12 For even Jesus Christ, our inseparable life, is sent by the will of the Father; as the bishops, appointed unto the utmost bounds of the earth, are by the will of Jesus Christ.
13 Wherefore it will become you to run together according to the will of your bishop, as also ye do,
14 For your famous presbytery, worthy of God, is fitted as exactly to the bishop, as the strings are to the harp.
15 Therefore in your concord and agreeing charity, Jesus Christ is sung; and every single person among you makes up the chorus:
16 That so being all consonant in love, and taking up the song of God, ye may in a perfect unity with one voice, sing to the Father by Jesus Christ; to the end that he may both hear you, and perceive by your works, that ye are indeed the members of his son.
17 Wherefore it is profitable for you to live in an unblameable unity, that so ye may always have a fellowship with God.
CHAPTER II.
1 The benefit of subjection. 4 The bishop not to be respected the less because he is not forward in exacting it: 8 warns brethren against heretics; bidding them cleave to Jesus, whose divine and human mature is declared: commends them for their care to keep themselves from false teachers: and shews them the way to God.
FOR if I in this little time have had such a familiarity with your bishop, I mean not a carnal, but spiritual acquaintance with him; how much more must I think you happy who are so joined to him, as the church is to Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ to the Father; so that all things may agree in the same unity.
2 Let no man deceive himself; if a man be not within the altar, he is deprived of the bread of God. For if the prayer of one or two be of such force, as we are told; how much more powerful shall that of the bishop and the whole church be?