An assertion of the government of the Church of Scotland in the points of…

These are the objections alleged for the independent and absolute power of congregations. But this is not all: Some seem to make use of our own weapons against us, making objection from the form of the Jewish Church, which we take for a plot-form. They say,¹ that the Synagogues of the Jews were not as the particular Churches are now: for they were not entire Churches of themselves, but members of the national Church, neither could they have the use of the most solemn parts of Gods worship, as were then ⟨p. 204⟩the sacrifices.² That the whole nation of the Jews was one Church, having reference to one Temple, one high Priest, one Altar; & it being impossible that the whole body of a Nation should in the entire and personal parts meet and communicate together in the holy things of God, the Lord so disposed and ordered, that that communion should be had after a manner, and in a sort, and that was by way of representation: for in the Temple was daily sacrifice offered for the whole national Church. So the names of the twelve Tribes upon the shoulders of the Ephod, and upon the Breast-plate, and the twelve loaves of Show bread, were for Israel signs of remembrance before the Lord.³ That now the Church consisteth not (as then) of a Nation, but of particular Assemblies, ordinarily communicating together in all the Churches holy things: whence it cometh, that there are no representative Churches now, the foundation thereof, which is the necessary absence of the Church which is represented, being taken away in the new Testament.⁴ That besides all this, if we take the representative Church at Jerusalem for a pattern, then as there not only hard causes were opened, and declared according to the Law, but also the sacrifices daily offered, and the most solemn ⟨p. 205⟩service performed without the presence of the body of the Church: so now in the representative Churches, (such as Presbyteries and Synods) consisting of Officers alone, there must be not only the use of jurisdiction, but the Word and Sacraments, whether people be present or not: for how can there be a power in the Church of Officers for the use of one solemn ordinance out of the communion of the body, and not of another?