Five disputations of church-government and worship

Furthermore that the English Episcopacy is dissonant from all ⟨p. 53⟩Scripture Episcopacy, I prove thus. The Scripture knoweth but two sorts of Episcopacy: the one General, unfixed as to any Church or Country or Nation; which was not called Episcopacy in the first times: the other •ixed Overseers of determinate Churches appropriated to their special charge: these were called Bishops in those times: whereas the former were, some called Apostles, from their immediate mission and extraordinary. Privileges; or Evangelists, or Fellow labourers and helpers of the Apostles, or by the like titles signifying their unlimited indeterminate charge. But our English Bishops are neither of these: therefore not any of Scripture appointment but different from them. 1. They are not of the Apostolical Order of General Ministers: for 1. Their principal work was Preaching to convert, and congregate, and then order Churches but our Bishops seldom preached, for the most part. 2. They were not tied to any particular Church more then other, save only as prudence directed them p•o tempore & re not, for the succe•s of their work for the Church Un•ve•s•l▪ nor were they excluded or restrained from any part of the world as being another mans Diocese; save only as prudence might direct them for the common good, to distribute themselves pro tempore. This is apparent 1. by Christs Commission, who sendeth them into all the world, only by certain advantages and particular calls, sitting Pe•er more for the Circumcision, and Paul for the Uncircumcision, when yet both Peter and Paul and all the rest, did preach and look to both Circumcision and Uncircumcision. 2. By the History of their peregrinations and labours, which show that they were not so fixed, whatever some writers may ungroundedly affirm. Eus•bius (discrediting by fabulous mixtures the lighter sort of his Testimonies, and censured by some rejection by Gelasius and others) and some with him, do tell us of some such things, as some Apostles being fixed Bishops, but with no such proofs as should satisfy a man that weighs the contrary intimations of Scripture, and the discord of these reporters among themselves. Only it is certain, that nature it self would so restrain them that as they could be but in one place at once, so they could not be in perpetual motion: