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
Subject Ita tunc Deus supplebat id quod Magistratus Ecclesiae praestare debent tunc non Praestabant Grotius in 1 Cor. 4.21 Then God did supply what the Magistrates ought to have discharged and did not instancing in these very Punishments of Ananias and Saphira struck Dead of Elymas the Sorcerer struck Blind and of the Bodily Diseases sent out upon others Our Saviour Christ in his Life designed and contrived upon every occasion when any appearance that others should suspect him or when any apt opportunity to express and declare himself that he was neither to exempt himself from any instance of Subjection to his Governors nor exercise in any Case the Jurisdiction that was theirs and for this he Pays Tribute refuses to divide Inheritances nor did he invade any one private Person and we read of but one Colt that he commanded to be brought unto him to which as what was his Title we do not read so are we not told of any injury done by it nor of any Complaint made in the Streets on the occasion And his Death though pre-ordained in the fore determination of God for no one worldly end or design to serve no one Political Purpose but solely and altogether to satisfie for the Sins of Man to make compleat our Redemption yet it was ordered that the earthy Governors should have a Power given them from above for a legal Process and judicial Trial upon him he died in a course of Law and a Posture of Obedience to them And although it must be granted that some of the ancient Fathers and most eminent first Christians did Believe and Publish to the World that Christ should come again and reign upon Earth in his Person as Supreme Governor of all and his Saints with and by him in the independent full freedom use and advantage of the Goods of this World and of Sense that Jerusalem should be Rebuilt its Streets enlarged and inhabited by them So Justin Martyr Dialog cum Tryph. Jud. Irenaeus lib. 5. cont Heres c. 32. Tertul. lib. 3. cont Marcion c. 24. with Lactantius and others yet it amounted not to an Universal received Opinion of that Age. Justin Martyr acknowledges there were many 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Holy and Pious in their Judgments which did not acknowledge it And Eusebius in his Ecclesiastical History lib. 3. cap. 39. giving that slender account of its rise and original from Papias tells us that many but not all Ecclesiastical Writers led by a shew of the Antiquity assented unto it but yet this was not by any of them expected during this state of things on Earth and in the Regeneration Sed alio statu utpote post resurrectionem as Tertullian Tom. 4. inter fraâ—menta 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Justin Martyr supra Ibid. Post Resurrectionem coram judicio terram possidebunt As Irenaeus Ibid. but not till after the Resurrection ante coelum before their Ascension into Heaven as Tertullian again Ibid. when all Rule and Autority and Power has had its just Time and Period upon Earth is put under foot alone by God it seeming just that in what condition they had laboured and been afflicted tried and proved by all manner of ways or Sufferings upon Earth they there receive the Reward and Fruit of such their Sufferings as Irenaeus ill argues in qua enim conditione laboraverunt sive afflicti sunt omnibus modis probati per sufferentiam justum est in eâ recipere fructus sufferentiae they cannot be conceived to have thoughts of either evading or invading the Civil Power which then was supposed to be none at all because after the Resurrection and of which during its time for continuance by God affixed they were the most Zealous Maintainers and Asserters as has been already shew'd So far do they erre from the Spirit of these first and eminent Christians who pretending to the same Millennium or reign upon Earth oppose and fight against their present Governors to hasten and effect it § X BUT then to argue on the other hand that because it was not the design of the Gospel to erect a Temporal Kingdom upon Earth Christ and his Apostles design'd and erected none at all they had really no Power no Autority committed unto them this is as wide from Truth this runs from one extreme to the other which indeed is the usual course of such as are designed for error Clemens Alexandrinus in his Admonition to the Gentiles observed it of old among them and that their Ignorance still led them into one of the two Extremes of either Ignorance or Superstition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 either they Worshipped their many ridiculous beastlier Gods or else none at all denied the only true God On this score Evenemus Agrigentinus Nicanor Cyprius Diagoras Hippo Melius and Theodorus with some others were called Atheists Men that considered not the Truth only saw the Error of the then abominable Worships and Acknowledgments And the same is easily acknowledg'd throughout the whole Ecclesiastical Tradition how as Atheists before so Hereticks since have still run the same way and their Heresies by these courses been either started or maintained Thus that Pestilent Sect of the Arians united not only with the Miletian Scismaticks but with the Heathens too the more to oppose and make numerous their Party against the Catholicks as we have it in Sozomen Hist Eccles lib. 1. c. 15. Athanas Orat. 1. Cont. Arium and in his Apology Pag. 731. and his Epistle Ad Solitariam vitam agentes And the same did the Donatists after them who set open the Idol Temples that themselves might have liberty applauded and sided with Julian the Apostate and gave opportunity for the Publick Worship of the Devil that they might with full freedom serve their own particular Designs and their Malice and Revenge be gratified as St. Austin and Optatus at large declare Contra Petil. cap. 8. 92. Ep. 48. c. Contr. Parmen Donatist lib. 2. I might all along trace them down I 'le only make my farther instances in what comes more nearly up to the case in hand because there may be such a thing as Domination over the Clergy Therefore there is no real Power to be exercised over them because Diotrephes affected a Superiority where it belong'd not unto him therefore a Bishop and a Presbyter must be of equal Power The Church of God must not exercise Autority as do the Kings of the Gentiles therefore whatever the Power they execute is must be Tyranny and Usurpation The Church of Rome have notoriously exceeded their Commission Pretended to what they never had either from Christ or St. Peter as to depose Kings to acquit their Subjects of their Allegiance exercising Temporal outward Coercive Power as in their Charter by Religion Therefore the Church of God has no Charter at all is no Body or Corporation Autoritative and Juridical or as Mr. Selden and his Friends argue we read of no other Power in the
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-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
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
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
those who abominate the natural and direct consequences are thence to be drawn where the Civil Power is return'd into the Mediator but it throughly answers their Expectations who contend to have their Prince a Priest too and would delight more to see him in his Rochet and at the Altar Blessing and Consecrating than on his Throne and with his Scepter sweying and governing his People and for which latter they believe themselves equally capacitated and enabled as he and their belief on these Grounds is well bottomed for Christ when ascending up on high gave no other Gifts to Men than what either enabled to the work of the Ministry and which alone were for peculiar Persons or what made Christians good and virtuous men only and which were to all promiscuous and common And had our Church in her Article given to Kings that only Prerogative they saw given to Aristotles Prince and which is extended to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 also as is above shew'd to the things of Religion it had been the same though less popular and perswading I shall only add the Autority of Doctor Hammond in his Practical Catechism Lib. 2. Sect. 11. that Christ in his Sermon on the Mount medled not with the Fifth Commandment Though he were as God the King of all Kings and might have changed and disposed of their Dominions as he pleased yet he was not pleased to make any Alteration but to continue and settle all in that course wherein it formerly had been placed by God himself What he added to Moses in this Matter was only greater reverence and aw to the Father or Magistrate or Civil Power he left the Woman taken in Adultery and other Offenders to the ordinary legal course and would not upon any importunity usurp or take upon him any thing in that Matter and more considerate Papists as he goes on and tells us discerning this and yet unwilling to devest the Pope of his so long usurped Power have found it necessary to pretend another tenure for him and therefore style the Pope not the Vicar of Christ for that would give him no Power so much as of a Civil Judge but the Vicar of God whom he hath set up to be the Vicegerent of all the World The whole Discourse might not unfitly be here transcribed only 't is as it ought to be in every bodies hands BUT what if these Doctors were in the design § XXVII against us as we do not resolve our Faith into one Doctor or Bishop at Rome So neither do we into three or twice so many at home of what Order and Autority soever and which adds in it self just nothing to the Skill of a Divine nor is the Tradition of Truth broken by it And indeed there are so many Accidents in the World and with so great force upon Mankind so often influencing and over-ruling that Christianity in its particular Articles and sometimes the highest of them would be but in a bad Condition were it responsible for what every particular Doctor has said or wrote and which comes not up unto them whether out of a tenderness of Disposition a mistaken Zeal for Union and to reconcile Moderation and Comprehension a keeping present Peace or a design of working more effectually for the future or whether through a fear and impotency of Nature averse to and unable for Struglings wearied out by daily Provocations or a foresight of some Calamities foreseen and approaching and every one is not an Athanasius always undaunted or real misapprehension in the understanding or which is a thing very frequent upon the rise of an Heresie to set up for a middle way and which is as injurious to gratifie either lust in general or that itch of Ambition in particular and to become the Head of a Party whether out of peevishness or revenge or to magnifie their own Parts and Eloquence lead by the Autority of Names or by self-interest blinded by one or more of which ways errors and differences in Religion are either occasioned or started managed and pursued No sooner was his Master Justin Martyr dead but Tatianus grew Proud and puffed up with an opinion of being uppermost in the School turn'd Heretick Iren. adv Haeres cap. 31. l. 1. Basilides was a Master of luxury and was to do something extraordinary to disguise it as St. Jerone Tom. 3. l. 2. adv Jovinian and so was Marcion as Tertullian Prescript Cap. 51. and Lactantius tells us of several others who affecting the highest Order in the Church studying Honour and Greatness and sailing of it made a Secession from the Church not enduring Subjection Lib. 4. Sect. ult and so did Valentinus because he lost a Bishoprick Tertul. adv Valent. cap. 4. as did Aerius Novatius c. and Theodorit describes Hereticks in general ambitioni vanae gloriae mancipatos Eccl. Hist l. 1. c. 2. and Sozomen complains of a worser effect they have yet in God's Church Nonnullos in vias medias adigunt Eccl. Hist l. 1. c. 1. occasion the setting up somewhat like Truth which is not Truth when they write Irenicums and set up for Reconcilers make a hotch-potch of Truth and Falshood together a sure way to elude and baffle Truth and insinuate Error the abatement being still on Truth 's side and the Error is brought to become tolerable and which would not in plain terms have been endured but thus gets ground onward and so much of Truth is destroyed and erased to give place to the Falshood This was the most devilish Plot of Julian the Apostate by which he baffled Christianity he mixed his Paganism with it complied in many instances of its Performances that the less discerning might be the easier carried over to it a very ill consequence of Error mostly ruining Truth and mostly to be abominated the Ape is the more deformed because like a Man and is not one Tertullian turn'd Montanist in disdain of the Pride of the greater Clergy at Rome as inter fragmenta Tertull. and Hieron Catalog Script Ecclesiast no one stands fairer in the Church Story for Piety and Morals than Pelagius and he and his Scholars Julianus Celestius c. seduced many by it designed and perverted it to that alone purpose even Men of great Fame and Learning became thereby inclined to them as Sixtus at Rome John of Jerusalem Cyril in Egypt and Sulpitius Severus in France And particularly the Rich and Potent Women whom he strangely insinuated into by all manner of Flatteries Hypocrisies and Delusions and which generally are the Engines Hereticks have work'd by as in Church Story and for which Austin and Jerome sufficiently shrape him as an account is given at large by Joannes Garnerus the late Publisher of the Works of Marius Mercator Dissert 4. De Subscript c. Cap. 3. who was or who could be more stout and couragious for the Nicene Faith than was Liberius Bishop of Rome and which appeared in his behaviour all along particularly in his
of this Discourse Sect. 1. Not the Power and Offices of the Church but their Subject is what mostly exercises the Age Sect. 2. Whether the Power be originally in Believers in Common or in the Secular Prince in Particular or in a certain Definite Number of Believers the Bishops and Pastors of the Church Sect. 3. The Design of the Whole and its Three General Heads Sect. 4. VVHEN I first consider'd that of Thomas Hobbes in his Leviathan § I Part 1. Cap. 12. Of Religion and which is in short to this purpose in several Paragraphs there That every one is free upon the ceasing or discontinuance of the Miracle to Supersede or Change his Religion once attested by that Miracle to be from God and upon which account it was receiv'd and own'd if the change of the Climate and his Governors his former Education and the present Custom of the Place he resides in requires and all that other Authority and Obligation from Heaven obliged only for that present instant in which the Miracle was wrought and evidenced I with less concern passed it by reflecting on the Person a Man affected with and designing Novelty and Singularity filled with a Conceit of his own worth and autority and opposing it to all the World beside And in particular in this Chapter declaring himself to be such an one that believes an extraordinary felicity a sufficient Testimony of a Divine Calling but going on in my Thoughts and finding by a sad Experience that it went further than the Scheme or Systeme that a great part of our Age is thereby brought into this Opinion and 't is contended for so frequently as their Faith that the Church is nothing at all but in the State its Powers and Offices though once in the Apostles and some of their Successors for some time is now gone with those Miracles that at that time abetted and avouched them nor is the Gospel it self to be Preached or divulged upon other terms or a fixed enjoyned false Religion opposed nay farther this very same to be the stated professed Opinions of some and those too our highest dignified Church-men and left upon Record as the judgment of the greatest part and some of them the most remarkable of our first Reformers that the Prince is invested with whatever belongs to a Church-man then was my heart hot within me and while I was thus musing the fire kindled and at the last I spake with my Tongue I then set my self upon a particular immediate enquiry into the Matter and attaining to a more perfect knowledge of that way I here represent it to my Fathers and Brethren of the Clergy to all good Christians whatever in this following Treatise and only state the plain case as I find delivered down from our Saviour by his Apostles the Bishops Fathers and Doctors of the Church Catholique the Church Historians Councils and Laws Imperial from our own particular Church Articles Canons Rubricks our Book of Ordination and Homilies appointed to be read in the Churches in the time of Q. Elizabeth from our own Doctors and Writers in Divinity in their several times and from the Injunctions and Declarations of our Princes and even the Common-Law and Statute Book of our Kingdom the Honor and Duty I owe to my Jesus to his Universal Church to this particular Church of England to my own Profession as a Divine and love to all Christians is what have engaged to it other advantages I have none nor are any proposed these Considerations alone are they which now makes the dumb Child speak looses the string of that Tongue that held its peace and said nothing and brings him into publick otherwise by an universal Concurrency of all things both Persons and Objects design'd for silence and obscurity § II NOW in order to this I have so much prepared and made ready to my hands that the thing in general is immediately denied by none and that there is a Church-Power to be alwayes upon Earth till the restitution of all things and the Heavens be no more that is certain peculiar Persons and Offices to be separated and discharged in and for the affairs of Souls and the guiding and governing the World in order to Heaven and Salvation is affirmed by all that believe a Heaven and Christ Jesus the Way the Truth and the Life in the Attainment That which has so much unhing'd and discompos'd the World of late is concerning the Subject in which it resides the particular Persons design'd and appointed by our Saviour for the conveyance and execution the due force just extent and consequences of it in whom this Power is to be found and to whom limited since none are extraordinarily by miraculous and sensible demonstrations from Heaven commissioned and marked out thereunto as the Apostles and first Publishers of the Gospel were And though Mr. Selden himself as our great Herbert Thorndike in his Principles of Christian Truth tells us usually said in his common Discourse That all Church Power is an Imposture yet his First Book De Synedriis designed and levelled against this Autority Upon this alone score because presumed in and limited to the Bishops and Pastors of the Church as the Successors of Christ and his Apostles makes it plain his quarrel is because so assumed and limited by them because transferr'd from the Prince or Civil Power in whose hands alone he believes it placed and in those in deputation by him and for which he contends all along in that Book with what Success may be seen hereafter and therein places the Imposture THERE are three distinct Orders of Men § III or at the least to be supposed distinct in which this Power is contended for to be seated each exclusive of one another by the several Assertors and Fautors of the distant Opinions and Parties among us The One places it in the People the multitude of Believers in common as the general first immediate subject of Power Ecclesiastical who by their concurrent Notes Elections and Assignations limit and fix it on particular Persons for the Execution so appointing consecrating and investing for the work of the Ministry to negotiate in the affairs of Souls and in order to their Salvation The Other subjects all in the Prince or Secular Power who is supposed in actu Primo virtually and by a first inherency to be Priest and People equally as Prince and by the Right of Soveraignty as chief Magistrate upon Earth is instructed for all Offices and Duties in relation to Heaven with a Power for Deputation and Devolution as the Harvest may be great or the Labourers few upon each occasion requiring and as he is pleased by his secular Hand to mark out the Person The Third place it not in the Multitude in general or in the Prince in special but in a certain indefinite number of Believers called and impower'd thereunto not by their Gifts and Abilities as Christians in common but by a particular signal Donation superadded given
and left first by Christ to his Apostles and from them in Succession devolved on the Bishops and Pastors of the Church in whom it now remains who alone have the Power of its conveyance and on whomsoever it is they shall lay their hands together with the offices of Prayer or by any other outward Symbol overt Act or Testimony which they shall use to evidence the Deputation transfer it unto these shall receive this Power of the Holy Ghost be thorowly enabled for the transacting betwixt God and Man the things that belong to Man's Eternity § IV THE design of this present Discourse is to take away the two former and establish the latter to make it evident upon a just Enquiry and certain Demonstration That all Church-Power was designed by Christ and actually left by his Apostles only to Church-Officers the Order of the Gospel-Priesthood the Bishops Presbyters and Deacons to be separated on purpose and successively instated in such the Jurisdiction and Government by such of themselves that had before received and were fully invested with it and this like other Successions to continue and be so managed till the End cometh and the Kingdom be delivered up to the Father So that the general Heads I shall insist upon will be these Three 1. That this Power is not in the People or Christians in common 2. That it is not in the Prince or Secular Government 3. That it is in the Bishops and Pastors of the Church of Christ a Power and Offices peculiarly theirs as to the execution with its special force and Laws reaching to all that come to Heaven by Christ Jesus and as not derived from so no ways thwarting or interfering with the Civil Government And all this as suitable to the received Faith and Polity of the Church in the best Ages of it down from Christ and his Apostles to us ward so it agreeing with the particular Establishments of the Laws of our Kingdom made for the owning and defence of our Christianity and also with the Religion of the same received and professed in our Church since the Reformation CHAP. I. The Contents Church Power is not in the People either as a Body in General or as one Single Congregation Sect. 1. This Power must first evidence it self to be given from God e're executed on or derived to others Holiness in its Nature does not infer it The Priesthood not made Common before the Law under it or the Gospel Admit that first Right by Nature to all Things and Offices 't was to be sure afterwards limited and those that lay it open again must shew by what Autority they do it Otherwise Fanaticks in the sense of St. Jerome Sect. 2. The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 infers no such Power Sect. 3. The Peoples concurrency gives no Power even where their Notes are pretended to in the New Testament Sect. 4. Election and Vocation differ from Ordination in the Practice of our Saviour and first Ages of the Church still expressed by several words Sect. 5. The Votes of the People give no Power but yet are necessary because none is given without them both the People and Pastors are Christ's Vicars in the Case So Beza Blondel Sect. 6. Our Saviour's Practice and the Apostles are against them Sect. 7 8. That the People were not always at Elections Blondel allows He is contrary to himself Their Votes never reputed necessary and at last excluded quite Chap. 1. by reason of the Riots and Disorders in them Sect. 9. The concurrency of 12 Centuries down from the Apostles amount to a Divine Right Blondel's failure of it His injury to his Friends In what case Apostolical Ecclesiastical Practice is not immutable The ill Consequences attending his Power given to the People His Malice to the Order of Bishops Disreputing Christianity it self 'T is unpardonable in the French Reformation imposing their present harder necessity for our pattern The Deacon and Presbyter under the Bishop but neither in Subordination to the People Sect. 10. And this they do in point of Episcopacy also And we must have no Bishops in England because they have none in France and which is promoted by the advantage of the Rebellion and Schism among us Blondel offer'd his Service before to the Bishops of England but then he Prints his Apologia pro Hieronymo Dedicates it to the Rump Parliament and Assembly-Men Is nauseous in his Flatteries of both Commends the Scotch Covenant Is rude upon Bishops Soliciting their Ruine This the Sense of the Divines on that side the Sea Salmasius raves just so The Independents murder'd the King The Bishops not the Authors of all Heresies as black-mouth'd Baxter Andrew Rivet and so does Daulee Ignatius suffers for it He and Marcian and Valentinus compared Their few Complements does not acquit them We only lose by our Charity towards them The disadvantage thereby from our own Members The late Replyer upon Bishop Pearson and Doctor Beveridge is the same The late Letters from Paris Sect. 11. The People are only Witnesses of the good lifes of the Ordained Blondel's own Collection and the Autority of Cyprian is all along against him The Church Canons Our Ordinations at home The nature of the thing it self Sect. 12 13. The People are not to choose or refuse their Pastor as Blondel rudely and unreasonably contends with his usual Malice against Bishops and our Church 'T is his Proposal is so fatal to Christianity Sect. 14. Lay-men no Judges in Matters of Faith and the Determinations of Indifferencies The first Council at Jerusalem No Lay-Elders Sect. 15. § I THIS is not in the People and Believers in Common are not the Subject of Power Ecclesiastical The Power of the Keys is not seated in nor can it flow from or be devolved by them either as a Body in general or any one single Congregation in particular Their stretching or holding up the Hand their joynt-suffrages in the choosing numbring by the tale as by Stones Notes or Election deputing and assignation or whatever else in their own behalf they can make appear to be implied in the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which they lay great stress upon and wrest to their purpose are of no strength and validity at all of no more force to depute for the ministry to constitute in a new Order and Station to confer the Power of the Keys and place in that sacred Function then the common cry and rout of the Jews designing it devolved guilt on the head of our Saviour deposed him from his holy Offices took from him his Kingly Power when crying out with full throats We 'll have no King but Caesar we will not have this man to reign over us or their hands stretch'd forth in Prayer Isai 1. did bring a Blessing upon themselves when full of Blood but on the contrary hateful and abomination SUCH as pretend to this plead this Power § II for Deputation and that such only
