The reasons of the Dissenting Brethren against the third proposition, concerning presbyterial government· Humbly…

Secondly, It breeds an incongruous disproportion between the Offices of Ruling and Preaching Elders compared among themselves, for this Government makes the Extent of the Ruling Elders Office and relation, to be larger then that of their Teachers or Pastors; For the Pastor, quâ Pastor, is limited to his particular Congregation he is fixed to for the ordinary performance of his Office, as the Deacons also are; but the Ruling Elders Office, quâ Ruling Elder, is extended over all these Congregations in this Presbytery. The Ruling Elder performs his Office in the highest perfection of it, as to admonish, excommunicate in all these Churches, but the Pastors are limited in the highest work of their ⟨p. 7⟩Callings, Preaching being more excellent then Ruling, yea then baptizing unto one Congregation; That in the first Epistle to Tim. Chap. 5. Ver. 17. (interpret it as you will) justifies this.

Secondly, It breeds an incongruous disproportion between the Offices of Ruling and Preaching Elders compared among themselves, for this Governement makes the Extent of the Ruling Elders Office and relation, to be larger then that of their Teachers or Pastors; For the Pastor, quâ Pastor, is limited to his particular Congregation he is fixed to for the ordinary performance of his Office, as the Deacons also are; but the Ruling Elders Office, quâ Ruling Elder, is extended over all these Congregations in this Presbyterie. The Ruling Elder performes his Office in the highest perfection of it, as to admonish, excommunicate in all these Churches, but the Pastors are limited in the highest work of their ⟨p. 7⟩Callings, Preaching being more excellent then Ruling, yea then baptizing unto one Congregation; That in the first Epistle to Tim. Chap. 5. Ver. 17. (interpret it as you will) justifies this.

Thirdly, It perverts the order and distinction of Teaching Elders, and mere Ruling Elders (as the reformed Churches call them) or Church Governors (as the Assembly) That whereas Christ hath made some Teaching Elders, and some Ruling Elders, and these distinct in this, that the Preaching Elders Office is to preach and rule, the Ruling Elders Office only to rule: this frame of Presbyterial government, makes one person not only to do both these works, (which in a particular Congregation every Pastor doth) but formally to be both those Offices, in respect of a double relation he doth sustain, namely, a Pastor to be a Preaching Elder to the Congregation where he is fixed, and a mere ruling Elder to the rest of the Congregations of a Classical Church: for it is demanded, when a Pastor in a particular Congregation is in this common Presbytery, what sort of Officer he is to that Presbyterial Church? An Elder he is, because he doth the work of an Elder; A Teaching Elder to that Church he is not, for to that whole Church he labours not in the word and Doctrine. Timothy, Epist. 1. Chap. 5. ver. 17. Therefore a mere ruling Elder he must be, and so the same man bears two sorts of Offices, and by this means there are two sorts of mere ruling Elders, whereas in a particular Congregation, a Pastor though he rules, yet he ruleth as a Pastor to that Congregation. And this disorder and confusion is further set out, in that, by this means the same Officer hath a full relation to one Church, and but half a relation to another, and causeth him to perform the whole of his Office to one Church (the particular Church) he hath relation to, and but the half thereof to the other.