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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
word_n	apostle_n	bishop_n	presbyter_n	4,071	5	10.4784	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A36832	The conformity of the discipline and government of those who are commonly called independants to that of the ancient primitive Christians by Lewis Du Moulin.	Du Moulin, Lewis, 1606-1680.	1680 (1680)	Wing D2533; ESTC R25012	54,163	74

just the Reverse is practised and maintained 'T is now only the Priest that preaches in publick in the Assemblies of several thousands And likewise as the extent of the place unto which the Ministry of these at this day is confined is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so it was also heretofore that of the Bishop and he most commonly dated his Letters thus ex mea paraecia Which by the way plainly shewes us that the Intendance and Government of the Bishop in the Primitive Church was only over a Town or Villa which they called a Parish or a Suburb for also every Villa and Burrough had their Chorepiscopum Monsieur Larroque without thinking of it makes it clear and evident that it was the Ancient practise for the Bishop alone to have the charge of preaching in the greatest and most numerous Assemblies because the Bishops being aged and sick they called to his help and assistance not the Priests of the Bishop's Presbytry but some neighbour Bishops He tells us of one Nareissus Bishop of Jerusalem who being a hundred and sixteen years old had for his Coadjutor Alexander that had been Bishop of Capadocia and of one Theoctenus Bishop of Caesarea that shared the care of his Episcopacy with Anatolius who in truth was not as yet Bishop but who was then consecrated and called Bishop which plainly shewes was that a Priest could not be his Coadjutor This is also confirmed by the example of Valerius Bishop of Hippo who being old and decayed took not one of those who was to continue in the Presbytry for his Coadjutor but he took Saint Austin who was to be his Successor and who also was called Bishop of Hippo during the life of Valerius AS to those of the Presbytry who were called Deacons as they were the Creatures of the Bishop and wholy at his Devotion so likewise their Ministry was that which is spoken of in the 6. of the Acts which was not that of preaching in publick AS for the Priests or Elders who were not Deacons they did not ordinarily preach in publick assemblies whence it happened that we read of very few Homilies composed and made by the Priests Their Ministry was concluded and bound within the apartment or paraecia of the Bishop and as I have already said it was less fixt and more Itinerant for they went from house to house there was not a day past but that the Priest or Elder visited the good Families went to prayers there expounded the word and administred the holy Sacrament of the Lords Supper to them and as for Baptism it was most commonly celebrated by the Deacons in great Assemblies or in great Churches at the entrance of which the Fonts were placed or the Baptisterium 'T IS true the Bishops did frequently oppose those private assemblies and by their Synods and Canons so far as that the Synode of Gangr● anatheniatized them called in derision those that frequented them A●●phales and condemned even those that communicated with them They would do the like also to persons of quality that kept in their houses Priests and Oratories 'T is true also Saint Chrysostome would have the Lords Supper to be as publick as Baptism and that both should be celebrated and performed in the eyes of the whole World BUT because it would scarcely be believed that one Bishop singly as Cyril of Alexandria Cyril of Jerusalem and Saint Chrysostome of Constantinople could preach in publick one Lord's day to above a hundred thousand Auditors that were in each of their Villa's they say that of necessity several of the Presbytry must perform the office of Preachers in those other places of the City where the Bishop did not preach and this appears by the Homilies of Saint Chrysostome ad populum Antiochenum when he was not Bishop That is true but also those Priests had no fixt places no cure nor certain parish over which they were pastors because the Bishop himself was the Curate of the Parish so that the Priests were only the Vicars of the Bishops in the same manner as Nicholas 1. called the Bishop of Germany and of France Suos Episcopos Vicarios Those Priests were as the Deacons at the devotion of the Bishop and were entirely his Creatures and they might rather I am sure better be called the Ministers of the Bishop than of Jesus Christ or of the Church as it appears by the six and twentieth Canon of the Synod of Agde for they were like persons taken upon hire and to whom the Bishop gave Salary for their pains and trouble AFTER all these discoveries and Manifestations there is no doubt but that the Churches in the time of the Apostles and for a long while after were congregational and Independant on Synodes since that even every Family of the most considerable and better sort was a Church or at least they had one among them where the exercizes of Piety were regularly performed every day and where during their repast the holy Scripture was read as we may learn from the first Epistle to Timothy Chapter the IV. verse the fifth For every Creature of God is good and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer And where before they departed or indeed rose from Table they received the Communion as Tertullian tells us in his book de Corona Militis declaring that this practise was agreeing with the institution of Jesus Christ as it was also practised much in the 3. Age in the time of Saint Cyprian as he tells us in one of his Epistles Quotidie communicamus Although several families every Lord's day made very great and Numerous Assemblies where in most solemn manner they attended upon prayer preaching and celebration of the holy Supper yet he who performed the Action was called Primus Presbyter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Episcopus To which it seemes Saint Paul hath respect in his 1. Epistle to Timothy 5. 17. let the Elders that rule well be counted worthy of double honour especially they who labour in the word and Doctrine where though in the words he does not speak of two kinds of Pastors or Ministers distinct in rank and dignity nor even in office yet notwithstanding he does insinuate in that place that in the Presbytry and in the Company of the Ministers of Jesus Christ named indifferently Bishops Elders and Presbyters there were some that were Deacons and whose gifts were less for praying and preaching in publick FOR though I believe that the Apostles did not establish diverse degrees of Pastors and that in their time and a long while after they were called indifferently Bishops Priests Elders sacerdotes Ministers and Deacons And that the same Deacons bore a part in the Ministry of the word with the rest as it is seen for Example in Saint Stephen and Phillip and by what Clemens Alexandrinus tells us in the sixth book of his strom it es and Mr. James Capel