be their Slaves and Vassals and which is the invidious design of his whole Book how easily is it all return'd on his own pate and to what else can any one impute this his clawing with and condescending to the People to be but his own and the other of his Brethrens dependance upon them as it is at this day in France and 't is wholly in the Power of the Congregation both to Vote in and Eject their Minister at pleasure to bestow what Maintenance upon them their Wisdom directs nor is it at all in the Power of the Clergy as things are now with them streightned by the Civil Sword to avoid or amend it to them indeed in their circumstances the good-liking and choice of the People are necessary otherwise they must change the Climate their Churches and Ministry must cease and fall together And this I say not to insult over and upbraid them for their case in general is really to be pitied but thus do outward accidents imbody themselves and become as of the real Substance and too many Models and Systems and Professions have some regard too much yielding and complyance with them this one thing does it generally need a Pardon and to them in particular it cannot easily be granted it may with great justice be called their Pride and Usurpation that what is their own unavoidable Necessity what the frowns and injuries of their Native Countrey they live in the want of Countenance and Protection from the Prince and of a due Provision by Laws and which in reason ought to be otherways lays upon them this they 'l obtrude upon us upon all Churches as the Pattern upon the Mount the Platform not to be deviated from every ways to be copied out upon no less a peril than the breach of an antecedent immutable Law an Institution from Heaven What ought to be their care to represent as fairly as they can they magisterially command other Churches are condemned for not obeying a fault the Churches of the French Reformation are no ways to be acquitted of That there is a Subordination among Clergy-men and a dependence as on one Head and Superior in the several degrees of the Priesthood this is most certain 't is bottomed on as good and known Autority as our Religion it self and which will be made to appear by and by in this Treatise though not as the business of it The Deacon is a Minister or Servant to the Bishop and both Presbyter and Deacon receive their Power and Deputation from him but in any other sense we own no Head or Master Servants Ministers we are but of God and Christ of the Gospel which we minister unto them of which we are Stewards for their advantage and relief dispensing to every man his Portion ministring in our courses as the Angels in theirs for the good of all a faithful Minister of Christ for you so the Apostle Colos 1.23 and in this alone consists our 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the work of our Ministry and attendance at the Altar Thus we are to the People as Governors Rulers Instructers Teachers and which last Office allowed us by all so immediately implies Superiority and Prelation that it alone will not let us be their Servants as Autorized and Commissioned impower'd by and in Deputation from them NOR is this David Blondel's disingenuity § XI or undue dealings alone or in this case only of the Peoples Power over their Pastors there is one case more at least and which has more than one Abettor and 't is that of Episcopacy as the People are above the Clergy so must not one Clergy-man be above another the Order Solitary Power Superiority and Prelation of the Bishop must cease was never any then as by Usurpation there must be a level between a Presbyter and him because there are no Bishops in the French Churches an equality is now fixed and setled among them and in order to the surer certain compassing it in our Church of England they took the opportunity of a present Schism and Defection from our present Bishops abetted and heightned by a prosperous Rebellion they even insult over us as men that were down and to rise up no more they pursue us as a vanquish'd Enemy look upon the iron as red hot and to be stricken and their Presbyterian Model to be erected in our Kingdom as that Image once fallen from Heaven To this purpose comes upon the Stage their Triumviri Blondel Salmasius and Dailce Men throughly instructed by a vast and unwearied Industry and Reading and which they perverted to render Episcopacy less acceptable not to say odious in the World as the effect of Innovation and Ambition contrary to the designs of Christ and the Practice of the Church in the best Ages of it and herein their proficiency and advancement was not inconsiderable considering the badness and difficulty of their cause what St. Jerome has observed of Hereticks in and before his time in his Comments on the First Chapter of Amos Omnes enim Haeretici labore nimio ac dolore quaerendi ordinem aliquem consequentiam heraeseos suae reperire conati sunt is evident in them through abundance of toil and sore labour making pretence of Order shews of Antiquity and Consequences to advance and effect it And Blondel goes in the Front or at least has merited to be placed there with his renowned and much gloried in Apology Pro Hieronymo which he says he kept by him Three years ready for the Press but did not Print it by reason of the Wars in England or rather till the King and Church were both ruined easily then presuming of a fairer reception and which Book 't is more than probable he then Digested and Composed when his offer'd Service to write quite the other way and in the Defence of our Episcopacy establish'd in this Church was tender'd to that great Prelate and Martyr of Blessed Memory Arch-Bishop Land but rejected what were the Reasons moving the Wisdom of that excellent Prelate to refuse him I cannot tell he might suspect his Integrity or judge it less for the Honor of our Church on purpose to imply a Foreigner in the managery and defence of what is so neer and of so great a concern to us and he might not think the concurrency of one or two Doctors of the French Reformation so considerable or perhaps of any weight to turn the Scale for or against the famous Church of England as it now appears they are reputed he could not suspect his thorow Instructions and Ability for it and that the former mostly sweigh'd the wonted Sagacity of that excellent Person giving him no small Grounds for it will appear if we go on and find him dedicating That his Book Vniversis Dei optimi Maximi servis occidente toto maxime vero per Britannias ad Christiani populi Ecclesiasticum Politicum regimen vocatis To the Houses of Parliament and Assembly at
ask no Directions receive nothing of Autority from them Nor did this Autority thus limited to themselves cease with their Persons or was it translated and deferr'd to any other than of their own assignation by their own Hands and on their own Deputies and Successors the Bishops and Pastors of the Church in whose hands and whose alone it was by them left and there remained with a Power so to depute others and with command to be executed accordingly The very same Church Power I say though not in the same particular Circumstances avouch'd and attended in the same outward manner nor in every single act and effusion does it thus remain and is it to be executed upon all for Salvation and as Christ promised to be with them always to the end of the World and this will fully appear from the Church Records commencing where the Scriptures end from the Concessions of Emperors their Laws and Constitutions made in Church Matters SAINT Clemens Romanus an Apostolical § VII Person and one that wrote his Epistle to the Corinthians not long after the Schism in Corinth mentioned by St. Paul tells us That the Apostles being sent from Christ as from God and Preaching the Word of God through the several Regions and Cities made Bishops and Deacons of the elder Christians such as were the first fruit of their labours and whom they first converted being found sufficient in order to the Service of them that should believe to the bringing more into the Fold and reducing them to Christianity St. Ignatius his Contemporary in part in his Epistle to those of Smyrna commands them to follow the Bishop 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And in his Epistle to St. Polycarp 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That they take heed to him as God And again in his Epistle to Smyrna That nothing be done without him in Matters that belong to the Church and Salvation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the meaning is not ill express'd by the additional Pseudo-Ignatius whoever he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the whole Character whatever of their Image and Power God and Christ design'd to devolve and impress upon his Church whether as to the Government or Ministery of it are found in the Bishop He is the Person to whose Faith and Trust the People of God are committed and of whom an account is required of their Souls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he governs as Head and all Church Power and Business is to be translated within themselves as in the Apostles Canons wdich bear date about this time Can. 34.39 Irenaeus who trode pretty near their heels says that he can reckon up them that were Bishops instituted by the Apostles and their continued Succession to his days Lib. 3. Adv. Haeres cap. 3. Ed. Paris Habemus eos annumerare qui ab Apostolis instituti sunt Episcopi in Ecclesiis successores eorum usque ad nos to whom and only whom the Gospel was committed Sine quibus nullo certitudo veritatis Ibid. And again Episcopis Apostoli tradidere Ecclesias that the Churches of God were committed to and intrusted with them Lib. 5. cap. 20. Origen if possible is plainer and distincter yet and in his Third Book against Celsus in so many express words distinguishes betwixt the Senate in the Church and that in every City Ed. Cantab. p. 129. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And so again betwixt the Rulers and Governors of the Church and the Rulers and Governors of the City 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ibid. And in his Eighth Book towards the end he declares a different Model 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from that of the Empire in every City for which and whose safety and success in his Wars he contends and prays for and which he owns and acknowledges with it a Government framed constituted and erected 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the word which is God and which Government is the Church whose great King is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Word and Son of God who has his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his Governors still appointed resident and continued there ruling as he hath prescribed according to his own Laws and Dictates the Laws of the Empire being preserved inviolated by them Tertullian as plainly distinguishes betwixt the two Bodies in the Nine and thirtieth Chapter of his Apology against the Gentiles Corpus sumus de Conscientia Religionis Disciplinae unitate Spei foedere we Christians are a Body united in a sense of Religion under a different Discipline as well as hope altogether apart à Ministris corum Potestatibus à statu seculi from their Ministers and Powers and from the state of the World and tells us that Polycarp was made a Bishop in the Church of Smyrna by Saint John in the 23 Chapter of his Book of Prescriptions against Hereticks as also Clement over the Romans he returns to the Chairs of the Apostles which remained till his time in their Succession as the Authors of his Religion and 't is not from the Seat of the Empire but from Corinth and Phillippi from Ephesus and Rome he dates their Power and fetches their derivation Vnde vobis autoritas praestò est whence its rise and devolution And in his Fourth Book against Marcion cap. 5. Ordo tamen Episcoporum ad Originem recensus in Joannem stabit auctorem says that St. John is the Author of the Order of Bishops a Polity and Dispensation all along another thing from that of the Empire flowing from another fountain quite differing from and no ways depending upon it And 't is Tertullian's Argument in his Book De coronâ Militis that a Christian Souldier who fights in the Emperor's Camp and gives him his just Allegiance ought rather to lay down his Arms than wear a Laurel Crown on his Head though a mark of Favour from his Prince because relating too much to a religious Custom among the Ethnicks and he is no where commanded it in Scripture nor is it traditionally delivered to him by the Apostles or Bishops or Governors of the Church either in Precept or in Practice Quomodo enim usurpari quid possit si traditum prius non est quis denique Patriarches quis Prophetes aut Sacerdos aut 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quis vel denique Apostolus aut Evangelizator aut Episcopus invenitur Coronatus Cap. 9. where though it was his mistake in accounting such a thing Matter of Religion as the wearing a Crown of Laurels upon the Commands of his Prince This is a different thing from that command of Licinius the Tyrant enjoyning all that would remain in his Camp to Sacrifice to Idols as in Eusebius his Church History Lib. 10. cap. 8. and which rather than do Christians ought not only to leave the Camp but lay down their Lives yet upon the mistake and supposure it is plain that he remov'd from the Secular Power all Matters of Religion such was to be received from Christ alone
of the Church every ways dishonour'd and displaced § IX I know it will be here reply'd and 't is so generally All this was when the Emperors were Heathens nay more Opposers and Persecutors of Christianity how could the Offices Managery and Concerns of Religion be intrusted with them who did who would not understand it who scorned and affronted it who to their power endeavour'd to suppress it by all manner of Cruelties executed on its Professors the Church then did as well as she could and exercised her own Prudence and Strength that Power and Jurisdiction which they agreed upon and assum'd by particular compact among themselves and which became an Escheat to the Crown when the Empire became Christian and Kings then executed it in their own Right as inherent to their Secular Power designed and appointed and expected from them by God Almighty And in Answer to which groundless Plea and Objection I shall add farther either the Bishops and Doctors and Confessors of the Christian Church understood this Case as thus stated That this Power was not really in themselves and their execution of it was but accidental forced under the present Circumstances and to return to such Governors in State as should become Christians as its proper Seat or Subject or they did not understand it To say they did not understand it is to implead and represent them to all Ages succeeding guilty of Ignorance gross and inexcusable to give that for certain Truth which some of our Reformers have made their Libel and Objection against these first and Holy Christians That they were more Zealous than Wise Pious but imprudent less discerning men and from whom Truth is not to be had nor expected and which is in effect to put a baffle upon our whole Christianity in general and to lay a ground for mistrust upon each of its particulars it must receive a great blow upon such Supposals when reflected upon and considered that those who alone propagated our Faith for Three hundred years together did not understand the Power and Autority they were invested with in order to it or the true tenor or state of it To say they did understand it then surely it had been stated by them a Model of it drew up and left at least for Posterity a thing so in course and most usual in other cases thus to give Specimens Schemes and Draughts of the Design and Purpose especially when to propose attempt and carry on something that is but new not before received much more when thwarting to the common Sentiments and Apprehensions of Mankind That no Men but such as the Christians were given out to be by their Opposers and Persecutors Mad-men and Fools the followers of a Carpenter and a few Fishermen can be supposed guilty of Certainly the occasion and meaning of that particular Power they then exercised in the Church different from the Secular nay when enjoyned and commanded the contrary by those Powers that they act and speak no more in that Name when Persecuted to Bonds and Imprisonment moreover unto Death for it had been declared and published to such those Governors a Manifesto or Remonstrance made of it to all Princes of the World certainly among the many Apologies that were made to the Empire in their own behalf this had had a share a room at least in some one of them That what Jurisdiction was then exercised by them the Pastors of the Church was only under the present Necessity a present contrivance of their own to keep their Followers and Adherents in some tolerable Peace and Order to awe and restrain as they could better an assumed Usurped Government than none at all that the real and whole Government was laid upon theirs the Magistrates shoulders alone would they but be pleased to come in to the Faith and sustain and execute it What a plausible even cogent Argument is here all along omitted to let the Powers of the World know what a considerable Portion of their Birth-right as Princes they neglect and disown abdicate and relinquish what a real damage and disadvantage they receive in not coming in to the Church what a principal Jewel would be added to their Crown in so doing So great and considerable a number as they which are Christians and which grow upon the World and increase daily Vestra omnia implevimus Vrbes Insulas Castella Municipia Conciliabula Castra ipsa Tribus Decurias Palatium Senatum Forum cui bello non idonei non prompti fuissemus etiam impares Copiis as Tertullian in his Apology cap. 37. Vast Multitudes every where of all sorts in all Places and Offices who as they professed all manner of Allegiance and Duty to them in Seculars so would they acquit resign into their hands their Power Spiritual nay it is really theirs already and the execution falls in course upon them an accession that must be advantageous cannot be accounted mean and inconsiderable to a Government Thus to be the Fountain and Head of all Rule and every Jurisdiction to invest or abdicate to oblige or punish so great so considerable a Sect as are the Christians to constitute and influence to depose and remove every way to govern at Pleasure their Bishops and Pastors who thus grow upon the World and influence all Men the Motive could never have been neglected the Argument must have had a great deal of room in their several Apologies and Embassies to the Empire in behalf of themselves and their Religion who spared nothing like an Argument that might but ingratiate and insinuate into their good favour and liking as 't is evident from such their Writings and yet there is not one word there of any such Pleadings or any thing like it but the quite contrary as it hath been already made to appear I 'le go on farther and assert that 't is very improbable if not our Saviour himself yet that the Apostles should not have done all this and thus stated the case down to the World and yet no man sets these two Powers of the Church and State more apart than does St. Paul and so leaves them To instance in no more at present he often exhorts That they obey Magistrates and that they also remember those that have rule over them who have spoken to them the Word of God and his Bishop has his distinct care over the Church of God 1 Tim. 3.5 has his things to set in order Tit. 1.5 a Power to Summon by Process to receive Accusations as in Court as upon a Seat of Judicature before witnesses 1 Tim. 5.19 20. though no Power to lay either Confinement or any other corporal outward Punishment on their Persons The Powers of the World becoming Christian it must needs make a great alteration as to its Worship and great was the advantage the Gospel received thereby but so great a translation of Power from one Body to another must in all likelihood have been forewarn'd of and declared by such as had a
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
