A27050:482
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.
and that the assigning them to particular Churches did not make them of a new Order, but only give them a new object and opportunity to exercise the Power which they had before; and that Philip and other Deacons were not Evangelists merely as Deacons (which term denoteth a fixed Office in one Church), but by a further Call: And that you never did prove, that ever the Scripture knew one Presbyter that had not the power of the Keys, as Bishops have; yea, you confess your self the contrary. All therefore ⟨p. 92⟩that followeth in that Chapter, and your Book, of James the Just, and Mark, and others having Episcopal power, is nothing against us: The thing that we put you to prove is, that ever the Apostles ordained such an Officer as a Presbyter that hath not Episcopal Power and Obligation too, as to his Flock; that is, the Power of governing that Church according to God's Word.
and that the assigning them to particular Churches did not make them of a new Order, but onely give them a new object and opportunity to exercise the Power which they had before; and that Philip and other Deacons were not Evangelists meerly as Deacons (which term denoteth a fixed Office in one Church), but by a further Call: And that you never did prove, that ever the Scripture knew one Presbyter that had not the power of the Keys, as Bishops have; yea, you confess your self the contrary. All therefore ⟨p. 92⟩that followeth in that Chapter, and your Book, of James the Just, and Mark, and others having Episcopal power, is nothing against us: The thing that we put you to prove is, that ever the Apostles ordained such an Officer as a Presbyter that hath not Episcopal Power and Obligation too, as to his Flock; that is, the Power of governing that Church according to God's Word.
And I would learn, if I could, whether all the Apostles which staid long at Jerusalem, while James is supposed to be their Bishop, were not Bishops also with him? Whether they ceased to be Apostles to the People there? Or whether they were Apostles, and not Bishops? And whether they lost any of their Power by making James Bishop? And whether one Church then had not many Bishops at once? And if they made James greater than themselves, Whether according to your Premonition they did not give a Power or Honour which they had not (which you think unanswerable in our Case)?