add much credit to fet forms; but on the contrary we find the fame imperfections in it, as in moft before, which he lays here upon extemporal. Nor doth he ask of God to be directed whether liturgies be lawful, but prefumes, and in a manner would perfuade him, that they be fo; praying, "that the church and he may never want them.' What could be prayed worfe extempore? unlefs he mean by wanting, that they may never need them.

XVII. Of the differences in point of Church-Government.

THE government of church by bishops hath been fo fully proved from the fcriptures to be vicious and ufurped, that whether out of piety or policy maintained, it is not much material; for piety grounded upon errour can no more justify king Charles, than it did queen Mary, in the fight of God or man. This however muft not be let pass without a ferious obfervation; God having fo difpofed the author in this chapter as to confefs and discover more of mystery and combination between tyranny and falfe religion, than from any other hand would have been credible. Here we may Here we may fee the very dark roots of them both turned up, and how they twine and interweave one another in the earth, though above ground fhooting up in two feveral branches. We may have learnt both from facred history, and times of reformation, that the kings of this world have both ever hated and inftinctively feared the church of God. Whether it be for that their doctrine feems much to favour twa things to them fo dreadful, liberty and equality; or because they are the children of that kingdom, which, as ancient prophecies have foretold, fhall in the end break to pieces and diffolve all their great power and dominion. And thofe kings and potentates who have ftrove moft to rid themfelves of this fear, by cutting off or fup-preffing the true church, have drawn upon themfelves the occafion of their own ruin, while they thought with moft policy to prevent it. Thus Pharaoh, when once he began to fear and wax jealous of the Ifraelites, left

they

they fhould multiply and fight againft him, and that his
fear stirred him up to afflict and keep them under, as the
only remedy of what he feared, foon found that the evil
which before flept, came fuddenly upon him, by the pre-
pofterous way he took to prevent* it. Paffing by
examples between, and not fhutting wilfully our eyes, we
may fee the like ftory brought to pafs in our own land.
This king, more than any before him, except perhaps
his father, from his firft entrance to the crown, harbour-
ing in his mind a ftrange fear and fufpicion of men moft
religious, and their doctrine, which in his own language
he here acknowledges, terming it "the feditious exor-
bitancy" of minifters tongues, and doubting "left they," as
he not chriftianly expreffes it, "fhould with the keys of
Heaven let out peace and loyalty from the people's
hearts;" though they never preached or attempted aught
that might juftly raife in him fuch thoughts †, he could
not reft, or think himself fecure, fo long as they remained
in any of his three kingdoms unrooted out.
unrooted out. But out-
wardly profeffing the fame religion with them, he could
not presently ufe violence as Pharaoh did, and that courfe
had with others before but ill fucceeded. He chooses
therefore a more myftical way, a newer method of anti-
christian fraud, to the church more dangerous; and like
to Balak the fon of Zippor, against a nation of prophets
thinks it beft to hire other efteemed prophets, and to
undermine and wear out the true church by a falfe eccle-
fiaftical policy. To this drift he found the government
of bithops moft ferviceable; an order in the church, as
by men firft corrupted, fo mutually corrupting them who
receive it, both in judgment and manners. He, by con-
ferring bifhoprics and great livings on whom he thought
moft pliant to his will, against the known canons and
univerfal practice of the ancient church, whereby thofe
elections were the people's right, fought, as he confeffes,
to have "greateft influence upon Churchmen." They
on the other fide finding themselves in a high dignity,
neither founded by fcripture, nor allowed by reformation,

The fecond edition has to fhun it,
The fecond edition has apprehenfions,

nor

nor fupported by any spiritual gift or grace of their own, knew it their beft courfe to have dependence only upon him and wrought his fancy by degrees to that degenerate and unkingly perfuafion of "No bifhop, no king.' When as on the contrary all prelates in their own fubtle fenfe are of another mind; according to that of Pius the fourth remembered in the hiftory of Trent*, that bishops then grow to be moft vigorous and potent, when princes happen to be moft weak and impotent. Thus when both intereft of tyranny and epifcopacy were incorporate into each other, the king, whofe principal fafety and establishment confifted in the righteous execution of his civil power, and not in bifhops and their wicked counfels, fatally driven on, fet himself to the extirpating of thofe men whofe doctrine and defire of church-difcipline he fo feared would be the undoing of his monarchy, And because no temporal law could touch the innocence of their lives, he begins with the perfecution of their confciences, laying fcandals before them; and makes that the argument to inflict his unjuft penalties both on their bodies and eftates. In this war against the church, if he bath fped fo, as other haughty monarchs whom God heretofore hath hardened to the like enterprife, we ought to look up with praifes and thanksgiving to the author of our deliverance, to whom victory and power, majesty, honour and dominion belongs for ever.

