Henry VIII cap. 21. in the outward Courts and Jurisdiction Ecclesiastical neither did he in his Practice either in his own Person or the Persons of Church-Men by a Plea of deriving the Power unto them from himself take upon him any thing essential to the Priest-hood as to determine in Matters of Faith decide Controversies to offiociate at the Altar to ordain c. even to appoint Laws and Canons for discipline or Proceedings in that Convocation called and continued by his Power but as there first debated and determined framed into a Rule and in presiding over whom his headship so much consisted § IX WEE 'L go on from King Henry VIII to King Edward VI. and in the first year of his Reign cap. 2. Sect. 3. we meet with a notable alteration made in Words and though no more yet may make a shew as if he assumed a farther new Power to himself as supreme head of the Church which King Henry VIII did not do before him and whereas the Arch-Bishops Bishops and other spiritual Persons do use to make and send out their Summons Citations and Process in their own Names and with their own Seals it is enacted That they be made and sent out in the Name and with the Seal of the King c. but this relating only to the Courts Ecclesiastical as in the Words of the Statute and by which the King is own'd the Supreme by the Clegy as 't is also in the Statute worded and acknowledged nor can any Arch-Bishop Bishop c. summon any of the King's Subjects to any Place without his leave and not enabled by him the King may authorize them in what form he please whether of that of the Common-Law or in any other as in that of Majors in Corporations or Vice-Chancellors in the University or Court-Leets which latter was the form and is by this Act abolished and the first brought into its room and upon what reasons soever this Act was laid and passed in King Edward's days or repealed by Queen Mary as to be sure the two Parties the Puritan and the Papist thought they served themselves and particular Designs in it it was never re-enforced by any succeeding Parliaments nor attempted that I have met with in the days of either Queen Elizabeth or King James or King Charles the first or second The Prince was not thought to loose or gain any thing as to his Autority in Spirituals which way soever it went nor the Bishops to have any Plea of inroding the Errors by so using it as they now do in their own Names and with their own Seals as by the male-contented and puritanical Party in the days of King Charles the first it was objected they did and they libelled and traduced for it but are sufficiently vindicated therein by the reverend Father in God Robert Sanderson late Lord Bishop of Lincoln in a Treatise called Episcopacy as established by the Laws in England not prejudicial to regal Power And even in this very Statute of Edward VI. the Bishops are to use their own Seals and Names in all faculties dispensations collations institutions inductions letters of Orders c. and in limiting which also to his own Name and Seal the King's supremacy had been equally asserted nay more concern'd because peculiarly enlarged if that the thing was aimed at for the granting Letters of Orders is what is purely hieratical and solely Episcopal seated in the highest Order of the Priest-hood a peculiar embellishment to the Crown and the Bishops by acting in the other Instances in their own Names and by their own Seals must have in as his high a degree invaded a most singular and choice Prerogative of the Prince the right of Investiture admission into Temporals Institution and Induction into Benefices are Acts purely worldly and secular and originally in the Crown could an Objection be framed from the particular Form either ways and such its Circumstances as indeed and really cannot be § X I come next to Queen Elizabeth where we shall find that as she reassumed the Supremacie in the first year of her Reign alienated by Queen Mary and this by Act of Parliament cap. 1. in which is the Oath of Supremacy to be taken as in that Act ordered and limited and because a great many Cavils were made and sinister malicious Constructions The Queen her self in that very Year endeavors to rescue her Subjects and disentangle them from all such Jealousies and among her Injunctions 1559 for Peace and Order in the Church and State there is an admonition to simple Men deceived by Malitious The Words are these which though many I 'le here transcribe and in effect but the same with those of the Convocation 1562. on the very same occasion The Queens Majesty being informed That in certain Places of the Realm sundry of her Native Subjects being call'd to Ecclesiastical Ministry of the Church be by sinister Perswasion and perverse construction induced to find some Scruple in the form of an Oath which by an Act of the late Parliament is prescribed to be required of divers Persons for the recognition of their Allegiance to her Majesty which certainly was never meant nor by any equity of Words or good Sense can be there from gather'd would that all her loving Subjects should understand that nothing was is or shall be meant or intended by the same Oath than was acknowledged to be due to the most noble King of famous Memory King Henry VIII her Majesties Father or King Edward the VI. her Majesties Brother And farther her Majesty forbiddeth all manner her Subjects to give ear and credit to such perverse and malicious Persons which most sinisterly and maliciously labour to notifie to her loving Subjects how by word of the said Oath it may be collected that the King and Queens Possessors of the Crown may challenge Autority and Power of Ministry of divine Service in the Church wherein her said Subjects be much abused by such evil disposed Persons for certainly her Majesty neither doth nor ever will challenge any Autority than that was challenged and lately used by the said noble Kings of famous Memory King Henry VIII and King Edward VI which is and was in Ancient time due to the Imperial Crown of this Realm that is under God to have the Soveraignty and Rule over all manner of Persons born within these her Realms Dominions and Countries of what Estate either Ecclesiastical or Temporal ever they be so as no other Foreign Power shall or ought to have any Superiority over them And if any Person that has conceived any other sense of the Form of the said Oath shall accept the same Oath with this interpretation sense or meaning her Majesty is well pleased to accept every such in that behalf as her good and obedient Subjects and shall acquit them of all manner of Penalties contemn'd in the said Act against such as shall peremptorily and obstinately refuse to take the same Oath And because this is
If the Jesuit do let him look to it Christianity is not in fault An entring into or renewing the Covenant at the Font or Altar is no Encroachment on the but Justice of Peace in the Neighborhood Sect. 43. Excommunication and other Censures change no Mans Condition as to this World they have no force but in relation to known Duties Prudence is to rule in the Execution particular regard to be had to Princes Whatever is Coercive annexed is from the Prince Lay-Judges Chancellors c. when first granted by the Empire upon the Bishops Petition The same is Absolution neither innovate in Civil Affairs Sect. 44. Conciliary Acts invade no more than does the Gospel it self That Canons have had the precedency of the Law is by the savour of Princes a Council without local meeting Letters Missive Sect. 45. Ordaining others no more prejudicial to the Crown than the former acts This is Mr. Hobbe's Misapprehension Sect. 46. CHAP. V. THe grand Objection out of Mr. Hobbes If these two Powers command the same Person at the same time inconsistent Performances it arises from that false Principle that all Power is outward Sect. 1. This infers equally against the Laws of God and which may and do sometimes thus interfere are as difficultly reconcileable with the State Acts. No Church Laws oblige against Natural Duty The Laws of Religion considered at large in order to a clearer Solution Sect. 2. Mr. Hobbe's Rule will Answer all Consider what is and what is not necessary to Eternal Salvation Sect. 3. The same is the Rule of the Ancient Fathers Sect. 4. If Mr. Hobbes his Faith and Obedience be all that is Necessary 't is then easily determined because to obey only the Soveraign Sect. 5. Dr. Tillotson his Sermon of Love and Peace to his Yorkshire Countreymen not to be Vindicated from being herein of Hobbe's Judgment in what he Dissents from him No Church-Power since Miracles ceased according to Mr. Dean Sect. 6. The Gospel calls for Confession and Obedience in Opposition to though not in Contempt of Princes to the hazard of all So the best Christians the worst of Hereticks only Simon Magus Basilides c. did otherwise Sect. 7. For a full Answer the Laws of Religion are to be ranked under Three general Heads They are Arbitrary and Humane Arbitrary and Divine Necessary and Divine Sect. 8. Laws Arbitrary and Humane though never losing their Sanction yet cease in some Cases in the Execution As when the Empire gave Indulgencies beside the Canon Sect. 9. The Civil Injunction does not immediately oblige the Christian in these Cases The Church has her own Power never to be yielded up Ceremonies not the main thing Sect. 10. Not to be changed with our Clothes That Worship which is best not to be foregone only to yield to what is always Necessary The Case of the Asiaticks about Easter Sect. 11. Especially in our Church of England Sect. 12. Least of all are our Mutinies and Factions our even weakness a Ground for Change Sect. 13. Laws Arbitrary and Divine cease in some instances as to Practice the Advantage of Afflictions A good Christian always a good Subject the Empire still gave Rules and Limits in the Exercise of these Positive Duties Sect. 14. To submit and cease as to particular Practice upon the lawful Command of the Magistrate is not the Case in Doctor Tillotson's Sermon to give up the Institution to him If commanding a false Worship I am to withstand him 'T is no Hypocrisie though I go not into immediately and there Preach the same in Spain Mr. Dean's unheard of Notion of Hypocrisie in what Case the Magistrate is serviceable to promote the Faith Sect. 15. The last sort of Laws both Necessary and Divine are never to cease in any one Instance or under what Circumstances soever either as to their Right or Practice I am never to do any one Immorality always to own and profess the Cross of my Saviour Sect. 16. The great Goodness of God in giving such a Subordination of Duties that the end of each may be answer'd in enjoyning nothing absolutely necessary to Heaven but what is in our Power that no Contingencies of this World can take from us our Eternity a Reward we can never miss of without our own Faults Sect. 17. CHAP. VI. The Contents The last general of the Discourse Sect. 1. What the Autority of our particular Church and Kingdom is in this Controversie where not Apostolical and Primitive there not obliging Their Doctrine Laws and Practice all along on our side Sect. 2. The People are only Testimonies of the Manners of such as are to be Ordained in our Book of Ordination Sect. 3. No Autority in any but those of the Priesthood to Ordain Excommunicate c. as in our Rubricks Articles c. Sect. 4. Our Kings claim'd it not in their Acts Declarations c. in the days of Henry VIII in the Act of Submission He is declared a Lay-man nothing in Religion made Law but by him He defends Religion His Power as the Supreme Governor of the Church Is called Worldly and Secular Sect. 5 6 7 8. Of King Edward VI. That the Bishops were to use not their own as formerly but his Name and Seal in their Processes c. implies no such thing Sect. 9. Of Queen Elizabeth King James Sect. 10 11. The King and Church distinct Powers in our Statute Book Our Kings now have but the same Power the Empire of old and their Predecessors before the Reformation had If our Religion be Parliamentary that anciently was Imperial Sect. 12. Mr. Selden says the Parliament of England both can and has actually Excommunicated and the Bishops Power is derived only from them Sect. 13. The Acts of Parliament he produces V. VI. Edw. VI. Cap. IV. III. Jacobi Cap. V. infer it not Sect. 14. Nor do those of II. III. Edw. VI. Cap. 1. Elizabethae Cap. II. that the Prince limits Excommunications in the Execution is not against the Divine Right of them His Instances in the Rump Parliament Geneva The Parliament of Scotland III. Jacob. VI. Cap. XLV are all against him Sect. 15. Archbishop Whitgift is not proved to have Licensed Erastus his Works for the Press that they were found in his Study is no Argument he was an Erastian if Licensed by the Autority of the Nation no Evidence that his Doctrines were then owned Sect. 16. Our own Doctors of the same Opinion with us instances in two of them Sect. 17. Bishop Bilson St. Ambrose one of Doctor Tillotson's Hypocrites A private Liberty of Conscience not enough a false Religion to be declared against though by Autority abetted Mr. Dean gives advantage to the Papists Calumny That our Religion is only that of our Prince Sect. 18. Bishop Sanderson his particular Judgment concerning the Divine Right of Episcopacy Sect. 19. Mr. Selden objects again that our own Doctors and Writers are all on the other side The particular Authors each reckon'd up He
