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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A89568	The humble answer of the Divines attending the Honorable Commissioners of Parliament, at the treaty at Newport in the Isle of Wight. To the second paper delivered to them by his Majesty, Octob. 6. 1648. about episcopall government. Delivered to his Majesty, October 17. I appoint Abel Roper to print this copie, entituled The humble answer of the Divines, &c. Richard Vines,	Westminster Assembly; Marshall, Stephen, 1594?-1655, attributed name.	1648 (1648)	Wing M757; Thomason E468_21; ESTC R204007	22,916	44

The Humble ANSWER Of the DIVINES Attending the Honorable COMMISSIONERS OF Parliament At the TREATY at Newport in the Isle of WIGHT To the second Paper delivered to them by his MAJESTY Octob. 6. 1648. About Episcopall Government Delivered to his Majesty October 17. I appoint Abel Roper to Print this Copie entituled The Humble Answer of the Divines c. Richard Vines London Printed for Abel Roper at the Signe of the Sunne over against S. Dunstans Church in Fleet-street 1648. The humble ANSWER of the Divines attending the Honorable Commissioners of PARLIAMENT at the Treaty at Newport in the Isle of Wight To the second Paper delivered to them by his MAIESTY Octob. 6. 1648. Delivered to his MAIESTY Octob. 17. May it please your Mahesty AS in our Paper of October the third in Answer to your Majesties of October the second We did so now againe we do acknowledge that the Scriptures cited in the Margin of your Majesties Paper do prove that the Apostles in their own persons That Timothy and Titus and the Angels of the Churches had power respectively to do those things which are in those places of Scripture specified But as then so now also we humbly do deny that any of the persons or Officers fore-mentioned were Bishops as district from Presbyters or did exercise Episcopall Government in that sence Or that this was in the least measure proved by the alleadged Scriptures and therefore our Negative not being to the same point or state of the Question which was affirmed We humby conceive that we should not be interpreted to have in effect denyed the very same thing which we had before granted or to have acknowledged that the severall Scriptures do prove the thing for which they are cited by your Majesty And if that which we granted were all that by the Scriptures cited in your Margin your Majesty intended to prove It will follow That nothing hath yet beene proved on your Majesties part to make up that conclusion which is pretended As then we stood upon the Negative to that assertion so we now crave leave to represent to your Majesty that your reply doth not infirme the Evidence given in maintenance thereof The Reason given by your Majesty in this Paper to support your assertion That the persons that exercised the power aforesaid were Bishops in distinct sence is taken from a description of Episcopall Government which is as your Majesty saith nothing else but the Government of the Churches within a certaine Precinct commonly called a Diocesse committed to one single person with sufficient authority over the Presbyters and people of those Churches for that end which Government so described being for substance of the thing it selfe in all the three forementioned particulars Ordaining giving rules of Discipline and Censures found in Scriptures except we will contend about names words must be acknowledged in the sense aforesaid to be sufficiently proved from Scriptures and your Majesty saith further that the Bishops do not challeng more or other power to belong to them in respect of their Episcopal office as it is distinct from that of Presbyters then what properly fals under one of those three We desire to speak both to the Bishops challenge and to your Majesties description of Episcopal government And first to their Challenge because it is first exprest in your Majesties reply The Challenge we undertake in two respects 1. In respect of the Power challenged 2. In respect of that ground or Tenure upon which the claim is laid The Power challenged consists of three particulars Ordaining giving Rules of Discipline and Censures No more no other in respect of their Episcopal office We see not by what warrant this Writ of partition is taken forth by which the Apostolical office is thus sha●ed or divided The Governing part into the Bishops hands the Teaching and administring Sacraments into the Pr●●byters For besides that the Scripture makes no such inclosure or partition wall it appeares the challenge is grown to more then was pretended unto in the times of growne Episcopacie Jerome and Chrysostome do both acknowledge for their time that the Bishop and Presbyter differed only in the matter of Ordination and learned Doctor Bilson makes some abatement in the claim of three saying the things proper to Bishops which might not be common to Presbyters are singularly of Succeeding and superiority in Ordaining The tenure or ground upon which the claim is made is Apostolical which with us is all one with Divine Institution And this as far as we have learned hath not been anciently openly or generally avowed in this Church of England either in time of Popery or of the first Reformation and whensoever the pretension hath been made it was not without the contradiction of learned and godly men The abettors of the challenge that they might resolve it at last into the Scripture did chuse the most plausible way of ascending by the scale of Succession going up the River to find the Head but when they came to Scriptures found it like the head of Nile which cannot be found they shrowded it under the name and countenance