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 apoftles were not properly bithops; next, that bithops were not fucceffors of apoitles, in the function of apoftleship: and that if they were apoftles, they could not be precitely bishops; if bifhops, 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 reafon 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 bishops above them;" the ecclefiaftical ftory, to which he appeals for want of feripture, proves clearly to be a falfe and overconfident affertion. Sozomenus, who wrote above twelve hundred years ago, in his seventh book, relates from his own knowledge, that in the churches of Cyprus and Arabia (places near to Jerufalem, and with the firft frequented by apoftles) they had bithops in every village; and what could thole 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 weftern 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 themfelves. have written of thefe 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 chriftianity 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 bishop 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 cuftom than any ordainment of Chrift, were exalted above prefbyters whofe interpretation we truft fhall be received before this intricate stuff 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 ecclefi aftical examples;" how undivine-like written, and how like a worldly gofpeller that underftands nothing of thefe matters, pofterity no doubt will be able to judge; and will but little regard what he calls apoftolical, whe in his letter to the pope calls apoftolical the Roman religion. Nor let him think to plead, that therefore," it was not policy of ftate," or obftinacy in him which upheld epifcopacy, because the injuries and loffes which he fuftained by fo doing were to him "more confider than epifcopacy itfelf?" for all this might Pharaoh had to fay in his excufe of detaining the Ifraeli his own and his kingdom's fafety, fo much e We have a very curious hiftory of thefe church The fecond edition has it thus, "who u which he only roves at here." by his denial, was to him more dear than all their building labours could be worth to Egypt. But whom God hardens, them alfo he blinds. He endeavours to make good epifcopacy not only in religion, but from the nature of all civil government, where parity breeds confufion and faction." But of faction and confufion, to take no other than his own testimony, where hath more been ever bred than under the imparity of his own monarchical government? of which to make at this time longer difpute, and from civil conftitutions and human conceits to debate and question the convenience of divine ordinations, is neither wifdom nor fobriety and to confound Mofaic Priesthood with evangelic prefbytery against exprefs inftitution, is as far from warrantable. As little to purpofe is it, that we should ftand polling the reformed churches, whether they equalize in number" thofe of his three kingdoms;" of whom fo lately the far greater part, what they have long defired to do, have now quite thrown off epifcopacy. Neither may we count it the language or religion of a proteftant, fo to vilify the best reformed churches (for none of them but Lutherans retain bifhops) as to fear more the fcandalizing of papifts, because more numerous, than of our proteftant brethren, because a handful. It will not be worth the while to fay what "Schifmatics or Heretics" have had no bithops: yet, left he should be taken for a great reader, he who prompted him, if he were a doctor, might have remembered the forementioned place in Sozomenus; which affirms, that befides the Cyprians and Arabians, who were counted orthodoxal, the Novations alfo, and Montanifts in Phrygia, had no other bithops than fuch as were in every village: and what prefbyter hath a narrower diocefe? As for the Aerians we know of no heretical opinion juftly fathered upon them, but that they held bishops and prefbyters to be the fame. Which he in this place not obfcurely feems to hold a herefy in all the reformed churches; with whom why the church of England defired conformity, he can find no reafon, with all his "charity, but the coming in of the Scots army;" fuch a high esteem he had of the English! He He tempts the clergy to return back again to bifhops, from the fear of "tenuity and contempt," and the affurance of better "thriving under the favour of princes;" against which temptations if the clergy cannot arm themfelves with their own fpiritual armour, they are indeed as poor a carcafs" as he terms them. Of fecular honours and great revenues added to the dignity of prelates, fince the fubject of that queftion is now removed, we need not fpend time: but this perhaps will never be unfeasonable to bear in mind out of Chryfoftom, that when minifters came to have lands, houses, farms, coaches, horfes, and the like lumber, then religion brought forth riches in the church, and the daughter devoured the mother. But if his judgment in epifcopacy may be judged by the goodly choice he made of bifhops, we need not much amufe ourselves with the confideration of thofe evils, which, by his foretelling, will "ncceffarily follow" their pulling down, until he prove that the apoftles, having no certain diocefe or appointed place of refidence, were properly "bishops over thofe prefbyters whom they ordained, or churches they planted;" wherein ofttimes their labours were both joint and promifcuous: or that the apoftolic power muft "neceffarily defcend to bishops, the ufe and end" of either function being fo different. And how the church hath flourished under epifcopacy, let the multitude of their ancient and grofs errours teftify, and the words of fome learnedeft and moft zealous bishops among them; Nazianzen in a devout paffion, wishing prelaty had never been; Bazil terming them the flaves of flaves; Saint Martin, the enemies of faints, and confeffing that after he was made a bifhop, he found much of that grace decay in him which he had before. Concerning his "Coronation oath," what it was, and how far it bound him, already hath been spoken. This we may take for certain, that he was never fworn to his own particular confcience and reafon, but to our conditions as a free people, which required him to give us fuch laws as ourselves fhould* choose. This the Scots The fecond edition has fhall choose. could could bring him to, and would not be baffled with the pretence of a coronation-oath, after that epifcopacy had for many years been fettled there. Which conceffion of his to them, and not to us, he feeks here to put off with evafions that are ridiculous. And to omit no fhifts, he alleges that the prefbyterian manners gave him no encouragement to like their modes of government. If that were fo, yet certainly thofe men are in moft likelihood nearer to amendment, who feek a ftricter church-difcipline than that of epifcopacy, under which the moft of them learned their manners. If eftimation were to be made of God's law by their manners, who, leaving Egypt, received it in the wilderness, it could reap from fuch an inference as this nothing but rejection and difefteem. For the prayer wherewith he closes, it had been good fome fafe liturgy, which he fo commends, had rather been in his way; it would perhaps in fome measure have performed the end for which they fay liturgy was first invented; and have hindered him both here, and at other times, from turning his notorious errours into his prayers. XVIII. Upon the Uxbridge Treaty, &c. "IF the way of treaties be looked upon" in general, as retiring" from beftial force to human reafon, his first aphorifm here is in part deceived. For men may treat like beafts as well as fight. If fome fighting were not manlike, then either fortitude were no virtue, or no fortitude in fighting: And as politicians ofttimes through dilatory purpotes and emulations handle the matter, there hath been no where found more beftiality than in treating; which hath no more commendations in it, than from fighting to come to undermining, from violence to craft; and when they can no longer do as lions, to do as foxes. The fincereft end of treating after war once proclaimed is, either to part with more, or to demand lefs, than was at first fought for, rather than to hazard more lives, or worfe mifchiefs. What the parliament in that |