Power as the Supreme Governor of the Church Is called Worldly and Secular Sect. 5 6 7 8. Of King Edward VI. That the Bishops were to use not their own as formerly but his Name and Seal in their Processes c. implies no such thing Sect. 9. Of Queen Elizabeth King James Sect. 10 11. The King and Church distinct Powers in our Statute Book Our Kings now have but the same Power the Empire of old and their Predecessors before the Reformation had If our Religion be Parliamentary that anciently was Imperial Sect. 12. Mr. Selden says the Parliament of England both can and has actually Excommunicated and the Bishops Power is derived only from them Sect. 13. The Acts of Parliament he produces V. VI. Edw. VI. Cap. IV. III. Jacobi Cap. V. infer it not Sect. 14. Nor do those of II. III. Edw. VI. Cap. 1. Elizabethae Cap. II. that the Prince limits Excommunications in the Execution is not against the Divine Right of them His Instances in the Rump Parliament Geneva The Parliament of Scotland III. Jacob. VI. Cap. XLV are all against him Sect. 15. Archbishop Whitgift is not proved to have Licensed Erastus his Works for the Press that they were found in his Study is no Argument he was an Erastian if Licensed by the Autority of the Nation no Evidence that his Doctrines were then owned Sect. 16. Our own Doctors of the same Opinion with us instances in two of them Sect. 17. Bishop Bilson St. Ambrose one of Doctor Tillotson's Hypocrites A private Liberty of Conscience not enough a false Religion to be declared against though by Autority abetted Mr. Dean gives advantage to the Papists Calumny That our Religion is only that of our Prince Sect. 18. Bishop Sanderson his particular Judgment concerning the Divine Right of Episcopacy Sect. 19. Mr. Selden objects again that our own Doctors and Writers are all on the other side The particular Authors each reckon'd up He perverts and abuses them all Sect. 20. The two Vniversities in their Opus Eximium c. in the Reign of Henry VIII 1534. altogether against him Sect. 21. Stephen Bishop of Winchester Orat. de vera Obedientia is of the same Mind and so is Richard Sampson Dean of the Chappel to Henry VIII in an Oration to this purpose Sect. 22. The Papers in the Cottonian Library seems the same with Dr. Stillingfleet's M. SS in his Irenicum Both he and Dr. Burnet unfaithful in the Printing of it Dr. Durell's account of it Archbishop Cranmer with the Bishops and Doctors engaged in our first Reformation were not Erastians from the account given of them in his Church History by Dr. Burnet Less Discretion in Printing such Papers nor is their Autority really to be any thing Sect. 23. Mr. Selden is shameless in quoting Bishop Andrews who determines all along against him Those Laws that Protect the Church must in course inspect their Actions The Bishop disswaded Grotius from Printing his Book De Imperio summarum Potestatum in Sacris Ha' y' any Work for a Cooper is indeed of Mr. Selden's side and the Lord Falkland His very ill Speech in the House of Commons 1641. His Pulpit Law and Decision of the Divine Right of Kings as well as of the Church He and such like Speech-makers Promoters of the late Rebellion affronts both to King and Priest design'd at once when the Crown is entitled to the Priesthood Sect. 24. Archbishop Bancroft Archbishop Whitgift and Bishop Bilson under the Suspition of Erastianism Accused as such by Robert Parker de Politeia Ecclesiastica a Malicious Schismatick made use of still against our Church by Dailee against Ignatius his Epistles by Doctor Stillingfleet in his Irenicum Our Bishops and Doctors are not against the Divine immutable Right of Bishops as Doctor Stillingfleet mistook out of Parker and reports them to be Satisfaction may justly be required of him for it Sect. 25. The Writings of the best Men how they may be mistaken as of Justin Martyr The first Council of Nice St. Jerome concerning Chastity and Episcopacy Bishop Cranmer and our first Reformers Bishop Whitgift Bancroft and Bilson The Point was at first only the Bishop of Rome's Supremacy A secular title only no Characteristical mark then betwixt the Protestant and Papist The Lay-Elders in their Consistory set up after this as Popes in his room These our Bishops warmth was exercised against whatever indiscretion in laying the Argument The Power of the Prince and the Priest are still contra-distinguished Kings are not Governors next and immediately under Christ as the Mediator The mistake of many in their Pulpit Prayer Our Kings and Church do not thence derive their Power nor so claim it in their Acts Statutes Declarations Articles c. in the forms of bidding Prayer by Queen Elizabeth and King James c. of ill consequence if they do Doctor Hammond's Autority Sect. 26. Particular Doctors not the Rule in Religion The several ways by which Error comes into the World Julian's Plot to destroy Christianity How Pelagius managed his Heresie by Rich and Potent Women by feigned Autorities of great Men. Liberius of Rome and Hosius comply with Arianism wearied with Persecutions Theodosius his Doctores Probabiles Cod. 16. Theodos Tit. 1. l. l. 2 3. THE last general of this Discourse now § I follows and I am to shew that what hath hitherto been said concerning Church Power as a Specifick and distinct from any thing in either the People or the Crown is agreeable with the particular Establishments by the Laws of our Kingdom made for the owning and defence of Christianity and by consequence with the Religion it self so own'd and professed in our Church since the Reformation AN undertaking I do not therefore engage § II in as if these Doctrines of our common Christianity receiv'd from the beginning and devolv'd all along downward in the first Ages as is already shew'd could obtain further Autority or expected an after Sanction and Establishment from us and e're fully assented to and received wanted force and obligation was to be abated of or abolished where not according to our particular ordering model and constitution framed and drawn up autorized and made publick Fifteen hundred years after this is absurd in the Proposal and must be worse in the Practice it runs as it ought to do contrary to our selves to the Plot and Design of this our Church in each of her Collections Articles Injunctions Canons Constitutions and Homilies appointed to be read in the Churches in the time of Q. Elizabeth And altogether to our purpose are the Homilies composed by the Bishops limiting Church-Power to the Priesthood and apparently distinguishing betwixt the Autority and Laws of the Church and State assigning different Ends and Effects unto each Part 2. Of the Sermon of Good Works This arrogancy God detested that Man should so advance his Laws to make them equal with God's Laws wherein the true honouring and worshipping of God standeth and to make his
more private her Majesty declares in Parliament this very same thing in her first year Cap. 1. Sect. 14. Provided also that the Oath expressed in the said Act made in the first year shall be taken and expounded in such Form as is set forth in an Admonition annexed to the Queens Majesties Injunctions Published in the first year of her Majesties Reign that is to say To confess and acknowledge in her Majesty her Heirs and Successors none other Autority than that was challenged and lately used by the noble King Henry VIII and King Edward the VI. as in the said Admonition more plainly may appear § XI KING James who is next comes up to the same Point and in his Proclamation before the Articles of Religion thus declares That We are the Supreme Governor of the Church of England and if any difference arise about the external Polity concerning Injunctions Canons or other Constitutions whatsoever thereunto belonging the Clergy in their Convocation is to order and settle them having first obtained leave under Our Broad Seal so to do We approving their said Ordinances and Constitutions provided that none be made contrary to the Laws and Customs of this Land That out of Our Princely Duty and Care the Churchmen may do the Work that is proper for them the Bishops and Clergy from time to time in Convocation have leave to do what is necessary to the settling the Doctrine and Discipline of this Church SO that I think no more need be said to § XII satisfie any reasonable Person that the King and the Church are two distinct Powers in the sense of the Statute Book or in Parliament Language nor do our Kings interpose in Religious Matters any otherways than to make Religion Law what the Church in Convocation determines and recommends as the Tradition of Faith as agreeing to the Holy Scriptures and the Collections of the Ancient Fathers and Holy Bishops therefrom and to the guarding it with Penalties to be inflicted on such as oppose and violate it just as the first Christian Emperors did Nor can our Religion since the Reformation be any otherwaies called a Parliament Religion then it might have been called so before where the same Secular Power is equally extended and executed as in case of the Lollards certain supposed Hereticks Subverting the Christian Faith the Law of God and the Church and Realm to the extirpating of them and taking care that they be punished by the Ordinaries II. Henry V. Cap. VIII and so before IV. Henry IV. Cap. XV. where the Laws are these None shall Preach without the License of the Diocesane of the same place None shall Preach or Write any Book contrary to the Catholick Faith or the Determination of the Holy Church None shall make any Conventicles of such Sects and wicked Doctrines nor shall favour such Preachers Every Ordinary may Convent before him and Imprison any Person suspected of Heresie An obstinate Heretick shall be burnt before the People And VI. Richard II. Cap. V. Commissions are directed to Sheriffs and others to apprehend such as be certified by the Prelates to be Preachers of Heresies their Fautors Maintainers and Abettors and to hold them in strong Prison until they justifie themselves according to the Laws of Holy Church And which is more remarkable in the II. and III. of this King Cap. VI. the choice or Pope Vrban is made Law and confirmed in Parliament and 't is by them Commanded that he be accepted and obey'd But does the Pope of Rome therefore return and owe his Autority to the Parliament of England how would they of Rome scorn such a thing if but insinuated and yet the Act of Parliament was in its design acceptable and advantageous to them they had the Civil Autority thereby to back and assist them as occasion and which might work that Submission to the present Election his Holinesse's Bulls could not do at least so readily and effectually That this Nation did always understand the outward Policy of the Church or Government of it in foro exteriori to depend upon the Prince a learned Gentleman late of the County of Kent Sir Roger Twisden Knight and Baronet has given a very satisfactory account to them that will receive any in his Historical Vindication of the Church of England in Point of Schism c. Cap. 5. practised by the best of Kings before the Conquest Ina Canutus Edward the Confessor whose Praises are upon Record in the Romanists account of them and the last a Canonized Saint and to which they were often supplicated by the most Holy Bishops Upon the same Grounds are we to laugh at their Folly or Madness or rather Malice when they taunt us with a Parliament-Religion which has only the benefit of the Government for its Protection and our Kings do but that Duty is laid upon them by St. Paul take care that under them we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all Godliness and Honesty Christianity it self ever since Constantine's time may be as well reproach'd that it was Imperial or which is in effect the same Parliamental Since the Empire was Christian and defended it nay while it was Heathen for some particular Emperors upon some occasions have adhered to and protected it and that it had no other bottom than Reasons of State and a worldly Complyance and the lewd Pen of Baxter in his Prophaner History of Bishops c. Cap. 1. Sect. 37. gives the same account of the Church's increase under Constantine on the score of Temporal Immunities That a Murderer that was to be hang'd if a Christian was but to be kept from the Sacrament and do some confessing Penance c. for those Governors then assum'd the same Power in Religious Matters as have done our Kings since the Reformation as must appear to him that compares the two Codes Novels and Constitutions at large or if hee 'l not take that pains the Abridgment is made above with our Statute Book both which only take care that the Religion receiv'd and own'd in the Church and by Churchmen be protected and every Man in his station do his Duty in order to it if the common words in the Statutes carry the usual common sense and are to be apprehended by him that is not a common Lawyer and which the Author of these Papers does not pretend to be § XIII ONLY Mr. Selden inrodes us here again and comes quite cross too against us he tells the World other things That Excommunication in particular and then they may as well do all the rest is what belongs to the Parliament and which has actually Excommunicated and the Bishops are impower'd only by Parliament to proceed in the like censures and but by a Derivation from both Houses he says in plain terms that all Power and Jurisdiction usually call'd Church Power and Jurisdiction is originally and immediately from the Secular and this he thinks he has demonstrated from several Acts of Parliament to this purpose
