indispensable Subjection and Obedience of all Christians to their Power and Jurisdiction that all his profuser Criticisms and conjectural Triflings cannot make a Pretence against any ways bafflle or evade him and therefore his Epistles are rejected as spurious and counterfeit are Condemned to the Fire as the Holy Martyr himself was to the Beasts and which he endeavours more than to Martyr to annihilate passes his Sentence of perpetual oblivion and forgetfulness against them So Hereticks of old dealt with the Scriptures themselves Marcion blotted out with his Pen and wholly crased what he could not evade or deny what he could not by his Style and Expositions overthrow Macherâ non stylo usus est as Tertullian tells us in his Book of Prescriptions against Hereticks cap. 19. whereas Valentinus another Heretick there spoke of Non ad materiam Scripturas sed materiam ad Scripturas excogitavit blotted not out but brought the Scriptures to himself Proprietates verborum auferens wresting and perverting of them and which of the two took from and really did more violence to the Scriptures there is no occasion at present to enquire though Tertullian gives it to the latter for the Person we at present have to deal with is guilty of both Those two notorious Hereticks seem to survive in him at once nor has he with less tricks of words evaded the sence of him and others then with a resolved Contumacy at last quite blotted out the Writing of that most Holy and Apostolical Person nor will it abate much of his guilt or can I be much accused in making the Parallel betwixt him and two such notorious Hereticks and whose Objects were the Scriptures themselves for the Method is as natural and the same Hand and Pen is equally ready for the one as the other and the Canonical Epistles themselves have had the same usage as had by him these of Ignatius when standing in the way and this by some of his own design and complexion And how he hath dealt with our own Church in particular and much after the same Nature in many things not distinguishing her Practices from the depraved usages of Rome and particularly in Point of Government by Arch-Bishops Metropolitans and Bishops is to be seen in his Book De Cultu Romanorum and has been lately observed and reported to the World by a most Faithful and Learned Hand in another Language I cannot say but sometimes even these very Men appear more civil towards us and pass upon us high and mighty Complements and their Practice is not so rude as their Determinations are rigorus upon us nor do they approve our unruly Dissenters and Peace-breakers in point of Government though their Documents and Principles such our home-Schismaticks receive and Copy out from them and whose Autority we are still urged withal though what they would do were they as secure as Blondel thought himself in 1646. when he dedicated his Apology to the then Rebellious Parliament and Assembly-men is another question what manner of Spirit his was then has been already declared and what personal Aspersions and loads of Calumnies he laid as upon the Cause it self so upon the present Bishops will appear from that often-forced Apology of our learned Doctor Hammond for their Innocency and Integrity in his Answer to him Dissert 1ª contra Blondel cap. 12. sect 22. In haec unica Hierarchicorum doctrina adeò totum Antichristum ebibisse censeatur ut in hoc unum erroris Pelagus alia omnia Acherontis ostia se effudisse aut quidquid in illius Seculi Ecclesia peccatum ab Haereticis fuit illud statim in Episcopis hujus aevi puniendum videatur or whether it may return again God knows All the Progress we have made yet seems to be but this we have and still do pity and bemoan that state of theirs as sad and to be lamented which they have and do still account their Gospel-Simplicity and Perfection Plead that Necessity for them which they deny and wilfully persist in which provokes back again only their Pity for us not to say their Scorn and Contempt for so it has by some of them been return'd upon us and by the most favourable we are beheld as well-meaning but ignorant men so Gersom Bucer plainly tells Bishop Dounham in his Answer to the Sermon Pag. 594. our own Pleas and Arguments by Complyance and Condescensions to and for them is managed and retorted upon our selves and not by them only but and which is the greater disadvantage has come to us by it by our own Members and within the Pale of our Communion and the great popular prevailing Argument that Episcopacy is not Essential to Church-Government is this because our Charity hopes and concludes the best of them that God's Mercy through their sincerity and upright meaning may supply the defect they are under and endeavouring all we can to justifie them we have been disabled to justifie our selves This hath been the plain case