4. Most Presbyters that I know do perform all Ecclesiastical Matters upon supposition of a Divine Direction and not upon the Command of Humane Powers Ad 9m. The Ordination of meer Presbyters is not null and the Presbyters so ordained now in England are true Presbyters as I am ready to maintain But wait for the Accuser's proof of the nullity Ad 10m. 1. This calls me to decide the Controversie about the late Wars which I find not either necessary or convenient for me to undertake 2. The like I must say of deciding the Legality of Inductions and Admissions 3. If a worthy Man be cast out had you rather that God's Worship were neglected and the People perished for lack of Teaching then any other Man should be set over them though one that had no hand in casting him out Must the People needs have him or none as long as he lives Was it so when Bishops were cast out heretofore by Emperours or Councils I think may take the Guidance of a destitute People so I hinder not a worthy Man from recovering his Right 4. I never desired that any should be Excluded but the Unworthy the Insufficient or Scandalous or grosly Negligent And I know but too few of the Ejected that are not such And this Question doth modestly pass over their Case or else I should have said somewhat more to the Matter Ad 11m. 1. It is a necessary Christian Duty to see that we do not the least Evil for our own safety And all God's Ordinances must be maintained as far as we can But as I before disclaimed the Arrogance of determining the Controversie about our Diocesan Episcopacy so I think not every Legal Right of the Church which it hath by Man's Law nor every thing in our Liturgy to be worthy so stiff a maintenance as to the loss of Life nor the loss of Peace Nor did the late King think so who would have let go so much But I think that they that did this carnally for Self-interest and Ends did grievously sin whether the thing it self were good or bad especially if they went against their Consciences 2. I think there is no unlawful Prayers or Service now offered to God in the Church ordinarily where I have had opportunity to know it And I think we pray for the same things in the main as we were wont to do and offer God the same Service And that Mr. Ball and others against the Separatists have sufficiently proved that it is no part of the Worship but an Accident of it-self indifferent that I use These Words or Those a Book or no Book a Form premeditated or not And no Separatist hath yet well answered them Ad 12m. Such as you described you can hardly know and therefore not knowingly scruple their Communion for a Man's ends and knowledge are out of your sight You can hardly tell who did this against Knowledge and Conscience carnally for Self interest But if you mean it of your ordinary Ministers and Congregations I am past doubt that you are Schismatical if not worse you avoid the Assemblies and Ordinances mentioned upon such Accusations and Suppositions And I shall much easier prove this than you will make good your Separation Ad 13m. Permitting you to suppose Orthodox and Episcoparian to be the same at present you may easily know that the Episcopal are not all of a Mind but differ I think much more among themselves than the moderate Episcopal and Presbyterians differ some maintaining that the Ordination of meer Presbyters is not null with divers the like things which the novel sort doth disclaim The old Episcopal Protestant may not only take a Cure of Souls now without any Contradiction to his Principles but may comfortably Associate with the peaceable Ministry of the Land and may not conscionably avoid it The Novel sort before mentioned ought to rectifie their mistakes and so to take up their duty but as they are I see not how they can do it in consistency with their Principles unless under the Jurisdiction of a Bishop Ad 14m. For the Point of the legality of the Liturgy you call me to determine Cases in Law which I find my self unfit for And for the Directory its Nature is according to its Name not to impose Words or Matter nor bind by human Authority but to direct Men how to understand God's Word concerning the Ordering of his Worship Now either it directeth us right or wrong If wrong we must not follow such Directions If right it 's no unlawful disturbance of the Churches Peace to obey God's Word upon their Direction Circumstances wherein some place most of their Government they very little meddle with And indeed I know but few that do much in the order of Worship eo Nomine because it is so in the Directory but because they think it most agreeable to God's Word or most tending to Concord as things now stand Would you have us avoid any Scripture or orderly Course meerly because it is expressed in the Directory And think you those are Ways of Peace Ad 15m. I think on the Credit of others that the Jewish Church had a Liturgy I am sure they had Forms of Praises and Prayer in some Cases I know Christ taught his Disciples the Lord's Prayer I will not determine whether as a Directory for Matter and Order or whether as a Form of Words to be used or when or how oft used I conjecture you regard the Judgment of Grotius who saith in Matt. 6. 9. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In hunc Sensum Non enim praecipit Christus verba recitari quod nec legimus Apostolos fecisse quanquam id quoque fieri cum fructu potest sed materiam precum hinc promere i.e. Pray thus that is to this Sense For Christ doth not command the saying of the Words nor do we read that the Apostles did it though that also may profitably be done but hence to fetch the Matter of Prayer You know the Directory adviseth the use of the Words And how it was that Iohn taught his Disciples to pray I cannot tell nor will herein pretend my self wiser than I am The Example of the Primitive Church is never the more imitable for the Cessation of Persecution and its Example before is most to be regarded that being purest that is next the Fountain We are sure that the Church long used extemporate Prayers and its probable betimes some Forms withal I think they are strangely Dark and addicted to Extreams that think either that no Forms are lawful or that only prescribed or premiditated Forms are lawful And if you will condemn all publick extemporate Prayers you will err as grosly as they that will have no other Ad 16m. I know no necessity of any Godfather or Godmother beside the Parents unless you will call those so that in case of their necessary Absence are their Delegates Nor do I know that ordinarily among us any Dictates or Prayers are used that
omnes omnium Charitates inse complectitur Sir I have sent you my Answer written with a more legible hand and with some regard of ease to my self in transcribing with my very hearty love recommended and assured to you I commend you to the Grace and Blessing of Almighty God resting Your very respectful Friend Ra. Exon. Austie in Hartfordshire Iuly 21. 1655. Bishop Brownrigg ' s Answer about Government Prop. 1. YOur first Proposal is In every Parish where there are more Presbyters than one let one be the Chief and his Consent chiefly taken in the guidance of the Church Answ. 1. This Case is rarely to be found in the Parishes of England nor can there be a sufficient Maintenance for a Plurality of Presbyters in our Parochial Congregations yet if such be found it may be a good means to preserve Order and Peace that the ordering of Affairs which shall be referred to them be managed by him that hath the Praesecture of that Parish I wish that in those Churches which beside the Incumbent have had Lecturers this Rule had been observed Prop. 2. Let many such Churches be associated call it a Classis or what you will and let the fittest Man be their President as long as he is fit that is during life unless he deserve a removal Answ. 2. This Proposal looks like our Rural Deaneries or Choriepiscopal Order which hath been laid much aside but for the reducing of it and to make it profitable I wish that it may be bounded with fit Canons prescribing what they may do and with intimation from the Bishop and his Inspection and that such a Dean or President may be continued for Life that being a means to breed Experience if he do not deserve a removal Prop. 3. Let divers of these Classes meet once or twice a Year in a Provincial Assembly and let the fitâ—est Man in the Province be their standing President Answ. 3. This Course hath been by Law and Practice already used in our Church in the Archidiaconal Visitations and Synods which may be more quickened and actuated by sit Canons for their Direction what and who the President must be may be provided for by Canons and his Station continued and that Presbyters having Cure of Souls should not be accounted meer Preachers but Church-Guides and as they are already acknowledged Rectors of Churches Prop. 4. Let it be left to every Man's Conscience Whether the President be called by the Name of Bishop President Superintendent Moderator c. seeing that a Name is no meet Reason of a Breach c. Answ. 4. If by President you understand him that must moderate the Half-year or yearly Synods under the Inspection of the Diocesan as his Order may be newly framed so his Name may be newly imposed but that the Primitive Name of Bishop should be turned into a new Name is as you say no meet Reason for a Breach and we see Presbyters assume that Name to themselves and to put a new Name upon an old Institution is as Augustine speaks in the like Case Indoctis struere fallaciam doctis facere injuriam Prop. 5. Let no Man be forced to Express his Iudgment de Jure Whether the President have a Negative Voice in Ordination or Excommunication or whether he be distinct in Order or Degree seeing it is not the unanimous and right Belief of these things that is of Necessity for then they must have been in our Creed but the unanimous and right Practice but let them all agree that they will constantly joyn in these Classical and Provincial Assemblies and then only Ordain and that they will not Ordain but when the President is one unless in Case of flat Necessity which is never like to befall us if this may be takenâ— Answ. 5. If by President you understand the Diocesan then that the Bishop should be deprived of his Negative Voice in Ordination or Excommunication and so I conceive in other Censures and Acts of Government is to make him a meer Shadow without any Authority like our Scrutators in our University to propound Graces and collect Suffrages and pronounce Sentence Surely St. Paul invested Timothy and Titus with more Power and Authority both for Ordination and Censures but then to remedy the Inconveniencies of a wilful Negative it 's fit that an Appeal may be made to a Provincial Synod that may examine and if need be rectifie what was amiss in the Negative That Church Businesses were Ordered by the Concurrence of more Presbyters besides the Bishop in Cyprian's time was fit at that time when the Government of Church Affairs was Arbitrary and not Regulated by Law in which Case it was safest for the Bishop to have the Consent of others with him This is not our Case we have express Canons and Laws laid upon Bishops beyond which they cannot go and so may well be intrusted with the Execution of the Sentence of the Law the Sentence of the Judge being only Declarativa Executiva and if he transgress those Rules prefixed he is liable to Censure In our Church plurimum legi minimum Episcopo relinquitur as we see in Civil Matters one Justice of Peace hath the Power of Executing the Sentence of a Law or Statute but no Arbitrary Power granted to him That the Bishop be distinct from the Presbyter whether ordine or gradu is the Schoolmens Debate and I conceive may have such accord as may not ingender strife That Ordination be by the Assistance of Presbyters is already required in our Form of Ordination and if it be fixed to the Times of Synods it may be easily granted and sure that Blame that hath been laid upon our Bishops for Ordaining of insufficient Men is most what an undue Charge the Law of the Land hath set that lowness of sufficiency in Men to be ordained and instituted that if a Bishop refuseth to give Orders or Institution to a Man presented by the Patron he is punishable by the Judges As I have heard Archbishop Abbot was fined an Hundred pounds in case he did not admit a Clark so meanly qualified as the Law requires Some other Proposals are added in the End of your Letter Prop. 1. I Am satisfied that the Apostles have Successors in all those Works that are of standing Necessity and that Church Government is one of those Works and that it is improbable that Christ should settle one Species of Church Government in the Apostles Hands for an Age and then Change it for ever after and they that affirm such a change must prove it Answ. 6. Supposing what the Apostles did in ordering of Church Government to be in the Name and by the Authority of Christ this Assertion I conceive to be very true and it doth infer a Subordination of all Officers and Members of the Church to the Apostles and those that were their Successors Prop. 2. Whether the Apostles had a Power by Office to govern the LXX and the Presbyters as inferior Officers besides the
suggest nor did we ever hear any just Reasons given for their diâ—ient from the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy or Prelacy as it was stated and established in this Kingdom Which we believe to be for the main the true ancient primitive Episcopacy and that to be more than a meer presidency of Order Neither do we find that the same was in any Time ballanced or managed by any Authoritative Commixtion of Presbyters therewith Though it hath been then and in all Times since usually exercised with the Assistance and Counsel of Presbyters in subordination to the Bishops § 8. And we cannot but wonder that the Administration of Government by one single Person should by them be affirmed to be so liable to Corruptions Partialities Tyrannies and other Evils that for the avoiding thereof it should be needful to have others joyned with him in the power of Government Which if applyed to the Civil State is a most dangerous Insinuation And we verily believe what Experience and the Constitutions of Kingdoms Armies and even private Families sufficiently confirmeth in all which the Government is administred by the Authority of one single Person although the Advice of others may be requisite also but without any share in the Government that the Government of many is not only most subject to all the aforesaid Evils and Inconveniencies but more likely also to breed and soment perpetual Factions both in Church and State than the Government by one is or can be And since no Government can certainly prevent all Evils that which is liable to the least and sewest is certainly to be preferred As to the four particular Instances of things amiss c. § 9. 1. We cannot grant that the Extent of any Diocess is so great but that the Bishop may well perform that wherein the proper Office and Duty of a Bishop doth consist which is not the personal Inspection of every Man's Soul under his Government which is the Work of every Parochial Minister in his Cure but the Pastoral Charge of overseeing directing and taking care that the Ministers and other Ecclesiastical Officers within his Diocess do their several respective Duties in their several Stations as they ought to do And if some Diocesses shall be thought of too large Extent the Bishops may have Suffragan Bishops to assist them as the Laws allow It being a great mistake that the Personal Inspection of the Bishop is in all places of his Diocess at all times necessary For by the same reason neither Princes nor Governours of Provinces nor Generals of Armies nor Mayors of great Cities nor Ministers of great Parishes could ever be able to discharge their Duties in their several Places and Charges § 10. 2. We confess the Bishops did as by the Law they were enabled depute part of the Administration of their Ecclesiastical Jurisdictions to Chancellors Commissaries and Officials as Men better skill'd in the Civil and Canon Laws But as for Matters of more Spiritual Concernment viz. the Sentences of Excommunication and Absolution with other Censures of the Church we conceive they belong properly to the Bishop to decree and pronounce either by himself where for the present he resideth or by some grave Ecclesiastical Person by him Surrogated for that purpose in such Places where he cannot be Personally present Wherein if many things have been done amiss for the time past or shall be seasonably conceived inconvenient for the future we shall be as willing to have the same Reformed and Remedied as any other Persons whatsoever § 11. 3. Whether a Bishop be a distinct Order from Presbyter or not or whether they have power of sole Ordination or no is not now the Question But we affirm that the Bishops of this Realm have constantly for ought we know or have heard to the contrary Ordained with the Assistance of Presbyters and the Imposition of their Hands together with the Bishops And we conceive it very fit that in the exercise of that part of their Jurisdiction which appertaineth to the Censures of the Church they should likewise have the Advice and Assistance of some Presbyters And for this purpose the Colledges of Deans and Chapters are thought to have been instituted that the Bishops in their several Diocess might have their Advice and Assistance in the Administration of their weighty Pastoral Charge § 12. 4. This last dependeth upon Matter of Fact Wherein if any Bishops have or shall do otherwise than according to Law they were and are to be answerable for the same And it is our desire as well as theirs that nothing may be done or imposed by the Bishop but according to the known Laws For Reforming of which Evils c. § 13. 1. The Primates Reduction though not published in his Life time was formed many years before his Death and shewed to some Persons ready to attest the same in the Year 1640. but it is not consistent with two other Discourses of the same Learned Primate viz. the one of the Original of Episcopacy and the other of the Original of Metropolitans both printed in the Year 1641. and written with great diligence and much variety of ancient Learning In neither of which is to be found any mention of the Reduction aforesaid Neither is there in either of them propounded any such Model of Church Government as in the said Reduction is contained Which doubtless would have been done had that Platform been according to his setled Judgment in those Matters In which Reduction there are sundry things as namely the Conforming of Suffragans to the number of Rural Deaneries which are apparently private Conceptions of his own accommodated at that time for the taking off some present from Animosities but wholly destitute of any Colour of Testimony or President from Antiquity nor is any such by him offered towards the proof thereof And it would be considered whether the Final Resolution of all Ecclesiastical Power and Jurisdiction into a National Synod where it seemeth to be placed in that Reduction without naming the King or without any dependance upon him or relation to him be not destructive of the King's Supremacy in causes Ecclesiastical It is observable nevertheless that even in the Reduction Archi-Episcopacy is acknowledged As for the super-added Particulars § 14. 1. The Appointment and Election of Suffragans is by the Law already vested in the King whose Power therein is by the Course here proposed taken away § 15. 2. What they mean by Associations in this place they explain not but we conceive it dangerous that any Association whatsoever is understood thereby should be made or entered into without the King's Authority § 16. 3. We do not take the Oaths Promises and Subscriptions by Law required of Ministers at their Ordination Institution c. to be unnecessary although they be responsible to the Laws if they do amiss it being thought requisite as well by such Cautions to prevent Offences as to punish Offenders afterwards Upon all which Consideration it is that
am sure if not all quiet in their Habitations even in the Kings Quarters not so much as taking the Covenant so that I know not how you can except against them as casting out the Bishops What tell you them of other Mens Actions could they help it what if it be in a time when Bishops were so Ejected when you cannot prove them guilty of it 4. The Covenant it self doth not reject all Bishops but only such as stood in England and so concatenated to Chancellors Deans c. and with such an Explication Mr. Coleman gave it to the House of Lords If therefore you could prove that the Associated Ministers have taken the Covenant which you have not done yet that proves not that they were the Ejectors of the Bishops 6. There is no Bishop that we know of over this Diocese 7. You cannot prove that those that were Ordained by meer Presbyters might have had Episcopal Ordination of which more anon 8. It is not the Regularity of the Ordination that we desire you to acknowledge but only its being so that it is not a nullity So that you may see how unfaithfully you stated the case which is rather this Whether when the Bishop of this Diocess is dead and the rest taken down by the Reigning Power and we know not where to have Episcopal Ordination or at least without the great suffering of the Bishops on whom the present Powers will inflict so great a penalty if they Ordain if in this case any be Ordained by meer Presbyters are we bound to judge them no Ministers yea and to refuse Associating with others for their sakes Whether our Church doors must be shut up and Gods publick Worship thrown away till the Rulers will permit and the Presbyters and People admit Bishops again and Ministers and Churches all be null yea I do no find you prove that our Agreement requires any such acknowledgment as your self intimateth of which next Except Sect. 3. Mr. Baxter himself I name for one a Principal of this Association and protesting it one end of this Association that they may be acknowledged for true Presbyters and Pastors of their Churches by all who enter into this Agreement vid. p. 14. and the two last lines and p. 15. for eight lines also p. 14. Reas. 11. and Reas. 12. p. 47. mid and p. 49. fin Reply to Sect. 3. For my self I think you have more against me than any other Man in your Association But yet 1. you have not proved that I had not Episcopal Ordination which indeed I had 2. Nor that I consented to the removal of their Calling If I did so yet till you can know it you have no just ground for your alienation 3. If I did consent yet that nulleth not my former Call 4. You know not if I did whether I repent or not 5. No man must be rejected for a fault supposed without a just Tryal in all Equity you should hear me speak for my self I have publickly offered satisfaction to any that are offended with me 6. What if I only were faulty would that warrant you to separate from all the rest for my sake 7. But what do you alledge against me That I would have an acknowledgment that we are true Presbyters and Pastors A heinous Crime that I will not yield to have Gods Church among us unchurched by the Papists and his Worship cast aside for want of true Ministers 8. But what are all these Words of mine to the Agreement Those are but mine own Thoughts which none are desired to consent to You should have produced somewhat from our Articles of Concord and not from my Words Except to Sect. 4. Do they take in your acknowledged Grounds of all parts Episcopal and all who would have us acknowledge them Presbyters ordained in this Church without Bishops not by necessity as in the Churches wherein no Protestant Bishop could be had unless their Christian Charity can take Countenance to say that none of our Bishops were Protestants and that then they must have had no Ordination at all or Ordination by Papists requiring of them the Acknowledging the Popes Ecclesiastial Supremacy which was the confessed Case of those Protestants beyond Seas from whence they would fain borrow a Cloak for their Fact but the Covering is too short though they argue while the World endures there is a vast difference betwixt necessity and voluntary Engaging by Covenant and relinquishing casting off and laying by true Catholick Protestant Bishops Reply to Sect. 4. Yes Sir I am confident I take in the Grounds of the Episcopal Protestants But I dare not say yours for I do not know you nor are you able to manifest the contrary 1. Necessity may justify some things that else were unjustifiable and the absence of such Necessity may prove them sinful But if Presbyters may justly ordain in case of necessity then you will hardly prove our Ordination null for want of that Necessity though you should prove it irregular It seems you think that Lay Men may baptize in case of necessity if so you may prove it sinful but hardly null where Necessity is not 2. It is an incredible Assertion against the Sun that all those Protestants beyond Sea had such a Necessity and could not have Protestant Bishops Put out Mens Eyes and then tell them this Were the Low Countries so far from England that they could not possibly have borrowed a Bishop to Ordain Was not Bishop Carleton at the Synod of Dort with them why did not that Synod desire this Curtesy It is said he protested for Bishops in the open Synod and that he took their Silence for Consent and also that some after told him that they would have them if they could as if Silence were any Sign of Consent against their own established Discipline Who knows not that their loathness to displease King Iames of whom they had then so much need might well cause them to keep Silence about that which was not the Business of the Assembly as long as they held their present Government and if some said they would have Bishops if they could it is plain it was but few for if most had been willing what hindered them If you say the Civil Powers I answer 1. The Ecclesiasticks so taught them and desired the Presbyterian Government of them 2. They might have run the hazard of a Persecution as well as we and the civil Rulers of this Nation are as much at least against it as theirs So some gather from Moulin's Word to Bishop Andrews and some few other Mens that the French Churches would fain have Bishops as also they are said to have offered Obedience to the Papist Bishops if they would turn Protestants when as it is known they are against Bishops and if any particular Persons are for it it is against the Establishment of their Churches Perhaps they might think their Form of Government not of such Moment as to reject Episcopacy if it might come
is necessary absolutely to the Being of the Ministerial Calling I doubt not but all the unhappy Consequences will be unavoidable which you mention concerning the Churches of all the West But whether it be you or I that is to be blamed for those Consequences it is not your Word only that must determine and I am willing to try by weight of Reasons Except to Sect. 13. And now for the Proof of all this the whole weight is laid by this Book 1. Upon an Argument a comparatis If they the Protestants beyond Seas are lawful Pastors and Presbyters whose Necessity and Plea of Necessity publickly to have been made by those these our new Presbyterians cannot deny then our new ordained ones by Presbyters are Presbyters also though they want all such Pretence all colour of Necessity for themselves were the first Authors of it to those that ejected them which yet did not bring a Necessity neither which we all know If Necessity be pleaded to be above Ecclesiastical Laws as sometimes it hath dispensed even with divine positive Laws themselves then they pro imperio will be above them by their own Magisterial 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and by Consequence if they will take this to themselves that whatsoever is lawful to others upon necessity is and shall be lawful to themselves without Necessity they may in the next place Pope-like take to themselves to dispense with divine positive Laws also because necessity has sometimes dispensed with them Reply to Sect. 13. 1. You may as well say we dare not say the Sun Shineth as that we dare not deny the Protestant Churches to have been without Bishops to this day through necessity against their Wills when in almost all of them the full Power Civil and Ecclesiastical is supposed to be among themselves though I deny not but some particular Persons among them would fain have Bishops yet I think very few in comparison of those that were willing to be rid of them when they were received here 2. You boldly affirm without Proof that the Ministers of this County who were not ordained by Bishops were Ejectors of them or Authors of the Necessity 3. I shewed you before we have more Necessity than you mention and besides a Necessity whereof we are not guilty there may be a culpable Necessity which yet may free our calling from a nullity though not our selves from Sin What if God should permit all the Churches of Ethiopia or the Greeks to deny the Ius Divinum of Episcopacy which is possible as well as to permit the Reformed Churches to do i◠aud so to set up Ordination by meer Presbyters while I speak to you on your own Grounds I suppose this to be their Error and so their Sin yet would you presently unchurch them all and rather have God's Worship forborn as to the Publick There be many among us who are against Diocesan Bishops who give us good testimony of a sincere Heart impartial studying of the Point with as much self-denial and earnest Prayer for God's Direction as any Episcopal Man that ever I knew and yet remain against Episcopacy This kind of Necessity may sure free their Calling from the Charge of Nullity which needs not this Plea though it could not free them from the Charge of Error Except to Sect. 14. Instead of answering one Word to Ignatius God's Holy Saint and Martyr his renowned Epistles which he knew lately vindicated or to all the ancient Fathers avowing in terminis the jus divinum of Bishops above Presbyters and the Bishops sole Power of ordaining or producing any to the contrary he fills up his Books with Citations of modern Mens Writings which they all wrote charitably for the Patronage of those poor afflicted Protestants who had no Bishops because they could have none So that as well his Authorities as his Reasons are all drawn a loco comparatorum arguing weakly from the Priviledge of necessity to their licentiousness with or without Necessity which is one continued Sophism Reply to Sect. 14. 1. Though Ignatius were both a Saint and Holy yet I know not what call I had in those Papers to meddle with him Unless I must needs dispute the point of Episcopacy which I did disclaim 2. As I would not undervalue the late Vindicacation of Ignatius so I would not have you so far overvalue it as to think it should so easily and potently prevail 1. With all those that see not any Cogency in the Arguments or sufficiency in the Answers to the contrary Objections 2. Or with hose that will take Scripture only for the Test of this Cause 3. Or with those that are confident that you can never prove that Ignatius speaks of Diocesan Bishops but only of the Bishops of particular Churches 3. Your talk of all the Ancient Fathers avowing in terminis the Bishops sole Power of ordaining doth but discredit the rest of your Words You suppose us utter Strangers both to those Fathers and the English Bishops who maintain that Presbyters must be their Coadjutors in Ordination 4. What if I should grant that all the Fathers would have Bishops to have the sole Power of Ordaining ordinarily and for Order Sake And that it is a Sin of Disorder where unnecessarily it is done otherwise that 's nothing to the Question that I had in hand which is whether such Ordination by Presbyters be not only irregular but null and whether an uninterrupted Succession be necessary to our Office 5. I plainly perceive here again that you are loath to speak out your Mind but you seem to dissent from these charitable Maintainers of the Protestants Why else do you set Ignatius and the ancient Fathers as the Party that I should have respected instead of these if you did not think that the Fathers and these Men were contrary 6. My Business was to prove that according to the Principles of the Protestant Bishops in England our Ordination was not null eo Nomine because without a Bishop now I am blamed for proving this by Modern Writers and not Fathers If you will disclaim the Modern Protestant Bishops do not pretend to be of their Party but speak plainly If I fill up my Book with such Citations then I hope I was not deficient in bringing the Testimonies of the Protestant Episcopal Divines and yet many more I could cite to that end 7. To that of the Protestants Necessity enough is said till your Words are canonical or your Proof stronger I do not think but there are some Protestant Bishops so called at least in France and Holland now that went out of Britain and Ireland why cannot they ordain them Bishops in their extream Necessity Why did the angry Bishops so revile poor Calvin Beza the Churches of Geneva Scotland and many others for casting out Bishops and setting up Presbytery if all were done on a justifiable Necessity But enough of this Except to Sect. 15. But that these Authors cited by him may be authentical all the
