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DURRETT COLLECTION 



NOTES 



ON 



THE EPISCOPAL POLITY 



OF THE 



HOLY CATHOLIC CHURCH. 



NOTES 



ON THE 



EPISCOPAL POLITY 



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HOLY 



.> ; = - - ; :,.:. o o ; 

^ .: 3 " ?VlTt*: SfOsIE ACCOUNT OF , o : ,' " ' ^ 

" THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE MODERN RELIGIOUS SYSTEMS. 

BY 

THOMAS WILLIAM MARSHALL, B. A. 

CURATE OF SWALLOWCLIFFE AND ANSTY, IN THE DIOCESE OF SALISBURY. 

EDITED BY 

JONATHAN M. WAINWRIGHT, D. D. 

WITH A PREFACE, AND A NEW COMPLETE INDEX OF THE SUBJECTS AND OF THE 
' TEXTS OF SCRIPTURE. 

JTw; av tysvov av XQtotiavos, Ejiiaxonoiv pi] ovrow ; 

S. ATHANAS. AA Dracontium Epist. 



NEW YORK: 
D. APPLETON & CO. 200 BROADWAY. 

PHILADELPHIA : 

GEORGE S. APPLETON, 148 CHESNUT-ST. 
MDCCCXLIV. 





NEW -YORK: 
JOHN K . TROW & CO., PRINTERS, 

No. 33 Ann-street. 



PREFACE 
BY THE AMERICAN EDITOR. 



THIS volume, proceeding from the English press at the 
commencement of the present year, makes its appearance 
amongst us at a very seasonable time. The public mind 
has been awakened to a very remarkable degree of interest 
in the question which it undertakes to discuss. There 
seem, indeed, to be the clearest indications that in the Prov- 
idence of God a period has arrived when the essential con- 
stitution of the Christian Church, involving the essential 
order of the Christian ministry, is to be subjected once 
more to a thorough investigation. 



However much, therefore, a religious controversy may 
be deprecated by any one, and certainly when conducted in 
bitterness of spirit, and with a disregard of the ordinary 
courtesies of social intercourse, it is a painful and humilia- 
ting spectacle, yet it is not probable that the exertions of 
one, or even of many, could put a stop to it. Indeed, it is 
questionable how far it is expedient, or what is more, justifi- 
able, to make such an attempt. The asperities of polemi- 



il PREFACE BY 

cal strife, it is the duty of those engaged in it to banish or 
restrain to the utmost of their power, and upon those who 
are its spectators it is* incumbent to discountenance them 
by their stern disapprobation. - , -v 

But the conflict itself may safely be permitted to go on ; 
for it is in conformity with the uniform course of God's 
moral government of the world, that truth should be elicited 
by the collision of opposing minds. If Paul encountered 
Peter and " withstood him to the face, because he ought to 
be blamed," (Galatians ii. 11.) on account of his want of 
consistency in relation to a point of external order, those 
certainly cannot be esteemed blameworthy who now " ear- 
nestly contend for the faith which was once delivered to the 
saints," (Jude 3,) provided "" they are gentle unto all men, 
apt to teach, patient, in meekness instructing those that op- 
pose themselves." (2 Tim. ii. 24, 25.) 

This is the temper which he who enters into any dispute 
upon a religious question, should both strive and pray that 
he may be imbued with. And in the honest conviction that 
he is influenced by this spirit can he alone be justified in 
giving a wider circulation to controversial works which, in 
any "of their arguments or " developments" may seem to 
bear severely upon the opinions and practices of any mem- 
bers of the Christian family around him from whom he dif- 
fers. 

I trust that I am not unmindful of this responsibility 
when I am instrumental in procuring the republication of 
the work now offered to the public, and to which their seri- 
ous and candid attention is solicited parts of which, and 



THE AMERICAN EDITOR. Ill 

especially the fifth chapter, entitled "DEVELOPMENT OP 
MODERN SYSTEMS/' is calculated, I fear, to produce more 
than ordinary displeasure in certain quarters. 

Did I for a moment suppose that just occasion is there 
given for such displeasure, I should deem myself to be acting 
in utter inconsistency with the obligations of Christian char- 
ity by my agency in this matter. But my solemn conviction 
is, that that chapter especially contains statements substan- 
tially true, and statements that should be spread widely, in 
order that they may be pondered seriously in every commu- 
nity where the essential constitution of the Christian Church 
and the nature of the .Christian ministry are regarded as 
questions of comparatively little importance, because, as 
they say, touching only points of what they are pleased to 
call mere external order. As if " the house of God" (1 Tim. 
iii. 15) had been left by the all-wise Builder a heap of loose 
materials, for each one to erect a shelter from "the storm," 
according to his own fancy and as if " the Church of the 
living God, the pillar and ground of the truth," had not been 
constructed in form and strength sufficient to maintain that 
truth. 

Never, perhaps, since the question of Episcopacy became 
a subject of dispute, and that has been only within the last 
three hundred years, has there been a period when it could 
so fairly and fully be discussed, or when the discussion 
promised to be attended with more favourable results to the 
cause of primitive truth and order. Not, certainly, that any 
arguments new in themselves are now to be advanced, or 
that we are to expect fresh authorities in its favour to be 



iV PREFACE BY 

drawn from the stores of antiquity, since the subject has 
been investigated, time after time, by the most learned and 
able men of their respective ages. 

*. 

The present author states arguments and adduces au- 
thorities which have been often employed before ; but the 
manner is his own, and it is certainly a happy one. His 
introduction, too, places the question in a striking point of 
view. But the part of the work which gives it special in- 
terest is the fifth chapter, to which I have alluded, where an 
important consideration is brought forward, and one which 
cannot but have great weight with all thoughtful observers 
of the times, and this is the practical working of all those 
systems of church-government which have excluded the 
Episcopacy. 

No one who believes in the existence of a visible Church 
of Christ on earth, can doubt that it was designed to be the 
teacher and protector of evangelical truth, as well as the 
depository of holy ordinances. If, then, it can be made 
clearly manifest, that in any system of ecclesiastical disci- 
pline professing to be the Church, holy doctrines which 
have " every where and at all times " been considered as 
fundamental parts of gospel truth, have gradually been ob- 
scured, corrupted, or exploded, or that opinions unknown 
to the gospels-opinions extravagant, contradictory, irrecon- 
cilable with Scripture have been bred and fostered, i it not 
right, is it not the part of true charity, to solicit those who 
yet adhere to this syr.tem to examine once more the spirit- 
ual house they inhabit, to ascertain if it is indeed " built 
upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus 



THE AMERICAN EDITOR. V 

Christ himself being the chief corner-stone?" (Eph. ii. 
20.) 

To assist those who may be inclined to make this ex- 
amination, and also to encourage and confirm those who, 
having made it, have arrived at the conviction that the 
Episcopacy is essential to the Church, has been my design 
in promoting and superintending the present publication. 
My office as editor has no higher pretensions. In this con- 
nexion, however, I ought perhaps in candour to say, that 
I have in a few instances changed expressions which I 
thought calculated to give a wrong impression of the au- 
thor's meaning in this country. But in no instance have I 
altered or given a colouring to an idea different from that 
in which the author has presented it. 

Had I myself been employed in drawing up a chapter 
similar to the one above alluded to, I should perhaps have 
modified certain of the statements contained in it, and cer- 
tainly, out of respect to the many learned, pious, and most 
devoted members of different religious denominations with 
whose acquaintance I am honoured, and some of whom I 
have the valued privilege of calling my friends, I should 
have softened some of the language, and should hjive inter- 
posed some considerations in the hope of preventing the 
possibility of drawing from those statements any inference 
that could be personally offensive. But I could not with 
propriety thus modify the work of another author. He has 
a right to speak for himself, and in his own manner ; and 
with this right I have not interfered, except in the slight 
verbal instances above mentioned. 



PREFACE. 



To the original work a copious index has been added, 
arranged with great care, expressly for this edition, with the 
view of facilitating a reference to the different questions 
brought under consideration. 

JONATHAN M. WAINWRIGHT. 
NEW-YORK, MARCH 22, 1844. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



THE appearance of another work, however insignificant, 
upon a subject so fully exhausted as the Government of the 
Church, may seem to require some explanation. The 
learned and distinguished persons who, in past times, have 
gone over this ground, were not accustomed, as is well 
known, to leave much behind them for gleaners. Some 
variety of arrangement, or a different selection of evidence 
from the same originals which they so diligently explored, 
this is the sum of what can now be done by those who 
have come after them. Had it been intended, therefore, 
merely to repeat what they have already so well said, the 
present attempt would have savoured of superfluity, and 
might have deserved only censure. 

There is, however, one argument, from the use of which 
the earlier writers on Church-polity were either wholly pre- 
cluded, or which they could employ only at a disadvantage, 
but which, in consequence 'of certain recent events to be 
noticed in these pages, becomes, in the hands of their suc- 
cessors, a weapon of untried but admirable efficacy. The 
Anglican divines of the 16th and 17th centuries might re- 
fer as they did in enforcing allegiance to the Successors 
of the Apostles, to the history of earlier times, and point to 
the uniform progress from schism to heresy, which that 



VUl ADVERTISEMENT. 

history records. So far they occupied the same position 
with ourselves. But when they went on to predict a like 
declension for the principles against which their own 
writings were directed, and to warn men, from the analo- 
gies of the past, that innovation in discipline would infalli- 
bly lead to corruption in doctrine, it is obvious that their 
adversaries would be no way embarrassed in dealing with a 
prophecy whose force depended almost entirely upon its ful- 
filment. That fulfilment, once so little dreaded, it has been 
reserved to us to witness ; and the development of the mod- 
ern religious systems, though even now imperfect, is at 
length so far complete as to enable us to determine with 
accuracy their true character. 

The present condition of the various Protestant commu- 
nities of Christendom, of which the original organization 
was a human device, and therefore defective, is perhaps 
the most extraordinary and appalling subject of contempla- 
tion to the thoughtful mind, which our own or any other 
age of the Church supplies. To call attention to this actual 
condition is the main object with which these pages have 
been written ; and as this portion of their contents is, from 
the nature of the case, almost entirely novel, it may per- 
haps be relied upon as an adequate apology for their ap- 
pearance. 

The course of argument pursued, which it may be con- 
venient to state here, is as follows : 

I. The a priori objection to the truth of the Catholic 
System of Polity founded on the indeterminateness of the 
Sacred Records, and the antecedent probabilities in its 
favour derived from Prophecy and prescription, are briefly 
discussed. 

II. The positive evidence of Holy Scripture in recog- 
nition of the Episcopate is next adduced; and, 

III. The testimony of Antiquity as well that which 
has been supplied by the oiemies as by the servants of the 



ADVERTISEMENT. IX 

Church including the first four ages of Christianity, is then 
cited. 

IV. The adversary is next referred to the witness of 
his own masters and teachers, who, even in the first setting 
up of their new schemes, acknowledged openly the divine 
origin of that primitive government which they loudly de- 
clared their reluctance to subvert, and for the restoration of 
which they professed, in- the most animated terms, their 
sincere and unfeigned desire. The catalogue of witnesses 
of this class might have been considerably enlarged ; but it 
will be found to be sufficiently ample. The remarkable ad- 
missions of Knox and his confederates, together with many 
others, have been, for the sake of brevity, wholly omitted ; 
though it has been justly said, that " the views entertained 
by the Scottish reformer on the subject of Episcopal super- 
intendence views which he frequently and emphatically 
avowed might . be studied with advantage in modern 
times."* But it was necessary to prescribe a limit in ad- 
ducing confessions which are themselves almost unlimited. 

o 

'V. The final argument is that which is supplied by the 
actual history of those religious bodies which have been 
severed from the Apostolical Succession, and which were 
originally founded either upon the deliberate rejection of 
the divine office of the Episcopate, or the supposed suffi- 
ciency of other modes of ecclesiastical discipline for pre- 
serving in its integrity " the faith once delivered to the 
saints." 

And although hitherto many have been able to resist the 
combined testimony of Prophecy, Scripture, and Antiquity, 
and even to justify their adherence to the modern systems 
in spite of the explicit confessions of the very men by whom 

* Sec Dr. Michael Russell's History of the Church in Scotland, 
ch. vi. vol. i. p. 240; and Bramhall's Fair Warning of Scottish Dis- 
cipline, ch. i. Works, vol. ii. p. '19J. 



X ADVERTISEMENT. 

they were first framed ; we may perhaps hope, that the pres- 
ent aspect of those systems, and their uniform development 
without so much as a single exception into nurseries of 
heresy and unbelief, may constrain some few at least to 
reconsider their hazardous position, and to relinquish, 
while yet they may, the unhappy inventions, upon which 
let it be reverently said the Almighty seems at length, by 
abandoning them to utter decay, to have pronounced judg- 
ment before our eyes. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

TACK 

INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . 14 

CHAPTER II. 

SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

SECT. 

1. Case of St. James . . . . . . . . 32 

2. Case of St. Timothy 42 

3. Case of St. Titus ........ 49 

4. Case of the Asian Angels 56 

5. Notice of Objections ....... 76 

CHAPTER HI. 

EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

1. Nature of this Evidence . . . . . . . 90 

2. St. Clement of Rome 94 

3. St. Ignatius of Antioch 107 

4. St. Justin Martyr . . . ... . .119 

5. Pope Pius 1 122 

6. Hegesippus 123 

7. Polycrates 125 

8.. St. Irenseus 127 

9. St. Clement of Alexandria 133 

10. Tertullian . . 134 

11. The Apostolical Canons ; Arians, Donatists, Maliichsans, 

&c. &c. . 148 

12. St. Cyprian .160 

13. St. Jerome . . . 7 166 

14. St. Augustine 171 

15. St. Ambrose, St. Basil, St. Chrysostom, St. Athanasius . 175 

16. Summary . . . 177 



Xll CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER IV. 

ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

SECT. FA.GE 

1. On the General Question 183 

2. Calvin, J. Sturmius 215 

3. Beza, Farel, Rivet, N. Vedelius, P. Viret, Zumgle . . 224 

4. Melanctbon, Luther, Confess. Augustan . . . . 228 

5. Bucer, Gualter, Peter Martyr, Jerome Zanchy, Seckendorff 232 

6. Dr. Peter Du Moulin . 234 

7. H. Grotius, J. Casaubon 237 

8. Blondel, Salmasius 239 

9. Bochart, Amyraut, Drelincourt, Langlet, Daille, Turretin, 

University of Geneva ; Baxter, Calamy, Stephen Mar- 
shal, Cartwright, Dr. Cornelius Burges, Henderson, 

Lord Pembroke, John Hales, Sir Edward Deering . 242 

10. Summary 250 

CHAPTER V. 

DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

1. Nature of this Argument ...... 258 

2. .Development in Germany ...... 266 

3. Switzerland . . . . . . . 282 

4. France 292 

5. England ; Channel-Islands 301 

6. Scotland 315 

7. Ireland 324 

8. Holland, Belgium, Hungary, the Vaudois . . . 324 

9. Sweden and Denmark 331 

10. Prussia .......... 332 

11. Russia .......... 334 

12. United States of America 335 

13. General Summary ........ 354 



CHAPTER I. 

INTRODUCTION. 

I. AN attempt has been made, during the last three cen- 
turies, to introduce a theory of the Holy Church Catholic, 
with which our fathers do not seem to have been acquainted. 
Separating what had been religiously held to be one and 
indissoluble, men have ventured to speak of the Divine 
Institution as divided into two parts, external and internal. 
To the latter has been assigned all which they were willing 
to regard as of the essence of the Church all which was 
confessed to be in its nature immutable ; while the former 
was supposed to include only those elements of it which 
they chose to regard as its accidents and these were de- 
nned to be variable, subject to change and modification. It 
was to this division that they referred nearly all points of 
Discipline and Government. 

From this view it followed to speak of " the Church," 
and " the Polity of the Church," not only as separable ideas, 
but as, in fact, wholly distinct from each other. The judg- 
ment of other times, in which the Church both her doc- 
trines and her discipline, the " Mysteries" and the "Stew- 
ards of the Mysteries," the Gospel, the Priesthood, and the 
Sacraments was taken to be, not many parts without unity 
or coherence, but one altogether ; this was now rejected. 
And whereas in those days the new definition here noticed 
would have been thought to involve some such extravagance 
as if one should distinguish between a man and his body, or 
speak of a flame apart from that of which it is composed, or 
the like ; it was now represented as the only true and ac- 
curate philosophy ; and men did not fear to say of the un- 
speakable gift of God, " So much is from heaven, and must 
be used ; so much of earth, and may be put away." And it 
was in the spirit of this wisdom that they did go on to put 

2 



14 INTRODUCTION. 

away, some more, some less, of that Holy Discipline, which, 
though received from " the beginning " as divine, and con- 
secrated by the reverent acceptance of all Saints, they had 
resolved to exclude, as forming no part of that system which . 
was embraced in their theory of the Church. 

With this new notion of the constitution of the Church 
were developed, almost as a matter of course, new notions 
of the Bible. The earlier and catholic sentiment, to which 
these began now to be opposed, had been founded upon a 
consideration of the structure itself of the Inspired Volume, 
the history of the Sacred Canon, and the analogy of the 
Divine Dispensations ; and perhaps, yet further, upon the 
direct authority of Apostolical Tradition. The teaching so 
derived did not allow the first Christians to regard the writ- 
ten word of God as an exception to the other modes of 
revelation by which He had vouchsafed to manifest to His 
creatures the treasures of His goodness, wisdom, and power. 
They perceived that it expressly required for its due com- 
prehension certain conditions in those to whom it was ad- 
dressed, and that these were such as would be fulfilled only 
in few ;* that its own pages contained a warning lest men 
should " wrest" it " to their destruction ;"t and that it re- 
ferred, consistently with this warning, to a witness external 
to itself.f They were forbidden, therefore, to suppose that 
it would always, or even commonly, supply the interpreta- 
tion of its own sacred mysteries that it would contain at 
once a doctrine and the interpretation of the doctrine. There 
were evidently no antecedent grounds for such a supposition. 
The Church was more ancient than the Bible ; and when 
that new and priceless gift, complete and sealed in the ful- 
ness of perfection, was added to her already richly endowed 
children, so far was her authority as " keeper and witness " 
of the precious deposit from being impaired, that the same 

* S. John vii. 17; from which it is plain that doing God's will in 
order to knowing His doctrine, is to be regarded as a first principle of 
Christian morals. See this admitted even by Ernesti, Elements of 
Biblical Criticism, part ii. ch. i. ; M. Stuart's translation. 

t 2 Pet. iii. 16. t c. g. 1 Tim. iii. 15. 

"Prius fuit Ecclesia Dei quam allata esset prophetia : id est, 
priusquam Spiritu Sancto inspirati locuti essent sancti Dei homines." 
Turrian. De Ecclesia, lib. i. cap. i. " If the Apostles had never 
written at all, we must have followed Tradition; unless bod had 
provided for us some better thing.' " Bp. Tnylor, Dissuasive from 
Popery, Works, vol. x. p. 130. 



INTRODUCTION. .15 

decree which so greatly enlarged the one,- confirmed for 
ever the office of the other, as " the pillar and ground of the 
Truth."* 

To obscure this office was the earliest attempt of the 
teachers referred to. And as any recognition of the prime 
verity, that Holy Scripture bore one certain definite mean- 
ing,t and that this had been fixed wherever it had been 
uniformly held by the Church, would have been fatal to the 
new system which they desired to establish ; it was necessary, 
in the first place, to recede from this belief, and to frame 
such a theory of the Bible as should harmonize with that 
which they had already adopted with respect to the Church. 
This must be such as, while it permitted the rejection of all 
former interpretations, would give license for the construc- 
tion of new ones ; and in constituting the living sole judges 
of the truth, should not suffer the dead to be even witnesses. 
But this was no difficulty. It was decided at once, by men 
professing zeal for the Divine honour, and belief in the 
Divine promises, that the faith of all past ages might be a 
mistake. The Bible was now, for the first time, declared to 
be not only a message addressing itself to the mind of each 
individual believer, but such as it was both a right and a 
duty to interpret for himself.| And as the inability of the 
mass of men to solve its difficulties was beyond dispute, it 
was represented as containing none. 

That these opinions are in every case held consciously, 
with deliberation, and as portions of a definite system of 
theology, this of course it is not intended to assert ; nor is it 
proposed to do more in this place than barely to notice their 
existence. To consider them in detail, or to examine into 
the various tenets which we see, for the most part, to be 
held concurrently with them, is altogether foreign to our 
present purpose. There is, however, one notion, the last 
alluded to in the foregoing remarks, to which, as entering 
.into combination with nearly all the rest, and forming one 
of the most prominent features of the religious system to 
which they belong, it seems quite necessary, in as few words 

* Sr:'>i? (tret Ufaiwiia rr7? u\^0;ta;. 1 Tim. iii. 15. 

t " Nullum enim verbuai Dei," says even a Calvinistic writer, 
" nullum ipsius mysterium pbtest csse absquc suo vero se.nsu." N. 
Vodelius, De Arcanis Arminianismi, lib. ii. cap. x. p. 245. 

t " Unusquisque fidelis sibi cst interpres." Limborch. Thcolog. 
CJiri-st.inn.-Yilt. i. cnp. ii. 6. 



16 INTRODUCTION. 

as may be, to refer ; and this the rather because it affects 
fundamentally the whole subject to be considered in these 
pages. 

The notion in question is that which relates to the inter- 
pretation of Divine Scripture, and which takes for granted, 
as a sort of first principle of religious truth, that whatever 
God designs His creatures to believe or perform, He has 
plainly taught and declared. Its advocates accustom them- 
selves to assume, that since the obedience of man is to be 
exact and without reserve, the Revelation of God can be in 
no degree obscure. It is even argued, that so much is im- 
plied in the very notion of a Divine Revelation. If God has 
vouchsafed to deliver to us a message, He must have in- 
tended, it is said, that we should understand it. That He 
speaks at all, is proof enough that He \vould have us hear 
His words; and hear them, not as the confused cry of dis- 
tant voices, which can only perplex the ear, but so as to 
catch every sound, and discriminate between every tone. 
In a word, that it must still be with us as it was with our 
first parents, when they " heard the voice of the Lord God ;" 
we must not only be aware that He is speaking, but hear 
so distinctly as to be able, like them, to reply to His every 
question. 

It is the ready and obvious inference from this notion 
viz. that whatsoever is not clearly taught in God's word, so 
much we may safely neglect* which we are now about to 
notice; because it is upon this foundation chiefly that the 
common sort of men have been taught to build their objec- 
tion to theCatholic System, that if it had been Divine, it had 
surely been more plainly taught :t And as this cannot be 
denied to be a just inference, if the assumed hypothesis be 
true, and is yet, in effect, wholly subversive of our " most 
holy Faith," some observations shall be offered here, in 

* " Those things which are not plain, are not necessary ; those 
things we cannot comprehend, are no further necessary than is 
revealed. And when men go about to explain and make them clear 
to the world, they go about a work they need not." Bp. Hoadley, 
quoted by Leslie. 

t " Ubi per clnra et manifosta nequaquam intclligunt ea qiue 
Orthodox! pro claris habent, ideo, quod per bonam ac necessariam 
consequentiam e Scriptura eliciuntur, etsi errantc.s et ktsretici ea clara 
esse non mdcwnt." Vedelius, lib. i. cap. vi. p. 41 ; where he proceeds 
to enumerate the doctrines of the Holy Trinity, the Divinity of our 
Lord, &c. as amongst those rejected on this principle. 



INTRODUCTION. 

order to show that that hypothesis is, as might be expected, 
false and erroneous"; that it does not follow that, because 
God has spoken, He must needs have spoken as we imagine 
He ought to do ; nor that there is any other distinctness in 
His awful language than such as His own words assert 
" He that hath ears to hear, let him hear."* 

It might, indeed, have seemed a sufficient answer, without 
going further, to the objection which rejects the Catholic 
Discipline as too obscurely delivered, that in point of fact it 
was seen plainly enough in Holy Scripture to be received 
without doubt or misgiving by all Christians for the first 
fifteen ages, and then only discovered to be obscure when 
men had set up a new system in its place ; that it was never 
judged to want sufficient evidence until it had been resolved 
that no evidence should be accounted sufficient. Or it 
might have sufficed to inquire how such an argument could 
be urged by such assailants ; or with what reason men who 
had rejected one system of government on the very ground 
that on such points Scripture was obscure, could enforce 
another upon the opposite ground that it was in Scripture 
expressly set forth, t This reflection would seem to show, at 

* ToSro tort Soyfta ira\ai6v r /cat irayiov, o-xdroj elvai diroKpvipnv airov, 
irpo TUV 6<j>6a\iiuv ii[iereptiiv Ktjfvpivov ' KOI TO. iroXXa fi?/ KaOopaodai Tits aiiTav 
Jioocrjaecoj, irXiji; oaov iv djtvSpoTf ahiyp.aai KOL ^ai/Ta<r/ia<rii/" Eire TOV TV<J>OV fi/icav 
truoTEXXoiTOj, iv EiAwpev TO firiSlv ovTSs iTods TI]V d\rtOtviiv (ro<j>iav KOI irp&JTjjv' 
oAXd Trpof aitTov vevwjtsv [tovav } KCLI fyTOipev act rat's ixetdsv cnuyais ivatTTfiinTE- 

aOai, CITS SiA T>;S dcco/iaXta; .... K.T.\. S. Greg. Nazianz. Orat. xvij. 
torn. i. p. 268 (Paris. 1630). And what is here said of His dispen- 
sations, another writes of the Lord Himself: 'Ew/j09j yap ov povov "va. 
yvun0rj, dXX' '(va Kal X<J9;j. Origen. Contra Celsum, lib. ii. p. 101 (ed. 
Spencer). This refers to His Personal manifestation : His presence 
under the veil of Scripture is no otherwise described. " Msconsus 
vero in Scripturis thesaurus Christus, quoniam per typos et parabolas 
signifieabatur." S. Irenaeus, lib. v. cap. xliii. "Parabolis et propo- 
sitionibus sumptis, cojlestis veritas intimatur, sicut Ipse in 70 Psalmo 
testatiir," &c. Cassiodor. De Divinis Lectionibus, lib. i. cap. xvi. 
And this character of Scripture-teaching is accounted for by another, 
saying, " Multa enim propter exercendas rationales mentes figurate 
atque obscure posita." Aug. De Unit. Eccles. cap. v. : and again, 
" Obscuritates divinarum Scripturarum, quas e.xercitationis nostr<B 
causa Deus esse voluit." Ep. lix. Ad, Paulimim, torn, ii p. 117. 
They all admit, or rather teach, that Holy Scripture is obscure, and 
then give reasons why it is so. 

t It was a favourite opinion with all the enthusiasts of tliat age 
(the 17th), that the Scriptures contained a complete system not only 
of spiritual instruction, but of civil wisdom and polity." Robertson, 



IS INTRODUCTION. 

first sight, that the objection could neither be real nor hon- 
est. But without taking further advantage of it than to 
recommend it to the attention of those whom it may concern, 
it shall be attempted now to meet the objection upon other 
and higher grounds. 

(1.) With this object, let it be considered, in the first 
place, how many high and sacred truths there are, which are 
so far from being " clearly taught," as men speak, in Holy 
Scripture, that it is only by comparison and inference we 
are able to gather them thence. " Our belief in the Tri- 
nity," says one of the wisest of our race, " the co-eternity of 
the Son of God with his Father, the proceeding of the Spirit 
from the Father and the Son, the duty of baptizing infants, 
these, with such other principal points, the necessity whereof 
is by none denied, are notwithstanding in Scripture nowhere 
to be found by express literal mention, only deduced they 
are out of Scripture by collection."* And these are but a 
few instances out of many.t One such, however, will 

History of America, book x., Works, vol. ix. p. 311. And, as Bishop 
Sanderson observes, " 110 form of government ever yet was used or 
challenged, but hath claimed to a jus divinum as well as Episco- 
pacy." Episcopacy not prejudicial to Royal Power, part ii. 13. 
"The Presbyterians take it for granted," says Monro, "that their 
way is the only true religion ; that it is plainly revealed," &c. 
Quoted by Lawson, History of the Scottish Episcopal Church, p. 75. 
* Hooker, E. P. book i. ch. xiv. vol. i. p. 336 (ed. Keble). 
t " The words Person, or Trinity, or Trinity in Unity, are not 
there ; o/toooo-toy, or consubstantial, as the Arians objected, are not 
there to be found ; nor is BzavOpw-xos in all the Greek Testaments ; 
nor is it any where expressly, or in terms therein taught, that Jesus 
Christ is very God and very man in one and the same Person. 
A The like is to be said of the Deity of the Holy Ghost, Who, as the 
%: Unitarians object, is not once expressly called God in all the Scrip- 
tures of the New Testament^The same may be said of the doctrine 
of satisfaction, which is there, though not under that name; and 
also of infant-baptism ; the religious observation of the first day of 
the week, by Christian's called the Lord's day ; and of the Polity or 
Government of the Church by Bishops superior to and distinct from 
Presbyters, which yet was the form of government in all churches 
and ages for almost 1600 years after the time of the Apostles, though 
it is not in express words mentioned or described in Holy Scripture." 
Hickes, Christian Priesthood Asserted, ch. i 3. And this argu- 
ment was used almost from the first. T<3 TO-I-I TOV cravpov, says 

St. Basil, TOVS ELS TO OVOpa TOV KuplO'J ttyKOV 'iT]ITOV XptGTOU J/XTTlKOraj K'JLTU- 

<7jjjnaii'Eo-(?ai. TIS o iSia. yj)d ( ui.iaraf diSti&is ; TO TTJJBJ duaro^as rETp'ttliOai Kara. TIJV 
TTOIOV f^iSf iSiSa^K ypfyfia ; ra rijj E;nvXi7<rEa>j fiiijiara Effi r'j d'-'a- 



INTRODUCTION. 19 

suffice to show that if we are to accept no teaching but such 
as lies on the surface, as it were, of the written word, we 
have received too much. We must in that case, if it may 
be said, review our Creeds. If we may reject what is 
obscure, the Church has believed much that is needless ; if 
we may. despise " dark sayings," the Spirit has spoken in 
vain. And this is our first answer to the objection it would 
not only destroy the Discipline, bnt make void the Faith of 
the Church.* 

(2.) But further ; the objection under notice is fatal not 
only to the Catholic, but to any system whatever. For, to bor- 
row the reasoning of a modern writer, " if nothing is to be 
esteemed of any moment, but counted as a mere trifle and 
nicety among Christians, which is not expressly required in 
the Scriptures ; then it is a trifle and nicety, whether we 
believe the Scripture to be a standing rule of faith in all 
ages, whether we use the Sacraments in all ages, whether 
we have any clergy at all, whether we observe the Lord's 
day, whether we baptize our children, or whether we go to 
public worship ; for none of these things are expressly re- 
quired in so many words in Scripture. May I reject," asks 
the same acute reasoner, " may I reject the uninterrupted 
succession, because it is not mentioned in Scripture ? and 
may I not as well reject all the Gospels ? Produce your 
authority, mention your texts of Scripture, where Christ 
has hiing the salvation of men upon their believing that St. 
Matthew or St John wrote such a book seventeen hundred 



<5si|Ei rou uprou Tjj efyapurrias Kai ryv TTOTIJJIOO rrfr EuAoytaj, TJJ r&v 
eyypd'iuj ripTv Kara\^oi-Ev ; S. Basil. De Spiritu Sancto, cap. xxvii. 
torn. ii. p. 351. Cf. Tertullian. De Corona, pp. 121, 2 ; and Aug. 
De JBaptismo, lib. ii. cap. vii. and lib. iv. cap. vi. 

* " Praeterea si Scripturae tarn apertse sunt, qualiter erravit Arius, 
Macedonius, Nestorius ? prsecipue cum hi omnes ex Scriptura per- 
peram intellecta sui erroris occasionem sumpserunt ? Quod si in 
Scripturarum intelligentia isti erraverunt, indeque haereses suscita- 
verunt, qui fit ut vulgus indocturn non etiam erret ?" Then, chang- 
ing his position, and admitting, for the sake of argument, that even 
great saints as Cyprian, Austin, or Ambrose have erred in their 
interpretation of Scripture, this writer asks, " Si ergo isti doctissimi 
viri, post diuturnam in sacris literis exercitationem, post longam. 
meditationem, post orationem ferventem atque prolixam, decepti 
sunt illo teste, qualiter eis Scripturas dicet esse clarissimas in quibua 
tot talesque viri post longam attentamque earum inspectionem de- 
cepti sunt ?" Alfons. De Castro, Adv. Hares, lib. i. cap. iii. De 
causis externis unde Jusrescs oriuntur. 



20 INTRODUCTION. 

| years ago." The Bible, it seems, if we act upon this ob- 
jection, must be given up ; and next, of course, the Sacra- 
ments. For where, as the same writer continues, "shall 
we find it in Scripture that the Sacraments are to be con- 
tinued in every age of the Church 1 ?" And when these are 
gone, the Clergy must follow next. " If no government or 
order of the Clergy is to be held necessary, because no such 
necessity is asserted in Scripture, it is certain that this 
concludes as strong against government and the order itself 
as against any particular order. For if it be plain that there 
need be no Episcopal clergy, because it is not said there 
shall always be Episcopal clergy, it is undeniably plain that 
there need be no order of the clergy, since it is nowhere 
said that there shall be an order of the clergy."* 

(3.) The arguments employed thus far are founded on 
the consequences of the supposed objection, which we already 
perceive to be fatal to many of the primary articles of our 
religion : let it be observed next, with whom we must assi- 
milate ourselves, if we will urge it. And first, see how 
nearly akin this clamour for plain directions of Scripture is 
to the reasonings of the heathen about our Lord's resur- 
rection : " He did not show himself plainly enough," they 
said, " nor in the right way ! "t " How long dost thou 
make us to doubt T said the Jews ; " if thou be the Christ, 
tell us plainly"^. The Saddjacees too, in their controversy 
with the Pharisees, were wtmt to say, that " unless they 
could bring clear texts, that should affirm totidem verbis what 
they denied, they would not yield." 

Again, what is this demand this insisting upon plain 

* Law's Second Letter to Bp. Hoadley, Postcript, p. 133 (1835). 
" Some, indeed, there are that will not be satisfied with this. They 
tell us, that it is not sufficient that a thing be not forbidden, but that 

it must be commanded But if this opinion be true, I must 

confess that then it is unlawful to hold communion, not only with 
ours, but with, any Church that is or ever was in the world ;" be- 
cause no class of religionists whatever can show any such express 
authority for all which they believe or practise. See Bp. Grove's 
Persuasive to Communion, p. 14 (1681). 

t 'E^pfj", e'iirep ovrws in^viii Btiav dvvaptv riOe^EV, avrois ToTs iirrjpsdtraai 

KOL TOI Ka.TaiiK&<sa.vTi KO.\ 6'Auj ttatnv d^Qrjvat. Vide Origen. Contra Cel- 
sum, lib. ii. p. 101, where Origen assigns the reason of our Lord's 
reserve. 

$ S. John x. 24. 

Vide Bp. Sanderson, Sermon ii. (Fulford's edition.) 



INTRODUCTION. -5 1 

Scripture teaching but that of the worst and boldest here- 
tics ; as the Pneumatoraachi, whose challenge it was to 
" show the Scripture which makes mention of the Holy 
Ghost" Whom these blasphemers feared not to call " the 
unwritten God ;"* or the Eunomians, and others, who could 
say, " There is no Scripture-proof that Christ is God?"t 
And then these unhappy men would quote such passages as 
the following to prove, as they hoped, the inferiority of the 
Son : " My God and your God ;" that He could " do no- 
thing of Himself." " My Father is greater than I:" that 
He " slept," " awoke," " ate," " drank," was " weary," 
" wept."| His own words,. " I and My Father are One," 

* TloBsv r,[iiiv iireurdyeis %ei>3V Qsov Kal tiyna-^ov ; Vid. S. Greg. NaZ. 
Orat. xxxvii. De Spiritu Sancto, tom. i. p. 593 : and again, 'i is rpo- 
o-sia v 7<T Tto TrwuftuTi / .... tTov yiyoHirmi ; Ibid. p. 599. S. Gregory 
replies by " collecting" to use Hooker's phrase the doctrine out 
of Scripture; Ibid. p. 609. Cassiodorus uses his very word; " His 
beneficiis larga pietate collatis, oddita est nobis sanctas Trinitatis 
adorabilis et veneranda cognitio."- De Dimnis Lection, lib. i. cap. 
xvi. S. Basil uses the same method, De Spiritu Sancto, cap. x. tom. 
ii. p. 313, and cap. xxi. pp. 339, 40; which last chapter is occupied 
with the collection of such proofs. And S. Hilary, when about to 
refute Arius, says, " Maxime properamus ex propheticis atque e-can- 
gelicis preeconiis vesaniam eorum ignorantiamque confundere." De 
Trinitate, lib. i. p. 11. And, in a word, St. Austin, who notices the 
same argument of the Arian u Da, inquis, testimonia, ubi adoratur 
Spiritus Sanctus" Contra Maximin. Jlrian. Episc. lib. iii. cap. iii. 
tom. vi. p. 301 says, that " all who wrote before him on the doc- 
trine of the Trinity" drew their arguments from Scripture. De Tri- 
nitate, lib. i. cap. iv. tom. iii. p. 87. Scripture is seemingly obscure, 
yet, the Church interpreting, sufficient. Cf. S. Athanas. Contra, 
Arianps, Orat. i. tom. i. p. 237, and Orat. ii. p. 360, where this truth 
is stated. 

t Vide S. Greg. Naz. Orat. xxxv. tom. i. p. 574. This, too, was 
the language of the Apostate ; " Nclo, inquit, verba qutE nan scripta 
sunt dici." Vid. S. Hilarii Contra Constantium Jlugitstum, p. 329 ; 
and S. Cyril. Alex. Contra Julianvm, lib. x. tom. vi. p. 327 (ed. 
Auberti). " Ubinam, quaeso, est scriptum, Christum pracepisse, ut 
unusquisque inquirat, et norit, quatnam sit xera Ecclesia?" Faust. 
Socin. Tractat. de Eccles. p. 9 (Racov. 1611). The argument, there- 
fore, is as applicable in the one case as in the other, and has been 
used in either as occasion required. " Cur auteui (ita porrexit 
Vogelius), in tota Scriptura non datvr excmplum adorationis et cre- 
dendi in Sp. S. ?" Zeltner. Hist. Crypto- Socinianismi JUtorfini, cap. 
iii. 51, p. 644 ; Schroder answers, " You may find it in the Apostles' 
Creed;" &c. 

\ The Adrian takes one of these expressions, and reasons upon it 
thus : " He said, he could do nothing but what he saw the Father do ; 

o* 



INTRODUCTION. 

they willingly forgat, neither were suffered to know the 
Divine Mystery of " perfect God and perfect Man;"* and 
it was with such arguments as these that heretics impugned 
the divinity of Christ. They are evidently just such as 
schismatics employ against His Church. And how shall 
we marvel if some have learned that tJte Church is not in 
the Bible,t when others have discovered that the Holy Tri- 
nity is not there either 1 Is it strange that some should 
make a mock of the Bride, while others dishonour the 
Bridegroom? or that tJte same objection should prove the 
Church to be human which shows that Christ is not divine 1 

Enough has been said, perhaps, by way of illustrating 
the true nature of the principle in dispute. On one side are 
the Church and her best servants, as might be very fully 
shown, rejecting it ;t on the other, misbelievers of every 
shade defending it ; and between these two classes it is not 
difficult to make our choice. Other considerations might 
be offered in refutation of the shallow and irreligious as- 
sumption which has been noticed ; but there is no space 
for them here. Running counter to the analogy of God's 
dispensations, whether in His works or the. revelation of His 

and I had rather believe him speaking of himself, than what the 
Apostles may say for him." Vide S. Alhanas. Contra Jlrium Disput. 
in Niccno Concil. torn. i. p. 114. The same blasphemer, still resting 
his argument upon Scripture, asks, IL>uu' da-iv al ypu^ai al (pajnuvaai 
diSnv rdv vluv ; Ibid. p. 118. 

* Triv rov nvarriiLM duvajtiv KO.T' o'ufifva. Tfioiruv irvi'tKiS- S. Cyril- 
Alex. Jldv. Nestor. Jib. v. torn. vi. p. 126. 

t " In Scripturis didicimus Christum, in Scriptnris didicimus 
Ecclesiam : si Christum ipsum tenctis^ipsam Ecclesiam quarc non 
tenetis?" Aug. Ep. clxvi. torn. ii. p. 290. 

t Thus the great Christian philosopher. " We cannot argue," 
Bp. Butler says, " that this cannot be the sense or intent of such a 
passage, for, if it had, it would have been expressed more plainly, or 
have been represented under a more apt figure or hieroglyphic; yet 
we may justly argue thus with respect to common books. And the 
reason of this difference is very evident; that in Scripture we are 
not competent judges, as we are in common books, how plainly it 
were to have been expected what is the true sense should be expressed, 
or under how apt an image figured. The only question is, what 
appearance there is that this is the sense ? and scarce at all how 
much more determinately or accurately it might have been expressed 
or figured ?" Jlnalogy, part ii. ch. iii. ; with which compare the 
remarkable saying of St. Justin Martyr, quoted by Grabe, Spicilcg. 
torn. ii. p. 178. 



INTRODUCTION. 23 

will, and casting doubt upon all holy truths which are not 
delivered with such evidence as it approves, there are few, 
perhaps, of all the heresies which have distracted the Church 
from the beginning, which were not founded upon, or at 
least in some degree connected with, this very notion. It 
was necessary to speak of it here, because it presents itself 
as an obstacle in the very outset of the path through which 
the subject of these pages will lead us; because it takes for 
granted that the Government of the Church, being obscurely, 
or not expressly, taught, is of no importance. One remark 
only shall be added with reference to that characteristic of 
Holy Writ to which this wilful and disobedient spirit refuses 
to submit itself. 

It seems to be forgotten, then, that the writings of the 
New Testament were addressed to men who iad been in- 
structed " by word" long before they were taught by writing; 
who already possessed a testimony which we have not, the 
testimony of their eyes and ears ; who had heard Apostles 
preach and seen Apostles rule ; and whose minds the later 
instruction " with ink and pen" did but " stir up by way of 
remembrance" of that oral teaching, those " words spoken 
before," of which it was an express object of the written ad- 
monition to make them " mindful."* A hint which, in the 
naked letter, and with no expositor from without, conveys 
but little meaning to us, would .speak plainly enough to 
them; an allusion which is too obscure for our percep- 
tions, would flash like the supbeam upon their eyes: we 
must expect difficulties ; the; are our portion.t And so 
much, in brief, upon the notion adverted to. If the Disci- 
pline of the Church is unimportant because the Bible speaks 
obscurely of it, her Doctrioes are unimportant also. If Epis- 
copacy may be denied because it is not forced upon us, must 
not Christianity be rejected with it ?$ 

* 2 Thess. ii. 15, with 2 Pet. iii. 2 and 2 John 12. 

t As the wisest of oa' Fathers confessed, "In Sanctis Scripturia 
null to nesciam plura qu-im scio." Aug. Ep. cxix. Januario, torn. ii. 
p. 220. And again : " Sancta Scriptura . . . omnibus accessibilis, 
quumms paucissimis penetrabilis." Ep. iii. ad Volusianum, p. 7. 
"A-cp ravu dXt'yoi, savs another, and he supposed to have leaned too 

confidently to his c'wn wisdom, iJcr.vJiK-ao-t trvvtivai, nl iravra rov Piov iav- 
-tiv dvaOZvrcs, xa-a 'nv 'Ii7< i-vroArjv, r<3 cpcvvav ras yfxiQ&S ' Kal paXXoi/, r&5v 
$i\oGt>$r\<;avTuy 'EXXiji'wv wpl rti/of VO/U^O/JEV/JS en-wrij/ir;?. ava\r)^iv nxpj/cdtts 
/T;->t T>IV i.i*e.Ta.aiv 73 /JovXij/iaros rwi/ iep<3v ypapiia-<>>v. Origen. Contra Ccl- 
" 



sum, lib", vi. p/ 300. 

t " And Acre we cannot but take notice with what furious, in- 



24 INTRODUCTION. 

II. If it be admitted, then, that the " difficulties of Scrip- 
ture," as they have been called, may possibly constitute one 
portion of our trial, that it need not be so easy to find out 
God's will for ourselves, nor quite safe to reject any doctrine 
because it is not, as we think, " plainly" taught in His 
word, the way will be so far cleared for the considerations 
upon which we are presently to enter.* We shall not ven- 

consiflerate, malicious purposes some have pursued Episcopacy ; 
and rafter than have it stand, they'll fall themselves, deny what is 
otherwise their great delight, the divine right of presbytery, and 
take away all Church-power for ever with it. And, indeed, the . 
principles these men go upon are such, when to throw down Epis- 
copacy, thai they strike at once our whole Christianity with the same 
llow ; ... and there cannot be, under their guiding and conduct, 
any such thinj as either truth or heresie ; the one to be convincingly 
vindicated, or ttie other solidly confuted ; as might be easily made 
appear." Simoi, Lowth On Church Power, ch. iii. 11. On the 
true character and tendency of their principles, see the description 
of the views of Hoadley and his party by Jablonski, Institut. Hist. 
Christian, secul. xviii. 2. torn. i. p. 342. 

* There is, indeed, another objection, which gets rid of the 
whole subject of Chuich-Polity by regarding it as a "little matter, 
and intrinsically insignificant ; hut to so vain and presumptuous a 
notion a formal reply seems quite unnecessary. It is curious, how- 
ever, that it was noticed, 'ay implication, and censured, by a writer 
so early as Clemens Aleiandrinus ; vid. Stromat. lib. i. p. 278. 
St. Basil's saying is very staking : To val, /cat TO oS, irwXXa/Jai Siio dXX 

6'ficos TO (fparioTOj/ TOJV d-yadwv /) iXrj0i, /cat b eV^aro? 6'po? TJJS mvtjpias TU 
*l/v&os, Tots [iiKpoTs TOVTOIS p'?^ '' oAXa/ci ifi-tpii'xe.Tai. And presently ne 
adds, Et yap IK TOV i/D^oT) ;<3ra 'tv \ jtia nepaia o-a iraps^cvaETai, TTMS av {-ftTv 
do-cpaXes imepfiaiveiv nal TO. o-jxik-pdran j De Spiritu Sancto, cap. i. torn. n. 
pp. 292, 3. So St. ChrysOStom ; , . . 'AXXa xal ai>rd l>iv ow roCro Ian 
TJV irdvTcov ffltriov TUV KaKtSV) TO /trj KOI {nrep Ttav fiiK(i(Sv TOVTMV dyavaK-civ ' 
Sia. TOVTO T& /itova TUV ajiapTrifjLaTwv ifctiafi^Bev, STI TU EXdrrovn TJ/S 7rpo<r>7- 

KOVPJJS ov Tvyxavsi SiopGiaaeus. In Epist.ad Gal. torn. iii. p. 717. " Qui 
modica despicit," says St. Anselm, quoting Scripture, "paulatim 
decidit. Non debetis considerare qua-n parva sit res quam contra 
prohibitionem facitis, sed quantum malun\ sit inobedientia, quam pro 
parva re incurritis. Sola enim obedientia potuit hominem in para- 
diso retinere, unde per inobedientiam e]eetus est." Epist. Exhort. 
inter Opp. (Nuremberg. 1491). But St. Austin touches the root of 
the matter : " Non afferamus stateras dolosas," says he, " ubi appen- 
damus quod volnmus, et quomodo volumus, yro arbitrio nostro, di- 
centes, hoc grave, hoc leve est : sed afferamus divinam stateram de 
Scripturis sano.tis tanquam de thesauris Dominicis, et in ilia quid sit 
gravius appendamus, imo non appendamus, sed a Domino appensa 
potius recognoscamus." De Baptismo, lib. ii. cap. \\. torn. vii. p. 40. 
To which may be added the remarkable saying of a modern philo- 
sopher : " Quant a la distinction des points fondamentaux et non 
fondamentaux, M. Pelisson a raison encore de dire, que la moindre 



INTRODUCTION. 25 

ture to turn petulantly from the subject of Church-Govern- 
ment, on the plea that it is little noticed in Scripture, or 
only obscurely referred to ; for, even if this were true, we 
have seen that sacred doctrines, which we dare not reject, 
are no otherwise revealed to us therein. And if such rea- 
soning avail in one case, it will in another : if it defend 
schism, it will justify heresy ; if it be good for the separat- 
ist, it is good for the Socinian.* 

We might proceed, then, at once with our subject ; but 
since so much space has been given to the supposed a priori 
objection of the adversary, we must also, for our part, claim 
the benefit of certain antecedent probabilities, which deserve 
to be taken into account. 

