the Protestants but also the better part of his own Communion utterly deny it unto him And now having gone through your Paper all that remains for me further to do in order to your full satisfaction is that I perform my promise in making good unto you that supposing an Imperative Form of words in Ordination to be so essentially necessary as you would have it yet the Forms made use of in our Ordinal for the Ordination of a Priest were before the additions made to them by the Convocation in the year 1662 altogether sufficient in order thereto For as there is Matter and Form as they call them in all Ordinations administred by the Church of Rome so also is there in ours that is an outward visible sign at the performance of the administration and a Form of words expressing the thing intended thereby the former of which they call the Matter and the latter the Form of Ordination And as there is a double Matter and Form in their Ordinal for the Ordaining of a Priest so is there also in ours and that all things may appear the more clearly to you what I have hereafter to say concerning them in order to the satisfying you in the point proposed First I shall lay them down both together that is the Matters and Forms of their Ordinal as well as the Matters and Forms of our Ordinal as they were before the additions made to the Forms that are afore-mentioned that having that in your view which is the subject of the whole Dispute you may the better understand what shall be urg'd concerning it Secondly I shall from both of them observe some few particulars unto 〈…〉 leading to the same end And then Thirdly Having stated your Objection as fairly and to the best advantage of your Cause that I can I shall in the last place proceed to Answer it with such Arguments as I hope will give you full satisfaction First As to the Matter and Forms for the Ordination of a Priest both of the Romish Ordinal as well as those of ours as they were before the additions made to the Forms in the year 1662. They are as followeth In the Romish Ordinal In the Ordinal of the Church of England The first Matter is the delivery of the Chalice with Wine and Water in it and the Paten on the top of it with the Host thereon To the person to be Ordained to the Priesthood The first Matter is the Imposition of the Hands of the Bishop and Presbytery assisting with him at the Ordination on the Head of the Person Ordained The first Form is these words spoken by the Bishop at the delivery of the said Chalice and Paten Receive Power to offer Sacrifice unto God and to Celebrate Masses both for the Living and the Dead in the name of the Lord. Amen The first Form is these
Church as null and void I have only this further Request to make unto you that before you absolutely renounce our Communion on this account to go over to the Church of Rome you would be pleased well to consider these three particulars First Whether on your going over to the Church of Rome you can be sure to find valid Orders there Secondly Whether on supposition that you can you will any way better your self by them And Thirdly That supposing you do yet whether on other accounts it may not still be best for you to remain where you are And First Before you go over from us to the Church of Rome because you think our Orders not valid I desire you would consider whether you can be sure to find valid Orders there For if you do not you will lose the whole reason of your Change and be at the same loss among them that you at present pretend to be at among us But how you who are so scrupulous at our Orders can ever be satisfied with theirs if you act with any Sincerity in this Matter I cannot see possible For there are none of those Objections which they raise against our Orders for the nulling of them but may I assure you be urged with much more strength and reason against theirs If they urge against us the want of due Succession the many Schismes Disturbances and undue Elections of Popes which they have had afford us many instances to make it out against them with much more reason than they can object it unto us If they urge the defect of the Forms I have already shown you how all this Objection retorts upon themselves If they urge the Breach of Ecclesiastical Canons about Elections and Ordinations none have more broken them than themselves of which I have given you some few Instances and abundance of others might be added unto them If they urge the want of the Popes Confirmation at the Consecrating of our Bishops how many ages of the Church were there in which their own Bishops excepting only those of the Popes own Metropolitical Jurisdiction were always Consecrated without it If they urge Heresie or Schisme have not some of their own Popes as they themselves acknowledge been guilty hereof And if Simony be Heresie as is generaâ—ly held in that Church how few of them can be said to be free from it since most of them ascend the Papal Throne by buying the Votes of their Electors and to make themselves amends sell all the Ecclesiastical Benefices they dispose of afterwards as is too notoriously known to be denyed But waving these particulars that I may not be too long I shall insist only on one thing they hold which doth not only make it uncertain unto all men whether Orders are validly conferr'd on any that are