Five disputations of church-government and worship

§. 5. The first Church that we find it in, in History, is that of Alexandria. And Alexandria was a place exceedingly given to sedition, tumults, and divisions: the contentions between Cyril and Orestes, the murder of Hypatia by Peter and his company, the assault made upon Orestes by Ammonius & the other Nitrian Monks, and many such feats in the days of Theophilus, Dionysius, and up to the beginning, do show what they were. And Socrates saith of them expressly, li. 7. cap. 13. that [The people of Alexandria above all other men, are given to Schism and contention; for if any quarrel arise at any time among them, presently heinous and horrible offences use to follow, and the tumult is never appeased without great blood-shed.] such were the Alexandrians.

§. 5. The first Church that we find it in, in History, is that of Alexandria. And Alexandria was a place exceedingly given to sedition, tumults, and divisions: the contentions between Cyril and Orestes, the murder of Hypatia by Peter and his company, the assault made upon Orestes by Ammonius & the other Nitrian Monks, and many such feats in the dayes of Theophilus, Dionysius, and up to the beginning, do shew what they were. And Socrates saith of them expresly, li. 7. cap. 13. that [The people of Alexandria above all other men, are given to Schism and contention; for if any quarrel arise at any time among them, presently hainous and horrible offences use to follow, and the tumult is never appeased without great blood-shed.] such were the Alexandrians.

§. 6. But yet it is certain that the Original of this custom, of setting up one as President or chief Presbyter in a particular Church, cannot be found out, so as to say, by whom and when it was first brought in. But if it began upon the death of Mark at Alexandria ▪ it must needs be long before the death of John the Apostle, (in that Church, what ever other Churches did.) But it seems that there was then a difference and indifferency in this point, and that other Churches did not presently imitate the Churches of Alexandria and Rome herein. He that reads Clemens Epistle to the Corinthians without partiality, I think will be of Grotius mind (before cited, Epist. ad Gal. ad Bignon.) that Clemens knew not any such Prelacy among the Corinthians, when he wrote that Epistle: And so we may say of some other Witnesses and Churches in those times, and afterwards in many places.