A REMONSTRANCE TO THE Presbyterians, CONCERNING The Government Established in the Church of ENGLAND.  
AND A Vindication of EPISCOPACY FROM Its first Original, and Divine Institution.  

Published by Order.   
LONDON: Printed for G. HORTON, 1660.   

An Answer to the Solemn League and Covenant.  
THat the Name of episcopacy, even as it signifieth a degree of eminency in the Church, is a sacred and venerable Title; first in holy Scripture ascribed to our blessed Redeemer, who as he is Dominus Dominantium, Lord of Lords, so also, Episcopus Episcoporum Bishop of Bishops, the Shepherd and Bishop of our souls: next to the Apostles, whose Office in the Church is styled by the Holy Ghost Episcope; a bishopric, Let another take his bishopric; though it be translated, Let another take his Office, yet the Original signifies not an Office at large, but an Episcopal Function; that Office which Judas lost, and Mathias was elected into; which was the Office and Dignity of an Apostle. Lastly, to those whom the Apostles set over the Churches, as namely, to Timothy and Titas, who in the subscription of the Apostles Letters, D●vinely inspired, are styled Bishops in the restrained sense of the word, 2 Tim. 4. written from Rome to Timotheus, the first Bishop elected of the Church of Ephesus; and to Titus the first elect Bishop of the Church of the Cretians.  
It is confessed by Moline is, and other Learned Patrons of Presbyterial Government themselves, that Episaopacie is a Plant either set in the Church by the Apostles themselves, or their immediate Successors in the first and best ages of the Church; and is it agreeable to Piety to swear the extirparion of such a Plant?  
It cannot be denied, that when the Church most flourished, and was of fat larger extent then now it is, over he face of the Christian World; there was no other Government then Episcopacy regulated by Divine Precepts, and EcclesI stical Canons: and sh●ll we swear to extirpate that Government under which the Church most thrived & flourished? Shall we swear against our Prayers, viz. for the rooting out of that, upon which we are enjoined to pray God to pour down the due of his blessing? Surely the due of Heaven burns not the root of any Plant upon earth, but waters it and makes it grow,  
They were Bishops who had the chiefest hand first in the Plantation of Christian Religion in the days of ●ucius King of Britain; and after in the restitution in the days of Etheldred King of Kent; and in the Reformation of it in the Reign of Edward the sixth, and Queen Elizabeth: and is it a Religious act to eradicate that Government and Power which both planted and pruned Religion itself?  
Christ dyed not intestate; he made his last Will & Testament, and by it bequeathed many Legacies to his Church; and among them not onely catholic Doctrine, but Discipline also. This Discipline, if it be not Episcopal Government moderated by Evangelical and Apostolical Rules, the whole Church is guilty of the loss of a Sacred and precious Jewel; for certain it is out of Records of all Ages of the Church, that no other was ever retained, or can be found save this, before the Religious Reformer, and Magistrates of Geneva having banished their Popish Bishops, were after a sort necessitated to draw a new plate form of ecclesiastical Discipline by Lay-Elders.  
It cannot be conceived, but that Christ left a Pattern of Government to his Church, to continue till the end of the World: and doubtless, his Apostles with whom he conversed forty days after his Resurrection, speaking of those things which appertain to the Kingdom of God, Act. 3.1. delivered that to the Church which they received from their Master. What Government or Discipline was that? There can be conceived but three forms of Government; Episcopal, most conformable to Monarchy; Presbyterial, to Aristocracy; and ndependent, as they term it, to Democracy. Presbyterial or Independent it could not be, for Presbyterial is no elder then the Reformation in Geneva, and the ●ndependent no elder then New-England; whereas Episcopal Government hath been time out of mind, not in one but in all Churches.  
And sith it was not first constituted by any Sanction of a General Council, it follows necessary, according to St. Augustins observation, that it must needs be an Apostolical Institution. For what not one Church, but all Churches; not in one Age, but all Ages, hath uniformly observed and practised, and no man can define who, after the Apostles, were the beginners of it; must needs be supposed to be done by Order or Tradition from them.  
