Selected quad for the lemma: saint_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
saint_n	bishop_n	church_n	presbyter_n	1,570	5	10.2756	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A46639	Nazianzeni querela et votum justum, The fundamentals of the hierarchy examin'd and disprov'd wherein the choicest arguments and defences of ... A.M. ... the author of An enquiry into the new opinions (chiefly) propagated by the Presbyterians in Scotland, the author of The fundamental charter of presbytry, examin'd & disprov'd, and ... the plea they bring from Ignatius's epistles more narrowly discuss'd.../ by William Jameson.	Jameson, William, fl. 1689-1720.	1697 (1697)	Wing J443; ESTC R11355	225,830	269

Feet ye onght also to Wash one anothers Feet that every Apostle yea and every Believer is Lord and Master of the rest § 8. And writing to Euagrius I hear saith Hierome there is one so mad as to preferr the Deacons to the Presbyters that is to the Bishops For seeing the Apostle clearly teaches that Bishops and Presbyters are one and the same how can a Server of Tables and Widows proudly preferr himself to these at whose Prayers the Sacrament of Christ's Body and Blood is consecrated you will require a Proof hear a Testimony Paul and Timothy to all the Saints in Philippi with the Bishops and Deacons would you have another Example in the Acts of of the Apostles Paul thus speaks to the Presbyters of one Church Take heed to your Selves and the whole Flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you Bishops to Rule the Church c. And that none may contentiously plead that in one City there were many Bishops here also another Testimony wherein it 's most evidently proved that both Presbyter and Bishop were one and the same and then produces the 1 to Titus and 1 to Timothy 4. 8. 14. neglect not with the laying on of the Hands of the Presbytry And 1 Peter 4 and 1. 2 John 1. 3 John 1. And all these to prove that he had undertaken viz that both Bishop and Presbyter were one and the same Now it 's most observable that that he inferrs this Conclusion not only from Scriptures written long after the first Epistle to the Corinthians where it 's said I am of Paul c. but even from the last Epistle of John the longest Liver of all the Apostles And therefore no less notticeable is D. M's extream stubborness and aversion from Truth who would force Hierome to introduce Bishops presently after that Schism mention'd 1 Cor. 1. And accordingly as his bad Cause oblig'd him to do with this and the rest of Hierome's Testimonies wholly smuther'd it And indeed all hitherto who have adventur'd to graple therewith have been conquer'd thereby yea even Bellarmine himself is compell'd to give up the Cause Hierome indeavours saith the Jesuite to conclude the equality of Bishops and Presbyters from the Epistle to Titus to the Philippians and from the Epistles of Peter and John which were written after the first Epistle to the Corinthians Neither can the Jesuite find another way to be even with Hierome but by arraigning him as fraughted with self-repugnancy levity and instability in this Matter and all the Arguments he brings to prove Hierome a Favourer of Episcopacy are only so many fruitless Attempts to make that appear But let us go on with Hierome But saith he the reason why after this viz. the writing of both the Epistles of John one was chosen and set over the rest was that there might be a remedy of Schism least every one drawing the Church of Christ to himself should divide it For in Alexandria from Mark the Evangelist even to Heraclas and Dionysius the Presbyters still gave to one elected from amongst themselves and placed in a higher seat the Name of Bishop as if an Army should creat a General or the Deacons should chuse one of themselves whom they know to be industrious and name him Arch-Deacon On these words D. M. triumphs The Custome was saith he even from the days of St. Mark the Evangelist that a Presbyter was chosen who Governed the whole Society this in the Opinion of St. Hierome cuts off that imaginary Interval wherein the Chruch is said to have been Governed by a Parity of Presbyters Where he forgeth a Gloss no way contain'd in the words of Hierome whose Example of an Army and Deacons are only adduc'd to shew the manner of that Presbyter or nominat'd Bishop's entrance and not at all the measure of his Power over his Collegues And that no Power over the rest can be collected from this place is beyond Scruple clear from Hierome's present Scope who introduces this Ancient Alexandrian Practice to clear and prove the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter which according to him remain'd in the Church for a while after the Writings of John the longest Liver of all the Apostles Had D. M. perused Dr. Stillingfleet he had taught him that both Election and Ordination of this Alexandrian Bishop was only performed by his Fellow Presbyters that the Original of Hierome ' s exsors potestas any Power he mentions in Bishops over Presbyters is by Hierome attributed not to any Episcopal Institution but to the free choice of the Presbyters themselves for what doth a Bishop continues Hierome except Ordination which a Presbyter may not do Here the Jesuites and their Follower