them feed the Church of God over which not he himself by his sole Authority as Bishop of the Diocese but the Spirit of God had made them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Overseers I will not here dispute what these Elders of the Church were though St. Hierome tells me they were the Bishops of Asia who I suppose might better know than any that lives in our age I would here ask our Animadvertor whether St. Paul did not constitute these several Elders over the several Churches by laying hands on them and appointing them to their work I hope he doth not believe that the Spirit of God did in some visible and extraordinary manner appoint these Overseers but that St. Paul being filled with the Spirit of God did appoint them to such a work If so what makes this to his purpose and why should not he believe that our Bishops though not in so extraordinary manner are assisted and directed by the Spirit of God to constitute inferiour Priests over the several Parishes and to hinder those that are erroneous from infecting them I am confident our Animadvertor doth believe that the Ministers of his party are assisted by the Spirit in their preaching why not our Bishops in their governing Now that this must be the meaning of the place I think may very probably be educed out of St. Paul's summoning them to him to Miletus in his charging them to perform their duty in his freeing himself from the guilt of the blood of any of them if they miscarried which he needed not have done if he had not constituted them there 2. His second Proof is out of St. Peter wherein he commands his fellow Elders to feed the Flock which was amongst them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Oversfeeing them acting like Bishops and not like the Bishop of Worcester as lording over Gods Heritage but as Patterns of the Flock So he What is gathered from this Ergo the Bishop of Worcester is not chief Pastor of all the Parishes in his Diocese I confesse I am not quick sighted enough to see this consequence Nay I think it is quite contrary he bids them feed and oversee the Flock therefore they were chief Pastors of their Dioceses for if it be evidently clear as I think the Learned Dr. Hammond in his exquisite Dissertations hath made sufficiently appear that Bishops were instituted by the Apostles then there is no question but that these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 were the Bishops he speaks to And this were it now necessary to shew is further evinced both because the Apostle bids them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 two phrases which are generally both in Scripture and ancient Fathers used particularly to Bishops in our sence Neither yet am I satisfied why 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth not signify lording over the Clergy and I believe my Animadvertor can hardly render it better but this is not now my business But to go on his Inference is as infirm as his Argument for it doth not follow that because a Bishop and a Presbyter are names sometimes given to one person therefore as he would seem to intimate that in the Scripture sence they are one But with his pardon though he will find a Bishop sometimes called a Presbyter as our Earls are called Lords yet let him shew me a Presbyter called a Bishop either in Scripture or in antient Fathers I am very confident he cannot till then he hath done nothing 3. His third Exception is still worse when he sayes it seems to be a light and to say no more unseemly trifling with Sacred Scripture to affirm these words of our Saviour concerning such as come not in by the Door and therefore are Thieves and Robbers ought to be understood of such as Preach to Congregations without the Bishops Licence Thus he And I desire the Reader to judge whether our Animadvertor deals ingenuously Where doth my Lord Worcester say that he is a Thief and a Robber that Preacheth without the Bishops Licence His words are these That Mr. Baxter was neither Parson Vicar nor Curate of Kederminster or any where in my Diocesse For he never came in by the Door that is by any legal right or Lawfull Admission but climed up some other way namely by violence and intrusion and therefore by Christs own inference is a Thief and a Robber c. And I desire our Animadvertor to tell me whether he that by an unjust and usurped Authority comes into another mans freehold receives the profits thereof and robs the Owner of his reputation there is not more a Thief than he that Robs a Purse on the High-way I believe if D. E. had been put out of his Estate for his honesty and loyalty he would have counted the Possessors of it worse than many that suffer publiquely for filching and stealing But besides where doth the Bishop say that he forbad Mr. Baxter to Preach because he did it without his Licence but because he sowed the seeds of Schism sedition there For which cause I thought in my duty as being their Pastor in Chief not onely to forbid Mr. Baxter to Preach any more which by the way he had done without my License but and these are my Lords words now how strangely doth he report what my Lord sayes He never sayes he was a Thief and Robber because he came not in by his License but because he came in by violence and intrusion But further allowing the Bishop did say so which he doth not Can he be said to be come in at the Door that comes in illegally I can imagine