alike necessary or alike indifferent if the former why does no Church observe them if the later why does the Church of Rome charge upon others the shame of novelty for leaving of some Rites and Ceremonies which by her own practice we are taught to have no obligation in them but to be adiaphorous S. Paul gave order that a Bishop should be the husband of one wife The Church of Rome will not allow so much other Churches allow more The Apostles commanded Christians to Fast on Wednesday and Friday as appeares in their Canons The Church of Rome Fasts Friday and Saturday and not on Wednesday The Apostles had their Agapae or love Feasts we should believe them scandalous They used a kisse of charity in ordinary addresses the Church of Rome keeps it only in their Masse other Churches quite omit it The Apostles permitted Priests and Deacons to live in conjugall Society as appears in the 5. Can. of the Apostles which to them is an Argument who believe them such and yet the Church of Rome by no meanes will endure it nay more Michael Medina gives Testimony that of 84 Canons Apostolicall which Clemens collected De sacr hom continent li 5. c. 105. scarce six or eight are observed by the Latine Church and Peresius gives this account of it In illis contineri multa quae temporum corruptione non plenè observantur aliis pro temporis De Tradit part 3. c. de Author Can. Apost materiae qualitate aut obliteratis aut totius Ecclesiae magisterio abrogatis Now it were good that they which take a liberty to themselves should also allow the same to others So that for one thing or other all Traditions excepting those very few that are absolutely universall will lose all their obligation and become no competent medium to confine mens practises or limit their faiths or determine their perswasions Either for the difficulty of their being prov'd the incompetency of the testimony that transmits them or the indifferency of the thing transmitted all Traditions both rituall and doctrinall are disabled from determining our consciences either to a necessary believing or obeying 6. To which I adde by way of confirmation that there are some things called Traditions and are offered to be proved to Numb 9. us by a Testimony which is either false or not extant Clemens of Alexandria pretended it a Tradition that the Apostles preached to them that dyed in infidelity even after their death and then raised them to life but he proved it only by the Testimony of the Book of Hermes he affirmed it to be a Tradition Apostolicall that the Greeks were saved by their Philosophy but he had no other Authority for it but the Apocryphall Books of Peter and Paul Tertullian and S. Basil pretend it an Apostolicall Tradition to sign in the aire with the sign of the Crosse but this was only consign'd to them in the Gospel of Nicodemus But to instance once for all in the Epistle of Marcellus to the Bishop of Antioch where he affirmes that it is the Canon of the Apostles praeter sententiam Romani Pontificis non posse Conciliae celebrari And yet there is no such Canon extant nor ever was for ought appears in any Record we have and yet the Collection of the Canons is so intire that though it hath something more then what was Apostolicall yet it hath nothing lesse And now that I am casually fallen upon an instance from the Canons of the Apostles I consider that there cannot in the world a greater instance be given how easy it is to be abused in the believing of Traditions For 1. to the first 50. which many did admit for Apostolicall 35 more were added which most men now count spurious all men call dubious and some of them universally condemned by peremptory sentence even by them who are greatest admirers of that Collection as 65. 67. and 8 ⅘ Canons For the first 50 it is evident that there are some things so mixt with them and no mark of difference left that the credit of all is much impared insomuch that Isidor of Sevill sayes they were Apoeryphall made by Hereticks and published under the Apud Gratian. dist 16. c. Canones title Apostolicall but neither the Fathers nor the Church of Rome did give assent to them And yet they have prevail'd so farre amongst some that Damascen is of opinion they should Lib. ◠c. 18 de Orthod fide be received equally with the Canonicall writings of the Apostles One thing only I observe and we shall find it true in most writings whose Authority is urged in Questions of Theology that the Authority of the Tradition is not it which moves the assent but the nature of the thing and because such a Canon is delivered they doe not therefore believe the sanction or proposition so delivered but disbelieve the Tradition if they doe not like the matter and so doe not judge of the matter by the Tradition but of the Tradition by the matter And thus the Church of Rome rejects the 84 or 85 Canon of the Apostles not because it is delivered with lesse Authority then the last 35 are but because it reckons the Canon of Scripture otherwise then it is at Rome Thus also the fifth Canon amongst the first 50 because it approves the marriage of Priests and Deacons does not perswade them to approve of it too but it selfe becomes suspected for approving it So that either they accuse themselves of palpable contempt of the Apostolicall Authority or else that the reputation of such Traditions is kept up to serve their own ends and therefore when they encounter them they are more to be upheld which what else is it but to teach all the world to contemn such pretences and undervalue Traditions and to supply to others a reason why they should doe that which to them that give the occasion is most unreasonable 7. The Testimony of the Ancient Church being the only Numb 10. meanes of proving Tradition and sometimes their dictates and doctrine being the Tradition pretended of necessity to be imitated it is considerable that men in their estimate of it take their rise from severall Ages and differing Testimonies and are not agreed about the competency of their Testimony and the reasons that on each side make them differ are such as make the Authority it selfe the lesse authentick and more repudiable Some will allow only of the three first Ages as being most pure most persecuted and therefore most holy least interested serving fewer designs having fewest factions and therefore more likely to speak the truth for Gods sake and its own as best complying with their great end of acquiring Heaven in recompence of losing their lives Others * Vid. Card. Petron. lettre an Sieur Casaubon say that those Ages being persecuted minded the present Doctrines proportionable to their purposes and constitution of the Ages and make little or nothing of those Questions which
and granted on all sides then where both the words are used what shall determine the signification For whether to instance in this place shall Presbyter limit Episcopus or Episcopus extend Presbyter Why may not Presbyter signify one that is verily a Bishop as Episcopus signify a meere Presbyter For it is but an ignorant conceit where ever Presbyter is named to fancy it in the proper and limited sense and not to doe so with Episcopus and when they are joyned together rather to believe it in the limited and present sense of Presbyter then in the proper and present sense of Episcopus So that as yet we are indifferent upon the termes These men sent for from Ephesus are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Elders or Presbyters of the Church but at Miletus Spiritus S. posuit vos Episcopos there they are called Bishops or overseers So that I may as well say here were properly so called Bishops as another may say here were meere Presbyters * And least it be objected in prejudice of my affirmative that they could not be Bishops because they were of Ephesus there never being but one Bishop in one Church I answer that in the Apostles times this was not true For at Ierusalem there were many at the same time that had Episcopall and Apostolicall authority and so at Antioch as at Ierusalem where Iames and Iudas and Silas and the Apostles and Paul and Barnabas at Antioch and at Rome at the same time Peter and Paul and Linus and Clemens but yet but one of them was fixt and properly the Bishop of that place But 2 ly All these were not of Ephesus but the Elders of all Asia but some from other countries as appears vers 4. So that although they were all Bishops wee might easily find distinct Diocesses for them without incumbring the Church of Ephesus with a multiplyed incumbency Thus farre then we are upon even termes the community of compellations used here can no more force us to believe them all to be meere Presbyters then Bishops in the proper sense 2. It is very certain that they were not all meer Presbyters at his fare-well Sermon for S. Timothy was there and I proved him to be a Bishop by abundant testimony and many of those which are reckoned v. 4. were companions of the Apostle in his journey and imployed in mission Apostolicall for the founding of Churches and particularly Sosipater was there and he was Bishop of Iconium and Tychicus of Chalcedon in Bythinia as Dorotheus and Eusebius witnesse and Trophimus of Arles in France Vbi supra for so is witnessed by the suffragans of that province in their Epistle to S. Leo. But without all doubt here were Bishops present as well as Presbyters for besides the premises we have a witnesse beyond exception the ancient S. Irenaeus In Mileto enim convocatis Episcopis Presbyteris qui erant eb Lib. 3. cap. 14. Epheso à reliquis proximis civitatibus quoniam ipse festinavit Hierosolymis Pentecosten agere c. S. Paul making hast to keep his Pentecost at Ierusalem at Miletus did call together the Bishops and Presbyters from Ephesus and the neighbouring Citties * Now to all these in conjunction S. Paul spoke and to these indeed the Holy Ghost had concredited his Church to be fed and taught with Pastorall supravision but in the mean while here is no commission of power or jurisdiction to Presbyters distinctly nor supposition of any such praeexistent power 3. All that S. Paul said in this narration was spoken in the presence of them all but not to them all For that of v. 18. ye know how I have been with you in Asia in all seasons that indeed was spoke to all the Presbyters that came from Ephesus and the voisinage viz. in a collective sense not in a distributive for each of them was not in all the circuit of his Asian travailes but this was not spoken to Sopater the Beraean or to Aristarchus the Thessalonian but to Tychicus and Trophimus who were Asians it might be addressed And for that of v. 25. yee all among whom I have gone preaching shall see my face no more this was directed only to the Asians for he was never more to come thither but Timothy to be sure saw him afterwards for S. Paul sent for him a litle before his death to Rome and it will not be supposed he neglected to attend him So that if there were a conjunction of Bishops and Presbyters at this meeting as most certainly there was and of Evangelists and Apostolicall men besides how shall it be known or indeed with any probability suspected that that clause of vers 28. Spiritus S. posuit vos Episcopos pascere Ecclesiam Dei does belong to the Ephesine Presbyters and not particularly to Timothy who was now actually Bishop of Ephesus and to Gajus and to the other Apostolicall men who had at least Episcopall authority that is power of founding and ordering Churches without a fixt and limited jurisdiction 4. Either in this place is no jurisdiction at all intimated de antiquo or concredited de novo or if there be it is in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 v. 28. Bishops and Feeders and then it belongs either to the Bishops alone or to the Presbyters in conjunction with and subordination to the Bishops for to the meer Presbyters it cannot be proved to appertaine by any intination of that place 5. How and if these Presbyters which came from Ephesus and the other parts of Asia were made Bishops at Miletus Then also this way all difficulty will be removed And that so it was is more then probable for to be sure Timothy was now entring and fixing upon his See and it was consonant to the practise of the Apostles and the exigence of the thing it selfe when they were to leave a Church to fixe a Bishop in it for why else was a Bishop fixt in Ierusalem so long before in other Churches but because the Apostles were to be scattered from thence and there the first bloudy field of Martyrdome was to be fought And the case was equall here for S. Paul was never to see the Churches of Asia any more and he foresaw that ravening wolves would enter into the folds and he had actually plac'd a Bishop in Ephesus and it is unimaginable that he would not make equall provision for other Churches there being the same necessity from the same danger in them all and either S. Paul did it now or never and that about this time the other sixe Asian Churches had Angels or Bishops set in their candlesticks is plain for there had been a succession in the Church of Pergamus Antipas was dead and S. Timothy had sate in Ephesus and S. Polycarpe at Smyrna many years before S. Iohn writ his Revelation 6. Lastly that no jurisdiction was in the Ephesine Presbyters except a delegate and subordinate appeares beyond all
Corinth of eating Idoll Sacrifices expresly against the Decree at Jerusalem so it were without scandall And yet for all this care and curious discretion a little of the leaven still remain'd All this they thought did so concern the Gentiles that it was totally impertinent to the Iewes still they had a distinction to satisfie the letter of the Apostles Decree and yet to persist in their old opinion and this so continued that fifteene Christian Bishops in succession Euseb. l. 4. Eccles. hist. c. 5. were circumcised even untill the destruction of Jerusalem under Adrian as Eusebius reports First By the way let me observe that never any matter of Numb 4. Question in the Christian Church was determin'd with greater solennity or more full authority of the Church then this Question concerning Circumcision No lesse than the whole Colledge of the Apostles and Elders at Jerusalem and that with a Decree of the highest sanction Visum est spiritui sancto nobis Secondly Either the case of the Hebrewes in particular was omitted and no determination concerning them 2. whether it were necessary or lawfull for them to be circumcised or else it was involv'd in the Decree and intended to oblige the Jewes If it was omitted since the Question was de re necessaria for dico vobis I Paul say unto you If ye be circumcised Christ shall profit you nothing it is very remarkable how the Apostles to gaine the Iewes and to comply with their violent projudice in behalfe of Moses Law did for a time Tolerate their dissent etiam in re aliôquin necessariâ which I doubt not but was intended as a precedent for the Church to imitate for ever after But if it was not omitted either all the multitude of the Iewes which S. James then Act. 21. 20. their Bishop expressed by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thou seest how many myriads of Jewes that believe and yet are zelots for the Law and Eusebius speaking of Justus sayes he was one ex infinit â multitudine L. 3. 32. Eccles. Hist. eorum qui ex circumcisione in Jesum credebant I say all these did perish and their believing in Christ serv'd them to no other ends but in the infinity of their torments to upbraid them with hypocrisie and heresie or if they were sav'd it is apparent how mercifull God was and pitifull to humane infirmities that in a point of so great concernment did pity their weaknesse and pardon their errors and love their good minde since their prejudice was little lesse than insuperable and had faire probabilities at least it was such as might abuse a wise and good man and so it did many they did bono aâ—imâ— carrare And if I mistake not this consideration S. Paul urg'd as a reason why God forgave him who was a Persecutor 1. Tim. 1. of the Saints because he did it ignorantly in unbelief that is he was not convinc'd in his understanding of the truth of the way which he persecuted he in the meane while remaining in that incredulity not out of malice or ill ends but the mistakes of humanity and a pious zeale therefore God had mercy on him And so it was in this great Question of circumcision here only was the difference the invincibility of S. Paul's error and the honesty of his heart caused God so to pardon him as to bring him to the knowledge of Christ which God therefore did because it was necessary necessitate medii no salvation was consistent with the actuall remanency of that error but in the Question of Circumcision although they by consequence did overthrow the end of Christ's comming yet because it was such a consequence which they being hindred by a prejudice not impious did not perceive God tolerated them in their error till time and a continuall dropping of the lessons and dictates Apostolicall did weare it out and then the doctrine put on it's apparell and became cloathed with nenessity they in the meane time so kept to the foundation that is Iesus Christ crucified and risen againe that although this did make a violent concussion of it yet they held fast with their heart what they ignorantly destroyed with their tongue which Saul before his conversion did not that God upon other Titles then an actuall dereliction of their error did bring them to salvation And in the descent of so many years I finde not any one Anathema past by the Apostles or their Successors upon any Numb 5. of the Bishops of Jerusalem or the Believers of the Circumcision and yet it was a point as clearly determined and of as great necessity as any of those Questions that at this day vex and crucifie Christendome Besides this Question and that of the Resurrection commenc'd in the Church of Corinth and promoted with some variety Numb 6. of sense by Hymenaeus and Philetus in Asia who said that the Resurrection was past already I doe not remember any other heresy nam'd in Scripture but such as were errours of impiety seductiones in materiâ practicâ such as was particularly forbidding to marry and the heresy of the Nicolaitans a doctrine that taught the necessity of lust and frequent fornication But in all the Animadversions against errours made by the Apostles in the New Testament no pious person was condemn'd Numb 7. no man that did invincibly erre or bona mente but something that was amisse in genere morum was that which the Apostles did redargue And it is very considerable that even they of the Circumcision who in so great numbers did heartily believe in Christ and yet most violently retaine Circumcision and without Question went to Heaven in great numbers yet of the number of these very men they came deeply under censure when to their errour they added impiety So long as it stood with charity and without humane ends and secular interests so long it was either innocent or conniv'd at but when they grew covetous and for filthy lucres sake taught the same doctrine which others did in the simplicity of their hearts then they turn'd Hereticks then they were term'd Seducers and Titus was commanded to look to them and to silence them For there are many that are intractable and vaine bablers Seducers of minds especially they of the Circumcision who seduce whole houses teaching things that they ought not for filthy lucres sake These indeed were not to be indur'd but to be silenced by the conviction of sound doctrine and to be rebuked sharply and avoided For heresy is not an errour of the understanding but an errour Numb 8. of the will And this is clearly insinuated in Scripture in the stile whereof Faith and a good life are made one duty and vice is called opposite to Faith and heresy opposed to holinesse and sanctity So in S. Paul For saith he the end of 1 Tim. 1. the Commandement is charity out of a pure heart and a good conscience and faith unfained à quibus
in his Chaire and made the dictate the result of his pen and inke would certainly have taught him and all the Church but that the good Pope was ignorant that either pasce oves was his own Charter and Prerogative or that any other words of Scripture had made him to be infallible or if he was not ignorant of it he did very ill to complement himselfe out of it So did all those Bishops of Rome that in that troublesome and unprofitable Question of Easter being unsatisfied in the supputation of the Egyptians and the definitions of the Mathematicall Bishops of Alexandria did yet require and intreat S. Ambrose to tell them his opinion as he himselfe witnesses If pasce oves belongs only to the Pope by primary title in these L. 10. Epist. 83. cases the sheep came to feed the Shepherd which though it was well enough in the thing is very ill for the pretensions of the Roman Bishops and if we consider how little many of the Popes have done toward feeding the sheep of Christ we shall hardly determine which is the greater prevarication that the Pope should claime the whole Commission to be granted to him or that the execution of the Commission should be wholly passed over to others and it may be there is a mystery in it that since S. Peter sent a Bishop with his staffe to raise up a Disciple of his from the dead who was afterward Bishop of Triers the Popes of Rome never weare a Pastorall staffe except it be in that Diocesse sayes Aquinas for great reason that he who does not doe the office should not beare the M. 4. Sent. dist 24. Symbol but a man would think that the Popes Master of the Ceremonies was ill advised not to assigne a Pastorall staffe to him who pretends the Commission of pasce oves to belong to him by prime right and origination But this is not a businesse to be merry in But the great support is expected from Tu es Petrus super Numb 6. hanc Petram adificabo Ecclesiam c. Now there being so great difference in the exposition of these words by persons dis-interressed who if any might be allowed to judge in this Question it is certain that neither one sense nor other can be obtruded for an Article of faith much lesse as a Catholicon instead of all by constituting an Authority which should guide us in all Faith and determine us in all Questions For if the Church was not built upon the person of Peter then his Successors can challenge nothing from this instance now that it was the confession of Peter upon which the Church was to rely for ever we have witnesses very credible a Ad Philadelph S. Ignatius S. b Seleuc. orat 25. Basil c L. 6. de Trinit S. Hilary d De Trinitate advers Iudaeos S. Gregory Nyssen e L. 3. Ep. 33. S. Gregory the Great f In 1. Eph. Ioann tr 10. S. Austin g De Trinit l. 4. S. Cyrill of Alexandria h L. 1. Ep. 235. Isidore Pelusiot and very many more And although all these witnesses concurring cannot make a proposition to be true yet they are sufficient witnesses that it was not the Universall beliefe of Christendome that the Church was built upon S. Peters person Cardinall Perron hath a fine fancy to elude this variety of Exposition and the consequents of it For saith he these Expositions are not contrary or exclusive of each other but inclusive and consequent to each other For the Church is founded causally upon the confession of S. Peter formally upon the ministry of his person and this was a reward or a consequent of the former So that these Expositions are both true but they are conjoyn'd as mediate and immediate direct and collaterall literall and morall originall and perpetuall accessory and temporall the one consign'd at the beginning the other introduc'd upon occasion For before the spring of the Arrian heresy the Fathers expounded these words of the person of Peter but after the Arrians troubled them the Fathers finding great Authority and Energy in this confession of Peter for the establishment of the naturall siliation of the Son of God to advance the reputation of these words and the force of the Argument gave themselves lience to expound these words to the present advantage and to make the confession of Peter to be the foundation of the Church that if the Arrians should encounter this Authority they might with more prejudice to their persons declaime against their cause by saying they overthrew the foundation of the Church Besides that this answer does much dishonour the reputation of the Fathers integrity and makes their interpretations lesse credible as being made not of knowledge or reason but of necessity and to serve a present turn it is also false For * Epist. ad Philadelph In c. 16. Mat. tract 1. Ignatius expounds it in a spirituall sense which also the Liturgy attibuted to S. James cals 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And Origen expounds it mystically to a third purpose but exclusively to this And all these were before the Arrian Controversy But if it be lawfull to make such unproved observations it would have been to better purpose and more reason to have observed it thus The Fathers so long as the Bishop of Rome kept himselfe to the limits prescrib'd him by Christ and indulged to him by the Constitution or concession of the Church were unwary and apt to expound this place of the person of Peter but when the Church began to enlarge her phylacteries by the favour of Princes and the Sun-shine of a prosperous fortune and the Pope by the advantage of the Imperiall Seat and other accidents began to invade upon the other Bishops and Patriarchs then that he might have no colour from Scripture for such new pretensions they did most generally turn the stream of their expositions from the person to the confession of Peter and declar'd that to be the foundation of the Church And thus I have required fancy with fancy but for the maine point that these two Expositions are inclusiue of each other I find no warrant for though they may consist together well enough if Christ had so intended them yet unlesse it could be shown by some circumstance of the Text or some other extrinsecall Argument that they must be so and that both senses were actually intended it is but gratis dictum and a begging of the Question to say that they are so and the fancy so new that when S. Austin had expounded this place of the person of Peter he reviewes it againe and in his Retractations leaves every man to his liberty which to take as having nothing certaine in this Article which had been altogether needlesse if he had believed them to be inclusively in each other neither of them had need to have beene retracted both were alike true both of them might
