not at all concerned in the Case. If they were guilty of any Inconsistency in their Actings, what is that to those who are not of their Communion ? I shall therefore proceed to confider this Case more particularly without any Regard to the Compliances of the Romanists in the first Year of Queen Elizabeth's Reign; for none of them that we read of came to : the Publick Prayers after the Tenth Year of her Reign. But if they had all come to them even to this Day, what is it to the Purpose? Are we that have solemnly renounced Popery and all the Corruptions of the Romish Church to be directed by the Practice of those who continue in that Communion ? No, it is the Scriptures and the Practice of the truly Primitive Church founded on the Scriptures that must be our Guide in this as well as other Matters. But I suppose this Querist would have the World think that all who are for the Independency of the Church upon the State are Favourers of the Church of Rome. Whereas it was the Church of Rome which first destroyed the true Primitive Independency of the Church, and let in the Regale upon it, that by join ing with the Princes of the World to suppress the Power of other Bishops, they might raise the Pontificate or Power of the Roman Bishop to an higher Pitch than it could have obtain'd by any other Means. And were the Church restored to her true Primitive In dependency, Popery must fall of Course. For Popery is built on the Destruction of Provincial Synods, which was the highest standing Authority of the Church, till the Patriarchs first, and then the Popes ufurped upon them.

But to return to the Affair of Queen Elizabeth, The English Church having long groaned under the Papal Tyranny which had, by gradual Methods, been permitted to ufurp upon the Rights of all the Bishops of the West, as well as upon Princes, the Bishops of this Realm in the Reign of King Hen

ry

ry VIII. joined with that Prince to cast off that Yoke so contrary to the original Rights and Privileges of all Provincial or National Churches, and to renounce that Obedience which the Pope, contrary to the Laws of God and Man, had exacted from them. They found, that in the Primitive Church all Provincial Churches were so far independent upon each other as to own no Superiority of one Provincial Church or Metropolitan above another; but Matters were finally determined in the Synod of each Province, and they held a fraternal Communion without any other Subordination, than that of the Suffragans of each Province to their respective Metropolitans or Archbishops; that when they met in larger Synods, as they sometimes did, it was in a Fraternal way; and though at such Times it was usual to give the Primacy of Honour or Place to the Bishop of the greatest See, such as at that Time were Rome, Antioch and Alexandria; yet this gave them no Jurifdiction over other Metropolitans or their Synods; nor was any Province bound by the Decrees of those larger Synods any further than they had bound themselves by their Delegates whom they had fent thither to consent for them, or afterwards freely received them. This, when Learning began to revive, our Bishops discovered, and therefore juftly refused to allow the Pope or any other foreign Bi shop any Jurisdiction in this Realm, though they seemed not unwilling to have held a fraternal Communion with him, if that would have been accepted; but nothing but a Submission to the pretended Jurisdiction of the See of Rome would fatisfy the Pope, and that being justly denyed, the Communion was broke and a Schifm formed. But the Schism is not to be laid to the Charge of the English Bishops who only afferted their own Independent Right, and refused not a Fraternal Communion with the Pope, but he with them: So that from that Time the Pope and

