none away nor made them break off from any just and due Spiritual Dependence on their former Bishops whose own heretical Doctrine and corrupt Ministrations had made the people cease from depending any longer in Conscience upon them They wanted only to be Lawfully empowered and regularly ordained themselves by Episcopal Imposition of hands as all those reformed Bishops plainly were and so were no Spiritual Intruders nor guilty of any Civil Vsurpation or Injustice But where Bishops are Orthodox and are deprived for their adherence to Truth and Righteousness both in their private Practice and Publick Ministrations the people are still left Spiritually to depend on them And so we our selves should have thought at least we all seem as if we should if by Gods Providence the Civil State had gone on to ddprive our reformed Bishops for sticking to the Doctrines and Worship of the Reformation and had set up Popish Bishops in their places c. Vide. Eucher This Doctrine of that learned Person must be admitted with a grain of Salt or else it will be very unwholesom and prove very convulsive in the Ecclesiastick Body For tho every single Christian is to abhor and defie all false Doctrine condemned by the unanimous Sense and suffrage of the Universal Church from Divine Authorities yet single Persons cannot distributively and alone reject their Bishops as not Bishops for heretical Opinions or corrupt Ministrations which the general Body and all Orders of the Church do not uniformly censure irregular and renounce their Authors except a just and regular Sentence pass in form against them When Churches are concorporated into Provincial and Diocesan Unions there must be some public conduct for the diffusive multitude to a due discussion of Principles in order to such Divorces Thus of old when grievances arose from suspected Bishops the people appealed to Synods to judge upon their Cause but in Cases notorious they addressed to other Churches Bishops and Synods to allow their necessary Rejection of their irregular Bishop and ordain them others And this usage was as common as useful till the Papal Usurpations rendred it impracticable in the Western Church and so necessitated extraordinary forms of reformation For here the Prince and the People and a great Body of the Clergy having an Ecclesiastical Cause of Controversie against the Marian Bishops unrelievable by any fair domestic or foreign Synod were forced upon the Notoriety of the Evil to use extraordinary measures of purgation not by rabble or incoherent Partitions but by a National Judgment in Parliament as a middle expedient as well against intestine Schisms as Romish abuses upon which discharge of Papal Tyranny a way was opened to that true and uniform Sense of true Religion which the whole emancipated Church presently received with a glad and chearful Uniformity which was a felicity however not atchievable by a loose unorganized Multitude Since then the whole People of this Land did in their National Senate Vindicate the pure Religion established in former Convocations from the Marian Bishops the enacted Deprivation was designed more against their Spiritual Conduct than their Temporal fortunes and the People followed that publick intention not their own private counsel in the reception of new Bishops and the models of reformation And herein such measures of prudence were observed which cannot be secured in a promiscuous multitude which I wonder that Author did not consider For a Priest is not immediatly upon dropping of an Error materially heretical to be taken by all at random for a formal and self-deprived heretic or Anathema but he must be previously heard and admonished and only upon incorrigible Obstinacy to be rejected with appeal unto God and an apology to all Churches or Spiritual Fathers unconcerned and untainted But then this is a Canonical form of exauctoration by the Church not a formal Self-deprivation otherwise upon this Authors Principle all the Hierarchy of the Romish Communion was long self-deprived before the Reformation and totally exauctorated and how then will he justify our Episcopal Succession For such ipso facto irregularities that are so in their own nature and not by mere Canonical Ordinance degrade as well as deprive from not only Order but Communion to which of old upon Penitence they were wont to be restored not as Priests but as Laymen for that such a fall was an ipso facto Degradation of Order in which there were to be no public Penitents But now if we make such Deprivation the Act of the Christian People as we must then it and all the previous process thereunto must be executed by some formed Session or Council for the Place and People concerned but for the whole People of this Land we have no Council but that of Parliament And here it must be noted that a Christian Parliament hath