Faith but especially by the insinuation and consequent De Rom. Pont. l 4. c. 2. § secunda sententia acknowledgement of Bellarmine that for 1000 years together the Fathers knew not of the Doctrine of the Popes infallibility for Nilus Gerson Alemain the Divines of Paris Alphonsus de Castro and Pope Adrian VI persons who liv'd 1400 after Christ affirm that infallibility is not seated in the Popes person that he may erre and sometimes actually hath which is a clear demonstration that the Church knew no such Doctrine as this there had been no Decree nor Tradition nor generall opinion of the Fathers or of any age before them and therefore this opinion which Bellarmine would faine blast if he could yet in his Conclusion he sayes it is not propriè haeretica A device and an expression of his own without sense or precedent But if the Fathers had spoken of it and believed it why may not a disagreeing person as well reject their Authority when it is in behalf of Rome as they of Rome without scruple cast them off when they speak against it For as Bellarmine being pressed with the Authority of Nilus Bishop of Thessalonica and other Fathers he sayes that the Pope acknowledges no Fathers but they are all his children and therefore they cannot depose against him and if that be true why shall we take their Testimonies for him for if Sonnes depose in their Fathers behalfe it is twenty to one but the adverse party will be cast and therefore at the best it is but suspectum Testimonium But indeed this discourse signifies nothing but a perpetuall uncertainty in such topicks and that where a violent prejudice or a concerning interest is engag'd men by not regarding what any man sayes proclaim to all the world that nothing is certain but Divine Authority But I will not take advantage of what Bellarmine sayes nor what Stapleton or any one of them all say for that will bee Numb 13. but to presse upon personall perswasions or to urge a generall Question with a particular defaillance and the Question is never the nearer to an end for if Bellarmine sayes any thing that is not to another mans purpose or perswasion that man will be tryed by his own Argument not by anothers And so would every man doe that loves his liberty as all wise men doe and therefore retain it by open violence or private evasions But to return An Authority from Irenaeus in this Question and on behalf of the Popes infallibility or the Authority of the Sea of Rome Numb 14. or of the necessity of communicating with them is very fallible for besides that there are almost a dozen answers to the words of the Allegation as is to be seen in those that trouble themselves in this Question with the Allegation and answering such Authorities yet if they should make for the affirmative of this Question it is protestatio contra factum For Irenaeus had no such great opinion of Pope Victors infallibity that he believed things in the same degree of necessity that the Pope did for therefore he chides him for Excommunicating the Asian Bishops 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all at a blow in the Question concerning Easter day and in a Question of Faith he expresly disagreed from the doctrine of Rome for Irenaeus was of the Millenary opinion and believed it to be a Tradition Apostolicall now if the Church of Rome was of that opinion then why is she not now where is the succession of her doctrine But if she was not of that opinion then and Irenaeus was where was his beliefe of that Churches infallibility The same I urge concerning S. Cyprian who was the head of a Sect in opposition to the Church of Rome in the Question of rebaptization and he and the abettors Firmilian and the other Bishops of Cappadocia and the voisinage spoke harsh words of Stephen and such as become them not to speak to an infallible Doctor and the supreme Head of the Church I will urge none of them to the disadvantage of that Sea but only note the Satyrs of Firmilian against him because it is of good use to shew that it is possible for them in their ill carriage to blast the reputation and efficacy of a great Authority For he sayes that that Church did pretend the Authority of the Apostles cum in multis sacramentis divinae rei à Epist. Firmiliani contr Steph. ad Cyprian Vid. etiam Ep. Cypriani ad Pompeium principio discrepet ab Ecclesia Hierosolymitanâ defamet Petrum Paulum tanquam authores And a little after justè dedignor sayes he apertam manifestam stultitiam Stephani per quam veritas Christianae petrae aboletur which words say plainly that for all the goodly pretence of Apostolicall Authority the Church of Rome did then in many things of Religion disagree from Divine Institution and from the Church of Jerusalem which they had as great esteeme of for Religion sake as of Rome for its principality and that still in pretending to S. Peter and S. Paul they dishonoured those blessed Apostles and destroyed the honour of their pretence by their untoward prevarication which words I confesse passe my skill to reconcile them to an opinion of infallibility and although they were spoken by an angry person yet they declare that in Africa they were not then perswaded as now they were at Rome Nam Cyprian Epist ad Quintum 〈◊〉 nec Petrus quem primum Dominus clegit vendicavit sibi aliquid insolentèr aut arrogantèr assumpsit ut diceret se primatum tenere That was their belief then and how the contrary hath grown up to that heigth where now it is all the world is witnesse And now I shall not need to note concerning S. Hierome that he gave a complement to Damasus that he would not have given to Liberius Qui tecum non colligit spargit For it might be true enough of Damasus who was a good Bishop and a right believer but if Liberius's name had been put instead of Damasus the case had been altered with the name for S. Hierom did believe and write it so that Liberius had subscrib'd to Arrianism And if either he or any of the rest had believ'd the De Script Eccles. in Fortunatiano Pope could not be a Heretick nor his Faith faile but be so good and of so competent Authority as to be a Rule to Christendome Why did they not appeale to the Pope in the Arrian Controversy why was the Bishop of Rome made a Party and a concurrent as other good Bishops were and not a Judge and an Arbitrator in the Question Why did the Fathers prescribe so many Rules and cautions and provisoes for the discovery of heresy Why were the Emperours at so much charge and the Church at so much trouble as to call and convene in Councels respectively to dispute so frequently to write so sedulously to observe all advantages
there is no possibility of shewing the contrary in Scripture by the producing any other commission given to Presbyters then what I have specified I will hereafter shew it to have been the faith and practise of Christendome not only that Presbyters were actually subordinate to Bishops which I contend to be the ordinary office of Apostleship but that Presbyters have no Iurisdiction essentiall to their order but derivative only from Apostolicall preheminence 2. Let us now see the matter of fact They that can inflict censures upon Presbyters have certainly superiority of Iurisdiction over Presbyters for Aequalis aequalem coercere non potest saith the Law Now it is evident in the case of Diotrephes a Presbyter and a Bishop Would be that for his peremptory rejection of some faithfull people from the Catholick communion without cause and without authority S. Iohn the Apostle threatned him in his Epistle to Gajus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Wherefore when I come I will remember him and all that would have been to very little purpose if he had not had coercitive jurisdiction to have punish't his delinquency 3. Presbyters many of them did succeed the Apostles by a new ordination as Matthias succeeded Iudas who before his new ordination was one of the 72. as a Lib. 1. hist. c 12. l. 2. c. 9. Eusebius b Haeres 20. Epiphanius and c De script Eccles. in Matth. vide Irenaeum l. 4. c. 63. Tertul de praescript S. Ierome affirme and in Scripture is expressed to be of the number of them that went in and out with Iesus S. Clement succeeded S. Peter at Rome S. Simeon Cleophae succeeded S. Iames at Ierusalem S. Philip succeeded S. Paul at Caesarea diverse others of the 72 reckoned by Dorotheus Eusebius others of the Fathers did governe the severall Churches after the Apostles death which before they did not Now it is cleare that he that receives no more power after the Apostles then he had under them can no way be said to succeed them in their Charge or Churches It followes then since as will more fully appeare anon Presbyters did succeed the Apostles that under the Apostles they had not such jurisdiction as afterwards they had But the Apostles had the same to which the Presbyters succeeded to therefore greater then the Presbyters had before they did succeed When I say Presbyters succeeded the Apostles I meane not as Presbyters but by a new ordination to the dignity of Bishops so they succeeded and so they prove an evidence of fact for a superiority of Iurisdiction in the Apostolicall Clergy *** Now that this superiority of Iurisdiction was not temporary but to be succeeded in appeares from Reason and from ocular demonstration or of the thing done 1. If superiority of Iurisdiction was necessary in the ages Apostolicall for the regiment of the Church there is no imaginable reason why it should not be necessary in succession since upon the emergency of Schismes and Heresies which were foretold should multiply in descending ages government and superiority of jurisdiction unity of supremacy and coërcion was more necessary then at first when extraordinary gifts might supply what now we expect to be performed by an ordinary authority 2. Whatsoever was the regiment of the Church in the Apostles times that must be perpetuall not so as to have * Ut puta viduarum collegium Diaconorum coenobium fidelium c all that which was personall and temporary but so as to have no other for that and that only is of Divine institution which Christ committed to the Apostles and if the Church be not now governed as then We can shew no Divine Authority for our government which we must contend to doe and doe it too or be call'd usurpers For either the Apostles did governe the Church as Christ commanded them or not If not then they fayl'd in the founding of the Church and the Church is not built upon a Rock If they did as most certainly they did then either the same disparity of jurisdiction must be retayn'd or else we must be governned with an Unlawfull and unwarranted equality because not by that which only is of immediate divine institution and then it must needs be a fine government where there is no authority and where no man is superiour 3. We see a disparity in the Regiment of Churches warranted by Christ himselfe and confirmed by the Holy Ghost in fayrest intimation I meane the seaven Angel-Presidents of the seaven Asian Churches If these seaven Angels were seaven Bishops that is Prelates or Governours of these seaven Churches in which it is evident and confessed of all sides there were many Presbyters then it is certaine that a Superiority of Iurisdiction was intended by Christ himselfe and given by him insomuch as he is the fountaine of all power derived to the Church For Christ writes to these seaven Churches and directs his Epistles to the seaven Governours of these Churches calling them Angels which it will hardly be suppos'd he would have done if the function had not been a ray of the Sunne of righteousnesse they had not else been Angels of light nor starres held in Christ's owne right hand This is certaine that the function of these Angels whatsoever it be is a Divine institution Let us then see what is meant by these starres and Angels The seaven starres are the Angells of the seaven Revel 1. vers 20. Churches and the seaven Candlesticks are the seaven Churches 1. Then it is evident that although the Epistles were sent with a finall intention for the edification and confirmation of the whole Churches or people of the Diocesse with an Attendite quid Spiritus dicit Ecclesijs yet the personall direction was not to the whole Church for the whole Church is called the Candlestick and the superscription of the Epistles is not to the seaven Candlesticks but to the seaven starres which are the Angels of the seaven Churches viz. the lights shining in the Candlesticks By the Angell therefore is not cannot be mean't the whole Church 2. It is plaine that by the Angel is mean't the Governour of the Church 1. Because of the title of eminency The Angel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is the Messenger the Legate the Apostle of the Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For these words Angel or Apostle although they signifie Mission or Legation yet in Scripture they often relate to the persons to whom they are sent As in the examples before specified 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Their Angels 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Apostles of the Churches 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Angel of the Church of Ephesus and diverse others Their compellation therefore being a word of office in respect of him that sends them and of Eminence in relation to them to whom they are sent shewes that the Angel was the Ruler of each Church respectively 2. Because acts of jurisdiction are concredited to him as not to
they had from the Apostles So that not by Divine ordination or immediate commission from Christ but by derivation from the Apostles and therefore in minority and subordination to them the Presbyters did exercise acts of order and jurisdiction in the absence of the Apostles or Bishops or in conjunction consiliary and by way of advice or before the consecration of a Bishop to a particular Church And all this I doubt not but was done by the direction of the Holy Ghost as were all other acts of Apostolicall ministration and particularly the institution of the other order viz. of Deacons This is all that can be proved out of Scripture concerning the commission given in the institution of Presbyters and this I shall afterwards confirme by the practise of the Catholick Church and so vindicate the practises of the present Church from the common prejudices that disturbe us for by this account Episcopacy is not only a Divine institution but the only order that derives immediately from Christ. For the present only I summe up this with that saying of Theodoret speaking of the 72 Disciples In Lucae cap. 10. Palmae sunt isti qui nutriuntur ac erudiuntur ab Apostolis Nam quanquam Christus hos etiam elegit erant tamen duodecem illis inferiores posteà illorum Discipuli sectatores The Apostles are the twelve fountaines and the 72 are the palmes that are nourished by the waters of those fountaines For though Christ also ordain'd the 72 yet they were inferior to the Apostles and afterwards were their followers and Disciples I know no objection to hinder a conclusion only two or three words out of Ignatius are pretended against the maine question viz. to prove that he although a Bishop yet had no Apostolicall authority 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I doe not command Epist. ad Philadelph this as an Apostle for what am I and what is my Fathers house that I should compare my selfe with them but as your fellow souldier and a Monitor But this answers it selfe if we consider to whom he speakes it Not to his own Church of Antioch for there he might command as an Apostle but to the Philadelphians he might not they were no part of his Diocesse he was not their Apostle and then because he did not equall the Apostles in their commission extraordinary in their personall priviledges and in their universall jurisdiction therefore he might not command the Philadelphians being another Bishops charge but admonish them with the freedome of a Christian Bishop to whom the soules of all faithfull people were deare and precious So that still Episcopacy and Apostolate may be all one in ordinary office this hinders not and I know nothing else pretended and that Antiquity is clearely on this side is the next businesse For hitherto the discourse hath been of the immediate Divine institution of Episcopacy by arguments derived from Scripture I shall only adde two more from Antiquity and so passe on to tradition § 10. So that Bishops are successors in the office of Apostleship according to the generall tenent of Antiquity Apostolicall 1. THE beliefe of the primitive Church is that Bishops are the ordinary successors of the Apostles and Presbyters of the 72 and therefore did believe that Episcopacy is as truly of Divine institution as the Apostolate for the ordinary office both of one and the other is the same thing For this there is abundant testimony Some I shall select enough to give faire evidence of a Catholick tradition S. Irenaeus is very frequent and confident in this Lib. 3. cap. 3. particular Habemus annumerare eos qui ab Apostolis instituti sunt Episcopi in Ecclesiis ET SUCCESSORES EORUM usque ad nos ... Etenim si recondita mysteria scissent Apostoli ... his vel maximè traderent ea quibus etiam ipsas Ecclesias committebant ... quos SUCCESSORES relinquebant SUUM IPSORUM LOCUM MAGISTERII tradentes We can name the men the Apostles made Bishops in their severall Churches appointing them their successors and most certainly those mysterious secrets of Christianity which them selves knew they would deliver to them to whom they committed the Churches and left to be their successors in the same power and authority themselves had Tertullian reckons Corinth Philippi Thessalonica Ephesus and others to be Churches Apostolicall Lib. de praescript c. 36. apud quas ipsae adhuc Cathedrae Apostolorum suis locis praesident Apostolicall they are from their foundation and by their succession for Apostles did found them and Apostles or men of Apostolick authority still doe governe them S. Cyprian Hoc enim vel maximè Frater laboramus laborare debemus ut Vnitatem à Domino Epist. 42. ad Cornelium per Apostolos NOBIS SUCCESSORIBUS traditam quantùm possumus obtinere curemus We must preserve the Vnity commanded us by Christ and delivered by his Apostles to us their Successors To us Cyprian and Cornelius for they only were then in view the one Bishop of Rome the other of Carthage And in his Epistle ad Florentium Pupianum Nec haec jacto Epist. 69. sed dolens profero cum te Iudicem Dei constituas Christi qui dicit ad Apostolos ac per hoc adomnes praepositos qui Apostolis Vicariâ ordinatione succedunt quivos audit me audit c. Christ said to his Apostles and in them to the Governours or Bishops of his Church who succeeded the Apostles as Vicars in their absence he that heareth you heareth mee Famous is that saying of Clarus à Musculâ the Bishop spoken in the Councell of Carthage and repeated by S. Austin Manifesta est sententia Domini Lib. 7. c. 43. de baptis cont Donatist nostri Iesu Christi Apostolos suos mittentis ipsis solis potestatem à patre sibi datam permittentis quibus nos successimus eâdem potestate Ecclesiam Domini gubernantes Nos successimus We succeed the Apostles governing the Church by the same power He spake it in full Councell in an assembly of Bishops and himselfe was a Bishop The Councell of Rome under S. Sylvester speaking of the honour due to Bishops expresses it thus Non oportere quenquam Domini Discipulis id est Apostolorum successoribus detrahere No man must detract from the Disciples of our Lord that is from the Apostles successors S. Hierome speaking against the Montanists for Epist. 54. undervaluing their Bishops shewes the difference of the Catholicks honouring and the Hereticks disadvantaging that sacred order Apud nos saith he Apostolorum locum Episcopi tenent apud eos Episcopus tertius est Bishops with us Catholicks have the place or authority of Apostles but with them Montanists Bishops are not the first but the third state of Men. And upon that of the Psalmist pro Patribus nati sunt tibi filii S. Hierome and diverse others of the Fathers make this glosse Pro Patribus Apostolis