say that God will make their Acts as useful to the honest Receiver as if the Ordainer had done it by just Authority and another to say that such an Ordainer had Authority because his Incapacity was not known or judged that is because it was not then known that he had none 2. Moreover if the Catholick Churches Acceptation and Reputation which you mention would serve turn then 1. It were well worth the knowing what you mean by the Catholick Church do you mean the whole or only a Part If the whole then few Ministers or Bishops must be so accepted for who is known to all Christians in the World If a Part then what Part must it be what if one Part repute him a true Minister or Bishop and the other a false or none which is very common If you say it is the People over whom he is Pastor then nothing more common then for them to be divided in their Judgments If you say it is the greater part then we shall be at utter Uncertainties for our Succession as little knowing what the greater part of the People thought of our Predecessors if you mean the Superior Bishops then a Metropolitan it seems is the Catholick Church when a Bishop is to be judged of and it is like a Patriarch for a Metropolitan and the Pope for him But as 1. We know not how these judged of our Predecessors 2. So we little believe that these Mens Judgments can make a Man to be a Bishop that is none or make him have a Power which else he had not this is worse than the Doctrine which hangs the Efficacy of the Sacraments on the Priests Intention It 's like the Faith of some that think to make a Falsehood become true by believing it true 3. And you know it is the Pope whose Succession we are questioning and which is the Catholick Church that must accept and repute him a true Pope If the Council of Basil were the Catholick Church then you know how Eugenius was reputed and then where is our Succession I doubt not but true Christians that are not guilty of the Nullity of the Ordination nor knew it may have the Benefit and Blessing of such a Man's Administrations and they may be valid to the Receiver But that is on another ground which I have lately manifessed to another in debating this Cause and not that the Administrator had any true Ministerial Authority from God Again I refer you to my Answer to Bellarmine and others in those Papers Except to Sect. 18. V.G. Put case one not baptized thought to have been baptized had per ignorantiam facti been promoted to be Bishop Archibishop or Patriarch yet so long as the Church knew it not nor himself perhaps but did accept him bona Fide though ipso Facto had it been known such had been uncapable of Episcopal Order yet being so accepted by the Catholick Church Ordinations done by him were not null nor did he interrupt the Succession but latente omni defectu baptismi he was a true Bishop though after his Death by any Writing they had come to discover it for the Church as all Judicatures rightly proceeds secundum allegata probata the same I say of secret Symony V. S. But on the other side to speak now to the Presbyterian Case Reply to Sect. 18. Nay then put Case the Man were not Ordained and the Church took him to be Ordained you say the Church must proceed secundum allegata probata doth not this give up your Cause and yield all that I plead for which is that an authoritative Ordination and so an uninterrupted Succession is not simply and absolutely necessary to the being of the Ministry For you confess your Churches Reputation may serve without it By the way take head least you either make the People to be none of the Catholick Church or at least you give a Power to the People to make Ministers Bishops and Popes by their bare Thoughts without Ordination or so much as Election But then you will remember that if Reputation without just Ordination may serve turn I know not but those among us may be Ministers whom you disclaim For the Pastors and People of all the Protestant Churches in Europe except your selves here do take such for Ministers so far as it is possible by Writings Professions and Practices to know their Minds and I hope they are as good a part of the Catholick Church as the Pope and his Consistory are If Reputation then will make Pastors without Ordination we may have as good a Plea as those you plead for For the case of Symony you mention see what I cited out of Dr. Hammond and you know sure that many Canons make Ordinations null and the Office null ipso Facto whether ever the Party be questioned in Judgment or not such Canons and Laws are equal to Sentences A Case also may be known that is never questioned and Judged who could question the Sodomitical unclean murderous Popes though it was commonly known I take it for granted therefore that the Knowledge degraded them without a Judgment according to your own Words here unless one part of them contradict the other Except to Sect. 19. The same ancient Church which did make void and annul constantly all Ordinations made by meer Presbyters whether they Schismatically arrogated to themselves to be Bishops and were not nor so reputed by the Church or otherwise upon any Pretention whatsoever for at that time no necessity could be with any Colour nor was pretended Reply to Sect. 19. 1. But is it the Judgment of the Ancient Church that will serve to degrade or null a Minister of this Age If so then all your former Arguing is in the Dust For though your Popes had none to Judge them Wicked and Uncapable then yet the ancient Church before them did make void and null the Office and Ordinations of such as they If it must be a present Power that must do it we have not yet been called to any Judicature about it 2. Your Parenthesis seems to intimate that if the Presbyters be but Reputed Bishops by the Church then their Ordinations are not null All 's well on our side then except you only or the Romanists be the whole Western Church For not only Pastors and People here do take Presbyters to be Bishops having Power of Ordination but so do the rest of the Reformed Churches or at least most of them They think that the primitive Bishop was the Bishop of one particular Church and not of a Diocess or many Churches 3. You talk of necessity again but you would not say that necessity would have excused them then if there had been such though it seems you would be thought to judge of the Reformed Churches as the Protestant Bishops do or else hide your Judgment in part Except to Sect. 20. These Three Fallacies are the Summ of all his Arguments rather popular Calumnies for want of Argument
without grand Sacriledge and Prophaneness although by Corruption of Persons and Times they have been either superstitiously abused or too prophanely employed but rather to reduce them to their primitive Use and Donation 18. Whether the ancient Fasting Days of the Week and Festivals of the Church setled both by Provincial Synods in the Year 1562. and 1640. and confirmed by the then Regal Power and also by several Statutes and Laws ought not by all persons in Conscience to be still observed until they be abrogated by the like Powers again or how far the Liberty of Conscience therein may be used in observing or not observing them the like for the usage of the Cross in Baptism and the humble posture of Kneeling at the receiving of the blessed Sacrament of the Lord's Supper 19. Which way of security and peace of Conscience may a quiet Christian order and dispose himself his Wife Children and Family in his Duty and Service towards God and enjoy the right use and benefit of the Sacraments and other holy Duties as long as that part of the Catholick Church wherein he lives is under persecution and the visible Ruling Church therein is faln Schismatical if not in many particulare Heretical April 20th 1655. May 14th 1655. An Answer to the foregoing Questions sent to Sir R. Clare Ad Quest. 1m. EIther that Conscience owneth the right Religion and Discipline only or the right with some tolerable accidental Errours or a wrong Religion and Discipline in the Substance The first the Magistrate must not only tolerate but promote The second he must tolerate rather than do worse by suppressing it The third he must suppress by all lawful means and tolerate when he cannot help it without a greater Evil. I suppose no Judicious Man will expect an exact Solution of so Comprehensive a Question in few words And I find not that a large Discussion is now expected from me There are four or five Sheets of my Manuscripts in some hands abroad on this Point which may do more towards a satisfactory Solution than these few words Ad 2m. Either the tender Conscience is in the right or in the wrong If in the wrong the Magistrates Liberty will not make a Sin to be no Sin but the Party is bound by God to rectifie his Judgment and thereby his Practice If in the right it is a strange Question Whether a Man may obey God that hath the Magistrates leave till he be enforced by Mens violence Doth any doubt of it Ad 3m. Matter of Government depending only on Fact is a Contradiction Seeing Government consisteth in a Right and the Exercise of it I am not able therefore to understand this Question Yet if this may afford any help toward the Solution I affirm That the general and perpetual practice of the Church from Age to Age of a thing not forbidden by the Word of God will warrant our imitation I say of a thing not forbidden because it hath been the general and perpetual practice of the Church to Sin by vain Thoughts Words imperfect Duties c. wherein our imitation is not warrantable The general and perpetual practice includeth the Apostles and that Age. But what is meant by Evidencing the Right of a thing that dependeth only of Fact or by Evidencing the Truth and Certainty of a Fact by general and perpetual practice which is to prove idem per idem I will not presume that I understand Ad 4m. I know not what Bishops you mean A Congregational Bishop overseeing the People is undoubtedly lawful so is a Congregational Bishop being President of a Presbytery which is over that Congregation Where many Congregational Officers are associated I do not think that a President for a time or during his fitness standing and fixed is unlawful The like I may say of a President of many of those Associations again associated as in a Province or Diocess And I believe it were a very easie work for wise godly moderate men to agree about his Power And I would not seem so censorious as to proclaim that England wanteth such further than the actual want of such Agreement or just endeavours thereto doth proclaim it I am satisfied also that the Apostles themselves have de jure Successors in all that part of their work which is to be perpetuated or continued till now though not in their extraordinary Endowments and Priviledges But if the sence of your Question be Whether one Man may be the standing chief Governour of many particular Churches with their Officers having either sole power of Ordination and Jurisdiction as some would have or a Negative Voice in both as others it would seem great arrogancy in me to be the confident Determiner of such a Question which so wise learned godly sober Men have said so much of on both sides already Ad 5m. 1. He that knows how short Church History is in these Matters for the first Age after the Apostles at least and hath read impartially what Gersom Bucerus Parker Blondellus Salmasius Altare Damascen have said on one side and Saravia Downham Dr. Hammond c. on the other would sure never expect that I should presume to pass any confident Sentence in the Point And it 's like he would be somewhat moderate himself 2. I say as before I know not what you mean by Bishops I am confident that the Church was not of many Hundred years after Christ governed as ours was lately in England by a Diocesan Bishop and a Chancellor excluding almost all the Presbyters 3. Why do you say Since the Apostles days when you before spoke of the General and perpetual practice of the Church Ad 6m. The word National Church admits of divers sences As it was usually understood in England I think there was none for divers hundred years after Christ either governed by Bishops or without them They that will look after the most encouraging Presidents must look higher than National Churches Ad 7m. The Question seems not to mean any particular truly-schismatical Party of Ministers but the generality that live not under the Bishops and so I answer negatively waiting for the Accusers proof Ad 8m. 1. I know not what the Oath of Canonical Obedience is therefore cannot give a full Answer I know multitudes of Ministers ordained by Bishops that never took any such Oath 2. The Powers that violently took down the Bishops were the Secular Powers None else could use violence And it were a strange Oath for a Man to swear that he would never obey the Secular Powers if they took down the Bishops when the Holy Ghost would have us obey Heathen Persecutors 3. If it were so great a Sin to obey those Powers I conceive it must be so to the Laity as well as the Ministry And I knew but few of the Episcopal Gentry or others called to it that did refuse to take the Engagement to be true and faithful to that Power when the Presbyters here accused durst not take it
Power that they had by the meer Interest of their Gifts and Priviledge of being Eye Witnesses of the Works of Christ and Ear Witnesses of his Words Answ. 7. The extraordinary Gifts of the Apostles and the Priviledge of being Eye and Ear Witnesses to Christ were Abilities which they had for the infallible Discharge of their Function but they were not the Ground of their Power and Authority to govern the Church That the Seventy and so other Presbyters were inferior to the Apostles and under their Government doth appear to me though at their first sending by Christ they were immediately subject to Christ the Apostles not being then established in the Government of the Church but when Christ authorised his Apostles with the Power of Government Potestas Clavium was committed to them only not to the Seventy and so we must conceive that the Colledge of Apostles were invested with the Government of the Church and the Seventy not having the Keys committed to them were under the Authority of the Apostles and so were Presbyters to the Apostles Successors Prop. 3. If the Apostles Example will prove the right of an unfixed ambulatory Episcopacy yet I would see how it appears that ever they were fixed to particular Charges or ever any of them had a distinct and limited Diocess where the rest had not Charge as well as they Answ. 8. I conceive the Apostles as Apostles had an unlimited and as you call it an unfixed ambulatory Episcopacy being sent into the whole World and not by Christ's Institution confined to any one fixed Seat but yet that hinders not but that by Consent and Agreement among themselves they might have a Distribution of their several Circuits as it is seen in the Agreement between St. Peter and St. Paul which as it did not exclude their original Power over all Churches so it did accommodate them to a more opportune Discharge of their Function and accordingly they setled their Successors in those Places not committing to them an universal Jurisdiction which was a Personal Priviledge of their Apostleship Prop. 4. I am satisfied that very early after the Apostles the common Government of each Church was by a Bishop and Presbytery but yet I can see no Evidence that this Church for 150 or 200 Years was any more than one Congregation like one of our Parishes for Number of People which was congregated in a City and from the circumjacent Villages as our Independant or Anabaptist Churches now are while the Multitude were Infidels I would therefore crave any clear Proof that the first fixed Bishops ruled any more standing Congregations having ordinarily Assemblies and Communion in the Lord's Supper than one only and whether the multiplying of Believers did not make a real Change of the former Species of Government while the Bishop of the City took on him the Government of many particular Churches who had but one before and whether Bishops should not have been multiplied as fast as Churches were and Presbyters were Answ. 9. That the Government of the Churches was not only Vicatim but Regionatim appears by those Deputies and Successors which the Apostles constituted in particular Titus is authorised to ordain and govern not one Parish but the many Churches in Crete That those primitive Bishops did employ their ordinary Function of Preaching and adminstring the Sacrament in their City of Residence may well be granted which hinders not but that they might have Inspection into the circumjacent Villages for ordaining of Presbyters and other Administrations of Government and what needed a Colledge of Presbyters residing in the City with the Bishop if they were not sent out by him to officiate in those Villages adjacent as the Number of Believers required not did the multiplying of Believers in the adjacent places require several Bishops in several Congregations independent on the City Bishop but the ordinary Discharge of those Places was committed to them in Subordination to the City-Bishop and Presbyters there assembled as occasion required In this Case it fared with the Church as in Philosophy they say it is in the matter of Nutrition and Augmentation where the form is not multiplied but only extended ad novam materiam These Answers not changing my Judgment I made the following Notes upon them Ad 1. Every Church Primae magnitudinis speciei should be as great and no greater than is capable of PERSONAL Communion as our greater Parishes and every such Church had of old a Bishop One Altar and one Bishop was Ignatius's Note of one Church and such a one may maintain divers Ministers and the Rich should not burden the Church for maintenance but help freely Ad 2. This is a President of a Synod of Bishops Ad 3. I thank you for granting Presbyters to be Church-Rectors Ad 4. If he be but a President he is but a Bishop Primi Ordinis of one Church as the rest But if he be the stated Rector of many Churches he is really an Archbishop Ad 5. This was written when our Diocesane Frame was taken down to reconcile them that were for and them that were against such Bishops pro tempore If you take liberty to cast off the Example of Cyprian's times on pretence that the Case is altered by the Kings Laws then you will never know where to rest while Laws are alterable Qu. Whether the Practice of the Church till Cyprian's time be not a probable Notice to us what was the Apostolical instituted Government If not why use you the Argument of Antiquity for Episcopacy If yea Qu. Whether Rulers may alter the Apostolick Institution and the Office and work of Presbyters may be changed on pretence that now Bishops can do it without them He that ever tryed true Discipline will find one Parish big enough for one Man's or divers Mens right Performance of it and Six hundred or a Thousand Parishes too many Alas do you think it Lawful to ordain insufficient unmeet Men if the Law of the Land so command you what then are Christ's Laws for Ad. 6. Here I granted you the major of your grand Argument for Episcopacy Ad 7. The Apostles Superiority of Power I deny not but that the Power of the Keys was given to the Apostles only I deny If Christ immediately gave it to no other yet by his Spirit he did and by the Church-Law which he left to be the Instrument of continued conveyance and Title by which the Apostles were to invest others with that Power which the Schoolmen ordinarily acknowledge to belong to Presbyters as such who may use them to the People Ad 8. 1. De facto it is no where proved truly that the Twelve or Thirteen Apostles did by consent limit their Provinces But contrarily that they Officiated together at Ierusalem and Peter if at Rome as some think he was and Paul in the same Diocess at Rome c. and Paul and Iohn at Ephesus and Timothy also as is said 2. If they had this had been
E. g. The Time and Place of their Convention must be agreed on by them and the lesser part must yield to the greater or else by diffent no time or place may ever be agreed on So that if the greater part agree on one Translation of the Bible to be used in all the associated Churches or on one Version of the Singing Psalms it will tend much to Edification and agrees with the Scripture Commands of Unity If therefore that which they agree on seem to a particular Church or Pastor no better than another Version or scarce so good yet for Unity if it be not unlawful or like to be more hurtful than the Diversity will be they ought to concur But still be it remembred that the Churches Peace or Unity should be laid by Agreements on nothing unnecessary And therefore all agreements may not be seconded with an avoiding all Dissenters 17. Because in the great Case of taking Members from other Churches or Parishes the Exception from the general Rule of Parish Limits cannot be so enumerated as punctually to resolve each Doubt that may occur let us first lay down what Rules or Exceptions we can agree on at least this general that we will take no such Person into our Churches when it tendeth more to the hurt than the furtherance of the common Good and Christian Cause And therefore that we will first bring the particular case to the Association or at least be there responsible concerning it as we are about other Church Affairs Accordingly when any is actually offended that another hath taken a Member out of his or another's Church or Parish let the Association hear the case on both sides and if they justifie the accused there is an End if not they are to convince him or them that they go against some Rule of Scripture or Nature e. g. against the Honour of Christ and good of the Churches or christian Cause And if neither he nor they can be convinced nor brought to reform after sufficient Admonition it must be considered whether the case be small and tollerable or great and intollerable If the former we must bear with it yet professing our Judgment against it if intollerable we must proceed to disclaim Communion with the guilty and so to exclude them from the Association and common Communion which yet must not be done but in heinous cases And thus the particular cases must be tryed and concluded as they fall out for there is no laying down any Rule beforehand that will fit all cases particularly 18. Those first Associations being composed of such Pastors and Churches as are near and within a capacity of such Communion as aforesaid voluntarily combined should also hold correspondence with Neighbour Associations either by Delegates in some more general Meetings as in each County one or at least by Letters and Messengers which Communion is to be extended even as far as our Natural Capacity extendeth and the Edification or Preservation of the Churches shall require it And thus the Presbyterians and Congregational Men are agreed if they are willing If all will not let those agree that have hearts and not stay for the rest And here you see a Satisfaction to your two Demands My Question was What are the things that the Congregational must have and will insist on the denial whereof doth binder our Unity and Agreement Your Answer was in these words To manage all Church Affairs by the Elders and Brethren within themselves and without dependance unless for Advice on any other Ecclesiastical Power 2. To take in such as are qualified and freely offer themselves to joyn though of other Parishes Yet so as if a particular Church in that Parish which for the Substance is gathered according to the Order of the Gospel and the Party a Member thereof an account is to be given to the Church or the Elders of it of the Cause of his removal that it may be if possible with consent And this is all that hinders our Agreement it seems Alas 1. For the first it is granted you in terminis only in point of Ordination yield but to be Ordained by Teaching Elders which you confess lawful and others think necessary And remember 1. That to depend on other Ecclesiastical Power even for Advice is a great dependance 2. That to depend on them not as a Superiour Power but as a Link upon the Chain for Union and Communion we can never exempt you from nor will you sure desire it There is a fourfold Advice 1. An Authoratative Advice of Governours as Parents Schoolmasters Pastors to their Inferiours who are bound to obey them on a double account ratione materiae authoritatis Thus the Pastors in a Synod advise their Flocks conjunctly 2. The Authoratative Advice of one Officer to another And so as we preach to one another I think as Christ's Ministers we must advise one another 3. An Advice of a Major part among Equals in Order to Union and Concord and this is the Principal to be respected in these Conventions 4. An Advice of a private Person not authorized by Office and this binds but ratione materiae c. 2. To your second you will grant as I hope by the printed Debates that ordinarily Parish-bounds shall be the Rule for Limitation alter Parishes if they be amiss and that you 'l not swerve from this Rule but upon necessary Cause and not when it is to the apparent wrong of the Cause and Interest of Christ and you will yield to be responsible to the Association which you are a Member of concerning the Case when you are questioned And this shall agree us And why should I not add two Propositions for Peace with the Episcopal That way or the Persons are not so contemptible if you consider the Antiquity the great Difficulty their Number and Extent and the Works of many of them as to be refused our Communion though on some Abatements to them Prop. 19. Let therefore these Presbyteries of particular Churches have one to be the stated President as long as he is found fittest and let all the Associations at least where Episcopal worthy Men require it have such fixed Presidents quam diu bene se gesserint as your Assembly at Westminster had by common Consent Bishop Hall and Usher say this will satisfie but it will not without the next Prop. 20. Seeing the Presbyterians and Congregational say That except in case of necessity it 's lawful to forbear Ordination till the President be there and One and to take him with you and the Episcopal say That it 's of necessity therefore let the Case of Necessity and the Title be purposely silenced and left to each Man's Judgment but de facto let your Licet yield for Peace to their Oportet at least for some years trial And agree to Ordain none but in necessity without the President as he shall Ordain none without the Consent of the Association or at least the Elders of the
Liturgy and Ceremonies we most humbly represent unto your Majesty 1. First For Church-Government that although upon just Reasons we do dissent from that Ecclesiastical Hierarchy or Prelacy disclaimed in the Covenant as it was stated and exercised in these Kingdoms yet we do not nor ever did renounce the true Ancient and Primitive Presidency as it was ballanced and managed by a due Commixtion of Presbyters therewith as a fit means to avoid Corruptions Partiality Tyranny and other Evils which may be incident to the Administration of one single Person Which kind of attempered Pesidency if it shall be your Majesty's grave Wisdom and gracious Moderation be in such a manner constituted as that the forementioned and other like Evils may be certainly prevented we shall humbly submit thereunto And in Order to an happy Accommodation in this weighty Business we desire humbly to offer unto your Majesty some of the Particulars which we conceive were amiss in the Episcopal Government as it was practised before the Year 1640. 1. The great Extent of the Bishops Diocess which was much too large for his own personal Inspection wherein he undertook a Pastoral Charge over the Souls of all those within his Bishoprick which must needs be granted to be too heavy a Burthen for any one Man's Shoulders The Pastoral Office being a Work of Personal Ministration and Trust and that of the highest Concernment to the Souls of the People for which they are to give an Account to Christ. 2. That by Reason of this Disability to discharge their Duty and Trust personally the Bishops did depute the Administration of much of their Trust even in matters of spiritual Cognizance to Commissaries Chancellors and Officials whereof some were Secular Persons and could not administer that Power which originally appertaineth to the Pastors of the Church 3. That those Bishops who affirm the Episcopal Office to be a distinct Order by Divine Right from that of the Presbyter did assume the sole Power of Ordination and Jurisdiction to themselves 4. That some of the Bishops exercised an Arbitrary Power as by sending forth their Books of Articles in their Visitations and therein unwarrantably enquiring into several things and swearing the Church-Wardens to present accordingly So also by many Innovations and Ceremonies imposed upon Ministers and People not required by Law and by suspending Ministers at their Pleasure For reforming of which Evils we humbly crave leave to offer unto your Majesty 1. The late most Reverend Primate of Ireland his Reduction of Episcopacy unto the Form of Synodical Government received in the ancient Church as a Ground-work towards an Accommodation and fraternal Agreement in this Point of Ecclesiastical Government Which we rather do not only in regard of his eminent Piety and singular Ability as in all other Parts of Learning so in that especially of the Antiquities of the Church but also because therein Expedienâ— are offered for healing these Grievances And in order to the same end we further humbly desire that the Suffragans or Corepiscopi mentioned in the Primate's Reduction may be chosen by the respective Synods and by that Election be sufficiently authorized to discharge their Trust. That the Associations may not be so large as to make the Discipline impossible or to take off the Ministers from the rest of their necessary Imployments That no Oaths or Promises of Obedience to the Bishops nor any unnecessary Subscriptions or Engagements be made necessary to Ordination Institution Induction Ministration Communion or Immunities of Ministers they being responsible for any Transgression of the Law And that no Bishops nor any Ecclesiastical Governors may at any time exercise their Government by their own private Will or Pleasure but only by such Rules Canons and Constitutions as shall be hereafter by Act of Parliament ratified and established and that sufficient Provision be made to secure both Ministers and People against the Evils of Arbitrary Government in the Church 2. Concerning the Liturgy 1. We are satisfied in our Judgments concerning the Lawfulness of a Liturgy or Form of publick Worship provided that it be for the matter agreeable unto the Word of God and fitly suited to the Nature of the several Ordinances and the necessity of the Church nether too tedious in the whole nor composed of too short Prayers unmeet Repetitions or Responsals nor too dissonant from the Liturgies of other Reformed Churches nor too rigorously imposed nor the Minister so confined thereunto but that he may also make use of those Gifts for Prayer and Exhortation which Christ hath given him for the Service and Edification of the Church 2. That inasmuch as the Book of Common Prayer hath in it many things that are justly offensive and need amendment hath been long discontinued and very many both Ministers and People Persons of Pious Loyal and Peaceable Minds are therein greatly dissatisfied whereupon if it be again imposed will inevitably follow sad Divisions and widening of the Breaches which your Majesty is now endeavouring to heal We do most humbly offer to your Majesty's Wisdom that for preventing so great Evil and for setling the Church in Unity and Peace some Learned Godly and Moderate Divines of both Perswasions indifferently chosen may be imployed to Compile such a Form as is before described as much as may be in Scripture words or at least to Revise and effectually Reform the old together with an Addition or Insertion of some other varying Forms in Scripture phrase to be used at the Minister's Choice of which Variety and Liberty there be Instances in the Book of Common Prayer 3. Concerning Ceremonies We humbly represent that we hold our selves obliged in every part of Divine Worship to do all things decently in order and to Edification and are willing therein to be determined by Authority in such things as being meerly Circumstantial are common to Humane Actions and Societies and are to be ordered by the Light of Nature and Christian Prudence according to the General Rules of the Word which are always to be observed And as to divers Ceremonies formerly retained in the Church of England We do in all Humility offer unto your Majesty these ensuing Considerations That the Worship of God is in it self perfect without having such Ceremonies affixed thereto That the Lord hath declared himself in the Matters that concern his Worship to be a Iealous God and this Worship of his is certainly then most pure and most agreeable to the Simplicity of the Gospel and to his holy and jealous Eyes when it hath least of Humane Admixtures in things of themselves confessedly unnecessary adjoyned and appropriated thereunto upon which account many faithful Servants of the Lord knowing his Word to be the perfect Rule of Faith and Worship by which they must judge of his Acceptance of their Services and must be themselves judged have been exceeding fearful of varying from his Will and of the danger of displeasing him by Additions or Detractions in such Duties wherein they must
