to produce succeeding Officers with this Prerogative and Power or acknowledge this his Description naught which he so vainly offers in opposition to the Account of this Office offered by Protestant Divines 2. He sayes That this power was constant perpetual and to be transmitted to Successors Here I ask him whether the Apostles were to transmit their Power to one Successor and Supreme President or to devolve their Collateral Universal Power over all Believers and all subordinat Officers to respective Successors coming after every one of them If the Dr. adhere to the first he clearly homologats the Papal Pleadings for a Primacy over the Church Universal And indeed his owning as a Patern to the New Testament Church the Continuance of the Iewish Oeconomy does much oblige him thereunto If he assert that every one of the Apostles had a respective Successor then his Descripâ—â—on obliges him to mantain that every such Successor has transmited unto him A Perpetual Spiritual Constant Universal Inspection over all Churches both Ministers and Believers For this essential Authority of Apostles he affirms they were to transmitt to Successors and that according to the Command of our Saviour But to proceed Let us Listen to our Dr's Explication P. 97. The Apostles Permanent Successive Power was to Preach the Gospel Govern the Churches they Planted give Rules and Directions to Successors in the same Office and all Subordinat Ecclesiasticks Inflict Censures Communicat this Authority to others Hear Complaints Decide Controversies Settle Church Discipline Conferr the Holy Ghost as the Necessity of the Faithful requires He tells us He understands the Gifts that must needs attend the Authoritative Ministry of Holy Things This being Essentially the Apostolick Office it remains for ever in the Church the ordinary Necessities thereof requiring it should continue till Christs coming Here First I would enquire again since the Power thus described is in the Dr's Sense Permanent and Successive and necessary to the Church whether is it so as devolved upon every Person Succeeding and in the same Extent and for the same Eâ—ds as the Apostles Exercised it If it be not then every Body of Common Sense knows that this Apostolick Power and Office cannot be called Permanent and Successive and of a continued standing Necessity in the Church no more than a Pastors ordinary Power to Preach and Baptize will prove this and that they hold this entire Apostolick Office which he describes If this Apostolick Power and Office be devolved in its entire extent and to every Person Succeeding then every Person thus Succeeding has an Entire Unconfined Universal Authority and Inspection over all the Churches all Ecclesiasticks and Believers to use his own Terms and are obliged by their Office to Preach unto and Govern them all as the Apostles did to give Rules Inflict Censures upon all Subordinat Officers If he say that every Apostle did not so Extensively Preach and Govern I Answer even admitting some Gradual Difference in the Extent of the Actual Exercise yet this did no whit Lessen their Universal Commission exprest Matth. 28. and the Obligation of a Proportioned Endeavour could not Impeach their standing Authority over all the Churches and their Relation in Actu Exercito as immediat Catholick Officers thereof And the Dr in saying That this Authority and Iurisdiction reached over all Subordinat Officers and Believers without Exception which very Power he affirms they were to Transmit to Successors confirms what I said and cuts him off from this Evasion To clear this further in the second place it may be asked whether these supposed Successors are Authorized to Plant Churches give Rules to them Decide Controversies Conferr the Holy Ghost as the Apostles did with Respect to the End Manner and Extent foresaid If not then sure this Power is Transient not Permanent and Successive as the Dr. calls it If they have this Power of Apostles as above exprest Then first there lyes upon every such Successor an Obligation to Plant Churches where they were not For he will not deny that the Apostles were to Plant to Govern the Churches Planted and to give Rules and Directions thereanent The Absurdity of which Assertion is sufficiently apparent and its necessary Dependence upon what he asserts no less evident But while we speak of Successors giving Rules the Dr. would do well to inform us what Rules he means whether the Apostles Rules or others If the same then they could not Succeed the Apostles in Authoritative Infallible Delivery of the first Gospel Rules this Work being already done If others then the Dr. will ascribe to them such a Nomothetick Authority as to Rules as no Church can now acclaim in the Sense of all Protestant Divines If he say he means an Application or Declarator of Apostolick Rules in particular Cases Then I Answer This is not the Apostolical Delivery of Rules as all Men know but is toto coelo different from it both in its Nature and Extent So that this Shift will not help the Dr. out of the Briars But in the next place the Dr. has told us of an Apostolical derived Power in Deciding Controversies which he appropriats to the Bishops their Successors and in the Sequel of his Reasoning must atribute it to every one of them And here I would enquire of him how did the Apostles Decide Controversies The Dr. will not deny that any one of the Apostles by virtue of their Authority and Infallibility could decide Controversies infallibly as being our Saviours Living Oracles and having the Mind of Christ And what Bishop or Succeeding Church Officer I pray has this Power and Authority We know General Councils have erred in their Decisions But the Dr. gives a greater Power to every Bishop by this his New Notion Or if the Dr allay and lessen this Decision either as to Extent or Authority then he is still in the Briars and baffles his own definition and explication Further the Dr. has told us the Bishops succeeds the Apostles in giving the Holy Ghost The Scriptures tells us the Apostles gave the Holy Ghost and even Miraculous visible Gifts thereof by imposition of Hands and we have heard that Protestant Divines ascribe this to them as one of their incommunicable Prerogatives The Dr. will needs have them succeeded in this But being someway sensible of the absurdity of this lax Assertion he restricts it to such Gifts as must needs attend the Authoritative Ministry of Holy things Be it so but will he say that the Apostles did no otherways give the Holy Ghost This he cannot assert Then I say 1. He must acknowledge that here is a defective maimed not an intire Succession in this work and part of their Office 2. The Dr would be puzzled to shew a Reason why he restricts and limits this Point of the Succession rather than the rest Finally the Dr. calls this Power of the Apostles Supreme and no doubt since it is with him one Criterion of the Apostolick Office and competent
them that believe And in these first times gives Instance viz. their Casting out Devils Speaking with Tongues Taking up Serpents without Hurt this we read of Paul Act. 28. their Drinking Deadly Things without Prejudice yet Paul says speaking of these extraordinary Gifts truely the Signs Wonders and Mighty Deeds of an Apostle are wrought among you But notwithstanding this we know that Stephen tho no Apostle did Wonders among the People But who knows not that in the Apostles these Actings of the Divine Power were of another Nature and for another immediat End viz. To Confirm and Ratifie an Apostolick Authority as the Churches Infallible Universal First Messengers upon whose Doctrine the Foundation of the Church was to be laid Thus according to the Sense of the Judicious and Learned Professors of Leyden their Office consisted in this That they were Christs Universal Ambassadours to lay every where the Foundation of the Gospel Church and were sent immediatly and extraordinarly by him instructed with Infallibility in Doctrine and Power to Confirm it with Miracles So that in their Sense and in the Sense of Sound Divines already exhibit when we speak of the Apostolick Office somethings were more remotely and less principally Ingredients therein somethings more immediatly and properly to which the other was subservient Their Office lay in that Universal Legation mentioned and as Levelled at that great End of Founding the Gospel Church which necessarly included their immediat Mission as is said other things as Correspondent to this End were Ingredients in their Office in the remote Sense above cleared such as the Gifts of Tongues Miracles c. This serves to Unravel our Dr's Foolish Notion which he has P. 98 99. to disprove our Sense of the Apostolick Office Such as First That the Laity many of them had Extraordinary Gifts of the Holy Ghost I Answer not to stand upon his Expression the Laity or upon an Enquiry who of them had these Extraordinary Ministerial Gifts by denying they were either of that Nature Measure or for such an immediat End as those of the Apostles None certainly had such a clear comprehensive immediat infallible Light in Divine things as they And many things may convince the Dr. of this his Error For First What meant else their Solemn Extraordinary Seal of the Spirit Act. 2. striking the World with such Admiration What need the Promise of the Spirit to lead them unto all Truth and endue them with Power from on High Again the Dr. will acknowledge that the Apostolick Office was to Plant the Christian Church and Gospel Ordinances through the World And therefore he must by necessary Consequence acknowledge that their Gifts behoved to be of such a Nature and Measure as were suted to this End and in special to the immediat infallible Government of the Churches and the Direction of both Members and Officers thereof in their respective Duties Hence our Lord spent fourty Days after his Resurrection in instructing them in the things pertaining to his Kingdom that they might be thus immediatly fitted for this Work The Dr. will not deny that the Pastoral Gifts before Instanced of Scriptural Knowledge Skill in the Languages Prudence c. are proper Ingredients in that Office and Characteristicks thereof as suted to the Ends of the same and the Evidences of the Divine Call all other things concurring notwithstanding that some of the Laity may have these Gifts Next for their Infallibility the Dr. tells us That the Evangelists and Seventy Disciples were such I Answer supposing the Seventy to be Evangelists I deny this Infallibility competent to them understanding it of such a Nature and Extent as competent unto Apostles and an Ingredient of their Office else I beseech him why was Timothy after his Inauguration instructed by the Apostle in reference to so many Points of his Office and Duty and so many things pointed out to him to beware of As for Lukes Writing from the Testimony of Eye-witnesses and Ministers of the Word Any with half an Eye may see that this falls utterly short of proving an Apostolick Infallibility in its Nature and Extent and with respect to its Ends Altho the Spirit of GODs infallible Guidance in what he wrote is necessarly supposed What he means by Under-Ministers I understand not If the Spirit of GOD made use of his Information by Apostles or others in order to His End of this infallible Writing can any imagine that this will prove an Apostolick Infalibility properly and formally such As for Stephens doing Miracles and being endued with such Wisdom as Adversaries could not resist him I deny the Consequence that therefore he had Infallibility or Gifts of Miracles of that Nature and Extent or to such a proper immediat End as was competent to the Apostles upon the Ground already exhibite Next He tells us That Matthias was not immediatly called but by the Apostles yet had power to continue that Succession to the End I deny his Assertion which is among the rest of his gratis dicta It is evident to any that but reads the History that Matthias was by GODs immediat choice and Declaration by a Lot the Disposal whereof is of the LORD set a part for his Work and Office and GOD was sought unto by Prayer to shew His Mind as touching this Choice Which therefore was immediatly his own It is true the Apostles who had the Mind of CHRIST did with the consent of the Church present the two to the LORD but the Choice and Call was GODs And the presenting of these Eminent Persons to GOD by the Church will no more prove that Matthias was called and authorized by them than the Peoples presenting the seven Deacons to the Apostles to be ordained will prove that they not the Apostles ordained them The Dr. tells us That the first Apostles were Witnesses of Christs Resurrection yet this did not make them Apostles What does he drive at None sayes that merely to witness this made any of them Apostles or that to be an immediat Witness of it was indispensably needful in order to the Apostolick Office For so was not the Apostle Paul Altho there is no doubt but that the Testimony of CHRISTs Resurrection was a great Point of the Apostolick Doctrine and Testimony But the Dr. will needs add his Proof Or else saith he Matthias had been an Apostle before he was Invested Who would not pitty such impertinent triffâ—â—gs I know none who asserts that to be a Witness of CHRISTs Resurrection made an Apostle Who knows not that several Women incapable of a Ministry were among the early and first Witnesses of our LORDs Resurrection Besides that the Dr. has not proved that Matthiaâ— was such an immediat Witness The Dr's Conclusion ibid. is That the Essence of the Apostolick Office consisted not in extraordinary Priviledges so plentifully poured out on the first Ministers and Converts We have told him in what Sense the Apostolick Office included these Ingredients thereof And even
Precept supposing the same Had he Censured alone or assumed a sole Interest therein he had crossed the Apostles Doctrin who makes Censures the joint Authoritative Acts of the Collegiat Meetings of Pastors 1 Cor. 5.1 2 4 5 c. 2 Thess. 3.14 As for the exercise of such Episcopal Power in the Primitive times the Dr. will never prove the Bishops sole Power herein in the First and Purest times yea and even after the Episcopus Praeseâ— was set up and had obtained in Judicatories The Sixth Concession which the Dr will have from us is That this Authority was not of it self of a temporary duration transient or extraordinary but such as the constant necessities of the Church doth make necessary in all Ages That it was temporary and transient is that which we maintain and is the Sense of Sound Protestant Divines as is already made appear and we must have better Arguments to take this from us and beat us from this Post than our Dr's begging assertion without proof or a Shadow of it If the necessity of the Church calls for such an Office as this of Timothy according to the Scripture Character and Accounts then sure for that of Apostolat also in a proper formal Sense with all its Prerogatives viz That there be persons impowered to give infallible Commands to transient Evangelists and by infallible direction of the Spirit enjoining and Authorizing the exercise of their Function recalling thus the persons Authorized by an infallible Authority from one Church to the further prosecuting this Work in another and this in order to the Moulding and Watering of these Churches Hence 2. This Power not being properly and formally Episcopal but contrary to such a Function as well as in it self extraordinary and passed off with that first State and exigence of the Church neither can the Churches constant necessity crave it nor doth it in the least patronize the Bishops acclaimed Power For what the Dr. adds of Timothy's committing his Power unto faithful Men such as were able to Teach others We have above discovered the insufficiency of this Argument to bear the weight of his Conclusion And he must prove not barely assert that the Trust Committted to him was ordinary before it will be admitted or his ruinous Consequence built upon this rotten Foundation that therefore there was no need of an extraordinary Officer to manage it But now that the Dr. hath Done with Timothy he prâ—ceeds to Titus telling us P. 110.111 That the same Power was committed to Titus in Crete as one of Pauls Fellow-labourers And the exception that he was an Evangelist which he cannot but know to be the Sense of the generality of sound Pâ—otestant Divines our Dr. is bold to call a ridiculous subterfuge Truely if as ridiculous as his Arguments and Answers it were so at all will But why ridiculous Because it is no where said in Scripture that he was one of them who are called Evangelists I could wish the Dr. had been pleased to give us the definition of Evangelist properly so taken that it might be seen how good Harmony he keeps with Protestant Churches and Divines in this Point I must add that our critical Dr. seems very way-ward and ill to please He will not have Titus an Evangelist because no where so called Now he cannot but Confess Timothy is expresly called Evangelist yea and emphatically enjoyned to do the work of an Evangelist yet neither will he admit him to be such We told the Dr. that the Professors of Leyden have this notion of the Office That Evangelists were either scriptores Evangelici de vita morte dictis factis Salvatoris c. such as wrote the History of our Saviours Life and Death or ab Apostolis ad Evangelium una cum ipsis praedicandum vocati c. such as were called by the Apostles to Preach the Gospel together with them and attended them as their Fellow-labourers unless when they were by the Apostles set to oversee some Churches for a time such were Barnabas Silas Timothy and Titus to whom some add the Seventy Disciples Here is the Protestant Notion of the Office which clearly appears Scriptural And upon the equality and sameness of Timothy and Titus Function and Work concluds them both Evangelists I must further tell the Dr that in Ambrose sense Evangelists were such as did Evangeliz are sine Cathedra Preached without a fixed Charge And Saravia himself de diversis gradibus Minist Cap. 6. upon that Precept of Paul Do the Work of an Evangelist tells us That he will not deny Timothy the Name of Evangelist since Paul enjoyned him to perform this Office The Man knew Paul put not upon him an empty Name But further the Dr. will have nothing in the Office of an Evangelist inconsistent with the Dignity of Bishop Presbyter or Deacon That the Evangelistick Office as in Scripture delineat stands opposit to that of the Hierarchical Bishop I have above made good How he comes to say it s not inconsistent with the Dignity of these Offices is some what Mysterious since the general acceptation of the Evangelistick Office is that it was next in Dignity to that of Apostles at least above all Ordinary Officers And for the Dignity of Deacons it seems Odd that the Lowest Office hath a Dignity suteable to that of Evangelists The Dr. tells us further That Eusebius Notion of Evangelist is one who Preached the Gospel to such as had not heard it or at least had Resisted its Light and were not Converted Eusebius takes the Title two ways either for such as Wrote the Gospel or those that Taught it and those again were either such as had ordinary Places and Gifts or whose Places and Gifts were Extraordinary not Settled upon any Charge but were Apostolorum Vice or Vice-Apostles having a Vicarious Care of the Churches as the Apostles had the principal Which Justles with the Dr's Account And in the Passage of Eusebius Cited by him he makes the Evangelist Work to be a Watering the Apostles Plantations as well as a Preaching to such as had not heard the Gospel But he adds That its agreeable to the Function of either of these Offices to Preach the Gospel to such as are not yet acquainted with it This is hardly intelligible 1. That the Evangelists Office consisted in mere Preaching and to such as were in the Character of Infidels or Resisters of the Gospel as it appears not to be Eusebius Sense so he cannot shew it to be the Sense of any Sound Protestant 2. The Dr. will not say that Timothy's Preaching-Work in Ephesus where he was called to be instant therein in Season and out of Season respected not mainly the Members of that Church wherein he was also called to give Attendance to Reading Exhortation and Doctrine And moreover by the Dr's Confession to many pieces of a Iurisdictional Work which he must either grant to fall within the Compass of his Evangelistick Office and consequently
in Power It is 1. here impertinent to the Purpose and Point he has to prove For upon supposition that both Offices were Extraordinary and Ceast even admitting a Superiority of Apostles to the Disciples it will never prove essentially different Degrees in the Pastoral Office as is said And 2. Admitting some special Prerogatives in the Apostolick Office above that of the Seventy with a special respect to their Gifts the Jurisdiction and Power of both the one and the other with a general Respect to Church Government and the great and standing Ends thereof might notwithstanding be of the same Nature and Extent It is also here very noticeable how the Dr. prevaricats p. 393. and falls off the Hinges of the Point when he makes it to ly in this That our Lord appointed a Superiority and Subordination between Ecclesiastick Officers Which in general he cannot but know that Presbyterians do accord unto since we hold the Pastoral Office to be above that of the Elder and that of the Elder above the Deacon Whereas the State of the Question and the Drs. Undertaking therein is anent a superior Order of Officers called Bishops to whom the Order of Pastors is subject and subordinat or essentially different Functions in the Pastoral Office or Degrees thereof Now to prove this special specifical Subordination instanced from a Subordination of Ecclesiastick Officers in general is to argue a genere ad speciem affirmative Est animal Ergo est homo By which Reasoning our poorest Tyrones in the Logicks would thus derid their Fellows I shall not say the Dr. for good Manners sake Es animal Ergo es brutum And so I dismiss the Drs. first Argument CHAP. II. The Drs Second Argument taken from the Practice of the Holy Apostles Examined THE Second Argument whereby the Dr. undertaks to prove the the Divine Right and Institution of Episcopacy is from the Practice of the Holy Apostles And this he prosecutes at large from p. 393. to p. 404. His Proofs may be thus generally summed up and run to this issue viz. That the Apostles did not only exercise that Superiority in their own Persons which their Office gave them over the inferiour Clergy but also derived it down with their Office to their Successors And that therefore they look not upon the Institution of their superior Office of Apostolate as a temporary Expedient only but as a standing Form of Ecclesiastick Government to be handed down to all succeeding Generations In Answer to which I do observe that the Dr. holds the Apostolick Office in a Formal Sense and in its proper Nature with all its Ingredients viz. immediat Mission universal unconfined Inspection infallible directive Power their Apostolick Power of Coertion by Judgments their Gifts of Tongues and Miracles c. all which were included in the Apostolick Office to be an ordinary standing Function in the Church and succeeded unto in this its whole Nature and Extent and as he expresses it Handed down to all succeeding Generations Wherein as the Dr. palpably contradicts not only clear Experience of all Generations the body of all Protestant Divines yea all Men of Sense that have ever bestowed their Thoughts upon this Subject but also his very Fellow-Pleaders in this Cause One of their late Writers of no small Repute in answer to this Objection viz. That the Apostles Superiority over the Seventy was Extraordinary and Temporary grants That in some Things their Priviledges were Extraordinary and to Cease with themselves instancing their immediat Calling their sending to all Nations their Infallibility their Gifts of Tongues or whatever was necessary for the first Founding of the Christian Church Clearly contradicting the Drs. absurd Assertion of a Succession to the Apostolick Office without all Limitation But it s no strang thing that Midianites deal Stroaks among themselves when encamped against Israel By that Superiority which their Office gave them over the inferior Clergy he must needs understand an Official Superiority proper the Apostles as such and without any Restriction as is said since he makes the Apostolick Office to be institut by our Lord as Ordinary and Perpetual and the Practice of the Apostles in this pretended Derivation of their Office â—o Successors to be pursuant to the Institution of our Saviour He holds there was nothing of the Office of Apostolate of a Temporary Nature or as suted to the Exigence of that Time that it was the very same Office without any Restriction or Limitation which they did transmit unto Successors Thus he expresly p. 394. Now to raze this Foundation of the Drs Proof let these Things be considered First That our Divines do Harmoniously assert the extraordinary Nature of the Apostolick Office as such and that they could not be Succeeded to in idem officium eundem gradum Particularly the Learned Polanus in his Syntag. lib. 7. Cap. 11. P. mihi 537.338.539 reckons up these their Prerogatives beyond ordinary Church Officers 1 Their immediat Institution by Christ therefore Paul was called from Heaven to be an Apostle 2 Their immediat Mission to Teach 3. Their Universal Legation to Plant and Found Churches through the World 2 Cor. 11. 4. It s visible Badg Viz conferring the Spirit by Laying on of Hands 5. Immunity from Error in Teaching 6. Their singular Right of Spiritual Coercing the Rebellious and extraordinary Authority hereanent and extraordinary Spiritual assistance 2 Cor. 10. 7. The Gift of Fore-telling Things to come Rom. 11.25 26. 2. Thess. 2.3 8. Their extraordinary Authority beyond any Successors as being over the whole Church c. It would consume much Time and Paper to set down the vast number of Testimonies correspondent to this and the thing were Superfluous All who are acquaint with our Writers being convinced hereof From hence we may thus Argue They whose Call whose special Work and Duties whose Qualifications for their Work are ceased their Office is ceased and they are not Succeeded therein But the Apostolick Call special Work and their proper Qualifications are ceased Ergo c. The Major is evident it consisting of a sufficient enumeration of ingredients to make up an Office and further undenyably Confirmed by this That our Divines take in these very things mentioned in the Definition of an extraordinary Office and as the evidences of it The Assumption is as evident the Appostles Call was immediat who will deny that this is ceased Their special Work and Duty as Apostles was to Plant Churches and the Gospel Ordinances and Government among them throughout the World and that by a special Commission intrusted to them of all which Churches they were in an immediat Sense and in actu exercito Officers And what Church Officer dare now arrogat that to himself Their Gifts Qualifications were extraordinary such as the working of Miracles Gifts of Tongues infallibility in Doctrin And can any deny that these are ceased Secondly Hence as whatever he would draw the Episcopal Preheminence from will necessarly
Theodtret holding that he was Constitut their Bishop I answer 1. Tho his Episcopal Authority over this Church of Philippi were granted to the Dr. it will never come up to prove his Point and Assertion of devolving the Apostolick Office upon him but rather proves the contrary it being evident both from the Nature of the Thing it self and in the Judgment of Judicious Divines that these Two Offices are incompatible and inconsistent and it is a greater degrading of the Office of Apostolat as it stands delineat in Scripture to restrict it to any Particular Church than to make the Primat of England Curat of any Parish 2. The Dr. doth grosly mistake this Denomination of Epaphroditus while making it Import his being their Bishop as is obvious to any that Reads the Text and will view Commentators upon the place as might be easily and at large made appear if our intended brevity did permit The Belgick Divines upon the Passage tells us That the Word Apostle signifies one who was Called and sent forth by Christ himself to Preach the Gospel through the whole World meaning in its Strict and Proper acceptation for clearing which they Cite Gal. 1.1 Eph. 4.11 And here the Dr. may observe how they take the Nature and Extent of the Apostolick Office Then they add But here it is taken more largely in General for one who is sent forth by any one to act any Thing in his Name or for him He was by the Philippians sent unto Rome to Paul to carry him that which they had Contribut for his Maintinance Citing Chap. 4.18 Where the Apostle shews that he had Received what was sent by Epaphroditus Which discovers the Folly of the Drs. gloss They add That if it be rendered their Teacher the Word is sometimes taken so in a General Sense for any kind of Teacher Rom. 16.7 Where the Phrase of Note among the Apostles doth import among them who Preached the Gospel here and there paralelling this with that of 2 Cor. 8.23 Where the Phrase of Messengers or Apostles in the Churches is ascribed to other Brethren together with Titus and imports only Messengers and Teachers So That altho the Phrase of your Messenger or Apostle were in this place admitted to import a Pastoral Relation to Philippi it is as far from coming up to a Proof of the Drs. Gloss as East from West Grotius upon the place shews that Graece loquentes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 vocabant qui sacras pecunias colligebant atque portabant at Diximus ad Math. 10.2 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dixit Ignatius That the Word Apostle is here taken late or largly and for Honours cause put upon this Person as a Minister only is Asserted by Erasm. Simplicius Vorstius That he is thus called quia missus fuit cum Eleemosyna and that this is Confirmed by the ensuing Clause of Ministring to the Apostles wants has a large Harmony of great Judgments Thus Zanch. Simp. Estius Beza Collating this with 2 Cor. 8.23 For what the Dr. adds ubi supra of Ierem and Theodoret It is easily answered that the Word Apostle ot Bishop is by them used in a General Acceptation as might be cleared from many Passages of the Fathers especially Ierom holding that through the Apostolick times communi Concilio Presbyterorum Ecclesiae gubernabantur Thus in his Comment upon Titus where he proves this from Phil. 1. Act. 20. Heb. 13.17 1 Pet. 5. And if the Word Apostle in Scripture have this General Acceptation as we have heard why not also in the Writings of the Fathers The Drs Third Instance P. 398 is of Titus and some others whom the Apostle 2 Cor. 8.23 Calls Messengers or in the Greek Apostles of the Churches which the Dr. takes to hold out their Apostolick Authority over the same and will not have the Phrase to Import their Relation to these Churches whose liberality they carried Thereafter he Insists upon the Instance of Titus whose Episcopal Authority over Crete he endeavours to prove from the Epistle written to him To the Instance First in the General I Answer that the Drs. Sense of the Passage Cited is but his own Imagination without the least Shaddow of Ground in the Words or Context especially taking it to Import an Apostolick Authority in his Sense as might be cleared by multiplyed instances if needful We heard that the Pâ—lgick Divines take the Phrase to Import Teachers in a General Sense The Authors of part 2. Pool Annot. Thus Sense the Passage Viz That the Apostle calls Titus his Fellow-helper in the Business of the Gospel for the others he tells them they were such as the Churches thought fit to make their Messengers and had the Credit of the Churches whose Messengers they were since the Churches would not have Instructed them if they had not Judged them Faithful Both which Senses stands clearly cross to that which the Dr. Grounds upon And to discover further the weakness of his Reasoning even granting that this Text would Import a Fixed Episcopacy of Titus and these other Messengers over some Churches how doth it prove the Apostles devolving upon them the entire Apostolick Office in the same Nature and Extent as it was committed to the Twelve by our Saviour The Dr. will never be able to knit this Antecedent and Consequent by Scripture or Divine Reason And this being the Point he is all along undertaking to prove any may see how palpably he mistakes and misses his Mark in these Instances But now to examin the Drs. proof of Titus's Episcopacy these Things I do in general premise which do cut the Sinews of his or any others Arguings for the pretended Episcopacy of Timothy or Titus over these Churches 1. In Churches already constitut this Authority was not solely seated in them they were only to go before the Churches in wholesome Counsels in relation to the planting of Ministers not to do as they pleased excluding others as judicious Calvin expresses it Instit. lib. 4. cap. 3. since Paul himself neither imposed Hands nor Excommunicat alone in Churches constitut And a whole Colledge of Apostles had the ordinary Elders going along with them in a Synodal Procedure Act. 15. far less could Timothy or Titus assum this Episcopal Preheminence who were inferior to Apostles 2. After the Church of Ephesus was Exedified and Compleated in its Organick Beeing and after Timothy had gotten his Charge as to Ordination and Jurisdiction in Ephesus in the first Epistle directed to him wherein the Dr. and his Fellows hold him to be instructed with Episcopal Authority Paul committed the whole Episcopal Power and Charge to the Elders before Timothy's Face in his last Farewel to that Church calling these Elders the Bishops and enjoyning them the Exercise of their Authority as appointed by the Holy Ghost and this without the least Hint of any Inspection or Authority that Timothy had over them hereanent or of any relation they had to him in this Matter thus Act. 20. And