of the Angels of the Churches and of Timothy and Titus Those that would carry it higher endeavoured to impe it into the Apostolical office and so at last called it a Divine Institution not in force of any expresse precept but implicite practise of the Apostles and so the Apostolical office excepting the gifts or enablements confest only extraordinary is brought down to be Episcopal and the Episcopal raised up to be Apostolical Whereupon it follows that the highest Officers in the Church are put into a lower orb an extraordinary office turn'd into an ordinary distinct office confounded with that which in the Scripture is not found a temporary and an extinct office revived And indeed if the definitions of both be rightly made they are so incompatible to the same subject that he that will take both must lose the one aut Apostolus Episcopatum aut Apostolatum Episcopus For the Apostles though they did not in many things ut aliud yet they acted alio nomine alio munere then Presbyters or Bishops can do and if they were indeed Bishops and their government properly Episcopal in distinct sense then it is not needfull to go so far about to prove Episcopal government of Divine institution because they practised it but to assert expressely that Christ instituted it immediately in them For your Majesties definition of Episcopal government it is extracted out of the Bishops of later date then Scripture times and doth not sute to that Meridian under which there were more Bishops then one in a Precinct or Church and it is as fully competent to Archiepiscopal and Patriarchal government as Episcopal The parts of this definition materially and abstractly considered may be found in Scripture The Apostles Timothy and Titus were single persons but not limited to a Precinct The government of the Angels was limited to

successors then the names were by common usage very soon appropriated That of Episcopus to Ecclesiastical Governours That of Presbyter to the ordinary Ministers This asser●ion your Majesty is pleased to make without any demonstration for whom the Scripture cals Presbyters Rulers and Pastors and Teachers it calls Governors and commits to them the charge of feeding and inspection as we have proved and that without any mention of Church Government peculiar to a Bishop we deny not but some of the Fathers have conceived the notion that Bishops were called Apostles till the names of Presbyter and Episcopus became appropriate which is either an allusion or conceipt without Evidence of Scripture for while the Function was one the names were not divided when the Function was divided the name was divided also and indeed impropriate but we that look for the same warrant for the division of an Office as for the Constitution cannot find that this appropriation of names was made till afterwards or in processe of time as Theodoret one of the Fathers of this conceit affirms whose saying when it is run out of the pale of Scripture time we can no further follow from which premises laid altogether we did conclude the cleernes of our assertion that in the Scriptures of the New Testament a Bishop distinct from a Presbyter in Qualification Ordination Office or dignity is not found the contrary wherof though your Majesty saith that you have seene confirmed by great variety of credible Testimony yet we believe those testimonies are rather strong in asserting then in demonstrating the Scriptures Originall of a Bishop which is declared against by a cloud of witnesses named in the latter end of our former Answer unto which we should refer if matter of right were not properly tryable by Scripture as matter of Fact is by Testimony Wee said that the Apostles were the highest order of Officers of the Church that they were extraordinary that they were distinguisht from all other Officers and that their Government was not Episcopall but Apostolicall to which Answer your Majesty being not satisfyed doth oppose certaine assertions That Christ himselfe and the Apostles received their Authority by Mission their Ability by Unction That the Mission of the Apostles was ordinary and to continue to the end of the world but the Unction wherby they were enabled to both Offices Functions Teaching and Governing was indeed extraordiry That in their Unction they were not necessarily to have successours but necessarily in their Mission or Office of Teaching and Governing That in these two ordinary Offices their ordinary successours are Presbyters Bishops That Presbyters qua Presbyters do immediately succeed them in the Office of Teaching and Bishops qua Bishops immediately in the Office of Governing The demonstration of which last alone would have carryed in it more conviction then all these Assertions put together Officers are distinguished by that whereby they are constituted their Commission which being produced Signed by one place of Scripture gives surer evidence then a Pedigree drawne forth by such a series of distinctions as do not distinguish him into another Officer from a Presbyter whether this chaine of distinction be strong and the links of it sufficiciently tackt together we crave leave to examine Christ saith your Majesty was the Apostle and Bishop of our soules and he made the Apostles both Apostles and Bishops we do not conceive that your Majesty meanes that the Apostles succeeded Christ as the chief Apostle and that as Bishops they succeed Christ as a Bishop least thereby Christ his Mission as an Apostle and Bishop might be conceived as ordinary as their Mission is said to be But we apprehend your Majesty to mean that the Office of Apostle and Bishop was eminently contained in Christs office as the office of a Bishop was eminently