Three citations in conjunction with research mentioned in the preceding post:
From LEP 3.1.14: "For
although the name of the Church be given unto Christian assemblies, although
any multitude of Christian men congregated may be termed by the name of a
Church, yet assemblies properly are rather things that belong to a Church. Men
are assembled for performance of public actions; which actions being ended, the
assembly dissolveth itself and is no longer in being, whereas the Church which
was assembled doth no less continue afterwards than before...But a Church, as
now we are to understand it, is a Society; that is, a number of men belonging
unto some Christian fellowship, the place and limits whereof are certain. That
wherein they have communion is the public exercise of such duties as those
mentioned in the Apostles’ Acts, Instruction, Breaking of Bread, and Prayers.
As therefore they that are of the mystical body of Christ have those inward
graces and virtues, whereby they differ from all others, which are not of the
same body; again, whosoever appertain to the visible body of the Church,
they have also the notes of external profession, whereby the world knoweth what
they are: after the same manner even the several societies of Christian men,
unto every of which the name of a Church is given with addition betokening
severalty, as the Church of Rome, Corinth, Ephesus, England, and so the rest,
must be endued with correspondent general properties belonging unto them as
they are public Christian societies. And of such properties common unto all
societies Christian, it may not be denied that one of the very chiefest is
Ecclesiastical Polity."
From LEP 3.2.1: But we
must note, that he which affirmeth speech to be necessary amongst all men
throughout the world, doth not thereby import that all men must necessarily
speak one kind of language. Even so the necessity of polity and regiment in all
Churches may be held without holding any one certain form to be necessary in
them all. Nor is it possible that any form of polity, much less of polity
ecclesiastical, should be good, unless God himself be author of it.
From LEP
8.3.5: Dissimilitude in great things is such a thing which draweth great
inconvenience after it, a thing which Christian religion must always carefully
prevent. And the way to prevent it is, not as some do imagine, the yielding up
of supreme power over all churches into one only pastor’s hands; but the
framing of their government, especially for matter of substance, every where
according to the rule of one only Law, to stand in no less force than the law
of nations doth, to be received in all kingdoms, all sovereign rulers to be
sworn no otherwise unto it than some are to maintain the liberties, laws, and
received customs of the country where they reign. This shall cause uniformity
even under several dominions, without those woeful inconveniences whereunto the
state of Christendom was subject heretofore, through the tyranny and oppression
of that one universal Nimrod who alone did all. And, till the
Christian world be driven to enter into the peaceable and true consultation
about some such kind of general law concerning those things of weight and
moment wherein now we differ, if one church hath not the same order which
another hath: let every church keep as near as may be the order it should have,
and commend the just defence thereof unto God, even as Juda did, when it
differed in the exercise of religion from that form which Israel followed.
Taken from Richard Hooker, The
Works of that Learned and Judicious Divine Mr. Richard Hooker with an Account
of His Life and Death by Isaac Walton. Arranged by the Rev. John Keble
MA. 7th edition revised by the Very Rev. R.W. Church and the Rev. F. Paget
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1888). 3 vols. Accessed from http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/1731 on
2012-03-05
