to Baptize such as should submit to the Gospel And so to judge whether each man did so or not which they that were trusted with the Gospel were by consequence trusted to judge The effect of this trust is seen in the many Orders and Canons of the Primitive Church by which those that desired to be admitted into the Church by Baptisme are limited to the triall of severall years to examine their profession whether sincere or not And such as gained their living by such Trades as Christianity allowed not rejected untill they renounced them Not that my intent is to say that these Canons were limited by the Apostles But because it is an argument that always to judge who shall be admitted to Baptisme and who not is another manner of power then to baptize being the power of them that were able to settle such Canons Though it is plain by the Scriptures that those Rules had their beginning from the Apostles themselves For when S. Peter saith 1 Pet. III. 21. that the Baptisme which saveth us is not the laying down the filth of the flesh but the examination of a good conscience to God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he sheweth that the Interrogatories which the ancient Church used to propound to them that were to be baptized were then in use and established by the Apostles as the condition of a contract between the Church and them obliging themselves to live according to the Gospel as Disciples And the Apostle Heb. VI. 2. speaking of the foundation of repentance from dead works the doctrine of Baptisms and imposition of Hands manifestly shews the succeeding custome of the Church that they which sued for Baptisme should be catechized in the Doctrine of the Gospel and contract with the Church to forsake such courses of the world as stood not with it to be brought in by the Apostles This is it which is here called the doctrine of Baptisms in the plurall number not for that frantick reason which the distemper of this time hath brought forth because there are two Baptismes one of John by water another of Christ by the Spirit but because it was severally taught severall persons before they were admitted to their several Baptisms And therefore called also the Doctrine of Imposition of Hands because we understand by Clemens Alexandrinus Paedag. III. 11. and by the Apostolicall Constitutions VII 40. that when they came to the Church to be catechized and were catechized they were then dismissed by him that catechized them with Imposition of Hands that is with prayer for them that they might in due time become good Christians All visible marks of the power of the Church in judging whether a man were fit for Baptisme or not To which I will adde onely that of Eusebius De vitâ Constant IV. where speaking of the Baptisme of Constantine he saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that confessing his sinnes hee was admitted to prayer with Imposition of hands If it be said that there were added to the Church three thousand in a day Acts II. 41. which could not be thus catechized and tried my answer is that two cases were always excepted from the Rule The first was in danger of death The second when by the eagernesse of those that desired Baptism the hand of God appeared extraordinary in the work of their conversion to Christianity Besides it is not said that they were baptized that day but that they were added to the Church that day Which is true though they onely professed themselves Disciples for the present passing neverthelesse their examination and instruction as the case required If therefore there be a power setled in the Church by God to judge who is fit to be admitted into it then is the same power inabled to refuse him that shall appear unfit then by the same reason to exclude him that proves himself unfit after he is admitted This is the next argument which I will ground upon the Discipline of Penance as it was anciently practised in the Church Which is opened by the observation advanced in the 127 p. of this little Discourse that those who contrary to this contract with the Church fell into sins destructive to Christianity were fain to sue to be admitted to Penance Which supposeth that till they had given satisfaction of their sincerity in Christianity they remained strangers to the Communion of the Church For it appeareth by the most ancient of Church Writers that for divers ages the greatest Sinners as Apostates Murtherers Adulterers were wholly excluded from Penance For though Tertullian was a Montanist when he cried out upon Zephyrinus Bishop of Rome for admitting Adulterers to Penance in his Book De Pudicitiâ yet it is manifest by his case that it had formerly been refused in the Church because the granting of it makes him a Montanist And S. Cyprian Epist ad Antonianum testifieth that divers African Bishops afore him had refused it maintaining communion neverthelesse with those that granted it Irenaeus also I. 9. saith of a certain woman that had been seduced and defiled by Marcus the Heretick that after she was brought to the sight of her sin by some Christians she spent all her days in bewalling it Therefore without recovering the communion of the Church again And he that shall but look upon the Canons of the Eliberitane Councell shall easily see many kindes of sins censured some of them not to be admitted to communion till the point others not at the point of death In this case and in this estate these onely who were excluded from being admitted to Penance were properly excommunicate neither could those that were admitted to Penance be absolutely counted so because in danger of death they were to receive the Communion though in case they recovered they stood bound to compleat their Penance And from hence afterwards also those that had once been admitted to Penance if they fell into the like sins again were not to be admitted to Penance the second time Concil Tolet. X. Can. XI Eliber Can. III. VII Ambros de Poenit. II. 10 11. Innoc. I. Ep. I. August Epist L. LIV. It is an easie thing to say that this Rigor was an infirmity in the Church of those times not understanding aright free Justification by Faith But as it is manifest that this rigor of discipline abated more and more age by age till that now it is come to nothing So if we goe upwards and compare the writings of the Apostles with the Originall practice of the Church it will appear that the rigor of it was brought in by them because it abated by degrees from age to age till at length it is almost quite lost that the Reformation of the Church consists in retaining it that we shall doe so much prejudice to Christianity as we shall by undue interpretation make Justification by Faith inconsistent with it And in fine it will appear that all Penance presupposeth Excommunication being onely some abatement of it There
his Apostles extending it in one visible Society beyond the bounds of any Dominion with equall interesse in the parts of it through severall Dominions what title but force can any State have to doe it if we presuppose the Society of the Church as such unable to doe it Therefore by the Society of the Church and by Christians as Members thereof it must be done whatsoever is done either in Reforming the Church or in Separating from the Church And therefore the proceeding of the Congregations when they separate from the Church of England by a Right founded upon the Constitution of the Church is more agreeable to Christianity then the proceeding of the Presbyteries when they pretend to Reform the Church of England by the Power of the Parliament supposing it to be as great as any Secular Power can be in Church matters But I intend not hereby to grant that it is a rightfull Title upon which those of the Congregations separate from the Church of England For as men cannot make themselves Christians but the doing of it must presuppose a Church as at the first it presupposed the Power of constituting a Church estated by our Lord upon his Apostles Because our Lord hath required of those that will be saved not onely to beleeve his Gospel but also to professe Christianity and this Profession to be consigned in the hands of those whom he trusteth with the conduct of his Church and by them accepted because if not sincere and complete it is not to be admitted so the continuance in the Communion of the Church presupposing an acknowledgement of the Christianity professed therein to contain nothing destructive to salvation professeth an obligation of acknowledging the Governours thereof in order to the same And this obligation unavoidable by the premises unlesse Christian people by those Governours appear to be defeated of the benefit of such Laws given the Church by our Lord and his Apostles as appear to be of greater consequence to the Service of God for which the Society of the Church subsists then the personall succession of Governours and the Unity of the Church wherein it consisteth can be imagined to be Which in our present case is so far from being true that the premises being true all the particulars for which the Congregations separate and which the Presbyteries would Reform the Chief Power of the Clergy over the People the Superiority of Bishops above Presbyters the dependence of Congregations upon the City Church the Power of giving Laws to the Church the Right of First-fruits Tithes and all Consecrate things and above all the Unity of the Church and the Personall Succession of Governours in which it consisteth are all demonstrated to have been ordained by the Apostles The same is to be said of the Ceremonies as to the whole kinde though not to the particulars questioned For first it is proved that the Rule of Charity requires all Christians to forbear the use of that freedome which Christianity alloweth in all things determined by the Law of the Church not contrary to Gods Secondly though it be granted that the particulars questioned were not instituted by the Apostles for indeed the customes of severall Nations that have received Christianity are so different that for example that which the Apostle commandeth that men pray covered 1 Cor. XI 3. cannot be used among those Nations that uncover the head in sign of reverence which the Ancients did not And this is the true reason why the same Ceremonies of Divine Service are not in use now as under the Apostles yet whosoever shall separate from the Church upon this ground that significative Ceremonies are not to be used in the Service of God shall doe it to establish a Law contrary to the Apostles who ordained such to be used as I shewed afore Besides the Church of England and Governours thereof doe not maintain any infallible Power of conducting the Church professing themselves the Reformation which their Predecessors made and therefore are so far from refusing any Law of God to be a Law of this Church that if any Humane Constitution had been recommended to them evidently necessary or usefull to make the Laws of our Lord and his Apostles effectuall to this particular Church by such an authority as the Secular Power hath over them it is visible to all English that for the Peace of the Church and themselves they would not have refused it And therefore the true reason of this Separation or Reformation is because they will not part with that Power which is in them derived from the Apostles and at once with the Unity of the Church necessarily in this Case depending on the same I suppose what will be answered that all this is done to Reform the Church to bring in plentifull and powerfull Preaching and Praying as the Spirit shall indite for not knowing any thing else to be pretended and having shewed the rest of the change to be contrary to the Ordinances of the Apostles though I see no man is so hard hearted as not to think his own design to be the Reformation of the Church without ever proving it to be so yet I must needs think it part of my charge to say somewhat also to this I doe acknowledge then a charge upon the Church to provide that Christians made members of the Church by Baptisme be taught more and more in the true intent of their Christianity and exhorted to the performance of it by virtue of the Precept of our Lord Mat. XXVIII 19 20. Goe Preach and make Disciples all Nations baptizing them in the Name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost Teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you Which being given the Apostles is by the same reason given to all whom they should assume or Ordain or cause to be Ordained to exercise their Power or any part of it in dependence upon the same and according as the same should determine in time or place But that any thing is determined as of Divine Right or by the Scriptures when where how often how seldome in what manner and how frequent Preaching is by the Church to be furnished to the Church he will make himselfe ridiculous that undertakes to affirm That the Church is to endevour that this Office be as frequent as may be to the edification of the Church appears indeed by the Scriptures Not those which speak of publishing the Gospell under the terms of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or any equivalent as Rom. X. 14-1 Tim. IV. 2 5. 1 Cor. IX 16. But those that expresse the diligence of the Apostles and Apostolicall persons of their time in teaching the Assemblies of Christians Acts II. 42 46. V. 42. VI. 2 4. XI 26. and the frequenting of this Office in those times 1 Cor. XIV 1 Tim. V. 17. Rom. XII 6. 7. But that it should be so easie for them that now are admitted to the Service of the Church to
Church And this is the reason of that which I say here p. that the estate of the Church is then most happy and most pure when this legall presumption is most reasonable It is not onely true which I say p. 30. that the Power of binding and loosing which the Priests and Doctors exercised under the Law that is of declaring this or that to be bound or loose that is unlawfull or lawfull by the Precepts of the Law cannot be that which our Lord meaneth Mat. XVIII 18. when he saith Whatsoever ye binde on earth but also that the reason holdeth not under the Gospel to ground a generall Commission correspondent to the Power in force under the Law upon which it may be thought to be said Whatsoever ye binde For the reason of this Power under the Synagogue was the matter of positive Precepts not commanded because it was good but good because it was commanded Which where it was not determined by the Law was to be supplied by the Power of the Consistory established Deut. XVII 8 12. the determination whereof being declared by authority derived from thence made any thing lawfull or unlawfull before God by virtue of the generall Precept by which the authority subsisted For which reason the Consistory is to offer sacrifice for the transgression of private persons as you see here p. 158. so often as they are led into transgression by the Consistory deciding amisse And this reason holds under the Gospel in regard of matters of Positive right concerning the Society of the Church not determined by any divine Precept For if the Church have determined the matter of them further then it is determined by Divine right then is that bound or unlawfull which is so determined unlesse the authority by which it is determined declare that the determination is not to take place This is the effect of that Legislative Power which I challenge for the Church Chap. IV. from p. 170. and concerns onely those positive Precepts which tend to maintain the Society of the Church in Unity But in those things which concern the substance of Christianity because they are commanded as good the obligation being more ancient then the Constitution of the Church as grounded upon the nature of the subject and the eternall will of God this power hath no place And therefore cannot be understood to be signified by the terms of binding and loosing as borrowed from the language of the Talmud Doctors But whereas in the Synagogue it was things or cases under the Gospel it is persons that are said to be bound or loose For of every case questionable in point of Christianity there is no infallible authority given to assure all Christians that following it they shall always please God in all actions But as it is possible to judge of the state of all persons toward God upon supposition of their profession so there is authority founded in the Church of binding and loosing that is of remitting and retaining sins by admitting to or excluding from the Church In fine this interpretation is inconsequent to the words that went afore Let him be unto thee as a Heathen and a Publicane if we take them in Erastus his sense that thereby our Lord gives leave to sue such before the Secular Powers of the Romanes as would not stand to the sentence of their own Consistories For this plainly concerns matter of Interesse not matter of Office seeing it would be very impertinent so to understand our Lord as to command them to be sued in the Gentiles Courts that would not stand to the sentence of the Jews Consistories in matters of Conscience But if we understand binding and loosing according to this opinion to be declaring this or that to be lawfull or unlawfull before God then doth it not concern matter of Interesse but matter of Conscience or Office Besides this interpretation is impertinent to that which follows Again I say unto you if two of you agree upon earth about any thing to ask it it shall be done for them by my Father which is in heaven For where two or three are assembled in my Name there am I in the midst of them Whereas the interpretation which here is advanced of binding and loosing the persons of them that are admitted to or excluded from the Communion of the Church agreeth with that which went afore Let him be to thee as a Heathen and a Publican and no lesse with that which followeth tending to declare the means of loosing such as should be so bound to wit the Prayers of the Church as hath been declared As for the conceit of Erastus that this Precept of our Lord should concern onely the Jews that lived under the Romanes and not be intended for an Order to be observed in all ages of the Church it is so unreasonable that I finde no cause to spend words in destroying it Onely be it remembred that it is contrary to the Order instituted by our Lord and his Apostles that the differences of Christians should be caried out of the Church to be pleaded and heard in the Courts of the Gentiles according to that which was practised afore in the Synagogue as hath been said So that this sense of Erastus as you see by that which follows it is contrary to the practise of the Church under the Apostles As for the reason touched p. 43. that the practise of the Church before Constantine is the best evidence to shew the proper Power and Right of it it is here opportune to resume the distinction made afore and upon it to frame a generall argument against both Which shall be this Either there was a Society of the Church by right as we know there was in point of fact before Constantine or there is no such thing to be grounded upon the Scriptures in point of right but was onely an usurpation and imposture of the Primitive Clergy of the Church This later assertion is that which hath been refuted by the premises proving first a privilege or a precept of communicating in the service of God given to the community of Christians secondly a condition under which they were admitted to communicate and to be Christians and continued in the same estate But if there were a Society of the Church before Constantine constituted by Divine right then could not the same have been dissolved but by the same Power that constituted it from the beginning neither can it be known to be dissolved but by the same evidence by which it appears to have been constituted that is unlesse it can be made to appear by the Scriptures that God ordained it to subsist onely till the Romane Empire and other States and Kingdomes received Christianity then to be dissolved into the Power of those States being become Christian which I am confident no man will undertake to shew out of the Scriptures If it be said that it subsisted till Constantine not by Divine right but according to Divine right
of Deut. XVII 18. the Jews need not tell us as they doe Maimoni by name Tit. de Syncdrio that they were not bound to observe that in their dispersions for how could there be Consistories for the Jews in all Cities all over the world but this they tell us withall in particular Arba Thurim in the same title Sub init that thereby they hold themselves bound to erect Consistories in the chief Cities of their dispersions In this condition what is the difference between the state of the Synagogue and the Church setting aside that essentiall difference between the Law and the Gospel by which Judaism was confined to one Nation but Christianity had a promise to be received by the Gentiles By reason whereof the Law ceased as it was proper to the Jews and Christians became obliged only to the perpetual Law of God besides a very few positive precepts of our Lord as of Baptism the Eucharist and the Power of the Keys by virtue whereof and by the generall Commission of the Apostles all Ordinances whereby they should regulate the Society of the Church were to be received as the Commandements of God Here is the reason for which it is probable that the Apostles in designing the Government of the Church should follow no other pattern then that which they saw in use by the Law in the Synagogue For the design in both being to maintain the Law of God and the unity of his people in his service saving the difference between them what form should they follow but that which the Law had taught their Fore-fathers But when the effect hereof appears in the first lines of this modell traced by the Apostles and filled up by their Successors it is manifest that these Laws were the pattern but the Order of the Apostles the Act which put it in being and force The Churches of Jerusalem Antiochia Rome and Alexandria no man can deny were planted by the Apostles in person and by their Deputies That they became afterwards Heads of the Churches that lay about them is no more then that which the Consistories planted at Jerusalem or Tiberias and in the chief Cities of the Jews dispersions were to the Synagogues underneath them by virtue of the Law This is therefore the Originall of the dependence of Churches upon the greatest Mother Churches And therefore it is no marvell that Jerusalem once the Mother City of Christianity became afterwards the seat of a Patriarch indeed in remembrance of that privilege but inferiour in dignity and nothing comparable in bounds to the rest because it was none of the greatest and most Capitall Cities The Rule of the Apostles design being this that the greatest Cities should be the Seats of the greatest Churches And that Constantinople when it came afterwards to be a Seat of the Empire was put in the next place to the Chief as it was no act of the Apostles so it is an argument of the Rule by which the rest had been ordered for the same reason As for the other Law of Deu. XVI 18. I know not what could be more agreeable to it then that Rule of the ancient Church which is to be seen not only in those few ancient Canons alledged in the discourse of the Primitive Government of Churches p. 67. but in innumerable passages of Church Writers that Cathedrall Churches and Cities be convertible that is both of the same extent Thus the Epistle of Ignatius to the Romanes is inscribed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The presidence here expressed argueth the eminence of that Church above the rest of the Churches about it But Clemens directeth his Epistle from the Church of Rome to that of Corinth thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whereby we understand that the Country lying under the City belonged to the Church founded in the City and was therefore called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying that which we now call the Diocese in opposition to the Mother Church That this is the reason of the name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 appears because Polycarp addresses his Epistle to the Philippians in this style 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For if the Church of the Philippians dwelt near Philippi then the Country adjoining belonged to the Church of that City This reason therefore was well understood by him that writ the Epistle to the Antiochians in Ignatius his name granting it to be of an age much inferiour to his For he inscribeth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Signifying thereby that all the Christians of Syria belonged to the Church of Antiochia for which reason Ignatius himself in his Epistle to the Romanes calls himself Bishop of Syria not of Antiochia because being Bishop of the Head City Church the Christians of Syria either belonged to his Church or to the Churches that were under it A thing so necessary to be beleeved that there are many marks in his Epistles to shew that the Churches also of Cilicia belonged to his charge as we saw they did by their foundation in the Apostles time and as the reason of the civile Government required those parts where Paul and Barnabas first preached having continued longest in the Dominion of the Kings of Syria and therefore continuing under the Government that resided at Antiochia And thus are the words of Clemens in his Epistle to the Corinthians fulfilled where he saith that the Apostles having preached the Gospel in Cities and Countries constituted Bishops and Ministers of those that should beleeve to wit according to the Cities and Countries adjoining to them Those marks come from the ancientest Records the Church hath after the writings of the Apostles Of the rest there would be no end if a man would allege them If any man object that it cannot be made to appear how this Rule was ever observed in the Church the extent of Cathedrall Churches being in some Countries so strait in other so large The answer is that it ceaseth not to be a Rule though the execution of it was very different in severall Countries either because not understood so well as it should have been or because the condition of some Countries was not appliable to it so as that of others For the East we have these words of Walafridus Strabo libs de Rebus Ecclesiasticis Fertur in Orientis partibus per singulas Vrbes Praefecturas singulas esse Episcoporum gubernationes Whereby we understand that Cathedrall Churches stood very much thicker in the Eastern parts then in the West For thereupon it became observable to Walafridus In Africk if we look but into the writings of S. Augustine we shall finde hundreds of Bishops resorting to one Councell In Ireland alone S. Patrick is said by Ninius at the first plantation of Christianity to have founded three hundreth threescore and five Bishopricks On the other side in England we see still how many Counties remain in one Diocese of Lincoln and yet if we look into Almain and those mighty foundations of Charles the Great we
may finde perhaps larger then it The Rule notwithstanding all this is the same that Cathedrall Churches be founded in Cities though Cities are diversly reckoned in severall Countries nay though perhaps some Countries where the Gospel comes have scarce any thing worth the name of Cities Where the Rule must be executed according to the discretion of men that have it in hand and the condition of times This we may generally observe that Churches were erected in greater number when they were erected without indowment established by temporall Law So that in one of the Africane Canons it is questionable whether a Bishop have many Presbyters under him Fewer still where they were founded by Princes professing Christianity upon temporall endowments And upon this consideration it will be no prejudice to this Rule that in Aegypt till the time of Demetrius there was no Cathedrall Church but that of Alexandria If it be fit to beleeve the late Antiquities of that Church published out of Eutychius because they seem to agree with that which S. Hierome reporteth of that Church As to this day if we beleeve the Jesuites whose relation you may see in Godignus de Rebus Abassinorum I. 32. there is but one for all Prester Johns Dominion or the County of the Abassines For though men would not or could not execute the Rule so as it took place in more civile Countries yet that such a Rule there was is easie to beleeve when we see Christianity suffer as it does in those Countries professing Christ by the neglect of it Before I leave this point I will touch one argument to the whole question drawn from common sense presupposing Historicall truth For they that place the chief power in Congregations or require at all severall Presbyteries for the government of severall Congregations are bound at least to shew us that Congregations were distinguished in the times of the Apostles if they will entitle their design to them Which I utterly deny that they were I doe beleeve the Presbyterians have convinced those of the Congregations that in S. Pauls time the Churches to whom he writes contained such numbers as could by no means assemble at once But severall Churches they could not make being not distinguished into severall Congregations but meeting together from time to time according to opportunity and order given About S. Cyprians time and not afore I finde mention of Congregations setled in the Country For in his XXVIII Epistle you have mention of one Gaius Presbyter Diddensis which was the name of some place near Carthage the Church whereof was under the cure of this Gaius and in the life of Pope Dionysius about this time it is said that he divided the Dioceses into Churches and in Epiphanius against the Manichees speaking of the beginning of them under Probus about this time there is mention of one Trypho Presbyter of Diodoris a Village as it seems by his relation there under Archelaus then Bishop of Caschara in Mesopotamia Likewise in an Epistle of Dionysius of Alexandria reported by Eusebius Eccles Hist VII 24. there is mention of the Presbyters and Teachers of the brethren in the Villages And those Churches of the Country called Mareotes hard by Alexandria which Socrates Eccles Hist I. 27. saith were Parishes of the Church of Alexandria in the time of Constantine must needs be thought to have been established long before that time whereof he writes there After this in the Canons of Ancyra and Neocaesarea and those writings that follow there is oftentimes difference made between City and country Presbyters In Cities this must needs have been begun long afore as we find mention of it at Rome in the life of Pope Cains where it is said that he divided the Titles and Coemiteries among the Presbyters and the distribution of the Wards of Alexandria and the Churches of them mentioned by Epiphanius Haer. LXVIII LXIX seems to have been made long before the time whereof he speaks But when Justin Martyr says expresly Apol. II. that in his time those out of the Country and those in the City assembled in one farre was it from distinguishing setled Congregations under the Apostles Which if it be true the position which I have hitherto proved must needs be admitted that the Christians remaining in severall Cities and the Territories of them were by the Apostles ordered to be divided into severall distinct Bodies and Societies which the Scripture calls Churches and are now known by the name of Cathedrall Churches and the Dioceses of them constituting one whole Church This being proved I shall not much thank any man to quit me the Position upon which the Congregations are grounded to wit the chiefe Power of the people in the Church Though it seems they are not yet agreed themselves what the Power of the people should be Morellus in the French Churches disputed downright that the State of Government in the Church ought to be democratick the people to be Soveraign Wherein by Bezaes Epistles it appears that he was supported by Ramus For the man whom Beza calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and describes by other circumlocutions who put the French Churches to the trouble of divers Synods to suppresse this Position as there it appears can be no other then Ramus Perhaps Ramus his credit in our Universities was the first means to bring this conceit in Religion among us For about the time that he was most cried up in them Brown and Barow published it Unlesse it be more probable to fetch it from the troubles of Francford For those that would take upon them to exercise the Power of the Keys in that estate because they were a Congregation that assembled together for the Service of God which power could not stand unlesse recourse might be had to Excommunication did by expresse consequence challenge the publick power of the Church to all Congregations which I have shewed to be otherwise And the contest there related between one of the people and one of the Pastors shews that they grounded themselves upon the Right of the people So true it is that I said afore that the Presbyterians have still held the stirrup to those of the Congregations to put themselves out of the saddle As now the Design of the Congregations is refined they will not have it said that they make the People chief in the Church For they give them power which they will have subject to that Authority which they place in the Pastors Elders which serves not the turn We have an instance against it in the State of Rome after they had driven away the Tarquins They placed Authority in the Senate and Power in the People and I suppose the successe of time shewed that which Bodine disputes against Polybius De Repub. II. 2. to be most true that the State was thereby made a Democraty So the Congregations challenging to themselves Right to make themselves Churches and by consequence whom they please Pastors must needs by
