A93091:839
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.
Answ. True; but it hath been continued by the after consent, and subjection of the people to their Ministers chosen by others, else they must needs have broken a pieces and dissolved the Church, or taken upon them to choose others to themselves, which still shows that the essence of the call is in the people. What is said of the disorders of Ancient Churches in elections, we pass over as nothing to this purpose. That the Ministry might be lawful for substance, where there were many defects in the manner of the call we grant, the Church at length consenting to submit thereto, in whom the true right is placed by Christ: and therefore we pass over what follows to that purpose, though we might object against some passages in the discourse.
Answ. True; but it hath been continued by the after consent, and subjection of the people to their Ministers chosen by others, else they must needs have broken a pieces and dissolved the Church, or taken upon them to choose others to themselves, which still shewes that the essence of the call is in the people. What is said of the disorders of Ancient Churches in elections, we passe over as nothing to this purpose. That the Ministery might bee lawfull for substance, where there were many defects in the manner of the call we grant, the Church at length consenting to submit thereto, in whom the true right is placed by Christ: and therefore we passe over what followes to that purpose, though wee might object against some passages in the discourse.
Reply. As for the second branch of your answer we know not well your meaning; if this be your mind, that a Minister lawfully called and set over the Congregation, is to be esteemed a Minister in the usual Church, as the particular Church hath unity with, and is part of the universal or Catholic, and as a party baptized is not baptized into that Congregation only, but into all Churches, and that the Ministry is one, cujus a singulis in solidum pars tenetur, as Cyprian speaketh, and therefore though the Minister be unjustly cast eff by one Congregation, yet he is not to be esteemed as no Minister, we freely consent▪ But if your meaning be, that he is only by right a Minister of that particular Congregation, because unjustly deposed, as formerly in the execution of his Office, ee was a Minister to them only, and to no other society whatsoever, or in what respect soever your opinion is contrary to the opinion of the universal, and tends to destroy the unity of the Church, and that Communion which the Churches of God ought to have one with another.