in veritate So that this succession of Bishops from the Apostles ordination must of it selfe be a very certain thing when the Church made it a maine probation of their faith for the books of Scripture were not all gathered together and generally received as yet Now then since this was a main pillar of their Christianity viz. a constant reception of it from hand to hand as being delivered by the Bishops in every chaire till wee come to the very Apostles that did ordain them this I say being their proof although it could not be more certain then the thing to be proved which in that case was a Divine revelation yet to them it was more evident as being matter of fact and known almost by evidence of sense and as verily believed by all as it was by any one that himselfe was baptized both relying upon the report of others * Radix Christianae societatis Epist. 42. per sedes Apostolorum successiones Episcoporum certâ per orbem propagatione diffunditur saith S. Austin The very root and foundation of Christian communion is spread all over the world by the successions of Apostles and Bishops And is it not now a madnesse to say there was no such thing no succession of Bishops in the Churches Apostolicall no ordination of Bishops by the Apostles and so as S. Paul's phrase is overthrow the faith of some even of the Primitive Christians that used this argument as a great weapon of offence against the invasion of haereticks and factious people It is enough for us that we can truly say with S. Irenaeus Habemus annumerare eos qui ab Apostolis Ubi supra postolis instituti sunt Episcopi in Ecclesiis usque ad nos We can reckon those who from the Apostles untill now were made Bishops in the Churches and of this we are sure enough if there be any faith in Christians THe summe is this Although we had not prooved § 19. So that Episcopacy is at least an Apostolicall ordinance of the same authority with many other points generally believed the immediate Divine institution of Episcopall power over Presbyters and the whole flock yet Episcopacy is not lesse then an Apostolicall ordinance and delivered to us by the same authority that the observation of the Lord's day is For for that in the new Testament we have no precept and nothing but the example of the Primitive Disciples meeting in their Synaxes upon that day and so also they did on the saturday in the Iewish Synagogues but yet however that at Geneva they were once in meditation to have chang'd it into a Thursday meeting to have showne their Christian liberty we should think strangely of those men that called the Sunday-Festivall lesse then an Apostolicall ordinance and necessary now to be kept holy with such observances as the Church hath appointed * Baptisme of infants is most certainly a holy and charitable ordinance and of ordinary necessity to all that ever cryed and yet the Church hath founded this rite upon the tradition of the Apostles and wise men doe easily observe that the Anabaptists can by the same probability of Scripture inforce a necessity of communicating infants upon us as we doe of baptizing infants upon them if we speak of immediate Divine institution or of practise Apostolicall recorded in Scripture and therefore a great Master of Geneva in a book he writ against the Anabaptists was forced to fly to Apostolicail traditive ordination and therefore the institution of Bishops must be served first as having fairer plea and clearer evidence in Scripture then the baptizing of infants and yet they that deny this are by the just anathema of the Catholick Church confidently condemn'd for Hereticks * Of the same consideration are diverse other things in Christianity as the Presbyters consecrating the Eucharist for if the Apostles in the first institution did represent the whole Church Clergy and Laity when Christ said Hoc facite Doe this then why may not every Christian man there represented doe that which the Apostles in the name of all were commanded to doe If the Apostles did not represent the whole Church why then doe all communicate Or what place or intimation of Christ's saying is there in all the foure Gospells limiting Hoc facite id est benedicite to the Clergy and extending Hoc facite id est accipite manducate to the Laity This also rests upon the practise Apostolicall and traditive interpretation of H. Church and yet cannot be denied that so it ought to be by any man that would not have his Christendome suspected * To these I adde the communion of Women the distinction of bookes Apocryphall from Canonicall that such books were written by such Evangelists and Apostles the whole tradition of Scripture it selfe the Apostles Creed the feast of Easter which amongst all them that cry up the Sunday-Festivall for a Divine institution must needs prevaile as Caput institutionis it being that for which the Sunday is commemorated These and divers others of greater consequence which I dare not specify for feare of being misunderstood rely but upon equall faith with this of Episcopacy though I should wave all the arguments for immediate Divine ordinance and therefore it is but reasonable it should be ranked amongst the Credenda of Christianity which the Church hath entertained upon the confidence of that which we call the faith of a Christian whose Master is truth it selfe VVHat their power and eminence was and § 20. And was an office of power and great authority the appropriates of their office so ordain'd by the Apostles appears also by the testimonies before alleadged the expressions whereof runne in these high termes Episcopatus administrandae Ecclesiae in Lino Linus his Bishoprick was the administration of the whole Church Ecclesiae praefuisse was said of him and Clemens they were both Prefects of the Church or Prelates that 's the Church-word Ordinandis apud Cretam Ecclesiis praeficitur so Titus he is set over all the affaires of the new-founded Churches in Crete In celsiori gradu collocatus plac'd in a higher order or degree so the Bishop of Alexandria chosen ex Presbyteris from amongst the Presbyters Supra omnia Episcopalis apicis sedes so Philo of that Bishoprick The seat of Episcopall height above all things in Christianity These are its honours Its offices these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. To set in order whatsoever he sees wanting or amisse to silence vaine prating Preachers that will not submit to their superiors to ordaine elders to rebuke delinquents to reject Hereticks viz. from the communion of the faithfull for else why was the Angell of the Church of Pergamus reprov'd for tolerating the Nicolaitan hereticks but that it was in his power to eject them And the same is the case of the Angell of Thyatir a in permitting the woman to teach and seduce the people but to the Bishop was committed the cognisance of causes
they were to borrow words from the titles of secular honour or offices and to transplant them to an artificiall and imposed sense USE which is the Master of language must rule us in this affaire and USE is not contracted but in some processe and descent of time * For at first Christendome it selfe wanted a Name and the Disciples of the Glorious Nazarene were Christ'ned first in Antioch for they had their baptisme some yeares before they had their Name It had been no wonder then if per omnia it had so happened in the compellation of all the offices and orders of the Church BVt immediately after the Apostles and still more § 24. Appropriating the word Episcopus or Bishop to the Supreame Church-officer in descending ages Episcopus signified only the Superintendent of the Church the Bishop in the present vulgar conception Some few examples I shal give insteed of Myriads In the Canons of the Apostles the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Bishop is us'd 36 times in appropriation to him that is the Ordinary Ruler president of the Church above the Clergie and the Laity being 24 times expressely distinguish'd from Presbyter and in the other 14 having particular care for government jurisdiction censures and Ordinations committed to him as I shall shew hereafter and all this is within the verge of the first 50 which are received as Authentick by the Councell of a Can. 15. 16. Nice of b c. 9. alibi Antioch 25 Canons whereof are taken out of the Canons of the Apostles the Councell of Gangra calling them Canones Ecclesiasticos and Apostolicas traditiones by the Epistle of the first Councell of Constantinople to Damasus which Theodoret hath inserted into his story by the c post advent Episc. Cypri Councell of Ephesus by d advers Praxeam Tertullian by e lib. 3. c. 59. de vitâ Const. Constantine the Great and are sometimes by way of eminency called THE CANONS sometimes THE ECCLESIASTICALL CANONS sometimes the ancient and received Canons of our Fathers sometimes the Apostolicall Canons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 said the Fathers of the Councell in Ca. 4. cap. 18. de Ortbod fide Trullo and Damascen puts them in order next to the Canon of Holy Scripture so in effect does I sidore in his preface to the worke of the Councells for he sets these Canons in front because Sancti Patres eorum sententias authoritate Synodali roborarunt inter Canonicas posuerunt Constitutiones The H. Fathers have established these Canons by the authority of Councells and have put them amongst the Canonicall Constitutions And great reason for in Pope Stephens time they were translated into Latine by one Dionysius at the intreaty of Laurentius because then Anno Dom 257. the old Latine copies were rude and barbarous Now then this second translation of them being made in Pope Stephens time who was contemporary with S. Irenaeus and S. Cyprian the old copie elder then this and yet after the Originall to be sure shewes them to be of prime antiquity and they are mention'd by S. Stephen in an Epistle of his to Bishop Hilarius where he is severe in censure of them who doe prevaricate these Canons * But for farther satisfaction I referre the Reader to the Epistle of Gregory Holloander to the Moderators of the Citie of Norimberg I deny not but they are called Apocryphall by Gratian and some others viz. in the sense of the Church just as the wisdome of Solomon or Ecclesiasticus but yet by most beleived to be written by S. Clement from the dictate of the Apostles and without all Question are so farre Canonicall as to be of undoubted Ecclesiasticall authority and of the first Antiquity Ignatius his testimony is next in time and in authority Epist. ad Trall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Bishop bears the image and representment of the Father of all And a little after 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. What is the Bishop but he that hath all authority and rule What is the Presbytery but a sacred Colledge Counsellors and helpers or assessors to the Bishop what are Deacons c So that here is the reall and exact distinction of dignity the appropriation of Name and intimation of office The Bishop is above all the Presbyters his helpers the Deacons his Ministers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imitators of the Angells who are Ministring Spirits But this is of so known so evident a truth that it were but impertinent to insist longer upon it Himselfe in three of his Epistles uses it nine times in distinct enumeration viz. to the Trallians to the Philadelphians to the Philippians * And now I shall insert these considerations 1. Although it was so that Episcopus and Presbyter were distinct in the beginning after the Apostles death yet sometimes the names are used promiscuously which is an evidence that confusion of names is no intimation much lesse an argument for the parity of offices since themselves who sometimes though indeed very seldome confound the names yet distinguish the offices frequently and dogmatically 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epist. ad Heron Where by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he means the Presbyters of the Church of Antioch so indeed some say and though there be no necessity of admitting this meaning because by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he may mean the suffragan Bishops of Syria yet the other may be fairely admitted for himselfe their Bishop was absent from his Church and had delegated to the Presbytery Episcopall jurisdiction to rule the Church till hee being dead another Bishop should be chosen so that they were Episcopi Vicarii and by representment of the person of the Bishop and execution of the Bishops power by delegation were called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and this was done least the Church should not be only without a Father but without a Guardian too yet what a Bishop was and of what authority no man more confident and frequent then Ignatius * Another example of this is in Eusebius speaking of the youth whom S. Iohn had converted and commended to a Bishop Clemens whose story this was proceeding in the relation saies 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. But the Presbyter unlesse by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here S. Clement means not the Order but age of the Man as it is like enough he did for a little after he calls him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The old man Tum verò PRESBYTER in domum suam suscipit adolescentem Redde depositum O EPISCOPE saith S. Iohn to him Tunc graviter suspirans SENIOR c. So S. Clement * But this as it is very unusuall so it is just as in Scripture viz. in descent and comprehension for this Bishop also was a Presbyter as well as Bishop or else in the delegation of Episcopall power for so it is in the allegation of Ignatius 2. That this name Episcopus or Bishop was chosen to be
be obliged to believe much more yet this was the one and onely foundation of Faith upon which all persons were to build their hopes of heaven this was therefore necessary to be taught to all because of necessity to be believ'd by all So that although other persons might commit a delinquency in genere morum if they did not know or did not believe much more because they were oblig'd to further disquisitions in order to other ends yet none of these who held the Creed intire could perish for want of necessary faith though possibly he might for supine negligence or affected ignorance or some other fault which had influence upon his opinions and his understanding he having a new supervening obligation ex accidente to know and believe more Neither are we oblig'd to make these Articles more particular and minute then the Creed For since the Apostles and indeed Numb 11. our blessed Lord himselfe promised heaven to them who believd him to be the Christ that was to come into the world and that he who believes in him should be partaker of the resurrection and life eternall he will be as good as his word yet because this Article was very generall and a complexion rather then a single proposition the Apostles and others our Fathers in Christ did make it more explicite and though they have said no more then what lay entire and ready form'd in the bosome of the great Article yet they made their extracts to great purpose and absolute sufficiency and therefore there needs no more deductions or remoter consequences from the first great Article than the Creed of the Apostles For although whatsoever is certainly deduced from any of these Articles made already so explicite is as certainly true and as much to be believed as the Article it selfe because ex veris possunt nil nisi vera sequi yet because it is not certain that our deductions from them are certain and what one calls evident is so obscure to another that he believes it false it is the best and only safe course to rest in that explication the Apostles have made because if any of these Apostolicall deductions were not demonstrable evidently to follow from that great Article to which salvation is promised yet the authority of them who compil'd the Symboll the plaine description of the Articles from the words of Scriptures the evidence of reason demonstrating these to be the whole foundation are sufficient upon great grounds of reason to ascertaine us but if we goe farther besides the easinesse of being deceived we relying upon our own discourses which though they may be true and then binde us to follow them but yet no more then when they only seem truest yet they cannot make the thing certaine to another much lesse necessary in it selfe And since God would not binde us upon paine of sinne and punishment to make deductions our selves much lesse would he binde us to follow another man's Logick as an Article of our Faith I say much lesse another mans for our own integrity for we will certainly be true to our selves and doe our own businesse heartily is as fit and proper to be imployed as another mans ability He cannot secure me that his ability is absolute and the greatest but I can be more certaine that my own purposes and fidelity to my selfe is such And since it is necessary to rest somewhere lest we should run to an infinity it is best to rest there where the Apostles and the Churches Apostolicall rested when not only they who are able to judge but others who are not are equally ascertained of the certainty and of the sufficiency of that explication This I say not that I believe it unlawfull or unsafe for the Numb 12. Church or any of the Antistites religionis or any wise man to extend his own Creed to any thing may certainely follow from any one of the Articles but I say that no such deduction is fit to be prest on others as an Article of Faith and that every deduction which is so made unlesse it be such a thing as is at first evident to all is but sufficient to make a humane Faith nor can it amount to a divine much lesse can be obligatory to binde a person of a differing perswasion to subscribe under paine of loosing his Faith or being a Heretick For it is a demonstration that nothing can be necessary to be believed under paine of damnation but such propositions of which it is certaine that God hath spoken and taught them to us and of which it is certaine that this is their sense and purpose For if the sense be uncertain we can no more be obliged to believe it in a certain sense then we are to believe it at all if it were not certaine that God delivered it But if it be onely certaine that God spake it and not certaine to what sense our Faith of it is to be as indeterminate as its sense and it can be no other in the nature of the thing nor is it consonant to Gods justice to believe of him that he can or will require more And this is of the nature of those propositions which Aristotle calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to which without any further probation all wise men will give assent at its first publication And therfore deductions inevident from the evident and plain letter of Faith are as great recessions from the obligation as they are from the simplicity and certainty of the Article And this I also affirm although the Church of any one denomination or represented in a Councell shall make the deduction or declaration For unlesse Christ had promised his Spirit to protect every particular Church from all errors lesse materiall unlesse he had promised an absolute universall infallibility etiam in minutioribus unlesse super-structures be of the same necessity with the foundation and that Gods Spirit doth not only preserve his Church in the being of a Church but in a certainty of not saying any thing that is lesse certain and that whether they will or no too we may be bound to peace and obedience to silence and to charity but have not a new Article of Faith made and a new proposition though consequent as 't is said from an Article of Faith becomes not therefore a part of the Faith nor of absolute necessity Quid unquam aliud Ecclesia Conciliorum decretis Contra haeres cap 32. eâ—isa est nisi ut quod antea simpliciter credebatur hoc idem postea diligentiùs crederetur said Vincentius Lirinensis whatsoever was of necessary beliefe before is so still and hath a new degree added by reason of a new light or a clear explication but no prositions can be adopted into the foundation The Church hath power to intend our Faith but not to extend it to make our beliefe more evident but not more large and comprehensive For Christ and his Apostles concealed nothing that was necessary to the
to impose it upon others but with confidence to declare his own beliefe and that it was prescrib'd to others as a Creed was the act of the Bishops of Rome so he said nay possibly it was none of his So said the Patriarch of C. P. Meletius about one hundred and thirty years since in his Epistle to John Douza Athanasio falsò adscriptum Symbolum cum Pontificum Rom. appendice illâ adulteratum luce lucidiùs contestamur And it is more then probable that he said true because this Creed was written originally in Latine which in all reason Athanasius did not and it was translated into Greek it being apparent that the Latine Copy is but one but the Greek is various there being three Editions or Translations rather expressed by Genebrard lib. 3. de Trinit But in this particular who list may better satisfie himselfe in a disputation de Symbolo Athanasii printed at Wertzburg 1590 supposed to be written by Serrarius or Cleneherus And yet I must observe that this Symbol of Athanasius and Numb 37. that other of Nice offer not at any new Articles they only pretend to a further Explication of the Articles Apostolicall which is a certain confirmation that they did not believe more Articles to be of belief necessary to salvation if they intended these further Explications to be as necessary as the dogmaticall Articles of the Apostles Creed I know not how to answer all that may be objected against that but the advantage that I shall gather from their not proceeding to new matters is laid out ready for me in the words of Athanasius saying of this Creed this is the Catholike Faith and if his authority bee good or his saying true or he the Authour then no man can say of any other Article that it is a part of the Catholike Faith or that the Catholike Faith can be enlarged beyond the contents of that Symbol and therefore it is a strange boldnesse in the Church of Rome first to adde twelve new Articles Bulla Pii quarti supra forma juramenti professionis fidei in fin Conc. Trident. and then to adde the Appendix of Athanasius to the end of them This is the Catholike Faith without which no man can be saved But so great an example of so excellent a man hath been either mistaken or followed with too much greedinesse all Numb 38. the world in factions all damning one another each party damnd by all the rest and there is no disagreeing in opinion from any man that is in love with his own opinion but damnation presently to all that disagree A Ceremony and a Rite hath caused severall Churches to Excommunicate each other as in the matter of the Saturday Fast and keeping Easter But what the spirits of men are when they are exasperated in a Question and difference of Religion as they call it though the thing it selfe may be most inconsiderable is very evident in that request of Pope Innocent the Third desiring of the Greeks but reasonably a man would think that they would not so much hate the Roman manner of consecrating in unleavened bread as to wash and scrape and pare the Altars after a Roman Priest had consecrated Nothing more furious than a mistaken zeal and the actions of a scrupulous and abused conscience When men think every thing to be their Faith and their Religion commonly they are so busie in trifles and such impertinencies in which the scene of their mistake lies that they neglect the greater things of the Law charity and compliances and the gentlenesse of Christian Communion for this is the great principle of mischiefe and yet is not more pernicious then unreasonable For I demand Can any man say and justifie that the Apostles did deny Communion to any man that believed the Apostles Numb 39. Creed and liv'd a good life And dare any man taxe that proceeding of remissenesse and indifferency in Religion And since our blessed Saviour promised salvation to him that believeth and the Apostles when they gave this word the greatest extent enlarged it not beyond the borders of the Creed how can any man warrant the condemning of any man to the flames of Hell that is ready to die in attestation of this Faith so expounded and made explicite by the Apostles and lives accordingly And to this purpose it was excellently said by a wise and a pious Prelate S. Hilary Non per difficiles nos L. 10. de Trin. ad finem Deus ad bâ—atam vitam quaestiones vocat c. In absoluto nobis facili est aeternitas Jesum suscitatum à mortuis per Deum credere ipsum esse Dominum confiteri c. These are the Articles which we must believe which are the sufficient and adequate object of that Faith which is required of us in order to Salvation And therefore it was that when the Bishops of Istria Concil tom 4. Edit Paris p. 473. deserted the Communion of Pope Pelagius in causâ trium Capitulorum he gives them an account of his Faith by recitation of the Creed and by attesting the four Generall Councels and is confident upon this that de fidei firmitate nulla poterit esse quaestio vel suspicio generari let the Apostles Creed especially so explicated be but secured and all Faith is secured and yet that explication too was lesse necessary then the Articles themselves for the explication was but accidentall but the Articles even before the Explication were accounted a sufficient inlet to the Kingdome of heaven And that there was security enough in the simple believing Numb 40. the first Articles is very certain amongst them and by their Principles who allow of an implicite faith to serve most persons to the greatest purposes for if the Creed did contain in it the whole Faith and that other Articles were in it implicitely for such is the doctrine of the Schoole and particularly of Aquinas then he that explicirely believes all the Creed does implicitely believe all the Articles contain'd in it and then it 22 ae q. 1. a. 10. cap. is better the implication should still continue then that by any explication which is simply unnecessary the Church should be troubled with questions and uncertain determinations and factions enkindled and animosities set on foot and mens soules endanger'd who before were secur'd by the explicite beliefe of all that the Apostles requir'd as necessary which beliefe also did secure them for all the rest because it implied the belief of whatsoever was virtually in the first Articles if such beliefe should by chance be necessary The summe of this discourse is this if we take an estimate of the nature of Faith from the dictates and promises Evangelicall Numb 41. and from the practice Apostolicall the nature of Faith and its integrity consists in such propositions which make the foundation of hope and charity that which is sufficient to make us to doe honour to Christ
