A27058:139
The true history of councils enlarged and defended against the deceits of a pretended…
The true history of councils enlarged and defended against the deceits of a pretended vindicator of the primitive church, but indeed of the tympanite & tyranny of some prelates many hundred years after Christ, with a detection of the false history of Edward Lord Bishop of Cork and Ross in Ireland ... and a preface abbreviating much of Ludolphus's History of Habassta : written to show their dangerous error, who think that a general council, or college of bishops, is a supreme governor of all the Christian world ... / by Richard Baxter ... ; to which is added by another hand, a defence of a book, entitled, No evidence for diocesan churches ...The true history of councils enlarged and defended against the deceits of a pretended vindicator of the primitive church, but indeed of the tympanite & tyranny of some prelates many hundred years after Christ, with a detection of the false history of Edward Lord Bishop of Corke and Rosse in Ireland ... and a preface abbreviating much of Ludolphus's History of Habassta : written to shew their dangerous errour, who think that a general council, or colledge of bishops, is a supream governour of all the Christian world ... / by Richard Baxter ... ; to which is added by another hand, a defence of a book, entituled, No evidence for diocesan churches ...
London: printed for Tho. Parkhurst, 1682
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.
7. God having made the Great Power and Extent of the Roman Empire, so great a means for the propagation of Christianity, the Christians thought that the Greater they grew themselves, the more it would tend to the Churches deliverance, from contempt and persecution: And their advancement lay in that advancement of the Bishops, which private men could not expect, save only by subsequent participation. Hereupon the Bishops, by the Peoples consent, endeavoured to form the Government of the Church within the Empire, into a conformity to the Government of the Empire: And they contrived that those Cities whose Governors had the chief Civil Power, their Bishops should have answerable Church-Power; the Glory of the Empire drawing them for seeming Interest, into imitation.
7. God having made the Great Power and Extent of the Roman Empire, so great a means for the propagation of Christianity, the Christians thought that the Greater they grew themselves, the more it would tend to the Churches deliverance, from contempt and persecution: And their advancement lay in that advancement of the Bishops, which private men could not expect, save only by subsequent participation. Hereupon the Bishops, by the Peoples consent, endeavoured to form the Government of the Church within the Empire, into a conformity to the Government of the Empire: And they contrived that those Cities whose Governours had the chief Civil Power, their Bishops should have answerable Church-Power; the Glory of the Empire drawing them for seeming Interest, into imitation.
8. From the like Principles they desired greatly the enlargement of the Churches of which they were Overseers: And whereas Christ had made single Churches like Schools, and every stated Worshipping Church, was also a Governed Church, as every School hath its School-Masters, one, or mo•• by degrees these Churches were by degeneration quite altered […]o other things: First, They were like a Parochial Church, […] addeth Chapels: They thought not so contemptibly of the P••••ral work as we do, but found enough, as is said, for many me[…] a Church of a few hundred or thousand souls: And when by Persecution, or Numbers, or Distance, they could not all meet ordinarily in one place, they appointed them to meet under several Presbyters, in several places, but without appropriating a particular Presbyter to each Assembly.