but two wayes of coming in either by the Door or over the Pales Joh. 10. which our Saviour mentions and certainly if he that comes legally in comes in by the Door he that comes illegally in comes over Pale let our Animadvertor understand it either according to the Municipal Law of the Land or the Law of the Church which pleaseth him best But let us see his Arguments why he that Preacheth without the Bishops License doth come in by the Door His first Argument is because then he knows not what Ordination signifies Yes certainly you do know it gives him Authority to Preach but not to another mans flock nor in a Diocese where he hath no charge committed to him And this was my Lord's Reason though he sayes the principal reason was because he Preached without his License and very dis-ingenuously leaves out the following words having no cure of souls of his own to Preach to Besides had he had a flock my Animadvertor by the last words of his Arguments doth sufficiently justifie the Bishops proceeding when he sayes that moral and notoriously vitious misdemeanors may be a sufficient cause and this certainly Mr. Baxter was guilty of that Preached Sedition Rebellion and Schism and that hath done what he could to make the King Odious to his people His second Reason is more strange for one Minister of the Gospel
A VINDICATION Of my Lord Bishop of Worcester's LETTER TOUCHING Mr. Baxter from the Animadversions of D. E. LONDON Printed for Henry Herringman at the Anchor in the lower walk of the New-Exchange Anno 1662. A VINDICATION Of my Lord Bishop of Worcester's Letter touching Mr. Baxter from the Animadversions of D. E. Expected when I first saw these Animadversions that my Lord Worcester's Relation touching his carriage to Mr. Baxter had been false in many particulars and in all partial for I could hardly believe any Ingenuous person could write so sharply against a Father of our Church if he did not believe that he had truth on his side as to the main occasion of the Bishop's Letter But I confesse I was much amazed when I found our Animadvertor not only silent as to the main businesse but of my Lord Bishop's opinion as to the Controversy if Dr. Gunning and Dr. Peerson state it right And yet he is so angry that through all this discourse he gives the Bishop not one civil Epithete never calls him Lord but taxeth him of testiness choler of malicious ill-grounded fancy of unpeaceableness virulency of trifling with Scripture of boldnesse impiety And that this worthy Prelate might not go alone he calls the Imposers of Ceremonies unconscionable and so joyns all our Bishops with him I never yet to deal ingenuously saw so much choler in so few words come from the pen of any person much lesse from one whose judgement as he tells us is for the Order of Bishops from one who ever opposed the Covenant and is a zealous lover of the King I am now more fully confirmed in my former opinion that my Lord Bishops Letter is unanswerable since our Animadvertor strives rather to pick a quarrel with it than to answer it He had certainly a very great desire of writing or a very great animosity against this Bishop in publishing of his Animadversions since he knew before he writ them that as to the Controversy the Bishop was right and only here and there takes out a passage which he thinks may afford some dispute How well he hath done this this ensuing Discourse shall evidence The first Exception he takes at the Bishop is that he supposeth so strict an union and inseparable dependence between Kings and Bishops that they must stand and fall together I am glad he confesseth the event of this War is some advantage to this Position But I believe if he looks but about him he will hardly find any that opposed their Bishop but did their Prince as soon as they had power to do it He means nor I suppose in his Answer to this Axiom the Anabaptistical or Fanatick party the Munster Rebellion will sufficiently shew their Principles by their practices And as for the Presbyterians for them the World esteems the most sober of our dissentors although I am fully of Arch-Bishop Whitgifts opinion that they differ in nothing from them but length of time because the consequences of their Positions do naturally carry them to the Anabaptists I wish I could ever find their Government in any place established but upon a War but upon Arms against their lawful Magistrates He that should hear of Zuinglius killed fighting of Beza's trouping under the Banner of the Prince of Conde of the Genevans expelling their Bishop and lawfull Prince of the Hugenots fighting in France against their lawful King of the Dutch subverting their Monarchical Government into a Common-wealth of the Scots to name no more expelling their lawful Q. Mary He that considers who first taught the lawfulness of taking Arms for Religion invented the distinction of Offensive and Defensive Arms and who generally teach the People that the whole Power and Government is in them will easily believe that their Principles are inconsistent with Monarchy which hath produced such fatal effects throughout this part of the World But this by the way his first Reason why this Axiom is not true is 1. Because Kings were in all parts of the World before Bishops and what hath been may be I understand not at all how this is argumentative because there were Kings before there was any Christian Church and so consequently