[¹] Epistle to Barnabas. No. 10.
* An age after this, Justin Martyr thus glories of the power of the gospel-faith; “We, says he, who before we became Christians, loved our wealth and possession above all things, now give up all property in them, that they may be in common for all that want them. Qui pecuniarum & possessionum fructus ac proventus præ rebus omnibus adamabamus, nunc etiam quæ habemus in commune conferimus, & cum indigentibus quibuscunque communicamus.”[¹] What a lean, heathenish figure must the Doctor’s proverb of charity beginning at home, have made in the days of St. Barnabas, Clement, or Justin Martyr? Or who durst then have made such an use of the text of St. Paul, as the Doctor has done, or coupled it with such a proverb? Were any of these first saints to judge of this matter, the Doctor might, for ought I know, have a worse reprimand from them for so doing, than if he had only coupled Cardinals with Pluralists.
[¹] 2 Apology
In order to shew the Doctor that he was very unseasonably preaching against the sin and folly of an excessive charity, when yet every part of the church wanted to be shewn how they were fallen from the gospel degree of it, I set before him an imaginary Bishop of Winchester, yet drawn according to the model of the holy Bishops of the first ages. I supposed this Bishop so filled with the Spirit of Christ, that he looked upon all the revenues of his see, with no other eyes, than as our Saviour looked at that bag that was carried along with him by his disciples, as so much for his own necessities and the necessities of others. I supposed that in this spirit, he so expended his yearly income, that he chose to bring up his children strangers to all worldly figure, and in as low a state of labour as that to which our Lord and his apostles had been used. I supposed, that by a piety of life and conversation, equal to this exalted charity, he had instilled such an heavenly spirit into his wife and children, as made them highly thankful for their condition, and full of praise to God for the blessing of such a relation. Dr. [♦]Trapp, tho’ an antient divine, seems to start back with fright, at the sight of this apostolical bishop, and supposes, that if such a monster of a man was now to get into a bishoprick, he must needs make his children extraordinary wicked, fill them with abhorrence of his memory, and spread infidelity in the world, by making Christianity a jest to Infidels, p. 71.
[♦] “Trap” replaced with “Trapp”
I say, says the Doctor, very clearly and plainly, that such a bishop must be a mad man, p. 70. Now, if the Doctor will prove from the scriptures this bishop to be a mad man, it must be for the following reasons: First, because he had so mean a spirit, as to suffer the son of a bishop to work under a carpenter, as the Redeemer of mankind had done. Secondly, because he taught himself and his family to believe that which St. Paul believed, that having food and raiment, we ought to be therewith content. Thirdly, because he came up to the very letter of the great commandment, of loving our neighbour as ourselves. Fourthly, because he imitated the spirit of the first Christians at Jerusalem, who accounted nothing to be their own that they possessed. Fifthly, because he had turned himself and family from all the vanity of this world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. Sixthly, because he seemed to have this of the apostle fixed in his mind, “He that saith, he abideth in Christ, ought so to walk, as he walked.” Seventhly, because his life was fashioned according to this doctrine of the Holy Jesus, “Learn of me, for I am meek, and lowly of heart: I am among you, as he that serveth: whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; even as the Son of man came not to be ministred unto, but to minister.” For it may be said with the greatest certainty, that if the Doctor will have any proof from the scripture of the madness of this bishop, it must be as absurd as the reasons here alledged.
Come we now to consider this bishop according to the spirit, practice and laws of the church in all ages. Any one versed ever so little in the history of the church, must see at the first sight, that this supposed bishop is a true copy of the first apostolical fathers. And if this bishop was to be accounted a madman, because of the manner of his life, we must come down several ages after Constantine, to the mitre and triple crown, before we could find a bishop in his senses. The Clements, the Polycarps, the Ignatius’s, the Irenæus’s, the Cyprian’s, the Basils, the Ambrose’s, and a number that have long graced our calenders, as saints, must take their place among bedlamites: for they were all of them to a tittle, the very man I have supposed at Winchester. They considered every penny that was brought in by the gospel, as a provision for the poor, and themselves as only entitled to their common share out of it. They durst no more raise any of their relations to a splendor of life, or give them any figure from the revenues of the church, than commit sacrilege. They gloried as much in their own strict poverty and want of worldly figure, as in their having totally renounced idols.
But we have much more than primitive example for our bishop of Winchester: the doctrine and laws of the church have unanimously from age to age, to the very council of Trent, required every bishop to be of the same spirit of which we have supposed him. The church, both by the doctrine of fathers, and the canons of councils, constantly maintains; First, that the clergy are not proprietors, but barely stewards of the benefices they enjoy: having them for no other end, but for their own necessary, frugal subsistence, and the relief of the poor.[¹] Secondly, that a clergyman using his benefice for his own indulgence, or the enriching his own family, is guilty of sacrilege, and is a robber and murderer of the poor.[²] Thirdly, that if a clergyman has a reasonable subsistence of his own, and is not in the state of the poor, then let his benefice be what it will, he has no right to use any part of it for himself, nor for his kindred, unless they be fit to be considered among those poor that are to be relieved by the church.[³] Fourthly, that every bishop and clergyman is to live in an humble, frugal, outward state of life, seeking for no honour or dignity in the world, but that which arises from the distinction and lustre of his virtues.[⁴] Fifthly, that a beneficed clergyman using the goods of the church for his own indulgence, or raising fortunes for his children, or their expensive education, is sacrilegious, and a robber of the poor.[⁵] Sixthly, that every clergyman is to die out of the church as poor as he entered into it.[⁶] Seventhly, that a clergyman dying, cannot leave or bequeath any thing to his children or friends, but barely that which he had independently of the church.[⁷]
[¹] Nihil ecclesia nisi Fidem possidet.—Possessio ecclesiæ est Egenorum sumptus, Ambrose, Epistle 31.
[²] Si Pauperum Compauperes sumus, & nostra sunt, & illorum. Si autem privatim quæ nobis sufficiunt, possidemus, non sunt illa nostrum, sed Pauperum Procurationem gerimus, non Proprietatem nobis Usurpatione damnabili vindicamus, Augustine Epistle 50 to Boniface.