much Art as may partly appear by this discourse of the Cardinal Prosper Sanctacrucius with the French Ambassador Paul de Foix in the presence of Thuanus You compel me Sir said the Cardinal in your favour to reveal a Mystery that hath been conceal'd with a profound veneration which is that this Court uses an exquisite Severity when there is occasion and it may be done without danger and when any man of great Quality submits to it the Cause is prolong'd with abundance of delays till the fame thereof and the terror of our name be spread over the World This Severity is so long successful as it is tamely born either through weakness or religious fear but if a Prince be held by neither with caution and great dissimulation we depart from this Rigor This was an ingenuous Confession and it shews in what wretched condition they have been who most of all dreaded the Thunder of the Vatican That the Popes and their Creatures have infringed the Prerogatives of Princes is evident beyond exception And that others who have seem'd very adverse from them have notwithstanding in this imitated their Example appears also from many instances and will not be deny'd I suppose by you who have read Spotswood's History of the Church of Scotland and have no fondness for the Presbyterian Discipline But whoever they are that take such measures and invade and grasp into their hands the Rights of the Magistrate whether they pretend to it in order to things Spiritual or for the advancement of the Scepter of Christ they make the Gospel a Carnal thing and do infinite dishonour to Christianity by their Usurpations This may be sufficient to let you see that the sentiments I have of Ecclesiastical Government intrench not on the Temporal and that when you tell me The sword knows no other edge but what the Magistrate gives it it makes nothing against me who am of opinion that the Church hath no Secular Power but what is deriv'd from Secular Princes and what may be limited or extended by them Nevertheless I affirm in the next place that our Saviour communicated some Power to his Church and particularly that he conferr'd on his Apostles such Authority as Secular Princes could not bestow For he gave them the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven He gave them Commission to absolve offenders and an assurance that their Sentence should be ratified Whose soever sins said he ye remit they are remitted unto them and whose soever sins ye retain they are retained After his Ascension they acted as his Representatives and by the Power they received from him they constituted other Officers to be Governours of Churches and to them they convey'd some Authority For Authority is implied in the Titles that are attributed to them in the Scripture and in different degrees it belongs to all Ecclesiastical Rulers Obey them that have the Rule over you says the Author of the Epistle to the Hebrews and submit your selves for they watch for your souls Heb. 13.17 And Clemens Romanus admonishes those who had laid the foundation of the Schism at Corinth To be subject to their Presbyters to be contrite and penitent for their former miscarriages to lay aside their arrogant speeches and to learn submission since it were better as he tells them that they should be little in the Fold of Christ than to swell with pride and fall from their hopes in him The Authority that has been assigned to the Apostles and other Pastors of the Church is commonly called Spiritual and not unfitly for it is exercis'd in Spiritual matters and relates to the affairs of another World It does not touch or hurt the Body or Life or Estate of an Offender but by accident It may be assisted by the Coercive Power of the Magistrate but that is not essential to it The administration of it is sometimes rendred more easie by the favour of Princes and sometimes more difficult by their opposition but it is the same in it self under those various circumstances It has its proper effects in the times of Persecution as well as in those that are serene and calm and it must be granted that Obedience is always due to it under the pain of God's displeasure unless one will say that his Precepts may be broken without danger or that Ecclesiastical Government is one of the most precarious useless things in the World Before I dismiss this Subject it may be fit to take notice of the Attempts against Ecclesiastical Authority that have been made by a late Writer who is suppos'd by some to be what he thought himself a man of Demonstration You are no Stranger to his Opinions amongst which this is one that Christ himself had not nor hath in this World any Regal or Governing Power Our Saviour was sent says he to persuade the Jews to return to and to invite the Gentiles to receive the Kingdom of the Father but not to reign in Majesty no not as his Fathers Lieutenant till the day of Judgment And from hence he gathers that no obedience to his Officers can be requir'd For this purpose he produces these words of Christ My Kingdom is not of this world But he certainly mistakes their sense as the Manichees did before him and the Answer may be apply'd to him which was given to them by Theophylact who observes that it is said indeed My Kingdom is not of this World and again it is not from hence But it is not said My Kingdom is not in this World or it is not here The Kingdom of Christ is not from the earth