And therefore we do not find that the Apostles acted with a plenitude of Power till he had given them a new Commission after his Resurrection and it is remarkable that in St. Matthew 16. 19. he vests them with the power of Binding and Loosing in the Future Tense But in St. John 20. 23. after his Resurrection it is expressed in the Present Tense Then it was that he gave them that Authority which himself had exercised whilst he remain'd on Earth But then when immediately in pursuance of their new Commission the Apostles thought themselves obliged to choose one into their Order to supply the Vacancy made by the death of Judas What can be more evident than that they thought the Apostolical Office by our Saviour's Appointment distinct from and superiour to all other Offices in the Church So that it is manifest that the Form observed by the Apostles in the Planting and Governing of Churches was Model'd according to our Saviour's own Platform and after that it is not at all material to enquire whether he only drew the Model or erected the Building But whichsoever he did it is improved into an impregnable Demonstration from the undoubted Practice of the Apostles and from them the perpetual Tradition of the Catholick Church in that it is plain that they thought themselves obliged to stand to this Original Form of Church-Government For the Apostles we all know and all Parties grant during their days kept up the distinction and preeminence of their Order and from them the Bishops of the First Ages of the Church claim'd their Succession and every where challenged their Episcopal Authority from the Institution of Christ and the Example of his Apostles And now are we enter'd upon the second main Controversie viz. The Authority of the Apostolical Practice against which three things are usually alledged That neither can we have that certainty of Apostolical Practice which is necessary to constitute a Divine Right nor secondly is it probable that the Apostles did tie themselves to any one fixed Course in Modelling Churches nor thirdly if they did doth it necessarily follow that we must observe the same And the first of these is made out from the equivalency of the names Bishop and Presbyter secondly from the Ambiguity of some places of Scripture pleaded in behalf of different Forms of Government thirdly from the Defectiveness Ambiguity Partiality and Repugnancy of the Records of the succeeding Ages which should inform us what was the Apostolical Practice But as to the first I shall wholly wave the dispute of the signification of the words because it is altogether beside the purpose and if it were not our other Proofs are so pregnant as to render it altogether useless Neither indeed would this ever have been any matter of Dispute had not our Adversaries for want of better Arguments been forced to make use of such slender pretences But how impotently Salmasius and Blondel who were the main Founders of the Argument have argued from the Community of the Names the Identity of the Office any one that has the patience to read them over may satisfie himself As for my own part I cannot but admire to see Learned men persist so stubbornly in a palpable Impertinency when from the Equivalency of the words Bishop and Presbyter in the Apostles time they will infer no imparity of Ecclesiastical Officers notwithstanding it is so evident and granted by themselves that the Apostles enjoyed a superiority of Power over the other Pastors of the Church which being once proved or granted and themselves never doubted of it to infer their beloved 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Parity of the Clergy from the Equivocal signification of those two words is only to out-face their own Convictions and their Adversaries Demonstrations For if it be proved and themselves cannot deny it that there was an inequality of Offices from the Superiority of the Apostles it is a very Childish attempt to go about to prove that there was not because there were two Synonymous Terms whereby to express the whole Order of the Clergy But to persist in this trifling Inference as Salmasius has who when he was informed of its manifest weakness and absurdity would never renounce it but still repeated it in one Book after another without any improvement but of Passion and Confidence is one of the most woful Examples that I remember of a learned man's Trifling that has not the ingenuity to yield when he finds himself vanquish'd not only by his Adversary but his Argument Neither shall I trouble my self with other mens disputes about particular Texts of Scripture when it is manifest from the whole Current of Scripture that the Apostles exercised a superiority of Power over the other Pastors of the Church and that is all that is requisite to the Argument from Apostolical Practice for as yet it is nothing to us whether they were Presbyters or Bishops that they set over particular Churches that shall be enquired into when we come to the Practice of the Primitive Church it is enough that they were subject to the Apostles for then by Apostolical Practice there was a Superiority and