the same Judgment by necessary consequence we must make of Titus since the Dr. and his Fellows draw their proofs equally as to both from these Epistles 3. In these Epistles themselves their Power stands so described and circumstantiat as to Ordination and Jurisdiction over these Churches as it clearly excluds an Episcopal Preheminence and Authority For First As Diocesan Bishops they ought to have been designedly set and fixed as Officers in these Churches but the contrary appears in the Text I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus saith Paul to Timothy And again to Titus I left thee at Crete and to set in order things that are wanting Which words point at an occasional transient Imployment there not a fixed Instalment Secondly In these Epistles they are both called back without the least intimation of their returning Thirdly If their Power was Episcopal and Ordinary then in the Apostles Prescriptions and Rules anent their Successors the Power and Authority of these Successors ought to have been described and Rules given touching the Gifts Call Ordination c. of the Diocesan Bishop especially since the Dr. holds that the Description of and Authorizing such a Bishop is the great scope of both these Epistles and he will not say that this Office was to die with Timothy and Titus But so it is that the Apostle prescribs no Rules for any Church Officer higher than a Pastor and supposes still that he is the highest Ordinary Church Officer in all his Rules and Prescriptions in point of Church Government delivered either in these Epistles or any where else in Scripture Fourthly As Timothy is expresly called an Evangelist 2 Tim. 4.5 and consequently Titus is supposed to hold the same Office so this Office in the Judgment of Protestant Divines is acknowledged and held to be Extraordinary and Expired as that of the Apostles The Work and Exercise thereof consisting in a planetary Motion to Water where the Apostles Planted to bring Instructions from the Apostles to the Churches touching the Duties of both Pastors and People and Reports of the Churches State to the Apostles So their Office supposing the Churches in fieri as to their Organick Beeing in a great measure at least and also the Existence and Exercise of the Apostolick Office they must needs be as the Apostles themselves Extraordinary Officers And in special Timothy and Titus accompanying Paul in his Travels and continual planetary Motion being so clearly held out in Scripture concluds the Impossibility of their being fixed to any Station and proves that Character given to them by Ambrose as Evangelists viz That they did Evangelizare sine Cathedra Their continual planetary Motion is by some largly described from the Apostolick Epistles and the Acts of the Apostles Thus first Timothy is found at Berea with Paul Act. 17.14 then at Athens v. 15. thence Paul sends him to Thessalonica 1 Thess. 3.1 2. Then having been at Macedonia with Paul he came to him to Corinth Act. 18.5 Then he is with him at Ephesus and thence sent to Macedonia Act. 19.22 whether Paul went after him and was by him accompanied into Asia Act. 20. He is with him at Troas v. 5. and at Miletus v. 17. where Paul gave the Elders of Ephesus their last Charge as the Bishops of that Church And after this he is found either in Journeys or absent from Ephesus For after he is found a Prisoner with Paul at Rome being mentioned as his Companion in these Epistles written while Paul was there as the Epistle to the Philippians Philip. 1.1 Philem. v. 1. Col. 1.1 And he is never found again at Ephesus But towards the end of the Apostles Pilgrimage is sent for to Rome So Titus is found at Ierusalem before he came to Crete Gal. 2.1 thence is sent for to Nicopolis Tit. 3.12 then to Corinth Then he is expected at Troas 2 Cor. 2.12 13. and meets with Paul at Macedonia 2 Cor. 7.6 whence he is again sent to Corinth 2 Cor. 8.6 And after this near the time of Paul's Death is found at Rome from whence he went not to Crete but to Dalmatia 2 Tim. 4. 10. And after this is not heard of in Scripture So that whether we consider 1. The various Journies 2. The order of them 3. The time spent in them 4. The nature of their Imployment which was as the Apostles Co-adjutors to negotiat the Affairs of the Churches where they travelled and especially the Scripture-silence of their being Bishops of any one Church their supposed Episcopal Authority in these Churches of Ephesus and Crete doth palpably appear to be an Anti-scriptural groundless Fiction This Conclusion upon the premised accurat Search and Scripture account of Timothy and Titus is thus inferred by the reverend and learned Divines in their Conference at the Isle of Wight The Authors of Ius divinum minist Evangel In whose Words I have represented this Account both because of the judicious Concisness thereof and also because these Peices are but in few Hands These things thus premised its easie to discover the Absurdity of the Drs reasoning from his Third Instance to prove an Apostolical Authority Devolved upon Titus His Proof is from Chap. 1.5 For this Cause left I thee in Crete that thou shouldest set in order the things that are wanting and Ordain Elders in every City as I had appointed thee From whence the Dr. First Argues That Paul gave him the Supream Judgment in things that were wanting with an absolut Power to Reform and Correct them It is Answered 1 mo Tho an Episcopal inspection over this Church were granted the Dr. is infinitly behind in his Proof of Paul's devolving upon Titus an Apostolical Authority in the Scripture Sense and Extent as we have often told him 2 do Upon supposition of that which we have before made good Viz That both Paul as an Apostle and Titus as an Evangelist had extraordinary Offices and suted to such a Case and exigence of the Christian Church as is now gone off this direction and Command proper and peculiar to the one and the other as Apostle and Evangelist and supposing this Exigence of the Church can lay no Foundation of the Duty of Ordinary Officers 3 tiâ— By what consequence can the Dr. infer an Episcopal Authority and Inspection from these prescriptions to Titus unless he can prove the absolut seclusion of Ministers from the Work here enjoyned or any interest therein in Churches Constitut For as for what they did in the Constitution of Churches in fieri is not to the purpose I mean in respect of the Organick being especially since we find that the laying on of Hands in Ordination and the Authority thereof is in Scripture held out to be competent to a Presbytrie which they exercised upon Timothy himself one of our Drs supposed Apostles or Bishops and that tho Paul was present 1 Tim 4.14 2 Tim. 1.6 So that it is evident that neither Timothy nor Titus were instructed with any singular
Episcopal Authority in this Matter among Churches Constitut in their Organick Beeing In the 4 th place the Drs absurd Assertion of a Supreme and Absolut Power to Reform and Correct drawn from this Passage doth obviously appear to the meanest Reflection For 1. The Apostles themselves arrogat no absolut or supreme Power Paul disowns a Dominion and asserts a Ministerial Authority only competent unto him 1 Cor. 4.1 2 Cor. 1.24 I had alwise thought that in the Judgment of all Protestants yea of all Men of Sense who ever read the Scriptures there is none hath a supreme Iudgment or absolut Power over the Church of God but He who is the Churches Head and Husband there being but one Lord and all Ministers being Brethren one Master of the House of God who hath Dominion over the Ordinances under whom even Apostles are but Stewards and Servants which I suppose none if not this Dr. will deny 2. It s strang that in reading this Passage the Drs. Eyes and Thoughts could not fix upon and ponder the important last Clause of the Words viz As I had appointed thee which doth very clearly suppose and import both the Apostles superior Authority to Titus and his restricting him to his Rules and authorizing Information in this Matter And how these can consist with Titus's supreme Iudgment herein and absolut Power will sute the Drs. greatest Skill to prove and demonstrat In a word this odd Inference of such a supposed Power in Titus is disowned by all sound Interpreters as might be easily made appear And in special the Belgick Divines tells us upon this Passage That Titus was not to perform this by his own Authority and good Pleasure only as the Dr. holds but according to the Order which the Apostle prescribed and did observe himself paralelling this with 1 Tim. 4.14 where it appears that the Elders concurred with Paul in Timothy's Ordination And this last Clause of the Verse they render As I commanded thee The Drs. Second Proof of Titus's Apostolick Authority is P. 399 That he is authorized to ordain Elders in every City And there being Presbyters and Elders in Crete left by the Apostle before Titus was left there who yet had no power to Ordain else Titus's power of Ordination had been in vain and an invasion of their power as a Preshytry Therefore this power of Ordination was competent to Titus only not to Presbyters especially since it is extended not only to Ordination of Elders but also to Rebuking with Authority to the Correction of Offenders with the Rod of Excommunication chap. 2.15 To Admonish Hereticks and to Reject them from Communion of the Church if obstinat chap. 3.10 From all which the Dr. concluds his Apostolat in the Church of Crete to be the same that the first Apostles themselves had in the several Churches planted by them I Answer 1. The Dr. doth nothing but here again beg the Question and argue ex ignoratione elenchi and this one point being but supposed That the Office of Apostles and Evangelists was Extraordinary and we may justly suppose it having above made it good this Arguing appears mere puerile Sophistry But 2. To come more closly to the Drs. Arguing As for the laying on of Hands in Ordination we have told him That it is a Presbyterian Act competent to mere Presbyters And therefore neither Timothy nor Titus could have a Sole or Episcopal Authority therein unless the Dr. will make the Scripture inconsistent with it self Next as for his Authority in his Rebuking and Censures supposed in these Directions I answer That neither can this be Titus's sole Prerogative For either it is meant of a private Rebuke and this every Christian hath Authority in thou shalt in any wise Rebuke thy Neighbour and not suffer Sin upon him Levit. 19.17 or of a Ministerial Rebuke and this is competent to every Minister of the Word Isa. 58.1 2 Tim. 4.1 2. Tit. 1.13 2 Sam. 12.7 And besides Institutions and Reproofs of Church Officers will not prove a fixed Episcopal Power Prophets Rebuked but had no Jurisdiction over Priests nor Paul over Peter tho he reproved him Moreover we find the Authority to receive Accusations and to Correct Delinquents by Reproofs and Censures competent to the Juridical Courts and Church Mat. 18.16 17. 1 Cor. 5.4 5. Gal. 6.1 2. 1 Thess. 5.12 In which places a judicial Rebuke and Admonition is attributed to the Juridical Court of Pastors not to one Prelat not uni but unitati 3. As for the Drs. Notion of a supposed existence of Elders in that Church who had no power of Ordination else this Prescription which the Apostle gives Titus to Ordain had been fruitless and an Invasion of their Power in the Drs. Judgment I deny his Consequence as having no twist of a Connection For 1. Upon supposition of Apostles or Evangelists extraordinary Offices Pauls instructing Titus and his Authority in Ordination thereupon was a power and Authority Cumulative unto but not Privative of the Ordinary Officers and Elders their standing and ordinary Authority herein It being certain that this Authority of Apostles and Evangelists as is above described could not bevoided whatever advance of Gospel Ordinances there was in Churches these extraordinary Officers had still their Authority and Inspection vigent I suppose the Apostle Paul had in the presence of Titus the Bishop of Crete in the Drs. sense ordained Ministers or Elders in this Church will he own the consequence that this did nullify Titus's Authority herein as Bishop Surely not And thus he must acknowledg our Plea to be clear as to the reserved Authority of Pastors or Elderships notwithstanding of the Apostolical Prescriptions instanced 2. Elders once ordained its true have power to ordain Elders yet the bene esse did call for the Inspection and Direction of such highly gifted and extraordinary Officers as Evangelists and their interposed Authority in that infant-state of the Church wherein Apostolick Precepts and Rules in reference to Government were to be delivered to the Churches and practised accordingly And in a word the Dr. neither hath nor can prove that Titus did ordain here alone or solely perform any other authoritative Act where Elders were present and the Churches reduced to an Organick Mould and Form which is the consentient Judgment of sound Protestant Divines Judicious Calvin upon the place will tell him That Titus here acted only as a President or Moderator which is clearly evinced from the Authority and Power of Elderships asserted in Scripture And we may retort upon the Dr. thus If neither Apostles nor Evangelists extraordinary and highly gifted Officers did exercise their Power to the prejudice of standing Elderships or juridical Courts of Pastors much less ought any ordinary Church Officer arrogat such a Dominion and Authority over the Courts of Christ and Judicatories of His Church when the Office of Apostles and Evangelists is ceased I need not here stand further to tell the Dr. That the power of
some of you into Prison that ye may be tryed In a word what ever Characteristick of this Angel the Dr. shall produce we can make it appear to be applicable to Presbyters or Pastors First Is it a Commission to Preach and Baptize This he will grant belongs to all Pastors Is it the Power of Ordination The Scripture shews us that this is Seated in a Presbytrie 1 Tim. 4.14 Matth. 18.17 Is it the Ruling Governing Power All Ministers are such Angels All that Watch for Souls do Rule over them and all Labourers in the Word and Doctrin have an equal joynt Interest in Feeding Censuring and Ruling in the Churches over which they are set Heb. 13.17 1 Thess. 5.12 And People are accordingly to submit themselves to them Therefore this Prostasie and Ruling Power is no sole Prerogative of a single Angel or supposed Bishop Thus it was with the Church of Ephesus Act. 20. And it is much more suteable to understand the Angel of Ephesus of a Plurality of Ministers to whom in a plain Scripture the whole Government is found intrusted rather than to Explain that plain Text by a Metaphor and contrary thereunto to set up one Angel or Diâ—cesan Bishop over that Church with sole Power of Ordination and Jurisdiction The Dr. will find this our Sense of the Angel to be no new Opinion when he considers that Augustin Homil. 21. upon this Book thus takes it Expounding the Angel of Thyatira the Praepositi Ecclesiarum or Governours of the Churches So Aretas Lib. 1. Cap. 1.2.9.10 Primas in Apoc. Cap. 2. Ambros. Ambert Anselm Pererius Victorin Tirin Haym Bed Perkins Fox in his Meditations on the Revelation pag. 7 8. Pilkintoun Bishop of Durham in his Exposition of Hag. Ch. 1. v. 13. The second thing I premise is that the Dr. hath no advantage tho it be yielded that the Angel is a single Person For 1. He may be the Angelus Praeses or the Moderator Angel not the Angelus Princeps or the Lord Angel yea and the Praeses or Moderator for the time as a Speaker in Parliament Ephesus had many Angels Act. 20.28 1 Tim. 5.17 of equal Authority who were made Bishops by the Holy Ghost and set over that Church accordingly and they are spoken to in the Plural though the Angel is named in the Singular Number 2. This Angel is said to have no Jurisdiction or Superiority over the rest of the Ministers nor can the Dr. shew where this Angel is spoken to with reference to Ministers as subject to him which notwithstanding is his begged Supposition and Petitio Principii all along in this Argument 3. The Parochial and Diocesan Division of the Churches were long after this and not until the 260 year after Christ in the Judgment of best Antiquaries 4. Nothing is required of this Angel but that which is the common Duty of all Pastors Finally suppose it were granted to him that a Superiority were imported in Naming this Angel it may be a Superiority of Order Dignity or Gifts and in such Moral Respects not of Power and Jurisdiction The Dr in Order to this his Scope proposes generally the Method of his Proof shewing That he will prove that they were single Persons 2 ly That they were Persons of great Authority in these Churches 3 ly That they were the Bishops or Presidents of these Churches Before I examin his Proofs it is pleasant to consider how well this Undertaking of the Dr. answers his Scope which all along in this Dispute is to prove a Succession of ordinary Officers in the Office of Apostolat as he calls it and in their whole Power of Ordination and Jurisdiction excluding Pastors from the least Interest therein By his Principles these supposed Succeeding Prelats are the sole Governours of Churches have the sole Legislative Power wherein he says the Essence of Government consists the Power of Consecration and Ordination to Ecclesiastick Offices and that of the same Nature and Extent as he supposes the Apostles had it by vertue of their Apostolical Mission The Bishops also have by his Principles the sole Executive Spiritual Jurisdiction Monopolized in them as their peculiar Prerogative viz. as the Dr. explains it to Cite Examin Admonish Offenders Exclud from or Admit to Church Communion Censure or Absolve Bind or Loose The twelve Thrones to Judg Israels Tribes promised to Apostles he understands of the Authority of Judging and of all Spiritual Jurisdiction in the Church Visible committed to them and by them to the Bishops as their only Successors in this Authority To which we may add the Confirming of the Baptized by Imposition of Hands which he also ascribes to them as their sole Prerogative This the Dr. at large insists upon from P. 433. to P. 438. Now to prove all these Prerogatives of the Bishops and this Extensive Power so paramount to all Authority or Interest of Pastors in Government as it renders them mere Cyphers without a Figure from the seven Asian Angels Because they were single Persons or of great Authority in the Churches or President-Bishops in these Churches is such a Proof as the Simplest may Laugh at For 1. Will any Man think that their being Saluted as single Persons will prove this Extensive Authority Why may not a Senate be Saluted in the Consuls a Parliament Addressed in the Chancellor or the House of Commons in an Epistle to the Speaker 2 ly Say that they were Presidents and admit that they had Deference and Authority as such as the Consul in the Senate will this suppose or by any Shadow of Consequence or Connection inferr that they had such a Power as is here described and such as swallows up wholly and absolutly all Authority of the Members of Church Judicatories Nay the Dr. will as soon joyn the Poles together as unite this Antecedent and Consequent Besides in calling them Presidents he discovers this and confutes himself since the Terme both Name and Thing in all Languages and in the Sense of all Men is appropriat to such as are set over Juridical Courts Civil or Ecclesiastick the Members whereof are still supposed to have a Decisive Suffrage and Interest in the Government Again 3 ly The Dr. says he will prove that they were Persons of great Authority in these Churches But if he speak to the Point and prosecut his Scope he must call it Absolute and Sole Authority intirely exclusive of all Interest which Pastors or any other Church Officers may claim therein Come we to the Dr's Grand Proofs First That they were single Persons he proves from this That they are mentioned as such the Angel of Ephesus the Angel of Smyrna And thus all along Addrest in the Singular Number I know thy Works I have a few things against thee Ans. This Argument is abundantly removed by what is premised anent the Collective Sense of the Word Angel which our Lords Addressing the the Epistle to one Angel doth no whit Impugn in the sense of sound Protestant
Divines For further clearing this let us hear the Belgick Divines upon the Text To the Angel i. e. to the Overseer Inspector or Pastor of the Church This is set down here in the Singular Number either in regard of their whole Colledg as Mal. 2.7 Under the Name of Angel in the Singular the whole Colledg of Priests was to be understood or because that some one had the Presidency among them in Order by whom it was to be communicat to the rest as appears by Act. 20.17 28. That there were more Elders or Overseers in this Church of Ephesus whom Paul charges in his last Farewel to take heed to themselves and to the whole Flock over which the Holy Ghost had made them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. Overseers for to Feed the Flock So that it is groundless from hence to inferr an Episcopal Authority of one person above the rest For the verry matter it self written here to the Angel of the Church is Written for a warning to the whole Church as appears by v. 7. here and above Chap. 1.11 The English Divines the Authors of Part Second Annot. going under the Name of Pool thus sense that Passage Rev. 2.1 To the Angel it appears from Act. 20.17 That there were more Ministers there than one but they were all Angels and from the oneness of their business they are called one Angel And upon Chap. 1.20 they tell us That certain it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies no more than is commmon to all Ministers viz. to be Gods Messengers and move upon his errands That we are to understand here the Doctors Pastors and Ministers of the Church is the sense and Judgment of Cluverus Dr. Lightfoot Cluverus takes notice that the Change of the Number v. 10.19 Argues that the Epistle is not directed to one Person And Dr. Lightfoot shews that this Tittle is with allusion to that of the Minister of the Synagogue whose Office was publickly to read and expound the Prophets unto the People as these Ministers were to Read these Epistles in the publick Congregation Thus also Piscator understands the whole Pastors of the Church From whence and from many others which might be added it is evident 1. That the collective Sense of the word Angel is Judged by them consonant to Scripture and to the Scope of the Epistles 2 ly That even supposing some speciality in the Address to one person this doth import a simple Presidency only especially in the sense of the Belgick Divines and that they do intirely join with us in the Grounds we have offered against the Dr's supposition of an Hierarchical Bishop and particularly from this that the Angel is sometimes addressed in the Plural That Ground which the Belgick Divines and others insist upon taken from the Matter of the Epistles is important and that our Lord addresses to all the Angels of the Church as concerning them Rev. 1.11 Write saith he to the Churches of Ephesus Smyrna c. And at the close of every Epistle Hear what the Spirit saith to the Churches And therefore when it is said I know thy Works c. this thou hast c. We must understand the whole Company of Ministers and the whole Church because the punishment or reward is proposed to the whole And the Dr. will not say that for the sin of one Bishop the Gospel is to be removed when other Ministers and the Church it self is free from his evils The Dr. alledges That the Angel is alwise addrest in the singular number And to that which is adduced to prove his being addrest in the Plural he Answers That in these Passages he writes not only to the Bishops personally but to the People under their Government and inspection so he understands that of Chap. 2.10 The Devil shall cast some of you into Prison paralelling it with v. 13. Antipas slain among you and v. 23. And all the Churches shall know c. But first not to stand upon the Drs. begging the Question in a supposition cross to his scope the paralells are not every way alike When the Lord says all the Churches and slain among you c. the Scope and Mould of these expressions makes it evident that both Ministers and People are spoken of But when immediatly after addressing the Angel in the Singular he adds the Devil shall cast some of you into Prison changing the Singular Angel into a Plural it appears that the Ministers are more directly included as the adduced paralel 1 Tim. 2.15 Discovers But not to insist upon this In the next place the folly and inconsistency of his gloss and discourse in this Answer is several ways apparent For First He will have these Passages I know thy works I have some what against thee c. addrest Singlely to the Angel From the singularity of which Adress he collects the Bishop's single and absolute Authority over these Churches But I pray what Sense will the Dr. make of this Will he say our Lord knew the Works only of one single Bishop of no Ministers else That one Bishop Laboured at Ephesus none else That one Bishop at Ephesus fell from his first Love no Church Officers else A pityful imputation the Dr. puts thus upon Timothy the supposed Bishop of Ephesus in staging him as the only Apostat of the Church The same may be applyed to his other Instances I have a few things against thee Viz one Bishop no Ministers else Remember whence thou art fallen viz. The Bishop fallen only none else Repent and do thy First Works this only addrest to the Bishop none else concerned in this Duty but his Lordship If he say that these things are spoken to the Bishop as chiefly concerned and interested Then besides his begging the Question he losses his Plea and quite ruins all his Pleading from a supposed singularity of the Address to conclud the singularity of the person Addressed And thus including Ministers as concerned and interested in the prescriptions in point of Government he cuts the Wind-Pipe of his grand Topick and notion here But Secondly we see when he is forc't to acknowledg from the Plural Mould of the Address that more than the Bishop are spoken to he gives us a fair acknowledgment in these terms That the Bishops are not only written to Personally but also the People under their Government and inspection But I pray why not also Ministers and Pastors also bespoken as well as the People The Dr. asserting That both Clergy and Laity are under the Bishop's inspection Aâ—d it being supposible that in these Churches especially at Ephesus there was at this time a Colledge of Pastors How come the Dr. when he supposes the Address to overstretch the person of the Bishop and to includ more to assert That it reaches the People only and not to the Pastors also This I must confess is odd Sense in Divinity in these great Evangelistick Precepts and Reprensions the Lord Addresses not solely the Bishop
the Angel of Ephesus trying the false Apostles which imports a Juridical Tryal the Blame laid upon the Angel of Pergamus for having them that held the Doctrin of Balaam and of the Nicolaitans which shews his Power to have cast him out upon the Angel of Thyatira for suffering Iezabel to Teach which shews that it was in his Power and that he had Authority to eject her and her Followers Ans. The Dr's Proofs of Authority in these Angels and Churches in reference to Government are good and sound and accorded to by all Divines But he has left behind him two Points of his Proof in reference to his Scope which are to use our Scottish Proverb the Tongue of the Trump and without which all his Discourse is but like Sand without Lime 1. He says They were single Persons of great Authority But he has not yet made good that they were single Persons nor offered to Answer the pregnant Grounds pleaded by our Divines to prove the contrary and that the Collective Sense of the Term Angel is most suteable to the Scripture and the Tenor and Scope of these Epistles 2 ly Supposing them single Persons he has not proved either from the Title of Angel or their Authority imported in these Epistles that it reached any further than that of Presidents or that the Authority here Instanced was Monopolized and so inhanced in them as to exclud intirely all the Pastors therefrom The contrary whereof besides the Proofs we offered in the beginning we heard the Belgick Divines make out and give Instance particularly with reference to Ephesus to the Elders or Ministers of which Church Paul committed the whole Government as the propper Governours and Bishops thereof Act. 20.28 And therefore even supposing the Angel a single Person he cannot be supposed in Contradiction to that Scripture to have had such Authority and Power as did Inhance or Exclud that of the Pastors and Bishops of Ephesus so clearly therein asserted and held out The Dr. acknowledges That what our Lord writes is not to this Angel personally but also to the People P. 422. But I pray how will the Dr. set up his March-stone and shew us the Limitation of these Instructions in Point of Government distinguishing the Person of the Bishop from the Pastors since neither the Supposition that the Bishop is a single Person will prove this nor the Honourable Title of Angel as the Dr. calls it a Title suteable to all Pastors who are Angels and Messengers of the Lord of Hosts by their Office Nor can the Dr. flee to the Refuge of the Authority supposed in these Prescriptions without a palpable begging of the Question And as for the Communicating of the Epistles to the Churches as Directed to them This is so suteable to the Angelus Praeses or to any President or Mouth of a Meeting that it hath no imaginable Strength to bear the Weight of the Dr's Conclusion The Dr's Third and last proof of our Lords approbation of Episcopal Government in these Epistles and that the Angels were Bishops of these Churches and Presidents thereof is drawn from the Testimony of most Primitive Antiquity as he calls it for which he Cites the anonymous tract of Timothy's Martyrdom mentioned Bibleotheca patrum N. 244. Shewing that Iohn Two or Three years after his return from Patmos assisted with the seven Bishops of that Province he assumed to himself the Government of it which Seven were the Angels here here Addrest these Churches lying within the Lydian or Proconsular Asia of which Ephesus was Metropolis And therefore these Seven Bishops by whom he Governed the Province of Ephesus are the Seven Angels all within that Province He adds That Austin call the Angels of Ephesus praepositos Ecclesiae Epist. 162. and the Seven Angels praepositi Ecclesiarum Comment in Rev. That Ambrose in 2 Cor. 11. referring to these Angels tells us that by Angels are meant the Bishops Ans. 1. Since the Dr. calls these Angels Bishops and Presidents over these Churches in propounding this Proof if he intend only Presidents he will fall utterly short of his design and scope of evincing that Episcopal Power which he ascribs to them a President and one who has all Authority Monopolized in him being quite distinct things If he intend by Presidents of the Churches such as are set over it in a general Sense Are not all Pastors in Scripture called such as are set over God's People and have the Tittles of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If the Dr. will have them such Presidents over the Churches as had monopolised and enhanced in their persons all Authority of Government a President being of far larger extent and surely with a relation to a Church it is not all one to say such a person is President of a Church and a Sole President As it it is not all one to say such a man is Minister of London and the Sole Minister For all Ministers in the Scripture Sense are Presidents over the Churches But 2 ly since the Dr. draws his supposed demonstrative evidence of the power and Authority of these Seven Angels addrest by our Lord in these Epistles and of the nature and extent of that Office which is indigitat by the term Angel and consequently the meaning of the prescriptions given to them from Primitive Antiquity as he calls it I would know whether the Dr. will own this Principle that Antiquity or even that which he calls Primitive or the First human Testimony secluding the Scriptures or of the First Ages after the Canon of the Scriptures is the infallible Rule and Commentarie for understanding the Nature and Office of Church Officers mentioned in Scripture If the Dr. will not own this Principle his evidence by his own confession is no evidence For an evidence which will fail and not reach the conclusion is no evidence at all and in the best construction no proper evidence without restriction s and limitations added If the Dr. hold the Affirmative then I would urge him thus First If Mens Testimony or the Churches Primitive practice tho never so early must be the Key and Comment in this Case of the Scripture Sense of the Character and description of Church Officers and able solely to found our Faith and persuasion hereanent why may not also human practice and profession of the Church simply considered determin our Faith and prectice as to every Scripture Truth and duty therein held out For the Dr. can assign no difference nor upon admitting the antecedent shew the least shaddow of a ground which will limit and enervat the consequence Secondly If this be admitted I would know whether he will not thus set up an higher tribunal than the Scriptures as to the ground and Rule of our Faith and practice and in opposition to the Apostle Paul 1 Cor. 2.4 make our Faith stand in mans Wisdom not in the Wisdom of God and his Power and in contradiction to the Apostle Peter 2 Pet 1.20.21 make
