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WHat harm is there in your promising or swearing obedi∣ence to your Ordinary, in things Lawful and Honest. What a man should do, he should not refuse to swear or promise.
I will first tell you the words imposed, and then I will state the Controversie, and then I will tell you our Reasons.
The Words at Ordination are these. 1. On Deacons and Priests. [Will you reverently obey your Ordinary and other chief Ministers to whom is committed the Charge and Government over you; following with a glad Mind and Will their godly Admonitions and submitting your selves to their godly Iudgments? Answ. I will so do, the Lord being my help.
The Form of the Oath which they use to impose is this.
Ego A. B. Iuro quod praestabo Veram & Canonicum Obedientiam Episcopo Londinensi ejus{que} successoribus in omnibus licitis & honestis. (And little know we of What Religion their Successors will be, or who will have the choosing of them? I'le not swear to I know not who.)
The Bishops themselves also must take this Oath of due Obedience to the Arch-bishop. In the Name of God Amen: I N. chosen Bishop of the Church and See of N. do profess and pro∣mise all due reverence and obedience to the Arch-Bishop and to the Metropolitan Church of N. and to their Successors. So help me God through Iesus Christ.
What is your Controversie against any of this?
1. We do not question the duty of obeying the King and all his Officers, governing as Magistrates by the power of the Swords which the King may commit to them. If Bishops or Lay Chancellors be made Magistrates, we will o∣bey them as such: And therefore when they summon us, we appear and answer, because the King authorizeth them. And many Non-conformists have defended the taking the Promise as supposing that the Word [Ordinary] signifieth only the Judge of a Court set up by the King as Supream Governor by the Sword in matters and over persons Ecclesiastical as well as Civil, according to the true sence of the Oath of Supre∣macy.
2. We do not refuse to promise and swear due Obedience to such as are our Lawful Pastors, ruling the Church by the power of the Keys according to the Word of God: Though we think that requiring such Oaths is an irregularity in them, against the ancient Canons, and a farr higher presumption than the Independents Covenant.
3. We do not deny a patient and quiet submission to un∣lawful
persons and acts of Government, not owning their sin our selves, and doing no evil at their command.
But these are the things which we are not satisfied in.
I. Obedience hath essential Relation to the Laws and Man∣dates of those that we obey: And the Canons of England are the Laws by which they openly profess to Rule the Church: And therefore they call it the Oath of Canonical Obedience, that is, of obeying the Church Government according to the Canons; And when we know the Canons before-hand, we know what Government and Obedience is meant. And we swear fraudulently if we take not the Oath in the sence of the Imposers: And they commonly tell us, that this is the meaning of [Due Obedience], and if Godly Admonitions, or [in licitis & honestis] be put in, that doth but suppose that Obedience ac∣cording to the Canons is Godly and licitum & honestum, and not that we are left to choose which Canons we will obey. All Bishops I doubt not will stand to this Exposition of the sence.
Now there are abundance of things in the Canons which we think to be greater sins than we think meet to call them.
II. We know that the Rule of the Bishops is by Chancellors Courts and other such, where Lay-men exercise the Church Keys, by Decretive Excommunications and Absolutions: which wise men think to be sacrilegious Usurpation, and a Prophanation of a dreadful part of Christs Government: And Lawyers and Civilians tell us, that the word [Ordinary] signifieth the appointed Ordinary Judge of the Court, and so that we swear or Covenant to obey Lay-Civilians using the Keys. And [other chief Ministers] can mean no less than all the Archdeacons, Officials, Commissaries, Surrogates, &c. whom we covenant to obey; not in civil things or the circa Sacra belonging to Magistrates, which we refuse not, but in the exercise of the Church Keyes.
III. They that think they have fully proved that Diocesans Ruling many hundred Churches without any Bishops under them, are an Office in Specie contrary to Gods Word, and the practice of the Primitive Church, and that it corrupteth or excludeth true Church Discipline, do think it a sin to con∣form
by an Oath of Allegiance or Obedience to them, though they live peaceably under them.