Subordination in Church-Government And therefore I cannot but wonder here too at the blindness of Walo Messalinus who in pursuance of his Verbal Argument produces this passage out of Theodoret and spends a great deal of the first part of his Book in declaiming upon it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Then the same men were call'd Presbyters and Bishops and those that we now call Bishops they then call'd Apostles but in process of time the name of Apostolate was appropriate to them who were truly and properly Apostles and the name of Bishop was applied to them who were formerly call'd Apostles Than which words beside that they contain the true state of the Question there is scarce a clearer passage in all Antiquity to confound his cause For what can be a plainer Reproof to their noise about the Equivalency of words than to be told that it is true that the words Bishop and Presbyter signified the same thing in the Apostles time but that those that we now call Bishops were then call'd Apostles who exercised the Episcopal Power over the other Clergy but that afterward in process of time they left the word Apostolate to those who were strictly and properly so call'd and stil'd all other Bishops who in former times were stiled Apostles What I say can be more peremptory against his Opinion that concludes from the equivalency of Names to the parity of Power than this that notwithstanding the words were equivalent yet the Episcopal Power was then in the Apostles whose successors in their supremacy came in after-times to be call'd Bishops And if so then is it evident that there was the same imparity of Church-Officers in the Apostles time as in succeeding Ages Nay our friend Walo is not content to make this out for us only as to the
that passage of Sozomen l. 1. c. 9. in which some learned men fancy they find some footsteps of this Law it is quite to the other purpose that I but now mentioned viz. the Bishops Power of determining causes by the mutual consent of Parties When this Edict was forged and by whom it is uncertain but it is probably conjectur'd by Gothofred from the Barbarity of its stile and great likeness of it to that of Constantines Donation to have been forged in the same Shop and by the same hand But if this Edict were as true as the rest are which give Bishops Power to sentence causes praeeunte vinculo compromissi yet where do we find any Edict for enabling them to enforce their decrees by Excommunication Not one syllable of that in all the Roman Laws but on the contrary the Civil Magistrates and their Officers are commanded to put the Bishops Sentence in execution Is it not then a very forced way of Arguing that because the Roman Emperours granted the Christian Bishops some jurisdiction they must of necessity have granted them the Power of Excommunication though there is no such Edict extant in all their Laws They conferr'd many Priviledges upon the Clergy in the Titles De Episcopis Ecclesiâ—s Clericis de Religione yet there is nothing in both the Codes and all the Novels to vest them with any power of Excommunication and therefore as those other they enjoyed by the Emperours favour not by any antecedent Right so seeing they exercised this Power and that not by vertue of any Imperial grant it is evident that they received their Authority from some other hand So that to conclude there cannot be a more pregnant Argument against our Author's opinion than the body of the Imperial Law in which there is not one Instance recorded that ever any Emperour pretended to this Power himself or granted it to his Bishops for from thence it unavoidably follows that if they had it at all they had it from some other Commission And thus am I come to the conclusion of this Argument for though there are many Precedents of latter Times yet I am not concern'd to justifie what was done by Huns Goths and Vandals whose practices were the meer effects of Ignorance and Barbarity and oblige us rather to pity than to follow their Examples PART II. HAving hitherto treated with the false Pretenders to the Church of England I come now in the last place to treat more amicably with some of its mistaken Friends and they are those that own a Government in it but without Governours allowing indeed that there ought to be some sort of Government establish'd in the Church but then they deny any particular Form of it to have been settled by Divine Right or Apostolical Constitution and leave it wholly to the choice and determination of Humane Authority So that though the Church of England happen to be at present govern'd by Bishops and though upon that account we may owe duty and subjection to them as our lawful Superiours yet they are not set over us by any Divine Commission but purely by his Majestie 's good Will and Pleasure who at his Restitution to his Kingdoms might have forborn to restore the then Abolish'd Order of Bishops and instead of that have establish'd some other Form of Government that he judged most suitable to the present state of things which if he had done that then had been the Church of England Now the Birth of this Opinion seems