the Bishops thereof to the number of twenty seven had been ordained in the City it self but that it seems proving a false Allegation he has given us no reason to believe him in his Tradition An Inference much like this that supposing two persons to contend for their rights and the Advocate of one of them shall in his plea alledge a false prescription his Adversary should thence conclude upon him that he had no reason to believe that there was any such Person in the world as his Client For this is the case The matter of the dispute was where the Bishops of Ephesus ought to be ordained according to the Canons At Ephesus says Leontius by constant Prescription No says the Council for many of them have been ordained at Constantinople Now is it not awkerd to infer from thence that the Council denies the certainty of the Succession it self when as the debate was grounded upon the supposition of it It being granted on both sidesas a thing undoubted that there was a succession of Bishops at Ephesus and the Controversie was only about the accustomed place of their Consecration Now from the variety of that to conclude that it is uncertain whether there were any such thing as Bishops at all is such a forced Argument as proves nothing but that we have a very great mind to our Conclusion I might proceed to the Succession in other Churches of which we have certain Records but I will not engage my self in too many particular Historical Disputes where I know it is easie if men will not be ingenuous to perplex any matter with little critical scruples and difficulties and therefore I will cast the whole of this Controversie upon this one Principle That though the Records of the Church were as defective as is pretended yet seeing all that are preserved make only for Episcopacy and that our Adversaries are notable to trace out one against it that is evidence more than enough of its universal practice and if that will not serve the turn it is to no purpose to trouble our selves on either side with any proof that may be had from the Testimony of Antiquity for if upon that account we have not any it is not possible either for them or us to have it in this or any other Controversie whatsoever Thirdly The Succession so much pleaded for by the Writers of the Primitive Church was not a Succession of Persons in Apostolical Power but a Succession in Apostolical Doctrine Whether any Persons succeeded in Apostolical Power has been already considered and therefore all that is here requisite to be enquired into is by what Persons the Apostolical Doctrine was conveyed And if it be pleaded by the Writers of the Church to have been done by Bishops as the Apostles Successours that proves the Succession of Persons as well as Doctrines But seeing this is to be done as our Adversaries instruct us by a view of the places produced to that purpose let us view them too The first is that of Irenaeus Quoniam valdè longum est in hoc tali volumine omnium Ecclesiarum enumerare successiones maximae antiquissimae omnibus cognitae à gloriosissimis duobus Apostolis Petro Paulo Romae fundatae constitutae Ecclesiae eam quam habet ab Apostolis traditionem annunciatam hominibus fidem per successiones Episcoporum pervenientes usque ad nos indicantes confundimus omnes eos c. Where we see that whatever the Argument of Irenaeus was his design was to prove that the succession of the Apostles was conveyed down by the hands of the Bishops that were Successours to them in their several Sees So that it is evident that he designed to prove the Succession of the Doctrine by the Succession of the Doctors and therefore if he does not prove it he does more he supposes it and by the undoubted evidence of it demonstrates the truth of the Doctrine in that those Persons who were appointed by the Apostles to oversee and govern the Churches have conveyed the Apostles Doctrine down to us by their Successors And what fuller Testimony can there be of a Personal Succession of Bishops to the Apostles And yet Irenaeus does more than this he derives the Personal Succession from the Apostles down to his own time and they all succeeded the Apostles as they succeeded one another and as Linus was their Successour so was Eleutherius who sate at the same time that Irenaeus wrote and therefore if Linus was Successour to the Apostles so was Eleutherius and if Eleutherius was Bishop of Rome so was Linus So that it was one and the same thing to succeed in the Bishoprick and the Apostolical Authority And to the same purpose is the passage of Tertullian Edant origines Ecclesiarum suarum evolvant ordinem Episcoporum suorum ita per successiones ab initio decurrentem ut primus ille Episcopus aliquem ex Apostolis aut apostolicis viris habuerit Authorem Antecessorem Hoc modo Ecclesiae Apostolicae census suos deferunt sicut Smyrnaeorum Ecclesia habens Polycarpum à Joanne conlocatum refert sicut Romanorum Clementem à Petro ordinatum edit proinde utique â—aeterae exhibent quos ab Apostolis in Episcopatum constitutos Apostolici seminis traduces habeant The whole design of which passage is to prescribe against the Hereticks by the Authority of the Apostolical Successours and that being expresly appropriated to single Bishops I hope I need not now dispute whether they succeeded them only in Degree and not Order or in Order only and not Jurisdiction all that I desire from this Testimony is that they succeeded them in their several Churches for though he instances only in the Church of Rome yet he declares himself able and ready to give the same account of all other Churches and by