Ordain'd in that Church but even morally impossible that there should be now any at all among them that is their Doctrin of the Intention which is that none of their Sacraments can be validly administred to any when there doth not concur with the Act of administration the intention of him that administers them of doeing thereby what the Church doth And this Doctrin whenever you go over to the Church of Rome you must receive as an infallible truth and if it be so then must necessarily follow what I say First that it must be alwayes uncertain in that Church whether Orders which they hold a Sacrament are validly conferr'd on any that are there Ordained or no because how validly soever they may be administered as to matter and form and all other things requir'd which the Spectators may be certain witnesses of yet the intention of the ordainer being that of which no man can be certain it is impossible the wisest and most diligent inquirer can ever be certain whether any Priest under whose conduct he shall put himself be validly Ordain'd a Priest or no. And therefore when you go over to the Church of Rome for the sake of more valid Orders then you think we have after your best inquiry it may be your lot to light always on such Priests from whose hands to receive the benefits of the Priestly Ministration as for want of the intention of the Ordainer were never truely Ordain'd Priests at all and consequently be at no better pass among them then now you think you are among us But this is not the worst of that which follows from hence For Secondly If the intention of him that administers the Sacraments be alwayes necessary to make the administration good and valid and consequently that orders which they hold a Sacrament cannot be validly conferr'd on any without the intention of the Ordainer concurring at the act of Ordination this will make it not only uncertain who are true Priests among them and who not but also morally speaking render it utterly impossible that they should at present have any at all among them validly ordained to that Office. For the case is plainly thus They all hold Baptisme to be absolutely necessary to the Priesthood and the Priesthood to be absolutely necessary to the Order of Episcopacy so that a man cannot be validly Ordain'd a Priest unless he be first validly Baptised or validly Ordain'd a Bishop unless he be first validly made a Priest and that neither of these can validly be done unâ—ess there be in him that performes that administration a right intention of doing thereby what the Church doth So then to make a man a true Priest among them there must be First the right intention of him that Baptised him to make him capable of the Priesthood and Secondly the right intention of the Bishop that Ordain'd him validly to conferre the Office upon him And then to impower the Bishop validly to Ordain he must be Baptised with right intention Ordained Priest with a right intention and lastly be Ordain'd Bishop with a right intention and then again he that Ordained him Priest must be Baptised with a right intention Ordain'd Priest with a right intention and Ordain'd Bishop with a right intention and the same must be sayd of him that Ordain'd him Bishop and so up through all the descents that have hapned in the transmission of the Priestly power from the time of our Saviour down to us which through so long a succession of near 1700 years must make all the Acts of right intentions in the administering of Baptisme and in the administering of Orders which according to the Roman Doctrin are necessary to make their Orders at present good and valid to amount to the number of many hundred thousands and if of all these any one hath fail'd from the beginning that one alone breaks the whole chain of succession asunder and all that comes after is made null and voyd thereby And that in so vast a number there should not be such a failure yea and many of them too is that which morally speaking I say is utterly impossible For how many have been made Priests and
there are but two Forms of Imperative words in the Roman Ordinal before this Receive Power to offer Sacrifice c. and both spoken by the Bishop at the Vesting of the person to be Ordained with the Priestly Vestments For in the putting on the first sort of those Vestments he says Receive thou the yoke of the Lord for his yoke is sweet and his burden light and then immediately after at the putting on of another sort of Vestment he says Receive thou the Priestly Garment by which Charity is understood for God is able to encrease unto thee Charity and every perfect Work But by neither of these any thing of Priestly Power is given or do any of that Communion ever say so and therefore according to your own concession it must follow and it is that which the Learnedest of the Roman Communion say that the last imperative words in the Roman Ordinal which are spoken at the last imposition of hands Receive the Holy Ghost whose sins thou dost forgive they are forgiven and whose sins thou dost retain they are retained are the alone essential Form whereby the Orders of Priesthood are conferred in that Church and this Form we had in our first Ordinal as well as they in theirs and much more fully because therein are also subjoyned these words And be thou a faithful dispencer of