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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A70471	A treatise of the episcopacy, liturgies, and ecclesiastical ceremonies of the primitive times and of the mutations which happened to them in the succeeding ages gathered out of the works of the ancient fathers and doctors of the church / by John Lloyd, B.D., presbyter of the church of North-Mimmes in Hertfordshire.	Lloyd, John, Presbyter of the Church of North-Mimmes.	1660 (1660)	Wing L2655A; ESTC R21763	79,334	101

A TREATISE OF THE EPISCOPACY LITURGIES AND ECCLESIASTICAL CEREMONIES OF THE PRIMITIVE TIMES AND Of the mutations which happened to them in the fucceeding Ages GATHERED Out of the Works of the ancient Fathers and Doctors of the Church By John Lloyd B. D. Presbyter of the Church of North-Mimmes in Hertfordshire Let your moderation be known unto all men the Lord is at hand Phil. 4.5 Multum sacerdotalis officii meritum splendescit ubi sic summorum servatur auctoritas ut in nu●● inferiorum putatur imminuta libertas Leonis Epist 61. Episcopi sacerdotes se esse noverint non Dominos honorent clericos quafi clericos ut ipsis à clericis quasi Episcopis honor deferatur Hierom. ad Nepotianum De vita clericorum LONDON Printed by W. G. for John Sherley at the Sign of the Pelican and Robert Littlebury at the Sign of the Unicorn in Little Britain M.DC.LX TO The Right Reverend Father in God IOHN LORD BISHOP OF EXCESTER MY LORD WHen the dark night of our confusions was by Gods wonderful mercy never to be forgotten well nigh at an end by the near approaching of our Sun the breath of our nostrils our dread Soveraign Lord the Kings Majesty unto the horizon of his paenitent and loyal Subjects in his hereditary Kingdomes and Dominions whereby all began to be revived to be prepared for the receiving all good impressions in this beginning of our happiness considering with my self by what best means men of different apprehensions concerning Ecclesiastical things might be brought unto godly unity and meet uniformity therein I thought that the knowledge of the state of the Church of Christ in the Apostles dayes and in the four Centuries following their times as to the form of Ecclesiastical Government Discipline Liturgy and Rites used in them would very much conduce to the attainment of that blessed end For in those dayes many thousands of holy Confessors and Martyrs flourished in those times lived the most reverend Fathers of the first four general Councils of Nice Constantinople Ephesus and Chalcedon celebrated over all the Christian world of whose wisdome and godly care to do nothing in those particulars against the institutions of Christ and his Apostles but rather to do all things as might be most pleasing to God and most conducing to the edification of the Church no prudent and charitable man can entertain the least doubt Men they were and might erre but that so many men of extraordinary holinesse and wisdome compared to the best men of these latter Centuries should unanimously agree for the space of two three or four hundred years in setting up and practising superstition is incredible to them who believe that God hath promised to teach the humble his way and shew his covenant to them that fear him and not to forsake them which have not first forsaken him Having therefore reason and religion to assure me that all understanding and sober men if they could once see the form of Church-government with the Liturgies and Rites used by those Primitive Churches demonstrated by undeniable testimonies of pure antiquity would easily be induced to embrace them so far as they should appear to be convenient for Christian unity and edification in the present circumstances of time place and persons whereof not private men but the Governours Civil and Ecclesiastical are the onely Judges on earth I made what inquiry I could if any book were extant in the English tongue containing a brief full and plain demonstration of all the said Ecclesiastical things which might be had at a cheap rate soon read over and easily understood by all men of indifferent capacity whereby the knowledge of those things might be the more divulged But after diligent inquiry finding none I resolved being the work was within the limits of my vocation and in reading the ancient writers I had with no small diligence noted the passages conducing thereto invocato Dei Opt. Max. Nomine to use my poor talent with my best indevour to write such a little book which should comprehend in it the sum and substance of all the matters above specified as briefly fully and plainly as I could And this was the beginning of this small Treatise which being ended in convenient time was offered to worthy men of excellent indowments to be perused by them in hope that one or other of them knowing the usefulness of the matter treated of and observing the too plain low and uneven manner of writing would be moved to put forth a work upon that subject which being replenished with good variety of well ordered matters adorned with convenient eloquence and commended by the worthy name of an Author famous for his learning eloquence and vertues would be by all readily entertained greedily read and would sweetly convey the things