and his Adherents commenced Schifmaticks with relation to the English Church, and the Schism must be charged upon him for refasing to communicate with this Church, only because she would no longer bear his ufurpations and Encroachments upon her Primitive Liberties. After this, upon further Enquiry into the Scriptures, and the Practice of the Primitive Church, our Bishops also found that many Errors and Corruptions both in Doctrine and Discie pline had been introduced, these in the Reign of King Edward VI. thy took care to reform, endeavouring to reduce all to the true Primitive Pattern about the Time of the Council of Nice; and in all Prohability had reduced it exactly to that Plan if they would have depended on their own Learning and Judgment, and had not fent for Martyr and Bucer to confult with on this Occasion. However, as it was, 'twas a very good Reformation, and brought this Church nearer to the Primitive than any Church at that time or now in the World. And though I conceive, that it has some Defects, and might be made more Primitive; yet it has all Things necessary to Salvation. But this Reformation of our Church more enraged the Papists, who instead of being brought to a Sight of their Errors by it and to the Correction of them, became more obstinate and confirm'd all their Corruptions and Errors in the Council of Trent, making them alto Articles of Faith, and thereby adding Heresy to their Schifm. So that our English Church became the only Church in this Part of the World with which a Man could fafely communicate, all the rest having either no Bishops to be the Centres of Unity and Communion, as the Reformed abroad, both Lutherans and Calvinists, or only such Bishops as were both Heretical and Schismatical as the Papists, who refused Communion with us meerly because we thought proper to caft off the Papal pal Ufurpation, and those corrupt Novelties they had introduced, and resolved to be guided by the Scriptures and Practice of the Primitive Church. When Queen Mary came to the Crown she turned out the Catholick and Orthodox Bishops which her Brother King Edward left in Poffeffion of the Bishopricks. Some of these, as Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, Hooper and Farrar, she condemned to the Flames; others, as Barlow, Scory, and Coverdale, she forced to fly to save their Lives. But it was the Catholick, Orthodox reformed Bishops that were still the rightful Bishops of the Church of England, and the Bishops with whom the Martyrs of that Reign held Communion and owned for their Bishops. The Popish Bishops, though poffeffed of the publick Churches and Revenües, and under the Protection of the State, were nevertheless the Schifmaticks as well as Hereticks who intruded into the Sees of the Catholick and Orthodox Bishops. So that when Queen Elizabeth tame to the Crown, and with the Consent of her Parliament turned out the Popish Bishops and reftored the Catholick Orthodox Bishops to their Flocks: She acted but as a good Prince ought to do, restoring and protecting the true Bishops and the true Religion, and ejecting and discouraging falfe Bishops and false Religion. And had Queen Elizabeth still continued the Popish Bishops in their several Bishopricks as Queen Mary did, no true Catholick and Orthodox Chriftian who held fast to the Communion of the truly Primitive, Catholick, and Apoftolick Church of Christ, to which Communion our reformed Bishops had returned, could have communicated with them without Sin, both as they were Schifmati cal by intruding into full Sees, or had joyned Com munion with those that did so, and as the Terms of Communion which they imposed upon their Spiritual Subjects, were fintul, and fuch as could not be lawfully complied with. So that when Queen Elizabeth came to the Crown she did not nake the Bishop

Bishopricks vacant, but found them so as to all Spiritual Power; for an Heretick or Schifmatick cannot fill a Bishop's See though he get Poffeffion of it. But she found several Heretical and Schifmatical Bishops possessed of the Temporalties of the English Bishopricks, and that the and her Parliament deprived them of, and put Catholick and Orthodox Bishops into them. And we all agree, that Poslession of Tempo. ralties, when unjustly and forceably detained from the right Owners, must be given by the Civil Magistrate, who alone has the Power to do Right to those that suffer Wrong in such Cases. And the Primitive Christians allowed this even to Heathen Princes, that they alone could forceably eject such as had gotten a wrongful Possession of the Temporalties of a Church, as we have seen before in the Case of Paulus Samosate nus, when they applied to the Emperor Aurelian to eject him out of the Episcop al House at Antioch.

$ XLIX. But then it is further asked, If Schifmren ders the Administration of all Ministerial Offices ineffectual, and if the Pretensions of more than one to the Jame See makes a Schism, what shall be faid for the Orders of the English, and indeed of the whole Western Church, whith were received from Bishops in Communion with Antipopes who kept up a Schism for seventy Years together? Were the People all this Time, and (ince, deprived of all Benefit of Divine Ordinances without their Fault ? Το this it may be answered, That Orders given and received in Schifm, though ineffectual for that Time, as S. Paul teaches, that all Gifts and Graces are, where Charity is wanting, which cannot be had in Schism, for the Apostle particularly applies it to that Cafe; yet are not therefore wholly Null and Invalid; and consequently when the Schism is healed, and the Schismaticks returned to Catholick Communion, the Orders given and received in Schism become effectual also; and the same may be said of the Adminiftration of other Ministerial Offices. And therefore,