( I .) And first, we need not fear to express too confi- 
dently our conviction, that God, who regulated, with mys- 
terious jealousy, every minute particular of worship for His 
people Israel and that expressly with reference to a future 
service would scarcely leave us Christians to find out a 
worship for ourselves.f The knowledge of what He cer- 
tainly did for " our fathers," to whom He was no otherwise 
revealed than as " a jealous God," would suggest far other 
thoughts. It would be natural to suspect that He would 
not leave us to frame laws for ourselves, who forbade them 
to devise even ceremonies; and that if. "for our admoni- 
tion" He smote Uzzah in death who did but touch the Ark, 
and the men of Bethshemesh " because they had looked 
into it,"f He would scarcely suffer us to build up or pull 
down, each according to his own fancy, the Church of which 
it was only a type. This supposition seems utterly extrav- 

erreur dans la Foi, accdmpagnee de rebellion, peut priver du salut." 
Leibnitz, De la Tolerance des Religions, p. 96. 

* Vide F. Socin. Tractat. de Eccles pp. 8, 9 : So that the Catholic 
Faith is maintained against the Socinian by a course of reasoning 
precisely analogous to that by which the Primitive Discipline is 
defended against the Presbyterian. See Edwards's Preser-catice 
against Socinianism, part iv. pp. 150 et seq. 

t " Nor is it likely that God, who appointed several orders and a/ 

Prelacy in the government of His Church among the Jewish Priests,! 

should abhor or forbid them among Christian Ministers, who havel 

as' much of the principles of schism and division as other men." I 

, EtV(T>v B(riXx-^, p. 144. 

i Vide Spelman, De non Temerandis Ecclesiis, cap. xiv. 

u Dies me deficiet si omnia Arcaj sacramenta cum Ecclesia 
componens edisseram." S. Hieron. Adv. Luciferianos, cap. viii. 



26 INTRODUCTION. 

agant and improbable, and may be dismissed at once.* 
But further : 

(2.) This system the Jewish has been, in its main fea- 
tures, superseded ; yet not, let it be carefully observed, with- 
out manifold prophecies of Holy Scripture speaking wonder- 
fully of some such System by which it should be followed. 
This new System is often symbolized under the form of " a 
Woman," and that Woman is said to be the " Bride"t of 
Christ. " Kings" and " queens" are to " bow down" before 
her, even " at the soles of her feet;" " no weapon that is 

tom. ii. p. 202. Cf. FirmiJian. ad S. Cyprian, ap. Routh. Opusc. 
Ecclesiast. torn. i. p. 232. 

* " Et sane nulla ratio permittit, ut distinctior fuerit hierarchia in 
Testamento Veteri quam in Novo, cum illud umbrae, istud imagini 
comparetur db JLpostolo." Bellarmin, De Clcricis, lib. i. cap. xiv ; 
Disput. torn. ii. p. 327. " Tota Judase terra," St. Jerome says, 
" tribuumque descriptio, futurse Ecclesiae in coelis typus est." Adv. 
Joninian. lib. ii. cap. xviii. " Nihil allegorizari potest," says St. 
Irenaeus, lib. v. cap. xxxv. ILzira cKtlva, writes another, -ru-ag fijtErepos. 
S. Greg. Nyssen. De Baptismo,tom.ii. p. 218. ". . . JVi/tzHegalium 
institutionum, nihil propheticarutn resedit figurarum, quod non totuui 
in Christi sacramenta transient. Noliscum est signaculum circumci- 
sionis, sanctificatio chrismatum, consecratio sacerdotum; nobiscum," 
&c. S. Leonis Mag. Serm. Ixii. torn. i. p. 279 : cf. Serm. Ixviii. pp. 
295, 6. " In the New Testament," says our own Dodwell, " the 
hypothesis that Christianity is nothing but a mystical Judaism is so 
confessed, as that reasonings are allowed from Jewish precedents to 
show what ought to be under Christianity, and that most of the 
reasonings in the N. T. for introducing things proper to the Christian 
religion are indeed of that kind." One Mltar, chap. ix. p. 231. Cf. 
Mede, Sermon on the Reverence of God's House, Works, b. ii. p. 342, 
where instances of this way of reasoning are collected from the 
Apostolic epistles. See also, on the Typical character of the earlier 
Dispensation, Davison On Prophecy, p. 134. Even the adversaries 
use this argument freely, when it happens to them to do so conve- 
niently. " Albeit such a number of Elders may be chosen in certaine 
congregations, that one part of them may relieve another for a 
reasonable space, as was among the Levitts under the law in serving 
of the Temple." 'The Second Book of (Scottish) Discipline, ch. vi. 
And the " reformed" divines of Ley den, in their celebrated " Cen- 
sure" in support of the Synod of Dort, complain that the Remonstrants, 
in their chapter on the Orders of the Ministry, " do not allege a single 
testimony from the Old Testament, quasi utriusque inter se hie nullam 
avn\o-/iav, proportionem, et convenient! am videantur agnoscere." 
Censur. in cap. xxi. 2GS. 

t Isaiah liv. 5. " Sponsus et sponsa, vel vir et uxor, Christus et 
Eoclesia dicuntur." Aug. Contra, Faust, lib. xxii. cap. xl. torn. vi. 
p. 171. 



INTRODUCTION. . 27 

formed against her shall prosper;" she shall be " fair as 
the moon, clear as the sun, terrible as an army with ban- 
ners." She is figured as " the City of the Lord," which 
" God will establish for ever;" we must " tell the towers 
thereof, mark well her bulwarks, and consider her palaces," 
not for. ourselves only, but that we " may tell it to the gene- 
ration following ;" and she is so far like the first Church as 
to be also called " a garden enclosed, a spring shut up, a 
fountain sealed." 

All these, with other words great and marvellous, are 
spoken of her before the coming of her Lord in the flesh. 
Afterwards new names are given her, and new honour. To 
her consecrated servants is now given power to bind and 
power to loose sins;* they are "the glory of Christ;' 3 
" ambassadors for Christ :" sent by Him " even so" as He 
by the Father ; and they are to be summoned to their high 
office by an ordinance which He had long since appointed 
" called of God, as was Aaron," the Jewish High Priest. 
Whosoever shall now " neglect to hear" her voice whose 
servants they are, shall be counted, by Christ's command, 
and that both " in heaven" and " on earth,"t " as an hea- 
then man and a publican." She is now openly styled " the 
Body of Christ ;"f she is of Him made " the pillar and 
ground of the Truth ;" nay, she is "the fulness of Him 
that filleth all in all,"j| the very mirror in which the hea- 
venly hosts are bid to discern " the manifold wisdom of God."^[ 

(3.) Here, then, beyond all controversy, is some great 
and divine System, having the properties of vast dominion, 
exclusive honours and privileges, and eternal endurance. 
Akin, in some respects at least, to the institution which 
it supersedes ; joined to Christ as a bride to her lawful hus- 
band ; and counted to be the very marvel of marvels before 
the Angels of God. We need not attempt accurately to 
combine and explain all this. Enough that somciohere uport 
the earth, if there be truth in the Sacred Scriptures, this 
wonderful System is still to be seen ; not dimly and darkly, 
like the faint outline of a distant shore, but a mighty fabric, 

* S. John xx. 23. t S. Matthew xviii. 17, 18. 

\ Ephes. i. 23, and iv. 12. 1 Tim. iii. 15. 

|| Ephes. i. 23. 

tf Ephes. iii. 10. For an account of the attributes of the Church, 
as set forth both in the Old and New Testament, see Leslie's Case of 
the Regale and Pontificate. 19. 



28 INTRODUCTION. 

with bulwarks, and towers, and palaces, kings serving in its 
courts, and queens worshipping in its streets ; a sight fear- 
ful and beautiful to look upon " fair as the moon, clear as 
the sun, terrible as an army with banners." So much being 
manifest and acknowledged on all hands, let us see how 
stands the case. 

(4.) We have, at this time, actually before our eyes, such 
a vast and uniform System ; co-extensive with the limits 
of universal Christendom ; ascribed by Saints and Martyrs to 
the institution of Christ or His Apostles ; never assailed by 
the voice of the disputer for fifteen consecutive ages ; not de- 
nied by any to be traceable to within forty years of St. John's 
death ;* proved to have been then existing in every known 
Church in the world ; without even a pretended record, of 
any subsequent date, professing to give account of its origin ; 
believed by the friends and companions of the Apostles, and 
their disciples, to be that System which the Prophets fore- 
told ; and received without question, by all men, in all times 
and places, as an integral part of Christianity. 

(5.) We have, moreover, the sure word of God that His 
Church, whatever it be, is built upon a Rock, so that the 
gates of Hell shall not prevail against it ; and we have His 
immutable promise that " the Spirit of Truth" should come, 
almost from the very hour in which He left her to herself, 
to " guide" her " into all truth."* 

(6.) Put this together. Some mighty System was foreor- 
dained to succeed one which had, confessedly, existed as its 
type : they were so far like to each other, that Apostles 
spoke of one being the "shadow" of the other ; the adher- 
ents of the former were invited to enter the latter as being 
identical with it ; its individual members were promised a 
positive conviction of the truth in proportion to their holi- 
ness ; its collective body to be infallibly guided by the Holy 
', Ghost; and from the lifetime of St. John there has existed 
'ja Body, for fifteen unbroken ages without even a pretended 
jrival, which professed in the Name of Christ, and was be- 
lieved by all His servants, to be that Divine System. 

(7.) And we are now asked by the adversary to believe 
that a System opposed to this, founded upon the supposition 
that it was a human device, a supplanting of some purer 
form which Apostles had set up, by men whom Apostles had 

* See Chap. II. 4. t S. John xvi. 13. 



INTRODUCTION. 29 

known and loved ; a stifling of the true Church in its infancy 
by men whose blood was shed in its defence, and a rebel- 
lion against the will of Christ by men who gave up all for 
His JN ame's sake ; that a System which assumes that the 
unfaltering tradition of all ages was a cheat, and the unani- 
mous testimony of all people a lie ;* that God's holy promise 
was broken, and the " Spirit of Truth" not sent; that Proph- 
ecy was unfulfilled, Martyrs mocked, and Saints deceived ; 
we are to believe that a System, the day and hour of whose 
birth we know, which was protested against from its first 
erection by almost the whole world, excused as a necessary 
evil by its own framers, and never set up in any land but by 
rebellion and bloodshed ;f which has fluctuated from the first 
in incessant variations, and having changed its form and 
fashion times unnumbered, is now, in every quarter of the 
globe, fading into universal apostacy;J we are bid to think 
that such a System was the true divine one, the original 
scheme of our Saviour and his first Apostles. 

There is such a presumption against the probability of 
this as, one may say, no evidence could surmount ; and it 
seems almost to savour of blasphemy to assert it as even re- 
motely possible. And at least, if we must go on to weigh the 
claims of this new rival, we shall look, upon the very prin- 
ciples of its supporters, for the plainest and most convincing 
testimony. It will be enough for our cause that Holy Scrip- 
ture should not expressly repudiate our System ; we need 
no positive proof of God's word in its favour, because its 
very existence in our own and its history in past times, being 
the fulfilment of many prophecies, is irrefragable Scripture 

* " O magnum crimen omnium gentium quas in semine Abrahae - 
benedicendas promisit Deus ! " Aug. Festo, Epist. clxvii. torn. ii. 
p. 291. 

t " It is particularly remarkable of presbytery that it never came 
yet into any country upon the face of the earth tut by rebellion : 
that mark lies upon it." Leslie, Rehearsals, no. 161. "Begotten 
in rebellion," says Heylyn, " born in sedition, and nursed up by 
faction." History of the Presbyterians, p. 9. One of its features, 
as a system cemented by blood, was described by the Martyr King. 
"I. must show you, sirs," said he, on the scaffold, just before his 
death, " I must show you both how you are out of the way, and I 
will put you in the way. First, you are out of the way ; for cer- 
tainly all the way you ever had yet, as I could find by any thing, is 
in the way of conquest." Rushworth, Historical Collections, vol. vii. 
p. 1429. 

$ See Chap. V. 



30 



INTRODUCTION. 



proof. The adversary, on the contrary, must not only con- 
firm his scheme by distinct enforcement of Holy Writ, but 
account for the stupendous phenomenon before our eyes. We 
might even expect, upon his principles, some positive an- 
nouncement in the sacred volume that & false System should, 
without question of friend or foe, usurp for long ages the 
place of the true Church of God, and claim its just titles. 
We have but to show that the Bible recognizes, or does not 
in terms exclude us ; they, that it plainly asserts their views, 
and as plainly denies ours. It is ours to prove that Prophecy 
has been fulfilled ; theirs, to deny it :* ours to show that the 
Everlasting Church has never failed from the days of " our 
father Abraham;" theirs, that for the first fifteen ages of the 
Gospel, it was supplanted by a scheme of man: our faith is, 
that God has maintained His promises; their assertion, that 
He has broken them : we believe that the" Spirit of Truth" 
did come ; they, that He did not : we, that He guided the 
Church " into all truth ;" they, ^hat truth was discovered the 
other day. Lastly, if we be deceived, all who ever lived 
were in the same error ; if the Church Catholic be not the ap- 
pointed Ark of God, the One and Indivisible Body of Christ, 
then has His Church never existed, the declarations of the 
Bible are nugatory, the promises of God unmeaning, and the 
faith of man a dream. If, therefore, any weight is to be at- 
tached to a priori arguments, it will be admitted that the 
adversary occupies a very unfavourable position. 

Our case, then that we may state it again resting only 
upon the argument from Prophecy, . and antecedently to the 
consideration of evidence of any kind, is this : (1.) A great 
Ecclesiastical System, the Jewish, has existed, and passed 
away. (2.) A corresponding Institution was, however, fore- 
ordained to succeed it. (3.) Such a kindred System, giving 
manifold tokens of Divine origin, has actually existed for 
many ages, and (4.) was always believed to be the System. 
These points are admitted. It follows, then, that we are not 
about to search the Scriptures which is to be our next step 
in order to find whether they contain any Ecclesiastical 
System, and what ; our object is more definite. It is to dis- 
cover whether that System which is before our eyes, and to 

* " Vestrum enim est hsec ostendere, nam nobis sufficit ad causam 
nostram quod compleri prophetiam et Scripturas sanctas per orbem 
terraruin videmns." Aug. Honorato, Epist. clxi. torn. ii. p. 277. 



INTRODUCTION. 31 

which reference has been made, is recognized in their 
pages. Ours is not the lot of exiles, or wanderers, in search 
of a country ; we dwell at home, blessed be God ! and have 
a goodly heritage ; we have only to prove our claim to what 
we already possess. We have but to show that our holy 
forefathers were not all in error, nor the Church marred by 
her best, and wisest, and eldest-born children ; that God 
was graciously pleased to keep the promise which He vouch- 
safed to make ; and that they were, in fulfilment of that pro- 
mise, guided into all truth.* And at this point we turn to 
the Scriptures. 

* Which if we doubt or deny, " necesse est," says Vincentius, in 
one of the most striking passages of his treatise, " ut fides beatorum 
Patrum, aut tola, aut certe raagna ex parte, violetur : necesse est, ut 
omnes omnium sctatum fideles, omnessancti, oranes casti, continentes, 
virgines, omnes Clerici, Levitse et Sacerdotes, tanta Confessorum 
miiiia, tanti Martyrum exeroitus, tanta urbiuru, tanta populorum 
celebritas et multitude, tot Tnsulae, Provincise, Reges, Gentes, Regna, 
Nationes, totus postremo jam pene terrarum orbis. per Catholicata 
fideni Christo Capiti innorporatus, tanto seculorum tractu ignorasse, 
errasse, blasphemasse, nescisse quid credcret, pronuncietur." Vincent. 
Lerinens. Commonit. 24. 



CHAPTER II. 

SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

CASE OF ST. JAMES. 

I. IF we refer to the first chapter of St. Paul's Epistle to 
the Galatians, we find that Apostle making mention of his 
first visit to Jerusalem. Having said that he " went up to 
Jerusalem to see Peter," he immediately adds, " but other 
of the Apostles saw I none, save James, the Lords brother." 
It is to this expression that I wish, in the first place, to call 
attention. 

That this St. James was not one of the Twelve Apostles 
is commonly asserted by the authorities, both ancient and 
modern.* And so much seems probable, both from the 
distinct enumeration of them, and from the mention made 
of him by St. Paul in his first Epistle to the Corinthians. 
Speaking, in the fifteenth chapter, of the various appear- 
ances of our Lord after His resurrection, he shows how 
He manifested Himself first to Cephas, then to the Twelve, 
then to the five hundred brethren, then to James, then to all 
the Apostles. So that here St. James is reckoned distinctly 
from the Twelve, and they from t'K'e rest of the Apostles. 
There were others, then, to whom that title, whatever it 

* See them quoted by Hammond, Dissert, iv. De Episcopat. 
cap. iii. 2; and Weisman, Histor. Ecdesiast. torn. i. pp. 52, 53. 
Salmasius affirms confidently that St. James was not one of the 
Twelve : "Certum est," he says, " npn fuisse unum ex duodecim." 
Walo-Messalin. De E2;iscopis et Presbyteris, p. 20 ; and again p. 47. 
Not, however, that our reasonings depend upon this, one way or the 
other ; for, as Thorndike observes, " Whosoever this James of Jeru- 
salem was, we find the Church of Jerusalem under his charge almost 
as soon as there was a Church there." Primitive Government of 
Churches, chap. ii. The point is considered at length by St. Jerome, 
In Epist. ad Gal, cap. i. torn. vi. p. 125. 



CASE OP ST. JAMES. 33 

implied, belonged, besides the Twelve. It becomes, there- 
fore, an interesting question, under what signification this 
sacred name was applied to St. James. But without limit- 
ing our inquiry to. this object, some particulars shall be 
added with reference to that holy person, which, in confirm- 
ing the general "argument, may serve to explain this also. 

In the first place, we find his name mentioned, in the 
second chapter of the Epistle to the Galations -which pas- 
sage refers to an exercise of authority before that of St. 
Peter, who yet was the " chief of the Apostles." This rela- 
tive position of their names we are sure was not accidental, 
and therefore not without meaning. Further ; he presided 
at that assembly recorded in the fifteenth chapter of the 
Acts, at which were present St. Peter and St. Paul, as well 
as other eminent disciples. They had met together to con- 
sider a very grave matter ; namely, whether the law of Moses 
should be imposed upon the Gentiles who were converted to 
Christianity. And we read that, " when there had been 
much disputing, Peter rose up," and delivered his opinion. 
Now we might well suppose that his opinion would have 
been decisive, and yet we find it otherwise ; for he was fol- 
lowed in the debate by St. James, who did not merely ex- 
press an opinion, as others had done, but, having summed 
up what had been said by St. Peter, gave in his own name 
final judgment, saying, "therefore I give sentence"* 

Now, how came it to pass that, in an assembly where 
were met together St. Peter and St. Paul, Barnabas, Silas, 
and others of like rank, James, who was not one of the 
Twelve, should speak with this authority, and venture to 
pronounce judgment, when they only gave advice? The 
narrative, it must be confessed, is altogether singular and 
unexpected. There is evidently something unexplained in 
the story itself; and we are naturally led to search for other 

* Acts xv. 19 : Stu yo> Kp'.va. " The decretory sentence was given 
by St. James, and not by Peter ; KP'IVW eya>, saith St. James, I judge ; 
that is, saith Chrysostom, /-ET' rf lixftuy Xtyai roro, / with authority 
say this : and this determination of the question was made by James, 
saith Chrysostom, CKSIVOS yiio i}j rf/v apviiv iyxex/sipiapivoS) because he 
had the- government (viz. of tV e Church of Jerusalem) committed to 
him." iSVhitby, in /oc. St. ijnr.ysostoin elsewhere says, " He was 
Bishop of the Church in Jerusalem, thereforehe speaks last." Hom.il. 
xxxiii. in. Act. Jlpost., quoted ,.-;y Lardner, History of the Writers of 
the JV. T. chap. xvi. Flerpoj jqpjjyopsr, says Hesychius, aAA' 'IiW?>s 
Photii Bilili num. 275. 



34 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

passages which may throw light upon it. With this ohject, 
let us go on to observe the issue of this remarkable council.* 

It was determined, then, at the suggestion of St. James, 
to send letters from Jerusalem, expressive of the opinion 
entertained upon the matter in dispute, and conveying in- 
struction and commandment to the Churches. Now these 
letters of mandate were sent by the hands of certain pres- 
byters of the Church at Jerusalem ; and we find St. Paul 
saying of these very messengers, that they came, not, as we 
might perhaps have anticipated, " from Jerusalem," nor 
" from the assembly " at which were present St. Peter and 
the rest, nor yet " from the Elders," but "from James ."t 

Again ; if we refer to the twenty-first chapter of the 
Acts, we read thus : " And when we were come to Jeru- 
salem, the brethren received us gladly, and the day following 
Paul went in with us unto James." Now, why " unto 
James ?" why not rather " to the Elders " of the, Church ? 
Already we have seen St. Paul affirming of certain priestly 
persons who went from Jerusalem, that they went "from 
James ;" and St. Luke writing of others who had gone to 
Jerusalem, that they came " to James." This is surely 
very remarkable : let us hear one more witness the " chief 
of the Apostles " himself. 

An Angel had said to St. Peter ,J as he slept at midnight 
" between two soldiers, bound with two chains, .... Gird 
thyself, and bind on thy sandals; and so he did. And he saith 
unto him, Cast thy garment about thee,and follow me. And 
he went out and followed him." The heavenly guide led on, 
and they passed through " the first and second ward, the 
iron gate that leadeth unto the city opening to them of his 
own accord. They passed on through one .street," and the 
Angel departed. St. Peter, having " considered the thing, 
came to the house of Mary the mother of John, where were 
many gathered together, praying." Being admitted, after 
long delay, to the presence of the " astonished " company, 
he tells them " how the Lord had brought him out of prison." 
He turns to venture once more this time without a visible 
guide through the dark and i^ilent city; but before he 

* Compare the accounts given of fit by P. Benedict, xiv. DC 
Synod. Di<Ecc.san. lib. i. cap. i. 5 ; and F. Buddeus, De Slatu Eccles. 
Christ, sub dpost, Prasfat., who agree in regarding it as a very critical 
event in the history of the Apostolip Church. ".,,-. 

t Gal.it. 12. ' ' $ Actsxii;8: 



CASE OF ST. JAMES. 35 

goes, he leaves with them, even at that solemn hour, one 
brief charge ; it is this " Go, show these things unto James, 
and to the brethren."* 

In the absence of any further notices than are supplied 
in the Sacred Record, it is plain that all this must be unin- 
telligible to us. There may have been, and no doubt there 
were, g'ood reasons why St. James should preside in an as- 
sembly of Apostles; why the emissaries of that assembly 
should be said to be sent from him ; why Christians visiting 
Jerusalem should go to him ; and why, even at midnight, 
and under the influence of a supernatural vision, St. Peter 
should not forget to mention his name and recognize his 
authority. I say, there must have been sufficient reasons 
for all this ; but they do not appear on the face of the In- 
spired History. Whatever they were, we at least are not 
informed. Now it should be observed that this ignorance is 
confined to ourselves. To those who lived twenty-five years 
after the time referred to, there was no difficulty in these 
allusions ; they knew perfectly well what they meant. . St. 
Peter's midnight release from prison by the Angel, and his 
remarkable mention of St. James, occurred about the year 
41 ; and in the year 66 another Apostle, writing an Epistle 
to the Church Catholic, begins thus : " Jude the servant of 
Jesus Christ, and brother of James." At that time, there- 
fore, James had been filling a station so eminent and was 
so universally known, that his name not only needed no ex- 
planation itself, but served, so to speak, as the passport for 
another. St. Jude evidently took it for granted that every 
body knew who " James " was.t '* 

* Acts xii. 17. And all which is implied in these passages seems 
to be confirmed by the inscription of his own Epistle. For " why 
does St. James direct his Epistle ' To the Twelve Tribes scattered 
abroad,' but only because he looked upon all those Christians who 
had been converted from Judaism, yet still thought it their duty to 
come to Jerusalem to worship, to be under his care as the Bishop of 
that place, to which they yearly resorted from the several countries 
through which they were dispersed?" Brett, Church Government, 
ch. iv. p. 56. 

t It is important to consider this, because it renders it highly 
improbable that the early Christians could have been mistaken as to 
the office which he filled. The fame of his personal dignity endured 
so long, that men boasted in after years that they had succeeded to 
" the See of St. James." And even when Jerusalem was trodden 
down by the idolater, and her very name and title changed, "^Elienscs 



36 



SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 



Now a man searching the Scriptures with an honest de- 
sire to find out his Lord's will in respect of the Government 
of His Church, would probably be much influenced by all 
this. Perhaps if he should couple with it the unbroken 
tradition, the unvarying faith and practice of that Church, 
in every place and every age to a meek and candid mind 
it might suffice to prove the institution of Episcopacy. It 
would not fail to be considered by a person of such a temper, 
that many high doctrines and solemn observances e. g. the 
Baptism of Infants, and keeping holy the first day of the 
week depend solely upon inferences which are gathered 
from passages less numerous, and perhaps less emphatic than 
these, and which are confirmed similarly by the interpreta- 
tion of the Primitive Church. We are proposing to search 
for the Divine will from the best evidence which we can have 
of it, possessing no antecedent knowledge how far it may 
be expressed clearly or otherwise. If that evidence be such 
as to make it only probable that the Episcopal form of 
Church-government was the form instituted by the Apostles, 
all who "love the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity" will 
humbly and thankfully embrace it.* So that, if no further 
indication of God's will in this matter had been vouchsafed 
to us than is conveyed in these scattered sentences, it could 
not have b'een either prudent or dutiful to act upon our own 
will. We should be conscious of inconsistency in doing 
so ; and this, in the exercise of religious duty, would be a 

Praesules se Jacobi Apostoli sedem occupare jactabant." Le Quien, 
Oriens Christianus, torn. iii. p. 109. " He was a man of such sanctity 
and reputation with the people," says St. Jerome, " ut fimbriam 
vestimenti ejus certatim cuperent attingere." Ad Gal. cap. i. ; and 
the same Father notices elsewhere (Adv. Jovinian. lib. i. cap. xxiv. 
torn. ii. p. 157), that even Josephus attributed the destruction of 
Jerusalem to the judgment of God upon his murderers. St. Anastasius 
Sinaita also remarks (De S. Synaxi) that the Jewish writers take pains 
to record his last words. Was it possible that the next generation 
could be in any doubt whether he was Bishop of Jerusalem or not ? 
Cf. Origen. Contra Celsum, lib. \. p. 35. 

* " For to us," as Bishop Butler observes, "probability is the very 
guide of life. If, then, in questions of difficulty, . . . the result of 
examination be, that there appears, on the whole, any the lowest 
presumption on one side, and none on the other, or a greater pre- 
sumption on one side, though in the lowest degree greater ; this 
determines the question even in matters of speculation, and in mat- 
ters of practice will lay us under an 1 absolute and formal obligation." 
Analogy, Introd. ; 



CASE OF ST. JAMBS. 37 

grave offence. But, in point of fact, God has not left us 
without further testimony, which we may now proceed thank- 
fully to examine. 

What we have seen thus far in the Divine Scriptures may 
amount only to bare probability, yet it is weighty enough to 
suggest two important considerations. For, first, it plainly 
refuses to sanction, and is inexplicable upon, any of the 
modern theories of ecclesiastical discipline; whereas, sec- 
ondly, it not only does not contravene, but tends in a re- 
markable way to .confirm the ancient polity. So much 
seems undeniable ; and it is of no inconsiderable force. But 
if a man be not quite convinced, he might be supposed to 
say to himself at this point of our argument, " St. Paul de- 
sired the Churches to ' hold the traditions which they had 
been taught by word as well as by his epistles ;' and seems 
to intimate that they must do so, if they hoped to ' stand fast.'* 
Those traditions, whatever they were, we must be bound to 
hold as well as they, unless Christians have different obli- 
gations at different ages. And perhaps they might include 
some notice of this very point, and explain, which the Bible 
does not,t the true meaning of these allusions to St. James. 
At any rate it must be lawful to covet the knowledge of 
truths, whether great or small, which an Apostle commanded 
our forefathers to hold.J Without that knowledge these pas- 
sages of Holy Scripture, not to mention others, must remain 
for ever unexplained, which can hardly be the will of God. 
And it will be no mark of disrespect for His word, to search 
for aids towards its better understanding. Would, then, that 
some who lived at the time of the Apostles, or knew from 
others what they taught, had left some writings by which I 
might find how to decide for myself in this matter !" 

This sort of language, 1 say, would be very likely to be 
used by an earnest and humble-minded person, resolved, if 

* 2 Thess. ii. 15. " Unde patet, quod multa in Ecclesia non 
scripta sunt ab Apostolis docta, et ideo servanda." S. Thomas 
Aquinas, in loc. 

t " Quod totum provisum divinitus esse non dubito, ad edoman- 
dam labore superbiam, et intellectum a fastidio renovandum, cni facile 
investigata plerunque vilescunt.' Aug. De Doctrina Christiana, lib. 
ii. cap. vi. 

$ Why should we not be able to make the same boast as our 
Fathers ? llotov, airl ;u, TUV dirouToXixtSv IvraX/idrtJi' "ft ftiicpdv ft piya Kpos 

/m.Sv oii TsrripriTai ; S.Cyril. Alex. Contra Julian, lib. x. torn. vi. p. 
327. 

3 



38 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

possible, to obey " a jealous God" in all things. And to 
such a man we should have to give the glad intelligence, 
that it has pleased God to preserve to our times the writings 
of men who lived with the Apostles, and were taught by them 
or their disciples, and who not only knew but practised too 
all those " traditions," the observance of which St. Paul so 
emphatically enjoins. To those writings, the repository of 
Apostolical Tradition, we will now accompany our supposed 
inquirer. Others may fear to listen to such teaching, lest 
they hear truths which they have purposed not to receive, 
and shrink from words which might put to shame the fancies 
they are resolved not to abandon. With such persons we 
have no sympathy. We have formed no nations of our own, 
which ye are determined to maintain at all hazards. We 
are looking for Truth; and why should we be afraid to find 
what we profess to be searching for?* We know that St. 
Timothy was to teach in his generation what St. Paul had 
taught before him, and that he was to appoint others who 
should perpetuate that teaching.t We will receive it, there- 
fore, most gladly, most thankfully ; both because we have an 
hearty desire to profit by it, and because to reject it would be 
all one with rejecting St. Paul's commandment that is, God's 
word. And when the adversary, compelled by his unhappy 
position to fear and shun these early teachers, would rebuke 
us, as though, in listening to them, we preferred the witness 
of men to the witness of God, we impute such words to the 
necessity of his case, and so pass them by. It is because 
we love and honour God's word that we will not endure his 
private and arbitrary interpretation of it ; and for this very 
cause we ask help from our holy Fathers, and refer to them 
for all which they can tell us ; not for their opinions, val- 
uable as these must be, but for their testimony ; not for what 
they thought would be right, but what they knew the Apos- 
tles had said to be so. And' this we are now about to do 
in the case before us. 

The first witness cited shall be the Apostolic Papias, Ac- 
quainted with many who had looked upon the Incarnate 

* Like that insincere inquirer spoken of by St. Cyril, 

SeStws (in apa rl TWV tis opdu-rriTa )} d\f,Geiav, 5j TTS^POVJIKUIS 7j Afyeoj/, aXto. 
AAv. Nestor, lib. v. p. 326. Ei qoftticQt rr.v jr/uo-ir, says St. Athanasius, 

ri aTitivraTS ', etiet yap TI p) \8zTv, 5) i\G6vras [<>i <btvyiv. Jtd Solit. 

agentes Epist. torn. i. p. 819. 
' i 2 Tim. ii. 2. 



CASE OF ST. JAMES. 39 

Saviour, familiar with the friends of Apostles, and the dis- 
ciple, us it seems, of St. John himself, this ancient Father 
was likely to know more of St. James than we can do at the 
distance of almost eighteen centuries. His lightest word 
will outweigh all the wild assertions of men who speak only 
from conjecture and their own rude fancies. One sentence 
is all which we need to quote from him in this place. He 
is enumerating the various persons mentioned in the Holy 
Gospels under the name of Mary. Having spoken first of 
the Blessed Virgin, he notices next the wife of Cleophas or 
Alpheus, and describes her thus : " who was the mother of 
James, the Bis7iop and Apostle."* We can hardly be sur- 
prised at the intelligence conveyed in this expression, nor 
deny that it accords exactly with what we read in the Acts 
and Epistles. 

Let Ignatius, more ancient still, also the honoured friend 
of Apostles, speak next. Having occasion to make mention 
of the proto-martyr, St. Stephen, he calls him " the Deacon 
of James ."f Now let us hear Hegesippus, who wrote only 
fifty-eight years after the death of the Apostle John. He is 
the earliest ecclesiastical historian of whom we have any ac- 
count, and composed a work in five books, a very small por- 
tion of which has been preserved to our times, though it is 
referred to by an author of the third century . Speaking, in 
his history, of the death of St. James, he says, " James, the 
Lord's brother, -who was surnamed of all men the Just, un- 
dertook, together with the Apostles, the government of the 
Church at Jerusalem."^ Here we have the testimony of an 
historian, writing upon facts of which he was intimately cog- 
nisant. Symeon, the brother of James, and his successor in 
the see of Jerusalem, died in possession of that dignity sev- 
eral years after the death of St. John, and therefore after the 
birth of Hegesippus. And this circumstance alone renders 
it plainly impossible that Hegesippus could either have been 

* " Maria deopbae sive Alphei uxor, quae fuit mater Jacobi 
Episcopi et Apostoli." Papire Fragment, ap. Grabii Spieileg. torn, 
ii. p. 34. 

t Epist. ad Trail., quoted by Hammond, Dissert, ii. cap. ii. 3. 

t Vide Hieron. Catal. Script, and Euseb. Hist. Ecc. iv. 22. 

AiflJf^srat J Ttiir ixK\riGia.v y.sTa Ttov aTrooroAaii' o aJsX^ds TITO Kiipfnu 
'IiJKfi>/?, a uvuyairBels vtrd &VTWV Auwoj. Hegesip. De Marie S'. Jacoli, 
ap. Routh. Reliq. Sat. torn. i. p. 192. I have given Lardner's ren- 
dering ; but vide Petavii DC Ecclesiast. Hierarch. lib. i. cap. ix. 
11, 12- 



40 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

deceived himself, or have succeeded, even upon the injuri- 
ous supposition that he might have attempted it, in deceiving 
others. 

About thirty years later lived St. Clement of Alexandria, 
who was known to have been instructed by " the most primi- 
tive Elders,"* and was perhaps the most eminent Christian 
of his age. He has these words in reference to our subject : 
" Peter, and James, and John, after the Resurrection of the 
Saviour, although they were honoured of the Lord, did not 
contend for the dignity themselves, but made James, the Just, 
Bishop of Jerusalem . ' ' t 

Hear next St. Jerome, one distinguished even among 
Saints; himself, like Clement, only a Presbyter; and who 
thus writes : " Immediately after the Passion of the Lord, 
James was ordained by the Apostles Bishop of Jerusalem"^. 

Turn now to the testimony of St. Cyril. He was himself 
Bishop of Jerusalem, A. D. 349; and in a public discourse, 
delivered in the holy city itself, spoke as follows : " The care 
of these matters has not fallen upon me alone, but upon the 
Apostles, and upon James, toko, was Bishop of this Church:" 
and elsewhere he calls him, " James, thejirst Bishop of this 
Diocese"^ 

We have heard now witnesses from Europe, Asia, and 
Africa : it seems superfluous to add any thing to their testi- 
mony. That which is derived from the historians is of 
course founded upon their words. Thus Photius and he 
had the use of documents long since perished tells us that 
" James received the sacred unction and the government of 
Jerusalem at the Lord's hand."[\ And Nicephorus says, 

* Euseb. H. E. vi. 14. 

t Tiirpov 0Jjri Kal 'lavco.Soi' KOI 'luwi/qp ficra TJV dva\inl>i TOV 2&>r;pOf, 
US air KOL viro TOV Ktipfou irporsri^jjjiti/otis, pi e7ri(5i(cafT0ai S6*ris, A\\a 'lavw/Jnv, 
TOV Au'atoj/, eirta'KOTrov T<~tv 'l<)'i<roXi)ji&>i' k\scQai. Clem. Hypotyp. lib. vi., 
quoted by Binghatn, Jlntiq. Ec.c. torn. i. p. 62. ed. Grischov. 

+ " Post passionem Domini statim ab Apostolis Hierosolymorum 
Episcopus ordinatus." Hievon. Catal. Script., and vide Adv. Jovi- 
nian. lib. i. cap. xxiv. Cf. Aug. Contra Literas Petiliani, lib. ii. 
cap. li. 

Ilept yap TOVTUV oiix ejtoi fiuvov } dXX J\Sr] KOI TO?S osr'oirrdXoif, Kal 'lajcw- 
/?fd, T<O Tavrri; rrjs exii^rjiria.; TI<T<><J-'O, airovSri ylyovt. S. Cyrill. Ctt.te.ch. iv. 
CTiEiTO. uJ>Or) -la tatVTOv plv dJtX^ai 'laKu/3a> } eTTiaKomi t rpairw rrjs irapotKtuf 
ralri7f. Catech. siv. 

I] 'laKu,8os o irptSros dp^tepiuv, KOI SES-OTIXJI %jpi ra ispuv ypiT^ta KOI T>JV 
iifiopziav 'lp9o-oXii//wi/ Xa^iav, Trpoeor/ivfft . . . K.r.X. Photii Epist. CXvii. 
Theodorio Monacho, p. 158. ed. Montacut. 



CASE OF ST. JAMES. 41 

" James was Jirst appointed by the Saviour Clirist to the ! 
Church at Jerusalem."* And lastly, that we may bring 
these proofs to an end, Eusebius, an earlier historian, has 
recorded, not only that " James Jirst received the Bishopric 
of the Church of Jerusalem," but that the very throne in 
which the blessed Prelate sat had been preserved to his 
day, and was then openly exhibited to all the faithful as 
a sacred relic of the Apostolic age.f 

The fact being thus testified by witnesses so various and 
so competent and many more might be adduced^ little 
seems to be needed in the way of comment. The recogni- 
tion in Holy Scripture of the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy is all, 
as has been said, which our case requires ; and there is evi- 
dently much more than a bare recognition here. The ex- 
pressions in the Bible which, to say the least, indicate that 
St. James was head of the Church at Jerusalem ; and the 
testimony of holy men, who positively affirm, some of them 
from a personal knowledge of the fact, that he was actually 
ordained Bishop of that See by the Apostles ; these are in 
exact accordance with each other. And even if men should 
venture to reject both, they have still to encounter a new 
proof, more inflexible than either; namely, that which is 
supplied by the succession of Bishops continued downwards 
from St. James himself, and certified to us upon evidence 
as conclusive as that which we possess of any historical fact 
whatsoever.^ It is unnecessary, then, to say more here of 



* Tiji> 'IrpairoXufjoji/ Ev^XijTtai/ 'lavcj/Jof jrpwros TTIIPOL rot? Sairfjpos XptaroS 
syxsYcipiaTai. Nicepb. Hist. lib. ii. cap. xxxviii. ap. Morin. De Sac. 
Ordinal, par. iii. p. 38. 

t H. E. vii. 19 : while another writer has even preserved the 
memorial of an article of his episcopal attire ; see St. Epiphan. 
Hares. 78. 6 ,7* 71* M <'<?>' ; 'Y> 

t For, as Archbishop Whitgift observes, " the same thing do all ' 
ecclesiastical histories and wryters that make any mention of this j 
matter affirme of him." Defense of Answere to the Admonition, p. ' 
384. " It is not to be doubted," says another, "but that James his 
being Bishop of Jerusalem was a thing as notorious, and as certainly; 
knowne among Christians in those times, as there is no doubt made 
among us now, that Dr. Cranmer was Archbishop of Canterbury in 
King Henry the Eighth's time." Bishop Downame, Def. of Serm. 
book iv. ch. iii. Even the adversaries admit what they cannot 
successfully deny. " Cum magno consensu veteres tradunt, eo 
tempore Jacobum quemdarn ut Episcopum Ecclesiae Hierosolymitana? 
praefuisse." Buddeus, De Statu Eccles. Christ, sub jlpost.cap. iv. 3. 

The first fifteen Bishops of Jerusalem appear to have 



42 



SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 



the case of St. James. We profess to be searching after 
truth ; it will surely be an evil wilfulness to reject it when 
found.* 

CASE OF SAINT TIMOTHY. 

II. The next case to which I would direct attention is 
that of St. Timothy. That a certain jurisdiction was as- 

without exception Jews. In the year 135 the Church at ^Elia was 
composed entirely of Gentiles; and then Mark, the first Gentile 
Bishop, was elected. Since that time the line has continued unbroken, 
and is traced by Le Q-uien through 124 Bishops down to Milatheus, 
A D. 1733; De Patriarchate, Hierosolymitano, Oricns Christian/us, 
torn. iii. p. 106. St. Epiphanius (Hares. 66, torn. i. pp. 636, 7) gives 
the catalogue of the Bishops of Jerusalem, together with that of the 
Emperors, down to Hymenaeus, the 37th, in the time of Aurelian. 
Eusebius continues it to Macarius, the 39th. 

* This the adversaries do not venture to do openly. " From the 
Acts and St. Paul's Epistles," says one of the most learned among 
them, " we can perceive that after our Lord's ascension he (St. James) 
was of note among the Apostles. Soon after St. Stephen's death, in 
the year 36, or thereabouts, he seems to have been appointed Presi- 
dent or Superintendent (!) in the Church of Jerusalem, where, and 
in Judea, he resided the remaining part of his life. Accordingly he 
presided at the Council of Jerusalem." Lardner, Hist, of Writers of 
JV. T. ch. xvii. This notion of the holy Apostle being turned into a 
congregational " superintendent," is characteristic of the sect to which 
Lardner belonged. But they are not all so disingenuous. The 
famous Peter Du Moulin honestly confessed to Bishop Andrevves, that 
he believed St. James to have been Bishop of Jerusalem ; " Aerium 
damnavi ; ipsum Jacobum dixi fuisse Episcopum Icrosolymitanum ; 
a quo longa" serie deducta est Episcoporum ejusdem urbis successio." 
Petri Molinsei Epist. 3 tj a, ap. Andrewes, Opuscul. p. 184 (1629). 
" Luke describes James," says Martin Bucer, " as Prelate of the 
whole Church, and of all the Presbyters;" and he truly adds, " Talis 
ordinatio in aliis quoque Ecclesiis perpetuo observata est, quantum ex 
omnibus historiis ecclesiasticis cognoscere possumus ; etiam apud 
Patres antiquissimos, ut Tertullianum, Cyprianum, Ireuseum," &c. 
De Animarum. Cura, Opp. p. 280, ed. Basil. 1577. Calvin, as might 
be expected, is less candid, and tries to get rid of the case, though 
! he elsewhere contradicts himself, by saying, " I deny not that he 
i was Preefect of the Church of Jerusalem." In Preefat. ad Jacobi 
Epist. His successor, John Diodati, more openly calls him by his 
right name, " Bishop of Jerusalem ;" Argument, in Ep. S. Jacobi. 
Basnage styles him, " HierosolymitanaB Ecclesia? PrtEses ;" Ex- 
ercitat. Histor. Critic. Ann. 44. p. 506. Even Salmasius con- 
fesses that he " presided ^o^th superior authority over the assembly 
of Presbyters ; co3tui Presbyterorum . . . cum auctoritate majore 
prseesset." De Episc. et Presb. cap. i. p. 46. Francis Buddeus 
frankly concedes, " Hunc ipsum Jacobum Episcopum quoque fuisse 



CASE OF SAINT TIMOTHY. 43 

signed to him also, we know; and we would ascertain its 
nature and extent. With this object let us refer, as before, 
to the sure guidance of Holy Writ. 

( I .) And first, he was ordained to his office, whatever 
that may have been, by St. Paul himself. " Stir up the gift 
of God," that Apostle says, " which is in thee by the putting 
on of my hands"* Also this " Laying on of hands," 
which, in our days, is seen to share the fate of other high 
truths, was from the beginning included amongst the funda- 
mental "principles" of the Doctrine of Christ. In a state- 
ment of certain essential Catholic verities which constitute 
what St. Paul calls " the foundation" of Christian Doctrine, 
this occupies a place. " Repentance," " Faith," " Bap- 
tism," " Resurrection," and " Eternal Judgment" these 
are the doctrines with which the " Laying on of hands" is 
classed by the Holy Spirit.f And it is of this " Laying on 
of hands" that some men, in our days, fear not to speak 
lightly. 

(2.) " The gift," which St. Timothy had received was 
imparted by such an imposition ; and the sacred hands which 
touched his head, in order to its communication, were those 
of an Apostle. " Stir up the gift of God, which is in thee by 
the laying on of my hands." And now what authority had 

Hierosolymitanum." De Stat. Ecc. cap. iv. 3. p. 230 ; and see 
Benzelii Dissert, torn. i. p. 545, and the note. (Helmstad.) Many 
others might be added, whose unwilling admissions are for the most 
part of that kind noticed by the learned Jesuit Petavius : " Episcopum 
fuisse Jacobum partim perfracte negat Salmasius, partim titubanter 
ac timide fatetur, neque constat sibi." De Ecc. Hierarch. torn. iv. lib. 
i. cap. viii. 1. 