as much Spiritual Right against heretical Priests as the common Christian Multitude and if the Multitude may on such notorious Corruptions eject one and procure another Bishop even without the Consent of civil Powers according to this Authors Doctrine surely such Right much more belongs to the Christian Legislative to which the Care of Religion does by Divine Ordinances belong as well as to the Hierarchy and common Multitude which had a real need of their Counsel and Conduct in so great a Difficulty The People therefore in Parliament did their Part in the Ejection of the Marian Bishops and all the Chapters and other Ecclesiastical Orders sequaciously concurred and completed the Design of that Act in their Alienation from the condemned Recusants And tho' all this was done for refusing the Oath of Supremacy yet that Recusancy being grounded on false Principles in Religion and maintained in Defence of the Romish Usurpations and Corruptions the Statute of Deprivation had not only a civil Intention but Religious also and was received accordingly But all this while I find no Answer to that famous Passage quoted by me †Sol. and Ab. Pag. 32. out of Dr. Hammond's Tract of Schism tho' of so great Moment and of so great Strength to justifie such Statutes of Deprivation for the Security of the civil Government against Seducements and Seditions But if you would take my Counsel I would advise you not to lay the Cause of this Controversie in Points of Religion nor make common People the Judges of them for fear of a Snap that perhaps you are not aware of Dyscher What what do you mean I am a little startled at this Suggestion since we are where we were and have neither altered the old Doctrines nor the Practices they direct to Eucher Do not you remember that that great Man who wrote the Vindication of the Deprived Bishops vehemently argues †Vindic. of Depr Bish pag. 24.25 26 27. that not only Errors whether great or small but even unnecessary Truths become Heresies when they are made the Causes or Characters of different Communions And such all Principles and Rules of Christian Morals inforced on peril of Sin
uncertain Rochester Letter make the Abdication manifestly false since he says it makes the Disertion so Here I doubt his Courage will fail him lest his Argument and his Dedication follow the fate of the Pastoral Letter And yet it is manifest that though K. James made many large and previous steps to the Subverting our Constitution yet the Final Abdication of the whole Government consisted in his Desertion from whence the Vacancy Commenced and if this were no otherwise manifest we have Mr. Johnson's own Averment who tells us * ibid page 29. That we have an Act of Parliament which declares the Realm of England to have been Sovereign during that time of Vacancy between K. James's second flight and K. William's Admission by ordering all Indictments from the time of K. James ' s withdrawing till the 13th of February to run in their Name 'T is true indeed that meer Local Desertion of the Land of which there may be many Causes does not ipso facto extinguish the Sovereignty except it be judicially interpretable to an Abdication from other concurrent Circumstances and Indications on want of which a demand of Return becomes reasonable and the neglect thereof interprets the Recession to an Abdication but when there are evident tokens of yielding up a Government in the form manner causes and circumstances of such Local Desertion then a summons of Return is not necessary in point of Law or National Duty upon the antecedent forms of Virtual Abdication apparent in such Departure If therefore his Act of Disertion in its own form made a Legal and Effectual Abdication his Rochester Letter imports no more than that his words and actions are contradictory in quitting by deed and claiming by word the same Right at the same time Upon this Abdication therefore the Throne becoming actually Vacant was by the Act of the Nation filled up with their Majesties And here upon whatsoever powers K. James endeavours to Exert as they do not reach us nor send out their vertue by legal ways of course so are they too late and out of season not to mention that his late ways of Exertion under French Conduct how honest soever you may call them look not very natural or smiling upon English Men If we sum up the matter he was ruining all the Laws and Liberties with the Religion of the Lands he Ruled and they were just on the Precipice under his Exertions so that the Nation needed and gasped for relief under them Upon this the Prince of Orange having Great Interests and Legal Expectations here comes over with a declared Intention to set all things at Right in such order as the English Parliament should adjust which was a fair and most equal design this then was the time for K. James to have Exerted his Royal