A26975:163
Of national churches their description, institution, use, preservation, danger, maladies and cure, partly applied…
Of national churches their description, institution, use, preservation, danger, maladies and cure, partly applied to England / written by Richard Baxter for promoting peace ... and for the fuller explication of the Treaty for Concord in 1660 and 1661, and of the Kings gracious declaration about ecclesiastical affairs ... and for further explication of his treatise of episcopacy ...
London: printed by T. Snowden for Thomas Parkhurst, 1691
Chapter 5: Of Pastors or the Bishops of National Churches, that they are to be of Three ranks.
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.
§ 3. As Nature first formeth by the Soul and Spirits ex materia seminis, the heart and prime organical parts, and by them formeth all the rest, and last of all formeth the Stomach and Intestines to be the Organs of future nutrition, and then putteth in the nutriment, (which in the Chicken is the Yolk of the Egg, the bodily stamina being first made of the white) and ⟨p. 15⟩then closeth up the before enclosed stomach upon that food; so Christ did first by his Calband Spirit make some prime organical General or Indefinite Ministers, and by them make others, fixed in particular Churches and Offices, and by them edify and feed, and perfect the Body by their Official Ministration, and fit the people to digest the received food for their continued nutrition.
§ 3. As Nature first formeth by the Soul and Spirits ex materia seminis, the heart and prime organical parts, and by them formeth all the rest, and last of all formeth the Stomach and Intestines to be the Organs of future nutrition, and then putteth in the nutriment, (which in the Chicken is the Yelk of the Egg, the bodily stamina being first made of the white) and ⟨p. 15⟩then closeth up the before enclosed stomach upon that food; so Christ did first by his Calband Spirit make some prime organical General or Indefinite Ministers, and by them make others, fixed in particular Churches and Offices, and by them edifie and feed, and perfect the Body by their Official Ministration, and fit the people to digest the received food for their continued nutrition.
And as the King first maketh General Officers for his intended Army, and then by them, or immediately commissioneth Generals and Captains to raise their several Regiments and Companies, and doth not make the common Soldiers before the Officers, that are to Rule them; so was it done by Christ at the gathering of his Church. But when a Church is gathered (or an Army raised) they are not to be dissolved (or disbanded) when the Pastor (the Captains or Generals) die, but continue in the existent state of a Community, and the state of a Virtual Policy till a Pastor (or Ruler) be chosen, because the Legal Institution de specie, keeps up a virtual or intentional Policy still.