.■ff ^ i-'- THIS BOOK BELONGED TO TBE LIBRARY OF Rev. JOEL IIAAVES, D . D . tihtavy of t:Ke CKeological ^eminarjix PRINCETON . NEW JERSEY PRESENTED BY The Library of Center Church, Hartford AN ESSAY . , ^a^ ON . Xi^Wf' APOSTOLICAL aUCCJtSSION ; A DEFENCE OF A GENUmE > BRQTESTANT MINI>Til\', AGAINST TH3 SXCLtJsJiVE AND INTOLERANT SCHEMES OF PAPISTS AND HIGH CHURCHMEN ; AND SUPPLYING A GENERAL ANTIDOTE TO POPERY : ALSO, A CRITIQUE ON THE APOLOGY FOR APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION, BY THE HON. AND REV. A. P. PERCEVAL, B. C. L., Chaplain in ordinary to tlie Queen : AND A REVIEW OF DR. W. F. HOOK'S SERMON ON "HEAR THE CHURCH," PREACHED BEFORE THE QUEEN, JUNE 17, 1838: BY THOMAS POWELL, WESLEY AN MINISTER. NEW-YORK: PUBLISHED BY G. LANE & P. P. SANDFORD, FOR THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, AT THE CONFERENCE OFFICE, 200 MULBERRY-STREET. /. Collord, Printer. 1842. I CONTENTS Pa-e Preface to the first edition .. , ^, t Preface to the secoi;4 editiaric .;....; . . , . . ^ . ., ., 2..^.\ - ,7 Introduction "- . . ,'■ J . '.S. ..■ ". .... 1 .V 9 SECTION I. Statements of this doctrine of apostolical succession by its advocates -...-. 13 SECTION II. The state of the general question .......... 31 SECTION III. No positive proof from the Scriptures of these high Church claims — The commission of Jesus Christ to the apostles — The claim of apostleship for bishops — High priesthood of bishops — The case of Timothy and Titus — The angels of the seven churches ~. 25 SECTION IV. The general spirit and scope of the gospel opposed to this high Church scheme 64 SECTION V. Scriptural evidence against these claims, continued — Bishops and presbyters the same, proved from the New Testament . 80 SECTION VI. The same argument continued — Presbyters and bishops the same, proved from the purest Christian antiquity 89 Appendix to section vi 141 SECTION VII. The Church of England at the Reformation against these claims 144 SECTION VIII. Bishops and presbyters the same order, shown by the testimony of all the Christian churches in the world »^ ..... « 169 4 CONTENTS. \.'': SECT10N^'?X. I ': ;: ■■•"'' ",■']■ : '■'' Pa§e Presbyters and bishops showa to lie the ^ame order, by the testimony of the greatest divines of all ages .^ 201 No sufficient. hiRcimfe/pvldeBce'eT a .'personal succession of valid episcopal ordiriatio'nfe .': ." ': :■ .'■.'i'i.'i. 212 Nullity of the Popish ordinations — Character of ihe Popish Church, and Popish bishops, before and at the Reformation 224 SECTION XII. Popish ordinations of English bishops before the Reformation . . . 237 SECTION XIII. Nullity of Popish ordinations of English bishops, concluded 250 SECTION XIV. Genuine apostolical succession 271 Conclusion of the Essay 295 An Appendix : containing, — first, A Critique on the Apology for the Doctrine of the Apostolical Succession, by the Hon. and Rev. A. P. Perceval, B. C. L 311 Secondly, A Review of Dr.W, F. Hook's Sermon, Vicar of Leed's, on " Hear the Church" ;.. 340 PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. The writer of this Essay is alone accountable for all its faults and defects. He has written it without the counsel or the help of any man, or of any body of men. He believes, and therefore he has spoken. Perhaps it will make him some enemies : this he would regret, as he desires, as much as lieth in him, to live peaceably with all men. If maintaining the truth should make him enemies, he cannot help it. Some may think that he speaks too freely on certain points, and as to certain orders of persons. All he can say is, that he thought truth and piety required it. He would give honour to whom honour is due ; but he hopes he shall ever show the greatest courtesy to the truth of God. While men, or the ordinances of men, oppose not the truth of God, he would respect them, and \vould submit to them for the Lord's sake ; but when they oppose that truth, either in principle or in practice, he would call no man father upon earth. The author makes no pretensions to style : he only regards words as a plain man does his clothes ; not for ornament, but for use and decency. The confidence of his language arises from the convic- tion of his own mind, and not from any design to im- pose his opinions upon others. He dislikes to read an 6 PREFACE. author who does not appear to believe himself. If any choose to controvert his positions, he freely allows them the liberty which he has taken. His design is catho- lic, NOT SECTARIAN. Truth is his object : though his efforts should perish, yet he will rejoice in the triumph of truth. He commits his work to God, and to his church, praying that the kingdom of our Redeemer may speedily come ; that peace and happiness, truth and justice, religion and piety, may be established among us, and in all the earth, throughout all genera- tions ! Amen \ PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. The author, on issuing a second edition of this Es- say, embraces the opportunity of gratefully acknow- ledging his obhgations to the public for their favourable reception of his work. The difference between this second edition and the former one, consists in the addition of some important arguments ; in the amplification of others ; and in the increase of highly important authorities from writers of great celebrity, but whose works are expensive, and rarely to be met with by general readers. One of the most important additions will be found in the second sub-section of section 3, on the apostleship of bish- ops. On a mature re-examination of the works of high church Episcopahans, the author perceived that this was a position which they esteemed of the ve7y great- est importance, and in which they placed the greatest confidence. He set himself, therefore, to furnish a complete refutation of it. The reader is requested to give that sub-section a very attentive perusal. It will be found that several of the additional notes contain an exposure of the fallacies in the " Vindication of the Episcopal or Apostolical Succession, by the Rev. J. Sinclair, M. A., of Pembroke College, Oxford, » PREFACE. Fellow of the Royal Society, Edinburgh, Minister of St. Paul's Episcopal chapel, Edinburgh, &c." Dr. Hook having requested the Hon. and Rev. A. P. Perceval, chaplain in ordinary to the queen, to take up the defence of the high church succession scheme, the honourable and reverend gentleman has done so ; and his work having been announced by the doctor's party as a complete answer to the Essay, the author has added a Critique on that work. He thinks the examination of these two specimens of defence by Mr. Sinclair and the doctor's chosen champion, Mr. Perceval, will suffice, and will show the reader how futile all such defences are, when tried on the principles maintained in this Essay. The Review of Dr. Hook's sermon, on *' Hear the Church," having a very near affinity to the argument of the Essay, and that Review having been considered a complete antidote to the doctor's main fallacy, it is retained in the present edition. A general index is added to the whole. INTRODUCTION. " Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made you free," is a divine command. The truth of God, at the Reformation, made the Protestant churches free from priestly tyranny, and the traditions of men. It is the duty of every Protestant to watch against all encroach- ments upon this liberty. Popery commenced on the principle of exclusiveness and bigotry. " Out of the church is no salvation ; — the Church of Rome is the only true church ; — ergo, out of the Church of Rome is no salvation." This is the logic of Rome ; enforced, according to opportunity of power and circumstances, by excommunication and confiscation ; by fire and fagot to the body, and perdition to the soul, against all who have dared to resist its claims. All exclusiveness and bigotry generate intolerance. When any part of God's church asserts its right to the whole inheritance of his people, it publishes an act of ejectment against the rest ; and the spirit that dictated the ejectment will, when circumstances seem favourable, en- deavour to effect its object by persecuting those who do not admit this exclusive claim. To admit an unjust claim, is to encourage injustice. Our Christian birthright is a trust from heaven ; and we cannot " sell it for a mess of pottage," without an Esau's profaneness. A certain class of men have, at different times since the Reformation, come forward to effect that in the Pro- testant church which Popery endeavours to effect as to 1* 10 INTRODUCTION. the church universal. This they try to accomplish by a sophistical method of teaching the doctrine of apostolical succession. By this doctrine they excommunicate all the other Protestant churches in Europe. This is done se- riously and in earnest, and that, too, by men of consider- able influence and learning. The writer is convinced that the broad absurdity of their arrogant pretensions will be sufficient to lead many to treat those claims with just contempt. However, there are some that seem willing to receive the bold assertions and pretensions of such men, as proofs sufficient to support their claims. Others, who do not believe them, would yet be glad to see plain rea- sons for rejecting them. It is for this class of persons, chiefly, that the following Essay is designed. Another object with the ^vriter is to develop the nature of genuine Protestantism, and to supply an antidote to Popery. Popery is a deep-laid scheme. Its principal BASIS is priestly arrogance, generating the direst tyranny. This is not founded on the word of God, but in the traditions of men. This foundation must be exposed and broken up, or in vain shall we attempt to break the iron yoke of Popery. Now it is a matter worthy of the most serious and careful observation by the reader, that nearly all the great succession divines are semi-papists. Arch- bishop Laud is supposed to be the father of them. Among his distinguished disciples will be found Dr. Hickes, Bishop Taylor, the authors of " The Oxford Tracts for the Times," Dr. Hook, vicar of Leeds, &c. The reader may be surprised to find the celebrated Bishop Taylor represented as a semi-papist ; let him read his " Clems Do?nini," and his " Episcopacy Asserted," and he will see the evidence of the statement. Bishop Tay- lor's splendid talents have imposed upon many, and have gained him more credit than he deserved. Like many pious Papists, he could write well upon devotional sub- INTRODUCTION. 11 jects ; but he is no safe guide as a theologian. Dr. Hook, and the authors of " The Oxford Tracts for the Times," are evidently introducing Popery into the Church of Eng- land, and spreading it in the nation. Many of the clergy of the Established Church are strongly opposed to the errors of these men, and they have spoken out manfully in the pages of the " Christian Observer." They seem, however, to be very tender of this doctrine of apostolical succession. They perhaps think it is calculated to add importance to their ministry in opposition to the Methodists and Dissenters. A spirit of exclusiveness is, indeed, very general among the clergy of the Established Church. An opinion, too, of the divine right of episcopacy has spread extensively in the Church of England : most of its clergy seem willing to believe it. Hence, generally speaking, they are not the men from whom a refutation of this doctrine of apostolical succession is to be expected : yet it evidently increases Popery in the Church and in the nation. Its exposure and refutation, therefore, may be a general benefit to Protestantism. It will not be amiss here to obviate a difficulty that may arise in some minds. Perhaps some persons, especially the members of the Establishment, may think that the writer is attacking the Church. If by " the ChurcN' they will understand the principles of the Reformers, Archbishop Cranmer, Bishop Jewel, &c., on the questions here dis- cussed; then he most unhesitatingly declares, that, with some trifling exceptions, he heartily embraces them, and means to defend them ; but if by " the ChurcW they mean the principles of such men as Archbishop Laud, and his disciples the Oxford Tract-men, Dr. Hook, &c., then he does controvert them ; because he believes them to be un- scriptural, antiprotestant, exclusive, intolerant, and Popish. The author, indeed, writes not to attack, but to defend. 12 INTRODUCTION. These men make the attack. The consequence of their principles is to charge all other ministers as thieves and robbers ; they try to trouble and frighten their flocks ; they expect their gain by gathering those they never sought out of the wilderness : what sort of shepherds, then, shoidd we be to look with indiflerence upon such proceedings 1 In prosecuting the subject, we shall first produce the statements of this doctrine of apostolical succession from the advocates of the system. We shall then endeavour to give the true state of the question, and refute the arguments advanced m favour of that system. In the next place, the arguments against these claims will be brought forward, showing the whole to be contrary to the principles of the Reformation, and leading to persecution and Popery. Lastly, the nature of the only genuine and absolutely essen- tial apostolical succession will be briefly unfolded. The whole will be concluded with some practical inferences, and counsels of peace to the Protestant churches at large. APOSTOLICA3:.::SlLjCeES&T0N: STATEMENTS OF THIS DOCTRINE OF' APOStOLICAf,' SIITCCeS- SION BY ITS ABLEST ADVOCATES. The design of the following pages is, first, — the refuta- tion of certain errors fraught with pernicious consequences to the peace of the whole Christian church ; and then the establishment of Scriptural truth in their place. To give the authors, accused of maintaining these errors, as fair a trial as the limits of this Essay will admit, we shall, in the commencement, introduce copious extracts from the works of the most distinguished among them. This will enable the reader to judge of the pertinence of the arguments against them. The importance of the subject, and the celebrity of the writers, Avill, it is hoped, prevent the ex- tracts from appearing tedious. We shall arrange them under three heads : — . 1. As to their doctrine of apostolical succession ; 2. As to the necessity of ordination by succession bishops ; 3. As to the nullity or worthlessness of all other ordi- nations, and the ministrations belonging to them. First, then, as to their doctrine of apostolical succession. Bishop Taylor's " Episcopacy Asserted" was published by royal command. He had splendid talents : and doubt- less he exerted them to the utmost to please his royal master, and to support a cause which he enthusiastically admired. We select him as a leading advocate, to give the cause the fairest chance of success. He closes his argu- ment for the divine right of this doctrine of apostolical suc- cession, as follows : — " The Summe of all is this, that Christ did institute Apostles and Presbyters, or 72 Disci- ples. To the Apostles he gave a plenitude of power, for 14 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. the whole commission was given to them in as great and cpx^ipfehensi'v^e pjauses ay wi^e,in:iagi;(T[able, for by vertue of it, they fftCeived a powey cf giving the Holy Ghost in con- firmation,, aad of ^i-ving, ,his'^ra(.ce in the collation of holy orders, 'a., pcvver o'f-jmjs'dictioh and authority to governe the Church" ; and this power was not te?7iporari/, but successive and perpkudllt and y^d'Sf •ikteikled as an ordinary office in the Church, so th^t the' i>ilc'c'e6'sors of the Apostles had the '«ariie, righu and in^tit^atipri that ,"he /i.'po3ties themselves ha,d, ^j[(f though th3 pfh•—•' iBis\i((ps -are appointed to succeed the :ao(:t^*4€'s,„and like ihejfl. tn ^taao in Christ's place, and exercise his kin;yl7,' priestly,, and prophetical office over their ilxDcV,^,; . caij yoii, ;\vhe5i you consider this, think it novel, or iipprpper./ or uncouth, to call them spiritual princes, ano their- dioct^ 5 3 eg, princi- palities, when they have ev&iy 'thing m their- office that can denominate a„p<:ini?e ? 'Fpr , -whal; -, is :?c .prince, ^'but'.o chief ruler of a sofiety^ tba^ batk autiifrity. over the.? esV. to make laws for it, to challenge the obedience of all the members, and all ranks of men in it, a.nd powei^ to coerce them, if they will not obey ? . . . . They stand in God's and Christ's stead over their flocks, the clergy as well as the people are to be subject to them, as to the vicegerents of our Lord And the successors of the apostles, the bishops, like spiritual princes, exercise the same coercive authority that they did in inflicting spiritual censures upon their disobedient subjects. It would require a volume to show you the various punishments with which they cor- rected their disobedience. They degraded clergymen from their order, and as for the people, they put down those who were in the uppermost class of communion into the station of penitents, and other inferior places ; others they forbid to come further than the church doors, and those whom they did not so degrade, they often suspended from the sacrament. The contumacious both of the clergy and laity they punished with excommunication ; from which, after very long and very severe penances, they absolved some ; and others, who were enormous, and very frequent lapsers, they would not reconcile to the peace of the Church, but in the danger, and prospect of death. I need not tell you how much the ancient Christians stood in avje of the APOSTOLICAL ROD in the hands of their bishops, es- pecially of excommunication, which they looked upon as the spiritual axe and sword to the soul, and thought more terrible than death."* And Dr. Hook, the present vicar of Leeds, thus states his views on the subject : — " Some persons seem to think that the government of the Church was essentially different in the days of the apostles from what it is now, because * On the Dignity of the Epis. Order, pp. 191. &c. Lend. 1707, 8vo. 16 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. they do not find the names and titles of the ecclesiastical ;:9j!ficfer,s 5)5re<:isp;iy the sjim?i '',jppr ^?istance, as I have just :si^.id, h&.whom-we now cqH tMs: that the officer whom we now call a hi&ho>>, w^s\&y^rst called an apostle, although after- ward it was' thotight'btettM-' to confine the title of apostle "tf^ thq.se'who liatl seeij' the y^Or^ Jsb^ug, ''while their success- lots ^ £X'^rcising;Uie scs7iie.rights'3.l\(ii'e.tithority, though unen- dowed with miraculous powers, contented themselves with the designation of bishops. After this the title was never given to the second order of the ministry The pre- lates, who at this present time rule the churches of these realms, were validly ordained by others, who, by means of an unbroken spiritual descent of ordination, derived their mission from the apostles and from our Lord. This con- tinual descent is evident to every one who chooses to in- vestigate it. Let him read the catalogues of our bishops ascending up to the most remote period. Our ordinations descend in a direct unbroken liiie from Peter and Paul, the apostles of the circumcision and the Gentiles. These great apostles successively ordained Linus, Cletus, and Clement, bishops of Rome ; and the apostolic succession was regularly continued from them to Celestine, Gregory, and Vitalianus, who ordained Patrick bishop for the Irish, and Augustine and Theodore for the English. And from those times an uninterrupted series of valid ordinations has carried down the apostolical succession in our churches to the present day. There is not a bishop, priest, or deacon, among us, who cannot, if he please, trace his own spirit- ual descent from St. Peter or St. Paul."* In the next place, let us hear what is said about ordi- nation by succession bishops, even when wicked and heretical. Archdeacon Mason's " Defence of the Church of Eng- land JMinistry" was begun and completed by the patronage, and under the counsel of Abbot, archbishop of Canterbury, and was dedicated to King James I. Its authority is high among the Church of England divines. He ^vrites in the form of a dialogue, between a Romish priest, Philodoxus, * Two Sennons on the Church and the Establishment. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. I't and a Church of England divine, called Orthodoxus. The title of chapter eleventh, book 2, is this, " Does schism or heresy take Rway the power of consecration ?" He goes on to bring Philodoxus to confess that neither heresy, (p. 175,) nor degradation from the office of a bishop, (p. 176,) nor schism, (p. 180,) nor the most extreme WICKEDNESS, [quamvis enim viri essent omnium sceleratissi- mi, p. 178,) nor "any thing else, can deprive a person once made a bishop of the power of giving true orders." " Orthodoxus. Quod candid^ largiris, cupidi arripimus.^^ The Church of England divine says, ^^ what you,^^ the Papists, " candidly grant, we joyfully embrace ! !"* Every pious reader must be grieved to the heart to see the defenders of an important section of the Protestant church joyfully embrace the impious position, that a bishop is a true bishop, though a heretic, and the most wicked of men ! — and all for what ? why, merely to keep up the figment of episcopal ordination and succession. Indeed this is inevitable on the exclusive scheme of episcopacy, jure di- vino. If this perishes, they suppose their Christianity perishes. It must perish, on their scheme, or come through the hands of the moral monsters of Rome. Hence these impious positions are joyfully embraced to defend it. Lastly, these authors say, that no ordinations but such as are performed by succession bishops are valid and divine. This, also, with them is a necessary consequence. Thus Bishop Taylor: "Without (the offices of episco- pacy,) no priest, no ordination, no consecration of the sacra- ment, no absolution, no rite, or sacrament, legitimately can be performed in order to eternity. "f The learned Dodwell declares — " None but the bishop can unite us to the Father and the Son. Whence it will further follow that whoever are disunited from the visible communion of the Church on earth, and particularly ^rom that visible communion of the bishop, must consequently be disunited from the whole visible catholic Church on earth ; and not only so, but from the invisible communion of the holy angels and saints in heaven, and, which is yet more, from Christ and God himself ... It is 07ie of the most dreadful aggravations of the condition of the damned that * Vindica9 Eccles. Anglicanae, edit. sec. fol. .Lond., 1638. t Episcopacy Asserted, p. 197. 18 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. they are banished from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power. The same is their condition also who are disunited from Christ by being disunited from his visible representative,^^ (the bishop.)* Dr. Hook, on this point, says, " You will observe how important all this is which I have now laid before you. Unless Christ be spiritually present with the ministers of religion in their services, those services will be vain. But the oxLY ministrations to which he has promised his presence is to those of the bishops who are successors of the first commissioned apostles, and the other clergy acting under their sanction, and hy their authority." " I know the outcry which is raised against this — the doctrine of the Christian Church for eighteen hundred years — I know the outcry that is raised against it by those sects which can trace their origin no higher than to some celebrated preacher at the Reformation. But I disregard it, because I shall, by God's help, continue to do, what I have done ever since I came among you — namely, declare the whole counsel of God, icithout regard to consequences or respect of persons, and at the same time, as far as in me lies, live peaceably with all men."t A passage or two from the Oxford " Tracts for the Times" may suffice, though all their volumes are impreg- nated with the same principles. " The hold,''' say they, " which the propagandists of the ' Holy Discipline' obtained on the fancies and affectioiis of the people, of whatever rank, age, and sex, depended veiy much on their incessant appecds to t\\eu fancied apostolical succession. They found persons willing and eager to suffer or rebel, as the case might be, for their system ; because they had possessed them with the notion, that it was the system handed down from the apostles, ' a divine epis- copate ;' so Beza called it. Why should we despair of obtaining, in time, an influence, far more legitimate and less dangerously exciting, but equally searching and ex- tensive, by the diligent inculcation of our true and Scrip- tural claim V'\ * One Altar and One Priesthood, 1683, pp. 387 and 397. t Two Sermons on the Church and the Establishment ; and see Hickes on the Christian Priesthood, Pref. 194. t No. 4, p. 7. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 19 " I fear we have neglected the real ground on which our authority is built, — our apostolical descent."* " A person not commissioned from the bishop, may use the words of baptism, and sprinkle or bathe with the water, on earth, but there is no promise from Christ, that such a man shall admit souls to the kingdom of heaven. A person not commissioned may break bread, and pour out wine, and pretend to give the Lord's supper, but it can afford no comfort to any to receive it at his hands, because there is no warrant from Christ to lead communicants to suppose that while he does so here on earth, they will be partakers in the Saviour's heavenly body and blood. And as for the person himself, who takes upon himself without warrant to minister in holy things, he is all the while treading in the footsteps of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, whose awful punishment you read of in the book of Numbers. (Com- pare Numbers xvi with Jude 2.")t Here the reader sees the main featiu-es of this system ; -5-a system supported by a large number of learned and influential di\dnes in the Church of England since the time of Archbishop Laud. It has lately been revived by the authors of the Oxford " Tracts for the Times," Dr. Hook, vicar of Leeds, &c. This doctrine is the root of all their errors and Popish proceedings. By such a scheme as this they FORGE A CHAIN TO BIND HEAVEN AND EARTH, GoD AND MAN, TO THE ACTS OF PRIESTLY ARROGANCE. AlloW the above doctrine, and though Satan and his host incarnate should become ordained by succession bishops, yet no ordinances but such as they administer have the promise of Christ, but are all vain ! This scheme of Anglican- Popery will be seen to have a little variation in its ma- chinery from Roman-Popery ; but they are both animated by the same genius, and both terminate in the same con- sequences. The reader will not regret to see, in the commencement of this Essay, the opinions of two celebrated foreign Pro- testant divines on this subject : the one, of the Lutheran church, and the other, of the reformed French church. Chemnitius, a greatly admired Lutheran divine, in his ad- mirable Examination or Confutation of the Council of Trent, says, " By this measure, they (the Papists) endea- * No. 1, p. 2. t No. 35, pp. 2, 3. 20 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. vour not so much to reproach our (the Protestant) churches, as, at one stroke, to give a mortal stab, and to destroy them from the foundation. In their clamours by which they labour to establish this point, they contend, that in our churches is no true and legitimate administering of the sacraments; that God by our labours will give no blessing, no pardon, no remission of sins; that we can have no true sacrament of the body and blood of Christ ; that all our ministers are thieves and robbers, not having entered by the true door" (of apostolical succession) " into the sheep- fold. An atrocious denunciation indeed ! And they give no reason for it but this, that the ministers of our (Pro- testant) churches are not called, sent forth, ordained, shaven, and anointed by Popish bishops."* Now it is clear that there is a perfect identity in the matter urged against the reformers by the Papists, and that urged by high Church of England clergymen against all Protestants who have not episcopal ordination. If the latter have not ventured to be so bold in their denuncia- tions, we can easily see the reason. They know the full consequences, boldly declared, would, with many Protest- ants, even in the Church of England, work as an argu- ment am ad absurdum : the absurdity would produce re- action. They, therefore, generally throw it out to work upon weak, credulous, unsuspecting, or bigoted minds. Claude, in his able Defence of the Reformation, says, " And to speak my own thoughts freely, it seems to me, that that firm opinion of the absolute necessity of episcopacy , that goes so high as to own no church, or call, or ministry, or sacraments, or salvation in the world, where there are no episcopal ordinations, although there should be the true faith, the true doctrine, and piety there ; and which would that ALL RELIGION should depend on a formality, and even on a formality that we have shown to be of no other than humane institution ; that opinion, I say, cannot be lookt on otherwise then as the very worst character and mark of the highest hypocricy, a piece of Pharisaism throughout, that strains at a gnat when it swallows a camel, and I cannot avoid having at least a contempt of those kind of thoughts, and a compassion for those who fill their heads with them."t * Pt. ii, p. 421, fol. Genev., 1634. t Pt. iv, p. 97, 4to. Lond., 1683. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 21 SECTION 11. THE STATE OF THE GENERAL QUESTION. Having exhibited a general view of the doctrine of suc- cession as taught by these high Churchmen, it may now be proper to clear our way by giving the true state of the question. The succession divines maintain, — 1. That bishops are, by divine right, an order superior to, distinct from, and having powers, authority, and rights incompatible with presbyters, simply as pres- byters : 2. That the bishops of this order are the sole success- ors of the apostles as ordainers of other ministers, and governors both of pastors and people : 3. That this succession is a personal succession, viz. — that it is to be traced through an historical series of persons, validly ordained as bishops, transmitting, in an unbroken line, this episcopal order and power to the latest generations : 4. That no ministry is valid, except it have this epis- copal ordination ; and that all ordinances and sacraments are vain, except they be administered by such episcopally ordained ministers. Now we deny every one of these positions. And we shall show, — 1. That bishops and presbyters are, by divine right, the same order ; and that presbyters, by divine right, have the same power and authority as bishops ; that ordina- tion by presbyters is equally valid with that of bishops ; and, consequently, that the ministry of all the reformed Protestant churches is equally valid with that of any epis- copal church : 2. That presbyters are as much the successors of the apostles as bishops are : 3. That a succession of the truth of doctrine, o^ faith and holiness, of the pure word of God, and of the sacraments duly administered, is the only essential succession ne- cessary to a Christian church : 22 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 4. That all are true Christian churches where such a ministry and such ordinances are found. Here it should be well observed, that the distinguishing character of the scheme we oppose, is its unchristian ex- clusiveness and intolerance. If its advocates had contended only for the lawfulness or aUowableness of an ecclesiastical arrangement for a class of ministers whom they choose to call bishops, without excluding the presbyters of other churches from their Scriptural power and authority to per- form all the duties necessary for the being and well being of the Christian church, this might have passed : but this does not satisfy them. Nothing will answer their design, but the degrading of the presbyters of those churches, and all presbyters, to an incapacity for performing those duties which God has committed unto them, and the setting up of an order of bishops, by divine right, with the sole and exclusive powers of ordaining ministers, and of governing them and the church to the end of the world. Again, if these writers had contended simply for the importance of a succession of pious ministers, in a settled state of things, in any church, as a great blessing to that church, and an en- couragement to the faith of its members, without making an unbroken line of succession absolutely essentl^l in all states to the very being of a church, they would have acted commendably ; and not a word of disapprobation of such a succession is found in this Essay. But this would have allowed, with the early Christian fathers, that the succession of apostolical faith and doctrine is the only essential succession : this, however, is too liberal for our high Churchmen ; it would not answer their intolerant purposes. Bishop Taylor, the Oxford Tract-men, &c., solemnly maintain, that without an unbroken line of such bishops as their scheme maintains, and their ordinations from the apostles, there is no ministry, no promise of Christ, no blessings in any of the ordinances of religion ; and that, consequently, the Scotch church, the Lutheran church, and all the Protestant churches in the world, are consigned, like heathens, to the uncovenanted mercies of God ! As an epilogue to this drama, these writers, after this excommunication, sometimes affect to feel a little charity for the excommunicated, and say, " We do not hurt them — the Church doors are open — they can come in if they ON. APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 23 please — they shut themselves out, &c." Just so says Po- pery : " We are the church," say they, — " its doors are open." And they will " compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, they make him twofold more the child of hell than themselves."* But if a person does not see reason for the dominion of his holiness of Rome, for denying the evidence of his senses in their doc- trine of transubstantiation, &c., then they consign his soul to perdition, and his body to the secular arm to be burned. If you say, " This is cruel," it is replied, " O ! no : we pity him — we do not hurt him — the church doors are open —he may come in if he pleases — yea, we entreat him to come in — he shuts himself out — his blood must be upon his own head." The reader must determine whether or not this charity is from above. We repeat, then, that in perusing this or any other work on the subject, the reader must never forget that the estab- lishment of the fact of some kind of an order of bishops having existed in the church from an early period, and of ihefact of an unbroken line from the same period, would not establish the system of these men. It might be allowed that both are important to the well being of a church ; and yet it would not follow that they are necessary to the being of that church. No proof will do for the above scheme, but the proof that the Lord Jesus Christ has ABSOLUTELY determined that no ministers but such bishops as they feign shall convey this succession ; and that with- out this unbroken line of such bishops, and their ordina- tions from the time of the apostles, he will give no blessing to the ministry or ordinances of any church under heaven, to the end of the world. No proof but this will suffice to the establishing of their monstrous scheme. If its advo- cates would act candidly and fairly, they should set them- selves to produce this proof, or give up their cause. If the reader keeps this, the true state of the question, dis- tinctly before his mind, their endless assertions and soph- isms will be powerless ; if he does not, he will, of course, be mystified and misled. But though we thus state the subject, that the establish- ment of the fact of so7ne kind of an order of bishops from an early period in the church, and the fact of an unbroken * Matt, xxiii, 15. 24 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION, line from the same period, woiild not support their scheme ; yet, as to such an order of bishops as they contend for, and as to such an unbroken line of succession as they boast of, we DENY the FACT OF EOT?. God never instituted the first ; and the last does not exist. All this will be cleary shown in the sequel. This being the state of the question, the proof of their own propositions lies upon the succession divines. Their proofs must be Scriptural, clear, and strong. This is evi- dent from the interests of both parties. The interests of the succession divines and their followers require such proofs. They venture to suspend the validity of their own ministry and ordinances, and the whole Christianity of all their people, upon this doctrine : what wretched apprehen- sions, then, must they have, except their proof be Scrip- tural, clear, and strong. The interests of other Christian churches require this. The result of this doctrine, they are aware, is to excommunicate all the other Protestant churches in Europe. He that attempts this, should show cause why he does it. His own character requires this : this also is necessary for the conviction and conversion of the offenders, and for the satisfaction of the public mind. Bishop Taylor, and some others, have attempted it ; we shall examine their attempts. Dr. Hook, indeed, is un- warrantably arrogant and insolent upon the subject. He says, among other arrogant things, in his " Two Sermons on the Church and the Establishment," " It is very seldom that the clergyman of the parish feels it to be worth his while to enter into controversy with the Dissenting teacher. He knows his superiority^ and that he has nothing to gain by the contest." Now this is not so meek, — first to ex- communicate you, and then to insult you for asking the reason for this sentence. " He knows his superiority, and that he has nothing to gain by the contest." Indeed' what, no justification for this tremendous sentence ? What, then, has he something to lose here ? Truth always gains : error and evil deeds only lose by the light. Dr. Hook may possibly find he has something to lose, if he has nothing to gain. It is a common trick with the Pa- pists to be the most confident where they have least proof. They know many of their deluded followers will exercise an implicit faith in their assertions. This will do — rea- ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 25 soning would possibly lead many to doubt — perhaps to do more. It is wise in such a cause to avoid it, and to treat your adversary with scorn. Why not ? you have " nothing to gaivb'' by the controversy. Dr. Hook, however, has favoured us with the outline of his scheme and argumenta- tion. These we shall notice in their place. Now though the proof, as we have said, lies upon these assertors of this personal succession scheme ; and though no man ought to be required to -prove a negative; yet as they are shy of their proofs, and in their stead give the world their important ipse dixits ; and as their bold asser- tions may trouble many, an exposure of the baselessness and futility of these assertions may be useful. Let the reader remember, that if we can only show that a reasona- ble " douhf lies upon any part of this scheme, that doubt will be fatal to it. If we show more ; if we show every PROPOSITION to be DOUBTFUL ; — yea, more still, every proposition to be baseless and false ; then the whole fabric falls to the srround. SECTION III. NO POSITIVE PROOF FROM THE SCRIPTURES OF THESE HIGH CHURCH CLAIMS. We will proceed to examine the Scriptural proofs ad- duced in favour of these high Church claims. Bishop Taylor has granted, (what every Protestant ought to insist upon,) that, except they have clear. Scriptural grounds for these claims, the attempt to impose them on the church of God would be tyranny. " Whatsoever," says he, " was the regiment of the Church in the apostles'* times, that must be perpetuall, (not so as to have all that which was per- sonall, and temporary, but so as to have no other,) for that, and that only is of divine institution which Christ com- mitted to the apostles, and if the Church be not now gov- erned as then, we can show no divine authority for our government, which we must contend to doe, and doe it, too, or be call'd usurpers."* So says Chillingworth, in his immortal declaration, — " The religion of the Protest- * Episcopacy Asserted, p. 4L 2 26 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. ants — is the Bible. The Bible, I say, the Bible only is the religion of Protestants ! Whatsoever else they believe besides it, and the plain, irrefragable, indubitable conse- quences of it, well may they hold it as a matter of opinion ; but as matter of faith and religion, neither can they with coherence to their own grounds believe it themselves, nor require the belief of it of others, without most high and most schismatical presumption T* I ought to caution the reader on one point here — it is this, that he will not blame me if I do not bring forward any such arguments produced by these divines, out of the sacred Scriptures, as their cause might seem to demand. All I can say is, that I know of no arguments of this kind ; and therefore I cannot produce them. I promise him I will produce the best I have anywhere found urged by these advocates for their scheme. Perhaps, however, in justice to some eminent writers in favour of episcopacy, I should say, that they substantially give up direct Scripture proof, and rely chiejly upon an induction from the testimo- ny of the early Christian fathers. Thus, Dr. Hammond asks, " Who were the apostles' successors in that power which concerned the governing their churches which they planted ? and first, I answer, that it being a matter of fact, or story, later than the Scripture can universally reach to, it cannot be fully satisfied or answered from thence — but will in the full latitude, through the universal church in these times be made clear, from the recent evidences that we have, viz., from the consent of the Greek and Latin fathers, who generally resolve that bishops are those suc- cessors. "f The celebrated Henry Dodwell has probably never been surpassed in laborious ecclesiastical learning, and he devoted it all to the establishment of this system of exclusiveness on behalf of episcopal powers and authority. Now this high Church champion, after all his toil to estab- lish these claims, fairly gives up all direct Scriptural au- thority for them. " The sacred writers," says he, " no- where professedly explain the offices or ministries them- selves, as to their nature or extent, which surely they would have done if any particular form had been presented * Religion of Protestants, chap, vii, sec. 56. t On the Power of the Keys, Preface. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 27 for perpetual duration."* And the very learned Bishop Beveridge himself, another exclusionist, makes substan- tially the same acknowledgment. He says, " Nothing can be determined from what the apostles did in their early proceedings in preaching the gospel as to the establish- ment of any certain form of church government for perpetual duration."! But let us proceed to the attempts made to find some- thing in Scripture to support this scheme. ^ 1. — The Commission of Jesus Christ to the Apostles. Their first argument is taken from the commission of Christ to the apostles : " Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost : teaching them to ob- serve all things whatsoever I have commanded you : and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen. "J The scheme of high Churchmen asserts that this commission belongs to bishops alone, as the exclusive successors of the apostles, and as the sole rulers and ordainers of all other ministers to the end of the world. The proof is wanting : though Archbishop Potter tells us, that the passage before us " contains a full declaration of our Lord's intention ^^ It would be idle to quote the at- tempts to supply this want of proofs by the reiterated asser- tions of these writers on the subject. The reader may see them in Bishop Taylor, sec. 3, Dr. Hook's Two Sermons, &c. The great reformers of the English Church thought very differently from these men ; for they appointed this very commission as a part of the solemn office for ordain- ing all presbyters : thus most decidedly determining that they believed this commission to belong to all presbyters, as well as to bishops. There is not, indeed, a single syllable in the passage about distinct orders of bishops and presbyters. The whole commission plainly belongs equally to every minister of Christ, in every age, as it does to a bishop. The Lord made no distinction ; and the ser- vant that attempts it, attempts a tyranny over his brethren * De Nupero Schismate, sec. 14. t Cod. Can. Ecc. Prim. Vind., p. 317. Lond., 1678, 4to. X Matt, xxviii, 19, 20. (^ Church Govern., p. 121, ed. Bagster, 1838. 28 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. for which he has no divine warrant. To see that our Lord intended no such thing as this proud scheme, let us hear him in other places on the relation of ministers, one to another. " But be not ye called rahhi : for one is your Master, even Christ ; and all ye are brethren. And call no man your father upon the earth : for one is your Father, which is in heaven. Neither be ye called masters : for one is your Master, even Christ. But he that is greatest among you shall be your servant. And whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased ; and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted."* " But Jesus called them to him, and saith unto them, Ye know that they which are accounted to rule over the Gentiles exercise lordship over them ; and their great ones exercise authority upon them. But so shall it not be among you : but whosoever will be great among you, shall be your minister : and whosoever of you will be the chiefest, shall be servant of all. For even the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many."t The only just conclusions that can be drawn from these passages are, that all ministers of the gospel are equal by divine authority ; and that the only important distinctions before God will be those of deeper piety, more devoted labours, and greater usefulness to the church of God. " Whosoever will be the chiefest, shall be servant of all." Great dependance is placed by others upon our Saviour's words on John xx, 21-23, " Then said Jesus to them again. Peace be unto you : as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you. And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost : whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them : and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained^ Now this is just as inconclusive as the other ; nay, the very indefiniteness of the Saviour's language, in both passages, is against them ; for, had he meant what they would have him to mean, he would, in a matter, according to this scheme, so all-important, have said so ; but he did not say so, which proves decidedly that he did not mean so. And here also, again, it is unfortunate for these writers, as be- longing to the Church of England, that her reformers have indisputably shown, that, in their views, this whole pas- * Matt, xxiii, 8-13. t Mark x, 42-45. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 29 sage, whatever power and authority it conveys, belongs PROPERLY to presbyters, as well as to bishops, by applying the whole to presbyters in the solemn act of ^AeiV ordination to the ministry. We speak of the Book of Orders, or the Office for ordaining Priests (presbyters) and Bishops, as it was constituted by the great English reformers ; and as it continued till 1661, when it was altered to what it is at present. See section vii, of this Essay. § 2. — The Claim of Apostleship for Bishops. But it is said, and contended for, that bishops are now what the apostles were in their time. To be sure some things are excepted, as the pretence would otherwise im- mediately refute itself. Let us hear Bishop Taylor : " In the extraordinary priviledges of the apostles they had no successors, therefore of necessity a successor must be constituted in the ordinary office of apostolate. Now what is this ordinary office ? Most certainly since the extraordinary (as is evident) was only a helpe for the founding and beginning, the other are such as are neces- sary for the perpetuating of a church. Now in clear evi- dence of sense, these offices and powers are preaching, baptizing^ consecrating, ordaining, and governing. For these were necessary for the perpetuating of a church, unless men could be Christians that were never chris- tened, nourished up to life without the eucharist, become priests without calling of God and ordination, have their sinnes pardoned without absolution, be members and parts and sonnes of a church whereof there is no coadunation, no authority, no governour. These the apostles had with- out all question, and whatsoever they had, they had from Christ, and these were eternally necessary: these, then, were the offices of the apostolate, which Christ promised to assist for ever, and this is that which we now call the order and ojffice of episcopacy. The apostolate and epis- copacy which did communicate in all the power, and offices which were ordinary and perpetuall, are in Scripture clearely all one in ordinary ministration, and their names are often used in common to signify exactly the same ordinary function."* '' LnpositiGii of hands is a duty and * Pages 14, 15. 30 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. office necessary for the perpetuating of a church, ne gens sit vnius cBtatis, least it expire in one age : this power of imposition of hands for ordination was fix't upon the apos- tles and apostolike men, and not communicated to the 72 disciples or presbyters ; for the apostles, and apostolike men, did so de facto, and were commanded to doe so, and the 72 never did so, therefore this office and ministry of the apostolate is distinct and superior to that oi presbyters, and this distinction must be so continued to all ages of the church, for the thing was not temporary but productive of issue and succession, and therefore as perpetuall as the clergy, as the Church itself."* "For farther confirmation," says Bingham, "of what has been asserted, it will not be amiss here to subjoin next a short account of the titles of honour which were given to bishops in the primitive church. The most an- cient of these is the title of apostles ; which, in a large and secondary sense, is thought by many to have been the original name for bishops, before the name bishop was ap- propriated to their order. For at first they suppose the names bishop and presbyter to have been common names for all of the first and second order ; during which time, the appropriate name for bishops, to distinguish them from mere presbyters, was that of apostles. Thus Theodoret says expressly, ' The same persons were anciently called promiscuously both bishops and presbyters, while those who are now called bishops, were^ (then) ' called apostles. But shortly after, the name of apostles was appropriated to such only as were apostles indeed ; and then the name bishop was given to those who before were called apostles.' Thus, he says, Epaphroditus was the apostle of the Phi- lippians, and Titus the apostle of the Cretans, and Timothy the apostle of the Asiaticks. And this he repeats in seve- ral other places of his writings." " The author under the name of St. Ambrose asserts the same thing ; ' That all bishops were called apostles at first.' And therefore, he says, that ' St. Paul, to distin- guish himself from such apostles, calls himself an apostle, not of man, nor sent by man to preach, as those others were, who were chosen and sent by the apostles to con- firm the churches.' Amalarius cites another passage out * Pase 27. ox APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 31 of this same author, which speaks more fully to the pur- pose : * They,' says he, ' who are now called bishops, were originally called apostles : but the holy apostles being DEAD, they who were ordained after them to govern the churches, could not arrive to the excellency of those first ; nor had they the testimony of miracles, but were in many respects inferior to them ; therefore they thought it not DECENT to assume to themselves the name of apostles ; but, dividing the names, they left to presbyters the name of the presbytery, and they themselves were called bishops.' " " This is what those authors infer from the identity of the names, bishop and presbyter, in the first age : they do not thence argue (as some who abuse their authority have done since) that therefore bishops and presbyters were all one ; but they think that bishops w^ere then distinguished by a more appropriate name, and more expressive of their superiority, which was that of secondary apostles."* So Dr. Hook : — " The officer whom v/e now call a bishop was at first called an apostle, although afterward it was thought better to confine the title of apostle to those who had seen the Lord Jesus, while their successors, exercising the same rights and authority, though unen- dowed with miraculous powers, contented themselves with the designation of bishops."! The importance of these extracts must apologize for their length. Powerful efforts are sometimes made to hold up this system by claiming authority for it from the precedents of Scriptural bishops. This, however, its ablest advocates seem to be conscious is untenable ground. They find something more indefinite about the office of apostles. This makes it more easy to indulge in supposi- tions and assertions. Besides, the scheme is an imposing one : sole, exclusive successors of the apostles ! What may they not do, if they can establish this ? The world must bow to their awful authority. The pope has showni us what may be accomplished in subjugating the bodies, and souls, and substance of mankind, by one such suc- cessor : what would be the state of the world, then, were every bishop established as a pope in his diocess ? To * Page 21, vol. i, fol. Lond., 1728. t Two Sermons on the Church and the Establishment. 32 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. say this is all exaggeration, is to contradict all past history and experience. The nature of the subject, the boldness of these claims, and the confidence with which they are urged, demand a careful investigation of this apostleship of bishops. But before we enter upon that investigation, it will not be irre- levant to notice, how these and similar advocates of this high scheme of episcopacy disagree with each other. Bishop Taylor declares that, if this high Church scheme be not the same as was in the apostles' times, and if they " cannot show divine authority for it, they must be called usurpers.^'* But the famous Henry Dodwell, one of its most learned and strenuous advocates, affirms, " That all the reasoning from which men conclude that the whole model of ecclesiastical discipline may be extracted from the writings of the New Testament, is veri/ precarious. There is," says he, " ?io passage of any sacred writer which openly professes this design. Indeed there is not one which so treats of ecclesiastical government, as if the author, or the writer's author, the Holy Spirit, had in- tended to describe any one form of church government as being to remain everywhere as for ever inviolate. The sacred pen?ne?i have nowhere declared, with sufficient clear- ness, how great a change must take place in church go- vernment when the churches should first withdraw from the communion of the synagogues. They nowhere clearly show how much was allowed to the personal gifts of the Holy Ghost, and how much to places and ojfices. They nowhere, with decided clearness, distinguish the extraordi- nary officers, who were not to outlive that age, from the ordinary ministers who were not to cease till the second coming of Christ. Indeed, all things of this nature were then so generally known, and they so suppose this know- ledge in what they say, that they never for the sake of posterity explain them ; concerning themselves only with present things, and leaving the future. They nowhere pro- fessedly explain the offices or ministries themselves, as to their nature or extent ; which surely they would have done if any particular form had been prescribed for perpetual duration."! The learned Dr. Bentley declares, that " our bishops, * Episcopacy Asserted, p. 4L t De Nupero Schismate, sec. 14. ON APOSTOLICA.L SLCCESSION. 33 with all Christian antiquity, never thought themselves and their order to succeed the Scripture 'Et: lokotcoi, (bishops,) but the Scripture Apo^oAoi, (apostles:) they were diado- Xoi TG)v Atto^oAwv, the successors of the apostles. — The presbyters, therefore, while the apostles lived, were EiTWKOTToi, bishops, overseers."* Yet Dodwell, superior to Bentley in ecclesiastical learning, positively affirms, that " the office of the apostles perished with the apostles; in which office there never was any succession to any of them, EXCEPT to Judas the traitor."! Let the reader also remark, here, that the scheme of the apostieship of modern bishops fully concedes the point, that bishops and presbyters were, in the apostles' days, one and the SAME order. For these advocates never reckon more than three orders in the ministiy, namely, (1.) bishops, whose appropriate name, they say, is apostles ; (2.) priests or presbyters ; and (3.) deacons. Now were we to reckon Scriptural bishops and presbyters as distinct orders, this would make, for the apostles' dsiys, four orders : and would contradict their own enumeration of orders. It follows, therefore, that their plan of apostieship fully concedes that Scriptural bishops and presbyters not only had these names in common, so that presbyters were called bishops, and bishops were called presbyters indifferently, but that they ivere realli/ one and the same order. Accordingly, Dr, Hammond says, that presbyters, as mentioned in Acts xi, 30, were bishops ; also in Acts xiv, 23, and other places. And he says that the word presbyter was ^'' fitly made use of by the apostles and writers of the New Testament, and affixed to the governors of the Christian church."—" And although this title of presbyter have been also extended to a second order in the church, and is now only in use for them, under the name of presbyter, yet in the Scripture times, it belonged principally, if not alone, to bishops, there being no evidence that any of that second order were then instituted." In plain English, the doctor fairly grants that presbyters, in Scripture times, were bishops, and bishops were presbyters : that is, they were one and the saine order and office. And Bentley affirms that " presbyters, while the apostles lived, were bishops." * Rundolph's Enchir. Thcol., vol. v, p. 204. t De Nupero Schi.smatc, pp. .5.5, 68, ed. Lond,, 1704, 12mo. 2* 34 ox APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. We proceed, however, to investigate further these claims of the rights and authority of apostles for modera bishops. Let us consider ichom it is said they succeed, and to what they succeed. The claim amounts to this, that modern apostles, by voluntary humility called bishops, are the exclusive successors of the twelve apostles ; that they suc- ceed them in those rights and in that authority which no other order of ministers possessed : and that this inherit- ance is indivisible, that is, that it cannot belong to tivo different orders of men at the same time ; yea, that it is itself the very essence of the order of modern apostles ; so that no individual could possess it but he would, hy the very fact of this possession, immediately become an apostle himself. To establish their scheme, these advocates must show two things : 1 st, that the order of the twelve apostles was to be an ordinary, standing order in the church ; and 2dly, they must show divine law, positive divine law, for the exclusive succession of modern bishops to the rights and authority of these apostles. For if the order of the twelve apostles was extraordinary and temporary, the claim to succeed them in that which had no continuance beyond themselves is a vain presumption : and if there be no divine law for giving to bishops the exclusive rights and authority of the twelve, then the assumption of such rights and authority, without divine law, is an impious assump- tion, and an attempt at an intolerable usurpation in the church of Christ. This being the state of the question, on this point, we come to inquire into the proofs. The proofs produced are of two kinds : first. Scriptural; secondly, ecclesiasticcd. As this is a question of divine right, Scriptural authority alone can decide it. Ecclesias- tical or human authority, as authority, is impertinent, and can decide nothing one way or another. However, we shall examine it in its place. First, then, the Scriptural proofs. The claims being so high and awful, the proofs must be clear, plain, and power- ful. Dr. Barrow's remarks on the matter of proofs as to the pope's supremacy will hold Avith equal force as to the supremacy of bishops. We shall insert them, with w^ords in brackets, showing their application to this system. ox APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 35 " If," says he, " God had designed the bishop of Rome [bishops as supreme over ministers and people] to be for a perpetual course of times sovereign monarch \monarchs'\ of his church, it may reasonably be supposed that he would expressly have declared his mind in the case, it being a point of greatest importance of all that concern the admi- nistration of his kingdom in the world. Princes do not use to send their viceroys unfurnished with patents clearly signifying their commission, that no man out of ignorance or doubts concerning that point, excusably may refuse compliance ; and, in all equity, promulgation is requisite to the establishment of any law, or exacting obedience. But in all the pandects of divine revelation, the bishop of Rome [or, the supremacy of bishops,'] is not so much as oxcE mentioned, either by name, or by character, or by probable intimation ; they cannot hook him [themi] in other- wise than by straining hard, and framing a long chain of consequences, each of which is too subtle for to constrain any man's persuasion. — In the Levitical law all things concerning the high priest ; not only his designation, suc- cession, consecration, duly, power, maintenance, privilege of its high priest, [of bishops as high priests,] whereby he [they] might be directed in the administration of his [their] office, [of their supremacy,] and know what observance to require. Whereas also the Scripture doth inculcate duties of all sorts, and doth not forget frequently to press duties of respect and obedience toward particular governors of the church ; is it not strange that it should never bestow one precept, whereby we might be instructed and admo- nished to pay our duty to the universal Pastor ? [to these supreme pastors?] especially considerinor, that God, who directed the pens of the apostles, and who intended that their writings should continue for the perpetual instruction of Christians, did foresee how requisite such a precept would be to secure that duty ; for if but one such precept did appear, it would do the business, and void all contesta- tion about it."* Thus also speaks the learned Stillingfleet in his celebrated Irenicum : " We shall dissuss the nature of a DIVINE RIGHT, and show whereon an unalterable divine right must be founded." Yery well : now high * Dr. Barrow's Treatise on the Pope's Supremacy, Supp. 5, p. 155, &c., ed. Lond., 1680, 4to. 36 ox APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. Churchmen say that modern bishops have divine right to " the rights and authority of apostles." Let Stillingfleet state the law of the case.* " Jus (law) is that which makes a thing to become a duty : so jus quasi jussum, and jussa jura, as Festus explains it ; that is, that whereby a thing is not only licitum (lawful) in men's lawful power to do it or no, but is made dehitujn, (duty,) and is constituted a duty by the force and virtue of a divine command. — Whatso- ever binds Christians as an universal standing law, must be clearly revealed as such, and laid down in Scripture in such EVIDENT TERMS, as all who have their senses exer- cised therein may discern to have been the will of Christ, that it should perpetually oblige all believers to the world's end, as is clear in the case of baptism, and the Lord's supper." Let, then, such a law, such " a divine command, an universal standing law, clearly revealed as such, and laid down in Scripture in such evident terms, as all who have their senses exercised therein may discern to have been the will of Christ, that it should perpetually oblige all believers to the world's end" — let such a law be shown for the claim of the rights and authority of apostles as belonging to modern bishops, and the question is ended. We all cordially submit to, and acquiesce in, such a divine law. But, if no such law be produced ; if no such law can be produced ; if no such law ever was promulgated ; then, to urge such a claim upon the consciences of all other ministers and people, and, on this baseless assump- tion, to pronounce all their ordinances void, all their minis- ters as Korah, Dathan, and Abiram ; what is this but to curse those whom Christ has blessed ? what, but to intro- duce a system of usurpation in the church of God, essen- tially destructive of its peace to the end of the world 1 This for the nature of the proofs. But to proceed : it will be proper here, in order to avoid ambiguity, to notice the different significations of the term apostle. The general meaning of the term apostle is, one sent, a mis- sionary, a messenger. Accordingly, when the Saviour sent forth the twelve, he also, saith St. Luke, " named them apostles.'''' These are called the apostles, by way of emi- nence. Eusebius says, " The Lord Jesus Christ called twelve apostles, whom alone among the rest of his dis- * Stillingfleet's Irenicum, part i, chap. i. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 37 ciples he denominated Vvith peculiar honour, his apostles."* They are also called " the twelve" in various parts of the New Testament ; the " apostles of Christ,'^ in opposition to apostles of men, or of churches, 1 Cor. i, 1 ; 2 Cor. i, 1 ; xi, 13, and in many other places. The term, when applied to others, is simply " apostle," or " the apostle," or " mes- senger of the churches." The term apostle is also applied in the New Testament to several other individuals in a more general, and less dignified sense. It is, in this sense, applied to designate all who were sent to preach the gospel ; the twelve apostles, and all other preachers. This is proved by the following passages : — Matt, xxiii, 34, compared with Luke xi, 49. For the apostles, as mentioned in Luke, are explained in Matthew by being called " wise men and scribes ;" that is, all teachers or preachers of the gospel. So Dr. Hammond in Matt, xxiii, 34, " Prophets and others learned in your religion, which receiving the faith (Matt, xiii, 52) shall preach it to you ;" and therefore, in Luke xi, 49, he trans- lates the word " apostle" by the word " messenger ;" and so Treraellius translates the Syriac there. Dr. Whitby, in Matt, xxiii, 34, explains " wise men and scribes," by " true interpreters of the law and the prophets," and in- stances Stephen the deacon as one of them. Thus Calvin, Mr. S. Clarke, and Dr. A. Clarke, interpret these passages to mean all preachers of the gospel ; and, indeed, they do not seem capable of any other interpretation. In this sense, several of the fathers call the seventy disciples, sent forth by our Lord to preach the gospel, apostles. Apollos, who was nothing more than a lay preacher, is also in this sense called an " apostle :" compare 1 Cor. iv, 9 with v, 6 ; so is Barnabas, Acts xiv, 14 ; and see 2 Cor. xi, 13, vvith V, 15 ; Rom. xvi, 7 ; Rev. ii, 2. The word apostle seems, also, to be applied in the New Testament in a more general sense still, to signify any messenger on public business, whether a preacher of the gospel or not. Though we notice this sense of the term apostle last, yet it is, in truth, the most proper sense of the word ; and the former meanings only show particular ap- plications of this general one. Thus Dr. Hammond on Luke vi, 13: "The name (apostle) hath no more in it" * Euseb. E. H., lib. i, cap. 10. 38 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. than to " signify messenger on legate." " Among the Jews all sorts of messengers are called apostles. So Ahijah (1 Kings xiv, 6) is called aKXrjgog ATrog-oXog, that is, a harsh apostle, or messenger of ill news. And in the Old Testament the word is no otherwise used. Among the Talmudists it is used of them that were, by the rulers of the synagogues, seiit out to receive the tenths and dues that Jbelonged to the synagogues. And, in like manner, the ?nesse?igers of the church that carried their liberality, or letters congratulatory, from one to another, are by Igna- tius called ■^eodgofioi and ■deonpealSvrat, the divine carriers, or embassadors ; and so in the Theodosian Codex tit. de Jud<£is, apostoli are those that were sent by the patriarch at a set time to require the gold and silver due to them." Thus the persons who were chosen hy the churches to carry the money collected in Greece for the poor brethren at Jerusalem are called the apostles ; that is, as our trans- lators justly render it, " the messengers of the churches^'' 2 Cor. viii, 23. This is explained by the apostle Paul himself, where he says, in 1 Cor. xvi, 3, " And when I come, whomsoever ye shall approve by your letters, them will I send to bring your liberality to .Jerusalem :" as in 2 Cor. viii, 19, he speaks of them as " chosen of the churches to travel with us v/ith this grace," with this liberal contri- bution. The reader will observe that St. Paul does not number Titus with these apostles, or, more properly, mes- sengers ; and for this plain reason, these messengers were persons chosen or ordained hy the churches to this business, — Titus was NOT ; but only sent in company with them by the apostle ; they, therefore, were messengers of the churches, and they only, 2 Cor. viii, 23, " Whether any do inquire of Titus, he is my partner and fellow-helper concerning you : or our brethren be inquired of, they are the MESSENGERS of tlic churchcs, and the glory of Christ." In Phil, ii, 25, it seems to be used again to mean ^, public messenger, a messenger of the church, sent on their public business. Bishop Taylor here actually* perverts * No man's name should shield him when he perverts the truth. This is not the only instance in which Bishop Taylor has been guilty of perverting the truth to serve a system. Quoting the annotation of Zonaras, p. 280, upon the twelfth canon of the Laodicean council, " Populi saffragiis olim episcopi eligcbantur," he translates, ''■ of old ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 39 the sense by a false translation. He renders avvepyog, my " compeer,^^ in order to raise Epaphroditus, as a proto- type of modern bishops, to equality with apostles. He would thus make Priscilla and Aquila (Rom. xvi, 3) apos- tolic compeers, rovg owegyovg fiov ; and perhaps Priscilla would stand as a prototype for a race of female bishops ! Will he also make apostles themselves compeers with God, because they were workers together with him, Qeov yap EGiiev ovvepyoi ? 1 Cor. iii, 9. The apostle's language, however, is distinct, as before : — " Yet I suppose it neces- sary to send to you Epaphroditus, my companion in labour, GvvEQjov fiov, but YOUR messenger, vjxcovde anog'oXov," Phil, ii, 25. Dodwell has the candour and good sense to see this. " If it were true," says he, " that these secondary apostles of the churches were the apostles of the churches for no other reason than 'this, that they were sent to plant churches ; there would in this view be no ground on which they could be distinguished from the primary apostles : for the apostles of Christ were sent forth and appointed by Christ himself to this office of planting churches. Ephes. iv, 11-13. But we may easily gather from the Epistle to time bishops were chosen not without the suffrage of the people," instead of " by the suffrage of the people ;" and this is done evidently to weaken or alter the sense of the passage, as a proof of the people's power formerly in choosing the bishop "by their suffrages." He tells his reader, at p. 55, that Jerome is dissuading Heliodorus from taking on him " the great burden of the episcopal office." Now Jerome commences his discourse on the subject by saying, " Provocabis ad CLEROsI" — "Do you now come to the clergy 1" But then Jerome, in the next line, speaks of these clergy, without any distinction, as " SUCCEEDING to the apostolical degree." Here is the secret. So Jerome must be made to speak to Heliodorus about " the great burden of the episcopal office .'" Again, in the very same page : " Feed the flock of God which is among you, said St. Peter to the bishops of Ponfiis, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. Similia enim suc- cessoribus suis Petrus scripsit praecepta, saith Theodoras — St. Peter gave the same precepts to his successors which Christ gave to him," p 55. Here he finds Theodoret speaking of apostolical successors ; so they must be made bishops, though the sacred text expressly says they were " presbyters !" 1 Pet. v, 1-3. There is a very reprehen- sible attempt of the same kind upon the eighteenth canon of the coun- cil of Ancyra, at p. 176. The Church of England divines never spare the Popish divines when they detect them in such tricks ; they boldly charge them with " forgeries and corruptions of councils and fathers." They do right. " Thou that judgest another, thou condemnest thy- self," if thou doest any of the same things. 40 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. the Philippians to what the office of Epaphroditus, as an apostle or messenger, referred, (chap, iv, 18,) ' But I have all, and abound : I am full, having received of Epaphrodi- tus the things lohich were sent from you, an odour of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable, well-pleasing to God.' His office, therefore, belonged to pecuniary affairs. Rem igitur pecunia,riam spectahat ilia legatioP* He treats this subject well to the end of the section ; but we must study brevity. Here, then, we see the word apostle, or apostles, signi- nifies in the New Testament, first, " the twelve apostles," so designated by way of eminence, as distinguished from all others ; secondly, it signifies, in a more general and less dignified sense, all preachers of the gospel; and, thirdly, it signifies any public messenger, as " the messenger of the churches," 2 Cor. viii, 23 ; Phil, ii, 23. Here let the reader remark : First, that the application of the name apostle to the bishops of modern times, in the second and third senses, will give them no prerogatives over any other ministers of the gospel : it must, then, be claimed for them by high Churchmen in the first sense, as applied to designate the twelve ALONE ; this is their claim. Let this be strictly kept in mind, as these advocates often sophistically shift their terms. Secondly, observe, that from the exclusive nature of the twelve apostles' office, none besides themselves could pos- sibly possess it during their lives ; consequently, nothing possessed by any other ministers during the apostles' lives belonged to this exclusive office. To see the truth of the former part of this sentence : suppose that any other ministers, during the lives of the twelve apostles, pos- sessed what are called their prerogatives in common with them, (the solecism must be excused,) it is clear as the light that such things ceased to be the prerogatives of the twelve the moment they were possessed by others in common with them. This could not be succession, but possession in common. It follows, therefore, that from the exclusive nature of the twelve apostles' office, none besides themselves could possibly possess it during their lives ; and, consequently, that nothing possessed by any * Dodwelli Diss. Cyprian, No. 6, § 17, ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 41 Other ministers, during the apostles' lives, belonged to these exclusive prerogatives. Thirdly, then, it follows necessarily, that as Timothy, and Titus, and Epaphroditus, were not of the twelve, no argument can be deduced from any thing in their case in favour of the apostleship of modem bishops. Yet these advocates fill their volumes with tirades about Timothy, Titus, and Epaphroditus, as prototypes of modem bishops. Fourthly. To retort their own argument about names and things upon themselves — it would signify nothing for the divine right of the prerogatives of bishops were they sometimes called apostles by name, for all preachers of the gospel were sometimes called by that name ; they must prove the things apart from the name ; that bishops, as apostles, have what no other preachers of the gospel have. This brings us to things, to the prerogative of the twelve apostles : the proud claim of this system. What, then, were the prerogatives of the twelve apostles, EXCLUSIVELY posscssed by them, as distinguished from all other gospel ministers whatever? They were the following : — 1. Immediate vocation. Gal. i, 1, "Paul, an apostle, (not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead.") The ordination of an apostle, in the strict sense of the word, was not only immediately by Christ himself, without any imposition of hands, but it was complete at once, without the individual having passed through any other grades or offices in the ministry preparatory to it. Now no bishop was ever appointed immediately by Christ himself: high Churchmen maintain imposition of hands as necessary to their ordination ; and, w^hat is perhaps most to the point in hand, no man, on the scheme of high Churchmen, can be made a bishop who has not previously received what they call the indelible character of the priesthood, in his ordination to the office of a presbyter. A bishop, who had never been a presbyter, is considered incapable of admin- istering the sacraments, and of conferring orders.* How is it possible, then, that bishops should be properly apostles, when the ordination of the one so essentially differs from the other, both in the form and essence of the ordination, * Field on the Church, p. 157, fol., 1628. 42 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. and in the qualifications of the individuals to be ordained 1 Scriptural bishops, we know, were ordained such at once, without passing through any preparatory grades in the ministry ; but, then, the reason is plain, viz., that, in the Scriptures, bishops and presbyters were one and the same office. 2. Apostles were taught the gospel by immediate reve- lation: Gal. i, 12, "For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ." 3. They were infallible teachers of it to others : Gal. i, 8, 12, " But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ." 4. They had a commission of universal authority. 2 Cor. X, 13-16; xiii, 10; Rom. i, 14-16. They had a universal commission of divine infallible authority, as to the doctrine of faith and morals. It is not clear that they had any absolute authority in any thing else. They ordained elders or presbyters : so did Barna- bas ; so did Timothy and Titus, who were not of the twelve ; and so did presbyters, they ordained Timothy himself. But, when ministers had been ordained and appointed to any church, there is no decisive proof that the apostles alone governed those ministers. Dodwell remarks justly, that " their chief work was rather the planting of churches, than the ruling of churches."* Ignatius, the oracle of high Churchmen, says, " It is not lawful without the bishop, neither to baptize, nor to cele- brate the holy communion. He that does any thing with- out his knowledge, ministers unto the devil." On the high Church scheme, the apostles, during their lives, were the only real bishops. Now did the apostles claim any such authority as this over every special act of other ministers ? Never ! The thing, indeed, was impossible. How could they be everywhere to appoint every baptism, and every minute detail of ministerial duty 1 But there is not only * Dodwelli Diss. Cyprian., dissert, vi, sec. 17. " Illorum (Apos- tolorum) opera prfecipua in disseminandis potius, quam rcgendis, Ec- clesiis coUocata est." Ox\ APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 43 no proof that the apostles alone governed ministers as well as the church, but there is no direct proof to the contrary. The ministers of the seven churches were some of them remiss, and some wicked : who, then, takes authority to correct and judge them ? The apostle John ? No ; he that walks in the midst of the golden candlesticks : he does it. To say that John might, but did not, would be to say that the Saviour should first have rebuked John for this remiss- ness ; yet nothing of the kind is found in the divine mes- sage, but every thing to the contrary. It may be asked, What cure is there for wicked ministers ? We answer. The Scriptural method is, to teach the people to forsake them ; and to leave them to the judgment of God. This as to the church catholic : of course, every particular church has the right to expel bad ministers, as well as bad men, from its communion. 5. Apostles had the power not only of working miracles, but also of COMMUNICATING miraculous powers to others. Acts viii, 14-19 ; xix, 6 ; 1 Tim. i, 6. I believe there is nothing more than these five preroga- tives that belong exclusively to the apostles : all other ministers preached and baptized. It is most certain that others, especially presbyters, ordained persons to the ministry. 