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AND therefore if any Man shall af∣firm, under colour of any thing that is in the Scriptures, either that the Sub∣scriptions, or Directions of the second Epi∣stle of St. Paul to Timothy, of of his Epi∣stle to Titus, though they are found in the ancient Copies of the Greek Testament, are of no Credit or Authority: or, that such an Impeachment and Discredit laid upon them, is not very prejudicial to the Books and Writings of the Holy Ghost: or, that
it is not great presumption for Men in these days, to take upon them to know better, Whether Timothy and Titus were Bishops, than the Churches and godly Fathers did, which were planted and lived either in the Apostle's times, or presently after them; ex∣cept they have some especial Revelations from God: or, that whilst Men do labour to bring into discredit the ancient Fathers and Primitive Churches, they do not dero∣gate from themselves such credit as they hunt after, and as much as in them lieth, bring many parts of Religion into a won∣derful uncertainty: or, that it is probable, or was possible for Timothy to have observ'd those Rules that St. Paul gave him unto the coming of Christ; except (as the Fathers ex∣pound some of them) he meant to have them first observed by himself and other Bishops in that Age, and that afterward they should so likewise be observed by all Bishops for ever: or, that the ancient Fathers, and Ec∣clesiastical Histories, when they Record it to all Posterity, that these Men, and those Men, were made by the Apostles, Bishops of such and such places, are not to be held to be of more credit than any other Historio∣graphers, or Writers: or, that when the ancient Fathers did collect out of the Scri∣ptures
and practice of the Apostles, the con∣tinuance for ever of that Form of Church-Government which was then in use, they were not so throughly illuminated with the Holy Ghost, as divers Men of late have been: or, that it was an idle course held by the Primitive Churches, and ancient Fa∣thers, to keep the Catalogues of their Bi∣shops, or to ground Arguments in some Cases upon their Succession, in that they were able to deduce their beginnings, either from the Apostles, or from some Apostolical Persons: or, that the Form of Government, used in the Apostle's times, for the planting and ordering of Churches, was not, in ma∣ny respects, as necessary to be continued in the Church afterward; especially consider∣ing, that many Churches were not left ful∣ly ordered, nor in some places were at all planted, when the Apostles died: or, that true and perfect Order, grounded upon the very Laws of Nature and Reason, and established by the Holy Ghost in the Apostles times, was not fit for the Churches of God afterward to embrace and observe: or, that any Church, since the Apostles time, till of late years, when it received the Gospel, had not likewise Archbishops and Bishops for the Government of it: or, that divers of
the ancient Fathers did not hold, and that very truly (for ought that appeareth to the contrary) that our Saviour Christ and his Apostles, in establishing the Form of Church-Government amongst the Gentiles, had an especial respect to that Form which God had setled amongst the Jews, and did no way purpose to abrogate or abolish it: or, that any since the Apostles times, till of late days, was ever held to be a lawful Mini∣ster of the Word and Sacraments, who was not Ordain'd Priest or Minister, by the Imposition of the hands of some Bi∣shop: or, that it is with any probability to be imagin'd, that all the Churches of Christ, and ancient Fathers from the be∣ginning, would ever have held it for an A∣postolical Rule, That none but Bishops had any Authority to make Priests, had they not thought and judged, that the same Authority had been derived unto them the said Bishops from the same Apostolical Or∣dination, that was committed unto Timo∣thy and Titus, their Predecessors: or, that the Apostles, and all the ancient Fathers, were deceived, when they judged the Au∣thority of Bishops necessary at all times for the suppressing of Schisms; and that with∣out Bishops, there would be in the Churches
as many Sects as Ministers: or, that when Men find themselves, in regard of their disobedience to their Bishops, so fully and notably described and censured by all the ancient Fathers for Schismaticks and contentious Persons, they have not just cause to fear their own Estates, if they con∣tinue in such their willfulness and obstina∣cy: or, that the Church-Government, by us above treated of, is truly to be said to savour of Judaism, more than the observa∣tion by godly Kings and Princes, of the Equity of the Iudicial Law, given to the Jews, may truly be said to savour thereof: or, that it doth proceed from any other than the wicked Spirit, for any sort of Men, what godly shew soever they can pretend to seek to discredit (as much as in them lieth) that Form of Church-Government, which was established by the Apostles, and left by them to continue in the Church to the end of the World, under Archbishops and Bi∣shops, such as were Timothy and Titus, and some others, then called to those Offices by the said Apostles, and ever since held by the Primitive Churches, and all the ancient Fa∣thers to be Apostolical Functions; or to term the same, or any part of it to be Anti-Chri∣stian; He doth greatly Erre.