contained in that of Apostleship but thence it will not follow that inferior offices being contained in the superior eminently are therefore existent in it formally For because all honours and dignities are eminently contained in your Majesty would it therefore follow that your Majesty is formally and distinctly a Baron of the Realm as it is asserted the Apostles to have been Bishops in distinct sense That Mission refers to Office and authority and Vnction only to Ability we cannot consent for besides that the breathing of Christ upon his Disciples saying Receive ye the Holy Ghost doth refer to mission as well as unction we conceive that in the proper anointing of Kings or other Officers the naturall use and effect of the oyle upon the body was not so much intended as the solemn and ceremonious use of it in the inauguration of them so there is relation to Office in unction as well as to conferring of abilities else how are Kings or Priests or Prophets said to be anointed And what good sense could be made of that expression in Scripture of anointing one in anothers room to omit that Christ by this construction should be called the Messias in respect of abilities only And although we should grant your Majesties explication of Mission and Vnction yet it will not follow that the mission of the Apostles was ordinary and their unction only extraordinary That into which there is succession was ordinary That into which there is no succession for succession is not unto abilities or gifts extraordinary and so the Apostles were ordinary officers in all whereunto there is properly any succession and that is office They differed from Bishops in that wherein one Apostle or Officer of the same order might differ from another to wit in abilities and measure of Spirit but not in that wherein one order of officers is above another by their office To which we cannot give consent for since no man is denominated an officer from his meer abilities or gifts so neither can the Apostles be called extraordinary officers because of extraordinary gifts but that the Apostles mission and office as well as their abilities was extraordinary and temporay doth appeare in that it was by immediate Commission from Christ without any intervention of men either in Election or Ordination for planting an authoritative governing of all Churches through the World comprehending in it all other Officers of the Church whatsoever and therefore it seemes to us very unreasonable that the Office and authority of the Apostles should be drawn down to an ordinary thereby to make it as it were a fit stock into which the ordinary Office of a Bishop may be ingrafted nor doth the continuance of Teaching and Governing in the Church more render the office of teaching and governing in the Apostles an ordinary office then the office of teaching and governing in Christ himselfe render his Office therefore Ordinary The reason given That the Office of Teaching and Governing was ordinary in the Apostles because of the continuance of them in the Church wee crave leave to say is that great mistake which runnes through the whole file of your

Majesties discourse for though there be a Succession in the worke of Teaching and Governing yet there is no Succession in the Commission or Office by which the Apostles performed them for the Office of Christ of Apostles of Evangelists of Prophets is thence also concluded Ordinary as to Teaching and Governing and the distinction of Offices Extraordinary and Ordinary eatenus destroyed The Succession may be into the same worke not into the same Commission and Office the Ordinary Officers which are to manage the work of Teaching and Governement are constituted setled and limited by warrant of Scripture as by another Commission then that which the Apostles had And if your Majesty had shewn us some Record out of Scripture warranting the division of the office of teaching and governing into two hands and the appropriation of teaching to Presbyters of governing to Bishops the question had been determined otherwise we must look upon the dissolving of the Apostolicall Office and distribution of it into these two hands as the dictate of men who have a minde by such a precarious Argument to challenge to themselves the Keyes of Authority and leave the Word to the Presbyters In our answer to the instances of Timothy and Titus which Doctor Bilson acknowledgeth to be the maine erection of Episcopall power if the proofes of their being Bishops doe stand or subversion if the answer that they were Evangelists be good Your Majesty finds very little satisfaction though all that is said therein could be proved First because the Scriptures no where implyeth any such things at all that Titus was an Evangelist neither doth the text cleerly prove that Timothy was so 1. The name of Bishop the Scripture neither expresly nor by implication gives to either the work which they are injoyned to do is common to Apostles Evangelists Pastors Teachers and cannot of it self make a character of one distinct and proper office But that there was such an order of Officers in the Church as Evangelists reckoned amongst the extraordinary and temporary Offices and that Timothy was one of that Order and that both Timethy and Titus were not ordained to one particular Church but were companions and fellow Labourers with the Apostles sent abroad to severall Churches as occasion did require it is as we humbly conceive clear enough in Scripture and not denyed by the learned defenders of Episcopall Government nor as we remember by Scultetus himselfe during the time of their travailes 2. To that which Your Majesty secondly saith That we cannot make it appeare by any Text of Scripture that the Office of Evangelist is such as we have discribed his worke seeming 2 Tim. 2. 