good of the Church in general so by their own Authority for particular Churches to which they were more particularly related Here is I must say odd and confused stuff First The Dr. supposes that the Decree Act. 15. had no previous Scripture Foundation contrar to the express tenor and scope of the place where it is evident 1. That in this Disquisition there are Grounds of the Sentence laid down yea and Scripture Grounds 2 ly The Sentence runs in these terms It seemed good to the Holy Ghost viz. speaking in the Scripture and to us 3 ly Upon these previous Scripture Grounds of Charity and Union-and the esehewing the Offence of the weak Iews apparent in the debate and disquisition the things enjoined are termed necessary things and thus supposed materially such antecedaneously to the Decree Hence 4 ly The Dr. in saying That this Abstinence he must understand it in the present Case and circumstances of time place and persons was never prohibited by any standing Law of Christianity expugns from being Laws of Christianity all our Lords Precepts in point of Love and Unity and the eschewing the Offence of the little Ones For these Rules did clearly found this Abstinence and ground the necessity thereof in the present Case and exigence Again in the nexplace The great point the Dr. has to prove is That this supposed Legislative power is the Bishops sole prerogative secluding Pastors This he proves by the Apostles together with the Elders and Brethren their comming together and determining this matter One would think this makes fair to prove the contrary The Apostles here meeting with and taking into the disquisition and Decree and into every step of the procedure the ordinary Ministers and Elders as persons interested and concerned and who are found to concur with them in enacting and enjoining the thing Decreed in order to the Churches Obedience Ay but the Dr. tells us That by consent of all Antiquity by these Elders we are to understand the Bishops of Iudea for which he Cites Dr Hammond on Act. 11. A Dr. no doubt of a like soundness with himself But 1. If the Dr. adhere to Dr. Hammonds notion of Elders he must Esteem them Bishops where ever mentioned and deny the existence of any Pastors the true Scripture Bishops at this time wherein our Dr. will and must needs justle and deal stroaks with Dr. Hammond For to omit other instances he holds the Elders present with Iames when Paul went into him to be Pastors over which Iames as Bishop of Ierusalem did preside 2 ly None can imagin these Elders to be Bishops of Iudea without the most ridiculous Forgery imaginable For in the context it is evident that at this time the Apostles were but founding and gathering Churches in Iudea settling Churches therein and taking inspection of them by their Apostolick Authority And therefore it is a strange phantastick conceit to imagine Churches by this time grown up to a Diocess in Iudea and of such a bulk and number as to have Diocesan Bishops set over them yea and Diocesan Bishops of so considerable a Number as the Elders may be rationally supposed to be at this time and in this meeting yea and these besides the far greater Number of Ordinary Teachers and Pastors which this Man will not deny the Apostles to have ordained where Churches were planted Again why I pray the Bishops of Judea only gathered here in order to this general Decree for all the Churches and no Bishops of the Gentile Churches which he will say were by this time set up Besides that looking to the occasion of this debate anent the Circumcision which had its rise from some of them that went from Judea as from the Apostles and thus troubled the Churches the design of the Gentiles appears evidently to be to send Paul to the Apostles and Elders residing at Jerusalem without the least hint of any more enlarged Advertisement of others than such as were there at that time Again the Dr. says That Apostles and Primitive Bishops made general Laws for the whole Church and Bishops particular Laws for their particular Churches Thus saith he Paul gave Rules to the Corinthians for more decent communication of the Lords Supper Strong reasoning indeed and hanging well together First he supposes the Apostles made by their Apostolical Authority the general Rules for the whole Church as proper to them with concurrence of ordinary Bishops the ordering of particular Churches being peculiar to the ordinary or Primitive Bishops And presently to prove this he puts the great Apostle of the Gentiles into the class of Ordinary Bishops in giving Rules to this Church of Corinth and wisely supposes that Pauls Apostolick Prescriptions about Right and decent Communicating concerned only this Church of Corinth and were Authorized and enacted by no Apostoick Authority nor by the Apostle Paul as in that capacity To this scope the Dr. with as much Sense and soundness instances Paul's giving Laws and Canons to the Churches of Galatia contradicting therein the Relation of these Canons to particular Churches since they did respect both the Churches of Corinth and the Churches of Galatia Of the same nature is that which he here mentions of Pauls Charge to Timothy and Titus 1 Tim. 5.7 Tit. 1.5 touching the redressing disorders and supplying defects in these Churches For besides that Paul exerced an Apostolical Authority in these Directions to the Evangelists extraordinary Officers as Paul himself which clearly excludes Director and Directed from the compass of the Dr's Argument he will not deny several of these directions at least to have been of universal concern and necessity and in this respect also as remote from his Design The Dr. adds That what the Apostles and Primitive Bishops did to be sure they had Authority to do and whatsoever Authority they had they derived it down to their Successors That Apostles and Evangelists exercised a Lawful Authority is indeed very sure and no less sure than the Dr's Argument here is loose and unsure from Apostolical directions to Evangelists to conclud the Nature and Mould of the supposed Episcopal Authority of Prelats in reference to making Laws as is above evinced since the Dr. cannot shape out nor by any twist of reason and sound consequence inferr his supposed Hierarchical Prelat with sole Power of Ordination and Jurisdiction from the Office of either Apostles or Evangelists The Dr will not have any Officer beneath a Bishop to have been allowed suffrage in any of the First Four General Councils yet immediatly after some way retracting and correcting himself he allows them a place in General Councils but tell us it was only for debate and preparing the Matter of Laws but the form of Laws he says proceeded from the Bishops suffrage This is pretty First The Dr. will never prove that in the First Councils there were Prelats of his stamp and Mould Next its strange that in Councils Presbyters were sitting for
Conference and as no members I would fain know if the Dr. will say that these Elders meeting with the Apostles Act. 15. which he will no doubt acknowledg was one of the best Moulded Councils yea and a Standart for after-Councils were no Members but called and meeting for conference only since in the Scripture account and three fold Partition of those that mett Viz Apostles Elders Brethren there is an intire joint concurrence with the whole procedure viz both in the Disquisition the Sentence the decretal Epistle and Appointment in reference to the Churches obedience It does also sute the Dr's consideration to shew how it can consist with reason and the Nature of a Church Judicatory that such persons as are no Members nor fit to be Members are in tuto to prepare Matter for Laws and take share in debates But the Dr's Forgery here is evident For 1. If Presbyters concurrence in Ordination was Authoritative not by consent only and they imposed hands as proper Ordainers even when Bishops had obtained Power in Judicatories by confession of Episcopalians themselves see Dr. Forbes Iraen lib. 2. Cap. 11. I would fain know why such Ecclesiasticks or Church Officers as had Authority to Ordain which is one of the greatest Acts of Ministerial Authority had no Authority in enacting Laws in Councils but sat as Cyphers 2 ly The Dr. will find Antiquity against this deputed kind of conferring or consulting Power which he allows to Presbyters in Councils without Authority in enacting Laws Chrysostom hom 17. on Matth. calls Presbyters expresly Christi vicarios Christs Vicars or Deputes And its strange that such to whom Christ entrusted this Vicarious Power had no interest and Authority in enacting Laws in his Church and in the Government thereof Cyprian lib. 4. Ep. 8. shews that Dominus Sacerdotes in Ecclesia c the Lord condescended to elect to himself Priests or Ministers in the Church the Dr. will not say that he put this designation only upon Prelats And did he elect and constitute them for no interest in the Government thereof Nay on the contrary the Judgment of the Ancients is clear in this that the Power of external Jurisdiction and consequently the Authority of enacting Laws or Canons was common to Bishops and Presbyters Ignatius in his Epistle to the Trallians called the Presbytrie Senatum Dei Gods Court or Senat non consiliarios solum as our Dr. makes them sed assessores Episcopi not his Advisers only but his Authoritative fellow-Counsellors And I hope such he will grant as are in this Character have interest not only in preparing matter for Laws but an essential Official Right in the Authoritative enacting of them Irenaeus lib. 4. Cap. 44. calls them Principes Princes or Chief And if such in his Judgment the forementioned Authority is clearly by him attributed to them Augustin Serm. 6. calls the Brethren in Eremo Patronos Rectores Terrae And what pitiful Patrons or Rectors are they who have no Authority in enacting Laws Chrysostom asserts expresly on 1 Tim. 1. hom 11 That they presided over the Churches as Bishops and received together with them the Office of Teaching and Governing the Church And if this with the preceeding Testimonies give not the Lie to the Dr's forementioned distinction anent Presbyters sole consulting interest in Councils and upon the Bishops Call allennarly without any Authority in enacting Laws let any Judg. Chrysostom moreover in the beginning of that Homily stating the Question wherefore the Apostle after he had spoken to the Office and Duty of Bishops passes over to Deacons omitting the order of Presbyters returns this Answer and Reason Because betwixt the Bishop and Presbyter there is almost no difference and because that unto Presbyters also the care of the Church is committed And what he said concerning Bishops the same things also do agree to Presbyters And if with the Dr's good leave I might draw an inference from Chrysostom's assertion I would thus subsume But so it is that the Authority of Government and the enacting of Laws in Church Judicatories is by the Apostle ascribed to the Scripture Bishop whom he mentions Ergo the same Authority and Power is by the Apostle ascibed to Presbyters in Chrysostom's Sense Gratian in Decret Caus. 16. Quest. 1. Cap. shews that Ecclesia habet senatum Presbyterorum A Senat of Presbyters without whose Counsel the Bishop can do nothing They were not then called at the Bishops pleasure for debate only and preparing matters as the Dr. pretends but were the sine quibus non in the enacting of the Laws themselves The Dr. makes Prelats to enhance all decisive suffrage in Judicatories yet Cyprian Ep. 6. and 28. professes He neither could nor would do any thing without the Clergy And the Fourth Council of Carthage condemns the Bishop's Decision unless Fortified by their Sentence So far was it that the Bishop's sole Suffrage gave the Strength and Formality to Laws that they were null without Presbyters Authoritative Concurrence This is clear by so full a consent of Antiquity that we will find That neither in Censuring of Presbyters Nor 2 ly In Judging the conversation or Crimes of Church Members Nor 3 ly In Excommunicating or Receiving of Penitents Bishops could do any thing without Presbyters Tertulian Apolog. Advers Gentes shews vs That the Churches Exhortations Castigations and Divine Censures were put forth by the Probati quique Seniores who did preside the accused Person being brought into the Congregation And this Authoritative Sentence of Presbyters was more approved than when passed by one Man As when Syagrius and Ambrose passed Sentence in the same Case The Church was unsatisfied with the Sentence of Syagrius because he passed it sine alicujus Fratris Consilio without the consent of any of his Brethren But were pacified with the Sentence of Ambrose because saith he hoc judicium nostrum cum Fratribus consacerdotibus participatum processerat This his Sentence proceeded jointly from him and his Fellow Presbyters or Ministers Yea the very Admonition of Offenders were not given by the Bishops alone but by the Elders August De verb. Apost Serm. 19. Thus also Origen contra Celsum lib. 3. Excommunication it self Tertullian tells us was vibrated by those that laboured in the Word and Doctrin and the Presbytrie that delivered unto Satan as Jerom shews Epist. ad Heliod So Epist ad Demet. they also Received and Absolved the Penitents Cyprian Epist. 12 shews that this was the custom nec ad communicationem venire quis possit nisi prius ab Episcopo clero manus illi fuerit imposita such as were Excommunicat returned not to Church Fellowship before hands were laid upon him by the Bishop and Clergy And writing to his Charge anent lapsed Christians he tells them exomologesi facta manu iis a vobis in poenitentiam imposita After Confession and laying on of the Presbyters hands they might be commended to God And such as returned from
Heresie and were to be Received in the Church at Rome in the time of Cornelius Cyprian tells us Epist. 6. compared with 46. they came before the Presbytrie and Confessing their Sins were Received Now if Presbyters had such Authority and the Episcopal Power was of this Nature and thus Limited let any Judg how the Dr's Assertion can subsist viz That in Judicatories Pastors had no decisive suffrage For the Dr's after-discourse P. 436. anent the Civil Soveraigns Decrees in case of a supposed interfeiring with the Churches Legislative Power as he calls it I shall not it being some what out of our way much digress in examining the same tho I judg it very lax and liable to considerable exceptions yea and hardly reconcilable with it self or sound sense and Divinity The Dr. holds That the Churches Legislative Power cannot reach to controll the Civil Decrees And yet holds That these Decrees cannot countermand Gods Laws Now the Dr. will not say that the Churches Legislative Power is not founded upon and Authorised by Gods Laws nay he positively asserts that it is He adds That next to the Laws of God the Soveraigns Laws are to be obeyed And thus makes the Law of God the overruling Law the Regula Regulans and paramount to those of the Soveraign And therefore by good consequence from this Assertion the Churches Legislative Power in exhibiting and declaring Gods Laws must likewise be thus Paramount thereunto and first obeyed Especially if he stand to that instance of his Act. 15. as exhibiting the Plat-form and Standart of Church Laws wherein the enacted Canon and Decree is said to be the mind of the Holy Ghost and thus a Divine Law the Authority of God being thereto interponed Yet in the very next Words he lays down this Assertion That next to the Laws of the Soveraign the Laws of the Church are to be obeyed And so here these Civil Laws are set in an higher Sphere and made Paramount to all Church Laws and this without any exception or Limitation whether they be consonant to the Divine Law or not or any Limitation of Consonancy to the Divine Law in the Laws of the Church The person who will reconcile and soudder these must in my apprehension be better skill'd than all Vulcan's Gimmerers and no doubt better seen in logical Rules and subtilties than I. So much for the Dr's First Prerogative of a Bishop as distinct from a Presbyter in the Power Legislative and of making Canons The Second Peculiar Ministry and Prerogative of the Bishop above Presbyters the Dr. tells us is To Consecrat and Ordain to Ecclesiastick Offices Thereafter the Dr. spends much discourse upon Christs Mission of the Twelve Apostles as the Father sent him including a Power of Ordination of others which he Confirms by Luk. 24.33.36 Mark 16.14 Matth. 28.16 Which Commission he tells us was transferred Originally upon the Apostolick Order So that Ecclesiastick Commissions were either given by the hands of these First Apostles or by such Secondary Apostles as were by them admitted into Apostolick Orders and these Secondary Apostles were the same with Bishops Ans. We need not spend time in resuming what is said already in Answer to this There 's no doubt but our Lord gave a Power of Mission and of Ordaining Ministers to His Twelve Apostles A Power to Plant Churches through the World and a Gospel Ministry and Ordinances in them But that by vertue of this their Mission they were to transferr their Apostolick Office and Authority to ordinary Succeeding Officers is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Quaesitum or Question which the Dr. still beggs and supposes but will never be able to prove from either the Nature and intendment of their Mission or the Power and Authority of Succeeding Officers whom they Ordained as we have above evinced The Dr's Proofs are pitifully claudicant he tells us That tho the whole Disciples were present the Apostles only Imposed hands upon the Seven Deacons Act. 6. And why not The Authoritative Imposition of Hands in Ordination is no doubt proper to Ecclesiastick Officers not to the People but where were the Succedaneous Bishops here who had solely this Power tho Ministers were present The Dr. has let us see no shaddow of this from the Text. He next tells us of Paul and Barnabas Ordaining Elders in Antioch Iconium and Lystra A mighty proof The Apostles in planting Churches ordained Ministers in them Ergo Suceedaneous Bishops have an Apostolick Authority of Ordaining derived to them solely as their peculiar Prerogative above Pastors This Consequence is denyed If the Dr. own these Elders for Pastors it should seem they had an Ordaining Power else the Apostles settled these Churches in a very mank frame and lame posture and wanting the Essentials of an Organick Church If the Dr. allow them an Ordaining Power he crosses the Scope of a proof of Succeedaneous Bishops with Power of Ordination set up by the Apostles since thus he ascribes it unto Pastors And if he deny it he is liable also to the same absurdity and that mentioned above and will cross his Notion of the Bishops Office ascribed to the Elders of Ierusalem who mett with the Apostles in that Council Act. 15. Besides if the Dr. put an Episcopal Mitre upon these Pastors or Elders and make them Bishops in his Sense it is very odd that among these little new gathered Churches such highly Authorized Diocesan Prelats were set up before any Pastors for Feeding with the Word and Doctrin For discovering the folly of which Gloss and Assertion I dare appeal to the Current of Interpreters Or if the Dr. imagin the strength of his Proof to ly in this that these Officers were Ordained by Apostles solely he should know that as we all allow an extraordinary Power in Apostles in Churches not yet Constitut not competent to Ordinary Officers so his Assertion is anent an ordinary Power of Succeedaneous or Secondary Apostles as he calls them as sole and singular in Ordination But the Dr. finds a Difficulty in his Way viz. That Paul and Barnabas were ordained Apostles of the Gentiles by certain Prophets and Teachers in Antioch Act. 13.1 2. To which he makes this Return That these Prophets and Teachers had no doubt received the Apostolick Character being ordained by the Apostles Bishops of Syria For otherwise saith he how could they have derived it And this Notion the Dr. reposes such Confidence in that he tells us There is no doubt but they had this Character But truly whether the Insipid Folly of the Objection or of the Return here made unto it be greater is a Question to me First That Paul and Barnabas were at this time and in this Action ordained Apostles of the Gentiles I believe few if ever any except the Dr did imagin I had always thought that it is evident to any who reads the Account and Story of Pauls Conversion and Call to the Apostleship by the Lord from Heaven that when
Power of Government and Preaching being Eminenter contained in the Apostolick Office they did not commit the Ruling Authority to such to whom the Preaching work was intrusted Once more to reflect upon the Passage tell the Church we will find our Sense and Pleading correspondent to judicious Interpreters Dic Ecclesiae is coram multis inquit liber Musar 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Iustinus And that the person may have a punishment inflicted of many 2 Cor. 2.6 and the rebuke may be before all 1 Tim. 5.20 And that the person Offending may be moved by the consent and multiplicity of those rebuking him So Grotius who shews us that it was the practice among the Jews after the more privat admonition to bring the Matter to the Multitude 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the Court of Judges who have the Power of binding and loosing as distinct from the multitude Thus Camero Simmachus Beza To the Presbytrie representing the Church whereof mention is made 1 Tim. 4. 14 Piscator Beza Camero And these whom Paul cal's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Cor. 2.6 But to proceed with the Dr he tells us next That none but such as are of the Aopostolick Order can pretend to the Jurisdictional Power since it was First lodged in the Apostles and by them immediatly exercised or by the Bishops of the several Churches to whom they communicat their Authority and Order But one should think that such to whom they committed the Chief and principal part of their Office as they did to Pastors by the Dr's Confession to such they did commit their Order in so far as unto ordinary succeeding Officers and that together with this the other subservient part of Ruling was also committed both Keyes being in their Nature as above hinted so inseparably connected And he cannot give one instance of the Apostles giving the First to Successors without the Second Nay the instances are clear of their committing both to Pastors The Elders or Ministers of Ephesus are entrusted by the Apostle Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 both to Feed and Rule as Bishops Authorized by the Holy Ghost over that Church which command is by the Apostle laid upon them when taking his last farewell of the same and not a word is dropt by the Apostle of either the one or the other to Timothy their alledged Bishop The Apostle Peter enjoins the Elders as their Fellow-Elder to Feed and Rule and exercise Episcopal Authority over the Flocks A clear Demonstration compared with the preceeding Instances that these Elders and Ministers were the Apostles proper and immediat Successors in both Offices of Teaching and Ruling So that the Dr. may here see in this Scripture-Glass the Portraiture the clear Image of the Scripture Bishop and the Authentick and Original Character of the Office of these Pastors and Bishops of the Churches to whom the Apostles committed the Preaching and Ruling Work viz. the Preaching Pastors or Presbyters Shall I add a Caution and acknowledg to the Dr they were not the Bishops of his supposed Order since the Apostle discharged them to be Lords because in these simple times of Christianity the Apostles themselves were rude and not yet acquaint with the Grandure of Spiritual Lords and Lordships in the House of God But least the Dr do think this odd that I do hold the Work of Preaching and Administration of the Sacraments an higher Point of Episcopal Authority than Ruling at least if I may add only Ruling which he knows the Bishops arrogat to themselves solely not medling much with the first and that I hold the Governing Power to be appendant upon and consequent unto the Power of Order in Preaching and Administrating the Seals of the Covenant I must tell him that if this be an Errour A great one has led me into it and one of the Dr's most eminent Primary Bishops who I am sure had a Divine Authority for his Office and an Infallibility in Teaching besides It is even the great Apostle of the Gentiles who gives to Timothy this Precept The Elders that Rule well count them worthy of double Honour especially they that Labour in the Word and Doctrin wherein it is evident the Apostle allows the Labouring in the Word and Doctrin the higher Honour above Ruling yea and Ruling well But to prove that the Apostles committed this Iurisdictional Power only to the Bishops of their Order the Dr. brings the Instance of Pauls pronuncing the Sentence of Excommunication against the Incestuous Person 1 Cor. 5. shewing that he as present in Spirit had Judged i. e. saith the Dr pronunced Sentence concerning him who had done that Deed And v. 4 5. he orders them to declare and and execute his Sentence But that the Current of the Context runs Cross to the Dr's Pleading is several ways evident For 1. The Apostle blames this Church that this Sentence was not passed before and that they saved him not the Labour of this Prescription or Appointment in performing their Duty Antecedaneously thereunto It is evident he checks them that this Person was not by an Ecclesiastick Censure of such a Nature as is here intimat put away and taken from among them v. 2. 2 ly He writes to them to do it and this as an Act of their ordinary Authority proper to them as Church Officers viz. Authoritatively to deliver to Satan and that when by the Authority of our Lord they were mett together the Body of Professoâ—s being also concerned in a Consent to this Ejection And therefore they were not to meet merely to Declare or Witness what the Apostle had done before 3 ly He thus expostulats v. 12. Do not ye Iudg them that are within A convincing Proof that they had Power to Censure all that were within that Church by an Intrinsick Authority proper to them as Officers thereof 4 ly He calls this Act or Sentence 2 Cor. 2.6 A Censure or Punishment inflicted of many viz. the Church Officers not a Declaration of his previously passed Sentence I hope the Dr. will not fall into such a blunt Conceit as to make one and the same the Declaration of a Sentence passed by another and the formal Passing of a Sentence or Inflicting of a Censure or Punishment which if done warrantably as is here supposed doth necessarly import Authority in the Persons Acting Inflicted of many says the Apostle i. e. Not by all the Multitude as Independents Judge nor by one Person or Bishop as the Dr. Dreams As for his Expounding Pauls Judging this Person Censureable to be his Pronuncing Sentence it is a very gross Distortion For Paul as an Apostle infallibly Inspired by virtue of his Apostolical Directive Authority and in special as having the Care of the Gentile Churches upon him 2 Cor. 11.28 had Power to Direct and Prescribe Duty to either Members or Officers of any Churches And therefore if the Dr. will draw this Act to Exemplifie Episcopal Authority he draws upon
himself two gross Absurdities 1. That Paul had and Exemplified a standing lawful Episcopal Authority wherever such Prescriptions were exercised and to whomsoever they could reach And this Reaching over all Churches his Care being thus extended as is above cleared the Dr. makes him a standing Primat and Patriarch over them Exemplifying a sort of Patriarchal Primacy to be Transmitted in the Church 2 ly That his Apostolick Prescription of the Duties of Church Officers was not Cumulative unto but Privative of whatever Authority and Interest in Government they might acclaim or in the Exercise of the Power of Order And thus suppose the Bishop of the Dr's Mould set over the Church of Corinth had neglected his Duty as these Officers are here found faulty in this point Pauls Apostolick Direction in the Dr's Sense and Pleading nullifies his Power and proves he had none Or supposing an Archippus or negligent Minister had needed his Apostolical Direction to perform such Acts of the Power of Order as were proper to his Function Pauls Prescription of Duty by the same Reason swallows it up and makes it null Certain it is that neither could the Apostles divest themselves of this directing Power of Judging upon neglect of Duty which had been a divesting themselves of their Office nor can they be supposed without the grossest Consequences striking at the Root of all Church Authority to have by their directing or judging Power exauctorat such to whom the Direction was given of their Power and Interest in their respective Duties whether as Members or Officers of the Churches Pool Anot Vol. 2. Expound this 4 th v. of the Power and Authority of Christ concurring with them while gathered together And upon v. 5. Expounding the delivering to Satan of Excommunication and casting out of the Church They give this Reason because the Apostle speaks of an Action which might be and ought to have been done by the Church of Corinth when they mett together and for not doing of which the Apostle blames them Thus clearly Asserting the Intrinsick Authority of the Church Officers of Corinth herein and upon the same Grounds which we have Asigned To the same Scope do the Belgick Divines Expound this whole Passage paralelling it with the great Precept Matth. 18.15 Both upon v. 4 5. and upon 2 Cor. 2.6 touching the Subject of this Jurisdictional Act viz. That it was Inflicted of many they Expound of Church Governours or Officers Diodat upon Chap. 5. v. 4. thus Senses the Words That they were to perform this as the Lords Ministers by Authority received from Christ and that the Command is directed to the Pastors and Conductors of the Church being gathered together in Ecclesiastical Judgment having the Apostles Declaration instead of his Voice and Vote And to obviat such a Notion and Fancy as that of our Dr. upon this he adds That this was without doing any prejudice to the ordinary Ministry of the Church of Corinth And that Paul uses his Apostolical Power Modestly only to excite the other viz. the ordinary Power of Pastors and to strengthen it And he Expounds v. 7. not only of Purging out this Incestuous Man but all such Scandalous Kind of People who by their Infection might plunge again into the Ancient Corruption c. And upon v. 12. Do not ye Iudg them that are within He says That it is certain that a Judge cannot exercise his Jurisdiction but only over those that are within his Precinct and subject to his Tribunal Clearly Asserting a Spiritual Tribunal in this Representative Church To the same Scope he Expounds the last verse The English Annot. upon v. 2. of this Chap. in Correspondence to the Exposition and Answer premised and in Opposition to the Dr's Reasoning do shew That the Apostle finds fault with the Corinthians for that they had not Excommunicat this Incestuous Person before he had Wrote unto them and Charged them so to do because the Fact was Notorious and the Church Scandalized And upon v. 4. which mentions the Power of Christ they shew That the Power of Excommunication and Absolving is Christs and the Ministry thereof only Committed to the Governours of the Church And the delivering to Satan mentioned v. 5. they Expound by that Paralel Matth. 18.17 We need not spend time in multiplying Instances of Sound Expositors in opposition to the Dr's Sense of this place That there is here an Allusion to the Iewish Synagogue is the Consentient Judgment of the learned viz. in their Way of Excluding and casting out the Scandalous Thus Grotius Estius Hammond Simplicius Piscotor Beza c. Pareus Paralelling v. 5. with 2 Cor. 2. 6. shews that the same Persons are Authorized to Comfort and forgive him who inflicted the Censure viz. the Church Officers What we have said might be further improven from the end of the Action which was the purging out the Old Leaven and taking the Scandalous Person from among them and the Character of the Censure it self called a Punishment inflicted of Many in Opposition to the Dr's Design and Argument But the thing it self is obvious And therefore we proceed The Dr. Adduces next Paul's Threatning not to spare 2. Cor. 13. But to proceed with Ecclesiastick Censures And his mentioning Two or Three Witnesses to establish every word according to the Words of our Lord when he Institute this Power of Censuring Matth. 18. And v. 10. of 2 Cor. 13. Threatning Severity according to the Power given him to Edification And to come with a Rod He must needs saith the Dr mean Apostolical Censures and Excommunication to be Execute and Performed in his own Person in which Respect he delivered Hereticks of the Church of Ephesus to Satan 1 Tim. 1.20 It is Answered First all this is easily removed by the often Adduced Distinction of the Apostles ordinary and extraordinary Authority and of a Cumulative and Privative Exercise thereof Altho the extraordinary Power upon fit Emergents such as either the supine Negligence of Ordinary Church Officers or the more endangering spread of Offences or obstinacy of Offenders or a defect of the ordinary Church Officers in whom this Power was Lodged and Seated was alwise in readiness and to be Exercised for the Churches good and Edification yet nevertheless this Exercise as we have often told him was never exclusive of nor derogatory unto the Churches ordinary Intrinsick Authority nor except in Cases mentioned or Extraordinary Emergents without the actual Concurrence of the ordinary Church Officers And if as the Dr. says the Apostle here insinuats a method of procedure suitable to our Lords Institution Matth. 18. It could not be otherwise Besides he Threatens this severity as a proof of his Apostolick Power 2 Cor. 13.3 which some understand of his Miraculous Power to inflict Bodily Afflictions Others of his Power to cut off from the Communion of the Gospel Churches thus Pool Annot. And if the Dr. will allow that by mentioning Two or Three Witnesses he ties himself to
