A57976:55
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.
IV. Conclusion, 1is this. When the Church standeth of believers, only as contradistinguished from her guides, it is then totum homogeneum, a body consisting of alike parts, where the denomination of the whole is given to the parts; as every part of water is water, so every three believers of five hundred believers, is a Church of believers. Now if a Church should be in a remote Island, not consociate with other Churches, and yet wanting guides, our brethren say in this case, the power of the Keys should be seen to be in believers, and they might choose and ordain their own officers. I grant they have great Schoolmen to say with them,2 as Almain and Occam, and the School of Paris, who say, if all the Cardinals were dead, the faithful might and should choose the Pope. Sylvester in summa, verbo. excommunicatio 9. nu. 2. saith, The Roman clergy should have the power of choosing the Pope in that case. But C•jetan. Tom. 1. Epist Tractat. 1. Vasquez. in 3. part. Thomas Tom. 3. Disput. 244. cap. 3. 30. 31. do better say in that case, the power of choosing should be in the hands of a General Council, and that by divine right: Then by their mind supreme power or the keys by divine right, is in the hands of Church guides. But great Schoolmen say, that the keys by a miracle and extraordinary might remain in the body of the faithful. But I say in this case Necessity ⟨p. 7⟩is an unbooked and naughty Lawyer, and God extraordinarily should supply the want of ordination, as he can do the defect of second causes: so that if God send some pastors to a congregation that were unwilling to choose their own Eldership, Pastors might ordain themselves Pastors in that case to these people, and God should supply their want of popular election, and this is alls good to prove election to be in the hands of Church guides (which both our brethren and we deny) as the other case is to prove the power of the keys to be in the multitude. But we are now disputing about the power of the keys in a Church ministerial, which is totum heterageneum, where the whole giveth not a denomination to the part, as every part of a man is not a man,3 a Church made up of only believers is not Christs organical body; where there are eyes, ears, and hands, and feet, as is meant,