CII they diftributed the Countrys into Provinces or Diocefes peculiar to each Apoftle ; and had any Churches which they fuppofed to be peculiarly under this or that Apoftles Govern- ment fo as that any of the reft might not with Apoftolical power have come, refided, preacht and governed in the fame : No Scripture tells us offuch limits & Provinces.Nay,the Scripture tells us, that manyof them were as Apoftles at once in the fame places : As at 7erufalern oft. Paul and ?ohn had Apoftolical power at Ephefus Peter and Paul (as is commonly held) at Rome, And its probable that as Chrift fent forth his difcipies by two and two, fo the Apoftles went in company, as Paul and Barnabas did : fo that fuch appropriate fettlemeut of Provincial or Diocefan Churches, we cannot fee proved though Each a Generali .7Winiftry is eafily proved ; and we doubt not but by content they might have diftributed their Provinces, had they teen caufe, and that a&ually they did fo diftribute their labours as their work and ends required : But if they had become proper Provincial Bithops over leveral Diftritts or Provinces, it feemeth ftrange to us that no hiftory tellethus which were the twelve or thirteen Provinces , and how limited ; and that they continued not loner ; and that inftead of three Patriarchs firft, and four after, and five next, we had not twelve or thirteen Apoftles or Patriarchsfeared over all the world, with their known divífions And that men Peek not now to reduce the Churches to this Primitive State, rather than to the laid Imperial Conftitution; and rather to fubjec`t us all to the .Apof.7olical Seats, than to five Patriarchs in the dominions of ano_ thcr
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