Selected quad for the lemma: scripture_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
scripture_n	apostle_n	bishop_n	presbyter_n	3,386	5	10.4987	5	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A51419	Confessions and proofes of Protestant divines of reformed churches that episcopacy is in respect of the office according to the word of God, and in respect of the use the best : together with a brief treatise touching the originall of bishops and metropolitans.	Morton, Thomas, 1564-1659.; Ussher, James, 1581-1656. Originall of bishops and metropolitans.; W. C. Apostolicall institution of episcopacy.	1662 (1662)	Wing M2836; ESTC R40650	81,901	89

So he Lastly now under our Gracious Soveraigne King Charles in the time of Arch-Bishop Abbot Whose daily experience did testifie the reciprocall correspondence between him and with other Bishops and all reformed Churches beyond the Sea At what time likewise Cyrill late Greek Patriarch of Constatinople did so farre honour both him and our English Church as to professe his accordance therewith more specially then with any other And if our Bishops of later date had not been respected then surely would not the Divines about Breme in Germany have sent their controversies had among themselves onely unto certain Bishops in England as they did to have them moderated by their judgements not to speak of their dedications of some of their Books unto Bishops These last Relations nothing but the importunity of these times could have extorted from us Thus much of particular respects had in speciall to our English Episcopall Government by singular approved Divines of the reformed Protestant Churches In the next place as the thread of our method leadeth us we are to examine what they will say touching the unlawfulnesse or lawfulness thereof in generall II. THESIS That there was never any visibly constituted Church in all Christendome since the Apostles time for 1500. years and more which held Episcopacy in it self to be unlawfull WE are not ignorant that even at this time all Episcopacy and Prelacy of any one above Presbyterie is cryed down by some as unlawfull in it self notwithstanding our Opposites cannot but know what besides Epiphanius Saint Angustine recorded of one Aerius to wit that he because he could not obtain to be made a Bishop did therefore teach that there ought to be no difference between a Presbyter and a Bishop So he and for that cause they listed him among the erroneous Authors of that Age but he being excepted never any visible Church of Christ before him we adde nor yet any thus protested after him nor before these dayes of contradiction defended his opinion Now whether the humour of desire to rule others and the unwillingnesse to be subject unto others may not equally transport some Ecclesiasticks to oppose against Episcopacy they can best judge whom it most concernes We know beside infinite others who have acknowledged the lawfulnesse of Episcopacy some protestant Divines of remote Churches who have fully condemn'd the opinion of Aerius Three may suffice for three hundred if they be learned and judicious Authors and not interested in that which is now called Episcopall policy Master Moulin commeth on roundly I have since my infancy saith he abhorr'd the opinion of Aërius Tylenus also a Divine of the French Church as pertinently and plainly None ever before Aërius endeavoured the extirpation of Episcopacy nor yet after him any but some of Geneva What some he might meane we know not but whom he might not meane we have already shewn as Calvin Beza Sadle and Causabon who have given their ample suffrages for our English Episcopacy but only speak against the Romish Hierarchie And now for the generality of it Beza is again at hand saying If there be any as I think saith he there is not who altogether reject the Episcopall Order God forbid that any of sound brains should ever assent to their furies and besides protesteth his acknowledged observance and all reverence to all Bishops reformed Hitherto against the objected unlawfulnesse of Episcopacy in the Church of Christ. But this will not satisfie some men except furthermore the lawfulness thereof may appear in that degree which is called in respect of its right According to the Word of God It belongeth unto us to shew this by the Confession of Divines of remote Protestant Churches which we are ready to performe and more too III. THESIS That Episcopal Prelacy is acknowledged by Protestant Divines of remote Churches to be according to the Word of God and their consent therein unto Primitive Antiquity LVther may well be allowed for the fore-man amongst the Reformers of the Protestant Religion who proveth the Prelacy of Episcopacy above simple Presbyters for so he saith by Divine Right and this he doth in his Tract●te called his Reselution grounding his judgment upon Scripture whereof hereafter Accordingly Bucer against the Pope as Anti-Christ We see saith he by their perpetual observation of Churches and from the Apostles themselves that it seemed good to the holy Ghost that some singular one should be appointed among the Presbyters to Govern in so sacred an Order who hath for the same cause the Appellation of Bishop in Scripture Scultetus the Divine Professour at Heidelberg professing