and because Erastus his Works were Licensed for the Press and Published by the Autority of the Kingdom in the Days of Queen Elizabeth and which would not have been done did not the same Autority receive and own and espouse and submit to his Doctrines and which are wholly levell'd against the Church-Power as independent and not derived from the Magistrate I 'le consider each § XIV THE Acts of Parliament he produces are V and VI Edw. VI. Cap. IV. That if any Person or Persons shall smite or lay any violent hands upon any other either in any Church or Church-yard or draw any Weapon then ipso facto every Person so offending shall be deem'd Excommunicate and be excluded from the Fellowship and Company of Christ's Congregation Sect. 2 3. and III James Cap. V. That every Popish Recusant that is or shall be Convict of Popish Recusancy shall stand and be reputed to all ends and purposes disabled as a Person Excommunicated by Sentence in the Ecclesiastical Court Which two Acts being put together by Mr. Selden De Syned lib. 1. c. 10. p. 320. as one and the same and suitably he backs that of King Edward with this of King James Simili modo ex latâ Lege c. 'T is all the reason in the World they should interpret one another Now King James says expresly That lawful and due Excommunication is when denounced and Excommunicated according to the Laws of this Realm That is by a Sentence in the Ecclesiastical Court and this by a Bishop or Presbyter in Queen Elizabeth's Injunctions by a Judge that hath Autority thereunto Article 33. and which to be sure in the Act it self being not done as by Law and by the acknowledged Laws of the Land in such the Statute the Parliament rendred uncapable of doing of it being not the Judges appointed Mr. Selden must in course be supposed so intolerably absurd in his Inference that the Secular Power Excommunicates that common sense is not able to endure him And the true intent and meaning of the Parliament can only be this That these Offenders though they be not Excommunicated and which the Parliament though the Higher Court of England have not Power to do being not Judges with Autority thereunto yet they shall have the usual Secular Punishments inflicted and which are usually laid upon such as are duly Excommunicated the imposing which is the Act of Parliament alone and which as they may remove so they may impose when they please without any respect to the Excommunication anteceding They shall be deemed as such So King Edward They shall stand and be reputed to all ends and purposes as such So King James The particular Punishment instanced in by King Edward is Exclusion from the Fellowship and Company of Christ's Congregation which indeed comes somewhat nearer to what always and immediately follows Excommunication it self in the first Institution and Primitive Practice Vt à Communione Orationis conventus omnis Sancti commercii relegetur Tertul. Apol. Cap. 39. where so much Power over Mens Persons is obtained as to be able to exclude them their Oratories and the Christians usually absented themselves and 't is agreeable with the Practice and Injunction Apostolical with such an one not to accompany 1 Cor. 5.11 but yet this is not of the first Nature and Essence of it because this may be where the Excommunication is not 't is supposeable to arise from a different Autority and Motive and so the Secular Arm if agreeable to its self it s own Power and Proceedings and in relation to which it is to be interpreted must be concluded to appoint and execute in this Statute and no otherwise As every Science so every Power is to be conceived of as on its own object and proper work and those Apostatizing dissenting Christians of old who laid this Punishment upon themselves and out of peevishness or whatever undue ground turn'd themselves out of Communion with the Church in her Prayers and Eucharist the Church proceeded notwithstanding to Excommunicate them her own censure as a Church-Act did judicially proceed against them See Can. 2. Conc. Antioch fusius suprà Cap. 4. Sect. 31. and since our Parliaments have so frequently declared the Practice and Inferences of the first Doctors and Holy Bishops from the Old and New Testament to be their rule in all their religious Proceedings they have so often hither limited and confined themselves every one of such their Proceedings must in course be interpreted in Subordination to and complyance with them they are not to be concluded where Words and Actions and things will bear any favourable Construction to run cross to and Head against them or if they do and no Friendly office can be done them and a better gloss is not to be put upon it 't is to be reputed as that particular Error from which they plead not an Exemption and the general Design will weigh down if coming in Competition But the Statute of King James instances in and confines to a Punishment that is not pleadable to be otherwise than Secular and Worldly nor can be interpreted of any immediate Spiritual consequence upon whom 't is inflicted The Punishment is to be disabled as to Suits at Law and which every Body knows the alone Laws of the Land and Power of Parliament can impose and which may be and is imposed upon sundry other occasions and not that of Excommunication only and so supposed in the Act. § XV WHAT he brings out of Edward VI. and Queen Elizabeth in their Acts for authorizing and making Law the Common-Prayer-Book ibid. p. 386. as ranked by themselves so are they of different Complexions nor does the Prince there attempt any thing but what as Supreme Governor in all Causes as well Ecclesiastical as Civil he is enabled to do as Mr. Selden there very well refers to such his Title for his Evidence that is to see that every one does his Duty in his Order and Station enabling and protecting him thereunto the Prince is thereby to be interpreted no more enabled by his own Power whether in his own Person or the Person of any other to discharge the Office of a Priest than he is supposed to have the Skill and Capacity of any Artist Mechanick or what other Tradesman whom he Empowers by his Letters Patents or any otherways in Law acquits or indemnifies in the managery and publick Profession of such his Art and Invention his Trade and Employment and no otherwise can the Bishops and other Ecclesiastical Officers be said there to be impower'd to proceed by censures against all such as will not come to Church II. III. Edw. VI. Cap. I. Sect. XII I Elizabethae Cap. II. Sect XVI nor do any of those many many instances which his usual intolerable Pains has heaped together in several Pages both before and after in that Chapter about the Prince or â—ecular Powers interposing limiting and restraining in Excommunications prove any thing at
perverts and abuses them all Sect. 20. The two Vniversities in their Opus Eximium c. in the Reign of Henry VIII 1534. altogether against him Sect. 21. Stephen Bishop of Winchester Orat. de vera Obedientia is of the same Mind and so is Richard Sampson Dean of the Chappel to Henry VIII in an Oration to this purpose Sect. 22. The Papers in the Cottonian Library seem the same with Dr. Stillingsleet's M. SS in his Irenicum Both he and Dr. Burnet unfaithful in the Printing of it Dr. Durell's account of it Archbishop Cranmer with the Bishops and Doctors engaged in our first Reformation were not Erastians from the account given of them in his Church History by Dr. Burnet Less Discretion in Printing such Papers nor is their Autority really to be any thing Sect. 23. Mr. Selden is shameless in quoting Bishop Andrews who determines all along against him Those Laws that Protect the Church must in course inspect their Actions The Bishop disswaded Grotius from Printing his Book De Imperio summarum Potestatum in Sacris Ha' y' any Work for a Cooper is indeed of Mr. Selden's side and the Lord Falkland His very ill Speech in the House of Commons 1641. His Pulpit Law and Derision of the Divine Right of Kings as well as of the Church He and such like Speech-makers Promoters of the late Rebellion affronts both to King and Priest design'd at once when the Crown is entitled to the Priesthood Sect. 24. Archbishop Bancroft Archbishop Whitgift and Bishop Bilson under the Suspition of Erastianism Accused as such by Robert Parker de Politeia Ecclesiastica a Malicious Schismatick made use of still against our Church by Dailee against Ignatius his Epistles by Doctor Stillingfleet in his Irenicum Our Bishops and Doctors are not against the Divine immutable Right of Bishops as Doctor Stillingfleet mistook out of Parker and reports them to be Satisfaction may justly be required of him for it Sect. 25. The Writings of the best Men how they may be mistaken as of Justin Martyr The first Council of Nice St. Jerome concerning Chastity and Episcopacy Bishop Cranmer and our first Reformers Bishop Whitgift Bancroft and Bilson The Point was at first only the Bishop of Rome's Supremacy A secular title only no Characteristical mark then betwixt the Protestant and Papist The Lay-Elders in their Consistory set up after this as Popes in his room These our Bishops warmth was exercised against whatever indiscretion in laying the Argument The Power of the Prince and the Priest are still contra-distinguished Kings are not Governors next and immediately under Christ as the Mediator The mistake of many in their Pulpit Prayer Our Kings and Church do not thence derive their Power nor so claim it in their Acts Statutes Declarations Articles c. in the forms of bidding Prayer by Queen Elizabeth and King James c. of ill consequence if they do Doctor Hammond's Autority Sect. 26. Particular Doctors not the Rule in Religion The several ways by which Error comes into the World Julian's Plot to destroy Christianity How Pelagius managed his Heresie by Rich and Potent Women by feigned Autorities of great Men. Liberius of Rome and Hosius comply with Arianism wearied with Persecutions Theodosius his Doctores Probabiles Cod. 16. Theodos Tit. 1. l. l. 2 3. A Catalogue of some Books Printed for Benj. Tooke at the Ship in St. Paul's Church-Yard Folio HErodoti Halicarnassei Historiarum Libri ix Gr. Lat. Suarez de Legibus ac Deo Legislatore Bishop Bramhall's Works Walsh's History of the Irish Remonstrance A Collection of all the Statutes of Ireland Wiseman's Chirurgical Treatises Baker's Chronicle of England with the Continuation Judge Winche's Book of Entries Skinneri Etymologieon Linguae Anglicanae M. T. Ciceronis Opera notis Gruteri cum Indicibus 2. Vol. Heylyn's Cosmography in Four Books Mathaei Paris Historia Bishop Sanderson's Sermons The Paralel or the New Specious Association an Old Rebellious Covenant A Vindication of the Loyal Abhorrers The Trials of the Lord Russell c. And of Algernon Sidney Braddon Speke John Hamden Esq Sir Sam. Bernardiston Titus Otes the Rioters at Guildhall Daniel's History of England with Trussell's Continuation Quarto A Brief Account of Ancient Church Government The true Widow a Comedy by T. Shadwell Dumoulin's Vindication of the Protestant Relegion Phocena or the Anatomy of a Porpess Wroe's Sermon at Preston Sept. 4. 1682. at the Funeral of Sir Roger Bradshaigh 1684. Allen's Sermon of Perjury Gregory's Works Dodwell of Schism Octavo Dodwell's two Letters of Advice Considerations of Concernment Reply to Mr. Baxter Discourse of One Priesthood and One Altar Descartes Metaphysicks English Evelyn of Navigation and Commerce Wetenhall of the Gifts and Offices in the Worship of God Catechism Langhornii Chronicon Regum Anglorum The French Gardiner The Country Parson's Advice Boyle's Noctiluca Dodwell's two Discourses against the Romanists 12 o. Aesopi Fabulae Gr. Lat. 12 o. The Author's distance from the Press has occasioned some Errors in the Printing especially in the Pointing which the Reader is desired to correct and the following Errata ERRATA PAg. 10. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 21. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 83. l. 22. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 109. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 191. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 262. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ibid. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 267. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 268. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 277. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 288. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ibid. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 304. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 378. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pag. 43. in for ni p. 163. ausa for ausus put out non ibid. p. 181. line last Tit. 45. deest p. 253. conserisse for comperisse his for hi ibid. p. 258. Amoybeyms for Amoybeums p. 478. Dominum for Dominicam p. 500. Christiani for Christi pag. 28. une quarte to be put out p. 81. l. 12. Assent for assert p. 187. l. ult put out but to Princes something is more due then at other times p. 190. l. 8. put out which p. 231. l. 11. belief for unbelief p. 287. l. 18. Episcopale for Episcopate p. 380. l. 23. decided for derided p. 396. l. 6. so for to p. 440. l. 12. inroding the Errors for inroding the Crown p. 350. l. 18. titles for tithes OF THE SUBJECT OF Church Power In whom it Resides It s Force Extent and Execution that it Opposes not Civil Government in any one Instance of it The Introduction The Contents The Occasion
King than the King as such is a Priest than a good Man is always knowing or the Despotical and Regal Power go together The mixing these several distinct Gifts and Powers is the inlet to all disorder The King and Priest have been brought to a Morsel of Bread by it Sect. 3. Kings have no Plea to the Priesthood by their Vnction the Jewish Custom and Government no example to us if so the consequent would be ill in our Government Our Kings derive no one Right from their being Anointed Blondel's Account of this Vnction The Error and Flattery of some Greeks herein Sect. 4. The Church how in the Common-wealth and the Common-wealth how in the Church and both independent and self-existent Sect. 5. The Church founded only and subsisting in and by Christ and his Apostles Sect. 6. Proved from Clemens Romanus Ignatius Irenaeus Origen Tertullian Justin Martyr Athenagoras Minutius Foelix Sect. 7. A distinct Power is in the Church all along in Eusebius Eccl. Hist Socrates c. Opposed to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Power of the Prince so called all along in those Writings Sect. 8. This was not from the present Necessity when the Empire was Heathen if so the Christians had understood and declared it The Apostles God himself had forewarn'd and preinformed the World of it It continued the same when Christian only with more advantages by the Princes Countenance and Protection Sect. 9 10. In Athanasius Hosins St. Jerome Austin Optatus Chrysostom Ambrose Sect. 11. In Eusebius History from Constantine and other Historians downward the Emperor and Bishop have alike their distinct Throne and Succession independent as plain as words and story can report it Sect. 12. And the same do the Ancient Councils all along separating themselves from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sect. 13. This is not the Sense of the Bishops only in their own behalf and which is the Atheistical popular Plea and Objection the Cruelty of the French Reformers Sect. 14. The Emperors own and submit unto it as Constantine though misunderstood by Blondel Valentinianus Justinian Theodosius Leo c. Sect. 15 16. Blondel owns all this and yet does not understand it Sect. 17. All this farther appears from the Laws and Proceedings of the Empire and the Church as in the two Codes Novels and Constitutions from our Church Histories Photius Nomocanon Sect. 18. This farther appears from the Power of the Empire in