which no publick thing could passe I do here willingly mention Ignatius because of the injustice of that exception that is made against him Surely had we none but the old Copy which for my part is freely confessed to be interpolated and mixed with passages of a later hand I would confidently appeal to the common sense of any man not fascinated with prejudice how that can be imagined to be always foisted in which is the perpetuall subject of all his Epistles Dwelling onely upon the avoiding of Heresy and Schism and the avoiding of Schism every where inculcated to consist in this that without the Bishop nothing be done and all with advice of the Presbyters But it seems to me a speciall act of Providence that the true Copy of these Epistles free from all such mixture is published during this dispute among us Which the L. Primate of Ireland having first smelt out by the Latine Translation which he published Isaak Vossius according as he presumed hath now found and published out of the Library at Florence farre enough from suspition of partiality in this cause Nor is the learned Blondell to be regarded presuming to stigmatize so clear a Record for forged It seemes that his Book was written before he saw this Copy and had he not condemned it in his Preface he must have suppressed and condemned his own work But when it appears that this Record is admitted as true and native of all that are able to judge of letters it must appear by consequence that he hath given sentence against his own Book In the mean time it is to be lamented that by the force of prejudice so learned a man had rather that the advantage of so many pregnant authorities of a companion of the Apostles against the Socinians should be lost to the Church then part with his own whether opinion or interesse condemned by the same evidence Certainly those weak exceptions from the style of Ignatius have more in them of will then of reason to all that have relished that simplicity of language which called by S. Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is to be seen in the writings of Apostolicall persons Irenaeus Justine Clemens Romanus and after them Epiphanius and the Apostolicall Constitutions And he was very forward to finde exceptions that could imagine that Ignatius calleth the Order of Bishops 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because he so qualifieth the Ordination of Damas Bishop of the Magnesians being a young man when he was ordained Bishop As for the mention of the Valentinians Heresie in them he hath been fully told again and again that the seeds of it are extant before Ignatius in the writings of the Apostles But as to my present purpose he that considers of what consequence the Unity of the Church is to the advancement of Christianity and of what consequence not only Ignatius but S. Cyprian S. Hierome and all men of judgement professe the Power of Bishops to be to the preservation of Unity in the Church will not begge the question with Blondell by condemning Ignatius his Epistles because the one half of the subject of them is this one Rule nothing to be done without the Bishop all things to be done by advice of the Presbyters That to the Philadelphians is remarkable above the rest where he affirmeth that having no intelligence from any man of the divisions that were among them the Holy Ghost revealing it to him said within him for the means of composing them Without the Bishop let nothing be done If it be said that this Rule is ineffectuall hindring rather then expediting the course of businesse The answer is that it is enough that thus much is determined by the Apostles the rest remaining to be further limited by humane right as the state of the Church shall require According to this Rule it is justly said that Baptism is not given but by a Bishop as it is given only by those whom the Order of any Church which was never put in force without the Bishop inableth to give it A thing manifestly seen by Confirmation What reason can we imagine that Philip the Deacon being inabled to doe miracles for the conversion of the Samaritanes was not inabled to give the Holy Ghost but the Apostles must come down to do it Was it not to shew that all graces of that kinde were subject to the graces of the Apostles in the Visible Church whereof they were then Chief Governours So that as then those that received the Holy Ghost were thereby demonstrated to be members of the Visible Church in which God evidenced his presence by that grace So was it always found requisite that Christians be acknowledged members of the Visible Church by the Prayers and Blessing of their Successors Which Order as it serves to demonstrate this Succession to all that are void of prejudice so had it been improved to this Apostolicall intent what time as all Christians began to be baptized in infancy renuing the contract of Christianity that is the promise of Baptism and the Chief Pastors acknowledgement of them for members of the Church upon that contract by blessing them with Imposition of Hands without doubt it had been and were the most effectuall mean to retain and retrive the ancient Discipline of Church When men might see themselves by their own solemne profession obliged to forfeit the communion of the Church by forfeiting the terms on which they were admitted to it If it can thus be said that Baptism is not given without the Bishop much more will the same be said of other acts of the Power of the Keys whereof that is the first Presbyters have an interesse in it limitable by Canonicall Right but as to the Visible Church that any man be excommunicate without a Bishop is against this Rule of the Apostles About Ordinations divers matters of fact are in vain alleged by Blondell and others from the ancient Records of the Church tending to degrade Bishops into the rank of Presbyters If the Gothes from the time of Valeriane to the Councell of Nice for some LXX years as he conjectureth out of Philostorgius II. 5. if the Scots before Palladius as Fordone III. 8. and John Maire II. 2. relate retained Christianity under Presbyters alone without Bishops they had not in that estate the power of governing their own Churches in themselves but depended on their neighbours that ordained them those Presbyters and the Government of the Church among them then must be as now among the Abassines where their one Bishop does nothing but Ordain them Presbyters as Godignus ubi supra relates And as the Catholick Christians of Antiochia lived for some XXXIV years after the banishment of Eustathius Theodoret Eccles Hist I. 21. But if the Gothes had Bishops before Vlfitas at the Councell of Nice as he shews out of the Ecclesiasticall Histories is any man so mad as to grant him who never endeavours to prove it that they were made by their own Presbyters
Paul and Barnabas being Ordained by the immediate act of the Holy Ghost to Preach to the Gentiles the solemnity thereof is performed by those in whom we cannot imagine the Power of sending them to rest In which opinion I am much confirmed by the practice of the Synagogue For though it is manifest that the custome of promoting Judges by Imposition of Hands came from the example of Moses and the Ordaining of the LXX Elders and Joshua yet we must beleeve their Records compiled by Maimoni â—â— de Synedrio cap. IV. when they tell us that in processe of time it was done without that solemnity by an Instrument or so and yet still called neverthelesse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is Imposition of Hands And now let them that demand what is that speciall Act which Bishops are able to do and Presbyters not take their choice If they be content that the Bishops acting with this Interesse that without him nothing be done be counted a speciall Act they have the speciall Act which they demand in all things that are done in the Church If they be not though it is easie enough to dispute it everlastingly yet I will not contend with them about it seeing it is enough that nothing is done without him to make him a fair step above his Presbyters And yet I conceive there is an Act to be named peculiar to Bishops which is to sit in a Councell Which consisting of the representatives of all Churches and not capable of all Presbyters and the Bishops right being that without him nothing be done in his Church it follows that by the right by which he is a Bishop he is a member of his Synod which no Priest can be but by Privilege seeing the whole Order cannot And this according to the Scriptures For by the premises the Apostles had place in the Councell at Jerusalem as Ordinary Governours of the Churches concerned in it which Churches had there no other representatives but Paul and Barnabas as Heads of the Churches which they had founded so lately Acts XIII XIV as it appeares when by them the Decree is delivered to execution in the Churches Acts XVI 4. As for the Presbyters mentioned in it the same evidence which assures us that they were Presbyters assures us also that they were Presbyters of the Church at Jerusalem and none else This I conceive the fittest to be thought the speciall Act of a Bishop For the unity of the whole Church arises from the Power deposited in each Church By virtue whereof he that communicates with any one Church in any rank of it communicates with all Churches in the same Which was in the Primitive Church the effect of the literae formatae or letters of mark by which this Unity of the Ancient Church was maintained in as much as he that travelled with such a testimony of his rank in any one Church by virtue of the same was received in all Churches where he came And therefore Synesius in the sentence of excommunication against Andronicus which by his fifty seventh Epistle he publisheth to the Churches addeth that if any Church contemning the sentence of his Church as a small and a poor one should receive Andronieus to communion without satisfaction given to him and his Church thereby it shall become guilty of Schism This holds as such Acts are not questioned by any greater part of the Church as not concerning the State of other Churches Which if they be then as no Church can be concluded but by the Act to which themselves concur whereby all Excommunications Ordinations as wel as making of Canons are the subject of Synods so the chief Power must needs be most seen in that Act which concludes all Churches concerned which is the Act of a Synod As concerning the objection that there is no precept in the Scripture that Bishops govern all Churches and that many things Ordained by the Apostles are abolished in the Church It is a question whether it come from lesse skill or proceed to worse consequence For unlesse we will betray the advantages of the Church to very many and perhaps to all Heresies and Schisms that ever were we must confesse that as there are precepts in the Scripture that oblige not so there are many things not set down in the Scripture in the form of precepts that oblige What can be delivered in a more expresse form of precept then that of Saint Paul That women pray with their heads covered men with theirs uncovered and yet where is it in force The same is to be said of the Decree of Jerusalem against eating things strangled and blood On the other side we finde by the Scriptures that the Apostles kept the Lords Day but do not find there that they commanded it to be kept As for the fourth Commandement I suppose it is one thing to rest on the day that God ceased his work and another on the day that he began it And if there be precepts in the Scripture that now oblige not why may not Secinus dispute that the precept of Baptism was temporary for them that had been enemies to the Faith afore And though I say not that he shall have the better hand for the truth cannot be contrary to the truth yet it shall not be possible for every Christian to discern whether he hath it or no unlesse there be some more sensible ballast then nice consequences from the Text of the Scripture If it be thus of Baptism much more of the Eucharist which as you saw is not used any more in the Church as it was instituted As for the Power of the Keys it is absolutely by this answer betraied to the Socinians who would have it peculiar to the Apostles For it is no where delivered as a Precept but onely as a Privilege What means is there then to end everlasting difficulties Surely the same that there is to understand all positive Laws that ever were For if the ancient interruption of the practice of any Law secure the Church that it was not given to all times and places sure that which is not mentioned as a Precept and yet has been always in practice without interruption as it was in force afore it was mentioned so was intended to oblige not by the mention but by the act that first established it evidenced by practice Which if it be so then is there no Power on earth able to abolish the Order of Bishops having been in force in all Churches ever since the Apostles I must not passe this place of limiting all Interests without a word or two of the Office of Deacons in the Church In regard of two extreme opinions one of Geneva that makes them meer Lay men collectors of Alms by necessary consequence because under their Lay Elders the other of some that would have them understood to be Presbyters as oft as S. Paul mentions but two Orders of Bishops and Deacons Phil. I. 1. 1 Tim. II. 9. But as
in his Gospel hath left concerning Mariage For if this be peculiar to Christians as Christians then whatsoever becomes questionable upon the interpretation of this Law concerning the Church as it is the Church must needs fall under the sentence of those that are inabled to conclude the Society of the Church And therefore it is without question as ancient as Christianity that no Mariage be made which the Church alloweth not the Benediction whereof upon Mariages is a sign of the allowance of the Church presupposed as that upon the Mariage of Booz and Ruth Ruth IV. 11. presupposeth the act to be allowed by the Elders or Consistory of Bethlehem as you have it afore These difficulties thus voided it remains that the Secular Powers stand bound in conscience to inforce the Jurisdiction of the Church where the exercise of it produceth nothing contrary to the principles of Christianity or the quiet of the State As for the interesse of the State in Ordinations the same reason holds It is very manifest by many examples of commendable times under Christian Emperors that many Ordinations have been made at the instance and command of Emperors and Soveraign Princes And why not what hindreth them to make choice of fitter persons then the Clergy and People can agree to choose And what hindreth the Church upon consideration of their choice to reform their own But when Soveraign Powers by Generall Laws forbid Ordinations to proceed but upon persons nominated by themselves how then shall the Right of the Church take place or what shall be the effect of S. Pauls precept to Timothy To lay hands hastily on no man lest he partake of other mens sins Which cannot take place unlesse he that Ordain be free not to Ordain The President Thuanus writing of the Concordates between Leo the tenth and Francis the first by which the Canonicall way of Election of Bishops was abolished in France saith freely that that great Prince never prospered after that Act giving this for his reason because thereby that course of electing Bishops was taken away which had been introduced from the beginning by the Apostles In fine of this particular I shall need to say no more but this according to the generall reason premised that qualities ordained by the constitution of the Church are to be conferred by persons qualified so to doe by the constitution of the Church But with this moderation that Secular Powers be satisfied not onely that the persons promoted be not prejudiciall to the Peace of the State whereof they have charge by their proper qualities but also that as Christians they be not assistant to the promotion of those who professe the contrary of that which they as Christians professing are bound to maintain In the last place it will not be difficult from the premises to determine the interesse of the State in setling maintaining and disposing of the indowment of the Church For seeing the reasons premised which now are laught at by those that will not understand wherein Christianity consists have prevailed so far with all Christian people that all Tithes and many other Oblations and Indowments are and have been in all parts consecrated to God as the First-fruits of Christians goods for the maintenance of his Service it remains the duty of the Secular Sword to maintain the Church in that right For that publick Power that shall lay hands on such goods shall rob both God and the People God in respect of the Act of Consecration past upon such goods the People in respect of the Originall right and reason of the Church which first moved Christians to consecrate the same By virtue of which right that which first was consecrated being taken away by force Christian people remain no lesse obliged to separate from the remainder of their poverty that which shall be proportionable to that which all Christian people have always consecrated to God out of their estates And those that perswade good Christians that such consecrations have proceeded only from the cousenage of the Clergy for their own advantage may as well perswade them that they were cousened when they were perswaded to be Christians seeing such consecrations have been made by all Christian people As for the disposing of that which is given to the publick use of the Church I say not the same I hold it necessary that the Church satisfie the State that whatsoever is given to such use may be to the common good of the people and so leave the imperfection of Laws to blame that it is not A thing which I think may very reasonably be done For first all Cathedrall Churches being by the institution of the Apostles intire Bodies in themselves distinct from other Churches according to that which hath been proved of the dependence of Churches all Oblations to any Church originally belong to the Body thereof in common at the disposing of the Bishop and Presbyters thereof which is known to have been the Primitive Order of the Church derived from the practice of the Apostles which I have declared out of the Scriptures Though they have complied with the bounty of those that have indowed Parish Churches and consented to limit the indowments of every one of them to it self alone Secondly it is manifest that the Clergy are under such a Discipline of the Primitive Church that so long as they continue to live in such a discipline they can neither waste the indowment of the Church upon themselves nor use it to the advancement of their Families Which Discipline if the Secular Power be imploied to retrive it will not be thereby destructive to the Power of the Church but cumulative As likewise if it be imploied to the most advantageous distribution of that masse of Church goods which lies affected and deputed to any Cathedrall Church through the whole Diocese thereof in case the distribution made by Humane Right appear prejudiciall to those charitable purposes which are the means by which the Service of God through that Church or Diocese is maintained and advanced Provided always that a greater Sacrilege be not committed by robbing the Bishop and Presbyters of the Right and Power which they have from the Apostles in disposing of the indowment of their Church These things promised it is easie to undertake that there never was so great a part of the fruits of this Land mortified and put out of commerce and applied and affected to the Church but that it was in that estate more advantageous to the publick strength security and plenty of the Nation as well as to the service of God and the charitable maintenance of those that attend it in case the Secular Power had been improved to dispose of it for the best then it can be in any particular hands especially in the hands of Sacrilege CHAP. V. How the Church may be Reformed without violating Divine Right What Privileges and Penalties a Christian State may inforce Christianity with The Consent of the Church is the
onely mark to discern what is the subject of Reformation and what not All Warre made upon the Title of Christianity is unjust and destructive to it Therefore Religion cannot be Reformed by force Of the present State of Christianity among us and the means that is left us to recover the Vnity of the Church THat which hath been said as it concerns the present case of this Church seems to be liable to one main Objection which is this That if the power of Bishops and Presbyters be such as hath been said by Divine Right that nothing can be done without them in their respective Churches it will follow that in case the State of the Church be corrupt by processe of time and their default especially so that the common good of the Church require Reformation by changing of Laws in force if they consent not it cannot be brought to passe without breach of Divine Right This may well seem to be the false light that hath misguided well affected persons to seek the Reformation presently pretended For seeing it is agreed upon among us that there was a time and a State of the Church which required Reformation and that if the Clergy of that time had been supported in that power which by the premises is challenged on behalfe of the Clergy this Reformation could not have been brought to passe It seems therefore to the most part of men that distinguish not between causes and pretenses that where Reformation is pretended there the power lawfully in force to the Society of the Church ought to cease that the Reformation may proceed either by Secular power or if that consent not by force of the People To strengthen this objection as to the Reformation of this Church it may further be said that though it is true that the Order of Bishops hath been propagated in this Church at and since the Reformation by Ordinations made according to the form of that Apostolicall Canon That a Bishop be Ordained by two or three Bishops yet if we judge of the Originall intent of that Canon by the generall practice of the Church it will appear that it is but the abridgement of the IV Canon of the Councell of Nice which requireth that all Bishops be Ordained by a Councell of the Bishops of the Province Which because it cannot always be had therefore it is provided that two or three may doe the work the rest consenting and authorizing the proceeding A thing which seems necessarily true by that which hath been said of the dependence of Churches consisting in this that the Act of part of the Church obliges the whole because that part which it concerns and the Unity of the whole which it produceth stands first obliged by it being done according to the Laws of the whole By which reason the Act of Ordination of a Bishop obliges the whole Church to take him for a Bishop because the Mother Church to which he belongs and the rest of Cathedrall Churches under the same do acknowledge it And this is that which the Ordinance of the Apostles hath provided to keep the Visible Communion of the whole Church in Unity To which it is requisite that a Christian communicate with the whole Church as a Christian a Bishop Presbyter or Deacon as such But when among the Bishops of any Province part consent to Ordinations part not the Unity of the Church cannot be preserved unlesse the consent of the whole follow the consent of the greater part And therefore though the Canon of Nice be no part of Divine Right yet seeing the precept of the Unity of the Church being the end which all the Positive Laws of Church Government aim at obligeth before any Positive precept of the Government thereof which we see are many ways dispensed with for preservation thereof and that it appears to be the generall custome of the Primitive Church to make Ordinations at those Provinciall Councels which by another Apostolicall Canon XXXVIII were to be held twice a year it seemeth that there can no valid Ordination be made where the greater number of the Bishops of the Province dissent Which is confirmed by the Ordination of Novatianus for Bishop of Rome which though done by three Bishops as the Letter of Cornelius to the Eastern Bishops recorded by Eusebius Eccles Hist VI. 43. testifieth yet was the foundation of that great Schisme because Cornelius was Ordained on the other side by sixteen as we reade in S. Cyprian Now it is manifest that the Ordinations by which that Order is propagated in England at and since the Reformation were not made by consent of the greater part of Bishops of each Province but against their minde though they made no contrary Ordinations And by the same means it is manifest that all those Ecclesiasticall Laws by which the Reformation was established in England were not made by a consent capable to oblige the Church if we set aside the Secular Power that gave force unto that which was done contrary to that Rule wherein the Unity of the Church consisteth But in other parts the Reformation established was so far from being done by Bishops and Presbyters or any consent able to conclude the Church by the Constitution of the Church that the very Order of Bishops is laid aside and forgot if not worse that is detested among them Upon which precedent it sounds plansibly with the greatest part among us that the Unity of the whole being dissolved by the Reformation the Unity of the Reformation cannot be preserved but by dissolving the Order of Bishops among us Before I come to resolve this difficulty it will be requisite to examine what Privileges and Penalties the Secular Power is enabled to enforce Religion within a Christian State Because it hath been part of the dispute of this time that some Privileges of the Church are contrary to Christianity as also some Penalties upon matter of Conscience And the resolution of it will make way to my answer Now the resolution hereof must come from the ground laid from the beginning of this Discourse that Christianity importeth no temporall Privilege or advantage of this present World and therefore that Christianity enableth no man to advance and propagate his Christianity by force For as it is contrary to the nature thereof to bee forced seeing the Service of God which it requireth is not performed by any man that is not willing to doe it nor the Faith beleeved but by them that are willing to beleeve it So seeing it gives no man any privilege of this world which he cannot challenge by a lawfull title of Humane Right and that no title of Humane Right can enable any man to impose upon another that Faith which Humane reason reveals not therefore can no Humane power force any man to be a Christian by the utmost penalty of death which is that which force endeth in to them that submit not It is true the Law of Moses imposeth death for a penalty in
and effect to the acts of the same But in matters already determined by them as Laws given to the Church if by injury of time the practice become contrary to the Law the Soveraign Power being Christian and bound to protect Christianity is bound to imploy it self in giving strength first to that which is ordained by our Lord and his Apostles By consequence if those whom the power of the Church is trusted with shall hinder the restoring of such Laws it may and ought by way of penalty to such persons to suppresse their power that so it may be committed to such as are willing to submit to the superiour Ordinance of our Lord and his Apostles A thing throughly proved both by the Right of Secular Powers in advancing Christianity with penalties and in establishing the exercise of it and in particular by all the examples of the pious Kings of Gods people reducing the Law into practice and suppressing the contrary thereof Seeing then that it is agreed upon by all that professe the Reformation that many and divers things ordained by our Lord and his Apostles whether to be beleeved or to be practised in the Church were so abolished by injury of time that it was requisite they should be restored though against the will of those that bore that power which the Apostles appointed necessary to conclude the Church it followeth that the necessity of Reformation inferreth not the abolishing of the Succession of the Apostles but that more Laws of our Lord and his Apostles and of more moment were preferred before it where it could not regularly be preserved Which when it may be preserved is to be so far preserved before all designs which may seem to humane judgement expedient to the advancement of Christianity that whosoever shall endevour without such cause to destroy the power derived from the Apostles by conferring it upon those that succeed them not in it and much more whosoever shall doe it to introduce Laws contrary to the Ordinance of the Apostles shall be thereby guilty of the horrible crime of Schism For it is to be remembred that there are some things immediately necessary to the salvation of particular Christians whether concerning Faith or good manners and there are other things necessary to the publick order and peace of the Church that by it Christians may be edified in all matters of the first kinde The denying of any point of the first kinde may for distinctions sake be called Heresie when a man is resolute and obstinate in it But in the other kinde it is not a false opinion that makes a man a Schismatick till he agree to destroy the Unity of the Church for it It can scarce fall out indeed that any man proceed to destroy the Unity of the Church without some false opinion in Christianity Yet it is not the opinion but the destroying of a true or erecting of a false power in the Church that makes Schism And it can scarce fall out that any man should broach a doctrine contrary to Christianity without an intent to make a Sect apart yet onely a false perswasion in matters necessary to salvation is enough to make an Heretick This is the reason that both Heresie and Schism goes many times under the common name of Heresies or Sects among the ancient Fathers of the Church Otherwise it is truly said that Heresie is contrary to Faith Schism to Charity because the crime of Heresie is found in a single person that denies some point of Faith though the name of it be generall onely to those and to all those that make Sects apart In the mean time we must consider that the word Schism signifies the state as well as the crime in which sense all that are in the state of Schism are not in the crime of Schism but those that give the cause of it For as it is resolved that Warre cannot be just on both sides that make War so is it true that the cause of all divisions in the Church must needs be only on one side and not on both And that side which gives the cause are rightfully called Schismaticks though both sides be in the state of Schism as he in S. Augustine said of Tarquin and Lucrece that being two in one act yet one of them onely committed Adultery If then the Laws given by our Lord and his Apostles be restored by consent of some part of the Councell and Synod requisite to oblige any respective part of the Church and the Succession of the Apostles propagated by them alone in opposition to the rest that consent not unto them the cause of Schism cannot lie on this side which concurreth with the Primitive Succession of our Lord and his Apostles but upon them that violate the Communion of the Church by refusing such Laws and the right of such persons as acknowledge the same the condition of the Unity and Communion of the Church consisting as much in the rest of Laws given by our Lord and the Apostles as in that of the Succession and power of the Apostles Which is the case of the Church of England But whoever by virtue of any authority under heaven shall usurp Ecclesiasticall Power shall usurp the Succession of the Apostles and take it from them that rightfully stand possest of it upon pretense of governing the Church by such Laws as he is really perswaded but falsly to be commanded the Church by our Lord and his Apostles this whosoever shall doe or be accessory to is guilty of Schism The issue then of this whole dispute stands upon this point how and by what means it may be evidenced what Laws of the Faith and Manners of particular Christians of the publick Order of the Church have been given the Church by our Lord and his Apostles A point which cannot be resolved aright but by them which resolve aright for what reasons and upon what grounds and motives they are Christians For without doubt the true reasons and motives of Christianity if they be pursued and improved by due consequence will either discover the truth of any thing disputable in the matter of Christianity or that it is not determinable by any revealed truth Here it is much to be considered that the truth of things revealed by God is not manifested to the mindes of them to whom and by whom God reveals them to the World by the same means as to them whom he speaks to by their means Moses and the Prophets our Lord and his Apostles when they were sent to declare the will of God to his People were first assured themselves that what they were sent to declare to the world was first revealed to themselves by God and then were enabled to assure the world of the same By what means they were assured themselves concerns me not here to enquire It is enough that they were always enabled to do such works as might assure the world that they were sent by God For how could they demand
Apostles shall it be without the compasse of any Secular Power to dissolve it And therefore the consequence hereof in the present state of Christianity among us is further to be deduced because many men may be perswaded of their obligation to the Church upon supposition of the Divine Right of Bishops who perhaps perceive not the former reason of their obligation to them here asserted as to the Ordinary Pastors of the Church To proceed then out of the premises to frame a judgement of the state and condition of Christianity in England at the present and from that judgement to conclude what they that will preserve the conscience of good Christians are to doe or to avoid in maintaining the Society and Communion of the Church Put the case that an Ecclesiasticall Power be claimed and used upon some perswasions contrary to the substance of true Christianity and pretending thereby to govern those that adhere to the same perswasion in the Communion of those Ordinances which God requireth to be served with by his Church according to the same perswasion I suppose no man will deny this to be the crime of Heresie containing not onely a perswasion contrary to the foundation of Faith but also an Ecclesiasticall Power founded upon it and thereby a separation from the Communion of the Church which acknowledgeth not the same Put the case again that an Ecclesiasticall Power is claimed and used not upon a perswasion contrary to any thing immediately necessary to the salvation of all Christians as the foundation of Faith and all that belongeth to it is but upon a perswasion contrary to something necessary to the Society of the whole Church as commanded by our Lord Christ or his Apostles to be regulated thereby and this with a pretense to govern those that adhere to the same perswasion in the Communion of all Ecclesiasticall Ordinances according to it this I cannot see how it can be denied to be the crime of Schism And this God be blessed that I cannot say it is done in England but in consequence to the premises I must say that this is it which hath been and is endevoured to be done in it and therefore to be avoided by all that will not communicate in an act of Schism I doe not deny that Presbyters have an interesse in the Power of the Keys and by consequence in all parts of Ecclesiasticall Power being all the productions thereof But I have shewed that their Interesse is in dependence upon their respective Bishops without whom by the Ordinance of the Apostles and the practice of all Churches that are not parties in this cause nothing is to be done When as therefore Presbyters dividing among themselves the eminent Power of their Bishops presume to manage it without acknowledgement of them out of an opinion that the eminence of their Power is contrary to the Ordinance of our Lord and his Apostles or that not being contrary to the same it is lawfull for Presbyters to take it out of the hands either of Bishops or of simple Presbyters had they been so possessed of it When as they joyn with themselves some of the People in the quality of Lay Elders or what ever they will have them called and of these constitute Consistories for all severall Congregations endowed with the Power of the Keys over the same though in dependence upon greater Assemblies out of the opinion that this is the Ordinance of our Lord his Apostles and this not to manage the Interesse of the People that nothing passe contrary to the Laws given the Church by God which are their inheritance as well as the Clergies but in a number double to that of the Presbyters in all Consistories and in a right equall to them man for man so that it may truly be said that the whole Power of Clergy and People is vested in these Lay Elders that one quality consenting being able to conclude the whole When as the determination who shall or shall not be admitted to Communion returneth at last to a number of Secular persons making them thereby Judges of the Laws of Christianity and enabling them thereby to give and take away the Ecclesiasticall being of any member of the Church in those cases to which that power extendeth and investing a Civile Court with the Power of the Keys in the same All these points being members of the Ordinance for the establishment of the Presbyteries I say then that by that Ordinance an Ecclesiasticall Power is erected upon so many perswasions of things concerning the publick Order of the Society of the Church contrary to the Laws given the Church by our Lord and his Apostles by a Secular Power interessed onely in point of Fact in Church matters without any ground of Right to do it and that therefore the endevouring to establish these Presbyteries is an act of Schism which particular Christians though they never by any expresse act of their own tied themselves to be subject to Bishops are neverthelesse bound not to communicate in because they are bound upon their salvation to maintain the Unity of the Church and the Unity of the Church established upon these Laws whereof the Succession of Bishops is one As for the design of the Congregations it is easily perceived to come to this effect That to the intent that Christian people may be tied to no Laws but such as the Spirit of God which is in them convinces them to be established upon the Church by the Scripture and that thereupon the ordering of all matters concerning the Society of the Church may proceed upon conviction of every mans judgement Therefore every Congregation of Christians assembling to the Service of God to be absolute and independent on any other part or the whole Church the Power being vested in the members of the said Congregation under the Authority of the Pastor and Elders as aforesaid And that therefore every Congregation constituting it self a Church constitutes by consequence and destitutes Pastors Elders and Members So that by this design an Ecclesiasticall Power being erected upon so many perswasions contrary to the Laws given the Church by our Lord and his Apostles the act of Schism is more visible Though for the claim and Title by which this Ecclesiasticall Power is erected in both ways that of the Congregations is more sutable to Christianity because that of the Presbyteries more forcible both equally destructive to the right of the Church For that a Parliament by which Power the Assembly of Divines was called not disputing now the Power of a Parliament in England but supposing it to be as great for the purpose as any Christian State can exercise should erect an Ecclesiasticall Power by taking it from those that have it and giving it to those that have it not is without the Sphere of any Power which stands not by the Constitution of the Church For if the Church subsisted before any Secular Power was Christian by a Power vested by our Lord in
