have been thought expedient. The first authors thereof were wise and judicious men; they knew it a thing altogether impossible, for each particular in the multitude to judge what benefit doth grow unto them from their prelates, and thereupon uniformly to yield them convenient honour. Wherefore, that all sorts might be kept in obedience and awe, doing that unto their superiors of every degree, not which every man's special fancy should think meet, but which being beforehand agreed upon as meet, by public sentence and decision might afterward stand as a rule for each in particular to follow; they found that nothing was more necessary than to allot unto all degrees their certain honour, as marks of public judgment concerning the dignity of their places; which mark, when the multitude should behold, they might be thereby given to know, that of such or such estimation their governors are, and in token thereof do carry those notes of excellency. Hence it groweth, that the different notes and signs of honour do leave a correspondent impression in the minds of common beholders. Let the people be asked, who are the chiefest in any kind of calling? who most to be listened unto? who of greatest account and reputation? and see if the very discourse of their minds lead them not unto those sensible marks, according to the difference whereof they give their suitable judgment, esteeming them the worthiest persons who carry the principal note and public mark of worthiness. If therefore they see in other estates a number of tokens sensible, whereby testimony is given what account there is publicly made of them, but no such thing in the clergy; what will they hereby, or what can they else conclude, but that where they behold this, surely in that commonwealth religion, and they that are conversant about it, are not esteemed greatly beneficial? Whereupon in time, the open contempt of God and godliness must needs ensue : "Qui bona fide Deus colit, amat et sacerdotes," saith Papi- Præf. l. v. nius. In vain doth that kingdom or commonwealth pretend Silv. zeal to the honour of God, which doth not provide that his clergy also may have honour. Now if all that are employed in the service of God should have one kind of honour, what more confused, absurd, and unseemly? Wherefore, in the honour which hath been allotted unto God's clergy, we are to observe, how not only the kinds thereof, but also in every particular kind, the degrees do differ. The honour which

VOL. III.

Honour in

ornaments,

lege.

the clergy of God hath hitherto enjoyed consisteth especially in the pre-eminence of title, place, ornament, attendance, privilege, endowment. In every of which it hath been evermore judged meet, that there should be no small odds between prelates and the inferior clergy.

XX. Concerning title, albeit even as under the law, all they title, place, whom God hath severed to offer him sacrifice were generally attendancy, termed priests; so likewise the name of pastor or presbyter and privibe now common unto all that serve him in the ministry of the gospel of Jesus Christ, yet both then and now, the higher orders, as well of the one sort as of the other, have by one and the same congruity of reason their different titles of honour, wherewith we find them in the phrase of ordinary speech exalted above others. Thus the heads of the twentyfour companies of priests, are in Scripture termed archApx. priests; Aaron and the successors of Aaron being above those arch-priests; themselves are in that respect farther entitled high and great. After what sort antiquity hath used to style Christian bishops, and to yield them in that kind honour more than was meet for inferior pastors, I may the better omit to declare, both because others have sufficiently done it already, and in so slight a thing, it were but a loss of time to bestow further travail. The allegation of Christ's prerogative to be named an arch-pastor simply, in regard of his absolute excellency over all, is no impediment but that the like title in an unlike signification may be granted unto others beside him, to note a more limited superiority, whereof men are capable enough without derogation from his glory, than which nothing is more sovereign. To quarrel at syllables, and to take so poor exceptions at the first four letters in the name of an archbishop, as if they were manifestly stolen goods, whereof restitution ought to be made to the civil magistrate, toucheth no more the prelates that now are, than it doth the very blessed apostle, who giveth unto himself the title of an archbuilder.

As for our Saviour's words alleged against the title of lordship and grace, we have before sufficiently opened how far they are drawn from their natural meaning, to bolster up a cause which they nothing at all concern. Bishops Theodoret entitled "most honourable:" emperors writing unto bishops, have not disdained to give them their appellations of Lib. v. c. 8. honour, "Your holiness, your blessedness, your amplitude,

your highness," and the like: such as purposely have done Hist. Ecotherwise, are noted of insolent singularity and pride.

cles. l. vii. C. de sum

1. xxxiii. C.

Sacros. Ec

Honour done by giving pre-eminence of place unto one ma Trinit. sort before another, is, for decency, order, and quietness' sake, de Episc. et so needful, that both imperial laws and canons ecclesiasti- Cler. et 1. cal have made their special provisions for it. Our Saviour's xvi. C. de invective against the vain affectation of superiority, whether cles. in title or in place, may not hinder these seemly differences usual in giving and taking honour, either according to the one or the other

a

xlv. 7.

Something there is, even in the ornaments of honour also: otherwise it had been idle for the wise man, speaking of Aaron, to stand so much upon the circumstance of his priestly attire, and to urge it as an argument of such dignity and greatness in him: "An everlasting covenant God made with Aaron, Ecclus. and gave him the priesthood among the people, and made him blessed through his comely ornament, and clothed him with the garment of honour." The robes of a judge do not add to his virtue; the chiefest ornament of kings is justice; holiness and purity of conversation do much more adorn a bishop, than his peculiar form of clothing. Notwithstanding, both judges, through the garments of judicial authority, and through the ornaments of sovereignty, princes; yea, bishops, through the very attire of bishops, are made blessed, that is to say, marked and manifested they are to be such as God hath poured his blessing upon, by advancing them above others, and placing them where they may do him principal good service. Thus to be called, is to be blessed, and therefore to be honoured with the signs of such a calling, must needs be in part a blessing also; for of good things even the signs are good.