* 2 Tim. i. 6; and whereas St. Paul speaks elsewhere (1 Tim. iv.' 
14) of" the laying on of the hands of the presbytery ;" even Calvini 
acknowledges without reserve, that the expression refers not to pres-l 
byters at all, but to the .order to which Timothy was then appointed. I 
" Quod in altera epistola de impositione manuum presbyterii dicitur,? 
non ita accipio quasi Paulus de seniorum collegia loquatur ; sed hoc 
nomine ordinationem ipsam intelligo : quasi diceret, Fac ut gratia; 
quam per manuum impositionem recepisti, quum te Presbyterum 
crearem, non sit irrita." Calvin. Institut. lib. iv. cap. iii. 16. And 
this opinion of Calvin's Grotius applauds and embraces, saying, " ut 
TrosvpvTipiw qfficii sit nomen non ccetus admodum probabiliter sentit 
magnus ille Calvinus." Ordin. Holland, et WestfrisicR Piet. p. 98. 
" Presbyterium est ordo," says a very different writer, " qui manuum 
impositione confertur ad conficienda et dispensanda Sacramenta,"' 
&e. Pet. De Marca, De Concord. Sac. et Imp. lib. ii. cap. xiii. torn, 
i. p. 280. t Heb. vi. 1, 2. 



44 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

been committed to him 1 The following particulars seem to 
have been included in it. 

(3.) First, he was to "charge some that they teach no 
other doctrine "* but that which he had received. Observe, 
not only the people, but their pastors, their " teachers," were 
under his authority ; these also he was to admonish, which 
surely it were idle to do, if he possessed not the power to 
restrain them. St. Paul would hardly bid him assume a 
supremacy where all were of equal rank, or assert a superi- 
ority which none were to recognise. He possessed, there- 
fore, the powers which he was instructed to use ; and both 
priest and people knew that he possessed them.t 

Again, -he was to "command "$ ^with little efficacy, we 
must suppose, unless he could compel obedience. He was 
to " teach ;" and not only so, but to empower others to do 
the like : " The same commit tkou to faithful men, who shall 
be able to teach others also." They could not teach, there- 
fore, till he gave them license, nor teach any thing but what 
he bade them, nor at all unless they were " faithful men," of 
which he was the only judge. Their qualifications, their 
orders, and their preaching had, so to speak, no existence 
but in relation to him. Again, he was to " receive accusa- 
tions," even against " Elders," and that in solemn state, 
" before two or three witnesses "\\ at least. And this was a 
weighty office ; for we may not think that he held the judge's 

* 1 Tim. i. 3. 

f If Timothy were only a Presbyter equal to the rest, " those 
Teachers were as good as he; what, then, had he to do to charge 
Teachers ? or what would those Teachers care for his charge ? How 
equally apt would they be to charge him to keep within his own 
compass, and to meddle with his own matters ! It is only for supe- 
riors to charge, and inferiors to obey." Bp. Hall, Episcopacy by 
Divine Right, 5, p. 193. " How vaine and frivolous," says Bishop 
Bilson, " were all those protestations made by St. Paul, if Timothy 
and Titus had only voyces amongst the rest, and nothing to do but 
as the rest ! how fnrre was the Apostle overseen e to adjure them, 
and not the whole Presbyterie, to keep his prescriptions inviolable, 
if the Elders might every houre countermand them and overrule 
them by number of voyces !" Perpetual Government of the Church, 

chap. V. Tt ?% -n-fiSypa, asks St. EpiphaniUS, nrfowiirov irpr<r/?t>rfpfO JITJ 
7rtirA>?TTii', el ftfi nv vTrtp Tov TT(>taj3vTcpnv t^oiv Ttjv e^ovcriuv ; and he adds, 
" there is no admonition given to Presbyters not to rebuke Bishops." 
Hceres. 75, torn. i. p. 910. 

t 1 Tim. iv. II. 2 Tim. ii. 2. 

II 1 Tim. v. 19. 



CASE OF SAINT TIMOTHY. 45 

seat without his power. Any how it is plain that he did not ; 
for he was not only to "' receive accusations," but also, if it-;, 
became necessary, to pronounce judgment : he was to " re- 1' 
buJte,"* and that publicly, " before all," to the intent " that 
others also might fear ;" which they would scarcely do but 
in the apprehension of punishment. Men are not wont to 
care much for the rebuke of their equals. 

Moreover, he was to confer upon others the sacred " gift" 
after that specific form in which it had been conveyed to 
himself; he was to administer, not lightly nor inconsider- 
ately, the same sacramentam-ite whence he had derived his 
own prerogative. " Lay hands suddenly on no man,* was 
the great Apostle's injunction ; and solemnly does he charge 
his immediate successor, " before God, and the Lord Jesus 
Christ, and the elect Angels," that in the exercise of his Of- 
fice he should show " no preference of one above another," 
nor " do any thing by partiality "\ The Apostle, then, 
who could not be mistaken, judged that he had something 
to give worth having, or how should any one gain by his 
preference, or lose by his partiality 1 Also, he might, if he 
chose, dispense his gifts to this man or that, to the unfaith- 
ful instead of the " faithful." It were a crime in him, but 
he had power to do it; else why was this warning needed? 

Lastly, as being now to be left alone, he was to look well 
to himself henceforward, and, as his great predecessor had 
done, to " keep that good thing committed to him." " Let 
no man despise thy youth," was St. Paul's word to him. 
" Make full proof of thy ministry," he added ; "for I am 
now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at 
hand." He was now to take up the Office which St. Paul was 
about to lay down : it behooved him to discharge it well, and 
carefully to hand it on to the generation following ; for all 
which had been enjoined upon him was not delivered for his 
own sake only, but to be kept, so the blessed Apostle spake, 
whole and inviolate " until the appearing of our Lord Jesus 
Christ."^ 

I have examined sufficiently the Epistles to Timothy, 
wishing only to notice, as in the former case, expressions 
which indicate that he possessed authority of & peculiar and 
eminent kind. This is all which the course of my argument 

*. Tim. v. 20. t Ib. v. 22. 

t Ib. v. 21. 1 Tim. vi. 14. 

3* 



46 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

requires. Other passages might have been quoted from these 
Epistles in confirmation of those already adduced ; but these 
are enough for the present purpose they are enough, our 
position being such as it is. For since Prophecy has Dis- 
tinctly marked out a certain Ecclesiastical System, which 
should be coeval with the first preaching of the Gospel of 
Christ, and History has recorded the existence of a corres- 
ponding System from that very epoch down to the age in 
which we ourselves live ; then, if that which these Scripture- 
notices of the New Testament seem, however obscurely, to 
recognise, be not the very System in which both we and our 
fathers have lived, we must suppose one of two things ; 
either that those numerous passages which speak of a Church 
and its Discipline have no definite signification whatever, 
which were to dishonour the Blessed Spirit by Whom they 
were delivered ; or that though they do point to an Institu- 
tion then established by the Apostles, and thenceforward to 
increase and prosper throughout all time, that Institution 
was presently defaced and destroyed; either that those 
passages do not, though they seem to do so, contemplate any 
Church at all, or else that the church of the New Testament 
had no existence for fifteen ages ; for, during all that period, 
there was, confessedly, but that one alone, of which we are 
members. If, therefore, in other words, such passages as 
those above cited do not refer to, and so sanction, that which 
we call " the Church," they can refer to nothing; for there 
has been no other Church till yesterday which even profess- 
ed to answer to them ; and if they do, they would suffice for 
the present argument, even though they were much fewer 
and less emphatic than they are ; which is what I began 
by saying. 

And now if, after what we have seen, we should find that 
St. Timothy was indeed Bishop of Ephesus, we can hardly 
refuse to believe it on account of any counter evidence from 
Scripture. That evidence is all in one direction. It tells 
us plainly enough that he possessed certain great gifts and 
powers, a signal kind of authority, committed to him by the 
laying on of an Apostle's hands. It tells us that he was em- 
powered by the Holy Ghost to restrain, to rebuke, and to 
censure not only the Lord's flock, but also the Pastors of 
that flock, the Presbyters or Elders who either had been by 
other Apostles or should be by himself ordained ; and it 



CASE OF SAiNT TIMOTHY. 47 

teaches that, in the exercise of this high Office as a spiritu- 
al Judge, he was amenable to no human authority, nor re- 
sponsible before any tribunal but that of Christ himself. To 
this rule both Priest and people were subject ; but Tie was 
made subject to no man. 

Such are the intimations to be gathered from Holy Scrip- 
ture with respect to the Office which St. Timothy held in 
the Church. That they do harmonize very exactly with the 
belief and practice of that Church in all ages, will not be de- 
nied. It is an agreement which every true believer would 
confidently expect ; for the faithful are taught that the Bible 
and the Church, being the creation of the same Lord, can 
never contradict each other : that would be, if it may be 
said, as if he should contradict Himself. The Church 
teaches that St. Timothy was a Bishop ; the Bible, as we 
have seen, confirms her teaching : it .remains that we hear 
lastly the additional testimony of those ancient witnesses, 
who were able to speak on this matter with a confidence and 
assurance, by which we may well be thankful to the divine 
goodness that we are permitted to profit. 

It will not be necessary to make many references in this 
case, because it is similar to the last, and may be proved by 
testimony as abundant. I begin with two most ancient re- 
cords of the martyrdom of St. Timothy ; of which one was 
written by Polycrates, himself Bishop of Ephesus but a few 
years later, and born only thirty-seven years after St. John 
wrote his Epistle to the Angel of that Church ;* and the 
other by a writer whose name has not survived, but who af- 
firms, as expressly as the former, the Episcopal character of 
St. Timothy. His words are these : " The Apostle Timothy 
was ordained, by the illustrious Paul, bishop of the metro- 
politan city of the Ephesians, and there enthroned""^ These 
are plain words, and very much to the point. They accord 
with St. Paul's own expressions in the Epistles to Timothy, 
and serve to explain what we read there about his " receiv- 
ing accusations against Elders," " rebuking publicly that 
others also might fear," and so on. And if any refuse to 

* Vide Usserii Opuscula. 

t 'O dn-ocrroXos T/o8foj TJ<rd roil ficyaXou TiavKov KOI jfttpoTovsiTat riSv 
'ErfiSiritoi' [irirpoTra^tws Eiriaxaircs Kai ii-Opci't^Erai. Aftirtyrium Timotkei 

Apostoli, ap. Photii Bibliotk. num. 254. Accordingly the Pseudo- 
Areopagite addresses him as Pontifex, or High-Priest. Dionysii 
Areopag. De Cosiest. Hierarch. cap. ix. p. 3. ed. Corderii. 



48 " SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

receive such evidence, we can only say with a great writer 
of our communion, " He that will not give faith upon cur- 
rent testimonies, and uncontradicted by Antiquity, is a mad- 
man, and may as well disbelieve every thing which he hath 
not seen himself."* The man who is casting about for an 
apology for having already deserted the Church of Christ 
may reject it, because it condemns himself; but we are con- 
cerned rather with those whose profession it is, that they 
seek, not their own, but their Lord's will. 

Let us now hear the famous ecclesiastical historian. He 
tells us that" Timothy is related in history tohavejirstreceiv- 
ed the Bishopric of the Diocese of Ephesus, as Titus also did 
of the Churches of Crete. 1 'f St. Jerome says, " Timothy was 
ordained Bishop of the JEphesians by the blessed Paul"\ 
And this is confirmed by the voices of all who have any 
claim to be heard in such a matter. Only one more wit- 
ness shall be cited, because he spoke under peculiar circum- 
stances, and his evidence is such as can hardly be gainsayed. 
At the council of Chalcedon, held A. D. 451, there were 
present a multitude of Bishops. Among these was Leonti- 
us, Bishop of Magnesia in Asia ; and it is to his words that 
I am going to refer. They occur in the course of an address 
which he made to the Fathers assembled in that Holy Coun- 
cil ; and being obviously incidental, are the more valuable 
for our purpose. It was being discussed, with whom lay the 
right of electing and consecrating a bishop of Ephesus, upon 
the deposition of the Prelate of the day ; whether with that 
present Council, or with the Synod of the province of Asia. 
The latter view was maintained by Leontius, who appealed, 
as if to a recognised fact which could not be disputed, to 
the ancient and uniform custom. It was for Ephesus itself 
that he claimed the privilege in question, and it was thus 

* Bishop Jeremy Taylor. " Si enim ea quae non vidimus, hoc 
est, in prsesentia non sensimus vel mente vel corpore, neque de 
Scripturis sanctis vel legendo vel audiendo didicimus, nulla omnino 
credidissemus, unde sciremus esse civitates ubi nunquam fuimus ; 
vel a Romulo conditam Romam ; vel, ut de propinquioriVus loquar, 
Constantinopoliin a Constantino ? Unde postremo sciremus quinam 
parentes nos procreavissent, quibus patribus, avis, majoribus, geniti 
essernus ?" Aug. Epist. cxii. Paulina, torn. ii. p. 200. 

\ 'i ipoOeus ye /triv rijy iv E^terw Trapuixiaf ia-opeT-ai Trp^rcy Ttiv CTrtarKoirj;v 
Et'X)%Ei'<"- Wff *" a ' Tiro? TMV M K.p>'iT1s iKK^riOttSv. H. E. ill. 4. 

I Timotheus Ephesiorum Episcopus ordinatus a beato Paulo." 
Catal. Script.. Eccles. 



CASE OF SAINT TITUS. ' 49 

that he enforced the claim : " From the holy Timothy," said ' 
he, before all that grave assembly, " to. the present time, there 
have been twenty-seven Bishops, all of whom were ordained 
in Ephesus."* 

Here we may conclude the present case. I forbear to 
quote further the ancient writers who, with one voice, speak 
. of. St. Timothy as exercising the authority of Bishop of 
Ephesus. If the above do not prove the point, no amount 
of evidence will suffice to do so. And surely it does add 
something to the force of all this testimony, that until these 
last days no man ever doubted it ; that all the servants of 
God, for many successive ages, would as little have thought 
of denying that Timothy was Bishop of Ephesus, as that 
the Epistles addressed to him were written by St. Paul 
both facts having been delivered to them upon exactly the 
same testimony.^ 



CASE OF SAINT TITUS. 

III. Consider next the case of Titus. He too was or- 
dained by St. Paul ; and why ? Hear the Apostle him- 
self, who can best tell us. " For this cause left I thee in 
Crete, that thou shouldest set in order the things that are 



* 'Airo TOV ayiuv Ti/ioOcnv ni^pt vvv EiKoai Irrra iTriaKoiroi i-yevovro, 
iv 'E<ov;-> iyeinoTovrjdnrrav. Concil. Chalcedon. Actio Undecima, ap. 
Labbei et Cossart. Concil. Max. torn. iv. p. 700. " Certainly none 
can imagine," says Bishop Morton upon these words, " but th.it 
even shame itself would have restrained Leontius from making such 
a public declaration in the hearing of above 600 Fathers, if the mat- 
ter itself had been liable to any contradiction." Episcopacy Asserted 
Apostolical, chap. iv. 20. 

t " That Timothy was a Bishop, and Bishop of Ephesus, the 
metropolis or chief city of Asia, is so fully attested by all antiquity, 
that he must be either very ignorant or very shameless that shall 
deny it, especially there being besides very plain evidence of the 
episcopal power and authority wherewith he was invested in this 
very Epistle of St. Paul written to him." Bp. Bull, Sermon xiii. 
Works, vol. i. p. 328. Certainly, " if to model Churches, to pre- 
scribe Rules, to confer holy Orders, to command, examine, judge, 
and reprehend offenders openly (even Presbyters themselves), I 
say, if these are parts of Episcopal power, then was Timothy a 
Bishop indeed : and I should be loth to see half that charter given 
to a single Presbyter which is here given to Timothy by this great 
Apostle." Pelling, Antiquity of Episcopacy, p. 39. 



50 



SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 



wanting, and ordain elders in every city, as I had appointed 
thee."* Now " there were presbyters at Ephesus besides 
Timothy, and in Crete besides Titus; and yet Paul left the one 
at Ephesus to impose hands, and the other in Crete to ordain 
presbyters in every city. If without them the presbyters in 
either place might have done it, superfluous was both Paul's 
charge they should do it, and directions how they should do 
it. But his committing that power and care to them prov- 
eth, in the judgment of the Ancient Fathers, that the pres- 
byters without them could not do it."f This seems unan- 
swerable ; for if the presbyters who were in Crete before the 

* Tit. i. 5. " By this passage our Presbyterian brethren are, not 
without reason, put to great straits. The shifts to which they are 
driven may be conceived when (one of their most famous teachers) 
resorts to the disingenuous device of explaining it of the interposition 
of Titus, i. c. with the congregation, which, he adds, would have 
great weight with them ! " Bloomfield, Annot. vol. viii. p. 346. 
"Delegatus Apostoli vicarius fuit," says another of them ; " et ejus 
potestate et vice omnia regit." J. H. Bcehiner, Dissert. Juris Eccle 
siast. Antiq. Diss. vii. p. 403. But " each hath an interpretation ;" 
and it would be tedious to notice more of them. It is, however, 
observable how far the disciples have got beyond their master. With 
Calvin this one passage was proof enough of the imparity of minis- 
ters. " Discimus ex hoc loco," says he, " non fuisse tune sequalitatem 
inter Ecclesia? miuistros, quin unus pr&esset auctoritatc et consilio." 
In loc. : and again, Institut. lib. iv. cap. iv. 2. He and his successors 
laughed to scorn the notion of ministerial parity. " Absit a nobis," 
says Beza, " ut ullam dra^iav invehamus in Ecclesiam Dei, quse sane 
invehatur necesse est, si omnia Ecclesia? munera inter se paria et 
ajqualia faciamus." De Ecclcsia, cap. v., Tractat. Theolog. torn. i. 
p. 34 (ed. 1582). So Salmasius still more emphatically ; " Nunquam 
Ecclesiasme primatu fuit. . . . Nullum sane daripotest corpus, ordo, 
vel co3tus, sive civilis, sive ecclesiasticus, qui sine primatu fuerit, 
aut qui etiam possit sine primatu subsistere." Ad Miltonum Respons- 
cap. iii. p. 347. So Martin Bucer, Explicat. dc Vi et Usu S. Minist. 
p. 565 ; and De Ordinat. Legit. Minist. Ecc. p. 259. These men, 
who, in the language of the great Brarahall, "juggled themselves 
into as absolute a papacy as ever was within the walls of Rome." 
Fair Warning of Scottish Discipline, ch. viii. p. 506 certainly were 
of the same mind with the subtle Greek, 



yiiOui' ~a\VKoipavir] ' E!J K 
Els fiastieSs. It. ii. 204. 



t Bilson, Church Government, book xii. p. 225. " La subordina- 
tion dans la conduite et dans la hierarchic de 1'Eglise," says Quesnel 
upon the same text, " et la diversite de degres des pasteurs, se 
trouveht etablies des le terns des Apotres par 1'ordre de Jesus-Christ, 
qui les a instructs de vivc voiz." 



CASE OF SAINT TITUS. 51 

appointment of Titus had power to ordain others, why was 
he sent for this special purpose "for this cause" as the 
Apostle says ? 

In truth this one Scripture, even if there were no other 
such, is enough, as has often been remarked, to discredit all 
the inventions of modern times.* The whole course of his- 
tory agrees' exactly with it. From " the beginning" we find 
Bishops so ordaining ; St. Paul bids them to do it ; and 
never for fifteen ages did any question it, till they who had 
ventured to cast off God's Discipline, and set up their own, 
were obliged to do so, that they might defend their own pro- 
faneness. So that we might safely rest our cause upon this 
one text, if need were, and challenge the adversary to im- 
pugn it. " For," as it has been said, " unlesse they be able 
to shew, that in the first two hundred yeares the Presbyters 
either had de jure the power to ordaine, or that de facto they 
did use to ordaine, which they will never be able to shew, 
the worst of these testimonies for the Bishops is of more 
worth than all that they shall be able to say against them. 
Let them produce, if they can, any one sentence, out of 
Councils, Histories, or Fathers, proving that Presbyters 
without a Bishop had right to ordaine, and I will yield to 
thera."f Meanwhile, until they perform this impossibility,: 
we must have leave to think that the Sacred Scriptures mean 
what they seem to mean, and that all those holy men of God 
who believed Titus to be a Bishop, and that St. Paul made 
him so, were not mistaken in their belief ' 

It would be easy to accumulate passages from Scripture 
asserting for Titus, as for the others, that eminent power 
which none but Bishops have ever exercised. Thus, he was 
to " exhort," and to " rebuke witli all authority "\ Again ; 
" A man that is an heretic, after the first and second admo- 
nition, reject."^ So that to his Office belonged the power 

* Of which it has been well said, that before their advocates can 
excuse them, " they must first put the Epistles to Timothy and Titus 
out of the Bible." Thurndike, Primitive Government of Churches, 
ch. xii. And this, as Clement of Alexandria notices, some ancient 
heretics actually did ; Stromat. lib. ii. p. 383. Marcion, too, rejected 
them, as Tertullian informs us ; Jl<Lv. Marcion. lib. v. cap. xxi. p. 615. 
Aerius was content to put his own interpretation on them ; S. Epiphan. 
Hares. Ixxv. pp. 908-10 ; and it is worthy of notice, that his very 
words have been commonly used both by Presbyterians and Socinians. 
Vide Crellii Annot. ad Tit. i. apud Biblioth. Fratr. Polon. 

t Downame, Defence of Sermon, book iii. ch. iv. p. 90. 

t Tit. ii. 15. Tit. iii. 10. 



04 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

of Ordination, Admonition, and Excommunication ; and 
" each of these and the like Apostolical injunctions do fully 
express an Episcopal function and authority over Presbyters, 
and the whole Churches under them."* Moreover, these in- 
junctions were addressed to him personally : I left thee ; I 
appointed thee ; do thou rebuke with all authority ; do thou 
reject heretics. Which observation might have been made 
with respect to St. Timothy also. " This charge I commit 
unto thee, son Timothy;" " these things write I untotkee;" 
" that thou mightest charge some;"." against an Elder re- 
ceive not thou an accusation," &-c.; we only hear of Elders 
as being subject to the authority of St. Timothy, and they 
never complained of being in subjection.t And certainly, 
" receiving accusations against a man, examining witnesses 
in the case, and rebuking or censuring according to the de- 
merit, is jurisdiction and superiority, or I know not what 
is. Were these presbyters, then, equal to Timothy their 
Bishop ? was Bishup and presbyter, then, the same thing ? 
had every presbyter the same authority over Timothy that 
Timothy had over him? That would have made a wild sort 
of government.''^ And yet we are asked to believe that it 
was thus ordained by the Apostle ; or, if we like not this, 
to suppose that Timothy and Titus were indeed what the 
Universal Church believed them to have been ;. but that, in 
spite of St. Paul's express words to the contrary, they were 
to have no successors in their Office, which was to cease 
with themselves, and then all be reduced to parity of rank 
and power ! And this we are invited to accept for truth, 
in opposition to our own natural senses, the plain words of 
Holy Scripture, and the unanimous faith of all ages, places, 
and people. Such reasonings seem to be sufficiently an- 

* Bp. Morton, Episcopacy Apostolical, ch. iv. 5. 

t " The Bishops (then) pretended to no more than presbyters 
were willing to yield them ; and presbyters claimed no more than 
Bishops were ready to allow them. Their contentions lay chiefly 
with '.hose that were without; these intestine feuds and broils being 
reserved for our unhappy days," Bp. Burnet, Observations on the 
Second Canon, p. 57. 

J Leslie, Rehearsals, no 281. 

" Me quod attinet, libens agnoscam, Ecclesiis ab Apostolis 
Episcopos, qui Presbyteris gradu aliquo essent superiores, adeoque 
collegii Presbyterorum presides, fuisse praepositos " Limborch. 
Theol.og. Christian, lib. viii. cap. iv. 7 : only, Limborch adds, 
though the Apostles thus instituted Episcopacy, they did not mean 
that it should never be changed ! 



CASE OP SAINT TITUS. 53 

swered by those words of one of our Fathers : " Did you 
pleade before the poorest Jurie that is for earthly trifles, they 
woulde not credite your worde without some witnesse ; and 
in matters of religion, that touch the peace and safetie of 
the whole Church of Christ, do you looke your voluntarie 
should be received without all authoritie or testimonie to 
warrant it ? If your follie be such as to expect so much at 
other men's hands, their simplicitie is not such as to yield it. 
Indeed, to my conceiving, the summe of your answer is 
very like the forme of your discipline, neither of them hath 
any proofe, possibilitie, nor coherencie."* 

The case needs no farther pressing, being so like the oth- 
ers. A few passages shall be added in order to prove, 
what it is not very reasonable in this age of the world that 
we should be called on to prove, that we have in St. Titus 
another instance of that Office which the whole Church, 
without contradiction of friend or enemy, believed for so 
many centuries to be of Divine appointment. 

We have seen Eusebius saying, that the Episcopal gov- 
ernment of the Cretan Churches by Titus was an historical 
fact ; and it appears that he was not only Bishop, but Arch- 
bishop of that province.! For we learn, upon the same 
good authority, that, as early as the reign of M. Aurelius, 
A. D. 161, that is, let it be observed, little more than^half 
a century after the death of St. John, Philip was Bishop of 
Gortyna, and Pinytus Bishop of Gncssus, Dioceses of Crete /J 
And St. John Chrysostom records expressly of Titus, that 
" the whole island, and the charge of its Bishops, was com- 
mitted to him." 

* Bilson, chap. xiii. p. 270. 

t " I told you before, that although this name Archbishop is not 
expressed in Scripture, yet is the office and function, as it is evi- 
dently to be seen in the examples of Timothy and Titus, yea and in 
the Apostles themselves ; . . . and therefore M.Bucer, writing upon 
Ephes. iv. sayth thus : " Miletum Presbyteros Ecclesia? Ephesinze 
convocat ; tanien tjuia units inter eos praerut aliis, et primam Ec- 
clesiae curam habebat, in eo proprie residebat nomen Episcopi.'." 
Whitgift, Defense of Answerc to the Jldmonition, p. 813. " Ecce 
Metropolitani institutionem !" says De Marca, De Concord. Sac. et 
Imp. lib. vi. cap i. 

i Euseb. H. E. iv. 23; and vide Hieron. Catal. Script. Eccles. 
" Primaria olira insulte Creta? civitas Gnossus fuit, sed cujus poten- 
tise infinitis fortunse casibus extincta dcmum fuit, et ad Gortynam 
translata." Le Q'uiens, Oricns Christianus, torn. ii. p. 266. 

Airoi T>IV vfjcov 6Ad<.-Xjj3oi/ iTrirpsif/ev . . . reaovruv itrujKO-zuv Kpiatv 
sv. ' Homil.,1. in Tit. i. torn. iv. p. 381. 



54 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

One cannot marvel that the adversaries profess so great 
scorn of human testimony ; it is their wisdom to do so, for it 
is all against themselves. But then, if they would be con- 
sistent, they should reject that same testimony in settling the 
Canon of Scripture. For if the Primitive Fathers knew 
what Scriptures the Apostles wrote, they knew also what 
Government the Apostles framed; if they could arrange, the 
Bible,* they may very well define the Church. If their ev- 

* It may be well to explain what is meant by this expression : 

(1.) An Epistle was written by St. Clement, the " fellow-labourer" 
of St. Paul, to the Church at Corinth. After an interval of more 
than 100 years, we find (Euseb. //. E. iii. 16 and iv. 28, and Hieron. 
Catal. Script.) that it continued to be read on Sunday in the Churches. 
And the letter which was thus honourably used by the primitive 
Christians was written before some portions of the Canonical 
Scriptures were even composed, and long before they were collected 
together. How is it, then, that this Epistle of St. Clement does not 
form part of the New Testament ? If the public reading in the 
congregation gave canonical authority to the books so read, the 
Shepherd of Hernias, the dels of the Martyrs, and many other writings 
formerly read in the Churches, would at this day be canonical (vide 
Wetstenii Not. in Epist. .Jifricani ad Orig. p. 150) ; but they are not : 
why is this ? Whatever, then, procured for any Writing admission 
into the Sacred Canon, it is evident that the mere reading in the 
Churches was not enough to do so. 

(^.) Again ; St. Barnabas was, or was supposed to be, the author 
of an Epistle, which was entitled, so late as the time of Origen, 
''the Catholic Epistle of Barnabas" vide Orig. Contra Cdsum, lib. 
i. p. 49; and Clem. Alex. Stromat. lib. ii. p. 373; yet this Epistle 
too is excluded from, the Canon. It follows, therefore, yet further, 
that neither the authority of an Apostle's name, nor yet the title of 
' Catholic,' sufficed to this end. 

(3.) Again ; the Saints differed for a long time amongst themselves 
as to which were the Canonical Books. Thus St. Irenaeus (iv. 20) 
quotes the Shepherd of Hennas in that sacred character, and Clement 
of Alexandria (Pearson. Vindic. Ignat. pars i. cap. iv. p. 39) does the 
same ; yetTertullian, as Beaven notices in his Account of St. Irenteus, 
p. 126, " affirms that the Italian Churches had in express councils 
declared his book apocryphal." Similar contrarieties of opinion 
existed with respect to the Revelation of St. John, and the Epistle 
to the Hebrews, which were accepted by some, and rejected by 
others ; vide S. Hieron. Epist. ciii. Paulino, torn. iii. p. 340 ; and 
so fluctuating, if the expression may be used, was the Canon of 
Scripture, that, as late even as the time of St. Austin, we find rules 
laid down by that distinguished Saint for determining it. (Aug. DC 
Doctrina Christiana, lib. ii. cap. viii. torn iii. p. 11 ; who elsewhere 
applies these rules to the false scriptures of the Manicheans ; Contra 
Faustum, lib. x-xii. cap. Ixxix. torn. vi. p. 181 ) This difference of 
opinion amongst the great lights of the Primitive Church carries us 



CASE OP SAINT TITUS. . 55 

idence on the one point be worth little, how much is it worth 
on the other? If they have deceived us, or themselves, 
about Episcopacy, are we quite sure they were right about 
Inspiration? If they 'have commended to us a false Govern- 
ment, how do we know that they have handed down to us 
true Scriptures ? To those who know of no guides earlier 
than the sixteenth century, and acknowledge no law save 
their own wild fancies, this is a serious question. But it is 
our happiness to have no fears on either point. This is the 
privilege of the Catholic Christian ; to whom only is the 
promise given, that " he shall dwell safely, and shall be quiet 
from fear of evil." But to return. 

It seems unnecessary to say more here of Titus, or to 
heap up proofs for his Office ; as that St. Jerome calls him 
" Bishop of Crete ;"* St. Ambrose says, " the Apostle con- 
one step further, it shows that it was not upon their internal evidence 
alone that a place was assigned to these Scriptures ; for if it had 
been, how could the Saints differ about them ? 

(4 ) Once more. Besides the Scriptures which the Fathers found 
in their hands, new ones were perpetually springing up, witb whose 
claims they were at first perplexed. It was a common thing for 
heretics to give the name of a prophet or apostle to some apocryphal 
writing, and then to insist upon its reception. (J. A. Fabricius, In 
S. Philastr. cap. Ixxxviii. p. 166 ) Writings attributed to Apostles, 
the Blessed Virgin, and even to our Lord Himself (Ittigius, Dissert. 
j_ma de Pseudepigraphis), abounded ; and, as Agrippa Castor relates 
of Basilides, some even ventured to speak and write, in their own 
name, as inspired prophets. Now the history of these and similar 
writings furnishes one additional fact, the last which I shall notice 
in this place; it shows, that whatever authority may have prevailed 
to extend the Canon, it was the Voice of the Church which excluded 
from it. 

Now let us see what follows from all this in relation to the 
structure of the Sacred Canon. The evidence adduced is of two kinds, 
positive and negative. From the first it appears, that the Scriptures 
which were rejected from it were rejected by the Church; and from 
the second, that it was neither (1) the public reading in the Churches, 
nor (2) the authority of an Apostle's name, nor (3) the internal 
evidence of the writings themselves, which gave them a place in it : 
then it only remains to ask, What was it which did so ? or, in other 
words, upon what evidence was any given writing received by the 
Church as plenarily inspired ? This question, it seems, cannot be 
answered without affirming the truth above stated, that the Bible 
is given to us on the testimony of the Primitive Church. And if the 
Rule of Faith, why not the Rule of Discipline too ? 

* " Titus Episcopus Cretae a divo Paulo ordinatus est." Catal. 
Script. Ecc. The Saint adds, " Ibidem et dormivit, et sepultus est, 
nempe in Creta.' 



56 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

secrated Titus Bishop ;"* Theodoret, that he was the Bish- 
op of the Cretans ;f and so the whole band of witnesses. No 
man ever ventured to deny, till within these last three hun- 
dred years, that he was all this ; nor despised his sacred of- 
fice till pride and worse ambition moved some to "take it 
to themselves." And it seems answer good enough for such, 
that to use the. glowing words of a Prelate of our own 
Church " this course if you disdaine or dislike, you con- 
demne the whole Church of Christ from the first encreasing 
and spreading thereof on the face of the earth to this pres- 
ent age ; and preferre your own wisdome if it be worthy 
that name, and not rather to be accounted selfe-love and sin- 
gularitie before all the Martyrs, Confessors, Fathers, Prin- 
ces, and Bishops that have lived, governed, and deceased in 
the Church of God since the Apples' deaths. How well 
the heighth of your conceites can endure to blemish and re- 
proach so many religious and famous lights of Christendom, 
J knowe not ; for my part, I wish the Church of God in our 
dayes may have the grace for pietie and prudencie to follow 
their steppes, and not to make the world believe that all the 
servannts of Christ before our times favoured and furthered 
the pride of Antichrist, till in the endes of the world, when 
the faith and love of most men are quenched and decaied, 
we came to restore the Church to that perfection of disci- 
pline which the Apostles never mentioned, the ancient Fa- 
thers and Councils never remembered, the universall Church 
of Christ before us never conceived nor imagined."! 



CASE OF THE ANGELS OF THE ASIAN CHURCHES. 

IV. I proceed to consider one other case out of the Di- 
vine Oracles to which our appeal has been hitherto confined. 
It is to " the vision and charge of the blessed Apostle St. 
John, in. his Revelation," that we are about to refer. The 
subject is a solemn one, and needs to be approached with a 
cautious and lowly mind : if men will rush upon it in a care- 
less, disputatious mood, we cannot help it, nor do more than 
speak a warning both to ourselves and others. 

" Blessed is he that readeth," says the " Disciple whom 

* Praefat. in Epist. ad Titum. t In 1 Tim. iii. 

\ Bilson, ch. xvi. p. 304. 



CASE OF THE ANGELS OF THE ASIAN CHURCHES. 57 

Jesus loved," " and they that hear the words of this pro- 
phecy, and keep those things which are written therein."* In 
humble hope to share this promised blessing, let us listen 
now to his message. 

" John to the seven Churches which are in Asia: . . . . 
I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and heard behind me 
a great -voice, as of a trumpet, saying, I am Alpha and 
Omega, the first and the last : and, What thou seest, write 
in a book, and send it unto the seven Churches which are 
in Asia ; unto Ephesus, and unto Smyrna, and unto Perga- 
mos, and unto Thyatira, and unto Sardis, and unto Phila- 
delphia, and unto Laodicea. And I turned to see the voice 
that spake with me. And being turned, I saw seven golden 
candlesticks ; and in the midst of the seven candlesticks one 
like unto the Son of Man . . . and He had in His right 
hand seven stars . . . and when I saw Him I fell at His 
feet as dead." The explanation of this great vision was 
vouchsafed by Him who alone could give it. " The seven 
stars are the Angels of the seven Churches : and the seven 
candlesticks which thou sawest are the seven Churches."^ 
Now what these Churches were, we know, for they are all 
enumerated ; but who were the Angels ? This is the ques- 
tion which we are to consider. 

(1.) In the first place, then, the " Angels" were not " the 
Churches." This is evident, for they are all along distin- 
guished as " seven stars," while the Churches are as plainly 
said to be " seven candlesticks :" " the seven candlesticks 
which thou sawest are the seven Churches." The " seven 
stars," which the Lord " had in His right hand," were some- 
thing else. It was, therefore, to " the Angel of the Church 
of Ephesus," and not to " the Church of Ephesus," that St. 
John was to write. The Angels, that is, were not the 
Churches.f 

* Apoc. i. 3. 

t (Jhap. i. St. Augustine thinks the number seven symbolical. 
" Septem autem Ecclesias quas vocat yocabulis suis, non ideo dicit, 
quia ilia; sola? sunt Eeclesiae ; sed quod dicit uni, omnibus hoc dicit. 
Denique sive in Asia, sive in toto orbe, septem Ecclesias omnes esse, 
et unam esse Catholicam." Homil. i. in Apocal. torn. ix. p. 352 : and 
vide Epist. cxix. Januario, De Ritibus Ecdcsice, torn. ii. p. 215 ; and 
Ejjist. clxi. p. 276, where he says the number 7 represents Univer- 
sality. See also Clem. Alex. Stromat. lib. vi. p. 685. 

+ The attempt to prove this may appear superfluous ; yet some of 
the modern teachers, coerced by the necessities of their theory, have 



58 



SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 



(2.) But, secondly, neither were they any collective 
body whatever. " I know thy works," is the message to the 
Angel of the Church of Ephesus, " and thy labour, and iky 
patience, and how thou canst not bear them that are evil,". 
&LC. Were they all " patient" in Ephesus? or all "labo- 
rious?" had none fainted ? did all abhor evil? Or, on the 
other hand, had all " left their first love?" This, we know, 
is not meant ; and, besides, the Angel is commended for 
having " tried them which say they are Apostles, and are 
not."* Shall we think that they were all to be trying one 
another ? Or to whom, amongst them all, was this inqui- 
sitorial function committed 1 

Again : in the Church of Smyrna, were all " poor," or 
all " rich 1" And mark the plain distinction between the 
person addressed as the Angel of that Church, and some 
others apparently under his charge : to these it is said, 
" Behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison ;" and 
then, the singular verb beingnow used instead of the plural, 
to the Angel it is added, " Be thou faithful unto death, and 
I will give thee a crown of life."t We shall see presently 
who he was, and that he was " faithful unto death." 

Again : observe the message to the Angel of the Church 
in Pergamos. It was his own praise that he had kept the 

denied it; as Briglitman, In Jlpoc. p. 19; and Salmasius, with refer- 
ence to whose interpretation Bishop Morton observes, " He must 
first turn stars into candlesticks before lie can make Angels to signify 
the Churches;" and of whose notion he adds, that it would require 
the words to run thus : " Write to the Church of the Church of 
Ephesus." Episcopacy Apostolical, ch. iv. 9. " Vah ! quid non 
facit studium partium !" says Durell ; " quo mortales non abducit '. 
Angeius sunt Angeli ! " De Jure Divino Episcopat. cap. xxx. p. 377. 
But these eccentric interpretations began early : vide Aug. De Doc- 
trina Christiana, lib. iii. cap. xxx. ; who mentions that the Donatist 
Ticonius taught this very notion " ut ipsos Angelos intelligamus 
Ecclesias." Cf. St. Epiphan. Hares. 51. 32, 33. 

' * Apoc. ii. 9. These words refer, St. Austin says, to the Rulers 
of the Church ; Epist. clxii. Contra Donat. Pertinac. torn. ii. p. 281 : 
and a very different writer confesses them to have no other applica- 
tion. " Vagabantur enim tune in Asiaticis Ecclesiis impostores, 
Ebion, Cerinthus, et alii, pro Apostolis Christi se venditantes, . . . 
de quibus Paulus Ephesinos Presbyteros pra?monuerat. Erat igitur 
Episcoporum, pro puritate fidei tuenda se lupis fortiter opponere, 
quod non segniter Ephcsinum fecisse Christus testatur." D. Pareus 
In Apoc. p. 67. 

t To the first it is said, ;rr OXfi/w and then follow the words, 

yiviv -tirros <i%pi Oavdrov, ii. 10 



CASE OP THE ANGELS OF THE ASIAN CHURCHES. 59 

* 

faith : " thou boldest fast my name, and hast not denied my 
faith, even in those days wherein Antipas was my faithful 
martyr." But there were some in Pergamos who had fallen 
into heresy, holding the. doctrine of Balaam and of the Nico- 
laitanes;* and for this the Angel is severely threatened. 
Why so, unless, like Timothy and Titus, he had been 
charged with authority to coerce and restrain them 1 If all 
the teachers in that Church were independent, or had equal 
power, how could he help their teaching false doctrine 1 
And why should our Blessed Saviour rebuke him for the 
faults of men over whom he could exercise no control 1 

Once more : the Angel of the Church in Thyatira is to 
be admonished thus : " I know thy works, and charity, and 
service, and faith, and thy patience. . . . Notwithstanding, 
I have a few things against thee, because" now let his 
offence be observed " because thou suffer est, 011 lag, that 
woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophetess, to teach 
and to seduce my servants." Now, unless, this Angel pos- 
sessed Episcopal power, what possible signification can at- 
tach to these words 1 " For, if he had wanted such a power, 
he would have been unjustly condemned for the wickedness 
and subtle artifices of this pernicious Jezebel, since he was 
no otherwise partaker of her wickedness than merely in 'suffer- 
ing it. ... For why should he be censured for this matter, 
unless he had power to cast such persons out of the Church? 
It would be unreasonable for him to bear the blame of 
other men's faults, if he had no power to correct them."f 

* See the paraphrase of Ribera, Comment. itiJlpoc. cap. ii. Upon 
this passage Bishop Lucy remarks thus : "Here again see the neces- 
sity of Ecclesiastical Story to expound this Scripture. What, can 
any man tell, is the doctrine of the Nicolaitanes, which God hates, 
and so we ought to hate, but by Ecclesiastical Story ?" Treatise of 
the Nature of .a Minister, chap. vii. p. 120 (1670). And this used 
once to be admitted by all. " Diligenter legendum nobis est ac me- 
ditandum Dei verbum," says Beza, " el vettres ex Patrum scriptis 
cognoscendtB hareses." Epist.xliv. Are they good witnesses against 
the corruptions of the Truth, and yet not for the Truth itself? 

t Brett, Church Government, ch iv. p. 67. This is a warning, 
says a great Saint, to those Rulers of the Church, " qui luxuriosis et 
fornicantibus, et aliud quodlibet malum agentibus, severitatem dis- 
ciplinae ecclesiastica? non imponunt." Aug. Homil. ii. p. 354. So a 
divine of our own : " I hope the Governors of the Church, in whose 
hands the censures are, will not be angry with me if I put them 
in remembrance that God's controversy with most of the seven 
Churches was for want of discipline; for suffering the doctrines of 



60 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

It seems almost a waste of words to go about to prove so 
plain a matter. I will only add, in conclusion, that in the 
Syriac version, the Alexandrian, and several other manu- 
script copies, there is no room for the argument at all: 
for by the addition of the pronoun aov, thy, which those 
copies contain, the passage reads thus, " because thou suf- 
ferest thy toife Jezebel," &-c., and it is actually so cited in 
one of his letters by the Martyr St. Cyprian.* Of course, 
if this reading be the true one and there is authority for 
it there is no longer a question whether the " Angels" 
spoken of were individuals ; unless, indeed, we think there 
was no more distinction of wives in those days than some 
will allow of offices. 

But we need not rely upon this to prove what was never 
even doubted, till it became necessary to the success of the 
modern religion that it should be not only doubted but de- 
nied. It is not by such arguments that we need to confirm 
the clear warrant of Holy Writ. For who, it may be asked, 
would ever have denied these " Angels" to be individuals, 
and that of eminent power and name, unless his own schemes 
had required it, and the pride of a human theory had armed 
him with courage to fight against ancient truth ? And is 
this the spirit in which to read safely this most awful and 
mysterious Revelation ? or to share their blessing who shall 
" keep those things which are written therein ?" Consider 
one moment the character of this portion of Holy Scripture. 
It is designed to teach us something ; also its teaching, what- 
ever it be, is practical. Seven times it is said, " He that 
hath ears to hear, let him hear ;" there is a promise for them 
who " keep it," and -woe is threatened to the disobedient. 
And now, how does it teach ? Under symbols of Candle- 
sticks and Stars ! Is all this so plain and simple that each 
may safely judge for himself, when the issues of that judg- 
ment are more than life or death? And is not the very 

Balaam, and the Nicolaitanes, and other pretended false Christians, 
to go uncensured, and the woman Jezebel to seduce His servants ; 
ami for being slack and lukewarm in discipline, which is the life 
and soul of every Church." Hickes, Three Treatises, Epistle to the 
Reader. 

~ Vide Potter's Church Government, chap. iv. Works, vol. ii. p. 
133. (Oxon. 1753.) St. Cyprian quotes the passage thus : "Habeo 
(inquit) adversus te multa, quod uxorem tuam Jczabel, quae se dicit 
propheten, sinis," &c. Epist. lii. Ad Antonianum. 



CASE OP THE ANGELS OP THE ASIAN CHURCHES. 61 

form of this teaching a solemn warning to us all how we ven- 
ture to judge at alU' Can there be any other true interpre- 
tation of it than theirs who first heard it? And shall we 
not fear to wrest and criticise those words of our Maker, 
which when St. John heard, he " fell at His feet as dead ?"* 

On the whole, is it not plain that the " Angels of the 
Churches" were persons such as St. James, St. Timothy, 
and St. Titus, charged, like them, with the Apostolical 
Office, and singly responsible for its execution ? We have 
seen those holy Bishops invested with certain powers, and 
admonished duly to use them ; we see these " Angels," as 
they are called by the Head of the Church, praised for the 
discharge of the same functions, or rebuked for the neglect 
of them ; and, in either case, without an allusion to clergy 
or people, except as being subject to them. St. Timothy 
and St. Titus were appointed by St. Paul to ordain, to re- 
buke, and, if necessary, to excommunicate elders ; and so 
" the Apocalyptic Angels are commended for all the good, 
and charged with all the blame, of their respective jurisdic- 
tions ; which could not have been if they had been control- 
lable by a majority of suffrages of their several Presbyteries."t 

And now can we judge that saying of good Bishop Hall 
too bold : " Upon these clear passages of St. Paul and St. 
John, meeting with the grounds laid by our Blessed Saviour, 
I am, for my part, so confident of the Divine Institution of 
the majority of Bishops above Presbyters, that 1 dare boldly 
say, there are weighty points of faith which have not so 
strong evidence in Holy Scripture.";}: Some such points 



* Tii diT3)cvaAtt//iva T> 'Laavvij rfj OVK av dvayvovs tearaarXayeiii TJJV SJTI- 
Kpvfytv riSv liiroppiJTav /luor^pfaiy, ical r:3 fill voavvri TO. yeypappEva ifiipaivo^vaiv. 
Origen. Philocal. cap. i. " Apocalypsis Joannis tot habet sacra- 
menta quot verba." S. Hieron. Epist. ciii. Paulino, torn. iii. p. 340 : 
and in the same words St. Peter Damian, Serm. ii. De Excell. B. 
Joan. Evangel. And even one of a less reverent school could say, 
" Obscura quidetn ilia (prophetia), quod nemo negat, et luminis in- 
diga." Vitringa, In Apoc. Prafat. Here are reasons enough, then, 
for the cautious handling of a Book, of which these are true descrip- 
tions. 

t Dodwell, On, the Soul, Prsemonit. 9. Cf. Barrow, De Regi- 
mine Episcopali, Works, vol. viii. p. 42. 