that seeing the greatning or the lessening of Episcopal Power is in your Majesty's Judgment but a Matter of Convenience the Lord will put it into your Heart to make such an Alteration in the alterable Points as the Satisfaction of the Consciences of sober Men and the Healing and Union of these Nations do require As to our Plea for Primitive Episcopacy the Offices and Ordinances of Christ must be still distinguished from the alterable Accidents Though we plead not for the Primitive Poverty Persecution or Restraints yet must we adhere to the Primitive Order and Worship and Administrations in the Substance as believing that the Circumstantiating of them is much committed unto Man but to institute the Ordinances and Offices is the high Prerogative of Christ the Universal King and Law-giver of the Church Concerning the Matter of your Majesty's Concessions as related to our Proposals 1. WE humbly renew our Petition to your Majesty for the effectual Security of those premised Necessaries which are the Matter of our chiefest Care and whereunto the Controverted Points subserve viz. 1. That private Exercises of Piety might be encouraged 2. That an able faithful Ministry may be kept up and the insufficient negligent scandalous and non-resident cast out 3. That a credible Profession of Faith and Obedience be pre-required of Communicants 4. That the Lord's Day be appropriated to Hâ—ly Exercises without unnecessary Divertisements 2. For Church-Government In this your Majesty's Declaration Parish Discipline is not sufficiently granted us Inferiour Synods with their Presidents are passed by and the Bishop which your Majesty declareth for is not Episcopus Praeses but Episcopus Princeps indued with sole Power both of Ordination and Iurisdiction For though it be said That the Bishop shall do nothing without the Advice of Presbyters yet their Consent is not made necessary but he might go contrary to the Counsel of them all And this Advice is not to be given by the Diocesan Synod or any chosen Representatives of the Clergy but by the Dean and Chapter and so many and such others as â—e please to call In all which there being nothing yielded us which is sufficient to the desired Accommodation and Union we humbly prosecute our Petition to your Majesty that the Primitive Presidency with the respective Synods described by the late Reverend Primate of Ireland may be the Form of Church-Government established among us At least in these Three needful Points 1. That the Pastors of the respective Parishes may be allowed not only publickly to Preach but personally to Catechize or otherwise Instruct the several Families admitting none to the Lord's Table that have not personally owned their Baptismal Covenant by a credible Profession of Faith and Obedience and to admonish and exhort the Scandalous in order to their Repentance to hear the Witnesses and the accused Party and to appoint fit Times and Places for these things and to deny such Persons the Communion of the Church in the Holy Eâ—charist that remain impenitent or that wilfully refuse to come to their Pastors to be instructed or to answer such probable Accusations and to continue such Exclusion of them till they have made a credible Profession of Repentance and then to receive them again to the Communion of the Church provided there be place for due Appeals to Superiour Power All this we beseech your Majesty to express under your Fifth Concession because it is to us of very great weight and the Rubrick is unsatisfactory to which we are referred 2. That all the Pastors of each Rural Deaneries having a stated President chosen by themselves if your Majesty please to grant them that liberty may meet once a Month and may receive Presentments of all such Persons as notwithstaning Suspension from Communion of the Church continue impenitent or unreformed and having further admonished them may proceed to the Sentence of Solemn Excommunication if after due patience they cannot prevail And may receive the Appeals of those that conceive themselves injuriously Suspended and may decide the Cause Or if this cannot be attained at least that the Pastors of each Rural Deanery with their President may have power to meet Monthly and receive all such Presentments and Appeals and judge whether they be fit to be transmitted to the Diocesan or not and to call before them and admonish the Offenders so presented Yet if Presentments against Magistrates and Ministers be reserved only to the Diocesan Synod and their Appeals immediately there put in we shall therein submit to your Majesty's pleasure 3. That a Diocesan Synod consisting of the Delegates of the several Rural Synods be called as often as need requireth and that without the Consent of the major part of them the Diocesan may not Ordain or Exercise any Spiritual Censures on any of the Ministers nor Excommunicate any of the People but by consent of the Synod or of the Pastors of the particular Parishes where they had Communion And that not only Chancellors but also Arch-deacons Commissaries and Officials as such may pass no Censures purely Spiritual But for the Exercise of Civil Government coercively by Mulcts or Corporal Penalties by Power derived from your Majesty as Supream over Persons and in things Ecclesiastical we presume not at all to interpose but shall submit to any that act by your Majesty's Commission Our Reasons for the first part of Discipline viz. in particular Parishes are these IT is necessary to the Honour of the Christian Profession to the integrity of Worship to the destruction of Impiety and Vice to the Preservation of the Sound the raising them that are Fallen the comforting of the Penitent the strengthning of the Weak the Purity Order Strength and Beauty of our Churches the Vanity of Believers and the Pleasing of Christ who hath required it by his Laws And withal it is agreeable to the ancient Canons and Practice of the Churches and is consented to by our Reverend Brethren and so is no Matter of Controversie now between us Yet is not the Rubrick satisfactory which we are referred to 1. Because it leaves the People at their liberty whether they will let us know of their intention to Communicate till the Night or Morning before and alloweth us then only to admonish them when in great Parishes it is impossible for want of time 2. Because it doth allow us to deny the Sacrament to those only that maliciously refuse Reconciliation with their Neighbourâ—s and only admonish other scandalous Sinners to sorbear Though the Canons forbid us to deliver them the Sacrament The Reasons why we insist on the second Proposal are these It being agreed on between us That the younger less discreet sort of Ministers are unfit to pass the Sentence of Excommunication without Advice and Moderation by others and every Church is not like to be provided with grave discreet judicious Guides the necessity of these frequent lesser Synods for such Moderation and Advice and Guidance will appear by these two general Evidences 1.
the thing to avoid Errour but yet I think that none should stick much at this because it is but de Nomine and afterwards you seem to leave a true Governing Power not only in the Presbyters but in the Pastors and Elders of the Parish-Churches 7. Seeing your Moderators are truly Bishops as described and others also if the Parishes be true Churches why is Ordination appropriated to the Bishops so called Do you intend that he shall do it by Consent of his Synod or a Presbytery or by his own Power alone 2. Is he to suspend depose and excommunicate by himself alone as this General seems to intimate or only in and by Consent of his Synod or Presbytery 3. The same also I ask as to his Transplanting Ministers as he sees useful for if he may do all this himself ad libitum it may discourage a Man from meddling with the Ministery when after all his Study and Labour it is at the Bishop's pleasure whether he shall Preach or be Suspended For though you after say for what Faults he shall be Suspended yet that signifieth nothing if the Bishop be Judge Of Appeals as a dear Remedy and doubtful Men will be diffident And Transplanting may undo a Minister at the Bishop's Pleasure And I doubt the absolute Deprival of the People of their Power of Consent or Dissent in this and other Cases of Title to their proper Pastors will be found 1. contrary to the nature of the Pastoral Work 2. to the Scripture 3. and to all Antiquity and practice of the Catholick Church for many Hundred Years 15. If it had been said that none but such Bishops shall have power to pronounce the Major Excommunication or that which is now called Excommunication in Scotland to which Horning c. is annexed it would have less founded to the contradiction of Antiquity c. For Suspension from the Communion which you allow to particular Churches and Presbyteries is called by many the minor Excommunication and by some a Temporary Conditional Excommunication and by others as Sir Wil. Morrice is written against as an unlawful thing 'till some just Excommunication precede 22. Might but the Moderator with his Presbytery by consent Ordain it would more satisfie 24. In Transplanting both Moderators and Pastors should not either their own Consent or the Presbytery's or People's be made necessary 31. The words of the Formula of Ordination will be material as to honest Men's reception or refusal of the Office 32. The Office of a Pastor as instituted in Scripture is not only to Baptize and celebrate the Sacrament of Communion but also to Judge by the power of the Keys whom to Baptize and to whom to give the Sacrament of Communion that is in Subordination to Christ's Prophetical Preistly and Kingly Office to be his Minister in Office 1. To teach the People 2. To go before them in Worship 3. To guide them by the Keys of Discipline And he is no true Minister that wanteth any one of these Powers however he may be hindered from the Exercise 33. At least 1. Necessity ad finem 2. Scripture 3. And the Catholick Antiquity should be so far regarded as to make the People's Consent necessary though not their Election at least when they do not by unreasonable Denial forfeit this Priviledge 35. If this be a limitation of Can. 7. it s well A. 3. viz. Supposing there be a tolerable Pastor there and no notorious necessity for some Parishes may have no Pastor some worse than none and some with us as many in London-Parishes Stepney Giles Cripplegate Sepulchres Martins c. have more Souls than ten Men can Teach and Over-see who must not therefore be forsaken and given up to Satan what-ever we suffer for endeavouring their Salvation 47. A Bishop if he please may thus causlesly keep most Ministers in his Diocess from Preaching the Gospel for the most part of their Lives I had rather be punished as a Rogue at a Whipping Post before I am fully heard and judged than have innocent Souls deprived of the usual means of their Salvation under pretence of Punishing me At least let no Suspension be valid longer than the place is competently supplied by another 48. Will no Mulcts or Stripes satisfie the Law without Silencing Men and forbidding them to endeavour Men's Salvation before their Crimes are proved such as render them uncapable of that work 49. But hath the Synod or Presbytery a Negative Voice in his punishment or not 50. For Treason and Murder there is reason for it but if every Man must be deposed from the Ministry that did ever Curse Swear or had any scandalous Vice from his Child-hood before his Ordination or Conversion I doubt the number left will be too small 53. The old Canons distinguished Some Crimes left so great a blot as made Men uncapable others did not so If such a War should break out as between the Emperor Henry IV. c. and the Pope or between the Houses of York and Lancaster the prevailing Party will force the Ministers to own him and if the other Party after prevail their Crime will be called Treason and all the Churches left desolate and the Peoples Souls forsaken by the Ministers perpetual incapacity and the King 's pardoning Power much restrained 54. Why should it be left to the Bishop's Will whether he will restore such a Penitent or not 56. Peaceable Men will consent that no Ministers should be permitted to Preach or Talk Seditiously against even those Rules of Government which they do not approve But this Penalty is so high and severe that few worthy Ministers will think their Station secure but will prepare for Banishment For 1. These Rules are many 2. And Derogatory is a large Word and will extend far 3. And there are few worthy Ministers that have no Drunkards Fornicators c. for their Enemies to accuse them E. g. if I lived in Scotland and should but read Blondel de jure Plebis in regimine Ecclesiastico and say it is sound Doctrine and this in Discourse at my own Table I might be thus troubled and banished it being derogatory to that part of the King's Rules as here exprest which deprive the People of all power of Consent c. Is it not enough that this Paper of Canons be so far equalled with God's Word yea with the very Articles of our Faith as that the open Oppugners of them have the same Penalty as open Hereticks who of old were after a first and second Admonition to be avoided And surely I think even that this is too much and yet I would have turbulent Preaching against the Government or Endeavours openly to subvert it restrained But methinks after the first and second Admonition a competent Mulct might do that sufficiently till Men go so far as to be turbulent Incendiaries 63. Shall the Presbytery have a Negative Voice in the Ordination or be Cyphers 66. It is well that the Elders Consent is
enjoy what Success is such a Dispute like to have either with the People or with the Adversary will they not tell us our Church is invisible especially when these few Bishops are dead Except to Sect. 6. 2. Whether in this Worcestershire Association whosoever will enter into it doth not therein oblige himself to acknowledge that Presbyters while there remain alive fourteen or thirteen or twelve Catholick Protestant Bishops may proceed to publick Excommunications and Absolutions in foro Ecclesiastico without asking those Bishops Consent allowance or taking any notice of them See Resolution 12 13 14 15. and the Scope of the whole Book Reply to Sect. 6. To your second Question I answer The Term Excommunication we use not This Term is used to signify sometimes a delivering up to Satan and casting out of the Catholick Church sometimes only a Ministerial Declaration that such a Person should be avoided by the People acquainting them with their Duty and requiring them to perform it sometimes it signifies the Peoples actual Avoidance In the former Sense we have let it alone and that which you call your Excommunicatio Major we meddle not with much less do we usurp a compelling Power for the Execution The other we know to be consistent with the Principles of Episcopal Protestants if not also with Papists yea even when there is a Bishop resident in the Diocess it being but part of our teaching and guiding Office as Presbyters of that Congregation but I have said enough of this in my Explications already 2. But what if there be twelve latent Bishops in England when for my part I I hear not of above two or three have they Power not only to ordain but also to govern other Diocesses which have no Bishops Yea must they needs govern them 1. Woe then to the Churches of England that must live under such Guilt devoid of all Government 2. Woe to the Sinners themselves that must be left without Christ's Remedy 3. Woe to particular Christians that must live in the continual Breach of God's known Law that saith with such go not to eat c. for want of a Bishop to Execute it 4. Woe to the few Bishops that be for it all the Authority be in them then the Duty and Charge of executing it is only on them and then they are bound to Impossibilities one Bishop must Excommunicate all the Offenders in a great part of the Land when he is not sufficient to the hundredth part of the Work Then when all the Bishops in England are dead save one or two they are the sole Pastors of England and all Discipline must be cast away for want of their Sufficiency Then it seems the Death of one Bishop or two or three doth actually devolve their Charge to another and who knoweth which other This is new Canon Not only Protestant Bishops but some Papists confess that when a Bishop is dead the Government remains in the Presbyters till another be chosen sure they that govern the People at least with him whilst he is living as is confessed need not look on it as an alien supereminent transcendent Work when he is dead Bishop Bromhall against Mil. p. 127. gives People a Judgment of Discretion and Pastors a Judgment of Direction and to the chief Pastors a Judgment of Jurisdiction You may go well allow us by a Judgment of Direction to tell the People that they should avoid Communion with an open wicked Man even while a Bishop is over us Selden de Syne c. 8 9 10. and will tell you another Tale of the way of Antiquity in Excommunication and Absolution than you do hear But of this enough in the Books Except to Sect. 7. 3. Doth not he oblige himself also to acknowledge that not only Presbyters incommuni governing but one single one of them may proceed to Excommunicatiand Absolution in foro Ecclesiastico Reply to Sect. 7. Your third Question I answer by a Denial There is no such Obligation The Declaration of the Peoples Duty to avoid such an one is by one so is every Sermon so is your Episcopal Excommunication Doth not one and that a Presbyter declare or publish it But for advising and determining of it we have tyed our selves not to do it alone though for mine own private Opinion I doubt not easily to prove that one single Bishop or Pastor hath the Power of the Keys and may do all that we agree to do Except to Sect. 8. 4. That not only one single Presbyter but one whose Ordination was never by any Bishop to be Presbyter where also Bishops were that might have been sought unto hath that Power also of Excommunication c. Reply to Sect. 8. Your fourth is answered in the rest if his Ordination have only in the Judgment of Episcopal Protestants yea of some Papists an Irregularity but not a Nullity then he hath Power to do so much as we agree on Your Exception is as much against his other Ministrations Except to Sect. 9. I speak only of the Essence of their Association not insisting on what Mr. Baxter declares to the World that in some Cases the People not satisfied with the Bishops or Presbyters Ordination may accept or take a Man of themselves without any Ordination by Bishops or Presbyters to be their Pastor and Presbyter with Power of Excommunication and Absolution in himself alone without the People see p. 83. Reply to Sect. 9. That this may be done in some Cases I have lately disputed it with a learned Man of your Party and convinced him And methinks Nature should teach you if you were unordained but qualified by Gifts cast among the Indians that you should not let them perish for want of that publick constant teaching which is Ministerial or of Sacraments and Discipline only for want of Ordination that the Substance of Duty should not be thrown by for want of that Order which was instituted for its Preservation and not for its Destruction You dare scarce openly and plainly deny that Necessity warrants the Presbyters of the Reformed Churches to ordain And I doubt you allow it them then on no other grounds then what would warrant this that I am now pleading for Except to Sect. 10. And for any Votum or desire of Bishops Protest Bishops if they might have them or access unto them which was so oft the publick avowed Desire of the chiefest Reformers and Protestants beyond Sea much unlike the Spirit of our Presbyterians see what Mr. Baxter gives us to know p. 85. where comparing our present Bishops with a Leader in an Army he faith Nay it is hard trusting that Man again that hath betrayed us and the Church ibid. These have so apparently falsified their Trust that if we were fully resolved for Bishops yet we cannot submit to them for Ordination or Jurisdiction and then he proves it by Canon he thinks that the Presbyters now should not submit to the present Bishops by Canon Concilii Rbegien ut
perversi ordinatores nullis denuo ordinationibus intersunt and least you may reply that he speaks not this of all our present Bishops he immediately subjoins these Words Where then shall we have a Bishop to ordain of the old accused Tribe Is not this Christian Filial Duty of Presbyters toward the Bishops their Fathers Reply to Sect. 10. 1. For that Desire you again mention of Bishops in the Reformed Churches it is an unproved vain Assertion against full Evidence It is only of a few particular Persons in those Churches that you can prove it If so many Writings against Bishops and Constitutions and actual Practice will not prove them willing to be without them or at least not necessitated there is no Proof of any Man's Will or Necessity 2. What I said I must needs maintain till you say somewhat to change my Judgment I am past doubt it 's ill trusting the Betrayers and Destroyers of the Church with the Government of it And this I did prove and can with great Ease and Evidence prove it more fully 3. I pray you do not persuade Men that by the old accused Tribe I meant all the late English Bishops they were not all accused of destroying or betraying the Church that I ever heard of Where be the Articles that were put in against Usher Hall Davenant Potter Westfield Prideaux c. All those that I call the accused Tribe you may find Articles against in Parliament for their Devastations or Abuses Should the Arrians or other Heretick Bishops say to those that forsook them as you do of me is not this Christian Filial Duty of Presbyters towards the Bishops their Fathers There is no Duty to any Episcopal Father that will hold against God and his Church Take heed of making their Sins your own Except Sect. 11. And elsewhere by Irony he adds O what a rash thing it was to imprison though when he was imprisoned I believe it was by the Name of Dr. Wren or Bishop Wren for excommunicating depriving c. p. 51. and p. 68. To begin at home it is most certain according to many ancient Canons which are their Laws our English Bishops were incapable of ordaining for they lost their Authority by involving themselves in secular and publick Administrations Canon 80. Apostolig N B. That Canon is 30. beyond the Canons Apostolical for even the Papists themselves admit but of fifty genuine and he would eject all our Bishops by the 80th Canon Apostolical Lost their Authority also for neglect of instructing their Floâ—â— most or many of them and many more for non Residence c. Reply to Sect. 11. And why not Wren without any further Title as well as Calvin Luther Beza Zanchy Grotius c. 2. Let the indifferent Reader peruse all my words and blame me if he can What seems it so small a matter in your eyes to expel so many thousand Christian Families and silence and suspend and deprive so many able Ministers in so small a room and so short a time as that it is disobedience to our Fathers not to consent to their punishment It seems then these silly Lambs must be devoured not only without resistance but without complaint or accusing the Wolves because they say they were our Fathers God never set such Saturnine Fathers over his Church so as to authorize them in this or to prohibite a just remedy He never gave them power for Destruction but for Edification 3. What I said of our Bishops incapacity upon that reason was expresly ad hominem against mine own Judgement viz. upon supposition that those Canons are of such force as those imagine against whom I dispute 4. The Canon 80 Apost was also brought ad hominem for though it be confessed not of equal Antiquity with the rest yet for that Antiquity they have it is known how much use those men make of their supposed Authority But are there not enough others that may evince the point in hand besides that you may easily know it and in many Canons that null their Office who come in by the Magistracy Exception to Sect. 12. And whereas we are ready to make good against all the Papists in the world that our English Protestant Bishops had due Ordination in Queen Eliz. and King Edwards time by such who had been Ordained in King Henry the Eighths time Mr. Baxter tells us the Popish Bishops who Ordained in the days of Hen. 8. and many Ages before had no power of Ordination and this he speaks as his own judgment not only from the consequences of his Adversaries for he adds this I prove in that they received their Ordination from no other Bishops of the Province nor Metropolitan but only from the Pope singly yet this is all the Argument he hath to overthrow consequentially upon our objections the Ordination of those Protestant Bishops which himself acknowledges Learned Pious Reverend Men and all that Ordained or were Ordained in Hen. 8. 7. and many Ages before as he saith And indeed if his Discourse were of any force not only in our English Church but also in all the Churches of the West France Spain Polonia Swedland Denmark and throughout the Empire of Germany for these and those many Ages before which he speaks of and all this that our new Presbyterians of Enngland Volunteers in Ordaining and being Ordained without Bishops without pretence of necessity yea or difficulty or colour of difficulty except what themselves had created wherein they have as little Communion with the Protestants beyond seas as they have with the Episcopal Protestants of the true Reformed Church of England may be acknowledged good and lawful Presbyters and Pastors with power conjunctim divisim any one of them alone as Mr. Baxter thinks to Excommunicate and Absolve in foro Ecclesiastico Reply to Sect. 12. The word Due may signifie either such as is not null or else such as is fully regular or else such as they had Authority to perform who did ordain though they might have some Faults or Irregularities If you take it in the first Sense many will yield it who yet deny it in the last as supposing in some Cases Ordination Passive may be valid and so due in the Receiver when yet Ordination Active is without all just Authority in the Ordainer Though this may seem strange I am ready to give some Reasons for it It must be in the last Sense conjunct with the first that you must take the Word Due if you will speak to the point in Hand 2. I do expresly say there that it is according to the Doctrine of the Objectors consequentially that I affirm this not affirming or denying it to be mine own Judgment and to that end bring the Proof which is mentioned And yet you are pleased to affirm that I speak it as my own Judgment and not only from the Consequences of Adversaries Supposing your Grounds which I confidently deny that an uninterrupted Succession of due Authoritative Ordination