Councils and particularly that so much talked of Instance in Theodosius Sect. 19. From their Power exercised on Hereticks Heresie is defined to be such by the Bishops Sect. 20. In Ordinations Sect. 21. Church-Censures Mr. Selden's Jus Caesareum relates only to the outward Exercise of the Jewish Worship and comes up exactly to our Model The state then of the Jews answers this of Christianity Sect. 22. The Christian Emperors never Excommunicated in their own Persons or by their own Power Mr. Selden says they did His Forgeries detected His ridiculous account of Holy Orders from Gamaliel He was a Rebel of 1642. Design'd a Cheat on the Crown when annexing to it the Priesthood Sect. 23. What the Empire made Law relating to Religion was first Canon or consented to by the Clergy Nothing the Empires alone but the Penalty So Honorius and Theodosius Valentinian and Marcian Zeno and Leo. Sect. 24 25. No need of present Miracles to Justifie this Power to Assert it does not affront Magistrates 'T is always to be own'd before them Dr. Tillotson's Sermon on this bottom Arianism was of old opposed against Constantius That this Power ceased when the Empire became Christian is a tattle It receiv'd many Advantages but no one Diminution thereby Sect. 26. § I THIS Power of the Church or Power Ecclesiastical it is not in the Prince issues and flows not from the Secular Temporal Governor he is not the Subject of it he is in himself neither Bishop nor Pastor can neither officiate in the high Affairs of Salvation nor ordain substitute and depute others to do it 't is no Duty of his this way to Teach and Instruct the People the Holy Sacraments are not Administred nor can the Church Censures be executed by him Great and vast is the Power committed by God to Kings here on Earth peculiar is their Power and none else may have none else can Plead a title to it 't is the nearest to Infinite of any Devolution vouchsafed from the Heavens to Mankind and the most of his Image is Characterized and enstamped on their Persons communicated in the largest measure unto them and God hath own'd them all along as such in Scripture suitably severed and separated them from the rest of Mankind placed them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the higher places of the Earth next himself in the Honors and Dignities here above and beyond any other Order and Dignity of men whatever a Kingdom and Majesty and Glory and Honor by the most high God is given unto thee Dan. 5.18 but yet these are not the only Separates he has upon Earth his alone Anointed and that to Publick Offices and Services thus he had his Priests of old and whose Persons and Power was separate too Non est tuum O Ozia adolere Deo sed Sacerdotum 2 Chron. 26.18 It appertaineth not unto thee O Uzziah to burn incense to the Lord but to the Priests the Sons of Aaron that are consecrated to burn incense go out of the Sanctuary for thou hast trespassed neither shall it be for thine honor from the Lord thy God There is one Jesus of Nazareth a Man approved of by God and by his right hand exalted the Holy Child Jesus whom he hath Anointed whom he raised from the Dead and made both Lord and Christ God who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in times past to the Fathers by the Prophets hath in these last days spoke unto us by his Son whom he hath appointed Heir of all things too and who is also the Image of his Person who hath all Power in Heaven and Earth given unto him a Power to Teach and Baptize all Nations in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost a Power for the managery of the things not of the Men of the Earth but of their Souls and Persons for Heaven a Power above that of Angels but not to tread upon Thrones and Scepters of Princes contemn Dignities which Angels durst not do a Kingdom though not of this World yet a true one once given him of God and again to be delivered up by him to the Father who is the head of his Body the Church Colos 1.18 contrary to whom as we are not to set up and be beguiled by Angels so neither Kings nor Princes and not hold fast the head from which all the body by joynts and band having nourishment and knit together increase in the increase of God Col. 2.18 19. Nursing Fathers Kings and Queens are
foresight for that very purpose of all even Contingencies and much more of what was to come to pass in the future Ages of the Church and as the thing it self was so predivulg'd that Kings and Queens should be Nursing Fathers and Mothers to the Church and this seems reasonable and requisite to be done were it only to satisfie mens Minds in the revolution especially since all Revelations ended in their Persons and 't is only for such to believe and assent to after-translations and new appearances in the Affairs of Religion and not upon such notices aforehand as expect and depend upon new Discoveries and Periodical Illuminations whimsical and Enthusiastical Persons WHEN God was to constitute the Jewish § X Body engaged and stipulating according to the Law of Moses the present State and Necessities as well as other Occurrences foreseen hindring the perfection and full accomplishment of his designed Platform for some time the Wisdom and Mercy and Providence of God which is always present with himself and his own People and accompanies his designs foretold and declared what they were to expect in the particular instances the present narrower state of things and future ill humors of Men prohibiting the one and accidentally occasioning the other As when the Model and Shape of their Government was to be changed into that of Kings or a translation of Power from Person to Person as is the pretended case here it was declared long before by Moses Deut. 17.14 as when the Worship was to be transferr'd at first of necessity elsewhere as is again also here pretended that Church-Power was for a time in the Clergy to the place that God should choose to the Temple at that time not built Men are generally in love with old ways and call that old they have time out of mind been accustomed to Innovations are not relish'd without plain and a great Autority nothing but Prophecy or present notorious Miracles or a great assurance from those whom a known outward evidence makes appear and most manifest that 't was delivered down from Persons so assisted by God and as God's Wisdom and Goodness is always the same so neither certainly had his Mercy and Providence been shorter to this his Body of Christians than 't was to that of the Jews in the like case had there been any like it among Christians as indeed there was none the Government of the Church which is here in this Discourse asserted remaining one and the same and in the same succession of Persons when the Powers of the Earth were Christian as before when they were Heathen and the good Providence of God so ordered it that Constantine the Emperor's becoming Christian and his Succession the Church and Church-men received only new Courage and Strength the greatest additional advantages in such their Charges and Offices by the Imperial Countenance and Protection with all manner of supplies and abundance as to Places Utensils Revenues and Immunities Stately Churches being immediately erected with the greatest magnificence and elegancy of Structure the Furniture as rich and Endowments as large with a like Privilege as to Persons and Things Investitures every ways answerable and all assistance conferr'd and Provision for the time to come by setled Laws and most wholesome Constitutions to preserve and continue what was thus done and granted Serviant Reges terrae Christo etiam leges ferendo pro Christo as St. Augustine speaks in his 48 Epistle The Kings of the Earth serve the Church in making Laws to defend her and which Saying was occasioned by St. Augustine and more to that purpose in that Epistle by reason of the severer Imperial Laws and Penalties made against and inflicted upon that spawn of the Donatists those unruly Circumcellians who broke out into all manner of Outrages and Violence and though the Church had not long enjoyed this Peace but what is the woful effect of Ease and Plenty Divisions and Breaches arose and grew wide within her self carried on to great Ruptures and much was innovated and taught amiss in other Points yet as to this particular the Subject of Church-Power it was never questioned fell not under debate much less was it wrested out of the hands of Church-men did any one Emperor if not withal known Heretical either usurp it to himself or alienate it from the Bishops but all along acknowledge and confirm it to them and this will be as clear from the Aera or Date of their turning Christians as it has appear'd to have been from the first entrance of Christianity till then and that if we continue our Method and look into those times as we have done into the foregoing Ages THERE was no Man of the Age more § XI tenderly Conscientious in professing and paying his Obedience to the Emperor than was the holy Athanasius how solicitously and anxiously did he Vindicate himself when accused as an Enemy and Traducer of him when by his cruel and most malicious Adversaries which were many represented as Rebellious and Disobedient This will appear sufficiently from all such as have imployed their Pens in giving to the World an account of those Transactions by the Arians and Meletians managed and improv'd against him and which were numerous and particularly from his own Apology to Constantius of which he that will take a taste let him read the beginning of it only if he thinks much of his labour to go through with it he acknowledges the Power of the Empire in Religious things in assigning the Feasts of Dedication and their times 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he acknowledges his Power over his Person and asks his Diploma or Letters of leave for the exercise of his Episcopal Function in his own Church of Alexandria and for the Convention of Synods Ibid. p. 682. 754. 761. Ed. Paris he asks the Emperor's Grant concerning the Publick Service and Churches in Alexandria as we have out of Sozomen Eccl. Hist l. 3. c. 20. but yet he puts a difference betwixt the Work of a Synod and that of the Empire and blames those that confound them or rather refer all to the Emperor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 730. he refuses to receive Arius into Communion upon his Heretical Terms and Principles though the Emperor do Command him though he threaten him if he do not and for refusing he causes him to be deposed by a Synod held at Tyre for that very purpose and of his own Convention and afterwards banish'd him and which he submits to but not to deliver up the Rights of the Church of God as Socrates tells us in his Ecclesiastical History Lib. 1. cap. 27 28.32.35 and he is so bold with Constantius as to six the mark of Antichrist upon him when he undertakes the Protection of a wicked Religion dissolving the received Orders of Christ and his Apostles creates of his own head new Constitutions 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as in Athanasius Ep. ad Solit. Vit. agentes p. 845. 860. and reproves the Emperor
〈◊〉 they obey their appointed Laws and by their exacter Lifes and stricter Conversations go beyond the Laws supererogate and are more perfect than their Rules require or Sanctions enjoyn them To which I 'le add that of Octavius to Cecilianus in Minutius Faelix De nostro numero carcer exaestuat Christianus ibi nullus est nisi aut reus suae Religionis aut Profugus your Prisons swarm the Walls will scarce contain them but there is no Christian unless Runawaies and Desertors of their Religion and when we assert the divine Right of Titles and that God himself assigned and separated such a Portion of the goods of the Earth for the maintenance of the Evangelical Priesthood also and which Sanction is to endure together with the Kingdom and to take away this is to rob God we do not then maintain them with any such Clause in the Charter or Conveyance warranting and enabling a forcible violent Entry as in the usual cases of Right and Property upon dispossession that Power St. Paul speaks of as to Eat and to Drink not to work with our hands but to live upon the Gospel and which we believe to descend with the Gospel is together with holy Orders invested in him is quite another thing and neither implies nor supposes Power like it it is bottomed only on the Grounds and Reasons of our Association nor has it any other motives but those which make us Christians and which did not at all depend on outward force Hence it was till the world came into the Church that the Priesthood was maintained by what every one offer'd upon the forementioned inducements and as he that denied this maintenance to him that served at the Altar was supposed still to deny withal his Faith and place in the Body of Christians and suitably is it with the greatest equity and proportion of things still the continued Practice of the Christian Courts to Excommunicate or cut off such an one from the Church Communion so neither could they which saw no reason why themselves should become Christians be supposed to be convinced by other reasons of the necessity of maintaining those who claimed no other right for the maintenance than their Preaching and Publishing such that Religion And therefore when upon with-holding of Tithes or the Churches Revenue we proceed farther than Excommunication to Personal Confinement or whatever outward restraint we have no Warrant or Power for this but from the Prince and the Laws of the Land alone enable us to do it 'T is true to have a Body or Government in it self distinct and apart from that which is Secular and with its own obligations for maintenance which way soever it arises but more especially when from so prevailing a motive and engagement as that which makes men Christians and entitles them to Eternity to have their own bank or stock to what ends or on what Persons soever erogated and expended it matters not whether on their Poor or on their Clergy to which add the Power to assemble for religious Worship upon the same Considerations is what may carry some appearance for Suspitions and Jealousies from the State and advantages are possible to be taken for undermining and overthrowing of it upon each