Chap. 3. Nothing then is more certain, than that, when Quelt 14 Juftinian faid, that (79) Constantinople was the Head of all other Churches, his Meaning was only this, that all the chief Churches of the Oriental Empire were Subject to Conftantinople, in the Opinion of this Emperor. For, tho' the Pope did not confent to this Change of the ancient Difcipline in Favour of Conftantinople; yet the Bishops of Alexandria, of Antioch, and all the Oriental Prelates did. And as these were the only Perfons concern'd; the Greeks imagin'd, that the Pope's Confent was not neceffary.

Fourteenth QUESTION.

Are the modern Greeks the Catholick Church?

TH

ANSWER, HEY are not. My Reason is, because they are not in Communion with the Bishop of Rome, S. Peter's Succeffor, whom the Catholick Church has always own'd to be her Head by divine Institution. Be pleas'd to read the Treatife of Supremacy, in the fecond Tome of the true Church of Chrift, against Mr. Lesley, an 1715.

II. Chrift faid to St. Peter without Exception, S. Jo. xxi. v. 15, 16, 17, Feed my Lambs, Feed my Sheep. Either then the other Apoftles were not any Part of Chrift's Flock, or they were here committed to S. Peter's Charge. Again,

(79) Conftantinopolitana Ecclefia omnium aliarum ef Caput. in Co. L. 1. Tit, 2. §. 24. P. 15.

Again, if Chrift had faid to his Apoftles, Up- Chap. 3 on you I will build my Church, and the Gates Quest14 of Hell shall not prevail against it, we might have rightly concluded from thence, that the Apostles were the Vicars of Chrift, and had a Superior Jurifdiction to all Chriftian Pastors.

But Chrift faid to St. Peter, Thou art Cephas [that is a Stone, a Rock, S. Jo. I. v. 42] or, Thou art Peter, and upon this Rock I will build my Church, and the Gates of Hell fhall not prevail against it, S. Mat. xvi. v. 18. For it is the fame, as if he had faid, Thou art a Rock, and upon this Rock I will build my Church, &c. Which evidently denotes S. Peter's Perfon, as Dr. Hammond, a Divine of the Church of England, rightly obferves.

His Paraphrafe on the Text is [1] The Name by which thou art Styl'd, and known by me, is that, which fignifies a Stone or Rock: and fuch Shalt thou be in the Building of the Church; which accordingly fhall be fo built on thee, founded in thee, that the Power of Death, of the Grave, Jhall not get Victory over it: the Chriftian Church now to be planted, fhall never be deftroy'd.

And in his Note [2] on the fame Text; the Name, fays he, of mre Signifying a Stone bere, fuch an one, as for the Firmness and Validity is fit to bear the greater Stress and Weight in the Building, is applicable to the Perfon of S. Peter, in refpect of the Church.

In the fame manner Bishop Pearfon, When Peter, fays [3] he, had converted three thousand Souls, Acts ii. v. 41, which were added to the hundred

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(1) Paraph. on the N. T. p. 89. an. 1653. (2) pag. 91.col. 1. (3) Expofition of the Creed. p. 336. Edit. 4. an. 1676.

Chap. 3. hundred and twenty Difciples Acts. i. 15; then Quest14 was there a Church, and that built upon Peter, according to our Saviour's Promife.

III. And if Chrift inftituted that Form of Church-Government, which was to continue in After-ages; we cannot doubt, but as S. Peter was under Chrift] the Head of the vifi-· ble Church, as long as he liv'd, fo his Succeffors have been fince his Death, and will continue to the end of the World. In the middle of the third Age when Rome had receiv'd no Privileges from any Christian Emperor, S. Cyprian call'd it [4] the Chair of Peter, and the PRINCIPAL CHURCH, FROM WHICH THE UNITY OF PRIEST-HOOD IS RISEN; or the Center of Chriftian Unity. And a Spiritual Supremacy is nothing else.