temporall felicities and this thing proceeding from so great an Authority as the testimony of Papias drew after it all or most of the Christians in the first three hundred years For besides that the Millenary opinion is expresly taught by Papias Justin Martyr Irenaus Origen Lactantius Severus Victorinus Apollinaris Nepos and divers others famous in their time Justin Martyr in his Dialogue against Tryphon sayes it was the beliefe of all Christians exactly Orthodox 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and yet there was no such Tradition but a mistake in Papias but I find it nowhere spoke against till Dionysins of Alexandria confuted Nepo's Book and converted Coracion the Egyptian from the opinion Now if a Tradition whose beginning of being called so began with a Scholar of the Apostles for so was Papias and then continued for some Ages upon the meer Authority of so famous a man did yet deceive the Church much more fallible is the pretence when two or three hundred years after it but commences and then by some learned man is first called a Tradition Apostolicall And so it hapned in the case of the Arrian heresy which the Nicene Fathers did confute by objecting a contrary Tradition Apostolicall as Theodoret reports Lib. 1. hist. c. 8. and yet if they had not had better Arguments from Scripture then from Tradition they would have faild much in so good a cause for this very pretence the Arrians themselves made and desired to be tryed by the Fathers of the first three hundred years which was a confutation sufficient to them who pretended Vide Petaâ— in Epiph. her 69. a clear Tradition because it was unimaginable that the Tradition should leap so as not to come from the first to the last by the middle But that this tryall was sometime declined by that excellent man S. Athanasius although at other times confidently and truly pretended it was an Argument the Tradition was not so * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Matt. diâ—l ad Tryph. Iud. clear but both sides might with some fairnesse pretend to it And therefore one of the prime Founders of their heresy the Heretick †Euse. l. 5. c. ult Artemon having observed the advantage might be taken by any Sect that would pretend Tradition because the medium was plausible and consisting of so many particulars that it was hard to be redargued pretended a Tradition from the Apostles that Christ was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that the Tradition did descend by a constant succession in the Church of Rome to Pope Victors time inclusively and till Zepherinus had interrupted the series and corrupted the Doctrine which pretence if it had not had some appearance of truth so as possibly to abuse the Church had not been worthy of confutation which yet was with care undertaken by an old Writer out of whom Eusebius transcribes a large passage to reprove the vanity of the pretender But I observe from hence that it was usuall to pretend to Tradition and that it was easier pretended then confuted and I doubt not but oftner done then discovered A great Question arose in Africa concerning the Baptism of Hereticks whether it were valid or no. S. Cyprian and his party appealed to Scripture Stephen Bishop of Rome and his party would be judged by custome and Tradition Ecclesiasticall See how much the nearer the Question was to a determination either that probation was not accounted by S. Cyprian and the Bishops both of Asia and Africk to be a good Argument and sufficient to determine them or there was no certain Tradition against them for unlesse one of these two doe it nothing could excuse them from opposing a known truth unlesse peradventure S. Cyprian Firmilian the Bishops of Galatia Cappadocia and almost two parts of the World were ignorant of such a Tradition for they knew of none such and some of them expresly denyed it And the sixth generall Synod approves of the Canon made in the Councell of Carthage under Cyprian upon this very ground because in praedictorum praesulum locis solum secundum Can. 2. traditam eis consuetudinem servatus est they had a particular Tradition for Rebaptization and therefore there could be no Tradition Universall against it or if there were they knew not of it but much for the contrary and then it would be remembred that a conceal'd Tradition was like a silent Thunder or a Law not promulgated it neither was known nor was obligatory And I shall observe this too that this very Tradition was so obscure and was so obscurely delivered silently proclaimed that S. Austin who disputed against the Donatists upon this very Question was not able to prove it but L. 5. de baptism contr Donat. c. 23. by a consequence which he thought probale and credible as appears in his discourse against the Donatists The Apostles saith S. Austin prescrib'd nothing in this particular But this custome which is contrary to Cyprian ought to be believed to have come from their Tradition as many other things which the Catholike Church observes That 's all the ground and all the reason nay the Church did waver concerning that Question and before the decision of a Councell Cyprian and others might dissent without breach of charity It was plain then there was no clear Tradition Lib. 1. de baptism c. 18. in the Question possibly there might be a custome in some Churches postnate to the times of the Apostles but nothing that was obligatory no Tradition Apostolicall But this was a suppletory device ready at hand when ever they needed it and De peccat original l. 2. c. 40. contra Pelagi Caelest S. Austin confuted the Pelagians in the Question of Originall sinne by the custome of exorcisme and insufflation which S. Austin said came from the Apostles by Tradition which yet was then and is now so impossible to be prov'd that he that shall affirm it shall gaine only the reputation of a bold man and a confident 2. I consider if the report of Traditions in the Primitive Numb 4. times so neare the Ages Apostolicall was so uncertain that they were fain to aym at them by conjectures and grope as in the dark the uncertainty is much encreased since because there are many famous Writers whose works are lost which yet if they had continued they might have been good records to us as Clemens Romanus Egesippus Nepos Coracion Dionysius Areopagite of Alexandria of Corinth Firmilian and many more And since we see pretences have been made without reason in those Ages where they might better have been confuted then now they can it is greater prudence to suspect any later pretences since so many Sects have been so many warres so many corruptions in Authors so many Authors lost so much ignorance hath intervened and so many interests have been served that now the rule is to be altered and whereas it was of old time credible that that was Apostolicall whose beginning they
knew not now quite contrary we cannot safely believe them to be Apostolicall unlesse we doe know their beginning to have been from the Apostles For this consisting of probabilities and particulars which put together make up a morall demonstration the Argument which I now urge hath been growing these fifteen hundred years and if anciently there was so much as to evacuate the Authority of Tradition much more is there now absolutely to destroy it when all the particulars which time and infinite variety of humane accidents have been amassing together are now concentred and are united by way of constipation Because every Age and every great change and every heresy and every interest hath increased the difficulty of finding out true Traditions 3. There are very many Traditions which are lost and yet they are concerning matters of as great consequence as most of Numb 5. those Questions for the determination whereof Traditions are pretended It is more then probable that as in Baptism and the Eucharist the very formes of ministration are transmitted to us so also in confirmation and ordination and that there were speciall directions for visitation of the sick and explicite interpretations of those difficult places of S. Paul which S. Peter affirmed to be so difficult that the ignorant doe wrest them to their own damnation and yet no Church hath conserved these or those many more which S. Basil affirms to be so many that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the day would faile him in the very simple enumeration of all Cap. 29. despir Sancto Traditions Ecclesiasticall And if the Church hath fail'd in keeping the great variety of Traditions it will hardly be thought a fault in a private person to neglect Tradition which either the whole Church hath very much neglected inculpably or else the whose Church is very much too blame And who can ascertain us that she hath not entertained some which are no Traditions as well as lost thousands that are That she did entertain some false Traditions I have already prov'd but it is also as probable that some of those which these Ages did propound for Traditions are not so as it is certain that some which the first Ages cald Traditions were nothing lesse 4. There are some opinions which when they began to be publikely received began to be accounted prime Traditions Numb 6. and so became such not by a native title but by adoption and nothing is more usuall then for the Fathers to colour their popular opinion with so great an appellative S. Austin cald the communicating of Infants an Apostolicall Tradition and yet we doe not practise it because we disbelieve the Allegation And that every custome which at first introduction was but a private fancy or singular practise grew afterwards into a publike rite and went for a Tradition after a while continuance appears by Tertullian who seems to justifie it Non enim existimas tu Contra Marcon licitum esse cuicunque fideli constituere quod Deo placere illi visum De coron milit c. 3. 4. fuerit ad disciplinam salutem And againe A quocunque traditore censetur nec authorem respicias sed authoritatem And S. Hierome most plainly Praecepra majorum Apostolicas Tradiones Apud Euseb. l. 5. c. 20. quisque existimat And when Irenaeus had observed that great variety in the keeping of Lent which yet to be a fourty dayes Fast is pretended to descend from Tradition Apostolicall some fasting but one day before Easter some two some fourty and this even long before Irenaeus time he gives this reason Varietas illa jejunii coepit apud Majores nostros qui non accuratè consuetudinem eorum qui vel simplicitate quâdam vel privatâ authoritate in posterum aliquid statuissent observarant ex translatione Christophorsoni And there are yet some points of good concernment which if any man should Question in a high manner they would prove indeterminable by Scripture or sufficient reason and yet I doubt not their confident Defenders would say they are opinions of the Church and quickly pretend a Tradition from the very Apostles and believe themselves so secure that they could not be discovered because the Question never having been disputed gives them occasion to say that which had no beginning known was certainly from the Apostles For why should not Divines doe in the Question of reconfirmation as in that of rebaptization Are not the grounds equall from an indelible character in one as in the other and if it happen such a Question as this after contestation should be determin'd not by any positive decree but by the cession of one part and the authority and reputation of the other does not the next Age stand faire to be abused with a pretence of Tradition in the matter of reconfirmation which never yet came to a serious Question For so it was in the Question of rebaptization for which there was then no more evident Tradition then there is now in the Question of reconfirmation as I proved formerly but yet it was carried upon that Title 5. There is great variety in the probation of Tradition so that whatever is proved to be Tradition is not equally and Numb 7. alike credible for nothing but universall Tradition is of it selfe credible other Traditions in their just proportion as they partake of the degrees of universality Now that a Tradition be universall or which is all one that it be a credible Testimony S. Irenaeus requires that Tradition should derive from all the Lib. 3. c. 4. Churches Apostolicall And therefore according to this rule there was no sufficient medium to determine the Question about Easter because the Eastern and Western Churches had severall Traditions respectively and both pretended from the Apostles Clemens Alexandrinus sayes it was a secret Tradition Li. 1. Stromat from the Apostles that Christ preached but one year But L. 2. c. 39. Irenaeus sayes it did derive from Hereticks and sayes that he Omnes Seniores testantur qui in Asiâ apud Iohannem Discipulum Domini convenerunt id ipsum tradidisse eis Iohannem c. qui alios Apostolos viderunt haec eadem ab ipsis audierunt testantur de ejusmodi relatione by Tradition first from S. John and then from his Disciples received another Tradition that Christ was almost fifty years old when he dyed and so by consequence preached almost twenty years both of them were deceived and so had all that had believed the report of either pretending Tradition Apostolicall Thus the custome in the Latine Church of fasting on Saturday was against that Tradition which the Greeks had from the Apostles and therefore by this division and want of consent which was the true Tradition was so absolutely indeterminable that both must needs lose much of their reputation But how then when not only particular Churches but single persons are all the proofe we have for a Tradition And
not of weight and Authority to restraine their Liberty so wholy but that they may dissent when they see a reason strong enough so to perswade them as to be willing upon the confidence of that reason and their own sincerity to answer to God for such their modesty and peaceable but as they believe their necessary disagreeing SECT VII Of the fallibility of the Pope and the uncertainty of his Expounding Scripture and resolving Questions BUt since the Question between the Councell and the Pope Numb 1. grew high there have not wanted abettors so confident on the Popes behalfe as to believe Generall Councels to be nothing but Pompes and Solennities of the Catholike Church and that all the Authority of determining Controversies is formally and effectually in the Pope And therefore to appeale from the Pope to a future Councell is a heresy yea and Treason too said Pope Pius II and therefore it concerns us now Epist. ad Norimberg to be wise and wary But before I proceed I must needs remember that Pope Pius II while he was the wise and learned Patrum avorum nostrorum tempore pauci audebant dicere Papam esse supra Concilium l. 1. de gestis Concil Basil. Aeneas Sylvius was very confident for the preheminence of a Councell and gave a merry reason why more Clerks were for the Popes then the Councell though the truth was on the other side even because the Pope gives Bishopricks and Abbeys but Councels give none and yet as soone as he was made Pope as if he had been inspired his eyes were open to see the great priviledges of S. Peters Chaire which before he could not see being amused with the truth or else with the reputation of a Generall Councell But however there are many that hope to make it good that the Pope is the Universall and the infallible Doctor that he breathes Decrees as Oracles that to dissent from any of his Cathedrall determinations is absolute heresy the Rule of Faith being nothing else but consormity to the Chaire of Peter So that here we have met a restraint of Prophecy indeed but yet to make amends I hope we shall have an infallible Guide and when a man is in Heaven he will never complaine that his choyce is taken from him and that he is confin'd to love and to admire since his love and his admiration is fixt upon that which makes him happy even upon God himselfe And in the Church of Rome there is in a lower degree but in a true proportion as little cause to be troubled that we are confin'd to believe just so and no choice left us for our understandings to discover or our wills to chuse because though we be limited yet we are pointed out where we ought to rest we are confin'd to our Center and there where our understandings will be satisfied and therefore will be quiet and where after all our strivings studies and endeavours we desire to come that is to truth for there we are secur'd to find it because we have a Guide that is infallible If this prove true we are well enough But if it be false or uncertain it were better we had still kept our liberty then be cozened out of it with gay pretences This then we must consider And here we shall be oppressed with a cloud of Witnesses For what more plaine then the Commission given to Peter Numb 2. Thou art Peter and upon this Rock will I build my Church And to thee will I give the Keyes And again for thee have I prayed that thy faith faile not but thou when thou art converted confirm thy brethren And again If thou lovest me feed my sheep Now nothing of this being spoken to any of the other Apostles by one of these places S. Peter must needs be appointed Foundation or Head of the Church and by consequence he is to rule and govern all By some other of these places he is made the supreme Pastor and he is to teach and determine all and inabled with an infallible power so to doe And in a right understanding of these Authorities the Fathers speak great things of the Chaire of Peter for we are as much bound to believe that all this was spoken to Peters Successors as to his Person that must by all meanes be supposed and so did the old Doctors who had as much certainty of it as we have and no more but yet let 's hear what they have said a Irenae contra haeres l. 3. c. 3. To this Church by reason of its more powerfull principality it is necessary all Churches round about should Convene ..... In this Tradition Apostolicall alwayes was observed and therefore to communicate with this Bishop with this * Ambr. de obitu Salyri l. 1. Ep. 4. ad Imp. Cypr. Ep. 52. Church was to be in Communion with the Church Catholike .... b Cypr. Ep. 55. ad Cornel. To this Church errour or perfidiousnesse cannot have accesse .... c S. Austin in Psal. contra partem Donat. Against this Sea the gates of Hell cannot prevaile .... d Hieron Ep. 57. ad Damasum For we know this Church to be built upon a Rock .... And whoever eats the Lamb not within this House is prophane he that is not in the Ark of Noah perishes in the inundation of waters He that gathers not with this Bishop he scatters and he that belongeth not to Christ must needs belong to Antichrist And that 's his finall sentence But if you would have all this prov'd by an infallible Argument e L. 2. contra Parmenian Optatus of Milevis in Africa supplies it to us from the very name of Peter For therefore Christ gave him the cognomination of Cephas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to shew that S. Peter was the visible Head of the Catholike Church Dignum patellà operculum This long harangue must needs be full of tragedy to all them that take liberty to themselves to follow Scripture and their best Guides if it happens in that liberty that they depart from the perswasions or the Communion of Rome But indeed if with the peace of the Bishops of Rome I may say it this Scene is the most unhandsomely laid and the worst carried of any of those pretences that have lately abused Christendome 1. Against the Allegations of Scripture I shall lay no greater Numb 3. prejudice then this that if a person dis-interested should see them and consider what the products of them might possibly be the last thing that he would think of would be how that any of these places should serve the ends or pretences of the Church of Rome For to instance in one of the particulars that man had need have a strong fancy who imagines that because Christ pray'd for S. Peter that being he had design'd him to be one of those upon whose preaching and Doctrine he did meane to constitute a Church that his faith