Power Justice too in calling a Parliament for such purposes according to the sense of the whole Nation earnestly recommended to him by his Prelates Nobles and Counsellors for a long time by sundry Addresses even to the last and he having sent out some writs thereunto seemed a while enclined but upon Romish Advice recalls that purpose and instead of doing us that Justice was resolved to contest it with the Sword Hereupon his Army which had he called a Parliament to have healed the Nation would have secured him against all Forreign and Domestick Violence sunk their Affections as having no maw to Fight for him against their Native Country Liberties and Religion disperse by degrees and great part go over to that which they knew to be the Juster Cause and he being thus daily weakned retires disbands the rest and even not then calling a Parliament to help himself and us out of the Confusion he flies away to the Grand Enemy and Terrour of this Nation and leaves us to shift for our selves under those Aspects and apprehensions of dangers that lay before us If then he would not exert a Legal Power when he might 't is too late to offer at any Forreign ways of Exertion after a New Settlement or 't is at least unreasonable to demand our Reception of them to the destroying of our Redeemer after a National Allegiance given him for his sake who ever pursued our general Ruine against the Laws his Oath the ties of Natural Affection and the Sighs Groans and Requests of his Loyal People And whereas you say we may have his Power and Presence too if we will as lovely as that may be fancied 't is more than you can warrant For if we were disposed to accept your offers if he should come with a French force are you secured that the French would permit him to be as free and independent a Monarch as before 'T is possible they might erect him for a Vassal titularly Royal till their strength were fixed and then upon demand of Expences or other pretexts pick a quarrel with him to annihilate him for their Masters Glory Or supposing the French King for once a true Friend to King James would not his Forces make King James an Arbitrary Monarch here to exert more than a legal Power over all the Bodies and Souls Estates Coffers and Purses of the Nation If we had had any maw for such Power we might easily have had it while he was here and not have been beholden to the French for the Commodity But if King James should concert privately with us to return without any French measures or services can you assure us to keep this secret from the French King Or if you fail in point of secrecy are you sure he will let King James go or treat with us in neglect of his Interests and Pleasure Or would he not rather Bastile him for Ingratitude and treat him hereupon after his usual methods of humanity Thus pretty are your Projects to expose the Fate and Fortunes of Nations upon and discover such a distemper in the Brain as requires the Law of Bedlam rather than any other consideration Dyscher When we deny the Authority by which your Estates sate you ask us by what Authority was that Free Parliament called or sate that voted in King Charles the Second Sir if you please let another be called and vote in King James the Second When things are out of Order and good men set them to Rights again I do not think any man will oppose it upon the score of some small niceties but when subjects rebel against their Prince and drive him away and make that the ground of their going on and doing farther wickedness I cannot understand the Authority of this There is certainly in every man an innate natural Power and Authority to wish well to and vote for Right By virtue of this when things were in confusion the Subjects of King Charles the Second returning to their Wits and Allegiance send a convenient number to act for the whole who recall their rightful King and if you should do so likewise I should not be very quarrelsom with you But whatever
ingredient to a full Settlement or the Obligations to Allegiance founded thereupon For if a Nations Settlement be not full under New Powers till all the former lineal Heirs be Extinct or cease making their claims from Forreign Dominions I know not how many Ages may sometimes be necessary to fill the Settlement and it will be very hard if submission thereto for want of such a ground of plenitude should be Treason and all Sanguinary Commotions against it Pious and Loyal till the claim of all the Succeeding Heirs Lineal shall surcease for ever Or if you will allow a term for Prescription against all after claims then you must allow that a Settlement attaining to Prescription may exclude a Native Right or that a Native Right ceases by such a Tract of Continuance If it excludes Right only then you are no more to comport with it than with present Settlements exclusive if the Right