occasion a Government indeed ought to be watchful and jealous in such Cases Premunires Eschetes and Confiscations are but due and equitable Provisions as by Law assigned that surely is a very unsafe Rule I find among other as bad laid down by Mr. Dean in his Sermon in a case not very unlike to this in hand He that acknowledges himself to derive all his Autority from God can pretend to none against him Unless wee 'l suppose there can be no Cheats nor Hypocrites double dealings in the World or that a power or trust duely received cannot be abused and estranged such as designedly Act against God pretend mostly to his Autority and often have it really in them And the truth is nothing but the peculiar constitution of this Christian Body or Incorporation could have then by any one been permitted as it was by some before Constantine or now be pleaded for whose humble innocent peaceable temper and complexion as above described was so undoubted and notorious in every instance experienced whose very essence was obedience whose design of making good Christians was to make them good Subjects the very Plot of the Gospel was in part this that Government be every ways preserved and entire administring new Motives and Arguments for it and that Princes if possible be more Sovereign and Glorious thereby whatever the Gospel Preaches and Commands is all along with a just regard and even subordination to it But then again since thus it is by the Blessings and Providence of God that Kings and Queens themselves are become Nursing Fathers and Mothers of the Church since our Church Doors are set wide open by their command our Revenues in our hands at the publick disposal of our Bishops to which is superadded their own Royal Bounty and Endowments together with more from the Piety of others their Subjects and eminent Christians among us and all by Law Established and Confirmed unto us as the rest of our Tenures still to plead the example of the Primitive Christians who were under no one of these Advantages to keep a part in distinct Assemblies to make Privy Purses and Fonds brings such as practise it under as great a suspicion of Hypocrisie and private ill-laid designs as those first Christians were notorious for their integrity when so doing and unsuspected not only that Government under which they live but all good Christians have ground enough for jealousie of their underhand indirect purposes to implead and seize on the one hand and to admonish and censure on the other as Delinquents no one consideration of State can countervail the Damage a toleration or connivance of such may bring unto it nothing can justifie the Practice it self but that alone which was pleaded by the Primitive Christians and was their real case that the Association and Assemblies of Christians for the Profession and Service of the Gospel must cease and fall without so doing that Christianity it self cannot otherwise stand and which our supposal overthrows as to any such Pleas now adays nor indeed dare any of our Dissenters openly say it § XLIII THAT the Clergy alone preside in their several Districts is no more prejudicial to Government in State than any of the other and which will appear from their Offices there performed as to be the Mouth in Prayer and thanksgiving and which is already consider'd to Catechize Teach and Instruct the People and admonish them in the ways to Heaven by Virtue and the instances of all sorts of Obedience as indispensably required and nothing but a thorow after-repentance and amendment upon failure will regain the Inheritance forfeited and Iâ—le take it to be only an ill Phrasing or inconsideration in the Expression when Preaching the Gospel in the due sense
has not made that the immutable term of Man's Salvation but what is in his own Power and of which if he fails 't is his own perverse will and choice that is debauch'd and betrays him to it the Carved works of the Temple may be beaten down the Church-Discipline be weakned and her Laws and Rules for Holiness become of less force her Towers and Bulwarks be taken away and the Secular Protection be withdrawn I may have neither tongue to speak nor hands to lift up in prayer nor feet to walk to the House of God there may be no Houses of God in our Land the Tyrant may pull out or cut off the one or pull down the other the daily Sacrifice my cease and the Priest-hood too as to particular Persons and when we say where Episcopal Power is not there is no Church we do not so mean that where it is not Men cannot go to Heaven these all may be supplyed by an upright heart and due intentions God accepts of a Man according to what he hath and not according to what he hath not The Sacraments are only generally necessary to Salvation and so of other duties in the same Order of Sanction God does not oblige us to the Tyranny of Impossible Commands to climb up to Heaven and go down into the Deep and fetch thence our Eternity ask of us ten thousand Rams or a thousand of Rivers of Oyl or those Cattel upon a thousand Hills for a Sacrifice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as St. Clement argues to the Gentiles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 't is our own Lust not others we are to answer for if not Subdued and Conquered he does not bind us to go to Heaven when we have no Legs Move without Faculties Act without Strength Live when Dead Men and with Paralytick Joynts Enfeebled by Irrecoverable Weakness to work out our own Salvation every Brick-bat will then make an Altar and Prayers are to be made every where with Holy Hands lift up or but Devout Hearts without Wrath and without Doubting nor is it by Subduing Kings and Conquering Worldly Powers we are to go to Heaven Faith Love Dependence upon God c. are among those acts of the Soul usually called Elicitae whose Practice depends on no outward Faculty and if some Virtues equally indispensable are otherways seated and among those Acts call'd Imperatae and to be perform'd by the outward Organs of the Body yet are they equally free from outward Force so seated in each ones Self and lodg'd in his Person that no Violence but from a Man 's own self can reach them those the only Enemies that are of his own House and 't is every ones own hand that draws his Sword and makes him a Rebel his alone Adulterous Eyes and Heart Promote and Actuate whatever of uncleanness is from him and 't is neither Person nor Object nor Quality any thing that comes cross or is of force from within or without himself whether Devil or Tyrant or Lust any one accident or contingency that can either dismember him from the Church or disunite him from his God deprive him of sufficient Means here or Eternal Life hereafter even the Tyrannies and Deaths here will but Advance the Crown and these lighter Afflictions work for us that more Eternal Weight of Glory and which Considerations are to be the great Support and Comfort of all Christians Should it so happen in the courses of Providence and Kings and Queens cease to be Nursing Fathers and Mothers unto us Should a Nero or a Domitian a Parliament of forty two a Cromwel or a Committee of Safety or what Association soever be set up against and Tyrannize over us plane volumus pati verùm eo modo quo Bellum miles nemo quippe libens Bellum patitur cum et trepidari periclitari necesse sit tamen praeliatur omnibus viribus et vincens in praelio gaudet qui de praelio querebatur quia Gloriam consequitur praedam they are the words of Tertullian Apol. c. 5. to those Scoffers of the Heathens in his days and whom Julian the Apostate after imitated telling the Christians Afflictions was their Advantage and to be Loved by them because their Martyrdom and Crown We must willingly suffer and engage as the Souldier does in War and 't is the expectation of Victory and that recompence of Reward makes us fight on and Rejoyce under that Banner which otherwise the present Difficulties and Dangers working on our fears would engage us to avoid and run from 't was the constancy and evenness of the Christians for the Truth and in Gods Service 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 together with their Gravity Sincerity their Freedom and Modesty of Conversation gain'd upon their Enemies both Greeks and Barbarians and silenced their baser Slanders and Calumnies against them thus together with the learned discourses and endeavours by Writing and which were not few the Church grew and multiplied as Eusebius tells us Hist l. 4. c. 7. These the Weapons of a Christian Warfare and the many Shields of the Mighty these the Spoyls and Trophies they contended for I know not how in fitter words to conclude this Chapter than in those of our Noble Historian Eusebius in his Preface to his fifth Book of his Church History giving an account of those many and Eminent Martyrs in the days of Antoninus Verus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Others making Historical Narrations have delivered in their Writings Victories in War and Trophies over their Enemies the great Actions of Captains and the Valour of Souldiers that had stained their hands in Blood and a thousand Battels for their Children their Country and their Fortunes but the History or the Narrative of the Divine Common-wealth and Enrollment which is of Heaven writes on Eternal Pillars those Peace Designing Battels in order to the Peace of the Soul or that are Spiritual Those that fight in these Battels for Truth rather than their Country for Religion rather than their Children The constancy of the Contenders for Piety and their Fortitude in their manifold Sufferings their Trophies against Devils and Victories obtain'd against the Invisible Powers or Enemies making publick their Crown for an Everlasting Remembrance CHAP. VI. Chap. 6. The Contents The last general of the Discourse Sect. 1. What the Autority of our particular Church and Kingdom is in this Controversie where not Apostolical and Primitive there not obliging Their Doctrine Laws and Practice all along on our side Sect. 2. The People are only Testimonies of the Manners of such as are to be Ordained in our Book of Ordination Sect. 3. No Autority in any but those of the Priesthood to Ordain Excommunicate c. as in our Rubricks Articles c. Sect. 4. Our Kings claim'd it not in their Acts Declarations c. in the days of Henry VIII in the Act of Submission He is declared a Lay-man nothing in Religion made Law but by him He defends Religion His
Constitutiones Ecclesiasticae 1597. ut homines idonei ad sacros ordines admittantur IT were needless Pains to insist on and § IV shew the particular judgment of our Church Whether this Power be in her Pastors alone exclusive to as the People so the Prince also the Rubricks in the Common-Prayer Book suppose and farther invest all Offices there in the Hieratical Order what ever relate to the Divine Worship and Service and which are by them alone to be perform'd the Prjest is still distinguished from the People or Laity nor is the Prince there considered but as of the Laity in attendance in Common with the other Worshippers and to be sure in the Book of Ordination 't is the Bishop lays on Hands and Consecrates he the origin and head of all Power derived whether to Bishop Presbyter or Deacon and in what degree soever of Power it is that is given That Person which by open denunciation of the Church is rightly cut off from the Vnity of the Church and excommunicate ought to be taken of the whole multitude of the Faithful as an Heathen and Publican until he be openly reconciled by Penance and received into the Church by a Judg that hath Autority thereunto as among the Articles of Religion 1562. Article 33. and this Judg is neither Chancellor Official nor Commissary c. but a Bishop or Presbyter the Arch-Deacon cannot do it if not a Presbyter and but in Deacon's Orders in these alone is the Power of both retaining and absolving in the Articuli pro clero 1584. and the libri quorundam Canonum c. and in the constitutiones Ecclesiasticae 1597. and all set out by Queen Elizabeth he that would once for all be satisfied what is the sense of our Church let him but once read over our seven and thirthieth Article of Religion together with the occasion of it and he must be convinced that her Judgment is on our side however 't is received whether as Orthodox or Erroneous by him Among other Articles agreed upon by the Bishops and other learned Godly Men in the Convocation held at London 1552. this was one The King of England is supreme Head in Earth next under Christ of the Church of England and Ireland Many bad Inferences were made and sinister Consequences affixed and particularly that the King was declared a Priest impower'd to administer in Divine Service In the Reign of Queen Elizabeth 1561. and till which time during the Reign of Queen Mary the Objection to be sure had been urged sufficiently and improved a Convocation being called and Articles agreed upon by the Arch-Bishops and Bishops of both Provinces and the whole Clergy in the 37th Article and in answer to the Objection they more fully explain themselves in these Words and declare The Queens Majesty hath the chief Power in this Realm of England and other her Dominions unto whom the chief Government of all Estates of this Realm whether they be Ecclesiastical or Civil in all Causes do appertain and is not nor ought not to be subject to any foreign Jurisdiction Where we attribute to the Queens Majesty the chief Government by which Titles we understand the Minds of some dangerous Folk to be offended We give not our Princes the ministring either of God's Word or of the Sacraments the which thing the Injunctions also lately set forth by Elizabeth our Queen do most plainly testifie but that only Prerogative which we see to have been given always to all Godly Princes in holy Scripture by God himself that is that they should rule all Estates and Degrees committed to their Charge by God whether they be Ecclesiastical or Temporal and restraining with the Civil Sword the stubborn and Evil doers AND this is all is laid claim to by our § V Princes themselves and that the Statute-book or any other claim of theirs entitles to and invests them withal in the late collection of Articles Canons c. made by Anthony Sparrow now Lord Bishop of Norwich I meet with nothing done by King