Come we now to consider this bishop according to the spirit, practice and laws of the church in all ages. Any one versed ever so little in the history of the church, must see at the first sight, that this supposed bishop is a true copy of the first apostolical fathers. And if this bishop was to be accounted a madman, because of the manner of his life, we must come down several ages after _Constantine_, to the _mitre_ and triple crown, before we could find a bishop in his senses. The _Clements_, the _Polycarps_, the _Ignatius’s_, the _Irenæus’s_, the _Cyprian’s_, the _Basils_, the _Ambrose’s_, and a number that have long graced our calenders, as saints, must take their place among bedlamites: for they were all of them to a tittle, the very man I have supposed at _Winchester_. They considered every penny that was brought in by the gospel, as a provision for the poor, and themselves as only entitled to their common share out of it. They durst no more raise any of their relations to a splendor of life, or give them any figure from the revenues of the church, than commit sacrilege. They gloried as much in their own strict poverty and want of worldly figure, as in their having totally renounced idols.
But we have much more than primitive example for our bishop of _Winchester_: the doctrine and laws of the church have unanimously from age to age, to the very council of _Trent_, required every bishop to be of the same spirit of which we have supposed him. The church, both by the doctrine of fathers, and the canons of councils, constantly maintains; _First_, that the clergy are not proprietors, but barely stewards of the benefices they enjoy: having them for no other end, but for their own necessary, frugal subsistence, and the relief of the poor.¹ _Secondly_, that a clergyman using his benefice for his _own indulgence_, or the enriching his _own family_, is guilty of sacrilege, and is a robber and murderer of the poor.² _Thirdly_, that if a clergyman has a reasonable subsistence of his own, and is not in the state of the poor, then let his benefice be what it will, he has no right to use any part of it for himself, nor for his kindred, unless they be fit to be considered among those poor that are to be relieved by the church.³ _Fourthly_, that every bishop and clergyman is to live in an humble, frugal, outward state of life, seeking for no honour or dignity in the world, but that which arises from the distinction and lustre of his virtues.⁴ _Fifthly_, that a beneficed clergyman using the goods of the church for his own indulgence, or raising fortunes for his children, or their expensive education, is sacrilegious, and a robber of the poor.⁵ _Sixthly_, that every clergyman is to die out of the church as poor as he entered into it.⁶ _Seventhly_, that a clergyman dying, cannot leave or bequeath any thing to his children or friends, but barely that which he had independently of the church.⁷
¹ Nihil ecclesia nisi Fidem possidet.――Possessio ecclesiæ est Egenorum sumptus, _Ambrose, Epistle 31_.
² Si Pauperum Compauperes sumus, & _nostra_ sunt, & _illorum_. Si autem privatim quæ nobis sufficiunt, possidemus, non sunt illa _nostrum_, sed Pauperum _Procurationem_ gerimus, non Proprietatem nobis Usurpatione damnabili vindicamus, _Augustine Epistle 50 to Boniface._
³ Quoniam quicquid habent Clerici, Pauperum est――Qui bonis Parentum & opibus sustentari possent, si quod Pauperum est, accipiunt, _Sacrilegium profecto_ committunt, & per Abusionem Talium, Judicium sibi manducant, & bibunt, _Hieronymus, Epistle to Pope Damasus_.
⁴ Episcopus vilem _Suppellectilem_, & _Mensam_, ac _Victum Pauperem_, habeat, & Dignitatis, sua Authoritatum Fide & Vitæ meritis quærat, _Council of Carthage_, 4.
⁵ Memento quod _Pauperem Vitam_ Sacerdos gerere debet, & ideo si superbiam habet, si magno gaudet Beneficio, præter victum & vestitum _quod sperest_, Pauperibus dare non differat, quia omnia _pauperum_ sunt. _Augustine, Sermon 37 to the Brethren_.
⁶ Hujus tu e vicino sectare Vestigia, & cæterorum, qui Virtutum illius similes sunt, quos Sacerdotium & _humiliores_ facit & _pauperes_. _Hieronymus Epistle 4. to Rufinus._