ceases I pray shew me by what equity mere time can destroy a right in me Anno. 93. which was whole and within Memory Anno. 92. especially since the Regestries of Lines Royal usually endure as just Records that will out-live the longest ocular Testimonies and personal Memories whatsoever For the reason why Prescription passes Title is when there is no Authentick Evidence or memorial to the contrary And I will further note that the same Laws of Nations which admit prescriptions as a form of Title do not therefore assert the Title really right in the original means of procuring it but only externally Legal for want of better Evidence Prescription in it self being the weakest form of Title that must give place to all others if verified in foro and its ground or reason is only a supposed Composition Real I say supposed only not Asserted And those very Laws of Nations do not always suppose those Compositions every way right but only Legally Authoritative and Settling and do indeed allow such present Settlements within memory to be as Legal and Valid as those which being out of record and beyond memory can but be supposed Legal and this with more reason because men can better judge of what is present than of what is past into a Tohu an Age in which all things are forgotten Dyscher You are very long and I am almost tired considering the Zeal that is in me Eucher I have kept you so long under the Fatigue because what I ever thought has lately appeared in your Prints that the total ground of the Schism between us lies in this point of Right For you all say that Allegiance follows a thorow Settlement but a thorow Settlement is founded in the Right of him that Reigneth So that if admit the wrong then immediately all our Prayers for him are Immoral Polluted and Abominable as conteining Imprecations against the right and justice of him that is wronged and giving God Praise for the Advancement of the Usurper which we blasphemously attribute to God Whence there follows a necessity that all good Bishops Priests and People renounce Communion in these Liturgies and with all that use them and that if hereupon they be deprived by the Usurpers of all the Publick Advantages of their Ministry they must keep up holy Ministrations among themselves for so the Rule is set and agreed for with most prodigious Zeal and no less Accuracy and Learning by your admirable Author of Christian Communion But I wonder this great Man did not see how Tottering and Casual the visible State of Religion then must be upon every turn of the secular State and the various Competitions for the Sovereingty For how is it possible that Godly Pastors and their Flocks can be all unanimously certain at all times whore the real Right and Justice lies when matters of Fact and Law are so remote from their Cognisance Nor will your evasion of doubtful Cases which you allow much to heal the matter For in all such cases some will assert an indubitable Right others a dubitable one and that on both sides at the same time And thus your indubitable Men must fall into a state of Schism or Separation from each other upon their contrariant confidences in the Right of the opposite Claimers And your dubitable men must either be neuter to all Communion or choose a Communion with one or other of the indubitables at all adventure which to do with a doubting mind is a Sin and Snare And so it is in our present case Some says 't is indubitable that K. James is King de jure and that K. William is not King at all others say as indubitably that K. James is not King at all but K. William is King de jure others own K. William to be King only de facto and K. James de jure others that are indubitably for his being de facto doubt his being de jure King And a great number through ignorance confide or doubt more or less in all these points which they cannot reach Now since Practice must follow Principles and rules of Conscience how shall we settle all these under one Religious Communion on that Authors Maxims There is no possible way but by following the direction of the Convocation Book in Obeying the thorow Settlement of the King de facto made by publick Submission or continuance the form of which being a point of Law not Religion must be determined and defined by the Supremest Domestick Judgment we have in Civils which Certainly is that of Parliament after whose Decisions we need no further Torment our selves in vain about Antecendent questions but consider the Right we have as well as Duty to Live quiet under Publick Formal and Judicial Settlements which we are to take as Gods Ordinance for the time being By which Rule we shall secure our selves from both Extreams either of owning forcible Entry for Legal Title or proper Settlements or of Asserting all Change of Government to be Invalid and unobliging as Contrary to the Law of God who