1 Tim. iv, 14. Presbyters also nded or GOVERNED the cliurch, Acts xx, 28 : 1 Tim. v, 17, " Let the elders (presbyters) that rule well be counted worthy of double honour, especially they who labour in the word and doctrine." In which, then, and in what number of these prerogatives do modem bishops succeed the twelve apostles ? Have they had immediate vocation, not of men, but by Jesus Christ 1 Are they taught the gospel by immediate revela- tion? These advocates dare not claim either of these prerogatives. Are they infallihle teachers of others ? No. Have they a commission of universal infallible authority, as to doctrines of faith and morals, in all churches ? Have they universal jurisdiction, as bishops 1 This they know to be a contradiction to other parts of their scheme, viz., that there can be only one bishop in one diocess. Have they, then, the power of communicating the miraculous gifts of the Holy Ghost? The rite of confirmation is founded on the assumption of this, or it is founded on 44 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. nothing that was the prerogative of the twelve. The assumption confounds the advocates ; to give it up, gives up their cause. The claim, therefore, of the prerogatives of the twelve apostles for modern bishops, by these high Church advocates, is utterly unsustained by the New Tes- tament. This decides the whole matter. The claim is as baseless as it is bold. No names on earth ought to save it, for a moment, from the reprobation of the whole Chris- tian church. Thus much for Scriptural authority, both as to the name and the thing ; and no other authority can decide the question. However, though ecclesiastical authority will be discussed at length in the subsequent sections, yet as it will give a unity and completeness to the present article, we shall here briefly clear the subject of eccle- siastical authority. What ecclesiastical authority, then, is there for this claim of modern bishops, being, as apostles, really such, and exclusively the successors of the apostles ? Some readers may be surprised, when I say, that there is not a single Christian father who says so: not one. What! not Theodoret ? No, not Theodoret ! Hear him : he says, " Those who are now called bishops were (anciently) called apostles. But shortly after, the name of apostles was appropriated to such as were apostles indeed, a/irj^iog Arrog'oXoL, truly apostles." Here, then, even Theodoret declares that bishops are not apostles truly ; that is, they are truly, as to the prerogatives of the twelve, not apostles at all ! What, then, is the meaning of his ambi- guous expression, " Those who are now called bishops were anciently called apostles ?" Well, in the first place, he guards his own statement by declaring that those now called bishops are not " truly apostles." What are they then ? What you please, but not truly apostles. It is no matter to this argument what you call them. He says they were called bishops ; and his language imports that they then, in his ti?ne, exercised authority having some resemblance to what those anciently and truly called apostles, exercised. This is speaking to a fact, and not to the law of the case. We grant the truth of the fact : but what does it prove ? That they were really apostles ? No : Theodoret himself positively denies that as fact ; ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 45 and shows, that, even in his day, they were believed not to be truly apostles. And Ambrose, as cited by Amalarius, positively declares, that the ancient bishops were so far from thinking, with our modems, that apostle was truly the appropriate denomination for bishops, that they thought it NOT DECENT to assume to themselves the name of apostles. Thus we find their own authorities destroy their scheme. Never was there a more bold' and baseless fabrication palmed upon the public than this, that apostle was the APPROPRIATE name for bishops. The authors of it catch at some ambiguous expressions in writers o^ the fifth cen- tury ; but what evidence do they bring from the Scriptures, or the purest and earliest writers of the Christian church ? The Scriptures give no evidence for it, but the contrary. In those authors whom high Churchmen quote with the greatest triumph, Ignatius, Tertullian, and Cyprian, all the evidence is against this position of apostle being the appropriate name for bishop. Everywhere their highest declamations are made for them under the name — not of apostles, but of bishops. What a humiliation to men of learning, to lend themselves to the propagation of such strange perversions of the facts of the early history of the church ! But does not Ambrose say, that bishops were, by eccle- siastical wTiters, called apostles at first ? He does. But he does not say that bishops exclusively were called apostles. He knew better. " Many were called apostles hy way of imitation,^''* says Eusebius ; an earlier and better authority on such subjects than Theodoret or Ambrose. So he calls " Thaddeus, one of the seventy^'' an apostle. The learned Valesius's note on the place is as follows : — " Apostle here is to be taken in a large sense. After the same manner every nation and city termed them apostles, from whom they first received the truth of the gospel. This name was not only given to the twelve, but all their DISCIPLES, COMPANIONS, and ASSISTANTS, WCrO GENERALLY called APOSTLES." They all acted as missionaries in spreading the gospel. The word apostle means a mis- sionary. See, then, the goodly company of apostles ! Indeed Suicer shows that women, as well as men, were * Euseb. E. Hist., lib. i, c. 12. 46 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. sometimes called apostles by ecclesiastical writers ; and that the emperor Constantine and Helen were- both fre- quently called, by ecclesiastical writers, Loairog-oXoi, apos- tolic compeers^* So St. Augustine says, " that, generally, ^^ in his time, " it was applied to such as were introduced into the ministry." He divides apostles 'va.io four classes, and says the third sort who were called apostles in his day, were such as were smuggled into the priesthood by popular favour — '■' favor e viilgi in sacerdtium subrogatiP\ Jerome is plainer still. He makes the same division of apostles into four classes. In the first, he places Isaiah, the other prophets, and St. Paul ; in the second, Joshua the son of Nun ; the third he states to be, " When any one is ordained by the favour and request of men. As we now," says he, " see many, not according to the will of God, but by bribing the favour of the multitude, become S'/nuggled into the priesthood. "| Here it is plain from the testimony of these great men, earlier and better autho- rities than Theodoret, that, in their days, any priest, all priests, even the worst of priests, or presbyters, were cojiMONLY denominated apostles. Grotius shows, that the emperors Honorius and Arcadius, in their laws, called the Jewish presbyters, apostles.*^ Tertullian expressly calls the seventy disciples, apostles ;\\ though Bishop Taylor declares that they were only presbyters. Chrysostom and Theophylact, also, are mentioned by Estius on 1 Cor. XV, 7, as applying the term apostle to the severity ; so also Erasmus and Calvin, on the same place. Such is the result of ecclesiastical authority, as to the appropriate name of bishops. Bishops were sometimes called apostles ; but not bishops only. " Many," says Eu- sebius, "were called apostles byway oi imitation. ^^ This name was not only given, by ecclesiastical writers, to the twelve, but to the seventy disciples ; and, says Valesius, to all the disciples, companions, and assistants of the apostles." Augustine and Jerome prove that it was com- monly applied, in their day, to any priest, to all priests, * Suiceri Thesam., i, 477, and 1459. t August 0pp., torn, iv, App., p. 9, ed. Sugd., 1664. X Hieronymi Comment, in Epist. ad Galat., lib. i, cap i. () Grotii Annot. in Poll Syn., iv, 1, 280. II TertuU. adversus Marcion, lib. iv, cap. 24. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 47 even to the worst of priests. However, the bishops of that day, knowing that it did not truly belong to them, thought it not decent to use it, and to be called apostles ; they, therefore, laid it aside. Their modesty was com- mendable : in this our advocates do not choose to be their successors. But, if the argument from the name fails them, what was the fact as to the thing itself? Do ecclesiastical writers say that bishops were, in fact, the successors to the prero- gatives of the apostles ? There is no doubt that they soon began to write in an inflated style about bishops. Their opinions are worth no more than their reasons for those opinions are worth ; their opinions can decide nothing wfthout, or against, the Scriptures. We have seen that, in fact, bishops possess no Scriptural claim to the preroga- tives of the twelve apostles. But do ecclesiastical writers really say that bishops possessed these prerogatives ? Do they say that bishops have immediate inspiration of what they teach ? that they are infallible ? that they have un- limited authority? or that they have the prerogative of communicating the power to work miracles ? Speak, ye lofty succession men ! Ye are silent ! you dare not say that they do ! I dare say that they do not. Prove me mis- taken. Nay, so far from bishops being said to be the exclusive successors of the apostles in any thing, the greatest ranter in antiquity for bishops, viz., Ignatius, or rather the corrupter of his epistles, plainly says, that "presbyters preside in the place of the council of the apostles." " Be ye subject to your presbyters as to the apostles of Jesus Christ." " Let all reverence the presby- ters as the sanhedrim of God, and as the college of APOSTLES." " See that ye follow the presbyters as the apostles.'''' Do ecclesiastical writers say, that anciently bishops governed the church as bishops now govern it ? They say that the government of the church was in common, that is, by the common council of the presbyters, the first presbyter* being for distinction's sake, and for the sake of order,! called bishop. Even Ignatius calls this council of the presbyters " the sanhedrim of God — the council of the * Ambrosii (;!om. in Ephes. iv. + Hieronymi Com. in Tit., cap. i. 48 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION, apostles — the college of the apostles."* And Cyprian, next to Ignatius as to high notions about bishops, declares that he did " nothing without the council of presbyters ; that the mutual honour of each required him to act in this manner."! But do bishops now govern the church so ? No such thing. At the conference, at Worcester House, about the king's (Charles II.) declaration, when ministers desired that the bishops should exercise their church power with the counsel and consent of presbyters, Bishop Cosins (one of the most learned bishops in the canons, councils, and fathers) presently replied, " If your majesty grants this, you will unbishop your hishops^X Do the early fathers say that bishops had, by divine right, the sole power and authority of ordaining to the ministry ? Never ! Ignatius says, that presbyters were not even to baptize, nor do any thing, without the bishops. This no more proves that they could not ordain than they could not baptize. But the fathers give us the reason of this restriction upon presbyters, viz., that it was for the HONOUR of the bishop, for the peace of the church, and to prevent divisions : so say Tertullian, Jerome, and Augus- tine. All this proves their opinion of a divine right ioT good order, and peace in the church, and that such an arrange- ment was the best way of securing these ends ; and it proves nothing more. All deduced from it besides is mere sophistry and chicanery. But the matter of ecclesiastical authority will be discussed more at large in the following sections. The result, then, of this investigation of the apostleship of bishops, is, 1st. That the greatest champions of high Church episcopacy are divided among themselves upon it ; 2d. That the scheme necessarily concedes that Scripture bishops and presbyters were one and the same order; 3d. That every prerogative which the twelve apostles had, as distinguished from Scripture presbyters, was temporary and extraordinary, and that bishops inherit none of them ; 4th. That as to the name of apostle, as appropriate to the * Ignat. Ep. ad Mag. et ad Trail. t Cyprian Op. Ep. 6, ed. Pamel. % Calamy's Abridgment of Bapter's Life and Times, vol. i, p. 171, Loud., 1702, 12mo. ; and see decisive evidence on the same point in Abp. Usher's Reduction of Episcopacy. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 49 twelve, the claim of bishops to it is absurd, as it could not be appropriate to the twelve, and yet common to others ; 5th. That, as used in a larger sense, all preachers of the gospel had it alike, in the apostles' days : and after those days also. So that neither in the name, nor in the thing, is one single prerogative found, to Avhich bishops have any exclusive claim. Presbyters, therefore, are as much apos- tles as bishops are ; and, by the word of God, as the re- formers declare, they are one and the same office and order: all distinctions between them are of human origin ; and consequently have no more than human authority. Finally, then, we conclude with Dodwell, that " the office of the apostles perished with the apostles ; in which office there never was any succession to any of them, except to Judas the traitor :" — with the learned Dr. Barrow, we conclude, " The apostolical office, as such, was per- sonall and temporary; and therefore, according to its nature and desig-ne, not successive or communicable to others in perpetuall descendence from them. It was, as such, in all respects extraordinary, conferred in a speciall man- ner, designed for speciall purposes, discharged by speciall aids, endowed with speciall privileges, as was needfuU for the propagation of Christianity, and founding of churches."* With Whitaker, the celebrated Protestant chan!pion, that " Mimus episcopi nihil est ad munus apostolicum — that the offce of a bishop has nothing to do with the offce of an apostle.'"] And thus, being fortified by Protestant autho- rities, we concur with Bellarmine, the great Popish con- troversialist, that ^^ Episcopi nullam hahent partem ver plained as referring to him, not in the character of chief Pastor, as superintending other pastors, but as to his over- sight over the souls of the people — " Bishop of your souls." What can be a clearer proof, that the title of bishop, in the New Testament, was not given to designate an office principally distinguished in its superiority by its oversight over other pastors, than this, that the word is never so USED in the New Testament ; but always and only to imply OVERSIGHT OVER THE FLOCK ? 2. Bishops and presbyters in the New Testament have the NAMES COMMON, that is, bishops are called presbyters, and presbyters are called bishops, indifferently ; therefore they are essentially one and the same. It is granted by Episcopalians, high and low, that the names are common. Dr. Hammond, in chapter sixth of his Fourth Dissertation against Blondel, admits this, as to the fathers in general, and quotes the words of Theodoret, that " they both had the names common." And CEcumenius, says he, follow- ing Chrysostom, declares the same. So Bishop Taylor says, " All men grant that (in Scripture) the names are confounded,^'' sec. 32 : and even Dr. Hook does not deny this. However, these writers deny the conclusion, that the names being thus common, the offices are essentially the same : we affirm it. We affirm it from the usage of the language of the New Testament. There is no in- stance, in the New Testament, of using the names of offi cers so in common, and of employing the terms indiffer 84 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. ently, the one for the other, without any marked distinc- tion ; and yet those offices remaining essentially different and incompatible. Apostles are sometimes called elders ; but apostles are not called elders, and elders apostles, in- differently, and without distinction : they are mentioned together and distinctly, " apostles and elders," Acts xv, 6 and 23. Now this is never the case with bishops and presbyters ; they are never thus distinguished. When either of the terms bishop or presbyter is used, the other is never used along with it ; which proves they meant the same thing, as one always sufficed without the other. The same remarks apply to the word deacon. The general meaning of this word is minister. It is sometimes, there- fore, used for an apostle, as an apostle was a minister of Christ. But then the distinction is plain enough in the New Testament ; and for any one to say that apostles are called deacons, and deacons apostles, indifferently in the New Testament, would only be to expose himself to the contempt of every thinking person. The language of the New Testament, then, establishes the conclusion, that, where the " names are common," the things are substan- tially the same. Besides, the contrary position is absurd, and implies a strange imputation upon the Scriptures themselves, viz., that they should use the " names in com- mon and confound them," while the things were essen- tially different. This would be to say that the apostles, and the Holy Spirit that inspired them, were either unable to distinguish things by right names, or were totally negli- gent of such distinctions in matters of the highest import- ance ; or, lastly, that they designed to mislead their readers under the ambiguities o/' language :* all of which are im- * Mr. Sinclair (p. 10) actually declares that " we cannot reasonably look in the Holy Scriptures for any regular discussion or explicit state- ments" on these subjects ; yet he and his brethren think they can " reasonably''^ excommunicate others for not receiving that for which they " cannot reasonably look" in the Scriptures. He pronounces it " idle to expect'^ these things in the writings of the New Testament. There is good reason with Mr. Sinclair and such writers for these statements : they know the New Testament fails to support their cause. He asserts (p. 14) that the " offices of religion (of Christianity) could NOT at once possess appropriate designations." So the Holy Ghost really " could not give appropriate designations" to the officers of the church without the help of ecclesiastics ! ! Accordingly, he says, (p. 16,) ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 85 putations so monstrously absurd, not to say blasphemous, that no pious mind could maintain them, when seen, for a single moment. There is no such usage in any language, as that names should be common and confounded, where things are essentially different : the thing is impossible. The community of names, therefore, in the New Testa- ment, between bishops and presbyters, implies a com- munity of attributes, a substantial identity of nature ; and that bishops and presbyters are not only nominally, but really and indeed, one and the same office. We will now give a few examples from the New Testament of this community of names. In Paul's Epistle to the Philip- pians, he thus addresses them, chap, i, 1 : " Paul and Ti- motheus, the servants of Jesus Christ, to all the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippf, with the bishops and deacons." " The Greek and Latin fathers," it is granted, " do with one consent declare that the apostle here calls their presbyters their bishops." In his Epistle to Titus, chap, i, 5-7, he speaks as follows : " For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain elders [presbyters] in every city, as I had appointed thee : if any be blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children, not accused of riot, or unruly. For a bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God : not self-willed, not soon angry, not given to wine, no striker, not given to filthy lucre." Here no- thing can be clearer than that presbyters and bishops are spoken of as identical. To say, ordain elders, for a bishop must be blameless, is like saying, crown the sovereign, for the- king must be crowned. In 1 Tim. iii, 1, 2, &c., the same subject is treated nearly in the same words. In Timothy, the term bishop only is used, it being indifferent which was employed, whether bishop or presbyter, as they both meant the same. Again, in Acts xx, 17 and 28 — ■ " And from Miletus he sent to Ephesus, and called the ** We must NOT expect words and phrases to be used with the same precision, on their first appropriation," in the New Testament, " to ecclesiastical things and persons, as we find them in later ages : when their peculiar and restricted meaning was established, and when fami- liarity with their new interpretation had dissolved ancient associations." Is not this saying that ecclesiastics, and not the Lord Jesus Christ and his apostles, are to establish the terms and laws of office in Chris- tianity ■? The pope and Church of Rome never demanded more. 86 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. elders* [presbyters] of the church. And when they were come to him, he said unto them,' Take heed, therefore, unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, [bishops,] to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood." In these passages the matter is so clear, that to add any remarks would be to insult the reader's under- standing. St. Peter's language proves the same point. In his first epistle, chap, v, 1-3, he thus speaks : " The ELDERS which are among you I exhort, who am also an ELDER, and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also a partaker of the glor}' that shall be revealed : feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, {emaiw-ovvreg, acting the bishops,) not by constraint, but willingly ; not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind ; neither as being lords over God's heritage, but being ensamples to the flock." So much for the names ; we now come to the things. 3. Bishops and presbyters have the same qualifica- tions. Titus i, 5-7; 1 Tim. iii, 1, 2, &c. ; Acts xx, 17 and 28. 4. Bishops and presbyters have the same ordination. Acts XX, 17 and 28 ; TiUis i, 5-7. 5. Bishops and presbyters have the same duties : proofs as before. 6. Bishops and presbyters have the same power and authority. In the above passages no distinction is made ; neither is there any in the New Testament, at least in favour of bishops. But, 7. Presbyters OxNly are expressly said to ordain. " Neg- lect not the gift that is in thee, which was given thee by the laying on of the hands of the presbytery," 1 Tim. iv, 14. 8. The apostles sometimes call themselves presbyters, but never bishops. The term eniofcoTT')], in a quotation from the Old Testa- ment, is once (Acts i, 20) appUed to the office of an apostle in the New Testament ; and is translated " bishopric :" however, it is never repeated, in this use for the apostle- ship, in the direct language of the New Testament. This is remarkable. The apostles, therefore, are never called bishops in the New Testament ; neither is their office ever ox APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 87 designated by any cognate or similar term in the direct language of the New Testament. 9. Presbyters are mentioned as joining the apostles in the COUNCIL at Jerusalem, but no express mention is made of bishops. Acts xv, 2, 4, 6, 22, 23. 10. The collections for the poor at Jerusalem are to be sent to the presbyters, and no mention of bishops. Acts xi, 30. 11. It is well known that each church, containing the congregation of a city and its suburbs, was, in the apostles' time, the whole diocess. It was never called diocess by the earliest Christian writers ; the term parish was the usual appellation. Now presbyters are the only ministers expressly mentioned as having the oversight and govern- ment of the churches planted by Paul and Barnabas : Acts xiv, 23, " And when they had ordained them elders [pres- byters] in ever}^ church, and had prayed with fasting, they commended them to the Lord, on whom they believ^ed." If half so much could be said for the divine right of the superiority of bishops, as is found in Nos. 7-11, for the apparent superiority of presbyters over bishops, w^e should be accounted profane to doubt their eminence, dignity, powers, and authority. Here the presbyters are the only persons expressly mentioned as having the right and au- thority to lay on hands in ordination ; what sacrilege, then, it would be said, to violate this divine order ! The apostles are called presbyters ; therefore presbyters are apostles, and the only successors to their power and authority. Tliis is triumphantly proved, it would be argued in the same style, by the presbyters being the only ministers acting with the apostles in sacred council at Jerusalem. They only were intrusted with the collections sent by other churches to Jerusalem ; therefore all the goods of the church are by divine right under their government. They were the only persons expressly said to be placed in each diocess by the apostles themselves : who, then, can doubt that, whatever other ministers might be added afterward, they must be inferior to these apostolically succeeding presbyters ? Any man who knows church history, and the history of bishops, councils, and successions, will knov>^ that not a hundredth part of their proceedings have half so much 88 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. apparent divine right as is shown in the above particulars for the superiority of presbyters over bishops. And yet we do not seriously maintain that any essential difference existed between them. However, all the difference cer- tainly appears in favour of the divine right of the superi- ority of presbyters over bishops. They were all bishops ; but a presbyter-bishop was superior in gravity and wisdom, and in the authority which these qualities gave to him, over one who was simply a bishop. Let the reader peruse again the statements of the suc- cession divines, sec. i, and consider whether he finds a single point of that system established by Scriptural evi- dence. Not a word in the New Testament about bishops as a superior order to presbyters ; about the sole power of ordaining ministers belonging to them ; and about no mi- nistry nor ordinances being valid but such as emanate from these " spiritual princes and vicegerents" of God and of Christ ; — not a word will he find clearly in proof of these strange pretences. The pretence, then, for bishops as an order superior to presbyters, has no ground in the New Testament; the CONTRARY is plainly made out in this section. Presbyters have, therefore, by divine right, equally as much power to ORDAIN ministers, and to govern the church, as bishops ; nay, they have certainly more, for there is plain. Scriptural authority for their doing these things, but there is none expressly for bishops. All the other Protestant CHURCHES IN EuROPE, bcsidcs the Church of England, have ordination hy presbyters. Their ministers, therefore, and ordinances, are equally valid with those of the Church of England ; and more conformable to express Scripture. " Whatsoever'' says Bishop Taylor, as the champion of high Church episcopacy, " was the regiment of the church in the apostles' times, that must be perpetuall, (not so as to have all that which was personall, and temporary, but so as to have no other,) for that, and that only, is of divine institution which Christ committed to the apostles ; and if the church be not now governed as then, we can show NO DIVINE AUTHORITY for our government, which we MUST contend to doe, and doe it too, or be call'd Bishop Taylor's Episcopacy Asserted, p. 41. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 89 SECTION VI. THE SAME ARGUMENT CONTINUED PRESBYTERS AND BISHOPS THE SAME ; PROVED FROM THE PUREST CHRIS- TIAN ANTIQUITY. We are now coming upon ground of no essential im- portance to our cause. Divine right can only be proved by divine authority ; the fathers are mere human au- thority : they never expected to be received in any other light. Indeed no church, not even the Church of Rome, ever confined itself to the authority of the fathers any fur- ther than they found that authority favour their schemes and designs. Let any man read even Bishop Taylor's Liberty of Prophesying, sections 5-8, and he will be abundantly satisfied on this point. A short extract or two from him may suffice. " No church at this day admits the one-half oi those things, which certainly by the fathers were called traditions apostolical,^^ sec. 5. " And, there- fore, it is not HONEST for either side to press the authority of the fathers, as a concluding argument in matters of dispute, unless themselves will be content to submit in all things to the testimony of an equal number of them, which I am certain neither side will do," sec. 8. One of the greatest of the fathers, St. Augustine, shall state this point, of the authority of fathers, councils, (fee. To the Dona- tists he says, " You are accustomed to object against us the letters of Cyprian, the judgment of Cyprian, the cou?icil held under Cyprian. Now, who knows not that the holy and canonical Scripture is confined solely to the Old and New Testament ; and in this it is distinguished from the writings of all succeeding bishops, that no doubt nor dis- pute whatever is to be had about the sacred Scriptures, as to the truth and right of any thing contained in the same : but the letters of bishops, written after the confirmation of the sacred canon, may be reprehended or corrected, if in any thing they deviate from the truth, by the iciser writings of ANY ONE having in this matter more knowledge than they, or by the weightier authority and deeper prudence of other bishops or councils. And even councils themselves, held 90 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. in particular regions or provinces, yield, without question, to the autliority o( fuller councils, collected from the whole Christian world ; and these fuller councils are often cor- rected hy succeeding ones, when experience has brought something to the light which was before hid, and some- thing which escaped has become known ; and all this may, and ought to be done, without any sacrilegious presump- tion, any inflated arrogance, and with Christian charity."* This is worthy of St, Augustine. The Scriptures are alone divine authority ; all human writings and councils are fallible : their regulations are merely prudential. This the reformers maintained : this is the true principle of Protestantism. However, we shall see whether the boasting of these writers, as to the authority of the fathers, in favour of their scheme, is not vain also. The best writers on this subject mostly confine the purest Christian antiquity to the first THREE CENTURIES. Now I challenge any man to produce clear evidence of high Church episcopacy from the fathers of this period. There is one very natural mistake into which the advo- cates of this opinion have fallen. It is this, — that when- ever bishops are mentioned distinctly from presbyters, in ancient writers, they immediately suppose their point is proved. I say this, to them, is rather a natural mistake ; for such men are so accustomed to use the terms bishops and presbyters, in their own times, for what they receive as, by DIVINE right, two distinct orders, that they easily fall into the persuasion that the ancient writers meant the same as they mean. Bingham has quoted, though for a different purpose, a good observation from Cardinal Bona : " They deserve very ill of the sacred rites of the church, and of their venerable antiquity, \y\\o measure all ancient customs by the practice of the present times, and judge of the primi- tive discipline only by the rule and customs of the age they live in ; being deceived by a false persuasion, that the practice of the church never differed in any point from the customs which they learned from their forefathers and teachers, and which they have been inured to from their tender years : whereas we retain many words in common * Contra Donatistas, lib. ii, c. 3, pp. 32, 33, vol. vii, fol. ed., Lug- duni, 1664. ox APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 51 with the ancient fathers, but in a sense as different from THEIRS as our times are remote /rom the first ages after Christ'''* Hence it is necessary to take care that we neither deceive ourselves, nor others, by a misapplica' tion of words. Mr. Sinclair (p. 21) has a strange rule of criticism in these matters. Having translated the word Tjyovfievoc, in St. Clement, by " supreme rulers," he justi- fies his translation by saying, that in " later times it is among the ordinary- designations of a bishop." A very convenient way this of making the fathers say what we say. To prevent mistakes in words, it will be proper to fix the meaning of the terms ordo, gradus, ordo, ra^ig. 'Emvofj.'/} either comes from eiri. and VEfio, to distribute, divide, &-c. ; or from eirt and vofioc, a law or regulation. In the first case, it would most properly mean " a distribution or division" of the offices of bishops and deacons ; see this done, as he says, by St. Paul, in 1 Tim. iii, throughout. In the second derivation, it would mean " a law or regulation" of these offices. Mera^v, means " among, or mutually among one another." His expression /Lcera^v emvo^rj, therefore, following immediately upon his mention of bishops and deacons, evidently implies " a law or regu- lation of these offices separately and mutually." It may be doubted whether it ever means a catalogue, succession, or order of men. This proper rendering of the passage takes away all ground for the suppo- sition that St. Clement meant to say that the apostles left lists of per- sons for the succession ; and shows that the regulations he mentions, referred to the worthiness of the persons to be ordained. Now this is in perfect accordance with the regulations given by St. Paul to Timothy and Titus ; and it is to these that Clement most probably refers ; the other is unworthy of St. Paul and Clement, and only tends to support a bad scheme. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 99 if they read the epistle."* Of course he never mentions a syllable about the prerogatives of bishops in ordination, con- firmation, &c. ; never a syllable about their governing ministers as well as people. Clement knew no difference between a bishop and a presbyter. He uses the names as different denominations of the same office. We have heard what he says of bishops. Hear him as to presbyters. " Ye walked according to the laws of God, being subject to those who had the rule over you ; and giving the hoxour that was fitting to such as were pres- byters among you," sec. 1 . " Only let the flock of Christ be in peace with the presbyters that are set over it," sec. 54, Here presbyters are set over the flock, and rule them ; and are most evidently the same persons as those before called bishops. The occasion of his writing arose from the disorders in the church at Corinth, by the opposition of some factious members against their regular ministers. In speaking of this faction or sedition, he speaks of it " against the presbyters," sec. 47. In the conclusion, he exhorts to subjection unto their presbyters" sec. 57. Nay, he speaks of the happiness of those ^^pres- byters" who had finished their duties in their " episcopacy" before those times of sedition had come on, sec. 44. How could he have said more plainly that presbyters and bishops are one and the same, than by saying that presbyters exer- cised episcopacy, the very episcopacy which, he says, was meant by the Scriptures ? — yea, the very episcopacy, of which he declares the apostles left directions how ap- proved men should succeed one another in that office ? In those early days, a church, a city, a parish, and a dio- cess, were, as to extent, all one and the same thing. Now, according to modern episcopacy, there cannot be more than one bishop in one city, or diocess, at the same time. But Clement always speaks of the ministers of the si?igle city of Corinth, whether called bishops or presbyters, in the PLURAL number; that is, as maxy bishops in the one church at the same time. He never mentions such a thing as a bishop in the singular number. It is evident he knew nothing of modem episcopacy; nor even of one presbyter acting as chief presbyter in superintending other presbyters. It was then exactly as Jerome says, ^^ presby- * Miscellanea Sacra, vol. ii, p. 154, ed. 1770. 100 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. ters ruled the church in common.^'' The establishment of a superintendency, by one presbyter elected by the other presbyters to preside over themselves, took place " after- ward" Thus, then, this most ancient of all the primitive writers, coeval w^ith the apostle John, shows us that, in his day, the terms bishop and presbyter were only different names for the same office ; and that bishops and presbyters were one and the same order of ministers. Ignatius comes next. Dr. Cave places him A.D, 101. He is the greatest authority of high Churchmen. Cardi- nal Baronius also considers Ignatius's Epistles to be one of the bulwarks of the doctrines of the popedom. Some care will be necessary in examining his writings. I merely mention, though I do not stand upon it, that many profound scholars seriously doubt the genuineness of the Epistles which go under his name. I shall only bring one reason before the reader, though many might be added. It is this : that viewing the character of Ignatius in no ordinary light as a witness, and an eminent martyr for the truth, several parts of these Epistles are a powerful reflection on the soundness of his judgment, if not on the goodness of his heart. Such weak, silly rant, and rhodomontade, is found running through them, as makes a Christian half ashamed to own it as coming from so eminent a martyr. Those who contend for the authority of these Epistles, seem to me to prefer the credit of their scheme of episco- pacy to the character of Ignatius himself. It is probable the Epistles were greatly corrupted by some high advo- cates of priestly power and authority. Some parts of the Epistles, first published under his name, have been acknow- ledged HERETICAL, and have been rejected by the most learned men of the Church of England. " They laboured not only," says Archbishop Wake, " under many imperti- nencies unbecoming the character of that great man, but were fraught with many things that were altogether fabu- lous : nay, if we may credit Archbishop Usher, had some passages in them that tended to corrupt the very faith of Christ, in one of the most considerable points."* Many of the best continental divines, as Calvin, Salmasius, Blon- del, Albertinus, and Daille, reject the whole. " The whole question," says Mosheim, " relating to the Epistles * Abp. Wake's Prel. Disc, sec. 17. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 101 of Ignatius in general, seems to me to labour under much obscurity, and to be embarrassed with many difficulties."* And even Archbishop Usher, whom high Churchmen must allow to be a competent and unexceptionable witness, having mentioned the opinion of Salmasius, that all the twelve Epistles are either counterfeits, or certainly cor- rupted by interpolations in many places, adds, " to which judgment I willingly subscribe : having certain proof that six of them are counterfeits ; and that the remaining six are corrupted by interpolations in very many places. ^^\ How- ever, we will grant them to be genuine. Now two points w41l be sufficient to settle with Ignatius. The first is, that, whatever he makes of bishops, he yet makes presbyters as high as we can desire for our argu- ment. He says, the deacon " is subject to the presbyters AS to the LAW of Jesus Christ ;" — " the presbyters pre- side in the place of the council of the apostles. "j: " Be ye SUBJECT to your presbyters as to the apostles of Jesus Christ our hope."^ " Let all reverence the presbyters as the sanhedrim of God, and college of apostles." Same Ep. "Being subject to your bishop as to the command of God ; and so likewise to the presbytery." Id. " See that ye follow — the presbyters as the apostles."|| All the above passages are from Archbishop Wake's translation. If Ignatius's authority is worth any thing, it proves pres- byters to be in the place of the apostles. This is surely enough for the most rigid Presbyterian. The second point is, that he says, " Let no man do any thing of what belongs to the church separately from the bishops. Let that eucharist be looked upon as well established, which is either offered by the bishop, or by him to whom the bishop has given his consent. Where- soever the bishop shall appear, there let the people also be ; as where Jesus Christ is, there is the catholic church. It is NOT lawful without the bishop, neither to baptize, nor to celebrate the holy communion ; but whatsoever he shall approve of, that is also pleasing unto God ; that so what- ever is done, may be sure and well done. — He that does * Mosheim's Ecc. Hist., cent, i, part ii, chap, ii, sec. 20. t Usheri Diss., p. 136 ; and see p. 13, ed. Oxon, 4to., 1644. + Ep. to the Magnesians. § Ep. to the Trallians. Ij Ep. to the Smyrnians. 102 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. any thing without his knowledge, ministers unto the devil. '^ There is no stronger passage in favour of high Church episcopacy in his Epistles than this. The term translated "lawful," 'E^ov eg-L, frequently means ^^ permitted, ''' as by custom, or courtesy; so Acts xxi, 37, "May I speak unto thee ?" Acts ii, 29, " Men and brethren, let me freely speak unto you, Elov etTceivP Hence it does not neces- sarily mean divine law, but only what is matter of custom or courtesy. The expression, " Let no man do any thing of what belongs to the church separate from the bishop," simply signifies, that where a superintendent had been appointed for the sake of order, that order was to be kept. Very right. So say all churches where a superintendency has been established, though making- no pretensions to divine right for it. To suppose the passage to mean that a presbyter absolutely had not power, by divine right, to baptize, to celebrate the holy communion, nor to do any THING that belongs to the church, except the bishop bade liim, is absurd, and is confuted by Ignatius himself; for he says, " the presbyters are in the place of the apostles." Surely men that are the " sanhedrim of God and the college of the apostles'*^ have divine authority to baptize, &c., when occasion should require it, whether the bishop bade them or not. Indeed, fifty places might be quoted from coun- cils, and better writers than the author of these Epistles, where this mode of expression means nothing but human arrangement. We find bishops themselves forbid by a council to do certain things without the archbishop.-^ Is the order of archbishops, then, by divine right also ? These advocates will not say so. *' No bishop was to be elected or ordained," says Bingham, " without their (the metro- politans') consent and approbation ; otherwise the canons pronounce both the election and the ordination null. "J What will our high Churchmen make of this — a matter determined by the authority of hundreds of bishops in council ? Will they say it has divine right ? Then num- bers of the English bishops* ordinations were null ab initio : for they frequently were not ordained by their me- tropolitan, nor with his consent. Nay, it will destroy * Ep. ad Smyrn., sec. 8. t See the Council of Antioch, (90 bishops,) A.D. 3.41, can. 9. X Bingham, b. ii, chap, xvi, sec. 13. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 103 Archbishop Parker's ordination, upon which all the ordinations of the present bishops and clergy of the Church of England depend. For the canons require a metropoli- tan to be ordained by his patriarch, or, at least, by all the bishops of his province. Now Parker was ordained by neither, but against the consent of the first, and only by three or four, if any, of the last, many of the rest being opposed to his ordination. Even bishops were not allowed to do any thing of im- portance WITHOUT ihe presbyters. Bishop Overall himself affirms this in his letters to Grotius,* " Notum est antiqui- tus, NIHIL majoris momenti episcopum sine concilio sni presbyterii fecisse — It is a known matter that anciently the bishop did nothing of moment without his council of presbyters." So Cyprian apologizes for ordaining only a subdeacon without the presbyters and deacons, Ep. 24. • But Ignatius says, " Whatever the bishops shall ap- prove of, that is also 2^l6asi?2g to God^ Now it is clear that he makes the power or authority of the bishop in re- straining and in permitting to be equal. Whatever he could prohibit the presbyters from doing, he could equally appoint and approve of their doing the same thing. He could restrain them from baptizing, and he could appoint them to baptize. His authority in both respects was equal. Apply this to ordaining ministers. Suppose he could restrain presbyters from ordaining ; he could equally ap- point them to ordain ministers ; and then their performance of this duty " would be pleasing to God." Then pres- byters, as presbyters, have as much inherent power to ordain, as they have to baptize, or to do any thing else in the church. This is clearly the doctrine of Ignatius. Now all Churchmen allow they have the power and au- thority as presbyters to baptize. They have, therefore, from the principles of Ignatius, power and authority to or- dain ministers, to coifirm, &c., as much as bishops have. The only difference was, that for the honour of the bishop, and by ecclesiastic arrangement, they were not to do these things without the permission of the bishop. Hence, then, even Ignatius says nothing to prove high Church episcopacy of divine right ; but the contrary, that '■''presbyters are in the place of the apostles,^'' " the * EpistoIcB Prcestantium Virorum, p. 460, ed. secund. 104 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. college of the apostles,''^ " the sanhedrim of God" Stil- lingfleet says, " In all those thirty-five testimonies produced out of Ignatius's Epistles for episcopacy, I can meet with but one which is brought to prove the least semblance of an institution of Christ for episcopacy ; and if I be not much deceived, the sense of that place is clearly mistaken too."* The bishop, as superintendent, for the sake of ORDER, had, by ecclesiastical arrangement, the oversight of all, and authority to regulate the administration of the af- fairs of the church. So have the Lutheran superintendents ; so have the Wesleyan Methodist superintendents : but they and all the other ministers of those churches are equal by divine right. So were all the ministers in Ignatius's time. Polycarp was contemporary with Ignatius. There is extant an Epistle under his name ; having much greater marks of genuineness and purity than any of those under the name of Ignatius : indeed, there appears no reasonable ground of objection against it. He commences by saying, " Polycarp and the presbyters that are with him, to the church of God, which is at Philippi." He exhorts them to be " subject to the presbyters and deacons, as unto God and Christ." He never once mentions such a word as bishop from the commencement to the conclusion. How different this from the episcopal mania of the pseudo- Ignatius ! How different, too, from what would be the style of modern Episcopalians ! Would a modern bishop write to the church or diocess of another bishop, and yet never mention such a term as bishop? No such thing. This proves, along with a thousand other things of the same character, which for brevity's sake we omit, that modern episcopacy, leaving out of question divine right, has no resemblance to the government of the church in the days of Clement and Polycarp. Justin Martyr flourished about A. D. 155. The most celebrated passage in his Works, relating to the present question, is in his Apology, from c. 85 to 88, The presi- dent of the Christian assembly he denominates Trpoer^f . In these chapters, this term, and this only, as designating the minister, occurs six times : neither the term bishop nor presbyter is used at all. The word simply means a pre- sident. Reeves, the translator of Justin, a Churchman, * Iren. 309. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 105 and who loses no opportunity of opposing sectarians, allows, in his notes on the passage, that the ivgoeg-wg of Justin, the prohati seniores of TertuUian, the majores natu, in Cyprian's Works, (Ep. 75,) and the Trgoeg-direg rrgea- (ivregoL, or presiding presbyters, of St. Paul, (1 Tim. iv, 17,) were all one and the same. Now TertuUian, Cyprian, (or rather Firmilian, the celebrated bishop of Cesarea, in Cappadocia,) and St. Paul, all mean presby- ters. Their language cannot be otherwise interpreted without Adolence. " Presbyter," says Bishop Jewel,* " is expounded in Latin by natu major "f The bishop was, doubtless, included in the presbyter ; they were both one. Indeed, Irenaeus, in an Epistle to Victor, called in later days bishop of Rome, thus addresses him, (circa, A. D. 200,) " The PRESBYTERS who, before Soter, presided over that church which you now govern,— I mean Anicetus and Pius, Hyginus, Telesphorus, and Xystus." Here this ancient and celebrated writer expressly calls those persons presiding presbyters, whom later writers call bishops of Rome. This demonstrates that the president in each Christian church, in the time of Justin, was a presbyter. Ireneeus flourished about Ann. Dom. 184. He mentions both presbyter and bishop, but he uses them synonymously . Some persons who have only seen the partial quotations of high Church succession divines may doubt my asser- tion. However, they shall judge for themselves, and then decide what opinion they can have of the fairness of these writers. These divines have generally quoted Irenseus about the succession of bishops, as though he meant a succession of bishops, by divine right, and of bishops * " If ye [Mr. Harding] had been either so sagely studied as ye pretend, and your friends have thought, ye might soon have learned that presbyter'or priest is nothing else but senior, that is, an elder, and that a priest and an elder are both one thing. And therefore, whereas St. Paul saith : Adversus presbyterum accusationem ne admiseris, St. Cyprian, translating the same, saith thus : Adversus majorem natu ac- cusationem ne reciperis. Your own Doctor Thomas Aquina saith : Presbyter Graece, Latine senior, interpretatur. St. Hierome saith : Idem est presbyter qui episcopus. These two words, Tvpea^vr epog, rrpealivTaTog, are expounded in Latin, natu major, natu maximus, 1 Tim. v. Cyprian ad Quirin, lib. iii, cap. 76. Thom. Secund. Se- cunda, quest. 184, art. 6, dist. 24, Cleros. Hieron. ad 1 Tit. c. i."— Bp. Jewel's Defence of the Apology, part vi, p. 527, fol. ed., 1609. t Defence of the Apology, part vi, p. 527, fol. ed., 1689. 5* 106 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. ALONE as successors of the apostles. Let us hear him on the other side. He is, in the following passage, speaking of some who left the Scripture, and pretended tradition for their errors. " But," says he, " when we appeal to that tradition which has been preserved to us by the succes- sions of PRESBYTERS in the churches — qucB per succes- siONES presbyterorum in ecclesiis custoditur — they presume they are wiser not only than the presbyters, but even than the apostles, and that they have found the truth in a purer form."* In the next chapter he calls this succes- sion the succession of bishops, which, as it is agreed on both sides, we need not quote. In the very celebrated Epistle, above mentioned, to Victor, bishop of Rome, he speaks of Anicetus, Pius, Hyginus, Telesphonis, and Xys- tus, presiding as presbyters over the Church of Rome ; though these persons, by later writers, are all reckoned as bishops of Rome. These presbyters are all, even by Pa- pists and high Churchmen, put as links into the succession chaiii : they have no chain without them. He repeats the same mode of speaking of these presiding presbyters three times over in this letter, though a short one, and never uses any other ; never calls them bishops. He uses the word bishops as to the Asiatics, but not as to the Romans ; which would almost lead one to think that the term pres- byter, at Rome, in that age, was still considered the most honourable denomination, as it certainly seems to have been in the apostles' days, and for some time after. For what provincial bishop would write to the archbishop of Canter- bury, and, referring him to half a dozen of his predeces- sors in that see, would yet never call them any thing but presbyters, except he thought the title was the most hon- ourable one ? " Would not any man now bee deemed rude and saucy, who should talk in that style" to the arch- bishop ?t Again, " Wherefore obedience ought to be ren- dered to those who are presbyters in the church, who have, as we have shown, succession from the apostles, and who, WITH the succession of their episcopacy, have a sure deposite of the truth divinely granted to them accord- ing to the good pleasure of our heavenly Father. "J These are said to be presbyters, that is, properly such, " qui in eccle- * Lib. 3, c. 2. t Barrow's Supremacy, supp. v, p. 167, 4to. 1610. t Lib. 4, c. 43. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 107 sta SUNT PRESBYTERi." But thesG preshyters have the true apostolical succession, and, as presbyters, have episco- pacy ; that is, preside over the church, rule the church in common. In the next chapter, speaking still of presbyters as presiding over the church, he tells us that we ought to FORSAKE those who were wicked, though they held the chief seat, and that we ought to cleave to those who joined purity of doctrine to holiness of life : " Now those who are by many received as presbyters, yet serving their own lusts, and not having the fear of God before them ; but, being puffed up with the chief seats, (principalis consessio,) use others with contumely, and say to themselves, ' None see the evils we do in secret ;' these are reproved by the Lord, who judges, not according to glor^'ing appearances, but according to the heart. From all such we ought to DEPART, and to cleuve to those who preserve, as we have said, the doctrixe of the apostles, and, along with their order of presbyter, maintain sound words ; and show, for the instruction and correction of others, an irreproachable conversation. The church will nourish such preshyters ; of whom also the prophet (Isa. Ix, 17) speaks, ' I will give thy princes in peace, and thy bishops in righteousness.' Of whom also the Lord spake, ' Who, therefore, is a good and wise servant, whom his Lord shall place over his household,'''' &c.* AYhat can be clearer than that Irenseus here speaks of presbyters and bishops as the same ? He says, the prophet spake of these presbyters when he said, " I will give thy bishops,'' &c. Presbyters and bishops, therefore, with Irenaeus, were the same order, and equally successors of the apostles. One point more Irenaeus will help us to rectify. The high Church divines quote him as though he meant that a succession of persons, viz., of bishops, according to their views, was absolutely necessary to the existence of Christianity and its ordinances. We shall see that he means no such thing. He says, as above, we are to leave those ministers who leave the truth, notwithstandinor their pretence to personal succession. What he principally aims at is this, to prove an uncorrupted tradition, succes- sion, or delivering down of apostolical truth, faith, and holiness to succeeding generations ; and he uses the argu- * Lib. iv, cap. 44. 108 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. merit of a succession of ministers, called indifferently preS' hyters and bishops, to prove the succession of truth against the monstrous heresies of his day, in which the Scriptures were denied or corrupted; just as we use now, against infidels, the uninterrupted and uncorrupted tradition of the Scriptures themselves, and Scripture truth to the pre- sent day. Accordingly, Irenaeus says, " We cannot know the plan of salvation, any otherwise than by those persons through whom the gospel has come down to us. This they first proclaimed by their personal ministry. After- ward they delivered the will of God to us in their divinely inspired writings, the sacred Scriptures, which were hence- forward to be the foundation and pillar of our faith."* The heretics shuffled to avoid the force of this. " When we argue from the Scriptures, they (the heretics) accuse the Scriptures as not having the right doctrine, neither as su^cient authority ; that they contain views so diverse that they cannot he understood by those who are ignorant of tradition." — How like Popery, Dr. Hook, and the Ox- ford Tract-men ! — He then recites some of the ravings of the heretics, and says, " Such are the persons against whom we contend ; persons whom nothing can hold, but who wriggle, like' serpents, into every form, to escape from the grasp of truth. Wherefore, we must use evrry mode of arguing against them, that, being confounded with the discovery of their errors, we may, if possible, convert them to the truth."! The personal succession of ministers, (pres- byters and bishops he calls them indifferently,) in the Christian church, was one mode of argument. This was secondary and auxiliary to another, which was the succes- sion of the doctrine of Christian truth, the succession of the true faith. Hear the great Protestant champion, Whit- aker, in the days of Elizabeth, speaking of the succession maintained by the early fathers, Irenaeus, &c. : " Faith, therefore, is as it were the soul of this succession, which being wanting, a naked succession of persons is as a dead body. The fathers, indeed, always much more regarded the succession of faith than any unbroken series of men."| Irenaeus first remarks that the apostles taught no such de- lirious tenets as the heretics held, nor any secret doctrines. * Lib. iii, c. L t Lib. iii, c. 2. t Whitakeri 0pp., vol. i, p. 506, ed. Gen., 1610. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 109 " Then," he saith, " the Christian church at Rome pos- sessed this* tradition of the truth by the apostles, according to the faith preached hy them ; and proceeds to confirm this statement by mentioning the succession of ministers in that church : " We shall declare that which was delivered from the apostles, which the Church of Rome possesses, the FAITH they preached to mankind ; and which has come down to us through a succession of bishops reaching to the present time."t Here a succession of persons is made auxiliary to the main point, the succession of faith. We allow this argument its full weight. Where a real suc- cession of faithful ministers has existed, it is one mode of proving the true faith. But does Irenaeus say that there is no other mode, that no churches have the faith who have not this succession ? He never says so. He says, " the Scriptures are henceforward, from the time of the apostles, to be the pillar ar\d ground of our faith.'"% Does he say that all are to be received as true ministers who are in the succession ? No. He tells us we are to forsake those whose lives are wicked, and to cleave to the good. Tertullian flourished about A. D. 198. Many readers know that he is quoted with as much triumph by the suc- cession divines as though it were impossible for us to find any thing in Tertullian to prove the identity of bishops and presbyters, or against their doctrine of succession. Let us * The reader will see the importance of keeping in mind the differ- ence between tradition, as matter of unwritten report, and tradition as the coyiveying from age to age of a written word. The first kind of tradition is necessarily confused and uncertain ; it is not in human nature to prevent it. The second kind is capable of the utmost cer- tainty that historic evidence can give, and that human language can communicate.* Now it was the first kind of tradition, oral tradition, unwritten report, that the heretics pretended was to be the rule of in- terpreting the Scriptures : so do the Papists and high Church divines • generally. The second kind of tradition, that is, the conveying down from generation to generation the truth of God, and the faith preached by the apostles, by conveying the written record of this faith, em- phatically the Scriptures, — this is the tradition of the primitive church ; this is the tradition of Protestantism. Popery, and semi- popery, in all their ramifications, are founded on oral tradition, unicrit- ten report; and are full of uncertainty and confusion. True Pro- testantism is founded on the Scriptures, the written record of God's will, and has, in its mode of communication and interpretation, the utmost possible clearness and certainty. t Lib. iii, c. 3. X Lib. iii, c. 3. 110 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. examine Tertullian. In the work usually quoted on this subject, he writes against the heretics, such as those re- ferred to by Irenaeus. He is designing to show, that what is first in doctrine is the truth ; and that the heresies he opposes sprung up after the apostles' times, and were, therefore, extraneous and false : " But if any of the here- tics dare to connect themselves with the apostolic age, that they may seem to be derived from the apostles, as existing under them, we may say, ' Let them, therefore, declare the origin of their churches ; let them exhibit the series of their bishops, so coming down by a continued succession from the beginning, as to show their first bishop to have had some apostle or apostolical man as his predecessor or ordainer, and who continued in the same faith with the apostles? For this is the way in v/hich the apostolical churches cal- culate the series of their bishops.''* This passage is the triumph of succession divines. Now, that a succession of ministers was rightly urged against those who, by rejecting or corruj)ting the Scriptures, introduced into the Chris- tian church the wildest ravings, such as the Cerinthians, the Valentinians, Basiiidians, &c., we have shown in our observations on Irenaeus; to which place we request the reader to refer, as the subject is the same in both authors. But is this all Tertullian says about the rule of faith, in opposition to heretics ? The reader shall judge of the conduct of those who would lead others to believe it to be so. Within half-a-dozen lines of the passage above quoted, he shows that he only meant this personal succession as one mode of showing the biain point, viz., the succession of apostolical faith : "But if the \iQxei\Q,s feign ov fabricate such a succession, this will not help them: For their DOCTRINE itself, compared with the doctrine of the apostles, will, by its own diversity and contrariety, pronounce against them, that it had not, as its author, either, any apostle or apostolical man ; for as there was no difference among the apostles in their doctrine, so neither did any apostolical men teach any thing contrary to them ; except those who divided from the apostles, and preached DIFFERENTLY. To THIS FORM of trial wiU appeal be made by those churches henceforward daily established, * De Prescript., c, 32. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. Ill which, though they have neither any of tlie apostles nor any apostolical men for their founders, yet all agreeing in the SAME FAITH, are, from this consanguinity of doc- trine, to be esteemed not less apostolical than the former. Therefore our churches having appealed to both forms of proving themselves to be apostolical, let the heretics show some form by which they can prove the same. But they cannot show this ; for it does not exist : therefore they are not received into communion by those churches which are every icay apostolical, for this rea- son, because of the difference of their faith, which is in no sense apostolical." O! Tertullian, this is hard! What ! will not a succession of bishops help us at all, without a succession of the faith taught by the apostles 1 So he says. But what is a heavier stroke still, he says the succession of faith alone will make a church equally apostolical as those who have the succession of faith and the succession of persons too. This is death to the scheme of our high Church divines. He has much more to the same purpose in this very treatise : — " What if a bishop, or a deacon, or a widow, or a virgin, or a doctor in the church, or a confessor, shall have fallen from the faith, shall heresy hy them obtain the authority of the truth ? What ! do we prove faith by persons, and not rather PERSONS by the faith ?" c. 3. " Our Lord instructs us that many ravening wolves will be found in sheep's cloth- ing. Who are these ravening wolves, except deceitful workers, that lurk in the church to infest the flock of Christ ? Who are false prophets, but false preachers ? Who are false apostles, except those who preach an adul- terated gospel ?" c. 4. Hear this, ye semi-popish suc- cession divines ! who frequently preach for doctrine the commandments of men, and make void the law of God by your doctrine of traditions. But to proceed with Tertul- lian on the succession of faith : " Immediately after the day of Pentecost, the twelve apostles, which by interpreta- tion means missionaries, first having preached ihe faith to the churches throughout Judea, then went into the whole world, publishing the very same doctrine of the same faith to the nations of the earth. Churches were established in every city by the apostles ; from which churches the succession of faith, and the seeds of doctrine, were il2 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. derived to other churches ; and daily continue to be derived, to GIVE them existence as churches. And by this pro- cess these succeeding churches will he esteemed apostoli- cal, as the offspring of apostolical churches." Here the reader sees again it is faith, and faith only, that is, the true doctrine of the gospel, which constitutes the essen- tial CHARACTER of a Christian church. Again, "I am an heir of the apostles. As they provided for me as by will, committing the same to the faith, and establishing it as by OATH, so I hold it. But they have disinherited you heretics, and cast you out as aliens and enemies : but whence are heretics aliens and enemies to the apostles ? it is by oppo- sition of doctrine." C, 37. But what says Tertullian about the order of bishops by divine right ? You shall hear ; " The highest priest, who is the bishop, has the right of administering baptism. Then the presbyters and deacons, yet not without the authority of the bishop, because of the honour of the church." Well, (our opponents will reason,) here, at least, bishops are high priests ; now the high priest was an order by divine right superior to the other priests ; it follows, then, bishops are a divine order above presbyters. Besides, presbyters can do nothing without the bishop's authority. What can be more decisive ? So triumph our high Churchmen from tliis passage. Their triumph shall be short. They have not generally the honesty to quote the very next words, as this would spoil all in a moment. We will give the v/hole passage : " The highest priest, who is the bishop, has the right of administering baptism. Then the presbyters and deacons, yet not luithout the autho- rity of the bishops, because of the honour of the church. This being preserved, peace is preserved. Otherwise the right belongs even to laymen. However, the laity ought especially to submit humbly and modestly to the discipline or ecclesiastical regulations of the church in these matters, and not assume the office of the bishop, seeing their superiors, the presbyters and deacons, submit to the same. Emulation is the mother of divisions. ' All things are lawful to me,' said the most holy Paul, 'but all things are not expedient.' Let it suffice that you use your liberty in cases of necessity, when the condition of the person, or the circumstances of time or place compel ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 113 you to it."* This is too plain to need comment. To pre- vent di\asions, as Jerome says, to secure the peace of the church by taking away emulation, the mother of divisions, Tertullian shows, one presbyter was placed over the rest, as the highest priest, that is, the highest presbyter : and yet by no divine right : all, even laymen have, he says, " the RIGHT." His words are, " Alioquin etiam laicis jus estP This is enough for our present argument, and, with other bearings of his words, we, at present, have nothing to do. In his most celebrated work, his Apology, while de- scribing the order and government of the church, he says, " President prohati quique sexiores, &c. Approved elders or presbyters preside among us ; having received that honour not by money, but hy the suffrages of their hrethren" cap. 39. f Reeves, who was, as has been re- marked, a rigid Churchman, in his note on the place, says, " The presiding elders here are undoubtedly the same with the ILgoeg-G)^ in Justin MartjT." (Vid. p. 105 of this Essay.) Here the presbyters preside. One as primus presbyter, as the highest priest or highest presbyter, was, by the suffrages of his brethren, appointed or ordained to preside over the rest; and, for distinction's sake, was called bishop. So in another very noted passage in his Praescriptions against Heretics, he speaks of the apos- tolical churches " over which the apostolical chairs still presided." The order was usual, in the meetings of ministers in the primitive church, for the ministers' chairs to be set in a semi-circle. The middle chair was raised a little above the rest. The highest presbyter or priest sat in this, and the other presbyters or priests sat round him. The deacons w^ere never allowed chairs ; they always stood. I mention the fact without justifying it. Now these were the chairs Tertullian means. The presbyters sat in them, and thus in council presided over the church in common. So says Jerome, " The church was governed by * De Baptisrao, c. 17. t " Seniores are, in the Greek language, called presbyters," says the learned Popish ecclesiastical historian, Cabassutius. Notitia Eccle., p. 53. Indeed this is, beyond all doubt, the direct and proper sense. Scapula says, " 7rpea[3vTepog, senior :" Schrevelius : " Tvpea^vrepoQ, presbyter, senior:" and Suicer: '' TrpeafSwepog, id est, senior." 114 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. the common council of the presbyters.''^ Here, then, pres- byters are apostolical successors, sit in apostolical chairs, and are the same order with bishops. Clemens Alexandrinus flourished about A. D. 204. He says but httle that bears on the subject before us. A pas- sage in the sixth book of his Stromata is sometimes re- ferred to as supporting high Church episcopacy ; but a close examination of it will show that it supports nothing of the kind. He tells his reader, in the beginning of this book, that his design in it, and in the seventh, is to de- scribe the true " Gnostic,^'' or the perfect man. He pro- perly begins by showing, that he must be like God. He thus proceeds : — " Seeing God is indeed the good Parent, bo is permanently and immutably engaged in beneficence. Inactive goodness is no goodness : true goodness is certain to be engaged in acts of goodness. He therefore who having subdued his passions, and having attained true self-denial, daily practices with increasing success true beneficence : he is a perfect Gnostic, and is equal to angels. Thus shining as the sun in acts of goodness, he sedulously proceeds by true knowledge, and the love of God, like the apostles, to the mansion of holiness. The apostles were not chosen as apostles because of any natural excellence or inherent virtue of theirs ; for Judas was elected along with the rest : but they were elected by Him who saw the end from the beginning. Matthias was not elected with the rest, yet when he had shown himself worthy to be an apostle, he was appointed in the place of Judas. Hence it follows, also, that those now who walk in the Saviour's commandments, living as perfect Gnostics ac- cording to the gospel, shall be enrolled among the apostles. He is truly a presbyter of the church, and he is a true deacon or servant of the will of God, who does and teaches what God has commanded, and not he who has been ordained by the imjjosition of hands : neither is a presbyter counted a righteous man, because he is a pres- byter, but a righteous man, because he is a righteous man, is enrolled in the true presbytery : and though upon earth he be not honoured with sitting in the first throne, yet he shall sit on those /b?^r and twenty thrones judging the peo- ple, as John speaks in the Revelation. There is only one covenant of salvation, coming down from the creation of Ox\ APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 115 the world, through different ages and generations, in various modes of administration. It follows, therefore, that there is only one unchangeable salvation, given by one and the same God, and applied by one and the same Lord, (Jesus , Christ,) according to different dispensations. For which cause the middle wall that separated the Jews from the Gentiles has been taken away, that so of twain he might make one peculiar people ; and that they both might come to a unity of faith ; both have one and the same election. And of the elect, whether Jews or Gentiles, those are more particularly so, who, according to this perfect know- ledge, have been gathered from the church on earth, and honoured with the magnificent glory of sitting on the four and twenty thrones, as judges and administrators, in that assembly where the grace of time is crowned with a double increase. For even in the church here on earth, there are promotions of bishops, of presbyters, and of deacons ;^ which are, I suppose, imitations of angelic glory, and of that state which awaits those who walk in the footsteps of the apostles, and in the perfect righteousness of the gospel. These, the apostle tells us, being received up into the clouds, shall first be engaged in suitable services, and then advanced to the presbytery, according to the pro- motion of glory, (for glory differs from glory,) until they grow to a perfect man." We have given the whole of this passage that the reader may judge for himself. First, then, it is plain that Clemens set a comparatively light estimate upon ordination by im- position of hands, if separate from true piety. Secondly, he says he supposes that the " promotions of bishops, of presbyters, and of deacons, are imitations of angelic glory;" by which he appears only to mean heavenly glory in general. He never mentions different orders of angels in the pas- sage : the writer of the Revelation to whom he refers never uses the word archangel, or orders of angels. Thirdly, as to this angelic or heavenly glory, he explains himself by speaking of the four and twenty elders (pres- byters) as the summit of it — the highest perfection of that g'lory, that indeed in which the apostles are found. No higher place is assigned in the Scriptures to the apostles themselves, than to sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. Matt, xix, 28. And he makes 116 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. being " like angels," being " like the apostles." He speaks of his " perfect man," being " enrolled among the apostles," and explicates his meaning by going on to show, that though he should not on earth be " honoured with sitting in a first throne, yet he shall sit in the presbytery of those four and twenty thrones^ judging the people :" the apostles, therefore, according to Clemens, sit on such thrones. They belong to that presbytery. That pres- bytery is the mansion of holiness for the perfect man. Here is no place for the bishop over this presbytery, without placing him over the apostles themselves. With Clemens, then, nothing belonging to the church, either in heaven or on earth, is higher than a true presbyter. We hope multitudes of good bishops will be there : but, if Clemens be right, it will be their highest glory to be -per- fect PRESBYTERS. But Clemens has a passage in the beginning of the seventh book of the same work, in which he clearly main- tains the identity of bishops and presbyters. Speaking of the public worship of God, in opposition or contrast to mental worship, he says, " One part of it is performed by superior ministers, another part by inferior ministers. The superior part is performed hy presbyters ; the inferior, or servile part, by the deacons^ Here bishops are included in the presbyters, that is, they are one and the same order and office. This is another important testimony against high Church episcopacy. Origen flourished about A. D. 230. All he says is con- formable to the statement of Jerome, viz., that presbyters and bishops are substantially the same order ; the circum- stantial difference is, that one presbyter was set over the rest, and distinguished by the denomination of bishop. If we show this substantial identity, it will follow, of course, that the difference is only circumstantial. Let us hear Origen : " Dost thou think that they who are honoured with the priesthood, and glory in their priestly order, walk according to that order ? In like manner, dost thou suppose the deacons also walk according to their order ? Whence then is it that we often hear reviling men exclaim, ' What a bishop !' ' What a presbyter !' or, ' What a deacon is this fellow !' Do not these things arise from hence, that the priest or the deacon, had, in some thing, gone contrary to ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 117 his order, and had done something against the priestly, or the Levitical order ?"* Here is the priesthood and priestly order, and the Levitical order: the bishop and presbyter are EQUALLY put into xhefrst, that is, the priesthood, or priestly arder ; and deacons are noticed in the place or order of the Levites. The bishops and presbyters are spoken of as one and the same order. In another part, speaking of the queen of Sheba admiring the order of Solomon's ser- vants, Origen's lively imagination supposes that Solomon's household t}*pified the church of God ; and Solomon's ser- vants, the ministers of the church : — " Imagine the ecclesi- astical ORDER, siTTixG in the seats or chairs of bishops and presbyters. She saw also the array of servants standing to ■wait in their service. This (as it seems to me) speaks of the order of desicons standing to attend on divine service. "f Here one and the same ecclesiastical order includes both bishops and presbyters. Again: " What will it profit me to sit in a higher chair, if my works are not answerable to my dignity ?"J This is his mode of representing the circumsta7itiaJ difference of a bishop, occupying the dignity of a " higher chair,'^ in sitting, with his co-presbyters, to preside over the church. For he says the presbyters pre- side over the church too. Thus, addressing his hearers in Horn. 7, on Jeremiah, he says, " We, of the clerical or- DER, who PRESIDE over youT Now ever^-one knows that Origen was never any thing more than a presbyter. Speaking in another place of the ambition of some persons to be great in the church, he says, " They first desire to be deacons, but not such as the Scripture describes, but such as devour widows' houses, and for pretence make long prayers, and therefore shall receive a heavier judg- ment-. Such deacons consequently will go about to seize the HIGH chairs of presbyters — primas cathcEdras. Some also, not content with that, attempt more, in order that they may be called bishops, that is, rabbi ; but they ought to understand that a bishop must be blameless, and have the rest of the qualities described there, (Titus i, 6, &c.,) so that though men should not give such a one the name of bishop, yet he mil be a bishop before God."^ This is the general st}'le of Origen on this subject, and the substance of what * Horn. 2, in Num. t Horn. 2, in Cant. X Horn. 6, iu Ezek. ^ Tract. 24, b Matt. 23. lis ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. occurs in his Works, on the matter. It is clear enough that Jerome has given us the sense of Origen, as well as of the rest of the ancients. He was perfectly acquainted with Origen's opinion, and translated many of his works. Bishops and presbyters, luith Origen, were the same order ; they RULED the church in common^ the presbyters pre- siding with the bishop ; he having a higher chair, and being distinguished by the name of bishop. Cyprian flourished about A. D. 250. He was a great and good man, and nobly sealed the truth with his blood as a martyr of Christ. However, he certainly had some- what inflated views of the dignity of a bishop, and is con- sidered to be as high as any of the primitive fathers in his notions on the subject. Yet they amount to no more than Jerome's statement. Let the man that says they do, pro- duce the proof. As high language may be produced from Jerome as any used by Cyprian ; yet Jerome expressly tells us his sober view was, that, by divine right, bishops and presbyters were the same. The language, therefore, that Cyprian uses, is to be interpreted as consistent with this identity of bishops and presbyters. It is of much im- portance to keep this in mind. Another thing may assist the reader's judgment here. He has seen the levelling views of Tertullian. Now it is well known that Cyprian was so PASSIONATE au admirer of Tertullian as never to let a DAY pass without reading some part of his writings ; and his language, in calling for his Works to be brought him regu- larly for this purpose, was, " Da magistrum — Give me the master.''^ The admiring scholar must resemble his master. We shall see even under Cyprian, that the church was ruled in common by the bishops and presbyters. Cyprian did not suppose he ought to do any thing of moment in his church without the council of his clergy. Writing to his presbyters and deacons, he says, " From the beginning of my episcopacy I determined to do nothing of my own accord, but only by your council, and with the consent of the people. When, by the grace of God, I return unto you, then we will, as our mutual honour requires, confer in common upon those things which have been done, or which still remain to be done."* But he goes further than this. He shows his opinion that the presbyters had powers, by * Ep. 6, ed. Pamel, 1589. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 119 divine right, to perform any of a bishop's duties in his absence. In his seclusion from the rage of his persecu- tors, he writes to his presbyters and deacons, saying, " I beseech you, according to your faith and religion, that you perform your own duties, and also those belonging to me, so that nothing may be wanting either as to discipline or diligence." Ep. 5. Again, having mentioned matters of church government : "I rely upon your love and your reli- gion, which I well know, and by these letters I exhort and COMMIT THE CHARGE to you, that you, v/hose presence does not expose you to such peril, would discharge my duty, act in my place ^ {vice mea,) and perform all those things which the administration of the church requires." Ep. 6. These passages are decisive in proof, that sub- stantially, the bishop and presbyter were in Cyprian's opinion the same. The presiding power of the clergy is very strongly put by him, when, in writing to Cornelius, bishop of Rome, he speaks of them as " compresbyters of Cornelius," Ep. 42 ; and " the most illustrious clergy PRESIDING WITH THE BISHOP ovcr the churchP Ep. 55. Again, as "the sacred and venerable consistory of his clergy y Ep. 55, p. 107. He applies the term pnBpositus^ president, as well as pastor, to the presbyters and to the bishops in common. Ep. 10, 11, 23, and 62. Indeed, in Ep. 20, he applies it to presbyters alone, as distinct from the bishop. Cyprian uses the term collega for a bishop, very frequently. The fourth council of Carthage, A. D. 398, thus speak on the subject : " As in the church, and in the concession of the presbyters, the bishop sits in a higher seat than the presbytery, so in other places let him know that he is truly a colleague, collega, of the presbyters : can. 35." This was in the very city in which Cyprian had been bishop. There were two hundred and fourteen bishops in the council, among whom was the famous St. Augustine, at that time bishop of Hippo. This canon became imbodied in the canon law, and makes part of the law of the Ro- mish Church to this day. In his angry Epistle to Pupian, a bishop and confessor, when put upon the point of clear- ing himself from some charges of pride, haughtiness, &c., which Pupian had mentioned to him in a letter, he stands in the defence of the divine authority of his office in the church : he says the Lord strengthened this divine autho- 120 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. rity hy a revelation in a dream ; and he places it upon this, that he was a priest, sacerdos. None of our high Churchmen deny that a presbyter is a priest, or sacerdos. The council of Carthage, in the canon just now mentioned, use- the word sacer dotes for presbyters only, " Episcopus — collegam se sa- cerdotum esse cognoscat — let the bishop know that he is the colleague of the priests or presbyters.''