Pomp and absolut Dominion of the Prelats whom the Dr. pleads for And if any of them held this Notion of their pretended Dignity when their Power came to the length of incroaching upon that of Pastors in Government they held but an empty Chimerical Notion Contradictory to their Practice As the Popes Notion of his being Servus Servorum Dei The Dr. ibid. returns again to his Post telling us That it appears from what he has said we have no Shadow of Argument for our new Doctrine from the Texts above instanced Thus the Protestant Pleadings therefrom against the Papacy has no Shadow of Argument with him But whether our Arguments or his Answers be most Substantial is left to the Reader to Judge from what is said He tells us That Wallo Missalinus Glances at this Text but lays no great Stress upon it But the Dr. has not exhibit either his Words or Argument as neither Beza's Reflection upon the Passage in his larger Notes Tho he tells us as some great Discovery forsooth that Beza holds That all kind of Iurisdiction is not here forbidden but such as is joyned with Imperious Bitterness and Domination And what he would make of this I would fain know Did ever any imagine that all kind of Jurisdiction is here forbidden Did our Lord discharge all Government in his Church by this Precept and Prohibition As for Beza's expressing thus that which is forbidden it is evident to any who are acquaint with his Writings that he holds all pretended Spiritual Jurisdiction which is joyned with Domination or Lordly Rule of one Pastor over another to be a Sinful Abuse of Jurisdiction and consequently to fall within the Compass of what is prohibited in these Texts I proceed to another Notion and Answer of the Dr's We are told next ibid. That the Hierarchy and Subordination of Priests was establisht by Divine Authority in the Jewish Church If our Saviour had pulled down that Ancient Policy and commanded Equality among Presbyters of the New Testament he would not have stated the Opposition betwixt his Disciples and the Lords of the Gentiles but between the Mosaick Oeconomy and the Disciples of the New Testament Here the Dr. obliges us in affording still more Light in taking up his Judgment and Principles in Point of Church Government viz. in his Sense the Iewish Policy by our Lords Warrand was at this time standing as the exact Standart and Plat-Form for the Gospel Church Government And therefore we need not doubt what he means by Chief Places and Dignities and Honours in the Church and that he holds that our Saviour did not forbid but supposed the Lawfulness of a Chief Rule and Principality of one Disciple over the rest in the Church Nay P. 27. he is clear and positive in this That that Hierarchy the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whereof was divided in a Supreme and Subordinat Priests was never abrogated consequently stands imitable and imitated in the New Testament I think the Dr. will find the clearest Pattern at Rome of this his Holy Standing Hierarchy In Answer whereunto I need only say That the standing Policy of the Jewish Church never abrogat but continuing as the Measure and Standart of the New Testament Church Government is so notoriously known to be the great Popish Argument for the Papal Hierarchy pleaded by all the Antichristian Rabble and Locusts who stand up for this Monster and Mystery of Iniquity and so Universally condemned by all Protestant Churches and Divines that there needs no more to Stigmatize a Man as of that Number in their Judgment than such an Assertion That all our Divines do hold the Abrogation of the Iewish Church Policy is so clear that it would Load much Paper but to Recite their Names Rivet Cath. Orth. Tract 2. Quest. 4. brings in his Iesuit Ballaeus with this Argument in his Mouth That because one High Priest under the Old Testament had the Chief Government therefore it ought to be so in the New And tells him that there is Multiplex Abusus or a manifold Abuse and Corruption in this Pleading He shews him further that every thing in that Dispensation reaches not us that the High Priest was Typical of Christ as the Apostle shews Heb. 7. That if a Parity of Government were pleaded there should be a Dedication of one Family for the Ministry as there was for Priests and Levites c. Turret Part. 3. Quest. 16. Thes. 15.16 After he has set dâ—wn the Judgment of the Ancients against a Primacy in the Church he brings in the Solution of the Popish Objection and Argument taken from the Government of the Church under the Old Testament which he Baffles from several Grounds such as 1. The Extent of the Christian beyond that of the Iewish Church 2. That the High Priest had no absolute Authority over that Church being subject to the Jurisdiction of the great Sanhedrin Deut. 17.11 3. That what Authority he had was Typical of Christs the High Priest of the New Testament Wallaeus de Function Ecclesiast P. mihi 470. brings in this Objection against Parity of Pastors taken from the High Priest under the Old Testament and the twenty four Orders of Priests over whom there were Presidents And thus Answers That these things were partly Typical partly Political that there was a Priority of Order here not an Essential Difference of Power and Authority that they all Governed the Church by Common Counsel But for the Abrogation of this Ministry and that it was to be no Standart for the Gospel Church I will produce and offer again to the Dr's Consideration that one Text Heb. 7.12 The Priesthood being changed there is made of Necessity a Change of the Law viz. The Policy suted to the State of that Church must be changed also The Text asserts that the Priesthood or their particular Frame of Church Officers being changed or abrogat there is therefore a Change or Abrogation of the Law i. e. the Legal Ordinances respecting both their Worship and Government Pool Part. 2. tells us That this Change referrs to the Expiration of the Aaronical Order to which the Hebrews were not bound for that a better Priesthood and Law were to fill up its Room That the Mutation of the Priesthood required a Change of the Law That God determined that both Priesthood and Law should expire together English Annot. on v. 11. assert the Abrogation of the Legal Priesthood together with the Covenant viz. the Legal and by clear Consequence that Policy The Belgick Divines upon the place do shew That the Levitical Priesthood was many ways involved with the Legal Dispensation of the Covenant aâ—d therefore abolished with it Diodate shews That the Priesthood and all the Ceremonial Worship of the Tribe of Levi was to give place to Christs in whom was accomplished all the Reality and Truth and he is now both Priest and Law-Giver Bilson an English Bishop shews the Reason why that Policy cannot stand under the New
he adds in the other Branch in expressing what is enjoyned being examples to the Flock enjoining thus to Feed by Example and an Humble Ministry And this is opposit to all Dominion whatsoever and doth not discriminat one Dominion from another as is also evident in the positive part of the Paralel Precepts abovementioned We have also told him that the instance and Illustration drawn from such Princes of the Gentiles as were accounted Gracious Lords and the simple word of Rule used by Luke in the paralel confutes this Gloss and doth demonstrat that it is not proud insolent Dominion or a Dominion secundum quid and thus qualified which is only here forbidden but Lordship and Dominion simpliciter the desire whereof did notwithstanding proceed in the Apostles from some remainders of Pride and in their Case could not be exercised or assumed without a fastuous insolency it being Diametrically opposit to the Nature of their Holy Office and Function So then I argue against the Dr. from his own Principle and Gloss If Peter thus understood our Lords Precept Matth. 20. and Luk. 22. in this Sense that Pride was the Principle of their desire and of that greatness they sought and that the exercise of this greatness was prohibit as the very emanation of insolent Pride and if with all he coppied out this his Precept to Ministers from that great Command of his Lord and took his Measures therefrom he could not but look upon Pastors Lording over the Flâ—cks as proceeding from Pride and the very practice and exercise of a Domineering Tyranny yea he could not but put under this Character whatever exercise of pretended Ministerial Authority goes beyond the Limits of that humble exemplary Ministry that Ministerial diligence and service of the Lords Flocks which is enjoyned in the positive part of his Masters Command exactly coppied out in this his Apostolick Precept I further remark that the Dr. holding out the Sense of the Apostle as terminating only in this General discharging Pride and Insolency in Government without condescending upon the extent of the Negative and positive explication of the Precept and the Nature of that Power here specified and Discharged as Flowing from this Pride and Insolent Disposition and but only shewing that it is a Pride unsutable to all Power and Authority in the Church leaves room for even a Monarchy and Patriarchat and the setting up of such a Dominion in the Church as may be supposed in an abstracted Sense and in its general Nature Lawful and thus still saves the Popes Mitre from the Touch of this prohibition The Dr. holds That our exposition of those Texts was never heard of till these latter days Thus with him the Papists only have hit upon the true Ancient Exposition and Protestants have missed it Amongst many other confuting Instances he might have minded the abovementioned Passages of Bernard to Eugenius lib. 2. Apostolis interdicitur Dominatus Ergo tu tibi usurpare aude ut Dominans Apostolatum aut Apostolicus Dominatum CHAP. II. A Confutation of what the Dr. offers in Answer to the Presbyterians Argument for Parity of Pastors taken from the Official Identity of Bishop and Presbyter in the Scripture Account of the Pastoral Office THe Dr. by this time has finisht his first easie Task of Discussing our Argument from Christs Institution He will next fall upon our Argument from Scripture Consequences And that his Work here may be as easie as the first and least he should break his Word to his Friend in giving him a large History of our Arguments on this Head Of them all he is pleased to Single out one taken from the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter which he says fills all our Books Citing Smectym Ius Divin Minist Ang. Unbishopping Tim. and Tit. Altare Damasc. Durh. Dissert But surely any who have Seriously and Impartially perused these Authors and compares what they have written with that which this Man pretends to Answer may Laugh at his Prodigious Folly in Boasting of an Answer to Books which he appears never to have read or understood It were good for him that the Authors he paints his Margine with were out of the World that the Ignorant or such as never saw them might believe that this Personat Champion had made a mighty Baffling Assault upon them But all such as are acquaint with their Writings will easily discover that he is here Acting a Pedantick Nomenclator of these Authors and no more The Argument from the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter I mean an Official Identity I acknowledge is improven by these Authors and other Presbyterian Writers and am content to try Issue with him upon this Head but the Dr I find is so Loose and Perverse a Disputer that he doth not so much as offer to propose one of their Mediums and Arguments to the Scope He alledges We Argue from the Homonomy of Names of Bishop and Presbyter in the New Testament to prove the Sameness of the Office and that the Clergy of the New Testament are Dichotomised into Bishops and Deacons only in some Texts And thus in some Ancient Writers That we thus exclude the Authority of a Bishop above a Presbyter tho the Offices themselves be as much distinguished in several Texts of the New Testament as is possible He holds P. 22 23. That we found the Solidity of our Demonstration of the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter merely upon the Confusio Nominum which he represents in a distinct Character as our only Topick To which purpose he tells us we cite Act. 20.17 28. Philip. 1.1 Tit. 1.6 7. and several other places There needs no more than the Reciting of this to discover this Mans Precarious Vanity and Ignorance of this Controversie since all that are acquaint with it do know that it is not the Sameness ef Names simplely and in its self considered which the Presbyterians ground upon tho this have its own Secondary Weight but the Sameness and Identity of the Qualifications Ordination Work Duties and every other Essential of the Office Which is an Argument with more Demonstrative Nerves than that of the Sameness of Names Presbyters being in Scripture called and owned as Rulers Governors Overseers Bishops And both Ordination and Iurisdiction appropriat to them without the least Hint of Imparity among them in the Exercise thereof Tit. 1.5 Act. 20.17 28. 1 Pet. 5.2.2 1 Thess. 5.12 14. Heb. 13.7 17. 1 Cor. 5.12 1 Tim. 4.14 Now if it be thus sure the Conclusion of the Identity of the Office clearly follows And had this Man perused these Authors he might have discovered that their Arguments run to this Issue and are not merely Bottomed upon so slight a Ground as he would make such believe whose Knowledge is of a like Size and Measure with his own Yet so weak is his Cause that his Answer cannot stand before this very Argument as he propounds it at least with a due Respect to the Scope of the Places Cited which will
subsistence required the same in all times And besides these succeeding Officers when invested with this ordinary Power were still subordinat to them as Apostles and cloathed with that formal Office and Authority I know that in this Phrase of Subordinat Ecclesiastick Officers the Dr. excluds the Bishops in the Series of his Reasoning that he may take them within the compass of a supposed Apostolical ordinary Power over Pastors But how absurdly and inconsequentially as well as cross to the Sense of sound Divines in this Point is already evident and shall yet further appear To proceed the Dr. tells us That by the second i. e. their extrinsick extraordinary priviledges suted to the First Plantation of Churches they were in capacity to exercise their Authority with greater Success in the Conversion of Infidels in the Government of Churches Wherein I differ from him in tâ—is that he makes their Extraordinary Apostolical priviledges necessary only for the bene esse which were necessary Simpliciter for the Planting and Government of the Churches in that infant State thereof The very exercise of their Apostolical Authority as such did consist in exerting these extraordinary priviledges For thus their Mission their Gifts their extensive Power essential to the Apostolick Office taken in a formal sense Respected the founding and watering of the Churches in that Infant-state of Christianity the Establishing the Gospel Ordinances therein and all its ordinary standing Officers I must then mind the Dr. that when he speaks of the Apostles ordinary permanent essential Power by Essential he must not nay cannnot understand that Power which is Essential to them as Apostles strictly or under that reduplication qua Apostles For then their Office were not extraordinary but a standing Office to be succeeded to in its intire Nature formally as they were invested with it and did exercise it which is cross to that Sense of the Apostolick Office exhibit by Protestant Divines as I shall further make appear The Dr. will needs distinguish their Essential Apostolick Office from their extraordinary Prerogatives their transient temporary Priviledges who were the first Apostles and were Limited in the exigences of the First Christian Mission Wherein he speaks confusedly For 1. These Prerogatives suted to the Churches First exigence were in such manner suted as was the very Office it self and consequently were Essential ingredients thereof for this end Hence 2. The Essential Office of the Apostolat as such or taken in a proper formal Sense could admit of no such spliting and distinction unless the Dr. will split and distinguish the Essence which he should know consists in indivisibili The Essential Apostolick Office the Dr. tells us P. 96. is necessary peramanent perpetual citing Matth. 28. Lo I am with you alway even unto the end of the World Hence in his Sense the Command and Promise in that place imports the standing Essential Office of Apostolat to the end What Harmony this keeps with the Sense of Protestant Interpreters let all judg Pool tells us The Promise imports his presence to the end with his Ministers Preaching Baptizing Teaching to observe what he has Commanded That it relates to Gospel Ministers in their Ministrations as the Apostles successors thus the English Notes and Belgick Divines But that it imports a standing Apostolick Office to the end no sound Protestant ever dreamed To proceed to make this appear the more saith the Dr. ibid. The Apostles as such were formally and essentially distinguished from all other Ecclesiastick subordinat Officers This indeed makes it appear more if one contradictory Proposition will prove another For if the Apostles were Formally and Essentially i. e. in respect of their essential formal Office distinguished from all inferior Officers all Officers who were not in a proper formal Sense Apostles How could any succeed them in this proper formal Office And consequently How could that Office be permanent It being certain that such Functions wherein they were to be succeeded could not be their Characteristick as Apostles and their mark of distinction from succeeding Officers For instance the Function of Preaching and Baptizing with the appendant proportioned ordinary power of Government was a Work and Office wherein they were to be succeeded The Apostles were at first enjoyned go Teach Baptize and Disciple the Nations Paul enjoyned to the Elders of Ephesus to Feed and Rule by the Word and Discipline within their Percinct Hence these Duties simplely considered could not be that wherein they were distinguished from inferior Officers For 1. In respect of this Pastoral Work both the Apostle Peter and Iohn owned themselves as Co-presbyters which could have no good Sense if in this they were distinguished from all others 2. Hence this distinguishing Criterion had then evanished when inferior Officers had it So that the Dr. in his Series of Reasoning is driven upon this Scylla or Charybdis either to say that their Essential Office perished with themselves and consequently was not permanent in opposition to what he asserts P. 95. or else in respect thereof they were not formally and essentially distinguished from inferior Officers in contradiction to what he asserts P. 96. I know the Dr's tacite Evasion is that he supposes the Bishops not to be Subordinat Officers which how cross it is to the Series and Contexture of his Reasoning as well as the Sense of sound Divines we shall further mâ—ke appear The difference of their Office from that which is properly and formally Apostolick being so palpable that himself is forced to place a Distinction betwixt the Function of the one and the other yea and calls them a sort of secondary Apostles Thus distinguishing them from those he would have to be Primary But the Dr. will now enquire ibid. What distinguished the Apostles from the Seventy two from Presbyters in the Modern Notion as he speaks I could wish he had exhibite and refined his antique Notion from Deacons and other Offieers of the New Testament He undertakes 1. To exhibite the Presbyterian's Account of the Apostolick Office and tells us That the Presbyteriand and Socinians contrary to the uniform Testimony of Antiquity affirm that the Apostolick Office is ceased as extraordinary that the Apostles were distinguished from Subordinat Ecclesiasticks by infallibility in Preaching their power of Miracles their being immediatly called by our Saviour to the Apostolat by their unlimited and unconfined Commission to propagat the Gospel among all Nations This is such Stuff as I dare challenge and appeal all Protestant Churches and Divines to give Judgment and Character upon the person who presents it which I am sure will be such as will fasten upon him an infamous Stigma Nor shall I here much medle with or stand upon the shameless Man his comparing us to and ranking us with the blasphemous Socinians in this point citing their Racovian Catechism Sect. 9. Chap. 2. But to convince all that are but acquaint in the least with the Protestant Doctrine in this point I shall exhibit in some
or well known with the Apostles Diodat and the English Annot. take it to import Excellent Evangelists or Preachers or such as were well known to the Apostles But now our Dr. P. 101.102 〈◊〉 obviat one main Objection taken from the narrow Limits of the secondarie Apostles as he calls them This saith he alters not the Nature of their Apostolical Power within their Bounds no more than Kings of Judah can be denyed the Honour of sitting upon the Throne of David in full Power and Royality after the Apostacy they were as truâ—ly Kings as any of their Predicessors as Solomon tho the number of Subjects was not equal Ans. I pray was not in his Sense the Rectoral Spiritual Power which our LORD conferred upon his Disciples and Apostles of the Nature and Extent above exprest and such as he calls Supremâ— over all Church Officers and all other Believers And sayes he not expresly that this very Power thus described by him is Essential to the Apostolick Office and Permanent and that the Apostolick Office being no other than this remains for ever in the Church How then is it possible that such Officers as derive down this extensive Apostolick Power should crumble into a petty Diocess How are such petty confined Successors Supreme and over all Church Officers 2. The Dr. Similitudinary and paralel Reason cutts the Sinews of his Pleading and Argument It is true Kings â—â— Iudah sat upon Davids Throne in full Power over Iudah But I pray did they succeed to David or Solomons Throne or Dignity as they left it I trow not Now he has told us that the Bishops succeed the Apostles in that same Supreme Authority over Church Officers and all Believers which Christ committed unto them Should England be divided into two Kingdoms or into an Heptarchy will any say that the Man who succeeds to one of these petty Dominions succeeds to the Crown of England or unto the Kings thereof because they possess a part of his Throne and Dominion Surely not And so the Case is here In a word since in the Dr's Sense the narrowing the Limits of the Authority impeaches not the Episcopal Power and since he will no doubt owne the Maxime Majâ—s minus non variant speciem Nazianzen and such Bishops as aâ—e said to have had but little Dorps for their Diocesses had this Apostolick Power What consequence this will bear in reference to Pastors some whereof have a larger District I have already told him P. 102. The Apostles Bounds and Provinces of their Inspection was not as equal as their Power it self wherewith they were vested Who doubts of this Whatever was their Condescension this way and adjusted Measures of Travels for the more commodious spreading of the Gospel yet by vertue of their Commission their Authority reached the whole World and all Churches planted and to be planted and this conjunctly and severally As when the twelve Spies were sent to Canaan whatever wayes they might have separatly gone in a voluntary Condescension yet their Authority and Commission joyntly and a part immediatly and formally reached to a search of the whole Land But I need not labour in proving this For the Dr. is â—o ingenuous as to confess it telling us That the different extent of places to which they went did not alter or change that Rectoral Power and Iurisdiction wherewith they were endued But thus he inferrs ibid. no more did the Apostolick Authority transmitted to Successors differ from that which was lodged in the first Apostles tho confined in its exercise to narrower Limits But good Mr. Dr. the Paralel is pittyfully Lame the Original Authority lodged in the Apostles by our LORDs Commission is by your Confession and Description immediatly relative to all Churches and all Believers in them So that this immediat Relation and a Right to Officiat upon Occasion accordingly was still Vigent and Existent with any one of the Apostles tho ordinarly exercising their Ministry in never so narrow a Circle every one of them being Universal Doctors Bishops and Inspectors of the whole Catholick Church planted and to be planted and that ex natura officii as Apostles But I hope ye will not say this of the Bishop he being properly and immediatly related only to his Diocess It had been a gross absurdity to say Paul or Iames are only Apostles of such or such a Province and have a Relation Apostolical to no other Church as it is proper to say this Man as Bishop of such a Diocess has an immediat Relation to it and to no Diocess else How often shall we tell the Dr. whose nauseous Repetitions forces us to repeat that the Apostles were capable of no particular fixed Ralation to any one Flock or Diocess being as Apostles vi natura officii Catholick Doctors of the Church Catholick and constant infallible Inspectors and Directors of its Government and all the Ordinances and Officers thereof And consequently that this their proper formal Office of Apostolat went off and expired with that infant State and Exigence of the Church and could never be succeeded unto by any Church Officer P. 103. We are told That the Apostles by lot divided the places of their Travels and went about what fell to their share None doubts of this in general tho the particular Account of their dividing the World by lots and who were to go to Asia who to Scythia c. is a piece of Discovery on the back of the Bible which we let pass among the rest of the Dr's profound Notions He adds It s plain that when Matthias was chosen it was to take the lot of his Ministry and Apostleship Who doubts of this either And that every Apostle had a share of this Ministry of Apostolat because all of the same Office But this will noways infer except by the Dr's Logick which can prove quidlibet ex quolibet that they were capable of a fixt Relation to any one Post or Watch Tower of the Church That they Governed the Churches where they resided as the Dr. next tells us we doubt not Tho I add if the Churches were constitute in their Organick Beeing according to Gospel Rules their Apostolick Inspection was Cumulative unto not Privative of the Government of the Ordinary Officers Constitute therein He adds ibid. They committed their Apostolical Episcopal Inspection to particular Persons who succeeded them even in their Apostolick Authority This is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Question which the Dr. still Cants over without Proof We have often told him that their Apostolick Rectoral Power as he calls it related immediatly to the Catholick Church And to say that this they committed to particular Persons related to one fixed Post and by Consequence solely Pastors or Bishops thereof in an immediat proper Sense and subject to Superior Collegiat Churches and Judicatories which he must needs hold unless he embrace the Independent Principles and he cannot deny that de Facto the Bishops he pleads for were and
