decent rite (not being determined by the word to any one),
or else to use no rite at all, beside a public declaration that the person
there presented is called and appointed to serve the church in the
pastoral office, together with exhortation to the said person, and the
commending of him to the grace of God, the church not being tied by the
word to use any rite at all in the giving of ordination. 2. That it be not
used as a sacred significant ceremony to represent and signify either the
delivering to the person ordained authority to preach and to minister the
sacraments, or the consecration and mancipation of him to the holy
ministry; or, lastly, God's bestowing of the gifts of his Spirit upon him,
together with his powerful protection and gracious preservation in the
performing of the works of his calling, but only as a moral sign, solemnly
to assign and point out the person ordained; which, also, was one of the
ends and uses whereunto this rite of laying on of hands was applied by the
apostles themselves, as Chemnitius showeth.(1024) And so Joshua was
designed and known to the people of Israel as the man appointed to be the
successor of Moses, by that very sign, that Moses laid his hands on him,
Deut. xxxiv.

As a sacred significant ceremony we may not use it, 1. Because it hath
been proved,(1025) that men may never, at their pleasure, ascribe to any
rite whatsoever, a holy signification of some mystery of faith or duty of
piety. The apostles, indeed, by laying on of their hands, did signify
their giving of the gift of the Holy Ghost; but, now, as the miracle, so
the mystery hath ceased, and the church not having such power to make the
signification answer to the sign, if now a sacred or mystical
signification be placed in the rite, it is but an empty and void sign, and
rather minical than mystical. 2. All such sacred rites as have been
notoriously abused to superstition, if they have no necessary use, ought
to be abolished, as we have also proven;(1026) therefore, if imposition of
hands in ordination be accounted and used as a sacred rite, and as having
a sacred signification (the use of it not being necessary), it becometh
unlawful, by reason of the bygone and present superstitious abuse of the
same in Popery.

Now the right and power of giving ordination to the ministers of the
church belongeth primarily and wholly to Christ, who communicateth the
same with his bride the church. Both the bridegroom for his part,