Henry VIII save what is mentioned by King Edward VI. in the entrance to his Injunctions 1547. and which are there transcribed with his own additions the design and end of which is only to procure publick and general obedience to the Laws and Duties of true Religion and that every Man truely observe them as they will avoid his Displeasure and Penalties annexed All that Henry VIII got by the submission of the Clergy in the five and twentieth year of his reign cap. 19. was this as there set down in the Statute That the Clergy would not for the time to come assemble in convocation without the King 's Writ That they would not enact promulge or execute any new Canons Constitutions Ordinance provincial or other or by whatsoever Name they shall be called in Convocation unless the King 's Royal license be had his Assent and Consent in that behalf That all Canons Constitutions before made prejudicial to the King's Prerogative Royal repugnant to the Laws and Statutes of this Realm or overmuch onerous to the Subject be abrogated and of no value all other standing in their full strength and power the King's Assent first had unto them The meaning of all which appears only to be this That nothing relating to Church-Affairs and Proceedings is to be made Law or to be proceeded for or against in any outward Court whatever in a forensick judicial way but by the leave and autority of the King without his Royal Assent first had and his hand set to it And this is that Title of the supreme Head of the Church of England which he hereupon assum'd to himself and which some little time afterwards confirm'd to him in full Parliament his Heirs and Successors the Power of the Church it self is not at all abated as purely such and from our Saviour only brought to a dependency upon the King which before was upon the Bishop of Rome and who had exercised here that headship and still claims it § VI AND that this was really all the King then aim'd at by the submission of the Clergy viz a Right and Supremacie of Inspection over all Persons in all Causes within his Realms and Dominions and that no Pleas of Religion or the service of Christ is to exempt them from the judicial Cognizance and Jurisdiction of their Prince this will appear more plain and evident by the several Proceedings and Acts concerning Church-Affairs made by this King in that 19 cap. and five and twentieth year of his Reign where the submission of the Clergy is turned into an Act and in the several Acts ensuing in all which it does not appear that he ever assumed to himself and exercised any other than such like external Power and Autority in spiritual Matters he intermedles not with any one Instance of Priestly Power as purely such but on the contrary cautions with Clauses and Preventions lest any such thing should be or be supposeable so
he proves thoughout the Church Historians Fathers and Imperial Laws thus declaring assenting to and practising pag. 146. If by the Church you mean the Precepts and Promises Gifts and Graces of God preached in the Church and poured on the Church Princes must humbly obey them and reverently receive them as well as other private Men so that Prophets Apostles Evangelists and all other builders of Christ's Church as touching their Persons be subject to the Princes power Mary the word of God in their Mouths and Seals of grace in their hands because they are of God and not of themselves they be far above the Princes Calling and Regiment and in those Cases Kings and Queens if they will be saved must submit themselves to God's everlasting truth and testament as well as the meanest of their People and yet they are for all this Supreme and subject only to God as to outward Process either from the Pope or from any other Power And so pag. 147. he brings in those Passages of Tertullian Optatus and Chrysostom à Deo secundum solo Deo minorem parem super terram non habet c. the word Supreme was added to the Oath for that the Bishop of Rome taketh upon him to command and depose Princes as their lawful supreme Judg to exclude this wicked presumption we teach that Princes be supreme Rulers we mean subject to no superior Judg to give a reason of their doings but only to God pag. 164 165 166. it must be confessed he speaks not home as might be required when explaining how Kings as well as other Christians are comprized under the duty of obeying their Rulers and to be subject unto them c. surely there is a true real obedience due even from Princes to Church-Officers and their Power devolved from Christ and this learned Man seems here and in other places not to be rescued from that common prejudice and possession seized upon too many and all along continued upon casting of the Popes Superiority here in England that there can be no Church-Power at all universally obliging and requiring obedience but what implyes and infers corporal bodily subjection a change in Seculars 't is this puts him upon that great mistake that the Pastors of the Church are not influenced by the Kingly power of Christ and what is regal in him is given to the Civil Magistrate and who only succeed him in that Office perpetual Government of the Church cap. 10. and Arch-bishop Bancroft confounding these two Powers gives Beza and Cartwright as much advantage in that Particular as their Disciples and Followers can now really wish and because they say that Christ as a King prescribed the form of Ecclesiastical Government being a King the head of the Church doth administer his Kingdom per legitime vocatos pastores by Pastors lawfully called he runs them upon this absurdity that their Autority must be without any controul The Pastors must be all of them Emperors the Doctors Kings the Elders Dukes and the Deacons Lords of the Treasury c. survey of the holy pretended discipline c. cap 24. and yet after all 't is mostly Name◠and Titles that occasions this or the accidental pressing an argument as there will be occasion to consider anon and Bishop Bilson goes on and acknowledges all in effect only Bishops and Pastors are left out and tells us That the Church may be Superior and yet the Pope subject to Princes Princes be Supreme and the Church their Superior the Scriptures be superior to Princes and yet Princes supreme the Sacrament be likewise above them and yet that hindreth not their Supremacy Truth Grace Faith Prayer and other Ghostly Virtues be higher than all earthly States and all this notwithstanding Princes may be supreme Governors of their Countries and which though in over abating Terms and with too scrupulous a fear where no fear ought to be declares as fully as can be the thing it self viz. That Princes are to be subject to the Government in the Church settled by Christ in its Bishops and Pastors and which both as a Prophet a Priest and a King he derives unto them Church-Officers have a Power underived and independent to the Crown only 't is ill worded by the Warden Things Powers Gifts Virtues c. as standing and settled on Earth and not invested in Persons can really be of no force and command at all or rather and which at last will amount to the same will be what every one shall please to make them and the Prince will have as many Supremes as are pretenders to these Gifts of the Spirit and which will be enough as experience taught us this only then can be meant by these Circumlocutions and why it might not have been spoken in down-right terms I cannot imagine that the Bishops and Pastors of the Church with the Bible put into their hands as it is at their Ordination with full autority given for the Offices ministerial have a real Power and are truly Rulers in the Church have a Supremacy and Superiority peculiarly theirs and all that will come to Heaven must come under this Ministry or Government it 's jurisdiction and discipline be they Princes or Subjects on Earth or what ever worldly Government they are possessed of unless he 'l say every Man hath these Ghostly Virtues which can urge a Text of Scripture and which cannot be conceived of him and to this purpose he goes farther pag. 167 168. Though the Members of the Church be subject and obedient to Princes yet the things contained in the Church and bestowed on the Church by God himself I mean the light of his Word the working of his Sacraments the gifts of his Grace and fruits of his Spirit be far superior to all Princes The plain meaning of which can be but this Certain separate Persons invested by God beyond Christians at large with such Gifts and Graces the Bishops and Pastors of the Church and in which respect a good Emperor is within the Church and not above it as St. Ambrose is to this purpose here quoted by him pag. 171. You must distinguish the things proposed in the Church from the Persons that were Members of the Church the Persons both Lay-Men and Clerks by God's Law were the Princes Subjects the things comprized in the Church and by God himself committed to the Church because they were Gods could be subject to the Power and Will of no mortal Creature Pope nor Prince the Prince is above the Persons of the Church not above things in the Church pag. 173. 176. 178. you know we do not make the Prince Judg of Faith we confess Princes to be no Judges of Faith but we do not encourage Princes themselves to be Judges of Faith but only we wish them to discern betwixt truth and error which every private Man must do that is a Christian pag. 174 175 176. he approves of Ambrose's Answer to Valentinian that is was stout but lawful constant but
Publishing them and least of all to say no worse in urging them as the sense and judgment of our Reformers and not to be endured when in opposition to our received and established Church Articles Laws Rubricks and Book of Ordination which and which alone upon the full enquiry and debate each Proposal and Objection and which must be many answered and satisfaction given is to be concluded the sense of every particular Doctor and admit the Conference had been as Doctor Stillingfleet Mistook it appointed by King Edward and his Council and by Law in order to the Reformation and which was began in that King's days the Judgment of the Church of England was to have been reported not from the particular bandyings pro and con amongst them or the draught or draughts of any one or more men and which in their Season was useful nay necessary but from the joynt unanimous result of the whole and which we are sure as to that particular of Church-Power and its Subject ended and united in the Book of Ordination nor upon a general account can those Collections whether in the Cottonian or any Library be in any better repute among us than any other of all the Pamphlets Models of Church and State Government Attempts and Proposals the late unhappy Revolutions in our Kingdom gave occasion to and produced the Condition as to Religion being just such in King Henry VIII days as it was then and the Autorities an Hundred years hence if all shaked in a bag together will be much at one too every man contrived said proposed and wrote as his own either Fancy or Interest or Curiosity or sometimes Reason prompted and directed him and though they may make a Pleasant History with much of diversion yet little of the Sense and Autority of the Nation can be collected and urged from them I am now come to the last of Mr. Selden's § XXIV Friends and our supposed Adversaries those general Tracts De Primatu Regio de potestate Papae regiâ adversus Bellarminos Tortos Becanos Eudemon Joannes Suaresius c. mostly in the days of King James and which were wrote by Lancelot Bishop of Chichester John Collins and the Bishop of Rochester The two last I have not by me nor do I remember I ever saw nor is it of any concern whether I have Bishop Andrews either in order to the answering what is by Mr. Selden brought against him any one that has but heard of that once flourishing Prelate in this Church will easily grant him on our side and much more must he that has read and conversed with his Works find him so and indeed all that Mr. Selden brings out of him and the other two is really ours so far as he reports them to have asserted that the execution of all Ecclesiastical forensick Jurisdiction and by consquence that of Excommunication receives measures and is ruled by the King and his Laws as Head and Moderator and Governor of the Church and Realm and so it ought to be whereas with us the Prince and Realm is Christian and the Church-censures are backed and supported by his Penal Laws in course annexed to and following them the Prince cannot be supposed so void of foresight as to leave himself no Power of inspection in such Proceedings as thus to put his Power into another Man's hands and who is not accountable to him in the Execution Thus the King's Autority is capable of being used against himself and it must in course so happen to his best Subjects 't is that traiterous Position to be abhorr'd and 't is peculiarly provided that it be so and publickly too by the Laws of our Land in the Act for Vniformity of Publick Prayers and it is a great deal more horrible in Church-Affairs as more immediately entitling our Saviour therewith the great abhorrer of all and who we are sure renounced all Pleas in dividing and disposing in Seculars and did all the Power Bishops legally execute in this Kingdom or in others that are Christian belong to them as of Divine Right or was it any other ways so devolved and sixed upon them as thereby enabled in an Arbitrary way of Proceeding without the leave or against the Power of the King with no respect to the Laws and Customs of the Realm to put it in Execution the Bishop and the King thus Independent were also inconsistent any thing or person may and must be inroded and offer'd violence to when the Bishop will and the greatest worldly Punishments next under Capital whenever or upon what Grounds soever he is pleased to Excommunicate be necessarily inflicted this is Imperium cum Jove to erect an Empire within an Empire and no Governments thus divided and distributed can stand and I heartily wish such as upon these Considerations most readily detest it in the Bishop would make their Reflexions in other Persons and Cases also But if Mr. Selden mean as he must do if he continue on the design of his Book that Church-Power and Jurisdiction as such and coming from Christ naked and void of all outward Secular Additions and implies only the forfeiture as a Christian with no one worldly inconvenience no forfeitures of Personal outward Liberty or Estate that the execution and force of this depends on the Prince and Humane Pleasure to temperate restrain and abolish nor is it duly exercised other ways this is overthrown already throughout this Discourse and I 'le only add the Autority of Mr. Selden's mistaken Friend but our real one the great and most learned Bishop Andrews who all along in those very Pages to which Mr. Selden in his Margin refers asserts the quite contrary and the Power of the Prince and the Priest are declared by him two distinct things and not in Subordination he tells us how God instituted in Israel a Kingdom and a Church and which never coaluerunt in unum procul se habuit Imperium ab Ecclesiâ so came together by coalition as to make one but were still diverse and two things had different Works and Offices and thence concludes Conjungi debent Regnum Ecclesia confundi non debent they ought to be united but not confused together and he reckons up the several Offices and Duties of the Prince to take care of Religion in general to see that every Order do their Duties to reprove to correct and coerce in order to it Non licuisse tamen Davidi arcam contingere so Tortus objects upon him and to which he answers Nec regi quidem nostro licet nec ulli aut Sacra administrare aut attrectare quicquam quod potestatis sit mere Sacerdotalis ut sunt Leiturgiae conciones claves Sacramenta arcam figunt suo loco reges attingant post illi quos ea cura tangit ex suscepto munere Ministerii sui But it was not lawful for David to touch the Ark neither is it lawful for our King nor for any either to administer holy things