only Regnante Christo and the Reign of the Empire is left out though it do no ways infer and prove that all Empire is originally in Christ both as to Spirituals and Seculars and that he that is his Succession the Church has the disposal of the Kingdoms of the World too Primarily and Originally in him as some zealous Parasites of the Roman Faith thence it seems have inferr'd and against whom the main Plot of D. Blondel in this his Book is laid and very well yet this it infers and evidently proves That our Saviour and his Succession the Church have been always supposed to have had a Kingdom in the World not to supplant and overturn to usurp and encroach upon but to bless that other of the World to render it Prosperous on Earth and by her holier Laws and Discipline to bring all to the Kingdom of Heaven when the Reign on Earth is at an end But this D. Blondel could not or would not see himself and therefore a thing too usual with him runs into the opposite extreme to his Adversaries is angry when this very Church-Power and its existence of which himself gives so evident a Demonstration is asserted solitary and not in the Empire as no ways flowing and included in its Constitution as the other will have no Empire but from and in the Church so hard a matter is it for some Men to contend for Truth and against the Church of Rome at once and as has above been observed but these Oversights if no worse are usual with him 't is like his ill luck in other cases § XVIII AND he that duly consults and considers the sundry Proceedings and Laws and judiciary Acts of the Empire about Church-Matters either as interspersed in our Church Histories or as Collected and United in the two Codes the Theodosian and Justinian in their several Laws Novels and Constitutions will readily grant all this and more that the Church and State the Worldly or Secular and Ecclesiastical or Spiritual Power were still consider'd reputed and proceeded on as quite distinct Bodies and Powers though both flowing from the same Original and Fountain yet as diverse as the Soul and Body with several Offices and Duties on each incumbent in different Channels convey'd and all aiming at the great and ultimate end the general advantage of Mankind and each individual both with their faces to the same Jerusalem but in several Paths and Determinations judiciary in order to it Hee 'l find that as the Church the Councils and Bishops were ever Conscientious and Industrious that they entrenched not on the Empire withheld not from it what was its due usurped not any thing was not their own paid all manner of Observances to Kings and Secular Governors in all manner of Duties as Prayers Thanksgiving Instructions Directions Admonitions Tribute Loyalty c. So again did the Empire preserve their Functions Persons and Estates give them Liberties Enfranchisements Protestations unless where Apostates as Julian where overmuch favouring Heresies as some time Constantius c. countenanced and provided for Truth and Holiness and sound Discipline according to the Rules Canons Directions Interpretations and Determinations given by the Bishops assembled in Council or occasionally otherways made and recommended unto them the Church still Petitioned and Supplicated the Empire when by the Affronts and Insolencies the greater Impieties and Obstinacies of the World the edge of their Spiritual Sword was dulled and blunted when Coercive outward Punishments alone could hope to prevail for Peace and Amendment of this we have several Instances upon Record as for the deposing Dioscorus in Evagrius his Ecclesiastical History l. 2. c. 4. in placing Proclus in the Episcopal Throne Socrat. Hist Eccl. lib. 7. cap. 4. which was immediately by Theodosius Maximinianus the defuncts Body being not yet laid in the Ground to prevent the Tumults of the People To this purpose we have the Case of one Cresconius a Bishop who left his own and invaded another's Church and upon a remand from the Council refusing to return the President of the Country is Petitioned and his Secular arm which alone has a Coercive Power over Mens Persons sends him back again according to the Constitutions Imperial Concil Carthag Can. 52. just such another Case as that of Paulus Samosetanus in the days of Aurelian the Emperor above-mentioned and the course of Proceedings we see is the same now as then both in Church and State as that Laws may be made to restrain such as were fled to the Church for refuge Can. 60. that the Riot and Excess be taken away on their Festivals which drew Men to Gentilism again by the obscener Practices and which were without shame and beyond Modesty Can. 65 66. that the Secular Power would come in eò quod Episcoporum autoritas incivitatibus contemnitur because the Power of the Bishops is contemn'd in the Cities Can. 70. ut Ecclesiae opem ferat to assist the Church against these Impieties so strenuous and prevailing Can. 78. as in the Case of the unrulier Donatists Can. 95 96. and the Thanks of the Bishops were given for their Ejection Can. 97. and the Emperor is Petitioned to grant Defensors to the Church Can. 10.109 and as the Church thus supplicated the Empire in these arduous Cases and when its assistance was wanting so on the other side did the Empire still advise with the Church when designing to make Religion the Municipal Law of the Empire to imbody it with the World under the same Sanctions either as to Punishments or Rewards to make it the Religion of the State also they still consulted antecedent Canons or present Bishops in Council or some Ecclesiastical Autority they created nothing anew gave the help of the World for Countenance Assistance and Confirmation to stablish what the Church had put its Sanction upon And those Emperors that designed to discountenance Christianity or set up some particular Heresie and stifle it in part or depose any great Church-men and some such there was they attempted it not but by the Clergy though of their own the Power as in themselves alone was not pretended to they had their own Synods and Bishops in order to it and what they did was done in their Names also and all this will readily appear to any one acquainted with the Canons of the Church and Laws of the Empire or if it seem too hard a task he 'l find it at least attempted to his hand and with Care and Industry reduced to a little room by Photius Patriarch of Constantinople in his Book therefore called the Nomo-Canon to shew the concurrency of the Laws and Canons the Canons still placed first as in course anteceding And in this sense only that of Socrates can be understood in the Proem to his Fifth Book of Ecclesiastical History 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Reges viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So soon as Kings began to be Christians the things of the Church were managed and accomplished
great Mercy and Justice of the Empire thus to conserve Mens Liberties not to have them expos'd to the Temporal Punishments which always follow'd and severely too upon Excommunication Nor is it sit that an Action of so great a weight and consequence every ways of so great a concern both as to Body and Soul be altogether Arbitrary at the Pleasure many times Pique of one Man the Prince at this rate has not the Command of his own Subjects and his own Laws may be executed against the interest of his Government Excommunications are only then supposed to have effect Clave non Errante when duly executed according to Church Rules of which the Prince is or ought to be the Conserver no one is supposed to grant Priviledges against himself and as he enstates certain Persons with special Immunities so is he to enquire and to be concern'd as upon the admittance into as in the case of Ordinations just now considered so upon an exclusion from them otherwise his neither Favours nor Punishments are his own and his Power and Government may be weak'ned by it Ne Immunitatis Ecclesiasticae obtentu munia Publica vel nervi Reipublicae conciderent ad clericatum confugientibus iis à quibus munia Publica per Provincias sustinebantur 12. Cod. Theodos Tit. 1.69.104.115 c. which way soever his Subjects may be disabled for the Service of the Empire whether when Priviledges are too lavishly and inconsiderately conferr'd or Exemptions made the reason is one and so is the effect in either and the Prudence and Power of the Empire is to be imply'd alike for Prevention of each and securing the Subject for his own and the Subjects best advantage and consequently both the Censures and Orders of the Church when inflicted and conferr'd are to be under his Inspection If the Empire come in with his Power to assist and strengthen the Church and Religion gains its outward aid and Protection it must be in dependance on such the Power Secular whose Temporal Security is to be consulted and included in the Execution The Plot and Contrivance both of our common Christianity and our common Reason at once do require it and the same I have said above as to the Power of the Empire in all Christian Councils call'd and protected by him But the Emperor all this while is not found to Excommunicate or Absolve in his own Person by his own individual formal Act that is a Power that depends upon another Head is derived by a differing Stream and to a diverse Subject it is not in the force of the Secular Arm nor does the Prince lay a Claim or Pretence unto it Divina primum Vindicta the Divine Vengeance i. e. Excommunication passed first upon the Hereticks inflicted by the Church and then motus animi nostri the Punishments from the Empire those Penalties reckoned up before and in part following Cod. Justinian l. 1. Tit. 1. And the same Emperor some Bishops falling under his Displeasure and adjudged worthy his Animadversion for leaving their Cures and coming up to Constantinople under Pretence of Business about Religion without leave and to the expence of the Church He says he will not lay Pecuniary Mulcts upon them and which was all he could do except Banishments on their Persons but thinks Abstentions to be more proper 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but this is to be done either by the Patriarch of Constantinople himself if he be a Metropolitan that offended or if a Bishop only of a City by such his Metropolitan that he is under and which is no otherwise the work of the Empire then that he urges a due execution Ibid. Cod. Justin l. 1. Tit. 3.43 So again the deposition of a Bishop which is the same as Excommunication to a Lay-man is it made residentibus Sacerdotibus by the Priesthood it self a Synod of Bishops the Emperor only adds his Temporal Penalties as if he accept not such his Deposition but is Seditious and disturbs the Publick Peace he be banish'd an Hundred Miles from that City where he had officiated and which he had infested 't is the particular Punishment of the State 16. Cod. Theodos Lex 35. Tit. 2. the very same we have again Novel 42. Sententia Sacerdotum 't is the Judgment and Sentence of the Priest makes the Deposition the Empires Secular Arm seconds it proceeds to a Banishment of his Person and that his Books be burnt 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the first and original Right being in the Clergy Praefat. Ibid. Cap. 1. and more expresly there Cap. 3. 't is the Appointment of the Emperor that one Zoaras amongst others be anathematized but it follows 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Priests Determination must pass upon it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is the Churches own inward Autority and derived from none 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 only the Empire makes it of more Force and Autority that is by a Penal Mulct annexing Banishment unto it as it there follows and so 't is promised for the future whatever are the Church censures 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Laws Imperial shall corroborate and strengthen them ibid. and so all along the Church censuring the Empire punishing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epilog ibid. Novel 42. and 't is a Law of Theodosius the younger that the Clergy-man that is unfaithful in his Duty and retain'd Servants at the Altar and gave them refuge to the disadvantage of their Masters be deposed by the Bishop or his Animadversion be made sub Episcopalis jurisdictionis Arbitrio according to his Discretion and when degraded into the Order of a Lay-man Motum judiciarii rigori◠accipiat he be given up to the Civil Magistrate for farther Punishment Cod. 9. Theodos Tit. 45. l. 5. and of which more is to be seen in the Comments of Gothofred there And indeed all the Cautions Rules and Directions given to the Bishops in these instances imply only that they might erre in the execution the Power is all along supposed in the Church nor is it by the Prince attempted as he does not Excommunicate though seeing just reason for it so neither does he absolve upon the unjustest censures denounced wherein one Priest has been defective it has been enjoyn'd another remitted Majori Sacerdoti to a higher Order and Jurisdiction to the Metropolitan or Patriarch as was the Church Custom to appeal to the Superior Novel 123.11 So that we can readily yield to all that jus Caesareum Mr. Selden speaks of De Synedriis l. 1. cap. 8. pag. 223. that Caesarian Power both as to Excommunications and Absolutions And as Mr. Selden explains himself too and allow his own instances in the Jews Pag. 234 235. Caligula Caesar laid an Inhibition upon them and Banished their Persons out of Rome and denied them the exercise of their Religion which latter is the same in effect as Excommunication As he there argues this Inhibition was continued by Claudius Caesar for some time and afterwards quite taken off
by him and their Religion was allow'd after their own manner again The meaning of which can be only this that the Laws of the Empire gave License and Indempnity to their Persons in the ancient and accustomed exercise of it and which they accepted and were thankful for But does it hence follow that they acknowledged and return'd their Original Right either for their Worship in general or Excommunication in particular in and to Caesar and that they ceased to have any because denied by the Empire surely not they only were more streightned in its exercise when under his interdict Nor had they less right or stood they less bound to its Obligations in every respect when this liberty was not conceded under their Vassalage and though the Empire own'd them not even at this very time i. e. during their Captivity Mr. Selden says they assumed this Discipline of Excommunication or a naked Exclusion from outward Communion by consent among themselves the better to keep up and preserve this their Religion when so suppress'd by the Civil Power Ibid. suprà Cap. 7. pag. 141. 143. alibi as they would not this day in England or in what other Countries they are dispersed therefore forego such their Right should the present Government distress and frown upon them Nor do I know any one case or instance coming up nearer to the state of the Power and Right of the Prince in Ecclesiasticks and the Right of the Church Absolute too and Independent than this of the Jews under the Empire their Religion is from another Fountain and the Empire does not derive it unto them and Gallio the Secular Deputy could discharge his Duty without caring for any of these things when the Matters were purely of their Laws and Customs but yet their Persons and the Publick exercise of it are subject to this Government and Jurisdiction to limit or enlarge indulge or recall as may be the Reasons and Motives and is his Will and Pleasure Thus it stood with the Jewish Church in the days of our Saviour in the Flesh and of his Apostles and so it is to this day where the Association or imbodying is continued nor did the Empire conceive its Power any ways intrenched upon or abated thereby did he cease upon the account of their Worship to continue to them his Protection or had they any ingagement to withdraw their Obedience only those uncircumcised in Hearts and Ears which always resisted the Holy Ghost and Crucified the Lord of Life sometimes attempted Insurrections and Rebellions against him BUT however it was with the Heathen § XXIII Emperors in respect of the Jews Mr. Selden positively says it that the Christian Emperors did actually exercise the censures of the Church judicially Anathematize and Excommunicate in their own Persons and Rights he having first swollen up himself with an Opinion and a true one too true it is that himself is the great Searcher of Records and Authors and Laws of the Books and Practice of all Ages and if the mighty the laborious Selden has said it it must be so there can be no doubt of there needs no other search after it otherwise he could never have ventur'd to obtrude it on the world as out of the Imperial Code that Princes have so Excommunicated whose Laws Declarations Practice Positive Assertions and Dogmatical Resolutions are quite another ways as I have already made it appear in these foregoing Pages which Collection and Citations if any one distrust let but himself peruse the particulars with much more that might be added out of the Nomocanon Church-story and Primitive Fathers concurring with and giving strength to such the Relations and the Grounds he delivers it from is such that a Man may swear 't was his bloated conceit of his Name at the Fount like gild to the Pills possessed with as aery a Phancy that any thing would down of his wrapping up in the following Pages could engage him to it I confess could any one have found such things out none likelier than he his Zeal and Industry being singular I wish his Integrity had been so too he seldom missing of any thing within the compass of his designed subject that may be any ways useful to his present Plot and Enquiry had he as little fail'd in his use and applying of them The places he produces for Evidence in his Treatise De Synedriis lib. 1. cap. 10. pag. 318. is out of the Sixteenth Code Theodosian Tit. 5. Lex 6. where Gratianus Valentinianus and Theodosius thus give the charge to Eutropius not Hesperius as he That all Hereticks especially such as oppose the Nicene Faith Ab omnium summoti Ecclesiarum limine penitus arceantur communione Sanctorum inhibentur c. with others to the same purpose in the following Laws both here and in the Justinian Code That Justinian oft in his own Name thus speaks Anathematizamus Anathematizentur sub Excommunicatione fiet c. and which are to be found Code lib. 1. That such be not suffer'd to come into the Church be inhibited the Communion of Saints we do anathematize them Let him be Anathematized let him be under Excommunication c. by which all that can be meant is only this and which is the Province of every good Christian Governor to see that the Laws of the Church be duly put in Execution that the royal Will and Pleasure is it should be so the Laws and Canons of the Church the Rule of Faith to be believed and adhered to requiring it and to which his Imperial concurrence is annexed which he confirms and strengthens by his Autority and will stand by in the Execution as 't is explain'd Novel 42. and that is to be his sense if the Codes may interpret themselves which is much more proper than for Selden to do it it being there most certain that the judicial Act was from the Church and Phrases must be interpreted according to the present Subject and designed Matter and no more is meant then that Prerogative which we see to have been given always to all Godly Princes in Holy Scripture by God himself that they should rule all Estates and Degrees committed to their Charge by God whether they be Ecclesiastical or Temporal and restrain with the Sword the stubborn and evil doers as 't is expressed in our Seven and thirtieth Article and he himself confesses unawares in the next lines having a Quotation to bring in and cannot either omit it or tell where else to do it That they only simply judged them cursed of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as in the Georgick Laws and that their design was they should be notabiles and marked out for it by whose act and judicial Sentence 't is not express'd And what he brings out of the Hundred and three and twentieth Novel cap. 11. and Photius his Nomocanon 9.9 to prove it the Act of the Empire is quite another thing and none but he arrived to that strange Presumption as to
extraordinary Commissions have ceased which the Apostles and firsh Publishers of the Gospel had though by present Miracles not to be justified And this equally enabling and warranting the Church of God such as can evidence the Succession of Power in its own and appointed way as when Miracles were annexed to affront is an improper Speech but to Teach Declare and Protest against the Establish'd Religion of a Nation if a false one openly to draw Men off from the Profession of it in Contempt is again an ill Expression but in different ways and rules of Duty then those false ones of the Law and Magistrate though the Men of the World do Publish their dislike and threaten and punish and go on into a Law against them as they did when Christianity was first Taught and Church-Power first came down was setled and professed in the World though the Kings of the Earth stand up together and the Rulers take Council they rise up as one Man as did Herod and Pontius Pilate and all the Gentiles against the Child Jesus as it was then the Apostles so is it no less our Duty thus to speak before Kings and not be ashamed Church-Power came first into the World as not from the School of Gamaliel so nor from the Thrones of Kings and 't is independant and distant as in its rise so in its execution though embellish'd assisted and strengthened advantaged much by the outward favours of Princes their many Adjuncts and royal Appendages and which where conferr'd will equally embellish and add to their own Crowns to be sure in Heaven And upon these terms to suffer will be our Duty if what we profess be not received it will amount to Martyrdom If the King's wrath be the return and our Doctrine with our selves be cast out and if we do not this it will come too near the Traditores in the days of the Donatists or to those that offer'd at Heathen Shrines in the Persecutions before what will it be but to give up our Bibles and Profession upon the Summons of any prevailing Party to give up to be sure our Church-Power and which amounts to in effect the same nor can Christianity continue without it when upon Perswasion of the Arians first upon point as he thought of interest receiving his Father's Will from an Arian Priest and then by the Miletians joyning with them Constantius the Emperor engaged against the Faith of one Substance and great and rigorous Persecutions were its consequent Athanasius and his followers that adhered to the Nicene Faith in that Doctrine did not therefore in point of Conscience submit and say nothing with but silence give over and desert the Truth but the rather were more vigorous and active for it even to the greatest Calumnies and Distresses which through the malicious instigations of the Arians and Meletians as evil Men always unite against Truth the Emperor laid upon them And though Liberius of Rome and Hosius of Corduba this latter the ancientest Bishop then in the Christian World and who was one of the Council of Nice and Penned that Creed and Gregory Nazianzen and others even the whole World becoming Arians as St. Jerome complain'd by the height of Threats and succession of Miseries after sharp trials and resistancies did at length submit and subscribe to their Doctrines yet it cost them both repentance and tears as Gregory Nazianzen declares in particular in the Life of Athanasius And all this they did and thought themselves bound in Conscience to do not as extraordinarily Commissioned as the Apostles and first Publishers of the Gospel were as warranted and justified by Miracles but as commissionated in course by their Holy Orders instated with the same Autority though not in so open a shew and equally bound to render an account to God of such their trust and charge committed then and therewith unto them as the same Stewards of his Mysteries and this not upon the receipt of any new Revelation from Heaven but upon the score of their ordinary Ministry contending for the Faith once delivered to the Saints guided and directed by the Tradition of Faith delivered by the Apostles and conserv'd in the Church by a continued devolution and to which St. Athanasius and all the Catholick Bishops which strove against Arianism always referr'd themselves and is evident on all Occasions from Church History as Socrat. Eccl. Hist l. 2. c. 46. l. 3. c. 7. Athanasius ad Serapion ad Epictet Ep. that Faith into which when recommended to him and explain'd the Emperor Theodosius was Baptized Socrat. Hist Eccl. l. 5. c. 6. upon which rule all the Councils proceeded in their Conciliary Acts and Determinations as Can. 13. Conc. Nic. 1. Can. 19. Conc. Hab. in Trullo Can. 2. Conc. 2. Nic. Athanas Orat. 1. Cont. Arios and they proceeding upon this bottom what they Decreed is to be receiv'd for Truth by all Christians is to be subscribed and assented to is to be taught before Kings when denying of it 't was this Theodosius himself acknowledged at his Death 't is reputed as the Law the Voice of God himself as St. Basil ad Diodorum among his Canons apud Pandect Can. Beverig and so by Constantine the Emperor in Socrates Hist Eccl. l. 1. c. 9. Sozom. l. 1. cap. 20. 25. and in particular it will be expected that that common 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that usual shift be omitted so usual among us when this known Power of the Church is urged That 't is accidental only in its Original introduced by the present necessity and upon a common consent and compact the Christians being then under Heathen Governors to whose Judicatures it was neither for their Safety nor Honor to Appeal and stand their Trial and Verdict and therefore they resolv'd it all into the chief Church-men and which Power Constantine becoming Christian and so the succeeding Emperors confirmed by his Royal Autority and continued of his own choice and motion unto them This is the common tattle of the wiser Men as they think and are generally so reputed reporting it to the World with much Confidence and yet upon no other ground than old Womens Stories are told and bottom'd at the farthest they 'l tell you that Mr. Selden and Mr. Hobs said so and every one is as secure of its Autority and Credit as if they had read it in the Gospel of our Saviour or in one of St. Paul's Epistles when 't is all as false as the Gospel it self is true Great and many were the Priviledges Royal Favours and Immunities that Constantine bestow'd upon the Church and Church-men he receiv'd them with both hands and with him in the Comedy could he have found a third he would have gave it them He annex'd to them Adjuncts and Appendages which their Lord and Master Christ Jesus did not could not would not do his Kingdom being not of this World nor was it his business to divide Inheritances and he had all the reason in the world
