LXXX. There are in a minister of God these four things to be considered, his ordination which giveth him power to meddle with things sacred, the charge or portion of the Church allotted unto him for exercise of his office, the performance of his duty according to the exigence of his charge, and lastly the maintenance which in that respect he receiveth. All ecclesiastical laws and canons which either concern the bestowing or the using of the power of ministerial order have relation to these four. Of the first we have spoken before at large.
Concerning the next, for more convenient discharge of ecclesiastical duties, as the body of the people must needs be severed by divers precincts, so the clergy likewise accordingly distributed. Whereas therefore religion did first take place in cities, and in that respect was a cause why the name of Pagans which properly signifieth country people came to be used in common speech for the same that infidels and unbelievers were, it followed thereupon that all such cities had their ecclesiastical colleges consisting of Deacons and of Presbyters, whom first the Apostles or their delegates the Evangelists did both ordain and govern. Such were the colleges of Jerusalem, Antioch, Ephesus, Rome, Corinth, and the rest where the Apostles are known to have planted our faith and religion. Now because religion and the cure of souls was their general charge in common over all that were near about them, neither had any one presbyter his several cure apart till Evaristus1 Bishop in the see of Rome about the year 112, began to assign precincts unto every church or title which the Christians held, and to appoint unto each presbyter a certain compass whereof himself should take charge alone, the commodiousness of this invention caused all parts of Christendom to follow it, and at the length among the rest our own churches about the year 636 became divided2 in like manner. But other distinction of Churches there doth not appear any in the Apostles’ writings save only according to those3 cities wherein they planted the Gospel of Christ and erected ecclesiastical colleges. Wherefore to ordain κατὰ πόλιν throughout every city, and κατ’ ἐκκλησίαν throughout every church4 do in them signify the same thing. Churches then neither were nor could be in so convenient sort limited as now they are; first by the bounds of each state, and then within each state by more particular precincts, till at the length we descend unto several congregations termed parishes with far narrower restraint than this name at the first was used.
And from hence hath grown their error, who as oft as they read of the duty which ecclesiastical persons are now to perform towards the Church, their manner is always to understand by that church some particular congregation or parish church. They suppose that there should now be no man of ecclesiastical order which is not tied to some certain parish5. Because the names of all church-officers are words of relation, because a shepherd must have his flock, a teacher his scholars, a minister his company which he ministereth unto, therefore it seemeth a thing in their eyes absurd and unreasonable that any man should be ordained a minister otherwise than only for some particular congregation.
Perceive they not how by this mean they make it unlawful for the Church to employ men at all in converting nations? For if so be the Church may not lawfully admit to an ecclesiastical function unless it tie the party admitted unto some particular parish, then surely a thankless labour it is whereby men seek the conversion of infidels which know not Christ and therefore cannot be as yet divided into their special congregations and flocks.
But, to the end it may appear how much this one thing amongst many moe hath been mistaken, there is first no precept requiring that presbyters and deacons be made in such sort and not otherwise. Albeit therefore the Apostles did make them in that order, yet is not their example such a law as without all exception bindeth to make them in no other order but that.
Again if we will consider that which the Apostles themselves did, surely no man can justly say that herein we practise any thing repugnant to their example. For by them there was ordained only in each Christian city a college of presbyters and deacons to administer holy things. Evaristus did a hundred years after the birth of our Saviour Christ begin the distinction of the church into parishes. Presbyters and deacons having been ordained before to exercise ecclesiastical functions in the church of Rome promiscuously, he was the first that tied them each one to his own station. So that of the two indefinite ordination of Presbyters and Deacons doth come more near the Apostles’ example, and the tying of them to be made only for particular congregations may justlier ground itself upon the example of Evaristus than of any Apostle of Christ.