Episcopal degree to be of divine Right and professeth to prove it to be such by efficacious reasons who in the sequell of his discourse will be as good as his word with whom agreeth that admirable Schollar Isaac Casaubon the ornament of Geneva who held the same to be grounded upon the Testimonies of Scriptures These may serve for the present till we come to a larger consent All these and other the former confessions of Protestant Divines are the proper idiom and language of primitive Antiquity teaching thus Episcopacy is by the Ordination of Christ. So Ignatius and again Reverence your Bishop as Christ and the Apostles have commanded you Or thus To be a divine power the resistancè whereof is against God himself So Cyprian And thus God placed Bishops over His family So Origen And thus The Apostles were made Bishops by Christ who ordained others meaning Bishops in other places by whom the Church should be govern'd So Augustine Or thus Bishops constituted over Presbyters as the Word of God teacheh So Epiphanius And thus None can be ignorant that Bishops were instituted by Christ when he made His Apostles by whom others should be made Bishops whom we succeed and speaking of Bishops of whom Christ said he that despiseth you despiseth me So again Augustine Before we end this point we shall desire our Opposites to bethink themselves what they think may signifie the suffrages of the Fathers of the Synod of Calcedon for Antiquity one of the first four Generall and in this generality universally receiv'd throughout Christendom for amplitude consisting of six hundred and thirty Bishops and for aversenesse against the Pope of Rome that which undermin'd the very foundation of Romish Popedom which is a pretence of having been established by the divine Authority of Christ the universall Bishop of the Church and equalling another Patriarch with him and shewing that all the Primacy which the Pope of Rome had was but from humane Authority This Councell concerning Episcopacy ordain'd that To depose a Bishop down to the degree of a Presbyter is Sacriledge This so great a Harmony between the former Protestant Divines and those eminent Fathers how shall it not sound delightfull unto every docible and unpreoccupated hearer These confessions notwithstanding we have not discharg'd our

heard the Lord and afterward burnt a Martyr of Christ was ordained Bishop of Smyrna by Saint Iohn So Hierome Another Polycarpus Bishop and Martyr was placed by John Bishop of Smyrna So Eusebius A third before him By John was Polycarpus constituted Bishop of Smyrna So Tertullian And before him a fourth testifieth as one that had seen this Polycarpus That after that he had been instructed by the Apostles of Christ with whom he had been conversant he was made by them Bishop of Smyrna So Ireneus We ascend somewhat higher to one who write an Epistle to the same Polycarpus intituling him the Bishop of Smyrna and in his Epistle to the Church of Smyrna saluting him as their Bishop Ignatius in these Epistles and sayings which Vedelius the Professour in the Church of Geneva and an exact discerner and discoverer of the corruptions crept into his writings doth hold as genuine and legitimate Can our Opposites require a greater confirmation of any historicall point which they themselves maintain as more amply testified then this is whereto as many of our former Protestant Divines did subscribe so is there not one to our knowledge from this Saint Iohn that ever did contradict it XXVII THESIS That Christ himself shewed his approbation of the Prelacy which the foresaid Angels had in their severall Churches THere was yet never either favourites to Episcopacy nor opposites against it but have granted that whatsoever the Government was meant in these seven Churches it had the approbation of Christ by the tenour of his Epistles written unto them First from the words of the Chap. 1. 1. The Revelation of Jesus Christ sent by his Angel to his Servant John to acknowledge the Epistles to have been dictated by Christ himself conveied by an Angel to Iohn and as it followeth in the second and third Chapters distributed by Iohn to the severall Angels and communicated to the Churches After this by the vertue of the same letters an inquisition is made as it were a Visitation kept upon every Angel of the Churches concerning the discharge of their offices wherein two of them are found of weight and commendable the other five more or lesse criminally deliquents yet so as to manifest a justification of the Offices The approbation of the function is seen not only which reason none can deny by Christ his commending their diligence zeal and faithfullnesse but even likewise in his processe of convictions reprehensions and denuntiations against their remissenesse dissolutenesse and faithfulnesse of others but how certainly so that the condemnation of their vices and abuses argued an approbation of their Offices and Functions because it was done not with an absolute intent to remove them at the first but onely to reforme them and continue them upon their Reformation therefore was it said from Christ to one Repent or else c. Chap. 2. 5. 