under it Thus he Mr. Selden who was Contemporary with § IX this worthy wight and Man of Sense and no question but his Confident engaged and succeeded him in the very same Cause and by the very same Motives and Arguments only he appear'd not in the World till Nine years after and so had the advantage of much time and was imboldned by the horrid Anarchy and dismal Confusion of it and by an incessant Industry of his own improv'd the Argument to a greater height of irreligion and audaciousness and contemptuously treads upon whatever is like a Church Power in any instance of it which his Friend was a little shy of who allows in Church-men a Power for Non-communion or Abstention in some Cases which though he 'l by no means call it Excommunication and acknowledges that Justinian did only command that the Bishop proceed against the Faulty by Excommunication Suspension Deprivation but Mr. Selden says with the greatest assurance and impudence it was his own judicial act with that truth we have already considered but his Argument and course of proceeding is all along the same and upon the supposition founded in the constitution and practice of the Jewish Church and which he proves by a vast reading and intolerable expence of Pains to have used only outward Bodily Penal Coercive Punishments whether before or after giving the Law in Sinai so he tells us it was with Adam and Cain the one upon his fall the other upon his murder both banished their Countries for it the Sword is the punishment for Murder Gen. 9.3 And they were to be stoned that came near the Mount at the giving the Law Exod. 19. And the punishment was only secular upon the violation of the Seven Precepts given to the Sons of Noah the uncircumcised was to be punished though not forinsecally yet by Gods own immediate hand and a particular judgment of the same nature was the Curse upon Meroz the punishment of Kore Dathan and Abiram nor do the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Anathema c. as used by the Prophets according to the Septuagint or other Greek Translations signifie any thing else nor are there used for Excommunication or afterwards by the Apostles as in St. Paul's delivering up the incestuous to Sathan c. and the Jews took up that Excommunication which was of later years exercised among them by special Compact with one another in the time of Captivity and for the present Exigence when the Temporal Power was taken out of their hands and which was no ways appropriated to the Priest or any other Order of Men either now under their Captivity or for the infliction of those other Punishments before or after the Law and what Excommunications were practised in the Apostles times and the first Century where by the way his great Master Erastus will allow of none in his Hundred Theses answered by Theodore Beza in his Tractatus Pius Moderatus de verâ Excommunicatione Christiano Magisterio was first Judaick in imitation of the Jews for there was none of the Christians for many years after our Saviour's Ascension which were not either Jews originally or Greek Proselytes and were accounted as Jews in common repute and members of their Synagogue and so used their Customs and Rights as before and of which this of Excommunication was one and so living among the Jews and call'd by the same Name when Caesar indulged the Jews and they had the liberty of their own Religion the Christians enjoy'd the Priviledges together with them and thus their Excommunication became Caesarean their Church Acts derived a Publick Autority from the Empire having none before but by private Covenant and by this Autority they held Presbyteries had Judicatures relating purely to their Religion and retained a Power to Punish under Death as did the Jews and if not thwarting the Laws Imperial and which grant of Favour though abated by succeeding Emperors they notwithstanding retained a Body and Union among themselves upon their own terms for Confederation till the days of Constantine and the Empire became Christian and then the Church being taken in to the State the Jurisdiction wholly became his as naturally annexed to the Crown and there to reside till all Autority and Power ceaseth This is the chief of Mr. Selden's Plot for the overthrowing the Power of Christ's Kingdom in the Polity Laws and Rights of it Lib. 1. De Syned cap. 3. 4 5 6 7 8. 11. and which has with much more advantage been very lately represented to the Age than I am able to do by a great and Learned Hand Dr. Parker Arch-deacon of Canterbury Nor needs there any thing more to be added for the satisfying the World of the vainer Attempts and undue Consequents there raised only the general Design of this Discourse engages that it be not wholly passed by and which otherwise could not be answer'd THOMAS Erastus Mr. Selden's great and § X admired Master though not licking and shaping his Beastly Abortive brood so throughly Missing in many things what the other has Hit upon yet in his forementioned Hundred Theses he urges much the same way as that because the Sword was the Punishment among the Jews so all Offenders of what Nature soever are by the Coercion alone of the Magistrate to be Corrected and the Christian Church is to go no farther than theirs did and the Civil Magistrate has all the Care of Religion that it is very difficult to conceive how there can be two Heads in one Body both to have right to Punish and Exercise Domination over the same Subjects still supposing no Power to have or that can have existency but that of outward Coercion And which Plea however it might be forced from him and seem necessary and makes a plausible shew of Truth in regard of Beza's Lay-Elders and the Consistorian Government of Geneva and in whose irregular Power he instances laying Penal Mulcts and outward Restraints as do the Civil Magistrates and the Consideration of which ran him upon this his as groundless Extreme Yet as to the Constitution and Practice of the truly Catholick Christian Church it has no Pretence or likelihood at all as will hereafter be made to appear CLAVDIVS Salmasius though he was § XI a Man very much if not altogether of Beza's Complexion yet is he not so ingenuous and true to their common Cause as was Beza in his Writings against Erastus for in his Apparatus to his Book De Primatu Papae a long rambling indigested tedious Discourse purposely made against the Divine Right of Bishops he there to pursue home his Design takes away all Church-Government whatsoever at the same rate of arguing And if he concludes any thing at all and which is not easily seen it is this That a Bishop is so far from having a distinct Power above a Presbyter solitary and apart from him that he has neither 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in general no
penè Voce Amen Cantatur Halelujah That Amen which is answer'd and Halelujah which is Sung with one almost Voice throughout so many Nations Lib. 2. adv Literas Petiliani Donatistae super Gestis cum Emerito Episcopo So Athanasius in his Apology 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 How Decent and Holy is it to hear in the House built for Prayer the People say Amen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with one sound and consent there mentioned Carmen Christo quasi Deo dicere Semet invicem saying a Hymn to Christ as God in courses with one another As Pliny lib. 10. Ep. 97. and is referr'd to by Tertullian in his Apology 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Singing back again to one another in St. Basil 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Praying betwixt one another Ep. 63. Ad Clericos Neocesariensis Ecclesiae in amoibeunis and alternate Responses The Priest Parat mentes fratrum dicendo sursum Corda ut dum respondit Plebs habemus ad Dominum As St Cyprian upon the Lord's Prayer preparing the Minds of his Brethren saying Lift up your hearts and the People answering We lift them up to the Lord this the great and common constant Service of the Church of God The usual manner of old in the Performance of it and an earlier Pattern we have yet as to the Substance of it So soon as we meet with a Church gathered the Holy Ghost descended and those Thousands Converted by St. Peter Acts 7. he there opens to them the Scriptures they receive the Word and are Baptized they go on and continue stedfast in the Apostles Doctrine and Fellowship and Prayer attend the Holy Communion Praising God Poetically extolling of him And thus became Peter in the letter of it a Rock a first Stone or principal Pillar in the Church or People of God § XVII BUT then besides their Publick Worship of God did this Union into one Body or Corporation farther express and oblige the Members in their Duties and Services to one another in the Supplies and Assistances of all its Members whose either special Offices and Imployments in the Service and Support of the Church Body or Association rendred uncapable of undergoing the Cares and Offices of the World for the providing themselves sustenance suitable to their Office and Quality in the Trades and Imployments of it for the Body of Christians though a Collection and Incorporation for Heaven yet is to remain its due time and abode upon Earth and to subsist whil'st on Earth by the usual and lawful courses of it it does not therefore immediately receive Food from Heaven or else whose unavoidable Want and Poverty by the unaccountable disposal of things and the many Contingencies of this mutable state here lays before them in their Streets and High-ways in the rode to this Jerusalem also as Objects of Pity and Commiseration Relief and Charity for their Saviour has told them That the Poor you must always have with you and to them belongs the Kingdom of Heaven And this is to be done and is the general Duty of the whole Body and each Christian there in particular not only by the tenure of the special Charter from God and it is imply'd and made up and required in the Donation it self but by the common course and Laws of things no Body can subsist without it it must run to Decay Degeneracy and Contempt either through want of Instruction Order and Government on the one hand or by Idleness Destitution and Distress on the other and those weighty Reasons and Motives which engaged freely of their own choice no outward force compelling as in the Associations of the World in order to Governance and Subsistency to unite in God's Service it then necessitates that such ways and means be used here as in the sustaining other Societies and this upon the same Consideration and Motive as they believe it useful to be of such the Association and in Communion with one another especially where the force of the World enjoyns no other Provision as it did not till the Government became Christian and the World came in to the Support of the Church for which our Saviour did and must in reason provide upon failure otherwise Religion can no longer subsist then as the civil Empire pleaseth § XVIII AND first this general Care always extended and was made for such as labour'd among them in the Word and Doctrine such as attended the Altar and ministred in Holy Things and this not only to the maintaining their Persons but to the maintaining them in order to their Function and consequently in supplying them with all Utensils and whatsoever else was then thought necessary for the due and more solemn Performance of the Worship of God and the maintenance of his Service This is that St. Paul so much Pleads for and with so great earnestness and weight of Argument 1 Cor. 9.1 2 3 4 c. and tells them plainly That if he be an Apostle as he most certainly is to them who are the Seal of his Apostleship in the Lord then he hath a right to their Estates Have we not Power to eat and drink Have we not Power to lead about a Sister or Wife and to forbear working Who goeth to warfare at any time at his own Charges Who planteth a Vineyard and eateth not of the Fruit thereof or who feedeth a Flock and eateth not of the Fruit of the Flock Do ye not know that they that minister about Holy things live of the things of the Temple and they which wait at the Altar are Partakers with the Altar So hath the Lord ordained that they which Preach the Gospel should live of the Gospel And this the Church-men had not as Stipendiaries and Salary-men but the Believers brought in of their Goods and laid them at the Apostles feet which made a Common Stock or Bank to be at their Prudence in the disposal call'd the Lord's Goods and in relation to this Common Stock or Bank in the hands of the Apostles in which every Christian upon occasion had a right it is said That all things were common among these first Christians in the Book of the Acts for that no one had Property besides cannot be believed and the fault of Ananias and Sapphira was not that they did not bring all they had and lay it at the Apostles feet reserved nothing of their Estate to themselves but this was their guilt they kept part back and said it was the whole their lying to the Holy Ghost otherwise it was their own and they might have reserved to themselves what of it they pleased Now these common Gifts and common Purse as it was first intrusted with the Apostles so upon their failure did the trust descend and remain with the Bishops their Successors who distributed to the Necessities both of Churches and Church-men their Officers and Attendants as occasion required a competent Portion whereof was set apart and reputed their own Persoanl Goods
Church of Christ all Christian Bishops by whomsoever Consecrated and his Arm is to rule them whosesoever's Hands were laid upon them and this solitary and by himself nor is any one a sharer with or out of subjection to him To which I shall reply that though the distinction in it self will with very much difficulty be admitted of and the ordaining and governing Parts will be very rarely found asunder Nor do I believe there can be an instance given of but one Bishop who at his Consecration had the Power of governing left out of the Office in which that other of Ordination together with this were not design'd at once and transmitted though the Objects have many times been changed either enlarged or limited as they have been both suspended altogether yet allowing the distinction it may possibly do Estius this present Kindness lookt upon as a Disputant and oppressed with an Argument giving him the opportunity of something like an Answer and with some shew he may escape that severity of words and blacker censure he there acknowledges to be passed by St. Gregory in several Occasional Epistles against whomsoever it is shall style himself Universal Bishop or Bishop of all Bishops That the very Name is Prophane Proud Sacrilegious Diabolical a Name of Blasphemy and the forerunner of Antichrist and all this Estius there tells us was occasion'd from this Holy Father by reason of the Patriarch of Constantinople's Ambition in that Nature declaring that as the Emperor did alone hold the Empire and all Inferior Governors were sent by him and held of him the Head and not to do it was Usurpation and Treason so did he alone hold the Episcopacy and all Holy Orders were to descend and flow from him and to receive them and not from him was to climb up the wrong way and by intrusion come in But then what more right he has on his side or better Autority than Bellarmine has on his or how he can prove a solitary peculiar Care and Government demandated to and in its special Constitution settled on St. Peter and by his Succession at Reme or which way soever else it was over the Universal Church or whole Gospel-Priesthood so as to constitute him and them its immutable perpetual Head to Govern though not to Ordain them and which was not in the rest of the Apostles Persons to be sure not in their Succession this does not readily appear the Scriptures are favourers of both alike and indeed give to neither any bottom at all Nor does any such thing appear in the best Antiquity or succeeding Matter of Fact in his behalf no ill Argument of ever a Divine Right were it on their side § XXV THE first instance we have from the Ancients of this Pretended Power is in Victor Bishop of Rome in the year One Hundred ninety four who threatned Excommunication against the Asiaticks because they complied not with him in the Observation of Easter The Succession of the Bishops of Rome is all along delivered down in Church-History from the beginning to this day each Bishop particularized under the Title of Romanae Vrbis Episcopus Antistes c. there 's no one note of Singularity affixed unto him and this is the first time we meet with any thing like a Superiority there practised and at the most he is but ranked with the other Metropolitans Now whether this was attempted by Victor purely out of Zeal for an Apostolical Custom and we have many examples of Eminent Bishops that have intermeddled without their own Districts or whether as supposing himself really invested with a Power for Inspection and Animadversion upon all other Christian Bishops certain it is this his Power was disown'd and rejected by an eminent Branch of the Church Catholick and as eminent Bishops as any She had the Autority and Practice of St. John is set up and Pleaded against that of St. Peter as what every way balances nor doth it any way submit unto it And Irenaeus Bishop of Lyons in France and none of the Quartodecimane but one who comply'd with Victor in the Observation of Easter yet asserts the Asiaticks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Self-Autority nor is any Foreign Power to over-rule and controle them or the Peace of the Church to be broken on such occasions all which is to be seen in Eusebius Hist Eccl. l. 5. c. 23 24. and if we descend some time lower we shall not find any thing really more advantageous to him Constantine the Great Complements indeed Eusebius of Caesarea and tells him he is worthy of the Episcopale or Government of the whole Church De Vita Constant apud Euseb l. 9. c. 6. but that such an extent of Power was then in the Person of any one Bishop is no where said nor is there any probability to suppose it 'T is true that some Privileges have belong'd to the Bishop of Rome and which have been claimed as their due in good times Julius is very angry with the Clergy of Antioch that they did not call him to a Synod and urges it as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Law of the Church that whatsoever is done without the Bishop of Rome is to be void Sozom. Eccl. Hist l. 3. c. 10. and in an Epistle of his to some whom he accuses of Contention and want of Charity not consulting the Peace of the Church in the cause of Athanasius he farther adds Are you ignorant that this is the Custom that we are first to be wrote to that what is just may hence be defined Inter. Athanas Opera Tom. 1. Ed. Paris Pag. 753. But then whatever this Privilege was that it did not arise from any Connatural Right to his See but Ecclesiastical Canon is most plain out of Socrates his Church History l. 2. c. 8. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. and he may not have so much for what Vallesius in his Annotations there can produce for it Which is the alone Autority of Ferrandus that is Christian Ammianus Marcellinus an Heathen an Historian that concerns himself as little with Christianity and Church Affairs as any one can be supposed to have done that attempted an History of the Times in which so much of the Church concerns its Power and Autority was Transacted as in the days of Constantius and Julian and whose times make up the best part of his Story The latter he studiously affects to represent to the World with what advantages he can both living and dying And for the Christian Religion he does not I am confident so much as name it Twenty times in all his Books and then accidentally and very slightly and the greatest advantage that he gives us is we have his Testimony that such a Sect call'd Christians was then in the World and for that particular passage quoted by Vallesius it makes if any thing against himself for he tells us That when Constantius the Emperor who is known to be Athanasius his great and mortal Enemy and mov'd every