all along with us the words of our Learned Bishop Taylor are apt to this in his Treatise called Episcopacy Asserted Sect. 32. and may not unduly be here inserted For we were glad at first of Abettors against the Errors of the Roman Church we found these Men Zealous in it we thanked God for it as we had cause and we were willing to make them recompence by endeavouring to justifie their Ordinations not thinking what would follow upon our selves but now it is come to that issue that our Episcopacy is thought not necessary because we did not condemn the Ordinations of their Presbytery And even at this day after so thorow a debate by Monsieur Dailâ—e and Bishop Pearson they may have abated somewhat of that rigorous Practice in France that just now named learned Bishop in that his Treatise tells us was once in use amongst them That if any one returns to them they will re-ordain him by their Presbytery though he had before Episcopal Ordination and for which he refers us to Danaeus Part 2. Isagog lib. 2. cap. 22. Perron Repl. fol. 92. Impress 1605. but the result on their side is only this and 't is no further than Beza and Gersom Bucer had gone before insalubrior est as Bucer speaks in his Answer to Bishop Downham's Sermon Pag. 18. 255. 6. and tells us That the same is the opinion of Beza it is less advantageous that our Government though but a meer Humane Invention is what may be born with its yoke may be endured by those that are under it Et quamvis Episcoporum eminentiam supra Presbyteros Institutionis esse merè humanae firmissiâ—â— redam praestat tamen meo judicio regimen illud Episcopale patienter ferre c. So the late Replyer to Bishop Pearson and Doctor Beveridge Dailee the Son as 't is thought Observat in Ignatianas Pearsonis Vindicias in 〈◊〉 and after all their gilded Phrases Pompous words and higher Eulogies I never could find that any one of them ever has given us
of a Foreign Power and which consider'd not their Religion it had no Power to Protect it self and therefore by Compact among themselves they submitted to Excommunication A Politick accidental Contrivance of their own to keep themselves together The Offices of the Priests and Levites though appropriate and distinct as to some Acts and Powers yet not as to Government they as such were placed only in the Services of the Tabernacle the Temple and Altar And Grotius well describes them Judices erant de arduis Legis ut viri caeteris Eruditiores in Deut. 17.9 They executed the Offices of Judges as Men more Skilled and Learned than others it flowed not purely from their Priestly Delegation That Power came another way perhaps as Elected into the Sanedrim if there was such a continued Society for Government which from the Old Testament appears not however in use in the days of our Saviour And which makes me admire some Men among us who contend so much for the letter of the Scriptures and run down whatever is Tradition besides it and yet so much adore their magnified Sanedrim upon the alone talk of some Jewish Doctors which were but of Yesterday And it was a great Error in Theodore Beza and argued in him more Zeal than Judgment who in answer to this Part of Erastus in his forementioned Hundred Theses asserts the Jewish Church and State to have been two Bodies with different Powers for Judicature And who is followed herein by Matthew Sutcliffe De Presbyterio and others besides the very Stipulation and Compact betwixt Moses and Israel was for the Temporal Canaan upon Temporal Promises and Rewards the Milk and Honey and quiet Possession of it Nor did the Levitical Covenant as such engage for any more Whatever good things to come were expected by the more discerning part of them they receiv'd another way By accidental occasional Notices they saw in the Glass through the Veil in the Type and Shadow for so the Law was in the Plot and Design to be unto them or by the additional Advantages of the Prophets which God all along sent unto them whose Business it was at least a great part of it farther to reveal unfold and discover the End and Purport of the Law unto them and whose report was very hardly believed and consequently as were their Covenant and Indentment so were their Awards and Punishments In course they were to be Bodily and Temporal no wonder that Adultery was Punish'd by the Sword and they quite cut off from that good Land as it afterwards happened unto them So Saint Jerome speaks of the Jews Qui ob Praesentia tantum bona Legis praecepta custodiunt ut terrenae Foelicitatis longae vitae Praemium consequuntur Qui te ob praesentia tantum rerum promissa venerantur Ep. Damaso Tom. 4. who kept the Law only for the present Advantage for long Life and earthly Felicity and for the present Promises worship God And St. Clemens Alexandrinus Strom. 