before Bishops therefore when there is a Christian Church Kings can subsist without Bishops for whilst the World was Heathen we find a Monarchy amongst their Priests a superiority and an inferiority evidently amongst them and so though there were not Bishops yet it was necessary to have something that resembled them Amongst the Jews we find three distinctions of Clergy High-Priest Priest and Levites established by God himself which is a very probable Argument they were necessary to uphold a Monarchy for they were necessary to uphold the Jewish Chuch or else they had not been instituted I could not have believed that a person that seems Learned could have thought that Axiom reached further than since the World was Christian But if he only means since the World was Christian why doth he not assign some Monarchy that subsisted with Presbytery I think he can name none but Scotland which how long it kept from a Rebellion after Presbytery was by Law there established the Animadvertor knows as well as I do 2. His second Reason is because Bishops as they are by Law established in England are purely the King 's subordinate Ministers for the management of Ecclesiastical affairs This I think is more invalid than the former for allowing what he saith to be true which I am sure is not I do not understand why because the Bishops are the Kings Officers therefore there is not a necessity of Episcopacy in a Monarchy nay rather it inforceth the contrary for it demonstrates that Kings ever judged Episcopacy necessary to Monarchy by alwayes constituting such Officers to Govern the Church under them Our Animadvertor would do well to assign a King that put down Episcopacy upon his own free will and consent without the force of the people and settled up any other Ecclesiastical Government with which the Monarchy did better subsist But besides his Position is false for the Law of England doth not look upon the Bishops meetly as Ecclesiastical Officers but as a third Estate without whose consent no Act of Parliament did legally pass unless they did voluntarily exclude themselves and that they are a third Estate several Acts of Parliament expressely call them so Secondly All Bishops are to be considered in a double capacity First As Officers instituted by Christ and so the Power of Church Censures belongs to them and this Power our Kings never pretended to to have neither doth our Law any where cell you that this Authority the King gives them Secondly As Officers appointed by the King to exercise that former power given them by God within such bounds and limits And many times out Law gives the Bishop much power in the Secular affairs which will conduce to the good of the State as well as the Church which Power they
derive not from Christ but from the Secular Magistrate Now when the Magistrate is Christian it is necessary that the limits of each Bishops Jurisdiction be determined by him but were the Magistrate Heathen the Church had that power to prescribe the limits of each Bishop as we see they did in the first 300. years after Christ and we find no Christian all that time ever question them And the reason is evident because Christ that left the Bishops the Successors of the Apostles Governours of the Church could not but give them sufficient Power to do all things which was necessary to the peace increase and aedification of the Church which certainly the appointing of limits for each Bishop to act in must necessary conduce But in the third place I understand not how our Animadvertor agrees with himself when he tells us the King may conferr the management of Ecclesiastical affairs upon Lay Men calls the Episcopal power undue Dignity and Praelation of his inferiour Officers and yet some few lines before says his judgement is much for the Order of Bishops If he be for the Order of Bishops he must believe they have a power from Christ which no earthly man can either give or take from them but I believe he mistook himself or else he would not use such uncharitable Epithetes of their whole Order in calling it undue Dignity and as some Antichristian There is nothing more in these words but what before is answered His third Reason against this Union is worst still Because it will be found none hath been greater Enemies to the undoubted Soveraignty of Princes than some Bishops have been Ergo Episcopacy and Monarchy are not necessarily united I would in answer to this desire our Animadvert or to name me any sort of Men that are necessary to a Monarchy and let him examine himself whether this Argument is not against them There are by Historians esteemed two Foundations of Monarchy Nobility or Arms and have not many Noble-men which should be support of Monarchies been the ruin of them Witnesse the Barons Warrs what necessities were several of our Kings brought into by them And how often do we read in story of Armies deposing one Prince and setting up another So that this Argument is as strong against any sort of Men that a Monarchy makes use of as against Bishops But now to use Argumentum ad hominem for I confesse I cannot esteem our Animadvertor a friend to Bishops though he sayes he is since he useth no civiler language to one of them than to say the Pope is his Father Is that party that call the Dignity of Bishops Antichristian less Enemies to Soveraign Power than some Bishops have been I believe whosoever shall read the