vertue of that warranted the truth of their Doctrine Than which I must confess I cannot understand what more can be desired to justifie their Succession in the Apostolical Authority Especially from Tertullian who was neither Thomist nor Scotist and so was utterly unacquainted with those fine distinctions of Degree Order and Jurisdiction but spoke like a plain and a blunt African when he called the Bishops in their several Diocesses the Apostles Successours And so all the Writers of the same Age understood by a Bishop one superiour to subject Presbyters for whatever was the signification of the word in the Apostles time it was now determined to this Order and so used in vulgar speech so that when we meet with it in their Writings we must understand it in the common sense And therefore by a Bishop we must mean the same thing from the Apostles downward and a Bishop in their time was superiour to Presbyters and the Apostles are granted to have been superiour to the other Pastors of the Church so that the Succession from first to last continued in superiority of Jurisdiction And now when this Succession is
saying which is so triumphantly insisted on to blast the whole credit of Antiquity that it is difficult to find out who were the Successors of the Apostles in the Churches planted by them unless it be those mentioned in the Writings of St. Paul it is evident from his own words that the difficulty arises not from the deficiency but from the too great plenty of Successors 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For he had a thousand Helpers or as he was wont to call them Fellow-Souldiers So that the reason why it is so difficult to assign whom he appointed to preside over the Churches that he converted is because he had such an innumerable company of followers that whom he set over what Churches it is not possible to define than as himself has happened to name particular Persons as Timothy Titus Crescens Clemens Epaphroditus c. which alone are a sufficient evidence of the Apostles care to settle Successors in the greater Churches However this passage can by no means be made use of to blast the credit of Antiquity as to the matter in debate because it concerns not the uncertainty of the form of Government but only of the Persons who succeeded in the Apostolical Form in some particular Churches And that alone is answer enough to the third defect as to Persons viz. That granting the Catalogues of the first Bishops to be defective that is no proof against the certainty of Episcopal Government unless at the same time that we cannot find the Bishop we could find some other form of Government Nay further those particulars that we have are a sufficient Testimony to the general Truth that we assert in that it is attested by all the Records that are remaining and that is enough to satisfie any reasonable or impartial man especially when in the greater and more known Churches we have as certain an account of the Succession as we have of the Bishops of England from the Reign of Henry the VIII to Charles the II. But that concerns the Argument of Personal Succession which though I have prevented I may consider in its proper place At present in order to the confuting of this Objection from the defect of Time I shall shew that we have as certain and uninterrupted a Tradition of the matter in hand as the most curious and diffident enquirer can demand for his full satisfaction And first What can be more ancient or is more evident than the Testimony of Clement of Rome in his famous Epistle to the Corinthians where exhorting them above all things to Peace and Unity which indeed was the main Argument in the first Writers of the Church one chief way that he propounds in order to it is that every man keep his Order and Station where beside the Laity he reckons up three distinct Orders of the Christian Clergy which he expresses by an allusion as was the custom of the Apostolical Writers to the Jewish Hierarchy viz. The Office of High Priest Priest and Levite The passage is very full and pregnant 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The High Priest has his peculiar Office assign'd him and the Priest has his Station bounded and the Levites have their proper Ministries determined and the Lay-man is obliged to his Lay-Offices My Brethren let every one in his Place and Order worship God with a good Conscience not transgressing the settled Canon of his Duty according to the rule of Decency Where it is manifest that he describes the several Ministries of the Christian Church at that time by alluding to the Offices of the Mosaick Institution For why else should he conclude with this Exhortation And therefore my Brethren let every one of you keep his own Order unless this distinction of Officers concern'd the Corinthian Christians So that though it be expressed by alluding to the Ordinances of the old Jewish Institution yet it is a description of the present state of the Christian Church among those to whom he writes otherwise it were very impertinent to exhort them to keep those Stations if there were no such among them But the great Witness in this cause is that brave Martyr St. Ignatius Pupil to St. John and by him ordain'd Bishop of Antioch and chief Bishop of Asia who whilst he was in his way to his Martyrdom being sent from Antioch to Rome to be devoured by wild Beasts in his journey wrote several Epistles to several Churches in which he gives such a plain Account of the Constitution of the Hierarchy in his time by the Orders of Bishop Presbyter and Deacon as plainly demonstrates