A26911:346
The defence of the nonconformists plea for peace, or, An account of the matter…
The defence of the nonconformists plea for peace, or, An account of the matter of their nonconformity against Mr. J. Cheney's answer called The conforming nonconformist, and The nonconforming conformist : to which is added the second part in answer to Mr. Cheney's Five undertakings / by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for Benjamin Alsop, 1680
A DEFENCE OF THE NON-CONFORMIST'S Plea for Peace, AGAINST Mr. J. CH… › Chapter 28
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
In your 6th you tell us, That Bishops Name and Thing are Scriptural: And yet pag. 6. you say [A Bishop and a Presbyter in the Sense and Language of the Scripture, are the same.] The Reader may think that when you affirm, and when you deny, it is the same. And you ask how they would take an Oath to extirpate Presbyters, and were told, They mean not to extirpate them as Bishops, but as Presbyters.
Ans. Did you think you spake to the Case?
1. If they thought a Presbyter as such, as bad as a Bishop as such, no doubt they would have taken that Oath.
2. But do you take a Bishop here for the same as a Presbyter, or as a species of Presbyters, or as a superior to Presbyters? Which ever it is, it's nothing to the Case in hand: He that saith, We ⟨p. 97⟩renounce Diocesan Prelacy, but not Preeminence of Gifts, nor Parochial Episcopacy, doth but say plainly, I renounce not another thing by renouncing Prelacy in the known and explained Sense: But he that saith, renounce Presbyters but not Bishops, as they signify the same thing, or as Presbyters signifieth the whole Genus; or yet as Bishops are the Governors of Presbyters, speaketh gross Contradictions.