1. dividing the Law into Four parts he leaves out that Branch 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which belongs to Morality and concludes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Letter or Historical part to be alone Nomothetical and to oblige as a Law And so we find this one Reason of that one Branch of the Law which consists in Sacrifices not excluding that which is Typical of it as a tryal of the Jews Obedience to God that the Blessing of the Covenant may be continued unto them Quâ Populum pronum in Idololatriam Transgressionem ejusmodi Officiis Religioni suae voluit adstringere Tertul. adv Marcion l. 2. c. 18. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Just Martyr Dialog cum Triph. Jud. facilem ad Idola reverti Populum erudiebat Irenaeus l 4. c. 28. So St. Jerome l. 2. adv Pelag. Tom. 3. And in Jerem. 7.22 Isai 1.12 in Mat. 5. and all which are followed exactly by Grotius Comment in Exod. 15.26 in Mat. 5.17 Eph. 3.10 and De Veritate Religionis Christianae l. 2. Sect. 9. l. 5. Sect. 7. So that to speak to the whole at once the Disparity between the Jewish and Christian Government being every ways in the both Frame Practice and Reward so great the Inferences from the Jewish against the Christian cannot be due and just and must be also wide and inconsistent The Advantage by their Scheme and Objection as drawn up is on our side and we thence claim these following Conclusions which no Man as in themselves can deny though in their thwartings as to the Design of our Adversaries and compliance with ours they are bluster'd against and misrepresented § III THAT as the Levitical Discipline in its first make and design had only corporal Rewards and Punishments promised and inflicted suitably as the Command and Indentment was Carnal So the Body of Christ which is Spiritual hath its Rewards and Punishments which are Spiritual and like it self suitable to its Nature and Constitution and the Spiritual Commandment The earthly Magistrate or worldly Secular Power as call'd in Antiquity and which has been sufficiently already observ'd can have no first original share in the Churches Sanctions and Denunciations Administrations and Distributions because a Body in its frame independent in its design call'd out from the World capable of the World's favours but not of either a rise or dissolution by it And this Mr. Selden must submit unto upon the Supposition that the Church is a Body no body subsisting without its Laws as he learnedly argues and concludes soundly in his first Book De Synedriis and not to have Laws within it self but what are Arbitrary or borrowed from others is to destroy the Supposition and make it no Inclosure or Self-Community Or if the Levitical Polity does any ways relate to and infer upon the Christian as the Christian Church affirms it to do 't is as its Type and Shadow the Law being a Shadow of good things to come as the Author to the Hebrews speaks for though other Reasons are given or rather proposed only by the above-mentioned Fathers of the Church for the Sacrifical part of the Law and that it was given upon other Motives yet they exclude not that design which is Typical but suppose it in the first place and the principal purpose of the Law-giver was by Types and Shadows to represent the succeeding Gospel So St. Clemens Alexandrinus l. 7. Strom. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the Sacrifices under the Law did allegorize or speak in other things our Worship under the Gospel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as he speaks Ibid. the Sacrificing our selves or that we present our selves a living Sacrifice holy acceptable which is our reasonable Service Rom. 12.1 Mentem ipsam pro Sacrificio as Lactantius l. 5. Sect. 19. where the mind it self is the Sacrifice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Temperance Righteousness and Humanity is offer'd in Justin Martyr Apol. 2. Opima hostia Oratio de Carne Pudicâ De anima innocenti de spiritu
stone to ruine him had procur'd the Sentence of a Synod against him licet Sciret impletam and which he knew was sufficient and cogent of it self yet he endeavour'd all he could thereby to render him lower and more contemptible to have it corroborated and confirm'd by that Autority Quâ potiuntur Aeternae Vrbis Episcopi which the Bishops of the Eternal City or of Rome did enjoy which Autority what it was is still in the dark for him there 's no mention of it in any one Degree and 't is mostly agreeable that he endeavour'd it as the more great and popular Bishops of the World by reason of that Vrbs aeterna as the City of Rome for its Pompous Magnificence is all along through that History call'd that eminent City the seat of their Residence Lib. 15. Pag. 75 76. Ed. Lugdun in Duodecimo nor does it from this whole History appear that there was then as not any distinct