4 5. to be nothing else but diligence in preaching the word notwithstanding all impediments and oppositions We humbly Answer That exact definitions of these or other Church Officers are hard to bee found in any Text of Scripture but by comparing one place of Scripture with another it may bee proved aswell that they were as what the Apostles and Presbyters were the description by us given being a Character made up by collation of Scriptures from which Mr. Hooker doth not much vary saying that Evangelists were Presbyters of Principall sufficiency whom the Apostles sent abroad used as Agents in Ecclesiasticall Affaires wheresoever they saw need And that Pastors Teachers were settled in some certain charge and therby differed from Evangelists whose work that it should be nothing but diligence in preaching c which is common to Apostles Evangelists Pastors and Teachers and so not distinctive of this particular Office argueth to us that as the Apostles Office was divided into Episcopall and Apostolicall so this also is to be divided in Episcopall and Evangelistical Ordination and Censures belonging to Timothy as a Bishop and diligence in Preaching only being left to the Evangelists which division as we humbly conceive is not warranted by the Scripture Thirdly Your Majesty saith that that which we so confidently affirme of Timothy and Titus their acting as Evangelists is by some denyed and refuted yea even with scorne rejected by some rigid Presbyterians and that which we so confidently deny that they were Bishops is consirmed by the consentient testimony of all antiquity recorded by Ierome himselfe that they were Bishops of Pauls ordination acknowledged by very many late Divines and that a Catalogue of 27 Bishops of Ephesus lineally succeeding from Timothy out of good Record is vouched by Dr. Reynolds and other Writers Our confidence as Your Majesty is pleased to call it was in our Answer exprest in these words wee cannot say that Timothy and Titus were Bishops in the sense of Your Majesty but extraordinary officers or Evangelists in which opinion we were then clear not out of a totall ignorance of those Testimonies which might be alledged against it but from intrinsick arguments out of Scripture from which Your Majesty hath not produced any one to the contrary nor is our confidence weakned by such replys as these the Scripture never cals them Bishops but the Fathers do the Scripture calls Timothy an Evangelist some of late have refuted it and rejected it with scorn the Scripture relates their motions from Church to Church but some affirme them to be fixed at Ephesus and in Creet the Scripture makes distinction of Evangelists and Pastors but some say that Timothy and Titus were both we cannot give Your Majesty a present account of Scultetus and Gherards Arguments but do believe that M. Gillespi and Rutherford are able with greater strength to refute that opinion of Timothy and Titus their being Bishops then they do if they do with scorne reject this of their being Evangelists As for testimonies and catalogues though we undervalue them not yet Your Majesty will be pleased to allow us the use of our Reason so far as not to erect an office in the Church which is not found in Scripture upon generall appellations or titles and allusions frequently found in the Fathers especially when they speake vulgarly and not as to a point in debate for even Ierome who as Your Majesty saith doth Record that Timothy and Titus were made Bishops and that of St. Pauls Ordination doth when he speaks to the poynt between Your Majesty and us give the Bishops to understand that they are superior to Presbyters consueitudine magis quam Dominicae veritatis dispositione for catalogues their creditrests upon the first witnesses from whom they are reported by tradition from hand to hand whose writings are many times suppositions dubius or not extant besides that these catalogues do resolve themselves into some Apostle or Evangelist as the first Bishop as the catalogue of Ierusalem into the Apostle Iames that of Antioch into Peter that of Rome into Peter and Paul that of Alexandria into Marke that of Ephesus into Timothy which Apostles and Evangelists can neither themselves be degraded by being made Bishops nor be succeeded in their proper calling or office and it is easy for

to have been Bishops for our part we beleeve that ●Word-● belonged unto 〈◊〉 and Titus with 〈…〉 Churches where they might 〈…〉 any time have the Office of Ordeyning and Governing as it is written in the same Chapter 1 Tim. 3. 14 15. Those things I have written unto th●● c. that thou mayest know how to be have thy selfe in the House of God which is the Church and therefore if there had been any proper Character or Qualification of a Bishop distinct from a Presbyter if any Ordination or Office we think the Apostle would have signified it but because he did not we conclude and the more strongly from the insufficiency of your Majesties two reasons that there are onely two Orders of Officers and consequently that a Bishop is not superiour to a Presbyter for we find not as we said in our Answer that one Officer is superiour to another who is of the same Order Concerning the Ages succeeding the Apostles Your Majesty having in your first Paper said that you could not in Conscience consent to Abolish Episcopall Government because you did conceive it to be of Apostolicall Institution Practised by the Apostles themselves and by them comitted and derived to particular persons as their Successors and have ever since til these last times bin exercised by Bishops in