would be possible that War might be made upon the Title of Religion alone contrary to the Premises The learned Casaubon once called the Doctrine of Gregory the VII Pope when he undertook to deprive Christian Princes of their Estates because they stood Excommunicate Haeresim Hildebrandinam The Heresie of Pope Hildebrand And not without cause For seeing the foundation of Christianity consisteth in things to be done as well as things to be beleeved and that the summe of that which Christians professe to do consists in bearing Christs Crosse how shall he be other then an Heretick that renounceth the profession of Christs Crosse Or how can he be understood to professe Christs Crosse that holds any thing purchased by the Arms which are born upon the Title of Christianity For as all is his that conquers in lawfull Arms so cannot he be understood to renounce all for Christs Crosse that holds any thing by it which he is bound to maintain with the Title whereby he holds it Thus that Pope is not unjustly called an Heretick by some as Heresie imports a vice of a particular mans minde not a Sect in the Society of the Church seeing it cannot be said that this position is enjoined though suffered in the Church of Rome as it must be said of that Church the Society whereof and the Power which governeth that Society subsisteth by Arms grounded on Christianity Therefore supposing an Ecclesiasticall Power and by consequence a Church constituted by force used upon this ground it would be hard to clear it of Heresie the constitution whereof cannot stand with the profession of Christs Crosse But not to aggravate consequences seeing it is manifest that all errors in Religion overthrow the foundation by consequence but to shew what regret I have to say that which I must not conceal I will advance the onely possible expedient that I can imagine to restore the Unity of the Church among us For that of a Nationall Synod which is most obvious and plausible seems to me unpossible to be used lawfully and effectually both in our case I am not so faintly in love with the Cause which I expose my self to so much offense to maintain as to make a question how the Church of England were to be re-established if right might take place that is by re-estating the Synod thereof in full possession of that right which hereby I have proved that they are outed of onely by force But I speak now upon supposition that there is force on their side that refuse this right upon opinions contrary to the same and with an intent to advance a course by which it may be discerned how farre the Church of England may abate of the right which is denied onely by force for so good a purpose as to reconcile unto it those who may otherwise fall into Churches in name but Schisms indeed And in this case my reason is because those who chalenge the right of a Synod must proceed as authorized to judge between or rather to give Law to all parties Now being divided as we are between Right and force or the opinion of either or both it is not imaginable that either those that think themselves to have Right can or those that think themselves to have force will submit to receive sentence or Law from their adversaries unlesse we think them either no men to change their judgement when they come to have Power on their side or no Christians to acknowledge that to be Right which they are assured is not What remains then to restore peace when no party can yeeld Surely in all bodily diseases those parts and principles and elements of nature which remain untainted must be the means to recover the whole And in this distemper of the Church so much of Christianity as remains commonly acknowledged by all parties rightly husbanded may serve to reunite them in one upon better intelligence And the despair which any party ought to have of reducing the rest to themselves ought to perswade all to condescend to this good husbandry What remains then common to all parts beside the profession of Christianity the Scriptures to agree them about the meaning and consequences of them in matters questionable being that which remains in debate Could I say that all parts acknowledged that which the Church from the beginning every where hath received and used to be agreeable to the Scripture I should think the businesse half done But since it is otherwise we must have recourse to a more remote ground or principle which may serve for a reason to produce those consequences which follow from the said Rule in matters in debate seeing we pretend not to make a Rule without cause And this must be by examining the first motives of Christianity for what reasons we undertake the profession of it which being well rendred and shot home to the mark will not fail either to decide any thing in controversie or to shew that it concerns no mans Christianity that it be decided Now the onely means to bring forth and discharge these reasons to publick satisfaction is an open and free Conference for space of time or persons executed by persons advanced by the severall parties to improve what any man can bring forth to the clearing of any thing in debate and managed by persons chosen for their discretion to keep the debate from wandring till all be said to all points For seeing it must needs appear what are the terms of agreement when all reasons are spent it will be lawfull for those in whom rests the Succession of the Apostles and all claiming under them to consent to estate the Ecclesiasticall Power and the Ministery of Ecclesiasticall Offices upon persons to be agreed upon according to terms agreed And this consent as effectuall to reunite the Church as ever anciently Schisms were lawfully restored to the Church by admitting Bishops Presbyters Deacons and People to communicate in their own ranks and making good all acts done in Separation by subsequent consent not as to God but as to the Church which I have shewed afore was many times done As for those which have used this Power already they shall condescend no further by this agreement but to use that part of it which shall be limited them by the agreement upon an unquestionable title for the future But if our sins be still so powerfull as not to suffer a lawfull course to take place let me admonish those infinite numbers of Christian souls that sigh and groan after the Unity of the Church what means God shews them to discharge the conscience of good Christians to him while the temporall Laws of the State which ought to actuate it doe suspend their Office Which are in effect the persons of those in whom the Succession of the Apostles is vested and the Clergy claiming under them And that generall Law of Christianity for which those things which we insist upon cannot be quitted of sticking to all that
or spirituall Commonwealth by the Power of doing it Now the Law which is the condition upon which men are admitted to communicate with the Church is nothing else but the profession of Christianity upon which the Apostles of our Lord were first enabled to constitute Churches by baptizing them whom they should win to be Disciples according to the Commission of our Lord Mat. XXVIII 19. those onely being Disciples which undertook Christianity and therefore were afterwards called Christians being first called Disciples even after their Baptism Now Christianity consisting not onely in beleeving whatsoever our Lord Christ revealed but in the acknowledgement of an obligation to doe whatsoever he commanded it follows that this Law of Christianity consists of all Precepts of things to be beleeved and things to be done which our Lord Christ hath declared to his Church And not in these alone in regard that our Lord hath commanded Christianity not onely to be beleeved but also to be professed at the utmost perill of life and estate Therefore I said that the Law which is the condition of communicating with the Church is the profession of Christianity which entitleth to Baptism This profession seeing it cannot be made but to Christians that know what Christianity is and thereby are able to judge of the profession made how agreeable to Christianity of the person making the profession how sincerely how cordially he does it it followeth that the Power of the Church is committed to them that are trusted to judge of the profession of Christianity every one according to the Interesse which he justly pretendeth in that judgement Therefore is this Power called the Power of the Keys because it openeth the doore to the Communion of all Ordinances of Divine Service in the Church when it findeth the profession both agreeable to Christianity and to the heart life of him that makes it and shuts the same when it findeth things otherwise Therefore is it called the Power of remitting and retaining sinnes because God hath promised the free grace of remission of sins to all that make true profession of Christianity The benefit of which promise as it is good to him that makes such profession by virtue of his own act as to God so by virtue of the act that admits of the same it is good as to the Church Though it cannot be good as to God unlesse it be good also as to the Church by reason of the command of God that every Christian be a member of the Church For if it were morally possible that any man should attain to the knowlege and submit to the obedience of Christianity in such an estate of life and such Society of this World wherein it were not morally possible for him to hold Communion with the Church or those who in behalfe of the Church by the Laws of it are enabled to admit him to the Communion of the same by Baptism I would make no scruple to think that man in the state of salvation without Baptism or the Church And the same is to be said of all those that cannot be admitted to the Communion of the Church without professing or doing something contrary to Christianity which is the case of all that stand excommunicate upon unjust causes so that their Christianity obligeth them to communicate with no part of the true Church For seeing the Unity of the Church requires that he that is excommunicate to one part of the Church be excommunicate to all the Church seeing the Unity of the Whole cannot be preserved unlesse the Whole make good each act of the part which it hath power to doe it follows that he who is excommunicate for an unjust cause cannot with his Christianity communicate with any part of the Church his title to heaven remaining entire But this case ceasing the remission of sins depends upon the Church by reason of the profession of Christianity which as God requires every Christian to make so he enables the Church to admit And this is the Argument for the Power of Excommunication which is drawn from the Power of admitting to Baptism evidenced by divers Scriptures and divers particulars in the Primitive practice of the Church agreeable to the same And truly it was enough to point at some particulars for he that would undertake to produce all that is to be had in the records of the Church to depose for this reason and this right of the Church might easily fill great Volumes with nothing else Neverthelesse I will here adde one particular more because it seems this reason of the right and interesse of the Church is evidently seen in it And it will not require many allegations seeing it is a known Rule of the ancient Church that Clinicks should not be admitted to the Clergy alleged by Cornelius of Rome to Fabius of Antiochia in Eusebius Eccles Hist VI. 43. against Novatianus the Father of the Novatians to shew that he could not be Bishop of Rome in opposition to him being made Presbyter contrary to that Rule What was then the reason of this Rule and what were they that were called Clinicks It is very evident that there were very many in the Primitive times that beleeved Christianity but durst not professe it because it was no prejudice to beleeve it but to professe it so as to be baptized and come under the Discipline of the Church might be a matter of life and death in case of persecution Besides beleeving and not professing that is not pretending to Baptism they avoided the strictnesse of Ecclesiasticall Discipline What should the Church doe in the case of these men when they came to demand their Baptism undertaking the Rule of Christianity Surely as they could not utterly exclude them from the Church that had never offended or failed in that which they had undertook to it so of necessity they must stand at a greater distance to such persons as having their Christianity more in suspition then otherwise Wherefore in danger of death they were not to refuse them Baptism but in case they recovered again it was very reasonable that they which had attained their Baptism onely in consideration of the danger of death and must have given better triall of themselves otherwise before they were admitted should therefore stand so far suspected afterwards as not to be admitted to the Clergy which required a greater proficience in Christianity then that which qualified a man onely for Baptism These then are they which were called Clinici because they were baptized in bed as requiring their Baptism when they found themselves upon the bed of their sicknesse which might be that of their death And this is the reason of the Rule that they should not be admitted to the Clergy And by this reason the right and interesse of the Church is evident in admitting the profession of Christianity in those that thereby demanded to be admitted to Baptism In the next argument drawn from the Discipline of Penance it may be
one in the greatest City and the most populous for number of Christians that is mentioned in all the Scriptures Though no common reason can question but there were more Congregations considering that it cannot be thought that all the Christians contained in the greatest and most Christian of all those Cities could assemble together at once for the common service of God Upon these premises it is necessary to inferre that the Apostles Order was that which we see was the Rule of their practice that the severall Bodies of those that should be converted to Christianity within severall Cities and the Territories thereof should constitute severall Churches to be governed by the severall Presbyteries thereof constituted and regulated as shall be declared in the consequences Which being established it will not be difficult to inferre that the Power of the Keys and the consequences thereof are deposited in the said Churches that is trusted with them that are endowed with the Power of Governing those Churches To which if you adde this that the Churches of particular Cities were to depend upon the Churches of Mother Cities upon which particular Cities depended for the civile Government you have a reason and Rule of the whole frame of Church Government designed by the Apostles as generall as could be given to a Society that was to consist of severall Nations and Soveraignties without limits but not more generall then the Originall constitution of the whole Church derived from their design will evidence to be agreeable to those impressions and marks of it which are here produced out of the Scriptures This Position is liable to an Objection from those which the ancient Canons of the Greekish Councels call Chorepiscopi which we may translate Country Bishops because the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 properly signifieth the Country in opposition to or in difference from the City For if Churches constituted in Cities have their severall Presbyteries the Heads whereof being Bishops are by consequent Governors in chief of their respective Churches how are Bishops constituted in the Country that is in any of the chief Villages under any City For by this means either we have a Church in a Village or a Bishop without a Church and so the practise of the Church not to be reconciled with that which I make the design of the Apostles if either be true The answer to this in generall must come from that which you have here afterwards p. 62. that the Rule is as generally expressed in these terms as any Rule generall to those cases that may fall out so divers For the generall intent and reason of it is to preserve the Unity of the Whole Church by the subordination and dependence of the parts thereof to and from other parts and so the Whole If some particular provision prove necessary some time and place to attain this end it is not to be thought that the generall Rule holds not therefore For the particular here in hand one thing I conceive may be questionable in point of Fact and matter of Historicall Truth concerning these Country Bishops which the Canons quoted p. 146. speak of For in the beginning of the XI Canon of Antiochia it is said that they received 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Ordination of Bishops In the end of it it is provided that they be Ordained by the Bishop of the City to whom they are subject The first clause seems to intimate that they have the same Ordination with other Bishops which is by the Synod of the Province or those that represent the same Besides that we finde by the subscriptions of the Councels that they were called to Councels as if they received their trust immediately from the Synods of their Provinces By the second clause it seems they receive their authority immediately from the Bishop of the Province whereupon they are called Vicarii Episcoporum the Bishops Deputies as you see in the place afore named What my judgement is in this point you may have seen before p. 146. neither do I see cause to repent me of it For howsoever they were Ordained and from whomsoever they received their trust it is manifest by the Canons of Ancyra and Laodicea there quoted that they received it upon such terms as to be subordinate to the Bishop of the City which otherwise Bishops were not but immediately to the Synod of the Province and the Bishop of the Mother City Neither is it contrary to the ground of that generall Rule which I maintain that it should be within the Power of the Church contained in any Province that is to say the Synod of the same to Ordain that in regard some Village under some City of that Province grew considerable for the extent of it and the multitude of Christian souls contained in it therefore it should have a Bishop beside the Bishop of the City Alway provided that the dependence of Churches might be preserved wherein the Unity of the whole consisted But it is manifest that this dependence might be maintained two severall ways supposing a Bishop to be constituted in a Village First Ordaining him to be subordinate to the Bishop of the City Which is the case of those whom we speak of whose Power is tied up as you have seen by the said Canons of Ancyra and Laodicea But should they be left free from all dependence on the City Bishop then were they absolute Bishops and their Churches though in Villages and therefore lesse yet for their respective Power and right the same with other Churches constituted in Cities Which seems to be the case of the Churches of Africk where Bishops were so plentifull that every good Village must needs be the Seat of an Episcopall Church Neither doth this destroy the Rule which I maintain that Cities and Churches were originally convertible but argues that Villages in some Countries had that privilege which in others was proper to Cities To that which is said p. 53. of the difference between Prophesies and between Apostles and Prophets I adde this consideration That the Apostles of our Lord were necessarily Prophets because of the promise of the Holy Ghost to lead them into all truth to remember them of our Lords Doctrine and to make them understand the Scriptures all which are contained in the thing signified by this word Prophesie though the originall thereof import onely foretelling things to come as it is manifest by S. Paul 1 Cor. XIV But all Prophets are not necessarily Apostles that is sent by God to declare their Commission to his people or to charge them with those things which God revealed to themselves I grant that the Prophets under the Old Testament were such by reason of that Law by which God appointeth them to be obeyed and therefore giveth a Rule how to discern between true and false Prophets Deut. XVIII 18. And hereupon it is that their writings are the Word of God and that Prophesie is said to have failed after those whose Writings we
under the Altar of Burnt Sacrifices but standing in the lower part of the Sanctuary beneath the Altar of Incense Unlesse we take 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here for the Sanctuary as I shew that it is taken in the Apocalypse p. 115. and then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The name of Ministers when it answers the Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Scriptures if it be put absolutely without any addition signifies the Rank and Office of those that are ever since called Deacons in the Church But many times it is put with the additions here mentioned p. 99. of Ministers of the Word Ministers of the Gospel of the New Testament of the Church which serve as circumlocutions and descriptions of the Office of Apostles to the whole Church or their Deputies and Commissioners the Evangelists as when S. Paul writes to the Colossians I. 23 25. that he was made a Minister of the Gospel or of the Church according to the dispensation of God which is given me towards you to fulfill the Word of God that is the Mystery that hath been hidden from generations and ages and now is manifested to his Saints It is here manifest that he cals himself a Minister of God or of the Church in regard of publishing the Gospel and planting the Church which belongs not to the Presbyters of Churches whose name and office is respective to their particular Churches And this notion of the word is almost always to be gathered by the text and consequence of those passages where it is found Therfore the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when it is absolutely put 1 Tim. III. 8 stands in relation to Bishops and Presbyters mentioned afore in the notion of Waiting upon them whereas when it is put with the addition here specified it stands in relation to God making as much difference between Ministers of the Word and barely Ministers as between executing the immediate commands of God as Apostles doe and executing the commands of Bishops in regard of whom mentioned afore they are called barely and without any addition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Ministers in that place And so the VII at Jerusalem were first constituted to wait upon the Apostles by doing that Service which they did themselves at the first for the Church whereupon it was afterwards a custome in the Church that there should be VII Deacons in every Church as there were at Jerusalem Concil Neocaesar Can. XIV And therefore the Author of the Questions of the Old and New Testament in S. Augustines Works Q. CI. having observed that the Apostles call Presbyters their fellow Presbyters addeth Nunquid Ministros condiaconos suos diceret Apostolus Non utique quia multo inferiores sunt Et turpe est judicem dicere primicerium Would the Apostle call Deacons his fellow Deacons Surely no for they are much inferiour And it is absurd to call a Pronotary a Judge Where he makes the same difference between Presbyters and Deacons as Christian between Judges and Ministers of Courts and that according to the Originall custome of the Synagogue as well as of the Church as by and by it shall appeare Notwithstanding the Office of Bishops is called a Ministery very anciently by Pope Pius in his Epistle to Justus of Vienna as also the Office both of Bishops Presbyters and Deacons Concil Eliber Can. XIX but in another notion in opposition to the coactive power of the World as proceeding originally not by constraint but by consent and so they are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and their office 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Greek because their office is for the behoof of the people and in their stead But they cannot therefore be called Ministers of the People as Deacons are Ministers of Bishops and Presbyters because then they should be ruled by the people and execute that which they prescribe as the Apostles being Ministers of God in Preaching the Gospel are bound to execute his Commission and nothing else which the Clergy of Christian Churches may not doe That it may be beyond any Power upon earth to abolish the Order of Bishops out of the Church of England without abolishing the Church also as is said here p. 129. I prove Chap. V. to wit that no Secular Power can take away Ecclesiasticall Power from them that lawfully have it according to the institution of the Apostles though not by virtue of it To shew that in the judgement and practise of the Primitive Church all Power of baptizing was derived from the Bishop as is said here p. 136. we have but to remember the custome of the Church mentioned in so many Canons of sending the Chrism to all Parish Churches from the Mother Church once a year By which Ceremony it appeared that the Bishop trusted his authority of admitting to the Church by Baptism with the respective Pastors of the same And therefore it is not unreasonably judged that this custome of Chrisming was many times in stead of Confirmation to those Churches that used it Besides in that from the beginning no Ecclesiasticall office was to be ministred by any but the Bishop in his presence the dependence of all Ecclesiasticall authority whereby the same are ministred upon the Bishop is evidenced to us Thus in the passage of Eusebius concerning Origens Preaching before he was of the Clergy mentioned p. 106. it is further to be observed that the instances there alleged seem to shew that the Primitive Bishops did many times admit those that were of no degree in the Clergy to preach in their own presence Which that it was a further privilege then onely to preach may appear by that which is related out of the life of S. Augustine in the Primitive government of Churches p. 113. that he was imploied by the Bishop his predecessor to preach to the people in his presence and stead because he had seen it so practised in the East though in those parts it were not done In like manner it is manifest by many Records of the Church that none might Baptize Celebrate the Eucharist or reconcile the Penitent in the Bishops presence but himself for of Confirmation and Ordaining I need say nothing The fourth reason against the vulgar reading of the XIII Canon of the Councell at Ancyra p. 141. will be more clearly understood by setting down the effect of the LVI Canon of Laodicea which comming after that of Ancyra and taking Order that for the future there should be no Country Bishops made any more provides further that those which were already constituted should do nothing without the consent of the Bishop as likewise the Presbyters to doe nothing without the same Which being the provision which the latter Canon establisheth leaveth it very probable that the other going afore and intending to take order in the same particulars should consist of two clauses correspondent to the same That there were other Churches and Bishops
will seek no other argument but Tertullian though it were possible to finde more For he in his Book De Velandis Virginibus proveth that the Virgins were not exempted from wearing the like because at Corinth whither S. Paul directed this charge they were not And this the property of the Greek seemeth to argue when the Apostle calleth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Cor. XI 4 7. which differs something from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 this signifying that which is onely upon the head and so was the Vaile and therefore the woman is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 v. 10. the other that which is so upon the head that it comes down from the head as to the purpose before the face Neither doe I see any reason why we may not understand the Apostle when he says that the women ought to have power on their head because of the Angels to have respect unto the Legend reported in the Book of Enoch which we see was read in the Church in the Apostles time by the II Epistle of S. Peter and that of S. Jude of those Angels that are reported there to have been seduced by the beauty of women out of Gen. VI. 2. Not as if the Apostle did suppose that report to be true or did intend to give credit to the Book but that by alluding to a passage commonly known he may very well be thought to intimate that a like inconvenience to it not disputing whether true or not for the present might fall out in the Church For so when he saith that the Fathers drunk of the rock that followed them in the Wildernesse 1 Cor. X. 4. it is not I suppose his intent to affirm the truth of that which the Jews still tell and therefore without doubt did tell before S. Pauls time that the water followed the Fathers over mountains and valleys in their journey to the Land of Promise but that the Fathers drank of that water which the Jews say followed them For of the Jews themselves the learned Buxtorfe in his Preface to the Great Lexicon is of opinion that they doe not relate such fables as stories but as Parables and I conceive I have met with some things in their writings that seem to make it probable So again when S. Peter and S. Iude cite the Book of Enoch it is not their intent to credit it or tie us to beleeve that which they cite out of it but to argue thus from it that if those that reade it cannot but applaud the decorum which it keeps making the good Angels so reverent that they would not curse or blaspheme Satan what are we to think of those whom they speak of that blasphemed either Secular Powers as it is commonly understood or which perhaps is more probable the good Angels And thus by the way you see how to answer the reason for which some stick to receive these Epistles for Canonicall Scripture though it hold also in divers of S. Pauls in which are many sayings alleged out of Apocryphall Scriptures And thus the Apostles expression will be most artificially modest supposing his meaning to be onely this that women ought to be vailed because of that which we reade in the Book of Enoch to have befallen the Angels Now in those Countries where the vail was not used at the receiving of Christianity it seems this precept of S. Paul was not held to oblige As for men covering or uncovering their head in Preaching it can be nothing to S. Pauls meaning because uncovering the head in sign of reverence was a custome unknown in his time Thus you see these particulars propounded in the form of precepts notwithstanding do not oblige the Church Those that scruple the superiority of Bishops as a step to bring in Antichrist are not onely to consider that which is said here p. 291. that the Socinians have the same scruple of the substance of Christianity but also that which some of the Sects of this time give out as you see in the beginning of this Review that the making of the Church a Society or Community was the beginning of Antichrist which I have shewed was the act of our Lord and his Apostles And also that which Erastus objecteth unto the Presbyteries that by the means of Excommunication the Papacy which is the Power of Antichrist was advanced Whereby he hath requited all their aspersions upon Episcopacy and shewed all the world that the imputation of Antichrist is a saddle for all Horses that it is argumentum galeatum a reason that will serve to discredit any adversary if it may have passe-port without shewing by the Scriptures wherein the being of Antichrist consisteth And herewith my purpose was to rest contented for the present thinking this enough for this particular cause to answer the objection of Antichrist with But I have considered since that the whole credit of the ancient Church and the benefit that might redound to the resolution of all differences and difficulties from the acknowledgement thereof but in the nature of Historicall truth is utterly lost to us by the means of this prejudice In particular that by the Papers which passed between his late Majesty of happy memory and Master Alexander Hinderson lately published it appears that the whole issue of that dispute ended in it Upon these considerations therefore I have thought fit further to answer by denying the truth of this interpretation of S. Paul and the Apocalypse and to justifie this deniall by propounding so probable a meaning of those Prophesies to another effect as all those that apply them to the Papacy doe shew they could never attain to because they are fain to Prophesie themselves for the meaning of part of them which they confesse is not fulfilled And this I doe here the rather because hereby I shall declare the utmost of that argument which I have used for the Interesse of Secular Powers in Church matters grounded upon the Prophesies of the calling of the Gentiles whereby God declaring his will of bringing States to Christianity declareth by consequence that he calleth them to the same Interesse in matters of Religion which we know was exercised by the Kings of his ancient people And hereof the Apocalypse will make full proof being nothing else but the complement of all the Prophesies of the Old Testament concerning the calling of the Gentiles and therefore fulfilled in the subduing of the Romane Empire to Christianity and the vengeance taken upon the persecutors thereof Which though it cannot be fully proved without expounding all and every part of it to this effect yet because by the main hinges upon which it turns reasonable men may perceive that it cannot nor ever will be expounded to any other purpose I will stop here a while to shew this that men for the future may advise before they act upon supposition of such uncertain conceits I begin with the opening of the first Seale Apoc. VI. 1 2.