have been believed But I said the fancy was new and I had reason for it was so unknown till yesterday that even the late Writers of his own side expound the words of the confession of S. Peter exclusively to his person or any thing else as is to be seen in a Desens pacis part 2. c. 28. Marsilius b Recommend sacr Script Petrus de Aliaco and the glosse upon Dist. 19. can ita Dominus § ut supra which also was the Interpretation of Phavorinus Camers their own Bishop from whom they learnt the resemblance of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of which they have made so many gay discourses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 5. But upon condition I may have leave at another time to Numb 7. recede from so great and numerous Testimony of Fathers I am willing to believe that it was not the confession of S. Peter but his person upon which Christ said he would build his Church or that these Expositions are consistent with and consequent to each other that this confession was the objective foundation of Faith and Christ and his Apostles the subjective Christ principally and S. Peter instrumentally and yet I understand not any advantage will hence accrue to the Sea of Rome For upon S Peter it was built but not alone for it was upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets Jesus Christ himselfe being the chief corner stone and when S. Paul reckoned the Oeconomy of Hierarchy he reckons not Peter first and then the Apostles But first Apostles secondarily Prophets c. And whatsoever is first either is before all things else or at least nothing is before it So that at least S. Peter is not before all the rest of the Apostles which also S. Paul expresly averres I am in nothing inferiour to the very chiefest of the Apostles no not in the very being a Rock and a foundation and it was of the Church of Ephesus that S. Paul said in particular it was columna firmamentum veritatis that Church was not excluding others for they also were as much as she for so we keep close and be united to the corner stone although some be master builders Vid. Socrat. l. 1. c. 19. 20. Sozom. l. 2. c 14. Niceph. l. 14. c. 40. yet all may build and we have known whole Nations converted by Lay-men and women who have been builders so farre as to bring them to the corner stone 6. But suppose all these things concern S. Peter in all the Numb 8. capacities can be with any colour pretended yet what have the Bishops of Rome to doe with this For how will it appear that these promises and Commissions did relate to him as a particular Bishop and not as a publike Apostle Since this later is so much the more likely because the great pretence of all seemes in reason more proportionable to the founding of a Church then its continuance And yet if they did relate to him as a particular Bishop which yet is a further degree of improbability removed further from certainty yet why shall S. Clement or Linus rather succeed in this great office of headship then S. Iohn or any of the Apostles that survived Peter It is no way likely a private person should skip over the head of an Apostle or why shall his Successors at Rome more enjoy the benefit of it then his Successors at Antioch since that he was at Antioch and preached there we have a Divine Authority but that he did so at Rome at most we have but a humane and if it be replyed that because he dyed at Rome it was Argument enough that there his Successors were to inherit his priviledge this besides that at most it is but one little degree of probability and so not of strength sufficient to support an Article of faith it makes that the great Divine Right of Rome and the Apostolicall presidency was so contingent and fallible as to depend upon the decree of Nero and if he had sent him to Antioch there to have suffered Martyrdome the Bishops of that Town had been heads of the Catholike Church And this thing presses the harder because it is held by no meane persons in the Church of Rome that the Bishoprick of Rome and the Papacy are things separable And the Pope may quit that Sea and sit in another which to my understanding is an Argument that he that succeeded Peter at Antioch is as much supream by Divine Right as he that sits at Rome both alike that is Vid. Cameracens Qu. vel◠est neither by Divine Ordinance For if the Roman Bishops by Christ's intention were to be Head of the Church then by the same intention the Succession must be continued in that Sea and then let the Pope goe whether he will the Bishop of Rome must be the Head which they themselves deny and the Pope himselfe did not believe when in a schisme he sate at Avignon and that it was to be continued in the Sea of Rome it is but offered to us upon conjecture upon an act providence as they fancy it so ordering it by vision and this proved by an Author which themselves call fabulous and Apocryphall under the name of Linus in Biblioth PP de passione Petri Pauli A goodly building which relies upon an event that was accidentall whose purpose was but infinuated the meaning of it but conjectur'd at and this conjecture so uncertain that it was an imperfect aime at the purpose of an event which whether it was true or no was so uncertain that it is ten to one there was no such matter And yet again another degree of uncertainty is to whom the Bishops of Rome doe succeed For S. Paul was as much Bishop of Rome as S. Peter was there he presided there he preach'd and he it was that was the Doctor of the Uncircumcision and of the Gentiles S. Peter of the Circumcision and of the Jewes only and therefore the converted Jewes at Rome might with better reason claim the priviledge of S. Peter then the Romans and the Churches in her Communion who doe not derive from Jewish Parents 7. If the words were never so appropriate to Peter or also Numb 9. communicated to his Successors yet of what value will the consequent be what prerogative is entail'd upon the Chaire of Rome For that S. Peter was the Ministeriall Head of the Church is the most that is desir'd to be prov'd by those and all other words brought for the same purposes and interests of that Sea Now let the Ministerall Head have what Dignity can be imagined let him be the first and in all Communities that are regular and orderly there must be something that is first upon certain occasions where an equall power cannot be exercised and made pompous or ceremoniall But will this Ministeriall Headship inferre an infallibility will it inferre more then the Headship of the Jewish Synagogue
of that Synod which the Apostles convocated at Ierusalem about the Question of circumcision as is to be seen * Vide pag. Act. 15. to him S. Paul made his addresse Act. 21. to him the brethren carried him where he was found sitting in his Colledge of Presbyters there he was alwaies resident and his seat fixt and that he liv'd Bishop of Ierusalem for many years together is clearly testified by all the faith of the Primitive Fathers and Historians But of this hereafter 3. Epaphroditus is called the Apostle of the Philippians I have sent unto you Epaphroditus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 My compeere Philip. 2. 25. and your Apostle Gradum Apostolatus recepit Epaphroditus saith Primasius and what that is In hunc locum uterque Theod. in 1. Tim 3. we are told by Theodoret dictus Philippensium Apostolus à S. Paulo quid hoc aliud nisi Episcopus Because he also had received the office of being an Apostle among them saith S. Ierome upon the same place and it is very observeable that those Apostles to whom our blessed Saviour gave immediate substitution are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Apostles of Iesus Christ but those other men which were Bishops of Churches and called Apostles by Scripture are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Apostles of Churches or sometime Apostles alone but never are intitled of Iesus Christ. Other of the Apostles saw I none but Iames the Lords Brother Gal. 1. There S. Iames the Bishop of Ierusalem is called an Apostle indefinitely But S. Paul calls himselfe often the Apostle of Iesus Christ not of man neither by man but by Iesus Christ. So Peter an Apostle of Iesus Christ but S. Iames in his Epistle to the Iewes of the dispersion writes not himselfe the Apostle of Iesus Christ but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Iames the servant of God and of the Lord Iesus Christ. Further yet S. Paul although as having an immediate calling from Christ to the office of Apostolate at large calls himselfe the Apostle of Iesus Christ yet when he was sent to preach to the Gentiles by the particular direction indeed of the holy Acts. 13. v. 2 3. Ghost but by Humane constitution and imposition of hands in relation to that part of his office and his cure of the uncircumcision he limits his Apostolate to his Diocesse and calls himselfe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 11. 13. The Apostle of the Gentiles as S. Peter for the same reason and in the same modification is called Galat. 2. 8. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is the Apostle of those who were of the Circumcision And thus Epaphroditus is called the Apostle of the Philippians who clearely was their Bishop as I shall shew in the sequel that is he had an Apostolate limited to the Diocesse of Philippi Paulatim verò tempore procedente aliè ab his quos Dominus eleger at ordinati sunt Apostoli sicut ille ad Philippenses sermo declarat dicens necessarium In 1. cap. Galat autem existimo Epaphroditum c. So S. Ierome In processe of time others besides those whom the Lord had chosen were ordained Apostles and particularly he instances in Epaphroditus from the authority of this instance adding also that by the Apostles themselves Iudas and Silas were called Apostles 4. Thus Titus and some other with him who came to Ierusalem with the Corinthian benevolence 2. Corinth 8. 23. are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Apostles of the Churches Apostles I say in the Episcopall sence They were none of the twelve they were not of immediate divine mission but of Apostolike ordination they were actually Bishops as I shall shew hereafter Titus was Bishop of Crete and Epaphroditus of Philippi and these were the Apostles for Titus came with the Corinthian Epaphroditus with the Colossian liberality Now these men were not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 called Messengers in respect of these Churches sending them with their contributions 1. Because they are not called the Apostles of these Churches to wit whose almes they carried but simply 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Churches viz. of their own of which they were Bishops For if the title of Apostle had related to their mission from these Churches it is unimaginable that there should be no terme of relation expressed 2. It is very cleare that although they did indeed carry the benevolence of the severall Churches yet S. Paul not those Churches sent Vers. 22. them And we have sent with them our Brother c. 3. They are called Apostles of the Churches not going from Corinth with the mony but before they came thither from whence they were to be dispatch't in legation to Ierusalem If any enquire of V. 23. Titus .... or the Brethren they are the Apostles of the Church and the glory of Christ. So they were Apostles before they went to Corinth not for their being imployed in the transportation of their charity So that it is plaine that their Apostolate being not relative to the Churches whose benevolence they carried and they having Churches of their own as Titus had Crete Epaphroditus had Philippi their Apostolate was a fixt residence and superintendency of their severall Churches BVt in holy Scripture the identity of the ordinary § 5. And office office of Apostleship and Episcopacy is clearer yet For when the holy Spirit had sent seaven letters to the seaven Asian Bishops the Angell of the Church Apocal. 2. of Ephesus is commended for trying them which say they are Apostles and are not and hathfound themlyars This Angell of the Church of Ephesus as Antiquity hath taught us was at that time Timothy or * Doroth. Synops Gajus the first a Disciple the other had been an entertainer of the Apostles and either of them knew them well enough it could not be that any man should dissemble their persons counterfeit himselfe S. Paul or S. Peter And if they had yet little trying was needfull to discover their folly in such a case and whether it was Timothy or Gajus he could deserve but small commendations for the meer believing of his own eyes and memory Besides the Apostles all were then dead and he known to live in Patmos known by the publick attestation of the sentence of relegation ad insulam These men therefore dissembling themselves to be Apostles must dissemble an ordinary function not an extraordinary person And indeed by the concurse of of story place and time Diotrephes was the Man S. Iohn cheifly pointed at For he seeing that of Ephesus there had been an Episcopall chayre plac'd and Timothy a long while possess'd of it and * Vide Constit. Apost per Clement ubt quidam Iohannes in Epheso Episc. post Timoth. collocatur perhaps Gajus after him if we may trust Dorotheus and the like in some other Churches and that S. Iohn had not constituted Bishops in all the other Churches of the lesser Asia but kept
filii Episcopi ut Episcopi Apostolis tanquam filii Patribus succedant The Apostles are Fathers instead of whom Bishops doe succeed whom God hath appointed to be made Rulers in all lands So S. Hierome S. Austin and Euthymius upon the 44. Psal. alià s 45. But S. Austin for his own particular makes good De verbis Dom serm 24 use of his succeeding the Apostles which would doe very well now also to be considered Si solis Apostolis dixit qui vos spernit me spernit spernite nos si autem sermo ejus pervenit ad nos vocavit nos in eorum loco constituit nos videte ne spernatis nos It was good counsell not to despise Bishops for they being in the Apostles places and offices are concerned and protected by that saying he that despiseth you despiseth mee I said it was good counsell especially if besides all these we will take also S. Chrysostomes testimony Potestas anatthematizandiab Apostolis ad successores eorum nimirum Episcopos transiit A power of anathematizing delinquents is derived from the Apostles to their successors even to Bishops S. Ambrose upon that of S. Paul Ephes. 4. Quosdam In Ephes. 4. dedit Apostolos Apostoli Episcopi sunt He hath given Apostles that is he hath given some Bishops In 1. Corinth 12. 28. That 's down right and this came not by chance from him he doubles his assertion Caput itaque in Ecclesi â Apostolos posuit qui legati Christi sunt sicut dicit idem Apostolus pro quo legatione fungimur Ipsisunt Episcopi firmante istud Petro Apostolo dicente inter caetera de Iudâ Episcopatum ejus accipiat alter And a third time Numquid omnes Apostoli In vers 29. ibid. verum est Quia in Ecclesiâ Vnus est Episcopus Bishop and Apostle was all one with S. Ambrose when hee spake of their ordinary offices which puts me in mind of the fragment of Polycrates Biblioth Phot. n. 254. of the Martyrdome of Timothy in Photius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Apostle Timothy was ordained Bishop in the Metropolis of Ephesus by S. Paul and there enthron'd To this purpose are those compellations and titles of Bishopricks usually in antiquity S. Basil calls a Bishoprick 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So Theodoret. An Apostolicall presidency Lih. 4. c. 18. The summe is the same which S. Peter himselfe taught the Church as S. Clement his Scholler or some other primitive man in his name reports of him Episâ—â—pos ergo vicem Apostolorum gerere Dominum Epist. 1. docuisse dicebat reliquorum Discipulorum vicem tenere Presbyteros debere insinuabat He Peter said that our Lord taught that Bishops were to succeed in the place of the Apostles and Presbyters in the place of the Disciples Who desires to be farther satisfied concerning Catholick consent for Bishops succession to Apostles in their order and ordinary office he may see it in Epist. 1. ad Simpron Pacianus the renowned Bishop of Barcinona in b Homil. 26. in Evang. S. Gregory c Orat. 2. de imagin S. Iohn Damascen in S. Sixtus the first his second decretall Epistle and most plentifully in d Epist. 7. S. Caelestine writing to the Ephesine Councell in the Epistle of e Habetur Can. in Novo distinct 21. Anacletus de Patriarchis Primatibus c. In f In synod Hispal Isidore and in g Lib. 3. c. 15. super Lucam Venerable Bede His words are these sicut duodecem Apostolos formam Episcoporum exhibere simul demonstrare nemo est qui dubitet sic 72 figuram Presbyterorum gessisse sciendum est tametsi primis Ecclesiae temporibus ut Apostolica Scriptura testis est utrique Presbyteri utrique vocabantur Episcopi quorum unum scientiae maturitatem aliud industriam curae Pastoralis significat Sunt ergo jure Divino Episcopi à Presbyteris praelatione distincti As no man doubts but Apostles were the order of Bishops so the 72 of Presbyters though at first they had names in common Therefore Bishops by Divine right are distinct from Presbyters and their Prelates or Superiours TO the same issue drive all those testimonies of § 11. And particularly of S. Peter Antiquity that call all Bishops ex aequo successors of S. Peter So S. Cyprian Dominus noster cujus praecepta metuere observare debemus Episcopi honorem Ecclesiae suaerationem disponens in Evangelio loquitur dicit Petro ego tibi dico Quia tu es Petrus c. Inde per temporum successionum vices Epist. 27. ad Lapsos Episcoporum ordinatio Ecclesiae ratio decurrit ut Ecclesia super Episcopos constituatur c. When our B. Saviour was ordering his Church and instituting Episcopall dignity he said to Peter thou art Peter and on this rock will I build my Church Hence comes the order of Bishops and the constitution or being of the Church that the Church be founded upon Bishops c. The same also S Ierome intimate's Non est facilè Epist. 1. stare loco Pauli tenere gradum Petri. It is not a small thing to stand in the place of Paul to obtaine the degree of Peter so he while he disswades Heliodorus from taking on him the great burden of the Episcopall office Pasceoves meas said Christ to Peter and feed the flock of God which is amongst you said S. Peter to the Bishops of Pontus Galatia Cappadocia Asia and Bithynia Similia enim Successoribus suis Petrus scripsit praecepta saith Theodoret S. Peter gave the same precepts to his successors which Lib. 12. thes cap. 13. Orat. de laud. Basil Christ gave to him And S. Ephrem speaking of S. Basil the Bishop of Caesarea Cappadocia sicut rursus Petrus Ananiam Saphiram fraudantes de precio agri enecavit ita Basilius locum Petri obtinens ejusque paritèr authoritatem libertatemque participans suam ipsius promissionem fraudantem Valentem redarguit ejusque filium morte mulctavit As S. Peter did to Ananias and Saphira So Basil did to Valens and his Sonne for the same delinquency for he had the place liberty and authority of S. Peter Thus Gaudentius of Brixia calls S. Ambrose the tract primâ die suae ordinat Successor of S. Peter and Gildas sirnamed the wise saith that all evill Bishops whatsoever doe with unhallowed and uncleane feete usurpe the seate of S. Peter But this thing is of Catholike beleife and of this use If the order and office of the Apostolate Biblioth S S. P P. ton 5 in Eccles. ord in crepat be eternall to be succeeded in and this office Superior to Presbyters and not onely of Divine institution but indeed the onely order which can clearely show an immediate Divine commission for it's power and authority as I have proved of the function Apostolicall then
those which doe succeed the Apostles in the ordinary office of Apostolate have the same institution and authority the Apostles had as much as the successors of the Presbyters have with the first Presbyters and perhaps more For in the Apostolicall ordinations they did not proceed as the Church since hath done Themselves had the whole Priesthood the whole commission of the Ecclesiasticall power and all the offices Now they in their ordayning assistant Ministers did not in every ordination give a distinct order as the Church hath done since the Apostles For they ordayned some to distinct offices some to particular places some to one part some to another part of Clericall imployment as S. Paul who was an Apostle yet was ordain'd by imposition of hands to goe to the Churches of the Uncircumcision so was Barnabas S. Iohn and Iames and Cephas to the Circumcision and there was scarce any publike designe or Grand imployment but the Apostolike men had a new ordination to it a new imposition of hands as is evident in the Acts of the Apostles So that the Apostolicall ordinations of the inferiour Clergy were onely a giving of partilar commissions to particular men to officiate such parts of the Apostolicall calling as they would please to imploy them in Nay sometimes their ordinations were onely a delivering of Iurisdiction when the persons ordayned had the order before as it is evident in the case of Paul and Barnabas Of Acts 13. the same consideration is the institution of Deacons to spirituall offices and it is very pertinent to this Question For there is no Divine institution for these rising higher then Apostolicall ordinance and so much there is for Presbyters as they are now authoriz'd for such power the Apostles gave to Presbyters as they have now and sometimes more as to Iudas and Silas and diverse others who therefore were more then meere Presbyters as the word is now us'd * The result is this The office and order of a Presbyter is but part of the office and order of an Apostle so is a Deacon a lesser part so is an Evangelist so is a Prophet so is a Doctor so is a helper or a Surrogate in Government but these will not be called orders every one of them will not I am sure atleast not made distinct orders by Christ for it was in the Apostles power to give any one or all these powers to any one man or to distinguish them into so many men as there are offices or to unite more or fewer of them All these I say clearely make not distinct orders and why are not all of them of the same consideration I would be answered from Grounds of Scripture For there we fix as yet * Indeed the Apostles did ordaine such men and scattered their power at first for there was so much imployment in any one of them as to require one man for one office but a while after they united all the lesser parts of power into two sorts of men whom the Church hath since distinguished by the Names of Presbyters and Deacons and called them two distinct orders But yet if we speak properly according to the Exigence of Divine institution there is Vnum Sacerdotium one Priesthood appointed by Christ and that was the commission given by Christ to his Apostles and to their Successors precisely and those other offices of Presbyter and Deacon are but members of the Great Priesthood and although the power of it is all of Divine institution as the power to baptize to preach to consecrate to absolve to Minister yet that so much of it should be given to one sort of men so much lesse to another that is onely of Apostolicall ordinance For the Apostles might have given to some onely a power to absolve to some onely to consecrate to some onely to baptize We see that to Deacons they did so They had onely a power to baptize and preach whether all Evangelists had so much or no Scripture does not tell us * But if to some men they had onely given a power to use the Keyes or made them officers spirituall to restore such as are overtaken in a fault and not to consecrate the Eucharist for we see these powers are distinct and not relative and of necessary conjunction no more then baptizing and consecrating whether or no had those men who have only a power of absolving or consecrating respectively whether I say have they the order of a Presbyter If yea then now every Preist hath two orders besides the order of Deacon for by the power of Consecration he hath the power of a Presbyter and what is he then by his other power But if such a man ordayn'd with but one of these powers have not the order of a Presbyter then let any man shew me where it is ordayned by Christ or indeed by the Apostles that an order of Clerks should be constituted with both these powers and that these were called Presbyters I only leave this to be considered * But all the Apostolicall power we find instituted by Christ and we also find a necessity that all that power should be succeeded in and that all that power should be united in one order for he that hath the highest viz. a power of ordination must needs have all the other else he cannot give them to any else but a power of ordination I have proved to be necessary and perpetuall So that we have cleare evidence of the Divine institution of the perpetuall order of Apostleship mary for the Presbyterate I have not so much either reason or confidence for it as now it is in the Church but for the Apostolate it is beyond exception And to this Bishops doe succeed For that it is so I have proved from Scirpture and because no Scripture is of private interpretation I have attested it with the Catholike testimony of the Primitive Fathers calling Episcopacy the Apostolate and Bishops successors of S. Peter in particular and of all the Apostles in general in their ordinary offices in which they were Superior to the 72 the Antecessors of the Presbyterate One objection I must cleare For sometimes Presbyters are also called Apostles and Successors of the Apostles as in Ignatius in Irenaeus in S. Hierome I answer 1. They are not called Successores Apostolorum by any dogmaticall resolution or interpretation of Scripture as the Bishops are in the examples above alleaged but by allusion and participation at the most For true it is that they succeed the Apostles in the offices of baptizing consecrating and absolving in privato foro but this is but part of the Apostolicall power and no part of their office as Apostles were superiour to Presbyters 2. It is observeable that Presbyters are never affirmed to succeed in the power and regiment of the Church but in subordination and derivation from the Bishop and therefore they are never said to succeed in Cathedris Apostolorum in the Apostolick Sees 3. The places