his peculiar Charge So that whatever be the particular individual Limits of the Charge which is left to the Churches Prudence to assign yet the persons having such a Limited Charge as is above discribed flows from the Nature of the ordinary Ministry and the State and Case of the Church when the extraordinary Office of Apostolat is expired And to Convince the Dr. of this and of the Folly of this Lax Assertion that Confinement to a particular See proceeds not from the Nature of the Priesthood I would put to him this Querie Whether the Assigning unto one Bishop an Uâ—niversal Inspection and Primacy over the Catholick Church would be any impeachment of the Nature of his Priest-hood or Ministry Assigned to him by Gâ—d yea or not If not then who sees not that he owns the Lawfulness and Divine Warrands of a Papal Primacy especialy if the Church should Corroborat this by an Universal Constitution If he say that this extension were contrary to the Nature of the Priest-hood Then he Contradicts himself in Asserting that the Priest-hood of its own Nature requires no Confinment as he calls it and in Calling it so he Insinuats some sort of Violence offered to the Nature of this Ministry Besides these Constitutions he mentions Confining Bishops to a certain Charge are either cross or Correspondent to the Nature and ends of a Gospel-Ministry expressed in Scripture If cross thereunto then sure they are not Lawful unless he will say God gives the Church Authority to enact Constitutions cross to his Revealed Will and consequently paramount to his own Rules and Authority Which whether it be greater nonsense or Blasphemy is hard to determin If they be Correspondent to the Nature and ends of a Gospel Ministry how can he deny that such a Confinment or Constitutions proceed from the Nature thereof His Reason added viz. That the Apostles ordained Bishops for the Spiritual Service of such as should believe is as void of Sense or connection as any can be For so are all Pastors the true Scripture Bishops ordained by Apostles But will he be bold to say or if he say will not all Men of Sense hiss him That the Apostles ordained all and every Bishop or Minister for the actual immediat Service of all Believers of the Catholick Church as their proper peculiar Work and Charge This he must either say or his Reason is nought Nay will he not thus contradict himself in affirming his Secondary Apostles as he calls them to differ in Extension of Power from the first Apostles P. 105. We are told That the Apostles committed their Rectoral Power over subordinat Ecclesiasticks to particular persons succeeding in their Room in particular Churches Another piece of Repeated nonsense The Apostles by their Office had an Universal immediat Inspection over all Ecclesiasticks or Church Officers of the Catholick Church as himself describs their Office Yet this their proper formal Office thus described by him he will needs have them to devolve upon particular persons fixed to particular Churches as good Sense as to say the King Commits his Regal Primacy and Rectoral Power over his Kingdom when dying or leaving it unto the Man whom he hath enstalled in the Office of a Sheriff But the Dr. tells us that he will now propose the true State of the Controversy I am sorry a Doctor has disputed so long upon a Question and has yet the State of the Controversy to propose Common Ingenuity and Rules of Dispute would have prompted him in the first place to propose the true State of the Question and explain the Terms thereof But these Rules are too Pedantick for our Dr. who is more inclined to Pamphleting Harrangues than Systematick Divinitie Well what State of the Question offers he Thus it is Whether the Apostles committed their Apostolick Authority they exercised in particular Churches to such single persons duelie and regularlie chosen Or to a Colledge of Presbyters acting in administration of Ecclesiastick Affairs in a perfect Paritie and Equalitie I shall be glad to admit this State of the Question when one Exception is offered by way of Caution Viz That as we grant an Ordinary Authority which the Apostles exercised in particular Churches contained in their Office Eminenter which they transmitted to Successors So we deny that the Authority which they transmitted to these ordinary succeeding Officers was an Authority properly and formally Apostolical or such in a formal Sense as themselves exercised And this I have made appear to be the Harmonious Sense and Judgement of sound Divines who distinguish the expired Apostolick Office and Authority from that ordinary Power and Authority which they transmitted to Successors What next We are told ibid. That the Scripture-confusion of Names might I presume to prescribe a better Term to such a Master of Language as our Dr. I should rather to evite an apparent Reflection on the Holy Ghosts Language call it Community or Homonymie will not prove Community of Offices when persons are undenyablie distinguished with regard to their Authoritie If we forget this mighty Caution of our warry Dr. we must not blame him if an unwearied Repetition will help us The Dr. will have this fixed that we fight not in the dark The Presbyterians do hold this as fixed as he What next P. 105.106 The LORD promised a perpetual Duration of the Apostolick Office not in their personal but Spiritual Capacitie he loving his Church as much after as before his withdrawing If then they conveyed their Episcopal Power to single persons in all particular Churches and not to a Colledge of Presbyters acting in a Paritie and Equalitie then the Divine Right of Episcopal Government is clearlie Estabilished But 1. How often will this Man cant over his Petitio Principii and take that for the Ground and Topick of his Argument which is in the Question Yea and in the Question by his own Confession viz That the Apostolick Office is perpetual permanent and succeeded unto in a proper formal Sense What strange may I call it Impertinency or Inadvertancy is this Since himself asserts that we deny such a perpetual Office of Apostolat and he opposes above his definition anent their permanent perpetual Office unto Presbyterians assertion of the contrary and their Definition asserting the Apostles Transitorie Function 2. His Proof from Christs promise and constant care of the Church is in the Sense of all Protestants unsound and foolish and he is therein inconsistent with himself For in their Sense yea and by his own Confession there are many expired Prerogatives of Apostles yea Gifts of Officers in the first Apostolick Church which notwithstanding impeaches not either that promise of Christs constant Care of his Church or his constant Love thereunto And therefore it reflects neither upon the one nor the other that this formal Office of Apostolat consisting of such expired Prerogatives is ceased Nay himself confesses that without Impeachment of either of these the Apostles Extensive universal Power
Pools Annot. with several others take to be only the Signification of his Judgement upon the Question in Correspondence to what Peter had before spoken As for Simeons Succession to Iames in Ierusalem and Hegesippus Account of the Succession of Bishops there It is spoken to above and what Credit is to be given to the supposed Catalogue of Bishops in Ierusalem and other pretended Diocesses For what he adds of Calvin's Judgement upon Gal. 2.9 As favouring his Opinion I Answer Calvin takes him indeed to be among Eminent Apostles viz. In Moral Respects prudentia aliis dotibus as he expones the word Pillar and attributs the same Eminency to Peter and Iohn And speaking of his presiding in the Council he doth not positively assert the Ground which the Dr. alledges but problematically with a fortassis id factum c. And even granting his Admission of a Presidency the Consequence of an Official Presidency and as importing a Majority of Power far less eo nomine as formally Bishop there is so very gross and obviously impertinent as any with half an Eye may discover it The Dr. tells us That his Scripture Instances do plainly demonstrat that the Apostolical or Episcopal Authority was conveyed to single persons in the first Plantations of Christianity What Demonstrations these are I refer to the Reader to Judge from what is above replyed such sure as are not adapted to any Rules that hitherto hath been heard of whereof this is a very clear Demonstration that the Dr. in this Peroration and refined Summ and Conclusion of his supposed mighty preceeding Demonstrations hath pronounced as great None-sense as ever was spoken or written Which I demonstrat thus from the Series of his Reasoning In his Sense the Apostolick and Episcopal Office is one and equal and Apostles as such were Superior to all Church Officers except Bishops their proper Successors in Official Authority Now here is a Successor Bishop preferred to all Apostles eo nomine as Successor-Bishop yet deriving in his Sense also an Apostolat only And which is yet odder succeeding to an Apostolick Office who was an Apostle before and by his Confession thus related unto and having an Official Authority respecting the Church Universal Yet when his Charge is Restricted to Jerusalem as his proper Post and Diocess he doth upon this Ground Transcend all the Apostles in Official Authority If any will sodder these Assertions together and reconcile them to sound Sense and Divinity he must be better skilled than all Vulcan's Gimmerers The Dr. will not insist upon the Presbyterians imaginary and superficial Exceptions which they have invented They must be such because he saith it and save him from a Concern in Scanning them No doubt if as Superficial and Imaginary as his Demonstrations their Inventions were very shallow The Dr. brings next P. 114. the Trite Argument taken from the seven Asiatick Angels And first tells us of Salmasius taking the Angels as denoting the Churches the Denomination being taken from the purer Part of these Cities to which Christ wrote To which he replyes from the distinction of the Churches from the Angels Rev. 1.20 And that the Sense would thus be to the Church of the Churches Not to detain him much here we only tell him that whatever Salmasius Sense or Escape might be in this he cannot deny that in the Sense and Judgement of the Body of all Presbyterians the Angels are distinguished from the Churches as the Church Representative is from the Church Collective Besides himself acknowledges P. 115. That the Heavenly Admonitions are first addressed to the Angels and by them were Communicated to the Churches As at the close of every Epistle all are called to hear what the Spirit saith to the Churches And he will not doubt that Salmasius distinguisheth Ministers from Church Members in this Point and the Church Members concern in all that is written he can less doubt Besides that Salmasius words will hardly bear his critical and saucy Construction who calls them a silly subterfuge since he may be supposed to compare only the Populi purior pars as he Terms it with the rest of the Inhabitants of these Towns so that the Address distininguisheth them from others And the Angel of the Church in his Sense will import only the Church in such a City not the Church of such a Church But the Dr. will not have the Angel a Multitude but one single Angel presiding over Presbyters and People We have already made appear that the Collective Sense of the Term Angel is most suâ—eable to Scripture and the Scope of this Book But the Dr. will needs loose the Objection taken from the Plural Address of the Angel which he thus propones That some Instructions there are in these Epistles in which others beside the Angels are particularly admonished This is a piece of our Dr's petty Sophistry He must make the knot easie that he may know how to loose it The very proposing of this Objection is a yeelding of the Cause For if in this Plural Address these others addressed be not the Angel then there is no Plural Address of the Angel himself or Representation of the Term Angel in a Plural Mould But had the Dr. intended to Dispute not to triffle in proposing a simple Foppery in stead of a Presbyterian Objection he should have told his Reader that we hold and do exhibit Instances of it that the Angel himself is addressed Plurally and bespoken so in these Epistles as a plurality of Officers appear evidently to be pointed at by thâ— Term Angel As particularly when it is said To you and the rest in Thyatira Rev. 2.24 Thus likewise v. 10. Fear none of these things which thou shall suffer Behold the Devil shalt cast some of you into prison that ye may be tryed and ye shall have tribulation c. Be thou faithful unto death Well what saith he to this Objection Why The Epistle is no less addressed to the single Angel than that of the Philippians is to the whole Church at Philippi though Paul useth particular Compellations Chap. 4.2.3 I entreat thee also true Yoke-fellow help those Women c. But good Dr. here is both a particular special distinct Precept and under such a Compellation as is in tâ—rminis separat and distinguished from the Body of the Church and those general Precepts addressed thereunto So that there is no shadow of a Paralel when the Angel is plurally Addressed for the Precept and Injunction is the very same Fear none of these things which thou shalt suffer There 's a relative pointing at the single Term Angel Then the Devil shall cast you that ye may be tryed Be thou faithful c. There the same persons are addressed and spoken to both singlely as one Angel and plurally as many that in reference to the same very individual Purpose and Duty the Speech running on both to the same Persons and the same Scope So that to use the Dr's
Apostolick Warrand as knowing that the contrary Practice and Principles of almost the whole Body of Reformed Churches and Divines do in this Point contradict him He therefore pretends to Abstract from this supposed Necessity and the Grounds thereof and to plead only for the Lawfulness of the Order Yet least he should seem too Cool a Pleader he presents some things which he calls Positive Grounds of Episcopacy Whereof the First in Summ is That Christ hath appointed in his Church an Official Power which we call Episcopal paramount unto and above any Power that can be Exercised by a single Presbyter alone Which Power of Ordination and Iurisdiction is acknowledged utrinque Lawful in it self the only Difference is that Presbyterians hold it to be Seated in a Colledge of Presbyters and the Episcopalians hold it to be Concentred in one Person yet to be Exercised by Presbyters Concurrence and Consent So that the Difference of this Diffused Episcopacy in the Presbytrie and Contracted in a single Bishop to be managed with Consent of Presbyters is like that between mâ—nus aperta and manus clausa Ans. The Surveyer doth but here Shufflle and Obscure the true State of this Question betwixt Episcopalians and Presbyterians Which is this viz. Upon our Supposal of that Authority and Government ascribed in Scripture to Pastors or Presbyters and their Essential Interest therein how an Officer who is pretended to be Distinct from them and Superior unto them and Enhancing and Concentring all their Power in himself can be consistent with the Scripture Prescriptions in point of Government The Surveyer should have known that the Scripture doth not only appoint the Official Power but its proper Subject So that the Removing it from its proper Basis and Subject is a palpable Impeachment of these Institutions in point of Government And therefore if by our Lords Warrand this Official Power is Diffused in a Colledge of Pastors or Presbyters the Concentring it in the person of one Prelat must needs be an arrant Usurpation in Men yea and if possible in Angels Next the Surveyer Narroweth and Disguiseth the Bishops Power he pleads for And that several ways 1. He overleaps his Arrogated Power of Order whereof he is the proper and primary Subject in the Diocess wherein Pastors Act but as his Deputs 2. His Civil Acclaimed Power 3. He seems to Tye the Exercise of it to the Consent and Concurrence of Presbyters wherein he dissembles the Nature of their Arrogated Jurisdictional Power For if he did mean a Concurrence and Consent which is Decisive Besides that he in this contradicts himself in Concentring this Power in the Prelat since frustra est potentia quae non potest reduci in actum he durst not affirm that the Official Power of the Prelat then existent by Law and whom he pleaded for was of this Nature For according to the Law establishing Prelacy they were to Exercise their Power with Advice only and of such of the Clergy only as they should find they themselves being Judges of known Loyaltie and Prudence Again should the Surveyer say this Advice was only Consultive not Decisive he did but Mock and Prevaricat in adding this Limitation of Presbyters Consent and Concurrence and in pretending thus to put some Limitations on the Prelats sole Exercise of his Power as if it did not swallow up and exclude the Official Authority of Presbyters and Pastors in Government In a Word as it is certain that the Diversifying of the Subject diversifieth the Species and Kinds of Government which is evident in that of Monarchy Democracy Aristocracy c. So in the point of Church Government depending upon Divine and positive Institution It is easie to discover such a vast Variation upon this Ground as might have covered this Surveyer with Blushes and which baffles his Notion with his own Similitude of the manus aperta clausa For he will not deny the Lawfulness of an OEcomenick or General Council in a Just Representative of all Christian Churches having an Authority diffused in all the Members which respects the whole Churches Now here is the manus aperta and in his Sense the manus clausa or the Monopolizing and Concentring this Authority in one person doth no whit impeach the Lawfulness of the Power it self Then advance the manus clausa an OEcumenick Bishop or Supreme Head over all the Church having all this Authority Monopolized in him which was before diffused in the General Council And here it may be demanded whether this Pleader or such as he did owne such an Officer as Lawful or not If such an Officer be owned as Lawful then farewel the Protestant Profession and the Doctrine of all Reformed Churches against a Papal Supremacy Universal OEcumenick Bishop If such an Officer be held unlawful then this Notion and Argument is quit baffled and excluded which asserted the Lawfulness both of the Diffused and Contracted Official Power For here the one Power is owned as warranded of GOD and instituted in its Nature and Exercise The other is disowned as contrary to His Institution What the Surveyer adds upon this Head touching a Lawful Demanour towards Powers that are usurped and entertaining fellowship with a Ministerial Church though called by an usurping Bishop hath been sufficiently answered by the Apologist and Others and the Difference so clearly stated betwixt the Condition of a Church wherein Prelats are obtruded upon the standing Church Judicatories in which Case Ministers are to keep their places and contend against them and such a State and Condition of a Church wherein the Government is razed and the Foundation of it laid upon a Princes arrogated Supremacy over the same and Prelats Authority as his Administrators in the Government thereof and withall in the Concurrence a formal and direct acknowledgment of both the one and the other being required as the Condition of Ministerial Communion that nothing needs here be further added The Next Ground the Surveyer adduceth is That Ministers Union and Association of themselves and setting over them one single Person to Moderat and Govern the Actions of the Meeting is Juris Divini and that by our own Confession Ans. The Surveyer durst not make his Application here or had he done so the absurdity of the Consequence from this Moderator or President to the Prelat he pleaded for would have palpably appeared and his Inconsistency with himself For 1. He saith that Associat Ministers set over themselves this Moderator and this he holds to be Iuris Divini and GODs Will And if so then sure it is neither Iuris Divini nor GODs Will that this Moderator should be obtruded upon them by an Extraneous Power without the least shadow of their Consent as he could not but know the Prelats he pleaded for were obtruded upon this Church 2. If it be GODs Will that this President be set over Meetings of Ministers to govern the Actions of the Meeting and preserve Due Order then it is not His
send it back to the Dr. with a Censure of Impertinency till it be returned with a Testimonial of a better proof than of his bare Assertion and ipse dixit The Dr. enquires how we can argue a perpetual power of Ordination in the Church from the Ordination of Timothy and Titus citing Ius divinum Minist Evang. p. 159.167 if the Office they were ordained to were not perpetual And if perpetual then so is Episcopacy nothing different therefrom Answ. We hold the Ordination instanced to examplifie a Presbyterian Ordination as well as in General a Power of Ordination in the Church Timothy's Ordination having this Scripture account that it was by Laying on of the Hands of the Presbytrie which Power and Authority of a Presbytrie the Apostle Paul's presence and his Imposition of Hands tho supposed doth rather Strengthen than invalidat since neither the Eminent Gifts of Timothy nor his designment for such an Eminent Office nor Paul's Imposition of Hands the Great Apostle of the Gentiles did Swallow up or exclud the Presbytries Ordinary Power and Authority but Timothy must pass through this Door of a Presbytries Authoritative Ordination and Imposition of Hands in order to the Exercise of his Office therefore much more doth this Authority belong to the Presbytrie now when the Office of Apostles and Evangelists is ceased And for Titus's Ordination in an active Sense or his Ordination of Elders the Apostle tells him expresly Chap. 1.5 the Passage wherein the Dr. places his Chief Strength that it was to be performed according to the Apostles appointment which appointment in the Sense of our Divines is none other else than that which himself examplified and is Intimat 1 Tim. 4.14 2 Tim. 1.6 i. e. with Authoritative concurrence of the Presbytrie or Eldership So that Titus had no Episcopal Authority therein notwithstanding of his Evangelistick extraordinary Office And this is invincibly made good in opposition to the Drs Design and pleading in that the Apostle in the same very Text wherein he enjoins Titus to ordain Elders doth identify and make one and the same the Office of the Bishop and Elder which were a mere implicantia in terminis if the Apostle in this Precept did Authorize or enjoyn the Drs. supposed Prelatical Power in Ordination as Competent to an higher Order of Bishops Superior to Prerbyters For the Drs. asserting the Office of Episcopacy and that of Timothy to be one and the same he therein beggs thâ— Question and supposes what he has to prove The Office of the Prelat and Evangelist being so vastly different as we have already made appear And therefore his Reason and Argument is pitifully absurd from our assertting the Power of Ordination as inherent to the Church upon the Ground of the Apostles Ordaining Presbyters and Evangelists to conclud the standing Office of Prelatical inspection or Ordination The Dr. should also know that the asserting that a Church Officer such as an Apostle hath an extraordinary Authority conversant about Ordination can neither infer that the Power of Ordination it self is extraordinary and expired nor that every Person Ordained hath an ordinary standing Function Which the â—postles extraordinary Authority in the first Planting of Presbyters while the Churches were in fieri as to their Organick Being their Ordaining Evangelists extraordinary Officers together with their exercing extraordinary Gifts and Authority as well in their Actings of the Power of Order and Preaching with Miraculous Gifts of Tongues and Confirming their Doctrins with Miracles as in Point of Jurisdiction their Extraordinary Censures above exprest doth evince and make evident The extraordinary Mission of the Twelve Apostles hath derived from it a Ministry and Ecclesiastick Authority diffused and spread among all the ' Church Officers in the World none of which doth Succeed them into the same formal Office So Timothy's Evangelistick extraordinary Authority is derived handed down into and seated in a Presbytrie tho the Evangelistick Office is extraordinary and as such not Succeeded unto The Service and Work of Teaching and Governing to continue in all Ages and in all times doth not render the Apostolick Mission or Commission ordinary nor infer their being Succeeded in idem Officium eundem Ministerii gradum the ordinary Power being Institut and settled in the Hands of ordinary Officers by a New warrand and Commission according to the Scripture Rules of Ordination The Office of Moses was not rendered ordinary because many Works of Government exercised by him were recommitted to the Elders of Israel and so the Case is here The Evangelists extraordinary Office and Commission necessary as that of the Apostles for the First founding of the Churches for Watering the Apostles Plantation Building up the Churches in their Organick being and settling all the ordinary Officers thereof is changed into the Presbytries ordinary Collegiat Power of Ordination and Jurisdiction which we find was in the Apostolick Church exercised and even in this of Ephesus For the Drs Proofs from Antiquity upon this head and touching Timothies Episcopacy over Ephesus they are sufficiently obviat by what is said above and in special by what we have offered and evinced anent the Fathers various acceptation of the Names of Bishop and Apostle The Dr. brings an Anonymous Author to prove that Timothy was Enthroned forsooth Bishop of the Metropolis of Ephesus by Paul A pityful Proof indeed and fit only for a nameless Author It being evident by the best searchers of Antiquity that the Office of Metropolitans had not a Being till several Ages after Timothy For Chrysostom his asserting that Timothy was intrusted with a Church or whole Nation If we shall assert that this is applicable to his transient or temporary Evangelistick Trust in correspondence to the extensive Office of Apostleship it says nothing to our purpose And the Dr. should know that Chrysostom upon Tit. 1.5 makes the Office of Bishop and Presbyter one and the same and therein cuts the Sinews of the Drs. design and arguing For other Authors who do call Timothy together with other Bishops then in being Apostles which the Dr. further Pleads it doth sufficiently evince what is said above of their improper equivocal acceptation of the Term since no person of Sense who ever Read the New Testament can take the Office of Apostle as delineat in Scripture to be applicable to Timothy far less to ordinary Bishops fixed in certain Posts Nay the Dr. himself and in contradiction to himself doth unawares bewray this in his Greek Citation of Theodoret who asserts that the Twelve Apostles were more strictly called so or rather according to the Truth of the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Apostles according to Truth or in very deed Clearly importing that the Name appropriat to other Officers was but used 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or improperly as any Minister or Messenger of Christ may be thus called And if this be Theodorets general Rule as the Dr calls it that the Twelve Apostles were only such
all the Power of Government in the person of the Bishop excluding wholly all Presbyters from any Interest therein So that the Dr. in this unwary Citation contradicts Ignatius and himself and makes Ignatius inconsistent with himself In his next Citation of his Epistle to the Ephesians wherein Reverence is enjoined to the Bishop as the Person appointed by the Lord and Master of the Family to be his Steward He hath again Wounded himself For to be a Steward having a subaltern Service and Ministry under the Authority of the Master and tyed up to his Orders is point blanck contrare unto and toto coelo different from that Principality of the highest Degree before ascribed to the Bishop and owned by the Dr. as his and Ignatius's Sense of the Episcopal Office Sure to be a Prince and a Steward in Government are distinct things and entirely and wholly opposit if we will take the Apostle Pauls word for it who disowns a Dominion and in stead thereof and in opposition thereunto owns a Stewardship in God's Family and humble Sevice or Ministry 1 Cor. 4.1 2 Cor. 1. Ult. But now the Dr. plyes us with Inferences from these Citations Whereof the first is That these Epistles were Written not above Eight or Nine years after the Decease of St. Iohn and yet Bishops are supposed to be in all Churches appointed by Christ and his Apostles and they were lookt upon as no Members of the Church who were not Subject to them That they were necessary in the very Constitution of Churches so that they were not within the Altar but without it who were not subject to them And therefore it may be concluded there were no Churches without them I Answer that Ignatius wrot his Epistles early no body will doubt but that such trashie stuff and anti-scriptural Fooleries as are above rehearsed was written by Ignatius and was his Sense of Church Government no Man of Sense or who hath any Respect to the Memory of that Martyr will believe And we find the contrair is asserted and made good by several of the Godly Learned Not to stand upon a more critical Answer and to challenge the Dr. to prove the Universal Sense and Practice of the Primitive Church at that time from the Sense and Sentiments of this Author tho admitted unless he could prove by some Authentick Acts the Judgment of the whole Church to be correspondent thereunto and that none who either wrot not or whose Writings may be lost were of contrary Judgment which he neither attempts to prove nor will ever be able The Drs. next Inference is That since there were Bishops so early in this Age presiding over the Churches they behoved to receive several of them at least their Episcopal Orders from the Apostles since Ignatius at the writing of these Epistles had been Forty Years Bishop of Antioch an eminent Church planted immediatly by St. Peter It being the constant practice of the Apostles to ordain Elders in all the Churches they planted c. Ans. The Dr. hath not made good from these Testimonies that there were de facto and de jure such Prelats as he pleads for Nor can he from this Ground perswad any rational Man of this unless he could evince two Things which he will do ad Calendas Graecas 1. Not only that what is asserted in the Passages above rehearsed was the genuine Sense and writing of Ignatius but likewise the Sense and Judgment as well as the practice of the whole Church at that time 2. That this supposed Judgment and Practice anent such an Officer as the Bishop is correspondent to the Scripture Account and Sense of the Church Officers mentioned in the New Testament and the Apostles Doctrin and Practice in point of Church Government and the Institution of the Officers thereof which he will also find another insuperable Difficulty Again his Reason here is very odd whereby he fortifies this Inference viz. That the Apostles ordained Elders in all the Churches they planted For if the Dr. hold these Elders to be Bishops as he needs must if he speak consequentially I would fain know First What shadow of Proof he can give for this and how he can suppose that all the Scripture Elders were such For if this be asserted then it follows that Bishops were set up when there were no Elders to presid over contrary to the Sense and Pleading of his Fellows except Dr. Hammond And next I would know how the Dr. upon this Supposition will keep off the Rock of a Contradiction and that both to himself and Ignatius Since he makes Ignatius to distinguish the Bishops and the Elders and himself holds that the Elders with St. Iames at Ierusalem when the Apostle Paul went in to them were mere Presbyters or Pastors Again if the Dr. argue from their ordaining Elders to their ordaining Ignatius a Bishop as he thus disowns Dr. Hammonds Arguments and Notion who takes still the Elders for Prelats so he is obliged to prove the super-institution of Bishops over these Elders in every Church not to suppose it only else in his principles these Churches where mere Elders were placed were manck and wanted the power of Jurisdiction And since he has produced nothing from Scripture that proves such an institution of Bishops or such ordinary Officers fixed to certain Diocesses his Dream of Ignatius is as easily rejected by us as affirmed by him We read of a Church of Antioch planted by Paul and of an Eldership and Company of Teaching Prophets there who imposed Hands upon Paul and Barnabas when sent out among the Gentiles and are consequently supposed to be the subject of a Jurisdictional Power and Government But of the Apostle Peter his planting an Hierarchical Prelat of the Drs. Mould in either of the Antiochs the Scripture is utterly silent And a Supposition necessarly ensuing hereupon viz. That the Apostles planted Churches with different Moulds of Government sufficiently discovers the Absurdity of such an Opinion As for Chrysostom Tom. 5. edit Savil. p. 99. his admiring of Ignatius Dignity obtained by the Hands of Apostles laid upon him It is a very blunt and headless Proof of that Episcopal Dignity which the Dr. alledges For doth not the Dr. think that the Office of the Scripture Bishop is a great Dignity And he should prove not suppose only that Ignatius was by the Apostles installed a Bishop of his Mould or that Chrysostom understood this Dignity in his Sense which as he offers not to do so if attempting it he could not chuse but set Chrysostom by the Ears with himself who as is above cleared asserts the Identity of the Office of Bishop and Presbyter The same I repone to what the Dr. alledgeth P. 410 of Polycarp his supposed Episcopacy in Smyrna as also what is made good by many Protestant Divines viz. That the Fathers and Ancients used the Name of Bishops in a general Sense that the first 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or