^ Such is the solemn determination of two hundred and fourteen bishops, the great Augustine among them. Cabassute, the learned Romish historian of the councils, says of this council, " Never were more excellent and comprehensive regulations made for church discipline than in this council ; so that its de- crees may be said to be a storehouse of instruction as to the regulation of the whole order of the clergy." Here, again, then, the bishop and presbyter are in substance the same. Indeed, according to Dr. Barrow's view of the following passage, Cj'prian distinctly declares that, at the first, ''^ for a time,^^ there were no bishops as now ; but that they were afterward, and by human authority, constituted to take away schisms, exactly according to Jerome's statements. Cyprian says, " Heresies are sprung up, and schisms grown from no other root but this, because God's priest was not obeyed ; nor was there one priest or bishop /b?' a time in the church, nor a judge thought on for a time to supply the room of Christ." Ep. bb. " Where," says Dr. Barrow, "that by the church is meant any particular church, and by priest a bishop of such church, any one not be- witched with prejudice by the tenor of St. Cyprian's dis- course, will easily discover."* The Epistle on the Unity of the Church will develop the same thing. He explains and confirms his views by the case of the apostles. Peter, he thinks, had the ^r.y^ grant of the keys, though all had equal power. " After the resurrection, each and all of the other apostles had EQUAL power given to that of Peter." This, he supposes, gives a principle of unity, a kind o^ headship, with equality of power among all. Having laid down his scheme in the apostles, he applies it to all ministers. " All are pastors, but the flock is only one, which was fed by all the apostles with unanimous consent^ He proceeds to point out the duty of keeping this unity in general, and * Barrow's Pope's Supremacy, p. 141, ed. dto., 1680. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 121 shows the importance of the bishops of different parts of the church acting on the same plan, in order to prevent the scheme of Xovatus and others, who tried to gain over, and did gain over, some of the bishops to their side. This was good advice. Then " all ministers are pastors," as really as all the apostles were apostles : and one person in each city or district having a kind of headship over others, for the sake of unity, perfectly consists with equal powers among all ; as much so as that the apostles had all equal poicer, notwithstanding the headship of Peter. "VMiether Cyprian was right or Avrong in his opinion about Peter's headship, makes no difference to our present argu- ment. We give his scheme merely to show C}'prian's views of the substantial identity of bishops and presbyters, with the shadow of a distinction between them in the head- ship of the bishop. The remark again easily suggests itself, that the same mode of arguing which our high Churchmen employ for their view of bishops, jure divino, is employed with equal plausibility by the Papists for the UNIVERSAL headship of the pope. C}-prian maintained the DIVINE RIGHT OF EQUALITY amoug all pastors, and that the difference was circumstantial and nonessential. The contrary tends to Poper}^ So the celebrated high Church Dodwell fairly pushes himself, on this very point in C}*prian, to this clear establishment of the popedom — " Christ, as the head of the church, is not sufficient to its unity, but there must be besides a visible head in the visible church."* Glorious news for Poper)- 1 And all are doomed as schismatics to eternal damnation by Dodwell and the Oxford Tract-men who do not submit to this Popish dogma 1 1 Cyprian, however, directs the people to forsake wicked ministers. He says, " A people obedient to the Lord's commands, and fearing God, ought to sepa- rate themselves from a wicked bishop, and not partake of the sacraments of a sacrilegious priest, seeing they chiefly have the power of electing worthy ministers, and of rejecting the unworthy." Ep. 68. Bishop Beveridge and the learned Dodwell have selected the following as the strongest passage in Cj-prian for high Church episcopacy. If this can be shown to fail that scheme, then nothing in Cj^rian will support it. As * Dodwelli Diss. Cyprian, No. 7, sec. 22. 6 122 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. Cyprian is, perhaps, the highest in his notions on this subject of all the genuine fathers, it will conduce to the purpose of our argument to give this passage a thorough examination. The passage is in his " Epistle to the LAPSED, who themselves had written to Cyprian about the peace or reconciliation to the church, which Paul, the martyr, had given to them." The passage is as follows : — " Our Lord, (whose precepts we are obliged to reverence and observe,) when arranging matters that regard the honour of the bishop and the order of his church, thus speaks in the gospel, and says to Peter, ' I say unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon this rock will I build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it : and I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoerer thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven ; and whatsoever thou shalt loose upon earth, shall be loosed in heaven.' Hence the ordination of bishops, and the arrangement of the church, have, through different times and successions, come down to the present, so that the church is placed upon the bishops : and all acts of the church are governed by these same presidents of the church. Seeing then this is established hy divine law, I marvel that certain persons" — these lapsers — " should have the temerity to write to me in such a manner," — telling him, (Ep. 29,) that they did not need his (Cyprian's) let- ters of peace, since Paul, the martyr, had given them such letters ; — " seeing," says Cyprian, " the church is constituted of the bishop, the clergy, and of all the faithful of the people. Far be it indeed from the truth of the case, and from the long-suffering of God, that the church should consist in the number of the lapsed." Here then let us, first, explain the case of the lapsed; secondly, the laws of church government in Cyprian's time, on this and similar matters. First, the lapsed. These were persons who had fallen from their faith in the persecution. They were eager to be admitted to the peace of the church, before they had given those proofs of their recovery from their fall which were then generally judged necessary in such cases. Some of the martyrs, (persons who had survived their sufferings in the persecution,) from the honours they had gained by their constancy, had obtained great influence in ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 123 the church, and had, though only laymen, given letters of peace to the lapsed, without the concurrence of the bishop and of the clergy in general. Some few of the presbyters had acted in the same disorderly manner, " contemning the bishop and arrogating the whole authority in this matter to themselves." Ep. 10. Secondly, let us explain the laws of church govern- ment, in Cyprian's time, on this and similar matters. Cyprian then himself, ia numberless places, states that these laws required the mutual concurrence of the bishop, the presbyters, the deacons, and of all the faithful of the church : so that he could not, " durst not,''' he says, do any thing of importance without them : of course, no indivi- duals, as a party, could do any thing without him and the other clergy with him. This law he expressly and re- peatedly applies to such cases as ordaining readers, dea- cons, &c., and he expressly applies it to this case of reconciling the lapsed. In this act the bishop and the clergy both equally laid their hands upon the lapsed ia restoring them to the peace of the church — " manu eis ah episcopo ET CLERO imposita^ Ep. 10. The question in dispute, then, was not between the bishop and the presbyters ; nothing of the kind : but be- tween the bishop, with the clerg}^ in general on one side, and a faction in the church on the other. Cyprian claims no sole powers for the bishop. He repeatedly acknow- ledges that the power and authority of the bishop was so LIMITED, that he could do nothing of importance of him- self. His office was to convene the church, and preside over, or superintend, the acts of the church : "all acts of the church are governed by these presidents." He was, then, nothing more, by Cyprian's own account, than a limited superintendent, unable to do any thing of general importance aloxe ; but whose ojffice it was to superintend all the affairs and proceedings of the church, whether those pro- ceedings were by the ministers or the people^ separately or conjointly. Presbyters could, in an emergency, exercise all the powers of this office ; for so Cyprian himself re- quests and commands them to perform all things in his ajfice that belonged to the government of the church. This superintendency Cyprian (though his meaning is not clear) seems to think is established by divine law : his proofs are, 124 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. the authority given to Peter, the ordinations of bishops, the arrangements of the church, and the successions of bishops to each other. Sometimes, however, he seems to have doubted this point, viz., that this superintend ency was established by divine law : for in the passage above given from him by Dr. Barrow, he says there was no such president or judge for a time in the church, and that this was the cause of the heresies that arose for want of it. But Cyprian is very expert at using divine authority. He pleads his " night visions — noctumas visiones^^ — for this. Ep. 10. He styles the election of Cornelius by the clergy and people, " the judgment of God and of Christ." Ep. 46 and 52. This is frequently his way of answering his ad- versaries on disputed points. So in some disputed ordina- tions, Ep. 55 : and similar things in many other places, he thus makes them to be by divine authority. For Cyprian to plead THIS kind of divine authority for this superintend- ency, amounts to little ; and such certainly appears to be his style of reasoning in the passage in dispute. This limited superintendency, then, is Cyprian's episcopacy; and such is the divine right which he pleads for this limited superintendency. This is the very utmost that the strongest passage in Cyprian, himself the strongest advo- cate in antiquity, can prove. Does this, then, establish high Church episcopacy ? Cyprian, who was the arch- bishop of that part of Africa — yea, Cyprian durst not, could not, do any thing of importance without consulting his presbyters and deacons ; and frequently the people also : his presbyters in his absence, when need required, could perform all that belonged to his office without him. Will this superintendency satisfy a high Church bishop? no, verily, nor a low Church bishop either. When it was proposed at the conference, at Worcester House, about the king's (Charles H.) declaration, that "the bishops should exercise their church power with the counsel and consent of presbyter s,^^ Bishop Cosins (one of the most learned bishops in the canons, councils, and fathers) presently replied, " If your majesty grants this, you will unbishop your bishops." See p. 48 of this Essay. FiRMiLiAN, bishop of Cesarea in Cappadocia, was very celebrated in his day. He was contemporary with Cyprian. A very long letter of his is found in Cyprian's Works. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 125 He says, " All power and grace is in the church, in which PRESBYTERS PRESIDE, and havc the power of baptizing, confirming, and ordainixg. Omnis potestas et gratia in ecclesia constituta sit, ubi prjssident majores natu, qui €t baptizandi, et manum imponendi et ordinandi, possident potestatem." This is every way a decisive testimony. The manner in which he puts it, shows that he had not a suspicion that the assertion had any thing in it contrary to Cyprian's views. Had Cyprian believed in the divine right of the order of bishops, as possessing the sole power and authority of ordination and confirmation, he would necessarily have opposed the doctrine of Firmilian as a dangerous heresy. He did not. The consequence is plain : he did not hold such a view of the divine right of bishops. The decisive language of Firmilian gives a proper key to Cyprian. The letter of Firmilian has the most perfect authenticity. Firmilian is equal, or even superior authority to Cyprian himself. Eusebius (Eccles. Hist., 1. 6, c. 26) says, " he was very famous.'''' " He made," says Howel, " A MUCH more considerable figure in the church at that time than the bishop of Rome. Firmilian was president of this council,'''' that is., the council of Antioch.* Firmilian's testimony is as high and as decided as language can make it. And it does not speak of isolated facts, but of the practice of the church. It was the practice then for presbyters to preside over the church, to confirm, and to ordain. Suppose this chiefly to have been confined to the country of Firmilian, that is, to Asia Minor ; this is abundantly enough. Firmilian was known over the whole Christian world. The practice was never condemned; the ordinations were never objected to. This case is worth a thousand single instances of ordination ; for such a matter could not be established as practice, and then con- tinued as practice, in the most celebrated part of the Christian world at that time, without resulting in the ordi- nation of thousands of ministers. We have now gone through all the principal writers that speak on the subjects in question, during the first three CENTURIES ; and we see that their authority utterly fails to maintain the views of our high Church divines on the * Howel's Pontificate, p. 24. 126 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. order of bishops and apostolical succession ; and estab- lishes the contrary. A few observations on some of the later fathers shall close this section. Athanasius flourished A. D. 350. Some writers on episcopacy quote an Epistle of his to a monk named Dra- contius, in favour of bishops by divine right, as an order with powers incompatible with the ofiice of presbyters. Here is the usual fallacy of such writers, in presuming that any mention of bishops always means such an order of bishops as this. Indeed they must write upon this fallacy, or they must drop their pens. But this is begging the question, and proves nothing. Now in this Epistle of Athanasius there is not a syllable about the difference between bishops and presbyters. The substance of the whole is this — Whether a monk, who was a layman, should enter the Christian ministry and brave the dangers that then threatened all in that ofSce ; or whether he should, coward like, shun those dangers by remaining in the desert and in the cell. Athanasius presses the argu- ment that to despise this ministry, there spoken of as to a bishop, was to despise the ordinance of Christ. Yery true. We all believe this. But what does it prove as to the question before us ? just nothing. Such are the best of their attempts at proving their scheme from the fathers of any age, either early or late. We shall not swell this volume by a lengthened exposure of them. The case of Ischyras's ordination, mentioned by Athanasius, is not de- cisive for either side of the argument ; though a thorough examination of it would perhaps be decidedly against the high Church scheme.* Ambrose flourished about A. D. 370. A commentary on St. Paul's Epistles, published in his Works, is some- times supposed to have been the work of Hilary, a dea- con of Rome. Divines generally seem to admit its worth and weight to be equal, whether it be ascribed to Ambrose or Hilary. The deacons of that day had risen greatly in the principal churches, and had become eminent. The cause was this : the deacons had the principal manage- ment of the goods of the church. The churches had become very rich, even before Constantine's time. The * See Stillingfleet's Irenieum, pp. 381, 382. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 127 number of deacons was limited to seven, in the church of Rome ; and this while the presbyters amounted to more than seven times seven. The deacons, therefore, had much power and influence. Some of them were among the most able and learned men of the age. Athanasius was only a deacon, while he was one of the most celebrated champions for the faith in the great council of Nice. Am- brose then, or Hilary, says, " After churches were con- stituted in every place, and officers appointed, things BEGAN to be arranged differextly from what they were in the beginning ; for, at the first, all taught, and all bap- tized. But if all had continued to be allowed to perform the same things, it would have been absurd, and the min- istry would have become vile and contemptible. The apostles' writings are not altogether agreeable to the order of things as now practised in the church. For Timothy, who was ordained a presbyter by Paul, he calls a bishop ; because the first or chief presbyters, were called bishops. His words are, " Primi presbyteri episcopi appellqtantur."* First or chief presbyters were called bishops; and, as one departed, the next succeeded to the office. But because the next in succession were sometimes found unworthy to hold the primacy, the custom was changed by the provision of a council ; so that not the next in order, but the next in merit, should be made bishop, and consti- tuted such BY the judgment of a number of the presby- ters, lest an unworthy person should usurp, and become a general scandal. "f " The presbyter and bishop had one and the same ordination. The bishop is the chief among the presbyters — Episcopus est quiinter presbyteros primus. ^''\ Here it is plainly stated that the usages of the church, in his day, were different from what they were in the apos- tles' time ; and therefore they could only be of human authority, and not of divine right. The presbyters and bishops, he says, had " one and the same ordination." * Mr. Sinclair (p. 90) chooses to display some wit, and to show his knowledge, by declaring that " a frime presbyter, as presiding in the college of presbyters," is an '' iiiveyition of the modern followers of Ae- rius"— that " this poetic personage, this creature of the dissenting ima- gination, was created by David Blondel." Mr. Sinclair, of course, talks by hearsay about Ambrose, otherwise his wit would have been spoiled, and his learning improved. t Com. in Ephes. cap. 4. % Com. in 1 Tim. iii. 128 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. The consecration of bishops, as now used, has no Scrip- tural authority : it is merely a ceremony. Then he pro- ceeds to say, that a presidency became established. This, at the first, took place by mere seniority, and one was CONSTITUTED BISHOP BY the judgment of the other pres- byters : the presbyters made the bishop ; and this pre- cedence was given to one presbyter as bishop, for the honour of the church and the ministry, and not by any divine right. Indeed, he says, it was different from apos' folic usage. We may here introduce the matter of Aerius. I con- sider it of little importance ; and the opinion of Epiphani- us about it is much of the same value. Stillingfleet says, '' I believe, upon the strictest inquiry, Medina's judgment will prove true, that Hieron, Austin, Ambrose, Sedulius, Primasius, Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophilact, were all of Aerius's judgment as to the identity of both name and order of bishops and presbyters in the primitive church ; but here lay the difference : Aerius from thence proceeded te separation from the bishops and their churches, because they were bishops."* But then, say the advocates of episcopacy, Epiphanius wrote against his opinion, and numbered Aerius among heretics because of it. As to Aerius's views, we have heard Stillingfleet's opinion. They who say he was accounted a heretic solely for main- taining that bishops and presbyters were, according to the Scriptures, the same, do not know what they say. Who maintained this more boldly than Jerome ? But neither Epiphanius, who was a friend of Jerome's, nor any other person, ever counted Jerome a heretic on this account. Augustine says, " Aerius maintained that a bishop could not ordain. He opposed the existence of the distinction be- tween a bishop and presbyter; he rejected it; he also fell into the heresy of the Arians, &c.t And as to Epi- phanius, whatever he was besides, he was a hot-headed^ meddling bigot. He quarrelled with John, bishop of Jerusa- lem ; and ordained in John's diocess without his leave. He collected a council in Cyprus to condemn Origen's Works, and wrote to Chrysostom to do the same thing. Chrysostom refused. Epiphanius had the temerity to enter Constantinople, Chrysostom's see, in order to cause * Iren., p. 276. t Vid. Augustinide Heresibus, No. 53. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 129 the decree of Cyprus against Origen to be put in execution there. Before he entered the city, he ordained a deacon in one of Chrysostom's churches. He refused to hold com- munion with Chrysostom himself; threatened that he would, publicly, in the church, at Constantinople, with a loud voice, condemn Origen, and all who defended him. He came to the church, but being warned by Chrysostom that he might expose himself to danger from the people, he desisted. He tried to persuade the empress that God would spare the life of her son, (who was then dangerously ill,) if she would only persecute the defenders of Origen. He de- fended praying for the dead : Aerius opposed it. So he put Aerius into the list of heretics. Bishop Taylor him- self says, ' He that considers the catalogues [of heresies] as they are collected by Epiphanius, &c., shall find that many are reckoned for heretics for opinions in matters disputable, and undetermined, and of no consequence ; and that in these catalogues of heretics there are men num- bered for heretics, which by every side respectively are acquitted, so that there is no company of men in the world that admit these catalogues as good records, or sufficient sentences of condemnation.' "* And Dr. Cave, an unex- ceptionable authority with high Churchmen, says, "He [Epiphanius] was one of no great judgment and reasoning; he generally took his account of things upon trust, suffer- ing himself to be imposed upon by those narratives which the several parties had published of the proceedings, either of their own or of their adversaries' side, without due search and examination, which ran him upon infinite mis- takes, inconsistencies, and confusions "f Chrysostom, who flourished A. D. 400, says, " Paul, speaking about bishops and their ordination, what they ought to possess, and from what they must abstain, having omitted [1 Tim. iii] the order of presbyters, he passes on to that of deacons. Why so, I ask? because the differ^ ence between the bishop and the presbyter is almost no- thing. For the presidency of the churches is committed to presbyters, and the qualifications which the apostle requires in a bishop, he requires in a presbyter also ; being above them solely by their ordination, and this is the * Lib. of Prophes., sec. 2. Dupin, Biblioth Patrum. cent. 4th. f Dr. John Edwards' Pratrologia, p. 53, ed. 1731, 8vo. 6* 130 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. ONLY thing they, the bishops, seem to have more than presbyters."* This last remark refers to what is supposed to be the sheet anchor of episcopacy, in the modern sense, that is, the power of ordination. \ Chrysostom says they were the same in every thing else. Even as to ordination he only mentions the fact of the difference, and not the divine right. And as to the fact, his language is by no means decided. Jerome also himself has a remark of a similar kind in his Epistle to Evagrius : " What does the bishop which the presbyter may not do, except ordination X" The interpretation of the one may be sufficient for the in- terpretation of the other. Jerome, then, it should be remembered, does, in that Epistle, most plainly declare that bishops and presbyters are the same. He then says, that ♦' after the apostles' times, one presbyter was placed over the rest as a remedy against schism. For at Alexandria, from the evangelist Mark up to Heraclas and Dionysius, the bishops, (about A. D. 250) the presbyters always ELECTED one from among themselves, and placed him in the higher chair, and they, the presb}i;ers, gave him the name of bishop ; in the same manner as an army may make its general ; or as deacons elect one of themselves whose in- dustry they know, and call him archdeacon. For what does a bishop do," (that is, now he means about A. D. 400,) " except ordination, v/hich a presbyter may not do ?" Here then, it is evident, that Jerome speaks simply of the fact and custom which had then, inhis day, become established, as to what bishops do, and presbyters may not do ; not of * Com. in 1 Tim. iii. t There is a radical ahsiirdity at the bottom of all these mighty pre- tensions about the power of ordination. It is as plain as that two and two make four, that the greater always includes the less. Now the two sacraments of baptism and the Lord's supper are the greatest ritual ordinances in the Christian church. A sacrament is, by all divines, considered above all other ritual ordinances. Ordination is not a sa- crament. It is therefore less than a sacrament. He that has power and authority to perform the greater, has power and authority to per- form the less. All presbyters, by the confession of our opponents, have power and authority to administer the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's supper, the greater : all presbyters, therefore, have power and authority to administer ordination, the less. This, to a reasonable mind, would settle the whole question : but as the prejudices of some people are so strong as to take away the force of clear reason, we have met the opponents on their own ground. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 131 the power or right of presbyters, or that they could not by divine right do what the bishops did. This custom, or ecclesiastical arrangement, which, for the honour of the bishop and the church, made ordination generally a prero- gative of the bishop's office, Jerome advises the presbytery to comply with. Therefore " they may tio^," because of this custom, especially without the bishop's license, or- dain. Any other supposition would make Jerome contra- dict, in the same page, what he had most firmly maintain- ed. His illustrations show the same. The custom of the church at Alexandria was evidently intended by him as an example of ordination hy presbyters ; else why mention it as something which had ceased, in his day, to be common. The presbyters, at Alexandria, prior to A. D. 250, elected one of themselves, placed him in the chair, {all the conse- cration he had) — and gave him his title of bishop. It is trifling to say, as Episcopalians do, ' Perhaps there were bishops present who laid on hands and consecrated him.' This is little short of contradicting Jerome. He certainly makes the presbyters the doers of all that was done in making the bishop. The case of the army making its ge- neral is another instance which he mentions in illustration of his position. Every schoolboy knows that the Roman army in those days frequently created their generals by acclamation ; and it is to these proceedings Jerome alludes : the lawfulness of the thing was no more necessary to his argument, than the laufulness of the unjust steward'' s conduct to our Lord's argument. It is they«c^, and its bearing, which are important. The deacons, too, then appointed 07i€ of themselves as their head, calling him archdeacon ; so the presbyters make a presbyter their head, and call him bishop. The army made the general ; the deacons the archdea- cons ; and the presbyters made the bishop. This is plainly the sense. Presbyters, then, ordained even BISHOPS, in the see of Alexandria, from the time of St. Mark up to Heraclas and Dionysius, that is, for about the first two hundred years after Christ. What need be clearer^ than that Jerome's exception only regards the custom of the church in his day, (about one hundred and fifty years after what he refers to at Alexandria,) and not the power or right of the presbyters to ordain. Stillingfleet has moreover quoted, in confirmation of this view, the testi- 132 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. mony of Eutychius, the patriarch of Alexandria, who expressly affirms, " that the twelve presbyters constituted by Mark, upon the vacancy of the see did choose of their number one to be head over the rest, and the other eleven did lay their hands upon him, and blessed him, and made him patriarch," or bishop.* The manner it seems varied, the thing was the same. There never was any universally established manner of making bishops in the Christian church, excepting the Scriptural one, by which every man is made a minister and a bishop at once, by one and the same ordination. Chrysostom's language is similar to Je- rome's, and admits the same interpretation. He positively says, that the bishop had then nothing above presbyters but ordination ; and speaks douhtingly as to this : " This [ordination] is the only thing they seem to have more than presbyters." But even were he to speak with the utmost certainty, his language only states the fact and not the law. It was the fact, I believe, generally, in Chrysostom's days, for the honour of the bishop and the church, and (as they supposed) to prevent divisions, that bishops only or- dained bishops. This is perfectly consistent with all we have said to show the identity of bishops and presbyters by divine right. However, Calderwood, Alt. Damascen. p. 160, shows that a more accurate translation of Chrysos- tom's language will give a very different view of his mean- ing : the latter member of his sentence, correctly translated, being as follows : — " The bishop being above the pres- byter solely by their" (the presbyters') " suffrage ; and by this alone they seem to assume an unjust superiority over the presbyters." This proves that Chrysostom considered bishops and presbyters to be really and by divine right the same in all things, and taxes the bishops with abusing the power given them by the suffrage of the presbyters, inju- riously to depress those very presbyters. The questions on the Old and New Testament, found in the Works of St. Augustine, are mostly quoted as his by ^ Episcopal writers : they could not find fault with me, therefore, if I claim their authority as his authority. However, it is supposed they were written by a more an- cient author than Augustine. In quest. 101, while rebuking some deacons who put themselves before the presbyters, * Stillingfleet's Iren., p. 274. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 133 he says, " The superior order contains the inferior ; for a presbyter may perform the office of a deacon, an exorcist, or a reader. By a presbyter you must understand a bishop ; as Paul the apostle proves, when instructing Timothy, whom he ordained a presbyter, what sort of a person he ought to be whom he was to ordain a bishop. For what is a bishop but the first presbyter, that is, the highest priest? Finally, he addresses such as fellow-presbyters, fellow-priests. But does the bishop ever address the dea- cons as fellow-deacons ? No indeed ; and the reason is because they are so much inferior. — For in Alexandria, and through the whole of Egypt, the presbyter consecrates [that is, confirms] when the bishop is not present." Here Timothy is a presbyter ; he as a presbyter ordains bish- ops. St, Paul is said to mean a bishop when he speaks of a presbyter : and presbyters also perform confirmation, in the bishop's absence, " through the whole of Egypt. ''^ That presbj-ters both possessed and exercised the right of ordaining ministers in the primitive church, appears moreover by the thirteenth canon of the council of Ancyra, A. D. 315 : — " 'Tis not allowed to village bishops to or- dain presbyters or deacons ; nor is it allowed even to city presbyters to do this in another diocess without the license of the bishop.''"' High Church Episcopalians declare they cannot understand this canon ! It must be imperfect, or corrupt, or I know not what. So Socinians treat the Scriptures when they are plainly opposed to their schemes. However, no man who understands the Greek text of the canon will deny that the above is a fair translation. Here, then, in the first place, the chor-episcopi, or country bishops, are utterly forbid to ordain, and are evidently treated as inferior to city presbyters. Now Bishop Taylor, and many other learned Episcopalians, /wZZy admit that these chor-episcopi, or village bishops, had, by divine right, the power to ordain. Therefore the power of the city PRESBYTER to ORDAIN prcsbytcrs and deacons, is clearly supposed in the canon ; and is not taken away, but only limited in its exercise. He was not to ordain " in another bishop's diocess without his license ;" very proper : but then it is as clear as though the canon had said so, that the city presbyter might and did ordain presbyters and deacons in the diocess of his own bishop ; and might 134 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. do the same in any other diocess hy the license of the bishop of that diocess. It seems they had been guilty of the irregularity referred to in the canon. However, there is no limitation as to the diocess where they reside ; though the rules of order would require such things to be done with the consent of the bishop. Here, then, is another triumphant proof of the power of presbyters to ordain. There is considerable evidence arising to the same point from the illustrious council of Nice, A. D. 325, which condemned Arianism, and so greatly promoted the estab- lishment of the orthodox faith on the doctrine of the Trinity. A bishop, they say, was to be constituted by bishops. But in their Epistle to the church of Alexandria, and the other churches of Egypt, they seem to speak of presbyters as still frequently ordaining presbyters. They are speaking of the clergy who had not gone away in the division with Miletius. Their words are : — " But as for those who, by the grace of God, and your prayers, have been found in no schism, but have ever remained imma- culate in the Catholic Church, it pleased the holy synod that they should have power to ordain, and give up the names of such as were worthy to be the clergy ; and in short, to do all things according to the ecclesiastical law and sanction."* The synod took away this power from all the Miletian clergy who had made division ; but as to those of the clergy of Alexandria, and the other churches of Egypt, who had not, (hey allowed their power of ordain- ing, &LC., to REMAIN. Valesius thinks Christophorson is mistaken in applying this passage to presbyters ; but Vale- sius's reasons do not invalidate Christophorson's view. For even as to those from whom this power of ordaining was taken away, the Epistle says, they were to " continue possessed of their dignitv and office, but yet they were to acknowledge themselves always inferior to all those that had been approved of in every diocess and church, and who had been ordained before by our dearest colleague in the sacred function, Alexander." Now how could BISHOPS retain their honour and ojfice, in the same diocess, while other bishops over them had the sole honour and office of bishops in those diocesses ? This is absurd. It * Socrat. Eccles. Hist., lib. 1, c. 9. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 135 remains, therefore, that they spake of presbyters. These presbyters, their language shows, both possessed and exer- cised the power of ordaining presbyters and deacons; though at that time they direct that bishops should ordain bishops. The regulations about ordination in the Christian church appear to have been chiefly derived from the regulations of the Jewish synagogue. To make this plain, we will here repeat the statement of those Jewish regulations as given by Maimonides, and will add a few remarks upon them. " In ancient times," says he, (that is, the times be- fore Hillel the elder, who died about ten years after the birth of Christ,) " every one who was ordained himself, ordained his scholars. But the wise men, in order to show particular reverence for Hillel the elder, made a rule that no one should be ordained without the permission of the president, neither should the president ordain any one without the presence of the father of the sanhedrim, nor the father without the presence of the president. But, as to other members of the sanhedrim, any one might ordain, (having obtained permission of the president,) by joining with himself two others ; for ordination cannot regularly be performed except three join in the ordination."* " In the ancient times" of the church, " any one who was ordained himself, ordained others :" the presbyters ordained Timothy, and each church " was ruled by the presbyters in common." Then, probably, about the middle of the second century, one presbyter was elected by the rest to preside in the presbytery, and over the general acts of the church. This presiding presbyter was, for dis- tinction's sake, called bishop : a term which up to that time had been common to all the presbyters, but which henceforward became appropriated to this presiding pres- byter. For the honour of this bishop, or president, " a rule was made that no one should be ordained without his permission," neither could he regularly ordain without the permission of the presbyters, as is most clearly proved by many examples in Cyprian himself, who apologized for ordaining a reader or subdeacon without their permission, even at the time when the rage of his enemies made it unsafe for him personally to consult them. With the per- * Vid. Selden De Syned., lib. 2, c. vii, p. 173, 4to. Amstel., 1679. 136 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. mission of the bishop, however, the presbyters continued to ordain, as occasion required, for the first three hundred years : see the proof of this in the language of Firmilian, the celebrated bishop of Cesarea, in Cappadocia, and the decisions of the councils of Ancyra and Nice, in the pre- ceding pages. At Alexandria, it seems that the custom for the presbyters there to ordain their president or bishop continued until A. D. 250, as Jerome testifies. But the power and authority of the bishops gradually increased by their uniting to support each other ; by the pride and am- bition of many of them, (for the fathers themselves give abundant evidence of this,) and by their pleas that sub- mission to their authority was essential to prevent schisms, and to the peace of the church. They ventured at length in the council of Nice, not indeed to prohibit presbyters from ordaining presbyters ; but to make a law that bishops ALONE should ordain bishops. Of course, as the council was principally made up of bishops, there would not be any opposition. Yet Ambrose expressly declares that the bishops and presbyters had " one ordination," that is, really such ; as the consecration of bishops is only a ceremony. Such is the origin, and such is the history of episcopal ordinations. Presbyters still unite with bishops in ordain- ing presbyters in the Church of England, though bishops alone ordain bishops. If this be used as a matter oi pru- dential arrangement by a particular branch of the Christian church, it may be justified on the principle that such non- essential things may be left to the discretion of each church to determine ; but when it becomes urged as divine law ; when, upon this principle, the ministers of churches who use no such episcopal ordinations, are declared to be no ministers, and all their ordinances vain ; here the whole question is altered altogether : the peace of the Christian world at large is broken ; the ministers and people of all other churches are insulted ; a monstrous system of spirit- ual tyranny is introduced ; and a many-headed Popery is established upon this shallow pretence of the sole au- thority of bishops by divine right. That bishops ordaining or consecrating bishops is a nonessential, demonstrably follows from the proofs that have been given in these pages, that the order of bishops itself is a mere matter of ecclesiastical arrangement, and ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 137 has no divine right. At first they were made merely by the election of their fellow-presbyters, as in the church of Alexandria, for nearly two hundred years. Then it seems some ceremony was used in placing them in the higher chair or throne, as it was called ; so the term for it came to be ENTHRONizATioN. Yct SO far was it from impress- ing any indelible character, as they call it ; or conferring, as an act, extraordinary powers, forming a distinct order, that this enthronization or consecration was frequently repeated, when an individual was removed from one bishopric to another. So, for instance, Socrates,* speak- ing of Miletius, who first had been bishop of Sebastia, afterward of Beraea, but after this was sent for by the in- habitants of Antioch to be their bishop, says that here, at Antioch, another, a third enthronization, was performed. Many cases of a similar character might be given. And, indeed, that the consecration of bishops was not considered at the Reformation to be, like ordination, incapable of repe- tition, will be evident from the fact, that many bishops were then consecrated anew when translated to other bishoprics ; as may be seen by the instances and the words given from the registers, in Courayer on English Ordinations. f The Oxford Tract-men have a little outwitted themselves in publishing Archbishop Cranmer's translation of Justice Jonas's " Sermon on Apostolical Succession and the Power of the Keys," as containing the " mature and deliberate judgment" of Cranmer on these subjects. For, after speaking of ordination as performed by the apostles upon others for " the ministration of God's word,^^ he adds, "And THIS was the consecratioii, orders, and unction of the apos- tles, whereby they, at the beginning, made bishops and priests, and this shall continue in the church even to the world's end. And whatsoever rite or ceremony hath been added more than this, cometh of man's ordinance and policy, and is not commanded by God's word." Now Cranmer, we shall see, in the next section, distinctly maintained that bishops and priests were, by the law of God, the same. Here he says that that consecration, orders, and unction whereby the apostles appointed individuals to the minis- tration of God's ,word, was the only real ordination they * Eccles. Hist., part ii, chap. 44. + Page 65, English translation, London, 1725, 8vo. 138 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. had ; for " whatsoever rite or ceremony had been added more than this, cometh of marCs ordinance and poUcy, and is not commanded by God's word." " Cranmer and Bar- low," says Courayer, " affirm that the consecration [of a bishop] is not necessary, and that the designation [or ap- pointing to the office] is sufficient."* We wish to study brevity ; otherwise it would be easy to show at length the same point, viz., that the ordination or consecration of bishops, as distinct from their ordination as presbyters, has nothing in it but a mere human ceremony of appointing an individual to some specific duties in the church. The word of God has not a syllable upon it: the vefore it is utterly void of divine authority. There is not a particle of genuine evidence upon it for the first hundred years after Christ. It never had, in any age, any thing that essentially distinguished it from the ordination of a presbyter. This is abundantly evident from Morinus's celebrated work on Ordinations. There it is shown, that in every thing but imposition of hands, different churches and different ages have varied from each other ; and, in most of the matters, have varied without end. Now that cannot be essential to a thing which sometimes does not exist with it at all ; and this is the case with every thing belonging to the consecration of bishops, excepting impo- sition of hands ; and even this, in some cases, was not used. Imposition of hands is common to the ordination of a presbyter as well as to that of a bishop ; it cannot be common to both, and yet essentially distinguish the one from the other ; there is nothing, therefore, in the conse- cration of a bishop, nor ever was, that essentially distin- guished it from the ordination of a presbyter. If it be pleaded that the church has appointed words to be used at this consecration to distinguish it from that of a presbyter ; we grant it. But then the church never had any authority from Scripture to do more in this than to make it a pru- dential ecclesiastical arrangement. The reformers of the Church of England did not even appoint any words for the act of consecration to distinguish the office of a bishop from that of a presbyter : the words that now distinguish them were added in later times. * P. 147; and see Burnet's Ref., vol. i, Record, No. 21. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 139 If, then, the consecration of bishops is a mere human ceremony, it is impossible that the act of bishops, as hishops, in ordination, can have any divine efficacy or authority above that of presbyters. Bishops may ordain one another for ever, but this would never change the matter. A cipher multiplied by a cipher always produces a cipher. All the authority, then, that bishops have to ordain men to the ministration of God's word and sacraments, arises from their authority as presbyters, and from this ALONE. Scores of bishops in the Romish Church never were presbyters : yet these men have ordained presbyters and bishops in the church without number. Through these our high Churchmen have received their boasted orders. Such is their vaunted " unbroken series of valid ordina- tions" and apostolical succession ! The tenacity of high Churchmen to their exclusive and intolerant scheme must be my apology to the reader for the length of this section. We will now state the result of the inquiry : — • 1 . No clear evidence appears that any of the fathers of the first three centuries, or any council, ever maintained this high Church doctrine of the divine right of bishops ALONE to be successors of the apostles, and to ordain and GOVERN pastors as well as people. 2. No distinction appears between the office of pres- byter and bishop in the Epistle of Clemens Romanus, nor in the Epistle of Polycarp, the most ancient emd genuine pieces we have in the first century. 3. In the second and following centuries, a custom GRADUALLY bccomcs established for one presbyter to be placed over the others ; and the term bishop, or superin- tendent, becomes appropriated to him alone. 4. The ancients assign, as the reason for this arrange- ment, the honour of the church — the peace of the church — the prevention of schisms or divisions — and the unity of the whole. So Tertullian, Cyprian, Hilary or Ambrose, Augus- tine and Jerome. 5. Presbyters presided over the church ; in some places it would seem chiefly : but even where a superin- tendency had taken place, they appear with the bishop, as sitting to 'rule in common with him ; and without them he could not do any thing of importance in the church. So 140 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. Ignatius, Tertullian, Justin Martyr, Origen, Cyprian, Cor- nelius, Firmilian, and Jerome. 6. Presbyters ordained. This is, as to the fact^ proved by Firmilian, the celebrated bishop of Cesarea, in Cappadocia ; by the custom of the church of Alexandria for the first two hundred years after Christ ; by the testi- mony of Jerome and Eutychius ; and by the council of Ancyra, and the council of Nice. The right of power also necessarily follows from their being the same order as bishops. 7. Presbyters are the successors of the apostles; this is distinctly stated by Ignatius, Irenaeus, and Jerome. We have not yet given a most striking passage of Jerome on this point. Hear him then : " Do you approach to the clergy ? — God forbid that I should speak disparagingly of the CLERGY : they are successors to the degree of APOSTLES, — qui apostolico gradui succedentesJ^ And, after mentioning the difficulties and dangers of their station, he says, " Non est facile stare loco Pauli ; tenere gradum Petri" — " It is no easy matter to stand in the place of Paul, nor in the degree of Peter."* 8. The ONLY true and indispensable succession to the apostles is the succession of faith, and not oi persons : Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Ambrose. This last bishop says, " They have not the succession of Peter, who have not the faith of Peter."t The conclusion is, then, that in the purest Christian antiquity, bishops and presbyters were, by divine right, the SAME ; " all the difference which existed, in fact, between them was almost nothing ;" and was merely by custom, or the use of the church, as a prudential measure, to promote order, peace, and unity. Ordination by presbyters, and all other acts of presbyters, are, by divine right, equally VALID with those of bishops : the succession of faith is the only true succession. Ministers and churches who do not hold this — who adulterate it — are to be forsaken ; and those alone received as truly apostolical successors, ministers, ordinances, and churches, where this faith is preached as the apostles preached it, and as they left it to us in the sacred Scriptures as their last will and testa- ment, sealed as with their oath, and their blood. Let the * Epist. ad Heliodorum de Vita Eremetica. t De Penitentia. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 141 semi-popish divines, allowed improperly in the Church of England, and the thorough-going Papists of our country, look about them. Their succession is not the succession of the apostles, nor of the earliest fathers ; but cifabri' cation of their own, based \v^ow false assumptions, and built up by bigotry and intolerance, out of human traditions, forged authorities, and abominable idolatries. See section X of this Essay, APPENDIX TO SECTION VI. ON THE ECCLESIASTICAL ACCOUNT OF THE BISHOPS OF THE SEVEN CHURCHES MENTIONED IN THE REVELATION ; AND ON THE SUPPOSED DIFFICCLTT OF ACCOUNTING FOR THE EXISTENCE OF EPISCOPACY AT SO EARLY AN AGE OF THE CHURCH. There are two points which Episcopal writers consider of much importance in this controversy, and which we have not yet introduced. They might chronologically have been introduced sooner ; but the reader will here examine them with greater advantage, after the preceding discussion : they are, 1. As to what are called the bishops of the seven churches of Asia, mentioned in the Revelation of St. John : and, 2. The supposed diihculty of accounting for the exist- ence of episcopacy at so early an age of the church, ex- cept on the principle that it is jure divino, established by divine right. First, then, as to what are called the bishops of the seven churches of Asia, mentioned in the Revelation of St. John. As most of the difficulty upon both these points arises from the ambiguity of the words bishop or episcopus, and episcopacy, let it be premised that there are three different senses in which these words are used in this controversy. As to the word bishop : — this word is used in the New Testament, 1. As synonymous with the word presbyter ; " the names are common ;" see pages 83-86 of this Essay ; 2. Somewhere in the second or third century the word bishop was applied to distinguish the primus presbyter, appointed by the suffrages of the other presby- ters, and by ecclesiastical arrangement, as superintendent 143 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. of ministers and people ; 3. High Churchmen use it for an order of ministers claiming powers and authority incom- patible with the office of presbyters. Now we grant there were bishops in the seven churches of Asia in the first sense ; but we deny that there is any solid proof of their existence, in the second sense, in these seven churches. Clemens Romanus, who, according to the best authority, wrote A. D. 96 to the church at Corinth, (comparatively in the neighbourhood,) mentions not a syllable about a primus presbyter as superintendent over the presbyters. Presby- ters, according to Clemens, then " ruled the church in com- mon.'''' The Revelation is supposed to have been written only four years after this time. As to bishops in the third sense, high Church bishops, we utterly deny that there is any evidence of any such bishops in the seven churches. Even the corrupted Epistles of Ignatius would not sustain the authority of high Church bishops ; for presbyters are there made equal to the apostles: are they so with high Church bishops ? Nay, so far from this, Bishop Taylor maintains that bishops only are properly pastors, § 25 ; doctors, or teachers, § 26 ; and priests, § 27 : so that, on this scheme, poor presbyters are only a sort of tolerated pastors, existing by the leave of the bishops : see § 9 of his Episcopacy Asserted. As to tradition, on this question there is none that can be surely depended upon. Take, for instance, the case of Timothy's being bishop of Ephesus. There is absolutely none that gives him the rights and authority of a high Church bishop. But, passing the ques- tion of the ki?id of episcopacy, for a moment, is there any satisfactory proof of the fact, that Timothy was bishop of Ephesus, one of these seven churches ? I unhesitatingly answer. There is not; see page 57 of this Essay. Dr. Whitby grants, " that he can find nothing on this subject in any writer of the first three centuries." But then he says " this defect is abundantly supplied by the concurrent suffrage of the fourth and fifth centuries." Well, let us see. He refers to Eusebius first, and very properly : for succeeding authors generally took their reports from him. If the fountain fails us, the streams must fail too. Now Eusebius honestly confesses, that though he made it a main point, in writing his history of the early ages of the church, to inquire into such matters, yet all was dark, and ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 143 he " could nowhere find so much as the bare steps of any who had passed that path of inquiry before him," excepting something like "a torch here and there afar ojf." Then, speaking of Paul and Peter, and the churches founded by them, he says, " Now how many, and what sincere fol- lowers of them have been approved as sufficient to take the charge of those churches by them founded, is not easy to say, except such and so many as may he collected from the words of Saint Paul." Does this sort of evidence abundantly supply the defect of the total silence of the first three centuries? And nothing better is to be found. Euse- bius says, " Timothy is reported to have been the first that was chosen to the bishopric of the Ephesian church." He gives no authority; which he always does when he has it. The report is evidently only guess-work, in its origin, having arisen from St. Paul's mentioning his name in connection with Ephesus ; but see page 57 of this Essay. The stories in ecclesiastical history about the early bishops and founders of churches are generally full of confusion and contradiction ; they are mostly the inventions of a later age. See section x. But were we to grant these statements (confusion as they are) to be true, they never make the powers and authority to be those of high Church bishops ; the preceding discussion has abundantly shown this. The result, then, of this investigation of ecclesias- tical authority, and of tradition on this point, is, that there were bishops in the seven churches of x\sia ; for bishops and presbyters are spoken of by Clemens Romanus, the best authority on the subject, as one and the same ; that there is no clear evidence of a superintendency, in the seven churches, of a primus presbyter as over ministers and people ; and that, as to high Church bishops, it would be a burlesque to compare them with the bishops of the seven churches, and of Clemens Romanus. Secondly, let us consider the supposed difficulty of ac- counting for the existence of episcopacy at so early an age of the church, except on the principle that it is jure divino — established by divine right. Here we must remember the distinction above made, as to the different meanings of the word bishop : the same applies to the word episco- pacy. 1. We grant a Scriptural episcopacy by divine right, in which bishops and presbyters are identical; 144 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 2. We grant an ecclesiastical arrangement of superintend- ency, otherwise called episcopacy; 3. We grant a usurp- ation of powers and authority claimed for bishops by divine right, otherwise also called episcopacy. Now we have no difficulty in accounting for the Jirst^ or Scriptural episcopacy. The second also is easily accounted for, as is shown from Jerome, &c., in the preceding pages. The third kind, viz., high Church episcopacy, had no existence in the early ages of the church ; we have not to account, therefore, for lohat did not exist. SECTION VIL THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND AT THE REFORMATION AGAINST THESE CLAIMS. I KNOW it would be in vain for me to attempt to per- suade many Church people that I am not writing against the Church of England. They mean the Church as ne- cessarily implying a divine order of bishops, 6fc. I mean the Church, according to the principles of the reformers.* They mean the Church with all its state importance, its wealth, its emolument, &lc. The question of Church and State, in the abstract, is a matter of indifference to me ; and I think it is indifferent also in the eye of the Scrip- lures. At the utmost, however, the connection of a church with the state is only a circumstance : it is not essential to the existence of the church. The church is spiritual. The church is, under God, founded on its doctrines, dis- cipline, and ordinances ; on the faith and the piety of its members. In this light I view the Church of England. Taking the Church of England in this view on the ques- tion before us, as constituted at the Reformation, I write * Froude, a leader among the Oxford Tract-men, says, "Really I hate the Reformation and the reformers more and more." — "Why do you praise Ridley '? Do you know sufficient good about him to counterbalance the fact that he was the associate of Cranmer, Peter Martyr, and Bucer ■? As far as I have gone, too, I think better than I was prepared to do of Bonner and Gardiner." — Fronde's Remains. Very consistent ! ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 145 not a sentence to opposertt, but daily pray for the blessing of God upon it, and upon all other Christian churches. Taking the words as frequently used by bigoted Church- men, I utterly deny the truth and Scriptural character of their claims and pretensions ; I believe them to be semi- popery, and necessarily leading to bigotry, intolerance, and persecution. Believing, as I do, that this is the nature and tendency of these claims, I think myself bound in conscience to put away all flattering titles as to any men or order of men, and to speak as plainly and powerfully as I can to the overthrow of this system from its foundation. Amicus Socrates, Amicus Plato, sed magis Amicus Veritas : — Socrates is my friend, Plato is my friend, but Truth is my friend above all friends. Having come through the Scriptural view, and the view of the fathers, on the identity of bishops and presbyters, we proceed to show that the English reformers main- tained that bishops and presbyters are, by divine right, the same order ; if this be proved, the whole system of high Church succession men falls to the ground. For if pres- byters be, by divine right, the same order as bishops, then their spiritual power and authority are the same ; all their ordinations are equal to episcopal ordinations ; the minis- try and ordinances of all the other Protestant churches in Great Britain, and on the continent, as being administered by presbyters, are equally Scriptural with those of any modern Episcopal Church : consequently all these exclu- sive and arrogant high Church claims for episcopal ordi- nations, &c., will vanish before the light and power of truth. Bigotry will lose its support, and intolerance its plea for persecution. Christian truth and Christian liberty will extend their hallowing influences over the whole land. Then shall the heathen and the infidel exclaim, " See how these Christians love one another !" Wickliffe, who is called the morning star of the Re- formation, says, " / boldly assert one thing, viz., that in the primitive church, or in the time of St. Paul, two orders of the clergy were sufiicient, that is, a priest and a deacon. In like manner / afiirm, that in the time of Paul the pres- byter and the bishop were names of the same ojffice. This appears from the third chapter of the First Epistle to Timothy, and in the first chapter of the Epistle to Titus. 7 146 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. And the same is testified by that profound theologian Jerome."* But to come to those who actually formed the Articles, the Book of Orders, and the plan of the government of the Church of England. We shall give every reader the opportunity of seeing, with his own eyes, the truth of the matter, by extracts from original documents, as published by Bishop Burnet in his History of the Reformation. They appear to be the determinations of a convocation of archbishops, bishops, and divines ; for Cromwell, the king's vicar general, sig?isjirst, as presiding over the convocation. As these writers use the expressions " deacons or minis- ters, priests or bishops," it is hardly necessary to say to the most cursory reader, that they mean the same office by each of the terms in the separate clauses, " deacon or minister ; priests or bishops." Bishop Burnet observes, " Another thing is that both in this writing, and in the Necessary Erudition of a Christian Man, bishojjs and priests are spoken of as one and the same office." Priest, by these reformers, everywhere means presbyter. Bishop Burnet's remarks on the nature and value of these documents, shall now introduce them. He says, " After some of the sheets of this History were wrought off, I met with manuscripts of great authority, out of which I have collected several particulars, that give a clear light to the proceedings in those times. — I shall here add them." " In this writing, bishops and priests are spoken of as one and the same office. It had been the common style of that og-e," says he, " to reckon bishops and priests as the same ojice:' Here follow extracts from the document called " A De- claration made of the Functions and Divine Institution of Bishops and Priests. An Original." " As touching the sacraments of the holy orders, we will that all bishops and preachers shall instruct and teach our people committed by us unto their spiritual charge," " First, — How that Christ and his apostles did institute and ordain in the New Testament — certain ministers or officers, which should have spiritual power, authority, and * Wickliffe's Trialogus, as quoted by Vaughan in his excellent Life of Wickliffe, vol. ii, p. 275, ed. 1831, Lond. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 147 commission under Christ, to preach, &c., and to order and consecrate others in the same room, order, and office, whereunto they be called and admitted themselves : and finally to feed Christ's people like good pastors and rec- tors," &LC. " Item ; That this office, this ministration, this power and authority, is no tyrannical power, having no certain laws or limits within the which it ought to be contained, nor yet none absolute power, but it is a moderate power^ subject, determined, and restrained \mioih.os.e certain limits and ENDS for the which the same was appointed by God's ordinance ; — it appeareth that the same was a limited power and ojjice, ordained especially and only for the causes and purposes before rehearsed." " Item ; That this ofice, this power and authority, was committed and given by Christ and his apostles unto cer- tain persons only, that is to say, unto priests or bishops, whom they did elect, call, and admit thereunto by their prayer and imposition of their hands." " Secondly, — The invisible gift of grace conferred in this sacrament is nothing else but the power, the offices, and the authority before mentioned : the visible agid out- ward sign is the prayer and imposition of the bishop's hands, upon the person which receiveth the said gift or grace. And to the intent the church of Christ should never be destitute of such ministers as should have and execute the said power of the keys, it was also ordained and commanded by the apostles, that the same sacrament should be applyed and ministered by the bishop from time to time, unto such other persons as had the qualities, which the apostles very diligently deseryve [describe ;] as it ap- peareth evidently in the third chapter of the First Epistle of St. Paul to Timothy, and his Epistle unto Titus. And surely this is the whole virtue and efficacy, and the cause also of the institution of this sacrament, as it is found in the New Testament ; for albeit the holy fathers of the church which succeeded the apostles, minding to beautifie and ornate the church of Christ with all those things which were commendable in the temple of the Jews, did devise not only certain other ceremonies than be before rehearsed, as tonsures, rasures, unctions, and such other observances to be used in the administration of the said 148 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. sacraments, but did also institute certain inferiottr orders or degrees, janitors, lectors, exorcists, acolits and subdeacons, and deputed to every one of those certain offices to exe- cute in the church, wherein they followed undoubtedly the example and rites used in the Old Testament ; yet the TRUTH IS, that in the New Testament there is no mention made of any degrees or distinctions in orders, but only of deacons or ministers, and of priests or bishops : nor is there any word spoken of any other ceremony used in the conferring of this sacrament, but only of prayer, and the imposition of the bishop's hands." " Thomas (Ld.) Cromwell, {the King's Vicar Geoffrey Downes. General.) John Skip. T. Cranmer, Archbishop of Canteibury. Cuthbert Marshall. Edward, Archbishop of York. Marmaduke Waldeby. John, Bishop of London. Robert Oking. Cuthbert, Bishop of Durham. Nicholas Heyth. John, Bishop of Lincoln. Ralph Bradford. John, Bishop of Bath. Richard Smith. Thomas, Bishop of Ely. Simon Matthew. John, Bishop of Bangor. John Prynn. Nicholas, Bishop of Salisbury. William Buckmastre. Edward, Bishop of Hereford. "William Maye. Hugo,^ishop of Worcester. Nicholas Wotton. John, Bishop of Rochester. Richard Cox. Richard, Bishop of Chichester. John Edmonds. Richard Wolman. Thomas Robertson- John Bell. Thomas Baret. William ClyfFe. John Nase. Robert Aldridge. John Barbar. (Some other hands there are that cannot be read,) doctors of laws and doctors of divinity. ^^* Here the reader sees the Church of England solemnly declare, in convocation, that bishops and presbyters are one and the same ojffice. Their ''^ power., authority, and commis- sion under Christ," are made equal ; in which is expressly laid down their, equal power, authority, and commission " to order \ordain\ and consecrate others in the same room, order, and office, whereunto they be called and ad- mitted themselves." This is their solemn view of the " divine institution of bishops and presbyters,''^ What then can the reader think of those divines of this Church who deny that bishops and presbyters are, by divine right, ac- t Burnet's History of the Reformation, Collection of Records, B. 3, Add. No. 5. 4 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 149 cording to the true Church of England, one and the same office ; and deny also that ordination by presbyters is, by divine institution^ equal to ordination by bishops ? If any should pretend that the doctrine of this Church has been altered since the time above referred to, let him show when and where; let him produce the documents published by the Church, met in solemn convocation rescinding or repeal- ing the above, and as plainly declaring the order of bish- ops to be by divine institution superior to, and incompatible with, the office of presbyters as such ; and that such bishops ALONE have "power, authority, and commission, under Christ, to order and consecrate others in the same room^ order, and stead, whereunto they be called and admitted themselves." Nothing short of this will avail. They know they cannot do it. The date of the above document Burnet shows to be 1537 or 1538. In Burnet's account of the drawing up of a " Declaration of the Christian Doctrine for Necessary Erudition of a Christian Man," he remarks, that the convo- cation books are lost ; but that Fuller, his only guide, " assures the world that he copies out of the records with his own hand what he published." Now Fuller calls the assembly of bishops, &c., that drew up this declaration a convocation. Burnet has a little doubt of the correctness of this statement. But all he says is easily reconcilable with it. It would be out of all rule to allow trifles to set aside the statement made by a grave divine, declaring to the world that " he copies out of the records with his own hand." The assembly, then, was a convocation. This point is thus decided by Dr. Laurence : " Before its pub- lication it was approved by the convocation then sitting, in which it was examined in parts, as appears evident from the Minutes of that assembly, in Wilkins's Concilia Mag- nas Britanniae, vol. iii, p. 868."* The work thus drawn up, examined, and approved by the convocation, " The Ne- cessary Erudition of a Christian Man," was published by royal authority, and hence also usually called the King's Book. No determinations in the Church of England can have higher authority. In the chapter of orders, they " expressly resolve that priests and bishops, by God^s law, are o?ie and the same ; and that the power of ordination * Dr. Laurence's Bampton Lectures, p. 19 L 150 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. and excommunication belongs equally to both."* What can be more decisive ! Comment would darken this clear statement ; and to multiply words would be to dilute and weaken its force. The following are extracts from their decisions indi- vidually. Cranmer, archbishop of Canterbury. — " The hish- ops and priests were at one time, and were no two things; but BOTH ONE OFFICE in the beginning of Christ's religion." Bishop of London. — " I think the bishops were first ; and yet I think it is not of importance, whether the priest then MADE the bishop, or the bishop \he priest ; considering after the sentence of Jerome, that in the beginning of the church there was none (or if it were, very small) differ- ence between a bishop and a priest, especially touching the signification." Dr. Robertson. — " I do not think it absurd that a priest should consecrate a bishop, if a bishop cannot be had." Dr. Cox. — "Although by Scripture, (as St. Hierome saith,) priests and bishops be one, and therefore the one not before the other ; yet bishops, as they be now, were after priests ; and therefore made of (by) priests." Dr. Redmayne. — " They all be of like beginning, and at the beginning were both one, as St. Hierome and other old authors show by the Scriptures, wherefore one made another indifferently.'''' Burnet says that Dr. Redmayne "was esteemed the 7nost learned and judicious divine of that time." When the convocation " were about to state the true notion of faith, Cranmer commanded Dr. Redmayne, who was esteemed the most learned and judicious divine of that time, to write a short treatise on these heads ; which he did with that solidity and clearness, that it will * Calamy's Defence of Nonconformity, vol. i, p. 91, ed. 1703. This is the substance of that chapter, given in the words of Calamy. Its words in the Necessary Erudition are such as the following : " Of two orders only, that is to say, priests and deacons, Scripture maketh ex- press mention." Here presbyters and bishops are both one order. ^^ All lawful -powers and authorities of one bishop over another were to be given to them by the consent or ordinance, and positive laws of men only, and not by any ordinance of God in Holy Scripture." Then speaking of ministers of the gospel in general as successors of the apos- tles, they say that " Christ set them all indifferently ^ and in like power, dignity, and authority^ ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 151 suflSciently justify any advantageous character that can be given of the author." Here we find not only the most express statements that the reformers of the Church of England believed " bishops and presbyters to be one and the same ofice" but that PRESBYTERS MADE, that is, ORDAINED BISHOPS, and bishops presbyters, indifferently. The reader is now prepared to see through another common mistake. The Book for Ordaining Priests and bishops is appealed to in proof that the Church of England maintains that bishops and presbyters are not, by divine institution, one and the same off.ce. Now the principal bishops and divines who composed the Book of Ordination in King Edward's time, were the same as those whose views on the divine institution of bishops and priests have been given above, and whose decisions in solemn convo- cation, ratified by royal authority, we have just heard. This book, the Book of Orders, was put forth in the time of King Edward VI. Cranmer, and most of the other compilers, outlived him. The interpretation, therefore, of this book, as then put forth, which would go to maintain episcopacy as by di^dne right to have powers and authority incompatible with priests or presbyters, as such, would be to assert that these eminent men determined one thing in solemn convocation, and then immediately put forth a book contradicting their former determination, without ever giving any intimation of such a change in their views I Two parts of the Book of Ordination are appealed to by these writers for the purpose of maintaining the superiority of episcopacy by divine right : the part of the office for or- daining a bishop, as distinct from that part of the office for ordaining a presbyter ; and the preface to the book itself. First, then, as to the part of the office for ordaining or consecrating a bishop : let the reader keep in mind, that the question is not whether the English reformers made a class of ministers called archbishops and bishops, distinct from priests or presbyters ; no one denies this ; but the question is, did they do this on the principle of the divine right of the order of bishops, as distinct from, superior to, and incompatible with presbyters as presbyters ; or did they do it as an ecclesiastical arrangement, for the honour of the bishops and the church ; for order, peace, unity, and 152 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. good government ? They have solemnly answered for them- selves, that " by divine institution," bishops and pres- byters were one and the sa7ne office ; therefore they meant the distinction above referred to merely as an ecclesiastical arrangement according to the views of the Christian fathers, for the purposes just now specified. This is further evident from a fact of which many readers are not aware : it is this, that in the original hook, and up to the time of Charles XL, there was no difference in the words of ordaining a bishop, to DISTINGUISH his office from that of a presbyter. Bishop Burnet grants " there was then no express mention made in the words of ordaining them, that it was for the one or the other office." It cannot be denied ; the old form is standing evidence of the fact. In the time of King Charles II., about 1662, the bishops who had the care of revising the ordination service, after these words, "Receive the Holy Ghost," — added, with regard to priests, — " for the OFFICE and work of a priest, now committed unto thee by the imposition of our hands :" — and, with respect to the bishop, " for the office and work of a bishop in the Church of God, now committed unto thee by the imposi- tion of our hands, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." And in the interrogatories put to the bishop elect, there is one added, not anciently used, namely, this : " Will you be faithful in ordaining, sending, or laying hands upon others ?" with this answer — " I will so be by the help of God." Moreover those pas- sages of the New Testament that speak so expressly on the duties of a Scriptural bishop, were made part of the office of ordaining a priest or presbyter, and continued so until 1662. The form of ordaining a presbyter commenced with the epistle, as it is termed, out of Acts xx, 17-35 : or, in its place, 1 Tim. iii, entire. The reader will do well to read the places. Then for the gospel, — the commission given by our Lord to his ministers, as in Matt, xxviii, 18, and other passages out of John, chapter x, and xx. Now these passages thus applied to presbyters, in the solemn act of setting them apart to their office, clearly show that the Book of Orders, up to 1662, bore solemn testimony to their being, by divine right. Scriptural bishops ; and the very COMMISSION (Matt, xxviii, 18) about which high Churchmen make such a parade as belonging solely to bishops as a ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 153 distinct order, superior to, and incompatible %vitli presby- ters simply as such — this very commissian is, in this solemn dct, given by the reformers to presbyters alone, and is never applied to bishops as such, in any part of their ordi- nation. In the revision of 1662 these scriptures were omitted in the form of ordaining a presbyter, and were ge- nerally transferred to the form of consecrating a bishop. There was, indeed, in the old form of the consecration of a bishop, ver}^ little Scripture employed. The reformers, it is clear, looked upon it only as a decent ceremony, but as having no Scriptural authority, nor conferring any addition- al divine authority.* The changes in 1662 maybe thought to show the wishes of some of the parties concerned ; but still they do not alter elxij principle in the old form. All the alterations consist in detail and arrangement. The reformers of the Church of England, also, appointed presbyters to perform the imposition of hands in ordaining presbyters, along with bishops. So directs the Book of Ordaining Priests, &c. : " When this prayer is done, the bishop, WITH THE PRIESTS present, shall lay their hands severally upon the head of every one that receiveth the order of priesthood ; the receivers humbly kneeling upon their knees, and the bishop saying, Receive the Holy Ghost," &c. As the reformers believed that bishops and presbj'ters were, by the Scripture, one and the same office, this ordi- nation was, in their view, the only real Scriptural ordina- tion constituting any person a minister of God's word. Presbyters then are actually ordainers in all the Scriptural ordinations that ever have taken place in the Church of England. Several acts of parliament have ratified the or- dination of such as were ordained by presbyters only. Thus in the 13th of Elizabeth, cap. 12— "An act for the ministers of the Church to be of sound reUgion. That the churches of the queen's majesty's dominions may be served with pastors of sound religion, Be it enacted, that every person under the degree of bishop, which doth or shall pretend to be a priest, or minister of God's holy word and sacrament, by reason of any other form of institution, consecration or ordering, [ordaining,^ than the form set forth by parliament, shall declare his assent and subscribe the articles," and on these conditions he shall retain orders * Vide Burnet's Records, book 3, No. 21, quest. 10-14. 5* 154 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. and benefice. So in the 12tli Caroli, cap. 17 — "Beit enacted, tliat any ecclesiastical person or minister, being ordained by any ecclesiastical persons, &c., shall be, and is hereby declared, adjudged, and enacted to have been, be and continue the real and lawful incumbent, parson, rector, vicar and possessor of the said ecclesiastical benefice, livings and promotions respectively to all intents and pur- poses whatever." By these acts, hundreds of ministers who had no more than preshyterian ordination, or ordination by presbyters alone, without the presence of any bishop, were confirmed in their livings as true ministers in the Church of England. See a license also to this effect by Archbishop Grindal, " approving and ratifying the form of ordination," by a Scotch, presbytery , of Mr. Morrison, a Scots divine ; and giving hira commission " throughout the whole diocess of Canterbury, to celebrate divine offices, to minister sac- raments," &c.* " No bishop in Scotland, during my stay in that kingdom," saith Burnet, bishop of Sarum, " ever did so much as desire any of the Presbyterians to be reordain- ed."j Bishop Cosin, speaking of the presbyterian ordina- tion of the French churches, says, "If at anytime a minister so ordained in these French churches came to incorporate himself in ours, and to receive a public charge, or cure of souls among us, in the Church of England, (as I have known some of them to have so done of late, and can in- stance in many other before my time,) our bishops did not reordain him before they admitted him to his charge ; as they must have done, if his former ordination in France had been void. Nor did our laics require more of him than to declare his public consent to the religion received among us, and to subscribe the articles established." See a letter from Dr. John Cosin, afterward bishop of Durham, to Mr. Cordel, who scrupled to communicate with the French Protestants upon some of the modern pretences, published by Dr. Isaac Basire, archdeacon of Northum- berland, in his account of Bishop Cosin, annexed to his funeral sermon, and given as an appendix to " the judgment of the Church of England in the case of lay baptism."! ^^ * Neal's History of the Puritans, vol. i. t Bishop of Sarum's Vindication, printed London, 1696, pp. 84, 85, as quoted by Owen in his " Ordination by Presbyters," Introd. t Second edit. London, 1712. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 155 is a curious fact, that anciently incumbents, rectors, &c., were styled prelates.