to persecute it For if it preserve the power of the Sword in those hands wherein it is found when the Gospel is preached and received any where then of necessity all Rights all goods of this world in the possession whereof the Power of the Sword professes to maintain all Subjects are by the Gospel maintained in those hands that have them by just title of Humane Right And so that which I here suppose is no more then the received Position of Divines That temporall dominion is not founded in Grace For mens Rights Powers and Priviledges in civill Societies are no lesse their own and concern their estate no lesse then their Goods and Possessions Therefore though much more evidence might be brought to prove this from the Apostles commanding Christians to obey secular Powers children their Parents slaves their Masters wives their Husbands and the like according to the Laws but above the Laws for conscience to God obliging thereby all States to maintain Christianity yet this being a point which no party professes to stick at I will hereupon presume to take it for granted But though the Church is not endowed with any coactive power by Divine Right yet by Divine Right and by Patent from God it is endowed with a Power of holding Assemblies for the Common Service of God before any grant of the Powers of the world and against any Interdict of them if so it fall out For the Communion which the Gospel establisheth among Christians is not onely invisible in the heart beleeving the same Faith and disposed to live according to it but also outwardly visible not only in the Profession of the same Faith which may be common to those that communicate in nothing else but also in the Common Service of God For seeing God hath given his Church the Ordinances of his worship wherewith he requireth to be served in common by his Church some of them common both to the Church and the Synagogue that is to Jews and Christians others delivered by the Gospel onely to the Church it is manifest that the Church is priviledged by God because commanded to join in serving him according to those Ordinances And therefore we are not to ask an expresse warrant in Scripture for this whether duty or priviledge because it was always in force among the people of God though not always free from the bondage of strangers The Apostle truly writing to the Hebrews not to fall away from Christianity to Judaisme for the persecutions which the Jews their natives brought upon them which he that will diligently observe shall finde to be the full scope of that Epistle inferreth as a consequence Heb. X. 25. not to forsake the assembling of themselves Shewing that Christianity cannot be professed without so doing though it bring persecution with it As we know the Primitive Christians frequented the Service of God when they were in danger of the Laws because that which the Laws forbade was their Assemblies Wherefore as within severall Commonwealths there are particular Societies Colleges and Corporations subsisting by grant of their Soveraigns And as by the Law of Nations there is a kinde of Society and Commonwealth among those that are bound in the same vessell upon the same voyage which Aristotle cals 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as there is also among them that travell together in the Caravans of the East because they submit to some Rule in regard of some common interess So must we understand the Church to be a humane though not a civill Society Corporation or Commonwealth Not as these last named which consist of Subjects to severall States warranted and protected by the Law of Nations nor as the former by Charter from some Soveraign but by that Law of God whereby all Nations are called to serve him by those Ordinances which he hath established in the Church Therefore the main point of that Charter which makes the Church such a Society or Commonwealth is the right of Assembling and holding such Assemblies without warrant against all Law of the world that forbids it The particulars of it are those rights which God hath given his Church to preserve unity and communion in the celebration of those Ordinances for which it assembleth For since the principles of Christianity professe one Church and that the unity thereof extendeth to this visible communion it is manifest hereby that the will of God is that all Christians communicate with all Christians in all Ordinances of his service when occasion requires a thing which the practice of all sides confesses For though this communion be interrupted with so many Schismes yet since all parties labour to shew that the cause of separation is not on their side they acknowledge all separation to be against Gods Ordinance when they labour to clear themselves of the blame of it In the next place we are to inquire upon what Title of Right the Church is ingraffed into civill Societies and Soveraignties by vertue whereof secular Powers exercise that right to which they pretend in Church matters For I perceive those of the Congregations oftentimes demand what ground we have in Scripture for Nationall Churches Now the term of Nationall Churches it seems is something unproper because as one and the same Nation may be divided into severall Soveraignties and the Churches thereof by consequence subject to severall Soveraigns so may the same Soveraignty contain severall Nations and the Churches of them which in these cases are not properly Nationall Churches and yet are properly that which is signified by the term of Nationall Churches But setting aside this exception I conceive those of the Congregations have reason to make the demand and that the answer to it if once well made will be of consequence to settle many things in debate For that the same right in matters of Religion is due to Christian Princes and States which the Kings of Iudah practised under the Law of it self no way appears because of the generall difference between the Law and the Gospel To which may be added to tie the knot faster that there is this clear difference between them in the particular in hand that the Law was confined to one People as being the condition of that Covenant whereby God undertook to give them the Land of promise and to maintain them in the free and happy possession of it they undertaking on their part to serve him and rule themselves by it But the Gospell is the New Covenant by which God undertakes to give life everlasting to those that take up Christs Crosse to perform it The persons therefore of whom the Church consists being of all Nations all of them of equall interesse in that wherein they communicate and therefore in the Rules by which It is manifest that no Soveraign can have more interesse then another in creating that right by vertue whereof the Subjects of severall Soveraignties communicate Otherwise the Unity of the Church must needs suffer one Soveraign prescribing that as
is a sin unto death saith the Apostle 1 John V. 16. I say not that ye pray for it This is commonly understood of denying Gods truth against that light which convinceth the conscience Which if it were true the Apostles precept could never come into practice seeing no man can know unlesse by Revelation against what light his Neighbour sinneth But the Novatians at the Councell of Nice as Socrates and Sozomenus both report Eccles Hist I. 7. I. 23. answering Constantine that they refused Penance onely to those that sinned the sin unto death doe give us to understand that S. John was understood by the Church not to command that Apostates be admitted to Penance And so also Tertullian in many places of his Book de Pudicit as cap. XIV argueth from this place that Penance was not to be granted to Adulterers Which sheweth that the Church understood the place in the same sense though it admitted not his consequence So also Origen in Mat. XVIII 18. Tract VII I was long doubtful of the truth of this Interpretation because the Apostle premising If any man see his brother sin a sin not unto death let him ask of God seems to speak of private Prayers of particular persons But the words of S. James V. 16. have cleared me of this doubt Confesse your sins one to another saith he and pray for one another that ye may be healed In which words I make no doubt but he speaketh of publique Penance For having premised that the Presbyters be sent for to the sick that they confesse their sins to the Presbyters that they pray for them anointing them with oil that their sins may be forgiven them to shew neverthelesse that according to the custome aforesaid in case they recovered they were to stand bound to Penance he addeth Confesse your sins to one another to signifie that this Confession and Penance remained due before the Church as we understand by the XII Canon of Nice that the practice was so long afterwards And this is proved by the precept of both Apostles to pray for one another For it is manifest that there were two means to obtain remission of sins in this case the Humiliation which the Church prescribed and the Penitent performed and the Prayers of the Church Which S. John prescribeth not to be granted to Apostates The very same is the meaning of the Apostle to the Hebrews VI. 6. when he pronounceth it unpossible that those that fall away be renued again to Repentance For as they that stood for Baptisme when they were catechized in Christianity were properly said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be instructed or dedicated to Repentance because of the Repentance from dead works which they professed so they that forfeited their Christianity by violating the contract of Baptisme are no lesse properly said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be renewed instructed and dedicated again to Repentance And the Apostles reason agrees For because the earth that receives rain and renders no fruit is near the curse therefore the Church will not easily beleeve that such a one shall lightly obtain of God the grace to become a sincere Christian And therefore the Apostle says not that it is unpossible that such a one should repent but that he should be instructed again to repentance to wit by the Church As the Novatians answered Constantine that they remitted such persons to God not prejudicing their salvation but not admitting them to the means of Reconciliation by the Church And herewith agreeth the example of Esau used by the Apostle again XII 17. saying that he found not place of Repentance alluding to that roome in the Church where Penitents were placed apart by themselves And again X. 26. the allusion which he maketh to the custome under the Law understood by the Hebrews to whom he writeth consisteth in this that as there was no sacrifice to be made for Apostates though for Ethnicks for this was the use of the Law as we understand by Moses Maimoni in the Title of Dressing Oblations cap. III. num 3 5. So the Christian Sacrifice of the Prayers of the Church was not to be offered for those that had renounced Christianity If it be thus you will ask What was the fault of the Novatians seeing they understood this Text right And my answer is that neverthelesse they are Hereticks extending the name of Hereticks to those whom now we call Schismaticks as I have shewed you in the little Discourse pag. 197. that it is often used For S. John as he commands not so he forbids not that they be admitted to Penance the other Apostle tels them it is impossible to let them know that they must not expect it But neither says that the Church could not give it When therefore the Church to preserve Unity was necessitated to grant it as we see by S. Cyprian the Novatians were no lesse Schismaticks in making separation upon the quarrell though perhaps the reason be not urged by their adversaries then if they had understood the Text amisse The Unity of the Church being of more moment then much understanding in the Scriptures And so perhaps S. Pauls words will belong to this purpose 1 Tim. 5. 19. as not onely the Socinians of late but Pacianus among the Ancients Paraen ad Poenitentiam and Matthaeus Galenus among modern Writers do expound them To wit that when he saith Lay hands suddenly on no men nor partake of other mens sins he leaves it to Timothies judgement whom to admit whom not to admit to Penance Because this Blessing with Imposition of hands was not the mark of Absolution but of admission to Penance as well as the ceremony of Ordinations And though this Text of the Apostle be understood in particular of Ordinations yet by the same reason which he allegeth it is to be extended to all Acts of the Church that are blessed by the Prayers of the Church with Imposition of Hands For if Timothy by Imposing hands upon those whom he Ordains become accessary to their sins if they be unfit to be Ordained by the same reason if he Impose Hands that is grant Penance unto them that are not fit for it he becomes accessory to the sins which they commit by being admitted to it Imposition of Hands being nothing else but a ceremony of that Benediction which signifieth that those Acts to which it is granted are allowed and authorized by the publique Power of the Church So Imposition of Hands in Confirmation is the admission of him that is confirmed to the communion of the Visible Church In Penance the restoring of him In Ordination to the exercise of this or that function in the Church Prayer over the sick which the Apostle commands James V. 14. and our Lord in the Gospel made with Imposition of Hands signified the admitting of the sick to Penance And it is said that in some Eastern Churches to this day mariages are blessed with Imposition of Hands in signification that the Church
alloweth of them which as it was alwayes the right of the Church to doe as I shall observe in another place so it appeareth so to be in that mariage was never celebrated among Christians without the Prayers of the Church And this observation I insist upon the more chearfully because it much strengtheneth the argument which the Church maketh for the Baptism of Infants from the Act of our Saviour in the Gospel when he blessed the Infants with Imposition of Hands For if all Imposition of Hands be an act of the publique Power of the Church allowing that which is done with it then can this Imposition of Hands signifie no lesse then that those to whom our Lord granteth it belong to his Kingdome of the Visible Church One little objection there lies against this from the incestuous person at Corinth whom S. Paul in his second Epistle seems to readmit to communion his crime being as deep as Adultery which we say the rigor of Apostolicall Discipline admitted not to Penance To which I have divers things to answer That this cannot be objected but by him that acknowledges that he was excommunicate by the former Epistle That Tertullian in his Book de Pudicitiâ disputes at large that it is not the same case which is spoken of in both Epistles That the crime here specified perhaps is not of the number of those which from the beginning were excluded from Penance But waving all this as I excepted two cases in which men were baptized without regular triall so supposing the Rule to take hold in this case it is no inconvenience to grant that S. Paul might wave the rigor of Discipline so setled as supposing there might be cause to wave it If this opinion seem new my purpose requires but these two Points that the Penance practised by the ancient Church supposed Excommunication which it only abateth and that it was instituted by the Apostles and for that there is enough said I suppose even to them that beleeve not that the Apostles excluded any kinde of crimes from Penance Besides that of S. Paul blaming the Corinthians that they were puffed up and had not rather lamented that he that had done the evil might be put from among them 1 Cor. V. 2. And again fearing that when he returned he should be forced to lament many 2 Cor. XII 21. Which if we compare with the Primitive solemnity of Excommunication which by the constitutions of the Apostles II. 16. and other ways we understand was to put the person out of the Church doors with mourning it will appear that Epiphanius is in the right in expounding this later Text to this purpose Haer. LIX num 5. The power of Excommunication then by all this is no more then the necessary consequence of the Power of admitting to Communion by Baptism Which if it imply a contract with the Church to live according to the rule of Christianity then it is forfeit to him that evidently does that which cannot stand with that rule and the Church not tied to restore it but as the person can give satisfaction to observe it for the future Now I will make short work with Erastus his long labour to prove that there is no Excommunication commanded by the Law I yeeld it And make a consequence which will be thought a strange one But I have it from the speculation of Origen in Levit Hom. XI and others why the Church should onely be inabled to Excommunicate whereas the Synagogue was inabled to put to death From the observation of S. Augustine Quaest in Deuteronom V. 38. de Fide Operibus cap. VI. and others that Excommunication in the Church is the same that the power of life and death in the Synagogue My argument is then that the Church is to have the power of Excommunication because the Synagogue had the power of life and death And the reason of the consequence this Because as the Law being the condition of the Covenant by which the benefit of the Commonwealth of Israel was due inabled to put to death such as destroyed it So the Gospel being the condition of the Covenant that makes men denizons of the spirituall Jerusalem must inable to put them from the society thereof that forfeited it It is not my intent hereby to say that there was no Excommunication under the Law For I doe beleeve that we have mention of it in Ezra X. 8. grounded if I mistake not upon the Commission of the King of Persia recorded Ezr. VII 26. for that which is here called rooting out seems to be the same that is called in the other place dividing from the Synagogue of the Captives Being indeed a kinde of temporall Outlawry to which is joined confiscation of Goods For so saith Luther truly that the greater Excommunication among Christians is every where a temporall punishment to wit in regard of some temporall punishment attending it in Christian States which in Christianity is accidentall by Act of those States in Judaisme essentiall so long as those temporall advantages which were the essentiall condition of the Law were not forfeited And this without doubt is the same punishment which the Gospels call putting out of the Synagogue Though I cannot say so peremptory for the temporall effects of it Which severall Soveraigns could easily limit to severall terms For the right that Ezra might have to introduce this penalty is clear by the Law of Deut. XVII 12. which inabling to put them to death that obeyed not the Synagogue inabled to Excommunicate to Banish to Outlaw them much more But as we see the Romanes allowed them not the power of life and death which the Persians granted them so I am not to grant that putting out of the Synagogue in the Gospel implieth the extinguishing of the civill being of any Jew The Talmud Doctors say that those that were under the greater Excommunication were to dwell in a cotage alone and to have meat and drink brought them till they died Arba Turim or Shulchan Auroh in Jore Dea Hilcoth Niddui Voherem A speculation sutable to their condition in their dispersions which no man is bound to beleeve how far it was in force and practice But suppose the Synagogue in the same condition with the Church afore Constantine injoying no privilege but to serve God according to the Law as the Church according to the Gospel And then as the Synagogue must always have power to excommunicate which had power to put to death so I say is the Church inabled by our Lord to doe what I have shewed the Apostles did doe by Mat. XVIII 18. I yeeld that the terms of binding and loosing are used by the Jews to signifie the declaring of what is prohibited and permitted by the Law But I yeeld not that it can be so understood here because the ground of this declaration ceaseth under the Gospel being derived from the sixe hundreth and thirteen Precepts of the Law and from the power
must needs remain distinct bodies when the Church is ingraffed into the State and the same Christians members of both in regard of the Relations Rights and Obligations which in the same persons remain distinct according to the distinct Societies and qualities of severall persons in the same Therefore as I said in the beginning that no Christian as a Christian can challenge any temporall Right by his Christianity which the State wherein he is called to be a Christian giveth him not So on the other side no man by his rank in any State is invested with any power proceeding from the foundation of the Church as it is the Church So that which is true in the parts holds in the whole The Church is indowed with no temporall Right therefore the State is indowed with no Ecclesiasticall Right though it hath great Right in Ecclesiasticall matters of which in due time For all this Right supposeth the Church already established by that power on which it standeth and so must maintain it upon the same terms which it findeth The homage which the Church paieth to God for the protection of the State is not to betray the Right founded on the expresse Charter of God to Powers subsisting by the works of his mediate Providence But to subdue subjects to that obedience for conscience which the State exacteth by force For there is necessarily this difference between the principles upon which the Church and civill Communities subsist The Charter of the one is revealed by Grace The others stand upon the Laws of Nature and Nations and acts which Providence inables men to doe agreeable to the same Therefore as no State stands by the Gospel so no right setled by the Gospel can belong to any State or person as a member of any State Besides Kingdomes and States have their severall bounds Many Soveraignties are contained in Christendom whereas the Church is by Gods Ordinance one Visible Society of all Christians Now it is manifest first that there are some things which equally concern the whole Church and all parts of it Secondly that in things which concern the whole Church no part thereof in any State or Kingdome can be concluded by that State or Kingdome Again the Apostles Rule is 1 Cor. VII 24. that every man abide in the State wherein he is called to be a Christian And this proves that no Christian can challenge any temporall right by his Christianity because States subsist before they are Christian Therefore it proves also that no State or member of it is by being such endowed with any Right grounded on the constitution of the Church And therefore seeing the Church subsisted three hundreth years before any State professed Christianity whatsoever Rights it used during that time manifestly it ought therefore still to use and enjoy this being the most pertinent evidence to shew the bounds of it In particular as to the Power of the Keys and Excommunication the act of it seeing the intent of it is to admit into the Visible Society of the Church upon presumption that by the right use of it sinne is taken away and the person admitted to the invisible Society of life everlasting and seeing no Common-wealth no quality in any pretendeth to take away sinne or to judge in whom it is taken away it followeth that no man whatsoever by virtue of any rank in any State is qualified to manage this Power or can presume so to doe CHAP. II. That the whole Bodies of Christians contained in severall Cities and the Territories of them make severall Churches depending upon the Churches of greater Cities Therefore the People is not endowed with the Chief Power in any Church HAving seen thus farre upon what Patent the community of the Church is established and the Power thereof founded it will be necessary farther to dispute in what Hands this Power is deposited by the Apostles and what persons are trusted with it Which point before it be voided we can neither determine what Form of Government God hath ordained in his Church nor how it may be exercised in Christian States without crossing the Right which they challenge in Church matters The Presbyterians having designed severall Presbyteries for the Government of severall Congregations that assemble together for the service of God and having cried up this design for the Throne of Christ the new Jerusalem and the Kingdome of God seeing there is no question made that where there is a Presbytery there is a Church and where there is a Church there is the Power of the Keyes which God hath endowed his Church with seem to have given those of the Congregations occasion to inferre that every Congregation that assembles for the common Service of God is by consequence to have the Power of the Keys to excommunicate whereunto adding another principle that the chief Power of every Congregation is in the People it follows that they are all absolute without dependence on the rest of the Church But all this while both run away with a presumption for which they can shew us never a title or syllable of evidence in all the Scriptures For Presbyters and Presbyteries they may shew us in the Scriptures and no grandmercy unlesse they can shew us how to understand them better then they doe But that every congregation that assembles together to serve God in common should have a company of Presbyters for the Government of it is a thing so contrary to all the Intelligence we have concerning the State of the Church either under the Apostles themselves by the Scriptures or any Primitive Records of the Church or in the succeeding ages of the Church that they must demand of all men to renounce common sense and all Faith of Historicall as well as Divine Truth before they can beleeve it Whereas by the same evidence by which the rest of Christianity is conveyed and commended unto us that is by the Scriptures interpreted by the Originall and universall practise of the Church it will appear that the Apostles planting Christianity not onely in those Cities where they preached most because there the harvest was greatest but in the Countries adjoining which by the custome of all civile Nations every where resort to their Cities for Justice designed the severall Bodies of Christians that should be found abiding in severall Cities and the Territories of the same to make severall Churches the Government whereof they planted in those Cities both for themselves and for the Countries that resorted unto them And as in the civile Government of all civile people particular Cities depend upon Mother Cities Heads of Provinces Governments or Soveraignties so the Churches of particular Cities to depend upon the Churches of those Mother Cities that by the union and correspondence of those Churches drawing along with them all the Churches under them the unity of the whole Church consisting of them all might be established and entertained This is the effect of that observation which I advanced in the little
So Acts XV. 35. Paul and Barnabas continued at Antiochia Teaching that is the Church and preaching the Gospell to wit to Unbeleevers And with the same difference it is said of our Lord in the Gospels Mat. IV. 23. IX 35. XI 1. that he Taught to wit as a Prophet who had always the Privilege of Teaching in the Synagogues as his Disciples also by the same Title and preached the Gospel as sent by God for that extraordinary purpose But though the Apostles being sent to preach the Gospel were by consequence to Teach the Church yet is it never said that Presbyters being appointed to Teach the Church were also called to Preach the Gospel For their Relation being to Churches as much perswaded of the truth of Christianity as themselves they needed no such qualities as might make evidence that they were sent immediately from God to convince the world of the truth of it But onely such understanding in it above the people of their respective Churches as might inable them to conduct the People thereof in it And therefore what hindreth their Inferiours also to be imploied in Teaching the Church which now we call Preaching For if our Lord and his Apostles imploied their respective Ministers in Teaching those whom they could not attend upon themselves and in all Churches after the example of the first at Jerusalem Deacons or Ministers were Ordained to wait upon the Bishops and Presbyters of the same in the execution of their Office is it not the same thing for Bishops and Presbyters to imploy their Deacons in Preaching to those of their own Church as it is for the Apostles at Jerusalem to imploy S. Steven and S. Philip S. Paul Timothy or Erastus or Tychieus or Epaphroditus in Preaching to Unbeleevers for there remains as much difference in their Charges as in their Chiefs from whom they are imploied Besides who is able to prove by the Scriptures that those who are called Doctors 1 Cor. XII 28. Eph. IV. 12. were all of them men Ordained by Imposition of Hands as Presbyters Between whom and Evangelists there seems to be the same difference as between 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 on the one part and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 on the other this relating to Assemblies of Christians and importing the instructing of them in the right understanding of that Christianity which they already beleeve and professe that to those who are not Christians as undertaking to reduce them to Christianity which supposeth Commission and abilities answerable Further the supposed S. Ambrose upon Eph. IV. 12. comparing Evangelists with Deacons says that Deacons also taught without a Chair The custome of the Church then admitting them to Preach upon occasions but not sitting as the Bishop and Presbyters did Because they did not sit but stand in the Church as the Angels in the Revelation about the Presbyters Chairs as attending upon their commands And what is this but the same which you finde in use in the Synagogue Acts XIII 14. where Paul stands up to Preach whereas our Lord sits down like a Doctor when he goes to Preach in the Synagogue Luc. IV. 20 by which it appears that it was of custome drawn from the Synagogue for Deacons to Preach in the Church And indeed in the last place the practice of the Synagogue together with the reason of it and the Primitive practice of the Church agreeable to the same seems to make as full proof as a reasonable man can desire in a matter of this nature For in the Synagogue it is so manifest that Jurisdiction is above Doctrine and the Power of Governing above the Office of Teaching that the Prophets themselves who were Doctors of the Law immediately sent by God were subject to the Power and Jurisdiction of the Consistory setled by the Law Deut. XVII 8 12. So that though by the Law of Deut. XVIII 18. the whole Synagogue are subject to Gods curse if they obey not the Prophet by whom God speaks yet because it was possible that false Prophets might pretend to be sent from God therefore in the next words of the Law a mark is given to discern who was sent by God and who was not and he that pretended to be sent by God and was not being tried by this mark became liable to capitall punishment by the Law of Deut. XVII 8 12. for teaching contrary to that which the Consistory taught So that by this Law the Consistory hath Power of life and death even over Prophets whom they judged to teach things destructive to the Law And by this Power not usurped but abused our Lord also suffered under Pilate according to that which he had said in respect of this Power It is unpossible that a Prophet perish out of Jerusalem Luc. XIII 33. that is not condemned by the Consistory The Successors of the Prophets after the Spirit of Prophesie ceased that is their Scribes and Wise men and Doctors received the Privilege of Teaching the Law from their Masters For whosoever had learned in the School of a Doctor till forty years of age was thenceforth counted a Doctor as the Talmud Doctors determine and thereby privileged to decide matters of Conscience in the Law provided that he did it not while his Master lived and where he was R. Solomon upon the Title Sanedrin X. 2. Maimoni in the Title of Learning the Law cap. V. But if I mistake not in our Lords time they were counted so at thirty years of age For Irenaeus II. 39. says that our Lord began to Preach at the same age at which men were counted Doctors manifestly referring to this Rule of the Synagogue And this is the Reason which the Church afterwards followed in all those Canons by which it is forbidden that any man be made Presbyter being lesse then thirty years of age because at those years our Lord and S. John Baptist began to Preach though by an extraordinary Commission yet according to the custome of the Synagogue in their time saith Irenaeus But by Imposition of Hands they were further qualified to sit and Judge in their Consistories Whereby we see how Jurisdiction includes Doctrine but is not included in it So that the Metaphoricall Jurisdiction of the Church by the power of the Keys belonging as all sides agree to Presbyters it is agreeable to the perpetuall custome of Gods people that the Office of Teaching be communicable to their inferiours But with such dependence upon the Bishop and Presbyters as may be correspondent to the Rule of the Synagogue In which he that taught any thing as of Gods Law contrary to the Consistory and persisted in it was liable to capitall punishment by the Law so often quoted of Deut. XVII 8 Sanedrin X. 2. Maimoni in the Title of Rebels cap. III. And therefore he that Teaches contrary to the Church it behoveth that he be liable to Excommunication from it And upon these terms I suppose those of the Congregations will give