where there is a doubt and no sure witness to avouch the Baptism pretended once to be administred or the Persons themselves are not able to give an account of the Mysteries then delivered unto them as Can. 57. Conc. Carthag and which Canon was occasioned by their Embassador with the Moors who usually brought such Children from the Barbarians but yet there is no instance in the first Canons of rebaptizing those who were certainly known to be baptized in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost upon any accident by Lay-men and yet such we have reason to believe there was Hence Baptism once appearing to have been administred as to the Matter and Substance of it and in the words of the Institution and by such as were not of the Hieratical Order they adjudged it the safer way to trust the Mercy and Goodness of God for a supply of whatever defect might be in one or two outward Circumstances than to run the hazard of an attempt of what seemed so visibly and notoriously unlawful viz. a second admission by that Sacrament or a violation of that known and sacred rule or instance of our Belief one Baptism for remission of Sins And this as in all defects and where something is wanting it ought to be permitted and pardoned only under the present and unhappy Circumstances as also in the after practice of the Church but never produced and urged as a Rule enacted into a Law Infirmities are never made Presidents unless for Pity and Pardon and to quicken future care and watchfulness against them the common course of things abhors nor is it to be endur'd if otherwise Potestatem regenerationis demandans suis discipulis cum dixit iis Euntes docete omnes gentes baptizantes c. Iren. l. 3. c. 19. Christ Jesus then demandated or devolved the Power for Regeneration unto his Disciples when he bad them go and teach all Nations baptizing them c. and certainly such as attempt it ought first to receive the same Autority in Succession from him without which his Disciples that in Person attended him did it not Tertullian represents it as the height of impudence and irregularity for a Woman to baptize forsitan tingere a more sawcy act then to teach in the Church De praescr c. 41. then which no Book was ever wrote with a more Primitive Spirit and speaks of it as a thing in general forbad a Woman de Virgin Veland c. 9. He limits it to the Bishop Presbyter and Deacon only in necessity it comes to the Lay-man Sufficiat sc ut in necessitatibus utaris sicubi aut loci aut temporis aut personae conditio compellit tunc enim constantia succurrentis excipitur quam urgit circumstantia periclitantis De Baptism c. 17. and surely that which is but one never to be reiterated 't is Sacriledge 't is incest to do it to which so many and great Titles Eulogies and Effects are given by the Ancients it would be endless to repeat them so many to be sure more are not spoken of any one Service in the whole City of God That which first enters us into the Body and Association of Christians with so large Promises upon such solemn ties and obligations the Expectations and Duties of our whole life following and that which is performed and obtained with the same solemnity and invocation as in other Holy Mysteries invocato Deo Sanctificationis Sacramentum consequuntur aequae Tertul de Baptism c. 4. it is not agreeable that the Consecration and Solemnization be left and assigned promiscuously and to every hand and which is not in other Sacraments it must in course be equally peculiar and separate as to the separation of the Persons that are to be entrusted with the administration of it A further appropriated distinct Power to § XXX the Officers of the Church is to unite and determine in Council in the affairs of Religion as to Matters of Faith when less cleer when unhappily wrested and perverted by Hereticks in fixing things indifferent in their Nature for the more usefulness order and uniformity in the Worship of God for the setling of Consciences in the private apprehension of them and governing suitable to such the Laws and Canons in each case so made and constituted by them For this end the Apostles and Elders met together and united in Council at Jerusalem and determined concerning things offer'd to Idols and eating of Blood c. Acts 15. so those many subsequent Councils whilst the Empire kept off from the Church as against that Error of the Arabians that the Souls sleep upon the separation Euseb Hist l. 6. c. 37. in that against Novatus Cap. 43. against Paulus Samosetanus l. 7. c. 29. with several others in History transmitted to this purpose was that Body or Collection of Canons bearing the Title of the Apostles Canons upon several occasions made for the use and direction and government of the Christian Incorporation and Society such were the four first general Councils when the Empire became Christian and receiv'd the Church under its wings and protection The first under Constantine held at Nicaea against Arius and asserted the Eternity of the Son of God that he was not a meer Creature The second held at Constantinople under Theodosius the Great against Macedonius and asserted the Eternal divinity of the Holy Ghost who said the third Person was a meer Creature The third was held at Ephesus under Theodosius the lesser against Nestorius who own'd the both Godhead and Manhood of Christ but divided him into two Persons The fourth at Chalcedon under Marcian the Emperor against Eutiches who consounded the two Natures in one Person as Nestorius divided the Persons with others whether Oecumenical or Topical during or succeeding these and whose either Declarations as to what Faith was at first delivered and since received upon a just and traditional enquiry even to the placing some Books into the Canon of Scripture which were not with the earliest admitted or constituted Canons in Church-Polity were still thought obliging to all good and peaceable Christians determined and ended the present debate and only a Compliance was the issue of them and that either to all Christendom or particular Churches suitable as were the Councils either Universal or under single Metropolitans or particular Bishops accordingly did they oblige And this Legislative Power as originally given only to Church-Officers so is it alone residing in them to rule and to govern receive or reject to punish or reward according to such their own Laws as the reason and nature of such the Societies and their Constitution will direct and bear as unhappy Differences and Debates arose they were thus to be decided by the Convention of Councils who either confirmed what they found was well done before or passed farther Sanctions where the occasion was new or upon notoriety of failure in former Declarations For the Power of Councils was never asserted
〈◊〉 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
rather to be hazarded then to comply with and imbody into us any thing that is sinful even to gain a Protection for other instances of Virtue and Duty yet nothing but that which strikes at Religion it self will ingage or be a Warrant to proceed in this extreme utmost way upon him whose alone is the outward Coercive Power and who can weild his Sword at pleasure deny the Church that support countenance and assistance which our Saviour designed Religion should outwardly flourish under be in some respects propagated and preserved by become more notoriously visibâ—e and conspicuous to all Nations And what is said of Excommunication and other Church censures is to be said of Absolution which though a Power enstated alone in the Priesthood by Christ yet is not to be executed in an Arbitrary way and that not only as to the Laws of Christ but the Laws of Kingdoms also in many cases especially where Christian I 'le end this Section and Head of Discourse in the words of our Learned Dr. Hammond in his Book of the Power of the Keys Cap. 1. Sect. 1. The Power of binding and loosing is only an Engine of Christ's invention to make a Battery or impression upon the obdurate Sinner to win him to himself to bless not triumph over him it invades no part of the Civil Judicature nor looses the bonds thereof by these Spiritual Pretences but leaves the Government of the World just in the posture it was before Christ's coming or as it would be supposed to be if he had never left any Keys in his Church § XLV THAT the Church as a Body and Corporation of it self judiciarily determines in Council and lays obligations to Obedience infringes and inrodes no more than her other acts now mentioned if it be declarative of matter of Faith or Duty indispensably as received originally from Christ by Church conveyance the Determination is no more than the first Teaching and Promulgation of it was if it be constitutive of Laws and Canons for setling and enjoyning of Discipline the matter in it self indifferent but limited for present use and service and of which and to which purpose all Humane Laws Ecclesiastical or Civil are made and tend these Church Canons are as in the make and obligation so in the Practice and execution to retain that just regard to known Duties especially those of Allegiance that such the other Church acts and censures do and as already shewed 'T is true the great transcendent regard and reverence the Empire when Christian has had for the institution as from our Saviour for Religion it self in whose defence the Canons were made and for the high Dignity and Office of the Bishops his Commissioners that it still has made antecedent Canons the Rule of all Laws enacted if relating to or but bordering upon affairs Ecclesiastical as instances are already produced quas leges nostrae sequi non dedignantur Novel 83. and to command contra venerabilem Ecclesiam against the venerable Church Nullius est nisi Tyrannidis cujus actus omnes rescinduntur is reputed as the Act of a Tyrant and such Acts are null'd Cod. Justin l. 1. Tit. 2.16 nay farther Canones ubi agitur de re Ecclesiastica jure civili sunt preferendi and if the Canon and Civil Laws those of the Church and the State have happened to be different and in competition in any Ecclesiastical case the Canons have took place and obliged as in that Code and Title Sect. 6. and their general care and industry was mostly for these as the Determinations more immediately for the good of their Souls Novel 137. but this was from the greater Indulgence and Grace of the Christian Emperors and in particular cases and it cannot be supposed that the Church should designedly set up her Bishops and Laws above or in opposition to that Government which the frame of their Religion includes in Subordination to and by Protection of which it was to be propagated and preserv'd but of this we shall have occasion anon to consider farther And if it be reply'd that a Council cannot be convened or meet at all without the Prince's Grant at least his Letters of leave and how then can they have any Autority independent or should they otherwise assemble they are reputed Seditious Disturbers of the Peace and of Majesty and punishable as is the Law imperial 16. Cod. Theodos Tit. 1. l. 3. To this I answer neither can they nor ought they nor did ever any Christian Council otherwise unite in their Persons then by the Grant and Letters Imperial and that censure was just if any did otherwise attempt it But then it is farther to be consider'd that the form essence and force of a Council that which gives a right for Sanctions and invests with Autority Ecclesiastical is not their local personal meeting as in one place there convocated and sitting but a joynt-enquiry and resolution as to the Truth 's debated and concurrency as one man in the Laws enacted upon the true Motives and Reasons of Faith and the Gospel as by Tradition transmitted or in Discipline for Government and Peace useful and which may be done by the Bishops and Clergy dissite and in diverse Countries by their Letters Missive and Communicatory those Literae signatae or systaticae or circular Epistles to one another and which has been done under diverse Circumstances and when the state of the Church was so low and its Capacities not enabling her to do it otherwise as is plain from Church Story and Practice and that this was the course of the Church's 't is more than probable when that debate arose about the keeping of Easter an account of whose Epistles we have appearing to this purpose given us by Eusebius Eccl. Hist l. 5. c. 23. AND lastly that this Church Power is derived § XLVI only from the Church and her Bishops to others in the Succession exclusive to Kings and the Clergy are not in this sense his Ministers he ordains and substitutes them not carries nothing of opposition in the action it self nor any thing in the design than what the Incorporation and Offices themselves imply and which has been hitherto rendred altogether innocent The Leviathan scruples not to say That they all derive their Offices and Power only from the Prince and are but his Ministers in the same manner as Magistrates in Towns Judges in Courts of Justice and Commanders in Armies are and his account why they must be so is because the Government could not be secure upon other terms If the Soveraignity in the Pastor over himself and his People be allow'd of it deprives the Magistrate of the Civil Power and his Peoples dependency would be on such their Doctors both in respect of the opinion they have of their Duty to them and the fear they have of Punishment in another World Part 3. Cap. 42. but this mistake of his has been enough discovered all along in this Treatise and will be more
hereafter and he will suppose no Power to be but what is outwardly Coercive and for his two Reasons he gives they are no less apt and ill placed for that Duty and Obedience Christians are engaged in by St. Paul and suitably owe to their Doctors them that are set over them in the Lord reaches no farther than does their Commission which is only in order to Heaven and fear of Punishment in another World arises in a particular manner from their Rebellion and Disobedience to Princes this is one of the Sins is there to be Punished and for Church-mens being no less subject to Ambition and Ignorance than any other sort of men which he adds for another reason nothing in particular can justly be inferr'd from it because others are equally liable to them and which he does not deny CHAP. V. Chap. 5. The Contents 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. THERE is but one thing now behind that § I seems to me to be considered as requisite for the cleering this Discourse and 't is in the case just now stated As suppose the Canons of the Church and the Laws of the State should really and actually stand in competition that they enjoyn and prohibit the same action at the same time or at least so as the designs of both cannot at once be served and complied with and which is easily to be supposed and must fall out where are two Soveraign independent Powers over one and the same Subjects This Mr. Hobbs aggravates as that Kingdom divided in it self and cannot stand it must necessarily distract a People and expose them to the greatest inconveniences 't is a dividing the Soveraign Power here is a Supremacy against Soveraignty Canons against Laws a Ghostly autority against the Civil two Kingdoms and each Subject to must obey two Masters who both will have the Commands observ'd as Law which is impossible This he places among his other effects of an imperfect institution is reckoned up and urged by him among the Infirmities of a Common-wealth nay more as what is against the Essence of it in the number of those things that weaken and tend to its dissolution Leviathan Part. 2 cap. 29. And all this as objected by Mr. Hobbs is easily answer'd and has been over and over again in this Discourse for it proceeds alone upon that false precarious supposition and pertinaciously resolv'd upon Principle of his and his other Friends above reckoned up as Erastus Selden Salmasius c. which have formerly perplexed the World therewith and still do in their Adherents That there is no Power but what is outwardly cogent upon mens Persons or Estates or Liberties working by sensible force and impressions no other Kingdom but what is of this World unless a Kingdom of Fairies in the dark as Hobbs ridicules it for thus he argues against Bellarmine and concludes his Enquiries all in vain whether the Power of the Pope of Rome ought to be Monarchical Aristocratical or Democratical because all these Powers are Soveraign and Coercive and consequently none of them can belong to him as from Christ Part 3. c. 42. And hence he argues on in the next Section For if the Supreme King have not his Regal Power in this World by what autority can Obedience be required of his Officers with abundance of the same almost every where But yet because there appears some shew of objection in the thing it self and it may fall under some doubt with a less but conscientious considering Person whether it be likely and also consistent with obedience to and the ends of Government that two such Powers both obliging should be erected over one and the same
subject and in what case it will be that they are to obey I shall add farther THAT if this Conclusion be good That § II therefore there ought to be no Church Power nor Laws at all distinct from those of the State because at some one time or other both may stand in competition and the same Action at the same time may fall under an Injunction and Prohibition and these Laws of the Church must of necessary consequence overthrow and over-rule those of the State the same is equally deducible from the Laws of God and Christ immediately given by them or their Messengers the Apostles all which will be as much liable to the same consequence and found some times or other many times to be sure as inconsistent in the particular practice as to what the Secular Power may be necessitated to command The Duties to be performed in the Congregation as Prayer attending the Sacraments c. are what are the appointment of Christ and obliging every Christian and yet in the time of War in order to publick Justice by the very accidents and contingencies of man's life do and must come cross in Mr. Hobb's sense and the Governments dissolution must be also hazarded thereby and 't will be the same where the Gospel-Commands reach the Imperate Acts of the Will as they speak or organical Duties and which require set times and place and motions in the Performance and yet these were Soveraign Laws notwithstanding when actually and in their persons given by Christ and the Apostles then Mr. Hobbs acknowledges them to be such only to be superseded on diverse Considerations not so particularly engaging the Performance at some times and yet still continuing to be obliging as in their several designs and purposes and none do any more And Herod indeed suspected a Dissolution of the Government by it these very Laws of God compared with one another as with those of the Civil Magistrate upon these mens inferences must cease were unduly imposed because they are not at all times by reason of one another practicable and 't is equally impossible to Mourn and to Rejoyce to Fast and to be Hospitable to be upon my knees at Prayer and to be doing Justice on the Bench to obey God and my King in the same Person at one and the same time and in the same Duties as to obey Soveraignty and Supremacy Canons and Laws a Ghostly and a Civil Autority and all or none are on the same account to be placed in opposition If the Objection has any force as Mr. Hobbs thinks it has and lays his full stress against Ecclesiastical Laws upon it And again if whatever is from a due institution and from just autority then looses its Sanction and Nature is to be null'd and to cease if upon other Considerations suspended for some time something more weighty more useful or absolutely necessary may intervene and it is not at that time to be practised and complied with or thus because not always practicable it ought not to be enjoyn'd at all then sundry of God's own Laws must cease to oblige and that for ever or were unjust in their Enactions because obliging to practice only in their due times and circumstances The affirmative Precepts of the Ten Commandments themselves will fail one way or both nor does any pretend in his Expositions on the Decalogue to make but sense of such those Precepts without first laying down that distinction of semper and ad semper presupposing and taking it for a truth that that which is always a Law and of it self obliging does not actually engage to performance at every time has only its proper seasons for practice if then a compromising and adjustment is not allow'd to be made in one instance 't is not in the other and if in any one 't is in all we can as easily reconcile the Laws of the Church in their Practice with the Laws of the State as we can the immediate Laws of God and Christ as we can the Laws of God with one another and thorow Obedience in every respect is equally possible the same humane Prudence and Discretion one and the same but course of things their Natures and Obligations considered will determine and adjust in one as in the other and which not presupposed and made use of in all there will be indeed only justling and thwarting as to all our Obligations and at last 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Universal Dissolution Now in order to this in regard to the Soveraignty and Supremacy Laws and Canons Civil and Ghostly Obedience as 't is phrased and which is at present the particular concern what I have already said in the former Chapter concerning Church Censures Penances Excommunications and the Canons of Councils and their particular Obligations might suffice in general and satisfie any serious inquirer Nothing of this nature is to be of force if shutting out any antecedent immutable known Duty implying Rebellion and Sedition thwarting what is upon any occasional Necessity or appearance of a conveniency commanded by the lawful Civil Power the Church always asserts owns and pleads for Princes and what she enjoyns cannot be believed to be of force or by her intendment if against them But my purpose is to go a little farther in compliance with this present opportunity and to consider the Laws of the Church in the large acceptation as including the Laws of Religion in general whether meerly Humane and Ecclesiastical or more purely and immediately Divine given by Christ and his Apostles in their Persons and Instances whether as to Positive institutions or Moral and in regard to each of which what is the force and autority of a civil Command how far it either suspends or disengageth and I the rather also do it take this latitude because the one when well considered will add light and much contribute to the better understanding of the other especially to the clearing of the point of Ecclesiastical and Civil Power their extent and obligations NOW in order to this Mr. Hobbs himself § III has given us an excellent Key and his Method in general is to be followed by us I 'le here transcribe his words than which nothing can be more apposite But this difficulty of obeying God and the Civil Soveraign on Earth to those that can distinguish betwixt what is necessary and what is not necessary for their reception into the Kingdom of God is of no moment for if the command of the Civil Soveraign be such as that it may be obey'd without the forfeiture of life eternal not to obey is unjust and the Precept of the Apostle takes place Servants obey your Masters in all things and the Precept of our Saviour The Scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses Chair all therefore they shall say observe and do but if the Command be such as cannot be obey'd without being damned to eternal Death then it were madness to obey it and the Council of our Saviour takes