In the meanwhile, from his own words we may perceive eafily, that the fpecial motives which he had to endear and deprave his judgment to the favouring and utmoft defending of epifcopacy, are fuch as here we reprefent them: and how unwillingly, and with what mental refervation he condefcended against his intereft to remove it out of the peers' house, hath been shown already. The reafons, which he affirms wrought fo much upon his judgment, fhall be fo far answered as they be urged.

Scripture he reports, but diftinctly produces none; and next the "conftant practice of all chriftian churches, till of late years tumult, faction, pride, and covetoufnefs, invented new models under the title of Chrift's government." Could any papist have spoken more fcandalously *The fecond edition has in the Trentine story. againft

against all reformation? Well may the parliament and beft-affected people not now be troubled at his calumnies and reproaches, fince he binds them in the fame bundle with all other the reformed churches; who alfo may now further fee, befides their own bitter experience, what a cordial and well-meaning helper they had of him abroad, and how true to the proteftant cause.

As for hiftories to prove bifhops, the Bible, if we mean not to run into errours, vanities, and uncertainties, muft be our only hiftory. Which informs us that the apostles were not properly bishops; next, that bishops were not fucceffors of apoftles, in the function of apoftleship and that if they were apoftles, they could not be precifely bifhops; if bithops, they could not be apoftles; this being univerfal, extraordinary, and immediate from God; that being an ordinary, fixed, and particular charge, the continual infpection over a certain flock. And although an ignorance and deviation of the ancient churches afterward, may with as much reason and charity be fuppofed as fudden in point of prelaty, as in other manifcft corruptions, yet that "no example fince the firft age for 1500 years can be produced of any fettled church, wherein were many minifters and congregations, which had not fome bifhops above them;" the ecclefiaftical ftory, to which he appeals for want of fcripture, proves clearly to be a falfe and overconfident affertion. Sozomenus, who wrote above twelve hundred years ago, in his feventh book, relates from his own knowledge, that in the churches of Cyprus and Arabia (places near to Jerufalem, and with the firft frequented by apostles) they had bishops in every village; and what could those be more than prefbyters? The like he tells of other nations; and that epifcopal churches in thofe days did not condemn them. I add, that many western churches, eminent for their faith and good works, and fettled above four hundred years ago in France, in Piemont and Bohemia, have both taught and practifed the fame doctrine, and not admitted of epifcopacy among them. And if we may believe what the papifts themselves have written of these churches, which they call Waldenfes, I

find it in a book written almoft four hundred years fince, and fet forth in the Bohemian hiftory, that thofe churches in Piemont* have held the fame doctrine and government, fince the time that Conftantine with his mifchievous donations poifoned Sylvefter and the whole, church. Others affirm they have fo continued there fince the apoftles; and Theodorus Belvederenfis in his relation of them confeffeth, that thofe herefies, as he names them, were from the firft times of christianity in that place. For the reft I refer me to that famous teftimony of Jerome, who upon that very place which he cites here, the epiftle to Titus, declares openly that bifhop and prefbyter were one and the fame thing, till by the inftigation of Satan, partialities grew up in the church, and that bishops rather by custom than any ordainment of Chrift, were exalted above prefbyters whofe interpretation we truft fhall be received before this intricate ftuff tattled here of Timothy and Titus, and I know not whom their fucceffors, far beyond courtelement, and as far beneath true edification. These are his "fair grounds both from fcripture-canons and ecclefiaftical examples;" how undivine-like written, and how like a worldly gofpeller that understands nothing of thefe matters, pofterity no doubt will be able to judge; and will but little regard what he calls apoftolical, who in his letter to the pope calls apoftolical the Roman religion.

Nor let him think to plead, that therefore, "it was not policy of state," or obftinacy in him which upheld epifcopacy, because the injuries and loffes which he fuftained by fo doing were to him "more confiderable than epifcopacy itfelf?" for all this might Pharaoh have had to fay in his excufe of detaining the Ifraelites, that his own and his kingdom's fafety, fo much endangered

We have a very curious hiftory of these churches, written by Samuel Morland, efq. who went commiflioner extraordinary from O. Cromwell, for relief of the proteftants in the valleys of Piemont, It was published in folio, 1658.

The fecond edition has it thus, "who upon this very place which he only roves at here."

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