out of the Scriptures it will be easie to drive a worse Trade of Preaching then ever Priests did of private Masses The one tending only to feed themselves the other to turn the good order of the world which is the Harbour of the Church into publique confusion to feed themselves the profaning of Gods Ordinance being common to both And if the taking away of private Masses must be by turning the Eucharist out of doors saving twice or thrice a year for fashions sake it is but Lycurgus his Reformation to stock up the Vines for fear men be drunk with the wine The Church of England is clear in this businesse The Order whereof as it earnestly sighs and grones toward the restoring of publique Penance the onely mean established by the Apostles to maintain the Church in estate to communicate continually so it recommendeth the continuall celebration of the Eucharist at all the more solemne Assemblies of Lords days and Festivals As for the Sermon it is to be when it can be had and were it now abated when such Sermons cannot bee had as were fitting it is easie to undertake that there would be room enough left for the celebration of the Eucharist In the mean time the Reformers of this Age had they considered so well as it behoved them what they undertook should easily have found that the continuall celebration of the Eucharist at all the more solemne Assemblies of the Church and the Discipline of Penance to maintain the people in a disposition fit to communicate in it is such a point of Reformation in the Church that without restoring it all the rest is but meer noise and pretence if not mischief Now the reason why the celebration of the Eucharist is reserved to Presbyters alone in consequence to the premises is very reasonable and will be effectuall to shew that it is common to all Presbyters and therefore that there is no such thing as Lay Elders For seeing all agree that Presbyters have their share in the Power of the Keys though the Chief Interess in it be the Bishops according to the Doctrine of the Church and seeing the work of this Power is to admit to the Prayers of the Church as S. John sheweth when he describeth Excommunication by not praying for the sins of the excommunicate and seeing it appeareth by S. James that the Prayers of the Church for the sins of them whom the Church prayeth for are the Prayers of the Presbyters what can we conceive more reasonable and consequent to the premises then that the Power of the Keys is convertible with the Office of celebrating the Eucharist belonging to the Bishop and Presbyters by virtue of it For what can be more agreeable then that the Prayers of the Church which the Eucharist is celebrated with be offered by those that are to discern who is to be admitted who excluded from the same This is the meaning of Josephus the Jew in Epiphanius against the Ebionites where being baptized by the Bishop of Tiberias at his parting he gives him money saying Offer for me for it is written Whose sins ye remit they are remitted and whose sins ye retain they are retained Expressing thereby the sense of Primitive Christians who when they were admitted to the Prayers of the Church which the Eucharist is offered to God with made account thereby that the Power of the Keys was passed and continually did passe upon them to the remission of sins Whereupon we see that it is an ordinary censure of the ancient Canons that he which did so or so his oblations be not received that is that he be out of the number of those for whom the Prayers of the Church are made which the Eucharist is offered with Therefore Ignatius thus prosecuteth the words last quoted He that is without the Sanctuary saith he comes short of the Bread of God For if the Prayer of one or two be so forcible with God what shall we think of the Prayer of the Bishop and the whole Church For the efficacy of the Prayers of the Church dependeth upon the Unity of the Church And the Power of the Keys is that which containeth that Unity It is therefore agreeable that those Prayers which are of this efficacy be the Prayers of them whom this Unity and the Power which preserves it is trusted with And for this reason though all Christians be Priests as the Scripture says 1 Pet. II. 5. Apoc. I. 6. by a far better title then Moses promises the Israelites Ex. XIX 6. The Sacrifice of Prayer being the act of the whole Church Yet notwithstanding it is by good right that Bishops and Presbyters are called Sacerdotes or Sacrificers in regard of the same Sacrifice of Prayer and Thanksgiving for which all Christians are called Sacrificers That is to say by way of excellence because that which is the act of all is by ordinance of the Apostles passed upon the whole Church reserved to be executed and ministred by them whom that Power which preserveth that Unity which inforceth the Prayers of the Church is trusted with He that refuseth this reason as built upon consequences that convince not must by consequence acknowledge that the celebration of the Eucharist is peculiar to Presbyters meerly by universall and perpetuall practice of the Church derived from the Order setled by the Apostles Which whether those of the Presbyteries will admit I leave to themselves to advise For as for their pretense that the Ministery of both Sacraments is convertible with the Office of Preaching upon which they style their Pastors or Preaching Elders Ministers of the Word and Sacraments it appears to be as void of any ground from the Scriptures as it is wide from the originall and Universall practice of the Church The Ministery of the Word being the Office of Apostles and Evangelists according to the Scriptures The Ministery of Baptism and Preaching communicable to Deacons and possibly to Lay men onely the celebration of the Eucharist proper to the Power of the Keys in Bishops and Presbyters But putting all the reasons that here are advanced to compromise yet out of the premises we have two effectuall arguments to convince the nullity of Lay Elders The first from the manner of sitting in the Church In as much as it hath been shewed that the Order and custome of it is to be derived from the Apostles themselves as being in use in their time For if the manner of their sitting in the Church were so distinguished that all the Presbyters sate in one Rank in the uppermost Room with the Bishop in the midst that is in the Head of them his Seat advanced above theirs as S. Hierome witnesseth of the Bishops of Alexandria from S. Mark from which manner of sitting they are called by the Greek Fathers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as in the Scriptures 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and in Tertullian praesidentes how can common sense desire better evidence that there are but two qualities
to oblige superiours to that integrity by making the proceedings manifest and so to preserve the Unity of the Church I say not that these times are capable of such satisfaction upon the like terms as them But from this practice under the Apostles I shall easily grant the people an Interesse in such things as may concern their particular Congregations of excepting against such proceedings as can appear to them to be against any Rule of the Scripture or of the whole Church For this Interesse it is upon which the people is demanded in the Church of England what they have to say against Ordinations and Mariages to be made And if their satisfaction in matter of Penance were to be returned it would be no more then the same reason inferres Especially because it hath been shewed that the prayers of the People or of the Church is one part of the means to take away sinne by the Keys of the Church the other being the Humiliation of the Penitent according to that Order and measure which the Bishop and Presbyters shall prescribe James V. 14 15. 2 Cor. XII 20 21. Mat. XVIII 21. 1 John V. 16. And if this Interesse were made effectuall by the Laws of Christian States and Kingdomes to the hindrance of such proceedings wherein the Power of the Church may be abused the Church shall have no cause to complain But that the Power should be taken from the Church because the Laws of the State are not so good as they might be is as unjust and pernicious a medicine as to put the Chief Power in the hands of the People For seeing it hath been demonstrated that as it was the custome to passe such Acts at the Assemblies of the whole Church so was it also to advise and resolve upon them at the Consistories of the Clergy it is manifest that the suffrage of the People often mentioned in Church Writers was not to resolve but to passe what was resolved afore because nothing appeared in barre to it For the Interesse of the People extending no further then their own Church and it being impossible that all the Christians within the Territories of Cities belonging to the respective Churches should all assemble at once it is manifest none of these matters could be resolved by number of Votes and therefore that the Power was not in the People but a Right to be satisfied of the right use of the Power by those that had it Which how it may be made effectuall to the benefit of the People in a Christian Church and State is not for me to determine But by virtue of this Right it is that as Justellus in his Notes upon the Greek and Africane Canons hath observed to us especially out of the Records of the Churches of Africk and of the West for divers Ages the Best of the People who as he shews were called Seniores Presbyteri Ecclesiarum were admitted to assist at the passing of the publique Acts of those Churches In all which as there is nothing to be found like the Power of the Keys which Lay Elders are created to manage So he that will consider the interesse in which it appears they did intervene comparing it with the intolerable trouble which the concurrence of the People was found to breed when the number of Christians was increased by the Emperours professing Christianity will easily judge that it was nothing else but the Interesse of the People which in succeeding ages was referred to some persons chosen out of them to manage in the publique Acts of the Church And this custome is sutable enough with the Office of Church-wardens in the Church of England if it had been established as well in the Mother and Cathedrall as in the Parish Churches CHAP. IV. Secular Persons as such have no Ecclesiasticall Power but may have Soveraign Power in Ecclesiasticall matters The Right of giving Laws to the Church and the Right of Tithes Oblations and all Consecrations how Originall how Accessory to the Church The Interesse of Secular Powers in all parts of the Power of the Church THese things thus determined and the whole Power of the Church thus limited in Bishops and Presbyters with reservation of the Interesse of the People specified it follows necessarily that no Secular person whatsoever endowed with Soveraign or subordinate Power in any State is thereby endowed with any part of this Ecclesiasticall Power hitherto described Because it hath been premised for a Principle here to be reassumed that no State by professing Christianity and the protection thereof can purchase to it self or defeat the Church of any part of the Right whereof it stands possessed by the Originall institution of our Lord and his Apostles and therefore no person indowed with any quality subsisting by the Constitution of any State can challenge any Right that subsisteth by the Constitution of the Church and therefore belongeth to some person qualified by the same For Ecclesiasticall Power I understand here to be onely that which subsisteth by the Constitution of the Church And therefore all by Divine Right to all that acknowledge no humane authority capable of founding the Church And therefore by Divine Right invested in the Persons of them that have received it mediately or immediately from the Apostles seeing it is no ways imaginable how any man can stand lawfully possessed of that Power which is effectually in some body else from whom he claimeth not And therefore not to be propagated but by the free act of them that so have it But I intend not hereby to exclude Secular Powers from their Right in Church matters But intend to distinguish between Ecclesiasticall Power and Power in Ecclesiasticall matters and these to distinguish by the originall from whence they both proceed because so we shall be best able to make an estimate of the effect which both of them are able to produce according to the saying observed afore that the water rises no higher then it descended afore For if by Ecclesiasticall Power we mean that which arises from the Constitution of the Church it is not possible that by any quality not depending on the same any man should be inabled to any act that doth But if Power in matters of Religion be a Power necessary to the subsistence of all States then have Christian States that Power in the disposing of Christianity which all States in generall have in the disposing of those things which concern that Religion which they suppose and professe And this to prove I will not be much beholding to the Records of Histories or to the opinions and reasons of Philosophers Seeing common sense alone is able to shew us that there is not any State professing any Religion that does not exercise an interesse in disposing of matters of Religion as they have relation to the publique peace tranquillity and happinesse of that people The Power of disposing in matters of Religion is one part and that a very considerable one of that publique
Power wherein Soveraignty consists which subordinate Powers enjoy not by any title but as derived from the Soveraign Wherefore having premised for a principle in the beginning that Christianity makes no alteration in the state of civile Societies but establishes all in the same Right whereof they stand possest when they come to imbrace Christianity I must inferre that the publique Powers of Christian States have as good Right to the disposing of matters of Christianity so that according to the institution of Christ nothing done by the Church may prove prejudiciall to the State as any Soveraign Power that is not Christian hath in the disposing of matters of that Religion which they professe For seeing it is part of the profession of Christianity to confirm and establish not to question or unsettle any thing which is done by civile Justice in any State whatsoever secular Powers shall doe towards maintaining the State of this world in tranquillity cannot be prejudiciall to Christianity rightly understood Neither can it be true Christianity which cannot stand with the course of true civile Justice It hath been effectually proved by Church Writers against the Gentiles that supposing them not to beleeve the Christian Faith notwithstanding they cannot with civile Justice persecute the Christians And all upon this score that Christianity containeth nothing prejudiciall to civile Society but all advantageous But though the Christian Religion be grounded upon truth indeed revealed from God yet Religion in generall is a morall virtue and part of the profession of all civile Nations In so much as that people which should professe to fear no God would thereby put themselves out of the protection of the Law of Nations and give all civile people a Right and Title to seek to subdue them for their good and to constrain them to that which the light of nature is able to demonstrate to be both true and due For how can any of them expect Faith and Troth in civile commerce from them that acknowledge no reason for it Or how can they be thought to acknowledge any reason for it that acknowledge no God to punish the contrary Or how can they be but enemies of mankinde from whom that cannot be expected But in Christianity there is that particularity which I declared afore that God hath declared his will and pleasure to be that it be received into the protection of all Kingdomes and Commonwealths Wherefore it is further the will of God that secular Powers that are Christian act in the protection of Christianity not onely as secular Powers but as Christians And by consequence that they hold themselves obliged to the maintenance of all parts of Christianity That is whatsoever is of Divine Right in the Profession and Exercise of it But it is very well said otherwise that this whole Right of secular Powers in Ecclesiasticall matters is not destructive but cumulative That is that it is not able to defeat or abolish any part of that Power which by the Constitution of the Church is setled upon Ecclesiastical persons but stands obliged to the maintenance and protection of it For seeing this Power in the persons endowed with it by the Constitution of the Church is a very considerable part of that Right which God hath established in his Church it follows necessarily that no Power ordained to the maintenance of all parts thereof can extinguish this And truly he that advises but with his own common sense shall easily perceive that Ecclesiasticall Power may be able to preserve Order and Discipline in the Church by it self so long as the World that is the State professes not Christianity as we see it was before the Romane Empire was Christian But when the State professes Christianity it cannot be imagined that persons qualified by the State will ever willingly submit to acknowledge and ratifie the Power of the Church in all the acts and proceedings thereof unlesse the coactive Power of the Soveraign inforce it All States therefore have Soveraign Power as well in matters of Christian Religion as in other points of Soveraignty That is they are able to do all acts of Soveraign Power in Church matters To give Laws as well concerning matters of Religion as civile affairs To exercise Jurisdiction about Ecclesiasticall causes To Command in the same which seems to be the most eminent act of Soveraignty seeing that giving of Laws and Jurisdiction are but particulars of that generall the one that is giving Laws in Generals the other that is Jurisdiction in particular causes And both of them tending to limit that Power of Command or Empire which otherwise is absolute in the disposition and will of the Soveraign And therefore the most civile people that ever was the Romanes have denominated Soveraignty by this act of Command Imperium or Empire But all these acts of Soveraign Power in Church matters being distinguished from the like acts of Ecclesiasticall Power not by their materiall but formall objects that is not by the Things Persons or Causes in which but by the reasons upon which and the intents to which they are exercised must needs leave the Powers of the Church intire to all purposes as it finds the same in those that have it by the constitutions of the Church Here are two Points of the Power of the Church to be setled before we go any further Not because of any affinity or dependence between them but because the reason is the same which causes the difficulty in both Whether there be an Originall Power in the Church to give Laws as to the Society of the Church Whether there be an Originall Right in the Church to Tithes Oblations First-fruits and generally to all consecrate things seems to most men more then disputable because the accessory acts of secular Powers which in all Christian States have made the Laws by which Christianity is exercised the Laws of those severall States have established the endowment of the Church upon it by that coactive Power which they onely in Chief are endowed with being most visible to common sense seem to have obscured the Originall Right of the Church in both particulars Over and besides all this those of the Congregations deny the Church all Power of giving Laws Rules Canons or however you please to call them to the Church For to this purpose they make all Congregations absolute and Soveraign that nothing be done in the Church without the consent of every member of it Not acknowledging so much as that Rule which all humane Society besides acknowledges the whole to be bound by the act of the greater part But requiring that every mans conscience be satisfied in every thing that the Church does unlesse some happily appear wilfull whom by way of penalty they neglect for that time As for those of the Presbyteries I cannot deny that they grant the Church this Power But it seems upon condition that it may rest in themselves For to the Laws of this Church in which they received
and the Sacrifice by the Altar and so all consecration tended to communion with God by the participation of Sacrifices offered to God So having shewed how the Gospel ordaineth that Christians also communicate with God in the Sacrifice of the Crosse by the Sacrament of the Eucharist by the same reason it follows that what is given to build and repair and beautifie Churches to maintain the Assemblies of the Church to support them that minister Gods Ordinances to inable the poor to attend upon the Communion of the same is consecrated by the Altar of the Crosse and the Sacrifice thereof represented in the Eucharist being the chief part of that service which the Church tenders to God and that which is peculiar to Christianity S. Chrysostome truly construes the reason why our Lord would not have Mary Magdalen reproved for pouring out such an expense on his body to no purpose which might have done so much good among the poore Mat. XXVI 11. to be this that Christians might understand themselves to be bound as well to maintain the means of Gods service as the poor that attend upon it And let any man shew me the difference of the sin of Achan from that of Ananias and Sapphira For as he became accursed by touching that which was deputed to maintain Gods service and was so before he denied it So no man can imagine that these had been guiltlesse if they had confessed For they are charged by the Apostle not only for lying to the Holy Ghost but for withdrawing part of the price Acts V. 3. And therefore by the premises having shewed that the goods which were laid down at the Apostles feet were thereby affected applied and deputed to maintain the Body of the Church in the daily Communion of the Service of God especially of the Eucharist which they frequented Acts II. 42 46. it followeth that they were consecrated to God by the Altar as all Oblations of Christians to the maintenance of Gods service are by the Sacrifice of the Crosse represented and commemorated in the Sacrament of the Eucharist being the chief part of the service of God under the Gospel and that which is onely proper to Christians And by consequence that which is consecrate to the service of God under the Gospel is anathema for the same reason as under the Law because they are accursed that take upon them to apply it to any other use These things premised it will not be difficult to determine the limits of Soveraign and Ecclesiasticall Power in the conduct and establishment of matters of Religion in a Christian State Which seeing it chiefly consists in the Right of giving those Laws by which this establishment and conduct is executed and having shewed that the Right of Soveraign Power in Church matters is not destructive but cumulative to the Power of the Church and that there is an Originall Right in the Church of giving Laws as to the Society of the Church It follows that the Right of making those Laws whereby Religion is established in a Christian State belonging both to the Soveraign Power and to the Church are not distinguishable by the subject for I have premised that Soveraign Powers may make Laws of Church matters but by the severall reasons and grounds and intents of both That is to say that the determining of the matter of Ecclesiasticall Laws in Order to the sentence of Excommunication which the Church is able to inforce them with belongs to the Church that is to those whom we have shewed to have that power on behalf of the Church But the enacting of them as Laws of Civile Societies in order to those Privileges and Penalties which States are able to inforce Religion with belongs to the Soveraign Powers that give Law to those States For here it is to be known that any Religion is made the Religion of any State by two manner of means that is of temporall Privileges and temporall Penalties For how much toleration soever is allowed severall Religions in any State none of them can be counted the Religion of the State till it be so privileged as no other can be privileged in that State Though it becomes the Religion of that State still more manifestly when Penalties are established either upon the not exercise of the Religion established or upon the exercise of any other besides it Those of the Congregations seem indeed hitherto to maintain that no Penalty can be inflicted by any State upon any cause of Religion to which Point I will answer by and by Which if it were so then could no Religion be the Religion of any State but by temporall Privileges In the mean time having determined that by the Word of God Christianity is to be maintained by Secular Power and seeing it cannot be ingraffed into any State but by making the Laws thereof the Laws of that State in this doing my conclusion is that the matter of Ecclesiasticall Laws is determinable by the Church the force of them as to such means as the State is able to enact them with must come from the State The reason is first from that of the Apostle pronounced by him in one particular case but which may be generalized to this purpose 1 Cor. VII 20 24. Every one in what state he is called to be a Christian therein let him continue Which if it hold neither can any quality in any Civile Society give any man that Right which ariseth from the Constitution of the Church nor on the contrary Wherefore seeing it is manifest that there is in the Church a Power of giving Laws to every respective part of it as it is granted that there is in all Soveraign Powers in respect of all persons and causes it follows that they are distinguishable by the severall reasons on which they stand and arise and the severall intents to which they operate and the effects they are able to produce Secondly no Religion but Judaism was ever given immediately by God to any State and that by such Laws as determine both the exercise of Religion and the Civile Government of that people But all Nations think they have received Religion from some Divinity which they beleeve and therefore by the Law of Nations the ordering of matters of Religion must needs belong to those by whom and from whom severall Nations beleeve they have received it Much more Christianity received from and by our Lord and his Apostles must needs be referred to the conduct of those whom we have shewed they left trusted with it But the Power to dispose of the exercise of Religion is a point of Soveraignty used by all States according to severall Laws Wherefore Christianity much more obliging all Soveraigns to use this Power to the advancement of it the coactive Power of secular Societies must needs take place much more in establishing Christianity by such constitutions as Christianity may be established with Thirdly the whole Church is by Divine Right one Visible Society
by the Heathen Emperour Aureliane as you may see in Eusebius his Histories VII 30. For though the matter thereof were not evident to him that was no Christian yet the authority might be the support whereof concerned the Peace of the Empire And so it was evident in that case For there being a difference in the Church of Antiochia between the Bishop and some of the Clergy and People and the Synod there assembled having condemned and deposed the Bishop if this deposition were allowed by the Synod of the Church of Rome no man will deny that there was thereby sufficient ground for him that was no Christian to proceed and take away possession of the Church and Bishops house from him that by such authority was deposed And thus you see how true it is which I said that in Christian States the Power of the Church cannot be in force without the Soveraign because Excommunication which is the Sword thereof and the last execution of this spirituall Jurisdiction might be made void otherwise As for the prejudice which may come to a Christian State by a Jurisdiction not depending upon it in point of right but only in point of fact there seem to be two considerable difficulties made The first the Excommunication of the Soveraign Ormore generally thus that the Keys of the Church may then interpose in State matters The second in regard that I have shewed that by the words of our Lord this Power may take place in matters of interesse between party and party For if in any why not in all and if in all where shall the secular Power become that Power that is able to judge all causes being able to govern any State To the first the answer is evident that so farre as Excommunication concerns barely the Society of the Church any person capable of Soveraign Power is liable to it upon the same terms as other Christians are because comming into the communion of the Church upon the same condition as other Christians the failing of this condition must needs render the effect void But if we consider either the temporall force by which it comes to effect or the temporall penalties which attend on it to these which cannot proceed but by the will of the Soveraign it is not possible that he should be liable Thus I had rather distinguish then between the greater Excommunication and the lesse as some doe who conclude that the Soveraign cannot be subject to the greater but to the lesse For there is indeed but one Excommunication as there is but one Communion abstinence from the Eucharist being no permanent but a transient estate under which whosoever comes if he give not satisfaction to the Church becomes contumacious and so liable to the last sentence Let no man marvell at the good Emperour Theodosius giving satisfaction of his penitence to the holy Bishop S. Ambrose The reason was because Christianity then fresh from the Apostles was understood and uncorrupt It was understood that he held not his Empire by being of the Church nor that his subjects ought him any lesse obedience for not being of it He that taught him to be subject to God taught his people also to be subject to him for Gods sake as Christians always were to Heathen Emperours even Persecutors Which if it were received it is not imaginable that the Powers of the world could be prejudiced by any censure of the Church As for the objection that excommunicate persons are not to be conversed with by S. Pauls rule it is answered by all Divines that it ceases in such relations for example of Parents and children as are more ancient then the Society of the Church which it therefore presupposeth and so is to cease in things necessary to civile Society which Christianity as it presupposeth so it inforceth and not overthroweth In like manner it is to be said that all proceedings either of the Popes or of the Scottish Presbyteries in those cases which the burthen of Issachar mentions are the productions of the corruption or misunderstanding of Christianity For as Aristotle says that some things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so must we say that those things onely exclude from the Church which by the very nature and essence of them are inconsistent with Christianity being those things which a Christian renounces when he is admitted into the Church Now the affairs of States such as are Treaties and alliances with forein States reason of Government at home in Jurisdiction giving Laws and commands of State are such things as are not necessarily bad or good but may be the subject either of virtue or vice much lesse can it be manifest not only to the Body of Christians but even to the Guides of the Church when Governours forsake and when they cleave to their Christianity though it is certain that they doe either the one or the other always Wherefore for particular actions of the same kinde with those for which private persons are liable when they become notorious Princes also and publick Persons are subject to the censure of the Church But for publick Government the reason whereof must not be known the kinde thereof in the whole exrent being capable of good as well as bad it is nothing but the misunderstanding and corruption of Christianity that ingages the Church in them by the fault of those that by their quality in the Church seek to themselves some interesse in publick affairs which Christianity generally denies to be due And the same is to be said of them that make publick affairs the subject of their prayers and Preaching Which though it may be done to good purpose and in opposition to worse yet seeing Christianity requires not only that it may be so in the Church but also that it may not be otherwise as it must needs proceed from a decay of Christianity so it must needs tend to the utter ruine of it As for the drawing of Civile causes to the cognisance of Ecclesiasticall Judicatories by some things that have been said or done to the advancement of the Presbyteries in Scotland or here it appears there is cause of scruple But it is because the reason is overseen upon which our Lords saying proceeds For if the reason why our Lord will have the differences of Christians ended within the Church is that those that are without may not take notice of the offences that are among Christians this will not hinder Christians to plead before Christians and therefore will hinder no Jurisdiction of civile States as ceasing so farre as the State becomes Christian Wherefore it is not without cause that the Audiences of Bishops have been by the Laws of the Empire and other Christian States succeeding the same limited to such kinds of causes as seemed to stand most upon consideration of charity and so fittest to be sentenced by the Church But Matrimoniall causes seem to me necessarily to belong to this cognisance Because of that particular disposition which our Lord