were made Law and establish'd by the Civil â—…veraign and they were to thank God it was no worse and did the King command to adore the Linnen or Font or Tables themselves they are not to gain-say and affront because affronting Laws and Magistracy to pretend to a farther obligation from Conscience and to oppose even a false Religion or to make Proselytes to their own though they be never so sure they are in the right is to be guilty of gross hypocrisie without an extraordinary Commission from God to that purpose they are no more obliged to do it here at home than to go into Spain or Italy or Turkey and there make Converts and which no Protestant holds himself obliged to do Sure I am the Bishops had had more Justice done them than they found in the Sermon and it seems very unequal that they should be supposed to redress and be left wide open to a popular Odium because not doing what never was in their Commission what would have been their gross hypocrisie in attempting because having neither an extraordinary Commission for it nor hath the Providence of God made way by the Permission of the Magistrate and all that can be reply'd is this that Mr. Dean chang'd his Judgment upon the writing his next Sermon which he hath declared to be by Nature mutable and thereby has this advantage is always ready for better information or rather to act the Aecebolius as occasion and to do him all the right I can this is to be said for him that he dissents from Mr. Hobbs something in this very passage of his Sermon for the inference on his side is strong that where extraordinary Commission by Miracles is evidenced a false Religion is to be opposed and the true one to be Preach'd though the Magistracy and Law be otherwise which Mr. Hobs will by no means allow he will not permit it to the Apostles Leviathan Part 3. Cap. 42. but then how Mr. Dean will avoid this Consequence that there is no Church Power on Earth nor is it lawful for any one to Preach the Gospel when it is not Law by the Civil Soveraign since those Miracles which alone were in the Apostles time and which is though less of it every whit as rank Hobbism I have not sagacity enough to see that he desires to do it is not very certain all that can be said for him is that he seems to have been but raw in the Controversie and is ready as all such ought to be to submit upon better Information and to which if these Papers contribute they so far answer the design of the Author BUT whatever either Mr. Hobs or his Adherents § VII have wrote or preached sure we are our Saviour calls for Confession before Men for the owning asserting and publishing his Truths and most of all then and most publickly when mostly opposed with the greatest hazard and jeopardy even before Kings and not to be ashamed when the Kings of the Earth stand up and the Rulers take Council together against us and Christ risen from the Dead is not only to be believed in the Brain and Heart but to be confessed too with the Mouth if Salvation the effect of it as St. Paul tells us 1 Cor. 10. whatever anteceding Law against us or what Power soever enacting 't is our very case now as was St. Peter's in the Acts and we are to obey God and not Man And as sure I am also that this was the Practice of the succeeding Holy Fathers and Professors of the Church in the best Ages of it who still opposed whatever Religion was false by what Law soever established and abetted and still possessed and preached the true in opposition to it with the hazard of whatsoever was merciless from this World could attend them for it Nor was it then thought a Contempt or Affront to the Persons or Laws or Offices of the Civil Magistrate nor was it believed so to be by the Empire it self where satisfaction desired or enquiry made as appears particularly in the days of Trajan who ceased his Persecutions and Jealousies too being well assured that they met before day to Pray and give Thanks to and Praise God and Christ covenanting against Adultery Murder and such like Iniquities 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that they acted nothing at all against the Laws and the Government was not affronted nor endanger'd by it an account of which is to be seen Tertul. Apol. c. 1. and in Eusebius his Church History Lib. 3. c. 33. and not to Profess Christianity was to deny it and nothing but that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that second Baptism as 't is call'd in Sozomen's Church History that initiation or entrance by a new Engagement a thorow Change and severe Repentance could give again a Name or Interest in Christ replace such among the Candidates for Heaven And those that offered at the Heathen shrines at the Command of the Emperor that fell away and disown'd the Faith in the time of Persecution were not received nor had their Libellum Pacis admitted to a Reconciliation and Unity with the Church but upon severest Penance and a larger trial of after-adherency and such were never admitted into Holy Orders to any Charge or Publick Power in the Church or if in Holy Orders before he was deposed for ever of so much blacker a guilt was it not to Preach Christ than not barely only to confess him however Mr. Dean places no Duty at all in it but the quite contrary as appears all along in the Story of those times and the Rules and Canons of the Church made occasionally on such accounts And we have instances in some that when dragg'd to the Idol with Cenfers in their Hands and there forced to offer as it was one of the Devices of the Devil thus outwardly to gain Countenance to his Worship Men of greater Eminency in Christianity being reserv'd for this purpose and whose Examples were more prevailing and apter to perswade being represented as such that had freely offer'd these Christians did not satisfie themselves in their own innocency and that the Church did so repute and receive them but when released openly declared the force in the face of the Magistracy and their greatest Conventions and were again laid hold of for it went immediately to the stake or the Beasts suffer'd Martyrdom for it though the Laws of the Land Prohibited it and the doing of it was Death though indulged by the Church and the present Circumstances indemnified if not done yet all did not perswade when but in shew to the World their Christianity was not own'd and to the appearance of many denied by them they could on no other terms believe themselves Christians nor consequently design to live upon Earth than as on Earth they confessed their Saviour before Men on this account only did they expect that Christ should own them before his Father which is in Heaven And they were only the worst of
Hereticks and of Men which in that Age taught and practised otherwise Simon Magus and his Sect 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He was receiv'd to be the Ring-leader of all Hereticks nor was there any thing so impure which he and his followers did not out-do them in as Eusebius tells us Hist Eccl. lib. 2. c. 14. and particularly he tells us lib. 4. c. 7. that these were the Tenents of Basilides 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that it is indifferent to eat what is offer'd to Idols and deny the Faith in the time of Persecution and suitably I find this account of them in Irenaeus That whatsoever they outwardly committed against the rules of the Gospel was no Sin that they were not saved by their just actions that there was no such thing as Martyrdom and by the Redemption it was so ordered that the Judge had no advantage over them Ed. Fenard Paris l. 1. c. 20. l. 4. c. 64 c. that they were in their own opinion of themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Kingly Royal Priesthood and People in this sense because above all Laws and Rules of good living as St. Clemens Strom. 3. p. 438 439. Ed. Sylburg and no doubt but Mr. Hobs has been very well acquainted with these Men though he may pass for an Original with many of his Wel-wishers IT then appearing that Obedience is due § VIII from a Christian to both God and Man to his Church and his Prince and Religion and Loyalty are what he must Profess and Practice what is the case that the one may and must yield to the other in abate and be suspended for some time and in some distinct Acts and Offices and neither be violated be affronted or contemn'd in the true intent design and purpose of both I do now undertake to give Satisfaction and in order to which we are to range and limit the Laws of Religion under these three general Heads that the Duties in each Branch may the more particularly appear to whoso considers them 1. They are such as are Arbitrary in their Sanction and Enacting without any antecedent Necessity as to the particular instance and might have been these or other but are Humane only and Ecclesiastical constituted and limited by the Bishops and Governors of the Church in their Canons and Rules to that purpose and which together with the decency and aptness and usefulness of the things themselves renders obliging 2. They are such as are equally Arbitrary and without any foregoing Obligation as are the former the reason and force of which depends upon the choice and Autority of the Law-giver but here is the difference these Laws are Divine their Author and Institutor is Christ or such as were immediately inspir'd miraculously and in an extraordinary manner commissioned by him in order to this very thing Such are the Sacraments c. and which might have been other than they now are had he pleased 3. They are such as are no ways Arbitrary in the instance but follow necessarily and naturally upon the supposal and reception of Religion and this whether the Religion be that of Nature immediately flowing from our Natural Relations and dependency to and upon God and one another such are all the Acts of Natural Religion as Faith and Relyance upon God Prayer and Praises and Thanksgivings to him an Imitation and Copying out of his Purity and Holiness Love and Faith and Justice being tender-hearted and affectionate to one another with more of the like nature and to which all Mankind is oblig'd immutably and for ever not by any positive-superadded Law or Injunction but by the force and necessary results of his Creation connate and congenious with mans being and subsistency and the first Notions of Religion Man must fall from his Orb cease his own proper instincts and operations without them or whether the Religion be founded in the Offices of Christ to which he was since deputed of the Father upon Earth as a King Prophet and Priest in order to Man's Redemption and is in part now executed in Heaven to govern teach satisfie and intercede for him and which implies and includes in the first design and purpose whatever Duty and Service is Natural as above and its farther distinct Acts and Obligations are that this Saviour and Redeemer be believed in inwardly and from the Heart and suitably be obey'd and submitted to as is required of us by him and this to be publickly ownâ—d and confessed in each of his Offices even on the Cross it self when in the greatest hazards when call'd before Kings for his Name sake and this so immediately and indispensably every Christian's Duty that not only his Honour and Advantage is placed in it but he must cease to be a Christian without it and his Saviour will not upon others terms own him before his Father which is in Heaven the Religion cannot be where it is not we cannot suppose a Saviour to come in that Nature into the World so to dye and live for us upon other terms 't is all connate with the being and offices of a Redeemer I 'le consider them each in their order 1. THE Laws of Religion are Church § IX Laws Determinations of what are in themselves indifferent so order'd in the course of things as to be the Subject of Laws Ecclesiastical for the present Power to enact and repeal limit or enlarge suspend or execute as occasion and circumstances direct and urge and tend to the more decent and uniform apt and suitable Performance of what is in an higher order of Duty and farther degree of Necessity and to which there is no antecedent fixed Rule given nor can the most Lesbian rule of what Latitude or how comprehensive soever be so at once contrived and made upon the greatest foresight of the Law-giver as to be so fitted for and answer each Case that offers or Circumstance that may happen to fall in of it self and comply with the present accident and then if no present Power to oblige and over-rule only disorder and confusion in the Church will be the consequent Now these Laws though in themselves obliging and each Christian as a Member of that Society stands immediately engag'd unto them nor can any other Foreign Power repeal or null them as to their Sanction yet there may be there is to be a Cessation as to Practice under some Cases and Circumstances and the particular local Performance may be superseded at present or suspended for the future nor do the terms for Heaven consist in the forbearance or shut out of the Church-Society because of it little Accidents and Contingencies not to be foreseen nor prevented will oft obstruct and become lawful Impediments and much more where the Civil Power comes thwarting upon us and renders Church Laws impracticable a Secular inhibition upon Penalties and Inconveniencies which tend to the greater Damage of our common Christianity if incurr'd and to the silencing and abating from Duties of a higher concern
where the Prince has made Edicts inconsistent with their Practice and in whom the Church does acknowledge the Advantages of the World to be seated and which declares him to be Supreme over all Persons in all Causes Actions and Performances whatsoever Abatements then as to Practice there may there must be where that Common-wealth overbears out of which the Church cannot be or subsist where Necessity and Accidents prevent and obstruct even many times in order to Union and Uniformity that first Zeal of the Asiaticks afterwards abated about the time of keeping Easter and which they accounted not a thing necessary as succeeding Practice has declar'd and mostly when Religion may be in hazard otherwise these as they are of an after-Institution so must they yield in place to that which is antecedently God's Worship and in order to which alone they are acceptable Julian the Apostate among other Diabolical Stratagems and Infernal Devices he had for overthrowing and erasing Christianity Hist Tripart l. 6. c. 29. had this for one he instructed and adorned the Heathen Worship in all the Forms and Rites and Customs with every Order and Habit that was in use among Christians in their Worship hereby believing to gain from them a value upon his Idol Services to flatter and cheat the Christians into a compliance with and entertainment of them but this work'd not all upon the most holy Bishops and Confessors of the Age the outward form was reputed nothing if not leading to that within the Veil nor did one way of Worship at all prevail if so be without if engaging to deny that one Lord one Faith one Baptism one God and Father of all the Ceremonial part never had any other estimate than in order to the more Substantial and 't was in course that the Veil was rent at our Saviour's Passion when the Oracle was gone and that Worship to be no more and should it so fall out that what is in it self so advantageous to the true Worship be allow'd but upon severer terms and inconsistent with our Christian Profession as it was by Julian or the Carved or Polished works of the Temple only be beaten down and which is now so much contended for by those among us that own one Lord one Faith one Baptism one God and Father of all and which Julian did not do in the former case we are altogether to refuse in the latter we are to submit to the force and God must be served by us as he was by the Children of Israel for some time in the Brick Kilns and in the Wilderness and all along till the Temple was built by Solomon with allays and abatements as to what was better what their Lord God had chose and was otherways laid and design'd by him Persons and things in the ordinary course retarding and obstructing and which the Wisdom of God thought not convenient by an extraordinary Power to over-rule and prevent for the more speedy accomplishment BUT then on the other side to be so unequal § XI and uneven so rash and precipitant so heady and unfixed in the solemner Duties of Worship and higher Performances to God Almighty as to hold to no Rules and Orders in the discharge to innovate and change in the Forms and Ways and Expressions as we do in our Cloths as is usual in the shapes and modes of our Apparel another manner of Spirit sure becomes a Christian these are not befitting those goings of the Sanctuary nor are they like unto them as they were of old it argues every thing in the worshipper that can render the Worship it self little and mean and low in his conceit and apprehensions nothing can more abate of it and make it cheap in the Eyes of others or appear less revering and becoming that God that is worshipped this still brings Neglect and Contempt in any case and upon what Persons or Performances soever and much more in those that are religious and terminate in God where none can be supposed as discharged but upon the deepest Considerations the best weighed Reasons the highest Prudence and a thorow apprehension of the decency significancy exact proportion and every ways usefulness and advantage of it and what evil Consequences have hereby reach'd Religion it self too sensible Experience makes evident and since our innovating and quarrelling about the Modes and Circumstances of the higher Performance in Religion how has Religion it self been scorned and the most solemn Performances neglected disused and even ceased as at this day in our Land And as to our particular Church of England her Rites and Ceremonies when I hear and read them reported in Publick to be the best Model and Constitution the Christian World affords that she has even slit the Hair in each instance Order and Canon Rubrick and Injunction and is answering to every end of Piety and Devotion in the Worshipper of reverence and regard to God that is worshipped and full of Helps and Advantages all along in order to a suitable discharge of each When I hear her Wisdom and Prudence thorow and weightiest Considerations in the composing of each so exalted and extoll'd as is very usual both in Discourse and from the Press and yet again in the very next Breath or Page Proposals made for comprehension and compromisements as is frequent also for Repeals or Abatements of what is thus Prudent and Discreet Honorable and Beneficial every ways apt and significant and then to supersede this most holy Worship in so useful a way perform'd or which is worse to alienate it give it up for a Sacrifice to be burnt offer'd up and devoted to strange Gods the private Designs and perverser Enmities the Lusts and Passions and peevish interests of a never-satisfied Faction and Party among us such as have still turn'd the World upside down wherever having Rule and now attempt it in the ways of God's Worship among us and whose Spleen seems to swell and be fixed among us as did theirs of the City of Rome heathen against God himself Civitas Romana omnes omnium gentium Deos colebant praeterquam Judeorum Deum Arnob. Adv. Gent. l. 1. which worshipp'd all the Gods of the Gentiles only they receiv'd not the God of the Jews every thing is complied with but that which is thus by Law establish'd among us This I say is what I dare scarce trust to my Ears in when giving the conveyance I am rather apt to suspect an Indisposition in the Organ that the words are distorted and come cross to the design of the Speaker and seeing I can hardly believe I see it I still suspect either the Medium is undue the Optick is weak or 't is by a false Gloss by some one or more Errors in the conveyance whatever it is represented unto me And however I might be over-born by that Power which as a Christian I am not commissioned to resist and so may not escape the force and the worship must cease in Publick yet
I would as soon cut out my Tongue as speak or cut off my Hands as subscribe for the abolishing or ceasing of it and that upon any other terms than the omitting God's Worship altogether or that my Religion it self is not retainable with it He that values God's Worship it self must in a due Proportion value that which comes so near to it or at least he apprehends so to do which is so congruous so decent and so advantageous to and in the Performance of it And as my Religion in general is to be preferr'd before all things so is that which seems most apt and best answering with and proportion'd to its discharge to be next in my thoughts and designs to retain and continue and in the next degree would I become its Advocate These Proposals then of Moderation and from these Persons break and are inconsistent in themselves there is a repugnancy in the terms and then surely not allowable with a thorow considering Person If I believe the Service Book in the Church of England the best and aptest Instrument of God's Publick Worship I am no more to forego and give it over than I can satisfie my self that the Blind and the Lame and wither'd in the Flock was acceptable to God of old then I may devote my Body to his Service under the Gospel and leave out the best Member of it that I have or give but half of my self unto him and the worser part too my Body without my Spirit the life and soul of it The Controversie about the precise Day on which Easter was to be kept was high amongst the ancient Bishops and yet the more considering of them all the while counted for it in the order of those things which in their first Nature are indifferent and it might be kept on this day or on that no peremptory fixation of God's supervening nor does indeed the limiting and fixing it to any time conduce so much to the ends of Devotion and the Service and Honour of God as many other instances now under debate do only Victor Bishop of Rome incited whether by Zeal or Ambition went too high limiting Church Communion to one set time for the observancy and did to be sure threaten Non-Communion with the Asiaticks upon their dissent from the Western Churches in it but yet the first indifferency and original immutability of the thing it self was not concluded by them a ground sufficient to lay aside or alter that Custom when whatever it was in the Bishop of Rome because below an antecedent Command in the Gospel whether Zeal or Ambition demanded it none farther from imposing on other Churches what was the alone particular Practice of their own or from censuring what was differing from them and none again more strenuous in defending and maintaining their own way and time they did not recede from what so great and contiguous a tradition of most holy Bishops and Autority even Apostolical had devolved they had immediately receiv'd from and transmitted to one another and all along in an unalterable Practice upheld and maintain'd and recommended and Rome's Universal Power had not then gain'd so much in the Church as to over-rule and constrain them all which is to be seen at large in the account given of it by Eusebius Hist lib. 5. cap. 23 24. I do not say that Apostolical Practice it § XII self in the like instances is immutable and always obliging for the present case of keeping Easter contradicts Apostolical Practice was on both sides and several other Actions and Synodical Determinations by the Apostles do not now oblige Christendom being occasional Decisions and Canons But this I say where the concern is not only the same but higher as in the Publick Service of God in our Church and which more neerly relates to God in his Worship and with equal heat its abolishment is endeavour'd as was the time of keeping Easter after the manner of the Jews by the Bishop of Rome when equally bottom'd on the same both Autority and Antiquity even to Apostolical for so the Asiaticks pleaded the Autority of St. Philip and St. John and the Malice and Industry of our Opposers cannot gainsay us I 'le add where every thing concurs to the procuring Reverence Piety and Devotion and in which case Calvin himself contends for Ceremonies in the Church of Christ when Christ is so illustrated by them Ergonè inquies nihil Ceremoniarum debitur ad juvandam â—orum imperitiam id ego non dico omnino enim utile illis esse sentio id modo contendo ut modus ille adhibeatur qui Christum illusâ—ret non obscuret Institut l. 4. c. 10. Sect. 14. and for us to abate of these Rites to change or lay aside our either times or ways of Worship because perhaps a Neighbouring Church is differing and requires or perhaps and which is worse demands it of us as the Church of Rome did of the Church of Asia this hath no Precedent of Example no rule of Religion to enforce us to submit to or comply with we have a President of as famous Apostolical a Church as the Primitive Story acquaints us with that is against it and that Church which so urges and requires of us savours too much of the present Usurpations of Rome not improbably first attempted in Victor their once Bishop § XIII AND much less is that Church to submit when the unruliness and disobedience of her own Members attempt the alteration when private Pets and open Ambition in order to engrossing Superiority and Rule in themselves stimulate thereunto as in our late pretended Reformations and which is at this day only without Arms but with the same virulency of Spirit carried on in our Streets when at the best the Infirmities but raâ—her the impetuousness and madness of the People promotes it this no reason can indure and yet it is the great and popular Plea for the nulling our Laws Ecclesiastical now among us when the rule bends to the obliquity the right Line warps and complies with that which is crooked both become disorder'd and perverse together and which is the misery of all no standard supposed to remain to reduce them When the Laws of the Church submit to that Extravagancy they are design'd to prevent or remedy and the only reason why they are to be no more is because every Man may and must do what seemeth him good in his own eyes their Will and Lusts and Passions must reign and give Laws this is the height of Anarchy and Confusion or farther and for which there is something more of shew and pretence because Pity may be a Motive to give up all to the weak and infirm that is to those of the least understanding and discernment for St. Paul has no other sense of a weak Brother or a weak Conscience then that which is more ignorant what is this but to place the Discretion and Government of the Church in the hands of Ideots and half