as its Cause nor is it earthly in its Nature Yet is the Earth part of his Empire and he turns about the affairs of it at his pleasure In his state of humiliation he had power on Earth to forgive sins And then it was that he said to his Disciples Ye call me Master and Lord and ye say well for so I am After his Resurrection he declar'd that all power was given to him in heaven and in earth And so far is it from being true that he reigns not till the day of judgment that the Apostle says expresly He must reign till he hath put all his enemies under his feet If our Saviour had all Power he might delegate some part of it to his Apostles and that he did so appears from what has been said and it may be confirm'd from the Promise which he made to them that they should sit on twelve Thrones judging the twelve Tribes of Israel This place I know has been made use of to prove that no Ministers of Christ have any ruling power till he comes to judgment But one that attentively considers that the Jurisdiction which is represented by sitting on Thrones commences not with his coming in Glory but with his entring into it or being in it may find reason to think he design'd to intimate to his Apostles
enough in my Concessions I. I grant that originally there were but twelve Apostles and I doubt not but as S. Barnabas intimates they were so many in allusion to the twelve Tribes of Israel But it does not follow from hence that the Office of the Apostles was limited to that Number or to their Persons On the contrary I shall prove in another place that it was actually communicated to others yet I deny not but the Name of the Twelve was continued for as it was assign'd to the Apostles with regard to their first Institution when Judas was fall'n and there remain'd only Eleven so it was also when many more were admitted into the Sacred College And thus says Peter du Moulin The Regions of Decapolis and Pentapolis kept up their Names when some of their old Cities were destroy'd or when new ones were built within their Precincts and Neapolis which signifies a New City is still so call'd notwithstanding its great Antiquity II. I grant That the first Apostles saw the Lord but this was no part of their Office only it made them fit to be the first Witnesses of Christianity Because says Paulinus they were to be sent into the World for the Information of all Nations it was requisite they should receive the Faith they were to preach not only with their ears but with their eys that what they had more firmly learned they might more constantly teach But we cannot infer from hence that none might succeed them in teaching and governing Their Conversation with Christ in the Flesh was a great Privilege to which at this time none can justly pretend But what qualified them for the Mission by which they were enabled to constitute subordinate Officers did not hinder them certainly from appointing others to preside over them as themselves had done III. I grant That the Apostles had their Commission immediately from our Saviour But notwithstanding this Privilege others might as well succeed them in the Authority they had to govern the Churches as Princes might sit on the Throne of David who were not advanced to it in a manner so Extraordinary by the particular Appointment and express Declaration of the Almighty as himself had been Noah his Sons receiv'd Power by an express Revelation over the beasts of the earth and over the fowl of the air over every thing that moved upon the earth and over the fishes of the sea and liberty to eat of every living thing as of the green herb Yet they transmitted that Power and Liberty to their Posterity who have not such an intercourse with Heaven as themselves had Thus the first Apostles who were sent immediately by Christ himself might convey their Authority to others who had not that advantage And 't is manifest that their Office was actually delegated to Matthias to whom our Lord did not immediately speak the words of their Commission IV. I grant That the Apostles were in some sense the Foundation on which the Christian Church was built for so we learn from S. Paul Eph. 2.20 But this does not demonstrate that they were an Extraordinary part of the Building Some think they were said to be the Foundation because they first published the Gospel So the Socinians interpret that Expression and they infer from thence as you have also done that the Apostles were Extraordinary Officers But if for that reason they were so in any thing it was in teaching and consequently That was an Extraordinary Part of their work which you say was standing and perpetual Casaubon observes in one of his Exercitations on the Annals of Baronius that when the word Rock is used Metaphorically in Scripture it is with allusion to some Properties of a Rock and denotes Firmness and Stability or the like And says this Learned Man a Rock and Foundation are put for the same thing and differ not in Reality but in Notion only This is what you will be oblig'd to confute if you still adhere to your Opinion for in vain do you argue that the Apostles must needs have had Extraordinary Authority because they had the honour to be a Foundadation of the Catholick Church if no Authority be signified by that expression The Apostles were vested with Authority by their Commission before they planted Churches and therefore did not derive it from that