al the Churchs of Christ We thought it necessary in our Answer to subjoyne to that we had said out of the Scriptures the Iudgment of divers ancient ●riters and Fathers by whom Bishops were not acknowledged as a Divine but as an Ecclesias●ticall Institution as that which might very much conduce both to the easing of your Majesties scruple to consider that howsoever Episcopal Government was generally currant yet the superscription was not jugded Divine by some of those that either were themselves Bishops or lived under that Government to the vindication of the opinion which we hold from the prejudice of Novellisme or of recesse from the Iudgement of all Antiquity We doe as firmely beleeve as to matter of fact that Chrysostome and Austin were Bishops as that Aristotle was a Philosopher Cicer● an Orator though wee should rather call out Faith and beliefe thereof ●●rtaine in matter of fact upon humane Testimonies uncontrouled then infallible in respect of the Testimonies themselves But where is your Majestie saith That the darknesse of the Historie of the Church in the time succeeding the Apostles is a strong Argument for Episcopacie which notwithstanding that darknesse hath found so full proofe by unquestioned Catalogues as scarce any other matter of fact hath found the like Wee humbly conceive that those fore-mentioned times were darke to the Catalogue-makers who must derive the series of Succession from and through those Historicall darknesses and so make up their Catalogues very much from Tradition and Reports which can give no great Evidence because they agree not amongst themselves and that which is the great blemish of their Evidence is that the neerer they come to the Apostles times wherein they should be most of all clear to establish the succession firm and cleare at first the more doubtfull uncertaine and indeed contradictorie to one another are the Testimonies Some say that Clemens was first Bishop of Rome after Peter some say the third and the intricacies about the Order of Succession in Lin●s Anacletus Clemens and another called Cletus as some affirme are inextricable Some say that Titus was Bishop of Crate some say Arch-bishop and some Bishop of Dalmatia Some say that Timothy was Bishop of Ephesus and some say that Iohn was Bishop of Ephesus at the same time Some say that Polycarpus was first Bishop of Smyrna another saith that he succeeded one B●colus and another that Arist● was first Some say that Alexandria had but one Bishop and other Cities two and others that there was but one Bishop of one Citie at the same time And how should those Catalogues be unquestionable which must be made up out of Testimonies that fight one with another Wee confesse that the Ancient Fathers Tertulltan Irenaus c. made use of Succession as an Argument against Heretikes or Innovators to prove that they had the traduces Apostoliei seminis and that the Godly and Orthodox Fathers were on their side But that which we now have in hand is Succession in Office which according to the Catalogues resolves it selfe into some Apostle or Evangelist as the first Bishop of such a Citie or Place who as we conceive could not be Bishops of those places being of an higher Office though according to the language of after-times they might by them that drew up the Catalogues be so called because they planted and founded or watered those Churches to which they are entituled and had their greatest residence in them or else the Catalogues are drawne from some eminent men that were of great veneration and reverence in the times and places where they lived and Presidents or Moderators of the Presbyteries whereof themselves were Members from whom to pretend the Succession of after-Bishops is as if it should be said that Caesar was Successor to the Roman Consuls And we humbly conceive that there are some Rites and Ceremonies used continually in the Church of old which are asserted to be found in the Apostolicall and Primitive times and yet have no colour of Divine Institution and which is Argument above all other the Fathers whose Names wee exhibited to your Majestie in our Answer were doubtlesse acquainted with the Catalogues of Bishops who had beene before them and yet did hold them to be of Ecclesiasticall Institution And lest your Majestie might reply That however the Testimonies and Catalogues may varie or be mistaken in the order or times or names of those persons that succeeded the Apostles yet all agree that there was a Succession of some persons and so though the credit of the Catalogues be infirmed yet the thing intended is confirmed thereby We grant that Succession of men to feed and governe those Churches while they continued Churches cannot be denyed and that the Apostles and Evangelists that planted and watered those Churches though extraordinarie and temporarie Officers were by Ecclesiasticall Writers in complyance with the Language and usage of their owne times called Bishops and so were other eminent men of chiefe note presiding in the Presbyteries of the Cities or Churches called by such Writers as wrote after the division or distinction of the names of Presbyters and Bishops But that those first and ancientest Presbyters were Bishops in proper sence according to your Majesties description invested with power over Presbyters and people to whom as distinct from Presbyters did belong the power of Ordaining giving Rules and Censures wee humbly conceive can never be proved by authentike or competent Testimonies And granting that your Majestie should prove the Succession of Bishops from the Primitive times seriatim yet if these from whom you draw and through whom you derive it be found either more then Bishops as