IV. They that think that by Scripture, and Reason, and Universal Church Customs and Canons, they are no Bishops or Pastors that come in by Magistrates without the Election or consent of the Flocks and Clergy, think that to swear Obedience to them is to be guilty of their Usurpation.
These four be the things refused in this Oath and Covenant of Obedience.
And what have you against obeying according to the Canon?
I. You may gather it from the foregoing enumeration of the Canonical Impositions: Many things of a heinouser nature than Liturgies, Ceremonies or things Indifferent.
1. We dare not obey an Order for Excommunication ac∣cording to the 4th. Canon, against any man that affirmeth that the Book of Cammon-Prayer containeth any thing in it that is repugnant to the Scriptures. Judge that by the proof that I shall anon give.
2. The same I say of the Excommunication in Can. 5, 6, 7, 8. and many others, which are after to be particularly mentioned.
3. And there are many things in the Canons which we dare not practice, and therefore dare not swear Canonical Obedience.
That Oath doth not oblige you to approve of all that is in the Canons, no more than a Iustices Oath to execute the Laws doth bind him to approve of, or execute every Law.
We would not be guilty of an over rigorous Exposi∣tion: But had it been in the days of Queen Mary, when the Six Articles, and other Lawes for Murdering Innocents were on foot, and were actually expounded by Execution, I would not have been one of the Justices that should have sworn to execute them. Though a Justice be not bound to approve every Law, he is bound in the main to execute them in his place; And if he know that the Imposers of his Oath did mean, that he should in a special manner execute e. g. the Laws against Protestants, he should not take that Oath con∣trary to their sence. Our Canons make these things fore∣mentioned their principal part, as you may see by putting
them first with that strange penalty of Excommunication ipso facto. And indeed it is no small part of the whole Book that we dissent from.
II. But moreover we dare not promise or swear Obedience to our Ordinaries, till we know that Lay-men governing by the Keys are not those Ordinaries. I have consulted Lawyers, and some say that only the Bishop is meant by our [Ordinary]; But I think they are but few that say so. And indeed we are bound to believe the contrary, because terms of Art or Science are to be understood according to the use of the men of that Art or Science. But men of that profession commonly call other Judges of their Courts our Ordinaries, besides the Bishops: So doth R. Cousins in his Tables and others.
2. And other Governing Ministers whom we must obey, are mentioned in the Ordination Covenant also besides our Or∣dinaries.
Our Reasons against this are these.
1. It is unlawful to confederate with Sacrilegious Propha∣••ers of a great Ordinance of God, in stablishing and pra∣ctising that Sacrilegious Prophanation.
But to Covenant or Swear Obedience to Lay-men in usurp∣ing the power of the Keys of Decretive Excommunication and Absolution, we fear is such; and as to the Minor the reason of our fear is, if it be Sacrilegious prophanation for a Lay-man to usurp the other parts of the Pastoral Office, then it is so for him to usurp the power of the Keyes. But the Antecedent is confest, as to the Sacraments and the charge of ordinary Teaching and Guidance of the Flocks, &c.
2. Ad hominem. If the Bishops take it for Usurpation in Presbyters to exercise this power, supposing it proper to themselves, they must judge it much more so in Lay-men.
The Lay-men do it by the Bishops Authority and in his Name; and so he doth it by them: His Name is to the Excommunications.
1. The Chancellors have their Commissions from the King, which the Bishops cannot alter.
2. If it be so it is the worse.
1. That the Bishops name should be abused to a Sentence, when he never heard or tryed the Cause. If this be against the Bishops Will, it is a forgery; if he consent, it seems he
trusteth his Conscience in the Chancellors hands, and Excom∣municateth all at a venture that the Chancellor Excommuni∣cateth, though he know not whom nor why, which is against the Light of Nature, and the common Justice of the World.
2. And it is contrary to the nature of the Pastoral Office to execute it by men of another Calling: Either it is proper to Bishops or not; if not, Presbyters or Lay-men may use it; if yea, then none, may be deputed to use it, that are not Bishops. If the Keys and not the Sacraments may be used by Lay-men, then the use of the Keys is not proper to Pastors, but only Sacraments. But no man can give a just reason why Lay-men may not give the Sacraments as well as use the Keys.