D. M. dream they find a fine Distinction made by Hierome between Bishop and Presbyter but first they must make an unseasonable Antiptosis and compell Hierome to speak contrary to the express words of this place which are in the present Tense contrary to the scope and design of this Epistle which is professedly to shew the great Dignity of Presbyters yea even their Identity with Bishops and thereby to reach a sharper reproof to the petulant Deacon And contrary finally to Hierome's most clear and most frequently repeated Doctrine of the Scriptural Identity of both Offices Were it not madness then to dream with the Jesuits that in these words Hierome makes any Distinction between the Scripture Bishop and Presbyter who is here only asserting that in all places Rome excepted where the Presbyters were more depressed and the Deacons more raised than in other Churches even then in his time a Presbyter was allow'd by the Canons and Constitutions of the Churches to do ought that a Bishop might do save Ordination alone This his Design of holding forth the most great dignity of Presbyters yea even their equality with Bishops which Bellarmine acknowledges that he may the better compesce the Insolency of the Deacons Hierome all along this Epistle prosecutes and having again cited the Epistles to Timothy and Titus to prove that a Presbyter is contain'd in i. e. is one and the same with a Bishop otherwayes a Deacon is also in a Bishop and so Hierome had crossed his own Design by the very Argument wherewith he minded to compass it and having added some other Topicks to the same purpose thus concludes his Epistle And that we may know that the Apostolick Traditions are brought from the Old Testament that which Aaron and his Sons and the Levites were in the Temple the Bishops Presbyters and Deacons claim in the Church Nunc animis opus Aenaeae nunc pectore firmo All the Jesuites and their Complices will presently be about our Ears But Solamen nobis Soeios habuisse malorum Their Attaques are no less on Hierome than us wherefore this is one of the chief places brought by Bellarmine to involve Hierome in a maze of self-contradiction and make him propugn Prelacy who is followed by others of the Hierarchicks but

of Mentz who only informs us that the Heresie of Aërius consisted in despising Sacrifices for the Dead From all which to me it 's more than probable that there 's no ground to believe that ever Aërius Arrianiz'd Section VII No Diocesan Bishops in several Ancient Churches THo' their Argument brought from Antiquity be already satisfi'd we shall yet give some Instances of Churches which for several Centuries were really without Diocesan Bishops St. Patrick the Irish Apostle is commonly said to have ordain'd several hundreds of Bishops in Ireland who I 'm sure could not be Diocesans Dr. Maurice being displeas'd with this Instance rejects Nennius the Author from whom we have the account of St. Patrick's ordaining 365 Bishops as fabulous But it 's not in their accounts of the numbers of Bishops but of the Deeds and Miracles wrought by Bishops and others of their Saints that the fabulousness of the Writers of these times is commonly to be observ'd He next quarrels with the common reading of that Author alledging that He speaks only of the Bishops in France and Britain in communion with St. Patrick not of his Irish Bishops But I think we may in such critical Learning give Bishop Vsher the Preference who neither judg'd this Book fabulous nor its common reading to be suspected And this account of the great number of Ancient Irish Bishops is strongly confirm'd by what Clarkson cites out of Bernard and Baron shewing that there were well nigh as many Bishops as Churches This the Doctor passes over in silence which was scarce fair enough dealling Neither can the Doctor 's ordinary salvo viz. that the Practice was not generally approv'd nor of primitive Constitution here serve them for whatsoever differ'd from the Roman Model was presently made a Novelty And tho' Bernard and Lanfranc dislike the Practice of having so many Bishops yet they adventure not to instance any time wherein the Irish had been rul'd by a few Diocesans And lastly the Authors most regardable herein inform us that this Practice of having so many Bishops had place even in St. Patrick's time and meer infancy of the Irish Church § 2. Most visible footsteps of this also appear in the African Church during the time of Cyprian for in that Council of Carthage where he presided there was no smal number of Bishops conveen'd tho' doubtless there were many moe Bishops in Africk who could not be all Diocesans seeing few then were Christians in Africk save a small part of the Roman Colonies only Yea the hamlets and villages these Bishops had for their Jurisdictions are so obscure that the learn'd Pamelius is at a stand where to place them And long after in the time of the Vandalick Persecution as Victor Vticensis relates there were in the Zeugitan or proconsular Province alone 164 Bishops others reckon moe Now this was but a small part of what the Romans possess'd in Africk and few beside the Roman Colonies were at that time Christian for the Moors or old Africans who beside what they had in the Cities possess'd almost the whole Country are by