''Of Prelatical Episcopacy'' is a

religious tract A tract is a literary work and, in current usage, usually religious in nature. The notion of what constitutes a tract has changed over time. By the early part of the 21st century, a tract referred to a brief pamphlet used for religious and poli ...

written by

John Milton John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet and intellectual. His 1667 epic poem '' Paradise Lost'', written in blank verse and including over ten chapters, was written in a time of immense religious flux and political ...

in either June or July 1641.

Background

The tract, the shortest of Milton's tracts on prelatical issues, was written as a response to many works, such as Archbishop James Ussher's ''The Judgement of Doctor Rainoldes Touching the Originall of Episcopacy'' (25 May 1641). The tract was printed soon after, in either June or July 1641, under the title '.Wheeler 2003 p. 269

Tract

The tract is a direct response to other tracts and is hostile to any need for a medium between the

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...

and the individual reader, especially from such mediums as provided by an organized church. Instead, Milton says that such individuals are unnecessarily because we must have "first the

Gospel Gospel originally meant the Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words an ...

l our rule, and

Oracle An oracle is a person or agency considered to provide wise and insightful counsel or prophetic predictions, most notably including precognition of the future, inspired by deities. As such, it is a form of divination. Description The word '' ...

". Reading from the Bible, according to Milton, would teach us that there is not a "difference betweene a

Bishop A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...

, and a Prebyter". Any misreading of the text is the fault of the reader who is unable to understand the

Scriptural Religious texts, including scripture, are texts which various religions consider to be of central importance to their religious tradition. They differ from literature by being a compilation or discussion of beliefs, mythologies, ritual prac ...

truth or who was misled by other works. In particular, there are many older works that mislead readers, especially in their interpretations and claims about the meaning of Scriptural words:

During the tract, Milton discusses Ignatius's

epistles An epistle (; el, ἐπιστολή, ''epistolē,'' "letter") is a writing directed or sent to a person or group of people, usually an elegant and formal didactic letter. The epistle genre of letter-writing was common in ancient Egypt as part ...

and claims that some were faked:Corns 2003 p. 96

Themes

The purpose of ''Of Prelatical Episcopacy'' is, to Elizabeth Wheeler, that it "reminds readers that truth is attainable, and that all nonscriptural

authority In the fields of sociology and political science, authority is the legitimate power of a person or group over other people. In a civil state, ''authority'' is practiced in ways such a judicial branch or an executive branch of government.''The N ...

- including their own - is fallible. Truth is the prize, but confusion and distraction will be the risk one encounters along the way."Wheeler 2003 p. 270 Thomas Corns believes that ''Of Prelatical Episcopacy'' is an example of the way Milton relies on a

writing system A writing system is a method of visually representing verbal communication, based on a script and a set of rules regulating its use. While both writing and speech are useful in conveying messages, writing differs in also being a reliable form ...

in which "his main

clause In language, a clause is a constituent that comprises a semantic predicand (expressed or not) and a semantic predicate. A typical clause consists of a subject and a syntactic predicate, the latter typically a verb phrase composed of a verb with ...

s often support lots of subordinate clauses, and subordinate clauses often themselves support a number of clauses dependent upon them". That is not to say that this causes problems, and the discussion of Ignatius's epistles, as Corns continues, "is a sentence of over a hundred words, no great rarity in the prose of Milton or many of his contemporaries, though this one (like so many in Milton) is beautifully organized and controlled."

Notes

References

* Corns, Thomas. "Milton's English" in ''A Companion to Milton''. Ed. Thomas Corns. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2003. * Milton, John. ''Complete Prose Works of John Milton'' Vol II ed. Don Wolfe. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1953. * Wheeler, Elizabeth. "Early Political Prose" in ''A Companion to Milton''. Ed. Thomas Corns. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2003. {{John Milton Works by John Milton 1641 works