Expreffion be fomething clear'd by it, 'tis all I defign'd. I fhall therefore leave this Subject, and close this Chapter together, and proceed to what follows in the learned Enquiry before me.

H

CHAP. VI.

Itherto we have heard the proper Acts of the Clergy only; thofe peculiar to the Laity are confider'd next. He briefly mentions, 1ft, the Means of becoming Members of the Church, and then tells us what Powers and Actions the Laity exerted diftinctly by themfelves. No Controverfy need be raised about the former: That Baptifm makes Members of the Church, I think is agreed by all; (who own any) and that it gives a Right to all the peculiar Privileges of the Church, that is, to all the Spiritual Means of Grace and Salvation, in fuch Order as by Divine and Apoftolical Inftitution they are adminifter'd in it, (till fuch time as they forfeit that Right by just Cenfures for their Faults) I take to be equally true. But our learned Author (in his latter Claufe upon this Head) entitles his Lay-members to Powers and Privileges of another Nature: They had Power, he fays, to elect their Bishops; and in cafe they prov'd fcandalous, heretical, or Apoftates from the Faith, to depose them too: And these Powers he makes fo. full and proper to them, that he reckons them among the difcretive and particu

*

* Eng. p. 103.

Lar

lar Acts of the Laity; infomuch that if they call'd in any particular Bishops, or a Synod of Bishops, to affift or concurr with them in it, he reprefents that as an Act of Modefty or Difcretion only in them, and the Power entirely their own.

Now the Laity's Electing Power I have at large confider'd before,and referr the Reader to what I have offer'd there. Their Depofing Power (fo far as 'tis maintain'd here) is wholly grounded upon a fingle Paffage in the Anfwer of S. Cyprian and his African Synod to the Clergy and People of Legio, Afturica, and Emerita in Spain. The Cafe of which Churches, at that time, was this; their late Bishops, Bafilides and Martialis, being notoriously convicted of Idolatry, Blaf phemy, and other Crimes of the highest Nature, Felix and Sabinus were by a Synod of the Province conftituted Bifhops in their stead: The Ejected Bishops fecretly apply'd themselves to Stephen, Bishop of Rome; who, knowing little of the Merits of the Caufe, or over-forward (as 'tis most likely) to fhew fome Prerogative of his See, admits them into his Communion, and reftores them to their Bishopricks, as far as his Power would go: Upon this, they return to their respective Churches, and claim a Right to their Sees again: The People meet with two great Difficulties in this Cafe;

First, Whether their old Bishops, being receiv'd now into Communion with an Orthodox Bishop of the Catholick Church, had not reS 3 cover'd,

Eng. p. 105.

cover'd, by that means, a Title to their own Churches; according to the Catholick Rule, that Communion with one Church, gave a Right of Communion with all: And,

Secondly, Whether it were warrantable for them (be their Claim never fo good) to Communicate in all Holy Offices with fuch Idolatrous and Apoftate Bishops, as Bafilides and Martialis were certainly known to be.

For Satisfaction in thefe Points, as appears by the Epiftle, wherein the prefent Quotation lies; they write to a Provincial Synod in Africa, wherein S. Cyprian himself prefided at that Time. The Synod, in anfwer to the firft of their Scruples, flatly tells them, that all which Pope Stephen had done through the deceitful Infinuations of their deprived Bifhops, could not difannull the regular and juft Ordination of their new ones, but that Bafilides and Martialis were juftly depofed, and the others duly ordain'd in their Room. And if we would know by what Power this Charge was made, S. Cyprian will fatisfy us; who in exprefs Terms † tells

US,

* Cypr. Ep. 67. Edit. Oxon.

Nec refcindere ordinationem jure perfectam poteft, quod Bafilides - Stephanum collegam noftrum longe pofitum, & geftæ rei ac tacitæ veritatis ignarum fefellit, ut exambiret reponi fe injuftè in epifcopatum, de quo fuerit juftè depofitus fed nec Martiali poteft profuiffe fallacia Cypr. Ep. 67.

+ Quod & apud vos factum videmus in Sabini College noftri ordinatione, ut de univerfæ fraternitatis fuffragio, (and what that Suffragium means I have fhewn before) & de Epifcoporum, qui in præfentià convenerant judicio, epifcopatus ei deferretur, & manus ei in locum Bafilidis imponeretur. Cypr. Ib. § 3.

us, that Sabinus's Ordination into Bafilides's See was by the regular Authority of a Synod of Bishops, who met upon the Place for it; and furely Felix's Cafe must have been the fame, fince that was the known Catholick Practice in thofe Times and Places, and both thofe new Bishops were † fent by their respective Churches, to represent their common Cafe to the African Synod, and both recognized alike as Fellow-Bishops by them all. The Depofition therefore was over, and new Ordinations Synodically pass'd, before the People wrote to the African Council for any Advice in their Cafe, and all declared by the Council to be Juft and Valid, and fuch as the Bishop of Rome could not difannull. What a groundless Imagination muft it then be, to think that the Laity of thofe Churches should enquire any thing of that Synod about their own Depofing or Eleating Power, when all of that Kind was over in a Synodical Way before, and that they themfelves had approv'd of what was done? No! 'Tis plain enough, by the whole Tenor of the Council's Anfwer to them, that the two Queries above-mention'd were the Difficulties they wanted to be refolv'd in; and that the latter of them, relating to their joining in religious Offices with those Idolatrous Bishops, (fuppofing their Claim to be good) was directly referr❜d to, and clearly anfwer'd by that very Quotation, which is here fo unduly apply'd to a Depofing S 4. Power.

Legimus literas veftras, quas ad nos per Felicem & Sabinum Co-epifcopos noftros pro fidei veftre integritate feciftis. Ib.

1.

Power. The Circumstances they were in, explain the Thing; they had two Sorts of Competitors, claiming a Right of Ministry amongst them, the Depofed Idolaters (Bafilides and Marrialis) on the one hand, and the Orthodox Synodically ordain'd Felix and Sabinus on the other; neither of them of their own fetting up, or putting down, but both by the Synodical Authority of the Province. Now, which of thefe Competitors they thought themselves obliged to Communicate with, the African Council told them, they had a Liberty in that to choose and refuse; which is juft fuch a Power of making and depofing Bishops, as the Ifraelites had in that folemn Competition for the Priesthood in the Wilderness, when they feparated themselves from Corah and his ufurping Levites, and kept clofe to Aaron their lawful High-Prieft; and the African Synod ('tis plain) thought no otherwife of it; for they make that very Comparifon in this Place, and apply the Quotation here infifted upon immediately to it.

*

And however our learned Author came to ftrain this clear Paffage to fo very different a Senfe, he himself was Conscious, (we find) that at the Deposing of any Bishop, a Convention of Bishops was always prefent wherever it could be had; nay he confeffes, the Deposing Power

* Separamini, inquit, à tabernaculis hominum iftorum, &c. propter quod plebs à peccatore præpofito feparare fe debet, nec fe ad facrilegii facerdotis facrificia mifcere, quando ipfa maxime habeat poteftatem vel eligendi dignos facerdotes, vel indignos recufandi. Cypr. Ib. See Eng. p. 105.