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linus, Flavianus, Victor, Maximus Taurienfis, fix hundred and thirty fathers in the council at Chalcedon; Fulgentius, Gregory Turnafis, Fortunatus, Caffiodorus, Gregorius Magnus, the many bishops in the feveral councils at Toletum, the Roman fynod of a hundred and twenty-five under Agatho, Damafcene, Beda, Albinus, and the fathers in the council of Franckford, with many others in later times, and all the found divines and evangelic churches fince the reformation.

Now fince it appears that all the found and orthodox writers have unanimously declared for the eternal generation and Sonship of Chrift in all ages, and that thofe only of an unfound mind and judgment, and corrupt in other things as well as this, and many of them men of impure lives and vile principles, have declared against it, fuch must be guilty of great temerity and rashness to join in an oppofition with the one against the other; and to oppose a doctrine the church of God has always held, and especially being what the fcriptures abundantly bear teftimony unto, and is a matter of fuch moment and importance, being a fundamental doctrine of the chriftian religion, and indeed what diftinguifhes it from all other religions, from thofe of Pagans, Jews and Mahometans, who all believe in God, and generally in one God, but none of them believe in the Son of God: that is peculiar to the chriftian religion.

A DISSER

A

DISSERTATION

CONCERNING

The RISE and PROGRESS of
PROGRESS of POPERY.

WHA

THAT is generally meant and understood by Popery, is well known. As for the name it matters not from whence and from whom it is, nor when it began to be in ufe, nor in what sense the word papa is used in heathen and ecclefiaftical writers. By the latter it was given to christian bishops in common; as to Cyprian, Athanafius, Austin, Epiphanius, and others; until the bishops of Rome affumed it as peculiar to themselves: but it is not the name, but the thing we are inquiring after; and as things are before they have a name, fo Popery was in being before it bore this name. It did not begin at Rome, nor was it always confined there; nor did it cease at the Reformation in the reformed churches; fome of its unholy relics continued with them, andstill do, and even in Geneva itself. It is commonly believed by Proteftants, that the Pope of Rome is Antichrift; and the Roman church, its hierarchy, doctrines and practices, Antichriftian; and by Proteftant writers and interpreters, for the moft part, it is fuppofed that the fame Antichrift is meant in 2 Thess. ii. 3—10. to whom the description agrees; as, the man of fin, the fon of perdition, who exalts himself above all that is called God, or is worshipped; fitting in the temple of God, fhewing himself to be God. Now this fame man of sin, was then in being in the apoftles time, though not arrived to his manhood; to deny this, would be just fuch good fenfe as to deny that an infant exists because it is not grown up to man's estate. Antichrift was not then revealed, but was to be revealed in his proper time, when that which hindered his being revealed was taken away, even the Roman empire: he was in being, though he lay hid and. concealed till an apportunity offered to fhew himself. The mystery of iniquity, which is one of the names of myftical Babylon, or the Antichriftian whore of Rome, Rev. xvii. 5. began to work already, when the apoftle wrote the above. prophecy, and gave the above description of Antichrift; and fo the apoftle

John

John says, that the spirit of antichrift, which should come, even now already is it in the world, 1 John iv. 3. Antichrift was not only in embryo in the times of the apostles, but was arrived to fome bigness, so as to be active and operative. Now Popery may be confidered in a twofold respect; both as an hierarchy, an usurped jurifdiction, and tyrannical domination over others; and as a fyftem of antichriftian doctrines and practices: and in both views it will appear, that what is now fo called, had a very early beginning.

I. Popery may be confidered as an antichriftian hierarchy, a tyrannical jurifdiction over other churches, gradually obtained by ufurpation; and though fuch an affectation of pre-eminence and dominion was forbidden, and condemned by Christ, Matt. xx. 26, 27. and chap. xxiii. 8, 11. and by his apostles, and even by Peter, whom the pope of Rome claims as his predeceffor, 2 Cor. i. 24. 1 Pet. v. 3. yet this Diotrephefian fpirit, or love of pre-eminence, appeared even in the apoftolic age, 3 John ix. and though the office of bishop or overseer, and of prefbyter or elder, and of paftor, is one and the fame, and equal, according to the scripture-account, As xx. 27. and there were but two officers in the church, bishops and deacons, Phil. i. 1. yet we foon hear of the fuperiority of bishops to prefbyters, and of the subjection of prefbyters to bishops, as well as of deacons to both, and of the people to them all; as appears from the epiftles of Ignatius, in the second century; and in the third and following, we read of a great variety of offices, together with others fince added, which make the present antichriftian hierarchy; as will be obferved hereafter.

The bishops of Rome very early discovered a domineering fpirit over other bishops and churches; they grasped at power and exercised it, though they met with rebuffs in it. In the fecond century there was a controverfy about keeping Eafter. The Afian churches obferved it on the 14th day of the new moon, let it fall on what day of the week it might; but the church of Rome, with other churches, observed it on the Lord's day following. Victor, then bishop of Rome, being a fierce and bluftering bishop, threatened at least to excommunicate, if he did not excommunicate, the faid churches, for not obferving Eafter at the fame time that he did. Eufebius fays, that he attempted to do it; from which Irenæus of France, endeavoured to diffuade him, though he was of the fame mind with him, with refpect to the obfervance of Eafter; but Socrates the hiftorian fays, he did fend them an excommunication; which was an instance of tyrannical jurifdiction exercised over other churches. In the middle of the third century there was a dispute about rebaptizing hereticks who repented and came over to the church: the African churches and bishops, as Cyprian and others, • Socrat. Eccl. Hift. 1. 5. c. 22.

b

a Eccl. Hift. 1. 5. c. 24.