* As tlie constitution of this Church has established an order of men as bishops or su- perintendents, requiring all important matters to be under their superintendency, and that no ordinations especially should be performed without them, it is right enough to refuse any one regularly to minister in that Church, who positively and wilfully resists this arrangement. If this be done without claiming divine right for this superintendency, and without attempting to unchurch other churches because they do not adopt it, the writer would not say one word against it. Every church has a right to use its own judg- ment in such matters. Now for the second point, viz., the preface to the Book of Ordination. The words in the preface — " It is evident unto all men, diligently reading Holy Scripture and ancient authors, that from the apostles' time, there hath been these orders of ministers in the Christian church ; bishops, priests, and deacons" — are the same as they were in King Edward's ordinal, and therefore have the same interpretation; for there is nothing declared to the contrary in the revision of 1662. The question here, then, can be only as to the meaning which the reformers attached to the term order. Now we have seen that the fathers used it for a distinc- tion of persons in the church, possessing equal powers, by divine right, as gospel ministers. The reformers were familiar with the writings of the fathers. The proper in- terpretation of their language, then, is, that they mean, that from the apostles' times such disti?ictions as bishops, presbyters, and deacons had existed ; not that the office or duties of a bishop were by divine institution incompatible with the office of a presbyter as a presbyter ; for they ex- pressly affirmed the contrary. The bishop of London, as above quoted, along with Cranmer, intimates that there might be " some small difference between a bishop and a priest in the beginning of the church." That some dis- tinction did exist even in the apostles' time, we do not * Johnson's Clergyman's Vade Mecum, vol. i, pp. 183, 212, ed. 4th. Bishop Burnet, in the preface to his Vindication of the Ordinations of the Church of England, shows that several abbots, though no more than presbyters, not only wore the mitre, but ordained even bishops. 156 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. deny. We only deny that the powers and authority of bishops and presbyters were incompatible with each other as such, by divine right. There is considerable proof, as was shown in section iii, that presbyters were superior in honour and duties to bishops, perhaps as much so as rectors are to curates ; yet not so as to constitute authority and powers incompatible with the office of bishops. The preface, then, contains no proof of bishops, by divine right, as an order such as high Churchmen pretend. Additional evidence will arise both to the above inter- pretation of the Book of Orders, and to the general ques- tion, by the testimony of Bishop Jewel.* Jewel was bishop in Elizabeth's time, considerably after the publish- ing of the Book of Ordering Bishops, Priests, and Deacons. He stands in the very first class of reformers for talent, piety, and learning ; and for the ability with which he de- fended the Church of England against the Papists. " His Apology," says Dr. Randolph, " has had the sanction of public authority, and may therefore be relied on as con- taining the final and decided opinion of our reformers, approved in the general by the church at large."! The Apology was published in 1562. Harding, a Jesuit, pub- lished a Confutation of it. Jewel replied in a Defence of his Apology. This Defence, imbodying the Apology also, was in such universal and high repute, that it was placed in the parish churches to be read by all, as giving the best view of all the matters therein contained, corro- borated by the authorities of Scripture and the fathers of the first six centuries. Many have probably seen this huge folio, fastened with chains to a reading-desk, in the church. The edition from which I quote has a large strong iron plate at the bottom, with a hole through it, where the chain had been formerly fastened. In his Apology, he says, " That the catholic church is the king- dom, the body, and spouse of Christ; that Christ is the * Richard Hurrel Froude, a first-rate Oxford Tract-man, speaking of this illustrious writer, says, " Jewel was what you, [the Oxford Tract-men,] in these days, call an irreverent Dissenter. His Defence of his Apology disgusted me more than almost any work I ever read. He laughs at the apostolical succession, both in principle and as a fact; and says that the only succession worth having is the succession of DOCTRINE." — Fronde's Remains. t Preface to Dr. Randolph's " Enchiridion Theologicum." ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 157 only Prince of this kingdom ; that there are in the church divers orders of ministers ; that there are some who are deacons, others who are presbyters, and others who are bishops, to whom the instruction of the people, and the care and management of religion, are committed." Part ii, sec. 6. Now here is the distinction of bishops, presbyters, and deacons, called " divers orders.""^ Does this great writer, and champion of the Church of England, then, mean that bishops are an order, by divine right, with powers and authority incompatible with presbyters, as such ? Let him explain himself in his Defence. Harding, it seems, for the sake of cavilling, had introduced the question of the difference between priests and bishops, or " the distinction of a bishop and a priest," as he himself expresses it. Bishop Jewel says, " Here, to weigh down the AUTHORITY of God's HOLY WORD, Mr. Harding hath brought in a heap of ordinary stale quarrels of the differ- ence between priests and bishops ; of Lent ; of the com- munion book ; of the homilies ; of the order of service ; and of the perpetual virginity of our Ladie. His whole DRIFT herein is to bear us in hand, that there is very little or NO AUTHORITY in the Scriptures ; and that the whole credit and certainty of our faith resteth only in the Church of Rome. But what means Mr. Harding here to come in with the difference between priests and bishops ? Thinketh he that* priests and bishops hold only by tra- dition 1 Or is it so horrible a heresy as he maketh it, to say that hy the Scriptures of God, a bishop and d^. priest are ALL ONE 1 Or knoweth he how far, and unto whom he reacheth the name of heretic ? Verily Chrysostom saith, ' Between a bishop and a priest in a manner there is no difference.'' St. Hierome saith, somewhat in rougher sort, ' I hear say there is one become so peevish, that he setteth deacons before priests, that is to say, before bishops: whereas the apostle plainly teaches us, that priests and * Jewel does not here mean the distinction only, but the things themselves also : for his (Harding's) whole drift, and the whole drift of Popery, is, "to bear us in hand that there is very little or no authority in the Scriptures ; and that the whole credit and certainty of our faith resteth only in the Church of Rome. ^^ — A remark which no Protestant should ever forget. To accomplish this, some of their greatest men have exerted all their learning and ingenuity. 158 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. bishops be all one,' Augustine saith, 'What is a bishop but the first priest, — that is, the highest priest V So saith St, Ambrose, ' There is but one consecration of priests and bishops : for both of them are priests, but the bishop is the first.^ All these, and other more holy fathers, together WITH St, Paul the apostle, for thus saying, by Mr, Harding's advice, must be holden for heretics."* He thus quotes Augustine in another place : " Augustine saith ' the office of a bishop is above the office of a priest,' {not by authority of the Scriptures, but) after the names of honour which the custom of the church hath now obtained," p. 100. The words ^^ not by authority of Scripture, ^^ are Jewel's own words, put in to explain Augustine's sense. Jewel, we see, perfectly agrees with Cranmer, and the rest of the bishops and divines who formed the Constitu- tion, Government, and Book of Ordination, of the Church of England. He believes " bishops and presbyters, by the Scriptures of God, are all one ;" that, as Augustine saith, " the office of a bishop is above the office of a priest, (not by authority of the Scriptures, but) after the names of honour which the custom of the church hath obtained." His mention, as we have seen, in the Apology, of '•'■ divers orders, deacons, presbyters, and bishops," does not imply that the order of bishops has, by " authority of Scripture," prerogatives incompatible with presbyters, but that, while by the Scriptures, as to rights and authority, they are one, yet they are there distinct names, and that the bishop is the first priest or presbyter, and above the other presbyters by the names of honour which the cusTo:\r of the church hath obtained. So meant the reformers, and so means the ordination service. Dr. Whitaker, who lived in the time of Queen Elizabeth, was a profoundly learned divine of the Church of England, and a mighty champion of the Reformation against Popery, He says, " I confess that there was originally no difference between a presbyter and a bishop, Luther, and the other heroes of the Reformation, were presbyters, even accord- ing to the ordination of the Romish Church ; and, there- fore, they were, jure divino, bishops. Consequently, what- ever belongs to bishops, belongs also, jure divino, to them- selves. As for bishops being afterward placed over pres- * Page 202, fol. ed., 1609. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 159 byters, that was a human arrangement for the removal of schisms, as the histories of the times testify."* Hooker appears to maintain the very same view in his fifth book of Ecclesiastical Polity, a work of the very highest authority with the Church of England, and for its reasoning, its language, and its learning, the admiration of all. The sixth, seventh, and eighth books are of no AUTHORITY ; they were not published by hhnself, and are acknowledged to have been altered much by other hands ; so that no confidence whatever can be placed in them as Hooker's. In the fifth book, sec. 78, he says, " Touching the ministry of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the whole body of the church being divided into laity and clergy, the clergy are either preshyters or deacons.''^ Now where are bishops ? nowhere, except they be one and the same as presbyters. Nothing can be plainer. " For oi preshy- ters, some vjere greater, some less in power, and that by our Saviour's own appointment ; the greater, they which re- ceived fulness of spiritual power, and the less, they to whom less was granted." Let the reader carefully attend, and he will see that by the greater presbyters he means the first apostles endowed with power of miracles, &c., and by the less or inferior presbyters, he means all other ordinary Christian ministers, without distinction. He goes on : " The apostles' peculiar charge was to publish the gospel of Christ unto all nations, and to deliver them his ordinances received by i?nmediate revelation. Which pre- eminence excepted, to all other offices and duties incident to their" (that is, the apostles') " order, it was in them to ordaine and consecrate w^homsoever they thought meet, even as our Saviour did himself assign seventy others of his own disciples inferior presbyters, whose commission to preach and baptize was the same which the apostles had." Here, then, all are inferior presbyters, except the twelve apostles, who received greater fulness of spiritual power, and delivered ordinances by immediate revelation; and, which pre-eminence excepted, to all other offices and duties incident to the order of the twelve apostles, all the inferior presbyters were ordained and consecrated by the apostles. " To these two degrees'^ (as above men- tioned) " appointed of our Lord and Saviour Christ, his * Whitakeri 0pp., vol. i, pp. 509 et 510, fol, Genev., 1610. 160 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. apostles soon after annexed deacons.''^ — " It appeareth, therefore, how long these three degrees of ecclesiastical order have continued in the church of Christ," (1.) "the highest and largest, that which the apostles,^'' (2.) "the next, that which the presbyters,^'' (3.) " the lowest, that which deacons had." — " Evangelists were presbyters, of principal sufficiency." — " Pastors, what other were they than presbyters also ?" — " I beseech them, therefore, which have hitherto troubled the church with questions about degrees and offices of ecclesiastical calling, because they principally ground themselves upon two places, (1 Cor. ii, 28; Ephes. iv, 7-12,) that all partiality laid' aside, they would sincerely weigh and examine whether they have not misinterpreted both places, and all by surmising in- compatible offices where nothing is meant but sundry' graces, gifts, and abilities which Christ bestowed." — " It clearly appeareth, that churches apostolike did know but three degrees in the power of ecclesiastical order, at the first, (1.) 'Apostles,' (2.) ' Preshjters,' and (3.) 'Dea- cons;' AFTERWARD, instead of apostles, bishops, concern- ing whose order we are to speak in the seventh book." This he never published. But he has clearly given his judgment that presbyters and bishops, in " apostolic churches,''' were one and the same order and office. All the ordinary powers and offices of apostles, he affirms, be- long to all gospel ministers, whom he calls, compared with the twelve apostles, " inferior presbyters." The powers of ordination were among those powers, and therefore be- long equally to them all, by divine right, whether bishops or presbyters. They were all one and the same in "apostolike churches." Bishops, as superintendents over other ministers, were not, according to Hooker, in the apostolike churches ; they arose afterward. Hooker's design was not to establish the divi>e right of episcopacy, but to oppose the exclusive claim for the di- vine right of presbyterianism ; and to show that the cere- monies and discipline of the Church of England were lawful, that is, not antiscriptural, not sinful. Accordingly we find him, in the third book of his celebrated work, actually and ably reasoning against the exclusive divine right of any special form of church government : " We must note," says he, " that he which affirmeth speech to ON APOSTOLIC AX SUCCESSION. 161 be necessary among 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." — " The general principles [of Scripture] are such as do not parti- cularly prescribe any one, but sundry may equally be con- sonant unto the general axiomes of the Scripture." — •" We reckon matters of government in the number of things accessary, not things necessary." — " But as for those things that are accessary, those things that so belong to the way of salvation, as to alter them, is no otherwise to change that way, than a path is changed by altering only the up- permost face thereof, which be it laid with gravel, or set with grass, or paved with stones, remaineth still the same path ; in such things because descretion may teach the church what is convenient, we hold not the church further tyed herein unto Scripture, than that against Scripture nothing be admitted in the church, lest that path which ought always to be kept even, do thereby become to be overgrown with brambles and thorns." — " I therefore con- clude, that neither God's being author of laws for govern- ment of his church, nor his committing them unto Scripture, is reason sufficient, wherefore all churches should for ever be bound to keep them without change." This surely is sufficient to destroy for ever the claims of high Churchmen to the authority of Hooker in favour of their exclusive sys- tem. Hooker did not deny that presbyterianism was a valid form of church government, but he denied its exclusive validity ; and maintamed that episcopacy, when adopted by the church, was equally valid. So also the 36th Arti- cle : — " The Book of Consecration of Archbishops, &c., doth contain all things necessary to such consecration and ordering ; neither hath it any tiling, that of itself is super- stitious and uxGODLY." Many of the Puritans and rigid Presbyterians denied this ; and were utterly opposed to an order of bishops at all, even as a human arrangement, as perpetual governors of ministers as well as oi people. This arose from what they had seen of it in Popery, and in some who abused it in their day. Though Popery did not maintain the divine right of bishops, yet the pope gave them rights, power, and jurisdiction ; and the bishops, in return, 162 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. took a solemn oath to be faithful to the pope ; they JOINED THEIR AUTHORITY to Twet the chaius of pricstlt/ tyranny and bondage upon the church. The name of bishop, therefore, as weil as that of pope, had generally become hateful at the Reformation and afterward. As the documentary evidence in this section has been considered highly valuable, the reader probably will not regret the insertion of an extract from Dr. Field's work " Of the Church." Dr. Field was a learned divine of the Church of England in the days of Queen Elizabeth, and of James I. Mr. Palmer has pronounced his Avork to be profoundly learned. It is highly valued ; and is both very scarce and very dear, so that but few readers can have access to it. This learned defender of the Church of England thus speaks on the subject of the identity of bishops and presbyters : — " But they will say, whatsoever may be thought of these places wherein bishops did ordain, yet in many other none but presbyters did impose hands ; all which ordinations are clearly void : and so, by consequence, many of the pretended reformed churches, as namely those of France, and others, have no ministry at all. The next thing, therefore, to be examined is, whether the power of ordination be so essentially annexed to the order of bishops, that none but bishops may in any case ordain. For the clearing whereof we must observe, that the whole ecclesiastical power is aptly divided into the power of order, and jurisdiction. Ordo est rerum pari- um dispariumque unicuique sua loca trihuens congrua dispo- sitio : that is, — Order is an apt disposing of things, whereof some are greater and some lesser, some better and some meaner, sorting them accordingly into their several ranks and places. First, therefore, order doth signify that mutual reference or relation, that things sorted into their several ranks and places, have between themselves. Secondly, that standing, which each thing obtaineth, in that it is better or worse, greater or lesser than another, and so accordingly sorted and placed, above or below other, in the orderly disposition of things. The power of holy or ecclesiastical order is nothing else but that power which is specially given to men sanctified and set apart from others, to per- form certain sacred supernatural and eminent actions, which others of another rank may not at all, or not ordi- i ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 163 narily meddle with. As to preach the word, administer the sacraments, and the like. " The next kind of ecclesiastical power is that of juris- diction. For the more distinct and full understanding whereof we must note, that three things are implied in the calling of ecclesiastical ministers. First, an election, choice, or designment of persons fit for so high and excel- lent employment. Secondly, the consecrating of them, and giving them power and authority to intermeddle with things pertaining to the service of God, to perform eminent acts of gracious efficacy, and admirable force, tending to the procuring of the eternal good of the sons of men, and to peld unto them whom Christ hath redeemed with his most precious blood, all the comfortable means, assurances, and helps that may set forward their eternal salvation. Thirdly, the assigning and dividing out to each man, thus sanctified to so excellent a work, that portion of God's people which he is to take care of, who must be directed by him in things that pertain to the hope of eternal salva- tion. This particular assignation giveth, to them that had only the power of order before, the power of jurisdiction also over the persons of men. " Thus, then, it is necessary that the people of God be sorted into several portions, and the sheep of Christ divided into several flocks, for the more orderly guiding of them, and yielding to them the means, assurances, and helps that may set them forward in the way of eternal life ; and that several men be severally and specially assigned to take the care and oversight of several flocks and por- tions of God's people. The apostles of Christ and their successors, when they planted the churches, so divided the people of God converted by their ministry, into parti- cular churches, that each city and the places near adjoin- ing did make but one church. Now because the unity and peace of each particular church of God, and flock of his sheep, dependeth on the unity of the pastor, and yet the necessities of the many duties that are to be performed iii churches of so large extent, require more ecclesiastical ministers than one : therefore though there be many pres- byters, that is, md^ny fatherly guides of one church, yet there is one among the rest that is specially pastor of the place, vfhOjfor distinction sake, is named a bishop; to whom an 164 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. eminent and peerelesse power is given, for the avoiding of schisms and factions : and the rest are but assistants and coadjutors, and named by the general name of presbyters. So that in the performance of the acts of ecclesiastical ministry, when he is present and will do them himself, they must give place : and in his absence, or when being present he needeth assistance, they may do nothing with- out his consent and liking. Yea so far, for order sake, is he preferred before the rest, that some things are specially reserved to him only, as the ordaining of such as should assist him in the work of his ministry, the reconciling of penitents, confirmation of such as were baptized, by im- position of hands, dedication of churches, and such like. " These being the diverse sorts and kinds of ecclesias- tical power, it will easily appear to all them that enter into the due consideration thereof, that the power of ecclesias- tical or sacred order, that is, the power and authority to intermeddle with things pertaining to the service of God, and to perform eminent acts of gracious efficacy, tending to the procuring of the eternal good of the sons of men, is EQUAL and the same in all those whom we call presby- ters, that is, fatherly guides of God's church and people : and that only for order sake, and the preservation of peace, there is a limitation of the use and exercise of the same. Hereunto agree all the best learned among the Romanists themselves, freely confessing that that, wherein a bishop excelleth a presbyter, is not a distinct and higher order, or power of order, but a kind of dignity and office, or employment only. Which they prove, because a pres- byter ordained per saltum, that never was consecrated or ordained deacon, may notwithstanding do all those acts that pertain to the deacons order : (because the higher order doth always imply in it the lower and inferior, in an eminent and excellent sort.) But a bishop ordained per saltum, that never had the ordination of a presbyter, can neither consecrate and administer the sacrament of the Lord's body, nor ordain a presbyter, himself being none, nor do any act peculiarly pertaining to presbyters. Where- by it is most evident, that that wherein a bishop excelleth a presbyter, is not a distinct power of order, but an emi- nency and dignity only, specially yielded to one above all the rest of the same rank, for order sake, and to preserve ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 165 the unity and peace of the church. Hence it foUoweth, that many things which in some cases presbyters may lawfully do, are peculiarly reserved unto bishops, as Hie- rome noteth ; Potius ad honorem sacerdotii, quam ad legis necessitatem ; — Rather for the honour of their ministry, than the necessity of any law. And therefore we read, that presbyters, in some places, and at sometimes did impose hands, and confirm such as were baptized : which when Gregory, bishop of Rome, would wholly have forbidden, there was so great exception taken to him for it, that he left it free again. And who knoweth not, that all presby- ters, in cases of necessity, may absolve and reconcile penitents ; a thing in ordinary course appropriated unto bishops ? and why not by the same reason ordain presby- ters and deacons in cases of like necessity ? For, seeing the cause why they are forbidden to do these acts, is, be- cause to bishops ordinarily the care of all churches is committed, and to them in all reason the ordination of such as must serve in the church pertaineth, that have the chief care of the church, and have churches wherein to employ them ; which only bishops have as long as they retain their standing : and not presbyters, being but assistants to bishops in their churches. If they become enemies to God and true religion, in case of such necessity, as the care and government of the church is devolved to the pres- byters remaining catholick, and being of a better spirit : so the duty of ordaining such as are to assist or succeed them in the work of the ministry pertains to them likewise. For if the power of order and authority to intermeddle in things pertaining to God's service be the same in all presbyters, and that they be limited in the execution of it, only for orders sake, so that in case of necessity, every of them may baptize and confirm them whom they have baptized, absolve and reconcile penitents, and do all those other acts which regularly are appropriated unto the bishop alone ; there is no reason to be given, hwi that in case of necessity, wherein all bishops were extinguished by death, or being fallen into heresy, should refuse to ordain any to serve God in his true worship ; but that presbyters, as they may do all other acts, whatsoever special challenge bish- ops in ordinary course make unto them, might do this also. Who then dare condemn all those worthy ministers of God 106 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. that were ordained hy presbyters in sundry churches of the world, at such times as bishops in those parts where they lived, opposed themselves against the truth of God, and persecuted such as professed it. " But seeing bishops and presbyters are in the power of order the same ; as when the bishops of a whole church or country fall from the faith, or consent to them that so do, the care of the church is devolved to the presbyters re- maining catholick ; and as in the case of necessity they may do all other things regularly reserved to bishops only, (as Ambrose showeth, that the presbyters of Egypt were permitted in some cases to confirm the baptized, which thing also Gregorie after him durst not condemn,) so in case of general defect of the bishops of a whole country, refusing to ordain any but such as shall consent to their heresies, where there appeareth no hope of remedy or help from other parts of the church, the presbyters may choose out one among themselves to be chief, and so add other to their numbers by the imposition of his and their hands. This I have proved in my third book out of the authorities of Armachanus, and sundry other, of whom Alexander of Hales speaketh. To which we may add that which Du- randus hath, where he saith : That Hierome seemeth to have been of opinion, that the highest power of consecration or order, is the power of a priest or elder. So that every priest, in respect of his priestly power, may minister all sa- craments, CONFIRM the baptized, and give all orders : howsoever for the avoiding of the peril of schism, it was ordained that one should be chosen to have a pre-eminence above the rest, who was named a bishop, and to whom it was peculiarly reserved to give orders, and to do some such other things. And afterward he saith : That Hierome is clearly of this opinion."* One observation more shall conclude this section. Some may suppose, that if the power of orders, or ordain- ing, does not belong solely to bishops, and so constitute them by divine right a superior order, yet that the power oi jurisdiction does. By jurisdiction is meant the bishop's power of governing and judging both ministers and people. As to the fact, the bishops of the Church of England have this power each in his own diocess ; but by what right * Dr. Field on the Church, fol. ed., pp. 155-157 and 704. O.xford, 1628. i ox APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 167 or law ? If episcopacy, as a superior order, with the high prerogatives claimed for it, be of divine right, this jurisdiction must also be of divine right : but if there should be express acknowledgment in the constitution of the Church of England that their jurisdiction is of merely HUMAN origin, this will be another clear proof that, ac- cording to this Church, bishops have, by divine right, none of these prerogatives over presbyters, but are by the Scrip- tures one and the same office. Whatever views may be entertained as to the Scriptural right of the king of Eng- land to be supreme head of the Church, it is certain the Church of England maintains it as a fact; and here we have only to do with facts. Now the act of parliament in the twenty-sixth year of Henry YIIL, declares that the king " shall have full power and authority from time to time, to visit, repress, redress, reform, order, correct, restrain, and amend such errors, heresies, abuses, offences, contempts and enormities, whatsoever they be, which hy any manner of spiritual authority ox jurisdiction, ought or may lawfully be reformed." This was in 1535. According to the full power here given, commissions were issued to those who had bishoprics, giving them a license for their jurisdiction as hishops ; and they only held their jurisdiction on good behaviour, and at the king's pleasure. They are as fol- lows : — " Henry the VIII. king of England and France, defender of the faith, lord of Ireland, and, under Christ, supreme head of the Church on earth, to the reverend father in Christ, Edmund, bishop of London, peace, seeing all the authority of jurisdiction, and every kind of jurisdic- tion, as well that which is called secular, as that which is called ECCLESIASTICAL, emanates primarily from the kingly power as from a supreme head, &c. We, desiring to ac- cede to your humble supplication for this purpose, commit our office and authority to you in the manner and form hereafter described, and declare you to be licensed and appointed, therefore, to ordain to holy orders, &c. Also to make such visitations, &c., as the bishops of London, your predecessors, in past times, might exercise, by the laws of this realm, and not otherwise, &c. And to do every thing that in any way concerns episcopal authority and jurisdic- tion, over and above those things which are known to be committed unto you by authority of the Scripture, in our 168 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. stead, name, and authority. Having great confidence in your sound doctrine, purity of conscience, integrity of life, and faithful industry in the performance of your duties, &c., WE LICENSE YOU, by thcsc presents, during our plea- sure, &c., to answer before us as to your duty, at your bodily peril ; admonishing you in the mean time to exer- cise your office piously, holily, according to the rule of the gospel, and that you never at any time promote any one TO HOLY orders," &LC., (that is, otherwise than is here directed.) " In witness whereof we have commanded these presents to be made and confirmed by our seal for ecclesiastical causes. Given November 12th, 1539, and thirty-first year of our reign." Now these commissions profess to direct in matters " besides and beyond what are known to belong to bishops in the Scripture." What are those matters ? The answer is plain as to the meaning of the commission, for it mentions — the ordination of ministers, episcopal visitation, diW^ jurisdiction over minis- ters and people in that diocess. As bishops, none of these things belong to them any more than to any other minister, except by human authority. I am aware Bishop Burnet and others complain of the hardship of these commissions, and say that they were laid aside afterward : this does not in the least alter the question of law and authority. By 37th Henry VIII., cap. 17, it is enacted and declared, — " That archbishops, bishops, &c., have no manner oi juris- diction ecclesiastical, but by, under, and from his royal ma- jesty." These powers of the sovereign were renewed again as law in Edward VI., and in Elizabeth's reign ; and they continue to be the law of the land, as to the Church of England, to the present day. The conclusion, then, as to the Church of England, is, that the divine right of bishops is no part of its constitu- tion ; but that presbyters and bishops are, by authority of the Scripture, one and the same office ; that presbyters have EQUAL divine right to ordain ; but that, as a human arrangement, the order of bishops is lawful : and that the Book of Ordination has " all things necessary for that pur- pose ; neither hath it any thing of itself superstitious or ungodly r* All this I believe ex animo. * Dr. Holland, king's professor of divinity at Oxford, says, " That to affirm the office of bishop to be different from that of presbyter and ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 169 How lamentable ! that any ministers of this Church, for- getting the principles of the reformers, and violating the spirit of the gospel, should weaken Protestantism and strengthen the hands of Popery, by insulting all other Protestant ministers as schismatics ; denouncing their ordi- nances as the offerings of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram ; thus destroying the peace of all the Protestant churches in the world! May Heaven soon lead them into more Christian, brotherly, and pacific views ! May all Protest- ant churches unite, on the basis of the Bible, and in the spirit of Christianity, to proclaim a pure gospel, and to bring in the Redeemer's kingdom over all the earth ! SECTION VHI. BISHOPS AND PRESBYTERS THE SAME ORDER, SHOWN BY THE TESTIMONY OF ALL THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN THE WORLD. To hear some high Churchmen talk on this subject, a person would be led to think, that surely all the Christian churches in the world, ancient and modern, must have maintained that bishops are, by divine right, a distinct order, with powers and prerogatives of a very extraordinary and EXCLUSIVE character. How otherwise could it be, we should suppose, that men pretending to learning should dare to speak so pompously about them, and about the consequences of being blessed with such an order ? The only reasonable answer that can be given is, that they do not understand the subject. It has already been shown that the fathers did not maintain such a doctrine ; no council ever maintained it ; and we now proceed to show that no Christian church ever maintained this doctrine. The African church never maintained it ; as is clear by the case of the church of Alexandria, which was, at one time, one of the four or five great patriarchates into which the churches in the whole world were divided. Gregory superior to it, is most false ; contrary to Scripture, to the fathers, to the doctrines of the Church of England, yea, to the very schoolmen themselves." — Dr. Dwight's Theology, vol. v, p. 184, 8vo. 8 170 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. Nazianzen speaking, in his oration upon Athatiasius, about the importance of the see of Alexandria, says, " It is as though you should say that its bishop is bishop of the whole tvorlciy Tertullian, one of the most illustrious African fathers, teaches most expressly that bishops had no supe- riority by divine right : Jerome's testimony is decisive, as he lived so near to Egypt, having spent a great part of his life in Palestine. The Greek church never maintained the order of bishops by divine right : this is proved from the testimony of Fir- milian, bishop of Cesarea ; by the council of Ancyra, in the third century ; and from the epistle of the council of Nice. Theodoret, also, a Greek father in the fifth century, proves the same, as quoted in section iii. And there is no sufficient evidence, I believe, that the modern Greek church has decided differently from the ancient Greek church. Let us come to the Western church, as it is called, the Christian church in Europe ; and this as either included in the Latin church, or in those churches that have sepa- rated from that church. The Church of Rome never maintained such an order of bishops, by divine right, as our high Churchmen main- tain. We have seen the testimony of Jerome and Augus- tine, whose writings have had greater authority in that church than the writings of all the other fathers besides. Jerome's opinion, nay, his very words, were put into the canon law, the ecclesiastical law of that church : canon, Olim, dist. 95, et canon, Legimus, dist. 93. And John Semeca, a doctor of the canon law, in his Gloss or Com- ment on the law : " They say, indeed, that in i)ie first age of the primitive church the names and ofiices of the bishops and presbyters were common ; but that in the second age of the primitive church, both the names and offices began to be distinguished.''^ The canon, Legimus, dist. 93, con- tains Jerome's Epistle to Evagrius entire. The first chap- ter, under dist. 95, is, as we have said, in the very words of Jerome, as given at page 93 of this Essay. The sixth chapter is wholly taken from the treatise on the " Seven Degrees" found in Jerome's Works, as mentioned at page 92. It is as follows : " Behold, I declare that pres- byters have the power to perform the sacraments, even ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 171 while their own bishops are standing at the altar. But, seeing it is written, ' Let the presbyters be honoured with double honour, especially such as labour in the word of God,' it is the duty of presbyters to preach ; their blessing edifies the people ; confirmation by them is suitably per- formed ; it is proper for them to give the communion ; it is necessary that they should visit the sick, pray for the weak, and perf or fn all the sacraments which God has given. Let none of the bishops, inflated, on this account, with the envy of a diabolical temptation, show their wrath in the church, if the presbyters sometimes exhort the people ; if they preach in the churches ; if, as it is written, they bless the people. To any one that opposes these things, I would say. Let him who forbids the presbyters what God has commanded them, tell me, who is greater than Christ ? or what is to be preferred to his body and to his blood ? If the presbyter consecrates Christ, when he pronounces the blessing upon the sacrament on the altar of God ; is not he worthy to bless the people, who is worthy even to con- secrate Christ 1 It is by your bidding, O ye most unjust bishops ! that the presbyter, as to the laity and the women, has been deprived of the office of giving God's benediction — has lost the very use of his tongue — has no confidence to preach — has been mutilated of every part of his powers and authority — nothing but the bare name of a presbyter is left — the plenitude and perfection of his consecration are taken away. Is this your honour, O ye bishops, thus to bring ruin upon the flock 1 For when by your power you take away from the pastors the privilege of performing with diligence what God has commanded, contagion and destruction spread among the flocks, and you bring evil upon the Lord's inheritance, while you wish alone to be great in the church. We read, that, in the beginning, presbyters were commanded to rule in the affairs of the church — presbyters were sometimes in the councils of bishops ; for presbyters themselves, as we read, were called bishops : accordingly it is written to a bishop, ' Neglect not the gift which is in thee by the laying on of my hands ;' and, in another place, to presbyters, ' (The Holy Ghost,) who has made you bishops to rule the church of God.^ But proud bishops hate to have this name given to presbyters : they do not approve of what Christ approved, who washed 172 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. the feet of the di&ciples — ^who was baptized by John, though John exclaimed that he needed to be baptized by him. I write these things for this purpose, that if the ERROR OF PAST TIME cannot he remedied, humility at least may at present be preserved, that presbyters may perform those things in their churches, which are done at Rome, in the East, in Italy, in Crete, in Cyprus, in Africa, in Illyricum, in Spain, in Britain, and even in part of Gaul j and which is done in every place where that humility continues which takes place in heaven, (a matter still higher,) where the seats of angels have their due order," The writer of this Essay expressly disclaims any intention by this quotation to reflect upon all bishops, as unrighteous or tyrannical men. Many bishops, in different ages, have been truly men of God. His chief object in the quotation is to show the views of the Romish Church on the subject of episcopacy by divine right, at the period when this part of the canon law was composed. Episcopacy, in general, is certainly here declared to be an error of past times : and bishops, many of them, are spoken of as usurping tyrants. Presbyters are spoken of as despoiled by them of the authority and usefulness which, by divine right, truly belonged to presbyters. Part of the seventh chapter of the council of Hispala, in Spain, in the seventh century, is worth translating : — " It has been reported to us that Agapius, bishop of Cordova, has frequently appointed village bishops (chor-episcopi) or presbyters {icho hy the canons are both one) to consecrate altars and churches without the presence of the bishop. Which, indeed, is not to be wondered at, principally for this reason, that the bishop is a man ignorant oi ecclesiastical discipline. Therefore it ought to be determined unani- mously, that no such license should be used among us, knowing that the appointment and consecration of an altar is not allowed either to a presbyter or to a village bishop. For in the sacred Scriptures, the Lord commanded that Moses alone should erect the altar in the tabernacle, that he alone should anoint it, because he was the high priest, as it is written concerning him, ' Moses and Aaron among his priests.' Therefore that which the head priests alone might do, of whom Moses and Aaron were types, the preshyterSy who resemble Aaron's sons, ought not to pre- ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 173 sume to seize. For though in the dispensation of the sa- cred mysteries most things are com?non to presbyters and bishops, yet some by the authority of the Old Testament^ and so?ne by the authority of the emperors laws^ and by ecclesiastical rules, the presbyters know to be forbidden to them, as the consecration of presbyters, deacons, and vir- gins, the erection of an altar, the benediction and the unc- tion ; seeing it is not permitted to them to give the bene- diction to the church, nor to consecrate altars, nor to lay on hands in baptism, nor to give the Holy Ghost to such as are converted from heresy, nor to make the unction or holy ointment, nor to sign the forehead of the baptized with the holy ointment, nor even to reconcile a penitent publicly in the time of mass, nor to give recommendatory letters. For ail these things are disallowed to presbyters, because they are not in the highest part of the priesthood, which, by the command of the canons, belongs only to bishops.^'' Here are distinctions enough, with a witness, between bishops and presbyters. And here is a true history of them : — an argument from a type or figure in the Old Testament ; ecclesiastical rules ; and the emperor's laws. But do these make the distinction to be of divine right ? The council expressly declares the very reverse, and that it is " by the command of the canons." Besides, presbyters and chor-episcopi, village bishops are treated as the same : one law is applied to both. Now Bishop Taylor and others grant that ^^.llage bishops had the power to ordain, &c., and that such regulations only limit its exercise ; the same is true as to presbyters. And the author of the Trea- tise on the Seven Degrees, above mentioned, gives the same account. He says, " The ordination of clergymen, the consecration of virgins, the dedication of altars, and the preparation of the chrism, were reserved to the bishop SOLELY ybr the purpose of giving him authority or honour, lest the discipline of the church, being separated among many, divisions should arise between the ministers, and should produce general scandal. For this cause also the election of bishops has lately been transferred to the me- tropolitan ; and while this high power is given to the me- tropolitan, the same power is taken away from others ; so that the bishops themselves, as high priests, begin to feel another placed over them ; and this not as a matter of divine 174 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. right, but as a matter of necessity, arising from the nature of the case." Here the ground of the distinction between bishops and presbyters is considered to be the same as that between bishops and archbishops, that is to say, it is merely an ecclesiastical, prudential arrangement. Mr. Johnson, the translator of the canons of the univer- sal church, a strong succession advocate, and a man of great learning, says, " That opinion, that the order of priests and bishops was the same, prevailed in the Church of Rome for four or five ages [centuries] before the Refor- mation."* Thus, then, we have the history of the matter in this church up to the Reformation. Jerome determines the point in his day, A. D. 400. The canon law does the same, A. D. 1200. The learned Mr. Johnson, an unex- ceptionable witness with high Churchmen, settles the point for five hundred years before the Reformation. Bishop Burnet, too, we have seen, says, that at the Reformation it was " the common style of that age to reckon bishops and priests the satne office. ^^ Finally, the council of Trent positively refused to ac- knowledge the doctrine of the order of bishops by divine right. They decreed that the hierarchy was of divine right, and that bishops were in fact above presbyters ; but the pope's legates, and all who more especially belonged to the court of Rome, most strenuously opposed the doctrine of divine right of bishops. In these matters we only speak to facts ; and the facts are as above stated, as any one may see by consulting the acts and history of the council. It perhaps may surprise some, that we so decidedly charge the succession scheme as semi-popery, when in the doctrine of the divine right of bishops, an essential part of the scheme of our high Church divines, the Church of Rome differs from them. The reader has only to consider, that the same end may be aimed at by different means. This is the case here. We said, in the commencement of this Essay, that these high Church divines, " come for- ward to effect that in the Protestant church, which Popery endeavours to effect as to the church imiversal." Their machinery is different. The Popery of Rome created a one-headed pope : our high Church divines try to create a many-headed pope. The Popery of both has one mind — * Clergyman's Vade Mecum, vol. ii, Pref., p. 54'^ ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 175 bigoted, exclusive, intolerant, and persecuting. All the ju- risdiction of Popery centres in the pope. He imparts of his FULXESs to the bishops ; they swear fidelity to the pope. They support the pope, and the pope supports them ; and altogether they unite to bind the church in fetters of iron. Our succession-men place all authority by divine right in the bishops. The bishops, according to this scheme, are to reward them, by giving them the exclusive right to minis- ter the ordinances of Christ, They are to support each other, in order to form a chain to bind in Popish bondage the Protestant church, or else to excommunicate from the pale of Christianity such as bend not to their authority. Pre- vention is better than cure ; and it is hoped that this hum- ble effort, under God's blessing, may do something to ex- pose the Popery lying at the root of the scheme it opposes. The authors of the Oxford Tracts for the Times are Eng- lish Jesuits, and aim to accomplish for Anglican Popery^ w^hat the Roman Jesuits do for Roman Popery. There is a conspiracy : it is disguised Popery ! May Heaven scatter their counsel, and cause the gospel to run and be glorified ! We have shown that the original reformed Church of England gives no sanction to this semi-popish scheme : see section vii. The Lutheran church never maintained the divine right of bishops. The archbishop of Cologn joined them, but they never used his episcopal powers to give an order of jure divino bishops to their church. They retain the name, in some places, but they have no jure divino episcopal or- dinations. About 1528, says Haynes, in his translation of Melchior Adam's Life of Luther, " by the advice of Lu- ther, and by the command of John the Elector, was ordain- ed a visitation of the churches in Saxony." In 1528 Lu- ther put forth an" Institution of Visiters." Haynes quotes Luther, saying, " We are visiters, that is, bishops, and we find poverty and scarcity everywhere. The Lord send forth workmen into his harvest. Amen." And in another place to Spalatinus, " Our visitation goeth on ; of what mise- ries are we eye witnesses ; and how often doe we remem- ber you, when we find the like or greater miseries in that harsh-natured people of Voytland ! Let us beseech God to be present with us, and that he would promote the work of his poore bishops, who is our best and most faithful Bishop 176 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. against all the arts and forces of Satan. Amen." And again, — " In our Adsitation in the territories of Wittemberg, we find as yet all pastors agreeing with their people, but the people not so forward for the word and sacraments."* again, " Luther wrote thus to Melancthon : ' Concerning obedience to be performed to the bishops, as in jurisdiction and the common ceremonies, I pray you have a care, look to yourself, and give no more than you have, lest ye should be compelled again to a sharper and more dangerous warre for the defence of the gospel. I know that you always except the gospel in those articles : but I fear lest after- ward they should accuse us of breach of our covenant, and inconstancy, if we observe not what they please. For they will take our graunts in the large, larger, largest sense, and hold their own strictly, and as strictly as they can. In briefe, I wholly dislike this agitation for concord in doc- trine, as being a thing utterly impossible, unlesse the pope will abolish his popedom.' "f Luther was no more than a presbyter, but he ordained their first bishop. "About this time the bishoprick of Neoburgh, by Sala, was voyd ; there Nicolas Amsdorf, a divine born of a noble family, was j enstalled by Luther at the command of the elector of Sax- ony, the patron of that diocese ; and Julius Pflugius, whom the canons of the colledge chose, was refused. Luther placed him in the bishoprick Jan. 20, A. D. 1542. This thing, as many conceived, gave occasion to other stirres, and very much offended the emperour, who much affected Pflugius for divers respects. Of this we see more in Amsdorf 's Life. After this Luther wrote a book in the German tongue, and call'd it ' The Pattern of the Inau- guration of a true Christian Bishop.' "§ " The gospel," says one of the Lutheran articles, " gives to those that are set over the churches a command to teach the gospel, to remit sins, to administer the sacraments, and * Page 71, 4to. London, 1641. t Pages 83, 84. % Melchior Adam, in the Life of Amsdorf, mentions this matter as follows: "On the 20th day of January, 1542, the elector Frederic, and J. Ernestus, the brother dukes of Saxony, being present, in the city of Neoburg, by Sala, this noble and unmarried person [Amsdorf] was ordained bishop by Luther : Nicolas Medler, the pastor of Neoburg, George Spalatinus, the pastor of Aldenburg, and Wolfgang Steinius, another pastor, joining with Luther in the imposition of hands.^\ § Page 102. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 177 jurisdiction also. And by the confession of all, even our adversaries, 'tis manifest, that this power is, by divine right, common to all that are set over the churches, whether they be called pastors, or presbyters, or bishops." " But one thing made a difference afterward between bishops and presbyters, viz., ordination, because 'twas or- der'd that one bishop should ordain ministers in several churches : but since bishops and pastors are not different degrees hy divine right, 'tis manifest, that an ordination, performed by a pastor in his own church, is valid ; and that the common jurisdiction of excommunicating those that are guilty of manifest crimes does belong to all pastors."* The party of high Churchmen have lately republished a tract of Mr. Charles Leslie, the nonjuror, on episcopacy, in a periodical called " The Voice of the Church." In this tract, Leslie says, the Lutherans " still retain epis- copacy." Now could such men as Leslie, and can such men as Dr. Hook and the Oxford Tract-men, be ignorant of the principles and facts just stated about the Lutheran church 1 Can they be ignorant, therefore, that the episco- pacy of the Lutheran church, and the episcopacy which they advocate, have little in common but the name ; and that these two systems of episcopacy totally differ in all the great points for which high Churchmen most strenu- ously contend ? If they are not ignorant of these things, where is the honesty of leading the public mind astray by the mere ambiguities of language ? It is painful to be under the necessity of exposing these dishonourable proceed- ings. But these gentlemen must blame themselves. The fault is their own ; and it is but justice to the public to expose it.f * Abridgment of Mr. James Owen's Plea, pp. 40, 4L t The Rev. J. Sinclair has occupied about ten pages of his work on Episcopal or Apostolical Succession, with the sophistical ambiguity noticed in the text : he has placed it in front of all his arguments, as though he had nothing better to produce. In this attempt he tries to bring in the Lutheran church, Calvin, Beza, &c., for the support of episcopacy by divine right. The reader has seen the case of the Lu- theran church. The Augsburgh Confession expressly declares, that, *' according to the gospel, or jure divino, no jurisdiction belongs to bishops as bishops." Beza acknowledges bishops, so does the New Testament. He distinguishes them into three kinds, — Scriptural, 8* 178 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. The French church, and the reformed church in Germany, both maintain equality of bishops and presbyters. The synod of Dort, representing the reformed church of Ger- many, adopted the confession of faith belonging to the Belgic church. The thirty-first article contains this state- ment : "As regards the ministers of the divine word, they have everyw^here the same power and authority." The pastors and seniors of the French churches, met in national council at Vitry in 1682, subscribed the same confession. King James sent some English bishops and divines to the synod of Dort. They gave their suffrages to this confes- sion, along with the rest of the divines, as is clearly stated in session 146. This consent was caught at by some to impugn the very existence of an order of bishops at all in the Church of England, even as a mere prudential or ecclesiastical arrangement. Carlton, bishop of Chiches- ter, who was one of those that had been present at the synod of Dort by the order of King James, replied to this misinterpretation of their consent to that article, and showed that he and his colleagues had objected to such a construction of the sense of the articles as would encourage opposition to all exercise of superintendency by one class of ministers over others. The members of the synod with whom he conversed declared they wished for some such superintendency as they supposed the English bishops exer- cised, as calculated to promote good order, and to prevent divisions in the church. Yet they all, the English bishops and divines too, gave their votes for the confession just quoted, that, " as regards the ministers of the divine word, they have everywhere the same power and authority.''^ The case seems to be this :* they all believed that, by divine right, all ministers of the divine word, bishops and pres- byters, were equal ; but that, as a prudential ecclesiastical human, and antichristian : high Church bishops he classes among the last. See references to him, and to Calvin, &c., in the following sec- tion. What delusion, to pretend the authority of these reformers for such an episcopacy as Mr. Sinclair and his high Church brethren maintain ! * So Bishop Carlton, in his Treatise of Jurisdiction, p. 7, quoted by Calamy in his Defence of Moderate Nonconformity : " The poiocr of order, by all writers that I could see, even of the Church of Rome, is understood to be immediately from Christ given to all bishops and priests alike in their consecration." — Calamy, vol. i, p. 104, edit. 1703. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 179 arrangement, an order of bishops, as superintendents over other ministers, was not antiscriptiiral, nor ungodly ; but calculated to promote order and peace in the church, and to prevent divisions. This has certainly been the general opinion and practice of the church from the beginning of the second century, up to this day. The church is placed between two evils — the tyranny of the people, and the tyranny of ministers. The divine plan favours neither. The Scriptures lay down only general principles, and leave the details of church government to every society ; and while nothing is done contrary either to the letter or the spirit of Scripture, by either ministers or people, we may approve of all, and leave all to the full exercise of their own choice. Whoever takes upon him to condemn those who keep to these limits, is an enemy to the peace of the church. It is a plain Scriptural principle that ministers are to govern the people ; — that they are to govern according to the letter and spirit of their commission ; — and that, w^hile they so govern, the people are bound by the authority of the word of God to suhmit to their government, and to honour them as those who watch for their souls ; but when ministers violate the law of their commission, their authority so far ceases, and the people are, in that propor- tion, free from the obligation to obey them. A well-guarded superintendency of one class of ministers over other minis- ters, if determined upon by the church, is allowable ; and is a useful arrangement. All such plans must be judged by their own character and administration. Every reflect- ing reader will equally admire the divine wisdom in what is defined, and in what is undefined. What is defined^ guards -against anarchy ; what is undefined, guards against tyranny. May 'Heaven grant both ministers and people to see and preserve their privileges, without abusing the same, either to anarchy or tyranny ! The Rejnonstrafits perfectly acquiesced in the above principles, as may be seen in their Apology by Epis- copius.* The Waldenses had the same principles. There are two reasons for mentioning this remarkable people here. The first is, an occasional pretence by some Churchmen, * Episcopi 0pp., vol. ii, par. secund., p. 236, fol., ed. 1665. 180 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. that they have had their order of episcopacy by divine right through this church ; another is, a feeble and ineffectual attempt of some Moravian historians to claim for that church some superiority on the same ground. In " An Account of the Doctrine, Manners, Liturgy, and Idiom of the Unitas Fratrum, [that is, the Moravians,] taken from, and comprising the Supplement [dedicated to the Church of England] of the Vouchers to the Report of the Com- mittee of the Honourable the House of Commons, concern- ing the Church of the Unitas Fratrum, lately printed in folio," London, 1749, 8vo., we have a long extract from a letter of Jablonsky, a Moravian bishop, to Archbishop Wake. In this he quotes Comenius, another Moravian bishop and historian, in proof that " the Bohemian Brethren, arising from the ashes of Huss, regularly received the episcopal order — anno 1467," as follows : " The Brethren's chief concern was about pastors for the souls : whence they should get them, when those they had at present should decease. It was too uncertain a thing, to wait till some of the Roman ordination, for the love of truth, should come over to them. And they remembered, that the fore- mentioned primate of Bohemia, Archbishop Rokyzane, had often testified that all must be renewed from the bottom. Therefore an ordination was to be begun at home, by that power which Christ had given his church. But they were afraid that it might not be a regular ordination if a pres- byter should create a presbyter, and not a bishop. At length, in the year 1467, the chief persons from Bohemia and Moravia, to the number of about seventy, met together in a village near Richnow, called Lhota ; and, having poured fourth many prayers and tears to God, that he would vouchsafe to show whether he approved^-^f their design, they resolved to inquire the divine will by lot. They chose, therefore, by vote, nine men from amon-g them ; and, having put into the hands of a child twelve pieces of paper folded up, they bid him distribute to those nine men. Now nine of the papers were empty, and only on three stood written — It is : so that it was possible they all might get empty papers, which would have imported a negative will of God. But so it was, that the three written ones came into the hands of three among them, viz., Matthias Kuhnwald, a very pious man ; Thomas Przelau- ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 181 tins, a learned man ; and Elias Krzenowius, a man of sin- gular prudence. These found Stephen, bishop of the Waldenses, who sending for the other bishop, and some of the ministers, declared to them their descent from Con- stantine's time ; and also the articles of their doctrine, and the dreadful sufferings they had undergone in Italy and France ; and having heard again, with approbation and congratulation, the account which ours gave of their with- holding themselves as well from the Calixtines also now, as formerly from the pope ; and, finally, to enable these three ministers to ordain, they created them bishops by im- position of hands, and sent them back in peace." This is Comenius's account, who died 1670. Then Jablonsky speaks of the succession of these bishops in " The Unity," as having " gone on uninterruptedly from the first begin- ning of the Unity till 1650;" and he proceeds with an account of the succession till the time of writing to Arch- bishop Wake. At the close of his letter, the mention of the " episcopal succession" occurs three times in two pages ; and at page 135 the Church of England is spoken of as " their only episcopal sister in the Protestant world." Arvid Gradin, a person of great trust, and employed on the most important embassies among the Moravians, thus briefly describes this affair : " Being solicitous about a regular and apostolical ordination of pastors, there met in the year 1467, out of all Bohemia and Moravia grave, and pious men, about seventy in all, who sent three of their number, being marked out by lot, to Stephen, bishop of the Waldenses, then under banishment in x\ustria. He having called together the other bishops, his colleagues, consecrated these three persons, who were ministers and teachers remarkable for their piety and learning, bishops, by imposition of hands : their names were Matthias of Cunewald, Thomas Praelautensis, and Elias Chrzenovitz." He then speaks of " Comenius complaining that he, like Elias, was alone left remaining, without any hopes of handing down the apostolical succession which was lodged in him; and accordingly he wrote, in the year 1660, a very melancholy lamentation^ and dedicated it to the English Church." This, and much more in the same authors, shows a disposition unduly to magnify episcopal ordina- tion and succession. Indeed I think that both Comenius 182 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION, and Jablonsky really believed in the divine right of epis- copacy, a^ did many divines of the Church of England in the times of Comenius — times of much high Churchism in England. It was well for the Brethren that the truth of the matter was not so ; otherwise the church of God had perished among the Bohemians when Comenius died, for Bishop Holmes informs us in the work noticed below, that the succession expired in that branch at the death of Come- nius, and was not renewed again for nearly one hundred years, viz., in 1735. However, since the publication of the first edition of this Essay, I have received a candid and excellent letter on the subject of Moravian episcopacy, from the Rev. Benjamin SeifFerth, a Moravian minister at Kimbolton. From this I am happy to learn that the Moravians do not hold episcopacy to be of divine right. Mr. Seifferth refers in proof of this, among other authorities, to the " History of the United Brethren," by the Rev. John Holmes of Ful- neck, Yorkshire, who is a bishop of the Moravian church. At pages 50 to 53, vol. i, the Rev John Holmes gives the following account of the matter of sending to this Stephen, the supposed bishop of the Waldensian church, for episco- pal ordination : — " A most important subject of deliberation, both at their synods and at other times, was how to maintain a regular succession of ministers, when those Avho now exercised the ministry among them, and who had previously been ordained among the Calixtines, were dead. For the pur- pose of coming to a final decision on this point, a synod was convened in 1467, and met in the village of Lhota, in the house of a person of the name of Duchek. Seventy persons were assembled at it, consisting of ministers, noblemen, scholars, citizens, and peasants, deputed by the several congregations of the Brethren in Moravia and Bohemia. " The synod was opened by fasting, prayer, and reading the Scriptures. After much deliberation, they came to a unanimous resolution to follow the advice of Lupacius and others, and to elect their ministers from their own body. With the example of the election of Matthias before them, (Acts i, 15-26,) who was appointed by lot, they conceived that they were not acting contrary to Scripture by adopting ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 183 the same mode, and they reposed implicit confidence in 'the Lord, who alone hath the disposal of the lot, (Prov. xii, 33,) that, in a case of such emergency as the present, which involved such important consequences to their whole church, he would counsel them according to his will. They first nominated twenty men, from among whom nine were chosen, being in their opinion duly quali- fied for the office of the ministry, men of approved piety and irreproachable conduct, and possessing a thorough know- ledge of divine truth, and much practical experience. Of this number they determined that three should be ap- pointed by lot for the ministerial offiice. Being thus agreed on preliminaries, they prepared twelve slips of paper, on three of which they wrote the word est, [this is the man,] and left the other nine blank. All the twelve slips of pa- per were then rolled up, put into a small vase, and mixed together. " Hereupon Gregory addressed the assembly, admonish- ing them to be fully resigned to the direction and will of God, our heavenly Father, to whom they had referred the decision, whom of these nine men he chose to become ambassadors of his Son in the church. He encouraged them confidently to expect that God would hear and an- swer their prayer. After this they repeated their suppli- cations to the Lord, entreating him so to overrule their present proceedings, that the affirmative lot inscribed with the word est, might be received by such only of the nine men, previously nominated, as he himself designed to ap- point to the ministry, or if none of the present candidates were approved by him, he would cause each of them to receive a blank, or negative lot. Prayer being ended, they called in a little boy, directing him to hand one of the slips of paper to each of the nine men, who gave them unopened to other members of the synod. On opening the papers it was found, that the three inscribed with est had been received by Matthias of Kunewalde, Thomas of Presche- lauz, and Elias of Kreschenow. The whole assembly now joined in a solemn act of thanksgiving to God, joyfully receiving these three men as pastors and teachers, and promising them obedience by giving them the right hand and the kiss of peace. The transaction was closed with the celebration of the Lord's supper. 184 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. " The Brethren, however, soon found that the work was, not yet complete. In their- own estimation, the appointment of these men for the ministry of the gospel, in the manner described, was sufficiently valid ; but they knew it required something more to give it equal sanction with the religious public. They required regular ecclesiastical ordination. In order to discuss this important subject, another synod was convened before the end of the year. In this assem- bly two questions were principally agitated. " The first was, whether ordination by a number of pres- byters was equally valid loith that perfor?ned by a bishop T The decision of the synod was to this effect : — That pres- byterian ordination was consonant to ajyostolic practice^ (1 Tim. iv, 14,) and the usage of the primitive church, which might be proved from the writings of the primitive fathers ; consequently the newly elected ministers might be ordained by those now exercising the sacred functions of the gospel among them, and who had previously been Calixtine clergymen in priesfs orders. But, as for many ages no ordination had been deemed valid in the reigning church, unless performed by a bishop, they resolved to use every possible means for obtaining episcopal ordination ; that their enemies might thus be deprived of every pretext for discrediting the ministry among them. " This decision involved the second question, which was, to w^hat regularly organized community of Christians the synod might look for episcopal ordination. There could in reality exist but one opinion on this subject. For it was highly improbable, that any bishops connected with the Romish Church would transfer this privilege to the Brethren ; and besides this church, they knew only one other Christian community, to which they might apply with any hope of success. This was the Waldensian church. Several circumstances encouraged the Brethren to apply in this quarter. The Waldenses had existed for a long period as a distinct body of Christians, they constituted a regularly organized society, tracing the succession of their bishops from the times of the apostles ; they had on a former oc- casion come to the assistance of the Brethren, and now had several congregations in Austria, served by their own bishops and ministers. " Conformably to these resolutions of the synod, they ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 185 elected three of their ministers, who were already in priesVs orders, and sent them to the Waldensian bishop, Stephen. Having informed him of the object of their visit, the state of the unity of the Brethren, and the transactions of the synod, he received them with demonstrations of the most cordial joy ; and in his turn related the leading events in the history of the Waldenses, and gave them an account of their constitution, and the succession of their bishops. Hereupon he ordained these three presbyters bishops of the Brethren's church, with imposition of hands, being assisted by another bishop, and in presence of the elders. Of these three first bishops of the Brethren's church, Melchior Bradacius is the only one whose name has been handed down to posterity. He had from the very commencement of the church of the Brethren ren- dered it essential service, and merited an honourable dis- tinction. Of the other two, one had previously exercised the ministry among the Waldenses, and the other in the Romish Church. " Scarce had these bishops returned to their brethren, when it was resolved to convoke another synod. This assembly was principally occupied in amending and com- pleting their ecclesiastical constitution. In order to this, their first public act was the ordination of the three men, lately appointed by lot for the ministerial office, [to be] presbyters of the Brethren's church. One of them, Mat- thias of Kunewalde, was, before the close of the synod, consecrated bishop. They then proceeded to the appoint- ment of ten co-bishops, or conseniors, elected from the body of presbyters. No doubtful proof this of the increas- ing number of congregations and members, in connection with the Brethren's church." The reader will observe several discrepancies between these accounts. First, as to the opinion of the ancient Brethren about the real importance of episcopacy. Comenius says, — " They were afraidih.^i it might not be a regular ordination if a presbyter should create a presbyter, and not a bishop." Arvid Gradin says they were solicitous about it. Mr. Holmes says that the synod, after agitating the subject, decided to this effect : " that preshyterian ordination was consonant to apostolic practice and the primitive church ;" 186 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. and that they adopted episcopal ordination for this special, prudential reason, viz=, " that their enemies might thus he deprived of every pretext for discrediting the Quinistry among themP Secondly, Comenius, seems to make the meeting at Lhota, in which Matthias Kuhnwald, &;c., were elected, to be called for the special pm'pose of sending these three men to Stephen for episcopal ordination ; so does Arvid Gradin : Bishop Holmes makes this meeting appoint these three men to the office of the ministry without any regard to episcopal ordination; for at the close of the meeting, " the whole assembly joined in a solemn act of thanks- giving to God, joyfully receiving these three men as their pastors and teachers, promising them obedience by giving them the right hand and kiss of peace." Thirdly, both Comenius and Arvid Gradin state that the three men who were sent to Stephen, and consecrated bishops by him, were Matthias Kuhnwald, Thomas Przel- aucius, and Elias Krzenowius : but Bishop Holmes says the men who went to Stephen, and were consecrated bishops, were not the same as those mentioned by Come- nius and Gradin ; but that one of their names was Melchior Bradacius ; and that the names of the other two have not been " handed down to posterity." Then another synod, a third, is convoked, according to Bishop Holmes, and " their first public act was the ordination of the three men, lately appointed hy lot for the ministerial office, pres- byters of the Brethren's church. One of them, Matthias of Kunewalde, was, before the close of the synod, conse- crated bishop." I must confess that such very striking and material dis- crepancies, among these highly respectable historians of the Brethren's church, on a point so important, makes me suspect that there is very little of perfectly authentic history on the subject of this matter about Stephen and the epis- copal ordination and succession. Perrin, who possessed better means of information than almost any other historian of the Waldenses, differs, as we shall soon see, from all these historians : according to him, the object of this, the journey, was different ; the persons sent were different, " two ministers and two elders ;" the transaction between Stephen and those persons was different : what they did, ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 187 was not to give a succession of bishops, but " in token of their great joy, and that holy society and correspondence, which they desired to hold with them, they blessed them, praying and laying their hands upon them." The whole episcopal colouring of this affair seems to have arisen from the high Church imagination of Comenius : Jablonsky gladly laid hold of it to propitiate Archbishop Wake, of the Church of England ; and hence others have followed in the same track. But let us direct our inquiry to the opinions and practice of the Waldenses. The Moravians profess to have their episcopacy from Stephen, whom they call bishop of the Waldenses, in 1467. If the Waldenses neither taught this doctrine of high Church bishops, nor maintained such an order, then, of course, they could not give what they possessed not them- selves ; and all the authority derived from them for these pretensions comes to nothing. The doctrine of episcopacy by divine right, if true, is a matter of the very first importance ; all who held it, must have felt it to be so. Had the Waldenses held this, they would have spoken accordingly, in clear, strong, defined terms. Thus they did speak on all subjects they believed to be of great magnitude. It may then be taken as a sure rule, that, while the subject was constantly before them, and yet they never say clearly and strongly that the order of bishops, as having superintendency over presbyters, was by divine right ; — no, nor even mention such a thing as bishops among them ; that this negative evidence is proof they did not hold such a doctrine. But when they say much to the contrary, the proof strengthens still more. Besides, where were the Waldenses to get the notion? We have seen that the Roman church never held it ; the Greek church never held it ; the Scriptures do not teach it ; — where then were they to get it ? He that affirms they held it, must prove his affirmation. / deny it ; let it be proved. I might rest the matter safely here. The early and authentic writings of the Waldenses are very few ; yet some light may be obtained from them. Let the reader keep one thing in mind ; — viz., that suppose it could be proved, as a fact, that they had presbyters and bishops, still this would not prove that they held the high 188 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. Church notions of episcopacy by divine right. Jerome constantly mentions bishops in the church, in his day, as a fact, but positively denies the divine right of episcopacy. The Church of Rome had the distinction between bishops and presbyters as a fact, but never maintained the divine right of episcopacy. The reformers of the English Church established the distinction as a fact, but never maintained the divine right. By overlooking or denying this difference between the fact and the divine right, many showy volumes have been written in favour of episcopacy, which are nothing but splendid sophisms from end to end. However, / doubt the fact of the Waldenses having had bishops in their earliest history. I believe it cannot be proved from any of their documents, written before the time when the Moravians profess to have received the episco- pal order from them, viz., 1467. Any later evidence will be inconclusive. Much to the contrary certainly appears in their writings before that period, as the following extracts will show. They speak of ministers in the fol- lowing manner : — " They who are pastors ought to preach to the people, and feed them often with divine doctrine ; and chastise the sinners with discipline." Written A. D. 1100. "Feed- ing the flock of God, not for filthy lucre sake, or [nor] as having superiority over the clergy." " As touching orders, we ought to hold that order is called the power which God gives to man, duly to administer and dispense unto the church the word and sacraments. But we find nothing in the Scriptures touching such orders as they" (the Papists) " pretend, but only the custom of the church." Treatise of Antichrist, A. D. 1220. " All other ministerial things may be reduced to the aforesaid." Ibid. " Those that being partakers of the outward ceremonies, instituted ONLY by human inventions, do believe and hope to partake of the reality of pastoral cures and offices, if they be shaved or shorn like lambs, and anointed or daubed like walls," &c. Having described the ceremonies then used by the Romish Church in confirmation, they say, " This is that which they call the sacrament of confirmation, which we find not instituted either by Christ, or his apostles — therefore such sacrament is not found needful to salvation ; whereby God is blasphemed, and which was introduced by ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 1S9 the deviVs instigation, to seduce the people, and to deprive them of the faith of the church, and that by such means they might be induced the more to believe the ceremonies, and the necessity of the bishops."" Ibid. Speaking of '''pas- tors,^'' imthout any distinction, they say, " We pastors do meet together once every year, to determine of our affairs in a general council. Among other powers and abilities which God hath given to his servants, he hath given au- thority to chuse leaders to rule the people, and to ordain elders [presbyters^ in their charges according to the diver- sity of the work, in the unity of Christ, which is proved by the saying of the apostle, in the first chapter of his Epistle to Titus : ' For this cause I have left thee in Crete, that thou shouldst set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain elders [presbyters'] in every city as I have ap- pointed thee.' When any of us, the aforesaid pastors, falls into any gross sins, he is both excommunicated and prohibited to preach." From MSS. several hundred years before Luther or Calvin. Here it is remarkable, that their quotation from Titus stops, in such a way, as not to intro- duce the term bishop, occuring in the next verse. Why was this ? The following authorities will answer this ques- tion. Reinerus, the oldest authority on their tenets, as a historian, (having written about 1250,) says, " They consi- dered prelates to be but scribes and Pharisees ; that the pope and all the bishops were murderers, because of the wars they waged ; — that they were not to obey the bishops, but God only ; that in the church no one was greater than another ; that they hated the very name of prelate, as pope, bishop,^'' &c. A similar statement is given by iEneas Sylvius : " The Roman bishop, and all bishops are equal. Among priests, or ministers of the gospel, there is no dif- ference. The name of a presbyter does not signify a dignity, but superior merit."* Mr. Faber quotes Pilich- dorf, saying, " They rejected the consecration of bishops, priests, churches, altars, &c."f Perrin remarks, that "the monk Reinerus reported many things concerning the vocation of the pastors of the Waldenses which are mere fictions : as that they had a greater bishop and two followers, whom he called the elder * Catalog. Test. Veritat., vol. ii. t Faber's Vallenses, p. 418. Lend., 1838. 