we know changeth Times and Seasons and all the Kingdoms of the Earth and Dissolves and Resettles all the States of Men under proper Laws of Constitions according to the Just and Unsearchable Counsels of his Will And now I will only apply your Rules of Communion to our Case and so dismiss this Theorie If this present Settlement be full and the Judgment of the Nation herein against your Right then all your Prayers and Execrations against the present State are Irreligious Immoral Polluted and Abominable and under an ipso facto Anathema upon which all Christians must abhor your Communion even without any Ecclesiastical Sentence as being self-condemned and cut off And if all these Dangers and Snares await us upon every Civil Change upon Mens Private Cross Opinions about Right and Plenitude of Settlement Christian Religion Ecclesiastical Union could not have continued a Twelve-Month under the Changes of the Empire from Nero to Vespasian but must have Expired before it had been Exposed to the World And I desire
no more divinely instituted than the lowest Orders of Levi tho' he was to higher Services Nor is the Doctor less mistaken in his extraordinary Esteem and Elogy of the Annual Expiation as more noble than any Episcopal Functions For notwithstanding all its Solemnities and Operations yet its highest Excellency was but Typical of that Grace which was not given by Moses but by Jesus Christ And all its actual present Energy reached no further than a legal imaginary Cleansing of the Body of the Jews and this only for one Year past and that only for the securing him in the Temporal benefits promised in that Law But our Priestly Functions are not merely Typical of Grace not yet given but both commemorative and exhibitory also of that Grace which hath already appeared for the Salvation of all Men and consecrates the Souls and Bodies of Men unto Immortality not to mention the extraordinary Measure of the Spirit collated in the especial Acts of Episcopal Ordinations In all which interiour Sanctifications tho' there is no Transubstantiation yet is there a mystical Union betwixt Christ and his Members by the illuminating Communion of the Holy Spirit For which truth it is needful that we contend tho' I confess it was needless for him to contend against it And yet further supposing all this had been right which the Doctor hath dictated yet here arises another Infelicity in his Logic For tho' God might admit an intruded High-Priest yet it does not follow that Men may admit an intruded Bishop for can Man pretend to all the Authorities of God God is indeed superior to all his own Institutions and may dispense with them or ratifie Violations of them as he did the violent Successions in the Kings of Israel But does it follow that Men can lawfully without any Divine Dispensation given and granted admit the Violations of his Laws and the perverters of that Hierarchy which he has made organical to the Sanctity and Salvation of his Church Nay further yet the Doctor is very unaccurate in his very State of the Question which properly is not whether any Man may lawfully succeed an Ecclesiastic deposed by a Lay-power for if we grant that there can be any such Lay-deposition no doubt the Succession may be lawful but the Question is whether there can be any Ecclesiastical Deposition inflicted on Spiritual Orders by a Lay-power This is that we and our Fathers complain of that the Lay-powers enact Spiritual Censures of Suspension and Deprivation which your Ecclesiastics admit as regular and valid which were they so we should not quarrel at the Successions This I am sure is our Question whatsoever that of the Baroccian Treatise is if this differs from ours then in that respect the Treatise is impertinently adduced in our Case Besides the Question is not whether a Person duly invested with an Ecclesiastic Office of God's Institution may not be deposed by any Lay power For if God in the Jewish Church did subject their Ecclesiastics to a Lay-deposition no doubt in the Nature of the thing it might be lawful But the Question is whether first God did so subject the Jewish Ecclesiastics to such a Lay-authority And secondly supposing that God had so subjected their Ecclesiastics the next Question is whether he hath in like manner so subjected the Christian Hierarchy For if there be any specific Difference or intentional Disparity in the Nature and Purposes of the Jewish and Christian Religions if there have been such Changes admitted by God in the Authorities of one which have not been so conceded upon the Authorities of the other then the Argument from the Jewish doth not conclude upon the Christian Hierarchy And therefore by the Doctor 's leave not only the Divinity of the Institution but the Nature of the Offices and the Rules of Tenure and Succession instituted by God in his Church are