A53704:146
An enquiry into the original, nature, institution, power, order and communion of evangelical churches.…
An enquiry into the original, nature, institution, power, order and communion of evangelical churches. The first part with an answer to the discourse of the unreasonableness of separation written by Dr. Edward Stillingfleet, Dean of Pauls, and in defence of the vindication of non-conformists from the guilt of schism / by John Owen.An enquiry into the original, nature, institution, power, order and communion of evangelical churches. The first part with an answer to the discourse of the unreasonableness of separation written by Dr. Edward Stillingfleet, Dean of Pauls, and in defence of the vindication of non-conformists from the guilt of schisme / by John Owen.
London: printed by J. Richardson for Nath. Ponder, 1681
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
CHAP. I. Of the Original of Churches.
WHEN any thing which is pleaded to belong unto Religion, or the Worship of God, is proposed unto us: Our first Consideration of it ought to be in that Enquiry, which our Lord Jesus Christ made of the Pharisees, concerning the Baptism of John; Whence is it? from Heaven or of Men? He distributes all things which come under that Plea or Pretence, into two heads, as unto their Original and Efficient cause; namely, Heaven and Men. And these are not only different and distinct, but so contradictory one unto another, that as unto any thing wherein Religion or the Worship of God is concerned, they cannot concur as partial causes of the same effect. What is of Men is not from Heaven? and what is from Heaven is not of Men. And hence is his determination concerning both sorts of these things; Every plant which my Heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up. Mat. 15.13.
Designing therefore to treat of Churches, their Original, Nature, Use and End, my first Enquiry must be, whether they are from Heaven or of Men: that is, whether they are of a Divine Original, having a Divine Institution; or whether they are an Ordinance or Creation of Men: For their Pedigree must be derived from one of these singly; they never concurred in the Constitution of any part of Divine Worship, or any thing that belongs thereunto.