Power so nor any but Title affixed to the Bishops of Rome which other Christian Bishops had not The Bishops in general are called Christianae legis Antistites and Liberius of Rome has but the same Title or that of Episcopus Romanus and Vrbis aeternae Episcopi is what the whole Succession is call'd by Ibid. suprà Et lib. 20. Pag. 261. lib. 22. p. 329. AND now the whole of the Matter is driven § XXVI into this one Point or narrower room what the Power and Extent of this Church-Law or Canon Ecclesiastical was in what sense it was imposed own'd and receiv'd in the Church If universally and what was design'd for all Christendom and obliging let them produce the Rule it is not to be found in any thing yet we have consider'd and then reconcile it with the general Practice of the Church which appears another thing and to enlarge this Power whatever that above mentioned is as claim'd by the Bishop of Rome beyond a limited Exarchy or Primacy or that it any ways reaches to Antioch is to go beyond the whole Story Ecclesiastical in any tolerable Age of it 'T is to go beside the Acts of every General Council upon every occasion and all the Imperial Courses and Proceedings in point of Jurisdiction when the state came into the Church engaged for its Governance and Jurisdiction and turnâ—d their Canons into Laws There is nothing in any one Council whether General or Topical that either refers to determines actually or but implies any such thing unless what was foysted into the Canons of the first Council of Nice and recommended to the Council of Carthage for an Approbation with the rest of those Canons by Faustinus an Italian Bishop and Legate of Rome be since made Canonical Sure we are it was then detected and exploded for a Cheat by the Holy Bishops of that Council and who there and then disown'd the Superior Universal Power in the Bishop of Rome all which with the several Circumstances is to be seen in the opening of the Synod The See of Rome is still represented as but equal and in the same rank with the other Four great Churches of Christendom and its Bishop neither Presides in the Councils nor Over-rules in the Definitions of Christendom nor is the Autority any ways defective upon his absence or if convented without his License than upon the absence of or when not licensed by any other Bishop There is not an Instance of any one Reference or Appeal in Church-Affairs but still the either Patriarch Exarch Metropolitan Primate or Private Bishop is to accommodate and rectifie all as the alone Judges and Determiners under a Synod of Bishops or a Council and if new Canons be wanting 't is the Imperial Direction that the Bishop of Constantinople and the Convention of Priests be convened to consider of and to make them Cod. Justin l. 1. Tit. 2.6 Et Cod. Theodos 16. l. 45. Tit. 2. As for that of the Council of Sardica Can. 3. 4. and which seems to favour the Bishop of Rome in the right of hearing and adjusting Foreign Causes not to make any Reflexions on the Synod it self whatsoever it is 't is bottomed neither on Scriptures nor ancient Tradition or Custom but seems in particular Cases to be allow'd him for the honour of St. Peter nor can we believe it could run against the different Determinations of general Councils if so 't is to be of no Autority particularly the first of Nicea considering also that Hosius was President both at Nice and here I shall add it cannot be conceiv'd to run against it self whose Tenth Canon places the top and uppermost of all Church-Power in the Bishop 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and which is not consistent with a Superior Order in the Church fixed and immutable whether as to Jurisdiction and Ordination or Government only As Bellarmine and Estius are not agreed and those several Exempts we have an account of in Church Story 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and govern'd within themselves as Cyprus Bulgaria Iberia Anglia whatever they relate to and so called in respect of whether Patriarchacies Exarchies or this pretended Monarchy Universal or howsoever they came so to be they are Evidence sufficient against this claim of Rome and that every Church is not therefore Schismatical because disowning a dependency upon her especially if we reflect how strongly these Privileges are contended for in the Eighth Canon of the Council of Ephesus occasion'd by some Usurpations attempted upon Cyprus in particular and 't is there made Law that no inrode be made upon them And that which is farther considerable is that among all the Orders and Directions issued out to Church-men by the Empire for the executing the Canons and preserving the Discipline of the Church the Persons in Charge are the Bishops Metropolitan or Patriarch the Bishop under the Metropolitan the Metropolitan under the Patriarch