Ecclesiastical History of Scotland written by Archbishop Spostwood or shall but hear an impartial Relation of the Barbarous and unchristian usage of our present King when he was there will be soon convinced there never were a Generation of Clergy so Antimonarchical as that Nation hath produced amongst the Presbyterian party I think now I have sufficiently overthrown his Arguments against the Union of Monarchy and Episcopacy It still remains as firm as before Yet I would not be mistaken 't is possible a Monarchy may subsist without Episcopacy for we may fancy all people so peaceable and just as that a Nation may subsist without Laws But that Axiom doth mean that Episcopacy is necessary to the well-being of a Monarchy not simply to the being of it that the Church under a Monarchy can no wayes be prudently governed but by Bishops nor the King can no way have that influence over the inferiour Clergy as by the Bishops I speak here only in reference to the State But as to the Church Bishops are an Order so necessary that I doubt it will puzle our Animadvertor or any person whatsoever to prove any Ordination but by their hands lawful in any case whatsoever His second Exception against this Reverend Prelate is that he is the sole Pastor of all the Congregations in his Diocese I could hardly believe our Animadvertor wanted Ingenuity before For where doth my Lord Worcester say he is the sole Pastor of all the Congregations in his Diocese The Bishops words are these For it is the Bishop of Worcester and not Mr. Baxter that is Pastor of Kederminster as well as of all other Parochial Churches in that Diocese For there is much difference between my Lord Bishop's saying he is the Pastor and the sole Pastor for the Bishop is the Overseer and chief Pastor not only of all the Congregations but of all the Pastors in his Diocese and Mr. Baxter was not by any right present Pastor there and had no relation at all to that Parochial Church as in his third Excep I shall make appear So that this angry confirmation of the Justice of his Exception falls to the ground But let us follow him If this be defensible 't is only by those Arguments which are commonly alleged to maintain the Popes Supremacy over all Churches whatsoever For since a Bishop can no other way discharge his duty herein but by providing Substitutes what hinders but that the Bishop of Rome may oversee a Million of Churches as the Bishop of Worcester 500 This illustration I think was purposely chosen to fling dirt in this Bishops face that the World might suppose Prelacy Popery go hand in hand as their Covenant joyns them But we must allow Ill words from those that write little Reason This is grounded absolutely upon a false Hypothesis for here it must be supposed that every Bishops chief work is to feed his people where his work is to govern to see that the inferiour Clergy over his Diocese do their duty teach therein sound Doctrine And this work as it is more honourable so it is far more labourious Neither is there the least correspondence between 500. and a Million of Parishes because the account of the one may easily be done the other is impossible Besides 't is quite a different thing the Popes claim and our Bishops for the Pope claims to be Universal Bishop the only Successor of the Apostles and that Christ hath left him sole Governour of the Church and that all other Bishops derive their power solely from him whereas our Church teacheth according to the Opinion of the antient Fathers as were it necessary I could shew you that the Power of each Bishop is alike and as to their Precincts and Jurisdiction the Governours of the Chuch under persecution appointed more or fewer according as the place required and ever since what alterations have been made in their limits have been done by Civil Magistrates to whose care it belongs as Governours of the Church to see that each Bishop performs his duty But let us follow him to his Proofs letting alone his unnecessary parenthesis his first is Act. 10.28 when Paul sent for the Elders of the Church at Ephesus he bids
Eye than Schism and separation was and that they were more fatal to the Church than the hottest Persecution I need not give Examples for it he knows enough already As for the Texts of Scripture that are produced for it since they are nothing more but what every Nonconformist produceth for not conformity and have been so sufficiently answered by the Writers of our party I omit to answer them and the rather because the Reason against this Exception runs us in this Dispute not the Position it self 7. The seventh Animadversion is against that Chain of consequences which the Bishop produceth From diversity grows dislike from dislike Enmity from Enmity Opposition and from Opposition first Schism and separation in the Church and then Faction and Sedition in the State and I would we had not found it so by our own experience c. These are my Lord Bishops words and this he calls a Rope of Sand having first told us that for proof of this he virulently instances in our unhappy times I shall not here tell our Animadvertor that if he would have looked abroad he might find other instances besides this of England but let us examine his reasons why this is a Rope of Sand. His first is because nothing is so clear That there hath been nay ought to be Diversities in external forms without any dislike at all as to the