Law of his Country pretendeth to be for his good and to relish it aright when upon due consideration it appears to be no otherwise And so the punishment of the Law tends to the same purpose as all afflictions are sent by God to drive men to their good against their will And that those who fainedly submit to Christianity may as Aristotle says be Sun-burnt by walking in the Sun though they walk not in the Sun for that purpose That is by trying the effect of Christianity in the worship of God and reformation of mens lives among whom they live by being under such Laws may be won to imbrace it for it self which at first they imbraced for the worldly privilege of it To which purpose there can be no mean so effectuall as the restoring of the publick discipline of Penance in the Church By which it becomes most evident what inward esteem men set upon Christianity by the esteem they set upon the Communion of the Church And that the sentence of Excommunication is abhorred not for the temporall Penalties which by civile Laws attend upon it but for the Society of the Church which it intercepteth And truly this last inconvenience of Hypocriticall profession can by no means be avoided wheresoever Christianity or any opinion supposed to be a necessary part of it is made the Religion of any State For evidence whereof I must repeat first that which was supposed afore that there are but two reasons for which any Religion can be said to be the Religion of any State to wit Privileges and Penalties In the second place I must suppose here that as exemption from any penalty is a privilege so exemption from a privilege is a penalty Wherefore seeing no Religion can be the Religion of any State but by such privileges as another Religion is not capable of it is manifest that Toleration of Religion as it is a Privilege in comparison of punishment so it is a punishment in comparison of that Religion which is privileged These things supposed it will not be difficult to render a reason why Christianity must of necessity decay and why the power of it is so decaied since the world came into the Church For when men came not to Christianity till they had digested the hardship of the Crosse and resolved to preferre the next world afore this it is no marvell if they endured what they had foreseen and resolved against But seeing temporall privilege as well as temporall punishment may belong to true Christianity no marvell if men follow the reason of privilege not of Christianity when they goe both together though by consequence they will be ready to change as the privilege changes Now as to the Privileges which Christianity is endowed with by the Act of God or made capable of by the same from Soveraign Powers when they make Christianity the Religion of those States which they govern It is very easie to resolve from the premises that the Clergy are not exempt by Divine Right from any Law of those States under which they live For seeing the Clergy is a quality which presupposeth Christianity and subsisteth by virtue thereof and that no quality subsisting by the constitution of the Church or by Christianity endoweth any man with any temporall right wherewith he is not invested by the quality which he holdeth in his own Country it followeth that no man by being of the Clergy can be privileged against Secular Power or against those Laws which are the Acts of it And therefore the example of Abiathar High Priest removed from his Office by Solomon for Rebellion and Treason 1 Kings II. 26. to wit because as it is there expressed he had deserved to be removed out of the world is an effectuall argument to this purpose For if that Office to which his person was designed by Gods expresse Law supposing him to be lawfull High Priest might be taken away for a crime committed against the Majesty of the King subsisting by an Act subsequent to the Law established by God because the Law which allowed a King enjoined obedience by all the Penalties of the Law And indeed seeing the Clergy is but a degree qualifying men in Christianity above the People those temporall privileges which by Divine right are pretended to belong to the Clergy must needs belong to the People in an inferiour degree by the same right much more the Clergy presupposing the Church as the Church the State must needs leave all men that are qualified by it obliged upon the same termes as it findes them to the States wherein they professe themselves Christians Which cannot be when both Societies of the Church and the Commonwealth consist of the same persons But though the Clergy be not exempt from any Secular Jurisdiction by Divine Right yet they are so capable of exemption by Divine Right that no man can deny the Privilege granted by the first Christian Emperors the Causes of the Clergy to be heard and determined within the Clergy themselves to be very agreeable to reason of Christianity For if our Lord hath commanded and the Apostles ordained the differences of Christians to be ended within themselvs that they might not prove a scandall to Christianity it is but correspondent consequent thereunto that for avoiding the scandalls which the differences of the Clergy may occasion or to make them lesse publick they be ended within themselves seeing it is manifest to all understandings that the reverence of the Clergy is of great interesse to the advancement of Christianity On the other side seeing the Discipline which the Clergy are liable to by Christianity is so much stricter then that which the Civile Laws of any Commonwealth whatsoever can require and determine that Clergy men cannot incurre the penalties of Criminall Laws but they must be supposed to have violated the stricter discipline of the Church which they are under afore It follows that it is so farre from Christianity to privilege them against such Laws that the Church cannot otherwise be cleared of the scandall then by Ecclesiasticall censures correspondent to the temporall punishments which they incurre But if thus it be true that no man by virtue of his Christianity is endowed with any Secular Privilege of that Civile Society wherein he liveth By the same reason it must be true that no man is by his Christianity uncapable of any Right common to all members of the State in which he liveth unlesse some Law of Christianity can be produced whereby it may appear to be incompetible with the quality he holdeth in the Church Which hath been pretended with much noise to render the Clergy of this Church uncapable of imploiment in Secular affairs in point of Divine Right but will be very difficult to prove by the Scriptures in regard that Christianity containeth nothing but that which tendeth to the maintenance of Civile Society as on the other side Civile Society and the Powers thereof tendeth to the maintenance of
Christianity Therefore the words of our Lord That his Disciples should not be as the Gentiles among whom the great ones domineer over the rest and in so doing were called Gracious Lords Mat. XX. 25. Mar. X. 42 43. Luc. XXII 25 26. being spoken to his Disciples as Christians not as Apostles in commendation of humility and meeknesse a quality concerning all Christians cannot prove the Clergy forbidden secular imploiment but they must by the same reason inforce all Civile Power to be unlawfull among Christians as also in the Society of the Church all superiority of power as unlawfull as that which is here challenged on behalf of Bishops and Presbyters On the other side that which they are supposed to destroy they manifestly presuppose that is to say a Superiority of power among the Disciples of Christ by the names of greater and lesse competible with the quality of his Disciples And therefore concern not the lawfulnesse of power but the right use of it and so forbid no sort of Christians any power whereof any Christian is capable The words of S. Paul are more pertinent to this purpose 2 Tim. II. 4. for it is a comparison that he borroweth from the custome of the Romane Empire wherein Soldiers as they were exempted from being Tutors to mens persons or Curators to their estates so they were forbidden to be Proctors of other mens causes to undertake husbandry or merchandise Therefore when S. Paul saith to Timothy No man that goeth to the army intangleth himself in businesse of the world that he may please him that imprested him He raises indeed a particular exhortation to Timothy upon a generall ground of reason appearing in the Romane Laws that those of Timothies quality oblige not themselves to businesse inconsistent with it But can he be understood hereby to make that a Law to the Militia of the Church which was a Law to the Militia of the Empire Or can an exhortation drawn from a comparison be thought to create a generall Law to all of Timothies quality in generall or in particular further then the reason of the comparison will inferre in every particular case It is true that Soldiers were forbidden businesse of profit were exempted emploiments of publick service as was that of Tutors and Curators because thereby they became obliged to the Laws or to their own profit to the prejudice of their attendance upon their colours That is to say that for the great distance between Civile and Military emploiment in that State the Laws had rendred Soldiers uncapable of such qualities And so it is confessed that the Laws of the Church the Canons rendred the Clergy uncapable of the like during the distance between the Church and the State not yet Christian For so we find that in S. Cyprians time Clergy men were forbidden to be Tutors or Curators for the like reason because their obligation to the Laws in that estate would have excused them to the Church And because that by reason of the distance between the State of the Church at that time it could not tend to any publick good of the Society of the Church But in States that professe Christianity can it be said that the attendance of Clergy men upon the affairs of the Commonwealth cannot be to the publick good of the Church consisting of all the same persons onely in a distinct reason and quality whereof the Commonwealth consisteth To me it seems farre otherwise that in all publick Assemblies of States whether for making Laws or for Jurisdiction or for Counsell or for preservation of publick Peace to banish those from them whose quality and profession entitles them to the most exact knowledge and practice of Christianity is to banish the consideration of Christianity from the conclusions and effects of those Assemblies For though it be seen by experience that the Clergy come short of the holinesse and exact conversation in Christianity which they professe yet it will be always seen likewise that the people fail more and before them and that they are first corrupted by and with the people then corrupters of the people And as for the service of the Church which they cannot attend upon in the mean time supposing the Order here challenged to be instituted by the Apostles the inconvenience ceaseth For supposing all Cathedrall Churches to be Corporations trusted to provide for the government of all Congregations contained in them in Church matters and the Ministery of the Offices of Divine Service at the same whatsoever Clergy man shall by publick imploiment destitute his Congregation shall leave it to the care of the Church originally entrusted with it Which Churches being all Nurseries and Seminaries of Clergy designed for the Service of their respective Bodies may easily by the means thereof see all Offices discharged from time to time to all Congregations which they contain And this is that which I desired to say here in generall to this most difficult point of the Privileges and Penalties which Christianity may be established and enforced with by a State that professes it As for the particulars which upon those generall reasons may be disputed in point of lawfull or unlawfull as also for the point of expedience whereby that which in generall may be done ought or ought not to be done when the case is put I leave to them that are qualified and obliged to proceed in determining the same To come then to the great difficulty proposed it is to be acknowledged that the Power of the Church in the persons of them to whom it is derived by continuall succession is a Law ordained by the Apostles for the unity and edification of the Church So that no part of the Whole can stand obliged by any Act that is not done by the Councell and Synod of Bishops respective to that part of the Church which it pretendeth to oblige But withall it is to be acknowledged that there are abundance of other Laws given the Church by our Lord and his Apostles whether they concern matters of Faith or matter of Works whether immediately concerning the salvation of particular Christians or only the publick Order of the Church which proceeding from the same if not a greater power then the Succession of the Church are to be retained all and every one of them with the same Religion and conscience And with this limitation the distinction which the Church of Rome is usually answered with is to be admitted between succession of Persons and succession of Doctrine Not as if it were not a part of Christian doctrine that the Succession of the Apostles is to be obeyed as their Ordinance but because there are many other points of doctrine delivered the Church by our Lord and his Apostles all and every one of them equally to be regarded with it Again I have shewed that the Secular Power is bound to protect the Ecclesiasticall in determining all things which are not determined by our Lord and his Apostles and to give force
of any man to beleeve them till they shewed him a reason to beleeve Indeed though there can no reason be given why matters of faith are true there may bee a reason given why they are credible Because many things are true the reason whereof mans understanding comprehends not yet God can shew him reason why he should beleeve Thus was the Law of Moses thus was the Gospel of Christ advanced to the world and received God having bestowed on them that advanced the one and the other a power to do works the greatnesse and strangenesse whereof might be able to prevail over the difficulty of those things which they propounded to be beleeved and obeyed For though it is no inconvenience that God should grant revelations to many persons to whom he granteth not the power of doing such works as may serve to convince the world that those revelations are sent by God yet that he should imploy any man to declare unto the world any thing that God requireth to be beleeved and obeyed without any means to make evidence of his Commission ordinary reason will shew to be too grosse an inconvenience This being the motive of Faith in generall the difficulty that remains will be how it becomes evident to the senses of all ages all places all persons of the world that can be obliged to receive the Faith being done and seen onely by those persons that were sent and to whom A difficulty endlesse to those that advise not as they should doe with their own common sense For it is manifest that we receive an infinite number of truths which never came under our own senses from the sense of others when we finde all those that have had the means to take sensible notice of them agree in the same Such are all things that are or are done in any distance from any mans senses whereof he cannot be informed but by Historicall faith For all that is related from them that have seen carries with it the credit of Historicall truth as far as common sense obliges to beleeve that all that relate can neither be deceived nor agree to deceive Whereupon that which all agree in becoms unquestionable because it is as easie to know what may be seen as it is unpossible that all that agree in a report should agree in a design to deceive The common notions in Euclide are unquestionable and is it more questionable that there is such a City as Rome or Constantinople such a Country as Persia and China to those that never were there Would Physitians and Astronomers build their studies or be suffered to build their practice upon experiments and observations related by particular persons did not common sense assure that men would not take the pains to abuse others onely to be laught at and detested themselves The question then being to suppose a question where there is none because there is a question what is the true answer whether the miracles recorded in the Scripture were done or not neither could they that first received them agree to deceive or be deceived but stood convict because they must have done violence to their own senses otherwise and being once admitted unquestionable to the worlds end they remain no otherwise For the effect of them continuing in that the Law or the Gospel is in force by virtue of them they remain as certain as he that sees a City builded a thousand years since knows that there were men alive at the building of it The Jews therefore are in the wrong when they argue for the Law against the Gospel that because there never was or indeed can ever be such an appearance of all them of one age to whom the Gospel is addressed as there was of the Israelites at the giving of the Law when all of that age that were to be tied by it were present at once to be witnesses that it was sent from God therefore no Law abrogating the same can by any means become credible For as for the love of this advantage against Christianity they deny that which the first sending of Moses expresly affirmeth Exod. IV. 5. that all the miracles which he was endowed with tended to win faith of the people that God sent him And will have all the credit of the Law to stand precisely upon the appearance and standing of Mount Sinai as they call it where they will have all the people of Israel to have been Prophets of Moses rank whom God spoke face to face with without any commotion or rapture of his or their senses So they consider not how the truth of this appearance of Mount Sinai is manifested to their posterity Seeing that by the same means as it becomes evident to those that live under other times the motives of Christianity may also be conveyed and evidenced to them that are not present at the doing of the works This for the evidence As for the sufficience of the motives to the Gospel in comparison of those of the Law the possibility thereof necessarily follows upon Gods omnipotence the actuality of it is sufficiently proved by the judgement of all Nations that have imbraced the Gospel in comparison of one that imbraced the Law Especially if we consider the predictions of the Law and the Prophets going before and the conversion of the Gentiles following upon the publication of the Gospel Which being reckoned among the miracles that render the Gospel to be beleeved doe necessarily bring all the motives of the Law to depose for the truth of the Gospel Thus much premised it will be possible to resolve in a few words the subject of voluminous disputes All men know how those of the Church of Rome would have us beleeve and receive the Scriptures upon the credit of the Church affirming them to come from God And consequently whatsoever the Church determines to be the true meaning of the Scriptures and the Word of God So that there can be no true faith in any man that disbeleeves any part of it Whether by the Church they mean the Pope or a Councell or whosoever they shall agree to have right to conclude the Church On the other side it were easie to say who they are that professe to beleeve the Scriptures upon the immediate dictate of the Spirit of God to their spirit that they come from God And though I cannot say that consequently they deny any man to have faith that beleeves not all that their Spirit dictates to be the meaning of Gods word because the dictates of severall Spirits are so contrary that this can be no Rule yet when the qualities of mens persons with the dictates of their Spirits are alledged in bar to the received doctrine of the Church it is manifest that men expect such light to be struck out of the darknesse and confusion of such dictates that the Church shall at length be convinced to beleeve and receive it And truly those that professe that they could not beleeve the Scriptures but
by the immediate dictate of the Spirit by the same reason can conclude nothing to be the will of God and the true intent of his Word without it This if it were meant onely of the testimony of the Spirit of God witnessing with our Spirit that we are the children of God and sealing the assurance of this favour to our persons and actions then would it not take away the grounds upon which and the means by which we are effectually moved and brought to be Christians both in profession and in deed So that by consequence means might be had whereby a man 's own Spirit might be enabled to discern between the dictates of Gods Spirit and that of the world But being advanced in answer to this difficulty as the first ground of faith and the last resolution of it cannot be so understood But of necessity importeth that no man can be assured by the assurance of faith of any truth without that means by which God reveals himself to them by whom he declares his will to others That either any person on behalf of the Church or any private spirit should pretend to any such endowment is contrary to common sense and their own proceedings When they use the like means to inform themselves both why to beleeve the Scripture and what the meaning of it and the will of God is as other men doe And if they doe pretend more they must shew such evidence as God hath ordained to convince the world before they can pretend to oblige any man to beleeve them Besides that so it would not be possible to render a reason why God hath given his Scriptures at all seeing that notwithstanding he must furnish either some persons in behalf of the Church or all beleevers with revelations to convince them what is his will and meaning by the Scriptures But if they admit of such means as God hath appointed Christians to decide whether it be the Spirit of God or of the world that witnesseth with their Spirit then is the question where it was Because as God gives his Spirit to those that are Christians upon such qualities and to such intents as they who pretend to the Spirit of God ought to finde in themselves and to propose to themselves and no other so are they assured that it is the Spirit of God that moves them because they are assured of those qualities and intentions in themselves and by no other meanes Now having shewed before upon what grounds Christianity is to be imbraced I demand whether it be in the compasse of any reason that is convinced of the truth of Christianity to question whether the Scriptures are to be received or not Certainly he were a strange man that should consent to be a Jew or a Mahumetane and yet make a question whether the Book of the Law came from Moses or the Alcoran from Mahomet or not Therefore supposing that we stand convict of the truth of Christianity by the same means we stand assured that God hath caused those great works to be done by Moses and the Prophets by our Lord and his Apostles by which the world stands convict that they were sent by God and by the same that the Scriptures wherein those works and their doctrine is related are from God Neither can the Church act to the assuring of any body herein as the Church but as a multitude of men endowed with common sense which cannot agree to deceive or to be deceived For if the profession of Christianity goe before the being of the Church and Christianity cannot be received till it be acknowledged with the records thereof to be from God then this assurance though it come from the agreement of the men that make the Church goes in nature before the quality of a Church and therefore comes as well from the consent of Jews for the Old Testament as of Christians for the New Nor let it trouble any man that by this means faith may seem to be the work of reason not the grace of God seeing it may very reasonably be demanded Where is the necessity of grace to enable a man to beleeve what he sees reason to beleeve For though the matter of faith be credible of it self yet it is not evident of it self though sufficient reason may be shewed why a man ought to beleeve yet on the other side there are many scandals and stumbling blocks in the way to hinder him from beleeving the chiefe of which is the offence of the Crosse whereof our Lord saith Happy is he that is not offended at me For it cannot seem strange that a man should refuse to beleeve that which he sees sufficient reason to convince him to beleeve when as by beleeving he becomes liable to bear the Crosse of Christ specially not being inforced by the light of reason evidencing the truth of Christianity and determining the assent of the minde as fire does wood to burn but swaied by externall motives working upon the minde according as they finde it disposed to goodnesse For when this disposition is not perfectly wrought by Gods grace nothing hinders sufficient motives to prove uneffectuall to them whom the Crosse of Christ scandalizeth This being resolved it follows by necessary consequence upon what reasons and by what means the meaning of the Scriptures or rather the will of God concerning all matters questioned in Christianity is determinable For it is not the same thing many times to know the meaning of the Scriptures as it is to know how far it is Gods will that it binde the Church The name of the Scripture inforceth no more but that all is true which it containeth Now it containeth many times the sayings and doings of evill men as well as of good of Satan himself sometimes wherein it intends onely to assure that such and such things were said and done And not to insist on the Law of Moses which is all the word of God and no part of it binding to us as the Law of Moses because another disposition of Gods will may appear by other Scriptures in the New Testament it self are found many things that now have not the force of precepts though it appear that they did sometimes binde the Church Such is the practice of the Feasts of Love which S. Paul presses so hard as I shewed afore such is his precept that women be vailed men bare when they pray in the Church the decree of the Apostles at Jerusalem against eating blood and things strangled and sacrificed to Idols the precept of S. James of anointing the sick the ceremonies of Baptism which I shewed afore out of S. Paul to have been in use in the Primitive Church yea the very custome of drenching in Baptism which no man doubts but the institution signifies and yet is now scarce any where in use If therefore there be question of the will of God what is the true meaning of the Scriptures and how far it bindes the Church the
And so Elizeus curseth the children to death on purpose to punish the affront offered his person In all which particulars you have manifest characters of the Law inflicting death for the punishment of sin whereas under the Gospel which giveth life the inflicting of bodily punishment serveth to procure the good of the world by manifesting the truth of the Gospel and the presence of God in his Church which was known and supposed under the Law because those who had received the Law could not make any question that God was amongst his people and spoke to them by his Prophets When I say that it might be lawfull to take arms upon the title of Religion under the Law I say not that it was so in all cases or that it was not lawfull for the Jews to be subject to forein Powers which was the doctrine of Judas of Galilee complained of by Josephus but that it was possible for some case to fall out wherein it might be lawfull As for the conceit of Judas of Galilee it is manifestly taken away by Gods command to the Jews under Nabuchodorosor Jer. XXIX 7. Seek the peace of the City to which I have sent you Captives for in the peace thereof you shall have peace And it is most remarkable that our Lord being falsly accused of this doctrine to Pilate by the Jews it pleased God to suffer it so far to prevail afterwards that the arms which they took afterwards against the Romanes and the miseries which they endured by the Zelotes and finally the ruine of the City Temple and Nation must needs be imputed to this doctrine which they falsly accused our Lord of to gain the good will of the Romanes But of Christianity it must be said on the contrary that there is no case possible wherein it can be just to take arms for preservation or reformation of it upon the title thereof that is to say where there is not a Power of bearing arms established by some other title of humane right For where there is any such Power and Right established upon a title which the Law of Nations justifieth it is not to be said that Christianity voideth or extinguisheth the same seeing it hath been said that it preserveth the state of this world upon the same terms in which they are when it is imbraced But neverthelesse it moderateth the use of it so that it cannot with Christianity be imploied in very many cases in which the Law of Nature and Nations justifies the use of it These things thus premised it will be easie to shew that the Presbyterians offer wrong when they demand that the superiority of Bishops over Presbyters be proved to be of Divine Right by some Precept of Gods Law recorded in the Scriptures Supposing that otherwise it will be in the Secular Power of it self to erect an Ecclesiasticall Power by taking it from them that have it and giving it to them that have it not and requiring that so it be done For it is notorious to the world that from the beginning they claimed that Presbyteries should be erected in stead of the Government of the Church of England upon this ground that the Presbyteries are commanded by God and that therefore the superiority of Bishops as contrary to his Law is to be abolished And that upon this pretense the people were drawn in to seek the innovation endevoured at this time So that to require now that it be proved that the superiority of Bishops is commanded by God to be unchangeable by men otherwise that it be changed is to require that the conclusion may stand without any premises to prove it Notwithstanding to passe by this advantage suppose we the superiority of Bishops neither forbidden nor commanded but introduced by Ecclesiasticall Right grounded upon the Power given the Church of giving Laws to the Church by determining that which Gods Law determineth not Supposing but not granting this to be true it will remain neverthelesse without the compasse of any Secular Power upon earth to erect this Ecclesiasticall Power by taking it from them which have it and giving it to them which have it not For wheresoever there is a Church and the Government thereof not contrary to Gods Law in those hands which have it by mans there the Apostles precept of obeying the Governors of the Church 1 Thess V. 14. Heb. XIII 17. must needs oblige the People to those Governors that are established not against Gods Law And this Precept of the Apostle being of that Divine Right by which Christianity subsisteth cannot be voided by any Secular Power by which the Church subsisteth not in point of Right but onely is maintained in point of fact For the obligation which they have to the Church and the Unity thereof and the Order by which that Unity is preserved and the Government in which that Order consisteth being more ancient then the maintenance of Christianity by the State cannot be taken away by any obligation or interesse thereupon arising And therefore as the first Christians that were under Christian Powers in the time of Constantine were bound to adhere to the Pastors which they had by the Law of the Church for which reason neither did Constantine Constantius or Valens ever endevour to intrude those Bishops which they were seduced to think necessary for the quiet of some Churches being indeed dangerous to Christianity by their own Power but by a pretended legall Act of the Church after Constantine took Christianity into the protection of the Empire upon the same terms as afore So are all Christians to the worlds end obliged to adhere to the Pastors which they shall have by the Law of the Church not contrary to Gods Law against the command of any Secular Power to obey others And to demand that Ecclesiasticall Power not contrary to Gods Law be dissolved by Secular to which the persons endowed therewith are Subjects is to demand that there remain no Christians in England that can be content to suffer for their Christianity by obeying Gods Law before mans especially when they can obey both acting by Gods and suffering by mans But though I insist upon this right of the Church yet it is not my purpose to balk the fruit of the Divine Right of Bishops upon such terms as it hath been asserted That is to say as that which no man may lawfully destroy though not as that which being destroied voideth the being of a Church if it can be done without Schism because not commanded particular Christians as the substance of Christianity but the Society of the Church for the maintenance and support of it For if no Secular Power be able to give that Power to the Presbyteries which must be taken from the Bishops supposing that the superiority of Bishops stands neither by nor against the Law of God but onely by the Law of the Church according to Gods How much more when it is demonstrated that it subsisteth by the Act of the