to be considered in this Debate For to put the matter into a short Theory I think it fairly possible to conceive that the Jewish Religion in what it was peculiarly Jewish was only of a carnal Sanctity in Order only to Temporal Fruitions and so might be under the Conduct of Temporal Powers that are the Supreme Guardians of all Temporal Enjoyments but the Christian Religion is purely Spiritual not subordinated to Temporal Ends and so not under the like Authority of Temporal Powers Now whatsoever are the civil Authorities about matters Christian I suppose the Essential Differences of our Religion from the Jewish will bar the Argument for the same Rules of Subjection And if you please upon another Consultation to propose the matter to the Doctor 's second Thoughts I will be at the pains of repeating my Observations hereupon †Sol. and Ab. Pag. 21 22. First that the whole Institution of the Levitical Law was not of a Spiritual but carnal Sanctity yielded them by God somewhat in opposition and somewhat in conformity to the Aegyptian or other foreign Religions among whom the Priesthood had been long subjected to and perhaps first instituted by the Scepter And herein the Supreme Judgments in Civils upon the Law and Oracular Responses upon Consultations about Peace War and Temporal Actions and Successes were essential to the Authority of the Pontificate And yet we find this High-Priest not subject to any ordinary Power till Kings were also given this People after the manner of the Nations among whom the Mitre was subject to the Crown All which put together makes Abiathar 's Deprivation by a Temporal Power under that Constitution Legal But from the beginning it was not so Then there were Priests who till the Flood had the Government of the World without any Civil or Military Power and that Priesthood was in all its Intentions Spiritual So that when our Saviour came not only to restore but even to refine upon the primitive Rules he restored the Priesthood from Vassalage and founded his Hierarchy not in Princes but Apostles not inarmed but in unarmed Powers But if among the Nations of old the carnal Priesthoods were subject to Arbitrary and Imperial Powers and God conceded the Jews Kings with such Power after that Gentile manner the Jewish High-Priests thereupon became Subject not only to a Judicial but Imperial Authority and so legally deprivable at the pleasure of the secular Prince so far at least that these Censures might be effectually valid tho' not always good and just And hence all the Changes of the High-Priests violently and arbitrarily made by heathen Princes in the Jewish Pontificate seem to be legally and regularly valid ex jure Imperii toties quoties and so are nothing at all to the Case of an uncanonical Deprivation or the Doctor 's purpose But our Priesthood has nothing Civil in it nor is by God subjected to the Arbitrary Empire of Princes that so we should think our selves obliged to bow down our Faith and Freedom to such feeble Principles of Spiritual Bondage and Pusillanimity Eucher But a little to
crime deserved tho' the Dr. to serve his Hypothesis extenuates the guilt of his Rebellion And if this be in fact so then it seems rather a Concession with a mixture of Counsel than a mere austere command of Retirement for so verbs of the imperative Mood very ordinarily signifie and Solomons kind reflection on his Liturgies and Sufferings in the days of David fairly appear to intend so much If a Traytor were thus spoken to by his Prince never see my face more get the out of this place for this shall satisfy me instead of thy forfeited life or else thou art a dead man even to day the Traytor would interpret the recession to be a condition of Life rather than a precept of Civil Duty And his submission would be rather his choice for himself than any Service to his King And certainly he might refuse such offer at his choice and peril as Malefactors sometimes chose the Gallows rather than Transportation This option proposed to Abiathar in this Form the whole Text in every version sufficiently exhibits but the Septuagint most expresly in the citra position of these words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 within the first Clause and comes more up to the Hebrew than our Translation for the Hebrew and the Septuagint by a man of death intend the sense of a dead man and this signifies rather a Menace or Sentence of actual death especially when joyned with these words in this very day than a mere merit of death as we render it But such a Menace with a Concession of voluntary exile to Anathoth must be conditional if he went not thither and so admits option And moreover according to the Hebrew Structure of the words we must admit this interpretation from the Drs. own Authorities For thus Abravanel alledged * Case of Sees pag. 21. by the Dr. out