grant the Necessity of such Succession yet we need not grant the Nullity of our Calling 2. I deny that the English Bishops much less the Church of England did ever judge it necessary any farther than ad Hominem 1. Because it is apparent that they do ordinarily in their Writings speak against the Papists supposed Necessity of Ordination as I instanced out of some of them in my Book It is known to be a Point wherein the Protestants have commonly opposed the Papists 2. It is known to be but the later declining Generation of Bishops such at Montague Laud and their Confederates most in King Charles his Days very few in King Iames's and scarce any at all in Queen Elizabeth's that do join with the Papists in pleading the Necessity of Succession Even such Men as were as zealous against Queen Elizabeth's Episcopal Protestants as against the Papists at least many of them 3. The rest do expresly mention Succession and confute the Fâ—ble of the Nag's-Head Ordination in Cheapside to prove the Papists Slanderers So much to your Minor 3. If that will not serve I deny your Major All is not necessary that they thought necessary Protestants pretend not to Infallability in Controversals Many more perhaps ten to one at least of the English Clergy held it not necessary unless as aforesaid Ad 2 um Your second Argument hath all the Strength in it or rather shew of Strength â— first we must needs distinguish of your Terms Mediately and Immediately A Constitution may be said to be from Christ mediately either in Respect to a mediating Person or to some mediating Sign only Also it may be said to be mediante persona 1. when the Person is the cause totalâ—â— subordinata constituendi as having himself received the Power from God and being as from himself to convey it unto Man 2. Or when the Person is but Causa per accidens 3. Or when he is only Causa sive qua non vel quatenus impedementa â—emovit vel quatenus ejus Actiones sunt conditiones necessarie And so I answer 1. Immediately in the first absolute Sense excludendo personâ—â— res no Man ever had any Right communicated or Duty imposed on him by God unless perhaps the immediate Impress or supernatural Revelation of the Holy Ghost to some Peophet or Apostle might be said to do this Moses himself had the Ten Commandments written in Stone which were signa mediantia Those that heard God speak if any immediately without Angelical Interposition did receive God's Commands mediante verborum signo So did the Apostles that which they had from the Mouth of Christ. 2. God is so absolutely the Fountain of all Power that no Man can either have or give any Power but derivatively from him and by his Commission Man being no farther the Efficient of Power than he is so constituted of God the general way of his giving it must be by the Signification of God's Will and so far as that can be sufficiently discovered there needs no more to the Conveyance of Power Whether Men be properly efficient Causes of Church Power at all is a very hard Question especially as to those over whom they have no superior governing Power As Spalatensis hath taken great pains to prove that Kings or other Sovereigns of the Common-wealth have their Commission and Power immediately from God though the People sometimes may choose the Man for the Power was not given to the People first and then they give it the King but God lets them name the Man on whom he will immediately confer it so possibly may it be in Ordination of Church-Officers Three ways do Men mediate in the Nomination of the Person 1. When they have Authority of Regiment over others and explenitudine potestatis do convey efficiently to inferior Officers the Power that these have Thus doth the supream Rector of the Commonwealth to his Officers and Ergo they are caled the Kings Officers and he hath the choice of the very Species as well as of the individual Officers Now this way of mediating is not always if at all necessary or possible in the Church for the Papists themselves confess that the Pope is Ordained or authorized without this way of Efficiency for none have a Papal Power to convey to him His Ordination cannot be Actus Superioris And the Council of Trent could not agree whether it were not the Case of all Bishops to hold their Office immediately from Christ though under the Pope or whether they had their Power immediately from the Pope as the prime Seat on Earth of all Church Power who is to convey their Parts to others How the Spanish Bishops held up their Cause is known And it was the old Doctrine of the Church that all Bishops were equal and had no Power one over another but all held their Power directly from Christ as Cyprian told them in the Council of Carthage Add to this that the true old Apostolical Episcopacy was in each particular Church and not over many Churches together I speak of fixed Bishops till the matter becoming too big to be capable of the old Form Corruptio unius fuit generatio alterius and they that upon the increase of Christians should have helpt the Swarm into a new Hive did through natural Ambition of ruling over many retaine divers Churches under their Charge and then ceased to be of the Primitive sort of Bishops Non eadem fuit res non munus idem etiamsi idem nomen retinerent So that truly our Parish Ministers who are sole or chief Pastors of that Church are the old sort of Bishops for as Ambrose and after him Grotius argues qui ante se alterum non habebat Episcopus er at That is in eadem Ecclesia qui superiorem non habet So that not only all Diocesan Bishops but also all Parochial Bishops are Ordained per pares and so not by a governing Communication of Power which is that second way of Ordination when men that are of equal Authority have the Nomination of the Person Now whether or no he that ordaineth an Inferior as a Deacon or any other do convey Authority by a proper Efficiency as having that first in himself which he doth Convey yet in the Ordination of Equals it seems not to be so for they have no Government over the particular Persons whom they Ordain or Churches to whom they Ordain them nor could they themselves exercise that governing Power over that other Congregation which they appoint another to so that they seem to be but Causae Morales or sine quibus non as he that sets the Wood to the Fire is of its burning or as he that openeth you the Door is of your bringing any thing into the House So that if you will call the Ordainer of an Inferior causam equivocam and the Ordainer of an Equal causam univocam yet it is but as they morally and improperly cause The Third way of Mediating in the
Rome where none shall be admitted that will not swear to do wickedly and to false Ways And in the great Arrian Defection when scarce Six or Seven Bishops were to be found that did not turn Arrians among whom the Bishop of Rome was one that revolted and they would ordain none but those that would be of their Way and so would engage Men against Christ. God did not give them Power to destroy the Church but to preserve Order and propagate it They can do nothing by any Power from God against the Truth but for the Truth When Ergo They will not ordain to the Preservation but to the apparent Destruction of the Church we are not obliged to receive their Ordination And that the failing of regular Ministerial Ordination doth not destroy the Ordination or Law of God de Specie conservandâ and that it was never the Will of God that there should be no Ministry at all longer than they might be so regularly Ordained appears thus 1. The Office of the Ministry is of standing Necessity to the very Being of a Political Church whereas the Ecclesiastical Authoritative Ordination is but necessary to the well being and ordering of it Ergo the failing of the later causeth not a failing of the former The Reason of the Consequence may appear in that God hath oft suffered his Church in all Ages to fall into Disorders and Distempers when yet he hath preserved the Being 2. God hath not inseparably tyed a necessary certain End to one only mutable uncertain means But the Office of the Ministry is the necessary certain End of Regular Ecclesiastical Ordination viz. by one in Just Power and this is a mutable uncertain means Ergo God hath not tyed the Office of the Ministry to this alone The Necessity of the Ministry and the certain Continuance of it to the Church I suppose will be granted even to every Church while it remains a Church Political The Uncertainty and Mutability of that means is before proved 3. God hath not put it into the Power of Bishops or other Ordainers to destroy his Church for ever but if the Ministry were inseparably annexed to their authoritative Ordination it would be so Ergo It is in the Power of their Wills whether they will ordain any other Bishops to succeed them which if they should not do the Succession is interrupted and the Office must for ever fail If you say it is not to be supposed that all will deny to Ordain others I answer 1. What Promise or Certainty of the contrary 2. It is not possible their own Judgments may be turned against Bishops and so renounce that Calling or may they not turn most of them Heretical and so will ordain none that will not be so too As it was actually when the whole World turned Arrian except six or seven Bishops there were none left and a tenth Part nay the Hundredth part of the Church could not have recourse to six or seven persecuted Bishops hidden in Wildernesses or Corners or Fugitives that Men knew not where to find And that it was then unlawful to have submitted to the Arrians Ordination on their Terms I suppose will not be denied And the few that do not turn Hereâ—icks may yet clogg their Ordinations with such unlawful Impositions and Engagements as that no Man fearing God may justly submit to them which is at best the Case of all the Romish Church as is said So that if all Men else obey God they must not be Ordained by these Men and consequently these Men have Power to destroy the Church which if it were affirmed but of the Churches in one Nation is not true No nor of one Congregation for the Sense of the Precept for Ordination is this That the Churches may be edified and well guided and my Worship rightly performed do you ordain Elders c. 4. God hath made it indispensably necessary to his People to the World's End to assemble in solemn Congregations and then to perform his publick Worship viz. In Prayer Praises Sacraments Preaching and Hearing c. But without the Ministry this cannot be performed Ergo he hath made it indispensably necessary that they have a Ministry and consequently the failing of Authoritative Ecclesiastical Ordination doth not destroy the Ministry Both by necessity of Precept and of Means is Publick Worship necessary to the World's End Ordinary teaching publickly and being the Mouth of the People in Praising God and Administring Sacraments and blessing the People c. are Ministerial Actions Now suppose you come into a Nation or Country where such Ordination fails as if you had lived in the Reign of the Arrians durst you absolve all the Churches from all God's Publick Worship Durst you have said to whole Countries Never Assemble to Worship God by Solemn Praises Never baptize any Never communicate in the Lord's Supper This were to contradict a Precept in Force that binds them to do what you forbid them and it were to destroy their Souls and bid them forsake God and quench his Graces For without God's Publick Ministerial Ordinances Grace and Christianity it self could not be long continued at least ordinarily and in many Witness the Unchristianing of the vast Kingdom of Nubia for want of Ministers If you would have such to appoint Private Men to do these Things pro tempore in this Case of Necessity that is to grant all for then the People do make those Private Men Ministers pro tempore whether they give them that name or not for the Office is but Power to do those Works which belong thereto and if they have Power to do the Work they have the Office The like may be said of those Reformed Christians that live under the Romish Power if they must have no Miniâ—â—â—rs they must have no Worship or Sacraments which Ministers are to perform If they must have Ministers either Romish or Reformed Not Romish for they cannot follow them or join with them but by known sinning in wicked Engagements and wicked Actions Not Reformed if there be a Necessity of Authoritative Ordination For the Romish Bishops if they have Authority will not Ordain without forcing Men to open Sin nor may any Pious Man submit to their Ordinations on their Terms and many People cannot have Reformed Bishops no nor Presbyters to ordain them 5. The Law of Nature and the express unchangable written Word agreeing thereto do require Men to do the Offices of Ministers who have a fitness for it and where there is an undeniable Necessity of their Help But the failing of Authoritative Ecclesiastical Ordination will not dispence with the Law of Nature and the express moral written Law agreeing therewith Ergo It will not dispense with such Men for the neglect of such Ministerial Works I think none will question the Minor For the Major understand that those whom I call fit are they that have the Qualifications which I mentioned before Here I take it as undenyable that Duty and
Power to perform it so go together that God never calleth Man to Duty but he gives him this sort of Power that is Authority for the very Command to do the Work doth give Authority to do it Man may oblige himself without a Call and so have no Authority but whosoever is required of God to do it hath eo Nomine Authority to do it And the Office of the Ministry is but the Duty and Authority of performing the Works of the Ministry Moreover the Power is for the Work 's sake and not the Work for the Powers sake as the End So that if I prove once that the Duty is required of unordained Men I do thereby prove that the Power is given them Now that that Duty is required appears thus The greatest Works of Mercy to Mens Souls and of glorifying God are such as Men are obliged to by the Law of Nature if they have Ability and Opportunity and there be a Necessity But the Works of the Ministry are the greatest Works of Mercy to Mens Souls and Glory to God Ergo The Minor is proved by the Parts The Publick Preaching of the Lord Jesus to a Heathen People as the Jesuits have long been doing in the Indies and the Discipling Men to Christ and baptizing them is the greatest Work of Mercy imaginable Whereto add the teaching them to observe all things whatsoever Christ hath commanded and it makes up the whole absolutely necessary in all its Parts 1. The Greatness appears in that Men cannot be saved ordinarily without it It is to save Men from Everlasting Torments and help them to Everlasting Glory 2. It is that which Christ himself did yea made his Office to seek and to save that which was lost 3. It is that which he ordained the Ministry for yea giveth us his Gifts for yea upholds all things for and makes other Mercies subordinate to And that it is as conducible to that Honour that he will have by the Gospel and Mens Salvation is as clear For the Major Note that I suppose Ability and Opportunity for else they cannot be obliged Also I suppose Necessity that is that there be not Ordained Men Authoritatively enough competently to do it And then that it must be done without such Ordination rather than not at all is so plain in the Law of Nature that it needs no Proof To do good to our Power especially in so great Necessities and weighty Cases is a Principle in Nature that he who is a Man doth find in himself A Fortiore it 's proved that in lesser Cases we are bound to do thus much more in these so great If a Man be like to perish through Hunger or Nakedness he that is no Taylor must make him Cloaths if he can and he that is no Baker must make him Bread Or if a Man come into a Country infected with the Plague or other Epidemical Disease which he hath Skill in Curing he is a Murderer if he will not do it though he be no Physician while there is no Physician there that can Every Man that is able is a lawful Physician in case of desperate Necessity If these Instances serve not we may go higher In case of an unexpected Onslaught of the Enemy when the Commanders are asleep every Souldier may do his Office In case a General be slain in the Field or a Collonel or a Captain the next Officer may take his Place yea a common Souldier may do it in Necessity Or if the Commander turn Traytor the next Officer may take his Place and command the Souldiers against him Salus populi suprema lex esto is God's own Law And Salus Ecclesiae suprema Lex esto is no less his and unchangable as to all Church-Works still looking at his Glory herein as the highest absolutely He that should say I would cure these Sick Men but that I am not in Office a Physician â— or I would do this or that Work to save the City or the Army but it is not my Office or I have no Commission were not excusable Yet far more than he that would say I would Preach Christ to these People and Baptize them and acquaint them with his Laws to save them from Damnation but that I am not Ordained Durst you warrant that Man from being condemned for his Neglect Nay durst you encourage him to neglect it Nay durst you adventure to neglect it your self What should the People in New-England do if there were not Ministers among the Indians If there were Protestants cast into China and had the Opportunity as the Jesuits have what should they do To forbear the Ministerial Work till they had a lawful Ordination were no less than Soul-murder It would in probability never be had for if they travail'd for it to those parts of the World where it might be had there were no great probability of their Return If you say they may teach and baptize as private Men I answer If they do but what private Men here are allowed do viz. to Teach but privately and occasionally it would be still unnatural bloody Soul-murder To speak the Doctrine of Redemption to two or three in a House when they might speak to Multitudes and to teach now and then occasionally when they might do it ordinarily is cruel destroying of the most And to Baptize is no private Man's Work If you would have them Teach both publickly and ordinarily and Baptize then you would have them be Ministers under the Name of Private Men yea to do the Work of Apostles or Evangelists Certainly the Law of Nature is God's Law and Evangelical Ceremonies and points of meer Order do give Place to it as well as either Mosaical or Secular God hath as streightly commanded Obedience to Secular Power as to Ecclesiastical If therefore Matter of Order in Secular Things must stoop to Matters of Substance and Necessity and the Law of Corporations to the Law of Nature so it must do here The Gospel Crosseth not nor obliterateth Natural Principles And to love our Neighbours as our self and do him good especially to the Everlasting Saving of his Soul are too deep in Nature to be questioned or to stoop to a Point of meer Order If you say That the same God that requires us to do it doth require that we do it in his order and way I answer No doubt of it where that Order may be observed But where it cannot God's way revealed to Nature is to do it without as hath been shewed And Scripture seconds Nature in this Christ tells us That this is the second great Commandment Thou shalt love thy Neighbour as thy self and on this with the Love of God hang all the Law and the Prophets To do good to our utmost Power is a Charge laid on all Psal. 34. 14. and 37. 27. Gal. 6. 10. Eccl. 9. 10. As every Man hath received the Gift so must he as a good Steward of God's manifold Grace administer it 1 Pet. 4.
and Men cannot be Pastors against their wills and the will of their Diocesans That I contradict my Treatise of Episcopacy in denying this With more like this To which I say I. If the Parish Congregation were but part of a Church you might joyn with it as a part as well as with part of an Independent Church And they that can hear a Lay-man with the Separatists might hear the Ministers thereâ— II. Whether I contradict my self or not is nothing to your Cause and Conscience I undertook not when I wrote that none should wilfully or ignorantly misunderstand me The formal Notion of a National Church is nothing but a Christian Kingdom The Matter is Christian Rulers and Subjects and as ordered Confederate particular Churches England hath been such for many Ages Here from the Reformation they owned the Sovereign Power as the Head of the Political National Church as Christ is of the Universal under him They owned Parish-Churches under Diocesans and true Ministers therein Their Books shew their Judgment their Articles Apology Homelies Liturgy Ordination Canons c. These Books are still owned by the Church But at last a new sort of Bishops rose up that would have made the Parish Churches to be no proper Churches but like Chappels under the Diocesan These called themselves the Church of England when there were but about four or five Bishops left alive who Dr. Hammond said were of his mind Some such domineered afterward and would have set up that way but never prevailed either to retract the Churches Books and Laws nor to get the major part of the Clergy to own them Now all the vain question here is Which of these two Parties shall be called The Church of England Neither of them alone They are two disagreeing parts of it I argued against the last professing not to do it against the first which your Counseller would take no notice of And what 's all this to you If you will not be of the National or Diocesan Church you may be of a Parish Church III. I proved that if all the Bishops and Parliament had said The Parish Ministers are no true Pastors this would not have made them none though they might be guilty of deposing them as far as they could no more than it would make the Nonconforming Ministers and Churches to be none Because we all take the Office as instituted by Christ and Men to be but investing Servants to him having no power to alter it And as in the Marriage the Husband shall have power over the Wife though he that marry them say Nay so shall an ordained Elder be a true Pastor though the Ordainer say Nay IV. I proved that the old Church Books and Doctrine are in force still by Law and the Kingdom and Church are sworn or bound not to endeavour any alteration in the Government of the Church Therefore not to put down the Parish Ministry and Churches Therefore this is the Sence of the Church of England though not of the new Faction that usurped that Name V. Though a Man cannot be a Pastor against his will yet he may be one without his knowledge if by Errour he think he is none For he may consent to all the Office while he thinks it is not all and denieth the Name If a Man think that a Deacon may do all essential to a Pastor and so that he is but a Deacon he is nevertheless a Pastor if he consented to the Work Many thousands are Christians that think they are not and do truly consent to Christianity while they think they do not And why may it not be so also to the Ministry VI. But our Case needeth none of these Reasons For where there is all that is essential to true Pastors and Churches there are true Pastors and Churches But by God's great mercy in many thousand Parishes in England there is all that is essential to true Pastors and Churches Therefore they are such When you will call me to dispute it with any Denier I will fully prove to you That there is great need of Reformation 1. That the Church of England as it is a Christian Kingdom containing Confederate Churches under a Christian King and Laws is that very Form that Christ offered to settle in Iudea and did settle by Constantine 2. That if the Diocesans be good Men and lawfully chosen as they are meer Successours of Timothy and Titus and others that had the oversight of many Churches and Pastors by the Word they are righter than the Opposers 3. That the Incumbents of the Parish-Churches have a valid Ordination by such Bishops and Presbyters righter than the Dividers 4. That many thousands of such Pastors are Men of competent Abilities and many of greater Ministerial Abilities than most of us Nonconformists yea that no known Nation under Heaven hath in so small a compass so many able Ministers as England And that to deny it and separate is great ingratitude towards God 5. That Parish Bounds are a laudable Distribution of Churches the capable Members being Communicants and the rest Catechumens 6. That the ordinary Communicants in multitudes of Parishes are Membrs that have all that is essential to Church-Membership 7. That the Pastors have power from God for all their Work and Mens denial even the Ordainers nullifieth not that Power when they are in general ordained Presbyters 8. That by the Law of the Land they have all Power essential to Pastors They may keep from Communion all that are not Confirmed and there have owned their Baptismal Covenant or are ready and desirous so to do and therefore may try their readiness This is required by the Liturgy And they may deny the Sacrament to all that live in scandalous Sin And they must prosecute such to the Bishops Courts The Law calleth them Rectors Rulers and they own themselves for such And even the Canons that are their worst restraints do own the same and so do the rest of the Church-Books and Laws that they all subscribe to and promise not to alter Ask them whether they take not themselves for true Pastors if you would know whether they consent to be such 9. Though some late Innovators that called themselves The Church of England would as far as they could have nullified in some part the Parish Ministry and Churches and the Canons themselves do sinfully limit the Exercise of their Power the Cause of our Calamities yet this nullifieth not the Office and Churches the Essential Power being setled both by God's Laws and the Churches and the restraint of Exercise nulleth not the Power 10. That to Exclude any from Communion that are Baptized and at Age have owned their Christianity and are not proved by sufficient witnesses to have nullified that Profession by Apostasie Heresie or a wicked or scandalous Life is Church Tyranny and Injustice of which all are guilty that do it or desire it 11. That if this Discipline be neglected by the Ministers sinful Sloth or by the
made capable of holding the Parish places we cannot hitherto agree It was propounded at the Meeting this Afternoon as an Expedient to issue this business that considering that Patrons of Parish Livings claim a Right of Presentation the People of Election the Magistrate of approbation and the Eldership of Churches or Churches themselves by them and Power of Mission and Ordination And that since the Magistrate hath been still wont to betrust his Claim of Approbation in the Hands of Presbyters of one kind or other and Presbyters of all Perswasions hold themselves obliged to further the propagation of the Gospel abroad and claim a share in sending Preachers for that end I say these Things considered and to satisfie all Claims and yet to make a competent Provision for the spreading of the Gospel in all the Parishes it was proposed 1. That the Magistrate might be desired to betrust his Claim of Approbation in the Hands of a convenient Number of Presbyters of the three denominations indifferently in several places of the Common-wealth that none might be bound up by the Power being ingrossed by one or two Parties 2. That no Person presented by a Patron or chosen by the People should officiate as a publick Preacher in any Parish without an Instrument of Approbation first obtained under the Hand and Seal of at least three or more of the Presbyters aforesaid 3. That such an Instrument obtained should invest the Preacher with power to receive such Maintenance as is or shall be settled by the State or raised by voluntary Contribution of the People But alas it was thought by some that to interess the Magistrate in such a Claim will not be found in the Scriptures and to have a Hand in the investing of a Preacher with power to sue for Tithes whether it were known whether he would so use it or no is a thing not to be indured And I doubt the Party that propounded this Expedient is like to be looked shie on by his Brethren the Anabaptists for his labour as fit rather to be ranked among the Presbyterians as hath been hinted to him The business of Maintenance was moved by the Presbyterians again and again to be laid aside they would trust the Providence of God with that and that something might be resolved on about the Magistrates Approbation in which we might agree without which it was not thought probable to procure so much as opportunity of a fixed abode to preach in most places nor if there could would the Churches be able to supply the want of the Magistrates Countenance or Power in procuring Maintenance I may not enlarge to acquaint you what was offered on the by for the Magistrates Power the Dispute of it hath hitherto been declined only something was hinted That if Christ is King of Nations as well as of Saints then those that rule the Nations for him are as such charged with the care of his Interest and so with his Ministers as those in special by whom it is to be promoted There were some pretty large Concessions at last made by some of the Anabaptists who I confess were not so steady in their Debate as would have been wished unless it were in too much shieness of granting too much And the unhappiness is that some not leastly crochical among the Anabaptists nor most peaceable do interess themselves most in the management of this Treaty Indeed this Meeting was almost brought to a period this Night without any good Conclusion but my Lord Goff as some call him and some others did earnestly move that that wherein they had agreed might be improved for common benefit and which was agreed to that three or four of each Perswasion should meet privately to see what could further be done and that there should be no further Publick Meetings till they were in a readiness to call them I must acknowledge to you that I am many times sadly affected to hear and see the strange Confusions that swarm in this City about things both Civil and Divine and the height and confidence of many is wonderful that I am ready to wish with him for the wings of a Dove to flee into the Wilderness to be at rest And truly by several hints which I have picked up I cannot but expect the acting of some further force to some Alteration or other and what will be the end of these things It will become such as have any true sence of the Interest of Religion to be incouraging and stirring up one another to stand together and to bear up against the several Assaults which on every hand almost are made against it that if it be possible to prevent that no Man take our Crown Sir I was desired several Weeks since by Mr. Iackson Author of The Serious Word to send you a couple of his Books against the Quakers that you might see I think how Orthodox he is and far from Jesuitism I have now performed his desire by the hand of Mr. Pearsall by whom also I have sent you Mr. Rogers and Needham's piece and a Copy of my Retraction which I must thankfully acknowledge was helped on much by your hand and therefore if any good redound by his Publication you are like to have a large share in the reward You will Sir I hope excuse my prolixness I shall now put you to no further trouble but beg your Prayers for Wisdom how to carry it towards those that at least at first will be somewhat provoked against me for attempting the raising of the Wall of Separation though I have done it with as much moderation and care to prevent offence as I well knew how and have very much Peace and Satisfaction in my own Spirit in what I have done SIR I am entirely yours Will. Allen. Sept. 30. 1659. To the Reverend and his worthy good Friend Mr. Richard Baxter Minister of the Gospel in Kidderminster SIR SInce I saw you I have perused Mr. Rutherford's Piece upon the Covenant which ministers yet further occasion as I apprehend to second my former motion to you of handing the Doctrine of the Covenants in a more distinct manner then hath been done by any I have yet met withal For if that which is proper to each Covenant were handled apart by it self and the appropriate design end and use of each of them respectively were but plainly set forth so far as the Scripture will guide therein I cannot but think it would be of as great use as any one thing you can undertake and it is not my opinion alone For want of which it hath happened that Men have interwoven and confounded one Covenant with another and great Mistakes have thereby been committed by many in stating the Terms of the New Covenant and the true Notion of Justification by Faith and through such Mistakes a great part of the Apostles Epistles have been obscured instead of being expounded As for instance Whereas there may be a sixfold opposition easily observed in the