Of honour, another part is attendancy; and therefore in the visions of the glory of God, angels are spoken of as his attendants. In setting out the honour of that mystical queen, the prophet mentioneth the virgin ladies which waited on her. Amongst the tokens of Solomon's honourable condition, his servants and waiters, the sacred history omitteth not. This doth prove attendants a part of honour: but this as yet doth not shew with what attendancy prelates are to be honoured. Of the high-priest's retinue amongst the Jews, somewhat the

a They love to have the chief seats in the assemblies, and to be called of men, Rabbi. Matt. xxiii, 6. 7.

gospel itself doth intimate. And, albeit our Saviour came to minister, and not, as the Jews did imagine their Messias should, to be ministered unto in this world, yet, attended on he was by his blessed apostles, who followed him not only as scholars, but even as servants about him. After that he had sent them, as himself was sent of God, in the midst of that hatred and extreme contempt which they sustained at the world's hands, by saints and believers this part of honour was most plentifully done unto them. Attendants they had provided in all places where they went; which custom of the church was still continued in bishops their successors, as by Ignatius it is plain to be seen. And from hence no doubt those acolythes took their beginning, of whom so frequent mention is made; the bishop's attendants, his followers they were in regard of which service the name of acolythes seemeth plainly to have been given. The custom for bishops to Novel. 6. be attended upon by many is, as Justinian doth shew, ancient: the affairs of regiment, wherein prelates are employed, make it necessary that they always have many about them whom they may command, although no such thing did by of honour belong unto them.

p. 126. out

of Jus. 1.

way

Some men's judgment is, that if clerks, students, and religious persons, were more, common serving-men and lay-retainers fewer than they are, in bishops' palaces, the use and the honour thereof would be much more suitable than now. But these things, concerning the number and quality of persons fit to attend on prelates, either for necessity, or for honour's sake, or rather in particular discretion to be ordered, T. C. I. iii. than to be argued of by disputes. As for the vain imagination of some, who teach the original hereof to have been a viii. c. 15. preposterous imagination of Maximinus the emperor, who being addicted unto idolatry, chose of the choicest magistrates to be priests, and, to the end they might be in great estimation, gave unto each of them a train of followers and that Christian emperors, thinking the same would promote Christianity, which promoted superstition, endeavoured to make their bishops encounter and match with those idolatrous priests; such frivolous conceits having no other ground than conceit, we weigh not so much as to frame any answer unto them: our declaration of the true original of ancient attendancy on bishops being sufficient. Now, if that which the light of sound reason doth teach to be fit, have upon

like inducements reasonable, allowable, and good, approved itself in such wise as to be accepted, not only of us, but of pagans and infidels also, doth conformity with them that are evil in that which is good, make that thing which is good, evil? We have not herein followed the heathens, nor the heathens us, but both we and they one and the selfsame Divine rule, the light of a true and sound understanding; which sheweth what honour is fit for prelates, and what attendancy convenient to be a part of their honour.

sacr. Eccles. 1. v. C.

cles. 1. ii. C.

Touching privileges granted for honour's sake, partly in L. xii. C. de general unto the clergy, and partly unto prelates, the chiefest persons ecclesiastical in particular; of such quality and de sacr. Ecnumber they are, that to make but rehearsal of them we scarce think it safe, lest the very entrails of some of our godly brethren, as they term themselves, should thereat haply burst in sunder.

de Episc. et Cler.l. x.

C. de Episc.

et Cler.

endow.

XXI. And yet of all these things rehearsed, it may be there Honour by never would have grown any question, had bishops been ho- ment with noured only thus far forth. But the honouring of the clergy lands and livings. with wealth, this is, in the eyes of them which pretend to seek nothing but mere reformation of abuses, a sin that can never be remitted.

How soon, O how soon, might the church be perfect, even without any spot or wrinkle, if public authority would at the length say Amen unto the holy and devout requests of those godly brethren, who as yet with outstretched necks groan in the pangs of their zeal to see the houses of bishops rifled, and their so-long-desired livings gloriously divided amongst the righteous! But there is an impediment, a let, which somewhat hindereth those good men's prayers from taking effect: they in whose hands the sovereignty of power. and dominion over this church doth rest, are persuaded there is a God; for undoubtedly either the name of Godhead is but a feigned thing; or, if in heaven there be a God, the sacrilegious intention of church-robbers, which lurketh under this plausible name of reformation, is in his sight a thousand times more hateful than the plain professed malice of those very miscreants who threw their vomit in the open face of our blessed Saviour.

They are not words of persuasion by which true men can hold their own when they are over-beset with thieves. And therefore to speak in this cause at all, were but labour lost,