I remember some years ago, a virtuoso writ a small tract about worms, proved them to be in more places than was generally observed, and made some discoveries by glasses. This having met with some reception, presently the poor man's head was full of nothing but worms; all we eat and drink, all the whole consistence of human bodies, and those of every other animal, the very air we breathe, in short, all nature throughout was nothing but worms: And, by that system, he solved all difficulties, and from thence all causes in philosophy. Thus it hath fared with our author, and his independent power. The attack against occasional conformity, the scarcity of coffee, the invasion of Scotland, the loss of kerseys and narrow cloths, the death of King William, the author's turning Papist for preferment, the loss of the battle of Almanza, with ten thousand other misfortunes, are all owing to this imperium in imperio.
It will be therefore necessary to set this matter in a clear light, by enquiring whether the clergy have any power independent of the civil, and of what nature it is.
Whenever the Christian religion was embraced by the civil power in any nation, there is no doubt but the magistrates and senates were fully instructed in the rudiments of it. Besides, the Christians were so numerous, and their worship so open before the conversion of princes, that their discipline, as well as doctrine, could not be a secret: They saw plainly a subordination of ecclesiastics, bishops, priests, and deacons: That these had certain powers and employments different from the laity: That the bishops were consecrated, and set apart for that office by those of their own order: That the presbyters and deacons were differently set apart, always by the bishops: That none but the ecclesiastics presumed to pray or preach in places set apart for God's worship, or to administer the Lord's Supper: That all questions relating either to discipline or doctrine, were determined in ecclesiastical conventions. These and the like doctrines and practices, being most of them directly proved, and the rest by very fair consequences deduced from the words of our Saviour and His apostles, were certainly received as a divine law by every prince or state which admitted the Christian religion: and, consequently, what they could not justly alter afterwards, any more than the common laws of nature. And, therefore, although the supreme power can hinder the clergy or Church from making any new canons, or executing the old; from consecrating bishops, or refuse those that they do consecrate; or, in short, from performing any ecclesiastical office, as they may from eating, drinking, and sleeping; yet they cannot themselves perform those offices, which are assigned to the clergy by our Saviour and His apostles; or, if they do, it is not according to the divine institution, and, consequently, null and void. Our Saviour telleth us, "His kingdom is not of this world;" and therefore, to be sure, the world is not of His kingdom, nor can ever please Him by interfering in the administration of it, since He hath appointed ministers of His own, and hath empowered and instructed them for that purpose: So that, I believe, the clergy, who, as he sayeth, are good at distinguishing, would think it reasonable to distinguish between their power, and the liberty of exercising this power. The former they claim immediately from Christ, and the latter from the permission, connivance, or authority of the civil government; with which the clergy's power, according to the solution I have given, cannot possibly interfere.
But this writer, setting up to form a system upon stale, scanty topics, and a narrow circle of thought, falleth into a thousand absurdities. And for a further help, he hath a talent of rattling out phrases, which seem to have sense, but have none at all: the usual fate of those who are ignorant of the force and compass of words, without which it is impossible for a man to write either pertinently or intelligibly upon the most obvious subjects.
So, in the beginning of his preface, page iv, he says, "The Church of England being established by acts of parliament, is a perfect creature of the civil power; I mean the polity and discipline of it, and it is that which maketh all the contention; for as to the doctrines expressed in the articles, I do not find high church to be in any manner of pain; but they who lay claim to most orthodoxy can distinguish themselves out of them." It is observable in this author, that his style is naturally harsh and ungrateful to the ear, and his expressions mean and trivial; but whenever he goeth about to polish a period, you may be certain of some gross defect in propriety or meaning: So the lines just quoted seem to run easily over the tongue: and, upon examination, they are perfect nonsense and blunder: To speak in his own borrowed phrase, what is contained in the idea of established? Surely, not existence. Doth establishment give being to a thing? He might have said the same thing of Christianity in general, or the existence of God, since both are confirmed by acts of parliament. But, the best is behind: for, in the next line, having named the church half a dozen times before, he now says, he meaneth only "the polity and discipline of it": As if, having spoke in praise of the art of physic, a man should explain himself, that he meant only the institution of a college of physicians into a president and fellows. And it will appear, that this author, however versed in the practice, hath grossly transgressed the rules of nonsense, (whose property it is neither to affirm nor deny) since every visible assertion gathered from those few lines is absolutely false: For where was the necessity of excepting the doctrines expressed in the articles, since these are equally creatures of the civil power, having been established by acts of parliament as well as the others. But the Church of England is no creature of the civil power, either as to its polity or doctrines. The fundamentals of both were deduced from Christ and His apostles, and the instructions of the purest and earliest ages, and were received as such by those princes or states who embraced Christianity, whatever prudential additions have been made to the former by human laws, which alone can be justly altered or annulled by them.
What I have already said, would, I think, be a sufficient answer to his whole preface, and indeed to the greatest part of his book, which is wholly turned upon battering down a sort of independent power in the clergy; which few or none of them ever claimed or defended. But there being certain peculiarities in this preface, that very much set off the wit, the learning, the raillery, reasoning and sincerity of the author; I shall take notice of some of them, as I pass.
But here, I hope, it will not be expected, that I should bestow remarks upon every passage in this book, that is liable to exception for ignorance, falsehood, dulness, or malice. Where he is so insipid, that nothing can be struck out for the reader's entertainment, I shall observe Horace's rule:
"Quae desperes tractata nitescere posse, relinquas."
Upon which account I shall say nothing of that great instance of his candour and judgment in relation to Dr. Stillingfleet,[9] who (happening to lie under his displeasure upon the fatal test of imperium in imperio) is High Church and Jacobite, took the oaths of allegiance to save him from the gallows,[10] and subscribed the articles only to keep his preferment: Whereas the character of that prelate is universally known to have been directly the reverse of what this writer gives him.
[Footnote 9: Edward Stillingfleet (1635-1699), educated at Cambridge, wrote in 1659 his "Irenicum, or Weapon Salve for the Church's Wounds." He also published a "Rational Account of the Protestant Religion" in 1664. He occupied successively the important clerical offices of Prebendary of St. Paul's, Archdeaconry of London, Deanery of St. Paul's, and Bishopric of Worcester. The later years of his life were occupied in a controversy with Locke on that writer's "Essay on the Human Understanding." [T. S.]