or to turn to something else which though there be some reason for it I feel cometh from a want of Zeal for the Truth and from an impatient Temper of Mind I am ready to think that People should quickly understand all in a few words and if they cannot lazily to despair of them and leave them to themselves And I the more know that it is sinful in me because it is partly so in other things even about the Faults of my Servants or other Inferiours if three or four times warning do no good on them I am much tempted to despair of them and turn them away and leave them to themselves I mention all these Distempers that my Faults may be a warning to others to take heed as they call on my self for Repentance and Watchfulness O Lord for the Merits and Sacrifice and Intercession of Christ be merciful to me a Sinner and forgive my known and unknown Sins THE LIFE OF THE REVEREND Mr. Richard Baxter LIB I. PART II. § 1. IN the Time of the late unhappy Wars in these Kingdoms the Controversies about Church Government were in most Mens mouths and made the greatest Noise being hotly agitated by States-men and Divines by Words and Writings which made it necessary to me to set my self to the most serious study of those Points The result of which was this confident and setled Judgment that of the four contending Parties the Erastian Episcopal Presbyterian and Independant each one had some Truths in peculiar which the other overlookt or took little notice of and each one had their proper Mistakes which gave advantage to their Adversaries though all of them had so much truth in common among them as would have made these Kingdoms happy if it had been unanimously and soberly reduced to practice by prudent and charitable Men. § 2. 1. The Erastians I thought were thus far in the right in asserting more fully than others the Magistrates Power in Matters of Religion that all Coercive Power by Mulcts or Force is only in their hands which is the full sence of our Oath of Supremacy and that no such Power belongeth to the Pastors or People of the Church and that thus as Dr. Ludov. Molinaeâ—â— pleadeth there should not be any Imperium in Imperio or any Coercive Power challenged by Pope Prelate Presbytery or any but by the Magistrate alone that the Pastoral Power is only Perswasive or exercised on Volunteers yet not private such as belongeth to every Man to perswade that hath a perswading Facultyâ— but Publick and Authoritative by Divine appointment And not only to perswade by Sermons or general Speeches but by particular oversight of their particular Flocks much like the Authority of Plato or Zenâ— in his School or a Master in any Academy of Volunteers or of a Physician in his Hospital supposing these were Officers of God's Institution who could as the ground of their perswasitantâ— produce his Commission or Command for what they said and did But though the Diocesans and the Presbyterians of Scotland who had Laws to enable them opposed this Doctrine or the Party at least yet I perceived that indeed it was but on the ground of their Civil Advantages as the Magistrate had impowered by them by his Laws which the Erastians did not contradict except some few of the higher 〈◊〉 sort who pleaded as the Papists for somewhat more which yet they could not themselves tell what to make of But the generality of each Party indeed owned this Doctrine and I could speak with no sober Judicious Prelatist Presbyterian or Independant but confessed that no Secular or Forcing Power belonged to any Pastors of the Church as such and unless the Magistrates authorized them as his Officers they could not touch mens Bodies or Estates but the Conscience alone which can be of none but of Assenters § 3. 2. The Episcopal Party seemed to have reason on their side in 〈◊〉 that in the Primitive Church there were some Apostles Evangelists and others who were general unfixed Officers of the Church not tyed to any particular Chaâ—ge and had some Superiority some of them â—â—over-fixed Bishops or Pastors And though the extraordinary Parts of the Apostles Office ceased with them I saw no proof of the Cessation of any ordinary part of their Office such as Church Government is confessed to be All the doubt that I saw in this was Whether the Apostles themselves were constituted Governours of other Pastors or only over-ruled them by the Eminency of their Gifts and Priviledge of Infallibility For it seemed to me unmeet to affirm without proof that Christ setled a Form of Government in his Church to endure only for one Age and changed it for a New one when that Age was ended And as to fixed Bishops of particular Churches that were Superiours in degree to Presbyters though I saw nothing at all in Scripture for them which was any whit cogent yet I saw that the Reception of them in all the Churches was so timely even in the days of one of the Apostles in some Churches and so general that I thought it a most improbable thing that if it had been contrary to the Apostles mind we should never read that they themselves or any one of their Disciples that conversed with them no nor any Christian or Heretick in the World should once speak or write a word against it till long after it was generally setled in the Curches This therefore I resolved never to oppose § 4. 3. And as for the Presbyterians I found that the Office of Preaching Presbyters was allowed by all that deserve the Name of Christians and that this Office did participate subserviently to Christ of the Prophetical or Teaching the Priestly or worshipping and the Governing Power and that both Scripture Antiquity and the perswasive Nature of Church Government clearly shew that all Presbyters were Church Governours as well as Church Teachers and that to deny this was to destroy the Office and to endeavour to destroy the Churches And I saw in Scripture Antiquity and Reason that the Association of Pastors and Churches for Agreement and their Synods in Cases of Necessity are a plain duty and that their ordinary stated Synods are usually very convenient And I saw that in England the Persons which were called Presbyterians were emiment for Learning Sobriety and Piety and the Pastors so called were they that went through the Work of the Ministry in diligent serious preaching to the People and edifying Mens Souls and keeping up Religion in the Land § 5. 4. And for the Independants I saw that most of them were Zealous and very many Learned discreet and godly Men and fit to be very serviceable in the Church And I found in the search of Scripture and Antiquity that in the beginning a Governed Church and a stated worshipping Church were all one and not two several things And that though there might be other byâ—Meetings in places like our Chappels or private Houses
for such as Age or Persecution hindered to come to the more solemn Meetings yet Churches then were no bigger in number of Persons than our Parishes now to grant the most And that they were Societies of Christians united for Personal Communion and not only for Communion by Meetings of Officers and Delegates in Synods as many Churches in Association be And I saw if once we go beyond the bounds of Personal Communion as the end of particular Churches in the Definition we may make a Church of a Nation or of ten Nations or what we please which shall have none of the Nature and Ends of the Primitive particular Churches Also I saw a commendable care of serious Holiness and Discipline in most of the Independant Churches And I found that some Episcopal Men as Bishop Usher himself did voluntarily profess his Judgment to me did hold that every Bishop was independant as to Synods and that Synods were not proper Governours of the particular Bishops but only for their Concord § 6. 5. And for the Anabaptists themselves though I have written and said so much against them as I found that most of them were Persons of Zeal in Religion so many of them were sober godly People and differed from others but in the Point of Infant Baptism or at most in the Points of Predestination and Free-will and Perseverance as the Iesuits differ from the Dominicans the Lutherans from the Calvinists and the Arminians from the Contra-Remonstrants And I found in all Antiquity that though Infant Baptism was held lawful by the Churchâ— yet some with Tertullian and Nazienzen thought it most convenient to make no haste and the rest left the time of Baptism to every ones liberty and forced none to be baptized Insomuch as not only Constantint Theudâ—sius and such other as were converted at Years of Discretion but Augustine and many such as were the Children of Christian Parents one or both did defer their Baptism much longer than I think they should have done So that in the Primitive Churchi some were Baptized in Infancy and some at ripe Age and some a little before their Death and none were forced but all left free and the only Penalty among men of their delay was that so long they were without the Priviledges of the Church and were numbred but with the Catechumens or Expectants § 7. 6. As to Doctrinal Differences also between Arminians and Anti-Arminians I soon perceived that it was hard to find a Man that discerned the true State of the several Controversies and that when unrevealed points uncertain to all were laid aside and the Controversies about Words were justly separated from the Controversies about things the Differences about things which remained were fewer and smaller than most of the Contenders perceived or would believe § 8. 7. Yea I found that our Doctrinal Controversies with the Papists themselves were very much darkned and seldom well stated and that in the Points of Merit Justification Assurance of Salvation Perseverance Grace Free-will and such others it was common to misunderstand one another and rare to meet with any that by just Distinction and Explication did well state the Controversies and bring them out of the Dark § 9. What I begin to write about any of these Doctrinal Differences in my Aphorisms Confession Apologie c. I will now pass by and the manifold Censures and Encounters which I had thereupon and the many Manuscripts of worthy Brethren animadverting upon my Aphorisms which I was privately put to answer Because it is not such Differences that now I am to speak of § 10. I perceived then that every Party beforementioned having some Truth or Good in which it was more eminent than the rest it was no impossible thing to separate all that from the Error and the Evil and that among all the Truths which they held either in Common or in Controversy there was no Contradiction And therefore that he that would procure the Welfare of the Church must do his best to promote all the Truth and Good which was held by every part and to leave out all their Errors and their Evil and not take up all that any Party had espoused as their own § 11. The things which I disliked as erroneous or evil in each Party were these 1. In the Erastians I disliked 1. That they made too light of the Power of the Ministry and Church and of Excommunication and did not distinguish sufficiently of a persuasive Power which is but private and is founded only in the Reason of the Speaker and a persuasive Power which is publick in an Officer of Christ which Camero well calleth Doctoral and is founded conjunctly in his Authority by God's Commission and his Arguments 2. That they made the Articles of the Holy Catholick Church and the Communion of Saints too insignificant by making Church Communion more common to the impenitent than Christ would have it and so dishonoured Christ by dishonouring his Church and making it too like to the Heathen World and breaking down the Hedge of Spiritual Discipline and laying it almost in common with the Wilderness 3. That they misunderstood and injured their Brethren supposing and affirming them to claim as from God a coercive Power over the Bodies or Purses of Men and so setting up Imperium in Imperio whereas all temperate Christians at least except Papists confess that the Church hath no Power of Force but only to manage God's Word unto Mens Conscienceâ—◠§ 12. In the Diocesane Party I utterly distiked 1. Their Extirpation of the true Discipline of Christ as we conceive by consequence though not intentionally not only as they omitted it and corrupted it but as their Principles and Church State had made it unpracticable and impossible while one Bishop with his Consitory had the sole Government of a thousand or many hundred Churches even over many thousands whose Faces they were never like to see not setting up any Parâ—chia Government under them But just as if the Archbishopsâ— or rather the Patriarchs in Câ—nstantiâ—â—'s days should have deposed all the Bishops in the Empire and have taken all their Charges upon themselves 2. That hereby they altered the Species of Churches and either would deâ— all particular Churches and have none but associated Diocesane Churches who hold the Communion by Delegates and not personally or else they would turn all the particular Parochial Churches into Christian Oratories and Schools while they gave their Pastors but a Teaching and Worshiping Power but not a Governing 3. That hereby they altered the ancient Species of Presbyters to whose Office the Spiritual Government of their proper Folks as truly belonged as the Power of preaching and worshipping God did 4. That they extinguished the ancient Species of Bishops which was in the times of Ignatius when every Church had one Altar and one Bishop and there were none but Itinerants or Archbishops that had many Churches 5. That they set up Courts that were more Secular
a sober Christian hath the least reason to scruple Communion in Will you have a Pastor that shall not speak in the Name of the People to God or will you call his Prayers his own which he puts up by Virtue of his Office according to God's Word Ad 17m. I think they cannot without Sacriledge make such Alienation except where God's Consent can be proved For Example if the Ministers of the Church have full as much means given as is fit for the Ends to which it is given and yet the People will give more and more to the Burden and ensnaring of the Church and the impoverishing or ruin of the Common-wealth here I think God consents not to accept that Gift and therefore it was but an Offer and not plenarily a Gift for want of Acceptance for he accepts not that which he prohibits Here therefore the Magistrate may restore this to its proper use But whether this were any of the Case of these Sacrilegious Alienations too lately made in this Land is a farther Question I apprehend a deep Guilt of Sacriledge upon some Ad 18m. The Particulars here mentioned must be distinctly considered 1. About Fasts and Feasts the Question as referring to the Obligation of the Laws of the Land is of the same Resolution as all other Questions respecting those Laws which being a Case more out of my way I shall not presume to determine without a clearer Call Only I must say that I see little Reason why those Men should think themselves bound in this who yet suppose themselves loose from many other Laws and who obey many of the Laws or Ordinances of the present Powers 2. I much fear that not only the Querist but many more are much ensnared in their Consciences by misunderstanding the Nature and use of Synods It 's one thing for an Assembly of Bishops to have a superior Governing Power directly over all particular Churches and Bishops and another thing for such an Assembly to have a Power of determining of things necessary for the Concord of the several Churches I never yet saw it proved that Synods are over Bishops in a direct Governing Order nor are called for such Ends but properly in ordine ad Unitatem and so oblige only more than single Bishops by Virtue of the General Precept of maintaining Unity and Concord This is the Opinion of the most learned Bishop and famous antiquary that I am acquainted with 3. And then when the end ceases the Obligation is at an End So that this can now be no Law of Unity with us 4. All human Laws die with the Legislator farther than the surviving Rulers shall continue them The Reason is drawn from the Nature of a Law which is to be jussum Majestatis in the Common wealth and every where to be a sign of the Rectors Will de debito vel constituendo vel confirmando Or his Authoritative Determination of what shall be due from us and to us Therefore no Rector no Law and the Law that is though made by the deceased Rector is not his Law but the present Rector's Law formally it being the signifier of his Will And it is his Will for the continuance of it that gives it a new Life In all this I speak of the whole Summa potestas that hath the absolute Legislative Power If therefore the Church Governors be dead that made these Laws and no sufficient Power succeeds them to continue these Laws and make them theirs then they are dead with their Authors 5. The present Pastors of the Church though but Presbyters are the true Guides of it while Bishops are absent and the true Guides conjunctly with the Bishops if they were present according to the Judgment of your own side Whoever is the sole existent governing Powerâ— may govern and must be obeyed in things Lawful Therefore you must for all your unproved Accusation of Schism obey them The Death or Deposition of the Bishops depriveth not the Presbyters of that Power which they had before 6. Former Church Governors have not Power to bind all that shall come after them where they were before free But their Followers are as free as they were 7. The Nature of Church Canons is to determine of Circumstances only for a present time place or occasion and not to be universal standing Laws to all Ages of the Church For if such Determinations had been fit God would have made them himself and they would have been contained in his perfect Word He gives not his Legislative Power to Synods or Bishops 8. Yet if your Conscience will needs persuade you to use those Ceremonies you have no ground to separate from all that will not be of your Opinion 9. For the Cross the Canons require only the Minister to use it and not you and if he do not that 's nothing to you 10. Have you impartially read what is written against the Lawfulness of it by Amesius's fresh Suit Bradshaw Parker and others If you have you may at least see this that it 's no fit matter to place the Churches Unity or Uniformity in and they that will make such Laws for Unity go beyond their Commission Church Governors are to determine the Circumstances pro loco tempore in particular which God hath in Word or Nature made necessary in genere and left to their Determination But when Men will presume beyond this to determine of things not indeed circumstantial or no way necessary in genere nor left to their Determination as to institute new standing Symbols in and with God's Symbols or Sacraments to be engaging Signs to engage us to Christ and to Work Grace on the Soul as the Word and Sacraments do that is by a moral Operation and then will needs make these the Cement of Unity this is it that hath been the Bane of Unity and Cause of Divions 11. Kneeling at the Sacrament is a Novelty introduced many hundred years after Christ and contrary to such Canons and Customs of the Church to which for Antiquiâ—y and Universality you owe much more respect than to the Canons of the late Bishops in England 12. If your General Rule hold that you stand bound by all Canons not repealed by equal Power you have a greater burden on your back than you are aware of which if you bore indeed you would know how little this usurped Legislative Power befriends the Church And among others you are bound not to kneel in the Church on any Lord's Day in Sacrament or Prayer Grotius de Imperio Sumpotest would teach much more Moderation in these Matters than I here perceive Ad Q. 19m. 1. It 's too much Self-conceitedness and Uncharitableness to pass so bold a Censure as your Supposition doth contain of the visible ruling Church being Schismatical and so Heretical Which is the ruling Church I know none in England besides Bishops that pretend to rule any but their own Provinces and but few that pretend Order to Regiment Perhaps when the
their Consciences Why do they not obey the present Secular Powers in all other things It is known the King consented to relax this And however this is little to them that go on the Ground of Divine or Ecclesiastical Right And if we must so plunge our selves into Enquiries after the Rights of Secular Governours before we can know whether to stand or set at the Sacrament we are all uncertain what to do in greater Matters for there are as apparent grounds for our uncertainty of five hundred years old and more which this is no place to dive into And it would be as unlawful on this ground to read any other Psalm or Chapter but what was of old appointed for the Day as to forbear kneeling at the Sacrament And perhaps on the Opponents grounds it would be still as sinful to restrain a Child or Servant from Dancing on the Lord's Day And if it be Ecclesiastical Authority that they stick at that must be derived from Christ and so Originally Divine or it is none And then not to wade so unseasonably into the main Controversie 1. Before they have proved their Legislative Authority 2. And that this Congregation is Iure Divino part of their Charge and under their Jurisdiction 3. And that they had power to contradict the Examples of Christ and his Apostles herein and the constant practice of the Primitive Church and the Canons of Councils even General Councils 4. And that their Canons are yet in force against all these I say before all this be well done we shall find that there must go more than a slight Supposition to the making good of their Cause According to their own Principles a lower Power cannot reverse the Acts of a higher But the General Councils Nice and Constantinople that forbad Kneeling on any Lord's Day was a higher Power than the English Convocation Ergo The English Convocation cannot Repeal its Acts. Though for my own part I think that neither of their Acts do need any Repeal to Null them to us in such Cases 5. Besides this if these Canons bind Conscience yet it is either by the Authority that Enacted them or by the Authority of the present Church-Governours that impose them If old Canons bind without or against the present Power then the same Canon that forbiddeth Kneeling bindeth and many an hundred more a great part of which are now made no Conscience of If it be the present Authority that is above the Ancient then 1. They that pretend to such Authority over this Congregation should produce and exercise it For if we know them not not receive any Commands from them we are capable of no Disobedience to them 2. And in the mean time We that are in the place must take it as our Charge or do the Work or for ought I know it will in most Places be undone For the Authority is for the Work 3. We use to take it for the great partiality at least of the Church of Rome that will be judged by none but the present Church that is themselves when we would be tried by the Scripture or the Ancient Church In a word I do not think that when Circumstances tending to Order and Decency are so mutable that God ever gave power to any Bishops to tie all Congregations and Ages to this or that Sacrament Gesture nor at all to make them so necessary as that Bodily Punishment or Excommunications should be inflicted on the Neglecters of them And I think that Calling which hath no better Work than this to do is not worth the regarding And here I should propound to the contrary-minded one Question Whether if a Bishop should command them to stand or sit they would do it Yea or if a Convocation commanded it If they say Yea then must they lay by all their Arguments from pretended irreverence to prove Sitting evil for I hope they would not be irreverent nor do evil at the command of a Bishop or Convocation And then let our Authority from Scripture Example and the Universal Church and a General Council and the present Secular Power and the late Assembly and Parliaments and the present Pastors or Presbyters of the Congregations I say let all this be set against the present Countermand of I know not who nor for what Reason as being not visible But if they say They would not obey the Bishops if they forbad them Kneeling then let them justifie us that obey them not when they command us to Kneel having so much as is expressed to the contrary Thus Sir I have first given you my Reasons about the Gesture it self And of putting it into each Persons hands I have thus much more to say 1. I know nothing to oblige me to it 2. Christ himself did otherwise as appeareth in Matth. 26. 26 27. For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 take ye eat ye drink ye all of it doth shew that it was given to them all in general and not to each man singly 3. And in this also Antiquity is on my side the contrary being much later More Reasons I have that I shall not now trouble you with To this I may well add That no Man can have any Rational pretence that I know of against the Receiving of the Sacrament upon such a General Delivery 1. Because the contrary was never yet pleaded necessary Iure Divino that I know of 2. And if it were a Sin it would be the Ministers Sin so to deliver it and not theirs who as they have not the Rule of his Actions so they shall not Answer for them Having thus told you my thoughts of the Matters in doubt I shall next tell you my purpose as to your Motion 1. I did never hitherto to my remembrance refuse to give the Sacrament to any one meerly because they would not take it Sitting or Standing nor did ever forbid or repel any on that account nor ever mean to do If any of my Charge shall take it Standing or Kneeling I shall not forbid them on any such account 2. If they further expect that I should put it into each Man's hands individually I may well expect the liberty of guiding my own Actions according to my own Conscience if I may not guide theirs It is enough that in such Cases they will refuse to be Ruled by me they should not also usurp the ruling of me but let us be equal and let me have my liberty as I am willing to let them have theirs and if I sin they are not guilty of it Nor have they any ground to refuse the Sacrament rather than so take it 3. Yet if any of my Pastoral Charge shall be unsatisfied if they will but hear my Reasons first and if those Reasons convince them not if they will profess that they think it a Sin against God for them to Receive the Sacrament unless it be put into their hands Kneeling and Ergo that they dare not in Conscience take it otherwise I do purpose to
Removal 3. Let divers of these Classes meet once or twice a year in a Provincial Assembly and let the fittest Man in the Province be their standing President Hitherto there is no Concession on the Presbyterian side but that the President pro tempore be turned to a standing President nor any on the Episcopal side but that most necessary one that every Presbyter be acknowledged a Church Guide and not a meer Preacher 4. Let it be left to each Man's Conscience whether the President be called by the Name of Bishop President Superintendent Moderator c. seeing a Name is no meet Reason of a Breach 5. Let no Man be forced to express his Judgment de Iure whether the President have a Negative Voice in Ordination or Excommunication nor whether he be distinct in order or only in degree seeing it is not the unonimous and right belief concerning these things that is of Necessity for then they must have been in our Creed but the unanimous and right practice But let all agree that they will joyn in these Classical and Provincial Assemblies and then only Ordain and that they will not Ordain but when the President is one unless in case of flat necessity which is never like to befal us if this way be taken My Question now is Whether the godly moderate Episcopal and Presbyterian Divines on supposition that they can at present come no nearer to each other may not and ought not thus far to close and thus live in Christian Love and Unity seeing that we are bound to Concord in Practice so far as we agree in Judgment and seeing that if any nearer Closure be yet necessary in such United Bodies and Amicable Associations Assemblies and Correspondencies its most likely to be attained this way and indeed no other that I can as yet discern These Terms I once propounded to one most Reverend Prelate now near you who told me That with moderate Men they might suffice for an Union If you are of the same Judgment I should have the stronger hopes and if you are not I shall the sooner let them fall Were your leisure such as to admit of further trouble I would crave a word for the Resolution of my own Judgment in these Points 1. I am satisfied that the Apostles have Successors in all those Works that are of standing Necessity and that Church-Government is one of those Works and that its improbable that Christ should settle one Species of Church-Government in the Apostles Hands for an Age and then change it for ever after and that they that affirm such a Change must prove it and this Argument sticks close But then I would crave one of your strongest Arguments to prove though I know that the Presbyterians grant it that indeed the Apostles had a power by Office to Govern the Seventy or the Presbyters as inferiour Officers besides the power that they had by the meer interest of their Gifts and priviledge of being Eye-witnesses of the Works of Christ and Ear-witnesses of his Word 2. If the Apostles Examples will prove the Right of an unfixed Ambulatory Episcopacy yet I would see how it appears that ever they were fixed to particular Churches or ever any of them had a distinct and limited Diocess where the rest had not Charge as well as they 3. I am satisfied that very early after the Apostles the common Government of each Church was by a Bishop and Presbytery but I can yet see no Evidence that this Church for 150 or 200 Years was any more than one Congregation like one of our Parishes for number of People which was Congregate in a City and from the Circumjacent Villages as our Independant or Anabaptist Churches now are while the Multitude were Infidels I would therefore crave one clear Proof that the first fixed Bishops ruled any more standing Congregations having ordinary Assemblies and Communion in the Lord's Supper than one only And whether the multiplying of Believers did not make a real Change of the former Species of Government while the Bishop of the City took on him the Government of many Particular Churches who had but one before and when Bishops should have been multiplied as fast as Churches were and as Presbyters were Some Passages in the eldest Writers incline me to these Thoughts of which if they be wrong your Correction will be most acceptable May I crave if not your Solution of all these Doubts yet at least your Advice in the first Case of Practice and your Pardon of my Boldness I shall under great Obligations remain A humble Reverencer of your great Abilities and Dignity Rich. Baxter Kiderminster in Worcestershire June 8. 1655. If you return any thing Mr. Underhill at the Anchor and Bible in Paul's Church-yard will convey it me To the very Reverend and much Honoured Dr. Brownrigg Bishop of Exeter These Whereto the Bishop made this short Reply Worthy Sir I Have received your kind and â—â—â—â—teous Letter the Evidence of your very pioâ—â— and peaceable Spirit which I heartily desire may be a Provocation to others to lead them into the ways of Peace Sir Your Esteem of me and of my Abilities is the Errour of your Love and of those that have represented me to you in too great a Character quod non humiliter tantùm sed veraciter dico only I shall desire to be serviceable to God and his Church in what I am able Your Letter came to my hands at the time of my removal from Highgate into the Country here I have continued many Months suffering the trouble and pain of the Stone which which hath put me into a long and tedious Course of Physick Now I am upon my Iourney homewards from whence God willing I will write to you being truly sensible of your Religious Endeavours for so good a Work as the Composing of those woful Rents made in this Church The God of Truth and Peace guide us into the Ways of Truth and Peace to whose Grace and Blessing I do heartily recommend you resting SIR Your very respectful Friend who embraceth your Love and returns his to you very heartily Ra. Exon. Highgate July 3. 1655. And not long after I received this Answer Worthy Sir I Am indebted to you for an Answer to your Inquiries which I received from you It should have been more speedy but in truth I brought from London my crasie and ill-affected Body which since my coming home hath bred me much pain of the Stone and taken up my time in suffering those Distempers and using the Remedies prescribed to me I have now sent you my Thoughts which I doubt not but you will receive as candidly as I impart them to you The Age is quarrelsome but I apprehend you as one of a peaceable Spirit aiming only at the Settlement of our unhappy Distractions The God of Peace compose all our hearts to Peace and make the Rents of our Church to be the Matter of our chief Compassion Charitas Ecclesiae