person of another And his reason is because the Apostles that Preached to the Circumcision gave the right hand of fellowship unto the Apostles of the Gentiles although their outward Rites in publique worship were far more different than ours in Engl. In answer to this I say first That his instance of the Apostles is not at all the same for though the Churches of the Circumcision and Churches of the Gentiles were oftentimes in one and the same place yet they were of different Communions and this difference did arise not upon indifferent things but upon things absolutely necessary For the Churches of the Circumsion did follow Gods positive Command which as yet they were not convinced were to be buried with Christ so that the question between them was not concerning the use of external Rites but whether Gods Command that injoyned them to the Jews were still in force or no Secondly I believe our Animadvertor himself doth not count Circumcision an external Rite but something more since it was an Ordinance of Initiation into the Church of God and was backed with so severe a penalty that the Male that was not Circumcised the eighth day was to be cut off from the people But thirdly though the case be not the same yet what animosities and heart burnings did this difference cause amongst the Christians was it not the cause of the Council held at Hierusalem Act. 15. did it not make St. Paul withstand Peter to the face 2 Gal. 11. and how many divisions in after ages did this difference produce as particularly the keeping of Easter on the Jewish day of Passeover by the Eastern Church to name no more so it appears evidently the Church was never free from animosities till the Jewish Rites were quite laid aside and the whole Church became Christian that is followed one and the same Rites I say not this I would not be mistaken that the whole Chuch universal ought to follow one Rite but I say 't is necessary to the peace of the Church that every particular National Church follow one and the same Rites His 2. Reason for his Animadversion is because the State may be preserved without the least reference to the Church And this I suppose he directs particulary against the last words of my L. Bishops chain of consequences first Schism in the Church then sedition in the State And truly no man can think this an ill inference that considers the Doctrine of taking up Arms for Religion that considers this hath not been only generally taught but by most of their party believed as a great truth But his Argument herein is faulty to for though the State did subsist without any reference to the Christian Church did it not produce most horrible Murthers and blood sheddings of the most loyallest of its Subjects neither is the Reason good because a Heathen State was preserved without reference to the Christian Church therefore a Christian may without reference to a Christian Church for these States had still a Church though not of Gods which their Laws and Constitutions had reference to and without which 't was impossible to have kept Government in that order But lastly though 't is possible a State may be preserved without reference to the Church can it prudently be done and is it likely to hold long since Religion hath upon many people a greater force than any Law I am sure since the World was Christian there was never such an Example His third Argument is because Unity doth not depend upon Uniformity but upon Charity And of this he gives no Reason but his ipse dixit unless giving the Bishop ill words be a Reason I hope our Animadvertor can distinguish between Unity amongst Individuals and Unity with a whole body for though the first consists in Charity and candid forbearance this latter can only visibly consist in Uniformity and can only appear in every person then joynly assembled using one and the same Rite The heart no man can see and I believe let men never so well agree in their hearts that only which makes this agreement visible is their observing one and the same Rite openly And so I have answered this Reason also if it may be so called To follow him his eighth Animadversion is Whether as to the Matter of Fact the French Protestants do enjoyn standing and the Lutherans kneeling This he believes not upon the Bishops saying so but he hath more reason to believe it than the contrary since the practice of all those places do testify it for it is hardly possible to believe that people are more willing to obey the Church without Laws to back her than with Laws unto which a penalty is annexed Our Animadvertor here falls from this matter of Fact and disputes concerning the Jure of prescribing such Laws Now that is quite from the business here in hand this Reverend Prelate urgeth it as a good Argument that our Church may enjoyn Rites and Ceremonies as well as the French Dutch and Lutheran he should shew Reasons why our Church may not do it as well as others do But he runs into another Dispute unto which I will not follow him since all this and stronger Objections are every where answered by our Writers who have undertaken to handle this Controversy as Mr. Hooker the late Lord Bishop of Durham and others 9. His last Animadversion is an accusation of the Bishop of Uncharitableness because he sayes Crimine ab uno Disce omnes as if he did revile all the Presbyterian party by reason of Mr. Baxter I will repeat you the Bishops words You