which I have specifyed and they are all I could ever meete with are of peculiar answer For as for Ignatius in his Epistle to the Church of Trallis * Jdem ferè habet in Epist. ad Magnes Smyrnens he calls the Presbytery or company of Priests the Colledge or combination of Apostles But here S. Ignatius as he lifts up the Presbyters to a comparison with Apostles so he also raises the Bishop to the similitude and resemblance with God Episcopus typum Dei Patris omnium gerit Presbyteri verò sunt conjunctus Apostolorum caetus So that although Presbyters grow high yet they doe not overtake the Bishops or Apostles who also in the same proportion grow higher then their first station This then will doe no hurt As for S. Irenaeus he indeed does say that Presbyters succeed the Apostles but what Presbyters he means he tells us even such Presbyters as were also Bishops such as S. Peter and S. Iohn was who call themselves Presbyters his words are these Proptereà Lib. 4. c. 43. eis qui in Ecclesiâ sunt Presbyteris abaudire oportet his qui successionem habent ab Apostolis qui cum Episcopatus successione charisma veritatis certum secundùm placitum Patris acceperunt And a little after Cap. 44. Tales Presbyteros nutrit Ecclesia de quibus Propheta ait dabo Principes tuos in pace Episcopos tuos in Iustitiâ So that he gives testimony for us not against us As for S. Hierome the third man he in the succession to the honour of the Apostolate joynes Presbyters with Bishops and that 's right enough for if the Bishop alone does succeed in plenitudinem potestatis Apostolicae ordinariae as I have proved he does then also it is as true of the Bishop together with his consessus Presbyterorum Epist. 13. Episcopi Presbyteri habeant in exemplum Apostolos Apostolicos viros quorum honorem possidentes habere nitantur meritum those are his words and inforce not so much as may be safely granted for reddendo singula singulis Bishops succeed Apostles and Presbyters Apostolick men and such were many that had not at first any power Apostolicall and that 's all that can be inferred from this place of S. Hierome I know nothing else to stay me or to hinder our assent to those authorities of Scripture I have alleadged and the full voyce of traditive interpretation THE second argument from Antiquity is the § 12. And the institution of Episcopacy as well as of the Apostolate expressed to be Divine by primitive authority Epist. 27. direct testimony of the Fathers for a Divine institution In this S. Cyprian is most plentifull Dominus noster ** Episcopi honorem Ecclesiae suae rationem disponens in Evangelio dicit Petro c Inde per temporum successionum vices Episcoporum ordinatio Ecclesiae ratio decurrit ut Ecclesia super Episcopos constituatur omnis actus Ecclesiae per eosdem Praepositos gubernetur Cùm hoc itaque Divinâ lege fundatum sit c Our Lord did institute in the Gospell the honour of a Bishop Hence comes the ordination of Bishops and the Church is built upon them and every action of the Church is to be governed by them and this is founded upon a Divine law Meminisse autem Diaconi debent quoniam Epist. 65. ad Rogatian Apostolos i. e. Episcopos praepositos Dominus elegit Our Lord hath chosen Apostles that is Bishops and Church-governours And a little after Quod si nos aliquid audere contrà Deum possumus qui Episcopos facit possunt contranos audere Diaconi à quibus fiunt We must not attempt any thing against God who hath instituted Bishops The same Father in his Epistle to Magnus disputes against Novatianus his being a Bishop Novatianus in Ecclesiâ non Epist. 76. est nec Episcopus computari potest qui Evangelicâ Apostolicâ traditione contemptâ nemini succedens à seipso ordinatus est If there was both an Evangelicall and an Apostolick tradition for the successive ordination of Bishops by other Bishops as S. Cyprian affirmes there is by saying Novatianus contemned it then certainly the same Evangelicall power did institute that calling for the modus of whose election it took such particular order S. Ignatius long before him speaking concerning his absent friend Sotion the Deacon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epist ad Magnes He wishes for the good mans company because by the grace of God and according to the law of Iesus Christ he was obedient to the Bishop and his Clergy And a little after 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is home enough Ye ought to obey your Bishop and to contradict him in nothing It is a fearefull thing to contradict him For whosoever does so does not mock a visible man but the invisible undeceiveable God For this contumely relates not to man but to God So S. Ignatius which could not be true were it a humane constitution and no Divine ordinance But more full are those words of his in his Epistle to the Ephesians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that obeyes the Bishop and Clergy obeyes Christ who did constitute and ordaine them This is plain and dogmaticall I would be loath to have two men so famous so Ancient and so resolute speake halfe so much against us But it is a generall resolve and no private opinion Quaest. Vet. N. Testam qu. 97. For S. Austin is confident in the case with a Nemo ignorat Episcopos Salvatorem Ecclesiis instituisse Ipse enim priusquam in coelos ascenderet imponens manum Apostolis ordinavit eos Episcopos No man is so ignorant but he knowes that our blessed Saviour appointed Bishops over Churches for before his ascension into Heaven he ordained the Apostles to be Bishops But long before him Hegesippus going to Rome and by the way calling Euseb. lib. 4. c. 22. in at Corinth and divers other Churches discoursed with their severall Bishops and found them Catholick and Holy and then staid at Rome three successions of Bishops Anicetus Soter and Eleutherius Sed in omnibus ist is ordinationibus vel in caeteris quas per reliquas urbes videram it a omnia habebantur sicut lex antiquitùs tradidit Prophetae indicaverunt ET DOMINUS STATUIT All things in these ordinations or successions were as our Lord had appointed All things therefore both of doctrine and discipline and therefore the ordinations themselves too Further yet and it is worth observing there was never any Bishop of Rome from S. Peter to S. Sylvester that ever writ decretall Epistle now extant and transmitted to us but either professedly or accidentally he said or intimated that the order of Bishops did come from God S. Irenaeus speaking of Bishops successors to the Lib. 4. c. 43. Apostles saith that with their order of Bishoprick they have received charisma veritatis
certum a true and certaine or indelible character secundùm placitum Patris according to the will of God the Father And this also is the doctrine of S. Ambrose Ideò quanquam melior In 1. Corinth 12. Apostolus aliquando tamen eget Prophetis quià ab uno Deo Patre sunt omnia singulos Episcopos singulis Ecclesiis praeesse decrevit God from whom all good things doe come did decree that every Church should be governed by a Bishop And againe De dignit Sacerd cap. 2. Honorigitur Fratres sublimit as Episcopalis nullis poterit comparationibus adaequari Si Regum fulgori compares c and a little after Quid jam de plebeiâ dixerim multitudine cui non solùm praeferri à Domino meruit sed ut eam quoque jure tueatur patrio praeceptis imperatum est Evangelicis The honour and sublimity of the Bishop is an incomparable preheminence and is by God set over the people and it is commanded by the precept of the holy Gospell that he should guide them by a Fathers right And in the close of his discourse Sic certè à Domino ad B. Petrum dicitur Petre amas me .... repetitum est à Domino tertiò Pasce oves meas Quas oves quem gregem non solùm tunc B. suscepit Petrus sed cum illo nos suscepimus omnes Our blessed Lord committed his sheep to S. Peter to be fed and in him we who have Pastorall or Episcopall authority have received the same authority and commission Thus also divers of the Fathers speaking of the ordination of S. Timothy to be Bishop and of S. Paul's intimation that it was by Prophecy affirme it to be done by order of the Holy Ghost 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith S. Chrysostome he was ordained by Prophecy Homil. 4. Graec. 5. lat in 1. Tim. 1. cap. In 1. Tit. that is by the Holy Ghost 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thou wert not made Bishop by humane constitution 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so Oecumenius By Divine revelation saith Theodoret. By the command of the Holy Ghost so Theophylact and indeed so S. Paul to the assembly of Elders and Bishops met at Miletus Spiritus S. posuit vos Episcopos Acts 20. the Holy Ghost hath made you Bishops to be sure S. Timothy was amongst them and he was a Bishop and so were diverse others there present therefore the order it selfe is a ray streaming from the Divine beauty since a single person was made Bishop by revelation I might multiply authorities in this particular which are very frequent and confident for the Divine institution of Episcopacy in †Hom. 32. in Iohan. Origen in the Councell of Carthage recorded by S. Cyprian in the collection of the * Can. 6. Orientall Canons by Martinus Bracarensis in the Councells of a C. 25. Aquisgrane and b Octauum Can. 7. Toledo and many more The summe is that which was taught by c Epist. 2. S. Sixtus Apostolorum dispositione ordinante Domino Episcopi primitùs sunt constituti The Lord did at first ordaine and the Apostles did so order it and so Bishops at first had their Originall constitution These and all the former who affirme Bishops to be successors of the Apostles by consequence to have the same institution drive all to the same issue and are sufficient to make faith that it was the do-doctrine Primitive and Catholick that Episcopacy is a divine institution which Christ Planted in the first founding of Christendome which the Holy Ghost Watered in his first descent on Pentecost and to which we are confident that God will give an increase by a never failing succession unlesse where God removes the Candlestick or which is all one takes away the starre the Angell of light from it that it may be invelop'd in darknesse usque ad consummationem saeculi aperturam tenebrarum The conclusion of all I subjoyne in the words of Venerable Bede before quoted sunt ergo jure Divino Episcopi Lib. 3. in Lucam c. 15. à Presbyter is praelatione distincti Bishops are distinct from Presbyters and Superiour to them by the law of God THE second Basis of Episcopacy is Apostolicall tradition We have seen what Christ did now wee shall see what was done by his Apostles And since they knew their Masters mind so well wee can never better confide in any argument to prove Divine institution of a derivative authority then the practise Apostolicall Apostoli enim Discipuli Lib. 3. cap. 5. veritatis existentes extra omne mendacium sunt non enim communicat mendacium veritati sicut non communicant tenebraeluci sed praesentia alterius § 13. In pursuance of the Divine institution the Apostles did ordaine Bishops in severall Churches excludit alterum saith S. Irenaeus FIrst then the Apostles did presently after the ascension fixe an Apostle or a Bishop in the chayre of Ierusalem For they knew that Ierusalem was shortly to be destroyed they themselves foretold of miseryes and desolations to insue Petrus Paulus praedicunt cladem Hierosolymitanam saith Lactantius l. 4. inst famines and warres and not a stone left upon another was the fate of that Rebellious City by Christs owne prediction which themselves recorded in Scripture And to say they understood not what they writ is to make them Enthusiasts and neither good Doctors nor wise seers But it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the holy Spirit which was promised to lead them into all truth would instruct them in so concerning an issue of publike affaires as was so Great desolation and therefore they began betimes to establish that Church and to fixe it upon it's perpetuall base 2 ly The Church of Ierusalem was to be the president and platforme for other Churches The word of God went forth into all the world beginning first at Ierusalem and therefore also it was more necessary a Bishop should be there plac'd betimes that other Churches might see their governement from whence they receiv'd their doctrine that they might see from what starres their continuall fluxe of light must streame 3 ly The Apostles were actually dispers'd by persecution and this to be sure they look'd for and therefore so implying the necessity of a Bishop to governe in their absence or decession any wayes they ordayn'd S. Iames the first Bishop of Ierusalem there he fixt As S. Iames at Hierusalem his chayre there he liv'd Bishop for 30 yeares and finish'd his course with glorious Martyrdome If this be proov'd we are in a fayre way for practise Apostolicall First let us see all that is said of S. Iames in Scripture that may concerne this affayre Acts. 15. We find S. Iames in the Synod at Ierusalem not disputing but giving finall determination to that Great Qu about Circumcision And when there had beene much disputing Peter rose up and said c He first drave the question to an issue and
Rome at Antioch 2. Where no Bishops were constituted there the Apostles kept the jurisdiction in their owne hands There comes upon me saith S. Paul daily the care or Supravision of all the Churches Not all absolutely for not all of the Circumcision but all of his charge with which he was once charged and of which he had not exonerated himselfe by constituting Bishops there for of these there is the same reason And againe If any man obey not our word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2. Thess. 3. 14. signifie him to me by an Epistle so he charges the Thessalonians and therefore of this Church S. Paul as yet clearely kept the power in his owne hands So that the Church was ever in all the parts of it govern'd by Episcopall or Apostolicall authority 3. For ought appeares in Scripture the Apostles never gave any externall or coercitive jurisdiction in publike and criminall causes nor yet power to ordaine Rites or Ceremonies or to inflict censures to a Colledge of meere Presbyters * The contrary may be greedily swallowed and I know not with how great confidence and prescribing prejudice but there is not in all Scripture any commission from Christ any ordinance or warrant from the Apostles to any Presbyter or Colledge of Presbyters without a Bishop or expresse delegation of Apostolicall authority tanquam vicario suo as to his substitute in absense of the Bishop or Apostle to inflict any censures or take cognisance of persons and causes criminall Presbyters might be surrogati in locum Episcopi absentis but never had any ordinary jurisdiction given them by vertue of their ordination or any commission from Christ or his Apostles This we may best consider by induction of particulars 1. There was a Presbytery at Ierusalem but they had a Bishop alwayes and the Colledge of the Apostles sometimes therefore whatsoever act they did it was in conjunction with and subordination to the Bishop Apostles Now it cannot be denyed both that the Apostles were superiour to all the Presbyters in Ierusalem and also had power alone to governe the Church I say they had power to governe alone for they had the government of the Church alone before they ordayn'd the first Presbyters that is before there were any of capacity to joyne with them they must doe it themselves and then also they must retaine the same power for they could not loose it by giving Orders Now if they had a power of sole jurisdiction then the Presbyters being in some publike acts in conjunction with the Apostles cannot challenge a right of governing as affixed to their Order they onely assisting in subordination and by dependency This onely by the way In Ierusalem the Presbyters were some thing more then ordinary and were not meere Presbyters in the present and limited sense of the word For Barnabas and Iudas and Silas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 S. Luke calls them were of that Presbytery 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They were Rulers and Prophets Chiefe men amongst the Act. 15. Brethren yet called Elders or Presbyters though of Apostolicall power and authority 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Oecumenius For truth is in Act. Apost that diverse of them were ordain'd Apostles with an Vnlimited jurisdiction not fix'd upon any See that they also might together with the twelve exire in totum mundum * So that in this Presbytery either they were more then meere Presbyters as Barnabas and Iudas and Silas men of Apostolicall power and they might well be in conjunction with the twelve and with the Bishop they were of equall power not by vertue of their Presbyterate but by their Apostolate or if they were but meere Presbyters yet because it is certaine and proov'd and confess'd that the Apostles had power to governe the Church alone this their taking meere Presbyters in partem regiminis was a voluntary act and from this example was derived to other Churches and then it is most true that Presbyteros in communi Ecclesiam regere was rather consuetudine Ecclesiae then dominicae dispositionis veritate to use S. Hierom's owne expression for this is more evident then that Bishops doe eminere caeteris by custome rather then Divine institution For if the Apostles might rule the Church alone then that the Presbyters were taken into the Number was a voluntary act of the Apostles and although fitting to be retain'd where the same reasons doe remaine and circumstances concurre yet not necessary because not affixed to their Order not Dominicae dispositionis veritate and not laudable when those reasons cease and there is an emergency of contrary causes 2. The next Presbytery we read of is at Antioch but there we find no acts either of concurrent or single jurisdiction but of ordination indeed we doe Act. 13. and that performed by such men as S. Paul was and Barnabas for they were two of the Prophets reckoned in the Church of Antioch but I doe not remember them to be called Presbyters in that place to be sure they were not meere Presbyters as we now Understand the word as I proved formerly 3. But in the Church of Ephesus there was a Colledge of Presbyters and they were by the Spirit Act. 20. of God called Bishops and were appointed by him to be Pastors of the Church of God This must doe it or nothing In quo spiritus S. posuit vos Episcopos In whom the holy Ghost hath made you Bishops There must lay the exigence of the argument and if we can find who is meant by Vos we shall I hope gaine the truth * S. Paul sent for the Presbyters or Elders to come from Ephesus to Miletus and to them he spoke ** It 's true but that 's not all the vos For there were present at that Sermon Sopater and Aristarchus and Secundus and Gaius and Timothy and Tychicus and Trophimus Act. 20. 4. And although he sent to Ephesus as to the Metropolis and there many Elders were either accidentally or by ordinary residence yet those were not all Elders of that Church but of all Asia in the Scripture sense the lessar Asia For so in the preface of his Sermon S. Paul intimates ye know that from the first day I came into Asia after what manner I have vers 18. beene with you at all seasons His whole conversation in Asia was not confin'd to Ephesus and yet those Elders who were present were witnesses of it all and therefore were of dispersed habitation and so it is more clearely infer'd from vers 25. And now behold I know that YE ALL AMONG WHOM I HAVE GONE preaching the Kingdome of God c It was a travaile to preach to all that were present and therefore most certainly they were inhabitants of places very considerably distant Now upon this ground I will raise these considerations 1. If there be a confusion of Names in Scripture particularly of Episcopus and Presbyter as it is contended for on one side
chiefe of the Church doe it and none else And George Pachymeres the Paraphrast of S. Dionysius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In cap. 5. de Eccles. hierarch It is required that a Bishop should consigne faithfull people baptiz'd For this was the Ancient practise I shall not need to instance in too many particulars for that the Ministry of confirmation was by Catholick custome appropriate to Bishops in all ages of the Primitive Church is to be seen by the concurrent testimony of Councells Fathers particularly of S. Clemens Alexandrinus in * Lib. 3. hist. cap. 17. Eusebius a De Baptismo Tertullian S. b Epist. 1. cap. 3. ad Decent Innocentius the first c Epist. 4. Damasus d Epist. 88. S. Leo in e Epist. ad Episc German Iohn the third in S. f Lib. 3. ep 9. Gregory Amphilochius in the life of S. Basil telling the story of Bishop Maximinus confirming Basilius and Eubulus the g Apud Gratian de consecrat dist 5. can ut jejuni Councell of Orleans and of h Ibid. Can. ut Episcopi Melda and lastly of i Concil Hispal can 7. Sevill which affirmes Non licere Presbyteris .... per impositionem manûs fidelibus baptizandis paracletum spiritum tradere It is not lawfull for Presbyters to give confirmation for it is properly an act of Episcopall power .... Chrismate spiritus S. superinfunditur Vtraque verò ista manu ore Antistitis impetramus These are enough for authority and dogmaticall resolution from antiquity For truth is the first that ever did communicate the power of confirming to Presbyters was Photius the first author of that unhappy and long lasting schisme between the Latine and Greek Churches and it was upon this occasion too For when the vide Anastabiblioth praefat in Can. 8. Synodi Bulgarians were first converted the Greekes sent Presbyters to baptize and to confirme them But the Latins sent againe to have them re-confirmed both because as they pretended the Greekes had no jurisdiction in Bulgaria nor the Presbyters a capacity of order to give confirmation The matters of fact and acts Episcopall of confirmation are innumerable but most famous are those confirmations made by S. Rembert Bishop of vide Optatum lib. 2. S. Bernard in vitâ S Malachiae Surium tom 1. in Febr. Brema and of S. Malchus attested by S. Bernard because they were ratified by miracle saith the Ancient story I end this with the saying of S. Hierome Exigis ubi scriptum sit In Actibus Apostolorum Sed etiamsi Scripturae authoritas non subesset totius orbis in hanc partem consensus instar praecepti dial adv Lucifer obtineret If you aske where it is written viz. that Bishops alone should confirme It is written in the Acts of the Apostles meaning by precedent though not expresse precept but if there were no authority of Scripture for it yet the consent of all the world upon this particular is instead of a command *** It was fortunate that S. Hierome hath expressed himselfe so confidently in this affaire for by this we are arm'd against an objection from his own words for in the same dialogue speaking of some acts of Episcopall priviledge and peculiar ministration particularly of Confirmation he saies it was ad honorem potius Sacerdotii quà m ad legis necessitatem For the honour of the Priesthood rather then for the necessity of a law To this the answer is evident from his own words That Bishops should give the Holy Ghost in confirmation is written in the Acts of the Apostles and now that this is reserved rather for the honour of Episcopacy then a simple necessity in the nature of the thing makes no matter For the question here that is only of concernment is not to what end this power is reserved to the Bishop but by whom it was reserved Now S. Hierome saies it was done apud Acta in the Scripture therefore by Gods Holy Spirit and the end he also specifies viz. for the honour of that sacred order non propter legis necessitatem not that there is any necessity of law that confirmation should be administred by the Bishop Not that a Priest may doe it but that as S. Hierome himselfe there argues the Holy Ghost being already given in baptisme if it happens that Bishops may not be had for he puts the case concerning persons in bondage and places remore and destitute of Bishops then in that case there is not the absolute necessity of a Law that Confirmation should be had at all A man does not perish if he have it not for that this thing was reserved to a Bishops peculiar ministration was indeed an honour to the function but it was not for the necessity of a Law tying people in all cases actually to acquire it So that this non necessarium is not to be referred to the Bishops ministration as if it were not necessary for him to doe it when it is to be done not that a Priest may doe it if a Bishop may not be had but this non necessity is to be referred to confirmation it selfe so that if a Bishop cannot be had confirmation though with much losse yet with no danger may be omitted This is the summe of S. Hieroms discourse this reconciles him to himselfe this makes him speak conformably to his first assertions and consequently to his arguments and to be sure no exposition can make these words to intend that this reservation of the power of confirmation to Bishops is not done by the spirit of God and then let the sense of the words be what they will they can doe no hurt to the cause and as easily may we escape from those words of his to Rusticus Bishop of Narbona Sed quia scriptum est Presbyteri duplici honore honorentur .... praedicare eos decet utile est benedicere congruum confirmare c. It is quoted by Gratian dist 95. can ecce ego But the glosse upon the place expounds him thus i. e. in fide the Presbyters may preach they may confirme their Auditors not by consignation of Chrisme but by confirmation of faith and for this quotes a paralell place for the use of the word Confirmare by authority of S. Gregory who sent Zachary his legate Caus. 11. q. 3. can Quod praedecessor into Germany from the See of Rome ut Orthodoxos Episcopos Presbyteros vel quoscunque reperire potuisset in verbo exhortationis perfectos ampliùs confirmaret Certainly S. Gregory did not intend that his legate Zachary should confirme Bishops Priests in any other sense but this of S. Hieroms in the present to wit in faith and doctrine not in rite and mystery and neither could S. Hierome himselfe intend that Presbyters should doe it at all but in this sense of S. Gregory for else he becomes an Antistrephon and his owne opposite * Yea but there is a worse matter
