A27050:240
A treatise of episcopacy confuting by Scripture, reason, and the churches testimony that sort…
A treatise of episcopacy confuting by Scripture, reason, and the churches testimony that sort of diocesan churches, prelacy and government, which casteth out the primitive church-species, episcopacy, ministry and discipline and confoundeth the Christian world by corruption, usurpation, schism and persecution : meditated in the year 1640, when the et cætera oath was imposed : written 1671 and cast by : published 1680 by the importunity of our superiors, who demand the reasons of our nonconformity / by Richard Baxter.A treatise of episcopacy confuting by Scripture, reason, and the churches testimony that sort of diocesan churches, prelacy and government, which casteth out the primitive church-species, episcopacy, ministry and discipline and confoundeth the Christian world by corruption, usurpation, schism and persecution : meditated in the year 1640, when the et cætera oath was imposed : written 1671 and cast by : published 1680 by the importunity of our superiours, who demand the reasons of our nonconformity / by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for Nevil Simmons, 1681
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.
55. We hold that the first Churches that did devolve all arbitrations of differences among Christians upon the Pastors, did that which brought no great present inconvenience, when the People were but few and the Pastors had sufficient leisure; but that which prepared for the degenerating of the Ministry and the Churches lamentable corruption; And therefore that they should have foreseen this, and done as St. Paul directed them, and referred matters to any fit [wise man among them.] And when they saw the mischief, they should have quickly reformed it, as Silvanus Bishop of Troas aforementioned did: And that if there were Lay Elders in any of the ancient Churches, (as one passage in Origen, and one in Ambrose, and this of Silvanus in Socrates have made some think) they were truly Lay, and appointed only to such Arbitrations as these, and such other Animadversions over the rest, as Lay-men may do; (A help that I once tried and found to be very great.)
55. We hold that the first Churches that did divolve all arbitrations of differences among Christians upon the Pastors, did that which brought no great present inconvenience, when the People were but few and the Pastors had sufficient leisure; but that which prepared for the degenerating of the Ministry and the Churches lamentable corruption; And therefore that they should have foreseen this, and done as St. Paul directed them, and referred matters to any fit [wise man among them.] And when they saw the mischief, they should have quickly reformed it, as Silvanus Bishop of Troas aforementioned did: And that if there were Lay Elders in any of the ancient Churches, (as one passage in Origen, and one in Ambrose, and this of Silvanus in Socrates have made some think) they were truly Lay, and appointed only to such Arbitrations as these, and such other Animadversions over the rest, as Lay-men may do; (A help that I once tryed and found to be very great.)
56. We hold that when Constantine gave the Clergy the sole Power of Judging the Causes (Civil and Criminal) of all the Christians, he showed ⟨p. 39⟩more ignorant zeal, than true discretion, and did let in a pestilence into the Church; and that instead of that he should have only left Arbitrations to mans free choice, and have set up a Christian or Righteous Magistracy, to whom both Bishops and all other Christians should submit.