and monopolized in him And if we will admit of after suposed Decrees and Fables of this Nature opposit to Scripture we may make them as some Papists blaspheme them a Nose of Wax Again If the Dr. adhere to this phantastick Apocryphal History he crosses his own Pleading from Scripture and wounds his Cause to Death with his own hands For we have heard the great strength of his Scripture Argument as touching the Apostles setting up succeedanous Apostles and Bishops in correspondence to Christs Institution lyes in the supposed instalment of Timothy Bishop of Ephesus and Titus Bishop of Crete and that the instructions addrest to them in Point of Government in these Epistles are a clear indication yea and Demonstration in the Drs Sense and Pleading of this supposed instalment of the one and the other by the Apostles in these their pretended Diocesses of Ephesus and Crete and we know how much the Dr. labours to prove the consentient Judgment of the Fathers hereanent Now if the Dr. will hold with Bishop Taylor that the Apostles with their own hands installed not Timothy but Onesimus Bishop of Ephesus and Titus not Bishop of Crete but of Corinth what is become of all his pleadings from Scripture for their installment elsewhere The Dr. says The supposed Instalment of Titus and Onesinus at Ephesus and Corinth and that by the Apostles own Hands is most certain if we believe Ecclesiastical History And if most certain upon this Ground then most certain it is 1. That the Drs. Pleadings for Timothy's and Titus's Instalment at Ephesus and Crete is most false and all his pretended Scripture Proofs by his own Confession mere wind and lies And 2 ly That all the Dr's Testimonies of Fathers and pretended Historical accounts hereanent are Fabulous Dreams I know no imaginable evasion the Dr. hath but to alledge their after-instalment in these places by the Apostles But the Dr. must give a Scripture-account as well as Historical of this matter ere a door can be opened to him for this Refuge But to proceed The Dr's Third Inference is that the Bishops of this Age were lookt on as a Superior Order to Presbyters Ignatius commanding Presbyters to obey them according to Christs Institution Ans. we have heard what Judgment we are to make of these Epistles and consequently what a sandy Foundation the Dr. builds this inference upon Again if the Dr. will make Ignatius consistent with himself he must needs disown this Inference and Opinion of him For in his Epistle to the Trallians he enjoyns them to be Subject to the Presbytrie as the Apostles of Christ and calls the Presbytrie 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Court and Conjunction of Apostles of Christ And in the same Epistle he call the Colledge of Presbyters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 making the Bishop thus their Fellows in the Government and nothing else And how far this is from the Dr's supposition of Ignatius Judgment about the Hierarchy and the Practice of the Church in this Point let any Judg. The Dr. proceeds to his Proofs from the next Age further as he tells us from the Scripture Antiquity And no doubt the more Dark in this Point He tells us of Iustin Martyr in his Apology to the Emperour Antonius who speaks of a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or President in the Church who Consecrat the Bread and Wine gave to the Deacons to distribut to the present and to be carryed to the absent And that this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was Bishop he tells us appears by Dionysius Bishop of Corinth his Contemporary who used the Names of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Bishop promiscuously A sorry Proof no doubt The Churches had a President or these called by Iustin so Therefore Bishops with sole Power of Ordination and Jurisdiction and holding the entire Apostolick Office Again these Presidents are called sometimes Bishops and gets that general Name Therefore they were such Bishops and of such a Mould as the Dr. pleads for What Arguing can be more insipid and Vain But if the Dr. put a due Value upon the Argument drawn from Epithets as Pointing at the Office and Authority of the Persons thereby designed what thinks he of the Spirit of GOD in Scripture his Denominating Pasters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. as we have above cleared One would think this as strong a Proof of their Episcopal Authority as this of the supposed Bishops drawn from this Epithet of Iustin and Dionisius I might further Argue and press the Dr. thus If these Scripture Denominations do prove and argue an Essential Interest and Authority in Church Government competent to Pastors they do by necessary consequence overturn the Peculiarity of a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Presidency ascribed to the Bishop as set over Pastors and enhancing all this Authority and do by further consequence inferr either that Fathers contradicted the Scripture if attributing this Prostacie to the Bishops in the Dr's Sense or that if they speak according to the Scripture Sense and acceptation of the Word they must needs mean the Pastor only and not his imaginary Prelat And so whatever Sense the Dr. imbraces of Iustin and Dionisius his Cause and Pleading here is lost and falls to the Ground Moreover if the Dr. stand to this supposed account of the Bishops Office offered by Iustin he will make the Administration of the Lords Supper peculiar to him against the Dr's own Sense and Pleading who acknowledges that Preaching of the Word and Administration of the Sacraments are the proper Duties of the Pastoral Function whereas here it is made peculiar to the Bishop to Consecrat the Bread and Wine Besides that the Dr. here apparently approves the carrying of the Sacrament to the absent a seed of gross Popish Superstitions But I am weary of this pityful trash As for the Dr's Citation of Euseb. lib. 4. Cap. 23. And the Five Books of Hegesippus the Fragments whereof he says are in Eusebius's History anent the Succession of Bishops of Rome Anicetus Soter Eleutherius succeeding Sucessively and of Iames Bishop of Ierusalem succeeded by Simon Cleophae Euseb. lib. 4. Cap. 22. And thereafter that Dionisius Bishop of Corinth in his Epistles mentions Publius and Quadratus Successive Bishops of Athens and several other Bishops in their Respective Sees It is Answered this is abundantly obviat and removed by what is premised First Anent the suspected Credit and Faith of his vouchers whom as we have heard the learned does Censure and disown which has no small confirmation from this that Eusebius himself in the Proaem of his History Professes that he is entred into a dark Desert having no footsteps of Historians going before him but only some petty Narrations which certain persons in certain times and places have left And for Hegesippus whose Fragments the Dr. Confesses is all Eusebius's Foundation in this Point he is by most Famous Protestant Writers acknowledged fabulous and unworthy of Credit besides that no
Sense the whole Church by joynt Determination had simul semel made this Alteration it is evident that he charges the Error upon the Church as a Recess from the Divine Path but not at all upon the Divine Appointment it self which he diligently distinguishes from and sets in Opposition to this Custom and Practice of the Church So that the absurd Reflection upon the Apostles Government and the Wisdom of our Saviour the Dr. may see to be lodged nearer home viz. not only upon these who first brought in this Human Prostasie especially such as Scrued it up to an Hierarchical Primacy which is so cross to the Apostolick Parity but also and in a singular manner to be chargeable upon these who uphold it after its many Evils are discovered Ierom asserts only the Matter of Fact viz. That this Imparity was brought in for Remedy of Schism but leaves the chargâ— of Reflecting upon the Apostolick Government upon the Authors of this Innovation And upon the Promotters thereof it must still ly The Dr. alledges That Iorom approves of this as a Wise aâ—d Prudent Action An odd Approbation indeed To approvâ— a Custom or Action as Wise and Prudent which he holds to be opposit to the Divine Appointment For his proof viz. That Ierom asserts the Safety of the Church to depend upon the Authority of the High Priest or Bishop to whom if Supreme Authority be not given there would be as many Schisms as Priests As the Dr. has pointed us to none of Ieroms Writings for Proof of this so as we have cleared above Ierom and the Ancients in such Allusive Expressions intend nothing else but a Distinction of Offices in the Gospel Ministry and to assert the Authority thereof Blond Sect. 3. P. 135. shews out of diverse Councils their expressing the Gospel Ministry under the Character of Priests and Levites And I dare referr it to this Dr or any Man of Sense if a grosser Contradiction or Non-sense could ever fall into any Mans Thought than to hold the Necessity of an Hierarchical Bishop with Supreme Authority and yet the Necessity of a Divine Appointment to the contrary That which the Dr. calls the Unavoidable Consequence of Jerom 's Hypothesis viz. That the Church had gone to Ruine if a Wiser Form of Government than that of Apostles had not been taken up to supply its Defect We have made appear to be a very easily avoided Consequence and by no Twist of Reason to be deducible from Ierom's Hypothesis and that the Dr in drawing such a Consequence has in stead of Ierom involved himself in absurd Deductions He calls this Testimony of Jerom the only considerable Objection against the Universal Conformity of the Primitive Church to Episcopal Government And therein discovers his small and slender Reading in this Controversie since he might have seen in Blondel Salmasius and many others many more considerable Objections And this one we have found so very considerable that it hath quit baffled and born down the Dr's mean and inconsiderable Answers But to proceed In the close of this Section P. 421. the Dr. flies high in these his supposed victorious Answers to Jerom's Testimony telling us that the Apostolick Superiority of Bishops being handed down by Testimonies from Age to Age it s as unreasonable to reject the same as the Canon of the Scriptures thence derived The Dr. here discovers what Spirit he is of I had alwise thought that the Divine Impression of the Scripture Canon the intrinsick infallible evidences of a Divine inspiration had been the great ground of the Churches reception not its being handed down to us from former generations or the First receivers And that our Divines had alwise distinguished the Church and former Generations Testimony and recommendation from the innate Essential evidences of its Divine Authority as to the Ground of our Faith and reception But however I shall tell him that he should have exhibited as full and Divine proof and unanimous recommendation of all the Churches for his hierarchical Prelacy as there is for the Scripture Canon before he had offered such an high flown notion Before I part with the Dr. upon this head I must needs tho I have a little before touched it take notice of two pieces of signal unsoundnness and unfair dealing in this Matter of Jerom's Testimony First That in all his Animadversions and muster of Episcopal strength against it he doth not in the least take notice of Jeroms Scripture proofs of the parity of Bishop and Presbyter in correspondence to our Sense and Pleading Upon Philip 1.1 He argues That many Bishops are saluted by Paul in that Church and that it could not have many of the Diocesian stamp That therefore the Apostle speaks indifferently of Bishops and Presbyters as one and the same That Act. 20. Paul called the Elders of Ephesus Bishops set up by the Holy Ghost and that therefore he owned the Elders of that one City as Bishops That in the Epistle to the Hebrews the care of the Churches is divided among many obey them that have the Rule over you for they watch for your Souls That Peter called so from the firmness of his Faith exhorts thus the Elders the Elders which are among you I exhort who am also an Elder and Witness of the sufferings of Christ Feed the Flock of God which is among you not by constraint but willingly c. These things I write saith Ierom to shew that among the Ancients Bishops and Presbyters were one and the same and that by little and little the care was devolved upon one Now what says the Dr. to these his Arguings upon the Apostles Doctrin If they are not found why doth he not discover his mistake If they hold good the Dr's exceptions evanish unto Wind. As for instance That Ierom is too late a Witness that he is a Witness in his own Cause that he talks otherwise when not byassed with partiality c. For if these Reasonings be sound his Witness is both a most early and Divine Witness and in the cause of God and Truth And whatever other Testimony he may be supposed to give this Divine Testimony ought to be preferred wherein there can be no partiality unless the Dr. will impute partiality to the Divine Oracles and the Decision of the Holy GOD of Truth in this Point This also answers the Drs quible about a Decree Apostolick as the Ground of the Change of Government and that Ierom could mean no such thing since none can be so brutish as to impute to the Apostles a contradictory Decree to their own Doctrin As also that other exception of his evanishes upon this Ground Viz. That no such Decree of the Church was Recorded And that therefore there was none such For say it was either a Decree or gradual Custom if cross to the Apostolick Doctrin it ought to be rejected Thus also appears the Folly of his last exception That he imputes to the Apostolick
the Scriptures of a privat Interpretation as if the Prophesie had come by the will of Man For if I must believe no otherwise anent the Office of these Angels and the Scriptures pointing out the same than according to the human Testimony of after-Writers or the Testimony and Practice of supposed Bishops their pretended Successors then the custom and practice of fallible Men becomes the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the ratio and demonstration a priori the great and chief ground why I believe Scriptures to have such a Sense and no other And thus we will give Men a Dominion over our Faith which resolves ultimatly into an human practice and Testimony of fallible Men A Principle which no sound Protestant will own Besides that the proof of the Assumption of the Argument and to instruct this Matter of Fact and that all Primitive Antiquity as he calls it doth testify for the Bishop which he has shapen out would inextricably baffle his indeavours as is above cleared It being evident that as the Writings of many of the First Writers are lost and not a fâ—w corrupted So many Eminent for Piety and Learning have written nothing in the First Ages which are therefore generally acknowledged to be very dark in the Matter of Fact The Affirmative proof lying upon the Dr. he is obliged to make it appear that neither the one nor the other has contradicted his supposed Testimonies else he but beats the Air and has said nothing to the purpose Thirdly The Scripture as hath been proved ascribing to Pastors the Power of Order and Jurisdiction and even to the Pastors or Presbyters of the Church of Ephesus the Angel whereof is First here addrest Act. 20.28 Compared with 1. Tim. 4.14 1. Pet. 5.2.3 1 Cor. 5.4.5 When this Scripture account of the Office and Authority of Pastors which surely is Antiquity prior to the Dr's most Primitive Antiquity and of far greater veneration stands cross to his pretended Primitive Testimonies of the Bishops Power and both are laid in even Ballances together which of the two will preponderat The Dr. for shame will not say the Second Hence I inferr that he must either accord his Human Testimonies with Scripture or quite this Plea And next he must acknowledg that he stands obliged to Answer the premised Scripture accounts of the Pastors Office and our Arguments drawn therefrom before his Human Testimonies deserve the least value or notice Again Fourthly We may here ply â—he Dr with a Notion and Argument of his own Mould The Dr. thinks it strange how we can suppose the Church to have so suddenly altered the Government from Presbytrie to Episcopacy if Presbytrie was her first Government But I would ask the Dr since its evident in Scripture that Pastors and Presbyters have both the Name and Thing of the Scripture Bishop and consequently Episcopal Authority ascribed to them yea and in the premised Scriptures several such paralells its actual Exercise supposed to be inherent in and competent to them And in special since the Elders and Pastors of the Church of Ephesus are enjoyned by Paul in his last Farewel to exercise Episcopal Authority joyntly over that Church without the least Hint of any Episcopal President over them and this after all his Prescriptions to Timothy and the Exercise of his Evangelistick Office there whence came all this sudden Universal Change in Iohns time that all this Episcopal Authority competent before to Pastors of Churches and particularly of Ephesus is Monopolized in the Person of one Bishop How came all the Churches of Asia to be so suddenly cast in this Mould And to press the Querie a little further if there was such an Universal Authority of Bishops in Iohns time and thus acknowledged and attested by all the Primitive Antiquity as the Dr. pretends yea and acknowledged by Ierom himself as well as by Augustin and Ambrose how comes Ierom to say that even in his time the Elders were subject to the Bishop by Custom not Divine Dispensation Comment on Tit. and on Isai. 3. that they had in his time Caetus Presbyterorum a Meeting or Court of Presbyters which he calls an Apostolick Senat How comes a Presbytrie to be mentioned in the Council of Ancyra Canon 18 How comes Ambrose or a Father Coetaneous to him upon Eph. 4. to assert that after the Church was enlarged caepit alio modo gubernari it began to be Governed after another manner than at first and that non per omnia conveniunt c. the Government of the Church in his time was not every way suteable and square to the Apostolick Appointment How comes Augustin Epist. 10. to assert with Ierom that by Custom of the Church Episcopatus was major Presbyterio How comes Firmiliâ—nus apud Cyprian Epist. 78. to assert that the Pastors or Presbyters possident ordinandi potestatem possesses the Power of Ordination And these Presbyters he calls Praepositi Presidents or Rulers using that very Term from which the Dr. draws the Episcopal Authority of these Angels Yea Chrysostom on 1 Tim. asserts that inter Presbyterum Episcopum inter est ferme nihil there is almost no difference betwixt the Bishop and Presbyter and that which is spoken by Paul to the one agrees also to the other Now if there be such Harmony in the Testimony of the Ancients in point of the Bishops Power as the Dr. pretends I would fain know what means this immusical Jarring and palpable Contradiction to his Assertion and even by these very Fathers whom he brings for his Vouchers Hence Fifthly it appears that the Dr's Proofs from these Testimonies and his pretended Argument from all Primitive Antiquity is pitifully Lame and short of his Design upon two important Grounds 1. That his Witnesses are not Harmonious several of them giving a palpably Cross Testimony to him 2. In that they do not assert that sole Authority of Bishops and that absolute Inhanced Power which he alledges For no Man of Sense can draw this Consequence from the general Name of Bishops used by him or from a simple calling of them Presidents will conclud them to be such as he pretends yea and not such de Facto far less Iure Divino since in other places they are found clear and positive in a contrary Assertion And therefore unless the Dr. will Stage these Fathers whom he mentions as the most Arrant Self-contradicting Non-sensical Fools that ever Spoke or Wrote he must needs acknowledg with us that they use the Term Bishop in a general Sense and as common both to such 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Presidents as had then obtained and to other Pastors So that in such Characters appropriat to such Persons they could neither understand an Episcopal Presidency founded upon a Divine Right and Apostolical Institution as the Dr. pretends nor such an absolute Power as swallows up and Inhances all Authority of Pastors in Government which he also asserts This considered with what is above offered doth so fully
Scandals as also the proper Subject of the Keyes and Iurisdictional Power and of that Power in special which is called Critick The Dr. holds That Christ here established a Iurisdiction in the Church he also acknowledges That the Church here meant hath Power of Authoritative Admonition and the Binding and Loosing Power since he holds it to be the same with that Binding and Loosing Authority which our Lord promises to Ratifie in Heaven Iohn 20.23 Matth. 16.19 He understands by this Jurisdiction this Authority and Exercise of the Keyes pointed at in these Paralells Nay he acknowledges P. 443. That in the Forecited Passage Matth. 18. our Lord institut the Power of Censuring And I need not tell him that Words of Institution of any Ordinance are the proper Standart and Measure thereof and the Pattern shewed upon the Mount Now what is meant by the Church the proper Subject of the Keyes in the Dr's Sense and Pleading is the Question The Dr. will not say it is the Political Magistrat as some have alledged for he holds That our Lord spoke this to his Church as a distinct Society and having distinct Officers from the Kingdoms of the World And whereas some have alledged that we are to understand this Church of a Iewish Sanehedrin the Dr in the whole Strain and Scope of his Discourse disownes this for he asserts That in this Text our Lord is speaking to the Christian Church and establishing a Spiritual Jurisdiction therein Neither can he understand by the Church the whole Collective Body according to the general Notion of the Word for the Dr in the Strain of his Discourse makes this Power and Authority peculiar and proper to Church Officers as is evident in his Paralells above-rehearsed and the Church Representative to be the proper Subject of that Jurisdictional Power here enjoyned Now all this being evident in his own Pleading since the proper Subject of this Power is by our Lord exprest who knew best how to express it by the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Church I would fain know by what Warrand the Dr. can can make this Term peculiar to one single Person viz. a Bishop so as it must be holden to express his sole Prerogative Or where will he shew or make it appear that in any Greek Author Sacred or Prophane the Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 denotes one single Person If he say that by the Church the Community of Church Rulers or Bishops is to be understood viz. that all Bishops in common and every Bishop apart hath this Power and Authority I Answer this understood of Scripture Bishops or Church Officers in general and of such Church Officers of particular Collegiat Churches is easily accorded But if he mean of his Hierarchical Bishops in Bulk and of every one of such a part he both Beggs the Question and Crosses the Scope of the Place For 1. Howsoever we take the Term 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Church whether for the Church Universal to whom Officers and a Government is given immediatly or for particular Churches to whom in a mediat Sense the same Government and Charge is given we must of necessity understand it to be given to such parts of this whole as do come under the Denomination and partake of the Nature of a Church and according to the Dr's Sense above-evinced an Imbodied Society or Juridical Court must in that Statute be understood which can never be applicable to a single Person And besides this would invert our Lords Method of Procedure and the Gradation here held out and enjoyned which is as the Dr. himself acknowledges from one to two or more and the last Result and ultimat Appeal is to the Church or the Imbodied Court of Officers with whom the Jurisdictional and Critical Power is lodged 2 ly Granting that this Jurisdictional Power in Order to the first Planting of Churches was for this end at first lodged with the Apostles yet the fore-mentioned great Rule and Fundamental Law as above Sensed and in a great Measure by the Dr. himself will still evince that the Apostles were not to Exercise it to the prejudice of the Authority given thereby to the standing Officers and ordinary Authorized Courts of the Christian Church unless they can be supposed to have had a Power Paramount thereunto For wherever a Christian Organick Chuch was gathered by vertue of this Precept tell the Church the Scandals were to be delated to the Officers thereof who consequently according to the Nature and Tenor of the foresaid Law are supposed to have the Binding and Loosing Power whatever Apostolical Authority might reach in Churches not Constitut or in way of Apostolical Direction to Churches Constitut as in the Case of the Incestuous Corinthian yet this was not Privative of but Cumulative to the ordinary Power of Collegiat Organick Churches as is often told him I might further urge the Dr. with this that that Passage Iohn 20.23 cannot but be extended to a Doctrinal as well as Iurisdictional Remitting or Retaining Binding or Loosing the Doctrinal Key as well as Jurisdictional being Primarly given to Apostles to be by them derived to Successors Our Lord in his Gift to Apostles divided them not And therefore neither were the Apostles to divide them in Devolving this Power upon and Committing this Authority to Successors And since the Dr. acknowledges that the Apostles by virtue of our Lords Commission Devolved upon Pastors the Doctrinal Authority and Committed to them that Key thus P. 427 428. why not I pray the Jurisdictional also both being inseparably tyed together Nay the Dr. himself upon the Matter yields this for he tells us ubi supra That the Command Go Teach all Nations Math. 28.19 did reach Pastors as the Apostles Successors in this Ministerial Duty and that Preaching was one of the principal Imployments belonging to the Apostolical Office And if the Apostles were to commit to Pastors one principal part of their Office why not also the less principal Besides that the Command Go Teach or Disciple all Nations will clearly includ the Jurisdictional as well as Doctrinal Key The Dr. adds ibid. That yet this Command of Preaching was not restrained to their Office since inferior Officers Preacht as the seventy Yet he adds That none Preacht but either by immediat Commission from Christ or Apostolical Ordination But I pray were any in his Sense otherwise allowed to exercise Disciplin but in this method Why will not the Dr. allow the exercise of Disciplin to the Seventy and such a Mission of Rulers consequently For Timothy whom together with the Seventy he probably Judges to have held an Evangelistick Office he pleads had Authority both to Teach and Rule And the Teachers Act. 13. he holds to be Bishops So that in his Sense Government being annexed in these instances thereunto the Lord did extraordinarly call in these times of the Church some persons who were not Apostles Therefore his Reason is insufficient to prove that the
atque Inspectioni Commissam non enim alicujus in alios Ministros Autoritatis aut alicujus prae aliis Prerogativae sed sâ—lius istius Curae ac Vigilantiae Respectu Episcoporum Titulo in Sacris Literis Insigniuntur That the Bishops are called such not with Relation to any supposed Subordinat Bishops or Presbyters but to the Church committed to their Vigilant Care in which Respect alone they have that Title in Scripture but not upon the Account of any Prerogative or Authority which one Minister has over another Which how clearly it asserts our Judgment Principles and Pleading upon these Texts in Opposition to the Hierarchical Bishop and for the Parity of Pastors is convincingly evident But let us hear their Inference Thes. 30. which is thus Non ergo ex Divino sed ex Humano Instituto aliquis post Apostolorum tempora aliis ex Ordine Presbyterorum fuit Authoritate praepositus atque Episcopus dictus ex singulari Prerogativa sicut post Hieronimum non-nulli quoque Pontificii confitentur nominatim Lombard Lib. 4. Distinct. 24. Gratian Dist. 93. c. Legimus Dist. 25. c. olim Cusanus de Concord Cathol Lib. 2. Cap. 13. Citing first Ierom on Tit. 1. ad Evag. In summ that the Setting of one Presbyter over another in a supposed Supereminent Authority and Peculiar Prerogative under the Character and Designation of a Bishop is an Humane Invention only without any Divine Warrand as not only Hierom but several Popish School Men have acknowledged The Professors of Saumur speak also our Sense here fully Syntag. Thes. Theolog. de Divers Minist Evang. Grad Thes. 7. They hold the Office of Apostles Prophets and Evangelists to be Extraordinary and Expired making peculiar to them their immediat Call Infallibility in Teaching their Universal Legation to all Churches their Extraordinary and Miraculous Gifts c. The Pastors and Doctors Office they hold Ordinary and affirm they are the same with Presbyters planted in every Church Thes. 16.20 de Episcop Presb. Discrimine Thes. 7.8 they shew that the Apostles placed Presbyters Church by Church for the Government thereof citing Act. 14.23 and 20.17 28. where they Collect that these Presbyters were Commanded 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to take heed to the Flock and are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from which they infer that it belonged to them to Watch over Inspect to see unto and take Care for such things as tended to the Conservation Propagation and Growth of the Church Adding Quod fieri sine Regiminis Cura Potestate non potest which could not be performed without the Care and Authority of Government Thes. 9. They assert that Pastors being thus in the beginning Constitute by the Apostles they did according to the Apostles Command and from the Nature of the Office Intrusted to them ex Officio sibi ab Apostolis demandato Govern the Church Communi Consilio by Common Counsel according to Hierom's Phrase Communibus Suffragiis Communi Solicitudine Cura by Common and Equal Suffrage and Care Adding Nullus tum eorum in reliquos Sym-Presbyteros Autoritatem Potestatem Imperium aut Iurisdictionem habuit sed par equalis Cura Solicitudo omnibus singuâ—is in totum Gregem competebat that in these First times no Presbyter or Pastor had Authority Power or Jurisdiction over his Fellow-Presbyters but the same and alike Care and solicitude over the whole Flock was competent to every one Thes. 10. they shew That tho there was one who as in every Colledge or Juridical Court was Primus or President yet that Primatus was Ordinis duntaxat non Authoritatis Potestatis Dominii Imperii Iurisdictionis sic enim non fuissent Sym-Presbyteri quomodo passim vocantur in Patrum Scriptis of Order only not of Authority and not importing a Iurisdictional Power and Dominion For thus they had not been Collegues or Co-Presbyters as they were every where called in the Writings of the Fathers Thes. 14. they shew That things being thus Constitute by the Apostles as every one of these Presbyters had not only the Authority and Power of Preaching the Word and Administration of the Sacraments Verum etiam pari Iure pari Autoritate ad Ecclesiae Clavum Gubernaoula sedebant quam ut dixi Communi Consilio Communibus Suffragiis regebant That with the same Authority also and Equal Jurisdiction Ministers did sit at the Churches Helm and Governed her by Common Suffrages Adding Quod hinc liquot quod omnes communiter Presbyteri Episcopi pariter in Scriptis Apostolicis adeoque Vetustioribus Scriptoribus vocantur promiscue That Pastors are called both Bishops and Presbyters promiscuously in the Apostles Writings makes the preceeding Assertion apparent Then they add the Scripture Proofs thus Id quod satiâ— manifestum ex loco Act. 20.28 Ubi Ephesinae Ecclesiae Presbyteri dicuntur â— Spiritu Sancto constituti Ecclesiae illius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 tam ex Philip. 1.1 Ubi Apostolus Epistolam suam inscribit Ecclesiae illius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nulla factâ— Presbyterorum mentione quos Episcoporum nomine isthic procul dubio intelligit Nunquam enim plures fuerunt in eadem Ecclesia Episcopi ex quo Episcopus singularem habuit ac praecipuam supra Presbyteros Autoritatem atque Potestatem ejusque Manus distinctum fuit a Presbyteriali Munere atque Ordine That the Parity of Bishop and Presbyter appears from Act. 20.28 where the Presbyters of the Church of Ephesus are said to be Constitute Bishops of the Church by the Holy Ghost As also from Philip. 1.1 where the Apostle inscribes his Epistle to the Bishops and Deacons of that Church making no mention of Presbyters whom without doubt he understands by the Name of Bishops For there were never more Bishops in the same Church since the time that the Bishop had a Singular Power and Authority above Presbyters and his Office was distinguished from the Order and Office of Pastors Then they add Thes. 15. Id ipsum manifestam ex 1 Tim. 3.2 Opportet Episcopum esse irreprehensibilem c. nulla mentione facta Presbyteri Nam si alias tum fuiâ—set Episcopus alius Presbyter Paulus isthic Presbyterum non omisisset sed adjecisset eadem in Presbytero requiri vel si alia aut pauciora in eo requiri voluisset id procul dubio monuisset alioqui ea in parte Officio suo Defuisset That the same appears from 1 Tim. 3.2 A Bishop must be blameless c. without mentioning the Presbyter For if the Bishop and Presbyter had been then distinct Paul would not in this place have omitted the Presbyter but would have added that the same things were required in him or if he would have required either other or fewer things in him he would without doubt have admonished hereof otherwise in so far he had been wanting in his Duty They add Idem liquet ex Tit. 1.5 7. Nam ubi dixit Titum se reliquisse in Creta