J Episcopacy by Divine Right, 7. And with the same confi- 
dence speaks Hooker : " A thousand five hundred years and upward 
the Church of Christ hath now continued under the sacred regiment 
of Bishops. Neither for so long hath Christianity been ever planted 
in any kingdom throughout the world but with this kind of govern- 

4 



62 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

have been noticed above; and it cannot be denied, that at 
least the proof in this case is more abundant than that which- 
can be offered, out of Scripture, for many a truth received 
by universal Christendom. But the goodness of God has 
provided, in this case too, yet further testimony for all who 
are willing to use it ; to that additional testimony we will 
now refer. But first let another briefly recapitulate the fore- 
going arguments, as applied to one only of the seven Angels, 
whose particular case we will then pursue. 

" Wee reade in the Revelation of S. John," says a 
learned divine, " of the Angel of the Church of Ephesus, to 
whom the Spirit of God directeth letters from heaven, as 
to the Pastour of that Church. It is not to be doubted but 
that there were many Presbyters, that is, ministers of the 
Word and Sacraments, in so large a Church as that of 
Ephesus was; nay, wee reade expressly in the Acts that 
there were many in that Church that fed the flock of Christ, 
and consequently were admitted into some part of pastorall 
office and employment : yet was there one among the rest to 
whom onely the Lord did write from heaven, to whom an 
eminent power was given, who was trusted with the govern- 
ment of that Church and people in mere speciall sort than 
any of the rest, and therefore challenged by name by Al- 
mighty God for the things there found to bee amisse ; the 
rest being passed over in silence."* Now, the eminence of 
this.person so addressed by Almighty God being thus mani- 
fest,"it seems natural to inquire next what name he bore. 

In the inspired document itself this is not expressed ; an 
omission which has been accounted for, even by one who 
had not the happiness to be a Catholic, upon the religious 
and reasonable supposition, that "Christ noted not the 
names, that His message might seem to be addressed not so 
much to their Persons as to their Order."t That message 

ment alone ; which to have lecn ordained of God, / am for mine own 
part even as resolutely ycrsvadcd, as that aw/ other kind of Govern- 
ment in the world is of God." E. P. book vii. vol. iii. p. 173. 

* Field, Of the Church, book v. p. 498: "Is it possible," asks 
the wise Hooker, " tbat in every of these churches, even in Ephe- 
sus itself, where many such ministers were long before, there was 
but one such when John directed his speech to the Angel of that 
Church? If there were many, surely St. John, in naming but one 
only of them an Angel, did behold in lhat one somewhat above the 
rest." Vbi supra, p. 390. 

t Pareus, p. 63. 



CASE OF THE ANGELS OF THE ASIAN CHURCHES. 63 

appears to have been written about four years before the 
close of the first century ; a period with respect to which we 
possess but scanty information in existing records. Still 
they may supply hints at least towards an approximation to 
the object of our search ; and as in such a matter no evidence 
can be insignificant, nor any knowledge trivial, we will use 
thankfully what has been provided for us, whether it be 
greater or less. 

The fast Bishop of Ephesus, as we have already seen, 
was St. Timothy ; whose martyrdom is narrated by Poly- 
crates, himself the eighth Bishop of that See, of which he 
was able to say, in a letter to his brother Apostle of Rome, 
" Seven of my kinsmen have been Bishops, and I am the 
eighth"* A competent witness truly; but we shall hear 
him again. Another whom we have heard, occupied the 
twenty-seventh place in the same succession ; and in his 
day the world knew enough at least of his predecessors to 
be assured that they were " all ordained in Ephesus."f But 
we are not unable to distinguish other links in this chain of 
Episcopal Fathers. 

There are still extant certain letters of the Martyr Igna- 
tius, the friend of St. Peter and St. John, and Bishop of 
Antioch in Syria at the very time that the latter Apostle 
wrote his Revelation. One of these letters, written only 
eleven or twelve years after that divine Book,f is addressed 
"To the Church which is in Ephesus of Asia." In it, 
then, we may expect to find some allusion to the Bishop of 
that Church ; nor shall we be disappointed. The Martyr 
was then on his road to death, and had been met, in that his 
last journey, by one of whom he thus speaks to the Chris- 
tians at Ephesus : " How many ye be that be called by the 
name of God, I have heard from Onesimus, whose love is 

* 'Ejrrii fi.lv JfffOK ovyyeveTs /tov IjrfoiCJTroi, iyi Si oyjoos. S. Polycrat. 

Epist. ad Victor. Romaque Urb. Ece. ap. Routh. Rel. Sac. torn. i. p. 
371. On the meaning of these words, vide Dodwell, One Altar, 
ch. ix. 5. p. 243. 

t Vide page 55. 

\ " The Revelation exhibited unto St. John upon the Lord's Day, 
is, by Irenaeus (in his fifth book), referred unto the empire of Domi- 
tian ; or, as S. Hierome, in his catalogue, more particularly doth 
expresse it, to the fourth yeare of his reigne, which .... was hut 
eleven or twelve yeares before the time when Ignatius did write his 
Epistles." Usher, Of the Sabbath, and Observation of the Lord's 
Day, Tracts, p. 93 (1<?57). 



64 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE, 

beyond all words, your Bishop according to the flesh; whom 
I beseech you, by Jesus Christ, to love, and that ye would 
be all like unto him. And blessed be He who has granted 
unto you, who are so worthy of him, to enjoy such a 
Bishop."* 

Now, that this Onesimus was the very Angel of the Church 
in Ephesus to whom St. John delivered the message of the 
Almighty, cannot be positively affirmed. From any thing 
which has appeared thus far, we learn no more than that he 
ruled that Church at some period between the Episcopate 
of Polycrates and of St. Timothy ; and that, at all events, 
about ten years after St. John wrote the Revelation, he was 
"granted by Jesus Christ," as the Martyr speaks, to be 
.Bishop of the Metropolis of Asia. This one fact is of course 
proof enough, if it were the only one preserved to us, that 
Bishops were, by Divine appointment, the Successors of 
Apostles. But it remains to be added, in relation to the 
particular inquiry at this point, that according to ancient 
documents this Onesimus who was stoned to death at 
Rome,t and afterwards carried to Ephesus to be buried 
' was the servant of that Philemon^ to whom St. Paul wrote 
an Epistle about the year 64, or nearly fifty years before the 
date at which we find him to have been Bishop. He must, 
therefore, if he were that very Onesimus, have followed very 
closely upon Timothy, if indeed he was not his immediate 
successor, as some writers assert. And this is all which it 
seems necessary to say about him. St. Timothy is by some 
supposed to have been martyred before the banishment of 
St. John, that is, before he wrote the'Revelation ; and if so, 
could not have been addressed by him as the Angel of the 
Church in Ephesus. How far it is probable that Onesimus 



T?|j> iro\vir\riptav vp&v iv ovfifiart GtoB direi\ri(fa Iv 'Qvrjaiptf, TU> Iv 
Ayairri d<5ii7yjjr(0, fyzcSv Si iv trapKi ir7<c<Jir Sv tvyfopai Kara 'Jj<roiiv Xf>iord> 
upas dyarrav, nal irdvras vpSs ai>ra iv O/IIHOTJJTI iivat. E-i^oytjros yap o yapiair- 
ucvof iiftiv d|io(? ovat TOIOVTOV bflaxotfov KrJJcr0ai. S. Ignat. AS, Ephes. 

2. 

t " Vinctus Romam perductus, ac pro fide Cbristi Japidatus, 
primo ibidem sepultus fait ; inde ad locum ubi Episcopus fuerat 
ordinatus corpus ejus delatum est." Martyrologium Romanum t p. 
81. (Antverp. 1613.) Cf. Usuard. Martyrolog. 16 Feb. 

t- " Porro hunc Onesimum Ephesiorum Episcopum,eundem esse 
cum eo de quo agit Paulus apud Philemonem, tarn Grecorum Me- 
nologium quam Latinorum Martyrologium fideni fnciunt." Baronii 
Jinnal. A. c. 60, 



CASE OF THE ANGELS OF THE ASIAN CHURCHES. 65 

was that person, let each, after due examination, judge for 
himself. Thus much, I think, will now be granted, that 
whoever it was, it was an individual* 

Another person to whom the Divine message was sent, 
was " the Angel of the Church in Smyrna ;" and now we 
are no longer beset with doubt or encompassed by difficulty. 
We are able to prove, upon evidence which none have ven- 
tured to dispute, that the first Bishop of Smyrna was ap- 
pointed by the Apostles themselves, and held his Office in 
their lifetime, and for very many years a&ufwards ; namely, 
until his death, by martyrdom, in the micrale of the second, 
century. And that he was the person referred to in the 
Apocalypse as " the Angel of the Church in Smyrna," 
seems so clear, that the less wilful amongst the adversaries 
have not attempted to deny it.t Let us hear a few wit- 
nesses in the case. 

* See Tillemont, Mernoirespour servvrhfHistoireEcelesiastique^ 
torn. ii. l er e partie, p. 267. The Angels are admitted to have been 
individuals even by the Presbyterians in the Isle of Wight confer- 
ences, by Beza, Cartwright, Reynolds, Blonde!, and others. See 
Abr. Woodhead, Brief Accownt of Ancient Church Government^ ch. i. 
p. 48. 

t " Testatur Irenaeus, quod et Eusebius refert, Polycarpum in ea 
qua? est Smyrnis Ecclesia cons titu turn fuisse Episcopum. Constat 
vero, Apostolos omnes prater B. Joannem ante Domitianum vita 
decessisse. Ergo sub Domitiano ante Jlpocalypsin revelatam Poly- 
carpum fuisse Smyrnse Episcopum, probabile est." Pareus, p. 97. 

Again ; 

" Principio indicatur, cui destinetur epistola coelestis,.Angelo 
Smyrnensis Ecclesiae, id est pastori. Testantur autem historian An- 
gdum sire Pastorem ilium Smyrnensis Ecclesm Polycarpum fuisse, 
ordinatum ab ipsis Apostolis, ab ipso inquam Joanne, Episcopum^ 
ac vixisse in ministerio hujus Ecclesise annos 86 ... unde claret, 
ilium factum esse Episcopum Smyrnensem anno Domini circiter 84, 
ideoque ante editam Apocalypzin, qujE 97 anno conseribitur, plures 
annos ministraverat Ecclesiae." Bulljnger, Concio nona in JJpocal. 
cap. ii. p. 28, 

u Polycarpus Eeclesiae Smyrnaeorum Angelas sive Episeopus ab 
ipso Jesu magnopere commendatur, Apoc. ii. 8. Nomen quidem 
non exprimitur, aliug tamen esse nonpotest quam Polijcarpus." G. 
Calixtus, De Auctor. Antiq. Eccles. 27, pp. 77, 8. 

It is admitted somewhat strangely by the Genevan Professor 
Vedelius, who, in his commentary upon the Epistle of St. Ignatius 
to St. Polycarp, rejects, after Scultclus, the words " obey your 
Bishop," on the ground that " Ignatius could not have forgotten 
that he wae writing to a Bishop." The criticism is weak, but that 



66 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE, 

And first, we have actually a letter of St. Ignatius ad- 
dressed to St. Poll/carp, as the Bishop of Smyrna, in his own 
day. But lest we should seem to lack testimony, others shall 
tell us who this holy man was. "Polycarp," says Irenaeus, 
himself a Bishop and Martyr, " was not only made a 
disciple by the Apostles, and conversant with many who had 
seen Christ, but was appointed by the Apostles over Asia, 
as Bishop of the Church which is in Smyrna ; WHOM ALSO I 
MYSELF SAW in my early youth, for he lingered long, and 
was very aged, and having accomplished a glorious martyr- 
dom departed th|Mife."* The same blessed witness could 
we have a better? speaks elsewhere of " those who have 
received the throne of Poly carp down to this day."t Ter- 
tullian, who was born in the age next to the Apostolic, in- 
forms us, that the Smyraaeans boasted in his time that they 
could "trace their succession through Polycarp to the 
Apostle John, by whom he was appointed the first Bishop of 
their Church." But it seems needless to cite more, when 
even the very Jews and heathen will witness for us. So 
well was the "Angel of the Church in Smyrna" known in his 
own day, that it was. the shout of the savage crowd, as Christ's 
venerable martyr stood before the Roman tribunal, " Poly- 
carp to the lions ! This is the Master of Asia, the Father of 
the Christians.''^ They were right in giving him this title ; 
for St. Jerome says, " he was the Head of all Asia ;"j| his 

does not affect the value of the admission. App< Notarunt Critica- 
rum, p. 138. The history of St. Poly carp would suffice to demon' 
strate the divine origin of Episcopacy, if every other ecclesiastical 
record were withdrawn from us. 

IIoAwcapTros oi povov fad diroorfiXwv //aOjjrswfcif, <rai o-uvaorpa^tt? jroAXor$ 
rots TOV XptOTov Ecopaicacrtv, dXXa KOI {mo UTrooroXwv /raraoraOaj eif rr;i> 'Affiai/ 
ev rj; iv Sppi/rj iKK\r\aia exiaKoitos, Sv Kal fipeis itopaxafisv iv rrj Trpurrj fip&v 
?)XiKta, iirl iroXv yap 7rapc^(i/E, Aral irdvv yj/paXeos, ivid<a$ Kal eiri^avlcrara /nap- 
ropficras, |i}X0 TOV 0iov. S. Iren. iii. 3. 

T Ot pe^pi vvv SiaSEypivoi TOV IloXtwcnpjrov dpovov* Ibid. 

$ De PrcBscript. Hceret. cap. xxxii. 

OiiTrfs iffriv & Tf/j 'Affiaj 6i6cr/caXoj, o Trarftp TUV Xpioriavuv. Vide 
Euseb. H. E. iv. 15. 

|j " Polycarpus, Joannis Apostoli discipulus, et ab eo Smyrnje 
Episcopus ordinatus, totius Asiae princeps fuit." S. Hieron. Catal. 
Script. Eccles. : upon which vide Natalis Alexandri Dissert. Ecc. i. 
p. 64. (Paris 1679.) Pliny calls Smyrna " primum Asioe lumen ;" 
and in the Arundel Marbles the Smyrnaeans are styled wpwrot rflf 
'Ao-t'aj. This may explain the phrase, " caput totius Asiae." Vide 
TS. Vossii Epist. ii. Contra Blondellum. 



CASE OF THE ANGELS OP THE ASIAN CHURCHES. 67 

ownfock, whose account of .his death it has pleased God to 
preserve to our times, call him " Bishop of the Catholic 
Church in Smyrna;"* Polycrates, who was thirty-eight 
years old at the time of his death, and could not be mistak- 
en either, styles him, " Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, and 
Martyr ;"f and lastly, the Saint himself commences a letter, 
the only relic of his writings which has survived to our age, 
" Polycarp, and the presbyters who are with him, to the 
Church of God which is at Philippi."J Thus has it seemed 
good to God praised be His Name ! to provide for us all 
kinds of witnesses; from the Bishops whose high office 
only marked them out as the first victims, to the fierce rab- 
ble who shouted round their graves. How long shall they 
bear witness in vain ? 

It seems unnecessary to pursue our inquiry beyond the 
two instances already considered, or to show that the other 
Asian Churches, no less than Smyrna and Ephesus, were 
ruled from the first by individuals. |( Enough has been said ; 
for of course one case such as that of Polycarp proves 
all the rest. But an important reflection remains to be 
offered upon what has been already advanced. 

The adversaries admit that the Churches were governed 
by Bishops within a very few years the most extravagant 
say, within forty years^j of St. John's death. At that time, 



* Ai5j37caAoy dirooToAiKOS /cat Trpo^nri/roj, yevdjisvos iviaKOTtas -rijs cv 
Kitl,>\tffj<; (.-;K\r]z'ias. Vide Euseb. H. E. ubi supra. 

t TlAuKapiroj o EJ> Zjmpvr] Koi arivicoiros Koi /japru?. S. PolycratlS Epist. 
ad Victor. 

\ IIiXuxafuMff /cat 01 truv a-arS> TrpevffvTCpoi TTJ KK\ri<TLa TOV 0oS rjj ira^oi' 
KoSa-r) <DiXrjr-ouj. Epist. ad Philipp. 

It would be natural to infer, the evidence being so varied and 
abundant, that to reject Episcopacy is a characteristic of unbelief; 
and we might expect beforehand, that in the case of those who do 
reject it, there would be a tendency to positive infidelity. It will 
appear in the progress of these pages that the expectation is a just 
one ; that the rejection has begun in schism, and ended in apostacy ; 
that the Bishop has first been mocked, and then Christ who appointed 
him ; and that not only in the case of individuals, but of whole 
communities. . 

|| With respect to whom similar admissions have been made to 
those already cited. " Fuit Antipas," says the learned Francis 
Junius, " Angelas sive Minister Christi in Ecclesia Pergamensium, 
ut scribunt Andreas, Aretas, et alii." JVbi. in Apocal. cap. ii. 

IT Frora a great mass of such admissions I select the follow- 
ing : 

" Insequalitatem esse vetustissimam, ac vicinam Jlpostolorum 



68 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

it is confessed, the Three Orders of the Priesthood were 
universally acknowledged. They might, indeed, with just as 
much reason, have fixed upon any other imaginary epoch ; but 
we may be content here to take the admission as they make 

temporibus, ultro nos fateamur." Chamier, Panstrat. Cat hoi. lib. x. 
cap. vi. torn. ii. p. 353. 

" Brevi post discessum Apostolorum, aut forte sub eorum eztrema, 
contigit," &c. Jablonski Institut. Hist. Christian, secul. i. cap. ii. 8. 
> " Statim post tempora Apostolorum, aut etiam eorum tempore." 
Pet. Molinau Epist. iii., ap. Andrewes, Opuscul. p. 179. 

" Equidem max post .Apostolorum discessum Presides etiam in 
Ecclesiis Christianorum apparuerunt." J. H. Bcehmer, Dissert, vii. 
6. De consessu ordinis ecclesiastic^ p. 398. 

" Episcopi solius erat ordinare, quod Presbyteris negabatur. 
Hoc ipsum tamen non ex dispositione Dominica, sed Jlpostolica, et 
consuetudine ita fuit in Ecclesiam introductum." Pfaffii Hist. Ecc. 
secul. ii. 7. 

" Etenim discrimen illud valde mature ipsorum Apostolorum 
temporibus in Ecclesiam irrepsit." Vedelii Exercitat. 3. in S. Ignatii 
ad Philadelph. cap. xiv. p. 138. (Geneva, 1623.) 

" Nam ut apud Patres Hieronymo vetustiores clara habemus 
testimonia, in prsecipuis Ecclesiis omnibus a temporibus Apostolorum 
ita observatum est, ut Presbyteris omnibus quidem officium Epjscopale 
fuerit impositum ; interim tamen semper, etiam Apostolorum tempori- 
bus, unus a Presbyteris electus atque ordinatus est in officii hujus 
ducem et quasi antistitem ; qui cseteris omnibus praeivit, et curam 
aniraarum ministeriumque Episcopale praecipue et summo in gradu 
gessit atque administravit." M. Bucer, De Anim. Cura, p. 280. 

" Nullum illustrius momentum occurrit in quod insignis ilia 
mutatio commode conferri posse videatur quam ann. Christi 335." 
Blonde!, Apolog*pro sententia Hieron. Praefat. 

" Interim Episcopale regimen esse antiquissimum, et paulo post 
Apostolos per universam Ecclesiam magno cum fructu obtinuisse, est 
mi hi compertissimum." Sam. Bochart, Epist. ad Morleium, p. 7. 
(Paris. 1650.; 

\ Lastly, even Gibbon ever anxious, like the rest of his class, to 

depress " Prelacy" as low as possible does not venture to say more 

than that " the Episcopal form of government appears to have been 

introduced before the end of the first century." Decline and Fall, 

i chap. xv. vol. i. p. 489. 

Such are a few of the concessions hardly and most reluctantly 
extorted, with the exception of the last instance, from some of the 
leading Presbyterian divines ; of whom five acknowledge the supe- 
riority of Bishops over Presbyters to have been established in the 
very lifetime of the Apostles, and the other four assert that it took 
place " immediately after their deaths ! " Truly there is little cause 
for apprehension as to the issue of such a controversy as this arma 
ddbunt ipsi ;-we need no other advocates of our cause than the 
adversaries themselves; and to their -writings we may refer for its 
efficient defence. 



CASE OF THE ANGELS OF THE ASIAN CHURCHES. 61) 

it. In the year 140, then, the Bishops throughout the world 
were in undisputed possession of their authority over presby- 
ters and deacons. 

Now at this time, and many years after, St. Polycarp was 
still alive. In the year 158 we find him at Rome,* in 
friendly communications with its -Bishop Anicetus, minis- 
tering at the same altar, and joining with him in the 
most solemn act of our religion, the administration 
of the Holy Eucharist.t But this Anicetus was, con- 
fessedly, such a Bishop as our Fathers of the present day, 
ruling presbyters and deacons with a power which he claim- 
ed to exercise, and was admitted to possess, as a lawful suc- 
cessor of the Apostles. What, then, was Polycarp ? He 
too is called, by those who lived with him, a " Bishop ;" his 
own flock, as has been noticed, style him " Bishop of the 
Catholic Church in Smyrna;" St. Irenseus, who saw and 
heard him, says, " He was appointed by the Apostles over 
Asia, as Bishop of the Church which is in Smyrna." I ask 
then, Was he such a Bishop as Anicetus and his brethren, 
who at that time occupied the episcopal chairs throughout 
Christendom ? If he was, then the Apostles, who are not 
denied to have ordained him, appointed such Bishops, and 
our argument is ended. If he was not, in what respect 
did he differ from them? If the " Angel of the Church in 
Smyrna" was indeed a "Prelate," then our venerable 
Hooker said truly of the Order of Bishops, " It is of God, 
the Holy Ghost was the author of it :" if, as some in this 
latter end of the world have been taught to say, he was a 
mere presbyter, then I ask again, How came that man of 
God to endure in others the shameless usurpation of au- 
thority which God gave them not ? How could he, the friend 
and companion of Apostles, kneel at the same altar with one 
who had dared according to our modern sectaries " to 
erect a throne where Christ had made all level;" to snatch 

* Baronius, Annal. ann. 157, places this visit a year earlier, and 
so the venerable author of the Annot. in Condi. Lug^un. ap. Bel. 
Sac. torn, i p. 414. Pagi, however, with Valesius, follows the 
Chronicon Alexandrinum in fixing upon 158; Crit. Hist or. Chronolog. 
in Baron, torn. i. p. 160 : and the Centuriators of Magdeburg do the 
same ; Hist. Ecclesiast. cent. ii. cap. x. p. 175. 

t Vide Euseb. U.E.v. 24. The right conceded by Anicetus to St. 
Polycarp was, according to the Marty rolbgist, " in publico omnium 
fidelium conventu suo Joco pontificalia munia obeundi." Ruinart, 
Act. Martyr, sincer. et select, p. 29. 

4* 



70 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

from his brother presbyters the powers which God had bid- 
den them to use, and not only impiously to subvert the 
Government which his Master had ordained, but with in- 
credible boldness to set up a scheme of his own, and call it 
by his Master's Name? Either Anicetus was an usurper 
and a tyrant, and Polycarp though he " took sweet counsel" 
with him knew it ; or else Polycarp was himself a Bishop * 

One objection has been urged against all this, with a 
* brief notice of which we may conclude this section. The 
more sagacious amongst the adversaries have not ventured 
to deny the individual pre-eminence of the respective " An- 
gels" addressed in the Revelation of St. John ; they seem 
to have judged that the evidence could not be resisted.! 

* And this reasoning may of course be applied in almost innu- 
merable cases. I will add only one. St. Symeon, the brother and 
successor of St. James, lived to a great age, dying early in the second 
century. It is beyond controversy that he was, in some sense, Bishop 
of Jerusalem. Was his office, then, in any respect different to that 
which had been held by his brother, the Apostle, who was also called 
by the same title of Bishop ? If so, in what did the difference of their 
functions consist, and who was the author of the change ? Was it St. 
Symeon himself ? This is evidently impossible, when we consider 
who and what that blessed person was. Was it effected afterwards 
by his own immediate successor ? or the next again to him ? or the 
next ? If any change was made, who made it ? Which, in short, 
of all the Bishops of Jerusalem, first assumed to be a Bishop in such 
a sense as his predecessors, including St. James, had not been ? It 
is evident that you cannot fix upon the criminal, nor separate one 
from the other they were all impostors, or none ; you cannot show 
any distinction between them. If, therefore, men will condemn 
Bishops as usurpers, let them be bold, and rebuke St. James, and all 
the Apostles, who first held their office. 

t " In the Church of Ephesus," says Reynolds, " though it had 
sundry Elders and Pastors to guide it, yet amongst these sundry was 
there one chief ', whom our Saviour calleth the Angel of the Church^ 
and writeth that to him which by him the rest should know. And 
this is he whom afterward in the Primitive Church the Fathers called 
Bishop." Conference with Hart, 3. " Ce furent ces Presidens, 
qui retinrent dans la suite le titre d'Eveque, k 1 'exclusion des Prtres." 
Beausobre t Lenfant, Preface sur la \e.re Epitre a Timothde, tome 
ii. p. 362. Cf. Thes. Salmur.pars ii. p. 327; where the "Angel" is 
confessed to have been " Primus ordine, honorn, et dignitate." And 
indeed, the pre-eminence here asserted has been admitted by all the 
distinguished writers of this party ; and that Calvin himself always 
insisted upon the necessity of a presiding ruler in every Church, 
needs not to be proved, because, as is well known, he did not confine 
his theory to verbal statements only, though these were sufficiently 
animated. " I should be sorry," says an anonymous writer, at a 



CASE OF THE ANGELS OF THE ASIAN CHURCHES. 71 

But this forced concession they have attempted to qualify, 
after a mode which has been fitly described as " more wor- 
thy of pity than confutation." And indeed it seems to be 
commonly true of them all, that no reasoning will appear, to 
an honest and reverential mind, more fatal to their cause 
than their own plea in its defence : but of this hereafter. 
Let their usual arguments be judged of by that which they 
allege in this case, and let it be noticed in the words of 
Bishop Hall. 

" So clear," says he, " is this truth" the authority and 
responsibility of the (f Angels" " that the opposites have 
been forced to yield the priority here intimated ; but apriority 
of order only, not of power ; a priority of presidency for the 
time, not personal. Beza yields him TOV TroosoTWTee, as he 
acknowledges Justin Martyr A. D. 139 to call him ' Pre- 
sident of the Presbytery ;' but hints that his office was per- 
haps not perpetual !* Wherein I bless myself, to see how 

critical period of English history, " to see any Bishop in this land 
have such authority over other Ministers as he had at Geneva, or 
John Knox in Scotland." Vide A Modest Advertisement on the 
Government of the Church (1641). " Episcoporum Simise," is the 
expressive title applied to these men by Turrian ; and a very little 
acquaintance with their history will show how convenient, and even 
necessary, it was for them to admit that the " Angels" were individual 
Rulers of. superior power and authority. 

* In Phil. i. Elsewhere he says, " Tw dyy^, id est, Trposorwrt, 
quern nimirum oportuit inprimis de his rebus admoneri, ac per eum 
caeteras Collegas, totamque adeo Ecclesiam.' In Apoc. ii. " Cum 
precandi et docendi officium in Ecclesia," says another, " prsecipue 
incubuerit r<5 Tr-pcS T&V TrpscrfivTcpaiv, Primo Presbyterorum, quern 
a?tas recentior Episcopum vocavit, facile patior Presides Presbyte- 
rorum Ecclesiae Christianas hie potissimum a Domino notari ; quae 
eadem qtioque Bezae fuit sententia." Vitringa, In Apoc p. 34. It 
is really painful to see such a man as Vitringa constrained, by the 
necessity of a false position, to such half-confessions as these. It 
would have been fatal to admit at once the whole truth, that these 
"Angels" were -Bishops, so they must be styled " Prime-Presby- p 
ters ! " Bishop Downame, quoting the above opinion of Beza, adds, 
"And as he professeth the presidentship in every Church to be a, 
divine ordinance and immutable, so he acknowledgeth those Bishops 
alone for divine who had this presidentship but for a short time, and 
by course ! " Defence of Sermon, book i. ch. ii. We may leave this 
extravagance to be rebuked by his own friends : " Episcopatus 
vocem sumpsi," says Grotiua, " eo significatu ut n-pooraoiav indicet 
non temporariam sed perpetuam." Vir. Erudit. Epis. Ep. ccxciii. p. 
487. (ed. Limborch.) " Primatus ille non fuit vel annuus vel menstruus 
aut hebdomadarius, ac per vices," says another of them, "'ut modo 



72 



SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 



prejudice can blind the eyes of the wise and learned ; for 
what author, in the whole world, ever mentioned such a 
fashion of ambulatory government in the Church 1* And 
do not our histories testify, that Polycarpus, the Angel of 
Smyrna, died Bishop there ? that Onesimus, by Ignatius's 
testimony, so continued Bishop of Ephesus ? James at Jeru- 
salem ? And if those errors, taxed by the Holy Ghost, were 
but for the time s of a shifting Presidency, why should any 
one of the momentary guides of the Church be charged so 
home with all the abuses of their jurisdiction 1 How easy 
had it been for him to shift the fault, as he did the chair ! 
for how could it concern him more than the next man ? 
Surely this conceit is more worthy of pity than confutation."! 
And yet it is a fair specimen of the reasonings with which 
some men in these last days would defend the revival of a 
" branded heresy." Without a solitary instance in the his- 
tory of the universal Church, without one clear witness 
amongst the successive generations of her children, without 
an example throughout all time, save only of one unhappy 
and self-condemned heretic, they fear not to supply the 
lack of all, and to cover their own disobedience with a pro- 
l fane guess ! Which " how palpable an untruth it is, is no 

hie, modo ille primus esset, sed perpetuus, sive, ut loquuntur, ad 
vitam." Thes. Salmur. pars ii. p. 322. So the "reformed" doctors 
of Leyden : " Episcopatus nihil aliud est quum perpetuata autperpetua 
presidential Censur. in Remonstrantes Synodo de Dorr, p. 277. 
(Lugdun. Batav. 1626.) So Beausobre, ubi supra : " On ne voit pas 
dans S. Paul que ce chef (du PresbytereJ fut pris tour a tour de tous 
les Pasteurs . . . . et les' terns qui succedent immediatement k ceux 
des Apotres ne permettent pas de le croire" as he then proceeds to 
prove at length. 

* Archbishop Bramhalb challenges the new teachers " to name 
but -one Church, or so much as one poor Village, throughout the 
whole world, from the days of the Apostles till, the year of Christ 
1500, that ever was governed without a Bishop (I except the Ace- 
phali, or such disordered persons as had no government at all) ; or 
to name but one Lay-Elder, or one ambulatory Bishop that governed 
by turn or course in the primitive times, in the whole Catholic Church, 
before the year 1536, when Calvin came to Geneva. "We find the 
proper and particular names of Apostles, Evangelists, Bishops, Pres- 
byters, and Deacons, in the Scriptures, in Councils, in Ecclesiastical 
Histories, in the Fathers ; if he and all his friends be not able out of 
all these authorities to name one particular Lay-Elder or ambulatory 
Bishop, the reason must be, because there never was such a creature 
in reriim natvra." lit. Serpent a/rc, V\ orks, vol. ii. p. 25. 

t Episcopacy ly Divine Right) part ii. 7. p. 201. 



CASE OF THE ANGELS OF THE ASIAN CHURCHES. lO 

hard matter," as Bishop Bilson has observed, " lor meane 
scholers to discerne. The first. Bishop Alexandria alter 
Mark the Apostle was Anianus, made the eighth yeere of 
Nero's reigne ; and he continued two end iwtntie yeeres be- 
fore Abilius succeeded him. Abilius sate thirtetne yeeres, 
and dying left the place to Cerdo. These three succeeded 
one another, St. John yet living; neither had Alexan- 
dria any more than two Bishops in thirty-five yeeres after 
the death of Mark. 

" Evodius, made Bishop of Antioch five and twentie 
yeeres before the death of Peter and Paul, survived them 
one yeere ; and after him succeeded Ignatius, who outlived 
St. John, and died in the eleventh yeere of Trajan, leaving 
the place to Heron, after he had kept it fourtie yeeres; so 
that in sixty-six yeeres the Church of Antioch had but two 
Bishops. 

" At Rome, whiles St. John lived, there were but three 
Bishops, Linus, Anacletus, and Clemens, which thus con- 
tinued two and thirtie yeeres"* And these, as the learned 
Prelate goes on to prove, are but a few out of innumerable 
instances-; so that he might well say of the adversary's as- 
sertion, "I knowe not whether I shoulde thinke it proceeded 
of too much ignorance, or too little conscience."f However, 
it is an assertion which has been much relied on, and it 
seemed right to refer to it. We have seen how much it is 
worth, and can but wonder greatly, first, that any should be 
bold enough thus to sport with holy things, and then that 
others should be weak enough to be led by them ; and not 
only to accept ashes for bread, man's inventions for the 
Ordinance of Christ, but even in their deepest degradation 
to fancy themselves gainers withal. 

The case, then, that we may bring it to an end, seems 

* Epistle to the Reader. He says elsewhere of Beza's strange 
invention " If you talke of ' going round by course,' it is the order 
of good fellows at a feast ; it was never the order of governing in the 
Church of Christ." Ch. xiii. p. 288. And another shrewdly remarks, 
"If we think of an ambulatory Government, at the next turn we 
must expect an ambulatory Creed ;" and Geneva, as we shall see 
hereafter, has proved the truth of the saying. Shaw, JVb Reforma- 
tion of the Established Reformation, Preface. 

t " Si ignoras, disce ; si nosti, erubcsce. Tgnorantia tibi as crib 
non potest ; restat ergo ut noveris." S. Optat. Adv. Par-men ian 
lib. ii. p. 48. 



74 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

to be as follows. The Divine messages in the Revelation 
are addressed to certain Rulers of the Churches, under the 
title of " Angels." These Angels are challenged by God 
as the responsible Governors of their respective Churches ; 
strict account of the condition of those Churches is de- 
manded at their hands; to have "tried" and convicted 
pseudo-apostles is made the praise of one Angel, to have 
"suffered" false Teachers the reproach of another ; their 
Office seems to have been Apostolical, the Primitive Chris- 
tians believed that it was so ; their very title is used inter- 
changeably with that of Apostle by St. John himself;* the 
friends of Apostles, as Ignatius, write to them their imme- 
diate successors, as IrenaBus, write of them; at the very date 
of the Revelation we find single Rulers in their chairs, and 
trace the succession of others in the same thrones ; they 
hold their office for life twenty, thirty, forty, fifty years 
and are followed by others who do the same ; the catalogues 
in each Church are preserved from the beginning; and 
whilst some boast that their first Bishop was the friend of 
St. John, others tell of his speech and mien, record his words 
and " the manner of his life ;"t lastly, in accordance with 
this combined testimony, the holy Fathers believed and 
taught that these Angels were Bishops in the Church" of 
Christ, and for fifteen ages no man had any other thought of 
them.! 

* 

* Rev. xxi. 12. I Vide S. Irensei Ejrist. ad Florinum. 

| St. Austin, in refuting the notion that they were celestial An- 
gels, which he does by pointing out that these had not " left their 
first love," adds, " Divina voce laudatur sub Angeli nomine prcvpo- 
situs ccclesice," &c. Contra Donatist. Pertinac. Epist. clxii. torn. ii. 
p. 281 : and his friend Paulinus, in addressing him as follows, seems 
to be alluding to the same truth ; " O Luccrna digne supra Candela- 
brum Ecclesias posita, quse late Catholicis urbibus de septiformi lychno 
pastum oleo laetitiaj lumen effundens," &c. Paulinus Augustine, 
Epist. xxxi. He uses the same image again to Alypius, Epist. xxxv., 
and septiformis is also repeated. Cf. Contra Ep. Parmen. lib. ii. 
cap. x. torn. vii. p. 10. 

St. Epiphanius, speaking of the heresy of the Nicolaitanes, ob- 
serves, that its condemnation may be read in the Revelation of St. 
John, 8g -ypoufxdv jiii rwv iKK^ijaiSiv ix irpotrajirov Kwioti, TOVTCVTI ru forierKOTrw 
rc~> EfL-EUTE KuracrraGev'ri . . . $r\aiv, K.T.\. HcETCS. XXV. 3, which IS a 

very express testimony to the mind of the Church in his day. Cf. 
Timothei Presbyt. Constantinop. Orat. i. in Nicolaitas, ap. J. Meur- 
sii Var. Div. Lib. torn. viii. p. 742. 

St. Isidore says, " Sacerdos Domini Omnipotentis Angelus est." 
Citat. a Corderio, Annot. in S. Dionys. p. 137. 



CASE OF THE ANGELS OF THE ASIAN CHURCHES. 75 

And yet all this, and much more besides, is to go for no- 
thing ; and we are now to think that the Scriptures have 
been misunderstood from the beginning, and they who were 
most likely to know God's will were most deceived about it ; 
that men who lived with the Apostles did not know their 
minds, and that the Apostles took no pains to correct them ; 
that the " Spirit of Truth" abandoned the whole Church to 
error, though sent to " guide her into all truth ;" and " a 
jealous God" suffered His own Institution to be destroyed 
by the very men who supposed that they were dying in its 
defence. And to all this, evil as it is, we are bid to hearken 

St. Hilary confirms it in a singular manner : he is warning the 
Church against an heretical Bishop, and he says, " Absistite itaque 
ab Auxentio, SatantB Angela, hoste Christi," &c. S. Hilar.*ftctav. 
Adv. Arian. p. 351 ; with which compare S. Basil. Epist. cxci. JYz- 
copolitanis Presbyteris, torn. iii. p. 207. 

St. Dionysius, or whoever wrote in his name, gives similar testi- 
mony. Ai' Sjv atrtar, says he, & na9' ijftaj ispao^Tj; ayyeXoj Ki)pu>u TtavTO- 
K(tiT.>f>os v-d TMV \ayiw .wvu^aarai ' S. Dionys. Areop. De Cosiest. Hier- 
arch. cap. xii. p. 135; where that the Bishop is called " Angel " is 
assumed as unqestionable, he only supposes an inquiry into the 
suitableness of the title. 

St. Ambrose too, in . his comment upon 1 Cor. xi. 10, where 
women are admonished to be "covered" in Church, "because of 
the angels" observes, " He calls the Bishops Angels, as we see in 
the Revelation of St. John." " Potestatem velamen significavit ; 
Angelos Episcopos dicit, sicut docetur in Apocalypsi Joannis." 
Pseudo-Ambros. torn. ii. p. 147. 

St. Jerome on the same place gives the same teaching. " Item 
hoc loco Angelos Ecclesiis precsidentes dicit, sicut ut Malachias pro- 
pheta testatur sacerdotcm angelum esse, dicens," &c. S. Hieron. In 
1 Cor. xi., Opp. torn. viii. p. 215. The same reference to the prophet 
is made by St. Gregory the Great, Exposit. Moral. lib. v. cap. xxviii. 
" Propter Angelos, id est, Sacerdotes." Gemma Animce, De Antiquo 
Ritu Missee, cap. cxlvi. 

But perhaps the most interesting and conclusive evidence, inas* 
much as it also involves the admissions of certain ancient heretics, 
on this subject, is that of St. Optatus. This Father tells the Douat- 
ists that they can pretend to no communion with the successors of 
St. Peter, and if they could, they had none with the Asian Angels : 
*' Excludat septem Angelos," he says, " qui sunt apud socios nos- 
tros in Asia, ad quorum Ecclesias scribit Apostolus Joannes. Cum 
quibus Ecclesiis nullum communionis probamini habere consortium. 
Unde vobis Angelum, qui apud vos possit fontem movere, aut inter 
caUeras dotes Ecclesias numerari ? Extra septem Ecclesias quicquid 
foris est, alienum est. Aut si inde habetis aliquem unum, per unum 
communicatis et ctsteris Angelis, et per Angelos memoratis Ecclesiis, 
et per ipsas Ecclesias nobis." Adv. Parmen. lib. ii. p. 50; and again, 
" Joannis socii esse noluistis." p. 56. 



76 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

as to the words of sober truth, because in the sixteenth age 
of the Gospel there was found a man who had courage 
enough to cast away God's Discipline, and to set up his own, 
which lasted about two hundred years, and then passed into 
apostacy.* 

V. It is not my intention to offer here any further evi- 
dence from Holy Scripture.t Enough, I think, has been 

* Of the present condition of Calvin's ecclesiastical republic some 
account is given in Chap. V. So disastrous has been the working of 
his invention, that a Genevan preacher, living in the very house and 
chamber of that distinguished "reformer," confessed to an English 
Clergyman in the year 1836, " The whole edifice of Calvin's Church 
is noOttfallcn into utter ruin, both in doctrine and discipline, and can 
never be repaired." " Illustrations of the Latitudinarian develop- 
ment of the original Calvinistic community at Geneva," from the 
Journal of the Rev. W. Palmer, p. 49. 

t Though it may be truly said, that if all the Scripture evidence 
here adduced should be omitted, there would still remain enough to 
prove our case. There is, indeed, a vast store of such evidence, and 
that both practical and mystical, to which DO reference has been 
made. To the former class belong all such prophetical sayings as 
are commented upon by St. Clement, Ad Cor. 42; by St. Austin, 
In Psal. xliv., Enarrat. torn. viii. p. 169 ; by St. Jerome on the 
same Scripture, Opp. torn. vii. p. 57 ; or again by Origen, In Cantic. 
i. 17, ap. Hieron. In Cantic. Canticor. HomiJ. iii. torn. viii. p. 152. 
To the latter may be referred those more profound and awful expo- 
sitions, which are too solemn for controversy -cogitfi-nda potius quam 
dicenda such as the following : r i'avnjs dp%ii T>IS kpapx'ias, says the 
Areopagite, rj irrjyij rijs &>rjs, >j o'viria T?js AyuOoTtjros. i; fiin TtXv ovriav airta. 
Tpi'us. De Ecclesiast. Hierarch. cap. i. p. 169. Cf. Clem. Alex. 
Stromat. lib. vi". p. 667 ; and Tertull. De Oratione, p. 149. The 
mystical expositions of holy men in relation to the Church men 
who saw in every thing, with Heaven-taught piety, types or emblems 
of the Most Blessed Trinity " Trinitatem quandam in omni re," as 
Austin speak are, as all must admit, too high and* sacred to be ex- 
posed to the handling of uncatholio tempers. That they regarded 
the threefold order of the Ministry as a Type of the Holy Trinity is 
to the faithful a solemn thought, but how dreadful to the adversary ! 
upon whom, indeed, there were little wisdom in urging it ; " Sed 
compellimur," as St. Hilary complains, " compellimur ab hsereti'co- 
runi ac blasphemantium vitiis, illicita agere, ardua scandere, inefla- 
bilia eloqui, inconcessa praesumere." De Trinitate, lib. ii. The 
following passages, as characteristic of the Scripture expositions both 
of the primitive and mediaaval ages, may be suitably added. " Unxit 
te Deus, Deus tuus, oleo lEetitiae prae consortibus tuis," is applied by 
one to the anointing of Bishops at their consecration. B. Ivonis 
Carnotensis, De Rebus Ecclesiasticis, ap. Hittorp. torn. i. p. 782. 
" Baptismum ignis," says another, speaking of a deep saying of 



SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 77 

produced to satisfy all who are in a condition to receive it ; 
all, that is, who are not disabled, by moral or religious dis- 
qualifications, from apprehending it. With respect to such 
persons, it must be considered that no testimony can amount 
to what is called proof, otherwise than relatively. And since 
Divine Truths are for the most part proposed to us whether 
from some secret necessity, or for the purposes of moral dis- 
cipline with only a certain degree of evidence, and no 
more ; then to such as require, in the case of this or that 
truth, a further amount of testimony than God has chosen 
to vouchsafe, such particular truth is incapable of proof, 
and must continue so in spite of all which can be said in its 
behalf.* The many clear passages which have been accu- 
mulated above, agreeing as they do both with the declara- 
tions of prophecy and the facts of history, both with the 
promises of God and their actual fulfilment in the Church, 
will, it is presumed, be accepted by most persons as effectual 
proof; whilst by some others they would be rejected, even 
if they were much plainer and more numerous than they 
are.* It is enough, therefore, for the present purpose, to 
have collected these. 

But in bringing this Chapter to an end, it may be well to 
notice the argument from Scripture for they have, strictly 
speaking, but one argument which the adversaries are ac- 
customed to oppose to" these portions of Holy Writ, and to that 
uniform interpretation of them which has been commended 
to us by the consent of all past ages. It will be found to be 
exactly such as others, reasoning upon the same principles, 
venture to urge against Articles of Faith, as the doctrine of 
the Most Holy Trinity, or the Divinity of our Lord Jesus 
Christ. 

. The argument is usually stated in some such tewas as 
the following : " St. Paul, in his Epistles, recognises but 

Holy Scripture, " accipimus per impositionem manus Episcoporum." I 
Amalarii De Ecc. Offic. lib. i. cap. xxvii. "Per ignem debemus, 
intelligere Spiritmn Sanctum quern die Pentecostes super Apostolosj 
tnisit, et qnotidie per Baptismura et per impositionem manuum Epis- \ 
coporum mittit." Remigii Altissiodor. In Joel. cap. ii. And these 
may suffice as examples of this mode of reference to Holy Scripture 
upon the subject under consideration. 

* Vide Bishop Butler's Charge, A. D. 1751, Works, p. 241. 

t " I endeavour to show the unreasonableness of Atheism u pon 
this account, because it requires more evidence for things than they 
are capable of." Tillotson, Rule of Faith, Preface. 



78 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

two Orders of the Ministry, Bishops and Deacons. Those 
whom in one passage he calls Elders or Presbyters, are de- 
nominated in another, Bishops. These are, according to 
his use, and that of the New Testament generally, convert- 
ible terms; they plainly indicate the same Office. They 
were not distinguished by the Apostles, and therefore can- 
not be distinguished by us ; only two Orders of Ministers 
were enumerated then, and there cannot be three now." 
This, I believe, is the sum of the argument.* 

*"- v \v\ rAtj^s Now it is observable, at first sight, how exactly this 
, r i" ,- reasoning coincides with that of the Arian or Socinian. 

1 '. > f- *?"".' "V i- jx, ^ 

t V < '"The Bible declares, again and again, that there is only 
f *~ one God ; therefore there cannot be a Trinity. It nowhere 

speaks of God the Holy Ghost ;f~therefore He is not a Per- 
son in the Godhead. Christ says, ' My Father is greater 
than I ;' therefore Christ did not assume to be equal with 
God." This philosophy of the Socinian is so closely allied 
to that of the Lutheran or Calvinist, that it explains the 
awful fact of their rapid amalgamation into one body, and 
accounts for the transition which is now going on, all over 
the world, from the one class to the other from the des- 
pisers of Primitive Discipline to the corrupters of Catholic 
Doctrine. But without noticing further in this place a con-" 
nexion which it is proposed to trace in a future chapter, the 
objection itself shall be considered under some of the differ- 
ent forms in which it has been proposed. 