190 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. son, and tlie younger, and a deacon ; that he laid his hands upon others with a sovereign authority, and sent them where he thought good, like a 'popeP " Against these impostures, here follows what is found in their writings, concerning the vocation of their pastors." He then gives the same account from their own writings as we have given in the text ; but no account of an order of bishops is found in them. There is no distinction among them but what age, or wisdom, or piety, might confer. Leger gives the monk Reiner's account of this matter a little differently. He introduces him speaking of the barbes or pastors, saying, " that they had always among them some chief pastor, endowed with the authority"^ of a bishop, with two coadjutors, one of whom he called his eldest son, and the other his younger'^] This is certainly more consistent with the other statements of Reiner. For how could he say they had a greater bishop, when he says they reprobated the very name of bishops? But he might say that some chief pastor was endowed with the authority of a bishop, &c. Their own writings say, " The last re- ceived pastors must do nothing without the license of their seniors : as also those that are first are to undertake no- thing without the approbation of their companions, that * Mr. Faber, referring to Gilly's Excurs. to Piedmont, p. 73, says, " The venerable Peyrani, when asked by Dr. Gilly, in the year 1823, whether, in the Vaudois church, there had not formerly been bishops properly so called, readily answered, * Yes : and I should now be styled bishop, for my office is virtually episcopal, but it would be absurd to retain the empty title, when we are too poor to support the dignity : and have little jurisdiction save that which is voluntarily submitted to among ourselves : the term moderator is, therefore, now in use with us, as being more consistent with our humiliation.'' " Now, if riches and worldly dignities are necessaiy to bishops properly such, then there were none such in the earliest ages of the church, nor of the Waldenses either : the same remark would apply to any jurisdiction with civil power to coerce: neither the primitive church, nor the ancient Wal- denses, knew any thing about such jurisdiction. If the term bishop is an " empty title" without these, something very different from primitive episcopacy must be meant by it. " But," says Peyrani, " a moderator is virtually a bishop ;" yes, as much so as a Lutheran superintendent or president. If this is what is meant by being " properly" a bishop, then many writers on these subjects express themselves very impro- perly. t See Peyran's Historical Defence of the Waldenses. Lond., 1826, Appendix, pp. 491, 492. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 191 every thing may be done among us in order. We pastors do meet together once every year to determine of our affairs in a general council,"* This is the authority the seniors had. Such have the Lutheran and Wesleyan Methodist superintendents. Such had the bishops in the days of Cyprian. Yet the Waldenses do not appear to have had the name of bishop. They are said to have HATED THE VERY NAME of bishop. Much less, therefore, had they the doctrine of divine right. Indeed this account of Reiner's about a bishop with two coadjutors, an elder son and a younger son, seems not properly to be spoken of the Waldenses at all, but only of those who were properly Paulicians. See Mr. Faber's Vallenses, pp. 564, 565. Hence it would appear that the Waldenses had no such name as bishop for any of their pastors, but that, according to the earliest historians who knew them best, "they reprobated the very name of bishops," Their pastors fed the flock, ruled the flock, and ordained others to the minis- try of the word. The Waldenses, then, had no doctrine of the divine right of bishops to govern the church, and to have the sole right of superintending and ordaining other ministers. The pretence of deriving the divine right of episcopacy through the Waldenses is, in truth, without any solid foundation whatsoever. The Moravian bishops have no superintendency by the power of their order over all other ministers ; they are ordained by the authority of the elders or presbyters ; and are subject to the conference of presbyters. They, by the authority of the presbyters, ordain other ministers. This office of ordaining ministers is their only important differ- ence from presbyters ; and as they do it by the authority of the presbyters, it amounts to nothing but a mere eccle- siastical arrangement. Bishop Holmes says, (p. 25,) " The writings of Wick- liflfe were the means used by God for illuminating the mind of Huss. Wickliffe himself, on the subject of equality and of gospel ministers, eYidenily followed the writings of the ancient Waldenses, for he sometimes uses their very words. Now Wickliffe boldly affirms all gospel ministers to be equal by divine right. Huss followed him in this, and maintained the same point, as may be seen in Fox's Acts * Perrin, part ii, b. i, chap. 10, 192 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. and Monuments.* He is charged with maintaining, and doth not deny it, that he saith, ' All priests are of like power ; and affirmeth, that the reservations of the pope's casualties, the ordering [ordaining] of bishops, and the consecration of priests, were invented only for covetous- ness.' The Waldenses taught Wickliffe ; Wickliffe taught Huss : they all maintained equality, hy divine right, of all gospel ministers^'' All the reformers viewed the Bohemian Brethren's church government in this light. The English reformers did. A number of the Bohe- mians fled out of Germany into England in the time of Edward VI. They were incorporated, as a church, under John Alasco. Now the later Moravians reckon John Alasco as one of their bishops at that time. Let us hear Bishop Burnet's history of this matter : " This summer, John Alasco, v^^ith a congregation of Germans that fled from their country upon the persecution raised there, for not receiving the interim, was allowed to hold his assembly at St. Austin's, in London. The congregation was erected into a corporation. John Alasco was to be superintendent, and there were four other ministers associated with him. There were also three hundred and eighty of the congre- gation made denizens of England, as appears by the re- cords of their patents,"! In the king's letters patent for their incorporation, the following is the style : — " De uno superintendente et quatuor verbi ministris erigimus, creamus, ordinamus, etfundamus,^'' &c. — "We erect, create, ordain, and found this church, under one superintendent and four ministers of the word." Would Alasco, who wanted neither talents nor courage to defend himself, have submitted to the degradation (as a thorough Episcopalian would have supposed it) of being stripped of his dignity in a solemn deed of incorporation, and made a mere superintendent ? Would not the same reasoning hold as to the opinion of the other ministers, and the whole church, upon the sub- ject ? The word superintendent is repeated ten times over in these documents ; but never the word bishop as applied to Alasco, or to any minister of the Bohemian church. The Rev. Benjamin Seiflerth, in the letter before men- tioned, speaking of John Alasco, thinks I am in an error * Vol. i, p. 791, &c., ed. 1641, folio. t Vol. ii, part i. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION, 193 in supposing that the latter Moravian historians reckon him as one of their bishops. He says, " Count Zinzen- dorf, indeed, fell into this error ; but I believe it has been acknowledged to be an error. Holmes is not chargeable with it ; nor, as far as I am aware, are any of our writers : and Comenius, and especially Regenvolscius, show that a Lasco was not even a member of the Brethren's church, though a warm friend to it." I have given Mr. SeifFerth's statement. Now it seems Count Zinzendorf believed a Lasco, or Alasco, belonged to the Moravians ; and the highly authoritative work above quoted, taken from the Vouchers presented to the House of Commons, and indeed to both houses of parliament, considers the transaction in Edward's time to have been with the Brethren's church, and of course with a Lasco as its chief minister. See p. 134 of that work. And, in a note on the same page, they speak of " one of our [Moravian] bishops having been in the commission for reforming ecclesiastical laws in England. We cannot forbear giving the honoured reader two of the most remarkable passages of our said Bishop John a Lasco's Preface to the Liturg}^ for his Congrega- tion at Austin Friars," in 1550 ; a similar statement, as to his being a Moravian minister, is made in a note at p. 108 — " This noble prelate of ours." It is not for me to decide who is right in this matter. It would be easy to prove that the Lutheran church viewed this Bohemian episcopacy as a mere ecclesiastical arrangement, amounting in substance to nothing more than the same arrangement among themselves ; sometimes de- nominating the individual a superintendent, as in Germany, generally ; and sometimes a bishop, or even archbishop, as in Sweden and Denmark. All the Swiss and Geneva reformers prove this by expressing their approbation of the church discipline of the Bohemians and Waldenses ; for every body knows that these reformers determinately main- tained the equality by divine right of all gospel ministers. Indeed the story about that Stephen, who, the Moravians say, conveyed to them this episcopal succession, is very differently related by Perrin, one of the earliest of the modern historians of the Waldenses. He had more au- thentic documents connected with their ancient history than any later historian ever possessed. He says, " About 9 194 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 1467, the Hussites, reforming and separating their churches from the Church of Rome, understood that there were some churches of the ancient Waldenses in Austria, lying Upon the frontiers of Bohemia, in which there were great and learned men ordained, and appointed to be pastors ; and that the doctrine of the gospel flourished in its full force and vigour among them : then that they might he informed of the truth thereof, they sent two of their ministers with two elders, giving them in charge to inquire into, and know what those flocks or congregations were ; for what reason they had separated themselves from the Church of Rome ; their principles and progress ; and also to discover and make known unto them the beginning of their own conduct in Bohemia, and to acquaint them with the cause and reason of their separation and dissension from the Romish Church. " These men being arrived thither, and having found out those Waldensian churches, after a diligent and care- ful search after them, they told them, that they did nothing but what was agreeable to the ordinances of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the doctrine of his apostles, confining themselves wholly to the institution of the Son of God in the matter of the sacrament. " It was a matter of great joy and satisfaction to the Waldenses, to understand, that a great number of people in Bohemia had advanced the glory of God, by casting off the corruptions and idolatries of the Roman Church, and exhorting them in God's name to continue and carry on that work which they had so well begun, for the know- ledge and maintenance of the truth, and for the establish- ment of a good order and discipline among them ; in token of their great joy, and that holy society and correspondence which they desired to hold with them, they blessed them, praying and laying their hands upon them^* And then, having mentioned the burning of a great number of the Waldenses in a violent persecution, he says, " Among others, the history gives us an account of oxe Stephen, AN ELDERLY MAN, who being buHit there," (at Vienna,) " confirmed many hy his constancy.''^ The translation I quote is by " A lover of our Protestant Establishment, both in church and state." Perhaps "one Stephen, an * Perrin's History of the Old Waldenses, part ii, b. ii, chap. 10. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 195 elderly man," should have been translated, " one Stephen^ a presbyter or elders This is the very Stephen of whom the Moravians speak as conveying the episcopal succession to them. Hence they sometimes speak about the Church of England as " their only episcopal sister.'''' The mission- ary labours of the Brethren we would duly estimate ; much may be said for their simple manners and piety ; yet all such representations as tend to canfine a gospel ministry and gospel ordinances to any episcopal succession schemes are to be suspected. Their tendency is to bind the bless- ings of Christianity by ordinances that God never made. No order of men ought to be encouraged to assume such powers. Simplicity may be frequently beguiled by them, and may look upon them as harmless ; but those who study the subject in the light of history, and the knowledge of human nature, will think very differently. As to apostolical succession, Reiner testifies that the Waldenses maintained, " that those only are the successors of the APOSTLES who ifnitate their lives. Liferring from thence, saith he, that the pope, the bishops, and clergy, who enjoy the riches of this world, and seek after them, do not follow the lives of the apostles, and therefore are not the true guides of the church ; it having never been the design of our Lord Jesus Christ to commit his chaste and well-beloved spouse to those who would rather prosti- tute it by their wicked examples and works, than preserve it in the same purity in which they received it at the be- ginning, a virgin chaste and without spot.'''' This is the true view of the apostolical succession. The reformers contended for this. We rejoice to believe that the bishops and presbyters in the Moravian church have this succes- sion ; but most eminently so their missionaries, and all other devoted missionaries to the heathen. May every church zealously contend for this succession, and may their labours be crowned with apostolical success in the con- version of thousands and tens of thousands from idols to the living God ! The matter of the Scotch church, and all the dissenting churches, as maintaining the identity by divine right of all ministers, is denied by none, and therefore needs no proof. The reader will have long since perceived that the main 196 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. end of this argument upon the identity of bishops and pres- byters, as one and the same office, is to show that presby- ters have EQUALLY as much divine authority to ordain others to the Christian ministry as bishops have. Another prerogative, however, is generally claimed for bishops, viz., that of CONFIRMATION. We have taken but little notice of this ; yet it would hardly suit the design of this Essay wholly to omit it. We account it not of sufficient importance for lengthened remark or discussion in a sepa- rate section : a brief notice of it here, therefore, by way of episode, may suffice. We may comprise all that is necessary to be said on the subject in two particulars ; first, as to the thing itself ; and secondly, as to the minis- ter who may perform it. First, as to the thing itself Those illustrious witnesses to the truth against Popery, the Waldenses, as we have seen, speaking on this subject, say, " This is that which they call confirmation, which we find not instituted either by Christ or his apostles ; therefore such sacrament is not found needful to salvation ; whereby God is blasphemed, and which was introduced by the devil's instigation, to seduce the people, and to deprive them of the faith of the church, and that by such means they might be induced the more to believe the ceremonies, and the necessity of bishops" Wickliffe also says, " It does not appear that this sacrament should be reserved to a Cesarean prelacy ; that it would be more devout and more conformable to Scripture language, to deny that the bishops give the Holy Spirit, or confirm the giving of it ; and that it therefore seems to some, that the brief and trivial confirmation of the prelates, and the ceremonies added to it for the sake of pomp, were introduced at the suggestion of Satan, that the people may be deceived as to the faith of the church, and that the state and necessity of bishops may be more acknowledged."* Melancthon observes, "The rite of confirmation, as retained by bishops, is altogether an idle ceremony : but an examination of youth, in order to a pro- fession of their faith, with public prayer for the pious part of them, would be useful, and the prayer would not be in vain."\ Ravanel, whose work had the approbation of the * Vaughan's Life of Wickliffe, vol. ii, p. 308, sec. ed., 1831. t Loci Communes, de Confirmatione. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 197 French reformed church, says, "The wrangling Popish divines maintain the dignity and efficacy of confirmation ABOVE the sacrament of baptism itself; for they assert that it is not lawful for any one but a bishop to confer it, while they concede that presbyters can administer baptism : and they impiously teach that confirmation is a certain perfecting- and consummating oi baptism, as if those were to be counted only half Christians who are baptized only, and not con- firmed ; whereas the apostle testifies that we put on Christ in baptism."* Bishop Taylor boldly declares, that, until we are confirmed, we are imperfect Christians ; such, " without a miracle, are not perfect Christians :" that is, not really Christians at all. Calvin has some admirable remarks upon the subject, Inst., lib. iv, c. 19. He ap- proves of a similar procedure to that mentioned above by Melancthon. He exposes the absurdity and impiety of taking the act of the apostles in conferring the visible and MIRACULOUS GIFTS of the Holy Ghost, by the laying on of their hands upon the baptized, as a ground for the pretence of bishops to confer the Holy Ghost by the laying on of THEIR hands in confirmation. He calls them " apes of the apostles." He shows that by this kind of pretence they invalidate baptism itself thus making void the command- ments of God by the traditions of men, and exclaims, " O the iniquity of this proceeding !" He then offers ironically an improved definition of confirmation, viz., that it is " a marked disgrace to baptism, which obscures the use of baptism, yea, abolishes it : the devil's false promise, to draw us away from the true promises of God." The rite of confirmation in the English Church differs from the Popish one in that it is not called a sacrament ; and some ceremonies are laid aside : in all other respects it is equally unscriptural in its pretences, and dangerous in its conse- quences. To establish a claim to it as a prerogative of bishops, in imitation of the apostles, they, the bishops, must confer the gift of miracles. The latter they cannot do : the claim, therefore, exposes Christianity itself to con- tempt. This claim ought to be given up. Bishop Taylor, speaking of the Popish doctrine of extreme unction, says, " When the miraculous healing ceased, then they were not Catholics, but heretics, that did transfer it to the use of * Bibliotheca Sacra, sub voce. 198 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. dying persons." By this rule lie would convict the Church of England of heresy in the use of confirmation. It doubt- less imbodies serious errors ; though we do not say it constitutes heresy. Every Christian has a right to repro- bate it as a public injury to religion. It is degrading also to all other ministers, as implying that the sacrament of baptism, as administered by them, is imperfect. It dero- gates from the sacrament of baptism itself.* Besides, there is the solemn declaration made by the bishop, in administering the rite of confirmation, that the " Almighty and everlasting God has given forgiveness of all THEIR sins" — all their actual personal sins — to the multi- tudes of young persons brought to be confirmed, many of whom are plainly ungodly persons, and who had never been seen by the bishop before. This is enough to make any pious person tremble. It is a daring presumption, only equalled by the height of Popery itself. The great danger to souls is, that multitudes believe it. I pity many good men who are entangled with these things. The re- formers of the English Church might find some excuse for retaining them, because it was difficult in the darkness of those times to see the truth in all things ; but there can be no excuse at this day for retaining them. Every Pro- testant ought to protest against these corruptions of Chris- tianity. Melancthon's view contains all that the Scrip- tures warrant. Secondly, let us consider who is the minister to whom the administering of this rite belongs. Indeed, as there is no divine authority for the thing itself, of course there is no divine regulation about the minister. Bishop Burnet grants, that there is " no express institution of it, neither by Christ nor his apostles ; no rule given to practise it."t * Bishop Heber, in his Life of Bishop Taylor, speaking of his work on Confirmation, says, " There is, indeed, a dangerous consequence attendant on both Taylor's arguments, that, by limiting the gift of the Holy Ghost to confirmation, he makes baptism, taken by itself, of NONE EFFECT, or, at most, of no further effect than as a decent and necessary introduction to that which would be, on this hypothesis, the main and distinctive consignation of a Christian." King James I., at the Hampton Court conference, declared his opinion, " that arguing a confirmation of baptism, as if this sacrament without it were of no validity, is plainly blasphemous." t Burnet on the Articles, art. 25. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 199 The whole is merely a matter of human arrangement. How- ever, Bishop Taylor dashes off the affirmation, that " bishops were always, and the only ministers of conjirmation.''^ It is humiliating to find this splendid writer frequently so reckless in assertion, and so careless of proof. Bishop Heber candidly acknowledges, in his admirable Life of Taylor, that " he was any thing rather than a critical in- quirer into facts (however strange) of history or of philo- sophy. If such alleged facts suited his purpose., he re- ceived them without examination., and retailed them without scruple.'" Vol. ii, p. 179, 12mo. Now, to overturn for ever, and from the foundation, his rash affirmation, and all similar affirmations, we have only to bring before the reader the indisputable fact, that in the Greek church it never was confined to the bishops, but always was, and is to the pre- sent day, administered by presbyters and bishops promis- cuously. There is no satisfactory proof, indeed, that it existed at all in the early ages of the church, after the apostles' time, in the sense and manner in which it is now used in the Church of England. As the concluding part of baptism ; and as a way of confirming the baptism of heretics, it somewhat early came into the church, as may be seen in Cyprian, epist. 72 and 76, ed. Pamel. ; in Sui- cer's Thesaurus, vol. ii, col. 1534, &c., ed. 1682; and Calderwood's Altare Damascenum, p. 257, &c., ed. 1708. " The invention,^'' says Bishop Burnet, art. 25, " that was afterward found out, by which the bishop was held to be the only minister of confirmation, even though presbyters were suffered to confirm, was a piece of superstition without any colour from Scripture. — In the Latin church, Jerome tells us, that in his time bishops only confirmed ; though he makes the reason of this to be rather for doing to them honour, than from any necessity of law. — It is said by Hilary, that in Eg}^pt the presbyters did confirm in the bishop's absence : so that custom grevn to be the universal practice of the Greek church." The learned Mr. Smith, in his work on the " Present State of the Greek Church," tells us, that " the administration of confirmation is conceded to bishops and presbyters promiscuously''^ in the present Greek church: p. 112, ed. sec, 1678. The Church of Rome, as an ordinary rule, confines it to bishops, but has always granted that presbyters, by the permission of the 200 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. church, were capable of administering confirmation ; and presbyters have actually and frequently administered it in that church.* So much for the truth of Bishop Taylor's rash and reckless affirmation, that " bishops were always, and the only ministers of confirmation." There is no divine authority for the thing : the present mode of administering it is full of presumption and danger. In a reformed state of the matter, presbyters might, by the will of the church, be equally as efficient administrators of it as bishops. To claim it as a divine prerogative of bishops, is like all the other assumptions of this scheme — an utterly baseless assumption'. Here, then, is abundant proof of the shallowness of the pretence of some who seem to boast as though almost all the authority of the Christian church was on the side of their high Church claims for episcopal succession. The truth is, we see, that no Christian church ever main- tained IT ; MANY have expressly negatived these claims ; none ever affirmed them. The maintaining of the true Scriptural liberty of every section of the Christian church is a matter of great import- ance to Christianity itself, and to the peace of the Chris- tian world at large. While no Scriptural principles are violated, and while the morals of the church are not cor- rupted, each church has the sacred right of adopting what form of government it deems the best. No section of the Christian church has any authority, beyond these princi- ples, to bind the practices of another church. Every at- tempt to do this is essentially Popery ; it is antichrist, setting up his throne in the church above the throne of God himself. Episcopacy, if administered with humility , and in a pacific spirit, may, on these principles of Chris- tian truth, be adopted and justified ; but, if its advocates become proud and insolent to those churches who adopt it not ; if they insult the ministers, and endeavour to disturb the minds of the private members of those churches by unscriptural declamation and denunciation against the va- lidity of their ordinances ; if they proudly arrogate to them- selves the sole right to administer the ordinances of the gospel : in such a case, they commence a spiritual usurpa- * See the Canon Law, distinction 95, and Lancelot's Notes on the same. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 201 tion and tyranny in the church of God. To overturn such a system is to defend the gospel ; and its overthrow will promote the peace of the whole Christian world. SECTION IX. THE GREATEST DIVINES OF ALL AGES SHOWN TO BE AGAINST THESE EXCLUSIVE CLAIMS FOR THE DIVINE RIGHT OF BISHOPS. Of course this point has been anticipated in the pre- ceding sections ; for while it has been shown that no church ever affirmed this order of bishops by divine right, but that all churches have substantially negatived it, the doctrine of these churches proves the opinion of the greatest divines of all ages to have been against the tenet of bishops being by divine right an order distinct from, and superior to, presbyters ; having government over mi- nisters as well as over people ; and the sole power and authority of ordaining other ministers in the church of God. But besides their testimony in the voice of their different churches, many of them have spoken so expressly upon the subject, that it may be worth while to hear them deliver their own decisions. First, The Christian Fathers. — We have treated this subject in a former section. We shall give the learned Stillingfleet's opinion in connection with this point. " I believe," says he, " upon the strictest inquiry, Medina's judgment will prove true, that Hieron, Austin, Ambrose, Sedulius, Primasius, Chrysostom, Theodoret, and Theo- phylact, were all of Aerius's judgment, as to the identity of both name and order of bishops and presbyters, in the primitive church ; but here lay the difference, Aerius from thence proceeded to separation from the bishops and their churches, because they were bishops."* Wickliffe : — " I boldly assert one thing, viz., that in the primitive church, or in the time of Paul, two orders of the clergy were sufficient, that is, a priest and a deacon. * Irenicura, p. 276, sec. ed., 1662. 9* 202 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. In like manner I affirm, that in the time of Paul, the pres- hyter and bishop were names of the same office. This appears from the third chapter of the First Epistle to Ti- mothy, and in the first chapter of the Epistle to Titus. And the same is testified by that profound theologian^ Jerome."* Erasmus : — " Anciently none were called priests but bishops and presbyters, who were the same, but afterward presbyters were distinguished from the priest ;"t that is, from the bishop. Cranmer : — " The bishops and priests [presbyters] were at one time, and were no two things, but both one in the beginning of Christ's religion."| Dr. Whitaker, one of the greatest Protestant champi- ons in the days of Queen Elizabeth and James I. : — " For- merly there was no difference between a presbyter and a bishop. — For the placing of bishops over presbyters was a HUMAN arrangement — ordo humanusfuit — devised to take away schisms, as history testifies."^ Calvin : — " The reason w^hy I have used the terms bishops and presbyters, and pastors and ministers, promis- cuously, is, because the Scriptures do the same ; for they give the title of bishops to all persons whatsoever who were ministers of the gospeiy^\ Beza : — " The authority of all pastors is equal among themselves ; also their office is one and the same."T[ As mighty efforts are often made to bring in the authority of Beza for these claims, we will add another passage or two from this great reformer. In his work on the Church, De Ecclesia, above quoted, he begins the thirty-second sec- tion thus : — " At length we come to the third species of ecclesiastical offices, viz., that which pertains to spiritual jurisdiction. Now this jurisdiction was committed to presbyters properly so called ; whose name implies as much as though you should call them senators or elders. The apostle, in 1 Cor. xii, 28, calls them governors or rulers. And Christ designates the college of presbyters, * Vaughan's Life of WicklifFe, vol. ii, p. 275, sec. ed. Lond., 183L t Scholia in Epist. Hieron. ad Nepot., folio 6, vol. i, ed. 1516. t Burnet's History of the Reformation. ^ Whitakeri 0pp., pp. 509, 510, fol. Genev., 1610. II Instit., lib. 4, c. 8, sec. 8. % De Eccles., sec. 29. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 203 the church, because in them resided the supreme power in the government of the church." Here " presbyters, properly so called, have committed to them the spiritual jurisdiction of the church, and supreme poiver.''^ How strange ! to pretend that such a writer is an advocate for the supreme power of bishops by divine right. Beza, speaking of the angel of the church, mentioned Rev. ii, 1, calls him the president, " who," he says, " ought in the first place to be admonished about these matters, and then by him his other colleagues, and so the w^hole church. But from this to try to prove the establishment of that order of episcopacy which was afterward introduced into the church of God by human arrangements, is what neither can nor ought to be done : it will not even follow from this place that the ofice of president should necessarily be per- petual ; even as it is now at length clear by that tyrannical oligarchy'^'' (that is, the bishops) " whose head or apex is antichrist, and icho arose from this scheme with the most pernicious effect upon the wliolc church, and upon the world" Melaxcthox : — " They who taught in the church, and baptized, and administered the Lord's supper, were called bishops or presbyters ; and those were called deacons who distributed alms in the church. But these offices were not so separated as to make it sinful for a deacon to teach, or to baptize, or to administer the eucharist. Indeed all these things are lawful to all Christians ; for the keys are given to all. Matt, xviii."* M. Flacius Illyricus. — Treating of the time of the apostles, he says, " A presbyter was then the same as a bishop.''^ Speaking of the primitive church, he says, " The bishop was the first presbyter among the presbyters of each church, and this was done for the sake of order." And, after quoting Jerome's statement, that, in the apostles'' time, bishops and presbyters were not distinguished one from the other, but that this distinction, of one to preside over the rest, was made afterward, as a remedy against schism, Flacius himself remarks, " Hence it is evident that, about this time, in the end of the first or the begin- ning of the second century, this alteration took place, so * Loc. Com., 12mo. Basil, 152L 204 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. that episcopacy is not so much by divine appointment as by human authority "* Blondell and Dalleus : — " Episcopacy as now distin- guished from presbyters, according to the custom of the church from the third century, is not of apostolical appoint- ment, but merely of human institution."! Claude : — " As to those who were ordained by mere priests, [presbyters,] can the author of the Prejudices be ignorant that the distinction of a bishop and a priest, or minister, as if they had two different offices, is not only a thing that they cannot prove out of the Scriptures, but that even contradicts the express words of the Scripture, were bishojjs and priests are the names of one and the same office, from whence it follows that the priests have, by their first institution, a right to confer ordination, that cannot be taken from them by mere human rules."J BocHART : — " If the question be as to the antiquity, I am plainly of opinion, with Jerome, that in the apostles' age, there was no difference between bishops and presby- ters, and that the churches were governed by the common council of the presbyters. Therefore presbyters are more ancient than bishops. In the mean time I grant that epis- copal government is very ancient, and that, a little after the apostles' times, it became universal and greatly useful." See his letter to Morley, chaplain to King Charles I., and afterward bishop of Worcester. Upon this letter the Rev. James Owen remarks, " Of late years some arts have been used to procure letters from some eminent foreign divines, to condemn the nonconformists here, without hearing both sides. This is evident by Dr. Morley's letter to the famous Bochart."^l| * Catalog. Test. Veritat., vol. i, p. 84. t Vid. Beverigii Codex Can. Eccles. Prim. Vind. Proem. X Defence of the Reformation, part iv, p. 95. ij Abridgment of Mr. James Owen's Plea, p. 39. II " When the French churches were earnestly solicited (particularly by Bishop Moreton) to receive a clergy ordained by English bishops, they absolutely refused that motion : Peter Moulin, a famous French Protestant minister, in his letter to the bishop of Winchester, excusing himself for not making the difference between bishops and presbyters to be of divine appointment, he pleads, — that if he had laid the difference on that foundation, the French churches would have silenced him.^^ — Ibid., pp. 37, 38. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 205 Grotius : — " 'ETTLaKOTTT}, or the office of a bishop, sig- nifies inspection or oversight of any kind. The inspectors^ or those who preside over the church, are presbyters. The chief of these presbyters, afterward, by way of excel- lence, BEGAN to be called bishop, as is evident from those canons which are termed apostolical canons, in the Epis- tles of Ignatius, in Tertullian, and others."* When this illustrious scholar had received a copy of the celebrated Epistle of Clemens Romanus, he tells us he " read and re- read it." He then gives his judgment in the following manner : — " Clemens never mentions that extraordinary authority of bishops, which, after the death of St. Mark, began by the custom of the church to be introduced at Alex- andria, and, by this example, elsewhere : but he plainly shows, as St. Paul does, that the churches were then governed by the common council of the presbyters ; which presbyters both Clemens and St. Paul say were the same AS bishops."! And, in his posthumous work, quoted by many Episcopalian writers with the greatest confidence, and even with something like triumph, he plainly declares, that " episcopal pre-eminence, or the superiority of one minister over others, is not of divine right." " This," says he, " is sufficiently proved, because the contrary is not proved.^X Logic this, which these writers are well pleased to forget, but which their readers should always have in mind. Here, perhaps, is a proper place to point out a mistake into which many Church-of-England divines have fallen. They have found that Calvin, Beza, and other illustrious foreigners, praised the ecclesiastical order in the Church of England, and have immediately jumped to the conclu- sion, that those divines and great scholars were in favour of episcopacy by divine right. Now the whole conduct of Calvin and Beza, for instance, in the government of their churches, as well as their declaration in the above quotations, distinctly shows the contrary. The case of Zanchius will illustrate the matter still further. Zanchius, says the Rev. J. Sinclair, " was by some * Annot. in 1 Tim. iii. t Grotii Epist., No. 347, ed. Amstel., fol., 1687. X De Imperio Sum. Potest, circa Sacra, cap. xi, p. 327, ed. Paris, 1647. 206 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. reputed among the most learned of Calvin's contempora- ries." Mr. Sinclair, and some others, catch at an admis- sion of this eminent reformer, that episcopacy may be properly established, as one form of church government, as though by this admission he meant to support episco- pacy by divine right. This is a fallacy which such writers always employ : without it they cannot stir a single step in this controversy. Zanchius spent nearly the whole of his life in the services of a church that was wholly preshyterian. This practice, therefore, utterly destroys all the claims of exclusive Episcopalians to the benefit of his testimony. In his Confession of his Faith, he solemnly delivers his judgment on the subject of ministerial equality : chapter twenty-fifth contains thirty-nine aphorisms on the govern- ment of the church, and on the ministry of the gospel. In aphorism ninth, he says that the Lord Jesus Christ con- stituted^ve orders of ministers, — "apostles, prophets, evan- gelists, pastors, and doctors, Ephes. iv, 11." The first three he says were extraordinary and temporary ; the two last " ordinary and perpetual." " For," says he, " the frequent mention, by the apostles, of bishops, presbyters, and teachers, does not constitute new orders; for those who are called pastors are the same as are always signi- fied by bishops ; and often by the name of presbyters." Zanchius maintained the notion that presbyters sometimes meant lay elders as church rulers ; and, therefore, he says, that presbyters often signified pastors, though, in his view, not always. Then, aphorism tenth, the title is, " The fathers not condemned by us because they added more orders of ministers." In aphorism eleventh, he explains himself about these new orders, added by the fathers, to what Christ and his apostles instituted. " Therefore," says he, "seeing that all the former ministers of the gospel were equally called pastors, bishops, and preshyters ; and seeing they were all of equal authority ; one began afterward to be placed over all his colleagues ; although not as a master or lord, but as a head in a college to the rest of the felloAvs of the college : to him principally was committed the care of the whole church, and therefore it became the custom to give him alone, by way of excellence, the name of bishop or pastor ; the rest of his colleagues being content with the name of presbyter; so that there ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 207 began to be only one bishop and many presbyters in each city : this arrangement we judge is not at all to be con- demned. As to which matter the account of Jerome, and the judgment he delivers in his Epistle to Evagrius, in his comment on Titus, is embraced by us, where he declares that this whole arrangement was rather from custom than divine appointment, to take away dissensions and schisms. On the same ground we think the appointment of archbish- ops, and even of the four patriarchs, which took place indeed before the council of Nice, may be excused and defended : although all these in course of time were car- ried to the highest ambition and tyranny. This is the reason why the nearer an approach is made in the orders of ministers to apostolical simplicity, the more we approve it ; and we judge that due care should everywhere be used to attain to this simplicity." Then, at the close of the chapter, is an enumeration of errors to be rejected ; the eleventh is, that of " extending the authority of a bishop beyond that given by Christ who called him." Here we see Zanchius solemnly declare his faith to be, that " all the ministers of the gospel, instituted by Christ and his apostles, were equally called pastors, bishops, and presbyters, seeing they were all of equal authority ;" that bishops, as superintendents over other ministers, were " added by the fathers ;" and that the ground of their exist- ence, as such, is the same as that of archbishops and patri- archs, which all grant to be merely a human arrangement. Zanchius, then, maintained that episcopacy was merely a human arrangement ; yet these men quote him to prove its divine right: Zanchius maintained that it might be approved and justified when modestly used ; yet these men quote him to maintain its necessity and its exclusiveness against the validity of all other forms ! But Calvin, Beza, Zanchius, &c., had no objection to episcopacy as an ecclesiastical arrangement of a superin- tendency of one minister over other ministers, for the sake of order and good government in the church ; provided it could be guarded against a tendency to ecclesiastical tyranny. Very right. The Wesleyan Methodists adopt the same opinion, and practise it under a very extended superintendency. It is so guarded among them as to pre- vent the possibility of supposing one minister superior by 208 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. divine right to another. The truth of the case is, then, that these great continental divines and scholars, in their approbation of the ecclesiastical arrangements in the Church of England, show that they really believed the episcopacy of that Church not to be of divine right, but of kuman authority: this is the only legitimate conclusion that can be drawn from their statements and conduct ; a conclusion directly opposed to the end for which many of the Episcopalians now quote them. Indeed, these men pervert and abuse the authority of the great reformers, and continental divines. ViTRiNGA : — " All the rulers or governors of the church of Ephesus were equally, and without the least difference, called bishops, presbyters, and pastors. Acts xx, 17, &c. Yea, indeed, were we to collect all those places in the his- torical books, and epistles of the New Testament, in which the persons presiding over the church are mentioned, under different circumstances, we should meet with them everywhere equal both in name and in office, no difference at all ever being made between them. Bishops, presby- ters, and pastors, according to the style of the sacred Scrip- tures, are names designating one and the same order of men ; they are neither distinguished in the kind of their order, nor their office. This position will stand, I am persuaded, as long as the Acts of the Apostles and their epistles shall be read without prejudice."* MosHEiM : — " The rulers of the church were called either presbyters or bishops, which two titles are, in the New Testament, undoubtedly applied to the same order of men."t SuiCER : — " At the first, therefore, all presbyters were equally over the flock, and had none over themselves ; for they were called bishops, and had episcopal power, and ac- knowledged none above themselves, seeing they all came by order to the primacy, which primacy was only a matter of order by sitting in the first chair, and conferred no superior power. And this was the constitution of the church under the government of the apostles. Afterward, when bishops were made above presbyters, both being the SAME in name and reality, then the bishops presided over * De Synagog. Vet., lib. 2, cap. 2, pp. 447 and 485. t Eccles. Hist., vol. i, p. 101. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 209 the presbyters of each city, all bishops being accounted equal. This state of things continued till the council of Nice, A. D. 325, or a little after. From that time metro- politans were placed over the bishops of a province, and had the right of ordaining the bishops of that province."* ScHLEUSNER : — " For at length, after the apostles' age, that difference was introduced betv^een the bishops and presbyters, that the bishops should have the greater digni- ty, as Suicerus rightly states in his Thesaurus Ecclesias- ticus."t Archbishop Usher : — " I asked him [Abp. Usher] also his judgment about the vdXidlijoi presbyter'' s ordination; which he asserted, and told me that the king [Charles I.] asked him, at the Isle of Wight, wherever he found in antiquity, that presbyters alone ordained any ? and that he answered, I can show your majesty more, even where PRESBYTERS ALONE SUCCESSIVELY ORDAINED BISHOPS ; and instanced in Hierome's words, Epist. ad Evagrium, of the presbyters of Alexandria chusing and making their own bishops from the days of Mark till Heraclas and Dio- nysius."J And his express words, quoted by Dr. Parr, in his Appendix to the Archbishop's Life, are these — " A presbyter hath the same order in specie with a bishop : ergo, a presbyter hath equally an intrinsic power to give orders, and is equal to him in the power of order. ''^^ Now here is a host of men, whose qualifications for giving their judgment in this matter were never surpassed, all determining, with one voice, that by divine right all ministers of the GOSPEL ARE EQUAL ; and that the order of bishops, as noiu existing, is only a human ar- rangement. Here, then, this all-deciding point is placed on the basis of a catholic or universal doctrine of the Christian church. The celebrated rule of Vincentius Lirinensis is, that a doctrine truly catholic, is one " believed in all places, at all times, and by all the faithful. And we are thus catho- lic, when we follow universality, antiquity, and consent : but we follow universality, when we profess that only to be * Thesaur. Eccles., torn, i, col. 1180. t Lex. Gr. in Nov. Test., sub voce eTTLaKOirog. X Life of Baxter, by Sylvester, fol., lib. i, part ii, sec. 63, p. 206. i) See Dr. John Edwards's Discourse on Episcopacy, chap. xiv. 210 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. the true faith which is professed by the church all the world over. In like manner, we are followers of antiquity, when we religiously adhere to that sense of Scripture which manifestly obtained among the holy fathers, our predecessors. And lastly, we follow consent, when we embrace the definitions and opinions of almost all, if not all, the bishops and teachers of the ancient church."* Vincentius himself shows no case in which this rule more fully applied than it applies to the position, that all gospel ministers are, by divine right, equal in power and authority in the Christian church. The MAIN PILLAR of this semi-popish succession scheme was the assumption of the divine right of episcopacy. But we have now shown that presbyters and bishops are one and the same, by the supreme authority of the sacred Scriptures most expressly; by the consent of the FATHERS ; and by the consent of all the Christian churches in the world. The following conclusions, then, are fully established : — 1 . All the acts of presbyters are, by divine right, of equal authority with the acts of any bishops or arch- bishops whatever. 2. Ordination hy presbyters has equal divine authority with ordination by bishops ; and is more conformable to the Holy Scriptures. 3. Presbyters are equally as much successors of the apostles, in all the rights and authority remaining to the ministers of Christ, as the bishops are. 4. Whatever evidence, moreover, there is in any epis- copal church for an uninterrupted line of bishops from Peter, or any other apostle, there is the same evidence for an uninterrupted line of presbyters from that very apostle to the present day in every other Protestant church in the world. No man can properly or Scripturally be a bishop, except he be first a presbyter. Every bishop, then, necessarily presupposes a presbyter: where there is no presbyter, there can be no bishop, even on the princi- ples of our opponents. Therefore, wherever there is an uninterrupted series of true bishops, there is an uninterrupt- ed series of presbyters also. The Lutheran church, the Reformed or Calvinistic churches of Germany, the re- * Reeves's Translation, chap. iii. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 211 formed French church, the church of Scotland, the Dis- senters in general of Great Britain and Ireland, and the Wesley an and Calvinistic Methodists, are all governed hy presbyters. These had an uninterrupted succession from other presbj'ters. Those in the Scotch church, in the Lutheran church, &c., had an uninterrupted succession from the presbyters (bishops) of the Romish Church : those of the different Protestant churches in England, from the presbyters (bishops) of the Church of England. What these bishops were, by ecclesiastical or human ar- rangement, as distinct from presbyters, or real Scriptural bishops, adds no validity to their acts above presbyters. This we have already clearly proved. All they had of real Scriptural authority arose from any claim they might have to be considered as real Scriptural presbyters. All this authority passed to the presbyters of the above-men- tioned churches by uninterrupted succession in their ordi- nation. The human authority of a bishop does not effect the question at all. If an uninterrupted succession is worth any thing, it is, therefore, worth as much for presbyters as for bishops. The ministry, the ordinations, the adminis- tration of the sacraments, in all the above-mentioned churches, therefore, are, even on this ground, equally as Scriptural, valid, and apostolical, as the ministry, &c., of any episcopal church. But, if they have equal validity and apostolicity from the argument of a succession of persons, many of them have reason to thank God, on their own behalf, that they have much more evidence of the same thing from the personal piety of their ministers, the doctrines they teach, the discipline exercised over their members, the unsecularized state of their churches, the Scriptural character of their various ordinances, and, above all, in the conversion of sinners unto God. This exclusive, intolerant scheme, then, of apostolical succession in bishops alone, as taught by these high Church divines, falls to the ground. It is a monstrous FABRICATION, designed to support a system of usurpation over ministers and people ; and to maintain a method of excluding from the pale of Christianity all who do not sub- mit to it. It is Anglican Popery with many heads, set up in the place, and to accomplish the purposes, of the Popery of Rome. Let all true Protestants protest against it. Let 213 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. us contend for the succession oi faith and holiness as the only infalUble tests of a Christian church. For this let all the true members of the Church of England contend, both ministers and people. The writer, for one, will then fer- vently pray that God may make them a thousand times as many more as they are at this day. The world is before us : the faith of the gospel must save it. It is adapted and designed for this purpose. May the preaching of this faith, by whomsoever and wheresoever, have free course and be glorified ! SECTION X. NO SUFFICIENT HISTORIC EVIDENCE OF A PERSONAL SUC- CESSION OF VALID EPISCOPAL ORDINATIONS. In the close of the last section, we have shown that the proof of the equality, by divine right, of bishops and presbyters, is fatal to the whole scheme of high Church suc- cessionists ; utterly destroying its exclusive character. Here we might safely rest the cause. But as pretensions are boldly avowed, by high Churchmen, of their ability to trace the pedigree of their ordinations through an unbroken series of apostolical bishops ; and as they employ this topic for the purpose of intolerance, it may not be without inte- rest, or utility either, if we examine this point also. Dr. Hook shall state their case : " The prelates who at the present time rule the churches of these realms, were validly ordained by others, who by means of an unbroken spiritual descent of ordination, derived their mission from the apostles and from our Lord. This continued descent is evident to every one who chooses to investigate it. Let him read the Catalogues of Bishops, ascending up to the most remote period. Our ordinations descend in a direct unbroken line from Peter and Paul, the apostles of the circumcision and the Gentiles. These great apostles suc- cessively ordained Linus, Cletus, and Clement, bishops of Rome ; and the apostolic succession was regularly con- tinued from them to Celestine, Gregory, and Vitalianus, who ordained Patrick, bishop for the Irish, and Augustine ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 21^ and Theodore, for the English. And from those times an uninterrupted series of valid ordinations has carried down the APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION in our churches to the present day. There is not a bishop, priest, or deacon among us, who cannot, if he please, trace his own spiritual descent from St. Peter or St. Paul."* I am perplexed to account for such statements as the above. I have investigated this subject, and I solemnly declare my belief that they are utterly false. My per- plexity is, I say, how to account for them. I cannot, I do not think, that the authors of them mean to say what they know to be false. I suppose they loished them to be true ; and, not having time to examine for themselves, take them upon trust, and give them at second hand. But then if we can find excuse for Dr. Hook's want of knowledge of his subject, his arrogance can have none. Let the reader care- fully mark the tone of the doctor's Two Sermons on the Church and the Establishment. They are full of arrogance and insolence to all other churches — " The words of his mouth are smoother than butter, but war is in his heart : his words are softer than oil, yet are they drawn swords." " You will observe," says he, " how important all this is which I have now laid before you. Unless Christ be spiritually present with the ministers of religion in their services, those services will be vain. But the only min- istrations to which he has promised his presence, is, to those of the bishops who are successors of the first com- missioned apostles, and the other clergy acting under THEIR sanction and by their authority. " I know the outcry which is raised against this — the doctrine of the Christian church for eighteen hundred years — I know the outcry that is raised against it by those sects which can trace their origin no higher than to some celebrated preacher at the Reformation, — ^but I disregard it, because I shall, by God's help, continue to do, what I have done ever since I came among you, namely, declare the whole counsel of God, without re- gard to consequences or respect of persons, and, at the same time, as far as in me lies, live peaceably with all men." After perusing the preceding part of this Essay, the reader will clearly see how much confidence is to be * Two Sermons, 3d edition, Leeds, 1837, pp. 7, 8. 214 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. placed in the doctor's assertion, that his doctrine of apos- tolical succession has been " the doctrine of the Christian church for eighteen hundred years." His excommunica- tion of ALL the Protestant churches in the loorld from the pale of Christianity, except the Church of England, (for it is at these he points the finger of scorn — " those sects which can trace their origin no higher than to some cele- brated preacher at the Reformation,") is exactly in the spirit of the declaration of Froude, a leader of the Oxford Tract-men, quoted at page 144: — "Really," says he, "I HATE the Reformation and the reformers more and more." Yet all this baseless assertion, and this denuncia- tion against all these Protestant churches, the doctor be- lieves he makes " hy the help of God /" — and, at the same time, he persuades himself that he endeavours " to live peaceably with all men ! .'" Let it be understood that the writer of this Essay does not wish to undervalue the succession of pious 'pastors in any church ; no, it ought to be a cause of gratitude to God, when he raises up and gives such men to his church. But God's gifts never bind his own hands from giving equally excellent men, in any age, to any church. How- ever, the case is altogether different when those who arrogate the title of his ministers, corrupt the gospel, and absolutely forbid any one, without their sanction and sinful impositions, to preach it in a purer form. And, since the lime of the apostles, this has been done repeatedly by pretenders to apostolical succession. Indeed, could this personal descent be made out with the completeness pre- tended, it would prove no divine right to any exclusive claims to God's ordinances and blessings. God never made it a requisite in true ministers ; and the man that attempts it, in order to exclude other churches from the pale of Christianity, is an enemy to the rights, and to the peace of God's church. He may have deceived himself, and think otherwise ; but such he is, and such he must be, till he abandon his scheme. No such descent, however, can be proved. We will now proceed to show that there is no suffi- cient historic evidence of this " direct unbroken line from Peter," &;c. Every link of this evidence ought to be clear and strong. Dr. Hook says they are " evident to any ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 215 one who wishes to investigate the subject." But the very first links are all broken in pieces. Eusebius is often appealed to with confidence by suc- cession divines. He had the fairest opportunity for giving certainty to this subject up to his day, could certainty have been had. He wrote about A. D. 320. He had read every thing which remained by any or all of the fathers before him. The emperor Constantine the Great was his friend ; so that he could not want facilities and means of information. One great end at which Eusebius aimed, was "to preserv^e from oblivion the successions, although not of all, yet of the most famous apostles of our Saviour in those churches which then were eminent and still renowned."* Now let us hear his own account of the certainty he possessed on such subjects. He tells us, in this very chapter, that he had " to tread a solitary and untrodden way — and could nowhere find so much as the bare steps of any men who had passed the same path before ; excepting only some shows and tokens divers here and there had left, particularly declaring of the times they lived in, holding forth torches as it were afar off, and lifting up their voices from on high, and calling as out of a watch-tower what way we ought to go, and how without error or danger to order our discourse." This is not a very luminous, certain path ! — Then speaking of Paul and Peter, and the churches founded by them, he says, " Now how many and what sincere followers of them have been approved as sufficient to take the charge of those churches by them founded, it is not easy to say, except such and so many as may be collected from the words of St. Paul." This is honest; but it shows the folly of building our Christianity upon such an uncertain foundation ; for St. Paul gives no suc- cession lists ; and even Eusebius hath nothing certain besides the words of St. Paul. He then proceeds to say, " Timothy is reported to have been the first that was chosen to the bishopric of the Ephesian church ; as also Titus, of the churches in Crete." This is evidently guess- work in its origin, upon the foundation of St. Paul's having mentioned their names in connection with these two places ; for Whitby acknowledges he " can find nothing * Eccles. Hist., b. i, chap, i, English translation Cambridge, 1683. 216 ON APOStOLICAL SUCCESSION. of this matter, as to Timothy and Titus being bishops of Ephesus and Crete, in any writer of the f,rst three centU" riesT* The thing refutes itself in Eusebius, as to Titus, by saying that he was bishop of the " churches," eKKXeaidiV^ in the plural, in Crete. No such thing occurs in the ear- liest Christian writers as that of any man being bishop of more than one church, {one parish.) This was seldom, if ever, more than a single congregation. Timothy, the New Testament says, was an evangelist : most probably Titus was so too. No place of residence is mentioned as to either of them : it is likely they had none, but travelled anywhere under the direction of the apostles, to set in order in new churches the things that remained to be set- tled. All beyond this is doubtful : all contrary to it is false. Bishop Pearson, whom all Churchmen will allow to be unexceptionable authority, positively declares that Eusebius had no archives or diptychs to go by ; and he says, the supposition that he had Catalogues of the Roman bishops is utterly vain — " conjecturam vanissimam esse.''''^ As to bishops of Rome, we shall immediately see that Eusebius is contradicted by others. There is no cer- tainty. Dr. H. adroitly slips by a difficulty of no small magni- tude, by tracing his own spiritual descent from Peter or Paul, Linus, &c. " There is a npcj-ov -i^evdog in this case lies at the bottom," says Dr. Cave, " it being gene- rally taken for granted, that St. Peter was in a proper sense bishop of Rome, which yet I believe can never be made good. "I It is a question never yet settled, whether Peter ever was at Rome ; but all the authority there is for Linus, Cletus, and Clemens, as links in the chain, make them to have derived ii from Peter, and not from Paul. Now Arch- bishop Cranmer says, " It is not even certain that Peter ever was at Rome.^^^ The very learned Flacius lUyricus declares himself doubtful whether Peter ever was at Rome.H The learned Zanchius, another eminent reformer, has * Whitby's Preface to the Epistle to Titus, t Pearsoni 0pp. Posth. de Successions, diss, i, cap. ii. t Dr. Cave on the Government of the Ancient Church, pp. 9, 10, ed. 1683, 12mo. Lond. (} Burnet's Ref , book ii, A. D. 1534. II Catalog. Test. Ver., v. 1, pp. 484, 485, edit, secund. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 217 shown enough to make any candid person stand in doubt on the same subject.* However, suppose we grant this, and even reckon Peter the first bishop of Rome : then wlio succeeded Peter ? No man on earth can tell. One mentions one person, another says it was another, and these the very witnesses who are cited to prove the point. " The fathers," says Dr. D wight, " however sincere, and however satisfactory their testi- mony, concerning facts which passed under their own eyes, yet received traditionary accounts loosely : and both believed and recorded much of what took place before their time without truth or evidence." Bishop Taylor himself says, " the fathers were infixitely deceived in their ac- count and enumeration of traditions^] Now Tertullian, Rufinus, and Epiphanius, say Clement' succeeded Peter. Jerome declares that " most of the Latin authors supposed the order to be Clement the successor of Peter. ''^ But Ire- naeus, Eusebius, Jerome, and Augustine, contradict the above authorities, and say Linus succeeded Peter ; Chry- sostom seems to go the same way. Bishop Pearson has proved that Linus died before Peter ; and therefore, on the supposition that Peter was first bishop of Rome, Linus could not succeed him. Cabassute, the learned Popish historian of the Councils, says, " It is a very doubtful question concerning Linus, Cletus, and Clemens, as to which of them succeeded Peter." Dr. Comber, a very learned divine of the Church of England, says, " Upon the whole matter, there is no certainty who was bishop of Rome, next to the apostles, and therefore the Romanists" (N.B., Romanists) "build upon an ill bottom, when they lay so great weight on their personal succession."! But who was the third bishop of Rome ? for of the second there is no certainty to be had. Here the confusion is greater still. The Roman Catalogues — the Catalogues of high Churchmen — must have somebody, so they put Cletus in. Hear Dr. Comber again : " The like blunder there is about the next pope, [bishop of Rome,] the fabulous Pontifical makes Cletus succeed Linus, and gives us seve- ral Lives of Cletus, and Anacletus, making them of several * Zanchius de Ecclesia, cap. 9. t Liberty of Prophesying, sec. 5. t Dr. Comber on " Roman Forgeries in Councils," part i, c. 1. 10 218 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. nations, and to have been popes at different times, putting Clement between them. Yet the aforesaid learned bishop of Chester [Pearson] proves these were only two names of the SAME person ; but the notes" (of the Popish editors of the Councils) " attempt to justify the forged Pontifical, by impudently affirming that Ignatius, (Anacletus's contem- porary,) Ireneeus, Eusebius, St. Augustine, and Optatus, were all mistaken, or all wronged by their transcribers, who leave out Cletus. But every candid reader will rather believe the mistake to be in the Pontifical, (which is a mere heap of errors,) and in the Roman Martyrology and Missal, which blindly followed it, rather than in those ancient and eminent fathers. And every one^nay see the folly of the Romish Church, which venerates two several saints on two several days, one of which never had a real being ; for Cletus is but the abbreviation of Anacletus's namey — Dr. Comber, ut supra. It must be evident to every reader, that as Dr. Hook, &c., maintain the same unbroken line of bishops with the Roman Pontifical, Dr. Comber's remarks apply directly to their succession in common with that of the Papists. The Pontifical is the Romish book containing the lives and pretended decrees of the early popes, according to the opinion of the Church of Rome. Their Catalogues are generally made from it : it is justly denominated a forgery by Dr. Comber. What a triumphant succession ! whose main authority is a forgery.* Then who was fourth bishop of Rome ? The Papists, Dr. Hook, &c., say Clement was. Dr. Hook does not distinctly make Peter bishop of Rome ; but this makes no material difference. Now we have heard that Tertullian, Rufinus, Epiphanius, and, according to Jerome, " most of the Latin authors," say he was second bishop, and suc- ceeded next to Peter. Platina, the Popish biographer of the popes, a high authority in his way, says, that just be- fore Peter's martyrdom he appointed Clement to be bishop of Rome ; and all this while he gives twenty-three years to the presidency of Linus and Cletus as preceding Cle- ment in that bishopric. Peter had been dead twenty years * That this Pontifical is a forgery is proved beyond a doubt by numerous authors ; among others, see Howell's Pontificate, Dupin's Bibliotheca Patrum, Jewel's Defence. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 219 when Clement is said to become bishop ; and yet they say Peter made him bishop of Rome ! Cabassute says, " tJie whole question is very doubtful!'^ Prideaux, a stanch and learned Churchman, says, " no certaixty is to be had." Howell, a thorough Churchman, and learned writer, after going at length into w^hat he calls the stupidity and fables of the Romanists on this point, concludes : — " Here it is evident how very doubtful and uncertain is the -personal suc- cession of the Roman bishops." Dr. Comber concludes this point by remarking, that the stupidity and fable here are ^' d^ sufficient proof there is neither truth nor cer- tainty in the pretended personal succession of the first popes." Dr. Hook must set his priests, curates, and dea- cons to work. Here is enough to do for the Rev. Mr. Ward, the Rev. Mr. Ayliffe Poole, &c., with the Rev. Dr. Hook to assist them. Similar confusion is to be found in several succeeding parts. Platina, who had as good opportunity as any man to know the truth of history, as to the succession of the popes, &c., acknowledges that the authorities on the sub- ject, in several of the following centuries, were full of confusion.*, " And he complains," says Prideaux, " that they who were appointed as protonotaries to register the passages in the church were in his time become so illite- rate, that some of them could scarce write their own names in Latin." Fine chroniclers ! on whose faithfulness and accuracy to place the existence of our Christianity ! Pri- deaux remarks in another place, A.D. 858, that " Onu- phrius, Platina, Ciaconius, complain much of the neglect of registering, [and] the confusion of their popes' lives, notwithstanding their succession is made such a con- vincing argument." The ELECTIONS of the bishops of Rome increase the doubts of a serious inquirer here. They were, even long before the time of Vitalianus, such scenes of intrigue, con- tention, violence, and bloodshed, that there is far greater probability that, Scripturally speaking, the most orthodox and excellent person was thrown out, and a heretic, as Liberius, or a murderer, usurped the seat, than that any thing like a legitimate succession constantly took place. Bishop Burnet shows that for about three hundred years * See his Lives of Anicetus L, John XIII. and XV. 220 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. " the popes were made upon the emperors' mandates. Nor did the emperors part easily with this right, but, after that, the Othos and the Henrys kept up their pretension, and came oft to Rome, and made many popes ; and though most of the popes so made were generally anti-popes and schismatics, yet some of them, as Clement the Second, are put in the Catalogues" — the succession — " of the Popes by Baronius and Binnius ; and by the late publish- ers of the Councils, Labbee and Cossartius. There was indeed great opposition made to this at Rome ; but let even their own historians be appealed to, what a series of MONSTERS, and not men, those popes" — succession bishops — " were ; how infamously they were elected, often by THE WHORES OF RoME, and how flagitious they were, we refer it to Baronius himself, who could not deny this for all his partiality in his great work."* A fine uninterrupted " SERIES — of monsters" — apostolical bishops — " elected often by the whores of Rome ! l^^ A pretty spiritual de- scent for high Church priests ! ! As Cardinal Baronius was one of the greatest champions of Popery, his testimony to the wickedness employed in the election of the popes is above all exception. He says, speaking of the beginning of the tenth century, " O ! what was then the face of the holy Roman Church ! how filthy, when the vilest and 7nost powerful whores ruled in the court of Rome ! by whose arbitrary sway diocesses w^ere made and unmade, bishops were consecrated, and — which is inexpressibly horrible to be mentioned ! — false popes, their paramours, were thrust into the chair of Peter, who, in being numbered as popes serve no purpose except to FILL up the Catalogues of the Popes of Rome. For who can say that persons thrust into the popedom without any law by whores of this sort were legitimate popes of Rome ? In these elections no mention is made of the acts of the clergy, either by their choosing the pope at the time of his election, or of their consent afterward. All the canons were suppressed into silence, the voice of the decrees of former pontiffs was not allowed to be heard, ancient traditions were proscribed, the customs formerly practised in electing the pope, with the sacred * Vindication of the Ordinations of the Church of England, p. 50, 4to., secOTid edition. Lond., 1688. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 221 rites, and pristine usages, were all extinguished. In this manner, lust, supported by secular power, excited to frenzy in the rage for domination, ruled in all things." His own words are— " Qu(B tunc fades sanctcB Ecdesids Rofnancs ! qudm fcB- dissima cum Rottkb dorrdnarentur potentissimcB mqu^ et sor- didissimcB meretrices ! quarum arhitrio mutarentur sedes, darentur Episcopi, et quod auditu horrendum et infandurn €st^ intruderentur in Sedem Petri earum amassii Pseudo- Pontijices, que non sint nisi ad consignanda tantum tempora in catalogo Romanorum Pontijicum scripti. Quis enim d scortis hujusmodi ifitrusos sine lege legitimos dicere posset Romanos fuisse Pontijices ? Nusquajn Cleri eligentis, vel postea consentientis aliqua mentio. Canones omnes pressi silentio, decreta Pontijicum suffocata, proscriptcB antiqucB traditiones, veteresque in elegendo Summo Pontijice consue- tudines, sacrique ritus, et pristinus usus prorsus extincti. Sic vendicaverat omnia sihi libido, scBculari potentia freta, insaniens, m see) 16 ... 112 1366 Simon Langham .. Simon Islip, a.s aJoce ... 115 1414 Henry Chichley... Sienna, Pope Gregory XII. (^) 29 ... 125 where, — e flood of inconstancy, audacity, impudent pretensions, and irreverence ; of lying, deceiving^ 4-c., has broken iyi upon all. Besides, except the sin of Lucifer himself, the son of perdition, none can be more detestable, abominable, and hateful to our Lord Jesus Christ, than by such BASE FRAUDS TO KILL AND DESTROY THE SOULS of OUr pastOral ofBce and charge.' Wlien these things came to the ears of the pope, unable to restrain his wrath and indignation, he, with a terrible counte- nance, and a haughty mien, exclaimed, ' "Who is this old, crazed, blind fool, who dares, with such temerity, judge our actions 1 By Peter and Paul, were it not for our inbred generosity, I would hurl such con- fusion upon him, that his folly and punishment should astonish the world. What! is not the king of England our vassal 1 Yea more, even our bond slave 1 And cannot we, by a sovereign nod, imprisan him, and bind him in his ignominy V " Pages of this sort of abominations, practised by the popes in England, may be seen in Mason, lib. iv, cap. 14. He goes through the reigns of thirteen kings, with this evidence of the robberies committed by the popes upon that kingdom. I leave the reader to his own judgment upon these apostolical successors. (/) Platina says, that Nicholas, to enrich his relations, robbed others. " He took away by violence the castles of certain noble Ro- mans, and gave them to his own relatives." This robber ordained, Peckham, archbishop of Canterbury. Bishop Godwin says, that " Peck- ham had hardly arrived in England, when the pope, his creator, (for so he was pleased to call him,) required a large sum of money from him, viz., four thousand marks. It will not be uninteresting to hear his answer. ' Behold V says he, ' thou hast created me, and forasmuch as it is natural for a creatare to desire to be perfected by his creator, so, in my distresses, I desire to be refreshed by your holiness. Truly a writ of execution, horrible to be seen, and terrible to be heard, has lately reached me, declaring, that except I answer to it within a month after the feast of St. Michael, by paying into the hands of the merchants of Lucca the sum of four thousand marks, according to my bargain with the court of Rome, I am then to be excommunicated, and am to be cursed, in my own and other principal churches, with bell, book, and candles." Admirable successors — of Simon Magus I ! {g) The consecration of Chichley by the hands of Pope Gregory XII. 246 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. ARCHBISHOPS OF YORK. The custom was for the archbishops of Canterbury to consecrate the archbishops of York ; but the popes, in the plenitude of their power, frequently overruled this regulation,* - J. Names of the Bishops Where and hy whom Years of Pages in '^' and Archbishops. ordained. Episcop. Godwin. 1119 Thurstan Pope Calixtus 26 ... 668 1 147 Henry Murdac Pope Eugenius 6 ... 670 11 54 Roger Theobald, abp. of Can- terbury, (irAom see). 27 ... 673 1191 Geoffrey Plantagenet Tours, by the pope's order . . 22 ... 675 1215 Walter Grey by Stephen Langton, {whom see) 40 ... 677 1258 Godfrey deKinton.. Rome 6 ... 682 1279 William Wickwane. Rome 6 ... 682 1285 John Romanus Rome 10 ... 683 1299 Thomas Corbridge.. Rome, Pope Boniface VIII. . 4 ... 684 1305 Wm. de Greenfield . Lyons, Pope Clement V 10 ... 685 1307 William de Melton.- Avignon 23 ... 685 1342 William le Zouch.. Avignon, Pope Clement VI. 10 ... 686 BISHOPS OF DURHAM. 1133 Geoffrey Rufus York, Thurstan of York, {whom see) 12 ... 734 1153 Hugo Pusar Rome 42 ... 735 1197 Philip of Poictiers.. Rome, Pope Celestine III 738 1217 Richard de Marisco. Walter Grey, archbishop of York, {whom see) 9 ... 739 is even put into Chichley's epitaph. Now this Gregory was one of the then THREE PRETENDERS to the popcdom ; to end which schism the council of Constance was assembled. The history of these confusions has filled volumes. However, Gregory XII. was deposed, and John XXIII. or XXIV. kept the chair. Yet Chichley received his episcopal succession from this Gregory, declared by a whole council to be no pope of Rome, no bishop at all ; and he, Chichley, continued to commu- nicate these false orders to the English bishops and archbishops, even in the fifteenth century, for twenty-nine years ! What an unbroken line of valid ordinations ! ! These notes may suffice. They might be multiplied and enlarged greatly, but this is needless. The fountains are corrupt ; the streams cannot be pure. Either the popes or the archbishops of Canterbury consecrated the archbishops of York. These two archbishops conta- minated all the bishops of their distinct provinces. Never was a sink of iniquity deeper than this ! ! * Vide Howell's Pontificate, p. 288, &,c., and Bishop Godwin, pp. 668, &c. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 247 . ^ Names of the Bishops Where and by whom Years of Pages in and Archbishops. ordained. Episcop. Godwin. 1249 Walter de Kirkham. Same as the afcove 10 ... 743 1283 Anthony Beak Wickwane, archbp. of York, {whom see) 23 ... 743 1311 Richard Kellow Greenfield, archbp. of York, {whom see) 5 — 745 1318 Lewis Beaumont... Rome 14 ... 745 1345 Thomas Hatfield... Rome 36 ... 749 BISHOPS OF WINCHESTER. 909 Frithstan Plegmund, abp. of Can- terbury, {xohom see) . . 23 1070 Walkelin Pope's legate 27 ... 213 1174 Richard Toclivius .. Richard, abp. of Canter- bury, (toAow sec) 15 ... 216 1205 PetrusdeRupibus.. Rome 34 ... 217 1260 Ethelmar Rome, Pope Alexander IV. . 1 . . . 220 1262 John of Oxford Rome 3 ... 221 1282 John dePontissara.. Rome : 24 ... 222 1323 John de Stratford... Avignon 10 ... 224 Winchester and Durham are taken as specimens out of the provincial sees : it is needless to go further. Proof abundant is here given that the episcopal ordinations in the Church of England flowed steadily through all the filth of Popery. We have shown the sin of simony in the popedom in the last section. The old adage is, " The receiver is as had as the thief^ The English bishops regularly traded with Rome in simoniacal traffic ; evidence enough of this is found in Bishop Godwin's Lives of the English Prelates. The court of Rome sold every thing. " Sometimes," says Godwin, " those who had purchased, were, by a fraudulent clause in a subsequent bull, thrown out of their purchase." It was then sold to a second huckster, and the pope re- ceived double. P. 106. John of Oxford, bishop of Win- chester, paid six thousand marks to the pope for his con- secration, and the same sum to Jordan, the pope's chan- cellor. P. 222. Greenfield, archbishop of York, was two years before he could obtain his confirmation and conse- cration from the pope, and then he pajd nine thousand five hundred marks for the favour. P. 685. When Moreton became archbishop of Canterbury, Bishop Godwin says, " he spunged from the bishops of the provinces a large 248 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. amount of money, compelling them, by the authority of the pope, to bear the cost of his translation to that see — to the amount of fifteen thousand pounds. P. 131. " These, and other enormities, viz., all manner of avarice, usury, simony, and rapine ; all kinds of luxury, libidinous- ness, gluttony, and pride, reign in the court of Rome, — Ejus avariticc totus non sufficit orUs Ejus luxuries meretrix non sufficit omnis.^^* The incapacity of these lord bishops was often ludi- crous. When Beaumont was made bishop of Durham, Godwin says, " he was lame of both feet, and so illiterate that he could not read the documents of his consecration. The word metropoliticcB occurring, he hesitated, and being unable to pronounce it, he exclaimed, 'Let us skip it and go on.'' " So also when he came to the term (Bnigmate, " sticking in the mud again^^ says Godwin, " he biurst out into these words, — ' By Saint Lewis ! he was very uncourteous who wrote that word there^ " His next successor but one in the same see was Thomas Hatfield. When the pope was reasoned with, that Hatfield was a young, trifling fellow, without either knowledge, gravity, or sincerity, he answered, — " If the king of England [who had requested the pope to consecrate this Hatfield] had asked me now to make an ass a bishop, I would not have refused himP P. 750. That all bishops were pledged to Popery before the Refor- mation will be evident from the account of the pall, and the bishop's oath of fidelity to the pope. Fox, the vener- able martyrologist, shall state this matter : " This pope, [Alexander HI.,] among many other his acts, had certain councils, some in France, some at Rome in Lateran, by whom it was decreed, that no archbishop should receive the pall, unless he should first swear. Concerning the solemnity of which pall, for the order and manner of giving and taking the same, loith obedience to the pope, as it is contained in their own words, I thought it good to set forth unto thee, that thou mayest well consider and under- stand their doings. " " The form and manner, how and by what words the * Archdeacon Mason's Vindic. Eccles. Anglican., p, 522. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 249 pope is wont to give the pall unto the archbishop, in English : — " To the honour of Almighty God, and of blessed Mary, the virgm, and of blessed Peter and Paul, and of our lord POPE N. and of the holy Church of Rome, and also of the church N., committed to your charge, we give to you the pall, taken from the body of St. Peter, as a fulness of the office pontifical, which you may wear within your own church upon certain days, which be expressed in the privileges of the said church, granted by the see apostolic. " In like manner proceedeth the oath of every bishop, smearing obedience to the pope, in like words as followeth, in English : — " I, N,, bishop of N., from this hour henceforth, will be faithful and obedient to blessed St. Peter, and to the holy apostolic Church of Rome, and to my lord N. the pope. I shall be in no council, nor help either with my consent or deed, whereby either of them, or any member of them may be impaired, or whereby they may be taken with any evil taking. The council which they shall commit to me either by themselves, or by messengers, or by their letters, wit- tingly or willingly, I shall utter to none to their hindrance. To the retaining and maintaining the Papacy of Rome, and the regalities of St. Peter, I shall be aider (so mine order be saved) against all persons, &c. So God help me and these holy gospels of God"* The learned Mr. Johnson, who was proctor for the clergy of the diocess of Canterbury, says, that " both the arch- bishop of Canterbury, and he of York, from the time of Austin and Paulinus, down to the reign of Henry VIII., (saving that eight of this province [YorA;] had it not, viz., those between Paulinus and Egbert,) received a pall from Rome, for which they paid an unreasonable sum. This pall was a supernumeral robe of lambs'' icool, curiously adorned, and worn by the archbishop when he celebrated : it is still the arms or device of the archbishopric of Canter- bury. It was pretended to be an ensign of archiepiscopal authority, but was in reality a badge of slavery to the see of Rome"i And will the metropolitan of all England con- * Fox's Acts and Monuments, vol. i, p. 259, fol. edition. Lon., 1684. t Johnson's Clergyman's Vade Mecum, vol. i, p. 41, fourth edition, 1715. 11* 250 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. tinue to bear, in the most distinguished place and manner, — *' in REALITY A BADGE of SLAVERY tO the SEE of RoME ?" Let the Church of England put such things away. They are discreditable and injurious to the cause of Protestant- ism in geneal. Here, then, is sufficient eAddence of the point that the episcopal ordinations in the Church of England, before the Reformation, came through the ^'■series of monsters,^'' — the popes of Rome. Evidence also has been given that the bishops, generally, were as corrupt as the popes. ^^ All ecclesiastical degrees, even from the pope to the doorkeep- ers, were oppressed with damnable simony." St. Bernard says that ambitious, covetous, sacrilegious, simoniacal, incestuous persons, fornicators, and such like monsters of mankind, flowed from all parts of the world to Rome, that by the apostolical authority they either might obtain or keep ecclesiastical honours." Such were the ordainers and the ordained ! Blessed channels ! through whom alone the pov/er and authority to preach a holy gospel is to be communicated for the salvation of the world ! SECTION XIII. NULLITY OF POPISH ORDINATIONS OF ENGLISH BISHOPS CONCLUDED. Having in the preceding sections exhibited a brief view of the ordainers of the English bishops before the Reforma- tion, and of the persons who were ordained by them, our way is now clear for the more immediate discussion of these Popish ordinations. Three questions require our consideration here : first, what is ordination ? secondly, what are the Scriptural regulations on the subject, as to the ordainers and the persons to be ordained ? and thirdly, what, according to these rules, is the validity of these Popish ordinations ? First, what is ordination ? Ordination is that act of the church by which persons are solemnly set apart to the ministry of the gospel. It is usually performed by laying on the hands of the ministers already existing in that church. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 251 Apostolical usage countenances this form ; but no particu- lar form was ever made necessary. The priests under the law had no imposition of hands in their ordination : the apostles had no imposition of hands in their ordination : it is never commanded. It is decent and proper, but not essential; not necessary to ordination. Some persons will assert the contrary, and maintain that imposition of hands is essential to ordination. The reader, who will receive assertions for proof, will believe them : sufficient Scriptural proofs they have not ; and human authority can enjoin nothing as essential in divine matters, such as the ministry of the gospel. To make this more clear, we may remark, that all the great writers on the subject generally grant that there is no command in the word of God enjoin- ing either any particular matter or form of ordination : that is, in plainer language, no particular action, sign, or form of words, is enjoined as necessary to ordination : imposi- tion of hands, consequently, is not enjoined, and therefore is not necessary. If we come to custom, it may be ob- served, that the Jewish sanhedrim, from which it is sup- posed that the Christian church took many of its ordination ceremonies, that this sanhedrim admitted, for a long period, ordinations to be performed without imposition of hands. It was frequently done by a written document, to absent persons, simply declaring them ordained ; in the same man- ner as one of the ministers of the sovereign would appoint a lieutenant to a county.* As to the opinions of Christian writers on the subject, they did not, for above a thousand years after the apostles' time, define what they considered necessary to ordination. When they began to attempt this, some fixed upon one thing, and some upon another, in endless confusion. Those who at last came to place m- position of hands among the essentials, did it upon no other ground than this, that the church had willed it to be so by its usage. They grant that the church might have used it or not used it, without violating any divine authority. The argument, then, is based on false premises, as it assumes that the church can add to the essentials of religion. The conclusion, of course, falls to the ground. And the po- sition remains immovable, that, as there is no command in the word of God enjoining any particular action, sign, or * See Seldon, de Syn., b. ii, c. 7, sec. 1. 252 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. form of words, as necessary to ordination ; therefore, no particular action, sign, or form of words, is necessary to ordination ; consequently, imposition of hands is not neces- sary to ordination. We may simply remark, in conclu- sion, that the words used by the Church of Rome and the Church of England, — " Receive thou the Holy Ghost, &c.," were not used by the Christian church for above a thousand years after Christ.* Secondly, what are the Scriptural regulations on the subject of ordinations, as to the ordainers, and the persons to be ordained. From the nature of the case, the qualifi- cations are generally the same as to both parties. The reader is requested carefully to bear in mind that part of section fourth^ extending from page 71 to page 80. From this he will see that holiness of life, the call of God, a.nd sound- 7iess in the faith, are required in a minister by our Lord and his apostles. The special command given by St. Paul to Timothy, as to the ordainers, is as follows : " The things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou io faithful men, v.ho shall be able to teach others," 2 Tim. ii, 2. This cannot reasonably be interpreted to mean less than these two things : first, that the man is a true believer, a true Christian ; and secondly, that he must give suitable evidence that he will he faithful to the truth and trust of the gospel, as a steward of its mysteries : less than this would not answer the divine requisition. Calvin remarks, with liis accustomed good sense, that the apostle requires them to be '■^faithful men, not according to that faith which is common to Christians in general, but that by way of emphasis they should spe- daily excel in faith." This is corroborated by the qualifi- cation for deacons ; even they w^ere to be " men of honest report, full of the Holy Ghost and of wisdom,^'' Acts \\, 3. Then, as to the persons to be ordained: the reader should keep in mind what has been said in section fourth, as above referred to ; especially what is laid down by divine authority on the subject in 1 Tim. iii, 1-7, and Titus i, 5—9 : * See on the points above stated, Morinus de Ordinationibus ; Ca- bassutii Not. Eccles., p. 178 ; Altare Damascenum, p. 174, edit. 1708 ; StiUingfleet's Irenicum, pp. 270 and 392 ; Masoni de Ministcrio Angli- cano, pp. 216, &c. ; and Courayer on English Ordinations, chap, x, pp. 161 and 197, edit. Lond., 1725. ox APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 253 " This is a tnie sapng. If a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, \-igilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach, not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre ; but patient, not a brawler, not covetous ; one that ruleth well his own house, hann? his children in subjection with all gravity- ; (for if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God ?) not a no- vice, lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the con- demnation of the devil. Moreover he must have a good report of them which are without ; lest he fall into re- proach and the snare of the devil.'' " For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain elders in ever\- city, as I had appointed thee : if any be blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children, not accused of riot, or unruly. For a bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God ; not self-willed, not soon angr\-, not given to wine, no striker, not given to lilihy lucre ; but a lover of hospitality ; a lover of good men, sober, just, holy, temperate ; holding fast the faithful word as he hath been taught, that he ma^' be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and to con-vince the gainsayers." Here, personal piety ; an unhlameablc hfe; knowledge of the gospel, ability to teach, &c., are strictly required. One point desenes especial notice here, as great mistakes arise from overlooking it, viz., the call of God, as PRECEDING all human appointment to the office of the ministry-. This call is stated and proved at page 73. Archbishop Potter, a high authorit}- on the subject, main- tains " that the whole power of erecting the Christian church, and of governing it since it was erected, is derived from [God] the Father. But then the person by whom this power is immediately conferred is the Holy Spirit. And the authority and special grace, whereby the apostles, and all church officers execute their respective functions, are in the same manner ascribed to the Spirit. So that all eccle- siastical authority, and the graces whereby men are ena- bled to exercise this authority to the benefit of the church, are the gifts ofthe Holy Spirit"* So Bishop Wilson : * Archbishop Potter on Church Government, pp. 254-256, edit. Baffster. Lond., 1838. 254 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. " As we consult God, as Jesus Christ himself did, when we ordain men to his service, so should we consult Jesus Christ when we assign them a place in his family. Would Jesus Christ have given this man the charge of the souls of this parish? That we may have the comfort of knowing that we enter into the ministry by a choice which proceeded from God, we must have some assurance in our own hearts, that the glory of God, the good of souls, was in our intention, and that we were called regularly, and according to the inten- tion of the church. It belongs to thee, O Holy Spirit of grace, to send such guides into thy church as may lead thy people in the right way, and to be the guide of those guides."* And Peter Damian, cardinal, bishop of Ostia, who assisted the popes in the eleventh century to settle the question of disputed ordinations, grants fully, that "aZ/that is great and holy in ordination is by the receiving of the Holy Spirit ; so that their ordination is to be ascribed to God and not to man ; and that the priests, on their ordina- tion, do, as it were, become clothed loith the righteousness of God.^'j From these statements, and from what has been above referred to, it clearly follows, that, as the call of God must jrrecede the human appointment, and be the basis upon which it rests, any human appointment which super- sedes, contradicts, or sets aside, this divine call, is null and void to all intents and purposes. God's call can never coii- tradict his own requisitions. He who requires in his writ- ten word, as qualifications for this office, that the candi- dates for it should be ^^ just and holy,'" would never, by the Holy Ghost, call a wicked and unholy man : he who requires, by his written word, a man to be " blameless,^'' would never call a man by the Holy Ghost who had no- thing but what WRS full of blame : he who requires by his written word that a man be " sober and temperate,^^ would never call a man by the Holy Ghost who was « drunkard: he who by his written word requires a man not to be given to ''filthy lucre,'' would never by the Holy Ghost call a simonist, a trader in holy things : he who by his written word requires a man " to hold fast the faithful word," would never by the Holy Ghost call a heretic to this minis- try. No wicked men, ih.exe.{oTG, no drunkards, wo simonists, * Bishop Wilson's Meditations in the Oxford Tracts, No. 65. t Damiani de Eccles. Inst., cap. 3, edit. 1536, 12mo. ox APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 255 no heretics, as such, ever had the call of God. But the greatest part of the ordainers and the ordained before the Reformation were wicked, drunkards, simonists, heretics, &c. ; see section xi and xii. God never sent them. " The blind led the blind, and both fell into the ditch." For any human authority, knowingly to put such men into the ministry, is to break God's ordinances, to introduce wolves instead of shepherds into the fold of Christ, and to increase the condemnation of the men so obtruded upon the church. He who ordains a wicked man to the ministry is a traitor to God and the church. Such is the view we derive from this supreme authority. If men speak according to these oracles, let us hear them ; but, if otherwise, they are of no authority. Let God be true, though every man be a liar. Our English reformers have some fine remarks on this subject. In the declaration made of the functions and divine institution of bishops and priests by the convocation, as noticed above, they say, " This off.ce, &c., is subject, determined, and restrained unto those certain limits and ends for the which the same was appointed by God's or- dinance; which, as was said before, is only to adminis- ter and distribute unto the members of Christ's mystical body, spiritual and everlasting things: that is to say, the pure and heavenly doctrine of Christ's gospel, and the graces conferred in his sacraments. And therefore this said power and administration is called, in some places of Scripture, donum et gracia, a gift and grace ; in some places it is called claves sive potestas clavium, that is to say, the keys, or the power of the keys; whereby is sig- nified a certain limited office, restrained unto the execution of a special function or ministration, according to the say- ing of St. Paul in the first chapter of his Epistle to the Romans, and in the fourth chapter of his First Epistle to Timothy, and also in the fourth chapter of his Epistle to the Ephesians." After a lengthened comment on the last reference, they conclude thus : " By which words it ap- peareth evidently, not only that St. Paul accounted and numbered this said power and office of the pastors and doctors among the proper and special gifts o{ lh.e Holy Ghost, but also it appeareth that the same was a limited power and office, ordained especially and only for the causes and purposes before rehearsed." These are golden sentences. 256 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. The office, power, and authority of bishops and presbyters " is subject, determined, and restrained unto those certain limits and ends for the which the same was appointed by God's ordinance.''^ From these premises it follows, — First, that it is limited to spiritual matters ; ministers of the gospel have no authority over the body and sub- stance of the people, either directly or indirectly : Secondly, that it is limited to the edification of the church, to the building up of God's people in their most holy faith ; as soon, then, as ever any one begins to subvert the faith of the church, his office loses its authority : Thirdly, that all bishops and presbyters are limited in their ordinations, not only to such qualifications of the candidates as " God's ordinance'''' requires, but also they are limited by God's ordinance in the power and authority they give to those whom they ordain ; that is, they cannot give either more or less than is " determined hy Gods ordi- nance?'' From overlooking this last point, a silly argument has been attempted by many writers on episcopacy, in order to prove that though presbyters in the apostles' time might have the power of ordination, yet if, when modern bishops ordained any presbyters, they did not choose to give these presbyters authority to ordain, that then these presbyters have no divine authority to ordain. This is saying not that " God's ordinance," but that the bishops' dicta deter- mines the limits of the gospel ministry. A delighful doc- trine to high Churchmen ! but a doctrine which is the very essence of Popery itself That any particular church may make prudential arrangements on the subject of ordination as a rule for its own ministers, is readily granted ; but this is a mere humxin affair, and never can in the least affect in the sight of God the authority of any true minis- ter of Christ in the church of God, Presbyters in the apostles' time were the same as bishops : Timothy was ordained by the laying on of the hands of the presbytery. Presbyters, then, had divine authority to ordain in the apostles' times — God never took it away — no power on earth can take it away. Presbyters, therefore, always had, and always will have, a divine right to ordain. Such are the divine limitations of the ministry — to spiritual things only ; to edification and not to subversion of the faith ; to ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 257 the qualifications of the persons, and to the restraining and fixing of the ministerial power and authority. Let these rules be observed, and a universal reformation must be the consequence ; but if the traditions of men are preferred to the commandments of God, men so sent will preach in vain : God never sent them. He will not forsake his faith- ful people ; but such men shall not profit them. This is substantially the meaning of the twenty-sixth article in the Church of England. It gives too much authority to such men ; but its principal design is to show that the effect of Christ's ordinance is not taken away by their wickedness — " from such as by faith and rightly do receive the sacra- ments ;" that is, that the true Shepherd will not forsake his fiock because wolves happen to be over them. Very true : but this will not prove that a v/olf is either a sheep or a shepherd. Wo to the men who on such a principle place wolves over the flock of Christ ! The desire to maintain an external unity led to an early corruption in this matter. For the supposed honour of the church, and to prevent divisions, as the fathers state, or- dination was very generally given up into the hands of the bishops. Many of them became tyrannical, proud, wicked, and worldly. And what made the case worse still, was this, that during the fourth century the greatest part of them became Arians, denying the true Godhead of Christ, and the personality and divinity of the Holy Ghost. Now what was to be done, when those who maintained the orthodox faith began again to prevail? They must either deny that heretics^ as the Arians were, could give true or- ders, and consequently altogether reject the Arian bishops, and their ordinations ; or they must receive their orders as valid and Christian. Well, to patch up the matter, and save the honour of the bishops, they generally received the ordinations of the Arians. And it is probable that nearly all the episcopal ordinations in the world have come from Arians. A glorious succession ! Then followed the attempt to find reasons, and make decrees, to justify such TJNscRiPTURAL and ABSURD proceedings. For what can be more unscriptural and absurd than to pretend that a man, who refuses to receive Jesus Christ, by refusing to " ho- nour the Son even as he honours the Father V John v, 23 — that such a man, I say, can have a commission from 258 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. Christ, to ORDAIN others to deny him also ? To pretend to salve this by saying, that if he uses the name of the Fa- ther, Son, and Holy Ghost, and does this by the authority of the church, his acts are valid, is a sophism. The authority of the church is limited by the Scriptures — by the authority of God : the church, therefore, can give no authority contrary to the Scriptures ; but the Scriptures " reject all heretics ;" — all that " deny the Lord that bought them," 2 Pet. ii, 1 ; — therefore the church can give such heretics no authority : see section fourth. The words, Fa- ther, Son, and Holy Ghost, are either used according to Scripture truth, or they are not. If an Arian should use them, according to Scriptiu-e (an impossible supposition) he comes to God with a lie in his mouth ; that is, he pro- nounces as true what he believes to be false, and this he does with the intention of deceiving both God and man. To suppose Christ would set his seal to this lie, would be blasphemy. An Arian, therefore, cannot use them in a true sense. Suppose, then, that he uses them in n, pervert- ed sense, — did Christ ever give him a commission to pervert his truth, and to appoint others to pervert it ? This again is blasphemous and absurd. An Arian, therefore, has no commission ; he can give none. All he does is null and void to all intents and purposes. A righteous division is better than a sinful unity. The orthodox should have act- ed on this principle. However, too much wickedness in life had at that time spread over those parts wliich held the orthodox view of the Trinity, so that there was not moral courage enough to resist and counteract these abominations. Heresy is destructive ; and faith, without works, is dead. Nothing but a living, fruitful faith, can conquer the world. Simony is a point to be well considered here. Though this was an early evil, yet as it never could be embraced by any part of the church as a mark of a sect or division in the church, so no evil schemes to defend it were laboured out by perverted ingenuity. It has always been condemn- ed by decisions of councils, as the foulest of sins ; as the following extracts will show : — " If any bishop, priest, or deacon, obtain his dignity by MONEY, let him, and him who ordained him, he deposed, and wholly cut off from communion, as Simon Magus was by Peter." — Apostolical Canons, No. 22. I am aware ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 259 of the dispute about the authority of these canons. I be- lieve them to be of no apostolical authority. However, it is generally acknowledged that they give us the views and practice of the church, in fact, at a very early age. They were, in the fourth and following centuries, referred to as ecclesiastical authority. They are in great estimation with high Churchmen. Mr. Johnson, the learned transla- tor of the canons, a strong succession advocate, remarks in his notes on this canon : — " Indeed, in the case oi simony, it may be said, that he who obtained orders by this means, his orders were null ah initio^'' — -from the beginning. He never had any really. " If any bishop ordain for money ^ and make a market of the unvendible grace, and perform the ordination of a bish- op, village-bishop, priest, deacon, orof any one listed in the clergy, for ^am, &c.,let him that is ordained be never the better for his ordination." — Council of Chalcedon, A. D. 451, can. 2. There were present six hundred bishops. " That they who are ordained for money, be deposed^ and the bishop who ordained them.'^ — Council o{ Constanti- nople, or Trullus, A. D. 683, canon 22. " Whosoever either sell or buy holy orders cannot be priests; hence it is written, ' Cursed be he that gives and he that receives.' How, therefore, if they be accursed, and are not holy, can they consecrate others ? How can he bless, who is accursed himself? There is no power in ordination, where buying and selling prevail." — Canon Law, by Gratian, in the twelfth century. " If any one should be enthroned in Peter's chair by MONEY, by human favour, by popular or military tumult, without the united and canonical election of the cardinals, such a one is not apostolical, but is an apostate ; and the cardinals, clergy, and people of God, may anathema- tize him as a thief and a robber, and may, by all human means, drive him from the apostolical seatP — Second Council of Lateran, Vid. Platin. in Vita. Nicolai. tertii. " Whatever holy orders are obtained by money, either given or promised to be given, we declare that they were NULL from the beginning, and never had any validity.'''' — Council of Placentina, A. D. 1095, can. 2. In the fortieth canon of the Church of England, simony, the buying and selliiig of orders, &;c., is declared to be 260 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. *' a detestable sin, and execrable before God." And every bishop, priest, &c., before he is admitted to any spiritual office, is obliged to take the following oath : — " I, N. N., do swear that I have made no simoniacal payment, con- tract, or promise, directly or indirectly, by myself or by any other, to my knowledge or with my consent, to any person or persons whatsoever, for or concerning the pro- curing and obtaining of this ecclesiastical office, &c. So help me, God, through Jesus Christ," Here, then, we have seen what qualifies a person for ordination; and what disqualifies him. Heaven has laid down the law. The authority of the church is limited by the authority of God. Every person truly ordained, must be ordained according to the word of God ; and must be ordained specially and only for the causes and purposes therein contained. Every ordination which is plainly and knowingly contrary to this rule, is null and void from be- ginning to end. But the ordination of every man who is plainly not a " faithful man ;" that is, a true Christian, the ordination of every wicked man, of every heretic, and of every simonist, is flatly contrary to the word of God ; therefore the ordination of every M'icked man, of every heretic, of every simonist, is null and void from the beginning, it is no ordination at all. Let us apply this divine rule to the Popish ordinations of English bishops, before and at the Reformation, The Church of Rome, by the united judgment of the reformers, was the " great whore" mentioned in the Revelation. Can this " great whore" have legitimate children ? Com- mon sense, as well as the Scriptures, would declare — No ! The Church of Rome is an idolatrous church ; can she, as such, have a heavenly commissioned priesthood ? — Impossi- ble ! The popes, bishops of Rome, who ordained the Eng- lish bishops, were monsters in crime, heretics and simon- ists of the darkest dye. They could have no commission from a holy God : they were " sons of Belial," " antichrist ;" they, therefore, could give no commission. The English bishops, generally, before the Reformation, were true sons of the " great whore." They bought and sold, and trafiicked in spiritual things; they were wicked men, idolaters and simonists. Any ordination of such men would be null from the beginning ; would be nothing :— ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 261 more, if possible, when they were ordained by those mon- sters of iniquity, the popes of Rome. The conclusion, then, is irresistible — Popish ordinations of the English BISHOPS BEFORE and AT the Reformation were null and void to all intents and purposes ! !* * Two objections are sometimes urged against this conclusion ; first, — that though one bishop who ordains might be vicious, a simonist, a heretic, &c., yet the others concerned in the ordination might not be so : and, secondly, it is urged that Judas continued to possess full apostoli- cal authority notwithstanding his being a thief, a devil, and a traitor ; and that, therefore, a bishop retains full episcopal authority, however wicked he may be. Let us examine these objections. Objection 1st. — That though one bishop who ordains might be vicious, a simonist, a heretic, &c., yet the others concerned in the ordination might not be so. This, I believe, is as the matter is usually stated. But the true state of the question is different. We will state it on their own principles; viz., on ecclesiastical authority — Scriptural authority it has none. In the ordination of a bishop there is always one bishop who alone consecrates ; this is the universal language of the rituals on the subject : the other bishops who take part in the ceremony are rather there as wit- nesses than as consecrators. The ancient rituals never speak of more than one consecrator. In all the ancient Greek forms of ordination, as exhi- bited by Morinus, one bishop only lays his kaJid on the head of the person to be ordained, the other bishops touching the Gospels placed upon the head of the person to be ordained. In the Roman Church the other bishops touched his head, but did not lay their hands on his head. One bishop only pronounced the consecration prayer. This was, in ninety- nine cases out of a hundred, either the pope or the archbishop : see Morinus, part ii, pages 234 and 250. The consecration of bishops, therefore, always depended upon the capability of the one bishop who consecrated ; and whenever he was found to be really incompetent, the general rule was to quash all his ordinations. The monsters of iniquity, the popes, as exhibited in the preceding pages, were the sole consecra- tors of the English bishops, as stated in section xii. By Scriptural rule they were utterly incompetent : their ordinations were consequently NULL. The rule just stated makes it difficult to prove the validity of Archbishop Parker's consecration ; upon which all the present ordina- tions and consecrations of the English Church since the Reformation depend. Barlow was his only consecrator ; but there is not full proof that Barlow himself was consecrated. The acts of the consecration of bishops are generally registered in the archives of the archbishop, but no registration of Barlow's consecration can be found. Objection 2d. — It is urged that Judas continued to possess full apos- tolical authority, notwithstanding his being a thief, a devil, and a traitor ; and that therefore a bishop retains full episcopal authority, however wicked he may be. We answer, — First, there is no proof that Judas was a wicked man w]\er\ first put into his office. Secondly, it is acknowledged by Churchmen of considerable note, 262 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. This was the general opinion of the Protestant churches at the Reformation ; and even before that time the same opinion was maintained by the Waldenses. In the Treatise of Antichrist, by the old Waldenses, written A. D. 1200, having described antichrist, they go on — " that iniquity that is after this manner, with all the minis- ters thereof, great and small, with all those that follow (v. Archbishop Potter on Church Government, pp. 35, 38, 51 and 52, ed. Bagster, 1838,) that the office of the apostles, before our Lord's resurrec- tion, was a very limited one. They performed no ordinations, exercised no superintendence over any societies, had no authority whatever over a single human being. When their commission was more fully given, they were to wait in Jerusalem until they received power from on high. This was given on the day of Pentecost. Thirdly, limited as this commission was in Judas's time, there is no proof that he performed a single act, as an apostle, or had any counte- nance from our Lord to do so, after he had become a thief, a devil, and a traitor. It was only six days before that passover at which our Lord suffered, that Judas is first charged with any of these crimes. It was certainly after even this time that the devil is said to have entered into Judas : his treason followed this. There is no proof, therefore, that he was continued in the authority of an apostle for a single day after any of these crimes. Fourthly, it is said expressly that " Judas by transgression fell from his apostleship,^'' Acts i, 25. " And none of them is lost but the son of perdition," John xvii, 12. Judas is here spoken of as already *' /os<," and as being the " son of perdition.''^ He was lost from Jesus, and consequently lost from his apostleship, before he hanged himself. The conclusion is, that there is no proof that Judas was continued a single day in his apostleship, or that he was allowed to perform a single act, as an apostle, after his transgression ; but, on the contrary, it is positively asserted in the word of God, that "by transgression he fell from it." No bishop, then, has an iota of authority from this case after he becomes a wicked man ; but it distinctly and positively proves that, as a wicked man, " by transgression he falls from his office.'^ So fall for ever all such schemes, in lohich bigoted^ infatuated men, would hide their intolerance and abominations ! Some readers may wonder why I have taken the pains to expose this last monstrous effort to make Judas, as the Rev. Charles Radcliffe humourously said, " a hook on which to hang the apostolical succes- sion." I can tell them. In my simplicity, I supposed such a thing too monstrous to be attempted : but I find I have been mistaken. Even evangelical clergymen, I have been told on good authority, have had the hardihood and infatuation to use it in the pulpit. But what crowns all, is, that the Hon. and Rev. A. P. Perceval, B. C. L., chaplain in ordinary to the queen, in an Answer which he has written to this Essay, by the request of Dr. Hook, &c., and dedicated, by permission, to the archbishop of Canterbury, has placed this case of Judas among his argu- ments ! ! See p. 85 of his "Apology for the Apostolical Succession." ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 263 them with a wicked heart, and hoodwinked eyes ; this congregation, thus taken all together, is called antichrist, or Babylon, or the fourth beast, or the whore, or the man of sin, or the son of perdition. His ministers are called false prophets, lying teachers, the ministers of darkness, &c. Antichrist covers his iniquity by the length or suc- cession of time, — by the spiritual authority of the apostles, — by the writings of the ancients, and by councils. These and many other things are, as it were, a cloak and a gar- ment, wherewith antichrist doth cover his lying wickedness, that he may not be rejected as a pagan, (or infidel,) and under which he can go on to act his villanies like a whore. Now it is evident, as well in the Old as in the New Tes- tament, that a Christian stands bound, by express command given, to separate himself from antichrist.''^ Then a great many passages of Scripture are quoted to prove this duty of separating from antichrist. On this ground it was also that they rehaptized those who had been baptized by the Popish bishops and priests, accounting them sacrile- gious and antichristian ministers, and incapable of admin- istering any sacraments. See Schlosser's note to his Latin version of Wall on Infant Baptism.* Calvin was consulted to know what should be done when any bishop, curate, &lc., from among the Papists, should desire to join himself to the reformed church ? He remarks, " first, that if he should be found not to have suf- ficient ability and qualification for the office of a minister, he should show the sincerity of his conversion by retiring into the station of a private member of the church. But if he should be found able to continue in the ministry, he was to give in a confession of his faith, and of his sincere and sacred adherence to the reformed religion. Then he was to acknowledge that his vocation or call to the min- istry had been a mere abuse : he was to request a new approbation ; he was expressly and by name to profess that his former institution by the authority of the pope had been of no validity ; and at the same time he was to renounce it as being conferred by means every way un- lawful and opposed to the order which the Lord Jesus Christ established in the church. After this, he was to join himself to the company of the other reformed ministers, * Vol. ii. p. 166. 4to. Hamburg!, 1753. 264 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. and be subject to the discipline and government established in that place where they are. It is certain and clear that none can be accounted Christian ministers, except they first RENOUNCE the PRIESTHOOD of PoPERY, to which they had been promoted to make and offer Christ as a sacrifice in the mass ; which is a kind of blasphemy to be detested by all possible means. These things being done, it will be the duty of such bishops to give diligence that all the churches that pertain to their diocess be purged from errors, idolatry, &c."* Here this great reformer, whose views were generally received almost like laws in a large portion of the reformed church, throws Popish ordinations to the winds. How abundantly this letter proves the misrepresentations of such men as Dr. Hook, who would fain persuade us that where episcopacy was not retained, " the reformers pleaded not principle, but necessity." Even Bishop Taylor grants the contrary. " M. Du Plessis," says he, " a man of honour and great learning, does attest, that at the first Reformation there were mani/ archbishops and cardinals in Germany, England, France, and Italy, that joined in the Reformation, whom they," the reformed churches, " might, but did not, employ in their ordinations. And w^hat necessity can be pretended in this case, I would fain learn, that I might make their defence. But, which is of more and deeper consideration, for this might have been done by inconsi- deration and irresolution, as often happens in the beginning of great changes ; but it is their constant and resolved prac- tice, at least in France, that if any returns to them, they will REORDAiN him by their presbytery, though he had before episcopal ordination, as both their friends and their enemies bear witness."! Here then is evidence from that illustrious champion of Protestantism, Du Ples- sis, and from the French church in general, that it was the constant and resolved practice to reject Popish ordina- tions as NULL and void. The English reformers viewed the matter in the same light. They continued to ordain as Christian ministers, but not on the ground of their Papal ordinations ; else why * Calvini Epistol., p. 339, fol. edit. Genev., 1575. t He refers to Danaeus, Isagog., part ii, lib. 2, c. 22, Perron Repli., fol. 92, impress. 1605. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 265 SO solemn a discussion by the bishops and divines in that day on such questions as this ? — " Question 13. Whether (if it fortuned a Christian prince learned, to conquer certain dominions of infidels, having none but temporal learned men with him,) if it be defended by God's law, that he and they should preach and teach the word of God there, or no ? And also make and con- stitute priests, or no ? ^'■Agreement. In the thirteenth ; concerning the first part, whether laymen may preach and teach God's word 1 They DO ALL AGREE, in such a case, ' that not only they may, but they ought to teach.' But in the second part, touching the constituting of priests of [by] laymen, my lord of York, and Doctor Edgworth, doth not agree with the other : they say that laymen in no wise can make priests, or have such authority ; the bishops of Duresme, St. David's, Westmin- ster, Drs. Tresham, Cox, Leighton, Crawford, Symmons, Redmayn, and Robertson, say that laymen, in such case, have authority to minister the sacraments, and to make PRIESTS. My lords of London, Carlisle, and Hereford, and Dr. Coxen, think that God, in such a case, would give the prince authority, call him inwardly, and illuminate him or some of his, as he did St. Paul."* So the great Protestant champions against Popery, Whitaker and Fulke, in the time of Queen Elizabeth: speaking to the Papists, " I would not have you think," says Whitaker, " that we make such reckoning of your orders, as to hold our own vocation unlawful without them." " And," says Fulke, " you are highly deceived if you think we esteem your offices of bishops, priests, and deacons, better than laymen." (And in his Retentive :) " With all our hearts we defy, abhor, detest, — your antichristian orders "\ Bishop Burnet, in his Exposition of the Twenty-third Article, says, " I come, in the next place, to consider the second part of this article, which is the definition here given of those that are lawfully called and sent: this is put in very general words, far from that magisterial stiff- ness in which some have taken upon them to dictate in * Burnet's Coll. of Records, part i, book iii, No. 21. + See Ward's England's Reformation, vol. ii, p. 121, where he refers to Whitaker Contra Dureum, p. 221, and Fulke's Answer to a Coun- terfeit Catholic. 12 266 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. this matter. The article does not resolve this into any particular constitution, but leaves the matter open and at large, for such accidexts as had happened, and such as might still happen. They who drew it had the state of several churches before their eyes that had been differently reformed, and although their own had been less forced to go out of the beaten path than any other, yet they knew that ALL THINGS among thejnselves had not gone according to those rules that ought to be sacred in regular times. Necessity has no law, and is a law to itself. If a company of Christians find the public worship where they live to be so defiled, that they cannot with a good conscience join in it ; and if they do not knov/ of any place to which they can conveniently go, where they may worship God purely and in a regular way : if, I say, such a body find some that have been ordained, though to the lower functions, should submit itself entirely to their conduct ; or find none of those, should, by a common consent, desire some of their own number to minister to them in holy things, and should, upon that beginning, grow up to a regulated constitution, though we are very sure that this is quite out of all rule, and could not be done without a very great sin, unless the necessity were great and apparent ; yet if the necessity is real and not feigned, this is not condemned nor annulled hy the article ; for when this grows to a constitution, and when it was begun by the consent of a body, who are supposed to have an authority in such an extraordinary case, whatever some hotter spirits have thought of this since that time ; yet we are very sure that not only those who penned the articles, but the body of this church for above half an age after did, notwithstanding those irregu- larities, acknowledge the foreign churches so constituted to be TRUE churches, as to all the essentials of a church, though they had been at first irregularly formed, and continue to be in an imperfect state. And therefore the general words in which this part of the article is framed seem to have been designed on purpose not to exclude them"* This is worthy of the great reformers ! I need * Burnet's account of his work is interesting : " I had been first moved to undertake this work by that great prelate," Tillotson, "who then sat at the helm ; and after that, [was] determined in it by a com- mand that was sacred to me by respect, as well as by duty. Our late ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 267 not say what a figure Dr. Hook and the Oxford Tract-men cut in the presence of such a statement. The great reformers and champions of the Reformation knew how to distinguish between what was essential to the FORMATION of a church in tiines of difficulty, persecu- tion, or confusion, and what was prudent, proper, and orderly in a settled and peaceable state of the church. The following passage from the Epistles of that great reformer, John Calvin, second to none in his day in talents, zeal, and influence in the Reformation, will show this : " Con- sider this matter fully now, — suppose a person, in a foreign region, desires the opportunity and ability of gathering to- gether a flock for Christ ; will not those who are in that place, and who agree to receive his ministry, by that very act of receiving him, elect him as their minister, even though no rite be used in the matter ? I confess, indeed, primate lived long enough to see the design finished. He read it over with an exactness that was peculiar to him. He employed some weeks wholly in perusing it, and he corrected it with a care that descended even to the smallest matters ; and was such as he thought became the importance of the work. And when that was done, he returned it to me with a letter, that as it was the last I ever received from him, so gave the whole such a character, that how much soever that might raise its value with true judges, yet in decency it must be suppressed by me, as going far beyond what any performance of mine could de- serve. He gave so favourable an account of it to our late blessed queen, that she was pleased to tell me she would find leisure to read it ; and the last time I was admitted to the honour of waiting on her, she commanded me to bring it to her. But she was soon after that carried to the Source, to the Fountain of life, in whose light she now sees both light and truth. So great a breach as was then made upon all our hopes, put a stop upon this, as well as upon much greater designs." " This work has lien by me ever since : but has been often not only reviewed by myself, but by much better judges. The late most learned bishop of Worcester," Stillingfleet, " read it very carefully. He marked every thing in it that he thought needed a review : and his censure was in all points submitted to. He expressed himself so well pleased with it, to myself and to some others, that I do not think it becomes me to repeat what he said of it. Both the most reverend archbishops, with several of the bishops, and a great many learned divines, have also read it. I must, indeed, on many accounts own that they may be inclined to favour me too much, and to be too partial to me ; yet they looked upon this work as a thing of that importance, that I have reason to be- lieve they read it over severely : and if some small corrections may be taken for an indication that they saw no occasion for greater ones, I had this likewise from several of them." — Preface, pp. 1, 2, fol. Load., 1699. These things are important. 268 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. that where a due order of doing such things has beE:^ ESTABLISHED in any church, it ought to be maintained, fixed, and immoveable ; but the case is widely different, where the very foundations have to be laid anew. For what shall we say as to most of the churches raised up by the Lord through Germany ? Shall we deny that those who first laboured there in preaching the gospel were re- ceived as true pastors, though no rite accompanied their admission to that office ? I do not wish to bind you to the authority of men ; but I produce this example as confirm- ing the position I laid down, viz., that the election or ap- pointment of a minister is not necessarily the same in an unsettled state of a church, as it is where a certain form and order have been already established."* This is the view of the Scriptures, of the earliest fathers, and of the greatest reformers. The contrary opinion is indeed be- longing to the very essence of Popery. It is an attempt to make that necessary which God never made so ; and then to bind the church to human ordinations, personal succession, episcopal consecrations, priestly absolutions : even while, by undeniable history, many of these men have been wicked, heretics, murderers, simonists, traffick- ers in the souls and bodies of mankind, shedding the blood of the saints, and leading mankind to destruction ! The case of the English reformers was a difficult one. They saw the truth ; but a great part of the nation was still under much Popish ignorance. The case very much resembled that of St, Paul with those Jews who were still zealous for the law of Moses. Paul, as a mere prudential measure, took Timothy and circumcised him, rejecting the obligation of circumcision as essential to Christianity. The English reformers, as a prudential measure, because of the multitudes who were still zealous for the ceremonies of Popery, retained, in form, the ordination and consecra- tion of the Popish bishops ; not because of their validity and necessity, by divine right, to the existence of the Christian church and Christian ordinances ; for they main- tained the contrary. The primitive church lived down those Jewish prejudices ; and circumcision, even as a circumstance, was utterly put away. The Anglican church should have done the same. It should have gone on to * Epist., p. 349, edit. Gen., 1575. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 269 declare boldly, that the ordination of its ministers was based on the spiritual and Scriptural qualijications of the men ; upon the call of God^ moving them by the Holy Ghost to take upon them the ministry ; and upon the call of the church, solemnly receiving them as the ministers of God, in the gospel of his Son. It has failed to do this ; and the strenuous attempts made by many of its erring advocates to maintain the essential importance of Popish ordinations, episcopal consecration, personal succession, &c. — these efforts, I say, have resulted in a constant leaning to Popery, in many divines and members of the Church of England. Wherever and by whomsoever these things are thus maintained, that church becomes a half-way house to Popery. Both the foreign and English reformers had great fears about what was left in the Church of England of Popish origin, lest it should afterward lead to the strengthening of Popery. Cranmer and his coadjutors did what they could, according to the times, and hoped their successors would finish what they had begun. Calvin, writing to Cranmer, A. D. 1551, then archbishop of Canterbury, says, " But to speak freely, I greatly fear, and the fear is becoming general here, lest by so much delay, the autumn or harvest should pass, and at length the coldness of a perpetual winter should succeed. You will need to stimu- late yourself, as the burden of old age steals upon you ; lest in leaving the world your conscience should distress you, because, through some tardiness in proceeding, all things should be left in confusion. I mention things as being in confusion, because outward superstitions are so corrected as to leave innumerable branches that will be con- stantly sprouting out again. Indeed, I hear that such a mass of Popish corruptioxs remain, as not only ob- scure, but almost bury the pure and genuine worship of God."* That Cranmer was not offended with this plain- ness is evident, for, in apparently a later letter, Calvin says the archbishop of Canterbury admonished him " that he could not do a more useful thing than to write frequently to the king."t The Popish, and semi-popish bishops and divines, conforming and nonconforming, did their utmost to hinder the removal of these evils. There is a * Cahini Epist., p. 101. t Page 384. 270 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. letter to Calvin from a venerable, aged, sorrowing, and almost dying person on this subject, dated Cambridge, 1550, pp. 96, 97. Zanchy wrote a bold letter to Queen Elizabeth on the Popish vestments, requesting her not to enforce them, 1571. The meek and peaceful Peter Mar- tyr, who spent a long time at Oxford, endeavouring to pro- mote and defend the Reformation, was written to by the venerable Hooper, bishop of Gloucester, on the subject of the Popish vestments. Hooper withstood their use. Mar- tyr, at that time, writing in answer to Hooper's letter, declares he most entirely approves of their removal^ but thinks that as they were not fundamental matters, they might be tolerated for a time : and then, afterward, in- creasing piety in the church would remove them : " for," says he, " if we first allow the gospel time to be propa- gated, and strike deep its roots, men will then perhaps be persuaded better and more easily to remove these external trappings." This letter is dated 1550. However, in a few years he altogether changed his mind. Writing to the Popish nobles, (professing to embrace the gospel,) and to their ministers, after recommending them to take care that " no splendour of names or titles, no kings, no fathers, no bishops, no popes, no councils, &c., should blind their eyes ; — that the Scriptures alone should be the supreme and infallible rule of their faith ;" he comes to say, " Use all your vigilance, brethren, that the house of God, defiled, and almost destroyed by antichrist, should be with diligent care rebuilt. Extirpate utterly all superstitious and false notions. This I the rather admonish, because / have seen some who have only cropt the leaves, and flowers, and buds of old superstition : but, having spared the roots, they afterward shot up again to the great injury of the Lord's vineyard. Let all the seeds of evil, and the rottenness of the roots be extirpated in the beginning. For if this be neglected at the first, (I know what I say,) afterward it will be much more difficult to pluck them up." — February 14th, 1556. And see Bishop Burnet's Letters; the one from Zurich, p. 55, London, 1727, where he shows that the bishops Jewel, Home, Cranmer, Grindal, took the same views, but that the queen was obstinately opposed to the removal of these things. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 271 SECTION XIV. GENUINE APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. We have now searched this pseudo-apostolical succes- sion scheme to the bottom, and have found it a baseless fabric. Those who have attempted its construction, what- ever they might be besides, have in this displayed a dis- position to erect a system of spiritual tyranny over the whole church of God. Many have been deceived by them. Multitudes of the holiest people upon earth have, in different ages, suffered bonds, imprisonment, and death, under the operation of this antichristian scheme. It will be proper to exhibit in a closing section a view of genu- ine APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION — the succcssiou of truth and holiness. God has always had a true church : and he always will have a true church. The gates of hell never have prevailed against it ; and we are assured by himself that they never shall. This church has always stood, as to its foundation, on the truth, and faithfulness, and power of God; and never on any ceremonies or circumstances of church government, or any order of men: thus it loill stand FOR EVER. Let us review the past. — In the brief divine history which we have of the antediluvian world, there is no inti- mation that the church depended on any order of men, as ministers of religion. That there were preachers of right- eousness, is plainly testified in the Scriptures. But from all that we can learn, they were not confined to any unin- terrupted succession, nor even initiated by any rite of ordination. They appear to have been good men, who, (blessed with the knowledge of God's favour to themselves, and of his plan of saving sinners,) were moved by the Holy Ghost to testify the judgments of God against sin, and his mercy to those who returned to him by repentance, and by trust in that mercy. This was the case for about two thousand years. From the deluge to Moses matters continued in the same state. The priesthood of Aaron was designed to typify the priesthood of Christ : as much oneness, therefore, and continuity was given to it as human things would allow. Hence a personal succession, in one 272 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. family, was the general principle of the high priesthood. Yet this was sometimes changed by divine direction ; but what is more, it was broken and interrupted by men ; and yet those who ministered in that office, though not of the succession, were not repudiated on this account even by our Lord himself, or his apostles. Dr. Hammond, a com- petent and unexceptionable authority, gives the following account of this matter : " At this time the land being under the Roman emperor, the succession of the high priests was now changed, the one lineal descendant in the family of Aaron, which was to continue for life, being not permit- ted to succeed, but some other, whom he pleased, named to that office by the Roman procurator every year, or renewed as often as he pleased. To which purpose is that of The- ophylact : ' They who were at that time high priests of the Jews, invaded that dignity, bought it, and so destroyed the law, which prescribed a succession in the family of Aaron.' It is manifest, that at this time the Roman prcs- feet did, ad libitum, when he would, and that sometimes once a year, put in whom he pleased into the pontificate, to officiate in Aaron's office, instead of the lineal descend- ant from him. And that is it of which Josephus so fre- quently makes mention. After the race of the Assamonaei, it seems Jesus, the son of Phoebes was put in ; then he be- ing put out, Simon is put in his stead ; this Simon put out, and Matthias in his stead. Ant., 1. 17, c. 6, — then Mat- thias put out by Herod about the time of Christ's birth, and Joazar put in his stead, Ant., 1. 17, c. 8, — then Joazar put out by Archelaus, and Eleazar put in, c. 15; and he again put out, and Jesus, the son of Sia, put in. Then in the first of Quirinus, there is mention again of Joazar, son of Boethi- us, 1. 18, c. 1, who it seems was put in, and so turned out again by Quirinus the same year, and Ananus, the son of Seth, put in his stead, who was the Annas here men- tioned by St. Luke. Then Gratus, at the beginning of Tiberius's reign, put out Annas and put in Ismael : and in his stead Eleazar, i\.nnas's son ; then in his stead Simon ; and after his year, Caiaphas here, who continued from that, all his and Pilate's time, till Vitellius displaced him, and put Jonathan, another son of Annas, in his stead; and in his, a year or two after, Theophilus, another son of An- nas, whom Agrippa again displaced, Ant., 1. xix, c. 5, and ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 273 put in Simon ; and turning him out the same year, put in Matthias, a fourth son of Annas, in the beginning of Clau- dius's reign, some nine years after the death of Christ ; and soon removing him, put in Elioneus, c. 7. Then it seems Canthares was put in, for in his place Herod put in Joseph, 1. XX, c. 1 ; and in his stead, about fifteen years after the death of Christ, Ananias, son of Nebedeus, c. 3. After him we find Jonathan, then Ismael, then Joseph, then Annas, another son of Annas, then Jesus, son of Damneus, then Je- sus, son of Gamaliel, then Matthias, in whose time the Jew- ish war began."* Theophylact, we find, says that the law of succession was destroyed by these confusions. Had our succession divines been doctors of the law at the time, they must have made it out that the church of God then became extinguished : yet we never find a single intimation of the kind by our Lord or his apostles. From the creation, therefore^ to the coming of Christ, the church never was built on any men, or order of men, but was founded in the living God. A GOSPEL MINISTRY is God's own positive institution. Ministers are God's gifts to the church. When they are what they ought to be, they are of very great importance and utility ; but when any of them become lords over God's heritage, God can lay them aside, and their personal succession too, and can raise up others who shall walk more fully after his will, and whose ministry he will con- firm and bless by the conversion of sinners and the increased holiness and edification of his people. This the history of the church in all ages testifies. Without design- ing to say one word against episcopacy, meaning by that a prudential and well-guarded superintendency ; or against the simple fact of a succession of ministers, suppose it could be proved to be true, — both of which, if not urged to ac- complish purposes of exclusion and persecution in the Chris- tian church, may be great blessings ; yet let the truth be spoken as to the fact of the operation of episcopacy, as hitherto established, and of the scheme of succession as it has existed hitherto in general in the Christian church : both have been at the head of nearly all the oppression and persecution that have been found in the church to the present day. I say, as they have existed. But the abuse * Hammond's note on Luke iii, v. 2. 12* 274 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. is no valid argument against the use* I believe abuse very early got into the church in an unguarded and not sufficiently controlled form of episcopacy. It generated into tyranny of the worst kind. Popery is its genuine off- spring. Great, however, as I acknowledge the abuse to have been, I do still think, that, under just regulations, it might have an important use. The names of kings and tyrants were synonymous in ancient times ; and both were alike hated. But what true Englishman will say that the office of king, as supreme civil magistrate, under just regulations, that is, a limited monarchy, is not a blessing ? Whoever would say so, — the writer would not. Let episcopacy, then, be placed under such regulations and restraints as shall not admit of any claim of divine right on the part of bishops for their superintendency and government. Let those who value episcopacy, and especially the bishops themselves, correct all abuses in the system. The Eng- lish reformers placed it generally on the right basis : the detail wanted perfecting. Time has shown the defects of the detail : let experience teach wisdom. If these things be not done, let no man trust an unguarded episcopacy ; it will do ichat it has always done, viz., degenerate into Popery. Whenever a true revival of vital godliness has taken place, it has usually been done, not by the pretended suc- cession bishops, but generally, in spite of them : it has been done — NOT by those whom succession-men assume to have had the sole power among mankind of continuing the church of God upon earth ; but by those who, according to their absurd scheme, had no power to continue it beyond a sijigle generation, even if they had so much as that. The Waldenses, in the valleys of the Alps ; the Lollards in England ; Luther, Melancthon, Calvin, Zuingle and Knox ; the Puritans in their day ; and the Wesleys and Whitefield in still later times, are all in full proof of what I say. The English reformers themselves do not con- stitute an exception to this remark. Who broke up the fallow ground ? who soiced the seed of the Reformation in England 1 and who watered it with their tears and with their blood, before Henry VIII. quarrelled with the pope ? — the bishops ? O, no ! no ! they imprisoned, and shed the blood of the saints like water ; but, as an order of min- ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 275 isters, they sided with antichrist till Henry quarrelled with the pope. For full proof of all this see Fox's Book of Martyrs. Protestantism had its worst enemies among the apostolical succession bishops. I rejoice to except, after that time, and record with due praise, such hallowed names as Cranmer, Latimer, Ridley, Hooper, and Jewel ; but they are the exceptions and not the rule. And it must be con- fessed that, since that time, all the persecution of the Puri- tans and Nonconformists originated generally with the bishops. It is intolerable to see the public mind abused by the grandiloquence often employed in speaking about episcopacy as it has existed ; the blessing of bishops ; of an apostolical ministry coming through the hands of bish- ops, &;c. Grotius has never been suspected of disaffection to episcopacy or bishops ; yet he speaks thus plainly — " Qui ecclesiasticam historiam legit, quid legit nisi episcopo- rum vitia? — He who reads ecclesiastical history, what does he read but the vices of bishops ?"* Let us distinguish between what things have been, and what they ought to be. Every true minister is a Scriptural bishop. Every modern bishop is a mere superintendent by the right of human authority. Many excellent men have been found among the bishops. This office is im- portant, and may be highly useful under proper regulations. Hitherto it has been wanting in these regulations in what are called Episcopal churches ; and it has been, on the whole, the source of great evils to the church at large. Let it be restored to its proper use. Then call that form of church government by what name you please. No wise man will quarrel about names. Against a duly regulated episcopacy, as already explained, we have nothing to say. Episcopacy hy divine right is a modern invention : it has been the source of much oppression. The personal succes- sion scheme is a scheme adopted at present hy bigots for the purpose of persecution. We have treated both without ceremony. Both are false — both lead to Popery. The succession of faith is the only succession essential to a Christian church. Accordingly, the fathers took this as the only supreme and essential rule of succession, y'vL., \\\Qpr caching o{\\\Q truth, oi the faith, of the doctrine taught by the apostles. See * Grotii Epistolac, No. 22, p. 7. Amstel, 1687. 276 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. the quotations following ; also sec. vi. Now who have been distinguished for this apostolic preaching ? — the bishops and the great succession-men ? By no means ! Leave out the first six hundred years ; they do not belong to these men ; their doctrine of succession was not then held : the only essential succession then maintained was the succession of faith. Since that time — who have been distinguished for apostolical preaching? — the bishops of Rome ? Nay, they have generally not preached at all. Bishop Jewel in his day remarked, " These nine hundred years, I say, since Gregory the first of that name, [A. D. 604,] it can hardly be found that ever any bishop of Rome toas seen in a pulpit. ^^ Sermon on Matt, x, 9. The same thing is true, to a great extent, of all the bishops of that church, and of all the branches of it up to the Re- formation. Hear Bishop Jewel again, in his sermon on 1 Cor. iv, 1,2," Christ said unto Peter, Lovest thou me ? feed my sheep, feed my lambs, feed my flock. But our great clerkes, our popes, our cardinals, our bishops, would seldom or never make a sermon : they fed not God's sheepe, they fed not God's lambs, they had no regard to God's flocke : and how then would they say, they were the min- isters of Christ, and stewards of God's secrets ? I leave out much of purpose, good brethren, I wittingly overpasse heere many things else that I could say heerein : the time would faile me, if I should rehearse unto you all those things wherein they have most shamefully abused themselves." They were, as a ivhole, the opposers and corrupters of the TRUTH. They formed one continued heresy. The apostolical preachers were the Waldenses, the Lollards, Wickliffe, Huss, and their coadjutors ; none of them suc- cession bishops, nor their partizans, but the very opposite, and generally out of this pretended succession. Since the Reformation, the Protestant churches in general have been out of this pretended succession. Whether the succession were true or false, the early bishops of the Church of England claimed no exclusive rights and authority from it. Luther, Calvin, Zuingle, P. Martyr, Melancthon, &c., &c., were not of it, as founders or reformers of churches. Since the time of Bancroft and Laud, the bishops and clergy of the Church of England have been greatly sur- passed in apostolical preaching by the Puritans, the Non- ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 277 conformists, the Dissenters, and the Methodists. The limits of this Essay allow not of an extended comparison, but the thing speaks for itself. Laud's plan, but for the Puritans, would have brought in Popery, The age of mere rationalism in preaching was not a match for infi- delity. It wanted Christ crucified, and the demox- STRATiox of the Spirit. The reader may see some good observations and illustrations on the point of rational preaching by the leading divines of the Establishment from about 1700, &c., in the Rev. Edward Bickersteth's excel- lent work, " The Christian Student," chap, ix, sec. 6. The following passages from that work are strikingly to the point. He quotes Dr. Vicesimus Knox, as saying, in his " Christian Philosophy," that he who receives divine teaching " will find that some of the most learned men, the most voluminous writers on theological subjects, were totally ignorant of Christianity. He will find that they were ingenious heathen philosophers, assuming the name of Christians, and forcibly paganizing Christianity for the sake of pleasing the world, of extending their fame, and enjoying secular honours and lucrative pre-eminence." Bishop Lavington, says Mr. Bickersteth, may be introduced as another unexceptionable testimony on this subject. This bishop says, addressing the clergy, (somewhere about 1750,) " My brethren, I beg yoa will rise up with me against moral preaching. We have long been attempting the reformation of the nation by discourses of this kind. With what success 1 — None at all. On the contrary, we HAVE DEXTEROUSLY PREACHED THE PEOPLE INTO DOWN- RIGHT INFIDELITY. We must change our voice. We must preach Christ, and him crucified. Nothing but the gospel is, nothing besides will be found to be, the power of God unto salvation. Let me, therefore, again and again request, may I not add, let me charge you, to preach Jesus and salvation through his name." Mr. Bickersteth is an excellent man, and, on the whole, a candid writer ; but it seengs to have been too much for him, as it has been for many others, to do any thing like justice to the labours of the Wesleys and W^hitefield, as instruments of divine Providence in the glorious revival of religion which has taken place since the beginning of the eighteenth century. Any statement by 278 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. the writer, as a Wesleyan, might be thought partial. It may not be amiss, therefore, to give the testimony of tlie Rev. Dr. Haw^eis, himself a clergyman, from his History of the Church in the Eighteenth Century. He says, " Through the moralists in the pulpit, and the deists in the press, Christianity was reduced to a very emaciated figure. Even the Dissenters, who affected greater purity of religion, had drunk deep into the general apostacy, and sunk into a worldly, careless spirit. The Presbyterians, especially, diverged into the errors of Arianism. The Independents were few, and but little attended to ; though among them the sounder doctrines were maintained, but in general too cold and dead-hearted ; and the Baptists hardly had a name. The Quakers, left to their silent meetings, were declining and forgotten ; and the other sects sunk into insignificance. It was in this state of torpor and depart- ure from truth and godliness, [A. D. 1729,] that at Oxford, one of our universities, a few, chiefly young men, began to feel the deplorable spiritual ignorance and corrup- tion around them. John and Charles Wesley, the first and most distinguished leaders in this revival of evangelical truth, were brothers : the one, fellow of Lincoln College ; the other, student of Christ Church [College.] With these associated a number of other students, whose minds were similarly affected. Mr. Ingham, Mr. Whitefield, and Mr. Hervey, were afterv/ard peculiarly distinguished. The multitudes which followed them were much affected : a great and visible change was produced in the minds of many. The attention paid to these ministers, and the blessing evident on their labours, roused them to increas- ing vigorous exertions. They were always at their work, preaching wherever they could procure admittance into the churches. " Though in age Mr. Whitefield was younger than the Wesleys, yet in zeal and labours he had no superior : his amazing exertions are well known, and the effects of them were prodigious through the whole land. He confined not his ministry to England — Scotland enjoyed the benefit of his visits, and furnished innumerable evidences of the power with which he spoke ; nor were his efforts restrict- ed to Britain, but extended to America, whither the Mr. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 279 Wesleys had first led the way. Suffice it to observe, that by the labours of these indefatigable men, a flood of gospel light broke upon the nation. At first they were wholly confined to the Church of England, as their attachment to it by education was strong : and had they been fixed in any settled station, they had, not improbably, lived and died good men, useful men, but unnoticed and unknown. A series of providences had designed them for greater and more extensive usefulness. The churches growing una- ble to contain the crowds which flocked after them, Mr. Whitefield first, at Bristol, [1739,] resolved to visit and preach to the \vild colliers in the wood, who had seldom attended any worship ; and his signal success among them encouraged his persevering efibrts. On his return to Lon- don, he used the same means of field-preaching at Kenning- ton Common and Moorfields, being now generally excluded from the churches, to which he had himself somewhat contributed, by perhaps too severe animadversions on the clerg)-, as we'll as the env}- and disgust that his singular popularity had occasioned. " Xor were ]Mr. John Wesley and his brother Charles less zealously employed, but also took the field and preached ever\'where. The congregations under the canopy of heaven were prodigious : sometimes, indeed, riotous and insulting, but in general solemn and attentive. By these labours multitudes were daily added to the church of such as should be saved." Then, after giving an account of the doctrines and discipline of the Calvinis- tic and Wesleyan Methodists, he adds, " It is observable, that all these great bodies, though driven to worship in places of their own erection, in order to secure the preach- ing of such evangelical principles as they cannot find in the churches in general, would be happy to have the cause removed that hath compelled them to these expedients : and were the bishops and clerg}^ zealous to inculcate the great fundamentals of gospel truth, and to adorn the doc- trine by a life of spiritual religion, the greater part of these partial seceders would probably return to the fonns and worship of the Established Church. As it is, their num- bers every day increase ; and while carelessness and luke- warmness cause the noblest edifices to be deserted, every 280 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. little meeting is crowded with hearers, whenever a minis- ter, earnest and evangelical, labours from his heart for the salvation of men's souls. " Such has been the progress of what is called Method- ism in the greater bodies that more immediately bear that name : but it has spread in a prodigious manner, both among those of the Church, as well as the dissenters from it, and has heen the means of rekindling the zeal of very many, so as to produce a vast alteration for the better in the conduct of thousands and tens of thousands. Predi- lection for the Establishment strongly attaches many to it, who have received their religious impressions from one or other of these Methodist societies, or from some of their own clergy, who lie under the imputation of being methodisti- cally inclined, that is, such as literally and with apparent zeal inculcate the doctrinal articles they have subscribed, and live in a state of greater piety and separation from the world, than the generality of their brethren. The number of these is of late amazingly increased. Where before scarcely a man of this stamp could be found, some hun- dreds, as rectors or curates in the Established Church, in- culcate the doctrines which are branded with Methodism : and everywhere, throughout the kingom, one or more, and sometimes several, are to be found within the compass of a few miles, who approve themselves faithful labourers in the Lord's vineyard. They naturally associate among themselves, and separate from the corruption which is in the world. Everywhere they carry the stamp of peculi- arity, and are marked by their brethren. Though care- fully conforming to established rules, and strictly regu- lar, they are everywhere objects of reproach, because their conduct cannot but reflect on those who choose not to follow such examples. They pay conscientious atten- tion to the souls of their parishioners ; converse with them on spiritual subjects wherever they visit ; encourage prayer and praise in the several families under their care ; often meet them for these purposes ; and engage them to meet and edify one another. Their exemplary conversation pro- cures them reverence from the poor of the flock, as their faithful rebukes often bring upon them the displeasure of the worldling, the dissipated, and the careless. They join in none of the fashionable amusements of the age, fre- ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 281 quent not the theatres or scenes of dissipation, court no favour of the great, or human respects ; their time and services are better employed in the more important labours of the ministry, preaching the word in season, out of sea- son, and counting their work their best wages. They labour, indeed, under many discouragements. All the superior orders of the clergy shun their society. They have been often treated by their diocesans with much in- solence and oppression. They can number no bishop, nor scarcely a dignitary among them. Yet their number, strength, and respectability, continue increasing. May they grow into a host, like the host of God !" The whole view of these facts goes to show, to demon- strate, that God never confined his church to personal suc- cessions and episcopal consecrations ; but the very re- verse. The chief persons in this pretended succession have been the principal corrupters and opposers of the truth. Whenever gospel truth has been preserved against error, and a real revival of apostolic faith and gospel holiness has been brought about, God has employed men NOT in this scheme of succession. The gospel would HAVE perished IF LEFT TO THIS SUCCESSION. Man Cor- rupts every thing. He is not to be trusted with so precious a treasure as Christianity. God keeps his own work in his own hands. He and he only holds the keys to the ministry of his word. He lets no wolves, no wicked men, into his fold. When a regular ministry is Scriptural ^nd pious, God greatly blesses it : it is an unspeakable bless- ing to the church. But when ministers forsake God, God forsakes them. He then raises up others ; he sets his own seal to their piety, doctrine, labours, and sufferings, by making them abundantly successful in the conversion of sinners, and in the edification and extension of his church. The residue of the Spirit is with him. The hearts of all men are in his keeping. He can raise up and qualify in- struments for his work from any quarter. The fishermen of Galilee — the poor men of Lyons — the Huguenots in France — the Lollards in England — Luther, the monk, in Germany— the Wesleys at Oxford — these, these have been God's instruments ! Well ! let all human schemes perish in their turn, when abused to prevent the progress of gos- pel truth and holiness. The Lord liveth! blessed be his 282 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. holy name ! Blessed be his name for his servants, for his martyrs, his confessors, his holy ministers of every name : above all, blessed be his holy name, for the unspeakable gift of his holy truth transmitted by the sacred Scrip- tures, and a holy ministry from generation to generation! May it more than ever prevail ! and may the earth be fill- ed with his glory ! Amen ! Amen ! The only true succession essential to the existence of a Christian church, then, is the succession of faith, of truth of doctrine, and holiness of life. We shall insert some noble testimonies on this point, and then conclude the subject. Ir.EN^us : — " In the very book in which he employs the argument of succession, he says he brings his ' demon- strations,^ not from persons, but ' from the Scriptures ;' — ■ which Scriptures are henceforward to be the foundation mid pillar of our faith. In book iv, c. 43-45, he says, we are ' to obey those presbyters who have the divine gift of the faith ;' that we are ' to forsake^ all wicked ministers ; and are to learn from such as have this divine gift of the truth:' Tertullian : — "But if the heretics feign or fabricate such a [personal] succession, this will not help them. For their doctrine itself compared with the doctrine of the apostles, will, by its own diversity and contrariety, pro- nounce against them. To this form of trial will appeal be madg by those churches henceforward daily establishing, •which, though they have neither any of the apostles, nor apostolical men for their founders, yet all agreeing in the SAME faith, are, from this consanguinity of doctrine, to be esteemed not the less apostolical than the former."* Cyprian : — Referring to Stephen, bishop of Rome, pleading tradition for what Cyprian believed to be a great error, answers, " What does he mean by tradition ? Does he mean the authority of Christ in the Gospels, and of the apostles in their Epistles ? — let this tradition be sacred : for if we return to this Head and Original of divine tradi- tion, human error will cease. If the channel of the water of life, at first coming down in large and copious flow, should suddenly fail, should we not return to the Fountain ? — If the channel becomes corrupted and leaky, so that the * De Praescript, c. 33. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 283 water does not flow constantly and regularly, it must be repaired in order to the supply of water to the citizens coming down from the Fountain. This ought the ministers of God now to do, observing as their rule the divine pre- cepts, that if any thing has tottered and shaken from the truth, it should be restored to the authority of Christ, the evangelists, and the apostles ; and all oiu- proceedings are to take their rise there, whence all order and divine authority rise — for custom without truth is only ANTIQUATED ERROR. Therefore, forsaking error, let us follow the truth, knowing that, as in Esdras's opinion, truth is victorious, so it is written, 'truth remains and prevails for ever,' it lives and reigns through endless ages. Neither is there with truth any distinction or respect of persons, but only that which is just it ratifies ; neither is there in the jurisdiction of truth any iniquity ; but the strength, and dominion, and the majesty and power of all generations. Blessed be the God of truth! This truth Christ shows in the gospel, saying, ' I am the truth/ Therefore, if we be in Christ and Christ in us ; if we remain in the truth, and the truth abide in us, let us hold those things which are of the truth."