in his Catechisme yet it is most certain that from the second age they were distinguished in names and offices that the first Priest or Bishop attended more peculiarly upon preaching in publique and the Priests and Deacons upon the functions of lesser consequence as alms-giving c. from whence it is that we read so often of the first Bishops of Rome that such a one created so many Priests so many Deacons and that Hyggen in the year 141. created fifteen Priests fifteen Deacons and six Bishops That Eleutherius in the year 184 ordained 12 Priests 8 Deacons and 15 Bishops not to serve in the Church of Rome but in other places where the Bishop who had ordained them was to attend upon the preaching in publick and the Priests and Deacons upon the other functions of the holy Ministry for their Ministry was less fixt they went to break bread from house to house they instructed they comforted they confirmed Christians and those whom they called Fideles in the profession of the Christian Religion and in the Practise of Piety and drew over Jews and Gentiles to them and they baptized them adding every day some or other to the Church of Jesus Christ to be saved In a word they formed almost as many independant Churches as there were families but which then did not constitute a Communion distinct from that of the same Fideles in the greater and more numerous Assemblies and where they assisted not only at the h●aring of the word but also at the participation of the holy supper and all the sacred Ceremonies as Mounsieur le Sueur tells us I must needs make one observation here which will be of no mean consequence as to what I have said about the diversity of the names of Bishop Priest Elder Sacerdote and Deacon in the same Ministry against those who would fain perswade us that not only this Intendance of a Bishop over the Priests but also the prerogative that they attribute to themselves of having alone the Authority and the right to ordain Pastors is of divine right and by the Institution of the Apostles I must needs observe I say that since the words and the Offices have been distinguished Christian Antiquity never thought this Intendance and Prerogative to be of divine right because it was in the liberty of a Bishop to abandon the order or office of Bishop without quitting the office of Priest or of Minister of Jesus Christ and indeed without being able to do it unless he were constrained to it by the sentence of deposition They did deprive themselves then of an humane arbitrary and Mutable order unto which they were called by men but they could not divest themselves of that which they had received from Jesus Christ That was the Judgment of the Councel of Ancyra in the year 314. which having deposed some persons from the Episcopacy lest them in the Presbytry This is what the sixth Oecumenical Councel did Canon twenty which deposed a Bishop but did not take from him the Presbytry so that if there was then an Indelible Caracter it was not that of Bishop but that of Tresbyter and this is the farther confirmed and more strongly by this consideration that as it was an Usurpation or at least a Right purely humane when one of the Members of the Presbytry who was called Bishop attributed to himself alone the right and the office of Preaching in publick and not of communicating it to others but only as far as he pleased The same Judgment ought to be made of this Intendance over Priests and this prerogative to ordain and to conclude that neither Episcopacy nor the power to ordaine nor that to preach in publick which one person reserved peculiarly to himself were of Christ's Institution THIS is if I am not mistaken an observation which has not as yet by any been thought on but which is the unravelling of all the difficulties that those great men Mounsieur Daille the Father Mounsieur Larroque c. On one side and Mounsieur Pearson Bishop of Chester on the other have formed concerning either the Establishment or the overthrow of Episcopacy And here now is the Resolution of the words of Saint Jerome which have put so many people on the rack and have spent both so much pretious time and paper Quid facit Episcopus quod non facit presbyter except● ordinatione Which words Marsillius de Padoüa understands of the power that the Bishop reserved alone to himself by a right purely humane to regulate the Affairs of the Church because it would be a thing altogether absurd to make Saint Jerome say that Jesus Christ had in all things equalled the Priest to the Bishop except the power to ordain And now also you may see by all these declarations and discoveries a very strong establishment of the Congregational way But I now will return from this digression to pursue the subject I left off for it THE conduct and Government of the Christians under the time of Persecution and before that of Constantine differ'd very much from the manner which was observed when the Emperours were Christians and when they assembled together both more publickly and in greater numbers enjoying their full liberty As a Rigorous discipline under those Christian Emperours could not be practised but upon a small number in great Towns as Rome Antioch Alexandria Canstantinople c. Most of the persons who could not be distinguished one from another in the Crowd and Multitude and on whom they could lay nothing by way of reproach either entred into no discipline and were neither Poenitentes nor Catechumeni or else they passed for those who were called fideles and whom they never so much as question'd whether they were baptized or not For Saint Ambrose who was looked upon as a very good man and one of the fideles that frequented the Religious Assemblies both in publick and private was neither in orders nor baptized when the people of Milan took him and carried him away as a holy body to be a Bishop Will they say that after he was a Bishop he passed through all the degrees of discipline or penitence and that he was a Catechumen and afterwards a fidelis which name was given only to those who were called Lay or Secular persons And the example of Constantine the great who was baptized at the very point and moment of his death and that of Satyrus the brother of Ambrose and of Valentinian whom that Father so highly commends and who died before they were baptized are a very strong proof and argument for that which I here maintain NOW those of the faithful who were so rather in reality than the name did not under those Christian Emperours quit their good custome of converting their houses and their families into so many little Churches they performed there the same exercises of Piety both during their repasts and out of them BUT I must here make one remark by the way upon the passage of