Cap. olim Dist. 95. He adds that these who have Laboured in Reforming the Church these Five Hundred Years have Taught that all Pastors be they Entitled Bishops or Priests have equal Authority and Power by Gods Word Citing first the Waldenses in Aeneas Silvius Hist. of Bohem. Cap. 35. Next Marsilius Patavinus Defens Pacis Part. 2. Cap. 15. Wickliff c. If the Testimony of Bishops will please the Dr we will find Bishop Iewel fully Combats him in this Point Defens Apol. cont Hard. Edit An. 1570. P. 243. What meaneth Mr. Harding saith he to make it an Heresie to say that by the Scriptures of God a Bishop and Priest are all one Knows he how far and to whom he reaches the Name of an Heretick Then he Cites Chrystos on 1 Tim. Hom. 11. shewing that inter Episcopum Presbyterum interest ferme nihil Betwixt a Bishop and Presbyter there is almost no Difference Ierom ad Evagrium asserting that Apostolus perspiâ—ue docet eosdem esse Presbyteros quos Episcopos The Apostle clearly Teaches the Bishop and Presbyter to be one and the same calling the contrary Opinion a Vecordia or Folly Also August Quest. Vet. N. Test. Quest. 101. Quid est Episcopus nisi primus Presbyter That the Bishop is only the first Presbyter Amb. de Dignit Sacerd. Episcopi Presbyteri una est Ordinatio Asserting that the Ordination and consequently the Function of the Bishop and Presbyter is one and the same All these and many more Holy Fathers saith Bishop Iewel together with St. Paul the Apostle for thus saying by Mr. Hardings Advice must be holden for Hereticks I will add and all these and many more together with the Apostle Paul by this Dr's Advice must be holden for Novelists and Scots Schismaticks But there are other Bishops will yet enter the Lists with our Dr Bishop Pilkinton on Revelation and in the Treatise of Burning of Pauls Church Bishop Bilson Perpet Gover. Cap. 2. Yea more of the Famous English Drs. Fulk against the Rhemists on Tit. 1.5 Dr. Humphray in Campian Duraeum Iesuitas Part. 2. Ration 3. Whittaker above Cited So also ad Rationes Campiani Ration 6. Confutat Duraei Lib. 6. Chemnitius Gentiletus the great Examinators of the Council of Trent the one a Divine the other a Lawyer doth both Condemn as a Trent Error our Dr's Assertion anent the Distinction of Bishop and Presbyter the one by Scriptures and Fathers the other by the Canon Law We have heard that Dr. Reynolds for this Parity of Bishop and Presbyter tells us It s needless to speak of the particular Persons since it s the common Judgment of the Churches of Helvetia Savoy France Scotland Germany Hungary Poland the Low Countreys and our own Witness the Harmony of Confessions Sect. 11. Now from all that is said whether the Body of Protestant Divines and Churches be not for the Official as well as Nominal Identity of Bishop and Presbyter Whether this be not likewise the Judgment of the most Ancient and Purer Church Whether our Argument be only a Confusione Nominum and Sophistical and Childish Is left to the Judgment of Judicious and Impartial Readers who shall Weigh what is said in the Ballances of Scripture and Sound Reason Before I proceed I cannot but take notice of this Dr's petulant impertinency in proposing our Argument He says this is our great Argument That there is no distinction betwixt a Bishop and Presbyter in Scripture And therefore we conclude that our Argument a Confusione nominum is demonstrative and solid As if when we maintain that in Scripture there is no distinction betwixt these Offices we meant a Nominal only and not a real diversity Had he ever perused the Authors he Cites or conferred with any Presbyterian who understands the Controversy he would have found that from the Scriptures Cited and many Paralels it s an Official oneness not a Nominal only we plead for and that our Arguments therefrom has such Nerves as he durst not medle with The Dr. tells us P. 23. That whether the Bishop be of an Higher Order than the Priest falls not under his enquiry nor is it very Material considered with Respect to the common Priesthood and Subordinat Officers they might be of the same Order tho at other times when Authority and Iurisdiction is Named the Bishop with regard to his Dignity and Power is alwise reckoned above a Presbyter Here I must say is a strange Confusion and that not Nominum but Rerum 1. The Dr. is so much for the Official Scriptural Superiority of the Bishop to the Presbyter that he affirms the Contrar Assertion to be a New opinion got into the Heads of his Countrymen and some others but never heard of this 1400 years For curing of which he has sent down this Learned Pamphlet yet he will not enquire whether a Bishop be of a higher Order or not to a Presbyter i. e. He will not enquire whether his Country-men or he have the Right in this Debate If the Bishop be not of an Higher Order his Countrey Presbyterians are Right their Arguments which ly level to this scope are good and Conclusive and do batter his Principle of a Superior Order of Ministers above the Pastor and in especial under this Designation and Character of Bishop The Antithesis whereof viz. that there is an Officer called a Bishop of a Superior Order eo no nine the Dr. Contends for tanquam pro aris focis yet he says the enquiry into this Point which to all men of Sense is the Cardo Questionis is not in it self Material Let any ponder whether this stout pretended Signifer doth not here let fall his Standart and even flees at the First alarm 2. He tells us when Authority and Iurisdiction is named the Bishop with regard to his Dignity is alwise reckoned above a Presbyter Now I do appeal to all Men of Common sense whether the Dr dos not here Assert 1. A Divine Authority and Jurisdiction of a Bishop above a Presbyter 2 By clear Consequence that he is of an higher Order than the Presbyter or else how can he be in Jurisdiction and Authority above him 3. That the Bishop under that Character and eo nomine is thus Represented in the Scripture Accounts of him Now all this being his Assertion in opposition to his Country-mens supposed Errors how can he decline the enquiry whether the Bishop be of an higher Order Let any Judge if he says not this upon the Matter the thing is Clear in it self in the Scripture Accounts and this I maintain in opposition to the Scots Presbyterians whom I do hereby Charge with a new Opinion on this Ground but am not Concerned to Examin their Arguments or make good my own 3. He tells us they are sometime considered as of the same order with respect to the common Priesthood I Answer we have proved that Presbyters or Pastors have both name and thing of all ordinary Ministerial
Authority appropriat to them and that with Relation thereto the Bishop and the Presbyter are in Scripture made one and the same 2. When he says they are made of the same Order with respect to the Priesthood common to either He speaks Confusedly and Ignorantly For will he say that the attributing to Two Church Officers who are different the same Geneal or to speak to the Dr's Scope the same Generical Priesthood or Ministry will inferr that they are of the same order therein or specifical Office If so then Apostles who are called Presbyters or Elders he must say are of the same Order with them yea with Deacons also since sometimes their Office and Ministry is represented by such a term as Represents a Deaconate or common service Further I must here warn the Doctor to take up his Shield and beware of the Rebound of his own Blow Was our Lord of the same Order with the Prophets or Servants of God because in the capacity of Mediator and with Respect to a general Ministry or Service of the Father he gets the Designation name and thing of Prophet Messenger and Servant of God Will the Dr. thus Blasphemously degrade him into the same Order with mere Creatures who are Prophets and Servants In a word let us hold the Dr to his affirmative and challenge his proof of this Point viz. That in Scripture there is an ordinary standing Church Officer exhibit under the Character and designation of a Bishop who is alwise Reckoned above a Presbyter or Pastor when Authority and Iurisdiction is Named And according to the scope measures and extent of this Assertion let his ensuing Discourse Answers and proofs be examined wherein I am sure he has fair dealing according to all acknowledged Laws of Disputation Well proceed we then to his Proofs of this Assertion and the ground of his ensuing Answer to this Argument taken from the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter He tells us that the inspired Writers as the Iews Dichotomotized or made a bipartit Division Reader be not so ignorant as to start at this term as a Goblin the Dr. as an English Orator may cast his Greek into an English Mould And you must know he is against new stanâ—â—t Opinions not Phrases Well what did they Dichotomtoize The Clergy saith the Dr. into Two Orders here he has soundly exponed his term like that of Priests and Levits tho as among the Jews So among Christians this admitted of a Sub-division and subordination of Church Officers among themselves as were the Priests of the Old Testament This he says was suitable to the Language of the Helenistical or Graecian Tribes high Oratory of the Apostolick Age the Name of Priest and High-Priest being Confounded Levit. 1.7 The Sons of Aaron the Priest shall put Fire c. v. 8. the Priests Aarons Sons shall lay the parts c. Now saith the Dr. if Priests and High-Priests got the same Name without any distinction of Order notwithstanding the High-Priests extraordinary priviledges the Name of High-Priest likewise being never affixt to Aaron or Eleazar and the term but Twice or Thrice mentioned in the Books of Moses while yet the Homonymie of Names pleaded not against the Subordination of Priests Could it be thought strange that Apostles or Apostolical Men in mentioning Presbyters of the New Testament might not make use of the current Phraseology of their Countreymen in speaking of Priests and Levites Dividing them into two Orders as if there were no more Tho the meanest Jew knew the high Priest was very Honourable and by all marks of eminency and Authority Disstinguished from ordinary Priests Thus he Pag. 23.24.25 I Answer Quod haec ad rhombum What says this to the Point Or how lyes this Discourse level to his scope either to prove the Bishops Jurisdictional Authority above a Presbyter or Pastor as Bishop in the Scripture Sense or to prove that we Argue sophistically when alledging that the Scripture makes the Bishop and Presbyter one in Name and thing and that therefore the discriminating of both by Episcopalians is antiscriptural How I say this lyes level to the Dr's Conclusion or can in solid Reason reach the same I must Confess passes my Comprehension For 1. Tho all the Dr. says be granted it is palpably evident that this pleading if it prove any thing levels merely against such as would draw the Identity of Bishop and Presbyter only from this that there is an homonymie of these two Names whereas it is the Identity of the Qualifications Gifts Duties and every essential of the Office which is the Topick and Principle Presbyterians plead from not merely the confusion of Names 2. The Dr. himsef acknowledges that notwithstanding of this supposed confusion of Names oâ— Dichotomotizing the Old Testament Church Officers yet the High-Priest was distinguished from the other Priests by marks of Eminency and Authority for instance that he is called High-Priest And therefore before his Discourse can have any shadow of Answer he is bound to Exhibit in a just Paralel the same Scripture marks of Eminency and Authority of the Diocesan Bishop above the Pastor or Presbyter-Bishop as the Scripture Exhibits in reference to the High-Priests above the ordinary Priests or the Priests in reference to the Levites else this Answer by his own Confession and in the Sense of all men of Sense is but a pitiful Begging of the Question For upon this Ground he might alledge a Distinction betwixt the Pastor and Preaching Presbyter He alledges P. 25. That in the Hagiographical and Prophetical Writings the High-Priest is frequently distinguished by his proper and special Character Well then he is obliged to let us see in Scripture such a frequent distinction of the Prelatical or Diocesan Bishop from the Pastor or Presbyter by such a Character as the Dr. makes special and Peculiar to him and exhibit his special Official difference therein and super eminent Authority over Pastors else he never touches the Point We hold that the Bishop and Presbyter are in Scripture alwise one Name and thing The Dr. grants that the High Priest and other Priests are not so but distinguished and therefore he brings an impertinent Paralel and exception anent the sometimes Community of Names of Priests and High-Priests unless he can otherwise than thus disprove and answer our Assertion Besides the Critical Disputant will here put him to prove that the inspired Writers of the New Testament followed the Phraseologie of the Iews in speaking of the New Testament-Church Officers especially since we find frequent recitations of them in a far other strain and Phrase and that in their several Classes and Degrees both ordinary and extraordinary as 1 Cor. 12.28 Rom. 12.6 7 8. Eph. 4.11 Moreover when in that place Levit 1. Aaron is called not merely the Priest but emphatice Aaron the Priest whose eminent immediat Call to the Priesthood is so clear and distinguished from his Sons the Priests mentioned in the plural in that very Passage
Gifts of the Spirit by the laying on of their Hands they add quae omnia fuerant c. All which were necessary in the Apostolick Office for laying the first Foundation of the Christian Church through the World Here again the Apostles Extraordinary Office is asserted by the Saumer University and that with the same Ingredients upon the like grounds as we do hold So here are more of the Socinian Principles if we may believe this Dr. and this University as well as that of Leyden found ignorant of and going cross to all Antiquity in this Matter The ordinary succeeding Officers and of the highest Function in that capacity they hold to be the Pastors and Doctors whom they assert to derive down what was ordinary in the Apostolick Office to whom the Authority Consequently and Power of Teaching and Governing the Church is committed citing Act. 13. where mention is made of this Authority in the Pastors and Teachers of Antioch and their joint collegiat Power in Imposition of Hands also 1 Cor. 14.29 30 31 32. where the Prophets Authoritative judging of every Member of the Colledge and Society and the due Subjection of every Prophet to their decision is asserted joining therewith Chap. 12.29 Are all Apostles are all Prophets are all Teachers c. Well shall we offer to the Dr yet more Scots Presbyterian Novelists and of the Socinian Stamp in this Matter Piscat de Minist Eccles. Aphorism 9 Apostoli immediate a Christo vocati fuerunt c. The Apostles were immediatly called by Christ and sent through the whole World to esâ—ablish every where the Kingdom of God by the Preaching of the Gospel In his Explication he shews that in this Aphorism the Ministry of the Apostles is explained in four Heads 1. Ex causa sine qua non c. From the Cause and Ground without which they could not discharge their Apostolical Office and this was their immediat Vocation and Calling 2. e subjectis Locis c. From the Places where they Exercised their Apostolick Function viz. the various Kingdoms of the World 3. Ex Fine ad quem c. From the Scope and End to which they were to Direct their Ministry and Labours viz. the Planting and Founding Churches c. 4. Ex Causa Instrumentali c. From the Instrumental Cause they were to make use of viz. their Unfixt Preaching of the Gospel Here I Appeal to all Men of Judgment whether this Account of the Apostolick Office is not the same with that which this Man rejects as Socinian Aphorism 12. Sequuntur Pastores c. He proceeds to Describe Pastors and Doctors whom the Church can never want in the Explication he tells us that a praecedentibus differunt Duratione They differ from Apostles Prophets and Evangelists in Continuance as being of constant Necessity to the Church Thus Denying in Contradiction to our Dr the Permanency of the Apostolick Office Afterwards he adds Officia Pastorum indicantur c. That there are four Branches of the Pastors work and Office The Interpretation of Scripture the Ordering of Government and Discipline the Administration of the Sacraments together with Authoritative Admonitions and Exhortations Shewing thereafter that the Pastors do Succeed to what is Ordinary in the Apostolick and Evangelistick Office And their Episcopal Pastoral Authority he proves from these notable known Passages improven by the Presbyterians Act. 20.28 1 Pet. 5.1 2. Philip. 1.1 1 Tim. 3.1 2. Tit. 1.5 7. Now I dare refer it to all Men of Sense whether this Man is not in this Point of the New Opinion of Scots Presbyterians and stands Antipode to our Dr's Uniform Testimony of all Antiquity Shall we Consult yet another Turret Part. 3. Loc. 18. Quest. 17. Thes. 3. Reasoning against Bellarmin in Point of Peters pretended Primacy he draws his Argument a Natura Apostolici Muneris and tells the Iesuited Cardinal and our Dr. with him that the Apostles had an immediat Power and Jurisdiction which they received from Christ immediatly And Thes. 4. in Answer to Bellarmin holding much to our Reverend Dr's Sense and Pleading that Peter had the Pontificat as an ordinary Pastor to be therein succeeded He Answers that gratis supponitur c. it is without Ground presumed that Peter was an ordinary Pastor to whom any could succeed Adding in the end denique cum Apostolatus c. since the Apostolat as such was an Extraordinary Temporal Transient Function which was to expire and cease in the Church it could have no Successors Herein flatly giving the Lie to our Dr's Grand Topick and Principle anent the permanent Function of Apostolat as necessary in the Church till the End of Time As for his Judgment of the Pastoral Office as the Highest Ordinary Function of the Church and the same with that of the Scripture Bishop and Presbyter and by Consequence the Succession thereof to what was Ordinary in the Apostolick Office we have already made it appear Musculus if I may Name him again without Angring our Dr. is full and clear to this Purpose de Offic. Minist P. 358 359. Apostolus est qui c. That the Apostles were not set over any one particular Church but the Lords Command to them was that they should Preach the Gospel through the World and the Command Go Teach all Nations was peculiar to them And P. 360. he shews that Pastors were the same with Bishops and were in this distinguished from Apostles that they were sent to Teach and Feed particular Churches and fixed to them Amand. Polan Syntag. Theol. Lib. 7. Cap. 11. de Minist Ecclesiae describes thus the Apostolick Office Apostoli Christi fuerunt Christi Discipuli immediate ab ipso edocti c. That the Apostles were the Disciples of Christ immediatly Instructed by him sent to Preach the Exhibiting of the Messiah before his Ascension and thereafter to Preach to the whole World and thus to Found the Gospel Church having this Testimony from God that they could not err in Doctrine c. Afterward he tells us what were the Privilegia Apostolorum and the Prerogative Praeordinariâ—s Novi-Testamenti Ministris their Prerogatives above the ordinary Ministers of the New Testament Instancing 1. Their immediat Institution by Christ. 2. Their immediat Mission by him to Teach 3. Their General Legation to the whole World with Authority of Founding Churches every where not in one place only Citing 2 Cor. 11.28 where Paul shews that the Care of all the Churches was upon him 4. The Visible Symbol and Badge of this Legation viz. the conferring of the Visible Gifts of the Spirit by Imposition of Hands 5. Their Immunity from all Error after their Receiving the Holy Spirit in the Day of Pentecost 6. Their Extraordinary Authority against the Rebellious Citing 2 Cor. 10.6 8. where Paul mentions his Readiness to Revenge all Disobedience and the Authority hereanent for the Edification of the Church whereof he might Boast 7. Their Prophetical Gift in shewing things to
Officers and Members are temporary expired Priviledges For this he clearly distinguishes from them And it being thus the Question still recurrs to what Bishops he ascribs this Whether to some of them who are of Special Character or to all If to all then none of them are subordinat and accountable to another as being all Infallible and Supreme in the Exercise of their Government If to some only under what Character are they Primats Arch-bishops or Patriarchs And whether are they subject to one Head If to one Head then they loss the Priviledge of Supremacy wherein the Dr. makes an Apostolick Succession to consist Yet it will be hard to say that they were not subject to a General Council as to their Doctrine and Administration And sure I am the Dr. will assert that the Apostles had such a Supreme Power as put them beyond the reach of Subjection to any Church Judicatory and this their Supreme Authority he asserts to be Constant and Permanent still necessary for the Church and died not with their Persons So that here is another confused Maze and Farrago of Inconsistencies But further to shew how this Mans precipitant folly has involved him two things are again considerable First He holds the Iewish OEconomy never to have been abrogat but to be still vigent as it exemplifies a Pattern to the New Testament Church This he acknowledges had a Supreme High Priest who was an OEcumenick President over that Church over all inferior Priests and all their Courts For he wil be far from admitting any inferior Priests to share in this Priviledge Hence iâ— inevitably follows that this Supremacy is in his Sense applicable only to the Supreme OEcumenick President that the Christian Church may come up to its Pattern And it being thus let us in the next place see how he notwithdanding crosses this in two Points 1. In making this Constant Supreme Spiritual Power over all Members and Officers in the Christian Church to have been first exercised by every one of the Twelve Apostles and by them derived to their respective Successors 2. In holding in discriminatim and without any note of distinction of one from another that the Bishops yea all Bishops are Successors of the Apostles he means in a proper formal Sense For this is the very Title of this goodly Chapter of the Succession of Bishops from the Apostles as is said Further I would gladly know whether our Dr. ownes any Church-Power to have been transmitted to Presbyters or Pastors and to be asserted Act. 20 28. 1 Pet 5.2 Heb. 13.7.17 and many such places pleaded by the Presbyterians It is probable he will acknowledge this so that it be within their Precincts insubordination to the Bishops Now I pray why will he deny them the Priviledge of Succession to Apostles in point of Church Power He hath no Shadow of Ground unless upon the Account of a Precarious Dependence upon the Bishop So that it is not a Supreme Spiritual Power as he defines that of the Bishops as succeeding Apostles therein And I beseech him why are not the Bishops upon this Ground of their Precarious Dependance upon Superior Bishops equally cut off from this Priviledge If he say the Bishops Power reaches to Church Officers under them not that of Presbyters I have already told him what an Insignificant Evasion this is and that he cuts himself off from this Answer in that he makes this Apostolick Power which is Transmitted to Successors to be a Jurisdiction and Authority over all Subordinat Officers all Ecclesiasticks and all others Believing in Christ. And he tells us That the Apostles were to give Directions to their Suceessors in the same Office So that if it be not thus understood who can reconcile his Words to Sense For he distinguishes the Successors to their Office from such as he calls Subordinat Ecclesiasticks who have no such Authority And to say the Office is perpetual and permanent that the Office imports Essentially a Supreme Power over all Church Officers and Members and is thus distinguished from all Inferior Offices that this very Office is derived to Successors as being Essential and necessary to the Church Government in all Ages and yet that these Successors one or more have a Power Encircled within a certain Plott of Ground or District is such a palpable Contradiction and Non-Sense as none can be more evident We are told P. 98. That the Essence of the Apostolick Office consisted not in the forementioned extraordinary Priviledges but in the Rectoral Power Transmitted to their Successors in all Ages I have told him and made it appear that their Rectoral-Power necessarly included these Priviledges and since he acknowledges that the Essence of their Office consisted in their Rectoral Power it does necessarly follow that these being of the Essence of that Power they were Essential to the Office We acknowledge with him that they were by their Office distinguished from Subordinat Officers The Dr. infers That therefore this Distinction must consist in something so peculiar to them as its incommunicable to any Orders of Officers not Honoured with this Character Before I come to a direct Answer I will here cleave all his Reasoning asunder with a Wedge of his own Setting The Apostles Universal Unconfined Inspection over all Churches Planted and to be Planted and as Catholick Universal Ministers thereof in Actu Exercito is that whereby they are distinguished from other Officers who are not of that Character And being thus distinguished this must of necessity be the Essence of their Office for it is the Essence from which Essential Distinctions flows Yet we will find the Dr. Disowning and Denying this P. 96. Next from hence its easie to infer that to give Successors the true Apostolick Character and Power it must be of this Nature and Extent else its Hetrogeneous unto and comes short of its Pattern Will any Rational Man deny that the Rectoral Power derived to Apostles by our Saviour wherein he says the Essence of their Office did consist was of this Nature and Extent Now let him produce if he can any one Officer or Successor with this Character Again that whereby they were distinguished or what was peculiar to them may be understood two ways 1. Materially or Simplely 2. Formally or as making up their Complex Office with its other Ingredients and as properly subservient to the proper formal immediat Ends thereof In the first Sense there were several things whereby they were not properly distinguished from other Officers at that time considering them materially and remotely such as Gifts of Tongues Miracles c. which others had in their own Sphere and Degree But formally they were proper to Apostles considering their Degree Circumstances and proper immediat End Others had Gifts of Tongues and of Miracles but these Gifts were distinguished from those of Apostles upon the Ground above exprest I would make it evident by a Scripture Instance Our Saviour shews what Miraculous Signs shall follow
his other transient Imployments therein If the Dr. deny this he will swallow Monstruous absurdities viz. He will assert that in other Churches he had no Authority to rebuke to receive accusations to rebuke such as sin before all to see to the Worship to Charity to the State and Carriage of Widows to the right Instalment of Deacons and all this without partiality c. If Timothy in all these other Churches had this Authority the premised prescriptions together with the express scope thereof were applicable to him as officiating else where then they can infer no particular Relation to this Church more than others If the Dr. say that they are applicable as in this transient Imployment Protunc but not so as in Ephesus where his Relation was fixed the directions consequently in a special manner applicable thereto Who sees not that this is a palpable and shameless begging of the Question supposing these prescriptions to infer a fixed Relation to this Church of Ephesus which is the very Quesitum and Point in question But Secondly to strike out the Bottom of the Dr's Notion and put this to a short Issue since upon the one Hand the Episcopal Charge as to both Order and Jurisdiction was by Paul in his last Farewel committed to the Elders or Ministers of this Church of Ephesus joyntly Which Charge the Apostles are found to intrust likewise unto Pastors in other paralell places And since upon the other Hand Timothies Inspection is found Transient and Relative to several other Churches and therein Exercised it follows necessarly that what Authority he had in this Church and is supposed in these Directions and the Scope thereof was Cumulative unto not Privative of the ordinary standing Authority of the fixed Pastors established or to be established therein and that Timothy had no sole or Episcopal Authority Paramount to that of Pastors intrusted to him Which may be further confirmed upon these Grounds in that 1. The Apostles themselves Exercised no such Authority in Churches constitute as is evident in the Presbytries Concurrence with Paul in Timothies Ordination and Presbyters Authoritative Excommunication of the Incestuous Corinthian 2. This Supposition of such a Paramount Authority would make the Apostles in Cloathing Single Persons therewith to contradict their Previous Doctrine and Practice in the Instalment of Pastors with the Episcopal Authority To make which convincingly apparant one thing further I would propose to the Dr Whether will he deny that several Prescriptions delivered to Timothy were Relative to such Authority such an Exercise of the Power of Order as is incontrovertibly Applicable to Pastors I shall take the Dr's own Instance of Rebuking such as Sin before all Seeing to Widows and the Objects of Charity I add To give himself to Reading Exhortation to take Heed to himself and the Doctrine to Preach the Word to be Instant in Season and out of Season c. All which the Apostle doth with the same Emphasis of an Explicit Special Address to Timothy prescribe And to the same Scope of Directing him how to behave in the House of God Charging him as Solemnly to observe the same as these that relate to the Power of Jurisdiction But will the Dr's Inference â—old good That therefore Timothy had a sole Interest therein and such as was Exclusive of that of Pastors If his Answer be Negative why shall his Argument hold good in the Point of Jurisdiction and the Precepts relative thereunto I know nothing he can Answer except that either Pastors had this Authority in a Dependance upon Timothy or that the Power of Order is attribute to Pastors elsewhere not that of Jurisdiction Both which Evasions are a mere Petitio Principii and a Baffling of the great Topick and Ground of his Argument taken from the Address of these Precepts to Timothy especially since the same Precepts and equally supposing Authority in Church Government are attribute to Pastors Who knows not that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 20.24 the Authoritative Rebuke of the Highest Degree even to Excommunication is ascribed to the Colledge of Pastors 1 Cor. 5 As lâ—â—ewise the Authoritative Admonition is held out to be their joynt Priviledge Gal. 6.1 2 Thes. 3.14 15. Likewise the Laying on of Hands in Ordination is ascribed to the Presbytrie 1 Tim. 4.14 And they are thus found clearly Judges of Scandals as being Impowered to receive Delations Mat. 18.16 17. And none can deny that these Authoritative Precepts are directed to them upon the constant standing Grounds exhibit in Scripture and to the same Scope viz. the Preciousness of Souls their Account to Christ the great Shepherd at his Appearing Act. 20.24 1 Pet. 5.1 2 3. Old Whittaker in Answer to Bellarmin long since told our Dr Controv. 4. Quest. 1. Chap. 2. That Timothy here is supposed to have no such Dominion over Elderships or Pastors as Prelats afterward assumed And that Receiving the Accusation imports according to the Apostles Mind bringing a Crime or Scandal to the Church That the Ecclesiastick Synod had the Chief Interest in Censures though even Appeals were made to the Metropolitan See Bucer de Vi. Usu. Sacr. Ministerii Willet Sinops Papismi Controv. 5. Quest. 3. Part. 3. in the Appendix Bucer de Gub. P. 398. Before I pass this I cannot but add a Remark or two further 1. That the Dr. will needs have Timothy Directed to Order the Publick Worship and Liturgies of the Church That he is Directed 1 Tim. 2.1 and elsewhere anent Publick Worship is certain But for Liturgies which the Dr. thrusts in he must be told they were not yet sprung up if we may believe Tertullian and others It is palpably evident that in all these Precepts there 's altum silentium of Liturgies whatever the Dr's Love to them might Buzze in his Ears 2. He tells us That Timothy and with Emphasis he alone in the Church of Ephesus is Charged before the Lord to observe these things c. Thus in the Dr's Sense it seems that no Pastor had any thing to do with Rebuking Sinners either by Doctrine or Censure or the Oversight of Widows and the Objects of Charity c. These being peculiar to the Episcopal Function An Assertion no doubt peculiar to the Dr. But proceed we We are next told P. 109. That in those Apostolical Directions and Injunctions addressed personally to Timothy are contained the Nature Extent and Authority of the Episcopal Power But why calls he it not an Apostolical Power Since in his Sense the Office derived is of this Nature and Character Again if this be the Nature of the Episcopal Power and if thus one and the same with that of Timothy then sure it is not paramount to the Collegiat Power of Pastors For such we have proved Timothies to be Next as for the Extent thereof we have made appear that his Evangelistick Authority is found extended to several other Churches And therefore if the Dr.