and the Patriarch is always last and uppermost and 't is very strange to reflect that if there was an Order above these a Power Universal residing in any one Person with a care over all the Churches in Christendom so setled by Laws Ecclesiastical and Superior to all the afore-mentioned Orders in Jurisdiction and Government and this Person and Power should still be overlook't and disregarded no one Direction and Application made unto him in the Affairs so immediately his of his Charge and Inspection and this too in the days of Justinian especially since whatever was done by the Empire was in Prosecution of what was Church-Law and Canon before according to the Appointments and Decisions of it And that this is all so 't is most manifest in our Church Story Acts of Councils and particularly the Proceedings Imperial in the two Codes and the Novels Vid. Cod. Justinian lib. 1. Tit. 3.43.2 Novel 5. Epilog Novel 6. Cap. 3. Epilog alibi saepius Not that the Empire was shye in giving the See of Rome any Power or Title was its due as it must be acknowledg'd very great things were
Oath we make Princes the only supreme Governors of all Persons in all Causes as well spiritual as temporal utterly renouncing all foreign Jurisdictions Superiorities and Autorities upon which Words mark what an horrible Confusion of all Faith and Religion ensueth if Princes be the only Governors in Ecclesiastical Matters then in vain did the Holy Ghost appoint Pastors and Bishops to govern the Church if they be Supreme then they are superior to Christ himself and in effect Christ's Masters if in all Things and Causes spiritual than they may prescribe to the Priests and Bishops what to preach which way to worship and serve God how in what Form to minister the Sacraments and generally how Men shall be governed in Soul if all foreign Jurisdiction must be renounced then Christ and his Apostles because they were and are Forreigners have no Jurisdiction nor Autority over England But this is what only the ill Nature and Malice of our Adversaries would have us to believe and assert and give out to the World we do 't is what is and all along has been repell'd with scorn and indignation both by our Princes in their single Persons and in their Laws in Parliament and though some of our Divines have wished the Oath had been more cautiously Penn'd and think it lies more open to little obvious Inferences of this nature than it needs and which amuse the unwary less discerning Reader yet all own and defend it as to the substance and design and intent of it and which is throughly and sufficiently done by the learned Warden in this Treatise as appears by this Specimen or shorter account is now given of it and he that peruses the whole Treatise will find more and John Tillotson Doctor in Divinity and Dean of Canterbury is if not the only yet one professed conforming Divine in our Church that publickly from the both Pulpit and Press has given the Romanist so much ground really to believe we are such as they on purpose to abuse us and delude others give it out we are and complyes so far with their Objection and Calumny just now recited as by Philander drawn up against us gives so much of Force and Autority to it § XIX BISHOP Sanderson in his Treatise now mentioned has a different task from Bishop Bilson the one was to vindicate the Prince that he invades not the Church the other the Bishops or Church that from usurping on the Prince Bishop Sanderson among many other things urged by him and as his Subject requires is express in these Particulars pag. 121. That there is a supreme Ecclesiastical Power which by the Law of the Land is established and by the Doctrine of our Church acknowledged to be inherent in the Church pag. 23. That regal and Episcopal Power are two Powers of quite different kinds and such as considered purely in those things which are proper and assential to either have no mutual relation unto or dependance upon each other neither hath either of them to do with the other the one of them being purely spiritual and internal the other external and temporal albeit in regard of the Persons that are to exercise them or some accidental Circumstances appertaining to the exercise thereof it may happen the one to be some wayes helpful or prejudicial to the other pag. 41. that the derivation of any Power from God doth not necessarily infer the non-subjection of the Persons in whom that Power resideth to all other Men for doubtless the power that Fathers have over their Children Husbands over their Wives Masters over their Servants is from Heaven of God and not of Men yet are Parents Husbands Masters in the exercise of their several respective Powers subject to the Power Jurisdiction and Laws of their lawful Soveraigns pag. 44. The King doth not challenge to himself as belonging to him by