to have happened on this manner Mr. Calvin having founded his Geneva Platform upon Divine Institution as he particularly does in the Fourth Book of his Institutions Chap. 11. though some men that are more his Disciples than they are willing to own are pleased to deny it And in pursuance of this Decree Beza and all the other first Apostles of his Church having spent all their pains in endeavouring to make it good out of the Word of God the learned men that came after them both in the French and Dutch Churches because they must needs go beyond those that went before them proceeded to advance the Argument from Scripture to Antiquity and have with infinite industry sifted all the Writings of the Ancients to prove that there was no other Form of Government in the Church but by Presbyters in the first Ages of it next and immediately after the Apostles The chief Labourers in which Cause among many other less learned were Blondel Salmasius and Dallé who spent the greatest part both of their Life and Learning upon this Argument But they proceeding for the most part in a sceptical and destructive way not so much relying upon the Testimony as impairing the credit of Antiquity which it seems they supposed the best way to maintain their Argument this soon gave occasion to some Learned men conversant in their Writings to conclude against all pretences to the Divine or Apostolical Institution of any unalterable and perpetual Form of Church-Government whatsoever and so to think of allaying those Controversies about a Jus Divinum that had been lately and still were managed among us with so much heat and noise by leaving it as they say our Saviour and his Apostles did to the prudence of every particular Church to agree upon its own Form as it judgeth most conducing to the end of Government in that particular Church This is the state of the Question as they determine it and the Opinion is grown popular and plausible in great Vogue both among the Learned and Unlearned and is almost become the Rule and Standard of all our Ecclesiastical Polity In so much that there are many worthy Gentlemen as any one may observe in his ordinary Conversation that were stout and loyal Confessors to the Church of England under its Sufferings that at this time look upon it as an Arbitrary and indifferent thing And therefore in pursuance of my design in behalf of the Church of England I am obliged to examine the reasons and Principles upon which it is founded and to shew that it is so far from tending to the Peace of an Establish'd Church that it is destructive to the Being and Settlement of all the Christian Churches in the World And though here I have many learned worthy men for my Adversaries yet I hope to manage the Dispute with that Candour and Integrity that none shall have any reason to complain of any more unkindness than what is absolutely necessary to my doing right to the Church of England And this I am sure can give no Offence to good men how much soever I may chance to cross with their particular Sentiments and Opinions And as for bad men for there are of both sorts engaged in the Opinion I were not true to my own Integrity if I suffered my self to be in the least swayed by their good or bad Opinion for I write not to please but to convince them which I know as long as they continue bad is but
Apostles themselves but as to their immediate Successors whom they employed in the settlement of Churches and to whom they committed the Apostolical Power for their Government and these too he proves were stil'd Apostles such as Titus Timothy Epaphroditus Clemens Linus Marcus so that not only the Apostles but the Evangelists as they call'd them were distinguish'd from the other Clergy and endued with a superiority of Power over their respective Churches and hereby we gain the authority of Apostolical Practice not only for themselves but for their Companions and Successors which does not only extend our Argument but joyns together the practice of the Primitive Times of which we have certain Records with that of the Apostles and so prevents all their fond Dreams of an unknown Interval immediately after the death of the Apostles for if these Apostolical men supplied their Places it will be very easie to find out who supplied theirs Neither thirdly need I trouble my self with any long dispute concerning the Obligation of Apostolical Practice for whether or no meer Apostolical Practice be obligatory by vertue of their Example is very little material to our Enquiry for some things are too trifling or too transient in their own Natures to deserve to pass into prescription but it is enough in this case that what the Apostles did was in pursuance of our Saviour's Institution and that in a matter of perpetual concernment to the Church and they who require to the Obligation of such an Apostolical Practice an express Law to declare their intention that it should bind for ever are guilty of the same phantastick niceness as they that require the same for the perpetuity of every Divine Law and therefore have been consider'd already And for that reason I shall add nothing more to