that his Restricted Sense thereof above expressed is foolish and impertinent or prove the Exception thereof out of that Precept and the Service and Ministry therein enjoyned him by the Apostle when he is thus exhorted to do the Work of an Evangelist and make fall Proof of his Ministry But now the Dr. will Answer the Objection taken from this Precept enjoyning the Exercise of an Evangelistick Office And First He tells us There was Good Reason for it No doubt of that Good Reason a Church Officer be enjoyned Diligence in his Office But why Good Reason in the Dr's Sense Because saith he Many among the Ephesians were Infidels Here is a Reason of this Precept rare to be found elsewhere But even granting this to be one Partial Ground that this was the only or main Ground of the Precept and that his Work as an Evangelist was only of this Nature is among the rest of the Dr's Magisterial Dictats and gratis supposita He adds That it is no where insinuated that he was only invested with that Authority that agrees to the Notion of an Evangelist separated and distinguished from either Bishop or Presbyter Here the Dr. speaks of an Evangelists Office separated and distinguished from that of Bishop or Presbyter Whereof he hath given us no distinct Account As for that Sense in Reference to Preaching which he hints as that of Eusebius and his own we have made appear how cross it is to the Sense exhibit by Sound Divines and that Timothy had an Office distinct from Bishop or Presbyter which consequently this Precept enjoyns so that it is enough for us that he was invested and in that Precept is supposed invested with such an Evangelistick Office as is inconsistent with the Office of the Bishop whom he pleads for And to this purpose it is observable that the Term Evangelist being thrice only used in the New Testament viz. Act. 21.8 Eph. 4.11 and in this Precept Since in the other two Places it is taken for the Extraordinary Function above described why not also here Besides tho Extraordinary Functions communicat in General Names with Ordinary as when Apostles are called Presbyters or Elders yet he cannot shew that Extraordinary Names are mâ—de use of at least so Emphatically as in this Precept to point at Ordinary Functions If we Paralell this Complex Phrase or Phraseology as the Dr. speaks with the like in Scripture Language this may be convincingly made good as when we read of Signs of an Apostle 2 Cor 12.12 Commands of Apostles 2 Pet. 3.2 Foundation of Apostles Eph. 2.20 Where the Term designs a peculiar Office And thus it must be when the Work of an Evangelist is enjoyned to Timothy So that if the Office and Work of an Evangelist which is in the Sense of sound Divines extraordinary and expired be ascribed to both these persons and found incompatible with the Work and Office of a Prelat the Dr's Evasions are evidently found nought Suppose a person enjoyned to do the Work of a Parent a Magistrat or a Husband none will doubt that the peculiar Relations and Duties of Parents Magistrats and Husbands are here intimat As likewise if a Pastor be enjoyned to do that Work the same is held out The Dr. will have it no where insinuat That Timothy was invested with that Authority that agrees to the Notion of an Evangelist separated and distinguished from either Bishop or Presbyter If by Separated Distinguished he understand an higher formal Office than that of Bishop or Presbyter the Passage above mentioned clearly proves it admitting the Evangelists Office to be of that Nature State and Rank above exprest If by Separate he understand such as is formally distinct from the Office of Bishop or Presbyter and of another specifick Nature the Precept doth likewise clearly insinuat this If by Only Invested he mean such an Office as cannot exert the Acts or Duties competent to Scripture Bishop or Presbyter this is impertinent to the purpose and there is no need of such Insinuation The Apostles and Evangelists were invested properly and formally with their Apostolical Evangelistick Offices which Eminenter had included therein the Pastors Work and Duties This doth abundantly discover the Dr's empty Quiblings ensuing to be mere impertinent Shifts Such as that one may do the Evangelists Work who is higher Sed quid hoc ad Rhombum the Apostles performed the Duties and Work of Pastors But that therefore there is no peculiar Office of a Pastor distinct from that of Apostle is a palpably weak Consequence And will he say that when a Pastor is commanded and enjoyned his Work there is no peculiar Office and Duty supposed because his Office is Eminenter contained in that of Apostles and that they performed and were enjoyned the same Duties The Dr's next Instance is as foolish Daniel saith he did the Work of a King yet was no King Dan 8.7 He is indeed said to do the Kings Business in a passive Sense That is performed Service to the King as the meanest Servant does his greatest Masters Business in serving him But he that will hold that upon this account he may be said to do the Work of a King That is performed the Royal Acts of his Regal Office and such as are peculiar thereunto or that this phrase hath the same import as Timothy's being enjoyned to the Work of an Evangelist hath a Crack in his Intellectuals We are told next P. 111.112 That Philip was an Evangelist Act. 21.8 yet also one of the seven Deacons mentioned Act. 6. But had no power to confirm the Baptized nor to ordain to Ecclesiastick Offices by imposition of Hands as Timothy Ans. First That Philip continued in the Office of a Deacon when called an Evangelist is more than he offers to prove or will be ever able to do The Belgick Divines with Diodiate others take the Office of Evangelist here for the extraordinary expired Function above described And consequently to be the same with the Office of Timothy Thus also Pool 2 d. Part paralelling this Passage with 2 Tim. 4.5 and Eph. 4.11 And upon the last Clause wherein mention is made of his Diaconate they assert that having discharged the Office of Deacon well he did purchase to himself this Good Degree as 1 Tim. 3.13 Judicious Calvin upon the place offers the same Sense of the Evangelists Office Inter Apostolos Doctores medii erant c. That they had a midle Function betwixt Apostles and Doctors and an Office next to that of the Apostolat that they might every where preach the Gospel and were sett to no fixed Station or Post. Whence he concludes that his Diaconate at Ierusalem was only transient or for some time exercised by him and that thereafter he was assumed to be an Evangelist since otherwise it had not been warrantable to him to leave Ierusalem and reside at Cesarea He further adds That he is not here proposed as a voluntar Deserter of his Office
Dominion of Earthly Kings The Reasons of his rejecting this Gloss he subjoyns Quia Apostoli non contendebant inter se de modo Primatus sed de Primatu ipso c. That the Apostles were not contending about the manner of a Primacy but the Primacy it self and therefore that our Lords Answer may be apposit to their Question it must needs absolutely forbid all Dominion 2. If our Lord had intended to forbid only some special kind of Dominion certum Dominationis modum he had not removed their Ambition which he is here endeavouring signally to remove since other Primacies also do Feed Ambition 3. Saith he this Phrase Not so viz. shall it be among you according to the Use of the Scripture doth import a simple and absolute Negation as Psal. 1.4.147.20 Adding that in the paralells Mat. 20. and Mark 10. it is expressed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 non it a sit inter vos It shall not be so among you He adds that if Christ had allowed a Dominion to Peter the Apostles had been admonished thereanent and that the Term 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying a Service or Ministry ascribed unto them is inconsistent therewith He afterward in the next Paragraph Answers the Objection taken from the Signification of the Compound Words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as importing a violent Domination shewing that the Words of themselves will not necessarly import such a thing which he proves from some paralel Texts and that they signifie a simple Dominion only which he further proves from Lukes making use of the Simple Verbs 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Adding in the third place that there was no need that our Lord should speak of a Dominion of this Nature because the Apostles Debate was not about a violent Domination He adds further Nec valet quod subjicitur c. It is of no weight which the Popish Adversary pleads against the Discharge of all Primacy because our Lord subjoyns He that is greatest among you since our Lord speaks not of a true Greatness in respect of the thing it self but of an Imaginary in respect of Affectation and Desire Which Matthew and Mark do expone and clear by these Words Whosoever will be great amongst you In the rest of his Reasons he hath several things to this purpose as if he had been expresly Disputing against this Surveyer as indeed upon the Matter he doth and Listeth him among the Popish Adversaries in this Point For that Point of the Persons spoken to the Surveyer tells us The Apostles were sometimes spoken to as representing all Christians Mark 13.37 In which Sense this Prohibition was not given to them which would strike at the Authority allowed among Christians Sometimes what is spoken to them concerns themselves alone in their Apostolick Capacity as Matth. 19.28 In which Sense we cannot understand this Prohibition since it would exclude all Ministers afterward Some things likewise were spoken to them as representing only Ministers as when Power of remitting and retaining Sins is given them Joh. 20. In which Sense we cannot apply this unto them since this will impeach the Superior Authority of any of them above others and their Authority over Inferior Ministers evidenced in Pauls Excommunicating Hymeneus and Alexander making Decrees for the Church of Corinth c. Ans. Whatever may be said to this Partition in it self it is certain the Enumeration is not so adequat as not to admit of a Super-numerary Some things might be spoken to Apostles which did most nearly concern them as Apostles as being immediatly directed to them and yet may have an useful reference in a Subaltern and Subordinat Sense to all the Ministers of Christ. As when our LORD said to His Apostles Ye are the Light of the World the Salt of the Earth This in some respect had a peculiar Application to them as Apostles and our LORDs Infallibly Inspired Ambassadors authorized to lay the Foundation of the Gospel Church prescribe her Ordinances and institute her Officers and several of them appointed to be the Holy Ghosts Pen-Men in writing the Scriptures in which respect the Church is said to be Built upon their Foundation But though no Ministers else could acclaim to be in this respect the Light of the World and Salt of the Earth or challenge a Right to the peculiar Priviledges of Apostles included therein it is notwithstanding certain that there is a Subordinat Application hereof unto ordinary Ministers that they are in their Capacity and Sphere the Light of the World and the Salt of the Earth and have the Honour and Duties of their Ministerial Office therein enjoyned and included as well as the Apostles had theirs 2. Since he grants the Apostles were pari honoris potestatis consortio praediti and cannot deny that our LORD bespoke them upon that Ground of an equal Official Power and as in that Capacity it follows that he bespoke Pastors whom he appointed to be in the same order of an equal Official Power and to succeed to the Apostles in their ordinary Authority The Surveyer can give no Reason wherefore our LORD discharged the impeaching this instituted Equal Power of Apostles by an Unlawful Dominion and not to have given the same Prohibition to Pastors Why a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Chief or Primat is discharged among Apostles and not also among Pastors The Surveyers Contrary Instances as he calls them of the Apostolick Authority over Ministers in the Church are palpably Impertinent and do miss the Mark. For 1. Their Authority in the first plantation of Churches can no wayes conclude what is the ordinary Authority of Pastors in the Churches ordinary and settled Government 2. Our Argument runs thus That the Apostles being placed in an equal Sphere of a Ministry were equal among themselves as Apostles formally and equal among themselves as Gospel Ministers upon this Ground But that therefore they could have no Authority Apostolical as Apostles over Inferior Officers doth nowayes follow this Supposition nor will it follow that because the Apostles were Ministers and had Authority over other Ministers that therefore there is a Lawful Official Authority of one Pastor over another because the Apostles were more than Ministers viz. Apostles and in that Capacity had that Superiority but not as Ministers simplely So that such an Argument would run cross to the common Rules It is certain whatever Authority they put furth in the Churches in fieri and in directing them in the Exercise of their ordinary Power yet in settled Judicatories they are found acting as Elders and Ministers and not as Apostles This hath been made Good in Pauls assuming the Presbytrie in the Ordination of Timothy The ordinary Elders or Ministers concurring with the Apostles in that Council Act. 15. Both in the Disquisition in the Sentence and enjoyning the Decree But sayes the Surveyer We must not distinguish where the Law distinguisheth not If notwithstanding this
the end and the person privatly admonished is not gained and convinced of his Miscarriage the Matter is to be brought to the publick hearing of the Church and such a Church and Collegiat Meeting as is supposed to be cloathed with power to censure Ecclesiastically So that admiting there is a Remedy here prescribed for the removal of the privat Offences it is still under the Notion of Scandals that might arise among them in point of Charity and Equity And hence it is evident that the Gaining here made the Scope of Dealing with the offending Brother respects mainly the gaining of his Soul to GOD So the word is taken Iam. 5.20 and the gaining of his Friendship only in a Subordinat Sense As for the Passages cited neither v. 21.22 of this Chap. nor Luk. 17.1.2 3 4. which the Surveyer himself dare not call exactly paralel to the place under debate can evince that the Offences mentioned were nothing but mere privat Injuries and not Scandals as Mr. Gillespie in the Aarons Rod Lib. 3. Ch. 2. hath abundantly proved And admitting there is a Medium betwixt privat Injuries and all Offences this place is meant only of Offences and Scandals Nor can it be hence inferred that the more grosser and the lesser Scandals may not fall under a diverse Consideration with reference to some pieces of a Method of Procedure as is evident from what the Apostle prescribes 1 Cor. 5. in reference to the removal of that attrocious Scandal of the incestuous Corinthian The Surveyer P. 203 204 205. spends a long Discourse in endeavouring to load with Absurdities the Distinction betwixt Civil and Ecclesiastick Powers upon the account of the Varieties of Offences arising upon sins of Omission and Commission sins of Quotidian Incursion Scandals from Actions Criminal or in point of Civil Injuries of Oppression c. And Injuries in order to the joynting of the supposed Discipline as he calls it with the Civil Government when the Civil Injuries and Scandal are joyned whether he shall complain to the Church to Iudge of the Scandal since thus the Church will Iudge the Civil injury and invade the Magistrats part or else pronounce the Actions Scandalous and Censure blindly following the antecedent Iudgment of the Magistrat or otherwise be necessitat to review the whole Process de novo c. Ans. As Matters coming before these Respective Judicatories must be considered Matterially and Formally so the proper difference betwixt the two Jurisdictions with respect to the Object is to be drawn from the Formalities of the Actions or the ratio suo qua they come under their Respective cognizances It cannot be the Materiality of the Action simplely for this would make the Two Powers inevitably to Justle and the Church might not medle with any Action which the Civil Magistrates Power doth in any Case touch such as habituated Adultery Perjury Incest c. So that the Scandal being the proper formal Object of the Churches Power the same Action as under the other formalis Ratio of the Civil injury is the proper object of the Magistrats Cognizance and in the Case wherein the Civil injury is dubious the Magistrats Right stands good as to a Priority in the Cognizance Likewise there are Civil wrongs wherein the Case is so dubious that before the Legal Decision the Person wronging cannot be presumed to have Acted from a bad Principle or purpose but from the ground of a mistaken Right and therefore after the Legal Decision no Scandal can be concluded And in cases wherein there is manifest Scandal the Churches Power takes place and herein there is no necessity as the Surveyer pretends either for a blind following the Magistrats Decision in this Point or an immediat medling with Civil Processes For the Scandals Mentioned by him we say that as in the Circumstantials of procedure there is such variety allowed to the prudentials of Church Governours according to the General Rules of the Word as cannot Justle with the Method prescribed in this Text so these Sins whether of ommission ordinary incursion of opinion in Matters Civil or Criminal in so far as habituat and scandalous do come under the Churches Cognizance understanding this still with the due Caution premised touching the Scandal of Civil injuries For Scandals in Matters Criminal if the Magistrats Sword of Justice do strike in removing the Person from the Land of the Living there is a prevention of any further dealing If he neglect his Duty the Church is to follow the ordinary Methods for gaining the Persons Soul and removing the Scandal In a word the Civil Ecclesiastick Jurisdictions being both Gods appointments as this Surveyer should not deny it necessarly follows that they have their distinct Limits and Measures drawn their proper Ends and Objects appointed by the God of Order and therefore cannot be said of themselves to interfere and clash together without a Blasphemous reflection upon him who is the Author of both so that whatever practical interfeirings and abuse of Power men in either Capacity may be guilty of can no more reflect upon these Ordinances themselves than Mans Sinful abuse can be said to impeach the Divine Authority of the Office he sustains I add this remark further that the Surveyer doth in the Premised discourse palpably contradict himself while endeavouring to asperse a true Ecclesiastick Jurisdiction for he professes to disclaim Erastus his way and asserts there ought to be a Godly Disciplin in the Church for correcting Offenders and keeping the House of GOD and his Ordinances in Purity and consequently he professes to own an intrinsick Church Government distinct from the Civil and by further consequence a coordination of the two Powers and Jurisdictions and likewise a necessary mutual Subjection of persons Cloathed therewith to the Respective Authority of the one and the other Jurisdiction yet in his muster of supposed absurdities he impugns this Principle and endeavours to prove that without palpable Confusions and clashing of Societies there can be no exercise of this Government Besides he pretends to impugn only the received sense of this Passage and to keep within these Limits yet while attempting to prove that this is not the sense of the place he rambles out into such a Discourse as if it prove any thing doth evince that neither this nor any other place of Scripture doth hold out an Ecclesiastick Jurisdiction and Disciplin as properly and formally distinct from the Civil The Surveyers next Answer P. 205. is in Summ this That supposing the Church Collective cannot be here understood but the Representative only in the Matter of Representation it is indifferent whether they be one or many one Commissioner may represent a Presbytrie in an Assembly So that tell the Church is tell the Presidents and Rulers of the Respective Churches or tell him that 's Chief with his Assistant Ans. The State of the Question is whether the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Church doth here import such an
imbodied Society or Court as is the proper Subject of a Jurisdictional Censuring Power and to whom the Appeal is to be made after more privat Dealings which if evinced the Hierachical Prelats arrogated Power monopolizing this Jurisdiction and to use the Surveyers term concentring this Authority in himself solely is sufficiently overthrown as contrary to the Scripture Pattern and cross to this great Rule and Standart For the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it is the Consentient Judgement of Criticks and Interpreteâ—s that it naturally signifies a Caetus and Caetas evocatus a concio convocatorum an indicta concio thus Suidas thus Demosthenes and in Scripture it points out generally a Convocation as Act. 19 32. and a Convocation in curia or a Caetus civilis v. 39. And sometimes it s put for the Assembly of Believers sometimes for the Church Militant sometimes for a Province Kingdom or City Compare Eph. 5.23 with Act. 8.13 Rev. 12.5 Rom. 16.5 And here good Interpreters do consequently take it to Represent the Ecclesiastick Senat or Presbytrie making it one and the some with that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Tim. 4.14 Hence the Verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 properly signifies in Concione delibero Verba facio to Consult Deliberat and Discourse in Publick Assembly The Text convinces of this For 1. The Gradation is from the Lesser to the Greater Number 2. Our Lord v. 19 20. speaks of an agreeing on Earth and gathering together in his Name Besides that the Surveyer himself expones the Church of the Rulers and Governours who if they have a joynt Essential Interest in their Jurisdiction he overthrows his Opinion of Concentring this in the Prelat if he ascribe the Jurisdictional Decisive Authority to one who is Chief making the rest but his Assistants he again contradicts himself in seeming to ascribe this Ruling Power to the whole Meeting for thus the Sense could not be as he says tell the Rulers and Governours For what he adds of Commissioners it is palpably absurd For 1. The Church Representative or the Officers thereof have a Divine immediat Institution are set by God therein and have not a derived Authority from the Church 2. It is the Court it self not the Deputed Commissioner one or more which is the proper Subject of the Jurisdictional Power 3. To make the Paralel hold he behoved to say the Prelats have a derived Power as Commissioner from the Church the Falshood whereof is apparent The Surveyer adds P. 206. That the attributing a Iurisdictional Power to the Church is nothing against him who allows not to one single Bishop this Power without the Council of Presbyters according to the 4th Council of Carthage Can. 23. though nothing is to be done without the Bishop Ans. In Stating the Question with the Presbyterians P. 192. he tells us It is whether this Power be equally Diffused in the whole Colledge of Presbyters or Concentred in one Person Now if the Person of the Bishop be the Centre he cannot allow this Official Power to step beyond that Centre So that no Members of the Meeting have any Interest therein He adds here as likeways in the place before Cited That the Bishop must exercise this Power with the Concurrâ—nce and the Assistance of Presbyters But this can import no Exercise of Jurisdiction since privat Persons may Counsel and Advise who have no Decisive Suffrage And he knew that in the late Edition of our Hierarchical Prelacy the Clergy were to Advise the Bishop only and scarce that So that our Prelats in such Exercise of their Power baffled that Act of the Council of Carthage which he mentions The Surveyer adds That there is a Plurality of Officers even where this Inequality of Power is supposed whether Iudging or Advising But if one only Judge and the rest are but mere Advisers the Judging Power being thus Concentred in one there is no such Court as is the Subject of a Jurisdictional Power So that the Surveyer bewrays great Impudence in saying that the Determination properly flows from them all since the Authority is thus Concentred in one But says the Surveyer since the Organick Church is made up of Rulers and Ruled the Notion of a Church will not import an Equality of Power in all Ans. This Paralel is palpably unjust and impertinent since the Church Organick considered thus complexly doth necessarly and essentially include Members and Officers Rulers and Ruled and consequently a necessary Inequality But the Surveyer could not deny that in this place the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Church imports a Society or Colledge of Rulers only which can come under no such Consideration of a necessary Inequality The Surveyers Fourth Answer is in Summ That we find the highest Censures of the Church inflicted by the Authority of single Persons who ever otherwise concurred So Paul excommunicat Hymeneus and Alexander 1 Tim. 1.20 And to say he acted as a Member of a Quorum is to make him a vain Boaster and to make the Scripture speak what we will Ans. The Surveyer must acknowledge yea hath acknowledged the difference betwixt the Apostolick Authority in the Framing and Constitution of Churches and the Exercise of their Power in Churches already constitute in their Organick Beeing In the first Case there was an indispensible necessity of exerting a singular Apostolick Authority when no Officers were to concur and Churches were not fully Moulded in their Organick Beeing And we heard himself distinguish the Apostles ordinary and extraordinary Power In the other Case when Churches were constitute it is evident and hath been made good that they did assume the Official Concurrence of ordinary Church Rulers The Surveyer challengeth us to produce a Warrand for our Assertion of Pauls acting here upon an extraordinary Apostolick Authority Thus he challenges the Apostle Paul to produce his Warrand for this his Apostolick Acting which he has long since produced and recorded if this Man had been pleased to read and consider it Whereas he tells us It was none of the extraordinary Characters of the Apostles to act in these Matters by his own only Authority We say it was where Churches were not constitute and no ordinary Officers to concur And this Surveyer might be challenged as the Affirmer to prove that this Act was put forth in an Organick Church where ordinary Officers were to concur or else in denying this to be one of the Characteristicks of the Apostolick Office he asperses his Apostolick Power and Authority He adds That what was beyond their immediat Calling infallible Direction illimited Iurisdiction c. was transmittable to his Successors and actually transmitted to Timothy and Titus It is Answered we have made appear that their immediat Calling considered with reference to its Nature and End of Planting Churches Constituting the Officers Ordinances thereof did necessarly include this Authority in this first Framing of Churches which neither was nor could be transmitted unless it be pleaded that the Churches Foundation could
why then did he in Contradiction to himself call for another Rule But the Surveyer P. 216.217 presents yet another evasion That this Church might have had a Bishop Eminenter so called though not present at Philippi That we cannot otherwise account of Epaphroditus who is called their Apostle Philip. 2.25 or Messenger as the Angels Rev. 2. and 3. are called the Angels of the Churches and not for any Temporal Imployment of being sent with their Alms it being too high a Stile to give Men upon so low an Account Thus 2 Cor. 8.23 We read of the Messengers of the Churches and the Glory of Christ. Ans. We have above removed the Foundation of this exception both in Reference to Epaphroditus and the Asian Angels That Epaphroditus gets the Name of their Apostle and Messenger Catachrestice and improperly and consequently that he was no such Bishop as the Surveyer pretends is most evident in the Sacred Text since he is thus termed with respect to that special Employment of carrying the Churches Benevolence to Paul For the Apostle after he hath called him their Messenger doth expresly adjoyn this ground of the Epithet and Denomination viz. He that Ministred to my Wants which doth clearly restrict and explain the Term Messenger in this Context Besides that v. 30. he is said to come to supply their Lack of Service towards the Apostle and the Apostle mentioning him again Ch. 4.18 tells this Church That he received from Epaphroditus the things that were sent by them As for the Surveyers Exception That this was too high a Stile to be given upon so low an Account comparing this with 2 Cor. 8.23 I have above told such Pleaders that the Service of the Churches and the Interest of Christ in them is such a Honourable Employment as the most eminent need not be ashamed of since he who is Lord of all came not to be Ministred unto but to Minister and the Holy Angels literally so called think it no Disparagement to their High Estate and Dignity to be sent forth as Messengers to Minister and do Service to the meanest who are Heirs of Salvation For that Passage 2 Cor. 8. we have made appear that it rather Confirms than Impugns our Answer and Exposition of this Scripture anent Epaphroditus The Apostles Scope in that place being evidently to stir up the Church to a large Expression of their Charity and Bounty upon the Account of the Fidelity and Worth of the Messengers sent to them for that end Next I might tell this Surveyer that Epaphroditus and these other Messengers being restrictedly called Messengers of the Churches and with a special respect to the Employment specified in the Text are thus distinguished from the Apostles who properly are Christs Messengers to the Churches And therefore Persons under this Character of Messengers from Churches to Churches have not that special proper Signature which the Surveyer pleads for upon the account of the general Name Messenger applyed to them In a word in this Conjecture as the Surveyer presents but a new Petitio Principii and groundless Fancy without the least shadow of Proof so it s baffled by his own Principle who thinks it below his supposed great Men to be sent upon a Temporary Employment Now it is certain that Epaphroditus was sent with this Churches Benevolence to Paul and it would have puzzled this Surveyer to Ansâ—er the Querie Why none else but the sole and eminent Bishop was sent with this Benevolence As likeways to Answer further these Queries First Why the Apostle Paul put the proper Name and Characteristick of this sole and eminent Bishop upon all the Pastors of the Church of Philippi Which upon his Principles did draw with it great Inconveniences as tending 1. To cast a Cloud of Ignorance upon these Pastors in reference to a Person to whom they did owe important Duties 2. This might tend to involve them in the Temptation of a Sinful Emulous Disposition and Breach among themselves And no body will judge that the Apostle was not careful to prevent this Besides this could not consist with that high Esteem of Epaphroditus which the Apostle here expresses thus to deal with him and in special to make him the Messenger of such Derogatory Expressions in this Epistle wherein he is so much commended Thus we have seen that the Evidence of this Scripture as likewise of the preceeding doth quite dispel the Mist of the Surveyers fond Exceptions The Surveyer tells us He finds one Scripture more wherein because Presbytrie is Named we account we have great Advantage for our Way The Passage is 1 Tim. 4.14 Whereas he may more justly triumph in the word Bishop so often mentioned in Scripture He professeth his Resolution pressely to consider this place And his Replyes shall be pressely considered His first Reply is That we cannot prove that by Presbytrie here is meant a Colledge of single Presbyters in the Modern Notion and not rather the Dignity and Office of a Presbyter as Calvin Institut Lib. 4. Cap. 3. Jerom and others also do judge Ans. 1. Not to stand upon the Surveyers cutting off by this Gloss Presbyters from so much as a consent to Timothies Ordination which in contradiction to himself here he doth in his other Replyes to this Text allow them It is in this place very considerable that this Word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Presbytrie being used only thrice in the New Testament viz. Luk. 22.66 and Act. 22.5 and in this Passage under Debate Since in the two first places it must necessarly be taken for a Concessus Presbyter orum a Colledge of Elders or Presbyters this Surveyer could offer no shadow of Reason or Evidence for the altering the Signification in this Passage Since 1. The Scope and Circumstances do clearly lead to this its ordinary Acceptation And 2. There can no such Exposition be offered here without a very gross Imputation upon the Language and Sense of the Holy Ghost It differing little from Non-sense if at all reconcilable to Sense thus to read the Text Neglect not the Gift given thee c. by the laying on of the Hands of the Office For what Hands hath an Office to lay on Not only Reason but the very Ear disrelishes such a Sense Especally if the Matter of Fact be admitted in opposition to which the Surveyer could give no Evidence that as there was Ruling Officers or Presbyters then existent so they did de facto lay Hands upon Timothy For Calvins Judgement we find that in his Commentary upon the place he asserts that such as understand the Word Presbytrie here in a collective Sense and to import the Colledge and Meeting of Presbyters do in his Iudgement put a right Sense upon the Words So that he cannot be reckoned as holding the Surveyers Gloss And however we do not judge that most worthy Person as neither Ierom in this point Inferior to Greek Fathers infallible or our selves obliged jurare in ejus verba As for the
98. This Surveyer did but ridicule the Scriptures or rather expose himself while pretending to impugn the Presbyterians and answer their Scripture Reasonings for he comes on with his may be this and may be the other Sense the one sense may be striking out and Contradicting the other whereas in the Judgement of all who own the Truth and the Authority of the Scriptures the true sense is but one since otherwise there can be no Truth where there are different and various Senses In his first Answer he will needs have High Officers of the Church as he calls them to concur with the Apostle Paul in Imposing Hands upon Timothy these High Officers he no doubt advances far above the Sphere of Presbyters and Pastors and puts them in the Character of his Magnates or Hierarchical Bishops yet in this second Answer he will needs in a palpable Contradiction to the First croud in all these High Officers into one Congregation yea and positively asserts that there is no evidence in the Text to prove that this Presbytrie was any other than a Paroch-Presbytrie and that it will trouble the Presbyterians to prove the contrary But would it not much more have troubled this Fantastical Dictator with his Linsey-Woolsey party coloured Senses and Comments to prove that these High Officers near to the Apostolick Character were all related to one Congregation and but a Meeting of a Paroch Presbytrie as he speaks His Third answer is taken from collating this Passage with 2 Tim. 1.6 where Paul enjoins Timothy to stir up the Gift that is in him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the putting on of my Hands as here 1 Tim. 4.14 He saith Grace was given thee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with the laying on of the Hands of the Presbytrie The former place importing his Authority in the Action and the latter the concern and consent of the Meeting of Presbyters with him So that granting a Presbytrie present there is no ordaining power can be hence inferred Ans. We have already made appear that these places Collated do clearly evince a Presbyterial Authority in the Point of Ordination and that since the imposing of Pauls hands in order to the Gifts is clearly distinguished from the imposing of the Hands of the Presbytrie which must needs respect his Ordination and consequently their Authoritative influence thereupon these Texts collated do confirm this Point and further do thus give light unto it that supposing that the Imposition of Pauls hands and the Hands of the Presbytrie were contemporary the Presbyterian Cause is the more strengthened in that the imposing of an Apostles Hands did not swallow up nor exclude the Presbytries Authoritative imposition So that this Authority may be much more now supposed competent to them when the Office of Apostle is gone I must here again Reflect upon it that this our vertumnous Expositor who will needs have in his First Answer several High Officers to concurr with Paul in this Imposition of Hands makes Timothy thereby to receive a Presbyterate only And I pray what needs such High Officers to concur with Paul in order to this end But in this Answer we find ordinary Pastors concurring in the Ordination of this his supposed Presbyter for the Surveyer in collating these Texts insinuats no Officers of a higher Order to have been present except the Apostle Paul And indeed the Passages themselves do only point at the Presbytrie and the Apostle Paul Here also Presbyters are found laying hands upon our Surveyer and his Fellows supposed Hierarchical Prelat set over the Church of Ephesus Next he acknowledges that the mention of imposing of Pauls hands 2 Tim. 1.6 with the emphatick 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or by respects the Gift of GOD in him wherein he seems to distinguish the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Authority and the Gift yet expones this precisely of Pauls Authority in his Ordination exclusive of that of the Presbytrie But so it is that the imposing of Hands in order to Gifts of the Spirit he must needs acknowledge to be of it self distinct from such an Imposition of Hands as is in order to Ordination Yea even some of his own party acknowledge that Hands were twice laid upon Timothy and once by the Presbytrie alone Besides that Passage 1 Tim. 4.14 we find him very confusedly and inconsideratly exponing thus Viz. The Grace given him with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the laying on of the hands of the Presbytrie Whereas the Text runs thus neglect not the Gift that is in thee which was given thee by Prophesie with the laying on of the Hands of the Presbytrie where it is evident the Gift given and the Prophesie are in two distinct Clauses and the laying on of Hands of the Presbytrie is in the third and last and diversified by a distinct Particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 both from the Gift and from the Prophesie So that it is apparent that this Grace or Gift hath a special Respect to the Prophesie but the laying on of the Hands of the Presbytrie is here set down in a distinct Clause as a distinct Priviledge from the other two and therefore must either import their Authoritative action or doth here signifie nothing especially since as is said the variation of the phrase 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or with doth here import so much and diversifie the one from the other Which baffles his Sense and Exposition that makes the imposing of the Presbytries hands to import no more but a Consent or Concurrence The folly of which Exposition is further evidenced in that 1. This solemn Action of Imposing Hands being in the Scripture Accounts and Sense a badge of Authoritative Blessing must neeeds import much more than a bare Consent or Concurrence for he will not dare to say that all those whose Hearts do concur in praying for the Blessing had right to impose hands upon the Ordained 2. He tells us in the beginning of his Answer that the Presbytrie imposed not hands alone without a Higher Officer joyned with them in the Act. Now I pray what was this Act if not of Ordination Now if the Presbytrie had an Authoritative Concurrence in the Act or rather an influence thereupon as their Act how can he say they did only consent to the thing For upon this ground of a naked consent he could not say that Paul was joined with him in the Act which imports their joint Authoritative Concurrence if this phrase have any Sense and yet notwithstanding of this according to his exposition in the latter part of his Answer the Action was Pauls alone and not theirs and he Confines the Authority of the Action within the compass of the Apostles Imposition solely I only add if the Actions were supposed diverse as severals do hold the Surveyer hath no Shield nor Buckler against such a Weapon which notwithstanding quite baffles this his Answer if admitted His fourth Answer is That since the Name of