Yea indeed the Sacramental administration cannot be pro∣per to the Pastoral Office if the Keys be not: For the ••se of the Keys is to Judge who shall be admitted to Sacramental communion: and if only Delivering and not Iudging to whom, be proper to the Pastor, then he is but a carrier or cryer and Executioner of Lay-mens Judgment, perhaps lower than the Deacon. Barely to say over the words and do the action, is but an outward Ministration, and no act of Power at all.
But it is not the Chancellor but the Surrogate that Excom∣municateth.
1. Ask those that have been much among them, how oft they have heard a Lay-Civilian say at once, [I admonish you, I admonish you, I admonish you, I excommunicate you].
2. Hypocrisie is but an aggravation of Sin: The Lay-man decreeth the Excommunication, which is the judicial act; when they use a Surrogate Priest, it is but as a hireling Ser∣vant to pronounce the Decree, to mock the Church with a Formality.
3. If indeed it be the Priest that Excommunicateth and Ab∣solveth, when no Bishop is there, then they confess that the power of the Keys is not proper to a Bishop, but may be validly used by a Priest.
But what have you against swearing Obedience to the Bishops themselves, supposing the Canons were materially Lawful.
III. We have nothing against a peaceable submission to them, if they were proved all Usurpers. For my part, when I
think how the High Priests were made (out of a wrong line, by Roman power and purchase, &c.) in Christs time, and how much he was for submission to them, and a use of all that was good and lawful, done by those bad unlawful intruders, it resolveth me to regard bare Possession, so far as our own edi∣fication and the common peace requireth. But as Christ was a Nonconformist to the Pharisees vain Traditions, so he was so far from swearing Obedience to these Usurpers, that he oft plainly and vehemently reproveth them. Many, for the bo∣num publicum, which is Suprema Lex and finis regiminis, did live in quiet submission to the Usurpers of civil power here, who yet would never have sworne obedience to them or justified their Usurpation.
That the frame of Diocesans as the only Bishops is unlawful tota specie, I have so largely proved in my Treatise of Episcopacy, that I must not here repeat it, as long as the Diocesan party by not answering it seem to grant it. I have proved,
1. That this Diocesan Species destroyeth the old Species of particular Churches, turning the Parishes into no Churches, but parts of a Diocesan Church while they make a Bishop essential to a Church.
2. That they set up a false Species instead of it, viz. A Church infimae speciei, which hath many score Parishes, if not many hundred in it, without any under-Bishop to them.
3. That it deposeth the old species of Bishops and Presbyters both, which were [to every Church of the lowest species] a Bishop with his Presbyters ejusdem ordinis (if they could be had) so that many score or hundred Bishops are put down, on pretense of setting up Episcopacy.
4. And they set up both Bishop and Presbyters of a humane unlawful sort instead of those deposed, viz. Arch-bishop in∣fimi ordinis, over a thousand or hundred Carcasses of Churches: and half Presbyters that have not the power of the Keys, nor are of the same Order with the Bishops.
5. That they deposed Christs true Church Discipline, and made it as impossible as for one School-master alone to govern all the Schools in a Diocess, or one Physician many hundred Hospitals, or one Mayor many Hundred Corporations, with∣out any School-master (but an Usher or Monitor) or any Phy∣sitian, or any Mayor or Justice under him.
6. That they have set up a false humane Discipline (be∣fore described) instead of Christ's, which they have taken down. And all this we dare not justifie by a confederacy by Oath.
IV. And we think that the fourth thing which we stick at needs no other reason; suppose the species of Diocesans were of God's appointment, and only the numerical Bishops usur∣pers, we can submit and live peaceably, but we cannot swear obedience to them. They plead more than we for the power of ancient Councils, and Canons. I have elsewhere fully proved (as Paul of Venice hath done, and Mr. Clarkson, and Dr. Burnet, and many others) that many great Councils nullified the Episcopacy of all that came in without the electi∣on, or consent of the Clergy and Flocks: And we our selves cannot conceive how any man can be the Pastor of those that consent not; though we can easily conceive that Dissenters may oft be obliged to consent when they do not; so may a Son or Daughter be obliged to obey their Parents in consenting to Marry, such as Parents choose for them, when yet it is no marriage till that consent. How few in a Diocese ever know of the Bishops Election till it's past, and how few con∣sent, I need not tell. We can submit to these, but not swear Allegiance to them.