it to have been of Apostolical Antiquity And this is so evident that there is no way of avoiding the Testimony but by flatly denying it And therefore our Adversaries will upon no terms allow these Epistles to be genuine and take infinite pains to prove them if it be possible supposititious so that this is become the great point in this Controversie and has been eagerly disputed by many Learned men on both sides The two last that engaged in it are a learned Prelate of our own and the famous Monsier Daillé in whose Books the whole cause is not only contain'd but I am apt to think decided For though Daillé was a Person of more Judgment Temper and Learning than most of his Brethren yet they were strangely overborn by the strength of Prejudice and it is plain to any man that ever look'd into him that he was first resolved upon his Opinion and then right or wrong to make it good and because he was well aware that these Epistles alone were so clear and full a Testimony to the Apostolical Antiquity of the Episcopal Order that they plainly prevented all Attempts and Arguments against it he therefore set himself with all vehemence and made it the business of his Life to destroy their Credit and with infinite pains sifted all the Rubbish of Antiquity to find out every shred and atom of a Criticism that might any way be made use of to impair their Reputation Yet after all this Drudgery are his Exceptions so plainly disingenuous and unreasonable that they would fall as well upon any other ancient Record whatsoever not only that ever has been but that ever could have been though upon no other score than purely that of its Antiquity But this Cause hath breath'd its last in this man and this advantage we have gain'd by his zeal to maintain and his ability to manage it that it has put an utter end to this Controversie in that all his forces have been rebuked and overthrown with such an irresistible strength of Reason and Learning that for the time to come we may rest secure that never any man of common Sense or ordinary Learning or any Modesty will dare to appear in such an helpless and bafled Cause For the particulars I refer to the learned Authors themselves but as to the general Argument I shall give a brief and distinct account of it and then leave it
succession of Persons in any Bishoprick has not been preserved with that care and diligence that it ought or might have been to conclude that therefore there was no certainty of the Episcopal form of Government is the same thing as to conclude that there never was any ancient Monarchy in the world because in all their Histories there are some flaws or defects or disagreements as to the names of Persons in the succession But we think it enough that where we find an established Monarchy though we meet with some intervals of History in which the Princes names that then reigned are uncertain or forgotten and meet with no Records that the Government was at that time changed into a Common-wealth to conclude that the Monarchy was all along preserved And that is the case of Episcopal Government in the Church in that in all times and places where and when Records have been preserved we find the same Form practised and therefore ought to conclude that the same was observed in those short intervals of time if we suppose there were any such in which they were lost Though I do not find that the Register of particular Persons is so defective as is pretended but that in most Churches their very names are accurately enough recorded Thus first for the Church of Jerusalem in which we find a succession of fifteen Bishops before its destruction attested by the best and most ancient Writers of the validity of whose Testimony we have no reason to doubt For it is no Objection that so many Bishops should be crouded into so narrow a Room that many of them could not have had above two years time to rule in the Church When almost all that time the Jews were in Rebellion against the Romans continually provoking them by their Insurrections to the utmost severity both against Jews and Christians for as yet the Romans understood no difference nor were they broken into any open division among themselves all these Bishops being as formally circumcised as any of the most zealous Retainers to the Jewish Religion So that it is no more wonder that so many Bishops should succeed in so short a time than that such an incredible number of Jews should perish by the Sword But secondly It is less material to enquire as Scaliger does where the Seat of the Bishops of Jerusalem was from the time of the destruction of the City by Titus till the time of Adrian For what if he had no Palace was he no Bishop Or what if we cannot tell where he assembled his Flock was there no Church Perhaps it was in a Cockloft at Pella but because we cannot tell where it was was it no where And therefore to return the Quere Was there then a Church of Jerusalem If there was whether Episcopal Presbyterian or Independent or all together I would fain know where it was and if you cannot tell me conclude as you do that there was no Church at all And so he has answered his own little Objection himself that the Church follows the Bishop and is not confined to stone Walls and therefore that the Church of Jerusalem was then at Pella though there was no such place as Jerusalem as at this day the Patriarchal Seat of Antioch is at Meredin in Mesopotamia and that of Alexandria at Grand Cairo As for the succession at Antioch I find not the least ground to doubt of its truth for I think it no objection that though it be