A93091:402
A treatise of liturgies, power of the keys, and of matter of the visible…A treatise of liturgies, power of the keyes, and of matter of the visible…
A treatise of liturgies, power of the keys, and of matter of the visible church. In answer to the reverend servant of Christ, Mr. John Ball. By Thomas Shepherd, sometimes fellow of Emanuel-College in Cambridge, and late pastor of Cambridge in New-England.A treatise of liturgies, power of the keyes, and of matter of the visible church. In answer to the reverend servant of Christ, Mr. John Ball. By Thomas Shephard, sometimes fellow of Emanuel-Colledge in Cambridge, and late pastour of Cambridge in New-England.
London: printed by E. Cotes for Andrew Crooke, 1652
Title page typeset from the transcription.
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.
Thirdly, They are not so appropriated to such congregations only as to exclude the members of those congregations which are under the government of a common Presbytery or other forms of government, for we have a brotherly esteem of such congregations, notwithstanding that tertium quoddam separabile of government, (as Mr. Baines calls it) being a thing that cometh to a church now constituted, and may be absent, the church remaining a Church.
Thirdly, They are not so appropriated to such congregations onely as to exclude the members of those congregations which are unde• the government of a common Presbytery or other formes of government, for wee have a brotherly esteeme of such congrega•ions, notwithstanding that tertium quoddam separabile of government, (as Mr. Baines cals it) being a thing that commeth to a church now constituted, and may be absent, the church remaining a Church.
Fourthly, although it be said by some Divines, that as faith is the internal form of the church, so profession of faith is the outward form, and that therefore bare profession of saith makes a member of the visible church, yet this must be understood according to the interpretations of some of them who so speak, for there is a double profession of faith; Personal, which is acted severally by particular persons; and common, which is acted conjointly in, and with a Society: The first makes a man of the catholic number of visible Saints, and so fit matter for political church-society: the other makes a man of the political church formally and completely; and in this latter sense profession of faith is the external form of a visible church, but not in the other.
Fourthly, although it be said by some Divines, that as faith is the internall form of the church, so profession of faith is the outward form, and that therefore bare profession of saith makes a member of the visible church, yet this must be understood according to the interpretations of some of them who so speak, for there is a double profession of faith; Personall, which is acted severally by particular persons; and common, which is acted conjointly in, and with a Society: The first makes a man of the catholick number of visible Saints, and so fit matter for politicall church-society: the other makes a man of the politicall church formally and compleatly; and in this latter sense profession of faith is the externall form of a visible church, but not in the other.