utmost Endeavour to put a stop to their farther Encrease and Progrefs when they do come! Which being a Duty incumbent upon Us especially, who have the Honour to be thus defpis'd forOurMaster's fake; Ishall,by God's Grace, endeavour somewhat towards it, by fhewing how Sacred our Authority is, For He, The Prieft, is the Messenger of the Lord of Hofts.

And as the Prieft under the Law, was in the Prophet's Language The Messenger of the Lord of Hofts, fo in that of the Apoftles,every Lawful Preacher of the Gofpel is an Amballador of Fefus Chrift. This was then and is now, that which only can make Authentick and Valid every Ministerial Act, both of the One and the Other, which otherwise is both Injurious to God and Uselefs to the People. Of the first we hear God complaining by his Prophet (Jer. 23. 21.) I have not fent and yet they ran, I have not (poken to Them and yet they Prophefy'd. And of the fecond the Apostle demanding, How can they Preach unless they are Sent? OurChurch therefore in her 23d Article declares, that It is not lawful for any Man to take upon him the Office of publick Preaching or Miniftring the Sacraments in the Congregation, before he be lawfully Call'd and Sent to Execute the fame; A thing fo plainly contain'd and fo often inculcated in Holy Scripture, and withal fo

agreeable

agreeable to found Reason and good Sense, that tho' it may not seem very ftrange, that the frantick Enthufiaft, the Man of new Light or wild Inspiration fhould despise it; yet that the fober Socinian, the great pretender to Right Reafon and True Judgment fhould peremptorily and Dogmatically deny any need at all of it, were enough to raise any Ones wonder, that is not well enough acquainted with that fort of Men to have learnt that as there is nothing fo plain in Scripture, that they have not the Art of perverting, or the Boldness of out-facing; fo when Reafon too is as much against Them, according to the Obfervation of Mr. Hobbes, (as good a Chriftian) they can be as much against Reafon. I fhall therefore

I. Shew the neceffity from Scripture and the Expediency from Reason of Such a Miffion in General, and confider Briefly the Socinian Arguments against it.

II. Affert our own Miffion in Particular, and Juftify the Sacred Authority, by which our Holy Mother the Church of England has fent us forth into Chrift's Vineyard.

I begin with the firft. The Neceffity in general for a Call and Commiffion from God, in order to exercise the Ministerial Office as it is evidently fet forth in Scripture.

Where

Where, if to rife so high as the Patriarchal Age, Even in that there are vifible footsteps of a Divinely instituted Priesthood, or of Representatives impower'd by God to intercede between Him and his Creatures, to fend Up Prayers for them to Him, and to bring Down Bleffings to them from Him; Inftances of both which parts of the Priestly Office, namely, Interceffion with God, and Blefling and Curfing in his Name, we find long before the time of the Levitical Inftitution; of the first in the ftory of Abraham and Abimelech, Gen. 20. Where tho' Abimelech has the Teftimony of fo good a Man, as to have the fingular Grace of God's appearance to Him, who alfo for the Integrity of his Heart had withheld Him from Sinning against Him, yet He receives at the fame time a Command from God, for the faving of his Life, to procure Abraham to Pray for Him, For He is a Prophet, faith God, and He fball Pray for thee, and thou fbalt Live! So Abraham pray'd unto God, and God healed Abimelech. And again, in God's fending Job's three Friends to Him to makeReconciliation for them, Therefore take unto You now (even Rams and go to my Servant Job, and offer up for yourselves a Burnt-offering, and my Servant Job fball pray for You, for him will I accept. Inftances of the fecond (i. e.) of God's dif penfing His Bleffings and Curfings by the

Miniftry

Ministry of Men, we have in Noab's Bleffing Shem and Curfing Canaan, in Isaac Bleffing Jacob and Rejecting Efau, and in Jacob's most remarkable and folemn Bleffing of the Twelve Patriarchs. For tho' every Man may in fome sense Bless another, fo far as praying for the Bleffing of God upon him may be fo call'd, yet folemnly to pronounce a Bleffing in the Name of the Lord, is an Act of Authority, and cannot be done fo as to have any force or validity without a Commiffion from God. And that these Bleffings and Curfings, which I have mention'd, were of fuch a Nature, the Event and Notorious Verification and Ratifying of 'em by God fufficiently argues, and is also further confirm'd, because that being once pronounc'd they were irrecoverable: which particularly appears in that of Ifaac, who tho' impos'd upon by the younger Brother, who had come by Subtilty and taken away the Bleffing, yet could not recall it ; But Efau was finally rejected, and could find no place of Repentance tho' he fought it carefully with Tears.

Which

plainly fhews, that his Father reckon❜d not the Bleffing that he had bestow'd to be given in his Own Name or Authority, but that it was a Ministerial Act, and as fuch, having been once Executed, was not in his Power to alter or reverfe. But to ftay no longer in the darker times that preceded the Law;

let

let us come to the Legal Priesthood; in the account of which we may find plainly and exprefsly related, how it pleas'd Almighty God to Choose and Sanctify one only Tribe, the Tribe of Levi,out of all the other Twelve to Minister to Himself, and out of that Tribe One only Family, to the highest Sacerdotal Dignity. He exalted Aaron, and gave him the Priesthood among the People; He chofe him out of all Men living to offer Sacrifices to the Lord, and to make Reconciliation for bis People. Ecclus 45. 6,7. 16. There we may fee the feveral diftinct Employments and different Charges allotted to them; how the Levites were in all their Service at the appointment and direction of the Sons of Aaron, They subject to the Principal Guides and Leaders of their own Order, and they all under Obedience to the High - Prieft. There we may read, with what Auguft Solemnities they were publickly admitted to their Holy Functions. How God beautify'd Aaron with comely Ornaments, and cloathed him with a Robe of Glory, with a Breast-plate of Judgment, and with Urim and Thummim, fuch as before him was none; neither did ever any Stranger put them on, but only his Children and his Children's Children perpetually. How Mofes confecrated him, and anointed him with Holy Oyl; How this was appointed to him by an Everlasting Covenant, and to his Seed, that they

should