clear it is not certain whether they succeeded St. Peter or St. Paul for be it either or both or neither it is all one so it be any that is enough that there was a succession though we did not know the particular Founder of the Church in whom it began and whoever of the Apostles it was whether one or more they had Apostolical Authority over it and whoever succeeded them succeeded in the same form of Government As for the Church of Rome all the difficulty is about the succession of Linus and Clemens being both reckoned in the first place but the conjecture is very probable that Clemens succeeded St. Peter in the Church of the Jews as Linus did St. Paul in the Church of the Gentiles and that surviving both Linus and Cletus that succeeded him till the union of the two Churches he governed both For whatever ground there is for the conjecture that there were separate Churches of Christian Jews and Gentiles in other Cities there is a very probable foundation for it at Rome in the Apostolical History Acts xxviii where St. Paul expresly declares to the Jews that from thenceforth he would preach only to the Gentiles and so in all probability gathered a distinct Church of them by themselves And therefore it is observable that in that famous passage of Irenaeus in which he derives the succession of the Bishops of Rome from St. Peter and Paul down to Eleutherius his Cotemporary that he speaks not of the Church of Rome in the single number but Ecclesiae Petro Paulo Romae fundatae canstitutae as if they had been several Churches And to this purpose it is a pretty observation of Mr. Thorndike that St. Pauls being buried in the Way to Ostia and St. Peters in the Vatican as we understand by Caius in Eusebius seems to point them out Heads the one of the Jewish Christians the other of the Gentiles in that the Vatican was then the Jury of Rome and notorious for the Residence of Jews But though these first Records could not be fully made out we have no reason to doubt of the History but rather to suspect some mistake in after-times or the omission of some circumstance that might if it had been recorded have removed the difficulty For it is very hard that when Irenaeus to mention no more gives us a Catalogue of the Bishops of Rome from St. Peter down to the time when himself was at Rome and who lived not at a greater distance from St. Peter than we do from the first Archbishop in Queen Elizabeths Reign that we should suspect the whole truth of his Relation because we cannot give an account of all the particular circumstances of the Succession This I say is too hard dealing with any ancient Records though the conclusion is much harder that because we have no certainty of all the Persons that succeeded in Church-Government and of the particular manner of their Succession that therefore we have no certainty of the particular Form of it notwithstanding we have no Record of any form but one As for the Church of Alexandria there the Succession is acknowledged to be clearest as indeed it is unquestionable only it is imputed to the choice of Presbyters but of that in its proper place the evidence of personal Succession is enough and all that is pertinent to our present debate And the succession of Ephesus might have been as unquestionable but that one Leontius pleads at the Council of Calcedon that all
so expresly derived down by single Persons and when the truth of the Apostolical Doctrine is vouched by the certainty of this Succession it is a very cold answer to tell us that the Fathers talk only of a succession of Doctrines and not of Persons Fourthly This Personal Succession so much spoken of is sometimes attributed to Presbyters even after the distinction came in use between Bishops and them I pray by whom Why by Irenaeus But does Irenaeus when he speaks of the Bishops and Presbyters of his own time confound their names and offices or any other Author of the same Age Nay do they not carefully distinguish them from each other though when they speak of things as done in the Apostles times they may speak in the language of those times The names therefore of Bishop and Presbyter being not then distinguished it was but proper for them to express things as they were then expressed So that though Irenaeus never would stile a Bishop of his own time by the name of Presbyter but ever carefully distinguished the two Orders yet when he speaks of the Bishops of the first time it is neither wonder nor impropriety if he call them Presbyters for I will yield so far to our Adversaries that they were so called till the death of the Apostles and then succeeding into their Power it was but fit that they should be distinguished by some proper name from the inferiour Clergy And there lies the root of all our Adversaries pretences that they will have the Office of a Bishop to have been born at the same time with the distinction of the Name Which if we will not grant them as without a manifest affront to the Apostles we cannot their whole Cause sinks to nothing For that is the only proof alledged in behalf of the sententia Hieronymi that the Offices were not distinguisht before the names But of that in its due place already at present I challenge them to produce any one Author that treating of things after the separation of the words was made ever calls a Bishop a Presbyter or a Presbyter a Bishop And in that I am very much their friend for if they can it utterly overthrows their main Argument that Bishops and Presbyters were the same in the Apostles times from the promiscuous use of their names in that we find them promiscuously