This Form of Government was generally embr●ced by the best of Christians till Ar●tus who stood for a bishopric and missed it, out of discontent broached that new doctrine wherewith the heads of ou● Schisma●i●ks are so much intoxicated, viz. That there ought to be no di●inction in the Church between a Bishop and a Presbyter. But our z●alous Reformers if they think themselves not too good to be advised by the Great, ●ounsellor ought to take heed how they rashly and unadvis●ly pluck, up the Tares, as they esteem them of holy Canons, & Ecclesiastical Laws, lest they pluck up by the roots the good Wheat of many profitable and wholesome Laws of the Nation, and Acts of Parliament: For to abolish Episcopacy, is the way: to bring confusion, as well in Secular as Ecclesiastical Courts.  
But if the Authority of Lords and Commons could soon cure these Sores in precedent Acts of Parliament, yet how will they make up the breaches in the Consciences of all those, who in the late Protestation, and the Solemn League and Covenant, have taken an O●th to maintain the privileges of the Members of Parliament, and the Liberties of the Subject? The most authentical evidence whereof, are Magna Charta, and the Petition of Right; in both which the Rights of the Church, and privilege of Episcopal Sees are set down in the Fore-front in Capital Letters.  
To strain this string a little higher, the power of granting Congedeliers, together with the investiture of Archbishops, Bishops, and Collation of deaneries and Prebends, with a settled Revenue from the First-fruits and Tenths there, is one of the fairest flowers in the Kings Crown; and to rob the mperial Diadem of it( confidering the King is a person most Sacred) is sacrilege in a high degree; and not sacrilege onely, but Perjury also in all those who attempt it. For all Graduates in the University, and men of rank and Quality in the Nation, who are admitted to any place of eminent Authority or Trust, take the O●th of Supremacy, whereby they are bound to defend and propugne all Pre-eminencies, Authorities, and Prerogatives annexed to the imperial Crown; whereof this is known to be one inherent in the King, as He is Supreme Head of the Church within his Realms, and Defender of the Faith.  
Yet for all this, admit that Reason of State should enforce the extirpation of Episcopacy thus rooted, both in the royal Prerogative and privilege of the Subject, and in the Laws of the Land; it is a golden Maxim of Law, Possumus quod jure possumus, we can do no more then lawfully we may. If Episcopal Government must be overthrown, it must be done in a ●●●ful way: not by popular Tumults, but by a B●ll passed in Parliament, and that to be tendered to his Majesty for his Royal Assent. And how such a Bill could be pressed upon his late Majesty, who at his Coronation took an Oath to preserve Bishops in their Legal Rights, I must learn from our great Masters of the Law. For by the Gospel, all inducements to sin are sin; and solicitations to Perjury are tainted with that guilt: neither is there any power upon earth to dispense with the breach of Oaths lawfully taken. For, if we desire that this Church of England should flourish like the Garden of Eden, we must have an eye to the Nurseries of good Learning and Religion, the two Universities; which will never be furnished with choice Plants, if there be no Preferments and encouragements to the Students there, who for the far greater part bend their Studies to the Queen of all Professsions, Divinity; which will make but a slow progress, if bishoprics, deaneries, Archdeaconries and Prebendaries, and all other Ecclesiastical Dignities,( which, like silver Spurs, prick on the industry of those who consecrate their labours and endeavours to the glorifying of God, in employing their talent in the Ministry of the Gospel, be taken away.  
And whereas many of the Covenanters will object and say, That Episcopal Government hath proved inconvenient and prejudicial to the State; and therefore the Hierarchy is to be cut down, root and branch.  
To this we answer, as Cicero doth of Cato his exceptions against Murena; Set aside the Authority of the Objectors, the Objection hath very little in it. For it is liable to many and just Exceptions, and admitteth of divers replies.  
First it is said, That Episcopal Government is inconvenient and mischievous, and prejudicial to the State: but it was never proved to be so.  
Secondly, Admit some good proof could be brought of it; yet if episcopacy be of Divine Institution, as hath been proved, it must not be therefore rooted out; but the Luxurious stems of it pruned and those additions to the first institution from whence these inconveniences have grown ought to be retrenched.  
Thirdly, If Episcopacy hath proved inconvenient, and mischievous in this Age, which was most beneficial and profitable in all former Ages, the fault may be in the Maladies of the Patient, not in the method of Cure. This Age is to be Reformed not Episcopacy Abrogated; that the Liberty and looseness of these Times will not brook the Sacred Bands of Episcopal Discipline is rather a proof of the integrity thereof, then a true Argument of any malignity in it to the State: without which, no effectual means or course can be taken, either for the suppressing schismatics, or the continuation of a lawful and undeniable succession in the Ministry.  
FINIS.