ftian World as oppofite to them. Therefore, to ftate the Cafe the most impartially; to receive Baptifm from thefe Diffenters,is, at leaft, an Hazard of many Thoufands to One; as many as all the reft of Chriftianity are more than they: But to receive it from the Bishops, or Epifcopal Clergy, has no Hazard at all, as to its Validity, even as own'd by the Presbyterians themfelves.

Now, if any Perfon fhould find fault with this way of Reafoning, and fhould fay, that this is rank Popery, a Popish Argument to perfwade People to come over to the fafer fide; and that if this Argument be conclufive, we our felyes muft return to the Church of Rome: I fay, if any fhall think thus, I here give them this Anfwer. That in all the Dif putes betwixt the Church of Rome and Us, we have the Advantage of this Argument against them in every Point. For Example; they fay, That if the Church thought it fit to give the Communion in both Kinds; to have the publick Offices in the vulgar Tongue, to have no Images or Pictures of God the Father in their Churches, and fo of other Matters, it wou'd do well, and they wou'd be pleas'd with it; and all of them that ever I met with fay, they wou'd be glad and rejoice in it. And confefs, (that 'bating the Authority of the Church) we are on the fafer fide of the Queftion. For no one fays, that it is a Sin to worship God without any Image of Him before me.

THEREFORE the whole Hazard lies on the other fide, viz. Whether that be not the Idolatry forbidden, Deut. iv. 12. 15, 16, &c. and many other Pla ces in Scripture? Again, it can be no Sin to receive the holy Sacrament in both Kinds, as it was inftituted, But the Difpute is, whether taking away the Cup is not mutilating the Sacrament, and confequently Sacrilege, as Pope Gelafius call'd it? And then, whether the Council of Conftance had Authority to enact this Sacrilege with a non obftante to the Inftitution of

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Cbrift,

Chrift, and the Practice of the Church to that Time, which was 1400 Years after Chrift?

I fay, we have no plainer and more perfwafive Arguments against the Papifts, than to fhew them, that we are on the fafer fide all the Way.

AND wou'd you (you who are fo much againft Popery have us lofe this Advantage, by running down the Argument of being on the fafer fide?

BUT now, the only Point wherein the Papifts fo much as pretend to turn the Argument upon us, is on Account of our Miffion. And this grounded on a falfe and foolish Story they had trump'd up of the Nag's-Head Confecration.

BUT this has been confuted, and our firft Confecrations fo fully vindicated, that, as Arch-bifhop Brambal has fhewed to us, the Fapifts themselves have quitted that Pretence and given it up.

The Arch-bishop has printed the Original Record of that Confecration which is ftill preferv'd and forth-coming. So that there is no Difpute of the Validity of our Ordinations, nor confequently of our Baptifm.

THEREFORE we perfwade you to the fureft Side, without giving any Advantage to the Papifts; for we perfwade them by the fame Argument. And are fure that we are on the fafe Side, in our Difputes with Them, as well as with Tou.

THEREFORE this Argument can be of no Advantage to the Church of Rome, nor is any Way leading to Popery.

AND now, having mention'd the Word Popery, I beg leave to fay fomething concerning it. And herein I fhall more immediately direct my felf to thofe poor People, who have been fo unhappily deluded with the Sound of this one Word Popery, as to fly affrighted from the beft conftituted, the moft Primitive and Apoftolic Church at this Day in the whole World; I mean the Church of England.

Το

To you, my Friends, I direct my Discourse at prefent, and therefore let me freely fpeak to you; and I entreat you to take particular Notice of what follows. I make no Queftion but that most of you think, that the Government of the Church by Bishops is an Innovation, brought in by the Popes of Rome, And indeed I do not greatly blame you for fo thinking, because I know that you have been taught to believe, that Bishops are an Innovation upon the primitive Government of the Church, introduced by the Pride and Tyranny of Rome: That in the firft and pureft Ages of Chriftianity, Bishops were utter Strangers to the Church: And that in later Ages when the Church had many Corruptions in it, this likewife of Bishops was introduc'd, particularly by the Pope of Rome, [that Man of Sin] upon the Ruins of the true primitive Presbyterial, Apoftolic Government. That (as I faid before) in the firft and pureft Ages, Bishop and Presbyter were the fame, without any Difference; and if fo, (no doubt) Bishops fuperiour to Presbyters must be an Ufurpation upon that Difcipline which Chrift appointed: And therefore to say that there is any Difference between them is Popery, ay, rank Popery.