used after the distinction But that by the word Presbyteri Irenaeus does not mean a simple Presbyter is plain from the words themselves in which he prescribes against the novelties of the Hereticks by the undoubted antiquity of the Churches Tradition which he says was conveyed by the Apostles themselves to the Ancients who succeeded them in their Episcopacy so that by his Presbyteri he means as he explains himself such of the Ancients qui Episcopatus successionem habent ab Apostolis i. e. the Ancient Bishops This is all that I meet with material upon this Head for when they go about to prove by the Authority of Ignatius himself that Episcopacy is not a Divine but an Ecclesiastical Constitution they are to be given up for pleasant men that will attempt any Paradox in pursuit of the Cause And it exceeds even the rashness of Blondel himself who that as he speaks his St. Jerom might not stand alone like a Sparrow upon the house top has after his rate of inferring fetched in all the Fathers to bear him company except only Ignatius whom it seems he despaired of making ever to chirp pro sententiâ Hieronymi but now it seems at last that the holy Martyr himself might not be made the solitary Sparrow by being deserted by all the Fathers he is brought over to the Party but with such manifest force to himself as plainly shews him to be no Volunteer in the Cause Thus when he commends the Deacon Sotion for being subject to the Bishop ut gratiae Dei and to the Presbytery ut legi Jesu Christi By the Law of Jesus Christ we are taught to understand divine Institution but by the grace of God only humane Prudence though that too was directed to it by the special favour or Providence of God as the only means of preserving peace and unity in the Church Be it so the grace of God no doubt is as firm a ground of Divine Institution as the Law of Christ so that if Episcopacy was established by Gods special favour we are as well content with it as if it had come by the Grace of Christ. Neither does this Interpretation derogate any thing from the Episcopal Order but very much from our blessed Saviours Wisdom viz. that when he had established Presbyteries in his Church for the Government of it that establishment was found so ineffectual for its end that Almighty God was afterward constrained for preventing of Schisms and preserving of Unity in the Church in a special manner to inspire the Governours of it in after-ages to set up the Form of Episcopal Government And yet that was no less disparagement to himself than his Son for seeing what our Saviour did in the establishment of his Church he did by the Counsel of his Father if its Institution proved defective for its end it was an equal over-sight of both and the After-game of Episcopacy was only to supply a defect that they did not fore-see but were taught by Experience A very honourable representation this of the Wisdom of the Divine Providence However take it which way we will we cannot desire a plainer acknowledgment of Divine Institution for so it come from God it matters not which way he was pleased to convey it to us And now have we not reason to wonder when we see men attempt to bring this holy Martyr off with such slights so expresly against his own declared Opinion who every where grounds his Exhortation of Obedience to the Bishop upon the command of God and adds even in the words following the forecited passage 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And yet not to him but to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Christ who is the Bishop of us all and therefore for the honour of him that requires it it is our bounden duty to be obedient without hypocrisie What can be plainer than that the power of the Bishop stands wholly upon the command of God So again in the Epistle to the Ephesians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let us take care not to oppose the Bishop as we would be obedient to God and if any man observe the silence of his Bishop let him reverence him so much the more For every one that the Master of the Family puts into the Stewardship we ought to receive him as the Master himself and therefore it is manifest that we ought to reverence the Bishop as we would our Lord. And therefore it is a great over-sight to affirm that there is not one Testimony in all Ignatius Epistles that proves the least semblance of an Institution of Christ for Episcopacy when
the difference of some accounts concerning the Succession of some Bishops But this has been objected two or three times already and as often answered and therefore at present I shall say no more to it than only granting the truth of the Premises to mind the Reader of the weakness of the conclusion that from the uncertainty of some Persons in the Succession infers an uncertainty of the form of Government it self And now am I come to our Adversaries only positive proof in their own behalf that is the Authority of St. Jerom for though they pretend to one or two Authors more yet still at the last push St. Hierom is the only man And the sum of all that is pretended from him is this That though the Apostles exercised a superiority over the other Pastors of the Church during their own lives yet immediately upon their decease having it seems provided no Successours in that Power that themselves enjoyed the Church was every where governed by the whole Body or Common-Council of Presbyters but this Form of Government being quickly found very apt to breed Schisms and Divisions it was for the better prevention of them agreed upon all the world over