(1.) And first, it must be said, not by way of argument, 
but in all simplicity, that if it were ever so true, it would 
not impair, nay, it would not touch, the cause which it is 
brought to discredit. For suppose it were so, that the Apos- 
tles make mention of only two Orders of Clergy, presbyters 
and deacons, as ordained by their authority what were they, 
the Ordainers, themselves? Did they not constitute a third 
Order? And has not the Church always taught that the 
Rulers now specially styled Bishops succeed them ? They, 
and others appointed by them for that purpose, ordained, 
admonished, and censured the Presbyters and Deacons in 
the several Churches of their charge ; and it was to the 
authority of these single Rulers that Timothy and Titus, 
Clement and Epaphroditus, Ignatius and Polycarp, and the 
rest in turn down to our own day, succeeded. With what 

* See it stated at length by Hooker, E. P. b. vii. ch. xi. 



SCfctPTtJRE -EVIDENCE. 79 

object, then, does the adversary assert that the Apostles speak 
of only two Orders of the Priesthood as subject to their rule ? 
He must show, if he would prove his case, that the Apostles 
were of ike same Order with the clergy whom they ordained 
and governed* 

(2.) But then it is said : " However this may be, we find 
no such definition in the Bible of the Episcopal Office and 
Order as is here implied. Where do we see even the name 
Bishop to be used in its present signification 1 where, for 
instance, is St. James called Bishop of Jerusalem ?" 

The impotence of this second objection may be estimated 
by the fact, that it has been scornfully rejected by the very 
teachers who urge it, when used by others against them- 
selves.* An illustration of its true character may readily be 
found. Thus : we are told that " the disciples were called 
Christians first in Antioch," and that probably more than 
ten years after our Lord's Resurrection. Were they not 
Christians, then, before the name was assumed? If they 
were, then why are St. James and the rest to be denied their 
Episcopal character because the title was not yet applied 1 
If those Rulers were not Bishops because they were not called 
so, then the first disciples were not Christians, for they were 
not called so eitherl Every one sees how absurd this way 
of reasoning is in the latter case : why should it be thought 
wise and prudent in the former ? 

(3.) Again : " How was the Office of Bishop distinct," 
it is asked, " from that of Presbyter, when the same indivi- 
duals are called, by the same Apostle, both Bishops and 
Presbyters ?" This is another form of the objection ; spe- 
cious, indeed, in sound, but, as Hooker has said, " a lame 
and impotent kind of reasoning "t with which to convict all 
past ages of error. For let it be granted that the title of 
Bishop is not confined in the New Testament to that Order 

* " Ista vero putida objectio, voces illas in Scripturis non inveniri, 
quoties objecta, audita, repulsa, damnata est omnium bonorum et 
doctorum judicio." Theod. Bezae Epist. Ixxxi. Bishop Pearson says 
(On the Creed, Art. ix. Notes, vol. ii. p. 460) : " It was the ordinary j 
objection of the schismatical Novatians, that the very name of] 
Catholics was never used by the Apostles ; and the answer to it by j 
the Catholics was by way of concession, ' Sed sub Apostolis, inquies,/ 
nemo Catholicus vocabatur. Esto, sic fuerit ; vel illud indulge,' " &cj 
Pacian. Ad, Sympronian. Ep. i. 

t E.P. book vii. vol. Hi. p. 179. 'Cf. Whitgift, Def. of A. to A. 
p. 534. 




80 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

to which it was afterwards restrained * what then? Oar 
is about things, not names ;<jwe are looking for an 
Qrder of spiritual Governors higher than Presbyters, and 
possessing authority over them : and will any man deny that 

r , A J * u XL XT m A. n TT 

suc " an Order is to be seen in the JNew lestament" How 
id^ is it, then, to contend for a phrase,t and how perilous 
an argument in their lips who may be called upon to defend 
the fabulous vocabulary of the conventicle.J What rash- 
ness is this, to reject an Office recognised in the Word of 
God, and ever maintained in the Church, because suppos- 
iBg'it to be so men have since denoted it by a particular 
^ e * As if to speak of Baptism as a " Sacrament" were to 
annul its efficacy, because that word is not applied to it in 
^ c "P ture > or when Adam "gave names" to the creatures 
* roun< i hi ffl j ne raust have changed the constitution which 
t h ev h^ f rom God.^ But let us examine more closely an 
argument, upon the success of which the whole fabric of 
the modern discipline depends.^ 



* 



OPC*. 
' 



-- -. Which, however, they cannot prove. Hammond says, "The 

p ' word Bishop in the Scripture is never used for a Presbyter in our 
- ' ' '" modern notion of the word, but constantly for the one single Governor 
f /^ki-Ain a Church or city." Vindication of his Dissertations, 7. p. 40. 
/ ,.- " Where you find a Bishop and Presbyter in Scripture to be one and 
'SC^.the same which I deny to be always so it is in the Apostles' times. 
W Now I think to prove the order of Bishops succeeded that of the 
w 'Apostles, and that the name was chiefly altered in reverence to 
: -n>.: those that were immediately chosen by our Saviour." King Charles's 
ivs-i ft nswer to Henderson, quoted by Stillingfleet, Unreasonableness of 
' 'Separation, part iii. 13, p. 271. Cf. Jackson, Dissertation on Epis- 
.^.^copacy, p. 39. 

t " Si enim de verbis inter nos controversia est, facile contemnetur, 
dummodo rem ipsam quam concepisti mente videamus." Aug. De 
Ordine., lib. ii. cap. ii. " Nihil obstant verba, cum sententia congruat 
veritati." Lactantius, De Vera Sapientia, lib. iv. p. 332. 

t " These imperative men mightily forget their own principles; 
for they create new Senators, Vestry Elders, without any command- 
ment of the word ; they command whatsoever their own heads affect, 
without any commandment of the word ; to wit," &c. Bishop 
White, Letter to Archbishop Laud, prefixed to his Treatise on the 
Sabbath. Tia\iv <rv irvOev tyet; ras cas ditpo-noktis \ asks Naziansen ; and 
he warns the adversary that he must fall by his own principles of 
reasoning. Oral, xxxvii. torn. i. p. 606. But this is the fate of all 
sectaries ; like Saul, they fall upon their own sword. " Jam no 
vides, frater Panneniane, jam ne sentis, jam ne intelligis, te argu~ 
mentis tuis contra te militasse ?" S. Optat. Adv. Par-men, lib. it 
p. 51. 

" This is Salmasius his standing juggle, to make every passage 



SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 81 

There is no order above Presbyters, these new teachers 
say, " because some Presbyters are called Bishops." If this 
rule of interpretation be a sound one, it will bear 'a general 
application. Now, in the New Testament our Blessed Lord 
is called a Deacon, diaxovov 7isgiTO[ii}g :* " Shall we argue, 
therefore, that Christ is no more than of the order of Deacon 
in the Church? Such and no better are the arguments 
from the etymology of the words, that Bishops are no more 
than Presbyters."! 

Again : the Apostles are called in one place Deacims of 
the New Testament, Siuxorovs xctir^g dta&^xijg ;J elsewhere, 
St. Peter and St. John call themselves Presbyters, or Elders.^ 
The same persons, then, in those days, were called both 
Presbyters and Deacons ; therefore, by this rule, Presbyter 
and Deacon is the same thing ; and, by the same method of 
induction, Bishop and Presbyter have- been proved to be 
the same: therefore, Bishop, Presbyter, and Deacon, are all 
equal to one another, and there is no distinction of ministers 
whatever. And it is to an objection which leads to such a 
result, that we are required to furnish a serious reply.|| 
Such a reply, however, shall now be offered. 

in which either of these two words bishop or presbyter occurs a 
demonstration of the identity of Office ; . . if we bar him and his 
fellows but this one childish sophism, they must in this controversy 
be dumb for ever. It is the whole force, of all that they have written 
upon it ; all their books are nothing more than this one thing repeated 
so many thousand times over." Archdeacon Parker's Government 
of the Church, p. 24. 

* Rom. xv. 8. 

t Leslie, Rehearsals, no. 252. t 2 Cor. iii. 6. 

1 Pet. v. 1; 2 and 3 John. Bishop Andrewes has observed, 
that the Apostles are called Priests or Seniors, 1 Pet. v. 1 ; Deacons 
or Ministers, 1 Cor. iii. 5 ; Teachers or Doctors, 1 Tim: ii. 7 ; Bishops 
or Overseers, Acts i. 20 ; Prophets, Acts xiii. 1, and Rev. xxii. 9 ; 
Evangelists,! Cor. ix. 16; and, besides all these, Disciples. It. is 
surely, then, mere trifling to reason as some do upon the Names used 
in the New Testament. 

(I "They may as well prove," says Leslie, " that Christ was but 
a deacon, because He is so called Rom. xv. 8, &I&KOVOS, which we 
rightly translate minister ; and lishop signifies an overs.eer, andpres- 
lyter an ancient man or elder man ; whence our term of alderman. 
And this is as good a foundation to prove that the Apostles were 
aldermen in the city -acceptation of the word, or that our alder- 
men are all bishops and apostles, as to prove that presbyters and 
bishops are all one, from the childish'jingle of the words. It would 
be the same thing if we should undertake to confront all antiquity, 



0-* SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

Of course, if this confusion of terms strikes us as worthy 
of remark, it must have been noticed by those who lived 
before us. The old Fathers were apt to be very observant in 
such matters, and we shall find that this has not escaped 
them. The chief passage upon which the new expounders 
seem to rely is in the first chapter to the Philippians, where 
St. Paul salutes " the saints which are at Philippi, with the 
Bishops and Deacons :" here, they say,* is plain proof that 
the Apostle knew only of two Orders. This is the comment 
of these last days : now let us hear what a more primitive 
age thought of the same passage.f 

St. John Chrysostom observes upon it as follows : 
" ' With the bishops and deacons.' What does this signify 1 
were there many bishops in one city? By no means; but he 
gives this name to the presbyters ; for at that period they shared 
the same name, and even the Bishop was called a deacon."! 
And this commentary of the Saint is no " private interpre- 

and prove against all the histories, that the Emperors of Rome 
were no more than generals of armies, and that every Roman gene- 
ral was Emperor of Rome, because he could find the word Imperator 
sometimes applied to the general of an army. Or, as if a common- 
wealth-man should get up and say, that our former kings were no 
more than our dukes are now, because the style of grace, which is now 
given' to dukes, was then given to kings. And suppose that any one 
were put under the penance of answering such ridiculous arguments, 
.what method would he take, but to show that the emperors of Rome, 
and former kings of England, had generals of armies and dukes under 
them, and exercised authority over them ?" On the Qualifications 
necessary to administer the Sacraments, Works, vol. vii. pp. 105, 6. 
(ed. Oxon.) 

* Vide J. Pomeran, e. g., Annot. in Epist. ad Phil. 

t The interpretation of St. Ambrose, however, would supersede 
the supposed difficulty altogether. " St. Paul is speaking," he says, 
" of certain bishops and deacons who were at that time in his com- 
pany, and not of those at Philippi." But it must be admitted that 
Bellarmine rejects this, as " nimis dura expositio ;" De Clcricis, lib.i. 
cap. xiv. Still, even if we decline to receive this comment of the 
Saint, his words are very instructive, and afford a striking testimony 
to the mind of the Church in his day. " If," says he, " the Apostle 
had been addressing the bishops and deacons of Philippi, he would 
have addressed them personally ; he would have written, not to two 
or three, tut to the bishop of the place, as he did to Timothy and 
Titus, loci ipsius Episcopo scribendum erat, non duobus vel tribus, 
sicut et ad Titum et Timotheum." In Phil, i., Opp. torn. ii. p. 251, 

+ Suv iirivKdirois xol Siaxtivoi^.' Tf TOVTO ', ftias TdAsuj iroAAo! fTrianoirot 
fiaav f oiiSa^icas' dAAa roif Tfpsir/3vTC povs OVTWS iica.\c<re' T&TE yap TCCOJ iKOtvtH* 
vow TOIS ov&paai, KO.I StaKovo; o iiticKOTtos eXeysro. S. Chrysost. Homil.l. 



SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 83 

tation," but the catholic sentiment. " By bishops in this 
place we understand presbyters," says St. Jerome ; " for 
there could not be many bishops in one city."* " The first 
presbyters were called bishops," writes St. Ambrose, " be- 
fore Churches were appointed in all places."t " He calls 
the presbyters bishops," says QEcumenius ; " for up to that 
time tlie names were common"^. " They were not yet dis- 
tinguished ," says Theophylact. " He styles the presbyters 
bishops," Theodoret says ; " for at that time they used either 
name." 1| The same thing says the Greek scholiast ; and so, 

in Phil. \. torn. iv. pp. 5, 6; where he continues the subject with 
further illustrations of the promiscuous manner in which these dif- 
ferent titles were applied to the three Orders. 

* " Hie episcopos presbyteros intelligimus; non enim inuna urbe 
plures episcopi esse potuissent ; sed etiam hoc in Apostolorum Aeti- 
bus habetur." S. Hieron. In Epist. ad Pldl. cap. i. torn. viii. p. 258. 
" Nulla ars absque magistro diseitur," says the same Father else-, 
where ; and then he notices how even the lower animals have com- 
monly their single leader; bees elect a kind of sovereign, and cranes 
follow one in a regular order ; there is one emperor, and one judge in 
a province; Rome could not bear two rulers, but the one slew the 
other; Esau and Jacob fought in the womb of Rebecca; and so, be 
adds, " Singuli ecclesiarum Episcopi, singuli archipresbyteri, singuli 
archidiaconi, et omnis ordo ecclesiasticus suis rectoribus nititur." Ad 
Rusticum Monaclium, Epist. iv. How firmly this truth was held by 
the ancient Church is emphatically shown in a remarkable passage of 
the ecclesiastical historian. Liberius, Bishop of Rome, had been ba- 
nished, and his see unlawfully occupied by Felix. On the return of 
the former, it was proposed by tlie Emperor, that the two should rule 
the Roman Church conjointly. Whereupon, says the historian, the 
people, shocked at so strange a proposal, exclaimed with one voice, 
"ONE GOD, ONE CHRIST, ONE BISHOP" Ely QEOS, tts ^PICTCS. els 
i-ricKo-os. Theodorit. Ecclesiast. Histor. lib. ii. cap. xvii. p. 96. And 
Sozomen, speaking of the early death of this Felix, does not hesitate 
to ascribe it to the special Providence of God, who thus interfered to 
save the chair of St. Peter from the dishonour of being occupied by 
two Bishops at once. H. E. lib. iv. cap. xv. p. 558. 
t In Ephcs. iv. torn. ii. p. 241. 

t 'ETTiaKOTTOVS TOVS TTpGJ3v-fpOVS Kfl^eij TOTS yup Tt tKOlVtiVOVV Tofj CVOftOO'l. 

O3cumen. In Phil. i. torn. ii. p. 65. 

QTITTIIJ yap Tiaav &iaKtKpip.iva TO. ovdpara, aXXd KOI at ewiincoirot tiaxovot 
Kal TTpetrfivTepot iKoXovvTo. Theophylact. In loc. p. 577. " Sub Episco- 
porum nomine presbyteros amplexus est." Raban. Maur. De Institut. 
Clericor. cap. vi. "In principio, licet ordines fuerint distincti, non 
tamen nomina ordinum ; unde hie comprehendit presbyteros cum 
episcopis." S. Thomas Aquinas, In Phil. i. 

|| In loc. torn. iii. p. 323. Cf. Pseudo-Alcuin. Lit. de Divin. 
Qffic.j in cap. de Tonsura Clericorum; et Georg. Pachyin* in S. 
Dionys. De Calest. Hierarch. cap.'i. Paraphr. 



.* 
84 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

in a word, all the holy witnesses who were best able to speak 
in such a matter. But perhaps they were all leagued to 
suppress the truth ? It were a thought more injurious to 
the Master whom they served than to themselves ; but if it 
were so, there is yet another testimony, which shall be cited, 
in the last place. There is actually a Version of the Sacred 
Scriptures, and not the least valuable or authentic of the 
copies which the Divine bounty has preserved to us, in 
which the whole matter seems to be cleared up. In the 
Syriac translation of the Holy Records, as the most learned 
Bishop Beveridge has noticed, the words <rvv sTtiaxoTtoig xal 
diaxovotg, here in dispute, are actually rendered " with the 
presbyters and deacons;" and "in almost all places of the 
New Testament where the word ejiltrxono?, or bishop, occurs, 
it is translated by presbyter in the Syriac Version."* 

It would be natural to exult in the fulness of our proofs, 
but that to triumph in such a victory, or against such an 
adversary, would be unseemly. Rather let us, with humble 
thankfulness, rejoice in our own inheritance, and using 
wisely the privileges which belong to us as children of the 
Holy Catholic Church, seek with all gentleness and charity 
to win others to our own blessed lot. So shall we best use the 
injunction of the Apostle, and " save others " even against 
their own will " pulling them outofthejire." 

Our supposed difficulty, then, turns out to be no difficulty 
at all. The second order of Priests were indeed at first, 
and in some places, called " bishops," as being in some 
sense " overseers ;" but the Rulers of the Churches, the 
Angels themselves, were called not only bishops but Apos- 
tles, for they filled the Apostolic Office. We understand, 
therefore, why St. Paul speaks of other Apostles besides the 
Twelve, which he does in the first Epistle to the Corinthians ; 
why he calls St. James, though not of the Twelve, an 
" Apostle" who, as we have seen, was Bishop of Jerusalem ; 
why he applies the same title to Epapbroditus, which he 
does in this same Epistle to the Philippians, saying, " I sup- - 
posed it necessary to send to you Epaphroditus, my brother, 
and companion in labour, and fellow-soldier, but your 
Apostle, vfi&v de anoviokov ;"t and since he was not with 

* Cited by Collier, Ecclesiastical History, book vii. p. 617. 
t Calvin translates these words " Apostolum vestrum," and ad- 
mits, in commenting upon the subsequent verses, that Epaphroditus 



SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 85 

his Church at this time, no wonder that St. Paul does not 
salute the Angel of Philippi by name, but only " the bishops 
(or presbyters) and deacons." " He calls the blessed Epa- 
phroditus their Apostle," says Theodoret ; " plainly there- 
fore does he show that he had been intrusted with the 
Office of Bishop, since he bears the title of Apostle;"* so 
little doubt had the Early Church that the one implied the 
other ! And the same Theodoret tells us that Epaphroditus 
was Bishop of Philippi. 

Nor had our Fathers any other thought of Bishops but as 
Successors in the very Office and Order of Apostles. And 
therefore St. Jerome on that saying of St. Paul, " Other 
Apostles saw I none save James the Lord's brother," ob- 
serves thus : " For by degrees, as time went on, OTHERS 
WERE ORDAINED APOSTLES by those whom the Lord had 
chosen, as that passage to the Philippians proves, saying, 
" I supposed it necessary to send to you Epaphroditus your 
Apostle."^ " The Bishops are called Apostles, v says Pa- 
cian, " as Paul declareth in speaking of Epaphroditus."| 
And why they ceased to be so styled is not concealed from 
us. An ancient Father, who gives the same interpretation 

was the Pastor of the Philippians : so Grotius, In Epist. ad Phil. 
cap. i. And Tilletnont observes well, that St. Paul could not have 
styled Epaphroditus "Apostle" as being the first instrument in 
delivering the Gospel to the Philippians, because he had performed 
that office himself. Memoires, &c. tome i. 2de partie, p. 856. 

* ... SaptSs roivvv itiifiafcv. us' ri]V iTriaKotiiKr\v otVovo/uai; *airoff TTC- 
niarevTo, exuv oiroo-rdAow irpoatiyopiav . ubi supra. 

t " Paulatim, tempore praecedente, et am ab his quos Dommus 
elegerat ordinati sunt Apostoli ; sicnt ille ad Philippenses sermo 
declarat," &c. ; and then he observes that " St. Paul is speaking of 
such persons when he says, ' Whether our brethren be inquired of, 
they are the Apostles dm><rrAot of the Churches, and the glory of 
Christ' (2 Cor. viii. 23) ; and that Silas and Judas are both styled 
Apostles by the Apostles." S. Hierou. In Gal. i. 19. torn. vi. p. 
125. And St. Hilary, on the 2d chapter of Philippians, says, " He 
(Epaphroditus) was their Apostle eorum Apostolus and made so 
by the Apostle." So Clement of Alexandria calls his namesake 
"the Apostle Clement," Stromat. lib. iv. p. 516; and St. Austin, 
speaking of his own high office, says, " Ego minimus non splum 
omnium Apostolorum, sed omnium Episcoporum." De Actis cum 
Felice Manichao, lib. i. cap. vi. torn. vi. p. 207 ; and innumerable 
instances of the same way of speaking might be adduced. Cf. S. 
Athanas. Ad Dracontium, torn. i. p. 956; who certainly was quite 
sure that Apostle and Bishop were the same thing. 

t Pacian. Epist. i. ap. Bibliotk. Patrum, torn. iii. p. 4?1, 

5 



86 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

of St. Paul's words with the rest of his brethren, having 
remarked that, at first, the terms presbyter and bishop were 
applied to the same person, the name Apostle being given 
to those who were afterwards called Bishops, proceeds thus : 
" But in the course of time, they confined the title of Apos- 
tle to those who were truly so (i. e. the Twelve), and the 
appellation of Bishops they assigned to the per sons formerly 
styled Apostles. Thus (or in this sense) Epaphroditus was 
the Apostle of the Philippians, thus Titus and Timothy 
were Apostles respectively of the Cretans and Asiatics."* 
So that whilst, in the Apostolic age, presbyters were some- 
times called bishops, it was only because that highest Order 
of Church Governors to which this title was afterwards re- 
served were hitherto called " Apostles." And with this 
agrees the teaching of all God's servants. " The Bishops," 
says St. Ambrose, " are Apostles;"! and St. Cyprian, "the 
Lord appointed Apostles, that is, Bishops ;"| and St. Jerome, 
" Bishops'occupy the place of Apostles ;"<, and Pacian, " the 
Bishops are entitled Apostles ;"(] and Tertulliari, " were first 
ordained by the Apostles ;"ff and St. Irenajus, " are traced 
in all Churches from the Apostles ;"** and St. Austin, " are 
instead of Apostles :"tt and, in one word, all the Saints and 
all Martyrs, all Churches and all times, declare the same 
truth, that Bishops are the Apostles of the Most High ; or 
that, in the words of Hooker, " the first Bishops in the 
Church of Christ were His blessed Apostles."$$ 

* Cited by Bloomfield, Annot. in 1 Tim. iii. vol. viii. p. 227. 

t " Apostoli Episcopi sunt." torn. ii. p. 241. 

\ " Apostolqs, id est, Episcopos, Dominus elegit." Ep. Ixv. Ad, 
Rogatianum. 

" Apostolprum locum Episcopi tenent." Ep. liy . Ad Marcellam. 

|| " Episcopi Apostoli nominantur." uli supra. 

IT De Prescript. Haeret., and Adv. Marcion. lib. iv. cap. v. 
** Lib. iii. cap. iii. 

tt In Psal. xliv. torn. viii. p. 169 ; and St. Hilary of Poictiers 
" O dignos successores Petti atque Pauli," Contra Arianos, p. 442- 
and Amalarius, lt Imitatio Episcoporum Apostolorum chorus est " 
DC Ecc.-Off. lib. ii. cap. xii.; and so a host more, of whose unvarying 
testimony, confirmed as it is by the equally plain witness of Holy 
Scripture, we may confidently say, " Traditio nihil aliud est quam 
Scripture ipsius explicatio et interpretatio ;" Cassand. De Officio 
Pit Viri, p. 782. 

ft E. P. book vii. vol. iii. p. 183. A truth to which the divines 
of our own Church have constantly witnessed. " If there can be 
any better evidence under heaven," says Bishop Hall, "for any 



SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 87 

To conclude : the ecclesiastical order was, it should 
seem, at first as follows : (I) Apostles; (2) Presbyters; (3) 

matter of fact, let Episcopacy be for ever abandoned out of God's 
Church." Humble Remonstrance, &c. Works, vol. x. p. 280 (Oxon 
1837). 

And Bishop Andrewes : " Our Church doth hold, there is a 
distinction between Bishop and Priest, and that de jure divino." 
Answer to Cardinal Perron, Opuscul. 

And Bishop Bilson : " Of this (the Apostolical Succession) there 
is so perfect record, in, all the stories and Fathers of the Church, that 
I much muse with what face men that have any taste of learning can 
denie the vocation of Bishops came from the Apostles ; for that they 
succeeded the Apostles and Evangelists in their Churches and chaires 
may inevitably be proved, if any Christian persons or Churches 
deserve to be credited." The Perpetual Government of Christ's 
Church, chap. xiii. p. 247. 

And Bishop Bancroft : " Unlesse I could prove my Ordination 
lawful! out of the Scriptures, I would not be a Bishop four houres 
longer." Vide Fuller, Church History of Britain, book x. cent. 17. 
And Bishop Beveridge : " The continued and uninterrupted 
Succession, which is the great glory of our Church, and that which 
you can never sufficiently thank God for." Sermons on the Church, 
serm. ii. p. 58 (1837). 

And Bishop Sanderson : " The Bishops (are) the lawful successors 
of the Apostles, and inheritors of their power." On Episcopacy, 
'part iii. 11. 

And Archbishop Br am ball : " The line of Apostolical Succession 
is the very nerves and sinews of ecclesiastical unity and communion, 
both with the present Church, and with the Catholic Symbolical 
Church of all successive ages." Just Vindication of the Church of 
England, p. 29. 

And Bishop Taylor : " Episcopacy relies not upon the authority 
of Fathers and Councils, but upon Scripture, upon the institution of 
Christ, or the institution of His Apostles, upon an universal tradition 
"and an universal practice, not upon the words and opinions of the 
doctors ; and it hath as great a testimony as Scripture itself hath." 
Works, vol. vii. Dedication, p. xviii. ed. Heber. 

And Hooker : " Wherefore let us not fear to be herein bold and 
peremptory, that if any thing in the Church's government, surely 
the first institution of Bishops was from heaven, was even of God, 
the Holy Ghost was the author of it." E. P. book vii. vol. iii. 
p. 205. 

Lastly, so our two Martyrs, to whom it was given to seal their 
faith with their blood. " This I will say, and abide by it, that the 
calling of Bishops is jure divino, by divine right." Laud, On Church 
Ritual, p. 347 (1840). And his Royal Master : " It is well known I 
have endeavoured to satisfy myself in what the chief patrons for 
other ways can say against this, or for theirs ; and I find they have, 
as far less of Scripture grounds and of reason, so for examples and 
practice of the Church, or testimonies of histories, they are wholly 



88 SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 

Deacons ; the title of Bishop being applied sometimes to one 
order, sometimes to another. But when, after the Twelve 
were removed to the Church in Heaven, the name " Apostle" 
seemed too sacred to be applied in its first latitude, that is. 
to all the supreme Governors, it ceased to be so used, and 
the office which it had indicated was henceforward denoted 
by a title not hitherto restricted to that purpose ; the order 
being now, (1) Bishops; (2) Presbyters; (3) Deacons. "It 
clearly appeareth, therefore," says Hooker, "that Churches 
Apostolic did know but three degrees in the power of eccle- 
siastical order ; at the first, Apostles, Presbyters, and Dea- 
cons; afterwards, instead of Apostles, Bishops." He adds: 
" Heaps of allegations in a case so evident and plain are 
needless. I may therefore safely conclude, that there are at 
this day in the Church of England no other than the same 
degrees of ecclesiastical order, namely, Bishops, Priests, 
and Deacons, which had their beginning from Christ and 
His blessed Apostles themselves." 

This conclusion we shall see further cause to adopt in the 
progress of these pages : meanwhile, to use the emphatic 
language of the same wise and holy man, " High time it is 
to give over the obstinate defence of this most miserable 
forsaken cause ; in the favour whereof neither God, nor " 
amongst so many wise and virtuous men as Antiquity hath 
brought forth, any one can be found to have hitherto directly 
spoken. Irksome confusion must of necessity be the end 
whereunto all such vain and ungrounded confidence doth 
bring, as hath nothing to bear it out but only an excessive 
measure of bold and peremptory words, holpen by the start 
of a little time, before they came to be examined. In the 
writings of the Ancient Fathers there is not any thing witJi 
more serious asseveration inculcated, than that it is God which 
maketh Bishops, that their authority hath divine allowance, 
that the bishop is the priest of God, that he is judge in 
Christ's stead, that according to God's own law the whole 
Christian fraternity standeth bound to obey him. Of this 
there was not in the Christian world of old any doubt or 

destitute ; wherein the whole stream runs so for Episcopacy, that 
there is not the least rivulet for any other." EiVow Ba<riAtA<j, p. 145. 
Of which two testimonies we may surely say, with an ancient Father, 
" Intelligere debuerant aiiquid in ea re esse rationis, qua?, non sine 
causa, usque ad mortem defendatur." Lactant. De Justitia. lib v 
p. 456. 



SCRIPTURE EVIDENCE. 89 

controversy made, it was a thing universally every where 
agreed upon. What should move men to judge that now so 
unlawful and naught, which was then so reverently es- 
teemed 1 Surely no other cause but this ; men were in 
those times meek, lowly, tractable, willing to live in dutiful 
awe and subjection unto the pastors of their souls; now we 
imagine ourselves so able every man to teach and direct all 
others, that none of us can brook it to have superiors ; and 
for a mask to hide our pride, we pretend falsely the law of 
Christ, as if we did seek the execution of His will, when, in 
truth, we look for the mere satisfaction of our own against 
His."* 

* Ibid, book vii. vol. iii. pp. 323, 4. 



CHAPTER III. 

EVIDENCE OP ANTIQUITY. 

I. IF the Sacred Records had supplied no such evidence 
as has now been adduced in other words, if there had been 
no recognition whatever in Holy Scripture of that ecclesias- 
tical system which, from the beginning, all ages and almost 
all men have believed to be divine, even in that case, no 
progress would have been made towards proving it human. 
The truth of that system is not, as the adversary desires to 
represent it, a distinct,. independent proposition, subject to 
the ordinary methods of proof, and to be tested by the 
amount of positive evidence which can be exhibited in its 
behalf; very far otherwise. It cannot even be approached 
at all as a separate question. It is indissolubly connected 
with the integrity of the Gospel Revelation, closely linked 
with the free promises of the Gospel Covenant. A beautiful 
scheme in itself, it is but a small portion of one incalculably 
more vast and extended ; and it is impossible, so delicate are 
the relations between them, that the one should be seriously 
affected without a proportionate derangement of the other. 
It is important to notice the connexion here spoken of, 
which a few illustrations will serve to explain more clearly. 

It is asserted by some that the Episcopal Office, as now 
exercised, was not instituted by Christ or His Apostles ; that 
jt was, in fact, an invention of men, and a corruption of the 
true divine discipline. And it is supposed by those who 
advocate this theory, that it is directed merely against one 
particular view of ecclesiastical polity, which may be con- 
sidered upon its own merits, and be accepted or denied 
without reference to any other truth or doctrine whatsoever. 
How erroneous this notion is we easily perceive when we 
come to examine the theory in question, which, far from 
being opposed only to one certain form or mode of Church 



EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 91 

discipline, will be found to involve moreover a series of the 
most amazing consequences, such as, among others, the fol- 
lowing : 

First, inasmuch as the supposed corruption or alteration 
of the Divine discipline which this theory assumes, was ef- 
fected, as it takes for granted, close upon the days of the 
Apostles, and therefore with the connivance of vast numbers 
of their disciples, we must be prepared to believe that our* 
Saviour's Ordinance was set aside by His earliest and most 
favoured followers, and that men who had seen it adminis- 
tered by Apostles, and had embraced it themselves at the 
peril of their lives, had yet boldness to conceive and leisure 
to accomplish its total subversion. Next, we must think, 
that this act of hypothetical wickedness was consummated 
in every part of the world at once without consultation, and 
yet every where without variation ; the Bishops seizing upon 
an office which only marked them out as the first victims for 
death, while the Presbyters abandoned one for which no re- 
compense was even offered, which no power could have 
wrested from them, and to which they had been exalted by 
Christ Himself; the Bishops, in other words, being cruel 
and crafty, only to court sufferings which they might have 
avoided ;* and the Presbyters feeble and base, only to throw 
away honours which they might have preserved.t And yet 

* And yet " who will imagine," as Bishop Taylor eloquently 
writes, " that Bishops should at the first, in the calenture of their 
infant devotion, in the new spring of "Christianity, in the times of 
persecution, in all the public disadvantages of state and fortune, 
when they anchored only upon the shore of a holy conscience, that 
then they should have thoughts ambitious, encroaching, of usurpa- 
tion and advantages, of purpose to divest their brethren of an author- 
ity intrusted them by Christ; and then, too, -when all the advan- 
tages of their honour did only set them upon a hill to feel a stronger 
blast of persecution ?" Episcopacy Asserted, p. 181. That the fury 
of the persecutors was commonly directed in the first place against 
the Bishops, a slight acquaintance with ecclesiastical history will 
prove ; and there would be obvious reasons for such a policy. See 
the statement of Eusebius quoted by Barrow, vol. i. p. 350 ; and 
compare Caspar. Sagittar. De Martyrum Cruciatibus in Primitiva 
Ecclesia, cap. iii. 11. p. 60 ; and Pauli Qrossi Adv. Paganos Histor. 
lib. vii. cap. 27. 

t Which is an equally extravagant supposition; for if the low 
state of mind which is implied in the desire of pre-eminence was so 
common with the primitive Presbyters, how is it that they who were 
unsuccessful were so patient under their Disappointment ? ".Consi- 
der what mutinies, what animosities, what oppositions within, what 



92 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

further, we must suppose, not only that this change was 
effected throughout a world without concert and without re- 
sistance, in every land at the same moment, every where a 
new invention and yet every where the same, all Churches, 
without exception, departing from the Apostles' order, and 
all, without consultation or the possibility of it,* setting up 
precisely the same substitute, but more wonderful still, that 
of this prodigious movement, this wondrous device conceived 
in the womb of every Church at the same hour, and begot- 
ten throughout every land in the same form, po history that 
the world ever saw gives any account, no man that ever 
lived makes any mention ! Not only were the laws of uni- 
versal Christendom subverted, but never Christian knew or 
heard of the change ! It will follow moreover, from the 
same premise, that our Saviour Christ suffered His own de- 
sign to be thwarted from the first by the folly or treachery 
of man ; that He resigned His whole Church to a delusion 
so mysterious and overwhelming, that they who destroyed 
His Discipline were unconscious of their own act, and they 

scandals without, must have followed, if any had been excluded 
from rights possessed before. And how could they have prevailed 
that had encroached, when they had no power to force their sub- 
jects, but the conviction of their subjects' consciences concerning 
their own right ? and wherewithal the right itself, whatever it was, 
must have been so notorious ? How could all the different inde- 
pendent churches have been so unanimous in owning this claim, if it 
had indeed been an encroachment ? It is not probable they would all 
have yielded their rights willingly ; much less is it probable that they 
could have been forced by the practices of single persons to part with 
them unwillingly, when there was no other force that could be offered 
to them but pure considerations of conscience, granted on the merits 
of the course itself." Dodwell, On the Soul, 59. p. 297. And, be- 
sides, it has even been made a reproach to Christianity by scoffers, 
that the early Christians did contend so vehemently about what they 
call small matters. " Church history," we have been told, " is chiefly 
a relation of Churchmen's wrangles;" and one author has "denomi- 
nated every century from some eminent quarrel which arose among 
the Clergy !" Sam. Johnson's Growth of Deismin England, p. 21. 
Of course this is profane jesting : but if it were ever so true, it would 
only supply an argument in our favour ; for if they quarrelled so 
sharply about the least matters, how came they all to agree to this 
sudden and wonderful change without either consultation before or 
complaint afterwards ? 

* Vide Mosheim, De Rebus ante Constantinum, secul. i. 48. 
p. 155, who says, that no X!ouncils could have been called together 
at that time for any purpose, and therefore not for this. 



EVIDENCE OP ANTIQUITY. 93 

who submitted to the change did not know that any change 
had been made. It will appear that He did not " guide" 
His followers " into all truth," though he had freely prom- 
ised to do so ; nor save His Church from shame and con- 
tempt, though he died to exalt her to honour. And lastly, 
that the ignorance and folly of His servants was exactly pro- 
portioned to thenf zeal and self-denial, His Saints most 
blindly mistaking His will, and His Martyrs most resolutely 
opposing it ! Such are a few of the startling results which 
accompany the hypothesis, that Episcopacy is a corruption 
of the Discipline of Christ. 

Let it be repeated, therefore, that the truth of the Ec- 
clesiastical System cannot be considered at all as a separate 
question. The fulfilment of Prophecy* and the very exist- 
ence of the Church, the promises of God and our own interest 
in them almost all that is sacred or precious, enter into 
and are inseparable from it If it could be proved to want 
\evidence, Christianity itself would be undermined ; for the 
Revelation which was utterly misconceived in so principal 
a point during fifteen ages, could have been no revelation at 
all.t So that, as was observed, if the Sacred Records had 
been as scanty as they are copious in their testimony in this 
matter, even then our confidence in the faith of our Fathers 
would have continued unimpaired. We should have felt 
that the negative argument from the silence of Scripture 

* " Quoniam Ecclesiam Dei quae Catholica dicitur, sicut de ilia 
prophetntum est, per orbem terrarum difl'usam videmus, arbitramur 
nos non debere dubitare de tarn evidcntissima complctione sunctce pro- 
phetic." Aug. Honorato, Ep. clxi. torn. ii. p. 276. 

t To y5o vvv Trap' exsivitiv KaivaTanav^sva^ raTj //i' ~i<TToi7a-rt>> amirriav 
ip-inict. S. Athanas. De Synod. Arum,, et Selene, toin. i. p. 875. And 
this argument, from the general consent of mankind, has been much 
used even by the moderns : Calvin proves the canon of Scripture 
by it ; Ins ti tut. lib. i. cap. viii. 12 ; and his associates employed 
it constantly against those who went a little further than themselves. 
Nor can we over-estimate its importance when we consider that by 
its force alone, or at least chiefly, the heathen was constrained to 
accept, so far as he held it, the true doctrine of the nature of the soul. 
This interesting fact is thus stated by Cicero : " Quod si omnium 
consensus natural vox est, omnesque, qui ubique suut, consentiunt 
esse aliquid, quod ad eos pertineat, qui e vita cesserint ; nobis quo- 

que idem existimanduni est ; Sed ut Deos esse natura opina- 

mur, qualesque sint rationc cognoscimus ; sic permanere animos 
arbitramur consensu nationum omnium; qua in sede maneant, qua- 
lesque sint, ratione discenduin est." Quasi. Tusculan. i. 15, 16. 

5* 



94 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITV. 

coura not countervail the positive testimony supplied by. its 
own promises, and the interpretation put upon those prom- 
ises by all ages and people. And thus there would still 
have remained an appeal to other sources of information 
equally provided by God those, namely, from which we 
have received Holy Scripture itself; to which I proceed 
therefore, in the next place, to refer. And the first witness 
cited from these additional informants shall be ST. CLEMENT 
op ROME. 

II. There are many reasons why we should begin with 
the evidence of this eminent person. Living amongst Apos- 
tles, and 'fellow-labourer* with them, as St. Paul himself has 
recorded;* having, moreover, the testimony of the Spirit 
that " his name was in the Book of Life," it is needless to 
insist upon his qualifications as a witness upon the subject 
of these pages. He could not be deceived, because he lived 
with the Apostles themselves ; and he could not deceive, be- 
cause he was already elected to eternal life. And if it be 
said, that " it is dangerous so listen to an uninspired teach- 
er," it may be replied, first, that there is no thought of put- 
ting his words on a level with Holy Scripture, which may 
quiet all uneasiness on that head ; and secondly, that the 
primitive Christians were content to receive his instruction, 
which may very well keep us from despising it. It is a subtle 
scheme of the .enemy which would steal away our treasures 
by persuading us to think them worthless, and tempt us to 
put out the light in our hands by hinting that it may dazzle our 
eyes. But why should we suffer him to pluck from us our 
riches, on the mocking plea that we are better without them ?f 
St. Clement is the foremost of those " < '-atholic Fathers and 
Ancient Bishops," to whom the Church to which we belong 
refers her children for instruction-! We thankfully accept 

Phil. iv. 3. KX>jfEvros ' Kai rail' \onri5v a~ovpyp /* ou > wv T * AioMra iv 
/?l/?Aro <i>rjj- 

t " Since we have an" advantage over and above Scripture evi- 
dence, from the concurring sentiments of antiquity, we think it very 
proper to take that in also ; and we shall not easily suffer it to be 
wrested from us." Waterland, Defence of Query XXIX. vol. i. pt. ii. 
p. 326. Or, as it has been more forcibly said, u Truth alone is con- 
sistent with itself; we are willing to take either the test of Antiquity 
or of Scripture." Newman, On Romanism, fyc. Lect. i. p. 47. 

f In one of the Canons published together with the 39 Articles, 
A.D. 1571. See Bp. Cosins on the Canon of Scripture, ad finem. 



ST. CLEMENT OP ROME. 95 

her guidance, and will listen to him without fear or 
doubt. 

We are told by one who was b v orn only a few years after 
St. John's death, that Clement was the third Bishop of 
Rome.* Upon the same authority we learn, that his Epistle 
was addressed to the Church at Corinth on account of " no 
small sedition"^ which had broken out amongst its mem- 
bers. It was to compose this that his exhortation was writ- 
ten; and as the design of the letter in which it is contained 
was thus limited, we must not expect that it should take a 
wide scope, nor afford us much information ; though it seems 
to furnish some which is very important in itself, as well 
as quite conclusive on the subject under consideration. 

St. Clement begins by expressing his regret that he had 
not sooner given heed " to that wicked and detestable sedition, 
altogether unbecoming the elect of God, which a few hasty 
and self-willed persons had excited."^ Observe, he does not 
charge them, any more than St. Paul did, with holding cor- 
rupt doctrine, but with some breach of discipline ; they 
were " hasty and self-willed," and the authors of a " wicked 
and detestable sedition." 

He proceeds to remind them of a former state of inno- 
cence. " Ye did all things," says he, " withovt respect of 
persons, and walked according to the laws of God; being 
subject to your rulers, and yielding due honour to the presby- 
ters ;"< where there is a distinct enumeration of the Ruler 
and the Presbyter, the one receiving submission and obedi- 
ence, the other respect and honour ; and the reference is to 
spiritual governors. He adds, " Ye were all of you humble- 
minded, not boasting of any thing, desiring rather to be sub- 
ject than to govern."\\ Their offence, therefore, was impa- 
tience of government ; for he is contrasting their present 

* St. Irenaeus, lib. iii. cap. iii. 

t trrdaeus OVK dKyi, s . Id. ap. Euseb. H. E. v. 6. For the date of 
this Epistle, vide Grabe, Spicilcg. torn. i. p. 255, who fixes it before 
the year 70, Bp.~Pearson in 68, and Dodwell between 63-65. 

\ Tiff re dXXoTpias Kill tvns TOIS CK\KTOIS rov Qeov [iiapas xal dvotriov 
o-rdo-e-ii?, rjv dXi>o mjdo-wra irpo-tTii KO.L aiiOdtiti vm'tpKtivTO. .... i^ixavaav. 
J3d Cor. cap. i. Mr. Chevallier's translation has been mainly fol- 
lowed. 

'AirfJoo-coffoXijffrMj yap iriivra i-noteTre, leal roTs vvpots TO? 6ro8 iroprfj0E, 
vxoruffaaiitvat TOIS fiyovplvots vficSf, *-at Tip'.v T>IV KuQtiKovcrav dirnvipovTES roig 
irap' vfiTv TrftaSvTfpai^. Ibid. " Where the Rulers," says Bp. Beve- 
ridge, " are manifestly distinguished from the Presbyters." Codex 
Canomtm, p. 312. |) Cap. ii. 



96 EVIDENCE OP ANTIQUITY. 

state of insubordination with their former state of obedience, 
when, as he puts them in mind, " all sedition and all schism 
was an abomination unto you."* 

Having referred, incidentally, to the recent martyrdom of 
St. Peter and St. Paul, and commended the loveliness of a 
meek and lowly mind, he gives this practical admonition, 
" It is therefor^ just and holy, men and brethren, that we 
should become obedient unto God, rather than follow those 
who, through pride and sedition, have made themselves the 
leaders of a detestable enmlaiion."i 

St. Clement continues his exhortation by quoting the 
whole of the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah, and part of the 
twenty-second Psalm. The Corinthians are next reminded 
of certain eminent examples of obedience exhibited in the 
-Old Testament history. It is then suggested to them, that 
even the order and harmony of creation are, as it were, lively 
homilies, by which men are taught that concord and submis- 
sion are well pleasing to God their Maker ; and his applica- 
tion of all this is, " Let us honour those who are set over 

US."$ 

The necessity of obedience, so perseveringly enforced by 
this Apostolic person, is still further instanced by the willing 
submissioff which is paid to earthly governors; amongst 
whom, St. Clement" observes, " all are not captains of the 
host, all are not commanders of a thousand, nor of a hundred, 
nor of fifty, nor the like;" where, if the subject of his Epis- 
tle be considered, he must seem to imply, that there is a like 
gradation of spiritual offices. " Foolish and unwise men," 
he goes on to say, " who have neither prudence nor learning, 

Ilaaa ora<rts teal icav c^fo-^a fiSeXvKrov r^iV. Ibid. 

t Ainaiov ow xai 5<riov, Svfpes d6t\<po\, yirriKdoi's fy/aj ftaX^ov yevecOat 
T&> OEM, ^ roTs iv aAaoi>eio jtoi aKaruorao-fo pvirapov >;A</u dpyijyoZ'j |aitoAuu- 
Qciv cap. xiv. 

t Tovs wp-jjjyoufiEvous >ifuSi/ ai'<5CT0(5pi>, cap. xxi. : he continues, -o-is 
irpsatfwri'povj {,ptiv ri/Hjau/iEi', making the same distinction as before 
between the Ruler and the Presbyter. The analogy between the 
order of the visible creation and that of the Catholic Church is 
noticed with his usual eloquence by S. Gregory Nazianzen : TAfa O K. 
he says, TO TTOV o-ui/torijo-aro, ruis tTHve^u Ku l ra bruviiyia Kai TO iirlsta 



says, TO TTOV o-ui/torijo-aro, ruis tTHve^u Ku l ra bruvpiiyia Kai TO iirlysta, 
rafa iv vorirois, rdfa cv atoOriTnis, ra|ij e v ayyEXois, TU^IJ EI; aarpoij Kai KIVT\- 
cc.i ical ptyiQei KO.I O-^COTI Ttj Trpoy aAAjAa Kai Aa^rpdrijn .... ra|is Kav rais 



TO ftlv elvat TI itoijiviov. TO fil iroiftwas Hiwptae. ' Kai TO jiiv'apyciv rd 

. Orat. xxvi. torn. i. pp. 447-9. ' ' 

Cap. xxx vii. 