I make no doubt, but that I have ftated your Cafe right, I mean, that you fo believe, and that you have fo been taught.

AND now my Friends, let me entreat you to be undeceiv'd. And in order to it, I fhall firft remark, that this one Word POPERY, has been the Trojan Horfe let in among us, from whence moft, (if not all) of our prefent Troubles have arifen: This Word Popery has been that fatal Engine which has been used by wicked and malicioas Men, to raife thofe high, frightful, and un Chriftian Walls of Separation between us. This is an old Stratagem, (and I wou'd to God it were not now us'd.) If wicked Men have a Mind to klacken any Thing, tho' never fo good and innocent in itself, they prelently

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make

make an hideous Out-cry of Popery, Idolatry, and Superftition; this roufes the mad Enthufiaft, this it is that catches with the gaping Rabble,the mad unthinking Populace, who feldom examin Things deeper than their Surfaces; it was this Word Popery which the fubtile Sons of Machiavel and Mischief made ufe of (fometime after the Rebellion had broken out againft King Charles the Firft of bleffed Memory) to gain their wicked Ends: And it was chiefly by this fatal Ignis Fatuus,that they hurry'd our deluded Anceftors into thofe horrid Fields of Blood and Confufion: Where, when they were once enter'd (good God !) what Havock did they make! Parents against their Children, and Children against their Parents! How did they rifle (which was a Thing not prac tis'd by the worft of Men, nay, even a vicious Heathen wou'd have blufh'd at it) I fay, how did they rifle the fair, the facred and goodly Monuments of the Dead! and thofe ftately and magnificent Piles, thofe majestic and awful Structures, I mean thofe Chriftian Temples, which were rais'd in honour of our God and our Redeemer, were by thefe impious Wretches turned into Stables and Slaughter-Houfes. And at length, horridly ftriding from one Step of Wickedness to another, they, (oh dreadful!) they, I fay, murthered the Parent of their Country! the beft Chriftian as well as the beft King upon Earth; and after that, they overwhelm'd and bury'd in Ruins the beft Church in the whole World: But God be thanked it arofe again.

AND all thefe horrid Things were perpetra ted by Men who had been fadly deluded, and had been taught that many Things in the Church of England were Rags of the Whore of Babylon, and particularly that Bifhops were Creatures of the Pope's making, and to have them in the Church was rank Popery.

THIS (as I laid before) has been an old Device, and I do not fo greatly wonder that you likewife of

this

this prefent Age (both here and in New-England) are deceiv'd, when the fame Artifice is made ufe of to delude you.

BUT in answer to this Charge, that the Govern ment of the Church by Bishops is Popifh; I tell you, that it is a vile and wicked Infinuation. And to make it plain to you that it is not Popib, I will fhew you how it is impoffible that it fhould be fo: (and I should think that were fufficient in all Reafon, to fatisfy any Man, but him who is refolv'd not to be convinc'd:) And the Method I fhall take in proving this, fhall be firft, in telling you, that the firft Pope of Rome (in the modern, and in your Acceptation of the Word Pope) was not till the 7th Century, above Six hundred years after Chrift: And nextly I will produce the Teftimonies of the Primitive Fathers and Councils of the Church, and thefe Teftimonies fhall be brought from the firft and pureft Ages of the Chriftian Church, the firft Four hundred and fifty Years after Chrift: the latest of which Authorities is 150 Years before there was a Pope of Rome, (in the prefent Acceptation of the Word Pope) and if thofe Teftimonies which I'fhall prefently produce, make mention of the Bishops as the only Governours of the Church, and not only of the Time in which each one of these Perfons lived, but fpeaking of Bishops as ordained by Chrift and his Apoftles, and having defcended down all the Way to each one of them by an uninterrupted Succeffion; I fay, if thefe Teftimonies affirm thus much, let no Man be fo foolish, nay,wicked, and malicious, as to lay, that it is Popery, when fome of the Perfons, whofe Teftimonies I produce, lived above 500, and the latest of them 150 Years before the Pope was thought of.

HERE follows a fhort Collection of Authorities for Epifcopacy, as diftinct from, and fuperiour to Presbytery, taken out of the Fathers and Councils, in the first four hundred and fifty Years after Chrift.

In