desired to be published to the knowledge of all men But herein my hope failed me For those worthy persons were so imployed in the high and weighty affaires of the Church that they had no leisure to go about this although an useful work yet of less profit to the Church and less proportionable to their great abilities then the sublime imployment wherein their time was spent What remained then but that either that needful work must be altogether wanting or this poor treatise so void of due ornaments must be suffred to go abroad I had indeed once in a manner resolved to bury it in my study but an occasion bringing the matterr into a new debate I suffered some reasons to prevaile with me to give it leave to present it self to the view of the world yet not without some honourable Patron the glorious lustre of whose great learning Excellent Vertues and pretious name might both illumminate it and conciliate for the mean and obscure author some room in the good esteem and affection of learned and good men For which end I thought it most convenient to make choise of one of those very bright stars which his Majesties wisdome and goodness had been pleased to set in the firmament of our Church among whom your Lordship was first presented to my thoughts in your very learned elegant and eloquent works especially both in your testification of your great and very remarkable zeal for the now most blessed and glorious Saint and Martyr our late glorious King CHARLS the first and in your no less zealous fidelity to our most dear and dread Soveraign Lord King CHARLES the second manifested in times of greatest peril and also in your sighs groans complaints and prayers for and of the Church of England in her deep distress in your prudent indefatigable endevours for her restauration in those parts of your Lordships most learned writings wherein as in exceeding fair monuments more lasting then brasse you consecrate the blessed Memories of many very precious names viz. of the right reverend Fathers Bishop Andrews Bishop Morton Bishop Potter Bishop Hall Bishop Brownrigg and other honourable persons never to be remembred without

and branch no no he only taxeth the exorbitancy the abuse the ambition and not the holy function he expounds himself when in the same place he expresseth the prelacy which he wisheth outed to be the Tyrannie of Authority and preheminence it is that which caused many wife men to shun the function because in had company it is difficult to rule well which at all times is the work of an excelling faculty Greg. Niz in Apolog 1. In orat ad patrem Basilia praesente and it many times happens saith the same Father that grace it self begets Pride and then we know that the corruption of the best is the worst Secondly Hierome was not inferiour in learning eloquence and piety to any of the Ancients neither did any excell him in the knowledg of the antiquities of the Church And he that doth not look very narrowly into the works of Epiphanius may find him defective in this last Hierome's testimony concerning the originall of Episcopacy although in formall expressions it differs from Epiphanius's yet perhaps by the distinction of extraordinary and ordinary Episcopacy the difference in words may be brought into an unity in sense and if there be a difference in the sense between them Yet Hierome affords a more immediate direct and efficacious argument for Episcopacy and its contiruance then the other I am much deceived and have Crossed mine own resolution if I have not delivered the truth impartially as I found it in the holy old Doctors And although a lover of the Presbytery may dislike some passage of this little book singly considered and a lover of Episcopacy dislike some other passage in like sort apprehended yet I have good hope that when both have read the whole and layed before them the entire series of the discourse they may see good reason to like well in the whole what they disliked apart and by it self considered and will candidly acknowledg that every thing therein tends to the same good end which both profess to ayme at A Treatise of the Primitive Episcopacy Liturgies Rights c. IT having pleased God to choose for himself out of sinful men a peculiar people to set forth his glorious praises he never left the world destitute of heavenly institutions and Laws whereby men might be translated from the state of sin and misery to the state of holiness and Salvation and be made and preserved answerable in conversation to the blessed condition of their translation and change These willing and obedient people addicted to the Service of Almighty God were are and will be by him reputed his house Family and Kingdome which therefore cannot be imagined to be without order and rule without some certain persons set apart to teach the Divine Laws and execute other Divine institutions and with consent of the concerned to make Ecclesiastical Ordinances which times places and other circumstances require agreeable to the Divine and subservient to the due and most decent execution of them Of the number of these teachers and rulers of Gods house were Adam Noah Abraham and other heads of numerous Families unto the time of the giving of the Law by Moses after the Law partly fit persons of