ST. CLEMENT OF ROME. 97 

may mock and deride us, willing to set up themselves in their 
men conceits;"* which language does not seem less applica- 
ble to our own times than that which has gone before : but 
I pass on now to other and, for our present purpose, more 
important passages. 

Thus far, it will be observed, the earnest admonitions of 
this Epistle are all addressed, on the one band, to the en- 
forcing submission and loyal obedience to constituted au- 
thority, and, on the other, to the reproof of a "detestable 
emulation" in things spiritual. f St. Clement proceeds now 
to illustrate his doctrine by the example of the Apostles 
themselves, whose friend and companion he had been. 

He speaks of their manifold labours in preaching the Gos- 
pel of Christ, and it is while on this subject that he is led to 
make the statement contained in the following well-known 
passage : " Preaching thus," he says, " through countries 
and cities, they appointed the first fruits (of their conver- 
sions) to be bishops and ministers over such as should after- 
wards believe, having first proved them by the Spirit. Nor 
was this any new thing, seeing that long before it was writ- 
ten concerning bishops and deacons For thus saith *the 
Scripture in a certain plaoe, I will appoint thtir overseers 
(bishops) in righteousness, and their ministers (deacons) in 
."Vf 

This interpretation ofthe evangelical Prophet, and the ap- 
plication of his words to the Christian Priesthood, while it 
accounts for the emotions of awe, wonder, and thankfulness 
with which that portion of Christ's Institution has ever been 

* Cap. xxxix. " Multi enim sunt qui simulantes fidem non sub- 
dili sunt fidei, sibique fidem ipsi potius constituunt, quam accipiunt, 
sensu humanse inunitatis inflati, dum qua valunt sapiunt, et uolunt 
sapere quae vera sunt ; cum sapientia? hsec veritas sit, ea interdum 
sapere qua) nolis." S. Hilarii De Trinitate, lib. viii. p. 159. 

t "In the present age, in which no bounds seem to be set to 
claims of liberty of conscience, it is deserving of the most serious 
consideration among Christians, that the chief topic insisted on by 
the two Apostolical Fathers, Clement and Ignatius, is Church Union; 
and the grand object of their writing is to persuade men from sepa- 
rating for slight pretences from their lawful Pastors." Collinson's 
Bampton Lectures, p. 45. 

t K.ara %wpaj ovv icoi irdXcij KJjpucirovTS?, xaOioTttvov TUJ dn-ap^uf airSv, 
Aoxtu'la-avTes TO> Trvdfyian, eis CTriGKoiruvs KO.I dtanSvovf roSv p^6v-cav Trtanveci , 
Kat TUVTO oi> Kaivias, ex yap <5i) ircXXtov ypSviav iyiypu.TtT3 irEpl iiriaKOtrcov KOI 
v ' ovTbii -yap TTUV \iyet i] yfiaipn, K.aru<rr;)0'&) TOVS tTrto-fcfeaus arui> iv 
i'!!, /cat Tji'S fitiiKavous aurtov iv Tricrrtt. cap xlii. 



98 



EVIDENCE OP ANTIQUITY. 



regarded by the faithful, is a moving admonition indeed to 
those who have been persuaded, in late years, to " resist" 
this " Ordinance of God." And we cannot be surprised 
that a recognition of the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, such as is 
here derived from the Prophet by this Apostolical man, 
should have proved a stumbling-block to such persons, nor 
that their utmost labour should have been exerted in remov- 
ing it out of their way. What method they have employed 
to turn aside the edge which was too keen to be grasped 
with naked hands, shall now be noticed. It is humiliating 
to watch the efforts of SL perverse and ill-advised ingenuity ; 
but to this our present task compels us, and a miserable in- 
stance is the one under consideration. " St. Clement speaks 
here" it is thus that the modern teachers defend them- 
selves "of bishops and deacons as appointed by the Apos- 
tles : it follows then, from this testimony, that he knew of 
only two orders of ministers; for if he had known of. three, 
he would have enumerated them:" this is their answer.* 
Now we shall see presently that he does enumerate three 
orders, and so supply in his own words the omission charged 
upon him ; but his evidence would have been conclusive, 
even if it had stopped here, and that for many reasons. 

For it is admitted, upon this express declaration of one 
who could not be mistaken, that the Apostles did certainly 
ordain Bishops and Deacons, it is only the rank and char- 
acter of these officers which is in dispute ; and again, wheth- 
er at that time there were three orders of Ministers in the 
Church, which the adversary, having reduced them to two, 
or none, is compelled to deny. 

Now it will probably be allowed that these " bishops" 
mentioned by St. Clement were either governing Prelates, 
such as rule the Churches in our own day, or else co-ordi- 
nate presbyters ; either what Catholic Antiquity believed 
them to be, or such as modern sects affirm; we need not 

* " Sure the enemies of Episcopacy," saj r s Dr. Gauden, " are 
hardly driven to find testimonies against it, when they are forced to 
wrest them out of such writers as were themselves Bishops !" Ee- 
clesifB Anglicana Suspiria, book iv. ch. xix. p. 554. The learned 
historian Weisman candidly rebukes his brethren for asserting that 
St. Clement confounded the two orders ; confessing, at the same time, 
that it is undeniable, " from the unanimous declaration of the an- 
cients, that Clement himself was Bishop of Rome." Hist. Ecclesiast 
lorn. i. p. 76. 



ST. CLEMENT OF ROME. 99 

concern ourselves with any other supposition. Let us take 
the latter hypothesis first ; and then, if these bishops of whom 
the Saint speaks were only presbyters, and so no more than 
two orders are here spoken of as appointed by the Apos- 
tles, we must ask as before, What were the Apostles, them- 
selves, who ordained and governed them 'I to which order 
did they belong? were they presbyters or deacons? Nei- 
ther one nor the other, being, as almost every page of the 
New Testament history shows, distinct from and higher than 
either ; and therefore, eveli on this supposition, there were 
three orders in the Church in St. Clement's day, namely, 
Apostles, Presbyters, and Deacons. 

If, however, they were, as is most certain, single Rulers, 
such as St .James, Epaphroditus, and others, and so them- 
selves Apos'les, then it remains to inquire why the second 
order is omitted in St. Clement's enumeration, for we have 
in this case but two, viz. Bishops or Apostles, and Deacons. 
To this question several answers shall now be made.* 

* This may indeed seem needless, because, since he had men- 
tioned the third order, of preshyters, twice already, his enumeration 
was complete. But suppose that the Apostles did appoint at first, in 
some places, only Bishops and Deacons, this would be far enough 
from proving that they never appointed the whole three orders : for, 
as Epiphanius has observed, their ecclesiastical arrangements could 
only, from the. nature of the case, be perfected gradually. "The) 
Apostles were not able," he says, " to arrange all things definitelyj 
at first." And therefore " where in any place no one (of the new 
converts) was found worthy to be intrusted with the Episcopate, that 
place remained without a Bishop ; but where, from the populousness 
of the place, or other causes, a Bishop was necessary, there the ap- 
pointment was made." And so this Father continues, referring, by 
way of analogy, to the slender beginnings of the Jewish economy, 
when Moses went forth with only a rod. Hares. Ixxv. torn. i. pp. / 
90S, 9. And with this agrees the comment of Jerome upon that' 
saying of St. Paul, " For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thouA* 
shouldest set in order the things that are wanting ;" " Quse desuntli 
recto tenore corrige," says St. Jerome, " et tune deinum presbyterosjl 
poteris ordinare, cum omncs in ecclesia fuerint recti. Ad Tit. i.w 
torn. viii. p. 286. And at least the adversary cannot impeach this 
reasoning ; for, not to mention other instances, John Daille replies 
to the fact, that "there were no lay-elders in the times of the Apos- 
tles," with this argument : " True, but then there were no parishes, 
and presbyters and deacons would suffice in that early state of the 
Church." Thes. Salmur. De Vario Eccles. Christian. Regimine, 
38. pars iii. p. 356. And this I find unexpectedly confirmed, 
though for his own purposes, by one of the modern German critics. 
" Omnino vero notandum est, ecclesia; primBevse conditores/wrarfa- 



100 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

(I.) And first, St. Clement is here writing, not in contro- 
versy, but in exhortation : and he is addressing men who 
knew what the gradations of the Christian Priesthood were 
as well as he did, for they saw them before their eyes. There 
would have been a kind of absurdity in his aiming at accu- 
rate statements or arguing with them upon such a subject, 
as great as if a modern divine should trouble himself to 
prove that the English Church confesses three orders of 
Ministers, or the Prayer-book contains three Creeds, such 
things are not proved, but taken* for granted. 

(2.) And this we see actually dene both in the word of 
God and the teaching of the Church. How many passages 
are there in the Epistles, and generally throughout the New 
Testament, in which, as has been already observed, imper- 
fect, and at first sight, contradictory, statements are found ; 
some in which the Eternal Father alone is spoken of as Su- 
preme, others in which two Persons of the Holy Trinity are 
glorified, the Third sometimes the Son, and sometimes the 
Holy Ghost being omitted. And again, how do the inspir- 
ed writers vary, or rather seem to vary, in their account of 
Church-Officers, now giving one description of them and 
presently a new one, and omitting in one placfc to notice at 
all an order the appointment of which had been expressly 
recorded in another. Yet all these passages, which, taken 
by themselves, as heretics are used to do, appear defective, 
speak the same voice when arranged and combined. 

And so the Church of England, which, in two sever.il 
places of her Liturgy, has described the whole body of the 
Priesthood under the two classes of *' Bishops and Curates," 
teaches, in a third, that " from the Apostles' time there have 
been these three orders, viz. Bishops, Priests, and Deacons." 
And this is all the contradiction which we shall observe in 
St. Clement. 

(3.) Again ; that these apparently defective statements 
are consistent with the most emphatic.- acknowledgment of 
the Catholic System, appears from this,;tb,at the same omis- 
sion here noticed in St. Clement is found in^ther writers 
whose reception of the three orders is quite^notorious. I 
will mention a few instances. 

menta tantumjecisse hujus societatis, ad altiorem indies perfcctionis 
gradum evehenda, prout temporum, locorum, et singulorum ccetuum 
rationes postulaverint." Wegscheider, Prolegom. pars Hi. cap. v. 
182. p. 525. 



ST. CLEMENT OF ROME. 101 

Clement of Alexandria in two pi aces speaks of the Clergy 
as if they consisted only of Presbyters and Deacons, for in 
the passages referred to he limits his notice to those two or- 
ders; yet it was after using such language that he could 
presently make that striking observation so often quoted, 
" I imagine that the Ecclesiastical gradations (or promo- 
tions) of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons, are imitations of 
the Angelic Glory."* It was quite possible then, to speak 
of the two orders, and yet to have deep and awful notions of 
the three. 

Tertullian, the earliest of the Latin Fathers, writing al- 
most at the same date, supplies another but a different in- 
stance : he too speaks only of two orders; but it is the pres- 
byters whom he omits in his enumeration. " What if a bish- 
op," he says in a certain place, " or a deacon, or a widow, 
or a virgin, or a doctor, or even a martyr, should err from 
the faith,"t &c.; where he omits to speak of that very order 
of the Priesthood to which he himself belonged. 

St. Jerome does the like in many places, and very re- 
markably in his comments upon the Sacred Scriptures. 
Thus in the forty-fifth Psalm he supposes David 'to predict 
that God would give to His Church Bishops in the place of 
Apostles, after the removal of the latter ; and that they 
should be, as the Psalmist speaks, "princes in all the earth :" 
here he interprets the word of God as speaking of one only 
of the three orders, omitting Presbyters and Deacons4 Again v 
he gives the same interpretation to the words of the Prophet 1* 
Isaiah, which has already been quoted from St. Clement.^ 1 

* 'Erri vat at cvravBa Kara T>IV ZKxIwcriav TroiKmrai. sxiaKfaruv, irperTffvTCpiav. 
jtavovt,)!'* fitiiTJf/ara olfiai dyysXtxiis &o!-r;s. Stromat. Jib. vi. p. 667 j cf. 

lib. vii. p. 700. 

t " Quid ergo si episcopus, si diaconus, si vidua, si virgo, si doc- 
tor, si etiam martyr lapsus a regula fuerit, ideo haeresis veritatem 
videbantur obtinere ?" De Prescript. Hterct. cap. iii. 

$ " Pro Patribus tuis nati sunt, &c. Fuerint, 6 Ecclesia, Apostoli 
patres tui, quia ipsi te genuerunt. Nunc autem, quia illi recesserunt 
a mundo, hales, pro his Episcopos filios, qui a te creati sunt. Sunt 
enim et hi patres tui, quia ab ipsis reseris. [Constitues eos principes, 
&c.] Constituit Christus sanctos SHOS super omnes populos. In 
nomine>enim Dei dilatatum est evangelium in omnibus finibus mundi ; 
in quibus principes Ecclesiae, id est, Episcopi, constituti sunt." In 
PsaL xlv. toni. vii. p. 57. 

Quoting, like St. Clement, the version of the Septuagint.' 
" Ponam, inquit, principes tuos in pace et episcopos tuos in justitia. \ X' 
Pro quo in Hebraico scriptum est, Ponam visitationem tuam pacem,| 



102 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITV. 

In another j>lace he takes up and carries on the exposition 
of Origen upon the mysterious Song of Solomon ; in which 
scripture he finds not only the two orders of Bishops and 
Presbyters described, but also a distinction made between 
their offices. Here, then, he omits that is, he supposes 
the Holy Spirit to omit only the third order, namely, Dea- 
cons.* Elsewhere he even takes the pains to account for 
St. Paul's passing abruptly, in his Epistle to Timothy, from 
the duties of a Bishop to those of a Deacon, saying, that the 
Apostle " included presbyters under the name of bishops ;"t 
and again, after noticing what he prescribes to bishops, he 
adds, " No less carefulness did he manifest in the third 
order ;"J yet he had said nothing of that order which inter- 
vened. 

Similar instances occur in the writings of St. Augustine. 
He too supposes the Psalmist of Israel to be making mention 
in the forty-fifth Psalm of the Bishops who should hereafter 
be appointed in Christ's Church ; and an awful reflection it 
should be to the adversary, that the Old Testament was so 
interpreted by such men. The venerable Bede speaks, after 
Augustine, of St. Paul ordaining " presbyters and deacons," || 
omitting the first order ; and the pseudo-Augustine perhaps 
Tichonius of" bishops and presbyters only,' ; fl omitting the 

et praepositos tuos in justitiam. In quo scripturae sanctae admiranda 
majestas, quod principcs futures ccclcsice episcopos nominavit ; quorum 
omnis visitatio in pace est, et vocabulum digriitatis in justitia," &c. 
Comment. inEsai. cap. Ix. torn. iv. pp. 202, 3. 

* In Cantic. Canticorum, Hnmil. iii. torn. via. p. 152. It is 
curious that this divine book, which is so perplexing to the adversary, 
because it can hardly be ' wrested ' to bear any other than a catholic 
interpretation, has been rejected by sectaries of our own day as well 
as of earlier ages. Vide Leontii Byzantini Contra Nestor, et Eutycfi. 
lib. ii. cap. xvi. 

t " Q,uamtur cur de presbyteris nullam fecerit mentionem, sed 
cos in episcoporum nomine comprehenderit ; quia secundus imo pene 
est unus gradus, sio.ut ad Philippenses episcopis ac diaconis scribit, 
cum una civitas plurcs Episcopos habere non possit." In 1 ad Tit. 
cap. iii. torn. viii. p 277. So St. Ambrose ; " Nam in Episcopo 
omnes ordines sunt, quia primus sacerdos est, hoc est princeps est 
sacerdotum." In Epkes. iv. torn. ii. p, 241. 

j3d Heliodor. Epist. i. torn. i. p. 2. 

'Enarrat. torn. viii. p. 169. Cf. In Evangel. Joannis Expos. 
tract, i. torn. ix. p. 3; where his comment is of the same solemn yet 
practical character. 

I) Ad Tit. cap. 5. fol. 300. ed. Paris. 1522. 

II In Apocalypsin, Hoini!. ii. torn. ix. p. 356. 



ST. CLEMENT OF ROIkft:. 103 

third. And many other instances might be added ;* but 
these are quite enough to show that St. Clement needs not 
have been ignorant of the three orders, even if he had spoken 
only of two. 

(4.) Once more : another and an independent class of 
witnesses remains to be heard. This Epistle of St. Clement 
used to be read publicly, as I have noticed elsewhere, in the 
Churches, and that as late as the fourth century .t But, ac- 
cording to the adversary, it testifies against the Christian 
Hierarchy: observe, then, what follows from the fact just 
mentioned. Thus much we conclude from it, that if this 
Epistle be evidence, as they wish to think, against the 
Church System, then either those ancient Christians in whose 
ears it was so often read did not perceive this, or else they 
were content to listen to words which convicted themselves 
of having departed from the primitive discipline; that is, 
they were not only wicked enough to have changed the dis- 
cipline of Christ, but so foolish as to keep np a perpetual 
memorial of the change ! It is too much which our brethren 
ask of us, when they bid us think all our forefathers not only 
faithless but fatuous too. - And if the first four ages regarded 
this writing as a witness to Catholic truth, we must be 
allowed, for our part, to think it so still.J 

(5.) It follows from what has been said, that this passage 
of St. Clement, upon which we have been so long engaged, 
needs no addition to render it a complete and decisive testi- 
mony to the Apostolical institution of the three Orders of the 
Ministry. And now, in conclusion, even if it did need such 
addition, St Clement himself has supplied it. Let us refer 
again to his Epistle, that we may learn in what manner he 
has done this. 

In the chapter, then, which follows, he goes on to say, 

* All illustrating a distinction, which appears to have been quite 
common with the ancients, between the Sacerdotal and the Minis- 
terial office ; the former including Bishops and Presbyters, as being 
equally Priests ; the latter Deacons. St. Cyprian (quoted by Parker, 
Government of the Church, 3.) frequently makes this distinction. 
Cf. Estii Comment, lib. iv. p. 2. 25. for a somewhat different 
example.' 

t " Scripsit ex persona Romanae Ecclesiffi ad ecclesiam Corinthi- 
orum valde utilem Epistolam, qua? et in nonnullis publice legitur." 
S. Hieron. Catal. Script. Eccles. 

$ As? yap fipSs Kara <TKOTTOV T(~tv etyiuv KCti r<3v irarcpr.w ?r>Xn-D<70af, xi 
TOVTOVS pipeta-Bui.. . S. Athanas. AA Dracontium, torn. i. p. 955. 



104 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

that it was no wonder the Apostles made the appointments 
above mentioned, when it is considered what Moses did in 
the like case ; by whom, as he remarks, the Levitical Priest- 
hood was instituted, " that there might be no division ;"* 
and then he continues thus " So likewise our Apostles knew 
by our Lord Jesus Christ that contentions should arise on ac- 
count of (or for the dignity oft) the oversee.rship (episcopate). 
And therefore having a perfect foreknowledge of this, they ap- 
pointed persons, as we have before said, and then gave a pre- 
scribed order in what manner, when they should die, other cho- 
sen and approved men should succeed in their ministry "% 

There is only one conclusion from these very important 
words which I shall stay to notice here : it is this, that the 
Christian Priesthood is referred to the Jewish as, in some 
sort, its type ; and that by one who could not but know well 
the mind ofthe Apostles on this solemn matter. The Jew- 
ish Priesthood, he says, was appointed " that there might be 
no division ;" and the Christian Priesthood for precisely the 
same reason. But on this point hear him again. " We 
ought to take heed " so the Saint speaks in a previous passage 
" that we do all things in order, whatsoever our Lord hath 
commanded us to do. That we perform our offerings and 
services to G'od at their appointed seasons ; for these He hath 
commanded to be done not rashly nor disorderly, but at cer- 
tain determinate times and hours''^ If the Head of the 
Church did indeed so appoint, and St. Clement would 

* "Ii'O firi uKaTatrrcuriit yivtirai iv r 'LrpaijA. cap. xliii. 

t " "Ovofia significat dfiwfia." Hammond, Dissert, v. cap. vi. 8. 
St. Austin seems to have had the same anticipation if it be lawful 
to speak of it in such a connexion and, in providing his own suc- 
cessor, thus expressed it : " Scio post obitus episcoporum, per am- 
bitiosos aut contentiosos solere Ecclesias perturbari ; et quod saepe 
expertus sum et dolui, debeo quantum ad me attinet ne contingat 
huic prospicere civitati." Epist. ex. torn. ii. p. 195. 

t iCui ot 7ro<7ToXot fyt<3v tyvtatrav 6ia TOV Kupiou f/ftiSv 'Iij<TO Xpt<rro{; 5 ort 
cpij serroi im TOV ovojtaTos rfji 7rj<nro7rijf. Ala Tavrtjv ovv Tnv alriav icpayvtoatv 
i',\^Ao-j TeXziav. KaricTriGav rovs Ttpoetpriiiivovs, Kail ^ra|n iviva^v SeSiaxcurtv, 
OTTCJJ eiv KOi/tijOiHa-iv, Sia.&i%u>i>Tai erepot SeioKipaapevot iiv&pts TIIV \EiTOVpyiav 
airwr. cap. XJiv. 

ILivra Ttiei irotciv ot&t&opEv, orra & Asan-ores eTrtTsXstv ene^evcrev Kara. 
Kaip-ji>s rtrayjisvovs' raj re xpocrtfnpas Kal ^sirovpyias firtT\ia6ai, Kal OVK EIK)/ 
?j driiKru; CKi\eVGZv ylvtaQut, dAA ajpifr^ej'OJS KaipaTs xal woaij. cap. xl. " By 

the one, -oafftinpa, we must understand the species of fruits of the 
earth and meats which the people offered, out of which the Eucha- 
rist being celebrated, the rest was spent in- the -Agapa, or feast of 



ST. CLEMENT OF ROME. 105 

know through His Apostles, shall we suppose that He left 
modes of administration to chance, or caprice of men ? Let 
us hear St. Clement further : " He liath himself ordained by 
His supreme will both where and by what persons they are to 
be performed, that all things being piously done unto all well- 
pleasing, they may be acceptable unto His will. They, there- 
fore, who make their oblations at the appointed seasons are 
accepted and happy ; for they sin not, inasmuch as they obey 
the commandments of the Lord." And then follow immedi- 
ately these remarkable words : " For to the Chief-Priest his 
peculiar offices are given, and to the Priests their own place 
is appointed, and to the Levites appertain their proper min- 
istries. And the layman is confined within the bounds of 
what is commanded to laymen."* 

We shall estimate duly this passage only by connecting it 
with the other teaching of this Apostolical witness. He has 
told us, then, that the Apostles prescribed, with a special ref- 
erence to the episcopate, or overseership, an order of suc- 
cession in the Ministry ; again, that they appointed Bishops 
and Deacons ; and further, that the Christians of Corinth 
" were subject to their chief-rulers, and gave due honour to 
their presbyters ;" and lastly, that we ought all to " venerate 
the one " still making the same distinction between these 
two officers " and to reverence the other." St. Clement, 
that is, speaks of the following Ecclesiastical Orders, Bish- 
ops, or Chief-rulers ; Presbyters (distinguished from the Ru- 
lers) ; and Deacons. And now, in exhorting the Corinthi- 
ans to the due celebration of the Holy Eucharist, and the 
suppression of schisms, the two prominent subjects of his 
letter, no more suitable admonition for these Christians 
occurs to him than this, that, by God's own appointment, 
obedience was due in their several stations tothe " High 
Priest, Priests, and Levites."^ 

love, to which the words of the" Apostle are to be referred ; by the 
other, \tirovpyia, the Eucharist, for celebration whereof he is so 
earnest with them to keep due order in their assemblies." Thorn- 
dike, Primitive Government of Churches, chap. vi. 

* .... Tw yap dp^icpcT iSiai Xrowpytai SeSopivai tiaiv, (rat rots iepev- 
aiv tJioj 6 TSiros irpoariraKTai, KOI Xnuraif iSiai Staxnviai irixtii/Tai ' b Xai'/coj 
avdpMiros roTs AaiVofj irpoardypaaiv iiSerai. ubi supra. 

* And this, as is well known, was a way of speaking quite common 
with the primitive writers, whose familiar use of the phraseology of 
the Jewish Synagogue is seen in such passages as the following. 
St Jerome says very plainly, " What Aaron and his sons and the 



106 EVIDENCE OP ANTIQUITY. 

That the Saint was in these words referring to an ecclesi- 
astical constitution among themselves, with which the kin- 
dred hierarchy of the Jewish Church might be appositely 
paralleled, will now be obvious to all, save only those whose 
condition does not suffer them to profit by his testimony. 
For ourselves, we may well be thankful to the good Provi- 
dence of God, which has preserved, through so many ages, 
this conspicuous proof of the primitive structure and order of 
His Church, and of our own communion with it.* And as 

Levites were in the Temple, the same are the Bishop, the Priests, 
and the Deacons, in the Church.'' Epist. lxxxv..4d Evagrium, torn, 
ii. p. 311 ; and he repeats it, Ad Nepotianum, Epist. ii. torn. i. p. 5. 
Tertullian styles the Bishop " "High Priest /" De Baptismo, cap. 
xvii. p. 263. St. Cyprian expressly traces the analogy between the 
ancient Levites and the corresponding order in the Church of Christ ; 
Epist. Ixvi. p. 114 ; and, as Hooker has observed, " deemed it no 
wresting of Scripture to challenge as much for Christian Bishops as 
was given to the High Priest among the Jews, and to urge the law of 
Moses as being most effectual to prove it." E. P. book vii. vol. iii. 
p. 211. Vide S Cyprian. Epist. Ixv. p. 113. St. Leo the Great, even 
when contrasting the elder with the later Dispensation, says, " Nuno 
etenim et ordo clarior Levitarum, et dignitas amplior Seniorum, et 
sacratior est unctio Saccrdotum." Serin. Ivii. De Passione Domini, 
torn. i. p. 265; cf. Epist. ad Anastasiwrn Thessalon. p. 441. 'O 61 
TOIOVTOS. says Synesius, re "bevies itrrlv. si rt vpc<r/3vTi:p'is, el re eTriatoiros 

Trap' fyuv . . . K.T.X. Adv. Adronicum, Epist. Ivii. p. 197 ed.Petavii. 
" Ad Subdiaconum pertinet," says St. Isidore, " calicem et patenam 
ad altare Christi deferre, et Lcvitis tradere." Ep. S. Isidor. apud 
Burchard. Decret. lib. iii. cap. 1. " Eja vos," St. Bernard writes, 
" qui Levitali ordine prasfulgetis, cantate," &c. De Sancto Stephana, 
p. 1677. "Ad Lmitas etiam atque Presbyteros," Salvian says, "et 
quod his feralius multo est, etiam ad Episcopos," &c. Epist. ix. Ad 
SaLonium, p. 213. And so customary was this language, that even 
Poets, in their sacred hymns, have been accustomed to use it. Thus 
Prudentius, in the fourth century, 

"Hie primus e septem viris, 
Q,ui stant ad aram proximi, 
Levita sublimis gradu, 
Et caeteris praestantior ;" &c. 

llcfiJ Sr0awdi/, Hymn ii. p. 106, and 
Hymn vi. p. 185. Paris. 1687. 

Cf. Hugon. a S. Victor. De Mysteriis Ecclesice, cap. v. ap. Hittorp. 
torn. i. p. 1345 ; and Raban. Maur. De Institut. Clericorum, lib. i. 
cap. vii. 'De Diaconis. The Canons of the great Councils abound 
with similar language. Vide Beveregii Cod. Can. De Episcopis, p. 
312; and Pandect. Can. torn. ii. in Can. Apost. ii. 

* " Illustre antiquissimae disciplinae monumentum," as it is 
denominated by the venerable President of Magdalen ; Jtel. Sac. torn. 



ST. IGNATIUS OF ANTIOCH. 107 

we hear St. Clement reminding the Corinthians how sharply 
St. Paul had rebuked their " parties and divisions," and add- 
ing such further censure as this : " It is shameful, beloved, it 
is exceedingly shameful, and unworthy of your Christian 
profession, to hear that the mostjirm and ancient Church of 
the Corinthians should by one or two persons be led into a 
sedition against its priests;"* surely we shall desire,in review- 
ing God's mercies upon our own " most ancient Church," 
to " take heed," as the same Clement solemnly exhorts, " that 
His many blessings be not turned to our condemnation at 
last."* 

* 

III. We will consider next the evidence of one who was, 
like St. Clement, the friend and companion of Apostles, like 
him a chosen witness of the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
and who exercised, as did he, the office of a Bishop by Apos- 
tolical ordination. " By them," says St. John Chrysostom, 
with whose words the Church concludes her morning and 
evening devotions, " by them was he ordained to this 
office, and the hands of the blessed Apostles touched his 
sacred head."| It is " the blessed IGNATIUS," as he is 
styled by Polycarp, the disciple of. St. John, whom we are 
now to hear. 

Widely separated by sea and land from him to whom we 
have just been listening Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch ; Cle- 
ment, Bishop of Rome they were separated, as we shall 
see presently, in no other respect. Ordained Bishop of An- 
tioch in Syria about A. D. 70, Ignatius occupied that see for 
a period of about thirty-seven years, with a fame and dignity 
to which all subsequent ages have witnessed.|| It is of the 
closing scenes only of his life that any account can be given 

ii. p. 378 : or, in the words of Bramhall, " as authentic a testimony 
as can be produced after the Holy Scripture." Discourse of the 
SablatJi, p. 920. 

* AtV^pa, (iydTrijTOi, Kal Xiai; aio-^po, Kal tiva^ia rijj iv Xpiorw dyeoyijf, 
axovEaOai, rriv ffe^aiwrarriv KOI ap-^aiav K.uptvOiajv exK\rjtri(tv, Si' cv r) Svo irpii- 
trttma, cmuria^Eiv irpas TOVS irpcffpvTcpovs. cap. xlvii. Grabe notices with 
commendation the remark of Dodwell, that dp^ata should be ren- 
dered by primordialis rather than antiqua. Spicileg. torn. i. p. 256. 

t Cap. xxi. 

S. Chrysost. In S. Jgnat. Encom. p. 500. 

Epist. ad Philipp. 9. 

|| S. Chrysostom says of him, -npoicTri rrjs nap' ^/(tV SKK\ri<rias 
Kal pera. Toaavri); aKpifftias, /i0' OOTK o Xpioros /?oiiXsr<u. w6?! supra. 



108 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

here, and such an account will serve to explain the compo- 
sition of certain letters written by the Martyr, which are 
next to be produced. 

" Ecclesiastical history," says a learned modern writer, 
" has scarcely preserved a more interesting and affecting 
narrative than that of the journey of Ignatius from Antioch 
to Rome. In tracing the procession of the martyr to his 
final triumph, we forget that we are reading of a prisoner 
who was dragged to his death in chains. He was commit- 
ted to a guard of ten soldiers, who appear to have treated 
him with severity ;* and after taking ship at Seleucia, they 
landed for a time at Smyrna. He had here the gratification 
of meeting with Polycarp. wh'o was Bishop of that see, and 
who, like himself, had enjoyed a personal acquaintance with 
St. John. His arrival also excited a sensation through the 
whole of Asia Minor. Onesimus, Bishop of Ephesus, Poly- 
bius, Bishop of Tralles, and Demas, Bishop of Magnesia, 
came from their respective cities, with a deputation of their 
clergy, to visit the venerable martyr ; and one particular 
must not be omitted, which is of the greatest interest in the 
history of this period, that these persons came to Ignatius 
in the hopes that he would communicate to them some spiritual 
gift. Ignatius took the opportunity of writing from Smyrna 
to the Churches over which these Bishops presided ; and his 
Epistles to the Ephesians, Trallians, and Magnesians, are 
still extant. Hearing also of some Ephesians who were 
going to Rome, and who were likely to arrive there more 
expeditiously than himself, he addressed a letter to the 
Church in that city. His principal object in writing was to 
prevent any attempt which the Roman Christians might have 
made to procure a reprieve from the death which was await- 
ing him. He expresses himself not only willing, but anxious, 
to meet the wild beasts in the amphitheatre; and there 
never perhaps was a more perfect pattern of resignation than 
that which we find in this letter. 

" From Smyrna he proceeded to Troas, where he was 
met as before by some of the neighbouring Bishops ; and 
the Bishop of Philadelphia became the bearer of a letter 
which he wrote to the Christians in that city. He also 
wrote from the same place to the Church of Smyrna ; and 
the personal regard which he had for Polycarp, the Bishop 

* See bis Epistle to the Romans, 5. 



ST. IGNATIUS OF ANTIOCH. 109 

of that see, will explain why he also wrote to him, and made 
it his dying request that he would attend to the Church of 
Antioch. These seven Epistles, which were written by 
Ignatius from Smyrna and Troas, are still extant, and have 
been published several times. Next to the writings of the 
Apostles, they are perhaps the most interesting documents 
which the Church possesses. They are the writings of a 
man who was contemporary with the Apostles, and who had 
certainly received more than the ordinary influence of the 
Holy Spirit."* 

And now, without further preface, let us hear a few sen- 
tences of this Saint and Martyr. His testimony on the sub- 
ject of these pages will appear explicit enough to convince 
all save those whom his judgment will be found to exclude 
from the Communion of Saints. Thus, then, wrote Igna- 
tius, in the progress of his last journey on earth, while he 
was yet some way from Rome, where that journey was 
to end. 

" Avoid divisions, as the beginning of evils. Follow the 
Bishop, all of you, even as Jesus Christ the Father ; and 
the body of Presbyters as the Apostles. Respect the Dea- 
cons, as the commandment of 6roe?."f It is thus* that he ad- 
dresses men in whose ears the words of St. Peter and St. 
Paul were still echoing. And he continues as follows: 
" Let that be esteemed as sure Eucharist which is either 
under the Bishop, or those to whom he may commit it."$ 
None, says he, who had been dwelling with the Apostles 
whilst they " continued daily in breaking of bread," but 
the Bishop only, can give authority to administer the sacred 
Eucharist. Could he be mistaken, who had received that 
heavenly food at the Apostles' hands ? 

* Burton's Lectures on the Ecclesiastical History of the first three 
Centuries, vol. ii. pp. 26-28. 

, t Tovs iitpiapovs <}>EvyT, uj <ipx>iv KOKWV. fiavres ra> eninKoirat dxo\ov- 
Bi:tTe t (*)f 'IijcroCj Xpioro s rS> Harpi icoi Tai irpecr^DTEpiUj a>j rots <KTOOTfiAoij ( " 
TOVS 61 SiaxSvovs evrpimaOe, us Qeov ivroMiv. Jld Smyrn. 8. The trans- 
lation used in vol. i. of the Tracts for the Times has been employed 
here, 

* 'E/mvij Ptfiaia. fv^apiaria fiysivOca, fi vTrd rSv eninKOitav owa, r) a> Sv 
air<3? erriTpiif/r]. Ibid,. 

And this is a matter pertaining to each man's salvatign ; nor 
do the Saints hesitate to speak of it with the charitable plainness 
which so awful a subject demands. To IIV/TTIKOV iro-rfipiav, says the 
blessed Athanasius, . . . irapa fi6votg rot; vofii/Jdis trpoea-r&oiv e 



110 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

" Where the Bishop is," here he is again addressing 
the Smyrnseans " there let the body of Believers be ; even 
as where Clerist Jesus is, there is the Catholic Church."* 
The faithful must cleave, he says, to the Bishop, as the 
Church is wedded to Christ : this is his parting advice to 
those whom he loved ; and he adds, " JKe that doeth any 
thing (in the Church) apart from the Bishop, worshippeth 
the devil '."t 

And Jet it be observed here, that this is not the testimony 
of Ignatius alone, which is conveyed in these words, but 
that of Polycarp too, also a disciple of St. John, and Martyr. 
For consider : he is writing to the Church at Smyrna, 
over which Polycarp presided, who well knew the mind of 
the Apostles, and to whose flock he dared not, if he would, 
represent that for truth which they would know to be error. 
" The Epistles of Ignatius, which he wrote unto us" that 
is, one to himself, and one to his flock " we have sent to 
you according to your desire," says Polycarp himself, when 
writing to the Philippians, " which are added to this 
Epistle : from which ye may be greatly profited, for they treat 
of faith and patience, and of all things which pertain to edi- 
fication in the Lord."! Such was Polycarp's judgment of 
the Epistles of Ignatius ; from which, with this strong con- 
firmation, a few more extracts shall now be made. 



. TOV a [iovov COT! TWV Ttis KaQo\iK>js KK\ricrias npasGT&TUiv ' fiovov -yap Vfiicv 

Ttpo-ivsiv TO alfia TOV XptoruS r<3v Si uXAcoy, oi,cv6s. Administered 
without tlieir authority, it is, says he, " sacrilege, and a profane 
mockery of the Blood of Christ." AA Imperat. Constant. Apol. torn. 
i. pp. 731, 2. Cf. S. Cyprian. De Unitate Ecclesits; and S. Cyril. 
Alex. Adv. Anthropomorphitas, lib. i. torn. vi. p. 380 ; who refers to 
Exodus xii., as affording a suitable admonition to Christians. 

* "Qm>v ay 'pavy b K[<TKOTTCS, ffei TO TrXijOoj I'arco. cotrrsp Sirov av ? Xptoroy 
'Irjo-oS?, EKEI rj KaBo^tKrt /,-KXjj<7t'a. Ibid. So St. Jerome, arguing against 
the Luciferians, who refused to allow a Bishop place of repentance, 
though they received laymen, says that this was impossible and in- 
consistent, for they must stand or faJl together : " Nos nobis adversa. 
non facimus ; ant Episcopum cum populo recipimus, quern facit 
Christianum ; aut si Episcopum non recipimus, scimus etiam nobis' 
populum rejiciendum." Ad-c. Luciferian. cap. ii. torn. ii. p. 197. So 
another : " Si Episcopus, Princeps Ecclesire, a fide ad haeresim mu- 
tatur, tota plebs ci subjccta commaculatur " and must join in his 
repentance. Gemma Jlnimce, cap. clxx. 

t 'O \dOpa i~iGKu~ov ri 7Tf<7<7<ui', TU Jfrt/ffdAoj Aarf/jiJff. 9. 

$ S. Polycarp. Epist. ad Pliilip'p. 13. 

This Epistle of St. Polycarp was still read publicly in some 
parts of Asia in the time of St. Jerome (Catal. Script. Erc/c.O : and 



ST. IGNATIUS OF ANTIOCH. Ill 

To the JVallians, whose Bishop, Polybius, had gone to 
meet him, he writes thus : " Guard against such men (here- 
tics) ; and guarded ye will be, if ye are not puffed up, nor 
separated from Jesus Christ our God, and from the Bishop, 
and from the regulations of the Apostles. He that is within 
'the altar is pure : that is, he who does aught apart from 
Bishop, and Presbytery, and Deacon, he is not clean in 
conscience. Not that I know aught of this kind in you; 
but for the love I bear you, I put you on your guard, fore- 
seeing the snares of the devil"* 

Again, to the Magnesians he says : " Your duty likewise 
is, not to make free with the youthfulness of your Bishop, 
but, according to the power of God the Father, to concede 
to him all homage ; as I am aware the holy Presbyters </o."f 
These Presbyters then did, in that most primitive age, 
obey their bishop, as set over them by Divine authority ; 
for he would hardly tell them to their faces that they did, 
if they did not. 

To the Philadelphians he said, with a reference probably 
to the false teachers of his day : " All that are of God and 
Jesus Christ, these are with the Bishop .... Be not de- 
ceived, my brethren : whosoever followeth one that malceth a 
schism, he inheriteth not the kingdom of God'; whosoever 
walketh by another man's opinion, he consenteth not to the 
passion of Christ."| And once more for we must now 

it has been truly said, that " this single Epistle is as full a testimony 
for Episcopal supremacy as all those of Ignatius, in that it particu- 
larly recommends them, to the Church of Philippi, and therefore it 
both proves and approves that Ecclesiastical Order which is every 
where there described." Parker, Church Government, 7. p. 93; 
The genuineness of the Epistle itself has never been questioned, 
even by those who usually adopt this way of silencing an unfavour- 
able witness. "Vide'Pearson, Vindic. Ignat. pars i. cap. v. p. 65. 

*&v\aTTStT9 ovv Tins Totav-oi$ ' TOVTO 6i tarai vpiv pi; tbvtiiovplvois, KOI 
ovtriv dveopioToif Qeiii 'IijtrsC ^.{norcC, Kai TOV iirianuirov, teal rwv cJjaray^arui/ 
Ttav aTTOtr/oAcjj'. 'O euros OvmaaTripiov &v, KiiOapCs iariv ' T5r' itrriv, b 
fti-ipls faiffKUTrov KOI TrpeaffvTCptov KOL itaKO'jov a^a.aatav rt, ovros o~o naQapos tori 
TJ) (rvvcdSqcrec. C'ox Eirsi cyytow ruio-Crop rt iv -u/uy, dXXii irpngtvXainrAi tyiaf ovrag 
pav dyajnjrotir, Trpocptiv raj ivitipaz rov <!ia/?oXou. AtL Trail. 7, 8. 

t Ktu vii.tv SK pirei JIT] avy^piicOat TTJ j'jAiKi'o rov ES-IO-KOTOU, dXXa icarii 
&uvayiv Qeov TlarpSs ~Scrav ivrpo-tiv av-tlt oK3vljie.iv, A-aOuj lyiruv xai ravg dyiors 
irpsff,8i<Tfp-jvs. Ad Magnes. 3. 

+ fjaoi yun GtciJ EiViv Kai 'iijiroi! Xpt(>~oi5, oirot ^IETU TOV i~ iHKOTtov flciv 
. . . jVl?; TT\avaff8s, d(?,\(^of /ion t? Tif v dAXorpTa yi/o>fip TrepmarfT, ovros TM 
in'tOsi oa ovynartiTiBsTat. Jld Phil adeJph . 3. " Extra evangelica pro- 



112 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITV. 

search elsewhere for the judgment of the Primitive Church 
" I cried out while I was among you," was his last admo- 
nition to the same Church, " I spake with a loud voice, 
Give heed to the Bishop, to the Presbytery, and the Dea- 
cons. Now some suspected that I spake things as knowing 
beforehand that among them was a spirit of division. But 
He is my witness for whom I am in bonds, that I knew it 
not from any living man ; but the SPIRIT proclaimed, say- 
ing, Apart from the Bishop do nothing : keep your body as 
the temple of God ; love unity ; avoid divisions ; be ye fol- 
lowers of Jesus Christ, even as He is a follower of His Fa- 
ther."* To such words nothing can or ought to be added ; 
unless, indeed, it be his own saying, " The Lord forgiveth 
all when they repent, if in repentance they turn to godly 
unity and the counsel of the Bishop ."t 

It appears needless to offer, as in the former case, any 
summary of the testimony just produced. There is no one, 
we may suppose, who will refuse to confess that, if we have 
here the very words of Ignatius, the Order of Bishops was 
appointed by Him for whose Name Ignatius died. There 
is, however, one particular in the character of his evidence 
'to which, before we quit it, I would again point attention. 
It is not to the circumstance that the letters of this . great 
Martyr were written in chains, and on the eve of a cruel 
death a solemn hour, and apt to inspire solemn counsel 
nor even to the rare gifts and high sanctity of their author, 
though it would be natural to allude to these, that I wish 
to refer. The observation to be made relates to others rather 
than to himself. 

missa est," St. Hilary says, " quisquis extra fidem eorum est, et 
impise intelligent'.;*: crimine spem simplicem perdidii." De Trinitate, 
lib. viii. p. 1G3. 

* 'E.Kpa.vya<ra prat> S>i>. e\a)>ov!> jusyiiAij ifxavrj ' Tw i-xio-noir';) TTjMcrf^Err, 
xoi Th> irp<r/3vTEptt.i, Koi 6iaKOvois. Oi C irriaavrts (pro UTroiTTrfo-ai'rls) f, &>s 
Trpoet jora TOV [ispitfftov rivuiv, Xtytty raBra [tapTVS it '[tot cv a> iilcjjtai, OTI d~d 
capKos dvdpta-ivrjs owe syvtai'. To SI JHusvpa evfipvcre-ei', \tycav rafe ' ~S.iapis 
TOV Tiovcchroi> jir,llv oieTrs' TIIV <7.-ip/ca VjiCJv ws vadv QEOV TtipsiTE' TIJV fi'6>irii 
dyairare ' TOVS pspttrnovs ipevyers ' fii^rai yivcaQe 'Ii)<roB XpioroS, us KOI avrns 
TOV THarpos avrov. Ibid. 7. This passage has drawn from a modern 
writer, whose failing certainly was not on the side of credulity, the 
remarkable confession, that " it is not improbable that Ignatius had 
been favoured with some Revelations." Jortin, Remarks on Eccle- 
siastical History, vol. i. p. 224. 

f JTao'ii' ovv fitravoovaiv ntpUi !> Krpios, zuf ftSTavai-crwatv eif cvorrira 
Kai m>vf.<S(uoi> TOV rTTio/cfcoT- 8. 



ST. IGNATIUS OP ANTIOCH. 113 

It was remarked just now, that the judgment of Ignatius 
is, in fact, that of Polycarp ; because it would be an absur- 
dity too great for any but skeptics to maintain, that one 
about to die for his faith would urge extravagant error upon 
those who had received truth from the same source as him- 
self. I say, Ignatius, the friend of St. Peter, would never 
have written to Polycarp, the disciple of St. John, " My soul 
be security for those to/to submit to their Bishop, Presbyters, 
and Deacons" unless they had both believed these three 
orders to be of divine appointment. We Jiave here, there- 
fore, as was said, the testimony of St. Polycarp conveyed in 
the words of St. Ignatius. And the same applies to all the 
Bishops and Clergy who came to " visit the venerable Mar- 
tyr," as well as to the various Churches to which he ad- 
dressed his letters. The witnesses are thus indefinitely in- 
crease'd, and they are all and this is why I notice it 
witnesses for us. 

That the question of Church-Government, then, is set- 
tled by the Epistles of Ignatius, is what may be called a 
truism. To the maintainers of the new discipline this was 
very evident ; and so, rather than resign that human polity, 
the first introduction of which even its founder, as we shall 
see hereafter, thought it necessary to excuse with many apo- 
logies, they caught at the only remaining device, and denied 
that these Epistles were genuine. 

Now it is plain, from what has been advanced already, 
that we could very well afford to give up the evidence of 
this Saint. When all the witnesses from the Apostles down- 
wards, and all ecclesiastical records from the hour of the 
Church's foundation, deliver the same unvarying testimony, 
we could spare even more than the scanty writings of which 
he was the author. But we are not so thankless as to re- 
sign even the least of our sacred treasures, much less this 
precious legacy of one of the earliest of the Martyrs of the 
Most High. For that St. Ignatius wrote the letters attribu- 
ted to him happens to have been so profusely attested, that, 
as a distinguished divine has said, " they who question it 
might as well have questioned several books of the New 
Testament itself, which notwithstanding they receive on 
lesser evidence."* 

The remarkable history of these Epistles, and the provi- 

* Dodwell, Separation proved schismatical, chap. xxiv. 8. p. 515. 