* Gregory Nazienzen : — In his Oration in praise of Athanasius, speaking of his election as bishop of Alexan- dria to the chair of St. Mark the evangelist, who is sup- posed to have founded that church, says that Athanasius was " not less the successor of St. Mark's piety, than he was of his pre-eminence. For if," says he, " you consider Athanasius only as one in the number of bishops of Alex- andria, he was the most remote from St. Mark : but if you regard his piety, you find him the very next to him. This succession of piety ought to be esteemed the true succes- sion. For he who maintains the same doctrine oi faith, is partner in the same chair ; but he who defends a contrary doctrine, ought, though in the chair of St. Mark, to be esteemed an adversary to it. This man, indeed, may have a nominal succession, but the other has the very thing icself the succession in deed and in truth. Neither is he who usurps the chair by violent means to be esteemed in the succession ; but he who is pressed into the office : not he who violates all law in his election, but he who is * Epist. 74, edit. Parael., 1589. 284 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. elected in a manner consistent with the laws of the case : not he who holds doctrines opposed to what St. Mark taught, but he who is endued with the same faith as St. Mark. Except, indeed, you intend to maintain such a succession as that of sickness succeeding to health ; light succeeding to darkness ; a storm to a calm ; and madness succeeding to soundness of mind ! It was not with Athanasius as it is sometimes with tyrants, who, being suddenly raised to the throne, break out into acts of violence and excess : such conduct as this is the mark of adulterate and spurious bishops, and who are unworthy of the dignity to which they are raised. These having no previous qualifications for their office, never having borne the trials of virtue, commence disciples and masters at the same time, and attempt to consecrate others while unholy themselves. Yes- terday they were guilty of sacrilege — to-day they are made ministers of the sanctuary ; yesterday they were ungodly — to-day they are made reverend fathers in God : old in sin, ignorant of piety, and having proceeded by violence in all the rest, (as not being influenced by divine but human motives,) they crown the whole by exercising their ty- ranny UPON PIETY itself."* St. Ambrose : — " They have not the inheritance, are not the successors of Peter, who have not Peter's faith."t Calvin : — " We have pretty opponents to deal with, who, when they are clearly convicted of corrupting the doctrines and worship of Christianity, then take shelter under the pretence that no molestation ought to be offered to the successors of the apostles. Now, this question of being successors of the apostles must be decided by an examination of the doctrines maintained. To this exa- mination, confident of the goodness of our cause, we cheer- fully appeal. Let them not reply, that they have a right to assume that their doctrine is apostolic ; for this is begging the question. What ! shall they, who have all things con- trary to the apostles, prove they are their true successors, solely by the continuance of time ? As well might a mur- derer, having slain the master of the house and taken pos- session of the same, maintain that he was the lawful heir. The popedom, indeed, differs more from that government * Athanasii 0pp., vol. ii, Appendix, edit. Paris, 1627. t De Poenitentia, lib. i, cap. 6. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION- 285 whicli the apostles established, than the most cruel and bloody tyranny ever differed from the best constituted government for the establishment of civil liberty. Who would tolerate the tyrant, that, having murdered the right- ful sovereign, only gloried in the usurpation of his name ? No less is their impudence, who, having ruined that go- vernment which Christ commanded and the apostles estab- lished, make a pretence of succession for the support of their tyranny. For, suppose that such an unbroken line, as they pretend, really existed, yet if their apostleship had perished, (and it necessarily did by their corruption of God's worship, by their destruction of the offices of Christ, by the extinction of the light of doctrine among them, and the pollution of the sacrament,) what then becomes of their succession? Except, indeed, as an heir succeeds to the dead, so they, true piety being extinct among them, suc- ceed to domination. But seeing they have changed en- tirely the government of the church, the chasm, between them and the apostles is so vast as to exclude any com- munication of right from the one to the other. And to conclude the point in one word, / deny the succession scheme, as a thing utterly without foundation y* Melancthon : — " The church is not hound to an ordi- nary SUCCESSION, as they call it, of bishops, hut to the GOSPEL. When hishops do not teach the truth, an ordi- nary SUCCESSION avails nothing to the church ; they ought of necessity to be forsaken."! Peter Martyr : — " It is a most trifling thing which they" [the Papists] " object against us," [the reformers,] " that we want the right succession. It is quite enough for us that we have succeeded to the faith which the apostles taught, and which was maintained by the holy fathers in the best ages of the church. "j: Zanchius : — " For we know that, as, on the one hand, where true doctrine alone, without a continued succession of bishops from the beginning, can be shown to exist, there is a true church, and a true and legitimate ministry ; so, on the other hand, where personal succession alone is boasted of the purity of true Christian doctrine having de- * Calvini Vera Eccles. Ref. Ratio. + Loci Com. de Signis monst. Eccles., ed. Erlang., 1838. X Loci Com., class, iv, cap. L 286 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. parted, there is no legitimate ministry ; seeing that both the church, and the ministry of the church, are hound not to persons^ but to the loord of God."* Bradford the martyr : — The Popish archdeacon, Harpsfield, is examining him. ^^ Harpsfield : It (the Romish church) hath also succession of bishops. And here he made much ado to prove that this was an essential point. Bradford : You say as you would have it ; for if this point fail you, all the church that you go about to set up will fall down. You will not find in all the Scripture this your essential point of the succes- sion OF BISHOPS. In Christ's church antichrist will sit. — The ministry of God's word and ministers be an essential point. But to translate this to the bishops and their suc- cession, is a plain subtilty. And therefore that it may be plain, I will ask you a question, — Tell me, whether that the Scripture knew a7iy difference between bishops and ministers, which ye call priests, [presbyters ?] Harpsfield : No. Bradford : Well, then go on forward and let us see what ye will get now by the succession of bishops ; that is, of ministers, which can be understood of such bishops as minister not, but lord it. Harpsfield : I perceive that ye are far out of the way. Bradford : If Christ or his apostles being here on earth had been required by the prelates of the church then, to have made a demonstration of that church by succession of such high priests as had approved the doctrines which he taught, I think that Christ would have done as I do, that is, [he would] have alleged that which upholdeth the church, even the verity, the WORD OF God taught and believed, not by the high priests which of long time had persecuted it, but by the prophets and other good simple men, which perchance were counted for heretics of the church, which church was not tied to succession, but to the word of God.^^j Bishop Jewel : — " The grace of God is promised to pious souls, and to those who fear God ; and is not affixed to bishops^ chairs, and [personal] succession." — iVpology. " For that ye tell so many fair tales about Peter's succes- sion, we demand of you wherein the pope succeedeth Peter ? You answer, he succeeded him in his chair ; as * Zanchii (confessio) Fidei, cap. 25, sec. 19. i Fox's Acts and Monuments, vol. 3, p. 293, &c., fol. ed. 164L ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 287 if Peter had been some time installed in Rome, and had solemnly sat all day with his triple crown, in his pontiji- calibus^ and in a chair of gold. And thus, having lost both RELIGION and DOCTRINE, yc think it sufficient, at last, to hold by the chair, as if a soldier that had lost his sword, would play the man with his scabbard. But so Caiaphas succeeded Aaron ; so wicked Manasses succeeded David ; so may antichrist easily sit in Peter's chair."* Whitaker ; — After briefly noticing Bellarmine's refer- ence to the fathers, Irenaeus, Tertullian, &c., he replies, " In the first place, I answer in general, that I might justly reject all these human testimonies, and require some clear testimony out of the Scriptures. For this is the con- stant determination of all the catholic fathers, that nothing is to be received or approved in religion which does not rest on the testimony of Scripture, and which cannot be proved and established by the Scriptures. But the fathers did not use this argument of personal succession as a firm and solid argument of itself, but as a kind of illustration of their main argument : they did not employ it to win the battle, but by way of triumph after victory. For when they had, by solid and powerful arguments out of the Scriptures, conquered their enemies, and established their cause ; then, by way of triumph, they brought forward the succession of bishops in this manner : the bishops hold this faith as they received it from the apostles ; therefore this is the catholic faith. This agument proves not that the succession of persons alone is conclusive, or sufficient of itself; but only that it avails when they had first proved (from the Scriptures) that the faith they preached was the same faith which the apostles had preached before them. Faith, therefore, is as it were, the soul of the iSuccession ; which faith being wanting, the r^ked succession of persons is like a dead carcase loithout the soul.^f Field : — " Thus still we see that truth of doctrine is a necessary note whereby the church must be known and discerned, and not ministry or succession, or any thing else, without it."J White : — The Jesuit objects that " The Protestant * Defence of Apology, p. 634, ed. 1609. + Whitakeri 0pp. vol. i, p. 506, fol. ed. Genev. 1610. t Field on the Church, book ii, chap. vi. 288 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. church is not apostolic, because they cannot derive their pedigree lineally without interruption from the apostles, as the Roman church can from St. Peter, but are enforced to acknowledge some other, as Calvin, or Luther, or some such," &LC. Query — have not Dr. Hook, Mr. Palmer, &;c., stolen their objections to the churches of the Re- formation from the Jesuits' school ? White says, " Our answer is, that the succession required to make a church apostolike, must be defined by the doctrine and not by the place ox persons. — Wheresoever the true faith contained in the Scriptures is professed and embraced^ there is the whole and full nature of an apostolike church. — For the external SUCCESSION WE CARE NOT."* Francis White, bishop of Ely : — " The true ^asible church is named apostolical, not because of local and per- sonal succession of bishops, (only or principally,) but because it retaineth the faith and doctrine of the apostles. Personal or local succession only, and in itself, maketh not the church apostolical, because hirelings and wolves may lineally succeed lawful and orthodox pastors : Acts XX, 29, 30. Even as sickness succeedeth health, and dark- ness light, and a tempest fair weather, as Gregory Nazianzen affirmeth."t Stillingfleet : — " Come we, therefore, to Rome ; and here the succession is as muddy as the Tiber itself. Then let succession know its place, and learn to vaile bonnet to the Scriptures. The succession so much pleaded by the writers of the primitive church, was not a succession of persons in apostolical power, but a succession in apostoli- cal DOCTRINE. "J Bishop Hall : — " First, we may not either have or expect now in the church, that ministry which Christ set : where are our apostles, prgphets, evangelists ? If we must always look for the very same administration of the church which our Saviour left, why do we not acknowledge these extraordinary functions ? Do we not rather think, since it pleased him to begin with those offices which should not continue, that herein he purposely intended to teach us, that if we have the samejieavenly business done, we should * White's Way to the True Church, sec. 52, ed. 1612. t Bishop White's Works, p. 64, fol. ed. 1624. t Stillingfleet's Irenicum, pp. 297, 303, 322, edit. 1662 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 289 not be curious in the circumstances of the persons ? But for those ordinary callings of pastors and doctors, (intended to perpetuitie) with what forehead can he deny them to be in our church? How many have we that conscionably teach and feed, or rather feed by teaching? Call them what you please. Superintendents, (that is,) bishops, pre- lates, priests, lecturers, parsons, vicars, &c. If they PREACH Christ truly, upon true inward abilities, upon a sufficient [if not perfect] outward vocation : such a one \all histories witness^ for the substance, as hath been ever in the church since the apostles' times, they are pastors and doctors allowed by Christ. We stand not upon circum- stances and appendances of the fashions of ordination^ manner of choice, attire, titles, maintenance : hut if for substance these be not true pastors and doctors, Christ had NEVER any in his church since the apostles left the earths* Again, speaking of the reformed churches and their government and ministers, Calvin, Beza, &c., and of the Church of England, he says to his opponent, " Why, like a true make-bate, do you not say, that our churches have so renounced their government. These sisters" — the Church of England and the reformed churches — " have learned to differ, and yet to love and reverence each other : and in these cases to enjoy their own forms without pre- scription of necessity or censure."! The Rev. J. Wesley ; — " I deny that the Romish bish- ops came down by uninterrupted succession from the apostles. I never could see it proved ; and I am persuaded I never shall. But unless this is proved, your own pas- tors, on your principles, are no pastors at all."J "The figment of the uninterrupted succession, he openly said ' he knew to be a fabled "^ Here is a glorious army of martyrs and confessors, venerable fathers and reformers, bearing testimony to the only essential succession, the succession of apostolical doctrine ! Truth and holiness, then, are the only infallible, essen- tial properties or signs of the church of God ; and the Scriptures are the only infallible rule of this truth and * Bishop Hall's Apology against Brownists, sec. 27. t Ibid. sec. 3L t Wesley's Works, vol. 3, p. 44, ed. 1829. ^ Watson's Life of Wesley, p. 286, 12mo. 1831. 13 290 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. holiness. God gives ministers to his church, as the means of leading men to the knowledge and belief of this truth, and to live accordingly ; but every man is required, at the peril of his soul, to believe, not in man, but in God ; not in ministers, but in the Scriptures. So saith St. Augustine : " Nimquam aliquis apostolorum dicer e auderet, qui credit in me. Credimus apostolo, sed non credimus in apostolum. — No apostle ever dared to say ' He w^ho believes in me.' We believe an apostle, but we do not believe in an apostle."* It follows, as a consequence, that as every man is to believe for himself, every man is to judge for himself. The Papists say that God has made the church the infallible guide in matters of faith. God never said so. Let no man deceive himself. But the position is a sophism from beginning to end: it takes for granted what ought to be proved. It takes for granted that ministers, bishops, and priests, are the church. This is contrary to the Scriptures. When our Lord said to Peter, " On this rock will I build my church,^'' the Papists say, that he meant he would build his church upon Peter and his successors ; that is, upon the bishops of Rome, and the other bishops and priests under them. Build what, upon Peter and his successors ? Why, if bishops and priests are the church, that he would build bishops and priests upon bishops and priests ! Peter upon Peter ! that he would build a thing upon itself ! This is hardly equalled by the poor South Sea islanders, build- i7ig the world upon a turtle^ and the turtle upon nothing ! Our Lord's meaning was, that his church, his faithful peo- ple, should be founded upon the truth of his being the Messiah, the Son of the living God. When the apostle addresses the presbyters or bishops of Ephesus — " Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood," Acts XX, 28, he clearly makes the " church of God" to mean " the fock" as distinguished from the shepherds ; that is, the people as distinguished from the ministers. It is true, indeed, that ministers are a part of the church generally ; but to say that they are the church, and upon * Augustini 0pp. v, 9, Tract 54, in Evang. Joan. p. 133, ed, Ludg. 1664. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. • 291 this partial statement to found a most awfully important claim, the claim of infallibility and lordship over the faith of all the people of God, is a daring, false, and impious position ! — Such is the foundation of popery. But they say, the right o{ private judgment runs into sects and heresies, and they make a mighty parade about this. Per- haps many of them do not understand what they say. This is their best excuse. If they mean to say that the Protestant churches have, as to the succession of faith, as taught by the apostles, gone into sects and heresies, let them show a single true Protestant society that does not hold and teach what the apostles held and taught. As they boast of the fathers, letlhem produce a single creed from any of the fathers, for the first three hundred years, that is not believed by every true Protestant church. Now if they cannot do this, where is the honesty of talking about sects and heresies arising from private judgment? But we turn the tables upon the Papists : they have added many articles to the creed which the apostles never taught : 4hey have corrupted the truth of God and pervert- ed the gospel. They have brought heresies and idolatry into the church by wholesale. No Popish priest under heaven can prove the Popish creed of Pope Pius IV. (the universal creed of the Popish Church) from the Scriptures, nor from the fathers of the first three hundred years. They have lost the succession of faith. That church is in a state oi heresy and idolatry : it is an apostate church ! The priesthood of Papists and high Churchmen may be an imitation of Judaism or Paganism, or it may be a com- pound of both ; but it is not, as a priesthood, the Christian ministry ; and no man in it is a gospel minister at all, any further than he is such according to the above principles of Protestantism. The priesthood of Papists and high Churchmen professedly and essentially depends upon an uninterrupted succession of bishops, to be traced in an unbroken series from Peter to the present day ; and upon the authority of episcopal consecrations, or ordinations as episcopal. Now no such uninterrupted succession exists. Episcopal consecration or ordination, as such, that is, as distinct from the power of their order as presbyters, is a mere ceremony; it has no scriptural validity whatever. Both Popery and high Churchism erect in the priesthood a V^'il*' 292 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. system of spiritual tyranny over the whole church of God, The succession here is, as Gregory Nazianzen describes it, " the succession of sickness to health ; light succeed- ing to darkness ; a storm to a calm ; and spiritual derange- ment to the spirit of health, and of love, and of a sound mind." Or, as Bishop Jewel states it, " it is like Caiaphas succeeding to Aaron ; Manasses succeeding to David ; or antichrist sitting in Peter's chair." ^'^*. The Protestant churches are one in their rule of faith, Chillingworth's immortal words shaM be here inserted : " Know then, sir, that when I say the religion of Protest- ants is in prudence to be preferred before yours, as, on the one side, I do not understand oy your religion the doctrine of Bellarmine, or Baronius, or any other private man among you, nor the doctrine of the Sorbon, or of the Jesuits, or of the Dominicans, or of any other particular company among you, but that wherein you all agree, or profess to agree, the doctrine of the Council of Trent : so accord- ingly, on the other side, by the religion of Protestants, I do not understand the doctrine of Luther, or Calvin, or Melancthon ; nor the confession of Augusta, or Geneva; nor the Catechism of Heidi eberg; nor the Articles of the Church of England ; no, nor the hannony of Protestant confessions ; but that wherein they all agree, and which they all subscribe with a greater harmony, as a perfect rule of their faith and actions, that is, the Bible. The- Bible, I say, the Bible only is the religion of Protestants * Whatsoever else they believe besides it, and the plain, irrefragable, indubitable consequences of it, well may they hold it as a matter of opinion : but as matter of faith and religion, neither can they with coherence to their own grounds believe it themselves, nor require the belief of it of others, without most high and most schismatical pre- sumption. I, for my part, after a long and (as I verily be- lieve and hope) impartial search of the true way to eternal happiness, do profess plainly, that I cannot find any rest for the sole of my foot, but upon this Rock only. I see plainly, and with mine own eyes, that there are popes against popes, councils against councils, some fathers against others, the same fathers against themselves, a con- sent of fathers of one age against a consent of fathers of another age, the church of one age against the church of ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 293 aiiother age. Traditive interpretations of Scripture are pretended, but there are few or none to be found : no tra- dition but only of Scripture, can derive itself from the foun- tain ; but may be plainly proved, either to have been brought in, in such an age after Christ, or that in such an age it was not in. In a word, there is no sufficient certainty but of Scripture only, for any considering man to build upon. This, therefore, and this only, I have reason to believe : this I will profess ; according to this I will live ; and for this, if there be occasion, I will not only willingly, but even gladly, lose my life, though I should be sorry that Christians should take it from me. Propose me any thing out of this book, and require whether I believe it or no, and seem it never so incomprehensible to human rea- son, I will subscribe it with hand and heart, as knowing no demonstration can be stronger than this, — God hath said so, therefore it is true. In other things, I will take no man'sliberty of judgment from him ; neither shall any man take mine from me. I will think no man the worse man, nor the worse Christian ; I will love no man the less for differing in opinion from me. And what measure I nfete to others I expect from them again. I am fully assured that God does not, and therefore that men ought not, to require any more of any man than this, to believe the Scriptures to be God's word, to endeavour to find the true sense of it, and to live according to it,"* The true Protestant churches, then, have the true suc- cession, the succession of the faith of the apostles, the doc- trine of truth as taught by the apostles. This is in the Bible, and in the Bible alone. All held besides this, as articles of faith, or as divinely hinding in obedience, is a CORRUPTION of Christianity, Let the Protestant churches remember their high privi- leges : let them bless God for them, and endeavour to the utmost to keep their trust pure and undefiled. Let the PEOPLE HONOR THEIR MINISTERS AS AMBASSADORS FOR Christ, The great aim of Papists and Semi-Papists is to lead the people to despise their ministers. Why do they do this ? Why 1 that they may make a prey of the people. Do they offer io feed them as pastors ? — it will be with the husks of tradition. Do they claim to govern * The Religion of Protestants, c. 6, sec. 56. 294 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. them ? — it will be as lords over God's heritage. Do they offer them liberty ? — it is that they may lead them to hon- dage. God has made the Protestant churches free; may they stand fast in their liberty, and never be entangled again with the yoke of bondage ! God has always had a church, a spiritual people ; he always will have a spiritual people, a true church. This church is a holy church : no body of people, as distinguish- ed by human arrangements, is so. Ungodly people are found among all denominations ; most particularly among Papists and high Churchmen. The church of God is a catholic church, consisting of all the true worshippers of God everywhere : no denomina- tion of Christians ever was catholic, that is, universal. The expression, Roman Catholic, is a solecism — ^is non- sense — is absurd ! It is as much as to say, a particular UNIVERSAL, that A PART IS THE WHOLE, that A CITY IS THE WORLD ! ! The true Catholic church is the same in all ages^ as well as in all places. It is made up of patriarchs and prophets, martyrs and confessors, and true believers : " I say unto you, that many shall come from the east and west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven," Matt, viii, II. "After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and -kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands ; and cried with a loud voice, saying. Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb," Rev. vii, 9, 10. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 295 CONCLUSION. The argument of this Essay is now finished ; and the high Church scheme of an order of bishops, hy divine right, distinct from and superior to presbyters ; possessing prerogatives incompatible with presbyters ; having the rights and authority of apostles ; which order of bishops is to be traced by a personal succession, through an un- broken line from Peter to the present bishops of England ; and whose ordinations are so essential to the validity of a true gospel ministry, that without them all preaching and ordinances are " vain," and vnthout the ^^ promise of Christ ;" this scheme has been examined in its fundamental posi- tions, and has been shown to be a baseless fabric, cal- culated only to destroy the peace of the church, and to promote pride, bigotry, exclusiveness, intolerance, and persecution ; in one word, to destroy Protestantism, AND to promote Popery. It has been proved, on the other hand, with all the evidence of a catholic or universal doctrine of the Christian church, that bishops and presby- ters are, by divine right, one and the same. Presbyters have been shown by the Scriptures, the only and sufficient authority in such matters, to have, by divine right, EQUAL power and authority with any bishops to perform ALL the acts of the Christian ministry ; instancing, espe- cially, that of ORDAINING ministers. Presbyters are equally as much successors of the apostles as bishops are. The only essential succession is the succession of faith. All churches are apostolical or not, in proportion as they ap- proach to, or recede from, the doctrine of the apostles. An unbroken line oi personal descent oi spiritual power to ordain in the English bishops, is a fable. No man ever did, or ever can prove it. In addition to all this, we have shown, that when examined by the Scriptures, and the doctrine of the reformers, the Popish ordinations of the English bishops, before and at the Reformation, were, from the monstrous wickedness, heresy, and simony of the persons concerned, null and void to all intents and purposes. 296 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. The validity of the ordination of the ministers of the Church of England, as well as that of the ministers of all other churches, must be judged, therefore, according to the Scriptural rule of the succession of doctrine ; the qiialijica' tions of the men in personal piety, ability to teach, minis- terial grace, the call of God, and their appointment to the work in a manner suitable to the Scriptures. A few brief observations, as corollaries, may be added. Ministers are God's gifts, and God's stewards in the church : — The Scriptures regularly speak in this style : — The Lord sends the labourers into his vineyard. Matt, ix, 28. The Lord appoints ministers as the stewards of his house- hold, to give them their portion of meat in due season. Matt, xii, 42. Jesus, as the chief Shepherd, brings in by himself, as the door, all true shepherds. When he ascended up on high, he gave to the church pastors, &lc. Ephes. iv, 11, 12. They are to rule by His word and will. Their office, we have shown, is a limited office : they are ser- vants, not masters, nor lords over the heritage. None but such as these can be true ministers of the gospel. God QUALIFIES THEM, MOVES THEM, AND SENDS THEM. Where no church is formed, they gather one. Where churches are formed, he moves and directs his church, if attentive to his will, to receive all he sends. Every minister of the gospel must be a real Christian, not a wicked man ; a man of some natural ability, not a fool ; endowed with knowledge of the gospel, not a novice ; able to teach and to convince gainsayers. Besides all this, he must have a special gift of the Holy Ghost for the work. Rom. xii, 6; 1 Cor. xii, 4-7; Ephes. iv, 7, &c. Every such man has a divine commission in general to preach the gospel : but he has no authority in any par- ticular church, as a pastor or governor over that church. To constitute him a regular pastor in a particular church, he must be solemnly received as such by the regular au- thority of that church. The mode of constituting a minis- ter in a particular church may vary according to circum- stances. If it be in a state of persecution, or reformation, the full reception of his ministry establishes him as the minister of that church : if it be in a settled state, he must be constituted or instituted a minister according to the ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 297 usages of that church. Scripture, and all antiquity, and the generality of the reformed churches, show this should be done by the laying on of the hands of the presbyter}", that is, of those ministers appointed for their wisdom, gravity, and experience to such office in the church. Only it should be kept in mind, that this form, though authorized by such high examples, is never commanded. It is becoming and proper, but not essential. It is pretty clear that the early ordinations were sometimes performed by the lifting up of the hands of those who ordained.* So the word x^^porovecj^ used in the ordaining of elders or presbyters in all the churches by Paul and Barnabas, properly means. Acts xiv, 23, Any act, indeed, by the authority of the church, setting men apart to this office, is ordination. This public authorized act is all that belongs to the essence of ordination ; all besides is accident or cir- cumstance. All ministers are equal, by divine right, in every thing that belongs to the being or well-being of the church. The church may arrange for one or more to perform, fer the sake of order, any particular duty, so that no attempt is made to claim for such acts or arrangements more than human authority. The moment this is done, such a claim makes war on the rights of other ministers, and on the peace of the church. The efficacy of a gospel ministry depends, a^ to God, upon the authority and power of the loord of God, and upon the operations of the Spirit of God ; and, as to man, upon the faith and obedience of the hearers. The mere preach- * I am aware that attempts have been made to refute this, by saying that the word ;^fiporovfw means to institute a person in some office. Very true. So balloting or voting frequently does the same. But this is only part of the truth. Expressions of this kind frequently declare the manner of doing this, as well as the thing itself; so voting by a show of hands expresses the manner, as well as the thing. The Greeks, from whom the word is taken, frequently instituted individuals in office by a show of hands. The text in Acts xiv, 23, uses the very word ap- plied to the institution of an individual in office among the Greeks, by a shoio of hands. Among them, therefore, it signified to ordain or ap- point to office by a show of hands. The sacred writer says that Paul and Barnabas thus instituted, that is, ordained, presbyters in every church ; they ordained them, therefore, by lifting up their hands in solemn attestation that they so instituted them as ministers of the word. Such seems to be the legitimate conclusion both from the language, and from the customs of the Greeks. 13* 298 ON APOSTOLICAL SLCCESSION. ing and administering of sacraments, as the act of the MINISTER, has in itself no saving efficacy. The opus operatum, or the doctrine of Papists and high Churchmen, that the mere outward performance of the offices and ordi- nances of religion necessarily produces inward religion, is PRIESTCRAFT, and destroys many of the souls of the people. The blind lead the blind, and both fall into the ditch. This abuse of the ministry of the gospel is no argument against its use and importance. The gospel ministry is God's ordinance. It is a highly important ordinance ; and, when properly performed, is highly use- ful. Is it not vastly important to know, that God has sent to us ambassadors of peace ; though the authority, and power, and efficacy of this embassy are really all divine ? Is it not highly useful to find, that, as to those who believe and obey that embassy, God will receive them by it into pardon and peace; to holiness and heaven? " Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believe, even as the Lord gave to every man ? I have planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth ; but God that giveth the increase," 1 Cor. iii, 5-7. The CHURCH OF God is the temple, the house of God : — This church is to be considered as universal or particu- lar ; the church universal includes all upon earth who are united to Christ by living faith ; and all who are united to Christ by living faith belong to this church. It includes all particular churches that hold the faith of Christ. Thus spake the English reformers in their definition of the holy catholic or universal church : — " It comprehends all assemblies of men over the whole world that receive the faith of Christ ; who ought to hold a unity of love and brotherly agreement together, by which they be- come members of the catholic church."* A particular church is a church distinguished outwardly by some pecu- liar views in doctrine or modes of worship, government, or discipline, from other churches. Each particular church has equal rights and privileges with any other church. None have a right to interfere with the just liberties of other churches. Civil or national establishments may * Burnet's History of the Reformation, book iii, anno 1540. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 299 have peculiar emoluments, but they can have no divine authority to restrain the peaceable exercise of spiritual duties in other churches. When they do, they become antichristiax. Church government : — By this is meant the system of ecclesiastical arrange- ment and discipline of some particular church. This church government must be distinguished into what is general, and what is particular; the principle, and the application in detail of that principle. The New Testa- ment lays down general principles, but gives no parti- cular F0R3I of churcR government in detail. All church government is Scriptural that abides by the general prin- ciples of the New Testament, however it may vary in detail. All church government is unscriptural that vio- lates any of the general principles laid down in Scripture, no matter what may be their form in detail. The follow- ing are general Scriptural principles : — As to the relations between ministers and people : — ministers are to feed and rule the people according to the word of God : the people are to submit to such a ministry, to honour and support such ministers. This is clear from the following passages : — ^latt. xxiv, 45 ; Luke x, 7; Acts XX, 28 ; 1 Cor. ix, 7-14 ; Gal. vi, 6-8 ; 1 Tim. iii, 4, 5 ; Heb. xiii, 17. Any limitation of this power in ministers, by the exercise of lay influence, is Scriptural, so long as it leaves the minister in possession of that authority by which he can regularly, when needful, exercise the power of governing, as well as of feeding, the flock. All beyond this is unscriptural. The people ruling the minister, is the sheep ruling the shepherd! It is absurd, as well as unscriptural. It wall always lead to the corruption of the truth in a man-pleasing ministry. It is as inimical to holi- ness of life, as it is to truth of doctrine : discipline will be relaxed, the hedge of the Lord's vineyard will be broken down, and the wild boar of the wilderness will spoil the vine. When ministers are, in themselves, or in their mi- nistry and government, clearly contrary to the Scriptures, they lose their authority, and the obligation of the people to obey them ceases. See section iv of this Essay. i\.s to ministers with ministers: they are all, by divine right, equal. They are all to aim at edification, order, 300 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. and efficiency. Gifts differ. Some men have talents for government, some for evangelists, some for pastors. It is consonant to the gifts of the Holy Ghost that the church should arrange for each man to occupy that place for which he is most qualified, and which will most promote the order and edification of the church. Any such arrange- ment is warranted by the gifts of the Holy Ghost, by reasons of order and edification, and by the judgment of the greatest and best men of all ages. All these human arrangements must be subordinate to, and in accordance with, the great principle, that all ministers are, by divine right, equal. The moment they violate this principle, they become unscriptural. They set up human authority above the word of God — all other ministers are degraded — war is made upon the peace of the church — antichrist begins to reign. As this is a point of so great importance, a little enlarge- ment will be in strict accordance with the design of this Essay : — • Scriptural episcopacy is, strictly, the feeding and governing of the flock ; and has nothing to do with govern- ing ministers. Every true minister is a Scriptural bishop. See section v. Scriptural church polity, as appears by the gifts of the Holy Ghost, by the example of the apostles, by the duty of doing all to edification, allows of, and countenances, such prudential arrangements among the ministers, as that some should have more eminently the ofiice of governing in the church, presiding in the councils of ministers, &c. ; and that others should more particularly labour as evange- lists, as pastors, as doctors or teachers ; others as apostles or missionaries. This arrangement must never interfere with the principle that the act of every true minister in preaching, baptizing, administering the Lord's supper, and ordaining to the ministry, or governing the church, is, by divine right, equal to that of any other minister. A super- intendency thus restricted and guarded is not antiscrip- tural : it violates no law laid down there : it is recom- mended by the distribution of the gifts of the Holy Ghost : no ecclesiastical tyranny can be exercised by it: it pro- motes order, union, strength, and the edification of the whole. Call it episcopacy, if you please : the name is not ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 301 very important, only define the thing. I think the term episcopacy is not to be commended, because by episcopus^ or bishop, the Scriptures never mean a superintendent of ministers, but only of the Jlock ; and because the use of the word in ecclesiastical writers has become ambiguous ; and will, therefore, always leave room for cavilling, and pre- tences to ecclesiastical tyranny. It is against the strictest rules of right reason designedly to put an ambiguous word into a definition ; the man that does it is a promoter of confusion, and not of peace. Episcopacy in the Church of England, viewed as the reformers viewed it, was, in other words, a superintend- ENCY of no more than human authority, designed for the order, edification, and good government of the church, established on the principle that all ministers, by divine right, are equal. All her ministers, who are qualified by piety, talents, and divine knowledge ; by the special gifts of the Holy Ghost moving them to the work of the minis- try ; and who are solemnly set apart to it according to the usages of that church, are true ministers of Christ. But every wicked man, in this or in any other church, every unconverted man, however set apart, is a wolf, is a hire- ling, a thief and a robber in the church. Let him repent, and give himself to God. Then, if he finds himself quali- fied by piety, and gifts, and moved by the Holy Ghost, and if the church be willing still to receive him, he will be a true minister. But the attempts to claim authority for bishops, as an order by divine right, on the high Church succession scheme, either in that church, or out of that church, is to declare war against the divine right of all true ministers, and against the peace and security of every Christian church. The advocates of these claims are the SCHISMATICS, or causers of division. They should be marked and shunned by every friend to the peace of the church. The man who aids them, or who wishes them God speed, becomes a partaker of their sin, and an enemy to the peace of the church. Antichrist came into the church by an unguarded use of ministerial superintendency. " The common appella- tion of bishops," says Beza, " was that of minister, until, for the sake of government, one minister was placed over the others, and began to be distinguished by the name of 302 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. bishop. Justin Martyr calls him the president. It was from this that the devil began to place the first foundation of tyranny in the church, bringing in the notion that the WHOLE GOVERNMENT of the church was, together Avith the name, given into the hands of one person. The scheme went on from the bishop [of a diocess] to the metropolitan [of a province] — from metropolitans to patriarchs." Lastly, the pope claims to be universal bishop, the lord over the whole church, and to sit as God in the temple of God ! This is the very character and image of antichrist. " Let no man deceive you by any means, for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition ; who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped ; so that he as God, sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God," 2 Thess. ii, 3, 4. All attempts to make ministers lords over God's herit- age is treason to the peace of the church, and leads to antichrist. Episcopacy, by divine right, is such an attempt. It is antiscriptural, intolerant, and antichristian. It sets up, as we have before said, Anglican Poperv with many heads, in the place of Roman Popery with one head. Both have the same mind, the mind of the beast ; and both make war on the church of God. Both also spread out this spiritual tyranny through the whole priesthood, by pretences to a peculiar priestly poiuer to effect wonders merely by their official acts. They can change the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ ; they can ab- solve sinners by their ministerial authority ; they can seal, saints, &c., though as wicked as Satan themselves. They have the keys of heaven and hell. They can depose kings, can curse or give away kingdoms. They can be very Pro- tcuses, can become gods or devils as they choose. These things are literally true, as to Roman Popery. As to An- glican Popery, we can only judge the child by its parent. As a child, it has had its deeds of darkness and horror, its five mile acts, conventicle acts, Bartholomew days, Sfc. Heaven forbid its maturity ! All the other Protestant churches in Europe, with some trifling exceptions, have laid aside the episcopal mode of church government : they are governed by presbyters. Presbyters ordain, and perform all the offices arrd duties of ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 303 the Christian ministry. These presbyters are all Scrip- tural bishops, each having immediate oversight over the flock. In some churches, as in the Lutheran and the Wesleyan churches, a superintendency of one minister over other ministers, as well as over the people, is established. This is a mere prudential arrangement, and not of divine right. The model of all these churches is more Scriptural and apostolical than the episcopal form : the model of the episcopal government arose only from ecclesiastical authority. Episcopacy, by divine right, has neither the authority of Scripture, nor Christian antiquity ; it is a USURPATION of modern times. It is simply an attempt to establish a popedom of bishops, instead of his HOLINESS of Rome. Church and state : — The state is a civil government : the church is a spiritual government. , Kings and magistrates are the heads of the state : ministers of the gospel are, under Christ, the heads of the church. The jurisdiction of the state is only a civil jurisdiction : the jurisdiction of the church is only spiritual. The end of the state government is the peace and order of the state, with the security of the rights of persons and property to every member or subject of the state : the end of church government is ih.e peace, order, and purity of the church, the edification of its members, and the conversion of sinners to God. Such are the nature, laws, and ends, of the church and the state, respectively. But what is to be said -abovXlhQ connection of church and state ? Every man, of course, has a right to form his own opinion ; and, while he obeys all the civil laws of the state, is loyal to the king or queen, as supreme civil magis- trate, and persecutes none for differing from him, no per- son has any right to hinder the peaceable expression of his opinion. The New Testament, I think, neither com- mands nor prohibits the matter. It is, therefore, in the abstract, not unscriptural ; neither is it necessary. If it takes place, it must, to be countenanced by true Christi- anity, be under such limitations as the nature, and laws, and end of each government, require. The state may supply pecuniary support to the church. This is plain from the nature of the thing. Any person may appropri- ate his money to the support of any thing that is lawful-. 304 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. tlie state is a collection of persons, and may do the same. To promote the support of gospel ministers is lawful; therefore the state may support gospel ministers. But then the state cannot, hy divine authority, make laws for church government, simply as such ; because its power is ONLY civil : these laws are only spiritual. For the same reason, the state catinot, by divine authority, either elect or appoint the ministers of the church, simply as gospel ministers, nor depose the same, any more than the church can appoint ministers of state, and depose the same. The pope has as much right to depose kings, as kings have to depose gospel ministers. The confounding of these things was the cause of the horrible wars between the popes and the German emperors. Opposition to any civil govern- ment, in the exercise of its own proper authority, under any pretence of religion, is ungodliness and rebellion ; and the civil sword ought to punish and repress it. There can be no peace to either church or state, but by each keeping distinctly within its own sphere. The state has a right to demand obedience to the civil laws, and loyalty to the king and constitution, from every subject of the realm. Protestantism teaches loyalty to all kings : Popery denies allegiance to all Protestant sovereigns, by the fourth Lateran council. No pretences about the good of the church should be suffered for one moment to interfere with this point. Where there is not true allegiance to the civil magistrate, there is no true claim to civil rights or privileges. But then, this allegiance being secured, with obedience to all the civil laws of the state, the authority of the state extends no further. Every man, as a peaceful and loyal subject, has a right to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience. And every society of men, while obedient to the civil laws, and loyal to the state, have a right, so far as the state is con- cerned, to form regulations for their own worship and church discipline. If they choose to give up this right to the state, in whole or in part, then, so far as such a society is concerned, the state has a right to exercise it. But the good of both will be best secured by keeping them per- fectly distinct. The state may give its support to any peculiar form of faith ; but it has no divine right to inter- ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 305 fere, by force, with any other forms of faith or worship, so long as the individuals following those forms are loyal SUBJECTS to the civil government, and to the king as su- preme civil magistrate ; otherwise the state might lawfully establish heathenism, or Mohammedanism^ and persecute Christianity. Any particular section of the church may accept of this support from a civil government, so long as it is done consistently with the nature, laws, and end of that church, and of all other Christian churches. As to its own interests, — it should make its own spiritual or purely ecclesiastical laws ; elect and appoint its own min- isters, as ministers of the gospel ; and administer spiritual discipline over its own members. To bring in the secular arm in any of these cases, is unchristian : it will also inevitably secularize and corrupt the church. A state CHURCH has no authority over other churches, be- cause of its pecuniary support from the state. The state can give it none. The state has no authority but civil authority. Civil authority has no jurisdiction over the conduct of individuals, except as am/ members of the state. In fact, any particular state church is rather under obli- gation to the members of all other particular churches /or their part m the support of that church. The members of any particular church have a civil right to object in an orderly, constitutional, and peaceable manner, to the state support of another particular church. If the state church becomes proud and persecuting, because of its state SUPPORT, then, it would seem, that a serious Christian would be bound to withhold his influence from its support. If he thinks he ought to do more, he is justified, so that he does it peaceably, orderly, and constitutionally. If he thinks otherwise, he ought to act as a conscientious man. Let no man condemn him. Such are the principles taught in the word of God; such also are the principles advocated in this Essay ; and such are their consequences. The church of the living God is a spiritual church : all true believers everywhere constitute this church. They are " one body, there is one Spirit, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above and through all, and in all" The ministers of this church are all brethren. We are to call no man master 306 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. upon earth, for one is our Master in heaven, the Lord Je- sus Christ. " Jesus said unto the apostles, Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them," that is, act as lords over them ; " but it shall not be so among you ; but w^hosoever M^ill be great among you, let him be your minister ^ Matt, xx, 25, 26. " But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of Christ. Where- fore, when he ascended up on high, he led captivity cap- tive, and gave gifts unto men: and he gave some, apostles ; and some, prophets ; and some, evangelists ; and some, pas- tors and teachers ; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." Ephesians iv, 7-13. Fellow Protestants, of every denomination, the writer would address you all as brethren. If he knows his own heart, he writes to promote unity among Protestants, as brethren. But this unity can only be established by putting aside all principles that exclude and -persecute such as hold the Holy Scriptures as the only and sufficient rule of FAITH and PRACTICE : such as, on the faith of the Scrip- tures, embrace the doctrine of the trinity ; the perfection and sufficiency of the atonement of Christ ; the divinity and sanctifying operations of the Holy Ghost ; justification by faith alone in that atonement ; sanctification through the operation of the Holy Ghost and living faith ; and Scriptural holiness as the fruits of this faith, and as the way to heaven. Wherever these are, uncorrupted by any paramount errors, Christ is there ; the church of God is there. The form of worship may differ ; but there is " the way, the truth, and the life." Christianity does not depend on forms of church government, but on the truth as it is in Jesus. On this rock Christ builds his church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Will you, on these principles, — the principles of the Bible, the whole Bible, and nothing but the Bible, — will you on these principles, give me, give every one that re- ceives them, the right hand of fellowship ? I trust you ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 307 will. I most cordially do it to every one, whatever may be the denomination he may have among men, who thus receives the truth as it is in Jesus. To me, there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, as to such, for we have all been baptized into one body, and have been all made to drink into one spirit. We are one and the same church — one and the same body of Christ. The little differences of doctrine, or modes of worship, that are found among such, do not affect the essentials of our Christianity. Genuine Protestantism is one ; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all ; one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. In this view of Protestantism as one, one body, the address .of the apostle is beautiful — may the Holy Spirit write it on the heart of every Protestant! — "For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body : so also is Christ. For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free ; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit. For the body is not one member, but many. If the foot shall say. Be- cause I am not the hand, I am not of the body ; is it there- fore not of the body ? And if the ear shall say, Because I am not the eye, I am not of the body ; is it therefore not of the body ? If the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing ? If the whole were hearing, where were the smelling ? But now hath God set the members every one of them in the body, as it hath pleased him. And if they were all one member, where were the body ? But now are they many members, yet but one body. And the eye cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of thee : nor again the head to the feet, I have no need of you. Nay, much more those members of the body, which seem to be more feeble, are necessary : and those members of the body which we think to be less honourable, upon these we bestow more abundant honour ; and our uncomely parts have more abundant comeliness. For our comely parts have no need : but God hath tempered the body together, having given more abundant honour to that part which lacked : that there should be no schism in the body ; but that the members should have the same care, one for another. 308 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it ; or one member be honoured, all the members re- joice with it." 1 Cor. xii, 12-26. Popery, brethren, according to all the venerable re- formers, whether in the valleys of the Alps, in Switzer- land, in Bohemia, in Germany, in France, or in Britain, — Popery is antichrist. It is an awful corruption of Christianity. It is spiritual whoredom ; the church for- saking her covenant with God, and playing the harlot with other gods and other lords. " So he carried me away in the Spirit into the wilderness : and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet-coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication : and upon her forehead was a name written, Mystery, Babylon the Great, the mother of harlots and abominations of the earth. And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus : and when I saw her, I wondered with great admi- ration." Rev. xvii, 3-6. The Church of Rome has been drunk with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus, PoPERy is UNCHANGEABLE. Popevy IS swom hostility to Protestantism. Every Papist is taught this as an article of his creed. All out of the Church of Rome she holds as HERETICS : Protestants she holds as heretics. She curses them with the most dreadful curses. Every Papist so- lemnly says in his creed, " I do, in like manner, con- demn, REJECT, and curse them." And he concludes : " This true Catholic faith out of which no one can be saved, which I do now, of my own accord, profess and truly do hold, the same I will take care to retain whole and invio- late most constantly, so far as I am able, unto the latest breath of my life ; and, by the assistance of God, I will take care that those who are subject to me, or whose care in the place I am in shall belong to me, shall hold, teach, and preach the same also." " I, the same N., do promise, vow, and swear this. So may God, and these holy Gospels of God, help me /" fc ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 309 '^ Popeiy makes no difference in her denunciations against heretics, as in the Establishment, or as of other denomina- ' tions. She curses that Church and the king or the queen, B.S fiercely as she curses the meanest subject of the realm. The pope thus cursed Queen Elizabeth as a heretic : " Moreover we do declare her to be deprived of her PRETENDED TITLE to the kingdom, and of all domi?iio?i, dignity, and privilege whatsoever. And also the nohility, subjects, and people of the said kingdom, and all others which have in any sort sworn unto her, to be for ever ab- soLYEDfrom any such oath, and all manner of duty, of do- minion, ALLEGIANCE, and ohcdicnce ; as we also do by the authority of these presents, absolve them, and do deprive the same Elizabeth of her pretended title to the kingdomy and all other things aforesaid ; and we do command and interdict all and every the noblemen, subjects, people^ and others aforesaid, that they presume not to obey her, or her ministers, mandates, and laws ; and those who shall do the contrary, we bind in the same sentence to be ACCURSED. " Given at Rome, at St. Peter's, in the year of the In- carnation of our Lord 1570." — Bull of Pope Pius V. This bull is given in "perpetual memorial of the matter — ^that the bishop of Rome, as Peter's successor, has ALONE been made Prince over all people^ and all king- doms, to PLUCK UP, DESTROY, SCATTER, CONSUME, plant and build, that he may retain the faithful that are knit to- gether with the bond of charity, in the unity of the Spirit, and present them spotless and unblameable to their Saviour." These things show what Popery is, and what Protest- ants have TO expect from Popery, What, then, is the wisdom of Protestants ? The watch- word of the enemy is, " Divide and conquer ^ Let the motto of Protestants be, " The unity of the Spirit in the BOND OF PEACE." Let no Protestants set up exclusive, intolerant schemes against their fellow Protestants. He that does so is an enemy to Protestantism, and a friend to Popery. This Essay has been written to expose, refute, and put away a scheme of this kind, already sufficiently characterized. The author requests the co-operation of 310 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. every true Protestant in this design. If there are any de- fects in the Essay, (and the author is far from considering it faultless,) let them be pointed out and corrected. If any can do better, he wishes them success. May the great Head of the church pour the Spirit out upon all pious MINISTERS, and upon all their congregations ; may he send faithful shepherds to his flock everywhere ; and may the kingdom of our God speedily come, and all the ends of the earth see his salvation ! Amen ! A CRITIQUE ON THE HON. AND REV. MR. PERCEVAL'S APOLOGY FOR THE DOCTRINE OF APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. On Saturday, Sept. 21, 1839, the following announce- ment appeared in the Leeds Intelligencer : — '• An Apology for the Doctrine of Apostolical Succession, with an Appen- dix on the English Orders, by the Honourable and Rev. A. P. Perceval, B. C. L., Chaplain in Ordinary to the Queen. This work, as the preface states, has been written at the request of the vicar of Leeds, and with the assistance of several prelates and divines of the Church of England. It is a complete answer to a pamphlet lately published by a Mr. Powell." The Leeds Intelligencer is, in church matters, under the influence of Dr. Hook and his party. The above state- ment, therefore, seems to demand that the author of the Essay on Apostolical Succession should give his readers an account of this answer to his work. The writer of the notice of Mr. Perceval's Apology evidently felt himself in an awkward predicament. A Dissenting teacher, a Mr. Powell, had published something on apostolical succes- sion, a subject dear as life to every high Church priest. Of course Dr. Hook, the vicar of Leeds, a spiritual de- scendant of Pope Vitalian, Alexander III., Innocent HI., Innocent IV., Nicholas III., &c., &c., knew his superiority too well to deign any notice of " a pamphlet, by a Mr. Powell." However, the public deigned to notice it ; and about two thousand copies were sold in little more than a twelvemonth. Many periodicals pronounced a high opinion on the work. Churchmen are convinced by it ; 312 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. and Dissenters feel confirmed in the superiority o{ their own ministry. Dr. Hook is not miconscious of these things. He, therefore, particularly requests his friend the Honourable and Reverend A. P. Perceval, brother chaplain to the queen, to prepare an antidote. This is undertaken : seve- ral prelates and divines assist in the work, and it is dedi- cated to the archbishop of Canterbury. " A pamphlet by a Mr. Powell" is greatly honoured by all this. However, this Mr. Powell is such a strange sort of creature that he feels no gratitude when no favour is intended ; and what he does not feel, he despises to affect. Yet certainly this " complete answer" to his work shall be examined. The Apology of Mr. Perceval presents one difficulty, which, I hope, few Dissenting productions exhibit. The difficulty is this ; Mr. Perceval generally answers his op- ponents by assertions, and not by proofs of their mistakes. But this is probably one of the advantages possessed by gentlemen of the succession, that they have authority to be believed without proofs ; and Dissenters have not. We have learned from a very old Dissenter from these gentlemen, to " prove all things, and to hold fast that which is good." Dr. Hook proclaimed that the spiritual descent of " every bishop, priest, and deacon, was evident to every one who chose to investigate it." Now what is sO evident to every one, must be capable of easy demonstration : but Mr. Per- ceval, in answer to the objection in the Essay, that there is " no sufficient historic evidence of a perpetual succes- sion of valid episcopal ordinations," says, " If nothing will satisfy men but actual demonstration," (sufficient historic evidence was the question,) " / yield at once^'' p. 79. This pamphlet has done something : the chosen champion of the succession scheme " yields at once'''' that there is no sufficient historic evidence to support it ! Still Mr. Perceval hugs the scheme, though he " yields at once," that it has no sufficient historic evidence to sup- port it. He considers it to be " an article of this one faith, [of the Bible,] and to be the authority for that one baptism" of the Bible, p. 62 : and justly concludes, that there is " a consequence springing from these premises if established : in respect, namely, of the paramount and exclusive claim upon the obedience of all Christians within the British ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 313 diocesses which belongs to the bishops of those diocesses," pp. 237, 238. And he has the courage to denounce the orders of all the Protestant churches of " Germany, Den- mark, France, Scotland, England, Ireland, and North America," (the Episcopal Church excepted in the latter,) ^^ pretended orders," and their power of ordination, a ^^ fan- cied power of ordination," pp. 54, 45. It is very amusing, too, to learn, that if Dissenting teach- ers dispute this, and tell such gentlemen as Mr. Perceval, that, to pronounce such a sentence of excommunication against all these churches, without the clearest, strongest Scriptural proof, is semi-popish, bigoted, and intolerant, — then, Mr. Perceval says, this is persecuting the Church of England. Hear him at p. 62 : " It is," says he, " I believe chiefly, if not wholly, on account of the exclusiveness of the doctrine that we who maintain it are exposed to ha- tred and reviling ; and if we may judge from the language of our revilers, shall have to endure persecution, if it shall be in their power to inflict it. If we would be content to teach episcopacy as one among many schemes equally true or equally doubtful, it should seem, from their latest writ- ings, that we should not he disturbed; but because we teach it, as the Scriptures and the church have delivered it to us, exclusively, therefore the loorld hateth us. Just so, if the early Christians could have been contented to profess their religion, as one of the six hundred tolerated by heathen Rome, and had been liberal enough, according to the modern abuse of the term, to regard all religion as pretty much alike, they would have had no n:eed to endure the cross, the stake, or the teeth of wild beasts : but be- cause they taught their religion, as the Scriptures and the church had delivered it to them, exclusively, therefore the world hated them. While, therefore, the charge of exclu- siveness is an argument in our favour against whom it is brought, seeing that we bear it in common with the primi- tive martyrs ; it is an argument against those who bring it, seeing that they do so, in common with the very heathen." We have quoted the whole of this paragraph, for the pur- pose, among other things, of giving a specimen of Mr. Per- ceval's views, reasoning, and style. He is in a dreadful fright, it seems, lest " the world," the heathenish dissenters, should call the successionists to martyrdom ! Good man ! 14 314 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. We will relieve him, by assuring him that the only perse- cution he has to fear from us, is one or other of the follow- ing tortures : either, first, To prove that the Scriptures teach this exclusive doctrine ; or, secondly. To withdraw his denunciations and excommunications of other Protest- ant churches ; or, thirdly. If he will continue them, withovt Scriptural proof s to support them^ then that he be published to the world as a semi-papist, a bigot, a persecutor, and a disturber of the peace of God's church. So far are we from persecution, that he bears witness to the contrary, by saying, that, if high Churchmen would be content that their scheme should be allowed " as one among many," we should NOT disturb them. Then it seems we only want to live and let live. Is this persecution ? But what shall be said of men who really and seriously maintain, that if they cannot reign alone, and eoetinguish all other churches, they are injured, reviled, about to be martyrs, and given to the teeth of wild beasts ! ! While noticing miscellaneous matters, it may not be im- proper to make a brief observation or two on a note at page 25, in which he charges me with " denying that the apos- tles had any sole jurisdiction ;" and concludes it by observ- ing that they who " carp at the authority of bishops, pre- sently proceed to carp at that of the apostles, and will pro- bably not be deterred from carping at that of our Lord him- self." Now as to what he calls " denying that the apos- tles had any sole jurisdiction," my language, even as quoted by himself, is this : " There is no very clear evi- dence." And again, " I think we find no declared autho- rity solely belonging to them as apostles, to call any minis- ters to account, or to depose them." Is this " denying" the thing, by merely expressing a thought dubiously ? — or, by saying, if there be any evidence, it is not " very clear evidence ?" " One might have thought," says Mr. Perce- val, " that the sentence concerning certain false teachers * whom I have delivered unto Satan, that they might learn not to blaspheme,' 1 Tim. i, 20, had been proof sufficient of such authority, and of the exercise of it." What Mr. Perceval might have thought, and what is " very clear evi- dence," may be different things. Now let us examine a little the only parallel case mentioned in the New Testament, agreeing to the statement made in the Essay, ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 315 viz., in churches already planted, having ministers already appointed over them — the case is found 1 Cor. v. 1-13. In this case, though the church had neglected its duty, yet the apostle does not proceed ^o excommunicate, even this private member, on his own sole authority. He directs a church court to be formed, or called together. Pool, in his Synopsis, quotes Estius thus describing the composi- tion of this court : " The apostle directs the calling of a public assembly, that all understanding the greatness of the crime, might acknowledge the justice of the punish- ment. It does not follow, indeed, from this place, that the multitude have the power of excommunication, yet the multitude in some sense excommunicate, namely, by their approbation and suffrage in favour of the excommunication, and by avoiding the excommunicated person. The minis- ter performed the act of excommunication by the direc- tion of St. Paul." Thus, also, Calvin on the place : " It is to be observed that St. Paul, though an apostle, did not proceed alone to excommunicate according to his own views and feelings, but he consulted with the church, that the thing might be done by the authority of all." Bishop Fell on the place, says, " The approbation and consent of the church was used in the apostles^ time in ecclesiastical censures." Erasmus, also, considers the matter was to be done in " a public assembly." The language of the chapter is decisive in proof of this. Here, then, we see it is not " very clear,'' that the apostle did this by his sole autho- rity ; indeed, it is clear he did not. And if he did it not in the case of a private member, much less, we presume, did he do it in the case of a minister. There is one more pas- sage which I leave for Mr. Perceval to make " very clear" as evidence that the apostle could at any time, on his sole authority, depose ministers : " I would they were cut off that trouble you," Gal. v, 12. If the apostle wished it, and could by his sole power do this, why were they not cut off? See Dr. Barrow on the Supremacy of the Pope, supp. 5, sec. ii, p. 187, 4to. edit., 1680. Mr. Perceval's charitable supposition, that they " who carp at the authority of bishops, will probably not be de- terred from carping at that of our Lord himself," shall be illustrated by that of another Oxford Tract advocate. In a work styled " The Oxford Tracts, the Public Press, and 316 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSIOT^. the Evangelica.1 Party," by G. P. (G. Perceval ?) de SanC' ta Trinitate, the author says, " The evangelical party in the Church are only restrained from the accident of their position from the destructive power of Rationalistic and Socinian principles : the spirit is already there^ only its full development is restrained." If such be their charity toward their brethren, what can a heathenish Dissenting teacher expect? Having made these miscellaneous remarks on things for which it seemed probable we should find no nxwe coDveni- ent place, we now proceed to a more regular examination of Mr. Perceval's Apology. He begins by laying it down as a fundamental position, that none are to minister in holy things, " in the name of God, without express warrant and commission from him, or from those whom he has impowered to grant such com- mission," p. 3^, This we fully concede. But when he says " nineteen-twentieths of the Christian world" hold this to be by " episcopal succession'^ — that " none who have not received episcopal ordination are lawful minis- ters of the church, or warranted to perform any acts in the name and with the authority of God," pp. 4 and 5, we deny it. Even Mr. Perceval shall disprove it. At pp. 7 and 8,. he says, the power of presbyters to confer orders " equally •with bishops" is both the " doctrine and practice of the Lutherans in Germany and Holland, the Presbyterians in England, Scotland, and Ireland, and North America ; and the Wesleyan Methodists." Mr. Perceval has the confidence to assert that the Church of England maintains his scheme, page 9 ; but he that reads the seventh section of the Essay will require something more than assertion on this subject. His first chapter he entitles " Congregationalism," and professes to examine the Scriptural evidence alleged to support it. He has amused himself with imputing to the Gongrega- tionalists certain Scriptural precedents as "wr§-e<^ in behalf of Congregationalism," page 11. I believe Mr. Perceval is conscious that the Congregationalists have more sense than to "urge" any such things as he mentions "in behalf" of their scheme. He himself intends the introduction of several of these instances as a caricature of Ccmgrega- ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 317 tionalism. But what honesty is there in such a misrepre- sentation of facts ? However, the instance of Jeroboam will find its best parallel in the conduct of Henry VHI. The case of the seven sons of Sceva (Acts x, 14) would rather belong to Mr. Perceval, as they were sons of " a chief of the priests." Probably, as being in the succession, they were mortified to see the heretic and schismatic Paul cast out devils, and supposed that surely they were the only divinely commissioned persons for such a work. He makes little out in the matter of Apollos ; of Aquila and Priscilla. They were, indeed, all lay persons ; Apollos was an emi- nent lay preacher of the gospel ; and Aquila and Priscilla were lay " fellow-helpers" of the apostles. Such proceed- ings now would shock our high priests. On the case of the man mentioned Luke ix, 50, Mr. Perceval assumes that he who opposes the succession scheme, opposes Christ. An easy way of answering difficulties, to beg the question ! But we have many gentlemen writers now-a- days: "dig they cannot; and to beg," or confess the poverty of their information, " they are ashamed." His second chapter is on " Ecclesiastical authority for Congregationalism." It contains only three lines and a half. " From ecclesiastical antiquity," he says, " I am not aware that a single precedent is, or ever has been alleged in fa- vour of the Independent or Congregational scheme," This only proves how little Mr, Perceval knows about the sub- jects on which he writes. There is abundant evidence that primitive churches consisted of only one congregation each. It was against the rule of all antiquity for one bishop to have the government of more than one church or congregation. And that these bishops and their churches were considered to be, by divine right, each in their go- vernment independent of all other bishops and churches in the earliest times, is too evident to need any proof. It is maintained by Dr. Barrow on the Supremacy of the Pope, that " the ancients did assert to each bishop a free, abso- lute, independent authority, subjected to none, directed by none, accountable to none on earth, in the administra- tion of affairs properly concerning his church," Suppos. 5, sec. V, page 220, 4to, edit., 1680. Cyprian maintains it, as Dr. Barrow there shows : and see Yitringa de Syn. Vet., lib. 3, cap. 17, p. 857, &;c. : Mosheim de Reb. ante 318 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. Constant., page 152, and Burnet's Reformation, vol. ii, anno. 1559. Mr. Perceval entitles his third chapter " Presbyterian- ism." He first very properly takes up the Scriptural evi- dence, as this, and this alone, can decide the question. The first passage he selects is from Numbers xvi, as to " Korah and his company." This, indeed, is not original ; most high Churchmen exult in this example as death to presbyterianism. It is an old saying, that a man may make " more haste than good speeds The breathless haste w^ith which such writers appear to run to this passage for weapons against presbyterianism, that is, every thing but high Churchism, may possibly be the reason of their blind- ness when they arrive at it. The rebellion of " Korah and his company" is analogous, say these gentlemen, " to the rebellion of presbyters against bishops." — Indeed ! Now who were " Korah and his company?" Who ? — Who ? Yes, Mr. Perceval, were tbey priests or laymen ? What does this mean — " Seek ye the priesthood also ?" If they were priests, how could they seek the priesthood ? Dathan and Abiram were Reubenites, and could not be priests. They none of them were priests at all ! Fie ! fie ! ye queen's chaplains and Oxford Tract-men, to trifle thus with the public mind ! But your violation of truth will return upon your own heads. The case is plain enough, it was the Levites and the people rebelling against the priests ; and not the priests against the high priest. Mr. Perceval has the same sort of egregious trifling about the false apostles mentioned 2 Cor. xi, 12 ; and about Diotrephes, page 23. He professes to bring these as Scripture grounds for presbyterianism. Of course he would insinuate that presbyterians urge them as such. However censurable this conduct may be in itself, yet possibly it may be excused in Mr. Perceval. He can be- lieve things without evidence : why should he not go a step further in his opinion of presbyterians, as he calls them, and persuade himself that they are foolish enough to sup- pose that an argument horn false apostles and the ministers of Satan, will be good grounds for presbyterian ministers being true apostles and ministers of God ! ! He just refers to the angels of the Apocalypse. He does not, however, Heed to prove that these angels were prototypes of high ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 319 Church bishops : his authority implying this is enough, and therefore he wisely spares all proof — proofs to some peo- ple are troublesome things. At page 26, the subject of the names of bishops and presbyters being used in common, is introduced. He acknowledges they were so " at the first, but have since been, by common usage, appropriated to distinct offices." Very well. Are we then to correct our Lord and his apostles by common usage since those times? "But," says Mr. Perceval, " our Lord himself is sometimes desig- nated as an apostle, 1 Pet. ii, 25 ; sometimes as a deacon, Rom. XV, 8. The apostles are not only designated by that title, Luke vi, 13, but their office is called a deaconship. Acts i, 18, 25, and a bishopric, Acts i, 20, and they themselves frequently styled presbyters, 1 Peter v, 1 ; 2 .lohn i ; 3 John i ; and deacons, 1 Cor. iii, 5 ; 2 Cor. iii, 6 ; and vi, 7. Again, the pastors at Ephesus whom St. Paul addresses are called indiscriminately bishops and presbyters, Acts xx, 17 and 28, and the same indiscrimi- nate use of terms is observable in St. Paul's First Epistle to Timothy and in that to Titus." All this we grant is true : but then are deacons as indiscriminately called Christ ? — are deacons as indiscriminately called apostles as presbyters are indiscriminately called bishops, and as bishops are indiscriminately called presbyters ? Mr. Per- ceval knows they are not. Then what solemn trifling is all this ! The reader will see the subject further treated at pages 83—86 of the Essay. The names thus indiscrimi- nately common between bishops and presbyters, inevitably proves that their powers were common, that they were one and the same office. The following is the best piece of reasoning in the whole book, and therefore we will give it respectful atten- tion. " But, say the presbyterians, in St. Paul's Epistle to the Philippians, he sends salutation to the bishops and deacons, Phil, i, 2, with no allusion to any other officer, therefore there were only these two instituted by the apos- tles, and any thing beyond this is of human origin. An- swer 1st. So do the prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, uniformly designate the Jewish ministry as priests and Levites, with no allusion to any other office ; and a man might as well argue, that therefore, at that time, there 320 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. was no superior office, no high priesthood among the Jews, as that there was no superior office, no chief episcopate, among the Christians when St. Paul ^^Tote," pp. 27, 28. The reader is requested first to turn to pages 50, 51, 52, 69, 70, and 80 of the Essay. Besides what is said in the above pages, especially the two points ; first, that in case of the pollution of the high priest, a common priest was appointed to officiate for him ; and, second, that all the ordination he had Avas necessarily by common priests ; we further remark, that the above argument is really a fallacy. The fallacy is found in putting a •part for the whole. We do not build our argument upon any one passage of the New Testament, but upon the whole: we say that there is no proof in the whole of the New Testament, not that there are no more than two orders of ministers of the gospel ; for, by the New Testament, deacons, as such, are not minis- ters of the gospel at all ; but we say, there is no proof in the whole of the New Testament of more than one stand- ing order of ministers of the gospel. To make the argu- ment about the high priest, therefore, a just one, it must be assumed that there is no allusion in the ivhole of the Scriptures to any other office than that of priest in general. Let this be done, and we declare that, supposing the premises just, the conclusion would inevitably follow, that, by divine right, there was no really and essentially distinct office of the high priest above that of the priests in general. There is, however, frequent mention of the high priest in other parts of the Scriptures, though not by Isaiah, Jere- miah, and Ezekiel. What Mr. Perceval says about the prophets so uniformly neglecting, with very few exceptions, to make any men- tion of the high priest, as distinguished from the other priests, is well worth attention. The writer has no quarrel with episcopacy, simply as such, yet the following particu- lars are remarkable. None of the prophets excepting Zechariah, it seems, ever mention the high priest distinct- ly. How striking the difference between the sacred writers and episcopalian writers ! In the word of God, we have a series of inspired writers, addressing both church and state by the authority of God for centuries, and yet they never mention the high priest, but only as included among the priests and Levites ; while episcopalian writers. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 321 addressing the church and state, seldom mention presby- ters and deacons at all ; but bishops — ^bishops — bishops ! No episcopalian dare professedly claim a higher authority for bishops over presbyters than what they suppose the high priest had over the other priests ; yet, in very deed, they ciaim ten times a higher authority. Where the pro- phets mention the high priest once, they mention bishops a thousand times. When the high priest was ceremonially incapable of duty, a common priest was considered capa- ble of performing it for him : a thing impossible for a pres- byter to do for a bishop, according to high Churchmen. The consecration of the high priest was alioays by ordinary priests, or by Moses, who was no priest according to the law ; but the consecration of a bishop hy presbyters^ a thing which the reformers maintained to be lav^ful by the word of God, our high Churchmen consider as destroying Chris- tianity itself! Mr. Peiceval says their system is accused of Judaizing ; but the reader will see, that, on these points, Judaism was mildness itself compared with such a system. His observation about Timothy's being admitted by the apostles to their own order, page 29, is completely.refuted in sec. iii, sub-sec. 4, of the Essay : we refer therefore to that place, and pass on. Mr. Perceval tries to say something about the apostle Paul's address to the presb)i;ers or bishops of the church of Ephesus, in Acts xx, 17, &c. His opinion is, that Ti- mothy was with Paul at the time ; that Paul " had already committed the superintendence of these very pastors to Timothy," and that having Timothy with him, Paul gave " this pastoral charge to the pastors at [of] Ephesus, be- cause their chief pastor Timothy" was with him on his journey, page 39. All this is mere conjecture, and evi- dently contrary to the scope of the whole address. These presbyters are charged to take heed to the flock over which the Holy Ghost had made them overseers or bishops : but, according to Mr, Perceval, this charge ought to have been given to Timothy ; and Paul should have taught these presbyters that Timothy was the bishop to whom the Holy Ghost had committed the government of the flock, and of themselves also ; and that they should take heed to be obedient to his lordship Timothy. But other absurdi- ties follow Mr. Perceval's interpretation. First, on this 14* 322 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. scheme, here are the bishops of Ephesus : this the sacred penman settles beyond dispute. Secondly, here is Timothy, a bishop of bishops, a thing utterly repugnant to the first ages of the church : so Cyprian and eighty-six other bishops in council declare, " Neque enim quisquam nostrum episcopum se esse cpiscoporum constituat — Neither does any one among us constitute himself a bishop of bish- ops.''^ They account it tyranny to attempt it. Thirdly, here is an apostle making another grade of ministers. Now high Churchmen contend only for three standing orders in the church, including ajjostles as one, and deacons as another. However, Mr. Perceval can multiply orders ■with a dash of his pen. Here, according to Mr. Perceval, would be, first, deacons ; second, presbyters, except he fully grants, which he does not, that bishops and presby- ters were one and the same office in the apostles' days ; third, bishops ; fourth, Timothy, a bishop of bishops ; and fifth, apostles. Five standing orders of ministers of the gospel ! The Epistles of St. Paul to Timothy, as pleaded by presb}4erians, next come under Mr. Perceval's examina- tion. His first argument makes Timothy a bishop of bishops ; the absurdities of which scheme have just been exhibited. As to the presbyters who ordained Timothy, all he has to say is, that commentators of the fourth and following centuries say they were bishops. We say so too ; be- cause presbyters and bishops were then one and the same. But suppose they were bishops of a high Church stamp, and that high Church bishops are their successors ; then it follows, that they are successors of Scripture bishops only, and not of the twelve apostles. But this conclusion his more initiated brethren would tremble to hear mentioned. However, Chrysostom, the principal commentator on whom he depends, says, on the very place, " the difference between the presbyter and the bishop is almost nothing." Admit the utmost, then, that they say, it will not do for Mr. Perceval's episcopacy. But we do not admit them as authority ; we admit nothing as such but the Scriptures ; and the Scriptures clearly show that they who ordained Timothy were presbyters. " Moreover," says Mr. Perceval, " in the Second Epistle, I ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 323 St. Paul ascribes Timothy's ordination to his own act, 2 Tim. i, 6. The presbyterians [the author of the Essay- he means] would represent this last passage to relate to miraculous gifts ; but as there is nothing in the context to warrant such a supposition, but the contrary, it cannot be urged," pp. 33, 34. The passage is, " Stir up the gift of God which is in thee by the laying on of my hands." Now an English reader will perhaps be surprised to hear it said, that there is nothing relating to miraculous gifts in a passage the pith of which is, " Stir up the gift of God that is in thee." His surprise will be increased when he learns that the word " gift" in this passage is the very word Xagtafia, which the sacred writers use for miraculous gifts, in 1 Cor. xii, 4, 9, 28, 30, 31. The phrase, the " gift of God," never means an ojffice in the New Testament. The expression " stir up,^^ is never applied to an office, and seems incapable of such an application. Stir up thy bishopship, thy presbytership, &c., would be strange phraseology. All these objections would also apply to the interpretation which would suppose the gift to mean not Timothy's office, but his ordination. The phrase, " the gift of God," never means ordination in the New Testa- ment. To say, " Stir up thine ordination," is as absurd as to say, " Stir up thy bishopship." The passage, therefore, cannot mean, by the " gift of God," either Timothy's office, or his ordination. It evidently means spiritual gifts, gifts of the Holy Ghost. Accordingly, it immediately follows — " For God hath not given unto us the spirit of fear : but of power, SvvafieGjg, and of love, and of a sound mind." The phrase, the " Spirit of power — rrvevfia dvvaixewg,^^ most properly means the " power" of miracles ; as the word dwafug, when referred to spiritual matters, mostly means miraculous power. Chrysostom thus inter- prets the phrase, " the gift of God," that is, says he, " the gift of the Holy Ghost which thou hast received, to qualify thee for superintending the church, for working miracles, and for the whole service of the church." We have shown in the Essay, page 55, that the gift of working miracles was conferred by the laying on of the apostles' hands, as a pre- rogative of their apostleship. Now are we to suppose that these gifts were conferred in this manner on so many inferior individuals, (as the Scriptures show they were,) 324 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. and that so eminent an individual as Timothy should not be favoured with them ? This would be strange. I still think, therefore, that the peculiar force of the passage principally refers to this gift of God. That all other rich endowments of the Spirit for the ministry would accom- pany it, we need no more doubt than that others, who had these miraculous gifts, were also favoured with rich endowments of the Spirit for the personal performance of every Christian duty. Understanding the passage in this manner, the exhortation has great beauty and force : " Stir up the gift of God that is in thee by the laying on of my hands," — I, as an apostle, having been honoured as the instrument in conferring upon thee this " gift of God," these gifts of the Spirit, presume I may use some authority in exhorting thee to exert them to the uttermost in governing the flock, in miraculous operations, and in the whole ser- vice of the church. In his fourth chapter, Mr. Perceval proceeds to examine the arguments of presbyterianism from ecclesiastical an- tiquity. He first properly notices the testimony of Clemens Ro- manus. In answer to the argument from the fact that Clemens only mentions two orders, (suppose we count deacons an order,) viz., bishops and deacons, or presbyters and deacons, he refers to what he has said about the pro- phets only speaking of priests and Levites, with no mention of the high priest ; and we refer to the answer to what he has there said. But he finds it convenient to pass over the fact that Clement expressly says, that the sedition in the church was against the ^' presbyters,^'' sec. 47 ; that they were " presbyters" who had " the rule over them," sec. 54 ; that he speaks of ^'' presbyters'^ as having finished THEIR episcopacy, sec. 44 ; and that in conclusion he ex- horts the church to " be subject to their presbyters," sec. 57. He never says half so much about bishops. Clemens, indeed, does occasionally use the word bishop, as synonymous with presbyter, for he never uses them to- gether and distinctly ; but all his authority and exhorta- tion are applied to bring the church to submit to the go- vernment of the presbyters. All these points Mr. Perceval forgets. However, like a drowning man, he catches at a straw. He says, " The unsoundness of the presbyterian A ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 325 inference," from Clemens in favour of presbyterianism, " is beyond redemption, when we find St. Clemens ex- pressly ascribing to divine appointment, obligatory in his time, the triple order of the ministry. These are his words : ' It will behoove us, looking into the depths of divine knowledge, to do all things in order whatsoever our Lord has commanded us to do. He has ordained, by his supreme will and authority, both where and by vjhat persons they [the sacred services and oblations] are to be perform- ed. For the chief priest has his proper services ; and to the PRIESTS their proper place is appointed ; and to the Levites appertain their proper ministries : and the lay- man is confined within the bounds of what is commanded to laymen,' " page 38. Here he leaves the passage, as though it proved his point without a doubt. I was per- fectly aware of the passage when I wrote the Essay, but thought it too trifling to occupy space and attention ; except one wished for materials to make up a book. But Mr. Perceval should have gone on. Clemens proceeds : " Let every one of you therefore, brethren, bless God in his proper station, with a good conscience, and with all gravity, not exceeding the rule of his service that is ap- pointed to him. The daily sacrifices are not ofTered every- where ; nor the peace offerings, nor the sacrifices appoint- ed FOR sins and transgressions ; but only at Jerusalem — ■ they, therefore, who do any thing which is not agreeable to his will, are punished with death. Consider, brethren, that by how much the better the knowledge God has vouch- safed unto us, by so much the greater danger are we ex- posed to." Now Mr. Perceval considers, that, because Clemens says, the Lord appointed the Jews a high priest, priests and Levites, this proves that we are to have bishops, priests, and deacons. But Clemens also says, that the Jew- ish church had, by divine appointment, ^^ daily sacrifices, peace offerings, and sacrifices for slns and trangressionsP By his argument, therel'ore, we must have " daily sacri- fices, peace offerings, and sacrifices for sins and transgres- sions." It will not do to say, that spiritually we must; for, spiritually, all God's people are a royal priesthood, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. 1 Peter ii, 5, 9. Therefore lite- rally and really, without a figure, on his principles, we must 326 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. have daily sacrifices, &c. This is absurd : his argumeof, therefore, proves nothing. The simple meaning of Cle- mens is, that Christians are to follow God's rule for them- selves under the Christian dispensation, as the Jews were to follow God's rule for themselves under the Mosaical dispensation. What this rule for Christians is, he goes on to explain in the following sections ; and clearly shows that God had appointed "presbyters to be over the church, to RULE it, and that the people were to be subject to the presbyters." In the very Epistle to Evagrius in which Jerome expli- citly declares bishops and presbyters to be the same, he mentions the chief priest, priests and Levites, and laymen, as Clemens does. Grotius says, " Clemens's statement about the high priest, Levites, and laymen, does not per- tain to the Christian church, but to the temple at Jerusa- lem ; whence he infers, that as all things were to be done in a certain order by the Jews, much more should all things be done with decency and order among Christians." Grotii Epistol., p. 347, fol. Amstel., 1687. Mr. Perceval, p. 38, &c., tries his skill on the case of the church of Alexandria, where, Jerome testifies, the pres- byters made the bishops for about two hundred years : see the Essay, pp. 130-1 33. Archbishop Usher and Stillingfleet both understood Jerome as there explained. Mr. Perce- val says nothing on the subject of Jerome's statement that invalidates its testimony to the equality, by divine right, of bishops and presbyters. However, he makes an unusual stir about Eutychius. There may be some skill in this proceeding. Jerome was an untractable fellow, bearing a blunt, stubborn testimony against Mr. Perceval's scheme ; so he dismisses him as quickly as he can, since he can make nothing of him. Eutychius seemed a little more manageable ; he lived in a darker age ; his writings are incomparably less known and esteemed than Jerome's : so in this case it is easier to raise a dust about nothing. Now, in the first place, no stress was laid on Eutychius's authority in the Essay. It Avas only said that Stillingfleet had quoted him to prove the truth of Jerome's statement. The learned Selden had urged his authority for the same end. " But," says Mr. Perceval, " Abraham Echellensis has proved that Eutychius has been misunderstood." Now ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 327 what does the authority of Abraham Echellensis weigh against the authority of these profound scholars ? " This Abraham Echellensis," says the biographer of Selden, was " a Maronite priest, in the pay of the Roman pontiff; and he employed so much personal abuse in an attempt to refute Selden, that he injured his own reputation more than that of him whom he attacked."* Mr. PerceA^al speaks of the apostolical canons as evidence against Je- rome's statement about the presbyters of Alexandria mak- ing the bishop ; he forgets, however, to prove that these canons existed dX xhe time to which Jerome refers. There is no sufficient proof of the existence of the canon, to which he appeals, for the first three hundred years after Christ ; nor perhaps for five hundred years after Christ : but this is no great difficulty with Mr. Perceval. He refers to the question of the ordination of Ischyras, but this was about one hundred years after the latest time of which Jerome speaks. Mr. Perceval says the council connected with the matter " denied the power" of a presbyter to ordain. When he oflfers proof of this, it will be time enough to examine it. We deny that the council made this de- claration. It is not to be found in the place of Athanasius to which he refers. Councils pronounced ordinations null for " a bare contempt of ecclesiastical canons. This ordi- nation was done out of the diocess, in which case ordina- tions are nulled by council," Arel., c. 13 : see Stillingfleet's Irenicum, p. 381, &c. Presbyterians do not depend on the case of Ischyras to help their cause ; and Mr. Perce- val cannot prove it injures it. The next authority for presbyterianism, which Mr. Perceval examines, is that of Columba and his fellows, in lona, &c., as mentioned by Bede, and brought forward in the Essay, section xi. The purport of his first remark is, that as Bede mentions bishops under the authority of Columba, who was no bishop, but a presbyter, it would be want of sense to suppose there was " no such thing'"' as episcopacy among his followers, p. 45. So we think too ; but we think it would equally display want of sense to suppose that that which might be called episcopacy among them, was at all like high Church episcopacy. As epis- copacy, it seems to have greatly resembled Lutheran epis- * Memoirs of Selden, by W. G. Johnson, London, p. 288, 8vo., 1835. 328 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. copacy, where Luther, the p-eshyter^ ordained their first bishop. It is doubtless convenient to Mr. Perceval to con- found the different kinds of episcopacy; (1.) the Scrip- tural episcopacy, in which bishops and presbyters were the same; (2.) Lutheran superintendency or episcopacy ; (3.) the episcopacy of the English reformers ; and, (4.) high Church episcopacy. But such discourse confounds every thing, and settles nothing. He says, moreover, that " we know from a letter of Pope John, in Bede, that there were five bishops in Scotland at that time," p. 46. It seems Mr. Perceval does not know that Scotland then meant Ireland. He should read Archbishop Usher, to whom he there refers. He could not have made this mis- take, if he had ever read that work of the archbishop's — De Primodiis. " But," says he, " the superiority of the abbot of lona over the bishops of his house, turns out to be of the same nature with that which the dean of Westminster exercises over the bishop of Gloucester, one of the prebendaries of that chapter ; or which the dean of Exeter, as such, exer- cises over his own diocesan, as treasurer of that chap- ter," p. 47. Now, in the first place, Bede does not only say that all the bishops of '■'■his house''' were subject to the presbyter abbot; but that this house was the head "of all the houses both in Britanie, and also in Ireland ; and that to this presbyter abbot, always, both the whole coun- trey, and also the bishops thejnselves^ ought, after a strange and unaccustomed order, to be subject." Dr. Stapleton's translation. But, let us examine these cases of the bishop of Gloucester being, as " prebendary of Westmin- ster, subject to the chapter," &c. Is it " a strange and unaccustomed'''' thing for a prebendary to be subject to the chapter of that cathedral to which his prebend belongs ? and for a dean to have authority over the treasurer, " as treasurer," of the chapter of which the dean is the head ? Would a historian sagely report that as a strange and unaccustomed thing, when every body knows that it is the universal custom ? And it is a mere fallacy to say the bishop is subject, when they mean the prebendary, or the treasurer, " as the treasurer, ^^ is subject. Let the reader again peruse Bede's statement, and he will see that his meaning clearly is, that the bishops, as bishops, were ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 329 *' always" subject to the presbyter abbot. That all these bishops had only presbyterian ordination is shown in the Essay, section xii. The case of the Waldenses, as favouring presbyterian- ism, he yields up to our argument, so far as to grant that any other view does " not admit of a plain and easy refutation," p. 47. He says it is " certain they are now presbyterians." If they are now presbyterians, they always were so : all the evidence establishes this conclusion. The only remaining matter worth attention in this chap- ter, is, his assertion, that Jerome " denies to presbyters the power of ordination :" easily asserted, but never to be proved : see the Essay, section vi. The fifth chapter pretends to prove the presbyterian scheme " suicidal." The argument he uses is, that sup- pose presbyters, as bishops, after the apostles' times, ordained others to be ministers of the gospel, that is, pres- byters in the church, and did not commit to them the power of ordaining ; then, these last had no divine right. to ordain. This is an easy supposition with Mr. Perceval and his friends, viz., that man can alter God's institutions. It is the essence of Poper)^ We say, " What God hath joined together," no man, by human authority, " can put asunder :" but God hath joined the power of ordination with the office of a presbyter : no man, therefore, can by human authority put them asunder. Bishops or presbyters who ordain presbyters have no power to luithhold an iota of divine right from the office. Presbyters, therefore, have still a divine right to ordain. Here he finishes his answer to the arguments for what he pleases to denominate presbyterianism ; that is, for all that is not high Church episcopacy. And this writer, who cannot distinguish priests from Levites and laynien, in the case of " Korah and his company ;" who knows not the difference in argument between the whole and a part ; who makes Timothy a bishop of bishops, B,r\dfve orders of thin- isters of the gospel ; who can quote apostolical canons as evidence at a time when he cannot prove they were in existence ; whose suppositions make Bede incapable of writing common sense ; who quotes works which he had never examined on the subject for which he quotes them, as Usher's Primordia ; who never meets fairly one single 330 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. argument of the Essay : — this is the writer who, as Dr. Hook's CHOSEN CHAMPiOxV, has given " a complete answer''' to the " Essay on ApostoUcal Succession ! !" Well, but having vanquished the presbyterians, Mr. Perceval's way is clear, he supposes, to display irresistible evidence for high Church episcopacy ; and his first won- derful axiom is this—" I will commence," says he, " the episcopalian section by showing, that its utter failure to make good its claim to a divine origin, will not avail to clear the presbyterians of guilt," p. 57. Well done, Mr. Perceval ! It is wise for a person, who is conscious of an '-'■ utter failure^' to proAdde for the case. They say it requires as much generalship to conduct a good retreat, as it does to gain a victory. But then there is an old book which true Protestants hold as the only and sufficient rule of faith, which says, " Where there is no law, there is no transgression ;" that " sin is not imputed where there is no law :" but Mr. Perceval can prove that where there is an " utter failure" to make good a divine law, yet there is guilt. And, what is the best of all, he says, " Mr. Powell, the latest writer on the other side, and John Calvin, both say the same. Mr. Powell, speaking of a passage of St. Ignatius, says, that it ' signifies that where a superintendent had been appointed for the sake of order,' (by human authority, as a human arrangement, by custom, &c., these expressions occur in almost every page of the Essay,) ' that order ought to be kept ;' and then adds, ' Very right : so say all churches Avhere a superintendency has been established, though making no pretensions to divine right for it.' " Mr. Perceval quotes another passage from the Essay, which says, that " w^hen ministers violate the law of their commission, their authority so far ceases, and the people are in that proportion free from obligation to obey them." " Whether, therefore," says Mr. Perceval, " the origin of episcopacy be divine or human, yet this is clear from the above ; namely, that seeing the British churches were and are actually" (by a human arrangement, says Mr. Powell) " governed by bishops, the presbyterians can no otherwise avoid the condemnation of heresy — nor the testimony of Mr. Powell of open violation of the written law of God against those who break that established order, than by proving that the British bishops either are not ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 331 truly Christian bishops, or have violated the law of their commission ; a totally different question from that under consideration." Marvellous reasoning ! Mr. Powell says that the episcopacy of the English Church is a human arrangement, for the sake of order ; therefore Mr. Perceval says, that he, Mr. Powell, proves that the violation of this human arrangement is the violation of the " written law of God." Again, Mr. Powell says, that the British bishops never had a divine commission for that established order — that it is established by nothing but the authority of the sovereign, and the ratification of the English parliament. Yet Mr. Perceval states, that Mr. Powell makes it clear that it is heresy not to submit to it ! Mr, Powell is an extraordinary man to be able to prove that a thing is divine because it is human ; and that heresy is the breach of human regulations ! Mr. Perceval then meets the objections of uncharitable' ness, exclusiveness, <^c., and finds out that these are recom- mendations of his system — proofs that it is divine ! ! see pages 61 and 62. Then he comes to the objection of the Popery of this high Church scheme. He says this objec- tion " is an old device of the Papists," p. 64 ; and tells a tale of " one Cummin, a friar, who contrived to be taken into the Puritans' pulpits," &c. " The pope," he says, " commended him, and gave him a reward of two thousand ducats for his good behaviour." The practices of Popery are bad enough, I have no doubt, for all this : still Mr, Perceval is unfortunate in his example. Dr. Wells ob- jected this case of Cummins against the Dissenters above a hundred years ago. His talented and learned answerer, Mr. Pierce, referred him to Dr. Collins's Answer to Dr. Scott's Case of Forms of Prayer, for proof that " the whole story is such a notorious forgery, that no man can lay stress upon it, without exposing the reputation of his judgment or his honesty." Pierce's Remarks on Dr. Wells's Letters, p. 15, 12mo., London, 1710. And in Mr. Pierce's Vindi- cation of the Dissenters, a masterly work, part ii, chap, i, he tells us, that " Dr. Wells only replied, that he did not before know of any such writing, and never attempted to vindicate those foolish forgeries." A good example for Mr. Perceval. Mr. Perceval thinks, that because Christ has an eternal 332 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. priesthood in heaven, gospel ministers must be priests upon earth. When he shows the law for it, we shall believe it. But Mr. Perceval belongs to a party who are nearer to Popery than to Protestantism. He is consistent, therefore, in wishing to establish a priest- hood upon earth, " daily sacrifices, offerings for sin," &c. He quotes our Lord's sayings to his apostles and disciples about not being " called masters," as though we urged these sayings against " all claims on the part of the Christian ministry to authority and degree." Mr. Perce- val is expert at answering objections which were never made. We never urged his sayings for any such purpose. He is right (p. 70) in saying " that the only way author- ized by Christ to dignity and exaltation in his church, is, by discharging the offices of the ministry, and thus serving the people :" therefore it follows that episcopal consecra- tions, &c., are matters of ceremony, and not essential. To the objection made in the Essay, that the high Church doctrine " was unknown to, or unnoticed by, our Protestant forefathers, [that is, the divines who in the sixteenth century opposed the Church of Rome,] and therefore we Protestants need not concern ourselves about it," pp. 71, 72 ; he properly replies, " The divines of the sixteenth century were neither the founders of the Chris- tian church, nor the writers of the sacred Scriptures ; and, therefore, neither the Scriptures nor the Church are to be tried by them, but they and their doctrines are to be tried by the testimony of the Scriptures and by the voice of the Church," That the reformers' doctrine, and the doctrine of all uninspired teachers is to be tried by the Scriptures, and not the Scriptures by their doctrine, we glory to main- tain, as the great distinguishing principle of Protestantism, in opposition to all Popery and semi-popery. But the reader must not suppose that Mr. Perceval and his party maintain it; they hate it with a perfect hatred. The " voice of the church," — the voice of the church ! Here is their hiding place and their glory. However, should the reader wish to know what is meant by " the voice of the church," he might as soon expect to know where infallibility resides in the Popish Church, as to know what these persons mean by " the voice of the church," and where he is to find it. The best illustration of the case, ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 333 that strikes me, is the reported conversation said to have taken place between two distinguished statesmen on the subject of orthodoxy and heterodoxy. "What is the dif- ference between orthodoxy and heterodoxy ?" said one to the other. "Orthodoxy," the reply was, "is my doxy, and heterodoxy is your doxy." Ask Mr. Perceval, or any Papist or semi-papist, what is "the voice of the church?" the answer would substantially be, " That is the voice of the church which says as ice say ; and all which the fathers say contrary to this, we explain away either as heresy, particular opinion, or not of faith." There is no more common sophism among such writers than this play Tipon the term church, always assuming that their particu- lar party is the " catholic church." As to the authority of the fathers. Bishop Taylor himself says, — " It is not hon- est for either side to press the authority of the fathers, as a concluding argument in matters of dispute, unless them- selves will be content to submit in all things to the testi- mony of an equal number of them, which I am certain neither side will do."* Bishop Jewel, an incomparably better authority, says, — " There is no way so easy to beguile the simple, as the name and countenance of the fathers."! " I see plainly," said the renowned Chilling- worth, " and with mine own eyes, that there are popes against popes, councils against councils, some fathers against others, the same fathers against themselves, a consent of fa- thers of one age against the consent of fathers of another age, the church of one age against the church of another age. Traditive interpretations of Scripture are pretended, but there are few or none to be found : no tradition but anly of Scripture can derive itself from the fountain, but may be plainly proved either to have been brought in in such an age after Christ, or that in such an age it was not in. In a ivord, there is no su-fficiency but of Scripture only, for any considering man to build npon."| But these high Churchmen are pretty good imitators of their Popish breth- ren, who, above all things, love " a packed juryT When any of the fathers will speak for them, or any thing like it, they parade them in the court as though the fathers * Lib. Prophesying, sec. viii. f Preface to his Reply to Harding. t Chillingworth's Religion of Protestants, chap, vii, sec. Ivi. 334 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. were infallible : they will even bring acknowledged forge- ries into court as true witnesses ; as Bellarinine and others have done with the Decretal Epistles ; but if the fathers say a word against them, they kick them out of court as individual testimonies, private opinions, not of faith, and the like. Mr. Perceval and his party smart incurably under the correction of the great English reformers. Dr. Hook, indeed, has the boldness to assert, that by the reformers the " episcopal succession was assumed as a necessary doctrine of the Church of England ;" and that " one of the falsehoods propagated in these modern days is, that the reformers did not hold the divine right of episcopacy :" see that queer thing, " A Call to Union on the Principles of the Reformation, a Visitation Sermon, by the Rev. W. F. Hook, D. D., price 3^. 6<^." Appendix, pp. 140, 141. " The principles of the Church," says he, " as we have seen, form an i?i surmountable barrier between us and the Dissenters, and render union with those parties IMPOSSIBLE," p. 41. A glorious call to union ! It is a call, indeed, to Churchmen to unite to persecute Dissenters ; that is, all who presume to differ from these lordly priests. Did the reformers proclaim such sentiments to Calvin, to Peter Martyr, Bucer, John Knox, &c. ? Let the reader carefully examine section seventh of the Essay, for a refutation of all such libels on the reformers. Mr. Perceval comes to the objection that " there is no sufficient historic evidence of a personal succession of valid episcopal ordinations :" we have noticed his reply before — see the place. But after " yielding at once" that this is the case, he thinks that " if it be a moral impossi- bility that any man, who had not been duly consecrated, could be accounted a bishop of the Church of England at the present time, then the onus rests upon the objectors to say how that which is morally impossible now, could have been morally possible at any other period,'' p. 89. That is, what is morally impossible now, in times of Girder, is, according to Mr. Perceval, by the same rule, morally im- possible in times of confusion : that what is morally impos- sible in the light, is, by the same rule, morally impossible in the dark ! Fine reasoning ! But facts are stubborn things. And though it is a mere subterfuge to pretend that the onus of proof lies upon us ; yet, as these boasters ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 335 of the proof of their scheme being " evident to every one," were charj" of their production of that evidence, we have done what our argument needed not, we have produced proofs from unexceptionable testimony against the validity of the episcopal consecrations through which these men trace their succession. Mr. Perceval has invalidated none of them : see sections x and xiii of the Essay. Indeed Mr. Perceval himself furnishes us with proofs of the same kind. He says, at p. 110 of the Appendix, that there are " many instances to be found in church history of persons consecrated to the episcopate from the laity." Now we shall be glad to see Mr. Perceval prove that these were " duly consecrated bishops." On his principles he never can. On Scriptural principles, which admit that bishops and presbyters are one and the same office, there is no difficulty ; but then this cannot help Mr. Perceval, as he rejects these principles. Mr. Perceval's " moral impossi- bility," therefore, is contradicted by plain /ac^.?, and, on his own showing, " many instances are to be found in church history of persons" not " duly consecrated to the episcopate." For " a bishop oxdidlnedi per saltum" that is, " that never had the ordination of a presbyter, can neither consecrate and administer the sacrament of the Lord's body, nor ordaine a presbyter."* Historic evidence failing, and moral impossibility failing, we see something of the " utter failure'^ for which Mr. Perceval ominously provided. He thinks, p. 82, that the fact of the contradictions of history about the succession of the first ministers of the Church of Rome is of no importance ; it is enough, he sup- poses, that the church was then governed by bishops : but what kind of bishops ? Irenaeus addresses them by the title of " presbyters ;" Clement, who is supposed to have been one of them, writing to the church of Corinth, knows nothing about any bishop but what was identical with, and more distinguished by, the title of " presbyter." That, in the second century, the chief presbyter acted as a super- intendent by the consent and authority of the other pres- byters, may be granted : nothing more can be proved. But what will this episcopacy do for Mr. Perceval and his party ? Nothing ! * Dr. Field, " Of the Church," b. iii, chap, xxxix, p. 157, fol. ed., 1635. 336 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION, As a ^^ forlorn hope,^^ he takes to the case of Judas, the traitor: the yeader will find this case settled to Mr. Perceval's satisfaction at pages 261, 262, of the Essay. Mr. Perceval, having cleared his system of the objec- tions above noticed, as exhibited in this review, now comes to display the full glory of evidence for his scheme of episcopacy. In noticing Congregationalism and presby- terianism, his method was to place what he represents aa their Scriptural evidence first ; and then, in the second place, the ecclesiastical evidence : in displaying the evi- dence for episcopacy, he reverses this order, and places ecclesiastical antiquity first ; and then, in the second place, the evidence from the Scriptures. This, in Mr. Perceval, IS consistent. Thus Papists and high Churchmen place the word of God under the authority, subject to the inter- pretation, of what they call the Church. However, after all, the reader who may not have the privilege of seeing Mr. Perceval's Apology, can hardly conceive what a mea- gre, miserable display, he makes of the evidence of eccle- siastical antiquity. A few trite passages from the fathers, Clemens Romanus, Ignatius, &c., are strung together, without hardly a single line to prove that they support his scheme. If it should be said that their evidence for his scheme is so clear as to need no explanation, we believe many of those who have candidly read the Essay will not be of this opinion. A complete answer to that work from such men as Dr. Hook and his party, should by all means have answered this part of it. But no : Mr. Perceval is afraid of " tiring his readers'' patience^^ p. 96. Very well : Mr. Perceval's kindness to his readers may pass, only he does not forget, that he has not answered the question. In the conclusion of this chapter, after quoting what are called the apostolical canons — a number of canons or regulations collected nobody knows when, nor by whom — he says " the Nicene council universally treats of bish- ops, and bishops only, as having power to ordain." That the canons of the Nicene council speak only about bish- ops ordaining bishops, we grant ; but if Mr. Perceval intends his reader to understand that that council gave any decision that presbyters had not power to ordain presbyters, or even bishops, he misleads his reader: that council I ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 337 made no such decision. Perhaps the reader may recollect that the Epistle of this council to the church of Alexan- dria was quoted section vi, of the Essay. In this Epistle, the council speaks of certain clergymen who " should have power to ordain," &c. Some reasoning is there employed against Valesius to prove that these clergymen were pres- byters — he supposing that they were bishops. That rea- soning is established as correct by the express statement of Athanasius, 0pp., vol. i, p. 732, B. C, edit. Paris, 1627. Here, then, this point of the power of presbyters to ordain is established by the council of Nice. They say that these presbyters were to have, that is, to continue to have, power to ordain ; which ordaining by presbyters, the Epistle states, was " according to the ecclesiastical law and sanction." So much for the council of Nice treating " of bishops only having power to ordain." The only diffi- culty in the passage is in the rendering of the word trgox^i'Qi'^ofiai. It sometimes seems to mean to propose for ordination, or to elect : this I admit. But then it also means to ordain ; and, what is important, it is indisputably used in the sense of ordaining in this Epistle only a few lines before, as to the bishop of Alexandria. The two acts of ordaining and electing are several times spoken of in this Epistle in varied phraseology — e^ovoiav e^eiv Xet-podereiv, npox^t-pc^eadai — e^ovacav 7rpo%api^£(70af, rj vno(3a?i?LeLv ovoiiara — e^ovauav exstv irgox^igi^sadai, icac ovoiiara entXeyeGOai. Here it will be noticed that ordi- nation is always spoken of first ; and invariably as the exercise of authority — e^ovatav ; the latter clause of the two referring to the proposing of names, or electing. This authority of ordaining, is, in two of these passages, accom- panied by the word we have rendered to ordain. The application of it to ordaining by the bishop of Alexandria is indisputable. These presbyters, then, are said to have e^ovatav Trgox^LQiQ^odaL, authority or power to ordain ; and this " according to ecclesiastical law and sanction." Such seems to me to be the legitimate meaning of the place. However, I do not wish to be positive, as there is some ambiguity in the language of the Epistle. But I am posi- tive that the council did not deny the power of presbyters to ordain : I think the above are strong reasons to believe that their Epistle affirmed it. 15 338 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. We now come to the Scriptural testimony for Mr. Per- ceval's scheme of episcopacy. But, alas ! for Dr. Hook, Mr. Perceval, and their party ! the Scriptures have so little to help their case, that this champion of their cause occupied very nearly as much of his work with Eutychius and Abraham Echellensis, as he does with the whole of the testimony of the Scripture in behalf of their system. But it is better to be silent when we have nothing to say. The Scriptural testimonies which he produces, are, the angels in the Apocalypse ; the case of Timothy and Titus ; the apostles' superintendence of the churches which they founded — which nobody ever denied ; — the commis- sion of our Lord to his apostles : — these are the principal, and almost the only instances, which he notices ; but as he does not even attempt an answer to that part of the Essay which treats on these passages, we have a right to conclude that he felt it to be unanswerable. The highest, the supreme evidence, the evidence of the Holy Scriptures, against this high Church episcopacy, remains, therefore, in all its integrity and completeness. This is the all- deciding point. Speaking of the exhortations to unity to be found in our Lord's discourses, Mr. Perceval says, p. 106, " Our oppo- nents are ever fond of citing those passages in Tertullian, Jerome, and others, which affirm that episcopacy was necessarily instituted for the preservation of unity. But if unity be a necessary end in the church, and episcopacy the necessary means for attaining that end, then how can the inference be set aside, that the Lord of glory, who or- dained the end, must himself likewise have ordained the means necessary for attaining that end ?" This statement is incorrect : those passages in the Essay which speak about the reasons assigned by the fathers for the institu- tion of episcopacy, do not say that the fathers " affirmed that episcopacy was necessarily instituted for the promotion of unity ;" but only that their opinion was that it was designed to promote this unity. But suppose they had affirmed this necessity for episcopacy as a means for the promotion of unity, still the argument is false : both the premises are false ; the conclusion, therefore, must be false also. The argument in full is as follows : What the fathers affirm is necessary as a means to the ON APOSTOLICAX SUCCESSION. 339 unity of the church, Christ instituted as a necessary means to the unity of the church : But the fathers affirm that episcopacy is a necessary means to the unity of the church : therefore, Christ instituted episcopacy as a necessary means to the unity of the church. In the first, or major proposition, Mr. Perceval legs the question; it is neither proved nor granted: it is false. The next step with this argument lands us in full-grown Popery. The authorities of that church say, that a uni- versal bishop is necessary for the unity of the church ; ergo, Christ instituted a universal bishop — the pope. The second, or minor proposition, is false also, in Mr. Perce- val's sense : the fathers never expressed an opinion, nor affirmed either, that the kind of episcopacy for which Mr. Perceval, Dr. Hook, and their party, contend, was neces- sary for the unity of the church. This is sufficiently shown in the Essay. The premises failing, the conclusion falls to the ground. Mr. Perceval concludes his Apology for Apostolical Succession with a long Appendix, employed in proving many things which nobody disputes. This no doubt was much the pleasantest part of the work to Mr. Perceval. Here we conclude this Critique on Mr. Perceval's task, enjoined by his friend Dr. Hook. He has " yielded'^ up the cause of historical evidence ; " utterly fails'^ to prove a divine origin of their system ; and ineffectually attempts an answer to the proofs that ecclesiastical episcopacy is a mere human arrangement. Such is this complete answer to the Essay on Apostolical Succession, by this chosen champion of Dr. Hook ! The reader is left to form his own judgment upon its completeness. AN APPENDIX, CONTAINING A REYIEW OF DR. HOOK'S SERMON ON « HEAR THE CHURCH." PREACHED BEFORE THE QUEENy AT THE CHAPEL ROYAL, ET ST. JAMES'iS PALACE, JUICE 17, 1838. Dr. Hook is the apostle and high priest of the high CJhurch scheme of the present times. If assertions were proofs, his writings would contain convincing evidence of the authority of his mission. I doubt his assertions ; and I controvert his scheme. His doctrine of the succession has been sufficiently refuted in the preceding Essay ; in- deed, the arguments in the Essay do, in their consequence, demolish his whole high Church building. But there is one topic upon which he evident^ delights to dwell ; for he speaks and preaches it everfiohere ; it is this — That the present Church of England was founded by the apostles, and has come down to the present day, with no greater difference, at any time, from that apostolic church, than the difference caused in the same man by having his face ivasked or unwashed ; see page 1 5 of his sermon. This is his favourite illustration. Speaking of the Church of this country before the Reformation, when sworn to Popery, the pope acknowledged a« its head by all its authorities^ when governed by bishops who preach- ed the doctrines, and were sworn to the government of Popery, when the Church itself was filled with idols and abominations ; with perfect and full-grown Popery, — and comparing that Church with the Church after the Refor- mationy he says, " The Church remained the same AFTER IT WAS REFORMED AS IT WAS BEFORE, _;W5i aS a man remains the same man after he has w&shed his face as he was hefore" page 12. The conclusions he draws from this argument, are, that the Church of England " maintains ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 341 those peculiar doctrines and that peculiar discipline, which have ALWAYS marked, and do still continue to mark, the distinction between the church of Christ, administered under the superintendence of chief pastors or bishops who have regularly succeeded to the apostles, from those sects of Christianity which exist under self-appointed teachers ; — that this Church is the only church of Christ in this kingdom : — that it possesses its original endowments^ which were never, as ignorant persons foolishly suppose, taken from one church and given to another," page 12 ; — that her bishops have regularly succeeded to the apostles ; and that her ministers are the only divinely commissioned ministers in this kingdom: all other denominations are SECTARIANS, SCHISMATICS, and left to the UNCOVENANTED mercies of God, On this ground he has the intolerable arrogance thus to insult the Christian churches in general in America : " When the United States of America were English colonies, the English Church was there established : at the revolution, the state was destroyed.* Monarchy has there ceased to exist-, but the Church, though depressed for a time, remained uninjured : so that there — among the American republicans — under the super- intendence of no fewer than sixteen bishops, you will find her sacraments and ordinances administered, and all her ritual and liturgical services celebrated, with no less of piety, zeal, and solemnity, than here in England ; there you may see the Church, like an oasis in the desert, blessed by the dews of heaven, and shedding heavenly blessings around her, in a land where, because no religion is esta- * This attack upon the religious bodies of the United States he mixes up with a political philippic. The writer is no advocate for a republic : indeed, he leaves politics in general to others. Yet there is a, sentiment, on the page adjoining the last quotation, which de- serves remark. The doctor says, " Were all connection between Church and state to cease, we may be sure the monarchy would be destroyed.'''* This was telling the queen that none are loyal to her, as the queen, ex- cept she pays them for it ; and the same to kings in general. Dr. Hook, and such as he, may speak from their own feelings, as to what they would do for the queen if not paid by her : but to affirm it of Chris- tians in general, is a vile slander, and is calculated to disaffect the mind of the queen toward all her Christian subjects who are not of the Establishment. All real Christians receive the Bible as the rule of their faith and practice. From the Bible they learn to " submit to the powers that be" equally as much under a monarchy as under a republic. The 342 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. blished, if it were not for her, nothing but the ex- tremes of infidelity or fanaticism would prevail," pp.7, 8. The reader sees at once that this is the succession scheme a little modified. That scheme has been suffi- ciently refuted in the Essay. We intend in this review of the sermon, to expose the sophistry of this modification. Here, " the Church" is the topic : — "bishops" were the former topic. If Dr. Hook be the man he is said to be, it is hard to suppose that he is not conscious of the sophistry of his own argument : in which case he would be a public deceiver : if his reasoning powers be weak, he may possibly be en- tangled in his own net. Be these things as they may, his argument is a tissue of sophistry : — we shall endeavour to untwist it, and break its force of deceiving. The GREAT fallacy or delusion of the whole argument lies in using the expression " the Church" in different SENSES, in different parts of the argument ; that is, as lo- gicians would say, in changing the terms. The way in which he manages this, is, by giving only a general and imperfect definition of the terms in the be- ginning of his sermon; and then, wAxo^MOJiVLg particulars into it in the progress, ?i,s is the most convenient for decep- tion. So, at pages 5 and 8, he says, " Now at the very OUTSET, I must state that I refer to the Church, not as a mere national establishment of religion, but as the Church, a religious community, intrinsically independent of the state ; that is to say, I am about to treat the Church, not Wesleyan Methodists, for instance, yield not to the members of the Establishment in loyalty to the queen. But further — Was the Chris- tian church connected with the state for the first three hundred YEARS 1 Did not the state then persecute the church everywhere 1 The Roman republic had ceased to be when the Christian church began to exist. The emperor was more absolute than the king of England. Now, DID THE PRIMITIVE CHRISTIANS RISE TO DESTROY THE THRONE 1 Hear TertulUan : " In all our prayers, we are ever mindful of all our emperors and kings wheresoever we live, beseeching God for every one of them without distinction, that he would bless them with length of days, and a quiet reign, a well-established family, a stout army, a faithful senate, an honest people, a peaceful world, and whatsoever else either prince or people can wish for." For Dr. Hook to go before the queen to propagate his libel upon all her Christian subjects, and upon Christianity in general, deserves the severest rebuke. Such a man can cast " firebrands, arrows, and death, and say. Am I not in sport T' ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 343 in its political, but simply and solely in its religious charac- ter. And so you may perceive what is meant, when we say, that we wish to speak of the Church, not as an esta- blishment, but as the Church, a religious society, a PARTICULAR SOCIETY OF CHRISTIANS." Then, this ^^par- ticular society of Christians^'' becomes " our ChurcK^ — " the Church of Exgland" — " the Church ;" and, at the last, on the last page, this ''''particular society of Chris- tians,''^ becomes distinguished from all other " religious societies'' by these specific properties, as " maintain- ing those PECULIAR doctrines, and that peculiar disci- pline, which have always marked, and do still continue to mark, the distinction between the church of Christ, administered under the superintendence of chief pastors or bishops who regularly succeeded to the apostles, from THOSE SECTS of Christianity under self-appointed teachers.''^ Well, thanks be to the doctor for giving us, at last, a complete definition of the Chiurch of England. This definition, as perfected by himself, is, " That the Church of England is a particular society of Christians distinguish- ed from all other particular religious societies, by its pecu- liar doctrines, and its peculiar discipline." By discipline, he tells us, he means its church government, as adminis- tered hy its bishops : their succession is another question, and has been fully treated in the Essay. Now let us try his main position : " the present Church of England is the old Catholic Church of England, reform- ed, in the reig-ns of Henry, Edward, and Elizabeth, of cer- tain superstitious errors ; it is the same Church which came down from our British and Saxon ancestors. The Church remained the same after it was reformed as it was before, just as a man remains the same man after he has washed his face as he was before^'' pp. 11, 12. Here, then, let us examine the matter. The Church before the Reformation was "a particular religious society ;" and the Church after the Reformation was " a particular religious society." There is, then, this general agreement, that each was " a religious society." So a harlot* is a wo- * Some respectable persons have made a little objection to this illus- tration. The writer has duly weighed their observations, and thinks them groundless, for the following reasons : 1st. TLc authority of the word of God, and of all the great reformers, justifies and authorizes the 344 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. man, and a virgin is a woman. There is this general agree- ment between them, that each is a woman. Now if we wish to know the difference that distinguishes the harlot from the virgin, we should be told that it would be the peculiar principles, manners, and conduct of each. If, then, we wish to know the difference that distinguishes the Church before the Reformation, from the Church after the Reformation, the answer would be, " The peculiar doc- trines and the peculiar discipline of each Church." Each is a Church, that is, " a religious society ;" as each of the above persons is a woman : but were those Churches the SAME 1 This will be answered by another question — Are a harlot and a virgin the same 1 Yes, according to Dr. Hook, if the harlot ivashes her face ! Let us look at the face of the Church before the Refor- mation, and at the face of the Church after the Reforma- tion : — at their peculiar doctrines, and their peculiar discipline. 1. Peculiar doctrines: Transubstantiation. — The Church, before the Refor- mation, maintained the doctrine of transubstantiation, and committed hundreds to the flames for disputing it : but The Church, after the Reformation, declares it " repugn nant to the plain words of Scripture, that it overthroweth the nature of a sacrament, and hath given occasion to many superstitions." Art. 28th of the Church of England. Masses. — The Church, before the Reformation, main- tained that the priests did offer Christ for the quick and dead to have remission oi pain and guilt : — The Church, after the Reformation, declares these positions to be " blasphemous fables and dangerous deceits." Article 31st of the Church of England. Images. — The Church, before the Reformation, main- tained the worship of images, and the churches were full of images : — • The Church, after the Reformation, declares this to be idolatry ; see homily on idolatry. Thus also the 22d application of the term harlot as the most appropriate designation of a corrupt church ; so it is here applied to the Church of Rome. 2ndly. The contrast of the purity of the Church of England by the term virgin, pays a respect to that Church, as constituted by the reformers, and as a most important branch of the Protestant church, which, under this view, the writer has a pleasure in paying. ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 345 Article : " The Romish doctrine concerning purgatory, pardons, worshipping and adoration, as well of images as of r cliques^ and also invocation of saints, is a fond thing, vainly invented, and grounded upon no warranty of Scripture, but rather repugnant to the word of God." Justification. — The Church, before the Reformation, maintained that a man wa.s justified through the grace of God by works, and not by faith only : — The Church, after the Reformation, maintained that the doctrine " that we are justified by faith only, is a most wholesome doctrine, and very fall of comfort, as more largely is expressed m the homily of justification." Article 11. These points of doctrine may suffice — many more might be added. 2. Peculiar discipline : The Church, before the Reformation, acknowledged the POPE as SUPREME HEAD OF THE ChURCH, aS ChRIST's VICAR, and that all were heretics who rejected him. A few passages from the canon law, as collected by Arch- bishop Cranmer, and given in the Collection of Records by Bishop Burnet, in his History of the Reformation, book iii. No. 27, will illustrate this point : " He that acknowledgeth not himself to be under the bishop of Rome, and that the bishop of Rome is ordained by God to have primacy over all the world, is a heretic, and cannot be saved, nor is not of the flock of Christ. ^' All the decrees of the bishop of Rome ought to be kept perpetually of every man, without any repugnancy, as God's word spoken by the mouth of Peter, and whosoever doth not receive them, neither availeth them the Catholic faith, nor the four evangelists, but they blaspheme the Holy Ghost, and shall have no forgiveness. " The see of Rome hath neither spot nor wrinkle in it, nor cannot err. " The bishop of Rome may excommunicate emperors and princes, and depose them from their states, and assoil their subjects from their oath and obedience to them, and so constrain them to rebellion P All the bishops in England, before the Reformation, SWORE OBEDIENCE TO THE POPE OF ROME : SCO Section xii of the Essay : but The Church, after the Reformation, declared the pope to 15* 346 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. he antichrist, the son of perdition ; and the Church of Rome to be an idolatrous Church: see Essay, section xi. And every bishop of the Church of England is bound to reject THE AUTHORITY of the pope and the court of Rome, under the PENALTY of PR^MUNIRE. Thus we see that the ^^ peculiar doctrines and the pecu- liar discipline'''' of the Church before the Reformation, and those of the Church after the Reformation, expressly CONTRADICT EACH OTHER: the Church after the Reforma- tion charging idolatry and blasphemy upon the Church before the Reformation. Yet, says Dr. Hook, " They are the same." And Dr. Hook can prove it — yea more — he can prove, by his principles, that black is white, and that two and two are five. Thus, two and two are numbers ; and^ve is a number ; ergo, two and two are the same as five, that is, they are both numbers : — black is a colour, and white is a colour ; ergo, black and white are the same, that is, they are both colours. Yes, replies the reader, but it was supposed you meant that two and two were the same in amount as five ; and that black was the same colour as white. True, but this is leaving the general nature of the things, and coming to the specific differences ; and I only spoke in generals. Dr. Hook only shows you the general nature of the thing at first : the Church before the Reformation is a religious society, and the Church after the Reformation is a religious society ; ergo, they are the same, that is, they are both religious societies ; as black and white are both colours. True, says the reader, hut we supposed he meant that they had the same distin- guishing properties or qualities. Whether Dr. Hook meant it himself or not, I cannot say ; but he doubtless meant his readers to think they had the same distinguishing proper- lies, that is, the same peculiar doctrines, and the same peculiar discipline : see p. 23 of his sermon as quoted above. However, it was neither convenient for him to say so " at the outset" of his sermon, nor was it agreeable to him to exhibit this their identity afterward: black would have been seen to be black, and white would have been white still : the virgin would have appeared a virgin, and the harlot would have appeared a harlot, after the doc- tor's perspiration in loashing her face. The doctor's position, then, is a mere fallacy, involving ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. 347 the real absurdity, that two religious societies, distinguish- ed as societies by their '■^peculiar doctrines, and their jsecM- Zmr discipline," and \\\io^e peculiar doctrines and peculiar discipline flatly contradict each other, are yet one and the same society, that is, that contradictory propositions are identical propositions! — They are, — just as much so as black and white are the same, and as two and two are five. The absurdity of the doctor's position being thus mani- fest, all his conclusions fall to the ground ; and the fol- lowing opposite conclusions become established : Conclusion 1st. — The Church before the Reformation, and the Church after the Reformation, are two different churches, distinguished by directly opposite peculiar doc- trines, and peculiar discipline, or church government. Conclusion 2d. — The Church cfter the Reformation, as distinguished by its peculiar doctrine and peculiar disci- pline, was founded at the Reformation, as much so as the Scotch church, the Lutheran church, or any of those other sects toward which the doctor manifests such scorn. As to the succession of the bishops of the Church of England, through the Church of Rome, or through the Church before the Reformation, we have shown in the Essay, that they have no more claim, on that ground, than bastards have to the inheritance of legitimate children. Conclusion 3d. — The Church of England, and the bishops of the Church of England, have no more just af- finity to the British or Saxon churches, than any other church that equally resembles them in peculiar doctrine and discipline. The doctor's .assertion, at page 9, that " the Church, as at the period of the Reformation, had ex- isted, as all parties admit, from the first planting of Chris- tianity in England," is one of his accustomed, hardy, fal- lacious, and baseless statements. Had that Church, as distinguished at the period of the Reformation by such " peculiar doctrines and peculiar discipline" as we have seen above, existed as always marked (p. 23) by those " peculiar doctrines and that peculiar discipline" from the first planting of Christianity in England ? Yes ! the doc- tor says, " All parties admit" this ! ! Then all parties admit that full-grown Popery existed in England from the first planting of Christianity in this country ! ! The 348 ON APOSTOLICAL SUCCESSION. reader who believes this is worthy to be a disciple of Dr. Hook. Conclusion 4th. — The right of the present Church of England to those church endowments, which existed before the Reformation, is merely statute right. The parliament has as much power to alienate as to appropriate. If the Church of England has a righteous claim to those endow- ments, any other church might, by another statute, have an equally righteous claim to them. The sum of the whole, is, then, that the Church of England, as a religious society, must establish its claim to affinity with apostolical churches, with the British and Saxon churches, and the Church before the Reformation, by the resemblance of its peculiar doctrines and its peculiar discipline to the peculiar doctrines and the peculiar disci- pline of those churches. Her bishops, and her other ministers, must prove their claim to apostolicity by their likeness to the apostles in personal piety, a divine call to the ministry, and by the preaching of the faith as the apostles preached it. Whatever they possess besides is but as the chaff to the wheat. All other churches must do the same. Here is the divine rule. Here let all strive to excel : let all covet the best gifts. Above all, let them keep in mind the more excellent way. What is true indi- vidually, is true of churches collectively : " Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal," &;c., 1 Cor. xii. GENERAL INDEX. Abbots, though only presbyters, or- dain bishops, 155, note. Aerius, 128. African church never maintained episcopacy jure divino, 169. Alasco, John, 192, &c. American churches, Dr. Hook's attack upon, 341. Ambrose, St., on bishops as apos- tles, 30, 45 — on the primus pres- byter, 96 — his Commentaries, 126 — on succession of faith, 284. Ancyra, council of, on presbyters ordaining, 133. Angels of the seven churches of Asia, 59-63, 141-143. Apostle, different meanings of the word, 36, &c. — prerogatives of, 41, &,c. — power of, 314. Apostleship of bishops examined, 29-50. Apostolical bishops, who 1 49. Arian bishops, ordination by, 257, 258. Athanasius on episcopacy examin- ed, 126. Augsburg confession on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 177. Augustine, bishop of Hippo, on the word apostle, 46 — on the au- thority of fathers and councils, 89 — on the office of a presbyter, 133. Austin the monk, his treachery, 242. Baptism nullified by confirmation, 197, 198. Baronius on the election of the popes, 220, &c. Barrow, Dr. Isaac, on the nature of proofs, 34 — on the apostolical office, 49 — his arguments destroy high Church episcopacy, 51^-on forsaking bad and heretical minis- ters, 79 — remarks on Cyprian, 120, 121. Barrington, Lord, on Clemens Ro- manus, 98. Bede, on British bishops, 238, &c. Bellarmine on bishops having no part of true apostolical authority, 49. Bentley, Dr., on bishops being suc- cessors of the apostles, 32. Beveridge, Bishop, gives up Scrip- tural authority for any certain form of church government, 27 — on the term high priest, 50. Beza, on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 202 — on episco- pacy, 301. Bickersteth, Rev. E., his Christian Student quoted, 277. Bilney, the martyr, on the inward call to the ministry, 73. Bingham's Origmes Ecclesiasticae quoted, 30 — on the authority of Jerome, 95. Bishop, emaicoTrog, meaning of, in the New Testament, 82-87. Bishops, how successors of the apostles, 29-50 — how they re- semble the Jewish high priests, 50, 5 1 — ancient British, account of, 237-242. Bishopric, 86. Blondel, JDavid, on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 204. Bochart, on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 204. Bona, Cardinal, quoted, 90. Burnet, Bishop, quoted, 146, 149, 154, 192 — on the elections of the popes, 219 — on the nature of the Christian ministry, 265, 266. Cabassute quoted, 113, 120. 350 INDEX. Calderwood's Altare Damascenum quoted, 132. Calvin, on confirmation, 197 — on the identity of bishops and pres- byters, 202 — on Popish ordina- tions, 263 — letter to Archbishop Cranmer, 269 — on apostolical succession, 284, 285. Canon law quoted, 170. Carthage, fourth council of, quoted, 119, 120. Catholic Church, what 1 298. Cave, Dr., on the character of Epiphanius, 129. Chairs, apostolical, presbyters sit in, 113. Chairs, bishops', what 1 113,117. Charity of Papists and high Church- men, 22, 23. Chemnitius on the atrocity of the succession scheme, 19. Chillingworth, on divine right, 25 — a fine passage from, 292. Church government, 32, 299. Church of England, as by the re- formers, 11, 144-169, 301, 340. Church and state, 144, 303-305, 341, note. Chrysostom, on ordination, ex- plained, 129-132. Chor-episcopi, or village bishops, 133, 134. Claude, on the absurdity of the high Church scheme20 — on the identi- ty of bishops and presbyters, 204. Clemens Alexandrinus on episco- pacy, examined, 114, &c. Clemens Romanus's Epistle com- mented upon, 97, &c., 324, 325. Clergy, English, general exclusive- ness of, 11. CoUcga, term explained, 119, 120. Columba, the abbot of the monas- tery of lona, &c., governs bishops, 238-241, 328. Comenius quoted, 180. Comber, Dr., on the baselessness of succession, 217, &c. Commission of Christ to the apos- tles, explained, 27, 28. Confession of Augsburg on the identity of bishops and presby- ters, 177. Confirmation examined, 196-200. Congregationalism, 316. Cox, Dr., the reformer, on the identity of bishops and presby- ters, 150. Cosin, Bishop, on presbyterian or- dination, 48, 154. Courayer, Dr., on English ordina- tions, quoted, 137, 138. Cranmer, archbishop of Canter- bury, on episcopal consecration, 137, 138 — on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 150, 202. Cummin, the friar, 331. Cyprian, on episcopacy, examined, 118, &c. — on genuine succes- sion, 282. Daille, the celebrated French Pro- testant divine, exposes the plea of Timothy's being bishop of Ephesus, 58 — on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 204. Damian, P., cardinal-bishop of Ostia, quoted, 254. Dodwell, the Rev. H., on unity with bishops as necessary to salvation, 17 — gives up Scrip- tural evidence for any particular form of church government, 26, 32 — on the office of an apostle, 33 — on Judas, 33 — his arguments establish a popedom, 121. Edward VI. (King) on the high priesthood, 52. Elections of popes described, 220. Elfric, Saxon archbishop of Can- terbury, canons of, 92. England, king of, the vassal of the pope, 245. English bishops before the Refor- mation, ordination and descent of, 243, &c. Enthronization of bishops, 137. Epaphroditus, a messenger of the church, his oflflce explained, 40. Epiphanius's character, &c., 128. Episcopacy of the New Testament, what^ 82-88. INDEX. 351 Episcopacy, ecclesiastical, what 1 95, &c., 141-144. Episcopal consecration non-essen- tial, 136-139. Erasmus, on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 202. Exclusiveness too general among the clergy of the Church of England, 1 1 — of the high Church succession scheme, 22, and gen- erally through the Essay. EvangeUst, what 1 55. Eusebius, on the word apostle, 45 — on the darkness and difficulty of the succession, 215, 216. Eutychius, patriarch of Alexandria, quoted, 132, 326. Faber's work on the Vallenses, quoted, 190 — remark on, 190. Faith, succession of, the only essen- tial succession, 107-1 li, 281. Fathers, authority of, 89, &c. Field, Dr., on the identity of bish- ops and presbyters, 162-166 — on genuine succession, 287. Firmilian, bishop of Cesarea, on ordination by presbyters, 125. Flacius lUyricus, M., on the iden- tity of bishops and presbyters, 203. French reformed church, maintains the identity of bishops and presby- ters, 178 — on confirmation, 197. Froude, R.Hurrell,an Oxford Tract- man, hates the Reformation, 144 — is disgusted with Bishop Jew- el's Defence, 156. Fulke, Dr., on the nullity of Popish ordination, 265. " Gift of God," what 1 323. Gildas's account of the wickedness of the bishops in his days, 238. Godwin, Bishop, on the Lives of the English Bishops, 243, &c. Godwin, Dr., on the Jewish high priesthood, 51. Gradin, Arvid, quoted, 181. Greek church never maintained episcopacy jure divino, 170 — on confirmation, 199. Gregory Nazianzen, on genuine succession, 283. Grindal, Abp. of Canterbury, ap- proves of presbyterian ordination, 154. Grosthead, bishop of Lincoln, re- proves the pope, 244. Grotius, on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 205 — on divine right, 205. Hall, Bishop, on presbyterian ordi- I nation and genuine succession, j condemns this high Church I scheme, 288. Hammond, Dr., gives up direct Scripture evidence for episcopa- cy, 26 — on Scriptural presbyters as governors of the church, 33 — on the succession of the Jew- i ish high priests, 272. j Hands, imposition of, 29, 138, 250. ; Haweis, Dr., Church History of, I giving an account of the rise of I Methodism, 278. I Heber, Bp., remarks of, on Bp. Tay- I lor's doctrine of confirmation, and I on his use of authorities, 199. Hickes, on the dignity of the epis- j copal order, 15. i High Churchism, semi-popery, ex- j clusiveness and intolerance of, passim. High priest, Jewish, 50, 51, 68, 80, 319, 320. Hilary, the deacon, quoted, 126. Hispala, council of, quoted, 172. Historic evidence for high Church succession, none, 212, &c., 312. Holland, Dr., the king's professor of divinity at Oxford, on the identity of bishops and presby- ters, 168. Holmes, Rev. J., of Fulncck, " His- tory of the United Brethren," quoted, 182, &c. Hook, Dr., vicar of Leeds, on high Church episcopacy and succes- sin, 15 — on episcopal ordination as essential to salvation, 18 — arrogance of, 24 — on bishops 352 INDEX. being apostles, 31 — his blunder- ing and bigoted scorn of the re- formed churches, 213 — his " Call to Union," 334— On Hear the Church, reviewed, 340. Hooker, on presbyters, 62, 159, 161 — on divine right, 64, 160, 161. Ignatius's Epistles examined, 100. Irenaeus, on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 105, &c. — on genuine succession, 282. James, St., made bishop over the apostles ! ! 65. Jerome, on the word apostle, 46 — on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 93-95 — on ordination by presbyters, 131, &c. Jewel, Bishop, on the word presby- ter, 105 — hated by Froude, an Oxford Tract-man, 156 — on non- preaching prelates, 276 — on gen- uine succession, 286. Joan, Pope, history of, 229, &c. Johnson, Rev. Mr., translator of the Code of the Universal Church, quoted, 174 — on the monk Austin and the British bishops, 242 — on the bishop's pall, 249. Judas, his apostleship treated, 261. Jurisdiction of bishops, what 1 166- 168, 330, 331. Justin Martyr's testimony to epis- copacy, examined, 104, &c. Korah and his company,high Church blunders upon, 318. Lapsed, the case of, " in Cyprian, explained, 122. Laud, Abp., the father of semi- papist Church of England di- vines, and jure divino men, 10. Lavington, on moral preaching, 277. Leger, on the Waldenses, 190. Leslie, Rev. C, on episcopacy, 177. Lloyd, bishop of Worcester, refer- red to, 241. Luther ordains the first bishop of the Lutheran church, 176. Lutheran episcopacy, 96. Martyr, Peter, on Popish vest- ments, 270 — on the succession of faith, 285. Mason, Archdeacon, on the power of wicked bishops to give true orders, 17 — on St Austin's con- nection with the slaughter of one thousand two hundred pres- byters, 242. Melancthon, on confirmation, 196 — on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 203 — on genuine succession, 285. Methodists, Wesleyan, rise of, 278, &c. — superintendency of, resem- bles primitive episcopacy, 62, 97, 104, 211, 303. Ministers, gospel qualifications of, 71, &c., 252, &c., 296. Ministers, wicked, to be forsaken, 75-79, 107, 121. Moral impossibility, 334. Moravian episcopacy, 180, &c. Mornay, P. Lord du Plessis, 264. Mosheim, on Ignatius's Epistles, 100 — on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 208. Names of bishops and presbyters so used in common in the New Testament as to prove that the things were substantially the same, 83-86, 319. Nice, Council of, its Epistle quoted, 134-136, 337. Order, degree, &c., explained, 9L Orders, Book of, for ordaining Bish- ops and Priests by the reformers, explained, 151, &c. Ordination, Popish, examined, 250- 261. Ordination of presbyters, form of, in the Church of England, 29, 151, 152. Ordination by presbyters — see Presbyter. Origen, writings of, on episcopacy, examined, 116, &c. Overall, Bishop, quoted, 103. INDEX. 353 Oxford Tracts, quoted, 18 — wri- ters of, English Jesuits, 175 — their sophistical ambiguity ex- posed, 177. Pall, bishops', described, 248, &c. Parker's, Abp. , ordination, 103,261. Pearson, Bp., on the ancient cata- logues of bishops, 216. Perceval, the Hon. and Rev. A. P., on the case of Judas, 262. Peter, St., whether ever at Romel 216. Popes, catalogues of, 217, &c. — election of, 220 — schisms among, 221, &c.— wickedness of, 222, 228, 236 — encourage rebellion, 229, 345— heretics, 233— simo- niacs, 234 — depose sovereigns, 309. Pope Joan, history of, 229. Popery, 11, 66, 69, 79, 174, 216, &c., 290, 308, 309, 343, &c. Polycarp, Epistle of, quoted, 104. Pontifical, a forgery, 218. Perrin, on the Waldenses, 189, 193. Presbyter,meamng of the word, 105, 113. Presbyters, commission of the apostles, applied to their ordina- tion by the English reformers, 27, 28, 153 — possess the power of ordaining, 55-57, 71, 125, 130, 130-136, 140, 153-155, 166, 176, 177, 184, 239, &c.— suc- cessors of the apostles, 101, 106, 140, 210, 211— govern the church, 33, 43 — preside over the church, 101, 105, 106, 112, 113, 117, 119, 124. Presbytery, whati 56, 114-116. President in the primitive church, whati 190, 194. Prideaux, Dr., on the baselessness of a personal succession, 219, &c. — on the monstrous wicked- ness of the popes, 235, &c. . Priest, high, none but Christ under the new covenant, 51, 80 — Jew- ish, 50, 51, 68, 69, 80, 319, 320 — prophets neglect the title, ibid. Priests, none on earth under the gospel, 70. Prophets neglect the distinction of high priest, 318-320. Protean character of the high Church succession scheme, 53. Ravanel, on confirmation, 196. Redmayne, Dr., the reformer, on the identity of bishops and pres- byters, 150. Reeves's translation of Justin Mar- tyr, quoted, 104, 113. Reformation, hated by Froude, an Oxford Tract-man, 144 — scorned by Dr. Hook, 213, 214. Reformed churches maintain the identity of bishops and presby- ters, 178. Reformers, English, maintaining that the commission of the apos- tles belongs to presbyters, 27, 28,1 53 — opposed to high Church episcopacy, 144, 169, 265-267 — on ordination, 264. Reiner's (the monk) Account of the Waldenses, 190. Right, divine, nature of, 35, 36, 136, 137, 275. Robertson, Dr., the reformer, on the identity of bishops and pres- byters, 150. Rome, Church of, never maintained episcopacy jure divino, or by di- vme right, 170, 174 — idolatry and wickedness of, 224, &c. — Bishops of, see Popes. Salmasius on Ignatius's Epistles, 100. Sanhedrim, the manner of ordina- tion in the Christian church de- rived from the, 135. Saxon church, 343, &c. — canons of, make bishops and presbyters one order, 92. Schisms, many in the popedom, 221, &c. Schleusner, on the identity of bish- ops and presbyters, 209. 354 INDEX/ Scriptural evidence for the high Church scheme, none, 26. SeifFerth, Rev. B., letter from, 182. Semi-papists, high Churchmen such, passim. Simony, sin of, &c., 235, 244, 250, 258, 260. Sinclair, Rev. J., corrected, in the notes at pp. 56, 65, 84, 127, 177, and pp. 91, 206. Smith, on the Greek church, quo- ted, 199. Stillingfleet, on the nature of divine right, 35, 36 — on Ignatius, 104 — on apostolical succession, 288. Succession, high Church scheme. Popery of, passim. Succession, genuine apostolical, 271, 293. Succession of Jewish high priests, 272. Suicer, on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 208. Superintendency of bishops ex- plained, 96, &c. Superintendency, Wesleyan, 62, 97, 104, 211, 303. Superintendents of the Lutheran Church, 62, 96. Superhitendents of the Scotch kirk, 54. Synagogue, ordination rites of, adopted by the Christian church, 135. Taylor, Bishop, extracts from his Episcopacy Asserted, 13, 17, 25 — perverts the meaning of au- thors, 38 — on tradition, 89 — on Epiphanius, 129 — on confirma- tion, 198. TertuUian, extracts from, 110 — on genuine succession, 282— quoted, 342, note. Theodoret quoted, 30, 44. Titus not an apostle, 38. Timothy and Titus, case of, argued, 52-59, 142, 321-323. 2 Timothy i, 6, explained, 55, 323. Tradition, 89, 109. Trent, council of, on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 174. United States, churches of, attack- ed by Dr. Hook, 341. Usher, Abp., on the spuriousness of Ignatius's Epistles, 100 — on the identity of bishops and pres- byters, 209. Valesius's note on the word apostle, 45 — on the Miletian clergy, 134. Vestments, Popish, 270. Vitringa, on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 208. "Voice of the church," 177, 332. Wake, Abp., translation of Clemens Romanus corrected, 97 — on the Epistles of Ignatius, 100. Waldenses, an account of the, 179, 195 — their opinion of confirma- tion, 196 — on the nullity of Po- pish ordinations, 262. Wells, Dr., corrected, 222. Wesley, the Rev. J. & C, 278, &c. Wesley, the Rev. J., on apostolical succession, 289. Whitaker, Dr., on the apostolical office, 49 — on genuine succes- sion, 108, 287— on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 158, 202 — on the nullity of Popish orders, 265. W^hitby, Dr., 142 — on the simony of the Church of Rome, 234, &c. White, Dr. J., on genuine succes- sion, 287. White, Francis, bishop of Ely, on genuine succession, 288. Whitefield, Rev. G., 278, &c. Wickliffe, on the identity of bish- ops and presbyters, 145, 201 — on confirmation, 196. Zanchius, on the identity of bishops and presbyters, 206 — on Popish vestments, 270 — on genuine succession, 285. GENERAL CATALOGUE OF BOOKS. Miscellaneous. Abbott, Rev. Benjamin, Experience and Gospel La- bours of the ; to which is annexed a Narrative of his Life and Death. By John Ffirth. 18mo. SO 50 Admonitory Counsels, addressed to a Methodist on Subjects of Christian Experience and Practice. By John Bake- well. 18mo. 38 Advice to the Teens. By the Rev. Isaac Taylor. 18mo. 31 Alleine's Alarm, and Baxter's Call. 18mo. 50 Almanac, Methodist 06 Apology for the Bible, in a Series of Letters address- ed to Thomas Paine, author of the " Age of Reason," &c. By Bp. Watson. 18mo. * 38 Apostles and Evangelists, Lives of the. By Rev. George Peck, D. D. 18mo. 38 Baptism, Letters on. By the "Rev. T. Merritt. 8vo. pamphlet 09 Baptism, Christian, its Mode, Obligation, Import, and Relative Order. By Rev. F. G. Hibbard. 12mo. 63 Baptism, Obligation, Mode, and Subjects of. By Rev. H. Slicer. 18mo. 50 Baptism, Sermon on. By Rev. P. P. Sandford. 8vo. pamphlet 12 Bingham, Miss, Life of. 18mo. 38 Bramwell, William, Memoir of the Life and Ministry of. By James Sigston. 18mo. 50 Bunting, Miss Hannah S., Memoir, Diary and Letters of. Compiled by the Rev. T. Merritt. 2 vols. 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