A27054:689
The true and only way of concord of all the Christian churches the desirableness…
The true and only way of concord of all the Christian churches the desirableness of it, and the detection of false dividing terms / opened by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for John Hancock, 1680
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.
§. 44. 1. It is a great corruption of this Discipline, when it is exercised by Lay-Chancellors or other Lay-men, to whom the Keys of the Church-Government were never committed by Christ.
§. 44. 1. It is a great corruption of this Discipline, when it is exercised by Lay-Chancellors or other Lay-men, to whom the Keyes of the Church-Government were never committed by Christ.
§. 45. 2. It is a great corruption when it is done only by an officer of another species than Christ ever instituted.
§. 46. 3. It is an usurpation and corruption when it is done by the Pastor of some other Church, and not by the proper Pastor of the Church where the sinner liveth. Such is Papal Usurpation, when the Bishop of Rome will be judge in London.
§. 47. 4. Especially when such a pretender liveth far from the place, where persons and actions are not half known, and that only by great charge and travel. When the Pastor and people of the present Church may easily know all, and it belongeth to them, who are executively either to communicate with him or avoid him, which distant strangers have no opportunity or occasion to do, further than by declared consent.