some Errors of that Church or the like to consult of it that we may not also injuriously exclude him from our common Communion 6. In such cases of Error or Male-administratition to admonish Neighbour Ministers and Churches as also in case of any Abuse of their Pastors or choice of unsound heretical or ungodly Pastors or cherishing Seducers or ungodly Persons in their Churches or neglecting Discipline or faling to looseness or in case of Scandals among them or of Offences and Divisions among themselves or between them and some Neighbour-church or many the like cases the Advice and Admonitions of the Neighbour associated Pastors should be directed to them for their Recovery which cases single Ministers cannot so well be informed of nor perform their Duty with so much Advantage as the Association may 7. To concur in some Admonitions to the intractable and incorrigible of our several Parishes that they that will not hear their own Teachers through any Prejudice may be prevailed with by many and to strengthen our Hands and the Reputation of our Doctrine and common Duties with the People by our Unity and Concord 8. To help one another but especially the younger sort of Ministers to whom it may be as an Academy by Conference Disputations and other profitable Exercises and preaching they that ordinarily preach have need sometimes to hear and to have a Communication from their Brothrens Gifts as well as the People have from them 9. Those Ministers that scruple censuring any Offender without the consent of other Ministers may here take their consent and young Ministers that are unskilful in managing such Works may take Advice 10. We may here agree upon the fittest manner and season and persons and places in our helping the Congregations that are ignorant ill-provided or unprovided of Ministers or dangerously corrupted and may advise any Neighbour Churches that send to us to help them to a fit Minister or in the like cases 11. Because it is impossible to enumerate punctually the cases in which it is lawful to take Members to a particular Church out of another Church or Parish all Churches and Pastors shall give an account of any such Action to these Associations if any be offended with them Where it shall be enquired whether the Action be dishonourable to God and injurious to the publick Good of the Churches if it be not the Offence is removed If they find it be the Parties offending are to be admonished and if they give not Satisfaction it is to be enquired whether there be any thing in the Principles and manner of the Action that makes it an intollerable Offence to the Churches If there be then after sufficient Admonition and waiting the Guilty if impenitent are to be cast out of our common Communion or the Churches to resolve to have no Christian Communion with them But if there be no such heinous intollerable Ingredient we must be content only to admonish them and disown the Sin and continue Communion with them In like manner if any Scandal be raised of any Brother of the Association or if any have an Accusation against him we must hear them and he must be responsible and give account of his Ways though not as to his Governors yet as to his Brethren to remove Offence and to keep clear the way of holy Communion 12. It will be most regular and avoid the hurt of the Churches if Ordination of Ministers be either performed by these Assemblies on the Ministers to be ordained be here tried and approved and the Ordination to be performed in the Church to which he is ordained by such as they appoint or by the teaching Elders of that Church it self after their Approbation of the Person In these Twelve Particulars you may see what use there is of these Misterial Associations and Assemblies without medling with a superior governing Power and how great Reason there is that all sober godly peaceable Ministers should join in them even for communion of Pastors and Churches and the promoting of our common Work and Welfare 9. Let these Associations chuse their Presidents or Moderators and any fit Name by which they will call him and determine whether he shall be pro tempore or how long or fixed as long as he liveth and is the fittest according to the Judgment of the Ministers For this is not a case in which Men can be forced from their Liberty And if any will so far make use of his Advice as to be guided by him as none can deny him that Liberty of his own Mind so he must not seek to bind all others to the same Subjection but those that bring themselves to it by the same Estimation have their Liberty as he 10. Though it be not of necessity yet would it be of great conveniency and use if the Magistrate would be with us or appoint some Substitute to represent him in all our Assemblies that he may be a Witness of our Proceedings and see that we do no wrong to the Commonwealth and avoid all Suspicions that may be occasioned by Rumors But principally that he may see how far it is meet for him in any case to second us by his Power For as in many cases the Power of the Magistrate ought to be used to second the Ministry as to restrain Men from publishing demnable Heresies from disturbing the Churches Peace c. so we think it a vile abuse of Magistrates to require them to be the meer Executioners of our Sentences and to punish Men only because we have Excommunicated them before he know the justness of the cause As the Church or Ministers are Judges when the Question is whether such a Man is to be avoided rejected or excommunicated for Heresie or any Sin so the Magistrate only is Judge when the Question is whether he be to be corporally punished for Heresie or any Sin and therefore he must know the cause 11. As those Neighbour-Ministers that live at convenient Distance for such Communion should hold such Associations as aforesaid so the Communion of Christians and Pastors in special being to be extended as far as natural and moral capacity will permit it is meet that there be for more extensive Communion some more general Assemblies of the Ministers to be held by the Delegates of these Associations for matters that are of more general Concernment yea and that by Messengers and Letters we hold such correspondency with the Churches of Christ abroad as is necessary to promote the common Cause and the Love and Communion of the Saints 12. If these Associations should attempt any thing unjust and injurious to the Commonwealth or a corrupt Majority should grow in time to countenance either Heresy or Ungodliness or they should by Contentions among themselves disturb the Peace of the Churches and divide them and fall a railing at or excommunicating personately one another it is here the Magistrates Duty to interpose and reprehend and correct them and displace the unworthy and
by Laws 6. If there be Bishops in the Church sure they must have the superintendent Care and so Power over the whole Flock Presbyters and People yet so that for the Exercise of it they intrust to the Rector of each Parish with what shall be found necessary for the Souls of the People in daily Administration 7. I cannot think it meet that the 39 Articles which are the Hedge between us and the Papacy should be removed and Articles in bare Scriptureâ—terms substituted in their room unless by this means the Papacy receding also an universal Peace might be hoped which is a thing beyond our Prospect That no more Articles be added to clog our Communion is very reasonable That any of these established are excepted against by those in Relation to whom we now consider is more than I have heard 8. For the not removing any Minister but upon weighty Cause and not punishing Offenders by other than Ecclesiastical Censures leaving the rest to the Civil Magistrate I see no matter of Debate between us R. B.'s Reply THE Strictures returned instead of Abatements for Accommodation refer almost all the Matters in Difference to the Civil Magistrate We know that whoever is in possession of the Magistracy will be the Judge of his own Actions and give us Laws according to his Judgment Our Motion is not for Divines to do any of the Magistrates Work But when Magistrates against Episcopacy are up we would have Divines endeavour in their places to draw them from injuring the Brethren that are for Episcopacy And when Magistrates that are for Episcopacy are up we would have Divines endeavour in their places to draw them from injuring the Brethren that cannot comply with it any nearer than on the fore-expressed Terms And that the Party that is still under might not be look upon and used as a Sect and Division might not be cherished among us we much rather desire an Accommodation than a Toleration that we may be but one Bodyâ— and stick together whatever Changes come To this end we first desire that our Rule for Doctrine Discipline and Worship be such as may serve for an Universal Concord and next that we may be secured from Encroachments on our just Liberty and such Impositions besides or above the Rule as we know will cause Divisions and Persecutions That which we desire to these Ends from the Divines to whom we offer our Proposals is that they will express their own Desire that so much may be granted by the Magistrate as they find meet to be granted and agreeing on the fittest Terms among themselves will profess and promise their faithful Endeavours in their Places and Capacities to procure the Concession and Approbation of these Terms from the Magistrate And this any single person may to prepare for a further Communication consider of and consent unto viz. to improve his Interest to these Ends. Now to the Particulars 1. We desire that you will profess your Judgment and promise your just Endeavours in your place that no Laws may be made or continued that are contrary to these Christian Duties and I know of none such existent And then we consent that all Persons be responsible for their Miscarriages 2. This is the chief of our Desires that you will profess your desire and promise your endeavour in your place that the power mentioned in the eighth Article may by Law be granted to the Rectors of each Parish we suppose that their Office is of Divine Institution and therefore that Magistrates may not change it what is by Law established the Possessors of the Government will still be Judges of Did we believe that the Pastors of particular Churches are not of Divine Institution unchangeable by Man or that Diocesan Bishops could exercise Christ's Discipline over so many hundred Parishes so that it would not certainly be cast out by their undertaking it we would not have insisted on this Article but yield that Rectorsâ— shall never Rule 3. We might hope that the Ceremonies might be left indifferent and so there might be no Divisions about them As we find it now by Experience in our Assemblies in the singing of Psalms the Gesture is left indifferent and there is no trouble about it So in many places the Sacrament Gesture is left indifferent and one kneeleth and another standeth and another sitteth and there is no disturbance about it but Custom having taken off their Prejudice they have the Charity to bear with one another And some Congregations sing one Version of the Psalms and some another and though Uniformity in that be much more desirable than in a Cross or Surplice or Kneeling at Receiving the Eucharist yet there is no disturbance among us about it And when our Unity is not laid upon our Uniformity in these unnecessary things we shall not be necessitated to persecute one another about them nor to make Sects by our Toleration of Dissenters And doubtless if your Toleration be of all that profess Tenderness of Conscience in these Points you will find such abundance of godly Men avoid your Ceremonies and accept of your Toleration that you will think your selves necessitated to persecute them as dishonouring you and discouraging Uniformity by their dissent But if you tolerate some and not others that can lay the same claim to it your partiality will quickly break all into pieces We are certain that leaving these unnecessary things at liberty to be used only by those that will is the way to Unity But if this cannot be attained we shall be glad of a Toleration in our Publick Charges 4. The Patron 's Right of Nomination may be preserved though the Communicants have their Consent preserved without which none is to be obtruded on them Though in case of unreasonable refusal of fit men much means may be used by Church-Officers and Magistrates to bring them to consent But how can People be governed in the Worship of God and in a Holy Life by any Pastor without their own consent 5. The multiplying of Bishops is in our Account the making Discipline become possible that else is not to any purpose And though our own Judgment be that every Parish that is great should have a Bishop and Presbytery yet we yield to you for Concord and Peace that there be a Bishop and Presbytery in every City that is Corporation or Market-Town and these as is expressed in the Articles to have one in every County or Diocess to whom they shall be responsible We desire only the profession of your Consent to this Change and promise of your promoting it in your place by just means that so our Differences may be ended But if this cannot be granted and no particular Pastors tolerated to exercise Discipline in their own Parishes but all must be done by the Bishop and his Court we must take it as equipollent to this Conclusion Discipline shall be cast out of the Churches And then we have no hopes of the healing of our
the Lay-Judge And if he have power as a Presbyter why do the Bishop appropriate it to themselves If one that is no Bishop may exercise it when a Bishop bids him then is it not a thing appropriate to the Bishop's Office Besides these there are Arch-Deacons who by themselves or their Officials hold some kind of Inferiour Court which dealeth in lesser Matters Some Diocesses have one Arch-Deacon some two some few three or four The Bishops should go visit once a year and the Arch-Deacon oftner When they visit they go to some chief Town in the County and call all the Ministers to meet them where they hear a Sermon and Dine together usually They yearly compile a Book of Articles which Churchwardens are sworn to enquire after and to present the Names of the Offenders accordingly to the Bishop's Court. In brief this is the Frame of our Diocesan Government To which I only add That Fees and Money for Commutation of Penance are much of their Officers Maintenance and that such as they Excommunicate in most Cases are by a Writ De Excommunicato Capiendo to be laid in the Jail till upon their Repentance they have made their Peace and are absolved § 313. Having told you what our Government is let me tell you what the Execution of it is The Books of Articles are fitted somewhat to the Canon by those Bishops that are most moderate and cauâ—elous and therefore by the English Canons they may be known some of them usually are against Drunkards and Fornicators but the main bent of them is against those that wear not the Surplice that Baptize without the Cross that omit the Common Prayer that refuse to Baptize any Infant or that deliver the Lord's Supper to any that kneel not in receiving it or that so receive it without kneeling that stand noâ— up at the Gospel that bow not at the Name Iesus though they may sit when the same words are read in the Chapter and are not required to how at the Name Christ God c. Also about the Repair of the Church the Surplice the Books that none piss up to the Church-wall c. with many such things It is a rare thing for the Churchwardens to present any except Nonconformists that use not Ceremonies c. Swearers Drunkards and Whoremongers are seldom presented lest Neighbours be displeased but Puritans have some one or other that is more eager in looking after them When any Scandalous Person is presented he hath no other Spiritual Conviction or Exhoration to Repentance tending to Convert his Soul than at any Civil Court But telling them that he is Sorry and paying his Fees or Commutation Money he comes home But when Conscientious Nonconformists are before them whose Consciences will not let them say that they are Sorry vizâ— for praying or exhorting others in their Houses for giving the Sacrament to them that stand or sit c. they are usually Excommunicated I have been in most parts of England and in Fifty years time I never saw one do Penance or confess his Sin in publick for any Scandalous Crime nor ever heard but of two in the Country where I lived that stood in a White sheet for Adultery except in the space when Bishops were down and then I have heard many that have penitently confessed their Sin and begged the Prayers of the Congregation and been prayed for In a word their Courts are meerly as Civil Courts for Terrour but not at all to convince Men of Sin and bring them to Repentance and Salvation further than such Terrour is â—it to do it And note here That the Discipline of the Church is not to be judged of by the King's Declaration concerning Ecclesiastical Affairs which was never executed before it was void in these respects Nor yet by some of our Reformers or Chroniclers who tell you how it was exercised quickly after the Reformation in King Edward's or Queen Elizabeth's days As Hollingshead e. g. who telleth you of many Suffragans and of the Piety and Diligence of their Courts and of Exercises called Prophesying held up at the Arch-Deacons Visitations against the Subverters of which he thundereth But as it is in England at this day and hath been this Sixty or Seventy years by-past § 314. Now concerning this Diocesan Frame of Government the Non-Subscribers called Puritans by many do judge that it is sinful and contrary to the Word of God both in the Constitution and in the Administration of it And they lay upon it these heavy Charges the least of which if proved is of intolerable weight § 315. 1. They say That quantum in se it destroyeth the Pastoral Office which is of Divine Institution and was known in the Primitive Church for it doth deprive the Presbyters of the third essential part of their Office for it is clear in Scripture that Christ appointed no Presbyters that were not subservient to him in all the three parts of his Office as Prophet Priest and King to stand between the People and him in Teaching Worshipping and Governing And though the Actual Exercise of any one part may be Suspended without the Destruction of the Office yet to the Office it self which is nothing but Power and Obiligation to exercise one part is as essential as the other so then they say that That which destroyeth an essential part of the Pastors or Presbyters Office destroyeth the Office as instituted by Christ But the Diocesan state of Government destroyeth c. Ergo The Major will not be denied The Minor hath two parts 1. That governing Power and Obligation over the Flock is essential to the Office of a Pastor or Presbyter as instituted by Christ. Which they prove thus 1. The very Name of Presbyter and Pastor denoteth the Governing Power and was then used in that sence as Dr. Hâ—mmond hath well proved 2. There is no such thing found in all the New Testament as a Presbyter that had not the Power of Governing his Flock as well as Teaching it He that can find it let him Dr. Hammond hath gone over all the Texts in proving it 3. The Church long after knew no such Presbyters as had not the Spiritual Government of the Flock 4. The Papists confess that they have the Power of the Keys in foro interiori to this day which is the Spiritual Government 2. The second part of the Minor That the Diocesan Form denieth this Governing Power to the Presbyters appeareth 1. By their own Confessions â— 2. By the Actual Constitution disabling them and placing the Power elsewhere 3. By the instance of the â—orementioned Particulars and many more They have not the power of judging who shall be taken into their Churhes as Members by Baptism or Confirmed or who shall Communicate or who is to be publickly Admonished Censured Excommunicated Absolved buried as a Brother dying in Christ c. no nor what Chapter to read in the Church nor what Garment to wear nor what words of Prayer
Schism One useth the Surplice in the Pulpit and another not One Prayeth before Sermon And another only bids them Pray One Prayeth after Sermon and another not One at the Singing of Psalms doth sit another stand and it maketh no Schism And the Convocatioâ— 1640 Commend Indifferency about Bowing towards the Altar Therefore that Convocation was not of your mind But either way will serve us Prop. 5. Not to renonuce their Ordination or be Re-ordain'd Strict They are not Neither doth their Re-ordaining imply that they are but only that they are not sufficiently qualified to Officiate in our Church Ans. What Qualification is it that that they want Generals here decides not the Case If it be only the Qualification of Legal Authority or License Why will not the giving of that qualifie them Or what necessity is there of Re-ordination But when you as well as we profess that Re-ordination when real is unlawful and yet you require their Ordination de Nova which they call Re-ordination Doth not this tell the World that you take the first for null 6. Prop. No Excommunicate Person as such to be Imprison'd and Undone but such whose Crimes deserve it Strict Contempt of Authority is one of the greatest Crimes and for that it is that men are Excommunicated first and afterwards Imprison'd Why doth not this Exception lie against such as are Outlawed in the Chancery as well as against those that are Excommunicated Answ. Because the Cause differeth E. g. I believe I have had multitudes with me Conformable as well as others who being of timerous or melancholy Constitutions and under Temptations and Trouble of Mind dare not receive the Sacrament for fear of doing it unworthily and of eating and drinking Damnation and the Devil entring into them according to the words of the Liturgy which affright them and they never Communicated in their Lives at above 30 years of Age and have oft been going and never durst venture One of them was with me within this hour Some that have ventured have faln Distracted and some near it by Terror and Temptations You can tell them reason against all this And so can I and have done it as like as oft as most of your Curates and yet they are Uncured And I must not say how little is done in too many places to cure their Ignorance or Timerousness which is the cause And are you sure that all these poor troubled timerous Souls are worthy of utter ruine as Contemners of Authority For not Communicating they must be Excommunicated and after Imprison'd and undone in the World even during life unless they can be changed by you Every Man deserveth not utter ruin who doth not all the good that he can do But can such a person change their own minds and fears because you give them reason for it I know they cannot And when Christ tenderly carrieth his Lambs in his Arms and will not break a bruised Reed Shall I in his Name as his Minister Excommunicate them and deliver them up if not to the Devil to the Magistrate to be Beggered and perpetually Imprisoned Let me rather bear the wrath of all the Prelates on earth and all that they can say or do against me Prop. 7. But who shall be judged tolerable it doth not become us c. Strict As it doth not become you to be Judges of what is or what is not tolerable in the case of others so it doth much less become you to be Judges of what is or what is not to be granted in your own case Ans. We never arrogated any of your Power over our Brethren We have formerly in our Folly hoped that we might presume to be Petitioners though not Iudges what is to be granted us We are not ashamed to confess that we did desire leave to Preach Christ's Gospel But we become not Iudges in the Case of our Superiours Acts. But by or without your leave we must be discerning Iudges of our own Duty or Sin whatever it cost us And I think no sober Christian will give the contrary under his hand as his Judgment Prop. id That no Licensed Ministers shall Preach against any of the Doctrine c. Strict It seems Vnlicensed Ministers may be allowed to speak for or against what they list Answ. Our Case is hard with you I put in Licensed or Vnlicensed And the first Honourable and Learned Person that saw it thought Vnlicensed should be put out because it was unmeet for us to tell His Majesty whom he should tolerate or how far but to meddle only with our own Case who desired Licenses And now for blotting out that word and not medling with any others we are censured as motioning that the Unlicensed may say what they list Thus all our Peace-making motions have been long interpreted by some Prop. id That all Magistrates be excepted from all open Personal Rebukes and disgraceful Censures or Excommunications because c. Strict We take Excommunication to be an Ordinance of God from which Magistrates are not to be exempted Ans. 1. God never ordained that a Lay-Chancellor should Excommunicate them 2. God never gave power to any to excommunicate a King Prince or other Ruler if any at all but that particular Pastor to whom by voluntary Consent he committeth the Charge of his Soul The Independents that think as you are yet more modest in this in that they subject the Ruler to none but the chosen Pastor of that particular Congregation which he voluntarily joyneth himself to 3. Is not the World much abused when they are told that it is the Presbyterians that are for excommunicating Princes and not the Episcopal For my part I am fully of the mind of Bishop Bilson and Andrews in â—ortura Torti in this that to an Impenitent wicked Ruler I would suspend my own Act of giving him the Sacrament with Chrysostom's resolution rather to suffer But my Judgment is that no Bishop nor Minister especially one that is not his proper Pastor may lawfully use any open personal rebukes or disgraceful censures or Excommunications against Kings Iudges or Honourable Magistrates And my Reason no Papist Prelate Presbyterian or Independent is able to refel viz. from the fifth Commandment The stablished perpetual Law of God Commandeth us to honour them Disgraceful Excommunication is not accidentally but purposedly a dishonouring them For Men are excommunicated that they may be shamed The after-positive Institution of Excommunication nulleth not this antecedent Moral Law but must give place to it and bindeth not against it I farther prove that 1. Because all Men confess that this last is but a Law of Order and that Order is for the sake of the end and thing Ordered and that it oft obligeth not when it ceaseth to be a means to that end or would destroy it And that E g. If you knew that an Excommunication of a King or Judge would prove the Dissolution of that Church it were not Lawful Therefore neither when
his Conscience to baptize any Child who is not thus offered to God by one of the Parents or by such a pro parent as taketh the Child for his own and undertaketh the Christian Education Be it also Enacted that no person shall be constrained against his Conscience to the use of the Cross in Baptism or of the Surplice nor any Minister to deny the Lord's Supper to any for not receiving it kneeling nor read any of the Apocrypha for Lessons nor to punish any Excommunication or Absolution against his Conscience but the Bishop or Chancellour who decreeth it shall cause such to publish it as are not dissatisfyed so to do or shall only affix it on the Church-Door Nor shall any Minister be constrained at Burial to speak only words importing the salvation of any person who within a year received not the Sacrament of Communion or was suspended from it according to the Rubrick or Canon and satisfyed not the Minister of his serious Repentance III. And whereas many persons having been ordained as Presbyters by Parochial Pastors in the times of Usurpation and Distraction hath occasioned many Difficulties for the present remedy hereof be it Enacted That all such persons as before this time have been ordained as Presbyters by Parochial Pastors only and are qualifyed for that Office as the Law requireth shall receive power to exercise it from a Bishop by a written Instrument which every Bishop in his Diocess is hereby impowered and required to Grant in these words and no other To A. B. of C. in the Country of D. Take thou Authority to exercise the Office of a Presbyter in any place and Congregation in the King's Dominions whereto thou shall be lawfully called And this practice sufficing for present Concord no one shall be put to declare his Judgment whether This or That which he before received shall be taken for his Ordination nor shall be urged to speak any words of such signification but each party shall be left to Judge as they see cause IV. And whereas the piety of Families and Godly Converse of Neighbours is a great means of preserving Religion and Sobriety in the World and lest the Act for suppressing seditious Conventicles should be mis-interpreted as injurious thereto be it declared that it is none of the meaning of the said Act to forbid any such Family Piety or Converse tho more then four Neighbours should be peaceably present at the Reading of the Scriptures or a Licensed Book the singing of a Psalm repeating of the publick Sermons or any such Exercise which neither the Laws nor Canons do forbid they being performed by such as joyn with the allowed Church-Assemblies and refuse not the Inspection of the Ministers of the Parish Especially where persons that cannot read are unable to do such things at home as by Can. 13. is enjoyned V. And whereas the form of the Oath and Declaration imposed on persons of Office and Trust in Corporations is unsatisfactory to many that are Loyal and peaceable that our Concord may extend to Corporations as well as Churches Be it Enacted That the taking of the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and the Declaration against Religion and Disloyalty here before prescribed shall to all Ends and purposes suffice instead of the said Oath and Declaration VI. And whereas there are many peaceable Subjects who hold all the Essentials of the Christian Faith but conform not to so much as is required to the Established Ministry and Church-Communion Be it Enacted that All and only they who shall publickly take the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy before some Court of â—ustice or at the Open Sessions of the County where they live and that then and there Subscribe as followeth I. A. B. do unfeâ—gnedly stand to my Baptismal Covenant and do believe all the Articles of the Creeds called the Apostles the Nicene and Constantinopolitane and the truth of the holy Canonical Scriptures and do renounce all that 〈◊〉 contrary hereto shall be so far tolerated in the Excercise of their Religion as His Majesty with the advice of his Parliament or Council shall from time to time find consistent with the peace and safety of his Kingdoms VII And lest this Act for Concord should occasion Discord by emboldening unpeaceable and unruly or heretical men be it enacted that if any either in the allowed or the Tolerated Assemblies that shall pray or Preach Rebellion Sedition or against the Government or Liturgy of the Church or shall break the Peace by tumults or otherwise or stir up unchristian hatred and strife or shall preach against or otherwise oppose the Christan verities or any Article of the sacred Doctrine which they subscribe or any of the 39. Articles of Religion they shall be punished as by the Laws against such Offences is already provided I will here also Annex the Copies of some Petitions which I was put to draw up which never were presented I. The first was intended while the Parliament was sitting to have been offered but wise Parliament-Men thought it was better forbear it II. The second was thought fit for some Citizens to have offered but by the same Councel it was forborn III. The third was thus occasioned Sir Iohn Babor told Dr. Manton that the Scots being then suspected of some insurrection it was expected that we renewed the profession of our Loyalty to free us from all suspicion of Conspiracy with them We said that it seemed hard to us that we should fall under suspicion and no cause alledged We knew of no occasion that we had given But we were ready to profess our continued Loyalty but desired that we might with it open our just resentment of our Case They put me to draw it up but when it was read it was laid by none daring to plead our Cause so freely and signify any sense of our hard usage I. May it Please Your Majesty with the Lords and Commons Assembled in Parliament WHen the Common profession of resolved moderation had abated Men's fears of a Silencing Prelacy and the published Declarations of Nobilitie and Gentry against all dividing violence and revenge had helpt to unite the endeavours of Your Subjects which prospered for Your Majestie 's desired Restoration when God's wonderful providence had dissolved the Military Powers of Usurpers which hindered it and when Your welcome appearance Your Act of Oblivion Your Gracious Declaration about Ecclesiastical Affairs for which the House of Commons solemnly gave you thanks did seem to have done much to the Cure of our Divisions we had some hopes that our common revived Love and Concord would have tended to Your Majesty's and our common joy in the harmony strength and prosperity of Your Kingdoms and that we might among your inferiour Subjects have enjoyed our part in the common tranquility But the year 1662. dissolved those hopes fixing our old Difficulties and adding more which since then also have been much increased Beeing consecrated and vowed to the sacred Ministry we