114 EVIDENCE OP ANTIQUITY. 

dential discovery,* by two different persons, of two several 
manuscripts, in two different countries, written in two sepa- 
rate languages, and yet accurately according with each other 
and with the citations from Ignatius found in the writers of 
the first five centuries,t these interesting points I shall 
not stay to notice here in detail. They may be found at 
length elsewhere.f Nor shall I quote the words of the pro- 
found and good men who have written, more or less copi- 
ously, on this subject. It is not, as we shall see, necessary 
to do so. 1 ^ The adversaries have gained probably all which 
they proposed, by the sort of suspicion with which their bold 
expedient has invested the writings of Ignatius ; but their 
attempt has shared the fate which usually befalls such ven- 
turesome policy, it has failed ; and they themselves shall 
now tell us that the Epistles of Ignatius are genuine. 

The number of writers who may thus be cited on this 
point as witnesses against themselves is so large, that it even 
admits of classification into distinct ranks. There are (I ) 
those who candidly and truthfully avow the hidden motive 
of their friends in rejecting these Epistles ; (2) those who 
indignantly disclaim all sympathy with such unscrupulous 
assailants; and again (3), those who, keenly discerning that 
these primitive writings cannot be successfully impugned, 
accept with assumed alacrity, and then boldly claim them 

* " Reserved, no doubt," says Bishop Hall, " by a special Pro- 
vidence, for the conviction of the schisms of these last times." Mo- 
dest Offer, &c. p. 431. 

t The English copies were published at Oxford in 1644, and the 
edition of Voss in 1646. " Majoris quippe operis res est," says that 
learned man in reply to Blondel, " scriptum ab omni estate ante- 
acta agnitum falsitatis convincere, quam sibi forsitan persuaserit vir 
doctissimus cum illud institueret." Is. Vossii Epist., Ad Andream. 
Rivetum. 

t It is scarcely necessary to refer to the celebrated Vindicica 
Ignatian(B of Bishop Pearson ; a treatise beyond all praise, and 
which, I believe, no one has hitherto even attempted to answer. 

The opinion of Bishop Hall may be found in his Prim, and 
Apost. Trad. vol. vi. p. 246, and Def. Fid. Nicen. vol. v. p. 57. ed. 
Oxon. : and that of Bp. Beveridge, who says, " no fact in all anti- 
quity is more incontestably proved than the genuineness of these 
Epistles," in his Coder. Canonum, p. 311. See also Grabe, Spicilcg. 
torn. ii. p. 5 ; Hammond, Dissert, ii. cap. i. 2, who observes that 
" it was necessary to Blondel and other ' presbyterian' writers to put 
Ignatius out of the way." Cf. Mede, Of the JYarae Mtar, book ii. 
Works, p. 388. 



ST. IGNATIUS OF ANTIOC1I. 115 

for their own. We will hear a few of each class in this or- 
der ; and persons who are not familiar with the tactics of the 
school to which they belong will feel, perhaps, considerable 
surprise at the very curious illustration which their words 
will afford of a well-known fact, that, however skilfully 
any scheme which is based upon untruth may be devised, it 
will commonly be deranged by the timidity or incoherence 
of the very agents to whom its execution has been assigned. 

(1.) "The Epistles of Ignatius," says one of the most 
eminent and profoundly learned of the Lutheran divines, 
with an unaccountable but highly honourable franknes$ 
" would never have been called in question, had they not 
contained what the advocates of Episcopacy knew how to 
turn to the advantage of their cause."* This is, to say the 
least, a remarkable admission ; and it might even seem to 
be conclusive, but that we are very sure those theologians 
who despise Ignatius will feel as little difficulty in giving up 
Mosheim. Let us hear another, scarcely less distinguished 
for learning than he. 

The Epistle of Polycarp, in which, as we have seen, the 
writings of Ignatius are so highly commended, is being re- 
viewed by one of their most erudite authors : he speaks of 
it as follows : " In this Epistle, Bishops are not distinguish- 
ed from Presbyters j therefore even some amongst the Pres- 
byterians receive the Epistle of Polycarp as genuine."t How 
accurately did these acute men estimate the critical canons 
of their brethren ! It was not historical evidence, nor 
weight of authority, nor any other consideration whatsoever, 
which could induce them to accept an author whose testimo- 
ny would spoil their inventions ; but, on the other hand, let 
them find one who was either silent, or could be forced to 
witness for them, and then not all the voices of all past 
ages shall persuade them to resign him ; though these concur 

* Mosheim, De Rebus Christian, ante Constant., quoted by Hors- 
ley, Reply to Priestley, letter v. p. 33. It may be observed that 
Priestley and his confederates have always been as anxious as the 
' presbyterians' to get rid of St. Ignatius, and for the same reason, 
viz. that his witness is clear and distinct against their tenets. Their 
warfare, too, against him seems to have been marked with the same 
want of truth and honesty. Thus Priestley repeats the common ob- 
jections, and does not even notice Pearson's answer. Vide Kelt's 
Bampton Lectures, note p. 22 ; and the late Bishop Burgess's Tracts 
on the Divinity of Christ, p. 412. , 

t T. Ittigius, De Heeres. 2. cap. x. p. 187. 



J16 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY: 

in pronouncing him unworthy of credit, or his teaching be 
the very opposite to that which they infer from his words.* 

(2) We may hear next a few of those writers of the same 
party whose honesty, in this matter at least, has been too 
strong for their prejudices ; and first, the celebrated Theo- 
dore Beza. 

He is arguing in a certain place against a blasphemer. 
Private opinions are for the moment laid aside ; and forget- 
ting, in his just indignation, that he was the advocate of the 
Presbyterians, he exclaims, " Not only has this man misin- 
tjgrpreted the sacred word of God, but he has ventured, with 
a strange kind of impudence, to wrest the authority even of 
the Council of Nice (though he rejects the Athanasian 
, Creed), as well as that of more ancient writers, to wit, Igna- 
tius, Tertullian, Irena?us, and Lactantius."f It is thus that 
men who have bound themselves to support a theory, or to 
play an assumed part, will always trip at some time or other. 
Beza's predecessor, Calvin, had indeed once spoken of" the 
trifles of Ignatius ;" but observe how his friends apologize 
for their impetuous master. " He could not by this expres- 
sion mean," says Rivetus, " the very writings of Ignatius, 
but only the spurious interpolations ari*d additions to them :"J 
for if he did, says another Genevan Professor, " Scultetus has 
proved that of the twelve Epistles attributed to Ignatius seven 
are undoubtedly genuine ;" and Vedelius, who confesses 
many of the strongest passages which his writings contain 
on the subject of the Bishop's pre-eminence to be genuine, 

* Thus Calvin was not ashamed to quote Anacletus (Institut. 
cap. viii.) in support of his own theories, though Cardinal Cusa, De- 
Concord. Cathol. lib. iii. cap. ii., expressly gives him up ; as does 
Chamier, De CEcum. Pontif. lib. x. cap. xiv. p. 352 ; and Whitgift, 
Def. of J3. to A.) p. 327, who resigns him as " unworthy of defense.' 
Again, happening to want authorities against Servetus, he quotes as 
genuine a work of St. Justin Martyr, which, as Scrivener observes, 
Ap olog. pro Patr. Eccles. cap. viii., " he himself must have known 
to be spurious :" and many such instances might be mentioned. 
Well, therefore, and moderately, does Whitgift say to Cartwright, 
" I pray you give me that libertie in recyting Authors that you take 
t o yourselfe, and that no man refuseth when they serve to his pur- 
pose." p. 319. 

t In Vita I. Calmni : and again, in arguing against SeJneccer, he 
accepts and uses the testimony of this Saint. A& Selnec. Respons. 

| Apud Vedelii Apolog. pro Ignat. cap. iv. 

Ibid. Vedelius himself quotes him in other works ; vide De 
Arcanis Arminmnismi^ cap. vii. pp. 61, 62. 



ST. IGNATIUS OF ANT1OCH. 117 

and even shows the propriety of some of them, adds, that, 
besides these famous divines of Geneva, Jerome, Zanchy, 
Cassaubon, Pareus; Junius, and a host of others, both Cal- 
vinists and Lutherans, confessed the authority of this Saint. 
Of such admissions it would be tedious as well as superflu- 
ous to set down more ; and we may conclude with the strong 
words of F. Buddeus, who has candidly avowed his own 
conviction, that " at this time no man skilled in such ques- 
tidns will easily be found who esteems these Epistles as spu- 
rious, or as otherwise than genuine :"* and the same writer 
elsewhere admits the superiority of Bishops over Presbyters 
to be so clearly proved by them, " that it is impossible to be 
denied or even called in* question by any man."t 

(3.) And now, lastly, for those who, admitting them to 
be genuine, affect to claim them as witnesses in their own 
favour. Such is Brehmer, who is not afraid to quote Igna- 
tius in order to prove " that there was not in his time so 
great a distinction between Bishops and Presbyters !"f 

* In Binghami Antiq. Ecc. Praefat p. 11. ed. Griscbov. 

t De Statu Eccles. sub Apost. cap. vi. 5. p. 738. Sandius, De 
Veteribus Scrijjtoribus Ecclesiasticis, p. 38, refers to many other 
writers as Gerhard, Eckhard, Calovius, &c. who quote St. Igna- 
tius ; to whom the following may be added. Pet. Martyr, Defens. 
Doctrin. Vet. de Euchar. pars i. p. 442 ; pars iv. p. 723 (ed. 1559). 
Chamier, De Descensu ad Inferos, lib. v. cap. ix. 2, 3 ; in Corp. 
Controvers. torn. ii. p. 166 (ed. 1626) ; and De (Ecum. Pontif. lib. x. 
cap. vi. 16. J. Wigand, Arianorum Refutat. lib. ii. p. 80. Alex. 
-Alesius, De Trinitate, '8. p. 104. The Socinian (with Boahmer, 
Chamier, and others.) tried to wrest Ignatius ; vide Valentin. Gentil. 
H-istor. a Benedicto JAretio, cap. xii. p. 31, Genev. 1567. See also 
Pannonii In Trinitatepi, lib. i. p. 3 ; Hoornbeec\i,^poloff.pro. Eccles. 
Christian. Hodierna non Apostalica, p. l*"Jablonski Institut. Hist. 
Christian, secul. ii. cap. ii. ; Ccnsur. in Remonstr. in cap. xxi. p. 
275, where the Leyden divines, anxicus to reject Patriarchs and 
Metropolitans, observe that " Ignatius knew only three orders;" 
Pet. Molinau Epist. iii. p. 180 ; Weisman, Histor. Ecdcsiast.sec. ii. 
torn. i. p. 104, who says, "the genuineness of these Epistles (the 7) 
is so certain and so "firmly demonstrated, that nothing but empty 
and trifling cavils, and frivolous conjectures unworthy an author of 
any merit, can hereafter be alleged against them." Isaac Cassaubon 
uses the same language, Exercitat. xvi. in Epist. S. Ignat. p. 669; 
and, in a word, the epistles in question have been quoted, with 
various objects, by nearly all the continental divines of any name or 
repute. 

t Justi Henringii Brehmeri Olserv. Select, obs. v. ; upon which 
see the Jlnimadv. xxxv. of C. Fimian. The Puritans sometimes 
quoted this Saint against episcopacy ; see The Petition of the Prc 

6* 



118 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

Such, again, was the notorious Cartwright and his school, 
who, as Bishop Pearson says, " as often as any objection was 
urged against them out of these writings to which they could 
offer no reply, denied their genuineness ; but whenever they 
thought they could use any passage to prop up the newly 
invented presbyterian discipline, they used his authority 
freely and frequently :"* and one of them even argues, that 
because the presbyterian scheme of "Lay-Elders" is not 
condemned by Ignatius, it must have - been favoured by 
him !t Such are the Church's adversaries ; and they are 
not mentioned here as if the words of such persons deserved 
the notice of Catholic Christians, but only with the charita- 
ble design of showing some of our brethren whom they have 
chosen for their teachers and masters. 

And now we may conclude. It was necessary to rescue 
Ignatius from what some one has called his " second martyr- 
dom ;" and we may perhaps expect to hear no more of the 
spuriousness of his Epistles.f The sum is this. It has been 

lates briefly examined, p. 10 (1641) ; and compare Thf.s. Salmur. De 
Episcopi et Presbyteri Discrimine, pars ii. pp. 323, 4. 

* Pearson, Vindic. Ignat. Prooem. cap. iii. 

t See Downame, Defence of Sermon, book. i. ch. xi p 231. 

+ A single example of the treatment which these celebrated 
Epistles have received from some of the modern divines may be 
useful in this place. Dr. Miller, one of the most eminent Presby- 
terian controversialists in the United States, writing, in the year 
1807, a book styled Letters on t/ie Ministry, speaks thus of the 
writings of St. Ignatius : " That even the shorter Epistles of Igna- 
tius are unworthy of confidence as the genuine works of the father 
whose name they bear, is the opinion of some of the ablest and best 
judges of the Protestant world." Here he was arguing against the 
Church. * 

In 1821 he published his Letters on Unitarianism, and now St. 
Ignatius might be useful to him. "The author is aware," says he, 
on this occasion, "that the authenticity of the Epistles of Ignatius 
has been called in question. It is sufficient for his purpose to say, 
that the great body of learned men consider the smaller epistles of 
Ignatius as in the main the real works of the writer whose name 
they bear." 

Again, in 1832, he publishes an Essay on the Office of Lay-Elder. 
Here he is again attacking the Church, and therefore it is necessary 
this time "for his purpose" to say, " Intelligent readers are no 
doubt aware that the genuineness of the Epistles of Ignatius has 
been called in question by a great majority of the Protestant divines, 
and is not only really but deeply questionable." 

But once more : in a tract on Presbyterianism, written, as it 
seems, three or four years later, "sensible without doubt," says the 



ST. JUSTIN MARTYR. 119 

delivered to us upon the authority of Ignatius and Polycarp 
friends and disciples of the Apostles of Christ as well as 
upon the testimony of large bodies of the Christians of Asia, 
contemporaries of those holy Martyrs, that Bishops were 
appointed by our Lord Jesus Christ to rule over His clergy 
and people, and that no man can have communion with 
Him but through them : and all which can be said against 
this, and the concurrent testimony of all Saints during fifteen 
ages, is, that some few men in these last days think otherwise. 

IV. Our next authority is ST. JUSTIN MARTYR. Of his 
qualifications as a witness to catholic truth he seems to have 
been himself conscious when he says, " I speak no novel- 
ties ; but, having been a disciple of -the Apostles, I deliver 
such things as I received from them."* It is not, however 
so much for the sake of the testimony contained in his own 
writings, that a few words shall now be quoted from them, 
as because we shall be able to trace a close connexion be- 
tween this primitive writer and others of a later date, who 
are presently to be heard ; and because it is very important 
to notice, that all the witnesses from the first are, as it were, 
linked together : they are all true or all false ; which isjust 
the fact we are most anxious to keep prominently in view in 
the present controversy.f 

St. Justin is describing, with the religious reserve al- 
ways practised in communications with the heathen,| the 
method of one portion of Christian worship; and in his 
description he comes to a part of the Service of which he 

writer who exposes him, "that the testimony of Ignatius to a matter 
of fact cannot now be effectually questioned, he exhibits his utmost 
ingenuity in striving to make him a witness for Presbyterianism !" 
This curious story is taken from Dr. George Weller's Letter in reply 
to a publication of the Rev. Samuel Miller, D. D. p. 22 (1836) ; and 
this versatile critic upon St. Ignatius is described as quite one of the 
leading Presbyterian teachers. " But these," as Bp. Bilsonsaid long 
ago to a writer of this class, " be the brambles and briars of your 
discipline, which force you to say and unsay with a breath." Per- 
petual Government of the Church, chap. xiii. p. 288. 
* A& Diognetum, Epist. Opp. p. 501. Paris. 1636. 

t Ei Si KUT' aiiToiis arco TIJS vvv \>ira.TEias dp^iiv >7 iriortj %, T xairiaoviriv 
ol TTptoiSurspai <c<u ol jmicdpiot //uprupsj ; S. Athanas. De Synod. Jlrim. et 
Seleuc. torn. i. p. 872. 

+ Qi> ^pri yap ra yivoTiJjjta d/*uijroij TpaytidcTv. Id. A& Imperat. Con- 
stant. &pol. p. 731. Or, as Optatus expresses it, " Paganus non 
potest nosse Christiana secreta." De Schismat. Danat. lib. v. 



120 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

speaks thus : " Bread is then brought, and a cup of mixed 
wine and water, to the President of the brethren ;"* this, 
and one or two statements by which it is followed, is all 
which shall be noticed here. He proceeds, then, to say, 
that these elements are " sent to those not present by the 
Deacons ;" and presently he adds, that the oblations which 
are made are consigned to the charge of this President ; 
" and Tie ministers them to the orphans and widows, and to 
those who, through sickness or any other cause, are in ne- 
cessity, and to such as are in bonds, and to strangers, and 
supplies the wants of all who are in any kind of need what- 
soever."! 

Now, we are not required to prove that the person thus 
described was, in some sense, a ruler of the presbyters and 
deacons ; because so much the adversaries admit. The 
word " President" jrgoforaig here used by St. Justin, is 
that which was applied from the first to the highest order of 
the clergy ; and Beza and others contend that this was their 
" Proto-presbyter," or " ambulatory" bishop, who ruled for 
a while, and then gave way to one of his brethren, who, in 
his turn, was succeeded by another, and so on : an assertion 
which has already been noticed, and to which no further 
answer need be made, unless every wild notion with which 
men choose to amuse themselves must be deemed to deserve 
one. || It may be added, however, that the office here as- 
cribed to the " President" was as we learn from the Apos- 
tolical Canons, as well as the Canons of divers Councils, 
and the writings of individual Fathers discharged from the 



* "Eiiceira itpoafyipzTai r<5 rrpocffr&irt rSv dSe\<j>i5v apros, /."at Troriipiov i'S 
at Kpapa.Tos. Apol. ii. p. 97. 

t Ibid. p. 98. t p. 99. 

And to whom the vast powers which their own masters, as 
Calvin, Beza, and others, were suffered to exercise, compelled them 
to assign a superiority of jurisdiction,. in order to make their own 
practice square with the ancient order. Thus they say of this ima- 
ginary Proto-presbyter, " Singularem habuit ac praacipuum supra 
Presbyteros auctoritatem atque potestatem, ejusque munus distinctum 
fuit a Presbyterali munere atque ordine." Thes. Salmur. pars ii. De 
Episc. et Presb. Discrimine, p. 322 ; that is to say, they were Bishops, 
only such Bishops as Calvin, and not as Austin or Cyprian, Becket 
or Anselm, Andrewes-or Wilson. 

|| "You have provided a President," said Bishop Bilson to these 
men, "to execute your owne pleasures; now let God have one 
amongst you to execute His." Chap. xiv. p. 294. 



ST. JUSTIN MARTYR. 121 

most remote antiquity exclusively by Bishops.* Who pre- 
tends that any mere presbyter was ever charged with the 
sole control of ecclesiastical charities? On the whole, this 
is a striking confirmation, so far as it goes, of what has been 
heard already ; and it harmonizes, as we shall see, with what 
is yet to follow. One point only remains to be observed. 
St. Justin tells the heathen, who seem to have confounded 
as some have done in much later times heretics with 
Catholics, that he was the author of a work against the 
various heretical sects of that age.t It appears that he also 
wrote an "Interpretation of the Apocalypse;" and he seems 
to have written at some length against the heretic Marcion.| 
In these works it may be taken for granted that his view of 
Church-government would be quite plainly expressed ; and 
his view was that of the Apostles. Now Tertullian, who 
wrote about sixty years later, and whom we are hereafter to 
hear, refers to these works of St. Justin. He says that his 
own arguments were derived from them ; and that it was his 
fixed purpose, in every thing relating to matters of faith, to 
follow Justin, and others as St. Irenaeus who had written 
on the same subjects.^ But the works of Justin were ex- 
tant at the date of his writing, and therefore accessible to 
heretics as well as himself. Could Tertullian's statements, 
then, have differed from those of St. Justin 1 Could he con- 
tradict St. Justin, and yet persuade his subtle adversaries that 
he was following his teaching? But Tertullian speaks of 
Bishops as the supreme rulers of the Church by Apostolical 
ordination. St. Justin, therefore, whose sentiments he only 

* So that it seems to have been a sort of proverb, " Gloria Epis- 
copi est, pauperum inopiae providere." S. Hieron. Ad. JVepotian. 
Epist. ii. torn. i. p. 5 ; and St. Basil says, that the Bishop's office, 
as Almoner of the Poor, is concluded from the fact that oblations 
were laid (Acts v.) at the Apostles' feet. Epist. cccxcii. Ad Amphi- 
lochium, torn. iii. p. 400. It would be endless to refer to the canons 
of various Councils in which this office is defined. Vide Thomassin. 
Vet. et JVbv. Discip. pars i. lib. i. cap. li. 

t K.ar<i itaiiav Tuiv ysyevripivtAV a'tpiacuv. Afol. ii. p. 70. 

1 Vide Euseb. H. E. lib. iv. cap. xviii. 

" Nee undique dicemur ipsi nobis finxisse materias, quas tot 
jam viri sanctitate et praestantia insignes, nee solum nostri anteces- 
sores, sed ipsorum hseresiarchunchconteinporales, instructissimis volu- 
minibus et prodiderunt et retuderunt ; at Justinus Philosophus et 
Martyr, ut Miltiades Ecclesiarum sophista, ut Irenseus . . . quos in 
omni opere Jidei, qutmadmodum in isto, optaxerim assequi." Ter- 
tullian. Adv. Valentinianos, cap. v. p. 291. 



liVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

repeated, becomes, and would be so if every page of his 
writings had disappeared, a witness on our behalf. 

V. A contemporary of St. Justin, Pius, Bishop of Rome, 
may be heard next. He was the ninth in that succession, 
and appears to have addressed a letter, about A. D. 142, to 
his brother Apostle Justus, Bishop of Vienne. It contains 
the following words : " Thou hast been appointed to fill the 
place of Verus, and invested with the Colobium* (or Epis- 
copal robe). See that thou fulfil the ministry which thou 
hast received in the Lord. Let t?te Presbyters and Deacons 
reverence you, not as a superior, but as the servant of 
Christ."f Here, as Bishop Beveridge has remarked on the 
passage,:]: we have an enumeration of the Bishop, Presby- 
ters, and Deacons of a certain Church, and their relations ; 
namely, the two last being in subjection to the first, and that 
only forty-two years after the death of St. John. Nor is 
this all. Verus, who is here spoken of as the predecessor of 
Justus, and who was the first Bishop of Vienne, was a dis- 

* " Colobium fuit Episcoporum vestis propria." Du Cange. Cf. 
Macer. Hicro- Lexicon, in voc. The learned Meursius describes an- 
other habit, the a^nsro^imov, as " habitus Apostolicus, id est, Pon- 
tificalis, sive Episcopalis." Glossar. Graco-Barbar. Opp. torn. iv. 
p. 199. Polycrates makes mention, in very remarkable terms 
vide Rel. Sac. torn. i. p. 369, and Annot. p. 381 of a pontifical 
ornament worn by St. John the Apostle ; who, says he, " lay in the 
Lord's bosom, was a Priest, and wore the Petalum" (or '.plate of 
pure gold,' Exod. xxviii. 26) ; and Epiphanius reports, Hares. 78, 
that St. James, the Bishop of Jerusalem, wore the same Petalum. 
It is defined by Du Cange as " Lamina aurea in capite Summi Pon- 
tificis ;" and vide Euseb. H. E. iii. 31, and iv. 24. 

t " Tu vero apud senatoriam urbem Viennensem, ejus (Veri) loco 
a fratribus constitutes, et colobio Episcoporum vestitus. Vide ut 
minister! um quod accepisti in Domino impleas ; . . . Presbyteri et 
Diaconi non ut majorem, sed ut ministrum Christi te observent." 
Pii Epist. iv. Justo Viennensi, ap Severin. Binii Condi. Gen. torn, 
i. p. 85. 

t Pandect. Can. torn. ii. in Can. Apost. ii. 

Yet these words are quoted by Blondel to prove, that " though 
he commands the respect of Presbyters and Deacons to their Bishop, 
yet it is not as to their superior by divine right, b.ut their equal !" 
" What dealing is here with Antiquity," says Archdeacon Parker, 
who notices it, " that one good Bishop cannot admonish another to 
exercise his power with modesty and humility, but these men must 
presently strip him of it !" Government of the Church, 8. p. 96. 
Salmasiiis quotes the passage with the same comment ; Contra Pc- 
tavium, cap. iv. p. 275. 



HEGESIPPUS. 

ciple of the Apostles ;* and Pius was so far from being the 
first in his own city who had filled the office to which Justus 
was now elevated, that he could trace his succession 
through no fewer than eight predecessors to St. Peter and 
St. Paul. So true it is, that they who would drag the 
Bishops from their chairs, giust begin if such words may 
be used by pulling the Apostles from their thrones.f 

VI. HEGESIPPUS, who wrote between twenty and thirty 
years later, and is the most ancient of all uninspired ecclesi- 
astical historians, tells us, that after St. James, the first Bishop 
of Jerusalem, was martyred, Symeon, his brother, was ap- 
pointed by unanimous consent to fill his place, as being a 
kinsman of the Lord. He adds, that that Church retained its 
virgin purity, and was corrupted by no vain doctrines, till 
the time of one Thebuthis, who, being unable to procure 
his own election to the Bishopric, began to introduce cer- 
tain novel tenets. After this man arose other schismatical 
teachers, who, as Hegesippus reports, " rent asunder with 
their adulterous doctrines the Unity of the Church."! It is 
curious that the first schism in this the mother of all 
Churches should have had such an origin ; and we shall see, 
in the sequel of these pages, that certain adversaries of the 
Bishops in later ages have been so far like this miserable 

* Vide Tillemont, Mdmoircs, &c. tome iii. part i. p. 453. 

t There are other proofs of about the same date with this, pos- 
sessing one of its remarkable features, I mean, its allusion to a 
present existing system. Such is that very early record of Dionysius, 
Bishop of Corinth, who was martyred in the reign of M. Aurelius. 
He is described by the historian as admonishing Pinytus, Bishop of 
Gnossus, " not to lay the heavy yoke of chastity upon the necks of 
the brethren as an essential /if/ /3api> Qopriov l-avay^Es TO -rspi oyvtius TO?S 
(ifcA^ofj iiriTiQivii but to have respect to their infirmities." Apud 
Euseb. II. E. iv. 23 ; upon which it is obvious to ask, What had this 
Bishop to do with ' imposing a yoke' at all ? or how came the 
brethren to submit to what he imposed ? The Epistle iri which the 
admonition occurs is addressed to the whole Church ; would lie, 
then, speak to them in deprecation of an exercise of episcopal power, 
unless they confessed themselves to be subject to it? or tell them of 
an imaginary authority which had no real existence ? In another 
Epistle to the -Roman Christians recommending a certain method 
of charitable collection, he says, " This method your blessed Bishop 
Soter observed :" here again notice, that reference is made to a. fact, 
of the truth of which there could be no question made. 

} Euseb. //. E. iv. 22. 



J24 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

Thebuthis, as to have despised their Sacred Office only after 
they had been themselves rejected from it.' 

The same primitive writer refers elsewhere to that letter 
of St. Clement which has been so largely cited above ; and 
it is pleasant to learn upon such testimony that it was not 
ineffectual ; for he relates, that ^ the Church of Corinth (to 
which it was addressed) continued in the right faith, until 
the time of Primus, who was Bishop of that place;", with 
whom, he says, he enjoyed familiar intercourse when on his 
voyage to Rome, and with whose flock he sojourned no little 
time. Arrived at Rome, he took up his abode with Anicetus 
its Bishop. "After the death of Anicetus," these are 
again his words, " Soter succeeded, whom in the next 
place Eleutherus followed; and in every Episcopal Succes- 
sion, and in every city, the same doctrines were held which 
were delivered by the Law and the Prophets, and the Lord 
Himself."* 

It will be observed that these holy witnesses are unlike 
the modern teachers, as in almost every other respect, so in 
this, that they speak, not from conjecture, but from their 
own personal knowledge and assurance. It is what they 
had heard and seen, and not what they fancied, that they 
report. Their testimony, too, is offered not from one or 
two places, but from every part of the world. Already we 
have found Bishops, upon the infallible evidence of men 
who lived and conversed with them, at Jerusalem and Ephe- 
sus, at Antioch and Smyrna, at Corinth and Philippi, at 
Rome, at Vienne.; in Syria, in Greece, in Italy, in Gaul; 
and this at so early a date that we seem to be standing the 
while in the very foot-prints of the Apostles, and listening to 
their very accents. Fresh witnesses are springing up on 
every side, to guide us along the same track ; and others, 
as we shall see, ready at every moment to take their places. 
Meanwhile, it is a solemn inquiry in which we are engaged. 
This is no question of natural philosophy or human policy 
which we are debating agilur de vita et salute a mistake 
in this science may be fatal. And therefore it is that we 
seek from the adversary something more solid than guesses, 
something more convincing than assertions ; we will not be 

* Tlapa 'AKijroi> StaSs^rai StorJ/p, /.<?' Sv 'EXrffepoy iv IKUCTT) SI Sta- 
Kal -iv tKanTi) iroXei oirws % I > &s o vopos icijpvrrti KOI at -po^ij-at (cat o 
Ibid. 



POLYCRATES. 125 

put off with words ; we deal with facts ; and we warn all 
men who take part in this strife to ask for facts in return.* 

VII. POLYCRATES will next instruct us. He was, as we 
have seen above, the eighth Bishop of Ephesus ; and appears 
to have addressed a syuodical letter when in the sixty-fifth 
year of his age to Victor, the successor of Eleutherus, and 
thirteenth Bishop of Rome. The subject of this letter was 
the much controverted point of the observance of Easter, 
with respect to which the tradition of the Asiatic Churches 
had always varied from that which prevailed throughout the 
western Patriarchale.f Polycrates is defending his own 
custom against the remonstrances of Victor, and with this 
object is led to refer to some of the great authorities by 
whom it had been maintained. Those whom he enumerates 
are, " St< John, the Priest of the Lord, who died in Ephe- 

* " Let not the reader be carried away with taint shewes, neither 
let him believe that their pretended discipline was instituted by the 
Apostles, until they be able to shew, as they never will be, that it 
was sometime and somewhere practised within three hundred yeares 
say a thousand foure hundred, if you will after the Apostles. 
1 . We prove that the Apostles had the right of ordaining ; that this 
right was from them derived to their substitutes, as to Timothy in 
Ephesus, and Titus in Crete, to Mark at Alexandria, to Polycarpus 
at Smyrna, to Evodius at Antioch, to Linus at .Rome, &c. &c. 2. 
To their successors, as to Simon the sonne of Cleophas, the suc- 
cessor of St. James at Jerusalem, &c. 3. That from these substi- 
tutes and first successors of the Apostles the same was derived to 
their successors, which, without all doubt, were the Bishops of the 
several Churches. 4. And hereunto we adde the general consent of 
the Fathers and Councils, many of them affirming and confirming, 
not one I say, not one denying the superioritie of Bishops in or- 
daining ; the perpetual practice of all true Christian Churches, and 
not one approved instance to be given to the contrary ; . . . . But 
because he shall not carry the matter without proofes, this I will 
offer him, That if he can bring any one pregnant testiinonie or ex- 
ample out of the Scriptures, any approved authoritie or example out 
of the ancient Fathers, Councils, or Histories of the Church, prov- 
ing that the Presbyters had by and of themselves an ordinarie power 
or right to ordaine Ministers I meane Presbyters and Deacons I 
will promise to subscribe to his assertion. But if he cannot do this, 
as I know he cannot, then let him for shame give place to th'e truth." 
Downame, Defence of Sermon, book iii. ch. iv. pp. 94, 5, and book 
iv. ch. i. p. 36. 

t For an account of the Paschal controversy, and of the Councils 
held upon the subject at Rome, in Palestine, Pontus, &c. vide Euseb. 
H. E. v. 23, 24. 



126 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

sus ; Polycarp, Bishop and Martyr, who sleeps in Smyrna ; 
Thraseus of Eumenia, also Bishop and Martyr, who reposes 
in the same Smyrna; Sagaris, Bishop and Martyr, who 
sleeps in Laodicea; the blessed Papirius, and the eunuch 
Melito, who lieth in Sardis, expecting the coming of the 
Lord."* These all, he says, observed the Paschal Festival 
on the fourteenth day, according to the evangelical tradition, 
as well as hp himself and his kinsmen ; " for," he adds, in 
words already quoted^ "seven of my kinsmen have been 
Bishops, and E am the eighth."t And all this he further 
confirms by informing Victor, that the numerous Bishops, 
whom he had summoned at his request, were unanimous in. 
their adoption of the same custom. 

Now the nature of the office which was held by this 
Victor, as well as that of Polycraies himself, is beyond all 
cavil or dispute. The former, indeed, was so far like some 
of his successors in the See of Rome, that he did not hesi- 
tate to wind up the Paschal controversy by threatening to 
cut off all the Asiatic Churches from communion with his 
own ; for which he was rebuked by St. Irenaeus, Bishop of 
Lyons. At another time he justly excommunicated, by his 
own authority, one Theodotus, who, to save his life during 
a persecution, had denied the faith. And these circumstan- 
ces are not mentioned here in depreciation of Victor, who, 
as a prelate of our own Church admits, " was a godly Bishop 
and Martyr,"| but merely in evidence of the vast power 
which was asserted by the Rulers of'the Church so early as 
the age of Polycrates. This particular Bishop was indeed 
blamed, but, observe, not for assuming such power, but for 
the wrong use of it ; the power itself was conceded to him, 
or rather was very remarkably sanctioned and confirmed, by 
the very criticisms of those holy men who censured its rash 
exercise. And our question at this point is, did it differ in 
any degree from that which had been claimed and used by 
his predecessors ? Does Irenreus say so in his letter to Vic- 
tor? Does Polycrates say so? And when the latter refers 

* Rcl.- Sac. torn. i. p. 370. 

t " In all likelihood he means that they were his predecessors 
in the same See, and accordingly he mentions only some of them 
with whom he had conversed, though he was sixty-five years old at 
the writing' of the Epistle." Dodwell, One Altar, chap. ix. 5. 
p. 243. 

i Whitgitt, Defense of Jlnsiecrc, p. 510. ^ 



ST. IREN.EUS. 12? 

to his seven "kinsmen," as he calls them, who had been 
Bishops before him, does he hint that there had been any 
change in the Episcopal functions since they occupied their 
thrones? No; what they had been in their day, the Saint 
himself, in his turn, had now become ; and it was to " St. 
John" h imself, to the " Bishops" and " Martyrs" who were 
asleep in Ephesus, in Smyrna, or in Laodicea, and to the 
Prelates of his own jurisdiction then present with him,* that 
he was willing to appeal, as "knowing" to use his own 
words "that he did not belie his gray hairs, but had ever 
ruled his life by the precepts of the Lord Jesus Christ." 

VIII. ST. IRENJEDS, who was first a presbyter of the 
Church at Lyons, under the venerable Pothinus, and subse- 
quently, on the martyrdom of Pothinus,t raised to the Bish- 
opric of that See,f will now confirm the testimony of his 
brethren. When it is considered that he was acquainted 
with Papias, with Aristion, and others who possessed the 
same opportunities of knowing the mind of the Apostles, it 
will be admitted that he is a competent witness. But 
the following passage from a letter written by the Martyr to 
Florinus, a friend of his youth, will sufficiently attest his claim 
to be heard, and form the most suitable introduction to the 
extracts which are next to be offered. 

" I saw you" these are his words " when I was yet a 
youth, in the lower Asia with Polycarp. I can call to mind 
what then took place more accurately than more recent 
events ; for impressions made upon the youthful memory 
grow up and associate themselves with the very frame and 
texture of the mind. Well, therefore^ could I describe the 
very place in \vhich the blessed Polycarp sat and taught ; his 
going out and coming in ; the whole tenour of his life ; his 
personal appearance ; the discourses which he made to the 

* Polycrates, as Bishop of Ephesus, was a Metropolitan ; accord- 
ingly Eusebius says of him, rSv hfi rijj 'Ao-tas frimcfacov . . . >jyro 



H. E. v. 24. 

t It was Pothinus who, being asked by the Roman officer on his 
trial, who was the God of the Christians, replied, " If thou wert 
worthy, thou shouldest know " saw yg u(tas, yptoo-ij, a noble answer 
truly to one who possessed the power, which he presently used, of 
putting him to death. And this is the class of witnesses against 
whom the modern teachers are arrayed. 

t Vide S. Hieron. Catal. Script. Ecclcs. ; Aug. Contra Julianum 
Pelagianum, lib. i. cap. iii. 7; and Euseb. H. E. v. 5. 



128 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

people. How would he speak of the conversations which he 
had held with John, and with others who had seen the Lord. 
How did he make mention of their words, and of whatsoever 
he had heard from them respecting the Lord ; both concern- 
ing His miracles and his doctrine, which Poly carp received 
from those who had themselves seen the Word of Life"* 

We can with difficulty get ourselves even to compare 
such a witness as this with the voluble teachers of modern 
times ; nor is it necessary to do so.f Let the wise and sober 
choose betwen the testimony of this reverend Saint and 
Martyr, and the fables of men who would substitute for the 
Scriptures their own traditions, and for the Church them- 
selves. The great work of IrenaBUs against the Valentinian 
and other heretics of his day, from which the following pas- 
sages are taken, was written about seventy years after the 
death of St. John.J It appeals throughout to the Apostolic 
teaching preserved by tradition, and challenges the adver- 
saries to compare their tenets with it. " It is open to all 
men in every church," Irenaeus says, " who desire to look 
upon truth, to behold the tradition of the Apostles, manifest- 
ly set forth in every part of the world ;" to behold it, that is, 
with the eyes of the body : men could see the truth then 
acted out before them ; for, says he, " we are able to enume- 

* R?<5oi> y\p &e, irats iSv ert, iv rrj <car<o 'Ao-io irapa TW IIoXwapTrw, /f.r.A. 
Epist. ad Florinum, ap. Euseb. H. E. v. 20 ; and Frag. Deperdit. 
Tract, ap. Irensei Opera, p. 464. 

t A late commentator upon the writings of this Saint has collected 
some of his remarkable expressions, which may prepare us to receive 
attentively whatever he may have written. They are such as the 
following : " I have heard from an elder who had heard from those 
who had seen and been instructed by the Apostles;" "Wherefore 
the elders, who are disciples of the Apostles, say," ,&c. ; " As the 
elders, who saw John, the Lord's disciple, remember that they heard 
of him ;" " And all the elders who associated with John, the Lord's 
disciple, testify that John taught them this ; for he remained with 
them down to the time of Trajan," &c. Beavon's Account of St. 
IrentEus, p. 153. With which compare Waterland's Judgment of 
the Primitive Church, Works, vol. v. pp. 213, 14; who remarks, 
with the view of showing " how considerable a person he was," that 
" the charismata, the miraculous gifts, were common in his days, 
and he himself a witness of them in many instances." Accordingly,, 
as Waterland observes, " he lays it down as a rule and 'a maxim, 
that truth then went along with the Church, because the Spirit of 
truth rested upon it ; which is the argument St. Paul himself uses to 
the like purpose." 

i " Inter annum Christ! 170 et 174," according to Grabe (ed. Oxon. 
1702), Prolegom. 2. Dodwell refers it to an earlier date. 



ST. IRENjEUS. 129 

rate those who were appointed by the Apostles Bishops in 
the Churches, and their successors even down to ourselves, 
who never taught, nor knew of, such things as are madly 
dreamed by these men."* 

It was, then, to the Episcopal or Apostolical Succession 
that St. Irenseus, the disciple of Polycarp, confidently re- 
ferred the heretic for a refutation of his error ; and when 
such persons, with the characteristic subtlety of their kind, 
replied, that the Apostles had communicated to " the per- 
fect" certain peculiar mysteries apart from and beyond 
their ordinary teaching, the man of God rejoined, " If this 
had been so, then specially and chiefly would they have de- 
livered them to those to whom they committed the very 
Churches themselves. For it was their wish that they should 
be eminently perfect and irreproachable in all things, whom 
also they left to be their own. successors, handing on to them 
their own office of government, from whose wise and prudent 
conduct vast benefit would result, but, should they err, the 
most disastrous calamities.''! St. Ireuaeus certainly had an 
exalted notion of the Episcopal office and order ; and we 
have reason to be thankful that we can lie down and rise up 
again without any misgiving in our hearts, as we meditate 
upon such words of such, a witness. He proceeds to say, 
that since it would be tedious to reckon up " the successions 
in all the Churches," it will suffice to " confound the dark- 
ened and vain-glorious teachers of error, by" what method 
shall we suppose this Apostolical man suggests ? " by reck- 
oning up the chain of Bishops in the single Church of Rome, 
which Church, by means of that succession, was in posses- 
sion of the tradition received from the Apostles, and the 
faith once delivered to the saints."! 

* " Traditionem itaque Apostolorum in loto tnundo manifestatam, 
in omni ecclesia adeat perspicere omnibus qui vera velint videre ; et 
habemus annumerare eos qui ab Apostolis instituti sunt Episcopi in 
Ecclesiis, et successores eorum usque ad uos, qui nihil tale docu- 
erunt, neque cognoverunt, quale ab his deliratur. ' Adv. Hares, lib. 
iii. cap. iii. 

t " Etenim si recondita niysteria scissent Apostoli, quse seorsim 
et latenter ab reliquis perfectos docebant, his vel maxime traderent 
ea quibus etiam ipsas Ecclesias committebant. Valde enim perfectos 



et irreprehensibiles in omnibus eos volebant esse, quos et successores 
relinquebant, suum ipsorura locum magisterii tradentes ; quibus 
"nendate agentibus fieret magna utilitas, lapsis autem sum ma ca- 
mtas." Ibid. V 

t " Sed quoniam valde longum est, in hoc tali volnmine omnium 



130 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

" The blessed Apostles, then," he proceeds, " founding 
and building up that Church, committed to Linus the epis 
copal administration. Of this Linus, Paul, in his Epistles 
to Timothy, makes mention. To him Anacletus succeeded ; 
after whom, in the third place from the Apostles, Clement 
received the Bishopric. To Clement succeeded Evaristus, 
and to Evaristus Alexander ; and next Sixtus was appointed, 
the sixth from the Apostles ; after whom Telesphorus, next 
Hyginus, then Pius ; after him Anicetus, and, Soter having 
succeeded to Anicetus, now, in the twelfth place from the 
Apostles, Eleutherus holds the Bishopric. By this order and 
succession that tradition and that promulgation of the truth 
which the Church derives from the Apostles has come down 
to our times."* 

Such is the test aud measure of sound faith proposed by 
this primitive bishop and martyr : not what each man's un- 
disciplined reason may gather for himself that is a notion 
of yesterday but what has been safely handed down, and se- 
curely guarded, by the successors of the Apostles, the Bishops 
of the Church of Christ. 

It may be superfluous, and even tedious, to add more from 
this writer ; yet because of the greatness of his name and au- 
thority, one or two passages shall be briefly noticed, in which, 
as we may be confidently assured, the mind of the Apostles is 

Ecclesiarum enumerare successiones, maximae, et antiquissimse, et 
omnibus cognitaa, a gloriosissimis duobus Apostolis Petro et Paulo 
Romse fun da toe et constitutae Ecclesiae, earn quam habet ab Apos- 
tolis traditionem et annunciatarn hominibus firiem, per successiones 
Episcoporum pcrvenientem usque ad nos, indicanles, confundirnus 
omnes eos, qui quoquo modo vel per sui (sibi ?) placentiam ma- 
lam, vel vanam Gloriam, vel per csBcitatem et malam sententiam, 
prseterquam oportet colligunt." Ibid. .. 

* " Fundantes igitur et instruentes beati Apostoli Ecclesiam, Lino 
Episcopatum administranda; Ecclesiae tradiderunt. Hujus Lini Pau- 
lus in his quse sunt ad Timotheum epistolis meminit. Succedit au- 
tem ei Anacletus ; post eum tertio loco ab Apostolis Episcopatum 
sortitur Clemens . . . Hinc autem dementi succedit Evaristus, et 
Evaristo Alexander, ac deinceps sextus ab Apostolis constirutus est 
Sixtus, et ab hoc Telesphorus . . . ac deinceps Hyginus, post Pius 
post quem Anicetus. Cum autem successisset Aniceto Soter, nunc 
duodecimo loco Episcopatum ab Apostolis habet Eleutherus. Hac 
ordinatione et successione ea quse est ab Apostolis in Ecclesia tra- 
ditio et veritatis prseconiatio pervenit usque ad nos. Et est plenis- 
sima hsec ostensio, (in am et eandem vivificatrieem fidem esse, quse 
in Ecclesia ab Apostolis usque nunc sit conservata, et tradita in 
veritate." Ibid. 



ST. IREN^IUS. 



131 



declared. He teaches, then, in another place, that the Sa- 
cred Scriptures have been preserved free from corruption, 
suffering " neither loss nor addition," and duly, and safely, 
and holHy expounded, by means of " the successions of Bish- 
ops to whom, in each several place, the Apostles delivered 
the Church."| 

Again, meek and just as he was, he fears not to say, 
that " all they who come not together to the Church, par- 
take not of the Holy Spirit, but, by their perverse imagina- 
tions and most evil courses, defraud themselves of life ; for 
where the Church is, there is the Spirit of God ;"| and 
what he meant by " the Church" has been already very 
plainly shown. 

It was his answer to the heretical teachers, " These are 
far more recent than the Bishops to whom the" Apostles de- 
livered the Churches;"f and the fact that his arguments 
from the Episcopal successions were addressed to heretics, 
shows that this was one of the Church's weapons against 
the enemies of her Lord from the very first. 

Elsewhere he declares, that "All who sever themselves 

from this succession have 'fallen away from the truth ; and 

* those heretics who offer upon the altar of God strange fire 

that is, novel doctrines are consumed, like Nadab and Abi- 

hu, by the fires of heaven. Whilst they who^lift up them- 

* Lib. iv. cap Ixiii. : the whole passage deserves the most care- 
ful consideration. 

t "Spiritus non sunt participes omnes qui non concurrunt ad 
Ecclesiam, sed semetipsos fraudant a vita, per sententiam malam et 
operationem pessimam. Ubi enim Ecclesia, ibi est Spiritus Dei." 
lib. iii. cap. Ix. "Ipse est Spiritus Dei," says Augustine, "quern 
non possunt habere hseretici, et quicunyue se ab Ecclesia pracidunt. " 
In Epist. Joannis, Tractat. vi. torn. ix. p. 254 ; and he repeats the 
same sentiment with yet greater severity of language, De Symbolo, 
Ad Catechumenos, lib. iv. cap. xiii. p. 310. 'Ei> ravry yap says St. 
Athanasius, speaking of "the Faith preserved by the Fathers," 
ry t'K/cAijcrta TeOe/isXitaTai, (cat b -avTtjs sxTriTTTCiiv, oiV' av d'i7, otfr' av \iyoiro 
XptoTiayd?. AA Serapionem, torn. i. p. 202. " Christiani 

esse desierunt," is the strong saying of another witness, " qui 
Christi nomine amisso, humana et externa vocalula induerunt. Sola 
igitur Catholica Ecclesia est, quae verum cultum retinet. IJic est 
fons veritatis ; hoc est domicilium fidei hoc templum Dei ; quo si 
. quis non intraverit, vel a quo si quis exiverit, a spe vitoe ac salutis 
aeternse alienus est." Lactantius, De Vera Sapif.nt.ia, lib. iv. p. 408. 

t " Omnes enim ii valde posteriores sunt quam Episcopi, quibus 
Apostoli tradiderunt Ecclesias." lib. v. cap. xx. 



