Five disputations of church-government and worship

Sect. 105. Resp. 6. Presbyters have a Power of Ordaining: it is already proved. And to your confirmation (where you say that the Bishops gave them no such Power: therefore they have it not:) I answer: 1. I deny the Consequence. God gave it them: therefore they have it without the Bishops gift. 2. If by [Giving] you mean but an accidental Causation, or the action of a Causa sine qua non, or a designation of the Person that shall receive it, then I deny the Antecedent. The Prelates (and Electors) designed the person, and also invested him solemnly in the Office, which containeth this Power of Ordination which you deny them.

Sect. 105. Resp. 6. Presbytrrs have a Power of Ordaining: it is already proved. And to your confirmation (where you say that the Bishops gave them no such Power: therefore they have it not:) I answer: 1. I deny the Consequence. God gave it them: therefore they have it without the Bishops gift. 2. If by [Giving] you mean but an accidental Causation, or the action of a Causa sine qua non, or a designation of the Person that shall receive it, then I deny the Antecedent. The Prelates (and Electors) designed the person, and also invested him solemnly in the Office, which containeth this Power of Ordination which you deny them.

Sect. 106. Obj. The Prelates expressed no such thing in their Ordination. Ans. 1. It being not the Prelates but Christ that makes the Office, we must not go to the words of the Prelates, but of Christ to know what the Office is, though we may go to the Prelates (while the work was in their hands) to know who the person is. If a Prelate Consecrate a Prelate, and yet mention not particularly the works that are pretended to belong to a Prelate, you will not think him thereby restrained or disabled to those works. He that Crowneth a King, and they that choose him, though they name not the works of his Office and Power, do thereby choose him to all those works that belong to a King. ⟨p. 237⟩God hath set down in his Word, that the Husband shall be the Head or Governor of his Wife: if now the woman shall choose a certain person to be her Husband, and the Minister or Magistrate solemnize their Marriage, without any mention of such Governing Power, the Power doth nevertheless belong to the man; because God hath specified by his Law the Power of that Relation, and the man is Lawfully put in the Relation that by the Law of God hath such a Power: so is it in the case in hand.