Apud ibid.

others, were for rebaptizing them, and did; but Stephen, bishop of Rome, violently opposed the baptifm of them, and cut off all the churches in Africa for the practice of it; which is another instance of the power the bishop of Rome thus early ufurped over other churches: though indeed it was highly refented by the eastern churches, and displays his imperious and impofing temper, as if he wanted to make himself a bishop of bishops'.

In the beginning of the third century, in Tertullian's time, the bishop of Rome had the titles of Pontifex Maximus, and of Epifcopus Epifcoporum. Julius I. in the fourth century, took upon him to reprove fome eastern bishops for deposing others, and ordered the reftitution of them; though they despised his reproofs, and even depofed him for firft communing with Athanafius and others. Platina fays, that he reproved them for calling a council at Antioch, without the leave of the bishop of Rome; which he urged, could not be done without his authority, seeing the church of Rome had the pre-eminence over the rest of the churches: but the fame author fays, they confuted his claim with a sneer. Adolphus Lampe, in his Ecclefiaftical History', obferves, that it is thought that Mark, fitting in the Roman chair, A. D. 335. first arrogated to himself the title of universal bishop: and indeed, if the letters of Athanafius and the Egyptian bishops to him, and his to them, are genuine, they both gave the title to him, and he took it to himself; their letter to him runs thus, "To the reve"rend Mark, pope of the holy Roman and apoftolic See, and of the universal "church." And his to them begins thus, "To the venerable brethren Atha"nafius, and all the bishops in Egypt, Mark, the bishop of the holy Roman "and apoftolic See, and of the univerfal church." And in the former, the fee of Rome is called the mother and bead of all churches.

Though hiftorians generally agree, that the title of univerfal bishop was given by Phocas to Boniface III. in the year 606. at the beginning of the feventh cen tury, yet an anonymous writer', in an essay on fcripture prophecy, p. 104. publifhed in 1724. quotes from Sigonius De occid. Imper. p. 106, and 314. two paffages, fhewing, that Valentinian, the third emperor of the weft, in A. D. 445. and Marcion, emperor of the east, in A. D. 450. affigned something like an univerfal power to pope Leo I. which was more than a century and a half before the times of Phocas. The title of universal bishop might not be established by authority of the emperor until his time, yet pretenfions were made to it, and it was claimed by the bishops of Rome before, and in some instances given. And though

Vid. Cyprian Ep. 75.

Tertullian de pudicitia, c. I.

b Vit, Pontific. p. 44; 45.

• Concil. Carthag. inter opera Cyprian. p. 397.
Socrates, 1. 2. c. 15. Sozomen, l. 3. c. 8, 11.
1 L. 2. c. 5. f. 17.
* Athanafii opera.

In the abstract of the hiftory of popery, p. 1. margin.

though pope Gregory I. in the fixth century, a little before the time of Phocas, condemned John of Conftantinople as antichrift, for taking upon him the title of Oecumenical bishop, because it intrenched upon his own power and authority; yet this humble pope, who called himself fervus fervorum, asserted, that the apoftolic fee, meaning the fee of Rome, was the head of all the churches; and vehemently inveighed against the emperor, for taking it to himself'. And it is certain that this pope claimed a jurisdiction over the churches in Britain, fince he appointed his legate, Auguftine the monk, metropolitan over the whole island"; who endeavoured to bring the British bishops and churches to a conformity to the Roman church, and the rites of it, and to acknowledge the pope's authority. This was before the time of pope Boniface the third, who obtained of the emperor the title of univerfal bishop.

The primacy of the church of Rome to other churches, with respect to rank and order, which made way for primacy of power, was very early afferted, claimed, and allowed. Several fayings of the antient writers much contributed to it from the grandeur and magnificence of the city of Rome, being the metropolis of the empire, an argument was very early used to a fuperior regard to the church in it. Irenæus", who lived in the fecond century, obferves, that "to this church (the Roman church) every church should convene (or join in "communion;) that is, thofe every where who are believers; propter potentiorem

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principalitatem; in which always by them who are, every where is preserved "that tradition which is from the apoftles." And Cyprian °, in the middle of the third century, calls it the chair of Peter, and the principal church, from whence the facerdotal unity arifes. Jerom, in the fourth century, writing to pope Damafus, calls him his blefedness, and the chair of Rome, the chair of Peter: and Optatus, in the fame century, fays, the Roman church is the epifcopal chair, first conferred on Peter, in which he fat the head of all the apostles, and the chair of Peter and earlier in this century the council of Nice was held, the fixth canon of which gave equal power to the bishop of Rome, over the bishops of his province, as the bishop of Alexandria had by custom; and by the third canon of the council at Conftantinople, A. D. 381, 382. the bishop of Conftantinople had the prerogative of honour after the bishop of Rome, because Constantinople was New Rome: and this was confirmed by Juftinian the emperor, in the fixth century, who ordained, that the pope of Rome fhould have the first feat, and after him the archbishop of Conftantinople. And what ferved to strengthen the primacy of the church of Rome, and increase its power, and which the bishops

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