the Word of God and of his Sacraments in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost which are wanting in the Roman Ordinal which are not any such notorious and idle Tautologies as you are pleased to call them For although they express nothing more then what is comprehended in the foregoing words Whose sins thou dost forgive c. yet they are explanator of them and do more explicitly tell us what is contained in them For a Priest doth no otherwise remit our sins in the Church of Christ then as he administers to us the means in order thereto in the Word and Sacraments and the concomitant Offices belonging thereto Fourthly I further observe in your Paper that you quote Mr. Fox to prove that those who were ordained by King Edwards Ordinal were ordained again in Queen Maries Reign I must confess Mr. Foxes Book is too large for any one so throughly to know every particular of it as positively to deny what you say to be contained in it But when you convince me of this and show me in Mr. Fox where any such thing is said then will I believe that Dr. Burnet hath dealt falsly with us by telling us the contrary in his History of the Reformation Part II. Page 289. But be it so or be it not so the cause doth not at all depend hereupon Fifthly You infer the nullity of our Orders because in the conferring of them no power is given to Consecrate the Eucharist To this I answer that the words of our Ordinal giving power to Administer the Sacraments give power also to Consecrate the Elements in the Holy Eucharist and in all such Forms the more general the words are it is always the better provided they are such as include all the particulars as it is certain the words of our Form in the Ordination of a Priest include all the particulars that belong to that Office. But if you urge that it is not only necessary to express the power of Administring the Sacraments in general but that it must also be done in particular I must then ask the question why the Sacrament of Baptism ought not also in particular to be mentioned in the Form as well as the Sacrament of the Eucharist and why may we not from the omission of this in the Roman Ordinal infer the nullity of their Orders as well as they the nullity of ours from the omission of the other and that especially since the Sacrament of Baptism may be justly esteemed the nobler of the two as being that which first gives us Life in Christ whereas the other only adds Strength and Nourishment thereto But here you will object to what I have said that our Ordinal gives power only to dispence the Sacraments and not to consecrate the Eucharist To this I answer that by the word dispence the Church means the whole of what belongs both to the Consecration and Administration of that Sacred Rite and words are alwaies to be understood according to the meaning and receiv'd interpretation of them that use them and not as they shall be limited or forced by the impertinent cavils of every contentious Adversary and you may always take this for a certain Rule that when in the management of Controversie men come to cavil about words it is an evident sign that they are run on ground as to all things else· But to this point you further say that those that have Authority only thus to dispence the Elements have not power to make present the Body and Blood of Christ in the Holy Eucharist without which you hold this Sacrament cannot be administred To this I answer that if by making present the Body and Blood of Christ you mean a Corporeal presence by the transmutation of the Elements as the Church of Rome holds it is a monstrous opinion which we can never receive and I hope you are not gone so far as to swallow with them so absurd an opinion Sixthly You say Christ made his Apostles Priests when he said unto them Do this in remembrance of me and that you take this clearly to be the sense of the Church If you mean by the Church the Church of Rome I acknowledge what you say to be true they having so defined it in the Council of Trent but that the Church of England ever held this I utterly deny for it is a Doctrine peculiar to the Church of Rome and but of late date among them being first invented by some of the Schoolmen to serve a turn For about Six Hundred Years since and not sooner the Church of Rome taking up that most Sacrilegious practice of denying the Cup to the Laiety and being afterwards pressed with the institution of our Saviour who commanded the Administration to be in both Kinds to evade this they framed this subtle invention of saying that Christ in the institution of this Holy Sacrament made his Apostles Priests by saying unto them Do this in remembrance of me and that therefore the Commandement given them of Communicating in both Kinds belongs to them only as Priests and that the Laiety from this Commandment can claim no right thereto But this is a fetch which some of the wisest and ablest Men among them are ashamed of and it is particularly disowned by Estius Suarez and Christophorus a Castro as being neither agreeable to the Antients nor of any solidity in it self Seventhly You allow our Form of Episcopal Ordination to be sufficiently perfect which if granted will infer the Ordination of Arch-Bishop Parker and all the other Bishops in the beginning of Queen Elizabeths Reign to be good and