be Schismaticks with them that unite not in their Center or at least be not tyed to union by their ligaments So he is a Schismatick to a Papist that Centers not in the Pope as the Principium unitatis and visible Head of the Church and in the Roman Church as the Heart of the Church Catholick denominating the whole He is a SchismatiÌ„ck with some others that owns not every Order or Ceremony which they maintain For my part I should think that he that 〈◊〉 in â—hrâ—â—t and â—â—â—deth the sound and wholsome Doctrine contained in the Creeds of the Church and maintaineth love and unity with all Christians to the utmost extent of his natural capacity even with all that he is capable of holding Communion with is no Schismatick nor his attempts for that end Schismatical Combinations If there were a Bishop in this Diocess and he should go one way suppose he command that all Church Assemblies be at such a time and all worship in such a form and all the Presbyters and People go another way whether they do well or ill so the thing itself be tollerable and will not meet at the time nor worship God in the form which he prescribeth I should think I were guilty of Schism if I separated from all these Churches and guilty of ungodliness if I wholly forsook and forbore all publick worship of God because I could have none according to the Bishops commanding Much more if there were no Bishop in the Diocess at all This seems to be our case in respect of both Worship and Discipline at least for the most part Is that man guilty of no Schisme nor Impiety who will rather have no Discipline exercised at all on the profane and scandalous but all Vice go without controul and the rage of Mens sins provoke Heaven yet more against us who will rather have no Ministerial Worship of God in Prayer or Praise no Sacraments no Solemn Assemblies to this end no Ministerial Teaching of the people but have all Mens Souls given over to perdition the bread of life taken from their mouths and God deprived of all his Worship then any of this should be done without Bishops That had rather the Church doors were shut up and we lived like Heathens than we should Worship God without a Bishops Commands and that when we have none to command us 3. We distinguish of the necessity of Bishops either it is a necessity ad bene esse for the right ordering of the Church when it may be had or it is a necessity ad esse to the very being of a Church or of Gods Worship without which we may not offer God any publick Service or have any Communion with any Congregation that so doth The former we leave as not fit for our determination and therefore we do not contradict you in it nor seek to draw you to own any Declaration against it The latter we do deny there is no such necessity of Bishops as that God can have no Church without them and that we must rather separate from all our Assemblies and never offer God any publick Worship then do it without them remembring still that we speak of those Bishops whom we are charged with rejecting and not the Pastors of particular Congregations And in this distinction of necessity and in this conclusion I have the consent of the generality of the Protestant Bishops so far as I know to a Man as far as their Writings declare to us their Minds and therefore Episcopal Divines may consent Except to Sect. 2. 1. Whether in this Worcestershire Association whoever will enter into it doth not therein oblige himself to acknowledge those for Presbyters and Pastors of Churches who profess themselves to have been made such in a Church where there are and were Bishops that never denyed them Orders without the Hands Consent or Knowladge of the Bishop yea in a time when Bishops were without any accusation before any Ecclesiastical Superiour Synod or other unheard ejected laid by by their own sheep and Presbyters that owed them obedience Reply to Sect. 2. To your first Question I answer 1. You must distinguish of punishing and ejecting Bishops that deserve it and casting out their Order 2. Between casting out the appurtenances and corruptions which made up the English sort of Prelacie as differing from the Primitive and casting out the Order and Office of Bishops simply in itself 3. Between those Men that do cast them out and those that do not 4. Between a Church that hath Bishops and one that hath none 5. Between them that can have Ordination by them and those that cannot 6. Between those Ministers of this Association that were Ordained by Bishops and those that were not 7. Between the Irregularity and sinfulness or Ordination and the nullity thereof and so between a Minister regularly Ordained and a Minister Irregularly Ordained who is a Minister still Hereupon I answer further in these conclusions 1. That too many of the Bishops lately ejected did deserve it is beyond dispute 2. Whether the Parliament in the state that they were in had not power to punish them by Imprisonment or Ejection as Solemon did Abiathar without an Ecclesiastical Superior or whether the Clergy be exempted from such punishment by the Secular power till they are delivered up to them by the Ecclesiastical Head hath been voluminously disputed in the world already Sutcliffe Bilson Iewel and a multitude more have proved that Kings have power in all Causes and over all Persons as well Ecclesiastical as Civil and that the Pope hath no power of Jurisdiction in England let the Oath of Supremacy judge and if the Metropolitan of Canterbury or the highest Ecclesiastical Power miscarry who shall restrain or eject them but the Civil Power unless we go to the Pope for more acceptable witnesses I commend to you Spalatensis Grotius and Saravia yea Fr. de Victoria and several Parisians The two former one de Republ. Eccles. the other de Imperio summarum potestatum will never be well answered If it be said the King did it not I answer I think the Authority by whom that much was done that we now speak of will be acknowledged sufficient by most that were against the fact and that fought against the Parliament that understood the Laws It was long before the King withdrew 3. Many of those that approved of the Ejection of those unworthy men yet approved not of the dissolution of the Office and such may be many and for ought you know most or all of the Ministers here Associated Though I suppose rather it is otherwise yet while Men do for peace silence their opinions who knows what they are And sure I am many among us had no hand in the downfall of the Bishops and whether any at all be lyable in this to your Charge besides my self whereof more anon I know not most of our Association were in the Universities in the Wars and the rest were some I
This is like the Man that swears he never swore in his Life you blame me with charging you with what you contend for 2. But you do with as little Candor as verity say that in the next Page it is those same Men that I speak of when I purposely and plainly call these Gentlemen of the Episcopal Protestant Party as distinct from the Cassandrian Papists and as helping us in the Discovery of the Danger But I perceive it is your Desire to make Men believe that I took them for all one But a good Cause needs to such a way of Defenceâ— Did you think that the learned Doctor to whom you wrote would believe you who had my Book at hand and could see that your Words were false And is it not strange that upon such a dishonest Foundation you can build such a triumphant Exclamation as follows See how Uncharitableness betrays and accuses it self c. Exception to Sect. 27. Pag. 50. n. 4. If these that I dispute with will shew themselves openly to be Papists and plead that Women or Lay-Men may baptize in case of Necessity c. See see his Magisterial canting crying out Popery upon whatever likes him not Doth he know whom he here condemns for Papists Yes he doth for he tells us pag. 81. that the 38th Canon Elibertint Concilii and he tells us right decrees that in case of necessity a Lay Man may baptize well an ancient Catholick Council held under the primitive pure Times whilst Persecution yet exercised the Church more ancient than the Council of Nice and whereof Magnus Osius Confessor was a part is peacht of Popery too together with us Enough of this I might add much more All this within the compass of twenty Leaves from pag. 45. to 85. Reply to Sect 27. All this but a meer Mistake whether willing or unwilling I never took this Point alone enough to denominate a Man a Papist but because it is a Point wherein the Papists generally hold one way and the Protestants another I take it to be a 〈◊〉 Discovery which side the forementioned Persons are of I durst not say that the Error of Purgatory or praying for the Dead or praying to Saints no â— nor Transubstantiation alone is sufficient to denominate a Man a Papist But yet I think if a Man would degrade our Ministers and unchurch our Churches and all the Reformed Churches that have not Bishops and maintain the Romish Ordination and Church and yet saythe is not a Papist your Addition of one of these would further the Discovery I am not ignorant that Tertullian and others speak of Lay Mens Baptizing in case of necessity but not for Women though Pamelius would pervert Tertullian's Words for that End Except to Sect. 28. To give you a Taste when he quotes Fathers as he quoted above the 80th Canon Apostotical to eject our Bishops So also when he would prove that the ancient Church held it lawful for Ministers to impose Hands for the confirming of Parties haptised pag. 58. for Proof of what he saith he pretends to but Two Authors viz. Ambrose in Ephes. 4. and Augustin quoest ex vet novo Testam mixt both certainly spurious Pieces and the latter the Work of an Heretick Reply to Sect. 28. You go the farther the worse I quoted Bishop Downame as one of the Episcopal Protestants to shew that it is their Judgment that Ministers ordained without Bishops may be true Ministers Now because the Bishop brings these two Testimonies on the by about Confirmation and Reconciliation of Penitents you do in my Judgment not well 1. Feign me to be the Speaker of those Words and the Alledger of those Authors when it was a Bishop and his Words go cited because a Bishop 2. You make me to do it in order to prove the Power of Ministers to impose Hands on the Confirmed and Reconciled when even Bishop Downame brought in that and these Testimonies thereto but as subservient to the others But perhaps I left you some occasion of this mistake to charge me with the Words of the Bishop No none at all I enclosed his Words with this Mark and after I wrote so far Bishop Downame that there might be no place for such an Oversight But where you talk of but two Authors for this I thought you had known how easy it is to bring more For if it be the Ceremony of Imposing Hands that you would deny to the Presbyters it was so far from being denied theâ—â— anciently that even the English Bishops allowed it them in Ordination which is the greater If you mena the Power of Confirming and Reconciling it 's known the Bishops might delegate Presbyters to it and the Corepiscopi used it yea Presbyters I think in some Cases And for Reconciliation Bishop Usher tells you in the Words I cited that even Deacons used it or had it Yet is not the Testimony of those Authors contemptible that ascribed to Ambrose is taken by Erasmus to be Remigius or Anselme by Maldonate to be Remigius by Brugensis and Bellarmine to be Hillarius Diaconus And well might Downame alledge them against the Papists when Bellarmine the Rhemists Alan and others so esteem them and quote them as Ambrose when it serves their turns And for the Book of Quest. in vet nov Test. 1. The Papists citing it Bellarmine Harding Turrian Eckius Cope Rhemists c. Downame might well cite it ad Hominem yea ad Rem it being matter of Fact that he speaks to and the Author so ancient that Hierome seems to take notice of him Except to Sect. 29. In all this you see I have not disputed the Case with him but only discovered to you his manner for that he himself professes he is resolved in this Book to forbear the Dispute p. 79. princip pag. 77. he would give us to understand that he hath much more behind that he can say by way of Argument for this is only crying out Popery Popish c. for Presbyters Power of Governing Excommunicating ordaining without a Bishop Let him be intreated to do it and lay aside his poor kind of calumniating his Adversary and deal Christianly by Arguments only and he shall soon be answered I believe For the present he may know his Papers prevail not but only provoke those he writes against Reply to Sect. 29. It 's strange that to call a Papist a Papist should be accounted Calumniation I profess to speak of none but Cassandrian Papists I name none They that are not such have no reason to say that I calumniate them when I professedly accept and and honour and seek Reconciliation with them They that are such methinks should not be ashamed of it It 's an ill Religion which a Man must be asham'd of and an ill Profession that is ashamed of a true Religion 2. That my Papers prevail not but provoke is no wonder 1. The Papists I expected to provoke by discovering their Designs and attempted not
Ordainer to do it where it will be needful to consider what is of Necessity to the Constitution of such Authority and what destroys it Before all which it would be necessary to know what the Ordainer's Work is and to what and how far his Power extends But this I am not now to meddle in That a Divine Ordination is of Necessity to the Ligitimation of our Calling in foro Dei I grant as also in foro Conscientiae Ministrantis That authoritative Ordination of Men is necessary Ordinis Gratiâ when it may be obtained and where God's Providence doth not make it naturally or morally impossible I also grant That Imposition of Hands with solemn Prayer is the most convenient manner and necessary for the Ordainer to use Necessitate Praecepti Medii ad bene esse Ordinationis I also grant That the Power of Ordaining is ordinarily only in the Hands of Christ's Ecclesiastical Ministers I acknowledge whether Bishops or Presbyters we now question not and that it is not divolved to any others but in Case of Necessity The Things then that I deny are that Imposition of Hands or present Prayer or the Presence of the Ordainer are of Necessity to our Office That the true just Authority of an Ecclesiastical Ordainer is of Necessity to the being of our Office And consequently that an uninterrupted Succession of Just Authoritative Ecclesiastical Ordination from the Apostles is of absolute necessity to the being of our Calling Nay that any Authoritative Human Ordination at all besides the Peoples meer Consent is of such absolute indispensable Necessity ad esse Officii all this I deny And my Opinion is that in Case of a failing of all Ecclesiastical Authoritative Ordination the Magistrates Ordination may suffice ad esse Officii And in case both fail the Peoples meer Acceptance Consent or Election may suffice supposing the Person meetly qualified And whether you will call this act of the People a Constitution or Ordination or not I am indifferent Certainly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 oft signifies the Constituting which is not an Act of Government or superior Authority But no Term hath so much need of Explication as the Word Office or Ministry which is the Terminus of Ordination An Office is a stated Power or Authority or Faculty with Duty of doing certain Works to certain Ends. The Ministerial Office of a Presbyter is to be differenced ab objecto a fine The Authority and the Duty in a lawful Officer go together Such a one only is in sensu primario proprio an Officer But he that is a Usurper or hath no lawful Call may yet both 1. Have all the Duty of that Office lying upon him and by his own Intrusion oblige himself to the Performance and yet want the true Authority for performing it seeing he came in without God's Call and there is no Power but of God 2. And he may have the Name of an Officer though given him but analogically or in sensu secundario ecclesiastico 3. And the Church may owe him that Respect and Observance due to a lawful Officer the Reason is because it is one thing to know who is a truly lawful Officer as in Matter of Membership I am bound to use many as true Christians even all that have the Profession of such who yet are not such So am I bound to take all those for lawful Officers that have the external Tokens of such seeing we cannot know any further though they be not such indeed 4. And all that Man 's Ministerial Actions are valid to the Church that doth her Duty in observing him and yet they are all null or unlawful and flat Sins to the Performer The Reason of the later is both because no Mna can lawfully do that which he hath no Authority given him for and because nemini ex proprio crimine debetur beneficium and Ergo his Usurpation cannot secure him The Reason of the former is because Duty and Benefit go together and therefore the Church that performeth but her Duty in taking those to be truly called Pastors that seem so to be having those Tokens which she is bound to judge by as probable must needs have the Benefit of his Ministry in their way of Duty for God requireth no Duty in vain As also because nemini debetur pâ—na ex aliena culpa qua talis est Now whether we shall dispute de necessitate ordinationis ad officium verum legitimum proprie primario sic dictum in foro Dei Or only as ad Officium analogicum secundario minus proprie in foro tantum ecclesiae sic dictum is to be considered How far your Sense will concur I know not but in respect of both these do I hold my former Negations Yet further before I either answer your Arguments or determine of the Sense of our Question it is very necessary that the end of our Enquiry be understood which in order must go before the means I take it for granted that you do not dispute this question as necessary to be determined in order to our Association before you can join with the present Ministry Or yet as necessary to the Determination of that further Question whether those are true Ministers that are not Ordained by Bishops and those true Organized Churches that have only such Ministers for if I thought this were your end 〈◊〉 would dispute many other Questions first before we came to this and try first whether you could prove that the Presbyterian Churches cannot produce a Succession of true Ordination on the same Grounds as the Episcopal for the main But I suppose your Ends are some other and in special those mentioned in your Paper I conjecture that I shall nearest approach your Sense if I state the Question thus Whether an Ordination by Ecclesiastical Men having just Authority thereto be in all Times and Cases since the Apostles of absolute Necessity to the very being of the Ministerial Office both coram Deo coram Ecclesiâ and consequently an uninterrupted Succession of such Ordination be of the same Necessity For if I should put the Question about Imposition of Hands or de modo aliquo ordinandi I know not but I might miss of your Sense on one Side and on the other if I should extend it to all Ordination whether by Magistrates or others Ad 1 um Your First Argument I suppose should be formed thus That which the English Bishops thought necessary to prove against the Papists that is necessary to be proved against them But the English Bishops thought it necessary against the Papists to prove the Non-interruption of their Succession in just Ordination Ergo Resp. 1. Concedo totum It was necessary to prove it against the Papists arguing ad Hominem because it is the way of fuller Conviction and Satisfaction when a Man can confute an Adversary on his own Grounds It will much shorten the Dispute when we shew them that though we should
the Error For if I had understood that it contained two Propositions 1. That Men thus and thus qualified shall preach the Word or it is the Duty of Men thus and thus qualified to preach the Word And then 2. That Men thus and thus qualified ordinis gratia shall be set apart to it or shall be appointed to Preach I never had made this Animadversion but should have acknowledged a formal Answer But I understood it only thus that Men thus and thus qualified shall be appointed that is it is their Duty being so and so qualified to seek for Ordination or it is their Duty being so and so qualified to be appointed to the Work which I thought might be true and yet they no Ministers till they were de facto set apart But now very well understanding that it may well bear both Propositions and the first coming up close to the Question in hand I shall willingly retract all that I said upon that Point and acknowledge a formal Answer which I think may satisfie But whereas you say that by disclaiming my last Argument I denied Imposition of Hands to be so necessary and by urging something hereabouts did seem to forget what I said anon I answer I did never intend to deny Imposition of Hands to be of necessity to legitimate Ordination I said indeed an Argument drawn from thence against the Question in Hand was frivolous But I did not intend to disparage the thing it self any farther than Relatively to the Question then in debate And whereas you say that Fasting was not used I answer that there never was any Ordination but Fasting was previous to it by the Appointment of the Church in Ember-Weeks which were constantly kept by the Sons of the Church though neglected by others and this I think might serve though it was not the same Day and I believe you will say so too But in these things neither will I be boisterous till I am better informed what may be the substantial or essential Parts of Christ's Ordinances and what not which I confess I have not yet such an Idea of So as to say in every Ordinance what is essential and what not Ad. 3 um Whereas you wonder that upon such slight Grounds I should so tenaciously stand to part of my third Argument I answer that I did not intend to inforce that the Case of extream inculpable necessity was the Sectaries Case But such a Necessity as did inevitably intangle them in their Invasion of the Ministry which though it doth no ways make them lawful Ministers yet it makes them inconfutably lawful Ministers till the Opinions which first made them separate be proved to them to be erroneous my meaning is this I think if this Hypothesis be true that in case of extream Necessity Men may and some must enter irregularly into the Ministry it is not possible to convince an Anabaptist that his Invasion of the Ministerial Work is unlawful till we can first convince him that Anabptism is erroneous Now hereupon I thought their Hands was much strengthened over what it would have been had that Hypothesis been false For then we could incontroulably have cleared their Invasion of the Work though they had in the mean time remained unconvinced of their erroneous Opinion But now if we cannot convince them of their Error but their way still appear Truth to them then they need do no more to justifie their Practice to themselves but borrow our Principle and that sets them right and so their Invasion is inconfutable from what they borrow from our selves And so though they do not justifie themselves to us because we think their Necessity culpable and through their own default yet they so far justifie by this very Principle their Practice to themselves that it renders them unconfutably lawful till we can prove and make it out plain to them that their very Opinions are erroneous So that you mistook while you thought that I intended to prove their Practice lawful whereas all that I intended was to shew that upon such a Principle their Invasion became less confutable and their Hands something strengthned over they could have been upon the contrary Hypothesis by which you may perhaps see what Link of your Chain I intended to break But enough of this I shall now come to the Business I first spake of First therefore you lay down the Episcopal Principles pag. 65. viz. That no Church is a true Church without Ministers and no Man a Minister that is not Ordained by a Bishop and no Man a Bishop that is not ordained by a Bishop lawfully called and not deprived again of his Power And this Bishop must be Ordained by a former Bishop and he by a former and so the Succession must be followed up to the Apostles Having done thus you catechize these Seekers as you call these Doctors And then proceed to prove that these Reverend Learned Pious Bishops which you acknowledge to be now in this Nation are no lawful Bishops upon the Principles laid down because they were ordained by such as had no Authority to ordain This you prove because they were Ordained at length by the Popish Bishops in Hen. VIII Time who had no Authority to Ordain this you prove because they derived their Authority from the Pope who had no Authority to give them any That the Pope had no Authority you prove by an Interruption of Succession of lawful Bishops in that Chair That there hath been an Interruption in that Chair you prove by the Instances of Liberius Honorias Dame Ione and many others as you say out of Bishop Iewel The Strength of these Instances depend upon that Hypothesis that Heresy or notorious Impiety doth evacuate holy Orders Now if it can be infallably proved that Heresy or Impiety doth not evacuate Holy Orders or rather if you cannot infallably prove as it is my part at this time to deny I being upon the defensive that Impiety or Heresy doth evacuate Holy Orders then it will not follow that there was an Interruption though Liberius was an Heretick And if no Interruption then Pope Clement the Incumbent at Rome in Henry VIII Days was notwithstanding what is urged in full Power to Ordain And then if he had Authority then the Popish Bishops which derived from him had full Authority and if they had then our Bishops who at length derive from them have also full Athority and so the whole Structure will fall at once in that Hypothesis which is the Foundation of all shall chance to shake And therefore Sir in the first place I pray you take notice that I deny that Heresy or Impiety doth evacuate Holy Orders and expect the Proof of it â—â—But then suppose I should grant this which I never intend I may I conceive falsly debate that though there should be an Interruption in the Succession of the Chair at Rome yet the Pope that now is or the Pope that sat at Rome in Hen. VIII Days were