V. And in all the foresaid cases, we have another disswasive.
1. It is so much of the King's Prerogative that all Subjects must swear Allegiance and Fidelity to him, that in almost all Nations it hath been thought dangerous, to make the Sub∣jects also swear obedience to every Justice or inferior Officer, lest it should make them too like Kings. 2. Lest the Subjects should be entangled between their Oath to the King, and their Oaths to all these Officers, in case of the Officers contradicti∣on to the King's. 3. Lest so many Oaths should make that Government a snare to the conscientious, which should be for their ease and safety. 4. Lest so much swearing make Oaths contemptible, and bring in perjury, and endanger the King, who should by our Oaths be secured.
2. And I have elsewhere named many Councils, and Canons which prohibit Bishops this practice of making the Clergy swear fidelity to them, and have condemned it, as of dange∣rous
consequence. And they that are for Councils should not engage us causelesly against them.
3. The present Impositions greatly stop us, till we better know what it is that we must do. We have cause to make a stand, when we are all sworn [never to endeavour any altera∣tion of the Government of the State] which we readily obey, and yet seem to be called to do that which we are told by some is an alteration of it: That is, the making of our present species of Archbishops, Bishops, Deans, Archdeacons, yea Chancellors, Officials, Commissaries, &c. as unchangeable a part of the Government as Monarchy it self is, and so dis∣abling the King to make any alteration in them.
For set all this together and consider, 1. All the Clergy is bound or sworn to obey both Bishops and every Ordinary. 2. The Canon ipso facto, Excommunicates every man that af∣firmeth that the Church Government under his Majesty by Archbishops, Bishops, Deans, Archdeacons and THE REST THAT BEAR OFFICE in the same, is repugnant to the word of God; so that all the Lords and Gentlemen in England that have affirmed that the Government by the Keys as used by Diocesans over hundreds of Churches, or by Archdeacons, Lay Chancellors, &c. is repugnant to God's word, being al∣ready ipso facto Excommunicate, how far they are capable of being Parliament-men I know not: but I suppose if in Par∣liament they shall affirm any such repugnancy they are Excom∣municate; and without the Act of King and Parliament no alteration can be made. 3. And now to fix them all, the Kingdom is sworn never to endeavour any alteration in the Church Government: viz. In the Corporation Act, the Militia Act, the Vestry Act, the Oxford swearing Act, after the Act of Vni∣formity. And is not every Chancellor, or Archdeacon, or Bishop now made as immutable necessary a part of the King∣dom as the King?
You speak ignorantly for want of acquaintance with the Law: Do you think King and Parliament oblige themselves. It is only particular subjects out of Parliament that they oblige.
I. But when the Parliament is dissolved, are they not all particular subjects save the King. And are they not all then hereby bound? And do you think that it was the meaning of the
Act that they who swear never to endeavour alteration, may yet endeavour it, if they be chosen Parliament men? I will manifestly disprove it. All these Oaths do joyn the Govern∣ment of Church and State together: Yea, and put the Church-Government first, as if it had the preeminence. But it was ne∣ver the meaning of the Oath, that the Parliament may en∣deavour to alter Monarchy, which is the State-Government: Ergo, it meant not that they may endeavour to alter Pre∣lacy or Church-Government.
II. But suppose it be as you say, They that know the pre∣sent thing called the Church of England know that their Writers openly maintain that the Obligation of the Canons depends not on the Parliament, save only as to the forceable execution of them, but on the authority of the Church as a Society em∣powred by Christ: And therefore that King or Parliaments at least may be Excommunicated by them as well as others. All are Excommunicate men that do but call their Govern∣ment sinful.