work But if we think that because they formed those Societies their Authority must needs have been Extraordinary and Incommunicable we may as well conclude that Romulus was no King because at Rome he laid the Foundation of the Regal Government which work was not repeated by those that succeeded him in the Throne For my part I know no necessity that they who constitute Churches should be of a distinct Order from those that afterwards preside over them Frumentius was as much a Bishop when he travell'd from one place to another in India after his return thither to plant Churches as any that govern'd them in succeeding times and they that were ordain'd Bishops by the Apostles of those that afterwards should believe did not forfeit their Character whatever that was or acquire any Extraordinary Authority if they were employ'd to convert those that were committed to their Charge But you tell me that whilst the Founder of a College lives it is the duty of the founded on emergent difficulties to have recourse to him and take his directions but he dying his Authority dies with him And it may be so and it may be otherwise You your self cannot be ignorant I am sure how usual it hath been for Founders to appoint Visitors of their Colleges and how permanent their Power has been in our Universities So that this Argument if one may call it so may easily be turn'd against you But Founders you say as such as have no Successors This is profound and it signifies that none came after them to lay the very same Foundations which they had finished before If such arguing as this silences all disputes and puts an end to the fatal Controversies which you truly say have almost destroy'd the Church it must be when the contending Parties are become very weary of their strife and are mightily inclin'd to an Accommodation V. I grant That the Apostles had Power to work Miracles for the Confirmation of their Mission and Doctrine But this hinders not a Succession to them in that Authority which is not miraculous but may be continued in all Ages There was something Extraordinary in the manner of discharging the Apostolical Office but it does not follow from hence that the Office itself was so or ought to be laid aside Otherwise for the same reason we must lay aside Baptism Imposition of Hands Praying and Preaching because all these things were attended with something Extraordinary and Miraculous 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 says S. Chrysostom There was nothing that was merely humane or common in that Age of Wonders But Miracles are said to be the
it I do not understand You have some other quotations from the Fathers which I need not here examine having done it already But I proceed to shew that it is altogether improbable that the Pastours of the Church who came next after the Apostles should conspire to deprave a Divine Institution And this I think will appear if it be consider'd 1. That they were persons of admirable Holiness and Virtue 2. If they had not been such they could not so suddenly have agreed in the same design to corrupt the Church as you contend in the same manner 1. They were persons of admirable Holiness and Virtue Clemens Alexandrinus gives an account what care S. John took of the Churches after his return from Patmos and that he admitted such into the Clergy as were design'd or distinguish'd by the Holy Ghost And as I noted before Irenaeus says the Apostles were desirous that they should be very perfect and unblamable in all things whom they left to be their Successors to whom they committed their own place of Government And can we imagine that such persons as these conspir'd to deprave an Institution of Christ When they daily expos'd their lives to danger when they despis'd the Vngulae and Catastae the rage of Savage Boasts and more Savage Men when a firm adherence to their Religion expos'd them to the Scourge or the Cross the Axe or the Fire and when they express'd such a chearful readiness to embrace the sorest evils that could be inflicted on them and death it self under the most dreadful Circumstances rather than deny their Master were they then contriving to ruin his Discipline or Caballing to make themselves great Or if the mystery of iniquity did so generally work in the Prelates who are suppos'd to have usurpt Authority over their Brethren was there not an honest Presbyter in the world to put them in mind of their Duty or to admonish them to keep their Station Was there not one upon earth that would oppose their Innovations or plainly tell them that by the appointment of Heaven all Presbyters are equal If the Presbyters had no regard for their own Authority had they no concern for their Masters glory Had they no remembrance of what the Apostles taught or of the Instructions for the Government of the Church which they had given Did they not only quietly see the degeneracy spread apace but help it forward by relinquishing the Trust and Authority committed to them by the Holy Ghost We have no reason certainly to suspect any such matters of them but if we had I should dread the Consequences of it 2. If the Bishops who liv'd in the next Age to that of the Apostles had not been persons of so much Perfection and Virtue yet they could not so suddenly have agreed to corrupt the Church in the same manner Arnobius disputing against the Gentiles says in vindication of the History