IV. But was not the Greek Church, at her Separation from Rome in the ninth or in the eleventh Age, in Communion with the four Eastern Patriarchs, of Conftantinople, of Alexandria, of Antioch, and of Jerufalem? was She not then the main Body of Chriftians?

I ANSWER, The Schifm in both Cafes began at Conftantinople: and, when complete, involv'd the other Eastern Patriarchs. But it does not appear, that the Greek Church was then the most numerous Society of Chriftians: and, being separated from the Head, or Root, 'tis plain that it was not the Catholick Church. Branches, when cut off, may be greater than the Stem: But their Bulk deceives no one. Every Child

(4) Petri Cathedram, atq; Ecclefiam principalem, unde Unitas facerdotalis exorta eft. S. Cypr. Epift. Iv, ad

Cornelium.

Child will tell you, which is, which is not the Chap. 3. Tree. The Catholick Church in Fact has al-Questi ways been more numerous, than any one Society or Communion of Chriftians befides. But, tho' She were not, She would be known infallibly by this Mark; that She is, and always was, the Church of all Nations, at leaft in a limited Serife, and that She adheres to the Head inftituted by Christ.

V. The Greek Church, how large and populous foever She had been formerly, was extremely reduc'd and leffen'd before the Schifm.

First, by the Turks, who had destroy'd or perverted the greatest Part of it. Egypt, Syria, and Palestine, with the Patriarchal Sees of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerufalem, were Subject to them. So was all Arabia, Perfia, Chal daa, Mefopotamia, and Africa. Jerufalem was taken by the Perfians an. 614. Antioch, now a fmall Village, was taken by the Turks an 638. Alexandria, an. 640; above two hundred Years, before Photius's Schifm, and have continued, without any great Interruption, in the fame Slavery ever fince. Conftantinople stood out the longest: but is now the Head of the Turkish Empire and fhews us, how great a Defolation there is of Religion, where ever those Infidels prevail. The Laity is thin, and the Clergy titular. Conftantinople had formerly fix or seven hundred Bishops, now only about å hundred and fifty, under it: and 35 of these are titular Arch-Bifhops without any Suffragans, as a late Greek [5] Writer observes. Дfrica is another Instance, in what a prodigious

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(5) Chrift, Angelus, Frankford, an. 1655.

Man

Chap. 3. ner Christianity Suffers from the Mahometans. Queft14 Carthage, and what the Roman Emperors poffefs'd in Africa, was taken by the Mahometans an. 696. And by the middle of the eleventh Century, there were [6] scarce five Bihops left in the whole Country. Conftantinople was taken by the Turkish Emperor Mahomet the Second, an. 1453, on the 29th Day of May, which was Tuesday after Trinity-Sunday, Conftantin the Seventy-fourth Greek Emperor being killl'd in the Siege, in whose Perfon the Greek Empire ended; after it had stood one thousand one hundred and twenty three Years.

Secondly, Another confiderable abatement of the Greek Church, was the great Number of Neftorians, Eutychians, and Semi-Eutychians, feparated from her Communion, tho' dwelling in the fame Countries and Cities. Neftorians infefted Syria; Eutychicns, and Semi-Eutychians, Egypt, and the two Armenias.

Neftorians are fo numerous in Syria, Affyria, Mefopotamia, Chaldæa, Perfia, Tartary, and India, that Dr. Heylin fays, (7) they are the GREATEST SECT of Chriftians in all the East. And a later Hiftorian, the GREATEST PART, fays (8) he, of the Christians in the Eaftern Parts are of this Sect. Which is reckon❜d to comprehend no lefs, than (9) three hundred thoufand Families. Their Patriarch refides at Moufful, a City in Diarbeck, or Mefopotamia. Eutychians

(6) Audimus quinq; vix Epifcopos fupereffe in tota Africa, inquit Leo nonus Papa, Epift. 3. Tom. ix. Concil. p. 972. AB. (7) Cofmogr. Lib. 3. p. 116. col. 1. (8) Moll's Geography. Part 2. p. 43. Col. 1. Edit. 4. an. 1722. (9) Perpetuite. T. 1. p. 112. an: 1670.