good Christian who is also a good Subject is to abate of what Duties and Performances he in some instances immediately owes to Religion and his Saviour in obedience to those Secular injunctions to which if not engaged to submit the Government cannot subsist and be managed as in these particular instances did a pretence to or the actual present exercise in religious Worship exempt and disingage Every one is born a Subject owes a duty to his Prince and the Government as soon as he is indebted for his Being to his Maker and an after-dedication of my Person by holy Orders does not cancel that first dependency my Saviour himself hither all along had his regard and he laid his Religion in relation to it and when in the Pulpit or which is more at the Altar in the midst of my Office am I to give up my Person to that Civil Power by my Christianity supposed and by the same God placed over me The severer Rules and Laws of the Sabbath were to give place to the saving the life of a Man in the design of Moses as our Saviour expounds him to the Pharisees and much more for the support of Kingdoms and Communities and so in all other Instances of this sort of Holiness called Relative and which is good only from the institution and positive appointment and no greater more notorious Cheats than those in Ordine ad Deum that manage and abet Disobedience by a Charter from Religion 't is that very Corban in the Gospel so severely chastised by Christ the saying it is a gift and robbing my Father and Mother That absence from Divine Service or religious Worship which is in it self a sin upon a single instance of Charity for the advantage and relief of the neighbour-hood and then surely of a whole Community is a duty on this score Christians fight their Battels on the Lord's-day the very Ass is to be pulled out of the Pit and how the reasons and ends of Government for its better managâ—ry and conservation did stiil over-rule in the Christian Church in each of these like religious Performances in the best and most flourishing Times of it and the Empire when Christian gave Laws Directions and Limitations as to the Collectae and Publick Assemblies in Ordinations Excommunications Absolutions c. for the more orderly administration of the Civil Affairs is already shew'd in this discourse and yet the things themselves are immediately from Christ that power is not from the Prince which warrants and makes effectual the Institutions and Offices of each of them AND if it be replied that this seems § XV to come too near to what the design of this discourse is laid against or to be sure was the occasion of it If the Magistrate and the Law are to silence and limit in the exercise and profession of these higher Instances of Christianity what is this less than to submit my Religion to their pleasure To which I answer the case is not at all the same this is only adjusting of Duties in order to a due performance a suspension upon a higher reason and duty intervening and both which are equally Christian or at the most a but concealing some truths upon present reasons and motives and which every one allows may be done Should the Prince command me not to say my Prayers at all as he did Daniel to preach or speak no more in Christ's Name as the Sanedrim did the Apostles that Ordinations and Censures be no more Church both Officers and Offices cease for ever or which is the case in Mr. Dean's Sermon should a false Religion be commanded in their rooms and be made the Religion of the Nation this is the case in which I am to speak before Kings and not be ashamed when my life is in my hand as 't is the expression of holy David with a great many more to that purpose in the hundred and nineteenth Psalm then I am not only to exercise what is my duty as a private Christian but to make what open Proselytes I can to that Religion which I am sure is in the right to draw off all I can from that which is false and imposed by the Magistrate and Law This is that confession with the Mouth call'd for all along in the sacred Epistles Confession at Matyrdome that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in St. Clemens Strom. l. 4. p. 503. an eminent way to gain Mercy for our sins and 't is call'd by the Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 § XI perfection as he there tells us pag. 480. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the highest act of Charity the greatest demonstration of love when expressed to Souls in the profession of a right and rescuing from a false Religion at so great a distance was it set from gross hypocrisie and which Mr. Dean demonstrates to be such in the next Paragraph of the Sermon I 'le go on so far with his Worship and Consent that where neither Miracles to justifie the extraordinary Commission as had the Apostles nor the providence of God makes way by the permission of the Magistrate the Proselytes are very like to be few and since the former is ceased altogether and never to be more expected the countenance and protection of the latter is what usual course and common Prudence directs to wait for upon any attempt for converting and reducing of Nations from a false Worship I find the Proposal and the Complaint recited and made both at once by our learned Doctor Hammond Serm. 10. in Joh. 7.48 Vol. 2. I 'le here use his own Words If we should plant Christianity in Turkey we must first invade and conquer them and then convince them of their Follies which about an hundred years ago Cleonard proposed to most Courts in Christendom and to that end himself studied Arabick that Princes would join their strength and Scholars their brains and all surprize them in their own Land and Language at once besiege the Turk and his Alcoran put him to the Sword and his Religion to the touch-stone first command him to Christianity with an high hand and then to shew him the reasonableness of the Command Thus also we may complain but not wonder that the reformation gets ground so slow in Christendom because the Forces and potent Abetters of Papacy secure them from being led captive to Christ as long as the Pope is invested so fast in his Chair and as long as the Rulers take part with him there shall be no doubt of the truth of their Religion unless it please God to back Arguments with steel and to raise up Kings and Emperors to be our Champions we may question but never confute his Supremacy Let us come with all the power and rhetorick of Paul and Barnabas all the demonstrations and reasons of the Spirit and yet as long as they have such Topicks against us as the autority of the Rulers and Pharisees we may dispute out our hearts and preach out our Lungs
Laws for them to be left off God hath appointed his Laws wherein his Pleasure is to be honoured His Pleasure is also That all mens Laws not being contrary unto his Laws shall be obeyed and kept as good and necessary for every Common-wealth but not as things wherein principally his honour resteth and all Civil and Mans Laws either be or should be made to bring Men better to keep God's Laws that consequently or followingly God should be the better honoured by them Part 2. Of the Sermon of the right Vse of the Church And according to this Example of our Saviour in the Primitive Church whipping the Buyers and Sellers out of the Temple which was most Holy and Godly and in the which due Discipline with severity was used against the wicked open Offenders were not suffered once to enter into the House of the Lord nor admitted to Common Prayer and the Use of the Holy Sacraments with other true Christians until they had done open Penance before the whole Church and this was practised not only upon mean Persons but also upon the Rich Noble and Mighty Persons Yea upon Theodosius that Puissant and Mighty Emperor whom for committing a grievous and wilful Murder St. Ambrose Bishop of Millain reproved sharply and 't is in the Margin he was only dehorted from receiving the Sacrament until by Repentance he might be better prepared Chrysost did also Excommunicate the said Emperor and brought him to open Penance and they that were so justly exempted and banish'd as it were from the House of the Lord were taken as they be indeed for Men divided and separated from Christ's Church and in most dangerous estate yea as St. Paul saith even given unto Sathan the Devil for a time and their company was shunn'd and avoided of all Godly Men and Women until such time as they by Repentance and publick Penance were reconciled Part 2. Of the Homily of Fasting It is necessary that we make a difference between the Policies of Princes made for the ordering of their Common-weals in provision of things serving to the most sure defence of their Subjects and Countries and between Ecclesiastical Policies in prescribing such Works by which as by secondary means God's Wrath may be pacified and his Mercy purchased An instance of the one is in enjoyning Abstinence from Flesh for the increase of Victuals and the better sustenance of the Poor and the furniture of the Navy the forbearing some piece of licentious Appetite upon the Ordinance of the Prince with the consent of the Wise of the Realm An instance of the other is prescribing a form of Fasting to humble our selves in the sight of Almighty God and which binds the Conscience as to time and occasion and other Circumstances as the Church requires and which has Power to enjoyn or relax as is to be seen in the Homily Each Law of the Kingdom relating to Religion which still suppose whatever is taught and reported enacted and made Law receiv'd and submitted to maintain'd and protested as the Establishments of our Church and State to be bottomed on the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament and what the Catholick Fathers and ancient Bishops have thence Collected particularly in the four first General Councils or any other General Council 10 Elizabethae Cap. 1. Sect. 36. Nor does our Reformation commence upon any other Grounds than a supposed depravation and defection as to such that first depositum those Rules and Practices depending and with a purpose to restore and reinforce them and did I believe our Church of England not to have followed this Rule did I find her any wayes but swerving from and much rather then if running cross to any one or more of those Primitive Standards designedly erected for the Pillars of Truth the constant Marks and Copies for the practice and adherency of future Ages always obliging for all Church Laws and Practice are not so even of the most Primitive Church even the Laws and Practice Apostolical I would be so far from abetting or closing with such her Autority and Actions that I would immediately go over to and embrace the Rule wherever or if any where to be found in the Isle of Patmos with St. John or in the Cave with Holy Athanasius as not Magistracy and Law so not the Reformed Church of England should be my either fear or obligation to the contrary be the crosser Circumstances whatsoever or wheresoever that attend me could I not joyn with a present visible Church or Body of Believers in the Enjoyment and Profession of it This is only that which as my own Satisfaction so I endeavour to make it others that as Born and Baptized in the Church of England and still in Union with her and my self in particular as a Presbyter there have subscribed to her Articles Canons and Constitutions so 't is to and in that Church which is every ways Primitive and Apostolical and particularly in this instance of Church-Power and that it is so is easily and readily to be demonstrated and which I shall endeavour to do Methodo Synthetica as they speak as it lies in the course of things and actions 1. In the Judgment and by the Determinations of our Church in her conciliary Acts Articles Canons Rubricks in her Book of Ordination c. 2. By the publick Acts and Determinations of the Prince both in Parliament and out of it in his Statutes Injunctions and Proclamations making Law these Antecedent Church Determinations and Autorities preceding 3. From our own particular Doctors in their several Tracts and Writings § III THAT this Power is not any ways supposeable in the People in our Church or Kingdom 't is clear in the form of ordering Deacons and Priests and which is made Law in the Realm where all that the Bishop addresses himself to the People for is this Whether as supposed to be more conversant with them they know any notable Crime they are guilty of and which may render them unfit for the said Holy Function the words of the Bishop are these Brethren if there be any among you that know any Impediment or notable Crime in any of these Persons for which he ought not to be admitted into this Holy Ministry let him come forth in the Name of God and shew what the Crime and Impediment is The People are no more concern'd in Ordinations then as Testimonies of the manners of those who are to be Ordain'd and in which alone they were concern'd of old and in the Articles and Constitutions taking care that fit Men he admitted to Holy Orders what relates to the People and they are to be enquired of is a Testimony of their Conversations and if the Bishop lay hands on suddenly and without due Enquiry and competent Satisfaction and the Person ordained prove unworthy the Orders notwithstanding are valid the Penalty is laid on the Bishop he is to be suspended and to ordain no more for two years Articuli pro clero 1584.
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
in the Objection the several Acts are these That no one Canon of the Church have the force of a Law but what is appointed by such Inspector of the Canons as he shall name and appoint That no Appeals be made to Rome upon the Penalty and Danger contained and limited in the Act of Provision and Premunire made in the 16th year of King Richard II. That all the Canons not repugnant to the Laws of the Realm or to the Damage of the King's Prerogative Royal are to be used and executed as they were before the making this Act. That no license is to be required from the See of Rome for the Consecrating and Investiture of Bishops That 't is in the King alone to nominate and present them That the Pope has no Power in Spiritual Causes to give Licenses Dispensations Faculties Grants c. all this is to be done at home by our own Bishops and in our own Synods and Councils cap. 21. and this Provision is particularly made Sect. 19. ibid. provided that this Act or any thing or things herein contained shall be hereafter interpreted or expounded that your Grace your Nobles and Subjects intend by the same to decline or vary from the Congregation of Christ's Church in any thing concerning the very Articles of the Catholick Faith of Christendom or in any other things declared in Holy Scripture and the Word of God necessary for yours and their Salvation but only to make an Ordinance by Policies necessary and convenient to repress Vice And for good conservation of this Realm in Peace Vnity and Tranquility from Ravine and Spoyl insuing much the old ancient Customes of this Realm in that behalf not minding to seek for any Relief Succor or Remedies for any worldly things and humane Laws in any case of necessity but within this Realm at the hands of your Highness your Heirs and Successors Kings of this Realm which have and ought to have an Imperial Power and Autority in the same and not obliged in any worldly Causes to any Superior § VII IN the 26th year of his Reign cap. 1. when declared Supreme Head of the Church of England in Parliament as before recognized by the Clergy the Power he thereby is invested with is also declared viz. To visit redress reform order correct restrain and amend all such Errors Heresies Abuses Offences Contempts and Enormities whatsoever they be which by any manner of spiritual Autority or Jurisdiction ought or may lawfully be reformed repressed order'd redressed corrected restrained or amended most to the pleasure of Almighty God the increase of Virtue in Christ's Religion and for the conservation of Vnity Peace and Tranquility of this Realm cap. 14. he appoints the number of suffragan Bishops the Places of their residence and the Arch-Bishop is to consecrate them In the 28th year of his Reign cap. 10. The King may nominate such number of Bishops Sees for Bishops Cathedral Churches and endow them with such Possessions as he will In the 31th year cap. 14. he defends the Doctrine of Transubstantiation the Sacrament in but one kind enacts that all Hereticks be burnt and their Goods forfeited that no Priest may marry for Masses Auricular Confession c. in the 34 5. cap. 1. recourse must be had to the Catholick Apostolick Church for the decision of Controversies And therefore all Books of the Old and New Testament in English being of Tindal 's false Translation or comprising any matter of Christian Religion Articles of the Faith or Holy Scripture contrary to the Doctrine set forth sithence Anno Domini 1540. or to be set forth by the King shall be abolished no Printer or Book-seller shall utter any of the said Books no Persons shall play or interlude sing or rhime contrary to the said Doctrine no Person shall retain any English Books or Writings concerning Matter against the holy and blessed Sacrament of the Altar or for the maintenance of the Anabaptists or other Books abolished by the King's Proclamation There shall be no Annotations or Preambles in Bibles or new Testaments in English the Bible shall not be read in English in any Church no Women c. to read the New Testament in English nothing shall be taught contrary to the Kings Injunctions and if any spiritual Person preach teach or maintain any thing contrary to the King's Instructions or Determinations made or to be made and shall thereof be convict he shall for his first Offence recant for his second abjure and bear a fagot for the third he shall be adjudged an Heretick and be burnt and loose all his Goods and Chattels In the 37. year cap. 17. The full Power and Autority he hath by being Supreme Head of the Church of England is To correct punish and repress all manner of Heresies Errors Vices Sins Abuses Idolatries Hypocrises and Superstitions sprung and growing within the same and to exercise all other manner of Jurisdiction called Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction Sect. 1. and Sect. 3. 'tis farther added To whom by Holy Scriptures all Authority and Power is wholly given to hear and determine all manner of Causes Ecclesiastical and to correct Vice and Sin whatsoever and to all such Persons as his Majesty shall appoint thereunto And so far is all this from deriving to himself and exercising any thing of the Priest-hood that he is totidem verbis declared and reputed only a Lay-Man in the first Section of that Chapter nor do any one of these Instances here produced amount to any more than to the defending and guarding by Laws Truth and punishing and repressing Errors whether in Doctrines or in Manners at least such as are so reputed by the Church and State § VIII 'T IS true and easily observable that just upon the assuming to himself the Title of the supreme Head of the Church there was ground enough for suspition that the Church her self and all her Power was to be laid aside and whereas the reason and end of every particular Parliament before and of each of his till then is still said to be for the honor of God and holy Church and for the Common-Weale and Profit of this Realm 't is abated and said only for the honor of God and for the Common-Weale and Profit of this Realm the benefit of holy Church is in words at least left out and in the room of it is once added to the conservation of the true Doctrine of Christ's Religion As if the design was according to the Models now adayes framed and endeavour'd by private Persons to be set up That the care was to be only of Doctrines in which and in charity and love and abatements to one another the Essence of Church-Unity in general and each Christian with another consists But yet however this so hapned or upon what design either in himself or others 't is certain he abridged not the Church-Men of any one Instance of that Secular worldly Power as that of the supremacie derived unto them is called 25