fully authorized to ordain if they were but ordained by such who neither were Heretical or Impious For the Authority or Power of Ordination I conceive doth not come to any Bishop by Vertue drawn from his Predecessor in sede but by Vertue derived from him who laid Hands upon him at his Consecration For Example that you may understand my meaning suppose Dr. Winneffe the late Bishop of Lincoln was consecrated by the Imposition of the Bishop of Worcestor's Hand I conceive it is unreasonable to affirm that this Doctor received his Episcopal Orders rather from Dr. Williams his Predecessor in the Chair at Lincoln than from the Bishop of Worcester who is supposed to lay Hands upon him at his Consecration Or if the Question be whether he was a lawful Bishop that gave him Orders I conceive that it is equally unreasonable that we should go and inquire rather after Dr. Williams his Authority who was his Predecessor in sede than after the Bishop of Worcester who was or is supposed in the â—aâ—e to be his Consecrator Or if Iohn Williams who was his Predecessor should have de facto proved an Arrian or a Conjurer while he sat in the Diocesan Chair aâ— Lincoln I think it is every whit as unreasonable to affirm that therefore Dr. Winneffe who succeeded him in that Seat should lose his Episcopal Authority when as his Consecrator can have no such thing fastened upon him In like manner though Liberius was an Arrian while he sat in the Pontifical Chair at Rome yet if that Bishop whoever he was and look you to that who consecrated Pope Clement were Orthodox and so forward till we come to the Apostles his Authority was good enough though one or more of his Predecessors in sede were Heretical If you shall say that the Case is not alike betwixt the Succession of Popes and other Bishops I ask where 's the difference If you say that the difference is in this that the Pope claims not his Authority from his Consecrator but from his Predecessor I answer That it is very probable that he doth do so But let him and the Popish Doctors therefore see how they can quit their Hands of this Interruption For our parts we conceive we need not be engaged in this Controversy It is enough for us to reply to this asserted Difference That the Question is not what they lay claim to but what they ought de jure to lay claim to If you say That de jure they do challenge their Authority from their Predecessors I expect that you must prove it before I will promise you that I will believe it But if you say that the Difference is only this That they do de facio claim their Authority after another manner than other Bishops then I rejoyn that it doth not follow that they have their Authority after another manner than other Bishops because they say they have If therefore the facultas Ordinandi doth not come from the Bishop's Predecessor in sede but from the Bishop who is the Consecrator Then Sir you must prove that some of those Bishops who Consecrated Pope Clement e're the Succession reach the Apostles were Hereticks It little avails to prove that some of his Predecessors in Cathedre was such at least to me who are unwilling to be thought a Protestant But then Thirdly Suppose we should grant this which we likewise never intend how will you make it appear that our Bishops in Hen. VIII Time had their Authority from the then incumbing Pope If you say they went over to him for Imposition of Hands that 's improbable if you say he came over to them that 's intollerable if you say that he did delegate his Authority to some of our English Bishops or sent a Deputy or Nuncio authorized to those Ends I answer that it may be true that he did so But then the Question will again be whether our English Bishops had not full Authority to have done all this without his Knowledge or whether rather an Expectation of a Commission from him were not a Fruit of the Error of those times holding him to be the universal Bishop If it was though it be Argumentum ad hominem and will again I think press fore upon the Papists who assert the same yet it doth nothing trouble us who assert no such Universality I ask therefore must we acknowledge the Pope to be universal Bishop or must we not if we must why do we not If we must not why should any Man urge that Practice in his own Defence which he himself judgeth to be erroneous I speak plainlier if the Bishops in Hen. VIII Time had their Authority from the Pope then this must be pretended I think upon others Grounds either because the Bishops had indeed no Power to Ordain without his Commission or because they thought they had none or because they could not exercise that Power which they both had and knew they had without his leave If you say they had indeed no Power to Ordain without his Commission I say that you are more than a Cassandrian Papist If you say they had no Power because they judged they had none I deny the Consequence and expect you should prove it Or 3. If you say they had their Authority from him because they could not exercise it without his leave I shall only propound this Case in answer to you Suppose General Cromwell should put in so between you and the Exercise of your Ministry that without his leave you should not preach or administer the Sacraments would you say if you had leave from him that you derived your Authority from him because the external Exercise of your Authority depends upon his Leave I think you would not Well Sir I shall now only rehearse what I expect you should prove And the first thing that is expected is this That Heresy or Impiety doth evacuate Holy Orders 2. That the Power of Ordination is derived from the Predecessor in sede 3. That some of Pope Clement's Consecrators e're his Line reach the Apostles were heretical or impious 4. You must prove that the Bishops in Hen. VIII Time did not only judge that they had dependance upon the Pope for Authority but that indeed they had no Authority but what they derived from him If you can indeed make good all this then I shall confess that the Interruption of Succession is made good also But till then I shall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Yet in the mean time shall be a very great Admirer of your Worth and Lover of your Industry M. Iohnson Wamborn Dec. 8. 1653. For my Reverend and very Worthy Friend Mr. Baxter Minister of the Word at Kidderminster These Mr. Iohnson's Fifth Letter to Mr. Baxter SIR THE Question as I remember was stated between us thus Whether an infallible Knowledge that our Ordainers have full Authority to ordain be necessary to make us have true Peace of Conscience in the Exercise of our Ministry To which Question
doubt that neither the Episcopal Presbyterian nor Independant way alone will well settle the Church But that each of the three Parties and those called Erastians have somewhat of the Truth in peculiar and somewhat of Faultiness and if ever the Church be well setled it must be by taking the best and leaving out the worst of every party and till that can be done we must bear with what we cannot amend Octobo 9. 1688. Mr. J BEcause your Friend refuseth Conference though I promised secrefie and a loving Debate I will for your sake answer your Questions my self which I take to be these Two I Whether you ought not presently to fix your self in a particular Church and not continue any longer occasional Communion with many II. What Church you should be a fixed Communicant in I. As to the First I know not well what is meant by fixed Membership by the Author of the Writing which you shewed me you must be a fixed Member of Christ and the Church Universal or else you are no fixed Christian But as to particular Pastors and Congregations Order and Concord and Edification are the general Rules which tell you where to fix and how far 1. You ought not to commit any real Sin for Communion with any Church 2. Though you may and must join with faulty Assemblies and Worship yet you must not justifie their Faults nor profess your Consent to them nor promise that you will never endeavour any Amendment of them 3. There must be no Self-obliging unnecessarily Liberty is not so contemptible a thing that we should cast it away for nought much less must you bind your self contrary to God's Providence or without excepting Alterations by it 4. Your Church-Membership as to particular Congregations must have no greater fixedness than your Habitation and other Obligations You may remove your Congregational Relation when you remove your Dwelling and none can hinder you from removing both when your Interest requireth it Suspect them that would make you their Propriety II. As to the Second where you should fix 1. You are in your Father's House under his Government and must obey him in all lawful things and must not go against his Consent 2. You are a Member of a Christian Family and no Scripture tells us of the Members of one Christian Family being of divers Churches nor alloweth it 3. Scripture knoweth no particular Churches but what were bounded by Neighbourhood and Cohabitation except Hereticks There were never Churches gathered out of Churches then nor two approved Churches of the same Language in the same Bounds 1. I do hereby undertake to prove against any Disputer that there is no Form so agreeable to God's Word as this following 1. A Christian Kingdom consisting of a Christian King or supreme Power and particular confederate Churches being the Burgesses and peaceable Unbelievers that tolerated Aliens or Catechumens 2. A reformed Episcopacy Successors to the Evangelists that without the Sword or Force had the Care of many Churches 3. Reformed Parish-Churches consisting of Godly Pastors and professed Christian Cohabitants the incapable being Catechumens which made the old Nonconformists declare that they were so far from being against Parish-Churches that their Lives would be a burden to them if they were not restored to them The first Church State that Christ himself made was the Platform of a Christian Kingdom Church offering to make Iudaea such setting Twelve Apostles over the Twelve Tribes and Seventy two Disciples the Number of their great Council and so would have gathered all Ierusalem's Children to himself as a Hen gathereth her Chickens Mat. 23. which they refusing he declared that the Kingdom of God should be taken from them and given to a Nation that would bring forth the fruit thereof and so they were cut off for their Unbelief and we graffed in to the same Olive or political State the Mosaical Law only changed for Christ's Law And as all the Prophets foretold this that Christ's Church should be a Davidical Kingdom so after Two Hundred Ninety Four Years Tryal it was set up and the Pagan Empire Babylon did fall and Christ reigned by Christian Emperors and his enemies were made his Footstool and the Kingdoms of the World became the Kingdoms of the Lord and of his Christ consisting of Churches confederate for Unity and the Nations brought in their Glory to it and the Fulness of the Gentiles came in and all the Israel of God were saved Iudaea becoming the most Christian Nation in the World And Heaven and Earth rejoiced at the Fall of Babylon and this new Ierusalem's iniâ—ial Sâ—aâ—e And sure it is such a Kingdom-Church which those expect that talk of the future Thousand Years Reign of Christ. As Teachers are under him as Prophet and Priests as he is Priest so are Christian Kings as he is King and bad Kings are no more Reason against his Institution than bad Teachers and Priests 2. There are Three Sorts of Pastors or Bishops in Christ's Church I. Such as were to gather many Churches out of Infideâ—s and to set Elders or fixed Bishops over them and then oversee both the Elders and People Such Christ made the Apostles whose Office was partly extraordinary and temporary and is so far only ceased and partly ordinary and continued and so Christ promised to be with them to the end of the World And such were Evangelists sent forth with and by the Apostles to gather and oversee many Churches and Pastors Such were Titus Timothy Luke Mark Barnabas Silas and many more God never recalled this Order of Ministers if any say he did it lyeth in them to prove it This was the first sort of Pastors II. The Second Sort were the fixed Elders which these ordained in every Church who were all Bishops over the Flocks and so called but under the general Ministers who yet had none of them any forcing Power by the Sword these two God instituted III. The Third Sort between these Two was a President Pastor in every particular Church like the President of a Colledge who had some moderating guiding Power among the rest of the Elders This was set up to avoid Division among the Elders every Church having usually many and received even in some of the Apostles Days and never rejected for a Thousand Years 3. Particular Churches in Scripture Times were distinguished by the places of their Neighbourhood as I said before and there were never two Churches in the same Bounds except Hereticks and Men of divers Languages From this it is plain that the most Divine From of Government is 1. A Christian Kingdom 2. With Reformed General Ministers 3. And Reformed Parish-Churches having fixed Pastors and where it may be our Chief c. Moreover as to your fixing the Churches in Question with you I suppose are not the Papists the Quakers the Familists c. But the Episcopal the Presbyterian the Independent and the Separatist if not the Anabaptists also I. The Episcopal are of Two Sorts
Conformists and Nonconformists The Episcopal Conformists are of Two Sorts some lately sprung up that follow Archbishop Laud and Dr. Hammond hold that there are no Political Churches lower than Diocesan because there are no Bishops under them and so that the Parish-Churches are no Churches properly but part of Churches nor the Incumbants true Bishops but Curates under Bishops nor the Foreigners true Ministers or Churches that have no Diocesan Bishops This Party called themselves the Church of England 1658 1659. When we knew but of Four or Five Bishops left alive who Dr. Hammond said with that Party of the Clergy were of his Mind And these seemed uppermost in 1660 and 1661. and were the men whom I disputed with in my Treatise of Episcopacy The other Episcopal Conformists are they that follow the Reformers and hold the Doctrine of the Scripture as only sufficient to Salvation and as explicatory of it the Thirty Nine Articles the Homilies Liturgy Book of Ordination Apology c. These take the Parish-Pastors for true Rectors and the Parish-Churches for true Churches but subordinate to the Diocesans and to be ruled by them But the Laws have imposed on them some Declarations and Subscriptions which they think they may put a good Sense on though by stretching the Words from their usual Signification The Bishops and Deans are chosen by the King indeed and by the Prebends in shew The Incumbant are chosen by Patrons ordained by Diocesans with Presbyters and accepted by Consent of the Communicants of the Parish The Episcopal Government is managed partly by the Bishops and partly by Lay-Civilians and Surrogates The Episcopal Nonconformists are for true Parish-Churches and Ministers reformed without swearing promising declaring or subscribing to any but sure clear necessary things desiring that the Scripture may be their Canons disowning all persecuting Canons taking the capable in each Parish for the Communicant and Church and the rest for Hearers and Catechized Persons desiring that the Magistrate be Judge whom he will maintain approve and tolerate and the Ordainers Judges whom they will ordain and the People be free Consenters to whose Pastoral Care they will trust their Souls desiring that every Presbyter be an Overseer of the Flock and every Church that hath many Elders have one Incumbent President for Unity and Order and that Godly Diocesans may without the Sword or Force have the Oversight of many Ministers and Churches and all these be confederate and under the Government of a Christian King but under no Foreign Jurisdiction though in as much Concord as is possible with all the Christian World And they would have the Keys of Excommunication and Absolution taken out of the Hands of Lay-Men Chancellors or Lay Brethren and the Diocesans to judge in the Synods of the Presbyters in Cases above Parochial Power That this was the Judgment of the Nonconformists that treated for Peace in 1660. and 1661. is to be seen in their printed Proposals in which they desired Archbishop Usher's Model of the Primitive Episcopacy joined with the Synods of Presbyters II. The Presbyterians are for Parish-Churches as aforesaid guided by Elders some teaching and some only ruling and these under Synods of the like Class without Diocesan or Parochial Superiors and all under a National Assembly of the same as the Supreme Church Power III. The Independants are for every Congregation to have all Church Power in it self without any superior Church-Government over them whether Bishops or Synods yet owning Synods for voluntary Concord Of these some are against local Communion with the aforesaid Churches and for avoiding them by Separation some as if they were no Churches and had no true Ministers some for Forms of Prayer some for faulty Communicants some for Episcopal Ordination and some for subscibing and some for all these and many other pretended Reasons But some Independants are for occasional Communion with the other Churches and some also for stated Communion in the Parish-Churches for which you may read Mr. Tomes's the chief of the Anabaptists in a full Treatise and Dr. Thomas Goodwin on the first of the Ephesians earnest against Separation as the old Nonconformists were Now which of all these should you join with I affirm that all these except the Separatists are parts of the Church of England as it is truly essentiated by a Christian Magistracy and confederate Christian particular Churches All are not equally sound and pure but all are parts of the Church of England Liturgies and Ceremonies and Canons and Chancellors are not essential to it as a Church or Christian Kingdom But it is now a Medly less concordant than is desirable but you are not put upon any such Disputes whether you will call the present Church of England Roman as denominated from the King that is the Head or whether you will say that King and Parliament conjunct are that Head and so it is yet Protestant because the Laws are so or whether you will denominate it materially Protestant because the Clergy and Flocks are so your Doubt is only what Congregation to join with I answer That which all your Circumstances set together make it most convenient to the publick good and your own Though I hold not Ministerial Conformity lawful I take Lay-Communion in any of these except the Separatists to be lawful to some Persons whose case maketh it fittest But I judge it unlawful for you to confine your Communion to any one of them so as to refuse occasional Communion with all save them 1. The Parish-Churches have the Advantage of Authority Order and Confederacy and the Protestant Interest is chiefly cast upon them therefore I will not separate from Lay-Communion with them though they need much Reformation 2. You must not go against your Father's Will no nor divide the Family without necessity The same I say of your Husband when you are married 3. The Nonconforming Episcopal and Presbyterians have not such Churches as they desire but only temporarily keep Meetings like to Chappels as Assistants to others till Parishes are reformed 4. I think it a stated sinful Schism to fix as a Member of such a Church and Pastor as is of the Principles of the Writing which you shewed me I. Because they grievously slander the Parish-Churches and Ministers as none and their Worship and Government as far worse than it is II. Because they Renounce local Communion with almost all the Body or Church of Christ on Earth by renouncing it on a Reason common to almost all III. Because they separate from such Churches as Christ and his Apostles joined with and so seem to condemn Christ and his Apostles as Sinners Christ ordinarily joined with the Iews Church in Synagogues and Temple-Offices when the High-Priest bought the Place of Heathens and the Priests Pharisees and Rulers were wicked Persecutors and the Sadduces Hereticks or worse he sent Iudas as an Apostle when he knew him to be a Theif or a Devil The Apostles neither separated nor allowed Separation from
be sinful and hazarding our Souls c. We should never have stuck at Conformity to them And it is no small Number of Sins so heiâ—ous which we suppose since imposed that we dare not so much as name them least we displease you and make you say that we render the Conformists such heinous Sinners But I will alledge your Authority when any of us are next blamed for discovering the â—einous Sinfulness of Conformity as we yet believe it would be to us If you say that the Licensers would licence our Writings if we did it with Sobriety 1. You know that the Canon and Law is against it 2. I shall then in Justice challenge you to make it good and here promise you an account of my Nonconformtiy whenever you will procure it licensed 6. And which way got you so strong a Faith as to be past doubt that did we discover any sinfulness it would by Authority have been taken away Make this true yet after neer Two Thousand Ministers have been neer Sixteen Years ejected and silenced and many killed by Imprisonment and the People of the Land divided and distracted by the training Engines and you shall have the Honour of being the greatest healer of our Breaches that ever rose in the Days of my Remembrance But if it be not true III. The Third Passage is p. 69 70. throughout These are great things to be spoken so boldly 1. Do you suppose your Reader one that never read Church-History What Work the Bishops made for Arrianism for Nestorianism for the Eutychians and Aâ—â—phalites against Nazianzen Chrysostom c. for the Monothelites about the tria Capitula for Images against Emperors and Kings setting up the Pope and decreed the Deposition of all Princes that obey him not and making Loyalty to be Heresis Henriciana How the River Oronte at Antioch hath been coloured with the Blood and the Graves of the Monks and People that fought it out in the Streets for the several Bishops what work they made at the first Council at Constance the first and the second of Ephesus the Council at Calcedon and many another How many Ages they were and yet are the Army of the Pope to subdue Princes and Nations Truth and Justice and set up the Evil that now reigneth in the Christian World How even against the Popes Will they made the best King and Emperor Ludovicus Pius as a Pennance resign his Crown and Scepter on the Altar to a Rebel Son and sent him to Prison He that ever read but Baronius Binnius or other Episcopal History will pity you can you name one Presbyter for very many Bishops that have been the Heads or Fomenters of Heresie Schism or Rebellion and yet Presbyters were more in Number than Bishops Innumerable Bishops saith Binnius were in the Monothelite Council under â—hilipicuâ— Of all things that ever befel the Christian Church I scarce know any thing comparable in Shame and Mischievous Effects to the horrid perfideousness Contention Schism and Pride of Bishops Cursing one Year by Hundreds all that were of one Opinion and another Year all that were of the contrary as the times and Interest and Emperor changed And if Arius or Novatus Aerius and Donatus which are all you name were the Beginners of any Schism how many hundred Bishops were the Promoters of them all save that of Aerius against themselves And is it any honour to Episcopacy that Arius and Aerius an Arian were not Bishops when they were said to be Seekers of Bishopricks and to divide because they could not obtain them Sure they were Prelatical Presbyters what honour were it to Episcopacy that you are no Bishop if all these and such things were vended by you in hope of a Bishoprick or some Preferment I will never whilst I breathe trust a Presbyter that sets himself to get Preferment no more than I will trust a But did you know or did you not that as for Novatus and Novatian one of them was an ill-chosen Bishop of Rome and the other a Promoter of his Prelacy and that as for Donatus there were two of them one of them a Bishop and that the Donatists Schism was meerly and basely Prelatical even whether their Bishop or Cecilianus should carry it and that their Re-baptizing and Re-ordaining and Schism was because they took none to have power that had it not from their Bishop as being their right like our Re-ordainers And are these Instances to prove what you assert Were it not for entring upon an unpleasing and unprofitable Task I would ask you 1. Who that Iuncto of Presbyters was that dethroned the King was it they that petitioned and protested against it 2. Whether it was not an Episcopal Parliament forty to one if not an hundred that began the War against the King 3. Whether the General and Commanders of the Army twenty to one were not Conformists 4. Whether the Major Generals in the Countries were not almost all Episcopal Conformists The Earl of Stamford was over your Country 5. Whether the Admiral and Sea-Captains were not almost all Episcopal Conformists As Heylin distinguisheth them of Archbishop Abbots mind disliking Arminianism Monopolies c. 6. Whether the Archbishop of York were not the Parliaments Major General 7. Whether the Episcopal Gentry did not more of them take the Engagement and many Episcopal Ministers than the Presbyterians 8. Whether if this Parliament which made the Acts of Uniformity and Conventicles should quarrel with the King it would prove them to be Presbyterians and Nonconformists 9. Whether the Presbyterian Ministers of London and Lancashire did not write more against the Regicides and Usurpers and declare against them than all the Conformists or as much And the Long Parliament was forced and most of them cast out before the King could be destroyed And when they were restored it made way for his Restoration And Sir Thomas Allen Lord Mayor and the City of Londons inviting General Monk from the Rump into the City and joyning with him was the very Day that turned the Scales for the King But all these are Matters fitter for your better Consideration than our Debate I rest Your Servant Rich. Baxter Iuly 26. 1678. To Mr. Long of Exeter Numb VI. A Resolution of this Case What 's to be done when the Law of the Land commands Persons to go to their Parish-Church and Parents require to go to private Meetings Quest. THE Law of the Land commandeth me to go to the Publick Churches the Canon commandeth me to go to my own Parish-Church and not to another Parish Both forbid me to go to Conventicles and silenced Preachers My Father and Mother forbid me to go to the Publick Churches and command me to go constantly to a silenced Minister in Meetings forbidden by the Law But specially not to go to my Parish Priest saying he is an insufficient and drunken Railer but to a Neighbour Parish if I will not obey their first Command Am I now bound to obey my Parents
Guilt of the Division caused by it But when they are Imposed we may do that which in it self is lawful without any consent to the Imposition at all Yea and that which as imposed tendeth to Division may upon supposition that it will be and is imposed be practised sometimes as the way to Unity and to avoid Division § 310. 7. Lastly it is said That the Necessity which is pretended for this Conformity is none at all For 1. As to a Necessity of Communion with the Church Catholick it requireth not Personal Local Communion with each particular Congregation but that at a distance we own them so far as they are to be owned 2. And for the Escaping of Punishment from Men there is no necessity of it nor yet of our Personal Liberty to preach the Gospel when we cannot do it upon lawful Terms But to this the moderate Nonconformists say That 1. our Catholick Communion requireth that we in Judgment or Practice separate from no Church of Christ which forceth us not to sin but hold Communion with them as we have a Call and Opportunity And that we must not separate from one upon a Cause that is common to almost all 2. That though there be no Necessity of our escaping Persecution nor any absolute Necessity of our Personal Preaching yet there is of this last an ordinate Hypothetical Necessity laid upon us by God himself and wo to us if we preach not when we may So that you see that these general Reasons which some Nonconformists extend to all the moderate allow only as Seconds against those things which first are proved unlawful § 311. I. For the particular Controversie about Diocesans 1. Some of the Nonconformists are against all Bishops as distinct from Presbyters by any other than a Temporary Presidency or Moderatorship But the most of them of my Acquaintance are for the lawfulness of some stated Episcopacy that is that there be fixed Presidents or Bishops in every particular Church they take to be lawful as of Humane Constitution and Ecclesiastical Custom contrary to no Law of God 2. That there be more general Overseers of many of these Bishops and Churches as the Apostles were though without their extraordinary Call and Priviledges they think also lawful if not in some fort of Divine Institution 1. Because Church-Government being an ordinary standing work in that the Apostles were to have Successors 2. Because they think it incredible if the Apostles had been against particular Primitive Episcopacy that no Church or Person would have been found on Record to have born witness against it till it had been so universally received by all the Churches But they are all agreed that the English Diocesan Frame of Government and so the Popish Prelacy is unlawful and of dangerous tendency in the Churches And that this Controversie may be understood the English Frame must here be opened § 312. There are in England two Archbishops and under one of them four Bishops and under the other One and twenty Bishops In all Five and twenty Bishops with Two Archbishops Every Bishop hath a Cathedral Church which is no Parish Church nor hath any People appropriated to it as Parishioners But a Dean with a Chapter of Prebends or Canons are the Preachers to it and Governours of I know not whom In some Bishopricks are Three hundred some Four hundred some Five hundred some One thousand some Twelve hundred Parishes and some more In the greatest Parishes of London are about Threescore thousand Souls as Martyns Stepney Giles Cripplegate in others about Thirty thousand as Giles's in the Fields Sepulchres in others about Twenty thousand and in the lesser Parishes fewer Usually the greater Country Parishes in Market Towns have about Four thousand or Three thousand or Two thousand Souls and the ordinary Rural Parishes about One thousand in the bigger sort and Two hundred or Three hundred in the lesser some more and some less In these Parishes the Ministers who have watched over them and of late times instructed and catechised every Family and Person young and old apart in many places do find that the number of those that are ignorant of the Person and Office of Christ and the Essentials of Christianity and of all Religion and of those that are ordinary Drunkards Whoremongers Prophane Swearers Cursers Railers or otherwise notoriously Scandalous or Ungodly is not small For the Government of these besides preaching to them and exhorting them and giving them the Sacraments the Parish Minister hath no power He hath no power of judging whole Children he shall baptize but must refuse none though the Parents be professed Heathens or Infidels if Godfathers and Godmothers bring them to be baptized who yet never adopt them nor meddle more as Owners of them with their Education and perhaps know not what Baptism or Christianity is themselves They have no power to judge what Persons of their Parish shall be confirmed or admitted into the number of Adult Communicants so that all their Flocks are imposed on them They have no more power than any private Man to admonish the Scandalous before Witness or to admonish them before the Church or pray for their Repentance by Name or to judge who is to be cast out of the Communion of the Church or to be Absolved nor to deny the Sacrament to any unless for a particular time when he is just going to Administer it he see any there that are notoriously guilty and he take them then aside and they will not so much as say We will do better And it is uncertain whether he may Suspend any of these but the Malicious that will not be reconciled So that the Ministers may read Prayers and Preach and may read an Excommunication or Absolution when it is sent them and may if they please joyn with the Churchwarden as Informers to present some Men to the Bishops Court but Church-Government is denied them The Government then of all these Churches and Exercise of Holy Discipline belongeth to the Bishops in Title but the Bishops do and must Exercise it in their Courts or Consistories In every Diocess there is one of these Courts where the Ordinary Judge is the Bishop's Chancellour a Lay-man and a Civil Lawyer though in many Cases the Bishop may fit himself if he please The Court hath also a Register and Proctors to plead Mens Causes as Counsellers in Civil Courts And they have some Fellows called Apparators who are their Messengers for Citation besides the Churchwardens Presentments who bring them in Custom This Court is to hear all considerable Causes and determine them by Excommunications or Absolutions and to send their Excommunications or Absolutions written to the Parish Priest who is to read them But pro forma when the Lay-Chancellour hath resolved who shall be Excommunicated they have a Clergy-Presbyter present to speak the Sentence in the Court who yet hath no power but of meer Pronunciation but is a Ceremony to put off the Odium from