ect, "Let the elders
that rule well and preach the word and doctrine well, be counted worthy
of double honor; but especially those who labor much in well ruling and
in well preaching:" in such an expression the case had been very clear
and evident. 4. Should this comment stand, that they who labor more in
the ministry than others should have more honor, more maintenance, than
others, how many emulations and contentions were this likely to procure?
Who shall undertake to proportion the honor and reward, according to
the proportion of every minister's labor? 5. As for the criticism of the
word _laboring_, which Bilson lays so much stress upon, these things are
evident, 1. That here _laboring_, signifies emphatically nothing else
but that labor, care, diligence, solicitude, &c., which the nature of
the pastoral office requires in every faithful pastor; as is implied 1
Thess. v., 12, 13, "Know them which labor among you, and are over you in
the Lord;" and the apostle saith that every minister "shall receive a
reward according to his own labor," 1 Cor. iii. 8. Such labor and
diligence also is required in them that rule, whilst they are charged to
rule _with diligence_, Rom. xii. 8, which is as much as _with labor_:
yea, the common charity of Christians hath its labor; and this very word
_labor_ is ascribed thereunto, _labor of love_, 1 Thess. i. 3; Heb. vi.
10. 2. That if the apostle had here intended the extraordinary labor of
some ministers above others, not ordinarily required of all, he would
have taken a more emphatical word to have set it out, as he is wont to
do in some other cases, as in 2 Cor. xi. 27, "In labor and weariness." 1
Thess. ii. 9, "For ye remembered, brethren, our labor and weariness." 6.
Finally, "If there be but one kind of church officers here designed,
then," as saith the learned Cartwright, "the words (_especially those
that labor_) do not cause the apostle's speech to rise, but to fall; not
to go forward, but to go backward; for to teach worthily and singularly
is more than to teach painfully; for the first doth set forth all that
which may be required in a worthy teacher, where the latter noteth one
virtue only of pains taking."

_Except_. 8. Though it could be evinced, that here the apostle speaks of
some other elders, besides the ministers of the word, yet what advantage
can this be for the proof of ruling elders? For the apostle being to
prove that the ministers of the word ought to be honored,