SECT. III.

1. THE second power I instance in, is 'preaching the gospel;' for which work he not only at first designed apostles, but others also were appointed for the same work for ever, to all generations of the church. This commission was signed immediately before Christ's ascension"; "All power is given to me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore and teach all nations, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you; and lo I am with you always, even unto the end of the world." First, Christ declared his own commission; "all power is given him into his hand:"-he was now made king of all the creatures, and prince of the catholic church; and therefore as it concerned his care and providence to look to his cure and flock, so he had power to make deputations accordingly. "Go ye therefore," implying, that the sending them to this purpose was an issue of his power, either because the authorizing certain persons was an act of power; or else because the making them doctors of the church and teachers of the nations, was a placing them in an eminency above their scholars, and converts, and so also was an emanation of that power, which, derived upon Christ from his Father, from him descended upon the apostles. And the wiser persons of the world have always understood, that a power of teaching was a presidency and authority; for since all dominion is naturally founded in the understanding,-although civil government, accidentally and by inevitable public necessity, relies upon other titles, yet where the greatest understanding and power of teaching are, there is a natural pre-eminence and superiority, 'eatenus,' that is, according to the proportion of the excellency. And therefore, in the instance of St. Paul, we are taught the style of the court, and "disciples sit at the feet" of their masters, as he did at the feet of his tutor Gamaliel, which implies duty, submission, and subordination. And indeed it is the highest of any kind, not only because it is founded upon nature, but because it is a submission of the most imperious faculty we have, even of that faculty which, when we are removed from our tutors, is submitted to none but God; for no man hath power over the

■ Matt. xxviii. 19, 20.

understanding faculty; and therefore so long as we are under tutors and instructors, we give to them that duty, in the succession of which claim, none can succeed but God himself, because none else can satisfy the understanding but he.

2. Now then because the apostles were created doctors of all the world, 'hoc ipso' they had power given them over the understandings of their disciples, and they were therefore fitted with an infallible spirit, and grew to be so authentic, that their determination was the last address of all inquiries in questions of Christianity: and although they were not absolute lords of their faith and understandings, as their Lord was,-yet they had, under God, a supreme care and presidency, to order, to guide, to instruct, and to satisfy, their understandings; and those, whom they sent out upon the same errand, according to the proportion and excellency of their spirit, had also a degree of superiority and eminency; and therefore they who were κοπιῶντες ἐν διδασκαλίᾳ, “labourers in the word and doctrine,” were also προεστῶτες πρεσβύτεροι, “presbyters that were presidents" and rulers of the church. And this eminency is for ever to be retained, according as the unskilfulness of the disciple retains him in the form of catechumens; or as the excellency of the instructor still keeps the distance; or else, as the office of teaching, being orderly and regularly assigned, makes a legal, political, and positive authority, to which all those persons are, for order's sake, to submit, who, possibly, in respect of their personal abilities, might be exempt from that authority.

3. Upon this ground it is, that learning amongst wise persons is esteemed a title of nobility and secular eminency: "Ego quid aliud munificentiæ tuæ adhibere potui, quàm studia, ut sic dixerim, in umbra educata: et quibus claritudo venit," said Seneca to Nero. And Aristotle and A. Gellius affirm, that 'not only excellency of extraction, or great fortunes, but learning also makes noble; "circum undique sedentibus multis doctrinâ, aut genere, aut fortunâ nobilibus viris." And therefore the lawyers say, that "if a legacy be given 'pauperi nobili,' -the executors, if they please, may give it to a doctor." I only make this use of it, that they who are

• Apud Tacitum, lib. 14. cap. 53. 9 A. Gellius, lib. 19. cap. 10.

P Arist. lib. 4. Polit. cap. 4.

+ Barthol. in lib. Judices, Cod. de Dignit, lib. 12. Baldus in lib. Nemini. C. de Advoc. Divers. Judic.

by public designation, appointed to teach, are also appointed, in some sense, to govern them: and if learning itself be a fair title to secular opinion, and advantages of honour, then they who are professors of learning, and appointed to be public teachers, are also set above their disciples, as far as the chair is above the 'area' or floor, that is, in that very revelation of teachers and scholars: and therefore among the heathen, the priests who were to answer 'de mysteriis,' sometimes bore a sceptre.

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Χρυσέῳ ἀνὰ σκήπτρῳ, καὶ ἐλίσσετο πάντας ̓Αχαιούς.

4. Upon which verse of Homer, Eustathius observes, Σημεῖον δὲ βασιλείας, καὶ λόγων, καὶ δίκης, τὸ σκῆπτρον ἦν, 'The sceptre was not only an ensign of a king, but of a judge and of a prophet; it signified a power of answering in judgment, and wise sentences.' This discourse was occasioned by our blessed Saviour's illative; "All power is given me; go ye therefore and teach;" and it concludes, that the authority of preaching is more than the faculty, that it includes power and presidency: that therefore a separation of persons is 'ex abundanti' inferred, unless order and authority be also casual, and that all men also may be governors as well as preachers.