virtue of his Supremacy Ecclesiastical the Power of ordaining Ministers excommunicating scandalous Offenders the power of Preaching adminstring Sacraments c. and yet doth the King by virtue of that Supremacy challenge a Power as belonging to him in the right of his Crown to make Laws concerning Preaching administring the Sacraments ordination of Ministers and other Acts belonging to the Function of a Priest pag. 69 70 71. it is the peculiar reason he gives in behalf of the Bishops for not using the King's Name in their Process c. in the Ecclesiastical Courts the occasion of the whole discourse and which cannot be given for the Judges of any other Courts from the different nature and kind of their several respective Jurisdictions which is That the Summons and other Proceedings and Acts in the Ecclesiastical Courts are for the most part in order to the Ecclesiastical Censures and Sentences of Excommunications c. the passing of which Sentences and others of the like kind being a part of the Power of the Keys which our Lord Jesus Christ thought sit to leave in the hands of the Apostles and their Successors and not in the hands of Lay-Men The Kings of England never challenged to belong to themselves but left the exercise of that Power entirely to the Bishops as the lawful Successors of the Apostles and Inheritors of their Power the regulating and ordering of that Power in sundry Circumstances concerning the outward exercise thereof in foro exteruo the Godly Kings of England have thought to belong unto them as in the Right of their Crown and have accordingly made Laws concerning the same even as they have done also concerning other Matters appertaining to Religion and the Worship of God but the substance of that Power and the Function thereof as they saw it altogether to be improper to their Office and Calling so they never pretended or laid any claim thereunto but on the contrary renounced all claim to any such Power or Autority And for Episcopacy it self the Bishop sets down his opinion in a Postscript to the Reader the words are these My opinion is That Episcopal Government is not to be derived merely from Apostolical Practice or Institution but that it is originally founded in the Person and Office of the Messiah our Blessed Lord Jesus Christ who being sent by his Heavenly Father to be The great Apostle Heb. 3.1 Bishop and Pastor 1 Pet. 2.25 of his Church and anointed to that Office immediately after his Baptism by John with Power and the Holy Ghost Acts 10.37 38. descending then upon him in a bodily shape Luk. 3.22 did afterwards before his Ascension into Heaven send and impower his holy Apostles giving them the Holy Ghost likewise as his Father had given him in like manner as his Father had before sent him Joh. 20.21 to exercise the same Apostolical Episcopal and Pastoral office for the Ordering and Governing of his Church until his coming again and so the same office to continue in them and their Successors unto the Worlds end Mat. 28.18.20 this I take to be so clear from these and other like Texts of
Scripture that if they shall be diligently compar'd together both between themselves and with the following Practice of all the Churches of Christ as well in the Apostles times as in the purest and Primitive time nearest thereunto there will be left a little cause why any man should doubt thereof § XX AND now I have done only Mr. Selden is once more to be encountred with who appears against all this and says that the Doctors of our Church are quite of a different Judgment and have declared the same to the World in their Writings De Syned l. 1. cap. 10. pag. 424 425. As the two Universities at once Published in the Reign of Henry VIII 1534. called Opus eximium de vera differentia Regiae Potestatis Ecclesiasticae quae sit ipsa veritas virtus utriusque Stephen Gardiner Bishop of Winchester in an Oration de vera Obedientia Joannes Bekinsau de Supremo absoluto regis Imperio with abundance more which he tells us was to have been Printed in King Jame's days but the Printer was in the blame The Manuscripts in the Cottonian Library where an account is given of Henry VIII entrance upon the Reformation 1540. and the Question among others is Vtrùm Episcopus aut Presbyter possit Excommunicare ob quaenam delicta utrum ii soli possint jure divino whether the Bishop or the Presbyter can Excommunicate and for what Offences and whether they alone can do it by Divine Right and about which great Divines were distracted in their Opinions but the Bishop of Hereford St. David Westminster Dr. Day Curwin Laighton Cox Symons say that Lay-men may Excommunicate if they be appointed by the high Ruler or the King and all those Writings in every Bodies hands De primatu regio de potestate Papae Regiâ against Bellarmine Tortus Becan Eudemon Joannes Suarez c. in the time