the same Victor without exception call'd Gentiles and many of the Romans themselves had not yet imbrac'd Christianity Now subduce from that small number of the Zeugitan Province who were Christians the many Arrians and other Hereticks and Schismaticks whom these Bishops did not reckon as a part of their Flocks and surely there shall scare be found so many as to make up above 164 Parishes Dr. Maurice tells us that all the African Bishops in Cyprian's time could not have suppli'd the Dioceses of one Province in the V or VI Century Which if true is a strong Confirmation of what we plead for viz. that they then were nothing less than Diocesans seeing as is now evident there were even in the fifth Century but a very small number of Christians in Africk compar'd with the rest of the Inhabitans And in Cyprian's time it may well be judg'd that there were some hundreds of Bishops in the Roman Africk But in such Cases not the extent of Bounds but number of Souls is to be considered Wherefore he should be a wild Reasoner that should conclude from Africa's having a dozen or such a number of Bishops or Pastors for surely there were but few at the entry of Christianity that there needed be no more afterward and so make that number the Standard to discern how many Bishops by primitive Right were to be plac'd in all Africa And this is a Kin to what he says elsewhere that tho' there were Bishops in small Towns this was not the primitive State of the Church it may be indeed nor yet at the first entry of the Gospel were there Bishops in most part of the great Towns but was this for fear of Multiplication of Dioceses no surely but these few were all could be then gotten The substance of his Answer here is that Africa was most large fertile popolous The first of which is readily granted but the second not so easily much of these Regions being more fertile of sand and Serpents than of Corn and Wine and this in part discredits the third seeing so much as was barren is not to be suppos'd Popolous wherefore it 's surprising to find him making the Old Roman Africk more Popolous than France is now He supposes that Africk had but 500 Bishops and yet might have 40000 villages But I answer that if the villages were considerable and had Christian Inhabitants for otherways this is nothing to this purpose then had Africk 40000 Bishops for H. Thorndick acknowledges that Bishops in Africk were so plentifull that every good village must needs be the Seat of an Episcopal Church Which words of H. Thorndick are cited by Clarkson but dissembl'd by the Doctor In the mean while I can find nothing which can shake what I have said above or overturn as for example what I have noted from Victor's words and oblige me to lessen my substraction Add to what is said the words of Dr. Burnet In St. Augustin's time saith he it appears from the journals of a Conference he had with the Donatists that there were about five hundred Bishopricks in a small tract of ground But we need not cross Seas in pursuit of ancient Churches free of Diocesans seeing our Country Scotland affords us so luculent a proof of our Assertion The words of Prosper Aquitanicus in his Chronicle annex'd to that of Eusebius and Hierome are most clear and cogent Palladius saith he is ordain'd by Pope Coelestine for the Scots that had already believ'd in Christ and is sent to them to be their first Bishop Never was a passage of any Historian more universally believ'd than this of Prosper which Beda● and a MS. Chronicle of Scotland in the Library of Glasgow yea the whole stream of Historians repeat and approve but none more amply and plainly than Cardinal Baron whose words are

the perpetual Practice of these times frees us from further debate herein I can never find that the Romans brought Christians from Asia or such remote places to be executed at Rome but still to the nearest seats of Justice as is clear in Polycarp and other most famous Bishops or Pastors And truly saith Dr. Stillingfleet the story of Ignatius as much as it 's defended with his Epistles doth not seem to be any of the most probable For wherefore should Ignatius of all others be brought to Rome to suffer when the Proconsuls and the Praesides provinciarum did every where in time of Persecution execute their Power in punishing of Christians at their own Tribunals without sending them so long a Journey to Rome to be martyr'd there And how came Ignatius to make so many and such strange Excursions as he did by the Story if the Souldiers that were his Guard wers so cruel to him as he complains they were Now all these uncertain and fabulous Narrations as to Persons then arising from want of sufficient Records made at those times make it more evident how incompetent a Judge Antiquity is to the certainty of things done in Apostolical times And now from what is said jude if D. M. had any good ground to query whether there 's any good and solid Argument brought by the Presbyterians against the Authority of St. Ignatius his Epistles that is not already sufficiently answered Section III. The second Hypothesis viz. that the Antiquity of the trne Ignatius could not secure him from all Lapses or Escapes in Doctrine or serve to Prove that there was no Declension in his time MY second Assertion is that