the Church originally always every where hath professed and used From them let them seek the communion of the Church not onely in the exercise of such Christian Ordinances as men cast upon desert coasts and utterly destitute of Ecclesiasticall Society for the present for so our distractions have made us can participate in but also in such acts of the Power of the Keys as passe not the inward court of the conscience Neither let them ever think themselves necessitated to communicate with Schisme while the Law which is the source of all Laws and the persons which are the seed of all publick persons of the Church continue And let them know further that in adhering to the Society of a Church never so much destroied by force no Secular Power whether lawfull or unlawfull shall ever have more rightfull title to persecute them then the Romane Emperours had to persecute the Apostles and Primitive Christians part of their profession being not to defend themselves by force grounded upon the title of Christianity but to suffer with patience what force shall inflict for it Which doing as the purchase is not of this world so let them not doubt to finde the effect of the promises which are to come A REVIEW CHAP. I. SInce the writing of this Discourse I have understood by relation and by some Pamphlets that there is one opinion on foot among the many of this time that there is no such thing as a Society of the Church by the Ordinance of our Lord and the institution of his Apostles That wheresoever we reade of the Church in the Scriptures there we are to understand no more but onely a number of men that are Christians who may or ought to assemble together for the service of God as they find opportunity and means But that there should be thought to be any condition of communicating in the Service of God which should make all Christians a Society called the Church as excluding those that are not qualified with it this they think to be an Imposture that hath made way for Antichrist And though this opinion be so groundlesse that very few Readers will expect any opposition to be made yet because my intent was by this Discourse to improve the Reasons heretofore advanced and to try the effect and consequence of them in destroying the grounds of the divisions framed among us And because if that which I propound be the truth it will with a little husbanding be effectuall to convince all manner of errors it will be requisite here to give notice that all the reasons which this first Chapter produceth to prove the Power of the Keys and the punishment of Excommunication the effect thereof to belong to the Church are effectuall to prove the Society of the Church which this Power constitutes and therefore the effect thereof evidenceth And truly though there is an infinite distance between the productions and consequences of this opinion and that of Erastus in as much as this manifestly tendeth to challenge to all Christians freedome of doing what they please in the exercise of their Christianity without any account to the State under which they live that of Erastus challenging to the State all Power to govern all Christians in their Christianity yet if we consider the ground on which both stand they will appear to be as the Rivers that rise out of Apenninus which empty themselves some into the Sea of Tuscany others into the Gulf of Venice For I suppose every mans common reason will furnish him so much of the metaphysicks as to make it appear that every thing which hath a beeing is by that beeing distinct from other things So that if there be no difference between the Society of the Church and that of the State when it professes Christianity but that both make one Community Corporation or Commonwealth as that of the ancient people of God under the Law then is there no Society of a Church when the State is Christian seeing it is agreed upon on all hands that there is one of the State and this opinion inforces that there is no more but one True it is that there are two things to say either that before Constantine the Power of Excommunication stood onely by Humane right that is by custome of the Church or that by the Ordinance of our Lord and his Apostles it was to stand onely before Christianity were received by Kingdoms and Commonwealths but afterwards the Power of governing the Church hitherto in the Body of the Church to be dissolved into the Secular Power of the State But whether this or that in all cases he that taketh away the Power of the Keys in opening and that of Excommunication in shutting up the Church must needs appear to take away the Society and Communion of a Church either because it never was or because it ceaseth when the State becomes Christian This consideration improves very much the reasons of this Chapter against Erastus making his opinion liable to all those Scriptures which acknowledge a Society of the Church and the sense of all Christians which suppose the same And deserveth here to be represented because it may be observed that the proceeding of the Discourse did not give leave to presse it to this effect For the intent of it being to limit the concurrence of Secular and Ecclesiasticall Power in Church matters it was necessary to declare in the first place upon what ground God hath instituted the Society of the Church by Revelation from above having before constituted civile Societies of the same persons whereof the Church consisteth by the Law of Nature and Nations and the operation of his ordinary Providence Especially seeing that Christianity addresseth it self to all Nations and therefore intendeth to constitute one Church of all civile Societies which imbrace the same For seeing it is manifest that Religion hath always been a very generall Title of many Wars and commotions against the Publick peace and that therefore all States must needs be jealous of that Religion which asks no leave of the State to beleeve what it beleeves but professes an obligation of beleeving though never so contrary to the Laws of the State it appears to have been requisite that there should be in Christianity some condition that might clear it from this jealousie especially because one Society of the Church consisting of the persons which constitute many States must needs be concluded in point of conscience by a Power of the Church not derived from that of the State and so possibly the Subjects of a State be concluded in conscience by strangers to that State as they are members of the Church This is the difficulty which was to be removed in the beginning of this Discourse that it might appear no ways prejudiciall to civile Societies that God should institute one Society of the Church to consist of all persons of severall States that professe Christianity And the removing of this difficulty consists in the
is manifest that he which requireth the Unity of Ecclesiasticall Assemblies supposeth a Society of the Church to procure and maintain the same But it is not this passage of S. Paul alone wherein this privilege is supposed intimated or expressed but wheresoever there is mention in any part of Scriptures of any Ordinance of the Service of God instituted or exercised at the Assemblies of Gods faithfull people provided that it may appear otherwise by the Scripture to be common to the Law and the Gospel there you have the Charter or Patent of this grant and privilege and by consequence of the Society of the Church founded upon it But though Erastus securely taketh it for granted that Christian States have right to exercise their Soveraign Power in Church matters because it was so in the Synagogue yet I doe not understand how he would convince them that at this time deny this consequence among us Seeing there is so much difference between the Law and the Gospel between the Church and the Synagogue that that which is held in the one cannot be presumed to hold under the other without a reason common to both And so far as that reason prevails and no further must the Power and Interesse of States in Church matters be understood to prevail And truly there is a saying of S. Jeromes which may justly move a tender spirit to doubt whether this Interesse of States in Church matters be from God or not For seeing it is most true and visible to experience which he says Ecclesiam postquam coepit habere Christianos Magistratus factam esse opibus majorem virtutibus autem minorem That the Church since it began to have Christian Magistrates is become greater in wealth or power but lesse in virtues And that it is a presumption in reason that that which goeth before is the cause of that which followeth upon it when no other cause appeareth well may it be doubted that the Interesse of Secular Powers in Church matters is not from God from which so great a decay of Christianity proceedeth which must not be imputed to any thing which God hath appointed To which agreeth that Legend in the life of Pope Sylvester which saith that when Constantine had endowed the Church so largely there was a voice from heaven heard to say Hodie venenum effusum est in Ecclesiam To day is there poison poured out upon the Church The reason then which here I render upon which the Kings of Gods ancient people had that power in maters of Religion which by the Scriptures we know they did exercise I hope will appear reasonable to them that have perused the IV Chapter and seen how it is not destructive but cumulative to that which by the Law in matters of the Law is given to the Consistory And since it accrued to the King not by the Law because not constituted by it but by the desire of the People admitted and assented unto by God by which he became Head of a People already in Covenant with God what difference is there between this case and the case of a whole people together with the Powers of the same converted to Christianity but this that the Israelites were in Covenant with God before they were under Kings for though Moses and the Judges had Regall Power yet it was not by a standing Law Christian Nations under the Powers of the World before they became Christian Unlesse it be further that the Church is one of all Nations the Synagogue of equall extent with the People of Isâ—ael which is not of consequence to this purpose The Apostle rendring a reason why he commands Secular Powers to be prayed for at the Assemblies of the Church 1 Tim. II. 2 3 4. assigneth the end of them to be That we may lead a quiet life in all godlinesse and honesty Which is manifestly said in respect of Secular Powers that are not Christian For of them the Church justly expects protection and quietnesse paying them prayers subjection and duties But he addes further this reason Because this is good and acceptable to God our Saviour who would have no man to perish but to come to the knowledge of his truth If then the will of God be that the Soveraign Powers of the Gentiles be converted to Christianity is it not his will that they imploy themselves to the advancement of it not onely as Christians but as Soveraigns which cannot be expected from Gentiles There is reason therefore to ground this Interesse upon the declared will of God concerning the calling of the Gentiles the Apostle having declared that their Secular Powers are invited to the Faith and the Prophesies of the Old Testament having declared that their Kings Queens should come to the Church and advance it Psal II. 10 11 12. LXXII 10 11. Es XLIX 23. LX. 13. This reason is far more effectuall to me by the Prophesies left the Church in the Apocalypse The main scope and drift whereof I am much perswaded to be nothing else but to foretell the conversion of the Romane Empire to Christianity and the punishment of the Heathens that persecuted the same For if the intent of those Prophesies be to shew that it was Gods will that the Empire should become Christian and that the reign of the Saints upon earth there foretold is nothing else but the advancement of Christianity to the Government of the Empire and by consequence of other Kingdomes into which the Empire was to be dissolved it cannot be doubted that Christian Powers attain the same right in matters of Religion which the Kings of Gods ancient People always had by the making of Christianity the Religion of any State This opinion it was not my purpose to publish at the writing of this Discourse because it is like to become a mark of contradiction to the most part being possessed more or lesse of a far other sense But having considered since how many and horrible scandals are on foot by the consequences of that sense so that I cannot condemne my self of giving scandall by publishing the best means I can see to take it away and having met with another reason necessitating me to declare it for the effectuall proceeding of this Discourse I will put it down in the Review of the last Chapter where that necessity rises desiring those that seek further satisfaction in this reason to reade it there for that purpose As for the objection that was made from the decay of Christianity after the Powers of the World protected it and enriched the Church it is a meer mistake of that which is accidentall for the true cause For the coming in of the World to the Church is one thing and the Power of the State in Church matters is another though this depend upon that And it is true that the coming of the World into the Church was the decay of Christianity but the Power of the State in the Church is a prop to sustain it from
that is to say by the Power given the Church by God of ordering those things which were not determined by any Divine Precept and yet became determinable the case is the same and the reason is where it was For if the Church by the Power given it by God immediately be enabled to make it self a Society for the better maintenance and propagation of Christianity and have executed that Power by enabling every part of the Church to maintain it self in the Unity of the Whole by the same Power in order to and dependence upon the Whole then are all Christians bound by a Divine Precept of obeying the Governours of the Church before they can be bound to obey the Secular Powers in Church matters The one Power being constituted by the immediate revelation and appointment of God in matters concerning the Society of the Church the other constituted indeed by the Providence of God executed by man but enforced by the Law of Christianity to be obeyed in all things not excepted by the same whereof this is one And if the consent of the Christian world can be of any moment in a matter wherein the Clergy are parties indeed as they must needs be but must challenge their right at their utmost hazard it is not possible to give a more pregnant instance for the right of Excommunication in the Church then the troubles of Athanasius of Alexandria and Alexander of Constantinople for refusing to admit Arrius to communicate with the Church being cast out by the Councell of Nice the act whereof they could not void the good Emperour being seduced to think it necessary for the quiet of the Church And not onely by this particular but by all the proceedings of the first Christian Emperours in the affairs of the Church who had great advantage in discerning the true Interesse of the State and the Church not onely by the advise of those Bishops which had received it fresher from the source but by sensible knowledge of the whole right which they found the Church in possession of when they came to be members of it it is manifest that they never sought to bring to effect that which they were perswaded to be necessary for the establishment of Christianity whether truly or falsly as well as for the quiet of their Estates and People by the immediate act of their own Soveraign Power but by the act of those that were then held able to conclude the Church Imploying their Secular Power in consequence to the same to inforce such acts though not always valid to oblige the Church by temporall Penalties on them that refused as enemies to the publick Peace Seeing then that the Church is a Society Community Corporation or spirituall Commonwealth subsisting by the immediate revelation and appointment of God without dependence upon those Christian States wherein it is harboured as to the Right by which it subsisteth and the matter wherein it communicateth but depending upon them for the force which is necessarily requisite to maintain the whole People of all Christian States in the communion of their respective Churches and by them of the whole it followeth of necessity that it is endowed with Rights correspondent to those wherein the Soveraignty of States consisteth The Power of the Sword is the principall of those Rights into which the rest are resolved when they are enforced to have recourse unto it for the execution of that which becomes requisite to make them available And the Church hath the Sword of the Spirit which is the word of God which is used two manner of ways as the Sword is either to subdue strangers or to cut off malefactors Let no man imagine that any private person is enabled to propagate the Gospel and constitute new Churches of persons newly converted to Christianity without competent Commission from the Church To bring men to be Christians indeed is that which not onely any of the Clergy but any Christian may doe and is to doe when he findes himself able to act towards it without disadvantage to Christianity It is that which the Ecclesiasticall Histories informe us that Frumentius and Aedesius did in India and the captive maid in Iberia as well as those of the dispersion of Jerusalem in Phoenice and Cyprus and at Antiochia Acts XI 19 20. But the authority by which they became a Church they were to seek where it was before at Alexandria and Constantinople as well as those at Jerusalem Acts XI 22. Because in the Church the Sword of the Spirit which is the word of God is deposited and trusted with the Church for the propagation as well as the maintenance of it and though all Christians must needs understand themselves to be under an habituall trust or a commission dormant to perswade all that they can to the Christianity which they have themselves yet the expresse commission of the Church imports further the exercise of that Power which the Society thereof already useth towards them that by virtue of the said Commission shall be brought to be Christians At least it may import so much if we suppose it granted to such purpose The Sword of the Spirit is used within the Church to the punishment of malefactors upon two sorts of causes For if any man forfeit his Christianity either by denying the Faith upon profession whereof he was admitted to Christianity or by living contrary to the same the same Sword of the Spirit which pronounces him cut off from God cuts him off from the Church And in regard that it is part of Christianity to beleeve that God hath ordained a Church the consequence whereof is to oblige all Christians to maintain themselves in the Unity of the same which cannot be done by those that refuse to be concluded by it in all things not contrary to Gods Law the same Sword of the Spirit that subdues all men to be Christians upon condition to live members of the Church cuts them off from the Communion of the Church that will not live within compasse of the Unity of it The Power of the Sword being supposed in the Church Jurisdiction follows which consists not so much in judging as in executing the sentence Not that there is any such thing as Jurisdiction such as the Civile Laws of the Romanes and all other People understand which proceeds by constraint of outward force in the Church But because the Church being constituted of such as desire to continue Christians upon supposition of this will to continue a Christian he may be said to be constrained to hear the Church that cannot communicate with the Church unlesse he doe so as it requires Upon the same ground subsists the Right of Ordinations answerable to that part of Soveraignty in States which consists in creation of Magistrates and Officers for it is without doubt beside the intent of the Romane Laws to call the Soveraign a Magistrate Magistrates being generally Ministers of the Soveraign which creates a particular Power over the
Clergy by the Jurisdiction of the Church For in regard that as it hath been said on divers occasions in this Discourse the Clergy is promoted upon supposition of some degree of proficience in Christianity over and above that upon supposition whereof men are admitted to be only Christians it followeth not that those who by their conversation render themselves unworthy of that degree which they hold in the Clergy doe by the same means render themselves unworthy of the Communion of the Church Therefore the punishment of a Clergy man may be competent by onely voiding his degree when another Christian cannot be competently punished but by putting him from the Church Whereby it appears that the Power of Ordaining as well as censuring persons Ordained is grounded upon the Power of the Keys as giving or taking away not the communion of the Church but a degree and quality above it which supposeth it Again upon the constitution of the Society of the Church follows the Power of making Canons Constitutions and Ordinances obliging the respective body thereof correspondent to the Legislative Power of Kingdomes and Common-wealths wherein the justice of them most appears though the strength of them is more seen in the Power of the Sword which gives all Laws force And so it is no more inconvenience to all these Canons the Laws of the Church then it is to call the Power of Excommunication the spirituall Sword of the Church Neither is it any more for the Church to have this Power then that which States ordinarily allow the meanest Corporations which they Privilege to wit to give Laws to their own Bodies for the maintenance and execution of the Laws originally given them by those who are enabled to institute them In fine in correspondence to the Exchequer of a State is the Title that God hath given his Church to the Oblations of the Faithfull their First-fruits and Tithes The right whereof he hath endowed the Church with leaving the seizure to the voluntary tender of those whō he calleth to be voluntary Christians And thus and by this correspondence with a State the parts of Ecclesiasticall Power are more clearly and more intelligibly distinguished in my opinion then by the ordinary terms of Jurisdiction and Order For first these terms being introduced by the Canonists and School Doctors seem to presuppose a coactive Jurisdiction in the Church upon the constitution and originall Title of the Church such as the Church of Rome challenges and the Decretall Epistles of the Popes presuppose whereby they challenge to themselves that Power by Divine Right which by the sufferance of Princes and States they did exercise intangling the Schools of Divines with as inextricable difficulties to make it good as Christian States with commotions to shake off the consequences thereof meerly for neglect of the principle here presupposed that Christianity importeth no right of this world and therefore that the coactive Power of the State remains where it was before it Secondly it seemeth that the Power of Order and Jurisdiction are not contradistinct but subordinate the Power of Order being the production and consequence of the Power of Jurisdiction if it be rightly understood For by the same reason which proveth here p. 199 that the power of consecrating the Eucharist belongeth to Presbyters upon the Power of the Keys and that all Benedictions with Imposition of Hands whether in Confirmation Ordination Penance Mariage or whatsoever else are marks of that Power which alloweth those acts which are blessed to be done in the Church as you have it here p. 23. by the same reason it follows that the ministery of all Ordinances of God deposited with the Church is a mark of that superiority which those that minister the same have in the Church And therefore if the Power of Order be in respect of Christs own Body as ordinarily they describe it it proceeds from the Power over his mysticall Body which is that of Jurisdiction as they make it Or if as others will have it the Power of Order consists in the ministery of such divine Ordinances as are the means to procure and increase Gods grace in the persons to whom they are ministerd the same reason takes place Because they are not to be ministred but by them whom the Church trusteth to do it to that true intent which it teacheth Wherefore it seemeth that the term of Jurisdiction ought to expresse the common source of all Ecclesiasticall Power which it doth not because that as Jurisdictiis but a part of Soveraignty in a State so the Power from which the metaphoricall jurisdiction of the Church floweth which I conceive cannot be better expressed then by calling it the Power of the Keys as the Gospel hath done produceth other branches of Ecclesiasticall Power correspondent to other parts of Soveraignty in a State as hereby you have seen CHAP. II. HAving thus determined whereupon the Power of the Keys is founded and wherein it consisteth it remained to proceed and declare what persons it is trusted with For seeing the persons of whom Christian States consist are the same of whom the Churches or parts of the whole Church that are contained in those States consist if there be no provision of Gods Law tying the Right of managing this Power and the productions and branches thereof to some qualities consequent to the constitution of the Church it will necessarily fall as an escheat to the State and we shall be tied to grant it Power to conferre those qualities by which it is managed and all this will be truly said to no purpose Here in the first place I must insist upon a point the truth whereof the Presbyteries and Congregations have equally divided between them and left it entire to the Church For those of the Congregations finding that the design of the Presbyteries had ordered a Presbytery for the government of every Congregation that assembles together for the common service of God had reason to inferre that all those Presbyteries ought to be endowed with the Power of the Keys as to their own Bodies To which assuming another demand that the chief Power in every Congregation was that of the People it followeth that all Congregations are independent and absolute not to be concluded by any Church or Synod representative of Churches above themselves On the other side the Presbyterians finding that no Unity can be preserved without dependence and desiring to preserve Unity among themselves though not with the Church have designed the Power of the Keys as to the act of Excommunication to rest in Representatives of the Presbyteries of Congregations which neverthelesse they call by the same name of Presbyteries or Classes the same being subject to Synods of Presbyteries and those to Nationall Assemblies Whereas there is never any mention in all the Scriptures of any Presbytery or Company College or Bench of Presbyters as likewise there is no mention of any Church but in a City No mention of more Churches then
his Angels as the XII Standards of Israel is camped without the Tabernacle which is the Church containing all Christians But the XII Apostles and LXX Disciples must needs be understood to hold correspondence with the XII Heads of the Tribes and LXX Elders And the whole reason and ground of this correspondence to consist in the whole Power of governing the spirituall Israel of God which is his Church to remain in their hands as the Rulers and as the Counsell thereof while it was altogether in one Body from thence to be propagated into the like when it came to be divided into severall Bodies by the founding of severall Churches as you have seen that it was among the Jews in Palestine Aegypt and Babylonia Wherefore as there can no question be made that the Jews by virtue of Gods Law created themselves that Government which they established in their dispersions by sufferance of their Soveraigns according to the form designed by the Law by a Consistory in the Mother Cities of their dispersions with inferiour Consistories where the number of Jews was so great as to require a form of Government No more can it be doubted that when Churches were founded in the greatest Residences concurring with Churches founded in the like and depending on those of the Mother Cities for the maintenance of Unity in the Whole all this though executed by humane discretion was done by virtue of the Rule designed by the Apostles And as all Israel had no power to adde or take from the Law yet was to be concluded in that which the Law had not determined by the Consistory so all the Church having no Power to make any thing of divine Right that was not so from the beginning hath Power to determine what the Church shall either do or acknowledge for the preservation of Unity in it self in all matters not determined by Divine Right As for the Priests Office from which most men desire to derive the preeminences of the Clergy although it were manifestly peculiar to Israel after the flesh and to cease with the same seeing the Church hath no other Sacrifice but that one of Christ upon the Crosse not repeated but represented continually by the Prayers of the Church at the celebration of the Eucharist as the reason which must make all those Prayers effectuall by the peculiar Covenant of Christianity it follows that those that are intrusted with the Government and maintenance of Christianity are by consequence intrusted with the offering of this Sacrifice and of these Prayers of the Church unto God by the same reason for the which I said afore that the Consecration of the Eucharist floweth frō the Power of the Keys So that whether they be called Elders or Priests they have both denominations from the quality of Presbyters Seeing then that the Apostles are by their Commission the XII Patriarchs of the spirituall Israel of God which is his Church and so the Chief Governours of the same let not the Presbyterians imagine that they can degrade them to the rank of their buckram Elders or shew us what particulars mentioned in the Scriptures the Apostles acted as Apostles and what as Elders as that they concurred in the Councell at Jerusalem in the common quality of Elders unlesse they can produce other Scriptures of other Apostles superiour to these that appoint it All these recording the acts of chief Governours of the whole Church as founders of it by their Originall Commission and Lawgivers to it in whatsoever our Lord had not determined afore And though their proceedings are throughout a pattern of meeknesse and condescension to all ranks in the Church using their Power with that humility which our Lord had commanded to his Chief Disciples to give satisfaction to all of the reasonablenesse of their proceedings because there was then just presumption that others would use the like reverence to them in receiving satisfaction as they in tendring it yet by S. Paul to the Corinthians we see how far it reached when any pretense opposed it self against it Suppose now for the purpose that Barnabas was one of the LXX as Epiphanius affirms shall we indure it to be affirmed that when he is sent by the Church at Jerusalem to Antiochia Acts XI 20. he is sent by the appointment of certain of the people who had a Commission from our Lord before they were Christians even for the founding of that Church wherein they who are thought to send then received Christianity Surely the Commission of our Lord Mat. XXVIII 18 extendeth to the LXX as well as to the XII though in dependence on them as the XII Princes of Israel And therefore as it is manifest that Barnabas was sent to Antiochia because those that had made Christians at Antiochia had not power to found a Church there by ordering their Assemblies which Barnabas is said there to have done so is it manifest that he could not receive this power from the people of the Church at Jerusalem which may better challenge it then any Lay Elders whose Title must come from the People as I have shewed Chap III. and will shew by Gods help by and by more at large but that he must be understood to be sent by the Church because by the XII and by the LXX with the consent and concurrence of the Clergy and People And sent so to order a new plantation of the spirituall Israel that notwithstanding one of those that sent him taking the charge afterwards into his own hands might become Patriarch of that Tribe which should be planted in and under that City As also Barnabas himself to become the Head of another plantation in Cyprus or Paul who by virtue of the Power received by Barnabas at Jerusalem was by him assumed to his assistance being afterwards acknowledged to be called by God into the rank of the XII to become a Patriarch of those plantations which received Christianity by his means And thus it is no inconvenience which some of the Fathers have incurred by affirming that the XII have the rank of Bishops and the LXX of Presbyters if we refer them to the whole Church not to any particular Church but onely by correspondence For so were the XII Patriarchs to the people of Israel as the LXX were Presbyters and Elders to the same as I said of the Consistory Every part of the Church planted in and under any City having neverthelesse according to one and the same form a Ruler of a Bishop and a Councell of Presbyters And yet is it nothing inconvenient in another regard that the Councell of Neocaesarea Can. XIII compares Country Bishops to the LXX the City Bishops being by correspondence consequently compared to the XII Because on the one side those Country Bishops were to be subordinate to the Bishops of their Cities as the LXX were to the XII On the other side the LXX being answerable to the LXX Elders of Israel must needs be understood to be of a higher quality
