A27050:700
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.
1. If it be a Layman and the work be but Accidental or Extrinsic to the sacred function, I grant that he may do it: But for such works we need no Bishop: For what a Layman may do when he bids him, he may do when the King or his Magistrates bids him. This is not the thing in question. But if it be a proper Pastoral Act, this Layman that doth it, either receiveth from the Bishop power and obligation to do it, or not. If not, he cannot do it as his Official: If he do, then he is a Pastor or Bishop himself, and is Ordained, and so no Layman: For I provoke any dissenter living to tell me wherein the sacred office (or any other) lieth, but in a Power (or Authority) and an Obligation to do the proper works of that office, so that undeniably here is a contradiction.
1. If it be a Layman and the work be but Accidental or Extrinsick to the sacred function, I grant that he may do it: But for such works we need no Bishop: For what a Layman may do when he bids him, he may do when the King or his Magistrates bids him. This is not the thing in question. But if it be a proper Pastoral Act, this Layman that doth it, either receiveth from the Bishop power and obligation to do it, or not. If not, he cannot do it as his Official: If he do, then he is a Pastor or Bishop himself, and is Ordained, and so no Layman: For I provoke any dissenter living to tell me wherein the sacred office (or any other) lieth, but in a Power (or Authority) and an Obligation to do the proper works of that office, so that undeniably here is a contradiction.
And if any were of opinion that pro tempore in a case of necessity a Layman might do any Ministerial sacred act, as Preach, Baptize, Consecrate the Sacrament of Christs body and blood, excommunicate, absolve, &c. 1. I answer, if that were true, if would but prove that those Acts are not proper to the sacred function in such a case of necessity as single Acts, but only as ordinarily and statedly done by one separated to them. 2. And therefore this would not at all concern our case, which is not about extraordinary Acts in cases of necessity, but about an ordinary stated course, by Courts, Chancellors, and Officials.
And if any were of opinion that pro tempore in a case of necessity a Layman might do any Ministerial sacred act, as Preach, Baptize, Consecrate the Sacrament of Christs body and blood, excommunicate, absolve, &c. 1. I answer, if that were true, if would but prove that those Acts are not proper to the sacred function in such a case of necessity as single Acts, but only as ordinarily and statedly done by one separated to them. 2. And therefore this would not at all concern our case, which is not about extroardinary Acts in cases of necessity, but about an ordinary stated course, by Courts, Chancellors, and Officials.