as it is an hard and measuring Cast whether they were more unwise more unjust or more unfortunate and which had infallibly been our destruction if by the Grace of God their share had not been as small in the subtilty of Serpents as in the innocency of Doves A pretty knick-knack of Speech-making every body must own it to be but as to the occasion and matter of it each line as evidently deserves a lash and is as lyable to it there appears only passion and prejudice rancor and malice in the height and truly scarce sense under some of the pretty cadencies and chiming Words but not one dram of that incomparable reason Mr. Dean magnifies him for and once saw in him but for him to own it here will not be at least convenient could he find it out as perhaps he may though another cannot All I shall say at present is and 't is as mostly relating to this present discourse how wonderfully the same Fate has still attended the Crown of England and the Church of England the King and the Bishops of it and the Power the Institution and Autority of both as from Heaven and not of Man is still if either of them decried and run again at once and by the same Person and ten to one it had not come into my mind had not a Man of his own complexion in Loyalty in the late life of Julian told it the world much to the honor of this great and loyal Lord as he thinks that the Doctrine of Dr. Manwaring's and Dr. Sibthorp's Sermons long before the War broke out was as ridiculous to him as it appears from this his Speech in 1641. was then the Autority and Actions of the Bishops and the divine Right of Kings as well as the divine Right of the Church independent to the People are both but Pulpit Law that is in his admired most ingenious Expression and which alone then confuted and still confutes Doctor Manwaring the prate and tattle of idle Church-men from the Pulpit and the both King and Church fell at once and together and which himself particularly experienced at Newbery when 't was too late to help what himself by Speech-making and Scoffings had promoted and Abner's Epitaph seems in this respect exactly fitted for him nor know I in what other terms his death could be lamented better had the Pulpit laws been more frequently made more encouraged and executed in teaching the Peoples dependency upon Kings and duties to them that unnatural Rebellion had never followed had not those worst of Principles publisht in Scotland by Buchanan de jure regni apud Scotos and Knox in his Appel and Church-history placing both Church and Crown in Subordination to the People come hither into England and by their Country man the Lord Falkland in the House of Commons incouraged and those now a-days mend the Matter bravely that rescue us from the People and put us under the Prince Herein enlarge his Prerogative beyond his Progenitors that he is uppermost in Religion are zealous for him to be a Priest but leave him as King in the hands he was before and below the People and thus in sight strike at both Monarchy and Religion at a blow as is the Priest so is the King to take their Measures and Protection from others a false Religion is to be obeyed if the Religion of a Nation lest affronting Magistracy and Law and every one may Petition and libel the Government that pleases the Bible is put into the King's hand and the Scepter taken out the King may excommunicate but he may not govern his People and both Prince and Priest are in a pretty Condition and the notorious contempt Church Power and Offices lye under at this day amongst us is an evident Testimony of the mock Addition they design and contend for to his Crown in that the Power Sacerdotal is with so much noise and bussle seated in him 't is only to ridicule both at once and with the same Argument render them contemptible nor can any in the course of things as well as in common Experience be found to give to Caesar the things which are Caesar's but he that gives to Christ the things that are Christ's No Bishop No King is and will be a Maxime still a first truth and not to be gain-sayed § XXV IT is to be confessed there are Passages in the Writings of some of the Principal of our Doctors in the days of Queen Elizabeth and King James as Arch-Bishop Whitgift Arch-Bishop Bancroft Bishop Bilson c. that lean too much to the Erastian Way or rather by an incuriousness of Expression do not give that account of Church Power nor state it so clearly as may be expected and 't is not impossible where a design to render them as of the Party Something of this nature has been observ'd already in Bishop Bilson and Arch-Bishop Bancroft and he that reads over the first Book de Politeia Ecclesiasticà cap. 1 2 3 4 5. c. wrote by Robert Parker and printed at Frankfort 1616. and only reads him will conclude them not only almost but altogether such he was a Man vehement and of extremity of Spirit and his business is in his whole three Books to set and continue our Church against her self oâ—e of her Members against another and all of them opposite to Christ Jesus exactly answering his Title de Politeia Ecclesiastica Christiani Hierarchica opposita and indeed most that have appear'd since him against the Government of the Church and with appearance of pertinency have not only sharpned but borrowed their Weapons from this shop of the Philistines it is their Magazine and Store-house as another Armory like that of David's in Israel wherein are Mille Clypei all sorts of Weapons for these Mighty and with which they have still made their Attempts even Batteries and Breaches upon us Our learned Doctor Pearson since Lord Bishop of Chester in his Vindiciae Epistolarum Ignatii in his first Chapter or Proeme there relates him to be though not the first setter on foot and contriver of that unworthy most shameful Design upon Ignatius's Epistles in representing them spurious and imposed on the World and that not one of them was wrote by that most Holy and Apostolical Martyr whose name they bear yet he was more bold and went farther in the Attempt than any one had done before him and with whose Conjectures Dailee's dissertation is stuffed and he may be said a principal Cause why it spread so far and has been so successful to the great disadvantage of our common Christianity from him or Dialee or both unless Blundel and Salmasius be added and which are much the same thing it is Doctor Stillingfleet translates what he has on this Subject in his Irenicum and who may have the honor to be the first that made it English for any other I have met with and tells us in the Mother-Tongue The story of Ignatius as
much as it is defended with his Epistles doth not seem to be any of the most probable cap. 6. Sect. 16. I have heard I confess of Doctor Owen's Preface to his Book of Perseverance and then to be sure he is with abundance of honor his second and to omit the other ill Adventures in that unlucky Book of particular Forms of Church-Government and which savour too much of Robert Parker's musty Vessel the Doctor is beyond measure unfortunate who having by a notorious Mistake urg'd the Autority of our whole Church representative in King Edward VI day 's to avouch his most false Assertion That Episcopacy is not necessary and immutable That the King's Majesty may appoint Bishops or not appoint them or appoint other Officers for the Government of the Church cap. 8. When he goes on further to prove this by the particular Autorities of our Doctors since as Whitgift Cozius Whitgift's Chancellor Lowe Hooker Bridges c. he is if possible more unlucky yet and his Mistake more shameful he not only transcribes every Quotation out of Parker's second Book De politeia Ecclesiastica cap. 39.42 and the very Book Page Chapter Section and Figures stand all in Parker's Margin as they are wrote in his Book and which is no great Matter but and which is the harder Fate he urges and appeals to them as his Autority that Episcopacy is mutable and of but humane assignation and which thing Parker all along there owns and declares was not these Doctors Opinions he upbraids and taunts them for asserting the contrary as contradicting themselves and putting Cheats upon others because they believe Bishops by divine Right and perpetually obliging 't is his Objection upon them that their own Principles will not bear them out in it This is the case these Doctors assert over and over again as they must do if agreeing with our Church and their own Subscriptions that the Scriptures are not a full and perfect Rule for Discipline and Government and there is still a Power in the Church to make Laws as occasion offers even to vary from Examples of Discipline and Government which has there been practised Parker thinks he has the advantage and concludes upon them that then the Government by Bishops is changeable also and which is sounded only on Scripture Example and who reply that though they can make Laws in some Cases and alter them as occasion yet in all they cannot though some Examples in Scripture do not yet others do necessarily oblige and the Examples they produce necessarily obliging are these Imposition of Hands in Ordinations that to impose Hands is appropriated to Bishops as the Apostles Successors The observation of the Lord's-Day The institution of Metropolitans c. and this very account Parker himself gives us as to these Instances and all which will readily appear to any one that reads over Parker l. 2. cap. 39 40 41 42. particularly cap. 42. Sect. 8. 9. and that consults farther than Titles and Margins And that this Power of making Canons and Laws for the Government and Discipline of the Church is one of the main Foundations of the Hierarchy and therefore Parker sets himself with might and main to oppose it This will be yielded to Doctor Stillingfleet 't was this alone by which the Courts Ecclesiastical kept them within some moderate Bounds nor did they break out into Rebellion and Schism till that Power was abated in the execution and which made the Bishops so odious to them but that Episcopacy it self is as Arbitrary in its original and occasionally only as are many Church Laws and in the Power of any order of Persons or any Person now upon Earth to alter or confirm it This Parker by arguing would willingly infer upon these Doctors from their own Principles but acknowledges they did not own contrary to their Principles this Dr. Stillingfleet every ways mistakes and reports out of Parker's ill gathered Conclusion and Objection as their both Principles Practice and so every ways defames them and I shall only propose it to the Doctors consideration whether some satisfaction may not ought not to be required of him for the injury he has done to so many Worthies of our Church hereby I can assure him it has been long expected and if it be not done suddenly he may believe the World ere it be much older will be particularly disinformed at present I shall return to those Doctors mentioned in the beginning of this Section and who are not yet freed from the Contumelies laid on them by Parker as these are from his though I do not question but I shall equally vindicate both § XXVI IT is an easie thing to make any Man 's Writing in a plausible shew to run thwart to and contradict themselves the occasion and Circumstances not considered and if particular Occurrencies be not abated for the worst of Heresies will thus shelter themselves under the best Autorities How largely and frequently do the Ancient Fathers of the Church speak of the Powers and excellence of Nature and Reason when disputing against the Gentiles when Apologizing for and recommending to them the Christian Religion Justin Martyr Apol. 2. goes so far as to say the wiser sort of the Greeks were Christians such as Socrates Heraclitus c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. because living up to the Rules of Reason but must not those be wide Arguings that say and some have said it the Fathers thought the use of Reason alone able to direct and assist us for Heaven when 't is the coming of Christ in the Flesh his additional super-natural Revelations of Grace and Truth those farther discoveries and assistances to Mankind is the occasion and general subject of their Writings and a belief of which is that they endeavor to bring the Greeks unto to make evident and rational to all Men when 't was only the particular application of an Argument they aim'd at and in the design is most true that every one so far as truly rational he is Christian Christianity is no new thing nor strange 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Whosoever pursues Justice and Honesty and other commendable Actions suited to the universal eternal Rules of Nature is acceptable to God by this both the Jews under the Law and the Patriarchs and holy Men from the first Creation through the knowledg of Christ were saved as Justin Martyr disputes cum Tryphone Judeo and Eusebius has a whole Chapter to this purpose Eccl. Hist l. 1. c. 4. Every one that is read in that History knows that the great cry of the Arians against the Council of Nice was they were Innovators and a licentious Pen has of late managed and pursued it afresh Sandius hist Enucleata as using Words and bringing in Doctrines which were not either in Scripture or in the Writings and Determinations of the ancient Doctors of the Church when asserting and explaining the one substance or eternal Generation of the Son of God which though it