4. (2). Now that here was a plain separation of some persons for this ministry, I shall not need to prove by any other argument besides the words of commission; save only that this may be added, that there was more necessary, than a commission; great abilities, special assistances, extraordinary and divine knowledge, and understanding the mysteries of the kingdom; so that these abilities were separations enough of the persons, and designation of the officers. But this may, possibly, become the difficulty of the question: for, when the apostles had filled the world with the sermons of the gospel, and that the Holy Ghost descended in a plentiful manner, then was the prophecy of Joel fulfilled, "Old men dreamed dreams, and young men saw visions, and sons and daughters did prophesy." Now the case was altered; and the disciples themselves start up doctors, and women prayed and prophesied, and Priscilla sat in the chair with her husband Aquila, and Apollos sat at their feet; and now all was common again: and therefore although the commission went

out first to the apostles; yet, when by miracle God dispensed great gifts to the laity and to women, he gave probation that he intended that all should prophesy and preach, lest those gifts should be to no purpose. This must be considered.

5. These gifts were miraculous verifications of the great promise of the Father, of sending the Holy Ghost, and that all persons were capable of that blessing in their several proportions, and that Christianity did descend from God, were 'ex abundanti' proved by those extra-regular dispensations : so that here is purpose enough signified, although they be not used to infer an indistinction of officers in this ministry.

6. These gifts were given extra-regularly: but yet with some difference of persons: for all did not prophesy, nor all interpret, nor all speak with tongues: they were but a few that did all this: we find but the daughters of one man only, and Priscilla, among all the nations of the Jews, that ever did prophesy, of the women: and of laymen I remember not one, but Aquila and Agabus: and these will be but too strait an argument to blend a whole order of men in a popular and vulgar indiscrimination.

7. These extraordinary gifts were no authority to those who had them, and no other commission, to speak in public. And therefore St. Paul forbids the women to speak in the church; and yet it was not denied but some of them might have the spirit of prophecy. Speaking in the church' was part of an ordinary power, to which not only ability but authority also and commission are required. That was clearly one separation; women were not capable of a clerical employment, no, not so much as of this ministry of preaching. And by this we may take speedier account concerning deaconesses in the primitive church; "de diaconissa ego Bartholomæus dispono; O episcope, impones ei manus, præsentibus presbyteris, diaconis et diaconissis, et dices, 'respice super hanc famulam tuam;" so it is in the Constitutions Apostolical under the name of St. Clements: by which it should seem they were ordained for some ecclesiastical ministry; which is also more credible by those words of Tertulliant; "Quantæ igitur et quæ in ecclesiis ordinari solent, quæ Deo nubere maluerunt?" And Sozomen "tells of Olympias, "Hanc

enim, cum genere esset nobilissimo, quamvis juvenculam, ex quo vidua facta erat, quia ex præscripto ecclesiæ egregiè philosophata, in ministram Nectarius ordinat:" and such a one it was, whom St. Basil called, "impollutam sacerdotem." Whatsoever these deaconesses could be, they could not speak in public, unless they did prevaricate the apostolical rule, given to the Corinthian and Ephesian churches: and there fore though Olympias was an excellent person, yet she was no preacher; she was a philosopher, not in her discourse, but in her manner of living and believing: "philosophata ex ecclesiæ præscripto;" and that could not be by preaching. But these deaconesses, after the apostolical age, were the same with the κοπιῶσαι ἐν κυρίῳ, the good women, that did domestic offices and minister to the temporal necessity of the churches in the days of the apostles: such a one was Phœbe of Cenchrea. But they were not admitted to any holy or spiritual office: so we have certain testimony from antiquity, whence the objection comes, For so the Nicene councily expressly : Ἐμνήσθη μὲν τῶν διακονισσῶν, &c. ἐπεὶ μηδὲ χειροθεσίαν τινὰ ἔχουσιν, ὥστε ἐξ ἅπαντος ἐν τοῖς λαϊκοῖς αὐτὰς ἐξετάζεθαι. "Deaconesses are to be reckoned in the laity, because they have no imposition of hands," viz. for any spiritual office. For they had imposition of hands in some places to temporal administrations about the church, and a solemn benediction, but nothing of the ἱερατικὴ δύναμις : the same were the πρεσβυτίδες, προκαθήμεναι, the presbyteresses, who were the σωφρονιστρίαι, or the governesses of women, in order to manners and religion; but these, though (as Tertullian affirms, and Zonaras and Balsamo confess) they were solemnly ordained and set over the women in such offices, yet pretended to nothing of the clerical power or the right of speaking in public. So Epiphanius": "There is an order of deaconesses in the church, but not to meddle, or to attempt any of the holy offices." And in this sense it was, that St. Ambrose reckons it amongst the heresies of the Cataphrygians, that they ordained their deaconesses,' viz. to spiritual ministries; but those women that desire to be meddling, are not moved with such discourses; they care for none of all these