of Christianity If that be false whence comes it to pass that the whole World was in so short a time fill'd with this Religion or how came Nations so distant to receive it with one consent And in like manner I may demand If Prelacy be a defection from an Institution of Christ or his Apostles how came it to gain so early an admission amongst persons of so many different Countries and Languages How came it so suddenly to be establish'd in all the Churches upon the face of the Earth You say that Ecclesiastical Prelates arose at best by occasion and prudentially upon the increase of Believers But how did they every where meet with the like occasions How came all the Churches in the World to act by the same Prudential Rules If you can shew how all the Bishops upon Earth agreed to exalt themselves above their Brethren and how the Presbyters every where so suddenly consented in their submission to them you are the man of the world fittest to write a Commentary on the Philosophy of Epicurus and to prove that his Atoms by their accidental concourse perform'd all the feats and wonders that have been attributed to them That I have not been singular in matching such improbabilities may appear from the words of Mr. Chillingworth which I shall here set down When I shall see says he all the Fables in the Metamorphosis acted and prove Stories when I shall see all the Democracies and Aristocracies in the world lie down and sleep and awake into Monarchies Then will I begin to believe that Presbyterial Government having continued in the Church during the Apostles times should presently after against the Apostles Doctrine and the will of Christ be whirl'd about like a Scene in a Masque and transform'd into Episcopacy In the mean time continues my Author whilst these things remain thus incredible and in human reason impossible I hope I shall have leave to conclude thus Episcopal Government is acknowledged to have been universally receiv'd in the Church presently after the Apostles times Between the Apostles times and this presently after there was not time enough for nor possibility of so great an alteration And therefore there was no such alteration as is pretended And therefore Episcopacy being confessed to be so Ancient and Catholick must be granted also to be Apostolick CHAP. XVII Episcopacy cannot be thought a degeneracy from an Apostolical Constitution if the Testimony of the Fathers may be admitted Their Testimony vindicated IT is certain that the Testimony of the Fathers cannot be admitted to determine the Controversie between us but with the ruine of your Cause it being altogether inconsistent with your Opinion That Episcopacy was not of a Divine or Apostolical Appointment but introduced prudentially and gradually advanced upon the steps to Corruption Even of that select Company who as you say were as Pious and Learned Fathers as any the Churches ever own'd and to whom you profess'd your adherence there was not a man who did not believe that Bishops were constituted by Christ himself or his Apostles or by both You have one Refuge however yet remaining which is to reject those as incompetent Witnesses who upon examination appear against you And accordingly you tell me That the Fathers wrote things they saw not and fram'd matters according to their own conceits and many of them were tainted with partial humours You farther add That the Catalogues of the Succession of Bishops which Eusebius has given us are only Conjectural and Traditionary words fitly join'd together That himself tells us there was a great Chasm in Ecclesiastical History for the three first Centuries Ay that in the third Book of that History Chap. 4. he says expresly as to the persons that succeeded the Apostles in the Government of the Churches that it is hard to tell particularly and by name who they were And that in making his Catalogues he went by way of Collection and Inference from what is written by S. Paul c. But the sum of what Eusebius does indeed say in that
mention he makes of his power to use sharpness if his directions were not observ'd and his challenging obedience from them to whom he ow'd obedience could not but be very surprizing and his threatning that he would come with his Rod if they did not prevent it by their Reformation and that then he would not spare must needs have appear'd very strange language to his good Masters the Corinthians Another Argument by which you pursue the design of the Leviathan in opposing Ecclesiastical Authority is taken from the inconsistence you conceive it hath with the Civil Government if it be not deriv'd from it You conclude there can be no Jurisdiction at all unless it be in the Magistrate or proceeds from him because as you tell me in one Kingdom there can be but one spring or fountain of it But if this be at all pertinent and by Jurisdiction you do not only mean that which is Secular your Objection makes as much against the Ruling Power of the Apostles as of other Spiritual Pastors Yet is this some of that stuff which you so highly extol and I suppose that in your Epistle Dedicatory you had it particularly in your eye where you say that were your Idea of Church-Government receiv'd by all others with the same degree of candour as you assure your self it shall by your Noble Friends it would be of infinite advantage to end those fatal controversies that for many Ages have