it self was not thought to be concerned 't was what was reputed only secular and the most eminent and very near all the Bishops were zealous Sticklers against the Pope or at least submitted to it then when zealous for the Roman Catholick Religion Doctrines and Worship and to which they adhered in King Edward's days and Queen Elizabeth's when the Reformation went on farther and was settled as now by Law in the Church The Supremacy was not then the Characteristical Mark though since to keep up the Parties it is so and which occasioned that warm Dialogue betwixt the Jesuite and Doctor Bilson of which I have given so large an account already the Doctor 's design being to vindicate our Church from the Opinions of Erastus urged in effect upon us by the Jesuite and that by asserting the Prince Supreme in all Causes over all Persons we give not to him any thing that is Church-Power enstated by Christ on the Apostles and by them derived to the Bishops their alone Successors herein this being thus settled and over-ruled against the Romanist another Enemy Man comes with his Tares and which are scattered in the seed-Plot and grow up together with it the Puritan starts up in the midst of us and the Point is That this Power of the Keys is in the Presbytery their Eldership made up of Lay-Men mostly call'd Lay-Elders and these for the greatest part as must be in abundance of Parishes Mechanicks and the meaner sort who have the Power of laying on of Hands Ordaining and Excommunicating nay more these inconsiderable Persons are not only invested with the Power of Bishops and Church-Men but with that Power and Supremacy is by us given to the Prince to Preside over and Govern all Persons and Causes by Process to Cite Summon and Convene before them to implead acquit or condemn amerce or punish even to confinement in their Consistories and no Cause or Person to be exempted if manageable in order to Religion they emulate and succeed the Pope himself and in the highest instances of his pretended Power and Soveraignty even to Summon and Censure Kings of whom Personal Attendance is required now against this it is these Worthies change and wield their Weapons accordingly as a good Fencer is ready at all against these New Popes as they call them and whoso please may read in Bishop Bancroft's Survey of the pretended holy Discipline cap. 22 23 24 25. and in his Book of Dangerous Positions and Proceedings published and practised within the Island of Britain under pretence for Reformation and for the Presbyterial Discipline In Bishop Bilson's Perpetual Government of Christ's Church Cap. 9 10. and Bishop Whitgift's Defence of the Answer to the Admonition Tract 17. pag. 627 628 629 630 c. against these it is their warmth and Argument is spent in Defence of the Rights of the King and Church in scorn and detestation of such those pretending Ignaro's Their words are these with a deal more to this purpose As though Christ's Soveraignty Kingdom and Lordship were no where acknowledged or to be found but where half a dozen Artisans Shoo-makers Tinkers and Taylors with their Preacher and Reader Eight or Nine Cherubins forsooth do rule the whole Parish So Bancroft Dangerous Positions c. l. 2. c. 2. That the King must submit to the Pastor and be content to be joyned in Commission with the basest sort of People if it please the Parish to appoint him and if over-ruled must be contented and the Prince loses all Autority in Ecclesiastical Matters and he must maintain and see executed such Laws Orders and Ceremonies as the Pastor with his Seniors shall make and decree So Bishop Whitgift ibid. p. 656 657. That the Church-warden and Syde-men in every Parish are the meetest Men that you can find to direct Princes in judging of Ecclesiastical Crimes and Causes a wretched state of the Church it must be that shall depend on such silly Governors as Husbandmen and Artisans Ploughmen and Craftsmen and we descend to the Cart for advice in Church-Government So Bishop Bilson Perpetual Government Cap. 10. and if thus in behalf of the Regal and Sacerdotal Power the Magistracy and the Ministry and which are the only Governors of the Church of Christ as they contend against these monstrous sort of People with their High-shoo'd feet and Clowns hands invading both the King and the Church be set as one man to oppose them and their distinct Powers not so nicely and distinctly stated at one time as they are and require an another and appear but as one Weapon that with present advantage it may be wellded against them this is to be imputed to the warmth and zeal of the Disputant whether as Aggressor or Defendant his settled particular judgment is to be fetch'd from his particular designed Decision and Determination in other Cases and when the naked Cause is alone and before him the immediate proper object of his Consideration and it must be confessed neither do I believe the great reason and choicer learning of that excellent Prelate were he now alive again could upon second thoughts extricate himself that Bishop Bilson's Argument against Lay-Elders Cap. 10. Pag. 148. and which Robert Parker so much twits him with is wide of a Conclusion and very ill laid it runs thus I cannot conceive how Lay-Elders should be Governors of Christ's Church and yet be neither Ministers nor Magistrates Christ being the Head and fulness of the Church which is his Body governeth the same as a Prophet a Priest and a King and after his Example all Government in the Church is either Prophetical Sacerdotal or Regal the Doctors have a Prophetical the Pastors a Sacerdotal and the Magistrates a Regal Power What fourth Regiment can we find for Lay-Elders All that can be said is this there appear'd an Argument against a Lay-Elder he was thought thus shut out from having any Place or Power as from Christ not considering the ill distribution of the offices of Christ in general and his bad-placed Successions and more especially the worser consequence that must attend a deriving the Magistrates Power from the Mediatorship and 't is what neither Whitgift nor Bancroft did Consider As a King Priest and Prophet he erected and settled his Church on Earth by virtue of that Commission and All Power given him of the Father Mat. 11. but he did not as such meddle with the Kingdoms on Earth as the Mediator he was himself a Subject and professed and practised Subjection and Obedience demanded only the Subjects right Protection by the Government he found established in the World by his Father But however the present Argument was wrong laid and whencesoever the Magistrates Power is derived 't is all along and by them all supposed and maintained quite different and apart from that of the Ministry or the Priesthood and they are asserted two quite diverse offices and their Powers do not reach to one another I 'le only now instance
in Bishop Bilson Cap. 9. pag. 113. As for Excommunication if you take it for removing the unruly from the Civil Society of the Faithful until they conform themselves to a more Christian sort of life this he takes to be the Power of a Christian Magistrate and he goes on and says I am not averse that the whole Church where he is wanting did and should concur in that action for thereby the sooner when all the Multitude joyn with the Pastor in one Mind to renounce all manner of conversing with such will the Parties be reduced to a better mind to see themselves rejected and exiled from all company but 't is the Pastors charge only to deliver or deny the Sacraments Pag. 114.147 but otherwise Lay-men that are no Magistrates may not challenge to intermeddle with the Pastors Function or over-rule them in their own Charge without manifest and violent intrusion on other mens Callings without the Word and Will of Christ who gave his Apostle the Holy Ghost to remit and retain Sins And so expresly again p. 149. If you joyn not Lay-Elders in those Sacred and Sacerdotal Actions with Pastors but make them Overseers and Moderators of those things which Pastors do this Power belongeth exactly to Christian Magistrates to see that Pastors do their Duty exactly according to the Will of Christ and not to abuse their Power to annoy his Church or the Members thereof neither is the case alike betwixt Pastors and Lay-Elders Pastors have their Power and Function distinguished from Princes by God himself insomuch that it were more than Presumption for Princes to execute those actions by themselves or by their Substitutes To Preach Baptize retain Sins impose Hands Princes have no Power the Prince of Princes even the Son of God hath severed it from their Callings and committed it to his Apostles and they by imposition of hands derived it to their Successors but to cause these actions to be orderly done according to Christ's Commandment and to prevent and redress abuses in the doers this is all that is left for Lay-Elders and this is all that we reserve for the Christian Magistrate and that no other Church-Power was then thought by any to belong to the Prince he was not at all considered as its Subject there was no such thing as a pretence then on foot 't is most plain Cap. 9. pag. 108. and among the many Conceits about the Power of the Keys and Subject this never entred into the heart oâ— any his words are these The Power of the Keys and right to impose Hands I mean to ordain Ministers and to Excommunicate Sinners are more controverted than the other two the Word and Sacraments and which were never questioned by reason that diverse Men have diverse Conceits of them some fasten them on the liking of the Multitude which they call the Church others commit them to the judgment of certain chosen Persons as well of the Laiety as of the Clergy whom they call the Presbytery Some attribute only but equally to all Pastors and Preachers and some especially reserve them to Men of the greatest gifts ripest years and highest calling among the Clergy But there 's none mentioned that they are in the Prince 'T is I know the usual Expression in the Pulpit Prayer and the King is placed next under Christ in these His Majestie 's Realms and Dominions and which as that Prayer it self has no good bottom that ever I could meet with for such the use of it a meer Arbitrary customary thing where did God ever make Christ his Deputy and the King Christ's as to the worldly Powers and Secular things of this life his Commission to our Saviour ran quite contrary and nothing less can be gathered from it this is to found right of Dominion in Grace with a Witness our Kings did not receive or rather reassume it upon these terms nor do they since acknowledge it as so derived King Henry VIII did not and there 's no such thing in any one Act or Statute in his days Doctor Burnet indeed in his Collection of Records gives us two instances wherein the Title of Supreme Head under Christ of the Church of England Supremum Ecclesiae Anglicanae sub Christo Caput The one in the Injunctions to the Clergy made by Cromwel Pag. 178. Num. 12. the other in the Commission by which Bonner held his Bishoprick of the King Pag. 184. Num. 14. but in his Addenda Pag. 305. Num. 1. in the Preamble to Articles about Religion set out by the Convocation and Published by the King's Autority 't is only and in Earth Supreme Head of the Church of England and which is of more Autority than the other because in Convocation It is once or twice used by King Edward before his Injunctions Articles c. and sometimes lest out but no mention of it but never used by Queen Elizabeth in any of hers or in her Proclamations nor is it commanded in her Form of bidding of Prayer nor in the Canons or Form of bidding Prayer in the days of King James 't is neither in the Oath of Supremacy or Allegiance and which is to be seen in the account we have of them by Anthony Sparrow now Lord Bishop of Norwich in his Collection of Canons Articles Injunctions c. and our Seven and thirtieth Article of Religion gives the Queens Majesty that only Prerogative was given all Godly Princes by God himself in Holy Scriptures that which had the Kings of Israel and Judah that which had the Kings of the Gentiles the King of Nineveh in the Prophecy of Jonah and which is an instance I find given by our Divines of the preceding Power in other Princes we contend for and have determined to be in ours and with which if the Prince be not invested he has no Government over his People a great part always will and all may when they will exempt their Persons and Actions from his cognizance and inspection upon pretence of their Faith and Religion but there is not a word of any one Derivation as from Christ nor as the Mediator doth he can he bestow any such Power upon them or are Kings thus under him or any ways then as Members of his Body and as Christians they are to submit to and receive his Laws in order to Heaven and these Laws are to be their Rule in their Government upon Earth which they are to obey and protect which indeed supports and exalts them as Righteousness does a Nation but 't is in and by that Autority they were invested in before Christ and they were indeed in a feeble piteous Case if no other Power to rule with than what the crucifyed Jesus can give them whose Kingdom was not of this World nor did he manage any thing by the Powers of it I know it is the least of the Designs of such that still use this Expression in their Prayers and Discourses and they have great Examples for it and of