the Antiquity even of the true Ignatius was not able to secure him from all Lapses and Mistakes and that in his time some Churches not only might but actually were itching after several Novelties Which Assertion if once demonstrated renders Ignatius of little or no use to our Antagonists their Inference is that if Ignatius spoke positively in favours of Episcopacy and lived in a closs vicinity to the Apostles then there 's no doubt but the Apostles established such a Government which consequence like the Aples of Sodom resolves anon into smoake our Assertion being prov'd which I now come to demonstrate The Apostles of our Lord had not chang'd their earthly Tabernacle for that which is not made with hands when to their inexpressible sorrow they beheld not only particular Persons but even the greater part of some Churches they themselves had either planted or watered in stead of Grapes to bring forth will Grapes and in place of being the Repositories of the precious Truths of the Gospel become nests and cages of the most abominable Errors Other Churches there were that holding fast the Foundation of the Apostolick Doctrine but raising thereupon a structure of the stubble and hay of either Judaism or Paganism in one of which all of them had been educated had well nigh made up an Edifice of most Hetrogeneous Materials Hence it is that the Apostle is at such pains to Correct them in their Abuses of the Sacrament in their Superstition concerning Meat and Drink and their unwarrantable observation of Times that wanted all Divine Sanction § 2. But these infallible Guides being at length possessed of their Master's Joy Affairs grew yet worse for then the grand Enemy of the Church did in greater abundance and with more security sow his tares Hence it was that not only those who are justly branded for Arch-Hereticks and Schismaticks but even those who persisted Orthodox in the main Principles of Christianity were drawn into neither few nor inconsiderable Mistakes § 3. I 'm sure Papias Bishop of Hierapolis was a Man both in respect of his Antiquity and Authority among the primitive Christians little inferiour to Ignatius 't was he notwithstanding who either greedily imbrac'd or first of all hatch'd the gross Fancy of the Saints their corporal Kingdom for a thousand years after the Resurrection Moreover saith Eusebius speaking of Papias the same Writer alledges something as from unwritten Tradition viz. some strange Parables and Doctrines of our Saviour and some other fabulous things and amongst the rest he saith that after the Resurrection there shall be a thousand years wherein Christ shall reign on Earth bodily But to me he seems through misunderstanding of the Apostle's Discourse to have taken what was spoken mysteriously in a quite other sense from its true meaning For he was os a very weak Judgement as his Writings sufficiently declare He was notwithstanding the Author of this Opinion to the most part of the following Ecclesiastical Writers for they look'd only to his Antiquity as Irenaeus and whosoever else favoured his Opinion We see here a Man of no little Antiquity and Repute drawing the greatest Lights of the Church and consequently the rest of the Christians to a Doctrine destitute of all countenance from the Word of God § 4. Another Conceit no less Ancient but more wild was that of the Angels their carnal Knowledge of Women This was hugg'd by Justin Martyr who lived in the same Century with yea and not many years after Ignatius The Angels saith he transgressing their Order by carnal Copulation with Women fell from their primitive State aud begot Children who are now called Devils He was follow'd notwithstanding by Irenaeus Athenagoras the most famous Writers of their Age as also the stream of these that flourished in the succeeding Centuries Irenaeus also with a great many others held that the beatifick Vision is not enjoy'd untill the day of Judgement Now beyond peradventure such Leaders as these had the most part of the Churches at that time for their Fellows and Followers in these Opinions § 5. And seeing both such Pillars and the rest that lean'd on them were ready to swerve in Matters of Speculation or Opinion they were no less capable of straying in things belonging to Practice for there 's no more security promised to the Church from the one than the other Neither did the closs Vicinity to the times of the Apostles preserve the Churches from evident Lapses of this nature Was not the mixing of the Sacramental Wine with water a matter of Practice and altogether destitute of warrand from Scripture in which we hear of nothing but the Fruit of the Vine drunken by Communicants And yet Justin Martyr informs us that the mixing of the Sacramental Wine with water was the Practice of his time § 6. Another Instance of the most early Declension of the primitive Church in Matters of the same kind viz. the external Rites and Ecclesiastick Ceremonies was their observation of Easter concerning which the Controversies first arose between Polycarp and the Churches of the East on the one hand and Anicetus and the western Churches on the other Polycarp alledg'd John the Evangelist whose Disciple he had been for the Author of his Opinion but Anicetus and the Romans pretended the