of King James and whose Authors were Bishop Andrews Bishop Buckeridge Dr. Collings Bishop Carlton c. and in which three first Mr. Selden instances a great appearance of Adversaries and considerable withal and did not Mr. Selden give in the Catalogue whose unfaithfulness and imposings I have so oft experienced in this kind would be much more terrible in reality than they at first look appear incouraged therefore by former success I 'le encounter him once more and undertake an Examination of so many of them as I have by me and it is very pardonable if I have not all we that live remote in the Countrey and but poor Vicars there have not the advantage of Sir Robert Cotton's Library cannot attend Auctions or but common Booksellers Shops and have not Money to imploy others especially for the obtaining such Authors as these most of which are out of Print and some very rarely to be had by any and I am the more encouraged to the search just now finding in that Book of Bishop Sanderson's I had so lately occasion to make use of some of these Authors made use of on the contrary side as those who by the occasion of the title of Supreme Head our Church being charged with giving to the Prince the Power Autority and Offices of the Priest openly disavow and disclaim it and I think I may as soon rely upon Bishop Sanderson's report as Mr. Selden's his skill as Divine and Integrity as a Christian can be no ways below him even in the Judgment of Mr. Selden's Friends THE Opus eximium de verâ differentiâ c. § XXXI comes first the work he says of the two Universities I do not know why the Universities are entitled to it but upon Mr. Selden's report for this time will grant it readily because the Autority how great soever is really on my side nor does it answer any thing at all of Mr. Selden's design in producing of it The first Part is De potestate Ecclesiasticâ and is wholly levelled at the Power of the Pope and discovers his Usurpations over the Christian both Kingdoms and Bishops that his pretended both Spiritual and Temporal Plea has no ground either on the Scriptures or Fathers for it is altogether begged and sandy I cannot so much commend the clearness of it when discoursing of Church-Power as in it self and purely in the Donation and which he allows and defends he appearing not to have the true Notion of Church-Laws and stumbles at that so usual block that all Laws must be outwardly Coercive or they cannot be call'd Laws and so can be only in the Prince whom he well enough proves to have alone that Power and what he allows the Church is to make Canons i. e. rules to be receiv'd only by those that are willing but not Laws which enforce with more to this purpose something too crudely and which the then present Age will plead something for Confirmant quidem praedicta potestatem Ecclesiasticam sed Dominum regant tribuunt autoritatem non jurisdictionem admonere hortari consolari deprecari docere praedicare Sacramenta ministrare cum charitate arguere increpare obsecrare certissimis Dei promissis spem in Deo augere gravibus Scripturarum comminationibus a vitiis deterrere eorum sit Proprium qui Apostolis succedunt quibus etiam dictum est quorum remiseritis peccata c. Leges autem poenae judicia coerciones sententiae caetera hujusmodi Caesarum Regum aliarum Potestatum but surely all these are Laws too and have real Penalties if our Saviour himself be a Law-giver and have Autority and do oblige the unwilling only they break in sunder the bonds of Duty on whose Truth these their Admonitions Increpations c. are to be founded by whose Virtue the Sacraments have their Influence and the Power of retaining is executed unless the Pains of Hell are only painted or have no force because not inflicted so soon as denounced there is a Dominion sure goes along with Christ's Kingdom too accompanying his Ordinances only 't is not by the Rules and with the Consequents of the other Jurisdictions of the World and on this account Men have been so unwary as not to discern it to speak against it or unwilling to speak plainly out concerning it a mistake has been observed in others and 't is here pretty aged but 't is most sure and certain this 't is most plain and conspicuous the whether Potestas or dominium autoritas or jurisdictio as they distinguish Power or Dominion Autority or Jurisdiction that is allow'd to be Ecclesiastical is no where in the Treatise attributed to Kings to those that have Secular Dominion this is only eorum qui Apostolis succedunt theirs that succeed the Apostles The second Part is De potestate Regiâ where first the Divine Right of Kings is asserted and then their Power in the Church or over-spiritual things where their Right of Investiture is declared from Gen. 47. and the Priests received their Benefices from them as also over the Power and Persons of the