and the Bishops of the Province and the Clergy of the Church and the people of the Citty were assembled at the choosing of another the Emperour makes a speech to the Theodor. lib. 4. c. 5. Bishops only that they should be carefull in their choyce So that although the people were present quibus pro fide religione etiam honor deferendus est as S. Cyprians phrase is to whom respect is to be had and faire complyings to be used so long as they are pious catholick and obedient yet both the right of electing and solemnity of ordaining was in the Bishops the peoples interest did not arrive to one halfe of this 6. There are in Antiquity diverse precedents of Bishops who chose their own successors it will not be imagined the people will choose a Bishop over his head and proclaime that they were weary of him In those daies they had more piety * Agelius did so he chose Sisinnius and that it may appeare it was without the people they came about him and intreated him to choose Marcian to whom they had been beholding in the time of Valens the Emperour he complyed with them and appointed Marcian to be his successor and Sisinnius Socrat. lib. 5. c. 21. whom he had first chosen to succeed Marcian * Thus did Valerius choose his successor S. Austin for though the people nam'd him for their Priest and carried him to Valerius to take Orders yet Valerius chose him Bishop And this was usuall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Epiphanius expresses this case it was ordinary to doe so in many Churches 7. The manner of election in many Churches was various for although indeed the Church had commanded it and given power to the Bishops to make the election yet in some times and in some Churches the Presbyters or the Chapter chose one out of themselves S. Hierome saies they alwaies did so in Alexandria from S. Markes time to Heraclas and Dionysius * S. Ambrose saies that at the first In Ephes. 4. the Bishop was not by a formall new election promoted but recedente uno sequens ei succedebat As one dyed so the next senior did succeed him In both these cases no mixture of the peoples votes 8. In the Church of England the people were never admitted to the choyce of a Bishop from its first becoming Christian to this very day and therefore to take it from the Clergy in whom it alwaies was by permission of Princes and to interest the people in it is to recede à traditionibus Majorum from the religion of our forefathers and to INNOVATE in a high proportion 9. In those Churches where the peoples suffrage by way of testimony I meane and approbation did concurre with the Synod of Bishops in the choyce of a Bishop the people at last according to their usuall guise grew hot angry and tumultuous and then were ingaged by divisions in religion to Name a Bishop of their own sect and to disgrace one another by publike scandall and contestation and often grew up to Sedition and Murder and therefore although they were never admitted unlesse where themselves usurped farther then I have declared yet even this was taken from them especially since in tumultuary assemblies they were apt to carry all before them they knew not how to distinguish between power and right they had not well learn'd to take deniall but began to obtrude whom they listed to swell higher like a torrent when they were check'd and the soleship of election which by the Ancient Canons was in the Bishops they would have asserted wholly to themselves both in right and execution * I end this with the annotation of Zonaras upon the twelfth Canon of the Laodicean Councell Populi suffragiis olim Episcopi eligebantur understand him in the senses above explicated Sed cùm multae inde seditiones existerent hinc factum est ut Episcoporum Vnius cujusque provinciae authoritate eligi Episcopum quemque oportere decreverint Patres of old time Bishops were chosen not without the suffrage of the people for they concurred by way of testimony and acclamation but when this occasion'd many seditions and tumults the Fathers decreed that a Bishop should be chosen by the authority of the Bishops of the Province And he addes that in the election of Damasus 137 men were slaine and that sixe hundred examples more of that nature were producible Truth is the Nomination of Bishops in Scripture was in the Apostles alone and though the Kindred of our Blessed Saviour were admitted to the choyce of Simeon Cleophae the Successor of S. Iames to the Bishoprick of Ierusalem as Eusebius witnesses it was lib. 3. hist. cap. 11. propter singularem honorem an honorary and extraordinary priviledge indulged to them for their vicinity and relation to our Blessed Lord the fountaine of all benison to us and for that very reason Simeon himselfe was chosen Bishop too Yet this was praeter regulam Apostolicam The rule of the Apostles and their precedents were for the sole right of the Bishops to choose their Colleagues in that Sacred order * And then in descent even before the Nicene Councell the people were forbidden to meddle in election for they had no authority by Scripture to choose by the necessity oftimes and for the reasons before asserted they were admitted to such a share of the choyce as is now folded up in a peice of paper even to a testimoniall and yet I deny not but they did often take more as in the case of Nilammon quem cives elegerunt saith the story out of Sozomen they chose him alone Tripart hist. lib. 10. c. 14. though God took away his life before himselfe would accept of their choyce and then they behav'd themselves oftentimes with so much insolency partiality faction sedition cruelty and Pagan basenesse that they were quite interdicted it above 1200 yeares agone * So that they had their little in possession but a little while and never had any due and therefore now their request for it is no petition of right but a popular ambition and a snatching at a sword to hew the Church in peices vide dist 63. per tot Gratian. But I thinke I need not have troubled my selfe halfe so farre for they that strive to introduce a popular election would as faine have Episcopacy out as popularity of election let in So that all this of popular election of Bishops may seeme superfluous For I consider that if the peoples power of choosing Bishops be founded upon Gods law as some men pretend from S. Cyprian not proving the thing from Gods law but Gods law from S. Cyprian then Bishops themselves must be by Gods law For surely God never gave them power to choose any man into that office which himselfe hath no way instituted And therefore I suppose these men will desist from their pretence of Divine right of popular election if the Church will recede from her divine
the same reason of the honour And if so then the Question will prove but an odde one even this whether Christ be to be honour'd or no or depressed to the common estimate of Vulgar people for if the Bishops be then he is This is the condition of the Question 2. Consider wee that all Religions and particularly all Christianity did give titles of honour to their High-Priests and Bishops respectively * I shall not need to instance in the great honour of the Priestly tribe among the Iewes and how highly Honourable Aaron was in proportion Prophets were called Lords in holy Scripture Art not thou MY LORD Elijah said Obed Edom to the Prophet Knowest thou not that God will take THY LORD from thy head this day said the children in the Prophets Schooles So it was then And in the New Testament we find a Prophet HONOURD every where but in his own Country And to the Apostles and Presidents of Churches greater titles of honour given then was ever given to man by secular complacence and insinuation ANGELS and Apocal. 1. 1. Corinth 9. GOVERNOURS and FATHERS OF OUR FAITH and STARRS LIGHT OF THE WORLD the CROWNE OF THE CHURCH APOSTLES OF Iohn 10. IESUS CHRIST nay GODS viz. to whom the word of God came and of the compellation of Apostles particularly S. Hierom saith that when S. Paul called himselfe the Apostle of Iesus Christ it was as Magnifically spoken as if he had said Praefectus In Titum praetorio Augusti Caesaris Magister exercitûs Tiberii Imperatoris And yet Bishops are Apostles and so called in Scripture I have prooved that already Indeed our blessed Saviour in the case of the two sonnes of Zebedee forbad them to expect by vertue of their Apostolate any Princely titles in order to a Kingdome and an earthly Principality For that was it which the ambitious woman sought for her sonnes viz. faire honour and dignity in an earthly Kingdome for such a Kingdome they expected with their Messias To this their expectation our Saviours answer is a direct antithesis And that made the Apostles to be angry at the two Petitioners as if they had meant to supplant the rest and yet the best preferment from them to wit in a temporall Kingdome No saith our blessed Saviour ye are all deceived The Kings of the Nations indeed doe exercise authority and are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Benefactors Matth. 20. Mark 10. so the word signifies Gracious Lords so we read it But it shall not be so with you what shall not be so with them shall not they exercise authority Luke 22. Who then is that faithfull and wise steward whom his Lord made ruler over his Houshold Surely the Apostles or no body Had Christ authority Most certainly Then so had the Apostles for Christ gave them his with a sicut misit me Pater c. Well! the Apostles might and we know they did exercise authority What then shall not be so with them shall not they be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Indeed if S. Marke had taken that title upon him in Alexandria the Ptolomies whose Honourary appellative that was would have question'd him Highly for it But if we goe to the sense of the word the Apostles might be Benefactors and therefore might be called so But what then Might they not be called Gratious Lords The word would have done no hurt if it had not been an ensigne of a secular Principality For as for the word Lord I know no more prohibition for that then for being called RABBI or MASTER or DOCTOR or FATHER What shall we think now May we not be called DOCTORS Matth. 23. 8 9. 10. Ephes. 4. God hath constituted in his Church Pastors and Doctors saith S. Paul Therefore we may be called so But what of the other the prohibition runs alike for all as is evident in the severall places of the Gospells and may no man be called MASTER or FATHER let an answer be thought upon for these and the same will serve for the other also without any sensible error It is not the word it is the ambitious seeking of a temporall principality as the issue of Christianity and an affixe of the Apostolate that Christ interdicted his Apostles * And if we marke it our B. Saviour points it out himselfe The Princes of the Nations 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 exercise authority over them and are called Benefactors 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It shall not be so with you Not so how Not as the Princes of the Gentiles for theirs is a temporall regiment your Apostolate must be Spirituall They rule as Kings you as fellow servants 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He that will be first amongst you let him be your Minister or servant It seems then among Christs Disciples there may be a Superiority when there is a Minister or servant But it must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that this greatnesse doth consist it must be in doing the greatest service and ministration that the superiority consists in But more particularly it must be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It must not be as the Princes of the Gentiles but it must be as the sonne of man so Luke 22. Christ saies expressely And how was that why he came to Minister and to serve and yet in the lowest John 13. act of his humility the washing his Disciples feet he told them ye call me Lord and Master and ye say well for so I am It may be so with you Nay it must be as the sonne of Man But then the being called Rabbi or Lord nay the being Lord in spirituali Magisterio regimine in a spirituall superintendency and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may stand with the humility of the Gospell and office of Ministration So that now I shall not need to take advantage of the word * In locis ubi suprà 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies to rule with more then a politicall regiment even with an absolute and despotick and is so used in holy Scripture viz. in sequiorem partem God gave authority to Man over the creatures 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the word in the septuagint and we know the power that man Gen. 1. hath over beasts is to kill and to keep alive And thus to our blessed Saviour the power that God gave him over his enemies is expressed by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Psal. 110. And this wee know how it must be exercised 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with a rod of iron 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He shall Psal. 2. break them in pieces like a potters vessell That 's 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But it shall not be so with you But let this be as true as it will The answer needs no way to rely upon a Criticisme It is cleare that the forme of Regiment only is distinguished not all Regiment and authority taken away 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Not as
to speak better Latine then his Translatour had done And if it be thus in Translations it is farre worse in Expositions Quia scil Scripturam sacram pro ipsa sui altitudine non uno eodemque sensu omnes accipiunt ut penè quot homines tot illic sententiae erui posse videantur said Vincent Lirinensis in which every man knows In Commonit what innumerable wayes there are of being mistaken God having in things not simply necessary left such a difficulty upon those parts of Scripture which are the subject matters of controversy ad edomandam labore superbiam intellectum à fastidio revocandum as S. Austin gives a reason that all that erre honestly are therefore to be pityed and tolerated because Lib. 2. de doctr Christian. c. 6. it is or may be the condition of every man at one time or other The summe is this Since holy Scripture is the repository Numb 8. of divine truths and the great rule of Faith to which all Sects of Christians doe appeale for probation of their severall opinions and since all agree in the Articles of the Creed as things clearly and plainly set down and as containing all that which is of simple and prime necessity and since on the other side there are in Scripture many other mysteries and matters of Question upon which there is a vaile since there are so many Copies with infinite varieties of reading since a various Interpunction a parenthesis a letter an accent may much alter the sense since some places have divers literall senses many have spirituall mysticall and Allegoricall meanings since there are so many tropes metonymies ironies hyperboles proprieties and improprieties of language whose understanding depends upon such circumstances that it is almost impossible to know its proper Interpretation now that the knowledge of such circumstances and particular stories is irrevocably lost since there are some mysteries which at the best advantage of expression are not easy to be apprehended and whose explication by reason of our imperfections must needs be dark sometimes weak sometimes unintelligle and lastly since those ordinary meanes of expounding Scripture as searching the Originalls conference of places parity of reason and analogy of Faith are all dubious uncertain and very fallible he that is the wisest and by consequence the likelyest to expound truest in all probability of reason will be very farre from confidence because every one of these and many more are like so many degrees of improbability and incertainty all depressing our certainty of finding out truth in such mysteries and amidst so many difficulties And therefore a wise man that considers this would not willingly be prescrib'd to by others and therefore if he also be a just man he will not impose upon others for it is best every man should be left in that liberty from which no man can justly take him unlesse he could secure him from errour So that here also there is a necessity to conserve the liberty of Prophesying and Interpreting Scripture a necessity deriv'd from the consideration of the difficulty of Scripture in Questions controverted and the uncertainty of any internall medium of Interpretation SECT V. Of the insufficiency and uncertainty of Tradition to Expound Scripture or determine Questions IN the next place we must consider those extrinsecall meanes Numb 1. of Interpreting Scripture and determining Questions which they most of all confide in that restraine Prophesying with the greatest Tyranny The first and principall is Tradition which is pretended not only to expound Scripture Necesse enim est Vincent Lirinens in Commonitor propter tantos tam varii erroris anfractus ut Propheticae Apostolicae interpretationis linea secundum Ecclesiastici Catholici sensus normam dirigatur but also to propound Articles upon a distinct stock such Articles whereof there is no mention and proposition in Scripture And in this topick not only the distinct Articles are clear and plain like as the fundamentals of Faith expressed in Scripture but also it pretends to expound Scripture and to determine Questions with so much clarity and certainty as there shall neither be errour nor doubt remaining and therefore no disagreeing is here to be endured And indeed it is most true if Tradition can performe these pretensions and teach us plainly and assure us infallibly of all truths which they require us to believe we can in this case have no reason to disbelieve them and therefore are certainly Hereticks if we doe because without a crime without some humane interest or collaterall design we cannot disbelieve traditive Doctrine or traditive Interpretation if it be infallibly prov'd to us that tradition is an infallible guide But here I first consider that tradition is no repository of Numb 2. Articles of Faith and therefore the not following it is no Argument of heresy for besides that I have shewed Scripture in its plain expresses to be an abundant rule of Faith and manners Tradition is a topick as fallible as any other so fallible that it cannot be sufficient evidence to any man in a matter of Faith or Question of heresy For 1. I find that the Fathers were infinitely deceived in Numb 3. their account and enumeration of Traditions sometimes they did call some Traditions such not which they knew to be so but by Arguments and presumptions they concluded them so Such as was that of S. Austin ca quae universalis tenet Ecclesia nec à Conciliis Epist. 118. ad Ianuar. De bapt contr Donat. lib. 4. c. 24. instituta reperiuntur credibile est ab Apostolorum traditione descendisse Now suppose this rule probable that 's the most yet it is not certaine It might come by custome whose Originall was not knowne but yet could not derive from an Apostolicall principle Now when they conclude of particular Traditions by a generall rule and that generall rule not certain but at the most probable in any thing and certainly false in some things it is wonder if the productions that is their judgements and pretence faile so often And if I should but instance in all the particulars in which Tradition was pretended falsly or uncertainly in the first Ages I should multiply them to a troublesome variety for it was then accounted so glorious a thing to have spoken with the persons of the Apostles that if any man could with any colour pretend to it he might abuse the whole Church and obtrude what he listed under the specious title of Apostolicall Tradition and it is very notorious to every man that will but read and observe the Recognitions or stromata of Clemens Alexandrinus where there is enough of such false wares shewed in every book and pretended to be no lesse then from the Apostles In the first Age after the Apostles Papias pretended he received a Tradition from the Apostles that Christ before the day of Judgement should reign a thousand yeares upon Earth and his Saints with him in
