M. III. We have nothing against a peaceable submission to them, if they were proved all Usurpers. For my part, when I ⟨p. 36⟩think how the High Priests were made (out of a wrong line, by Roman power and purchase, &c.) in Christs time, and how much he was for submission to them, and a use of all that was good and lawful, done by those bad unlawful intruders, it resolveth me to regard bare Possession, so far as our own edification and the common peace requireth. But as Christ was a Nonconformist to the Pharisees vain Traditions, so he was so far from swearing Obedience to these Usurpers, that he oft plainly and vehemently reproveth them. Many, for the bonum publicum, which is Suprema Lex and finis regiminis, did live in quiet submission to the Usurpers of civil power here, who yet would never have sworn obedience to them or justified their Usurpation.
That the frame of Diocesans as the only Bishops is unlawful tota specie, I have so largely proved in my Treatise of Episcopacy, that I must not here repeat it, as long as the Diocesan party by not answering it seem to grant it. I have proved,
1. That this Diocesan Species destroyeth the old Species of particular Churches, turning the Parishes into no Churches, but parts of a Diocesan Church while they make a Bishop essential to a Church.
2. That they set up a false Species instead of it, viz. A Church infimae speciei, which hath many score Parishes, if not many hundred in it, without any under-Bishop to them.
3. That it deposeth the old species of Bishops and Presbyters both, which were [to every Church of the lowest species] a Bishop with his Presbyters ejusdem ordinis (if they could be had) so that many score or hundred Bishops are put down, on pretence of setting up Episcopacy.
4. And they set up both Bishop and Presbyters of a humane unlawful sort instead of those deposed, viz. Arch-bishop infimi ordinis, over a thousand or hundred Carcasses of Churches: and half Presbyters that have not the power of the Keys, nor are of the same Order with the Bishops.
5. That they deposed Christs true Church Discipline, and made it as impossible as for one School-master alone to govern all the Schools in a Diocese, or one Physician many hundred Hospitals, or one Mayor many Hundred Corporations, without any School-master (but an Usher or Monitor) or any Physician, or any Mayor or Justice under him.
⟨p. 37⟩6.
M. III. We have nothing against a peaceable submission to them, if they were proved all Usurpers. For my part, when I ⟨p. 36⟩think how the High Priests were made (out of a wrong line, by Roman power and purchase, &c.) in Christs time, and how much he was for submission to them, and a use of all that was good and lawful, done by those bad unlawful intruders, it resolveth me to regard bare Possession, so far as our own edification and the common peace requireth. But as Christ was a Nonconformist to the Pharisees vain Traditions, so he was so far from swearing Obedience to these Usurpers, that he oft plainly and vehemently reproveth them. Many, for the bonum publicum, which is Suprema Lex and finis regiminis, did live in quiet submission to the Usurpers of civil power here, who yet would never have sworne obedience to them or justified their Usurpation.
That the frame of Diocesans as the only Bishops is unlawful tota specie, I have so largely proved in my Treatise of Episcopacy, that I must not here repeat it, as long as the Diocesan party by not answering it seem to grant it. I have proved,
1. That this Diocesan Species destroyeth the old Species of particular Churches, turning the Parishes into no Churches, but parts of a Diocesan Church while they make a Bishop essential to a Church.
2. That they set up a false Species instead of it, viz. A Church infimae speciei, which hath many score Parishes, if not many hundred in it, without any under-Bishop to them.
3. That it deposeth the old species of Bishops and Presbyters both, which were [to every Church of the lowest species] a Bishop with his Presbyters ejusdem ordinis (if they could be had) so that many score or hundred Bishops are put down, on pretense of setting up Episcopacy.
4. And they set up both Bishop and Presbyters of a humane unlawful sort instead of those deposed, viz. Arch-bishop infimi ordinis, over a thousand or hundred Carcasses of Churches: and half Presbyters that have not the power of the Keys, nor are of the same Order with the Bishops.
5. That they deposed Christs true Church Discipline, and made it as impossible as for one School-master alone to govern all the Schools in a Diocess, or one Physician many hundred Hospitals, or one Mayor many Hundred Corporations, without any School-master (but an Usher or Monitor) or any Physitian, or any Mayor or Justice under him.
⟨p. 37⟩6.