then common Presbyters CHAP. III. THat it is no new reason that here is rendred p. 91. why the name of Episcopus under the Apostles was common to those that are since distinctly called Bishops and Presbyters may appear by a passage in Amalarius de divinis Officiis quoted out of the supposed S. Ambrose upon the Epistles produced by Salmasius In Apparatu quia beatis Apostolis decedentibus illi qui post illos ordinati sunt ut praeessent Ecclesiis illis primis exaequari non poterant neque miraculorum testimonium par illis habere sed in multis aliis inferiores illis esse videbantur grave illis videbatur Apostolorum sibi vendicare nuncupationem Diviserunt ergo nomina ipsa iisdem Presbyterorum nomen reliquerunt alii verò Episcopi sunt nuncupati hique Ordinationis praediti potestate ita ut plenissimè iidem praepositos se Ecclesiarum esse cognoscerent This is manifestly the very reason that I insist upon For saith he because the blessed Apostles deceasing those that were ordained to be over Churches after them could not be equalled to those first nor attain to the like grace of miracles but appeared to be beneath them in many other things it seemed too much for them to challenge to themselves the name of Apostles Hereupon they divided the names and left them the name of Presbyters and the others were called Bishops and they endowed with the Power of Ordaining that they might know themselves to be set over the Churches in the fullest right I marvell what pleasure Salmasius had to allege this passage which if it be admitted is enough alone to overthrow all that he hath said in this point For first he supposeth as the received Doctrine of the Church that Bishops in their severall Churches succeeded the Apostles Secondly he answers all S. Hieromes reasons to prove that Bishops and Presbyters are all one because they are called by the same name in the Scriptures by giving another reason even that which you have here Lastly he saith that Bishops are set over their Churches plenissimè in the fullest right and that therefore Ordination was reserved to them which is to say that in all things they have a speciall Interesse but especially Ordination is their peculiar And with this reason agrees Theodoret when he says that at such time as the name of Bishops was common to Presbyters those who were called Bishops afterwards were called Apostles extending the name of Apostles to others besides the Apostles of Christ This is then a sufficient reason why the name of Bishops should be afterwards appropriated to that rank wherein they succeed the Apostles and Evangelists in their respective Churches because they could not be called by the same which their predecessors had born though formerly common both to Bishops and Presbyters And this is the meaning of those words of S. Augustine which seemed difficult in the Councell of Trent because the opinion which derived all the power of Bishops from the Pope was so strong there Etsi secundum honorum vocabula quae jam Ecclesiae usus obtinuit Episcopatus Presbyterio major sit in multis tamen Augustinus Episcopus Hieronyme Presbyters minor est Let not the humility of S. Augustine be drawn into consequence and the property of his words shall enforce no more then I say He knew well enough how stiffely S. Hierome had argued that a Bishop and a Priest is all one in the terms of divine Right because the name of Episcopus is attributed to Presbyters by the Apostles Is it to be presumed that S. Augustine acknowledges this to be his own opinion because it is plain he intends not to crosse S. Hierome in it having other differences with him afore On the contrary it hath been shewed by other passages of his writings that his opinion was otherwise To use therefore that civility which his meeknesse prompted him to condescend to S. Hierome with he granteth his premises neither refusing nor admitting the consequence saying Though according to the titles of honour which now have prevailed in the Church a Bishop be greater then a Presbyter notwithstanding in many things Jerome the Priest is greater then Augustine the Bishop Where by naming the titles of Honour which now have prevailed in the Church he insinuates the reason for which I here maintain that they were thus distinguished afterwards and therefore supposes the ground of it Otherwise he might as easily have granted S. Hieromes consequence and pleased him more And yet I conceive that when he says a Priest may be greater then a Bishop it may very well be admitted not onely as a condescension of humility but as an expression of truth not onely in respect of learning or other personall considerations but of authority in the Church by reason of the dependence of Churches here premised The state and government of Churches is very properly compared by Origen contra Celsum VII to the State of Greekish Commonalties the Bishop bearing the place of the Magistrate and the Bench of Presbyters of the Senate as I have hitherto compared them to the Jews Consistories and as Pope Pius in his Epistle to Justus of Vienna calls the Presbytery of the Church at Rome Pauperem Senatum Christi in Vrbe Româ The poore Senate of Christ in the City of Rome In this estate and condition the eminence of the Bishop above the Presbyters is visible though not by the humility of Pope Pius who perhaps comprises both Bishop and Presbyters in the same quality of a Senate yet by the comparison of Origen the eminence of the Magistrate above his Councell in all Commonalties being so visible as it is But when congregations come to be distinguished as well as Churches and a greater flock assigned to some Presbyters then to Bishops in other parts of the Church and those Presbyters to doe all Offices to their Flock which those Bishops did saving that they depended on the City Church whereas those Bishops depended onely on the Church of the Mother City and therefore had Power to make Ordinations within their own Churches which Presbyters never could doe what hinders in this case I say not S. Augustine for I suppose he names himself but for an instance being indeed Bishop of an eminent City to be lesse then S. Hierome but some Bishop to be lesse then some Priest even for his lawfull authority in the Church A consideration of great consequence to the right constitution of Councels especially the most Generall and for which there is not wanting a valuable reason intimated in the proceedings of divers of the ancient Councels of the Church that is that the Church cannot be reasonably concluded by number of present votes as the Councell of Trent imposes upon us but by the consideration of Christian Nations and Provinces of the Church represented in those Councels For as we see that in the ancient Councels a few Bishops were many times admitted to act in behalf of their
Provinces as having Commission to conclude them in which case they must needs be considerable according to the Provinces for which they stood So in all things which may concern the Whole not onely every mans rank of Bishop Presbyter or Deacon is to be considered but also the eminence of the Church in which he bears the same So that by this reason nothing hinders a Presbyter of some chief Church to be of more consideration to the Whole then a Bishop of some mean Church such as we spoke of in Africk And therefore it would be inconsequent that the determinations of Synods should passe indifferently by the Votes of Bishops unlesse we suppose that consideration is had of the chief Churches and this consideration answered in the eminence of that respect which the Bishops of those chief Churches enjoy inswaying the determinations of those Synods to which they concur And this consideration might perhaps have served to take off part of S. Hieromes displeasure against Bishops grounded upon the Power which their Deacons had by their means above Presbyters which he in regard of the great difference between the two degrees in generall thinks to be so great an inconvenience Epist LXXXV ad Euagrium For though it is most true in regard of the Presbyters and Deacons of the same Church that it was a disorder that Deacons in regard of their neernesse to the Bishops should take upon them above Presbyters yet if we compare the Deacon of a chief Church with the Presbyter of a small country Parish no man can say that he is of lesse consideration to the Whole Church in regard of his rank unlesse he mean to make Steven or Philip Titus or Timothy or any of those that waited on the Apostles in person and were properly their Deacons as I have said in assisting them to preach the Gospel where they came to be meaner persons in the Church then one of those Presbyters which Paul and Barnabas Titus or Timothy Ordained in the Churches of those Cities where they came To that which I say p. 92. to prove that the word Angel in the Epistle to the VII Churches Apoc. II III. being an obvious and proper metaphor to signifie a Bishop or Presbyter cannot therefore be used to signifie a College of Presbyters the word being no collective nor any construction inforcing it to be used for a collective in all that Epistle I adde here the comparison of two passages by which it may be gathered for what reason and in what consideration the Spirit speaketh to the Body of those Churches in the Epistle directed to the Angels of them and by consequence who those Angels are The first is that of S. Paul to Titus II. 10. A man that is an Heretick after the first and second admonition avoid For is it S. Pauls purpose to command that onely Titus avoid those whom he should declare Hereticks Surely that would be to no great effect unlesse we understand that by virtue of this precept both Titus is enabled to charge the Churches under him to avoid them and they thereupon obliged to doe it The other is the Epistle under the name of Ignatius to Polycarpus wherein after such advise as he thought fit for Polycarpus without turning his speech from him to another person he proceeds to exhort his people with such instructions as he found to bee most requisite Which feems to be the reason why many count that Epistle counterfeit and none of Ignatius his own though for my part I confesse I am not yet perswaded to think so not onely because of the character both of the matter and language of it which seemeth to me to carry the stamp of Apostolicall upon it as the rest of Ignatius but also particularly because of the example of this Epistle of S. John to the VII Churches wherein it is plain he involves both Pastor and flock in the same praises reproofs advises and exhortations the reasons being the same in both because both sent to be read to the People in the Church as the Epistle to the Colossians and the Laodiceans Coloss IV. 15. and as the Epistle of Clemens to the Corinthians Eusebius says was wont to be read in that Church in his time Now if the instructions concerning the people be addressed to Titus and Polycarp is it not because of some eminence of authority in them by which they might be brought into effect among their people How much more that which is addressed unto the Angels of VII Churches being a style apt to signifie a person of eminent authority over others but never used to signifie a Body of persons much lesse with parallel authority among themselves It is commonly conceived that the Souls under the Altar which we reade of Apoc. VI. 10. were seen by S. John lying under the Altar of Burnt Sacrifices at the foot whereof the rest of the blood that was not sprinkled on the Altar was poured out and the blood being the life or Soul of living creatures in the language of the Scriptures that therefore the souls of those that were slain for the profession of Christianity are seen by S. John under the Altar Against this apprehension I allege p. 95. that it is not the Altar of burnt Sacrifices but the Altar of Incense within the Tabernacle but without the Vail which is represented in these Visions correspondent to the Primitive fashion of Churches where the Communion Table called also the Altar because of the Sacrifice of the Crosse represented upon it stood in the midst of that compasse which the Seats of the Bishop and Priests did enclose For though in the Temple the people prayed without the Sanctuary the Priest whose Office it was at the same time offering Incense with their Prayers yet in the Church where all the people are within the Sanctuary as Priests the XXIV Presbyters are described with golden Vials full of Incense which is the peoples prayers as David saith Let my prayer be set forth in thy presence as the Incense Apoc. V. 8. and besides the Angel puts Incense upon his Censer to the prayers of the Saints Apoc. VIII 3. therefore his fire is from the Altar of Incense within the Tabernacle though without the Vail Besides it is not imaginable how the souls of those that were slain could appear to S. John in Vision of Prophesie lying under the Altar of Burnt Sacrifices where the bloud of Sacrifices was poured out and that in such a multitude as we know there was of the Primitive Martyrs Especially seeing the circumstances of the Text inforces that they are the same Souls which first cry for vengeance and have long white Robes given them because they are not presently satisfied Apoc. VI. 9 10 11. and which are afterwards described standing and praising God in the white Robes that were given them afore Apoc. VII 9. And therefore when they are said to be seen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the meaning is not that they were seen lying
Provinces were constituted by in the Babylonian and after it in the Persian Empire then by any right belonging to him among his own people such as the posterity of Zorebabel had to be Governours of the Jews that remained in Babylonia when they were privileged to live according to their own Laws by their Soveraign But whether this or that as to the point here in hand both are to the same purpose I must not passe over this place without taking into consideration the reasons upon which and the consequences to which Erastus his opinion seems to be advanced in the late sharp work de Cive where it is determined that the interpretation of the Scriptures for which I may as well say the Power of Giving Laws to the Church seeing the greatest difficulty lies in determining controversies of Faith the constitution of Pastors the Power of binding and loosing belongs to every Christian State to be exercised by the ministery of Pastors of the Church For if this may take place then is all that hath been said to no purpose And truly I must imbrace and applaud one position upon which all this proceeds that the Church to which any Right or Power of acting according to any right is attributed in the Scriptures must needs be a Society that may be assembled and therefore stands obliged to assemble But that hereupon alone it should be inferred and taken for granted that therefore a Christian State and a Christian Church are both the same thing distinguished by two severall causes and considerations when both consist of the same persons I have all the reason in the World to stand astonished For it is not the persons which are supposed here to be the same that any question can be made of neither can the Church and the State be said to be the same thing because they are all the same For we speak not here of the nature of the persons their souls or bodies or any thing that either of both is endowed with but we speak here of the quality of a State or a Church affecting all those persons together upon some voluntary act of God or of themselves or both without making any change in the nature of any person so qualified onely supposing the person whose act it is able to doe the act upon which they are qualified to be a State or a Church and by doing it to oblige or privilege the persons on whom it passes Which kinde of things are oftentimes by Philosophers Divines and Lawyers called to very good purpose Morall things Such are all manner of rights in all manner of Societies whatsoever being nothing else but abilities of doing something which are not in other men not endowed with the same So likewise seeing that all the objects of any faculty naturall or morall any habit of virtue or vice or that which is neither but consists in skill or knowledge or any perfection of nature for which a man is neither good nor bad may be denominated and qualified by the faculties or habits that are exercised upon them by the same reason as colour is said to be seen or as that is said to be right and just which is done according to justice therefore by the same common reason if there be such a thing as Holinesse in the souls of men which disposes them to reverence God by tendring him that service which may expresse it then are the Means and the Circumstances the Times the Places and the Persons by which this reverence is publickly tendred to God capable to be denominated Holy by a morall quality derived from that Holinesse which dwels in the souls of Christians and not onely capably but actually so qualified in point of right supposing that which hath been proved p. 212 that the practice of Gods people evidenced by the Scriptures proves the reverence of the same to be effectuall and necessary for the maintenance of that reverence of God in those acts of his service wherein the Holinesse of Christians consisteth This though it belong not to my present purpose I have set down upon this occasion out of a desire further to declare the nature of that Holinesse for which Times Places and Persons as also all other means which God is served by are said to be Holy and for what reason I call it p. 217. sometimes Morall sometimes Ecclesiasticall Holinesse sometimes also Relative as others many times do call it For seeing it is grounded upon the relation which is between all faculties morall or naturall between all habits of virtue and vice or whatever else and the objects which they are exercised about it is manifest how properly it is called Relative Again seeing it hath been declared that those qualifications and denominations which arise upon some act of God or man having power to oblige either others or themselves are therefore called Morall in opposition to such as make a change in the nature of mens souls and bodies when they become endowed therewith because these Morall qualities accrue without any change in the nature of them to whom they accrue therefore that Holinesse which belongs to things uncapable of that Holinesse which dwels in the souls of Christians is properly called morall Holinesse as grounded upon the Will of God appearing to have appointed the reverence of them to maintain that reverence of him wherein Holinesse consisteth And as for this reason in generall it is called morall Holinesse so it is also called Ecclesiasticall for the same reason expressed in particular as depending upon that Will of God by which Christianity and the Church and the service of God therein subsisteth To return then to my purpose which gave me occasion to declare this here seeing that when the question is made whether the Church and the State consisting of the same persons be the same thing or not there can be no question understood of the nature that is the souls and bodies of the persons which are supposed to be the same but of the Morall beeing of a State whether the same give it the quality of a Church or not 3. And seeing the beeing of such things depends upon the act by which they are constituted we have no more to enquire but this whether the same Act constitute a Church which constitutes a State And then a very little enquiry will serve to shew that though all Churches and all States subsist by the Act both of God and man yet they are severall Acts by which they are States and by which they are Churches So severall that the Church subsists by immediate revelation from God by our Lord and his Apostles which no State doth and whatsoever it is that makes any man a member of any State it is not that which makes him a Christian and so a member of the Church but something else And therefore there is a fault in the reason of the inference propounded which concludes thus that a Church must be that which hath Power to assemble the
all that act upon the interesse and title thereof derived from the immediate appointment of God doe by their proceedings disclaim as I have declared much more is it to be presumed that all States notwithstanding the profession of Christianity must needs stand obliged to doe For all States content themselves with the procuring of civile justice for which they are instituted not tying themselves to question whether that which is done be agreeable to the will of God which the Gospel declareth either for the thing that is done which the Gospel many times determineth more strictly then the Laws of civile States doe or for the sincerity of intention which it is to be done with Wherefore if Christianity come to be limited by the determinations of civile Powers then must the truth of the Gospel and the spirituall righteousnesse which it requireth be measured by those reasons which the publick peace and civile justice which preserveth the same may suggest Whereas it hath been declared that it is not the bare profession of Christianity that intitleth any man to any degree of superiority in the Church but that promotion to all degrees of the Clergy doth by the originall institution and appointment thereof presuppose some degree of proficience in the understanding and practice of Christianity rendring them both able and willing to regulate all controversies of Christianity not according to Interesse of State but according to the will of Christ and that spirituall righteousnesse which he advanceth And though it is many times seen that Secular persons are more learned and pious in Christianity then others of the Clergy yet I suppose no man of common sense will presume it so soon of him that is not inabled nor obliged to it by his profession as of him that is And when the question is what is agreeable to the appointment of God in such matters as these I suppose it is no presumption that God hath instituted any thing because it is possible for in morall matters what is absolutely and universally impossible but because it is most conducible to the intent purposed And that to the purposed end of maintaining the truth of the Gospel and that spirituall righteousnesse which it advanceth it is more conducible that those things which concern it be determined by those that are inabled by their profession to spend their time in searching the truth and engaged by the same to advance the spirituall righteousnesse of Christ then barely Christians as Secular Powers As for the reason of this resolution because if the Power of determining matters of Faith might be in any person not subject to the State which the determination must oblige all that are to be obliged by it must become thereby subjects to the Power that maketh it As supposing the temporall Power of the Pope it is insoluble so supposing what hath been premised it ceaseth For seeing nothing prejudiciall to the publick Peace or to the Powers of the World that maintain the same can be within the Power of the Church to determine it cannot be prejudiciall to any Christian State to receive the resolutions and determinations of Ecclesiasticall matters from Councels which may consist of persons not subject to them as well as of such as are For if any thing prejudiciall to the publick peace and lawfull Powers that maintain it be advanced under pretense of Christianity that is if this Power be abused then have the Secular Powers right to God as well as Power to the world to punish such attempts But the Church neither right to God nor Power to the world of resisting them though their Power be ill used to the suppression of Christianity and of that Ecclesiasticall Power that standeth by it because it is to be maintained by suffering the Crosse and not by force As for the Power of binding and loosing it is very well understood to consist as well in judging that which is questioned to be consistent or inconsistent with that Christianity which a man professeth as in remitting or retaining sin that is in allowing or voiding the effect of Baptism which is the Communion of the Church But whereas it is said that the first is the right of the State the second the office of the Pastors of the Church I demand whether these Pastors shall have Power to dissent in case the judgement of the State agree not with their own or not For that this may fall out it is manifest and that any man by his quality in the Church should be bound to proceed in remitting and retaining sin according to his own judgement when as by his subjection to the State he is bound to proceed according to the judgement thereof is an inconvenience as manifest Whereas that a man should be bound by his obligation to the Church to proceed according to his own judgement in Church matters and by his subjection to the State to suffer for it when it is contrary to the judgement thereof is so farre from being an inconvenience that it is the necessary consequence of bearing Christs Crosse The same reason takes place in that which is said that the election of Pastors belongs to the State and the Consecration to Pastors For I have often shewed in the premises that Imposition of Hands is a sign of consent to the constituting of those who receive the same implying a Power of dissenting for the use whereof they are to render account if it be used amisse And truly that Paul and Barnabas should be called Apostles Acts XIV 4 13. in regard of their sending by the Holy Ghost Acts XIII 1 I count it not strange For the extent of the word and the use thereof will bear it Though it is manifest that otherwise Barnabas had Commission from the Church at Jerusalem Acts XI 22. that is from the Apostles Paul not from men nor by men but by Jesus Christ and God the Father that raised him from the dead Gal. I. 1. though acknowledged first as to the Commission which he received with Barnabas Acts XIII 2. by the Church of Antiochia but afterwards in the right of the XII Apostles by themselves at Jerusalem Gal. II. 9. But I count it strange that to prove the Power of the State in choosing Pastors it should be alleged that this dictate of the Holy Ghost by which Paul and Barnabas were set apart to the work for which they were designed Acts XIII 2. was to be acknowledged for the dictate of the Holy Ghost by the Church of Antiochia I have shewed that under the Old Testament the Consistory were to judge of Prophets and to obey them being received which power was sufficiently abused among them I doe beleeve also that there was means given the Church to be resolved in the same that the precept of the Apostle 1 Cor. XII 3. 1 John IV. 1 tendeth to that effect that the grace of discerning Spirits 1 Cor. XII 9. was to such a purpose I remember the words of S. Ambrose upon
blasphemers of your Goddesse By which instance we may be assured that Christianity obligeth us not to seek by scorn to bring any man out of love of a false Religion if they did it not to Idolaters And truly though the Israelites are commanded to destroy all monuments of Idolatry with all the scorn possible yet that is to be understood in the Land of Promise which God made them masters of upon that condition but under other Dominions it is provided by the second Commandement Thou shalt not bow down to them nor worship them not thou shalt not blaspheme them or shew despite against them Josephus indeed interpreteth that precept of the Law Thou shalt not curse Gods to mean that they are forbidden thereby to blaspheme the Gods of the Gentiles Wherein though it seems he flattereth the Romanes for you may have seen another sense thereof before yet this interpretation is presumption enough that they were not commanded by the Law to doe it I will not therefore condemne the Christians of the East for singing to Julians face as the Ecclesiasticall Histories tell us Their Idols are silver and gold and confoundâ—d be all they that worship carved images Because we know particularly that the Christians of his time were resolved to surfer for their Christianity rather then to defend themselves by force And therefore cannot interpret it to be done in scorn to him but to protest their resolution against Heathenism as also many zealous acts of the Primitive Martyrs must be interpreted But I will make this inference to prove that in point of right which you have seen was true de facto that because Christianity preserveth the estate of the world in the same terms and under the same Powers which it findeth therefore it enjoyneth no man to blaspheme the Religion of the lawfull Powers of the world because thereby themselves would be brought into contempt to the undermining of the obedience due to them And therefore this inference proceedeth not upon supposition of the truth of Christianity but upon a reason common to all civile Societies whether Christian or otherwise which Christianity prejudiceth not but maintaineth As for the second doubt it must also be resolved that those whom Christian States hold themselves not enabled to put out of the World or out of the State for professing any Religion those they cannot so punish for the exercise of that Religion which they professe For if it be so necessary for all men to professe and exercise some Religion that they should be out of the protection of the Law of Nations that should professe to have none and that to professe a Religion and not to live according to it is a bare profession that is a presumption that he hath none that doth so it follows that civility and the Law of Nations will inable all men to live after the Religion which they professe And therefore inable no State so to punish men for so doing In the mean time no State is hereby obliged to leave the exercise of other Religions beside that which it self professeth either free or Publick For I conceive the exercise of Religion is understood to be free in regard of those Penalties which are in the Power of every State to inflict on those that conform not to their own according to that which hath been said And to be publick is a further privilege though it necessarily import no more then Toleration containeth For the Christians before Constantine had not only Churches and those endowed with Lands and Revenues as it appeareth by Eusebius but those Lands and Revenues were the common goods of those Churches meerly because it was counted Sacrilege to spoile that Religion which was not counted Sacrilege And yet this was no more then Toleration for when the Soveraign Power would have Christianity goe for Sacrilege immediately they were spoiled of all under Diocletian That which is here resolved p. 259. that meerly a false opinion in matter of Religion is not to be punished with Banishment which is civile death to the State whereof a man is occasions a question concerning Athanasius banished to Triers by Constantine and the same Athanasius and many more by Constantius Valens and others wherein the injustice of the punishment lay whether the Power was onely abused or also usurped Whereunto it is to be answered that the sentence of Constantine upon Athanasius neither imported Banishment nor passed meerly in consideration of his opinion in Religion For seeing the place of abode to which he was confined was within the State whereof he was so that not changing Laws or Language for he must needs be understood over all the Romane Empire he could not be said to live among them that were barbarous to him or he to them barbarous he continued free of the State whereof he was afore though not in possession and use of that rank and estate which he bore in it As for the cause of this sentence it is manifest by the relation that it passed in consideration of the publick peace which seemed to suffer because Athanasius submitted not the trust which he had from the Church to the judgement of the Emperour in abandoning that which the Councell of Nice had done in deposing Arius But the ground of Constantius his sentence upon Liberius of Rome and Eusebius of Vercellae was meerly for acting according to their opinion in Religion Liberius for not condemning Athanasius in the common cause of the Church Eusebius for voting according to his judgement in the Councell at Millane As for the sentence upon Liberius it is the same with that upon Athanasius but that upon Eusebius being condemned to live in the deserts of Aegypt seems to have as much difference from it as there was between relegatio and deportatio among the Romanes the one being but a confinement to a strange people under the same State the other to no people but to some desert Iland or inhabitable place such as the deserts of Aegypt were which is to be removed from the Society of civile people Wherefore as it is no inconvenience to grant that Constantine used ill the Power that he had so that Constantius usurped that which he had not seeing we know that the Arians under him so persecuted the Catholick Christians as I have proved that no Soveraign Power can allow any Subject to be persecuted for Religions sake neither ever did the Catholicks persecute them again By the premises it may appear that the punishment which is commonly called by the term of Banishment may by the disposition of Soveraign Powers be so aggravated or so lightned by the circumstances that the right of inflicting it may be sometimes said to be abused sometimes usurped Therefore my position as the reason of it proceeds onely upon that which amounts to civile Death depriving a man of his right of continuing free of the State whereof he is I cannot here passe by that passage of Synesius Epist LVII 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