the tribe of Levi partly the Prophets partly men bred in the Schools of the Prophets and John the Baptist performed the Divine and Ecclesiastical functions unto the time of our Saviours Baptism after which time he himself the Builder and Master of the house and Family whose servants and under-officers all other rulets acknowledge themselves to be deriving from him not onely their authority but also all their abilities whereby they are made able in any measure to fulfill the holy offices he I say in his own person and in our nature was pleased to execute such parts of his own institutions as he saw convenient for himself to perform and to choose besides seventy Disciples twelve other men to be his Apostles and Ministers of the heavenly doctrine and annexed ceremonies It appeareth that it was the intention of our Saviour that the number of twelve Apostles should be his primary instruments in founding the Original Churches of Christ the Mothers of all other Churches to succeed unto the end of the world It was also his purpose to make them parents of all other Ministers which should succeed in an ordinary course which is hereby manifest because Christ promised to be with them unto the worlds end which cannot be verified of their persons and therefore is to be understood of them in the persons of their successors proceeding from them by successive ordination Basil constit Monast c. 22. Chrysost in Epist ad Coloss hom 3. and represented in their persons wherefore the ordination of the Apostles was in some sort the ordination of their successors and their mission to teach and baptize was a virtual or legal mission of the other There were three Editions of the covenant of grace the one from Adam to Abraham the second from him to our Saviour the third from our Saviour unto the end of the world In every of these the substance and kernel of the Covenant was and is the same the difference is in remarkable accidents and circumstances the Ministers of the heavenly Doctrine in the first and second preached Christ to come and had the Spirit accompanying the word and seals of the Covenant ministred by them as an incident annexed by Almighty God to their ordination but yet so as the spirit was ordinarily given in a lesser measure to the ministery of the first then or the second Edition The Apostles were in their call to the Apostleship before the death of our Saviour ordained ministers of the third Edition of the Covenant because Christ was now come in the flesh and had begun to publish the great Salvation and therefore they had a proportionable increase of the spirit added to their ministery for the working of repentance faith and holiness in men above the ordinary measure granted to the ministery of the second Edition Notwithstanding that the Ministers of the first and second Edition of the Covenant of grace Sect. 2. had a power of binding and loosing in having the spirit accompanying their office and service and that the Apostles in the mortal life of our Saviour had the same in a higher degree yet the promise made to the confession of St. Peter of giving unto him a power of binding and loosing with the Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven was not in vaine as of a thing which he had already received for he had received the same onely in the measure and degree meet to be dispensed at that time and not in the ordinary fulness promised to the ministers of the new Testament fully confirmed by the death and resurrection of Christ and therefore our Saviour after his rising again from the dead bestowed upon them that promised fulness of the Spirit which was in ordinary to accompany their ministery of the word Chrysost

to suspend their reception of the ancient Episcopacy but in very deed receiving in some hidden sort the substance of it secretly giving that Authority to the moderator of the Colledge of Presbyters which tantamounts the Authority of the ancient Bishops This was done by them in their Emergency out of the Gulfe of the Babylonish Idolatry and Haeresies when the state of persons and Circumstances would not permit them directly and manifestly to set up the ancient Episcopacy but covertly and cloathed with the apparel of Presbytery Because the appearing of it in its native cloathing seemed to threaten an extreme danger of returning again to Idolatrous Babylon Thus when two duties became inconsistent the keeping out of Idolatry and the open and manifest use of an Ordinance inferior to the maintenance of the purity of Gods worship they did as it was their duty so far forbear the open use of Episcopacy as seemed needfull that they might preserve the truth and sincerity of the worship of God I know many writers are of another mind but the intentions of Churches are better seen in the causes of their actions and the managing of them then in the letter of a Law or in the speculative opinions of private persons Some think the present condition of our Church to be almost the same with the state of those Churches when they first began their Reformation and therefore that we stand in need of the same cure under the habit of the Presbyterian Government Surely these are much deceived first in their opinion of our present state secondly in the sequele if our case