to chuse one Presbyter out of the rest and settle a Supremacy of Power upon him for the more effectual Government of the Church Antequam diaboli instinctu studia in religione fierent diceretur in populis Ego sum Pauli Ego Apollo Ego autem Cephae communi Presbyterorum consilio Ecclesiae gubernabantur Postquam verò unusquisque eos quos baptisaverat suos putabat esse non Christi in toto Orbe decretum est ut unus de Presbyteris electus superponeretur caeteris ad quem omnis Ecclesiae cura pertineret ut schismatum semina tollerentur From whence it is inferred that though this Form of Government hapned to be set up in the after-ages of the Church yet it was not upon the account of any Divine Right or Apostolical Constitution but purely upon prudential motives and by the Churches discretion that might have instituted either that or any other alterable Form as it judged most tending to its own peace and settlement Before I come to answer the whole Argument I cannot but observe what disingenuous advantage these men make of the hasty expressions of that good Father let him in the heat and eagerness of dispute but drop an inconsiderate word that may reflect upon the Records or the Reputation of the ancient Church it immediately serves to justifie all their Innovations And thus I remember Monsieur Daillé in his shallow Book of the Use of the Fathers frequently makes good as he thinks his charge against them all only by impleading St. Hierom but though he is made use of to serve them at all turns yet in this Argument they devolve the whole credit of all the ancient Church upon his single Authority And is it not very strange that two or three hasty passages of this single Father not only against the concurrent Testimony of all the ancient Church but against his own express Opinion should be seized upon with so much zeal and greediness to give defiance to all the practice of Antiquity That is bold enough but it is much more so to force all the rest of the Fathers against their own Consciences and Declarations to subscribe to his Opinion as Blondel has done who having first placed St. Jerom in the front and flourished all his sayings with large Commentaries ranges all the rest of the Fathers under his Colours excepting only Ignatius though since he too has had the honour to be admitted into the service but he has drawn them into the Party by such a forced and presumptuous way of arguing that I know not a greater Instance of the power of Prejudice in a learned man I once thought to have taken him particularly to task but his trifling is so grosly palpable that there needs no more to expose it to any mans contempt than that he can endure the Penance of reading him over And how was it possible for any man to discourse after a wiser rate that undertakes to prove that Clemens Alexandrinus Origen Irenaeus Tertullian Epiphanius Eusebius Chrysostom Theodoret Theophylact were Presbyterians It is just such another design as to go about to prove that Calvin Beza Blondel Salmasius Daillé and all the other Calvinian Fathers have been zealous Assertors of Episcopacy And yet this task too some men have undertaken and I suppose will make good by the same Topicks and doubt not but they will both gain belief together Now in answer to the great Authority of St. Jerom there are many things alledged and insisted upon by learned men some plead that it is contrary to his own express and declared Opinion and therefore is not to be taken for his setled and deliberate sense of the thing but only for an hasty and over-lavish expression Others endeavour to expound him to a good sense consistent with himself and the rest of the Fathers viz. that writing against some proud Deacons that would set themselves above Presbyters he tells them that it was much the same insolence as if they should go about to prefer themselves above the Bishop in that the distance was much the same they alone being reckoned in the Priesthood with the Bishop whereas the Deacons had no higher Office in the Church than to serve Tables and poor Widows So that the difference was the same as in the Levitical Priesthood the Bishop and the Presbyters being as Aaron and his Sons who alone were accounted into the Priestly Office whereas the Deacons had only the Office of Levites that were no better than Servants to the Priests And though Presbyters at that time exercised no Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction in the Church yet they were formerly joyned with the Bishop himself in the Government of it and shared in all acts of Power and Discipline excepting only Ordination And for this reason because they were placed so near to the highest Order that they were capable by vertue of their own Order to exercise almost all the Offices of that it was not to be endured that such inferiour Ministers as the Deacons were should prefer themselves above them Quis patiatur ut mensarum viduarum minister supra eos se tumidus efferat ad quorum preces Christi Corpus sanguisque conficitur Though this probably was all the design of St. Jerom yet because he seems to have said more than he designed I shall not contend about his meaning but shall give my Adversaries the whole advantage of his Authority and let them make the best of it Neither shall I go about to overthrow it by the contrary Testimony of the Ancients for though that were easily done the cause does not require it but granting the Authority of St. Jeroms Opinion and that it was never contradicted by any ancient Writer I will demonstrate the falshood of the Opinion it self from its own absurdity