Ductor dubitantium, or, The rule of conscience in all her generall measures serving as a great instrument for the determination of cases of conscience : in four books / by Jeremy Taylor ...

RULE XVIII. Evangelical Lawes given to one concerning the duty of another doe in that very relation con∣cern them both; but in differing degrees.

1. THis Rule I learn from S. Paul, and it is of good use in cases of Con∣science relating to some Evangelical lawes. [Obey them that have the rule over you,* 1.1 and be subject; for they watch for your Souls, as they which must give an account: that they may doe it with joy, and not with grief; for that is unprofitable for you.] Thus a Prelate or Curate of Souls is to take care that his Cure be chast and charitable, just and temperate, religious and orderly. He is bound that they be so, and they are more bound; but each of them for their proportion: and the people are not onely bound to God to be so, but they are bound to their Bishop and Priest that they be so; and not onely God will exact it of them, but their Prelate must, and they must give accounts of it to their superior, because he must to his supreme; and if the people will not, they are not onely unchast or intem∣perate before God and their Bishop, but they are disobedient also. It is necessary that infants be baptized; this I shall suppose here, because I have in* 1.2 other places sufficiently (as I suppose) proved it. Upon this supposition, if the inquiry be upon whom the necessity is incumbent, it will be hard to say, upon Infants, because they are not capable of a law, nor of obedience; and yet it is said to be necessary for them. If upon their parents, then certainly it is not necessary to the Infants; because if what is necessary be wanting, they for whom it is necessary shall suffer: and therefore it will be impossible that the precept should belong to others, and the punishment or evil in not obeying belong to the chil∣dren; that is, that the salvation of infants should depend upon the good will or the diligence of any man whatsoever. Therefore if others be bound, it is necessary that they bring them, but it will not be necessary that they be brought; that is, they who doe not bring them, but not they who are not brought shall suffer punishment. But therefore to answer this case, this rule is useful: It is necessary that the Parents or the Church should bring them to baptisme, and it is necessary that they be baptized; and therefore both are bound, and the thing must not be omitted. The Parents are bound at first, and the Children as soon as they can be bound; so that the precept leans upon two shoulders: if the first omit their share in their time, there is no evil consequent but what is upon themselves; but when the children can chuse, and can come, they must supply their pa∣rents omission and provide for their own proper necessity. It is in this as in provisions; at first they must be fed by the hand and care of others, and after∣wards by their own labour and provisions; but all the way they are under a necessity and a natural law of being provided for. * When S. Paul wrote to Timothy concerning the dispositions requir'd in those persons who were to be Bishops, it will not be very easy to say, of whom the defect of some of those conditions shall be requir'd. A Bishop must be the husband of one wife, that is, he must not marry while his first wife lives, though she

be civilly dead, that is, whether divorc'd, or banished, or otherwise in sepa∣ration. But what if he be married to two wives at once? Many Christians were so at first; many, I say, who were converted from Judaisme or Gen∣tilisme, and yet were not compelled to put away either. If a Bishop be chosen that is a Polygamist, who sins? that is, who is obliged by this precept? Is the Bishop that ordains him, or the Prince or people that chuses him, or the Ecclesiastick himself that is so chosen? The answer to this inquiry is by considering the nature of such a law, which the Italians call il mandato volante, a flying or ambulatory Commandement, in which the duty is divided, and several persons have several parts of the precept incumbent on them. He that chuses and he that ordains him are bound for their share, to take care that he be canonically capable; but he that is so chosen is not bound to any thing but what is in his power; that is, he is not oblig'd to put away her whom he hath legally married, and her whom without sin he can lawfully retain: but because that which is without sin, is not alwaies without reproach and obloquy, and that which may be inno∣cent may sometimes not be laudable, and of a Clergy-man more may be requir'd then of another that is not so; they who call him to the office are to take care of that, and he which is called is not charg'd with that. But then though he be not burdened with that which is innocent and at present out of his power, and such a person may be innocently chosen, when they who chuse him are not innocent; yet when any thing of the will is ingre∣dient on his part, he must take care of that himself. He may be chosen, but he must not ambire, not sue for it, nor thrust himself upon it; for here begins his obligation: there can be no duty, but what is voluntary and can be chosen; but when a man can chuse he can be oblig'd. I doe not here dispute how far and in what cases this law does oblige; for of that I am to give account in the chapter of Ecclesiastical Lawes: but the present inquiry is, who are the persons concerned in the obligation. It was also taken care that a Bishop should not be a Novice: and yet S. Timothy was chosen a Bishop at the age of five and twenty years, and he was innocent, because it was the act of others, who came off from their obligation upon another account. But if he had desir'd it, or by power or fraction thrust himself upon the Church with that Canonical insufficiency, he had prevaricated the Canon Apostolical: for to so much of it he was bound; but in what he was passive, he was not concerned, but others were.

But this is to be limited in two particulars.* 1.3 1. In what the Clerk is passive he is not oblig'd; that is, in such matters and circumstances as are extrinsecal to his office, and matter of ornament and decency. Thus if he have been married to an infamous woman which he cannot now help; if he be young, which he cannot at all help, but it will help it self in time; if he have an evil and an unpleasant countenance, if he be deformed; for these things and things of like nature, the chusers and ordainers are con∣cerned; but the Clerk may suffer himself to be chosen, the law notwith∣standing. But if the Canonical impediment be such as hinders him from doing of his future duty, there he may not suffer himself to be chosen; and if he be, he must refuse it. The reason of the difference is plain: be∣cause the Electors and Ordainers are concerned but till the Election is past; but the Elected is concerned for ever after: therefore although there may be many worthinesses in the person to be chosen to outweigh the

external insufficiency and incapacity, and if there be not, the Electors are concerned, because it is their office and their act, and they can hinder it, and therefore they onely are charg'd there; yet for ever after the Elected is burden'd, and if he cannot doe this duty, he is a sinner all the way; he is a Wolfe to the Revenue and a Butcher to the Flock.

2. Though in matters of decency and ornament the person to be cho∣sen is not so obliged but that he may suffer himself to be chosen if he be otherwise capable,* 1.4 because those things which are not in his power are not in his duty, yet even for these things he also is oblig'd afterwards; and he is bound not to doe that afterwards, which if it was done before, others were obliged not to chuse him. If a person was divorced before and mar∣ried again, he may accept of a Bishoprick; but if he doe so afterwards, he is guilty of the breach of the Commandement: for he must not goe back to that door where he might not enter, but then he is wholly oblig'd; he alone, because then it is his own act, and he alone can hinder it. I say he must not goe back.

But if he be thrust back to that door,* 1.5 where if he had stood at first he ought not to have been let in; he is no more oblig'd at last then at first: he that does not govern his house well, and hath not his children in sub∣jection, may not (by the Apostles rule) be chosen; but when he is a Bi∣shop, and fals into the calamity of having evil and rebellious children, this is no impediment to his office directly, and does not so much as indirectly pass upon him any irregularity.

But then as to the rule it self,* 1.6 this instance is fit to explicate it. For Parents are tied to rule their Children, Masters to govern their Servants; but Children are also oblig'd to be governable, and Servants must be obe∣dient. For in relative duties every man must bear his own burden, and observe his own share of the Commandement.

Notes

• * 1.1

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• * 1.2

  Great Exemp. Disc. of Bapt. of Infants: Li∣berty of Proph. Sect. 18. edit. in folio.
• * 1.3

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• * 1.6

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