66

66

66

"But as the fick are to be visited and "attended, as well as the poor relieved, "it may be neceffary alfo to appoint women for thefe purposes, especially as to attending and nurfing the poor "of their own fex. These may require many offices highly improper for men "to be engaged in; though the nurfing fick men, or visiting and relieving them, may very properly fall alfo under the 66 care of women. Thefe women may alfo be called Διάκονοι τῆς ἐκκλησίας (fee "Rom. xvi. 1.) fervants or minifters of the "church. Those who are to be deemed

66

66

66

proper for thefe offices, muft not be

young, raw, unexperienced girls; nor married women, whofe attention belongs to their husbands and families,

I Cor. vii. 34; nor the younger wi"dows, who are not arrived at a time of "life fuitable to fuch employments,

1 Tim. v. 11: let these marry, to keep "themselves out of mifchief, ver. 12, 66 13, 14. The only women who are fit "to be chofen as fervants or miniflers of "the church in the refpects above men"tioned, fhould be far advanced in years; "that is to fay, not lefs than threescore years old, who having buried their "husbands and brought up their children, I Tim. v. 1o. have time, as well as " inclination,

66

"inclination, to devote themfelves to "the offices of the church. They should "alfo be fober and difcreet perfons, who, by their conduct in their younger

66

years, have fhewn their temperance "and fobriety, by having contented "themselves with one bufband, and who,

ever after the death of that husband, "have fecluded themfelves from any "further worldly engagements of that "fort, fo as to be justly styled widows

indeed; though defolate, yet trufting in "GOD (1 Tim. v. 5.); and like ANNA, "Lukeii. 36, 37. continuing in fupplications "and prayers night and day."-This I take to be a confiftent and clear view of these paffages taken together. As we may from bence infer, that there were women in the church younger than fixty years, by the Apostle's exprefs exclufion of thofe under that age from thofe offices to which women were to be chofen ; as also that there were many who had been twice married, by his defigning those who had been but once married for the aforefaid offices; fo we may as fairly conclude, from his faying a bishop-dẽ, čiva—ought to be-and again, if any, sw, is or be the bufband of one wife-that there were many Chriftians, not who bad bad, but at that prefent time actually had more than one

wife. If this had not been the cafe, it would have been as much out of the question to have mentioned the having but one wife, as to have faid, that none fhould be chofen but those who had but one head or one body, when it was not to be fuppofed that any man had more.

•

66

As to the conceit, that, "what the Apoftle fays about the bishops and deacons, is to prove that no minifter may marry a fecond time," it is all but as bad as faying, with the church of Rome, that he ought not to marry at all.

With respect to the bufinefs of polygamy, as to the thing itself, nothing that is here faid proves it to be more or less finful in one man than in another; that depends wholly on the law of GOD delivered by MOSES. Therefore the prudential reafons, for which he evidently excepted against polygamifts being elected to church-offices, no more affects the matter of polygamy, than the excepting against women under fixty years old, proves it finful in a woman to bẹ younger, or that, because no woman was to be chofen to the office of a deaconess who had been twice married, therefore it was finful for the woman to marry again after the death of her husband, contrary to I Cor.

1 Cor. vii. 39. and to the express advice of the Apostle, 1 Tim. v. 14.

As to the fuppofed unlawfulness of second marriages, or the notion, that if a man loft his wife, it was finful to marry again; this began very early in the church, and fpread itself even to this country. We find in the time of Ed. I. about the year 1 276, the parliament adopted a conftitution made by the Pope at Lyons, to exclude men that had been twice married from all clerks privilege. So that if a man was convicted of felony, who would otherwife have had his clergy, and it appeared that he had been twice married, he was to be executed like other laypeople. A ftatute of 18 Ed. III. mitigated the rigour of this law with respect to clerks, by making a suggestion of bigamy triable by the ordinary, before the juftices could proceed. But all were delivered from the bondage of fuch laws by 1 Ed. VI. c. 12. § 16. which enacts, that-" every perfon, who by any law or "ftatute of this realm ought to have "the benefit of clergy, fhall be allowed "the fame, although he hath been divers "times married to any fingle woman or

fingle women, or to two wives or more, "or to any widow or widows."

Among the fix famous articles proposed

66

by Henry VIII. to the parliament and convocation, one was-" whether priests, that "is to fay, men dedicate to GOD by priesthood, may, by the law of GOD, marry after or no?"-" After great, long, deliberate, and advised difputa"tion and confultation had and made concerning the faid article, as well by "the confent of the King's Highness, as by the affent of the Lords fpiritual and temporal, and other learned men of his Clergy in their convocations, and by the "confent of the Commons, in this prefent parliament affembled, it was and is finally refolved, accorded, and agreed "-that priests, after the order of priest❝hood received as afore, may not * marry by

* In the eighth century, fome monks pretended, that the angel Gabriel had brought twelve articles from heaven, one of which was, that ecclefiaftics muft not marry. See Jortin Rem. vol. ii. p. 43...

In the ninth century, Pope Nicholas I. made a decree to reftrain priests from marrying. The bishop of Augsburg wrote a pathetic letter to the Pope, fetting forth the fad and mifchievous confequences of taking their wives from the priests. The letter is at large in Fox, vol. ii. p. 392. and well worth reading. He tells Pope Nicholas, that his predeceffor Saint Gregory (i. e. Gregory IV.) made such a decree, but repented of it on this occafion; to use the old bishop's words as they are there tranflated"Upon a certain day, as St. Gregory fent to his fifh-pond to have fome fifh, his fervants drained