of Areschmuth gives his formal sense upon this place Solomon commanded Abiathar not to stir a foot from the place assigned him i. e. Anathot For otherwise if he should dare to sally out hence his Blood should be on his own head as he had also intimated unto Simei the Son of Gera. And this is manifest from the words of Solomon but to day I will not slay thee as if he should say but I will slay thee on that day on which thou shalt dare to go from thence any whether Now if hereupon the Blood was to be on his own head if he stirred was it not put to his option in the sense of Abravanel whether he would confine himself within Anathot or die And if there were such option in his Continuance there was so in the first Recession There are * Vindic. of Depr Bish pag. 71. Christ Com. part 2. ch 3. p. 31 32. some of us make this act of Solomons a Banishment and not a proper Deposition the natural consequent of which Banishment was the debarring him the exercise of the Pontifical Office which Abiathar must be supposed to accept as a Favour and not insist upon his Right But then this Exile must be voluntary and that makes the Cession And I desire the Dr. if he can to discover any other form or importance in the words of Solomon For tho' he says the following words so Solomon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thrust out Abiathar make it more plainly to appear a mere absolute Deprivation by the alone act of Solomon without any Cession in Abiathar yet he cannot but feel a conviction within himself that this note is far from Cogent For he well knows that in all Languages verbs Actives have a great Latitude of signification as to the Forms and Manners of action and denote as well a moral as a natural influence And here the manner of Solomons ejecting Abiathar is at full declared moral only by enjoyning him to retire from Jerusalem to Anathoth on pain of death and it is in vain to strain 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to any other conception And truly since so many Learned men not concerned in our Case have had various notions of this procedure I wonder why the Dr. is so earnest to force this instance to an absolute Deprivation Why should he be fond of multiplying examples of Lay or Invalid Depositions Are there not too many such injurious Attempts at the fewest but we must needs rake and hale in more than really are to swell the number and improve the mischief of ill Precedents only to give colour to an odd and invidious Hypothesis Is the Baroccian trifle tanti Is there so much of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in it as to enflame the Church of England I am afraid there is and nothing hinders the present accension but dearth of paper scarcity of money and the danger of unlicensed Printing But however I hope I shall stifle it in this instance in which I only am engaged let others try and take their Fortunes in the rest Eucher But by your good leave Sir you shall not escape so for your Arguments and the Drs. drawing me contrary ways I would gladly see my way clear between you and get me out of the maze if possible Dyscher Then go you on as you think fit Eucher The Dr. then first of all tells us * that whatsoever is necessary for the present Peace and Tranquillity of the Church ought to be made use of †Case of Sees c. Chap. 1. provided it is not in it self Sinful and the ill Consequences which may possibly attend it are either not so mischievous to the Church or at least not so likely to happen as the Evils we endeavour to avoid Vpon this Maxim the Antients always prefer'd the Peace and Tranquillity of the Church to all other things the Essentials of Religion excepted There was no Custom or Law of the Church so Sacred or inviolable but what they readily sacrificed whensoever necessity required to the Peace and Tranquillity of it And in proof hereof the Dr. brings you several full Instances and Authorities to which I refer you and on which I demand your Opinion Dyscher I may allow every jot of this to be true but who shall judge for the Churches Practtice concerning the necessity and the Exigences the Evils and the Dangers thus to be balanced Eucher For a Province the Metropolitan and Bishops and where the Clergy have a Canonical Right they also are to be admitted In a single Diocese the Bishop and his Clergy especially the Chapters and if the Laity be concerned it is fit these Debates be managed in the presence of such standing and communicant Laic's as shall there appear in their own concernments Dyscher Can any resolves be valid against the Colledge of Bishops in a Provincial Synod or against the Bishop in a Diocesan Consultation Eucher No. Dyscher Will not the College of Bishops and the body of the Clergy think it Essential to Christian Religion to preserve the Hierarchy and Authority of the Priests Sacred and