16. to another Repent if not I will come against thee and the like this we see was no deprivation of the Officers at first much lesse abolition of the Offices which were to continue from age to age The last poynt will be our Assumption from all these premisses which is that these Angels being so amply evidently and with so unanimous consent of the most and best approved Protestant Divines agreeable to Historicall practise of Apostolicall Churches proved to have been such Bishops as had a Prelaey over the Clergy with Christs own approbation a truth which the evidence of these Scriptures did expresse in part from Beza himself his sentence is large consisting of these briefes First that the Episcopacy which seemed to him to be regulate was to be collected out of this Scripture of the Apocalyps Secondly that the same was a Presidency and Prefectureship of one Presbyter over the rest Thirdly that it was a Prelacy of Authority Fourthly that Hierome was of judgement Fifthly that to hold otherwise were to doate and play the foel all which prove the difference of Bishop and Presbyter both to have been of Apostolicall Institution because under Iohn in the Church of Asia and to have had the approbation of Christ because of Christ his commendation of the faithfull discharge of this Function which fully makes good unto us both our conclusions That Episcopacy for the Office and Function it self is according to the word of God and in respect of use therefore the Best The Originall of BISHOPS and METROPOLITANS briefly laid down by James Arch-Bishop of ARMAGH THe ground of Episcopacy is derived partly from the patterne perscribed by God in the Old Testament and partly from the imitation thereof brought in by the Apostle's and confirmed by Christ himself in the time of the New The government of the Church of the Old-Testament was committed to the Priests and Levits unto whom the Ministers of the New do now succeed in like sort as our Lords-day hath done unto their Sabbath that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Prophet touching the vocation of the Gentiles I will take of them for Priests and for Levits saith the Lord. That the Priests were superiour to the Levits no man doubteth and that there was not a parity either betwixt the Priests or betwixt the Levits themselves is manifest by the word of God wherein mention is made of the Heads and Rulers both of the one and of the other 1 Chron. XXIV 6. 31 and Ezr. VIII 29. The Levits were distributed into the three families of the Gershonites Cohathites and Merarites and over each of them God appointed one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Ruler Num. III. 24. 30. 35. the Priests were divided by David into four and twenty courses 1 Chron. XXIV Who likewise had their Heads who in the History of the New-Testament are ordinarily called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or chief of the Priests and clearly distinguished from that singular one who was the type of our great High Priest that is passed into the Heavens Jesus the Son of God Yea in the XI of Nehemy we find two named Bishops the one of the Priests the other of the Levits that dwelt in Jerusalem The former so expresly tearmed by the Greek in the 14. the latter both by the Greek and Latin Interpreter in the 22 vers and not without approbation of the Scripture it self which rendreth the Hebrew word of the same originall in the Old by the Greeke 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the New-Testament Of Levi it was said by Moses the man of God They shall teach Jacob thy judgements and Israel thy law they shall put incense before thee and whole brunt sacrifice upon thine Altar Because this latter part of their office hath ceased with them and the Leviticall Altar the truth prefigured thereby being now exhibited is quite taken away May not we therefore conclude out of the former part which hath no such typicall relation in it that our Bishops and Presbyters should be as the

present defence and agreeth as well to Timothy as to Titus Hierome hath recorded both Timothy and Titus Bishops the one of Ephesus and the other of Creete to whom Ambrose Primasius Gregory the great do consent Luther also bringeth in Augustine into the said Chorus We hasten to our last Act. Our second ground out of Scripture to prove a Prelacy over Presbyters to be according to the word of God is Rev. c. 2. 3. In the Book of Revelation Christ by his Angel properly so called commandeth Iohn to write unto the seven Churches in Asia vers 1. Telling him mystically of seven golden candlesticks vers 13. and of seven starres vers 16. and afterwards expoundeth their meanings seven starres to signifie seven Angels of the seven Churches and seven candlesticks to betoken the seven Churches vers 20. By and by descending to particulars he directeth his several Epistles to the several seven Angels of the seven Churches beginning at the Church of Ephesus saying Write to the Angel of the Church of Ephesus and so of the rest These are our Texts which we are in discussing these our differences to insist upon The State of the Question We readily grant that whatsoever matter was written to these Angels concerning either themselves or others were by them to be communicated severally to the Churches and all the faithfull as they were interested therein according to that Epiphonema severally applied in every Epistle thus He that