were like theirs for when we were like them in departing from Babylon we were unlike them in many other respects and needed not the habit of Presbyters but fall to purge the ancient Episcopacy from as many of the foul excrescencies which the sins of men made to grow to it as the condition of that time would permit whereby our Church kept more uniformity with the primitive Churches and by the blessing of God upon our endevour obtained more measure of the Heavenly light and of the power of Godliness in peace and that for a longer time then any part of those Churches attained unto which were necessitated to shrowd themselves under another habit of Government This I say not any way to disparage any other Church of Christ whom I honour and pray for from my heart or to ascribe any thing to our own wisdome and providence but to honour and glorifie the grace of God for his great mercies to our Church and to defend her honour against the mistakes of some But now our condition is changed our sins have brought us to misery the light and glory of our Church is turned to darkness confusion and contempt from which notwithstanding our unworthiness Gods infinite mercy which hath most gratiously restored our Soveraign Lord the King unto his Kingdomes and Subjects will be pleased I trust to deliver us and to beautifie our Church with the primitive Apostolicall Episcopacy attended by his assessors and Senate the reverend grave wise learned and pious Colledg of Presbyters to govern the house of God after the best pattern of the primitive holy orders and discipline for the obtaining whereof God would have us assisted by His grace to contribute our endevours improved to the uttermost of Christian Wisdom and moderation to be crowned with his rich blessing And because this business is about things for the most part spirituall tending to the edification of Gods house it will no doubt please our gracious King and his great Councell not to proceed in this work without the advise and counsell of them whom Christ hath ordained under Himself Minister all builders of His House least the neglect of His Ordinance and Ministers cause the Lord to blast all other Counsells and endeavours how probable soever they may seem to be in the eye of the world Give unto Casar the things which are Caesars and let the Vicegerents of Christ enjoy the things belonging to them let all interests have their due part in this weighty work and then whatsoever Government be settled what form soever of Divine service what Rites soever and Ceremonies shall be established they will with all readiness and due submission be received and embraced by all the people and all the obedient Sons and Daughters of our dearest Mother the Church of England among whom if there shall be some whose judgments cannot acquiesce in some determinations of the higher powers they will wisely consider first that in the remote conclusions of Divine maximes all good men in this our infirmity will never agree and that nature teacheth us that in controversies the resolution of the major part must be obeyed without which debates would never be ended and St. Paul saith let the spirits of the Prophets be subject to the Prophets Secondly That God hath appointed the powers civil and Ecclesiasticall in his stead to determine Ecclesiasticall controversies and to make Ecclesiasticall Ordinances from whose judgment there is no appeal but only to God by prayer Thirdly That to preserve the peace of the Church and Charity the bond of perfectness is a duty to be preferred before the duty of publick teaching divulging or preaching many of those Divine Truths whose ignorance if not voluntary doth not exclude from Heaven when that teaching or publishing doth disturb the publick peace and consequently the keeping of the peace requireth abstinence in that case from such divulging or preaching And from these considerations good men will infer that it is good for them and that it is their duty both for the sake of Gods Authority for good order sake and for Charity and peace sake out of a Conscientious regard to the higher powers to acquiesce in their determinations and to desist from opposing their private opinion to the publick judgment and pursuing their private interest to the prejudice of publick peace and Charity For which Wisedome and moderation that they may be in all let all good men pray to the onely wise and most mercifull God the Author of Truth and peace An APENDIX THe manner of the Ordination of Bishops forgotten to be shewed by me in due place is declared by the fourth Councill of Carthage in these words Can. 2. When a Bishop is ordained lay and hold the book of the Evangelists upon his head and neck and one Bishop pronouncing the Benediction over him let the rest of the Bishops present touch his head with their hands The Church never accounted any to be capable of this Episcopall Ordination that was not first ordained a Presbyter the manner of whose Ordination was that the Bishop blessing him saying receive the Holy Ghost whosoever sins you shall remitt Concil earth Can 3. c. and laying his hand upon his head the Presbyters present lay their hands upon his head by the hand of the Bishop There was a (a) Tert. de praescript c. 41. Cyprian Epist ad