N02341:238
Ratio disciplinae fratrum Nov-Anglorum. A faithful account of the discipline professed and practised; in…
Ratio disciplinae fratrum Nov-Anglorum. A faithful account of the discipline professed and practised; in the churches of New-England. : With interspersed and instructive reflections on the discipline of the primitive churches. : [Seven lines from Ezekiel]
Boston: printed for S. Gerrish, 1726
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.
§. 4. Before the Persons who have thus privately addressed the Pastor for Admission into the Church, are publicly admitted, he propounds their Names unto the Congregation, with an ⟨p. 91⟩Intimation of what they have desired. He takes his Time to Read or Tell unto the Church, (and sometimes as many of the mixed Assembly as please, are allowed also to stay,) what he judges proper of the Examination, which has been taken of their Pious Dispositions or Experiences; Adding, that he has received an Encouraging Testimony of their Conversation.
§. 4. Before the Persons who have thus privately addressed the Pastor for Admission into the Church, are publickly admitted, he propounds their Names unto the Congregation, with an ⟨p. 91⟩Intimation of what they have desired. He takes his Time to Read or Tell unto the Church, (and sometimes as many of the mixed Assembly as please, are allowed also to stay,) what he judges proper of the Examination, which has been taken of their Pious Dispositions or Experiences; Adding, that he has received an Incouraging Testimony of their Conversation.
The Candidates of the Communion, at the proper time for it, standing forth, now the Pastor calls upon the Brethren of the Church, to signify their Consent unto the Admission of these Persons unto their Communion, by lifting up their Hands; [For in all these Points, their Church-Government is not unlike the Government reported by Plato to have been sometimes in Athens, which Grotius also tells us was the Government of the Primitive Churches; ΑΡΙΣΤΟΚΡΑΤΙΑ ΜΕΤΑ ΕΥΔΟΚΙΑΣ ΤΟΥ ΠΛΗΘΟΥΣ. An Aristocracy ordering all things with the good liking of the People.