what I have already said as to this particular than to grant that whatever the Apostles either commanded or practised upon some particular temporary and occasional Cases was not sufficient to found any universal and unchangeable Obligation because the reason of the Precept was apparently transient and the goodness of the action casual But otherwise if there were any Prescript or Practice of theirs though it were not founded upon any Divine Institution that did not relate to peculiar Occasions and Circumstances but are or may be of equal usefulness to all Places Times and Persons that is a certain and undoubted evidence of their constant and unabolishable Obligation And therefore here I shall only put them to their former task to assign what particular ground and reason there was of establishing a Superiority and Subordination of Church-Officers in the times of the Apostles that is ceased in all succeeding Ages of the Church and till they can discharge this Task advise them not to depart rashly from so sacred and venerable a Prescription But that which improves the Argument both from our Saviour's Institution and the Apostles Practice into a complete Demonstration is the practice of the Primitive Churches in the Ages next and immediately succeeding the Apostles For if the Government of the Church were by our Saviour founded upon Divine Institution in an inequality of Church-Officers and if the first Governours of it thought themselves obliged to keep close to its Original Platform and if their immediate Successors conceived themselves as much obliged to observe the same as imposed upon them by the Command of Christ and deliver'd to them by the Example and Tradition of his Apostles that certainly may serve for a very competent proof of its necessity and perpetuity Now then as for the power and preheminence of the Episcopal Order it is attested by the best Monuments and Records of the first and most remote Antiquity and we find such early instances and evidences of it that unless it descended from the Apostles times we can never give any account in the World whence it derived its Original And this brings us upon the main sanctuary of our Adversaries viz. The defectiveness of Antiquity in reference to the shewing what certain Form the Apostles observed in settling the Government of Churches and here they run into a large common place of the deep silence of antiquity and the defectiveness of the Records of the Church in the interval next and immediately succeeding the Apostles But here in the first place I must desire them to consider that if this Objection be of any force against the certainty of Apostolical Tradition in this particular it will utterly overthrow all the testimony of the Ancients as to all other matters of Faith and particularly as to the certain Canon and Divine Authority of the Scriptures for if they are not as is pretended competent Witnesses of the practice of the Apostles because of their distance from the time of the Apostles neither for the same reason are their reports to be relied upon with any confidence as to the certainty of any of their Writings It is not to be expected that I should here reprent how false this exception is de facto and how unreasonable de jure either against the Constitutions or the Authentick Epistles of the Apostles it is enough that they stand and fall together so that whoever opposes the Divine and Apostolical Form of Church Government as delivered to us by the Primitive Church does upon his own principles defeat and reject all the proofs of the Divine Authority of the holy Scriptures in that those sceptical grounds and pretences he is forced to urge against one fall as dangerously on both And this may serve to prevent and invalidate the force of their Argument without answering it when if they should deal as rigorously in any other case as they are pleased to do in this the most certain and undoubted Records cannot escape the severity of their censure Though our comfort is that neither of them are liable to such wild and wanton Objections in that as I shall shew the Tradition of the Church was always constant and uninterrupted and that there was no such Chasm as is pretended between the times of the Apostles and the next Christian Writers For to say nothing here of the Canon of the Scriptures though the men of that Age left us no formal Histories and Catalogues of the succession of Bishops in all their several Sees wherewith some men unreasonable enough upbraid us when it is so manifest that it was at that time too young for that care in that as yet there was scarce any succession Yet were they no less than Apostolical men that vouched the Apostolical Order and Jurisdiction of Bishops and this one would think enough to satisfie any modest or ingenious man of their Institution from the beginning When it is asserted or rather supposed by the very first Writers of the Church that were capable of attesting it So that whoever can withstand their Evidence is proof against all Evidence of matter of Fact and may if he please laugh at all the Tales and Legends that are told concerning the