hath an ●ar to hear let him hear But the onely question is whether each of these Angels of the Churches were singular persons having a Prelacy over other Pastors and Clergy or no Our opposites say nay we yea The odds is ex Diametro We are therefore according to true method first to disprove their negative and after to evince our affirmation But in the first place be it known that our Opposites in their negatives are distracted into three Opinions One sort by the word Angel will have understood the whole Church collectively as well Laitie as Clergy Not so say the second Opinatours but by Angel is collectively meant onely the Order or Colledge of Pastours or Presbyters After these the Novelists it s neither so nor so but by Angel is meant one individual Pastour without relation to any other newly called an Independent whereas our tenet is by Angel to understand one individual Ecclesiastical person having a Prelacy above the rest XX. THESIS That our Opposites first Exposition which interpreteth the Angel to mean the whole Church and congregation is notably extravagant ALthough Wal● Messalinus the grand Adversary to Episcopacy be very peremptory for this exposition yet will it altogether appear groundlesse But first we are to hearken unto his glosse Let is be held a firm and fixt truth saith he that by the name of Angels are not signified any that had Presidency over others but the whole congregation and Churches So he Pythagorically upon his own word as we see whereunto we may rather answer Let it be held firmly and fixtly that this glosse upon the Text is evidently confuted by the context which standeth thus cap. 1. and 20. The Angels are called Starres and the Churches Candlesticks so that he must turn Starres into Candlesticks before that he can make the Angel to signifie the whole Congregation Beside cap. 2. 1. the command to John is Write to the Angel of the Church of Ephesus where if by Angel must be understood the Church then were it as much as to have been said Write unto the Church of the Church of Ephesus But we know the spirit of wisdom could not write unwisely XXI THESIS That our Opposites second Exposition of the word Angel to signifie only the Order and Colledge of Presbyters is erroneous notwithstanding the Arguments of our Opposites to the contrary The Answer to their first Argument THis indeed is the common exposition of our opposites whereunto our objectours adhere upon as they call them firme Arguments as first Our first Argument say they is drawn from the Epistle to the Church of Thyatira where after it was said to the Angell I have something against thee in the singular number cap. 2. 20. It is after added in the plural vers 24. But I say to you and to the rest But what of this This sheweth say they the word Angell to be collective to signifie a multitude of Pastours We answer if so then was Beza but dim-sighted who paraphras'd upon these words thus unto you that is saith he unto the Angell as President and unto Collegues as unto the Assembly meaning of Presbyters and to the rest that is to the whole flock So he Where we see that the Angell was as individuall and singular as either Thee or Thy And is it possible our Opposites should be ignorant what an Apostrophe is And that there is no f●gure of speech more familiar and usuall among men then it is As when a Lord writing to his chief Steward of matters belonging to him and other Officers under him and the whole Family Be thou circumspect in managing my affaires and afterward as well unto him as others but see that you and the rest keep at home as much as may be because of the danger of the Pestilence which now rageth on all sides Answer to the second Argument Our second Argument say they is drawn from the Phrases even in this very book of Revelations wherein it is usual to express a company under a singular person as the civil State of Rome called a Beast with ten heads which proveth that the Angell might be taken collectively Is this all Master Meade say they one better skil'd in the meaning of the Revelation then our adversary said that the word Angell is commonly if not alwayes in the Revelation taken collectively So they This saying have I diligently sought after but it fled from me But yet I shall be content to be satisfied of Mr. Meade his meaning from his other sayings more obvious unto me to shew that he hath not been rightly understood by these objectours For Collectively properly taken is a word comprehending a multitude without distinction of persons as Christ in his Lamentation said O Hierusalem how oft would I have gathered thy Children but tho● wouldst not where the words singular Thou and Thy do here comprehend all the Citizens of Hierusalem without distinction Had Master Meade this collective sense He sheweth the flat contrary Apoc. 9. 14. four Angells These four saith he were put for Nations which they were thought to Govern So then they did represent Nations as notwithstanding to be distinctly their four Governours Next upon Revel 14 6. I saw another Angell flying We are to call to mind saith he that which before was cap. 7. shewed that the Angells of like Visions de represent them of whom they have Government wheresoever And again upon vers 7. The flying Angell is ruler not onely of men but also of a