A57976:339
A peaceable and temperate plea for Pauls presbytery in Scotland, or, A modest and…A peaceable and temperate plea for Pauls presbyterie in Scotland, or, A modest and…
A peaceable and temperate plea for Pauls presbytery in Scotland, or, A modest and brotherly dispute of the government of the Church of Scotland wherein our discipline is demonstrated to be the true apostolic way of divine truth, and the arguments on the contrary are friendly dissolved, the grounds of separation and the independency [sic] of particular congregations, in defence of ecclesiastical presbyteries, synods, and assemblies, are examined and tried / by Samuel Rutherfurd ...A peaceable and temperate plea for Pauls presbyterie in Scotland, or, A modest and brotherly dispute of the government of the Church of Scotland wherein our discipline is demonstrated to be the true apostolick way of divine truth, and the arguments on the contrary are friendly dissolved, the grounds of separation and the indepencie [sic] of particular congregations, in defence of ecclesiasticall presbyteries, synods, and assemblies, are examined and tryed / by Samuell Rutherfurd ...
London: printed for John Bartlet, 1642London: printed for Iohn Bartlet, 1642
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.
Answ. 1That which is wholly, as touching its whole essence Antichristian, cannot ordain Christian Ministers: True, A dead man cannot beget a living bairn: The Roman Church was not wholly Antichristian, but kept some of Christs truth. That which is Antichristian in part only, may ordain Ministers, who have the true essence of a Ministerial calling; for Israel no wife, but a whore, Hos. 2. 2. a whore and no wife merito & jure, in ill deserving; yet a mother and a wife, de facto, and keeping something of a covenanted bride, is called Gods people, Hos. 4. 6. and Ezech. 16. 21. Thou hast slain my children, then her barns were Gods barns ⟨p. 126⟩in Covenant, and not bastards: God was still Samaria's God, Hos. 13. 16. a remnant according to election remained, Rom. 11. 5. The Orthodox Fathers acknowledged the Africans as a true Church, who defended heresy, that barns baptized by heretics were to be baptized again. 2. A calling is extraordinary, either in habit or in exercise; in habit, as to be an Apostle, and have the gift of miracles: Thus our reformers calling was not extraordinary, they were not immediately called by God from heaven; for they would not have concealed such a calling, if they had had any such: Or a calling is extraordinary in the exercise, and that two ways; Either in the Principle moving them to teach, or 2. in the manner of teaching and efficacy; a calling extraordinary in the principle moving, is twofold: Either a mere Prophetical impulsion of Revelation, stirring them up to such an act, as the Spirit of the Lord came upon Saul, and he prophesied, this our reformers had not, because we never find that they allege it. 2. A more then ordinary motion with illumination by Gods Spirit, speaking in the Scriptures, in which motions they were not subordinate in the exercise of their Ministry to the Church of Pastors; but immediately in that subordinated to God, and in this I prove that our reformers were extraordinary Doctors.