Christian when he refused to give up his Church to the Arians denied the Emperor's power over truth and to determine in Doctrines The Emperor might force him out if he pleased neither might he resist the force his Weapons being only Prayers and Tears but the truth must not yield up to him and he give his consent or seem to do it by his own departure that the Arian Doctrine be there preached this was not then thought an Affront to the Magistrate and Law nor had St. Ambrose a Commission immediate from Heaven and abetted with Miracles or was he judged a hypocrite in so doing because he did not go and preach the Cause against Arius amongst the Goths and Vandals who subscribed to his Creed at their receiving Christianity though Mr. Dean of Canterbury tells us he that pleads Conscience and preaches it in England and does not go and preach it also in Turkey is guilty of gross hypocrisie pag. 203 213. We do not make them Judges and Deciders of Truth but Receivers and Establishers of it we say Princes be only Governors that is higher Powers ordain'd of God and bearing the Sword with lawful and publick Autority to command for truth to prohibit and with the Sword punish Errors and all other Ecclesiastical Disorders as well as Temporal within their Realms that as all their Subjects Bishops and others must obey them commanding what is good in Matters of Religion and endure them with patience when they take part with Error So they their Swords and Scopters be not subject to the Popes Tribunal neither hath he by the Law of God or by the Canons of the Church any Power or Pre-eminence to reverse their Doings nor depose their Persons and for this Cause we confess Princes within their Territories to be supreme that is not under the Popes jurisdiction neither to be commanded nor displaced at his pleasure pag. 215 216. There be two Parts of our Assertion The first avouching that Princes may command for Truth and abolish Error The next that Princes be Supreme i. e. not subject to the Popes judicial Process to be cited suspended deposed at his beck The Word Supreme ever was and is defended by us to make Princes free from the wrongful and usurped Jurisdiction which the Pope claimeth over them pag. 217. 219. Bishops have their Autority to preach and administer the Sacraments not from the Prince but Christ himself only the Prince giveth them publick liberty without let or disturbance to do what Christ hath commanded them he no more conferreth that Power and Function than he conferreth Life and Breath when he permitteth to live and breath when he does not destroy the life of his Subjects That Princes may prescribe what Faith they list what Service of God they please what form of Administring the Sacraments they think best is no part of our thoughts nor point of our Doctrine for external Power and Autority to compel and punish which is the Point we stand upon God hath preferr'd the Prince before the Priest pag. 223. touching the Regiment of their own Persons and Lives Princes owe the very same Reverence and Obedience to the Word and Sacraments that every private Man doth and if any Prince would be baptized or approach the Lord's Table with manifest shew of unbelief or irrepentance the Minister is bound freely to speak or rather to lay down his life at the Princes feet than to let the King of Kings to be provoked the Mysteries to be defiled his own Soul and the Princes endanger'd for lack of oft and earnest Admonition pag. 226. by Governors we do not mean Moderators Prescribers Directors Inventers or Authors of these things but Rulers or Magistrates bearing the Sword to permit and defend that which Christ himself first appointed and ordained and with lawful force to disturb the Despisers of his lawful Will and Testament Now what inconvenience is this if we say that Princes as publick Magistrates may give freedom protection and assistance to the preaching of the Word ministring of the Sacraments and right using of the Keys and not fetch license from Rome pag. 236. Princes have no right to call and confirm Preachers but to receive such as be sent of God and give them liberty for their preaching and security for their Persons and if Princes refuse so to do God's Labourers must go forward with that which is commanded them from Heaven not by disturbing Princes from their Thrones nor invading their Realms but by mildly submitting themselves to the Powers on Earth and meekly suffering for the defence of the truth what they shall inflict A private liberty and exercise of their own Conscience and Religion was not then thought enough if the Religion of a Nation be false and though autority do abet it nor would the Autority in Queen Elizabeth's days have own'd that Person asserting and maintaining of it though not stubbornly irreligious but only wanting information in so notoriously a known case of practice pag. 238. In all spiritual Things and Causes Princes only bear the Sword i. e. have publick Autority to receive establish and defend all Points and Parts of Christian Doctrine and Discipline within their Realms and without their help tho the Faith and Canons of Christ's Church may be privately professed and observed of such as be willing yet they cannot be generally planted or settled in any Kingdom nor urged by publick Laws and external Punishments on such as refuse but by their consents that bear the Sword This is that we say refel it if you can pag. 252. to devise new Rites and Ceremonies for the Church is not the Princes vocation but to receive and allow such as the Scripture and Canons commend and such as the Bishops and Pastors on the Place shall advise not infringing the Scripture or Canons and so for all other Ecclesiastical Things and Causes Princes be neither the Devisers nor Directors of them but the Confirmers and Establishers of that which is good and Displacers and Revengers of that which is Evil which power we say they have in all things be they Spiritual Ecclesiastical or Temporal the Abuse of Excommunication in the Priest and contempt of it in the People Princes may punish excommunicate they may not for so much of the Keys are no part of their Charge pag. 256. The Prince is in Ecclesiastical Discipline to receive and stablish such Rules and Orders as the Scripture and Canons shall decide to be needful and healthful for the Church of God in their Kingdoms It is the Objection indeed and undue consequence the Church of Rome makes against us and the Oath of Supremacy and which is urged by Philander in this Dialogue betwixt him and Theophilus or betwixt the Christian and the Jesuite pag. 124 125. That we will have our Faith and Salvation to hang on the Princes Will and Laws that there can be imagined no nearer way to Religion than to believe what our temporal Lord and Master list in the
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
or to attrectate any thing which is meerly of the Sacerdotal Power as are Leiturgies Sermons the Keys and Sacraments Kings six the Ark in its place those afterwards touch it whose care it is by the receiving the Office of their Ministry and though Solomon's dedication of the Temple implyes something extraordinary yet he denies it to reach to any thing in the Temple which is Sacerdotal sed neque in iis quae sunt pontisicalis muneris regi jus facimus We give the King a right to do no Office which is the Priests semel autem habe sententiam nostram it is a thing so often said by our Doctors that he is a weary ita coccyzare of the Cuckow tone and speaking it so over and over again nos non regi potestatem tribuimus quam habere voluit Osias solam illam quam Josias habuit we do not give to our King the Power of Osias as Tortus says we do but the Power alone of Josias all this and more is to be seen in Tortura Torti from pag. 363 to pag. 370. nor is there any thing more on his side in the responsio ad Bellarminum cap. 1. and to these he refers the Reader so shameless is he in his Quotations and he must first slatter himself into a belief that the pointing of his finger from the Margin is direction and autority enough and supersedes all farther Inquiry Nor is he less disingenuous in his dealings with the Bishop when he there says that he corrected Grotius de sum Potest in Sacr. c. for the Press when Andrews over-rul'd him that he printed it not and it was at last but a posthumous Work So that unless Arch-Bishop Whitgift be an Erastian because Mr. Selden once in his Library at Lambeth saw Erastus's Works neatly bound up in yellow Leather with this Motto in Gold upon the out-side of it Intus quam extra formosior as he tells us and 't is his chief Argument de Syned lib. 1. cap. 10. pag. 437. he is like to go without a Doctor in the Church of England on his side for ought I know or as he knew either for he seldom misses a Name that bears but the likelyhood of an Autority hav ' y' any Work for a Cooper I remember makes it the serious part of that scandalous Libel to upbraid our Church and Church-men that the Prince makes them Bishops and Presbyters and their Religion is what the worldly Power pleases with a deal of stuff to that purpose I know not now where that Pamphlet is and 't is not worth searching after though the Author might be a Doctor for ought I know I am only sure he was not a Doctor of our Church Or unless the Lord Falkland turned Doctor as he might deserve it by the larger Character Mr. Dean of Canterbury gives of him joyn'd with Mr. Chillingworth as I remember in the Preface to his first Book of Sermons and then Mr. Selden is secure of one of his side and we of an adversary from within our selves though he impleads us in a different way owns it for our Judgment and states it very well abating some malicious Terms and ranks it among those abundance more Grievances of the Nation and the placing this together with those other is as great an honor he could have done us that we have evidently labour'd to bring in an English though not a Roman Popery equally absolute a blind obedience of the People upon the Clergy and the Clergy upon themselves and inveighs against them altogether according to the then zealous and modish way in that very ill Speech of his to the House of Commons 1641. I 'le repeat part of it as I find it transcribed and printed by a very good friend of his and one that seems to honor him as much as Doctor Tillotson does Mr. Speaker he is a great stranger in Israel who knows not that this Kingdom hath long laboured under many and great Oppressions both in Religion and Liberty and his Acquaintance here is not great or his Ingenuity less who doth not know and acknowledg that a great if not a principal Cause of both these hath been some Bishops and their Adherents Mr. Speaker a little will serve to find them to have been the destruction of Unity under pretence of Uniformity to have brought in Superstition and Scandal under the Titles of Reverence and Decency to have defiled our Churches to have slackned the stictness of that Union which was formerly betwixt us and those of our Religion beyond the Sea an Action as unpolitick as ungodly As Sir Thomas Moor says of the Casuists their business was not to keep Men from sinning but to inform them quà m prope ad peccatum sine peccato liceat accedere So it seemed their Work meaning the Prelates was to try how much of a Papist might be brought in without Popery and to destroy as much as they could of the Gospel without bringing themselves into danger of being destroy'd by Law Mr. Speaker to go yet farther some of them have so industriously labour'd to deduce themselves from Rome that they have given great suspicion that in gratitude they desire to return thither or at last to meet it half way Some have evidently labour'd to bring in an English though not a Roman Popery I mean not the out-side of it only and dress of it but equally absolute a blind Obedience of the People upon the Clergy and the Clergy upon themselves and have opposed Papacy beyond the Sea that they might settle one beyond the Water nay common fame is more than ordinarily false if none of them have found a way to reconcile the Opinions of Rome to the Preferments of England be so absolutely directly and cordial Papists that it is all 1500 l per Annum can do to keep them from confessing it We shall find them to have both kindled and blown the common fire of both Nations to have both sent and maintained that Book of which the Author hath no doubt long since wished with Nero Vtinam nescirem literas and of which more than one Kingdom hath cause to wish that when he writ that he had rather burn'd a Library though of the value of Ptolemey's We shall find them to have been the first and principal Author of the Breach I will not say of but since the Pacification at Barwick we shall find them to have been almost sole Abetters of my Lord Strafford whilst he was practising upon another Kingdom that manner of Government he intended to settle in this where he committed so many so mighty and so manifest Enormities as the like have not been committed by any Governor in any Government since Verres left Sicily and after they had call'd him over from being Deputy of Ireland to be in a manner Deputy of England all things here being govern'd by a Juntillo and that Juntillo governed by him to have assisted him in giving such Counsels and the pursuing such Courses
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
experienced the advantage of their Communion for a good while would be sensible of the loss be apprehensive of the sorrow and burden of it and that all Excommunications were not to take effect in the first times of the Church we have Origen for an example who when excommunicated by Demetrius with the assistance of other Bishops continued still a Presbyter and publickly associated as such And Vallesius annot in Euseb hist l. 6. c. 23. gives these two Reasons for it because his Sentence was denounced when absent and he had not legal Citations and it was not confirmed by the Bishop of Rome though to me a more probable reason may be given than either for the illegality of the proceeding and the no effect it had the ancient Canons of the Church still forbidding any one of the hieratical Order whether Bishop Presbyter or Deacon to be excommunicated Excommunication was the Punishment for the Laity the Clergies was Deposition nor were the Clergy subject to the other till removed from the Priesthood And certainly then much less can it be conceived in reason and as agreeable with the common courses of foresight and discretion that other things are managed in the Gospel with that this Ordinance should on such terms be instituted and put in execution as to reach Kings themselves and with less regard and consideration than to Persons in Holy Orders and be concluded more peremptorily and immediately to take effect upon them as if inconveniences and that over-ballance whatever the proposed advantage may be may not here be a consequent also Princes 't is true are equally subject to the Laws of Christ and his Church and they must come to Heaven in the same Path that the meanest of their Subjects do come in they are to be urg'd and taught publickly as are others and particularly in private and where due opportunity to be severely warned of but then upon a supposed failure to proceed to an open publick Exclusion this if in any one instance else ought first to be weigh'd and consider'd whether it be likely to have due effect to be for the good of the Church in general which his outward arm alone can protect and whether instead of reducing him as to his Person it may not much more harden him and especially since his Person falls under no farther Coercion than his engagements to Christianity lay upon him Examples of Kings are strangely influential and prevailing and whether a greater deluge of Prophaneness may not be let in by so doing or again whether the exposing him to shame and contumely would not withal expose his reputation to the contempt of his People and thus not only Religion and Morality but the outward Peace and Quiet of the Realm might be exposed to danger and the both Church and State be liable to inrodes and violence thereby we believe it to be what was appointed by God and supposed by our Saviour in the lay and frame of our Christianity that the Secular Power receive no abatement but on the contrary every of its Prerogatives be strengthen'd by its spreading over and reception in the World Since every other relation is to continue and be obliging so also must this of Kings which came into the World with the first is connate and coaevous with Paternity the Foundation was laid for both at once and Kings and Subjects are to remain so long as Fathers and Children the race of Mankind is on Earth continued and suitably to this first contrivance no sooner did the Empire come in to the Church and engage in Christianity but Emperors declared themselves and the Church joyfully receiv'd them for its Nursing Father and the Prince is the Supreme Governor there the Laws and Judicatures are the Kings and our Bishops give Citations in their own Names but by an antecedent Power derived from and by the Prince devolved unto them And the Bishops of old were so far from assuming to themselves any such outward Coercive Power as to make Citations of mens Persons to proceed by Court Process and Penal Mulcts that when they laid the Plot for Lay-Deputies Chancellors Commissaries Officials or whatever title they went under to sit in their Courts and give occasional Judgments for what private reasons I cannot tell but the pretended is this that it was less decent that they being Spiritual Persons should mingle themselves in Secular Affairs they could not constitute such their Deputies nor erect such an Order but by a special Grant and Seal from the Emperor a firm Argument that the Power was not originally theirs and they suitably supplicate him in order to it and he yields to their demand but gives a Caution that the Church be not dammaged thereby a thing in course to be suspected and perhaps the advantage the Church has since had that the Courts for her Justice are the Bishops and her Causes fall not immediately under a Secular Cognitor are so little and inconsiderable that though the first Piety and royal Indulgence is apparent yet the present benefit is hardly discernible at this day among us Vid. Cod. 16. Theodos Tit. 2. l. 38. and the Story is to be seen at large in the Commentaries of Jacob Gothosâ—red upon that Law And can we now with any shew of Reason suppose that in the design of our Saviour and the execution of Church Power no regard is to be had to the Prince and that Proceedings are to be alike as upon other Persons and promiscuously though all so far under the same Circumstances as equally Members of the same Association for Heaven Those rules of Policy which were contrived complyed with and submitted to in the first planting the Gospel seem not consistent with such an after-practice a Presbyter was not to be Excommunicated till first deposed and yet then shall each single Presbyter Excommunicate his Prince I do not say till deposed as was by the ancient Canons the Presbyter to be and then Excommunicated for that is what no Power on Earth can do and the Church of God never pretended to it 't was what she always abhorred but that the Considerations must needs weigh more and be much rather cogent that the censure go not out against a Prince and greater inconveniences must hence follow whatever they were the ancient Church did apprehend to be a consequent to the other and the common foresight of things could not also allow it The single Corinthian was Excommunicated by St. Paul when the whole Body of them each one full of iniquity had not the like Animadversions from him and what may not be connived at in him who is more than ten thousand and by which there is less Security that the edge of the censure will not be more abated and dulled thereby in whom is all Strength and Power in whose hand it is to expose all to the malice and violence of the Enemy to reduce the Church so near to the first state under the Heathens and which condition though it is
be in part a great untruth and both Athanasius Synod Nicen. Cont. heres Arian decreta p. 277 278. Ed. paris et Ep. de Synod Arimini et Seleuciae p. 889. Ep. ad ubique Orthodoxos c. p. 943. and Theodorit Eccl. hist l. 1. c. 5. 12. refer them to the Writings of the eminent Bishops and Doctors who lived an hundred and twenty years before the Synod of Nice and then used this Word Consubstantial in explaining the Divinity of the Father and the Son and 't is what Sandius in effect confesses only he thinks it for the dishonor of the Cause that all the Hereticks that were in the Church before Arius were Homousians hist Enucleat l. 1. and which in truth is only this the worst of Hereticks did not arrive to that height of impudence as to deny so received an acknowledgment in the universal Church Yet what Athanasius replyes upon Arius himself Tom. 1. disputat cum Ario pag. 134. making the Objection is a better answer here that what was in the Council asserted and declared was alwaies in the Scriptures by way of consequence and occasion was not given the Church till the rise and spreading of that Heresie for that particular and precise explication Heresies and Novelties must be and 't is the work of Councils to detect and determine against them but there would be mad work in the Church should that go for Innovation which an upstart Heresie forces the Church in new Terms to state and declare against and explain themselves thereby it must be declamed against as defective in Autority and Precedents because former Doctors had not sagacity enough the very Apostles had not Spirit of Prophecy enough to anticipate the Fictions of every Brain so to word it before-hand that the particular Heresie in its Nicety must be antidated and pre-abide upon Record bassled and contradicted He that reads over St. Jerome lib. 1. Cont. Jovinianum will find him there so urging Chastity as if Marriage it self was a sin and which that Father never design'd as his Opinion and Dailee confesses that he only speaks comparatively and is so to be understood as do and are to be many more of the Fathers cap. 5. de usu patrum though he will not allow it him in other Cases and when to serve his own particular Design of him I mean as to his Judgment of Episcopacy and will have his Epistle ad Evagrium and his Comments on Titus to the same purpose to be absolute and with no regard to those great even just Provocatious from the Bishops in preferring the Deacon before the Presbyters who as he well argues are of so much more Power and higher Order in the Church as that a Bishop is oft call'd a Presbyter in Scripture and Antiquity when so injurious were the Bishops to the Presbyters and so partial to the Deacons and indulgent that the Deacons scorn'd the Presbyters Order qui ignorantes humilitatem status sui ultra Sacerdotes hoc est Presbyteros intumescunt 〈◊〉 putent si Presbyter ordinetur Their nearer attendance on the Bishops Person and familiarity with him with other advantages attending occasioned that they found it an Injury to be promoted to the Presbyters Order as he tells us Comment in Ezek. cap. 48. and which together with the great superciliousness and insulting pride of John Bishop of Jerusalem exercized over him and giving some disturbance to his Monastick ease in the holy Land Ep. 60 61. something raised his spleen and in vindicating his own Order he spared not some little flourishes or Arguments abating of the Episcopate if thereby these indecencies might cease What effects all this had at that time we read not and that it was afterwards lookt upon by the Church as his alone Passion and particular Provocation we have all the reason in the World to believe it all ceased with his Person to be sure if not with the Passion nor do we find any one follower he had or is his Autority ever used against the solitary appropriated Power of a Bishop above a Presbyter 'till of late in these parts of Christendom who thence take the rise for their Schism and 't is the ground they stand upon for the battery and abolishing the whole Order and with-drawing their obedience and which to be sure St. Jerome never did nor attempted and herein they are particularly unlucky they beat down Bishops by St. Jerome's Autority to bring in their Schism and 't is the main Argument they still urge against them in the height of these Divisions and Distractions are now on foot in Europe and then too when they contend that St. Jerome knew no other occasion or use of Bishops but ad tollenda Schismata because Schisms and Divisions cannot be kept out of the Church but by them So that St. Jerome's Autority if any thing in their present Case must be against them and if complying with him they must for the present expedience submit unto Bishops whom they 'l allow to have acknowledged this necessity and usefulness of them what ever reasons else he saw for their institution and continuance 'T is that which Doctor Durel pleads for Arch-Bishop Cranmer that admitting him guilty of Erastianism and he did resolve the Power of the Keys into the Prince as Doctor Stillingfleet says he was and did his present Circumstances will plead much for him and the other Doctors of his time if of the same mind then with him he had been educated in many Errors with which the Church the whole Age at that time abounded and though a Reformation was on foot no wonder if in some Instances he was in the wrong 't was then their work to abdicate the Bishop of Rome and case him of that Primacy and usurpation he had exercised over this Church and it might so happen that in giving to the King what was his he abated too much of the Power of the Priesthood and the Church and which was hers and not to be given to any other and yet even this Error did he see at last acknowledged it to Doctor Leighton submitted to and subscribed the truth against it as the Dean of Windsor tell us he read it in Doctor Stillingfleet's Manuscript and in his presence And there is enough to be pleaded of this nature in the behalf of those inconsiderable Offers are made against our three eminent Bishops Whitgift Bilson and Bancroft and which will so thoroughly acquit them of the but suspition of Erastianism that the Bill must in course be flung out that is drawn up against them every one knows that is conversant in those their Writings whence Parker's Objections are taken The Point under debate was mostly very near altogether in King Henry VIII day 's betwixt the King and the Pope whether was supreme in the forensick outward Ecclesiastical Courts and Proceedings on the Persons of Men within this his Majesties Kingdom the Pope had usurped it for some time the King reassumes it Religion