perplexed and in this last almost destroy'd the Church What your Noble Friends think of your performance I cannot tell For my own part I am not surpriz'd to find you ascribing Infinite Advantage to the Exploits of your own Pen nor convinced but that if your Principles about Ecclesiastical Polity were generally embraced they might be of more pernicious consequence than the Collection which as Lactantius informs us Vlpian made of the impious Rescripts of Princes that he might shew what punishments should be inflicted on those who professed themselves Worshippers of God The Justice of this Charge will be manifest from hence that the Church cannot subsist without Government nor Government without Authority If therefore as you contend there be no Ecclesiastical Government or Authority but what proceeds from the Magistrate this would put it into the power of a Julian to destroy the Church by dissolving that Government and abrogating that Authority And to this he might be the more inclin'd did he believe that the Hierarchy could not be tolerated with safety to himself or were so dangerous a thing as you have represented it Had the Apostles you say own'd any pretensions of a design to erect a National much more an Vniversal Hierarchy or Form of External Government in the Church or had they done any thing to occasion a just suspicion of such a Design it would have much obstructed the true design and end of their Mission which was the planting and spreading Christianity For then Magistrates and Rulers in their own defence and for the preservation of their own inherent Prerogatives and Rights must have always oppos'd it That is they would have been obliged to restrain the Apostles or oppose their Attempts if they acted by other Principles or advanced other Notions than you have embraced And this may a little discover the tendency of your Letters of Church-Government There can be no question amongst those that believe the Gospel but that our Saviour might have established an Vniversal Hierarchy Nor can there be any doubt but if he enjoin'd his Apostles to erect an external form of Church-government it had been their duty to obey his Command And what must then the Kings and Rulers of the Earth have done If you have stated the Case right they might lawfully have taken counsel together against the Lord and against his Anointed They might and ought to have resisted his Design and Constitution or in your words They must in their own defence and for the preservation of their own inherent Prerogatives have always oppos'd it A passage which one would think you should hardly reflect on without something of Confusion It will deserve the severer Censure if it be true that such a Hierarchy as you condemn was indeed erected and that by the appointment of Christ himself And this I take to be certain For the Apostles to whom he committed the Government of all the Church Militant were not invisible Rulers nor were the people under their charge invisible Subjects They admitted not persons into the Christian Society by any secret Rite but by Baptism Nor did they expel them from it by any hidden practice but in a publick manner The Faithful were united to them and other Pastors ordain'd by them as also amongst themselves not only in Love or Charity as they were to all Mankind but in that mutual relation which they had as visible Members of the same Body and as such they were obliged to meet and communicate in the Assemblies that were held for the putting up of solemn Prayers and Praises to Heaven for the Celebration of the Eucharist and other external Acts of Worship And whosoever had Right to Communion in one of those Assemblies he had so in all provided his demand of it was no way irregular And whosoever was expell'd for his Offences from one particular Church he was virtually excluded from the Communion of all other Churches He could not rescind the Sentence against himself by shifting of places Nor could he be kept bound and loos'd on Earth unless he might have been absolv'd and condemn'd in Heaven at the same time After the Apostles days an universal and external Form of Church-Government was kept up and appear'd in great vigor notwithstanding the disturbance it receiv'd from without You your self confess that the Notion of Catholick Vnity then obtain'd which was not understood you say to be internal and spiritual but to consist in something external relating unto Order and Discipline as being an Vnity that was to be maintain'd by Communicatory and other Letters and by Orders and that was intended to support the Notion of but one Bishoprick in the Church and that every Bishop participated of that one Bishoprick in solidum A Notion that was of great use to make the Discipline and Power the more pointed for if but one Church then to be cast out of any part of the Church was indeed to be ejected out of the whole and if but one Bishoprick to be participated by all the Bishops what was done by one was done by all All did censure if one did The Expulsion made by one Bishop out of any Church was in effect an Expulsion from all Churches and so a cutting off entirely from Christianity and all Communion of Saints Yet useful as you think this Notion was and early as it obtain'd you take it to be intolerable The Authority which you acknowledge S. Cyprian approv'd and which was exercis'd by him and other excellent Men in his