THE

PREFACE

T

HIS Subject, how important foever in it felf, yet has been fo little treated of, and will feem fo fevere in many Parts of it, that if I had not judged this a neceffary Service to the Church, which did more decently come from one, who, how underferving foever he is, yet is raised to a Poft that may justify the Writing on fo tender a Head; I fhould never have undertaken it. But my Zeal for the true Intereft of Religion, and of this Church, determined me to fet about it: Yet fince my Defign is to correct Things for the future, rather than to reproach any for what is past, I have refolved to caft it rather into Advices and Rules, into plain and fhort Directions, than into long and laboured Difcourfes, fupported by the Shews of Learning, and Citations from Fathers, and Hiftorical Obfervations; this being the more profitable, and the lefs invidious Way of Handling the Subject.

It ought to be no Imputation on a Church, if too many of those that are dedicated to her Service, have not all the Characters that are here fet forth, and that are to be defired in Clergymen. Even in the Apostles Days there were falfe Apoftles, and falfe Teachers; as one of the Twelve was a Traytor, and had a Devil. Some loved the Pre-eminence; others loved this prefent World to a fcandalous Degree. Some of those that preached Christ, Phil. 1.16. did it not fincerely, but out of Contention: they

vied with the Apostles, and hoped to have carried away the Efteem from them, even while they were fuffering for the Faith: For envying their Credit, they defigned to raife their own Authority, by leffening the Apoftles, and fo hoped to have added Affliction to their Bonds. In the firft and pureft Ages of the Church we find great Complaints of the Neglects and Disorders of the Clergy of all Ranks. Many became the Stewards and Bailiffs of other Peoples Eftates; and while they looked too diligently after thofe Cares which did not belong to them, they even in thofe Times of Trial, grew very remifs in the most important of all Cares, which was their proper Bufinefs.

As foon as the Empire became Christian, the Authority, the Immunity, and the other

Advantages, which by the Bounty of Princes followed the Sacred Functions, made them to be generally much defired; and the Elections being then for the most Part popular, (though in fome of the greater Cities, the Magiftracy took them into their Hands and the Bifhops of the Province were the Judges both of the Fitness of the Perfon, and of the Regularity of the Election); these were managed with much Faction and Violence, which often ended in Blood, and that to fo great an Excefs, that if we had not Witneffes to many Instances of this among the best Men in those Ages, it would look like an uncharitable Imputation on thofe Times, to think them capable of fuch Enormities. Indeed the Disorders, the Animofities, the going fo oft backwards and forwards in the Matters of Faith, as the Emperor happened to be of different Sides, are but too ample a Proof of the Corruptions that had then got into the Church. And what can we think of the Breach made in the Churches of Africk by Donatus and his Followers, upon fo inconfiderable a Point, as whether Cecilian and his Ordainers had denied the Faith in the laft Perfecution, or not? which grew to that Height, that almost in every Town of Africk there were divided Affemblies, and feparating Bishops, upon that

Account. Nor was this Wound healed but with the utter Ruin of thofe Churches. St. Jerom, though partial enough to his own Side, as appears by his efpoufing Damafus's Interests, notwithstanding that vaft Effusion of Blood that had been at his Election; which was fet on by him, and continued for four Days with fo much Violence, that in one Night, and at one Church, a hundred and feven and thirty were killed; yet he could not hold from laying open the Corruptions of the Clergy in a very fevere Stile. He grew fo weary of them, and they of him, that he went and spent the Reft of his Days at Bethlehem.

Those Corruptions were fo much the more remarkable, because the Eminent Men of thofe Times procured a great many Canons to be made, both in Provincial and General Councils, for correcting Abuses, as soon as they observed them creeping into the Church: But it is plain from St. Chryfoftom's Story, that though bad Men did not oppofe the making good Rules, while they were fo many dead Letters in their Registers; yet they could not bear the rigorous Execution of them: So that thofe good Canons do fhew us indeed what were the growing Abuses of the Times, in which they were made; and how good Men fet themselves against

them;

them; but are no fure Indications of the Reformation that was effected by them.

The tottering State of the Roman Empire, which had then fallen under a vast Diffolution of Difcipline and Manners, and coming into feeble Hands, was then finking with its own Weight, and was become on all Sides an eafy Prey to its Invaders, who were either Pagans or Arians, ought to have awakened the Governors of the Church to have apprehended their approaching Ruin ; to have prevented it by their Prayers and Endeavours; and to have corrected those Abuses which had provoked God, and weakned and distracted both Church and Empire. But if we may believe either Gildas here in Britain, or Salvian in France, they rather grew worse, more impenitent, and more infenfible, when they faw the Judgments of God coming upon the Empire, Province after Province rent from it, and over-run by the Barbarians.

When that great Wound was in some fort healed, and a fecond Form of Chriftianity rofe up and prevailed again in the Weftern Parts, and the World became Chriftian, with the Allay that dark and fuperftitious Ages had brought into that holy Doctrine: Then all the Rules of former Ages were fo totally forgotten, and laid afide, that the Clergy univerfally loft their Esteem:

And