32. conditores basilicarum in rebus quas eisdem Ecclesiis conferunt nullam se potestatem habere SED IUXTA CANONUM INSTITUTA sicut Ecclesiam ita dotem ejus ad ordinationem Episcopi pertinere These Councells I produce not as Iudges but as witnesses in the businesse for they give concurrent testimony that as the Church it selfe so the dowry of it too did belong to the Bishops disposition by the Ancient Canons For so the third Councell of Toledo calls it antiquam Constitutionem and it selfe is almost 1100. years old so that still I am precisely within the bounds of the Primitive Church though it be taken in a narrow sense For so it was determin'd Can. 26. vide Zonaram in hunc Canonem in the great Councell of Chalcedon commanding that the goods of the Church should be dispensed by a Clergy steward 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Videatur Concil Carthag Graec. can 36. 38. 41. Balsam ibid. apologia 2. Iustini Martyris according to the pleasure or sentence of the Bishop ADde to this that without the Bishop's dimissory letters Presbyters might not goe to another Diocesse So it is decreed in the fifteenth Canon of the Apostles under paine of suspension or deposition § 39. Forbidding Presbyters to leave their own Diocesse or to travell without leave of the Bishop 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the censure and that especially 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if he would not returne when his Bishop calls him The same is renewed in the Councell of Antioch cap. 3. and in the Councell of Constantinople in Trullo cap. 17. the censure there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 let him be deposed that shall without dimissory letters from his Bishop 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fixe himselfe in the Diocesse of another Bishop But with license of his Bishop he may Sacerdotes vel alii Clerici concessione suorum Episcoporum possunt ad alias Ecclesias transmigrare But this is frequently renewed Vide Concil Epaun. c. 5. venet c. 10. in many other Synodall decrees these may suffice for this instance * But this not leaving the Diocesse is not only meant of promotion in another Church but Clergy men might not travaile from Citty to Citty without the Bishops license which is not only an argument of his regiment in genere politico but extends it almost to a despotick But so strict was the Primitive Church in preserving the strict tye of duty and Clericall subordination to their Bishop The Councell of Laodicea commands a Priest or Clergy Can. 41. man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not to travail without Canonicall or dimissory letters And who are to grant these letters is expressed in the next Canon which repeats the same prohibition Can. 42. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Priest or a Clerke must not travaile without the command of his Bishop and this prohibition is inserted into the body of the Law de consecrat dist 5. can non oportet which puts in the clause of Neque etiam Laicum but this was beyond the Councell The same is in the Councell of a Can. 38. Agatho The Councell of b Can. 5. Venice adds a cēsure that those Clerks should be like persons excommunicate in all those places whither they went without letters of license from their Bishop The same penalty is inflicted by the Councell of Epaunum Presbytero vel Diacono Can. 6. sine Antistitis sui Epistolis ambulanti communionem nullus impendat The first Councell of Tourayne in France and the third Councell of Orleans attest the selfe same power in the Bishop and duty in all his Clergy BUT a Coërcitive authority makes not a complete § 40. And the Bishop had power to preferre which of his Clerks he pleased jurisdiction unlesse it be also remunerative the Princes of the Nations are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Benefactors for it is but halfe a tye to indeare obedience when the Subject only fears quod prodesse non poterit that which cannot profit And therefore the primitive Church to make the Episcopall jurisdiction up intire gave power to the Bishop to present the Clerks of his Diocesse to the higher Orders and neerer degrees of approximation to himselfe and the Clerks might not refuse to be so promoted Item placuit ut quicunque Clerici vel Diaconi pro necessitatibus Ecclesiarnm non obtemperaverint EPISCOPIS SUIS VOLENTIBUS EOS AD HONOREM AMPLIOREM IN SUA ECCLESIA PROMOVERE nec illic ministrent in gradu suo unde recedere noluerunt So it is decreed in the African Code They that will not by their Bishop be promoted to a Greater honour Can. 31. in the Church must not enjoy what they have already But it is a question of great consideration and worth a strict inquiry in whom the right and power of electing Clerks was resident in the Primitive Church for the right and the power did not alwaies goe together and also severall Orders had severall manner of election Presbyters and inferior Clergy were chosen by the Bishop alone the Bishop by a Synod of Bishops or by their Chapter And lastly because of late strong outcries are made upon severall pretensions amongst which the people make the biggest noise though of all their title to election of Clerks be most empty therefore let us consider it upon all its grounds 1. In the Acts of the Apostles which are most certainely the best precedents for all acts of holy Church we find that Paul and Barnabas ordain'd Elders in every Church and they passed thorough Lystra Iconium Antioch and Derbe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 appointing them Elders * S. Paul chose Timothy Bishop of Ephesus and he saies of himselfe and Titus For this cause I SENT thee to Crete 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that thou shouldest oppoint Presbyters or Bishops be they which they will in every City The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies that the whole action was his For that he ordain'd them no man questions but he also APPOINTED THEM and that was saith S. Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1. Titus V 5. as I commanded thee It was therefore an Apostolicall ordinance that the BISHOP SHOULD APPOINT PRESBYTERS Let there be halfe so much showne for the people and I will also indeavour to promote their interest **** There is onely one pretence of a popular election in Scripture It is of the seven that were set over the widdowes * But first this was no part of the hierarchy This was no cure of soules This was no divine institution It was in the dispensation of monyes it was by command of the Apostles the election was made and they might recede from their owne right it was to satisfye the multitude it was to avoid scandall which in the dispensation of moneyes might easily arise it was in a temporary office it was with such limitations and conditions as the Apostles prescrib'd them it was out of the number
of the 70 that the election was made if we may beleive S. Epiphanus so that they were Presbyters before this choice and lastly it was onely a Nomination of seven Men the determination of the buisinesse and the authority of rejection was still in the Apostles and indeed the whole power Whom WE MAY APPOINT over this businesse after all this there can be no hurt done by the objection especially since clearely and indubiously the clection of Bishops and Presbyters was in the Apostles owne persons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith S. Ignatius of Evodias Evodias was first APPOINTED to be your Governour or Bishop by the APOSTLES and themselves did committ Epist. ad Antioch it to others that were Bishops as in the instances before reckoned Thus the case stood in Scripture 2. In the practice of the Church it went according to the same law and practice Apostolicall The People did not might not choose the Ministers of holy Church So the Councell of Laodicea 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Can. 13. The people must not choose those that are to be promoted to the Priesthood The prohibition extends to their Non-election of all the Superiour Clergy Bishops and Presbyters But who then must elect them The Councell of Nice determines that for in 16 and 17 Canons the Councell forbids any promotion of Clerks to be made but by the Bishop of that Church where they are first ordayned which clearely reserves to the Bishop the power of retayning or promoting all his Clergy * 3. All Ordinations were made by Bishops alone as I have already prooved Now let this be confronted with the practice of Primitive Christendome that no Presbyter might be ordain'd sine titulo without a particular charge which was alwaies custome and at last grew to be a law in the Councell of Chalcedon and we shall perceive that the ordainer was the onely chooser for then to ordaine a Presbyter was also to give him a charge and the Patronage of a Church was not a lay inheritance but part of the Bishops cure for he had 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the care of the Churches in all the Diocesse as I have already showne And therefore when S. Ierome according to the custome of Christendome had specified some particular ordinations or election of Presbyters by Bishops Epist. 61. 62. as how himselfe was made Priest by Paulinus and Paulinus by Epiphanius of Cyprus Gaudeat Episcopus judicio suo cùm tales Christo elegerit Sacerdotes Hieron ad Nepotian let the Bishop rejoyce in his owne act having chosen such worthy Priests for the service of Christ. Thus S. Ambrose gives intimation that the dispensing all the offices in the Clergy was solely in the Bishop Haec spectet Sacerdos quod cuique congruat lib. 1. offic cap. 44. id officij deputet Let the Bishop observe these rules and appoint every one his office as is best answerable to his condition and capacity And Theodoret reports of Leontius the Bishop of Antioch how being an Arian adversarios recti dogmatis suscipiens licèt turpem Tripart hist. lib. 5. cap. 32. habentes vitam ad Presbyteratûs tamen ordinem Diacontûs evexit Eos autem qui Vniversis virtutibus ornabantur Apostolica dogmata defendebant absque honore deseruit He advanc'd his owne faction but would not promote any man that was Catholike and pious So he did The power therefore of Clericall promotion was in his owne hands This thing is evident and notorious And there is scarce any example in Antiquity of either Presbyters or people choosing any Priest but only in the case of S. Austin whom the Peoples hast snatch'd and carried him to their Bishop Valerius intreating him to ordayne him Priest This indeed is true that the testimony of the people for the life of them that were to be ordayn'd was by S. Cyprian ordinarily required In ordinandis Clericis Fratres Charissimi solemus vos ante consulere mores ac merita singulorum lib. 1. Epist. 5. communi consilio ponderare It was his custome to advise with his people concerning the publike fame of Clerks to be ordayn'd It was usuall I say with him but not perpetuall for it was otherwise in the case of Celerinus and divers others as I shewed elsewhere 4. In election of Bishops though not of Priests the Clergy and the people had a greater actuall interest and did often intervene with their silent consenting suffrages or publike acclamations But first This was not necessary It was otherwise among the Apostles and in the case of Timothy of Titus of S. Iames of S. Marke and all the Successors whom they did constitute in the severall chayres 2 ly This was not by law or right but in fact only It was against the Canon of the Laodicean Councell and the 31 th Canon of the Apostles which under paine of deposition commands that a Bishop be not promoted to his Church by the intervening of any lay power Against this discourse S. Cyprian is strongly pretended Quando ipsa plebs maximè habeat potestatem Epist. 68. vel eligendi dignos Sacerdotes vel indignos recusandi Quod ipsum videmus de divinâ authoritate descendere c. Thus he is usually cited The people have power to choose or to refuse their Bishops and this comes to them from Divine authority No such matter The following words expound him better Quod ipsum videmus de divinâ authoritate descendere ut Sacerdos PLEBE PRaeSENTE sub omnium oculis deligatur dignus atque idoneus publico judicio ac testimonio comprobetur that the Bishop is chosen publikely in the presence of the people and he only be thought fit who is approved by publike judgement and testimony or as S. Paul's phrase is he must have a good report of all men that is indeed a divine institution and that to this purpose and for the publike attestation of the act of election and ordination the peoples presence was required appeares clearely by S. Cyprian's discourse in this Epistle For what is the divine authority that he mentions It is only the example of Moses whom God commanded to take the Sonne of Eleazer and cloath him with his Fathers robes coram omni Synagogâ before all the congregation The people chose not God chose Eleazar and Moses consecrated him and the people stood and look'd on that 's all that this argument can supply * Iust thus Bishops are and ever were ordayn'd non nisi sub populi assistentis conscientiâ in the sight of the people standing by but to what end Vt plebe praesente detegantur malorum crimina vel bonorum merita praedicentur All this while the election is not in the people nothing but the publike testimony and examination for so it followes sit ordinatio justa legitima quae omnium suffragio judicio fuerit examinata ** But S. Cyprian hath two more proof's whence we may
However things are now It was §. 49. And trusted with affayres of Secular interest otherwise in the Old Religion for no honour was thought too great for them whom God had honourd with so great degrees of approximation to himselfe in power and authority But then also they went further For they thought whom God had intrusted with their soules they might with an equall confidence trust with their personall actions and imployments of greatest trust For it was Great Consideration that they who were Antistites religionis the Doctors and great Dictators of Faith and conscience should be the composers of those affayres in whose determination a Divine wisdome and interests of conscience and the authority of religion were the best ingredients But it is worth observing how the Church and the Common-wealth did actions contrary to each other in pursuance of their severall interests The Common-wealth still enabled Bishops to take cognisance of causes and the confidence of their owne people would be sure to carry them thither where they hop'd for faire issue upon such good grounds as they might fairely expect from the Bishops abilityes authority and religion But on the other side the Church did as much decline them as shee could and made sanctions against it so farre as shee might without taking from themselves all opportunities both of doing good to their people and ingaging the secular arme to their owne assistance But this we shall see by consideration of particulars 1. It was not in Naturâ rei unlawfull for Bishops to receive an office of secular imployment S. Paul's tent-making was as much against the calling of an Apostle as sitting in a secular tribunall is against the office of a Bishop And it is hard if we will not allow that to the conveniences of a Republike which must be indulged to a private personall necessity But we have not S. Paul's example onely but his rule too according to Primitive exposition Dare any of you having a matter before another goe to law 1. Cor. 6. before the Vnjust and not before the Saints If then ye have judgements of things pertaining to this life set them to judge who are least esteemed in the Church who are they The Clergy I am sure now adayes But S. Ambrose also thought that to In hunc locum be his meaning seriously Let the Ministers of the Church be the Iudges For by least esteemed he could not meane the most ignorant of the Laity they would most certainly have done very strange justice especially in such causes which they Understand not No but set them to judge who by their office are Servants and Ministers of all and those are the Clergy who as S. Paul's expression is Preach not themselves but Iesus to be the Lord and themselves your servants for Iesus sake Meliùs dicit apud Dei Ministros agere causam Yea but S. Paul's expression seemes to exclude the Governours of the Church from intermedling Is there not one wise man among you that is able to Iudge betweene his Brethren Why Brethren if Bishops and Priests were to be the Iudges they are Fathers The objection is not worth the noting but onely for S. Ambrose his answer to it Ideò autem Fratrem Iudicem eligendum dicit quià adhuc Rector Ecclesiae illorum non erat ordinatus S. Paul us'd the word Brethren for as yet a Bishop was not ordained amongst them of that Church intimating that the Bishop was Vide etiam August de opere Monach ca. 29. to be the man though till then in subsidium any prudent Christian man might be imployed 2. The Church did alwaies forbid to Clergy-men A VOLUNTARY ASSUMPTION of ingagements in REBUS SAECULI So the sixth Canon of the Apostles Can. 7. Latin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Bishop and a Vide Zonarin Can. Apostol Priest and a Deacon must not assume or take on himselfe worldly cares If he does let him be depos'd Here the Prohibition is generall No worldly cares Not domestick But how if they come on him by Divine imposition or accident That 's nothing if he does not assume them that is by his voluntary act acquire his owne trouble So that if his secular imployment be an act of obedience indeed it is trouble to him but no sinne But if he seekes it for it selfe it is ambition In this sense also must the following Canon be understood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A Clerk must not be a Tutor or Guardian viz of secular trust that is must not seeke a diversion from his imployment by voluntary Tutorship 3. The Church also forbad all secular negotiation for base ends not precisely the imployment it selfe but the illnesse of the intention and this indeed shee expressely forbids in her Canons * Pervenit ad Sanctam Synodum quòd quidam qui in Clero sunt allecti PROPTER LUCRA TURPIA conductores alienarum Concil Chalced Act. 15. can 3. possessionum fiant saecularia negotia sub curâ suâ suscipiant Dei quidem Ministerium parvipendentes Saecularium verò discurrentes domos PROPTER AVARITIAM patrimoniorum sollicitudinem sumentes Clergy men farmers of lands and did take upon them secular imployment FOR COVETOUS DESIGNES and with neglect of the Church These are the things the Councell complain'd of and therefore according to this exigence the following Sanction is to be understood Decrevit itaque hoc Sanctum magnumque Concilium nullum deinceps non Episcopum non Clericum vel Monachum aut possessiones conducere aut negotijs saecularibus se immiscere No Bishop No Clergy man No Monke must farme grounds nor ingage himselfe in secular businesse What in none No none praeter pupillorum si fortè leges imponant inexcusabilem curam aut civitatis Episcopus Ecclesiasticarum rerum sollicitudinem habere praecipiat aut Orphanorum viduarum earum quae sine ullâ defensione sunt ac personarum quae maximè Ecclesiastico indigent adjutorio propter timorem Domini causa deposcat This Canon will doe right to the Question All secular affaires and bargaines either for covetousnesse or with considerable disturbance of Church offices are to be avoided For a Clergy man must not be covetous much lesse for covetise must he neglect his cure To this purpose is that of the second Councell of Arles Clericus turpis lucri Can. 14. gratiâ aliquod genus negotiationis non exerceat But nor here nor at Chalcedon is the prohibition absolute nor declaratory of an inconsistence and incapacity for for all this the Bishop or Clerk may doe any office that is in piâ curâ He may undertake the supravision of Widdowes and Orphans And though he be forbid by the Canon of the Apostles to be a guardian of pupills yet it is expounded here by this Canon of Chalcedon for a voluntary seeking it is forbidden by the Apostles but here it is permitted only with si fortè leges imponant if the Law or
Authority commands him then he may undertake it That is if either the Emperor commands him or if the Bishop permits him then it is lawfull But without such command or license it was against the Canon of the Apostles And therefore S. Cyprian did himselfe severely punish Geminius Faustinus one of the Priests of Carthage for undertaking the executorship of the Testament of Geminius Victor he Epist. 66. had no leave of his Bishop so to doe and for him of his own head to undertake that which would be an avocation of him from his office did in S. Cyprians Consistory deserve a censure 3. By this Canon of Chalcedon any Clerk may be the Oeconomus or steward of a Church and dispense her revenue if the Bishop command him 4. He may undertake the patronage or assistance of any distressed person that needs the Churches ayde * From hence it is evident that all secular imployment did not hoc ipso avocate a Clergy-man from his necessary office and duty for some secular imployments are permitted him all causes of piety of charity all occurrences concerning the revenues of the Church and nothing for covetousnesse but any thing in obedience any thing Vide Synod Roman sub Sylvestr c. 4. Concil Chalced c. 26. Zonar ibid. I meane of the fore-named instances Nay the affaires of Church revenues and dispensation of Ecclesiasticall Patrimony was imposed on the Bishop by the Canons Apostolicall and then considering how many possessions were deposited first at the Apostles feet and afterwards in the Bishops hands we may quickly perceive that a case may occurre in which something else may be done by the Bishop and his Clergy besides prayer and preaching 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Ignatius to S. Polycarpe of Smyrna Let not the Widdowes be neglected after God doe thou take care of them * Qui locupletes sunt volunt pro arbitrio Justin. Martyr Apolog. 2. quisque suo quod libitum est contribuit quod collectum est apud Praesidem deponitur atque is inde opitulatur Orphanis viduis iisque qui vel morbo vel aliâ de causâ egent tum iis qui vincti sunt peregrè advenientibus hospitibus ut uno verbo dicam omnium indigentium Curator est All the Collects and Offerings of faithfull people are deposited with the Bishop and thence he dispenses for the reliefe of the widdowes and Orphans thence he provides for travellers and in one word he takes care of all indigent and necessitous people So it was in Iustin Martyrs time and all this a man would think requir'd a considerable portion of his time besides his studies and prayer and preaching This was also done even in the Apostles times for first they had the provision of all the Goods and persons of the coenobium of the Church at Ierusalem This they themselves administred till a complaint arose which might have prov'd a Scandall then they chose seven men men full of the holy Ghost men that were Priests for they were of the 70 Disciples saith Epiphanius and such men as Preached and Baptized so S. Stephen and S. Philip therefore to be sure they were Clergy-men and yet they left their preaching for a time at least abated of the height of the imployment for therefore the Apostles appointed them that themselves might not leave the word of God and serve Tables plainly implying that such men who were to serve these Tables must leave the Ministery of the word in some sense or degree and yet they chose Presbyters and no harme neither and for a while themselves had the imployment I say there was no harme done by this temporary office to their Priestly function and imployment For to me it is considerable If the calling of a Presbyter does not take up the whole man then what inconvenience though his imployment be mixt with secular allay But if it does take up the whole man then it is not safe for any Presbyter ever to become a Bishop which is a dignity of a farre greater burden and requires more then a Man 's all if all was requir'd to the function of a Presbyter But I proceed 4. The Church prohibiting secular imployment to Bishops and Clerks doe prohibite it onely in gradu impedimenti officii Clericalis and therefore when the offices are supplyed by any of the Order it is never prohibited but that the personall abilities of any man may be imployed for the fairest advantages either of Church or Common-wealth And therefore it is observeable that the Canons provide that the Church be not destitute not that such a particular Clerke should there officiate Thus the Councell of Arles decreed ut Presbyteri SICUT HACTENUS FACTUM EST INDISCRETE per diver Apud Burchard lib. 2. decret cap. 99. sa non mittantur loca .... ne fortè propter eorum absentiam animarum pericula Ecclesiarum in quibus constituti sunt negligantur officia So that here we see 1. That it had been usuall to send Priests on Embassyes sicut hactenus factum est 2. The Canon forbids the indiscreet or promiscuous doing of it not that men of great ability choyce be not imployed but that there be discretion or discerning in the choyce of the men viz. that such men be chosen whose particular worth did by advancing the legation make compensation for absence from their Churches and then I am sure there was no indiscretion in the Embassy quoad hoc at least for the ordinary offices of the Church might be dispensed by men of even abilities but the extraordinary affaires of both states require men of an heightned apprehension 3. The Canon only took care that the cùre of the soules of a Parish be not relinquished for so is the title of the Canon Ne Presbyteri causâ legationis per diversa mittantur loca curâ animarum relictâ But then if the cure be supplied by delegation the feares of the Canon are prevented * In pursuance of this consideration the Church forbad Clergy-men to receive honour or secular preferment and so it is expressed where the prohibition is made It is in the Councell of Chalcedon Qui semel in clero deputati sunt aut Monachorum Part. 2. Act. 15. Can. 7. vitam expetiverunt statuimus neque ad militiam neque ad dignitatem aliquam venire mundanam That 's the inhibition But the Canon subjoynes a temper aut hoc tentantes non agentes poenitentiam quo minùs redeant ad hoc quod propter Deum primitùs elegerunt anathematizari they must not turne Souldiers or enter upon any worldy dignity to make them leave their function which for the honour of God they have first chosen for then it seemes he that tooke on him military honours or secular prefectures or consular dignity could not officiate in holy Orders but must renounce them to assume the other It was in obstruction of this abuse that the Canon directed its prohibition