132 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

selves against the truth, and encourage others against the 
Church of God, abide in hell, devoured by the yawning of 
the earth, like the company of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram. 
They, too, who divide and separate the Unity of the Church 
receive from God the punishment which was inflicted upon 
Jeroboam."* 

Lastly, this famous martyr says, " It is where the gifts of 
the Lord are deposited that we must set ourselves to learn the 
truth:" and where is that place? " Amongst those," he 
adds, " with whom is that Succession of the Church which 
proceeds from the Apostles."t 

Such is the teaching of one who was content, like so 
many of his brethren, to suffer thes harp agonies of torture, 
and at length the stroke of martyrdom, in testimony of the 
faith which he professed. And we may ask, in conclusion, 
if this man, with all his privileges, his exalted faith, and 
unflinching obedience, could miss the truth, what likelihood 
is there that we should find it? If to him, the friend and 
disciple of men who could not but know the mind of Christ,J 

* " Omnes autem (qui absistunt a principali successions) hi de- 
eiderunt a veritate. Et hseretici quidem alienum ignem afl'erentes 
ad altare Dei, id est alienas doctrinas, a ccelesti igne comburentur, 
quemadmodum Nadab et Abiud. Q,ui vero exsurgunt contra verita- 
tem, et alteros adhortantur adversus Ecclesiam Dei, remanent apud 
inferos, voragine terras absorpti, quemadmodum qui circa Chore, 
Dathan, et Abiron. Q,ui autem scindunt et se.parant unitatem, Ec- 
clesiae, eandem quam Hieroboam poenam percipiunt a Deo." lib. iv. 
cap. xliii. 

t " Ubi igitur charismata Domini posita sunt, ibi discere oportet 
veritatem, apud quos est ea quae estab Apostolis Ecclesia? successio." 
lib. iv. cap. xlv. And he every where teaches that these "gifts of 
the Lord " are only to be found in connexion with the Episcopal 
succession. It is with relation to this point, that one who has paid 
great attention to the writings of this Apostolical bishop and martyr 
observes as follows : " According to Trenaeus, the different classes of 
sectaries would be regarded as having neither spiritual life nor the 
Holy Spirit, except so far as they might be supposed to be in com- 
munion with the body governed by elders or bishops descended from 
the Apostles. If in any way or to any degree they can be supposed 
to be in communion with them, to that extent they would be 
thought to have the Holy Ghost, and to be in the way of life, but no 
further. I am not now discussing whether he was right or wrong ; I 
am merely pointing out the contrariety between his views of the 
Church and those which appear to be most popular at present. I 
doubt if most Protestants would not pronounce his doctrine to be 
gross bigotry." Beaven's Account (,f St. Irenesus, pp. 79, 80. 

{ This expression may appear strong : I only repeat it after Arch- 



ST. CLEMENT OP ALEXANDRIA. 133 

God's gracious promise was broken, why do we yet dream 
that it will be fulfilled to us ? And when, in the decay of 
the world, men arise, who, to make room for their own in- 
ventions, would wipe out from the history of the Church the 
first fifteen ages of her trials and her victories, as if they 
were ages only of darkness and error, how is it that we bear 
even to listen to them, or tolerate and applaud in religion the 
incoherent extravagances which in the affairs of the world 
we should instinctively detect and condemn? 

IX. ST. CLEMENT OP ALEXANDRIA is the next of our 
holy witnesses. Educated in the famous schools of Alexan- 
dria under Pantaenus, who appears to have been himself in- 
structed by contemporaries of the- Apostles, Clement suc- 
ceeded, about A. D. 188, to the distinguished office which 
Pantsenus then vacated, and which he had filled ever since 
the death of St. Mark, the first Bishop of that city.* He 
was a writer in the paschal controversy ; and it is worthy of 
observation, inasmuch as it cannot but affect importantly his 
character as a witness, that he accounts for the composition 
of the work which he wrote upon that subject, by saying that 
he had been compelled by his friends to commit to writing 
the traditions which he had received orally from the primi- 
tive elders. A few words only shall be quoted from him. 

In one place he speaks of " the innumerable precepts of 
Holy Scripture which pertain to Bishops, Priests, and Dea- 
cons."? In another, as has been noticed above, he supposes 

bishop Cranmer, who said of the martyr himself and that in con- 
troversy with a Romanist " lie could not be deceived, for he was 
the disciple of Polycarpus," &c. Answer to Gardiner ; 2d book 
against Transubstantiation, p. 317 (1551). So another, happening 
just then to want his. testimony, observes, that "he had received 
truth from Polycarp, as Polycarp from St. John;" adding that "his 
judgment cannot be called in question rashly, or without the most 
weighty reasons." F. Buddei De Slat. Eccles. cap. v. 4, pp. 393 
and 416. Melancthon speaks still more respectfully of him; Epist. 
Ad G. Bucholtzer, p. 433. 

* St. Jerome says of Pantsenus, " Hujus multi quidem in sanctam 
scripturam extant commentarii, sed magis viva voce ecclesiis pro- 
fuit." CataL Script. Eccles. Of this viva-voce instruction Clement 
was a hearer. KAfyn? /i> yao, says one, speaking of him, roTs byiots 
UTT.jo-roAuiy sird^Evof Travravij. S. Cyril. Contra Julian, lib. vi. torn. vi. 
p. 205. 

" t JMiwai 61 otrat v^aOr/Kat sis irpajjrcdra /cAs:ra Siartivovsai eyysypaQsrai 
THIS @i/3\t!Jts TO.TS ayiat; ' a! p.lv Trpfff/Jvrfjiotj, ai Si tVtcvcfeoij, al <? Staxovois. 

Ptedagog. lib. in. cap. xii. p. 264. Paris. 1641 . 



134 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

the three orders of the sacred ministry to be ordained types 
of the celestial hierarchy. What a deep conviction must he 
have cherished of the divine institution of that threefold 
order ; and how intimately must the same persuasion have 
leavened all Christians of that primitive age, when it was 
thus calmly and thoughtfully enunciated from the professor's 
chair in the most distinguished school of religion of those 
days ! 

Elsewhere he speaks of the humility of St. Peter, St. 
James, and St. John, who, " highly favoured as they were 
by the Lord, resigned to another the episcopal government 
of Jerusalem." And again, he records of St. John, that 
" after the death of the emperor, he came from the island of 
Patmos to Ephesus, and went about the neighbouring coun- 
tries appointing Bishops, and selecting for the clergy such 
persons as were signified by the Holy Ghost."* May we 
not unhesitatingly affirm that, if they were the only relics of 
the primitive times preserved to us by the providence of 
God, these writings of St. Clement would have sufficed to 
prove that Bishops were of His appointing 1 

X. TERTULLIAN, who was born about A. D. 160, and 
whose famous " Apology for the Christians " was written 
between the years 198 and 205, bears no less emphatic testi- 
mony to the same great truth. It will be remembered that 
he professed to found his statements upon the authority of 
St. Justin Martyr ;f but seeing that his father might have 
conversed with Apostles, he might very well have claimed 
to be heard as a witness in his own name only. Before, 
however, we listen to him in this character, let us hear him 
for a moment as a controversialist. He is handling in a 



5)j yap rov rvpui'VO-u T\VTficavTOs airo rrjj TiaTfuav Tr?j vrjaov [tSTt>\- 
6tv eis TJ)y "E^ec-oy, d-rjei irapai:aXorf<Ei-of KCLI i~l ra Tr)\r,<no%<i!pa rwv eO 
Sirov fiev eKurK6i;ovs KaTaarfjercav, oxov <5 o'Aaj s/cxXqc-ias afi/jotruv, C'TTOU it K\ 
eva yi nva xXripiacrtav TWV imo Xlvrii/jaroj crjj^aivo/ifycoy. Quis Dives sulxe 
ap. Euseb. H. E. iii. 23. The same deeply interesting statement is 
made by the very ancient author of the martyrdom of Timothy re- 
ferred to above ; who reports that " having returned to the metro- 
polis of Ephesus, in conjunction with seven other bishops he ruled 
over that city." Ap. Photii Biblioth. num. 254. And the circum- 
stance of the blessed Apostle being persuaded by the Bishops of 
Asia, or of the province of Ephesus, to compose his Gospel, is re-" 
peated by many other writers. Vide Hieron. Catal. Script., and 
Victoria. Petav. In Apocal. ap. Grabii Spicileg. torn. ii. p. 45. 
t See Section IV. 



TERTULLIAN. 

certain place the familiar argument that Catholic teaching 
is true, because it is Catholic ; that what has been believed 
always, every where, and by all, can only be rejected upon 
the impious supposition, that God has made no revelation at 
all. We shall find a new point in this reasoning as man- 
aged by his acute mind. " Grant that all have erred," he 
says : " grant even an Apostle has been so mistaken as to 
impart his message only to a few ; grant that the Holy 
Spirit has not vouchsafed to lead any Church into the truth,' 
though for this cause sent by Christ, and for this cause 
asked of the Father, that He might be a teacher of the truth ; 
grant that the steward of God, the vicegerent cf Christ, has 
neglected his office, suffering the Churches meanwhile to 
understand and to believe otherwise than He Himself de- 
clared by the Apostles ; all this, shocking as it is, he sup- 
poses to be granted in the argument, since the new opinions 
can only upon this monstrous hypothesis be justified but 
what then? granted that all Churches, in all ages to make 
his a'rgument our own have thus erred ; " is it likely," he 
asks, " that so many and so large Churches should have run 
by mistake into one belief?"* 

Let this argument be applied to our immediate subject. 
Grant (what the introduction of a new discipline pre- 
supposes) that the ancient regimen was needless or cor- 
rupt ; grant that Bishops are no divine order, their office 
human, and their authority usurped what then? Why, 
we must believe that, in .every Church throughout the 
world, and that within forty years of the Apostles' times, 
men dared to set up a new government of their own 
devising ; that in every Church there was one presbyter arro- 
gant enough to assume power, which all the others were 
weak enough to allow him ; and this not only at Rome, but 
in Jerusalem, at Antioch, Ephesus, Smyrna, Corinth, Phi- 
lippi, Vienne, Lyons, Carthage, Alexandria ; in Europe, in 
Asia, in Africa ; in a word, wherever the Gospel of Christ 
had reached ; and we must not doubt, that a revolution 
which we perceive to have been morally impossible even in 
a single province, was accomplished with precisely the same 
results, by the agency of the same means, and under the 

'* " . . . Ecquid verisimile est, ut tot ac tantse in unam lidem 
erravevint?" De Preescripti.one Haretir-orum, cap. xxviii. 



136 EVIDENCE OP ANTIQUITY." 

same mysterious secrecy and silence, in every land through- 
out Christendom !* 

Tertullian continues thus : " Different courses have dif- 
ferent issues ; the teaching of the Churches must then (sup- 
posing it human) have varied in its form; but what we 
find the same throughout a multitude, is not a mistake, but 
a Tradition. Let a man then be bold, and say, that they 
.erred who first delivered it! Truth," he continues, in 
righteous mockery, " awaited her release by some Mar- 
cionites and Valentinians !" or, as we may say, was first 
revealed to some Presbyterians and Socinians : " mean- 
while the Gospel was preached amiss ; so many thousands 
were baptized amiss ; so many miracles, so many spiritual 
gifts wrought amiss ; so many priesthoods, so many minis- 
tries discharged amiss ; finally, so many martyrdoms (the 
common lot of bishops) crowned amiss. "t 

* It seems, indeed, to be the common lot of those who reject 
truth, to accept some monstrous and incredible fable in its stead ; 
and here we have an instance of it. For, as it has been acutely 
observed, " the ages in which Primitive Episcopacy is pretended to 
have been transformed into Diocesan abounded with learning and 
writers, and a great many of their books have been preserved, but 
not the least hint of this fundamental alteration of Church-Govern- 
ment ! What ! so just an offence given by the Church, and no seer 
tary, no schismatic, to reproach her? Those who were so minute 
and trifling in their cavils, could they overlook so obvious a topic as 
this of Diocesan innovation ? Nay, these very sects, where their 
numbers made them capable, lived'themselves under the Diocesan 
way! If, then, in times of so much division, contention, and dis- 
pute, such a change as this could be introduced without any oppo- 
sition, and all parties of different opinions and interests conformed 
to it ; for my part I cannot sec how it can be denied that it was done 
by miracle. For what greater miracle can we well imagine, than 
that so many sorts of Christians, divided by principles and mutual 
aversions, should conspire to receive this pretended alteration of 
Episcopacy? So that those who deny it to be Primitive, must 
allow it a higher title, since Miracle carries with it much greater 
authority than Prescription.'" Maurice's Defence, of Diocesan Epis- 
copacy, p. 4. Saravia makes the same observation ; " Miraculum 
certe maximum esset, in hac una re potuisse consentire, et simul 
tanto consensu et tarn universali traditionem Apostolici regiminis 
mutare." De Divers. Grad. Minist. Eva-tig, cap. xxi. 

t " Nullis inter multos eventus unus est exitus ; variasse debue- 
rant ordine doctrina; ecclesiarum : creterum quod apud multos unum 
invenitur, non est erratum sed traditum. Audeat ergo aliquis dicere 
illos errasse, qui tradiderunt. Aliquos Marcionitas et Valentinianos 
liber.inda veritas expectahat : interea perperam 



TERTULLIAN. 137 

Having noticed that all heretics affect to appeal to Holy 
Scripture, and observed that a false interpretation vitiates 
truth as much as a false text,* Tertullian goes on to propose 
a method by which opposite and conflicting senses may be 
tested. " See," he says, " whether either of them can be 
traced back to the times of the Apostles ;" and "if there be 
any heresies claiming Apostolical antiquity," then comes 
the test " let them give account of the j?rs beginning of 
their Churches ; let them unfold the line of their Bishops, so 
running down by successions from the beginning, that their 
jirst Bishop may have had for his authority and predecessor 
some one of the Apostles, or such Apostolic men as continued 
to JioldwitJt, the Apostles." This is the way, it seems, that 
Christian teachers reasoned in the time of one who was 
born only sixty years after St. John died. Apostolical truth, 
they thought, must be tested by the Apostolical Succession. 
"For in this manner," he goes on, "the Apostolical 
Churches deduce their lines ; as the Church of the'Smyr- 
naeans produces Polycarp, appointed by John ; as that of the 
Romans, Clement, in like manner ordained by Peter ; and 
as the others, in like manner, point to those who were ap- 
pointed as Bishops by the Apostles, to deliver down for them 
the Apostolic seed."t 

Now every one will observe here and it is very impor- 
tant to do so that Tertullian is not proving that this appeal 

perperam credebatur, tot millia millium perperam tincta, tot opera 
fidei perperam administrata, tot virtutes, tot charismata perperam 
operata, tot sacerdotia, tot ministeria perperam functa ; tot denique 
martyria perperam coronata." cap. xxviii. xxix. 

* So Clement of Alexandria, admitting that heretics make their 
appeal to Scripture, says, Yes, but how ? sK^e-yd/woi ra dn<pt06).ws 
elfriftsva. sis rj iiias /^rdyo-uo-i iu^as, and, as he adds, "forcing the 
naked word to convey the meaning which they are resolved it shall 
bear." Stromat. lib. vii. pp. 757, 8.- 

t " Cseterum si qua? andent intersere se selati apostolicse, ut ideo 
videantur ab Apostolis traditae, quia sub Apostolis fuerunt, possu- 
mus dicere ; Edant ergo origines Ecclesiarum suarum ; evolvant 
ordinem Episcoporum suorum, ita per successiones ab initio decur- 
rentem, ut primus ille episcopus aliquem ex Apostolis vel apostolicis 
viris, qui tamen cum Apostolis perseveraverit, habuit auctorem et 
antecessorem. Hoc enim modo Ecclesia? apostolicre census suos 
deferunt : sicut Smyrnaeorum Ecclesia Polycarpum ab Joanne con- 
locatum refert; sicut Romanorum, Clemejatem a Petro ordinatum 
itidem ; perinde utique et- cabterae exhibent quos ab Apostolis in 
episcopatum constitutos, apostolici seminis traduces habeant." cap. 
xxxii. 



138 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

to the Apostolical or Episcopal Succession was customary 
with the primitive Christians, but reasoning from it as an 
admitted fact, and that in a controversial writing, when a 
false or inaccurate premise would have been fatal as well as 
foolish. And the early heretics were so far from denying 
the effectiveness of this famous weapon as wielded by our 
fathers in the Church, that they even attempted to learn its 
use, and employ it in their own defence. They, too, learned 
to boast of a scheme of doctrine derived by succession.* 
And when the Catholic doctors and bishops turned against 
them the sharp edge of this sword of truth, it was not as an 
unfair or unlawful weapon that they shrank from it, but 
because the feeble imitations which they had framed to 

* Thus St. Jerome introduces the Luciferians as consenting to 
the appeal to universal consent} AAv. Luciferian. cap. iv. torn. ii. 
p. 198. The Arian, too, professed to found his faith on Episcopal 
consent, evidently borrowing the Catholic doctrine. " Si fidem 
ineam postules," said Maximin, in reply to St. Austin, "ego illatn 
teneo fidem quae Arimini a, trecentis et triginta Episcopis, non solum 
exposita, sed etiam subscriptionibus firrnata est." Aug. Contra 
Maximin. lib. i. torn. vi. p. 284. So the Marcionites ; 'Ef 6Vou 
MapKicov ereXcSrjja-ai', roaovruiv ETTIOWTTOM', fia\b.ov SE i//U<5:ri<rKc$7rcoi', Trap' 
fytu' Stadax"^ y^y6vaai^ K. r. A. Orig. Dial. Contra Marcionistas, 
1. So Ptolemseus, a heretic of the 2d century, affected to derive 
his opinions from the " Apostolical tradition preserved by succes- 
sion," rijj aTTOOToAj/r/K TrapaJocstoy, ijv IK Sia8aj(r\g KOJ. rifieis TrapEtAij- 

(jHtnev. Ap. Epiphanii Hceres. xxxiii. p. 222. And so universal was 
this readiness on the part of heretics to adopt the Catholic way of 
reasoning, that, as the Poet says, 

" Even Arius and Pelagius durst provoke 
To what the centuries preceding spoke." 

Dryden, Religio Laid, vol. x. p. 47. 

There is a curious passage in the Stromata of Clemens Alexandrinus, 
lib. vii. p. 764, which shows (1) that the early heretics affected to 
trace their traditions, by a succession of their own teachers, to the 
Apostles ; and (2) that the true succession was thought a valid 
refutation of them. He instances the followers of Basilides, who 
" boasted" that they reached St. Peter through certain persons who 
professed to have been acquainted with Tkeodades, a friend of St. 
Paul. Evidently these men saw that the Episcopal Succession, which 
could not be denied, must be met by a counter-succession, if it was 
to be met at all. And how were they answered ? " This will not 
serve you," said Clement to others, who pretended that they fol- 
lowed some private teaching of St. Matthew ; " for as the teaching 
of all the Apostles was one, so is the tradition one also :" pia. yap n 
-IVTUV yeyove ri5v aTroordAcov wairsp <5n5ao7caAfa, OOTOJJ SI Kal /; ira 
Ibid. p. 7o5. 



TERTULLIAN. 139 

resist it were unequal to the. encounter. The blasphemer of 
old did not deny the Apostolical Succession ; he confessed 
it ; he tried to meet it ; and he was overcome by it. 

It might be useful to speak more at length of this holy 
doctrine, which in the primitive Ghnrch found such reve- 
rent acceptance. But as it would carry us beyond our limits 
to illustrate fully the mode in which it was urged by all her 
great teachers, one only shall be cited by way of example, 
and his words confirmed by such other references as may 
suffice in this place. St. Austin, who has been commonly 
described, by such as were qualified to speak of him, as one 
of the most gifted of his race,* and who lived in times when 
the growth of heresy gave ample scope to the exercise of his 
vast powers, is the writer whom it is natural to choose with 
this object. A rapid and superficial survey of his contro- 
versial works is all which can be attempted here ; yet such 
a glance will prove, I think, that the doctrine in question was, 
in the judgment and practice of the early Church, nothing 
less than fundamental. 

1. St. Austin speaks, then, of men being " severed from 
the root of Christian Communion, which, through the chairs 
of the Apostles, and the successions of the Bishops, is, by an 
orderly course of propagation, diffused throughout the 
world."f 

2. He tells the Donatists that the Canon of Scripture has 
been "preserved by the order and succession of ecclesiastical 
use."! 

* Vide Prosper. De Vita Contempt, lib. iii., and Epist. ad Au- 



gustin. 



t " Videte certe multos praecisos a radice Christianas societatis, 
quae per sedes Apostolorum, et successiones Episcoporum, certa per 
orbem propagatione diffunditur." Epist. xlii., Ad Madaurenses, 
torn. ii. p. 57. Paris. 1586. 

\ "... tot linguarum literis, et ordine et successione celebra- 
tionis ecclesiastics custoditur." Contra Donat. et Rogat. Ep. xlviii 
p. 70 ; the very argument which Calvin, when he had nothing to 
lose by it, urges with much point and emphasis. "Porro quam 
plurimum," he says, " nos movere debeat tails convenientia- tarn 
diversorum animorum, et rebus omnibus alioqui inter se dissidentium, 
quando earn rion nisi coelesti numine conciliatam apparet," &c. 
Institut. i. 8, 12. Surely this is as forcible reasoning in defence of 
the primitive Discipline as the primitive Doctrine ? as good against 
Calvin as against Servetus ? Let a man read the arguments of the 
Polish Socinians, and they will be found to coincide exactly with 
those of the Presbyterians, and therefore to demand the same re- 



140 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

3. He enumerates, one by one, the Bishops of Rome 
through thirty-eight successions that is, from St. Peter 
down to Anastasius, who occupied that see at the date of 
his writing in order to prove that Catholics were founded 
upon that Rock of which Christ spake to St. Peter : here 
again he is refuting the Donatist.* 

4. He tells a ManichBean, that " the succession of 
Bishops from St. Peter down to his own day, in an unbroken 
line," was argument enough to make and keep him a Ca- 
tholic.t 

5. Against the heretic Faustus he says : " The authority 
of our (sacred) Books, confirmed by the consent of so many 
nations, by the succession of Apostles, Bishops, and Councils, 
is opposed to you."| 

6. " If I refer to St. Matthew," he says to the same 
person, " you will tell me, that that narrative, which the 
universal Church, continued all along by a certain succes- 
sion from the chairs of the Apostles down to the existing 

ply. "In the primitive Apostolic age," says Wissowatius, Narrat. 
Compend., " the Church was pure and incorrupt, till the accession 
of the philosophers, and chiefly the Platonists, brought in those 
errors which are now maintained." This dark night nox ista 
atra he says, during which the Catholic Religion was maintained 
throughout the world, at length was illuminated by the dawn of a 
brilliant day. This dawn is represented by " Luther, Zuingle, and 
Calvin," whose bright coming " deinceps solis reducis clariores radii 
sequebantur;" and these "brighter rays" are of course the Socinian 
doctors. Christianity was corrupted, therefore, according to the 
teaching of these Jieretics, exactly as primitive Episcopacy was ac- 
cording to that of the Presbyterians. Is it not obvious, then, that 
each heresy must be disproved by the same evidence? And has not 
each as Calvin, in another matter, argues after Augustine the 
" consent of the whole world" against it? 

* De Donatist. Dissidio, Ep. clxv. pp. 286, 7. The uncertain 
author against Marcion had long before traced the same succession 
through eleven places to Anicetus ; 

" . . . . Pio suscepit Anicetus ordine sortem, 
Sub quo Marcion hie veniens, nova Pontica pestis," &c. 
Pseudo-Tertull. inter Opp. p. 803. ed. Kjgaltii. 

t " . . . ab ipsa sede Petri Apostoli usque ad praBsentem episco- 
patum successio sacerdotum," &c. Contra, Epistolam ManichcBi, cap. 
iv. torn. vi. p. 46 ; cf. De Utilitate C'rcdcndi, cap. xvii. p. 45. 

:f " Nostrorum porro librorum auctoritas, tot gentium consen- 
sione, per successiones Apostolorum, Episcoporum, Conciliorumque 
roborata,.vobis adversa est." Contra Faustum ManicJueum, lib. xiii. 
cap. v. p. 118. 



TERTULLIAN. 141 



Bishops, proclaims to be his," &>c.; and again, (7) "which 
is recommended by the most evident successions from the 
times of the Apostles to our own;" and again, (8) "If you 
desire to follow that authority of the Scriptures which is 
esteemed before all, follow that which has come down 
guarded, sanctioned, and explained throughout the universe, 
from the times of the presence of Christ Himself even to 
our own, by the agency of the Apostles, and the manifest 
successions of the Bishops from their chairs."* 

9. He examines and rejects spurious Scriptures by the 
same test which recognises the genuine. " If they had been 
truly theirs," he says of the apocryphal scriptures attri- 
buted to St. Andrew and St. John, " then would they have 
been acknowledged by that Church which, through the most 
unfailing successions of the Bishops, abides constant to our 
own and to ages yet to come."t 

10. Against Petilian he says : Granted that all men now 
were unworthy to be followed, still " what has the chair of 
the Roman Church, in which Peter once sat and now Anas- 
tasius, done to you 1 or that of the Church of Jerusalem, 
which James formerly occupied and at this time John ? with 
whom we are by catholic unity bound together ; but ye,"| &c. 

11. Lastly to give but a single instance of his exposi- 
tions of Holy Scripture the same Succession was, in his 
judgment, nothing less than the fulfilment of Prophecy, and 
a manifest token of the Divine Presence.^ 

* " . . continue dices illam narrationem non esse Matthaei, 
quam Matthaei esse dicit universa Ecclesia, ab apostolicis sedibus 
usque ad prsesentes Episcopos certa successione perducta." Ibid. 
lib. xxviii. cap. ii. p. 193 ; cf. lib. xxxii. cap. xix. p. 202, and lib. 
xxxiii. cap. vi. pp. 204, 5. 

t " Q,uae si illorum essent, recepta essent ab Ecclesia, quae ab 
illorum (Apostolorum) tcmporibus per Episcoporum successiones 
certissimas, usque ad nostra et deinceps tempora perseverat." Contra 
Adv. Leg. et Prophet, lib. i. cap. xx. p. 251 ; and Psal. contra 
Partem Donati, torn. vii. p. 5. 

t " . . . Cathedra tibi quid fecit EcclesiaD Romans, in qua Petrus 
sedit, et in qua hodie Anastasius sedet ; vel Ecclesize Hierosolymi- 
tanae, in qua Jacobus sedit, et in qua hodie Joannes sedet ; quibus 
nos in catholica unitate connectimur, et a quibus vos nefario furore 
separastis?" Contra Literas Pctiliani, lib. ii. cap. li. torn. vii. 
p. 108. 

In Psal. xliv. Enarrat. t. viii. p. 169. " Non ad Aaron," says 
he upon another Scripture, " quia jam sum mas sacerdos erat, sed ad 
Eleazarum voluit loqui Deus, qui ei succedere debebat. Hoc ergo 



142 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 



No\v, it is plain enough from these citations without 
going further that it was not mere private opinions, nor 
" secondary" doctrines, but the essential verities of the Ca- 
tholic Religion which this famous doctor was accustomed 
to defend by an appeal to the Apostolical Succession. And 
it is plain, moreover, that his argument was, in his own day, 
admitted to be a good one admitted to be so, that is, by 
the adversaries themselves ; for of course it is unnecessary 
to say that the Church deemed it so. And in order to ap- 
preciate adequately the importance of this fact, we need not 
claim for St. Austin the great gifts, either moral or intellec- 
tual, which the Church in all ages has allowed him ; we 
have only to suppose him a man of common sense,* and then 
to observe, that in one single work against Faustus one of 
the most subtle, as it appears, of all his adversaries he 
uses this argument from the Apostolical Succession no fewer 
than eight times.t Because it is manifest, from one such 

modo voluit per Eleazarum Deus non sacerdotium quod jam erat in 
Aaron, sed successionis sacerdotalis progeniem commendare." Qucest. 
super Num. xxx. torn. iv. p. 105; cf. Tractut. i. torn. ix. p. 3. This, 
too, may be confirmed by express declarations of religionists not in 
communion with the Catholic Church. "Hunc ordiuem Sacerdotii 
figurarunt Sacerdotes et Levitas, et Ithamar, et Eleazar, et Phinees 
Sacerdos, et Zacharias. Habitavit Excelsus super montern Sinai, et 
descendit manus ejus in Mosem, et Moses posuit earn super Aaron, et 
deducta est usque ad Joannem. Joannes dedit earn Domino nostro, 
Dominus noster dedit earn Apostolis, et illi per creaturas omnibus 
ordinibus Sacerdotii. Hunc Sarerdotii gradum constituerunt nobis 
sancti Apostoli, et hodie in medio Ecclesiae per manus Patris nostri 
perfioitur." Vide Sijrorum Maronitarum Ordinat. ap. Morini De 
Sac. Ordin.pars ii. p. 337. 

* " If any man allow not the pillars of the Church in their times 
the credit of discreet men, to have reason for what they report, yet 
must he allow Irenaeus and Tertullian to be men of common sense, 
when they allege the succession of Bishops in the Churches of that 
time wherein that of Rome is always one for an evidence of the 
faith which had been preserved in them ever since the Apostles ; the 
force of the reason lying in that which Calvin hath exceeding well 
observed, that it was a thing known and received at the time, that de 
facto the faith which the Churches professed came by succession 
from the Apostles, from which succession the heretics were fain to 
separate, and make congregations apart, wherein to profess the 
belief which themselves had devised. Be all the world judges now, 
whether a man in his right senses would appeal to the succession of 
Bishops, if it had been a thing questionable whether any such were 
or not." Thorndike, Primitive Government of Churches, chap. v. 
ad finein. 

t And I think more than fifty times in different parts of his works. ' 



TERTULMAN. 143 

instance, that the succession of Bishops from the Apostles 
downwards was a matter of fact too notorious for cavil or 
dispute : I say, this is manifest, for this one reason, that if 
it could have been denied, the heretics, against whom it was 
so triumphantly objected, would not have admitted it. 

And equally certain it is, that, on this supposition, the 
great teachers of antiquity would not have ventured to use it. 
How constantly, and with what solemn earnestness they did 
so, it would be instructive to show; but this would require 
a separate volume, and a few brief references only must be 
added here. We have seen the fact, that the Apostles con- 
templated and made provision for such a " Succession," 
asserted by their " fellow-labourer" Clement. We have 
seen it urged in defence of holy truths by the martyr Ire- 
naeus, by Tertullian, and others. It is used by Optatus, who 
recites the catalogue of the Bishops of Rome from St. Peter 
down to Siricius, the thirty-seventh, whom he calls " his 
own contemporary ;" and who applies it according to the 
suggestion of Tertullian, saying to his adversary, " If you 
profess to claim the title of a Church, give account of the 
origin of your chair."* 

Epiphanius, again, enumerates pointedly the succession 
in the same see ; adding, that his accurateness in mentioning 
every name need not surprise any one, since this succession 
was the test of truth. And his argument is, that all these 
holy bishops were deceived, if Manichaeus were right, that 
is, the Episcopal Succession convicted him of error.t 

St. Cyril of Alexandria, replying to the charge of the 
Apostate Julian, that the orthodox had corrupted the faith, 
refers him to the same Succession, as an ample confuta- 
tion of his error .| 



.t 



* " Vestras cathedrae vos originem reddite, qui vobis vultis 
sanctam ecclesiam vindicare." Adv. Parmenian. lib. ii. p. 48. 

t Kat /i) TIJ: daTjpatrrii on tKaara OOTCOJ dxpifftas SifiXdopsv ' Siu yap TOVTUV 
<isl T$ <ra(f>ls MKMTUI. Haires. xxvii. torn. i. p. 107 : cf. Hares, xlii. p. 
302; Hares. Iv. p. 471 ; Hceres. Ixvi. pp. 636, 7; in each of which 
places the same holy succession is referred to. The argument is 
thus proposed by another : 'ApxtT els dn6Seitv rov ripsTipov Myov TO 
X Etv vurpoOev r\KO-oaav vpof ifyias rfiv irapaSociv, ol6v nva i&Tipov 8C &KO\ovQias 
ix rtav diroaToXcav Sia rcav i<peijs byitav jrupa7r^^6vra. S. Greg. Nyssen. 

Contra Eunomium, lib. iii. torn. ii. p. 554. ed. Paris. 1638. " Ordi- 
nati enim db his sumus," says Hilary, by a strong figure, "et eorum 
sumus successores." Contra Arianos, p. 395. 
t Contra Julianum, lib. x. torn. vi. p. 327. 



J44 EVIDENCE. OF ANTIQUITY. 

The great Athanasius says, " We prove that this belief 
has come down to MS from father to father;' 3 and then he 
asks, " Which of our fathers will you appeal to?"* 

St. Cyprian connects the same Succession with the 
solemn doctrines of Christian unity and the vicarious remisr 
sion of sins.f 

St. Jerome declares that it may be traced throughout the 
Christian world, and speaks of " Stephen, who was the 
twenty-sixth Bishop of Rome from the blessed Peter. "f St. 
Basil, " that to be severed from that Succession, is to be cut 
off from the one channel of grace." St. John Chryscstom, 

* Syn. JVzcere. contra Arian. Decret. torn. i. p. 277. His use of 
this argument in defence of the most solemn doctrines as the In- 
carnation is almost as frequent as St. Austin's. Vide Syn. Nicen. 
Decret. p. 251; Ad Serapionem, p. 207; De Sentent. Dionysii contra 
Arianos, p. 550 ; Ad Epictetum Episc., p. 582 ; and in tlie same let- 
ter very emphatically at p. 584 ; and De Incarnatione Vcrbi .Dei, p. 
594 ; and DC Incarnatione Christi, pp. 614, 15, 16 ; and Ad Impcrat. 
Constant. Apol. p. 753; and these are^but a few examples out of 
many. S. Gregory Nazianzen says of S.' Athanasius himself, that he 
was raised to the throne of Mark tri rov Mapxov 6p6vov dvayt-ai not 
by force and violence, but after the apostolical and spiritual mode 
aTroo-roAu-tSs TE Kal 7n/t)partrcos and this, he adds, is the true succession; 
and whosoever is thus elected, d\fi9siav E^SC (Siuco^ijj. Oral. xxi. torn. 
i. p. 377. 

t Epist. xlii. Ad Cornelium, p. 57. " Potestas ergo peccatorum 
remittendoruin," writes one who knew his sentiments well, " Apos- 
tolis data est et Ecclesiis quas illi a Christo missi constituerunt, et 
episcopis qui eis ordinatione vicaria successerunt." Firmiliani Ad 
Cyprian. Epist. Ixxv. p. 148. It is needless to give examples in this 
case, when they may be found at almost every other page. 

| Ad Evagrium,' Epist. Ixxxv. torn. ii. p. 311. ed. Antverp. 1579. 
Cf. Ad Heliodor. Epist. i. torn. i. p. 2; Adv. Luciferian. cap. viii. 
p. 203 ; where he says, having referred to the succession of Bishops 
at Rome, " Quid facimus ? ita et nobis majores nostri, et illis sui 
tradidere majores." Elsewhere he speaks of the Apostles' Creed as 
received by such a tradition ; Ad Pammachium, Adv. Error. Joan. 
Hierosol. cap. ix. tom.'ii. p. 219. 

Epist. Ad Amphilocliium, torn. iii. p. 21. ed. Paris. 1638! Cf. 
Epist. ccccxii. p. 433, where he speaks of a Deacon who had assumed 
the Style of a Patriarch, aim IW TWOS dKoXorOi'uj tiiKaias ncii eiae^Eias ETTI 
ToCro e\6uv, and this he seems to think it enough to say against him. 
The Bishops he calls TOVS napa rov QEOV -CTayiiivovs iirtcrKiiirovs, Ep. ad 
Chilonem, p. 5. G^iXiVrarot 'miano-noi is a common phrase with him, 
e. g. Epist. cxciv. p. 211 ; and he speaks of their ordination being 
Kara Pov\riciv Qeov, Epist. ccxcii. p. 282. The Catholic doctrine of the 
Episcopal succession is referred to throughout his great work De 
Spiritu- Sancto ; and it is very observable that, severe and uncom- 
promising as he was, \ r et the Saint who could speak so sternly in 



TERTULLIAN. 145 

that it is not only essential to be united to that one body in 
' which it is to be found, but that not to occupy one's allotted 
place in that body is to fotfeit the Spirit.* 

And, lastly, Vincent of Lerins asserts, as a truth which 
may not be denied, that it has been the great safeguard and 
preservative of religion.t 

Such being the judgment of the ancients, it is needless to 
show how this truth has been maintained in later ages. 
Yet there are amongst moderns two persons the one es- 
teemed by all men as a profound philosopher, the other a 
theologian scarcely equalled in acuteness whose remark- 
able words it may be permitted, in conclusion, to notice. 
" That there is a holy succession in the prophets of the New 
Testament and fathers of the Church, Irom the time of the 
Apostles and disciples which saw our Saviour in the flesh, 
unto the consummation of the work of the ministry," said 

defence of this essential truth was more meek than most men, and 
had humbled himself, as the Canonist remarks, sis ia^arriv ra-ireivutnv : 
Balsamon. In Can. i. Ad Ampkiloch. So that one who knew him 
well commends as a rare conjunction in him TO iv rpuurr/ri OVVTOVOV ' 
TrpH-yfio. as he goes on to observe OVK iv TroAXotV tvpiGKOpsvov, oiol iroXAa 

l^ov ra 7rapa < kiy/.(ar. S. Greg. Naz. Orat. vii. Ad Patrem, torn. i. pp. 
144, 5. 

"... WCTTS oi>x iv&aQai TO) oxo/ian <k? povov. dXXu KGI TOV OLKEIOV TOTTOI/ 
ixi-)(tiv, hig ia.v 'u-pj:l>js, oii% IvcDtrat, owie ^^J? TO ^vc.vp.a. Homil. XI. In 
JZphes. torn. iii. p. 821. The succession, of which we are here speak- 
ing, he very solemnly declares to have been ordained by the Holy 
Ghost : 'tl ytif> Icpoxrovri TEXnrat fiiv ri TIJJ yi/Sj ~u|iv 61 iiiovpavitov 




pare with this the well-known parallel passage of Clemens Alexan- 
drinus quoted above ; see also Stromat. lib. vii. p. 757 ; and lib. i. 
pp. 274, 5, where the doctrine of the Apostolical succession is very 
plainly enunciated. 

t " Omnes luce clarius videant, bcatorum Apostolorum beata 
Successio quanta vi, quanto studio, quanta contentione defenderit 
susceptae semel religionis integritatem." Corn-monitor, cap. vi. And 
so well was the office of the successive generations of Bishops in 
relation to the maintenance of truth understood in the early ages, 
that St. Hilary could even use, without reproach, the phrase " Epis- 
copalis doctrina;" Ad Constantium, p. 339. So that, in a word, the 
succession was, so to speak, the common test of all doctrine ; and it 
was enough to condemn any dogma that^it could be described as 
irapa. TO /cara 7rapa<5o<rtj' <cni Kara AtaSiyitv ai'uOcv rns tv.-<.-X>jc-?a fBos ifiGev TTpo- 
qrjrevovTa. Alexandri Epist. ad Originewi, ap. Reliq. Sacr. torn. ii. 
p. 75. 



146 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

Lord Bacon, " I do believe."* And that this Succession 
was " the most undeniable and demonstrative proof for the' 
truth of" Christianity, and " such as plainly to distinguish 
it from all foolish legends and impostures whatsoever," was 
the opinion of the celebrated Leslie, and so expressed by 
him in his famous Method with the Deists. 

And yet this Succession, " prescribed," as St. Clement 
relates, by the Apostles, and hallowed, as the Scriptures 
show, by the Lord Himself; the touchstone of error, and 
safeguard of truth ; the shield of the faithful, and the terror 
of heretics ; which was used from the first against the ene- 
mies of Christ the Arian, the Donatist, and the Manichsean, 
the apostate, the infidel, and the deist and was effectual to 
confound them all ; which is proved as an historical fact by 
a complication of testimony amounting to demonstration, 
and assumed or acted upon as a first principle in all our 
affairs, both public and private, social, judicial, and political ; 
which is accounted by all Saints as one of the infallible 
proofs of the truth of our religion, confidently asserted as 
such in all ages, and confessed even by heresiarchs, ancient 
as well as modern, to be beyond their skill either to deny or 
gainsay ,t this holy and comforting doctrine of our faith, how 

* Confession of Faith ; Works, vol.ii. p. 488. The same eminent 
person once said though his words are not of course quoted as of 
any importance in themselves " This I say, and think ex animo, 
that the discipline of the Church of England by Bishops is the 
nearest to Apostolical truth." Advic.e to Sir Gco. Villiers, vol. iii. 
p. 435 : and Lord Burghley seems to have been enabled to make the 
same confession ; Strype, Jlnnals of the Reformation, vol. i. pt. i. 
p. 119. 

t With Calvin this "succession" was a thing of such moment, 
that he sought, by the plea of hard necessity, to excuse the want of 
it ; and could say, " Optandum esset, ut valeret continua successio, 
ut functio ipsa quasi per manus traderetur." Epist. cxc. Regi 
Polonies, p. 351. ed. Beza?. Beza makes the same admission, only 
with far more emphasis ; expressly commending the use which the 
holy Fathers made of this succession against the enemies of the 
Church. " Nonnulli tertiam notam addunt,' said he, in reply to 
the Cardinal of Lorraine ; "nempe, successionem ordinariam a tern- 
pore Apostolorum. Ad quod respondemus, kvjusmodi successionem 
maxime esse (Estimandam, dummodo recte consideretur et applicetur :" 
and what was his notion of this right application ? " quemadmodum 
ca contra hcereticos scepe sunt usi Patres, sicut apud Tertullianum, 
Irenasum, et Augustinum est, contra Manichseos et Donatistas." 
Vide Comment. De Statu Relig. sub Carolo IV. lib. iii. p. 143. 
" Certainly that succession," said another distinguished Protestant, 



TERTULLIAN. 147 

is it esteemed among us now ? We have lived to hear men 
grave men, at least by profession ; learned men, if we may 
judge from their office jest upon this Succession as a dream, 
or scoff at it as a fiction of priestcraft. Alas ! it is an evil 
service which such men are willing to perform, a miserable 
bondage which they are content to endure, while they serve 
a master who leaves them only liberty enough to mock in 
his name, and bids them speak against holy things, while he 
makes his own sport of them behind their backs. But it is 
time that we return to the evidence of Tertullian. 

One more passage we will hear, in which the truth is 
said by this primitive witness to be maintained and defended 
by "that regiment of bishops which," as Hooker declares on 
his own and our behalf, " we hold a thing most lawful, di- 
vine, and holy in the Church of Christ." 

" Come now" it is Tertullian who speaks " you that 
wish to turn this restlessness to profit in the search after 
salvation ; run over the Apostolic Churches, in which the 
very chairs of tlie Apostles still hold place of honour, in 
which the very letters they wrote are recited, echoing the 
voice and imaging the person of each of them. Is Achaia 
nearest to you? you have Corinth. If you are not far from 
Macedonia, you have Philippi, you have the Thessalonians. 
If you can reach Asia, you have Ephesus. But if you are 
in the neighbourhood of Italy, you have Rome. Let us see 
what this Church has learned, what she has taught :"f and 

" is a goodly ornament, if with the succession of persons there may 
be a succession of doctrine and conformity of virtue." P. Du Mou- 
lin's Answer to Cardinal Perron, book i. ch. xxxii. p. 85. Even 
Salmasius could speak of the " Christianorum doctrina ab.ipsis 
Apostolis tradita, et per manus a Patribus EcclesitB acccpta." Ad, 
Miltomim Respons. cap. ii. p. 209. Cf. Claude, Defense de. la Re- 
formation, 4 partie, ch. ii. p. 330 ; and J. Casaubon, Epist. ad Card. 
Perron, Ep. cccxvi. p. 380. 

* E. P. book vii. vol. iii. p. 180. 

t " Age jam qui voles curiositatem melius exercere in negotio 
salutis tusB ; percurre ecclesias apostolicas, apud quas ipsce adliuc 
cathedrae Apostolorum suis locis praesident ; apud quas ipsce authen- 
ticas litera? eorum recitantur, sonantes vocem et reprcesentantes 
faciem uniuscujusque. Proxima est tibi Achaia? habes Corinthum. 
Si non longe es a Macedonia, habes Philippos, habes Thessaloni- 
censes. Si potes in Asiam tendere, habes Ephesum. Si autem Italian 
adjaces, habes Rom am ; . . . . videamus quid didiceret, quid docu- 
crit." Ibid. cap. xxxvi. The translation of Tertullian employed 
thus far is that in the " Tracts for the Times," Records of the Church, 
No. 18. 



148 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

then he goes on to recite the articles of her creed. This, 
then, I repeat, was the primitive way of reasoning; this the 
momentous efficacy of the Apostolical Succession with the 
first servants of Christ and immediate followers of His 
Apostles. And we have no reason to suppose that what was 
received as true in the second century, may be lawfully de- 
nied because it happened to be spoken against in the six- 
teenth. 

And here I shall close the evidence of Tertullian ; not 
because it is exhausted, but because it seems needless to 
add more. Why should we care to know that this Father 
said, " The High-Priest, who is the Bishop, possesses the 
right of conferring Baptism, and after him the Presbyters 
and Deacons ; but not without the authority of the Bishop ;"* 
or that he told the heretic Marcion, who rejected the Reve- 
lation of St. John, that his error was exposed by the fact, 
that " if the order of Bishops were traced to its origin, it will 
terminate in John as its author ?"t We have already ad- 
vanced more than sixty years, in the chain of witnesses, be- 
yond the period at which even the most unscrupulous of 
the modern teachers confess the Bishop's supreme authority 
to have been admitted all over the world. We are no longer 
refuting them it is not necessary ; they are willing to per- 
form that task for themselves. For our own comfort, how- 
ever, and edification, a few additional witnesses may yet be 
heard. 

XI. And this, perhaps, will be the most appropriate place 
of reference to that ancient collection of ecclesiastical rules, 
entitled the " Apostolical Canons." Like other monuments 
of primitive discipline, they have been assailed by those 
whose novel opinions could not bear the dangerous contrast 
with antiquity.| It may, however, be enough to say here, 
that while the judgment of Bellarmine who assigned the 

* " Dandi quidem habet jns summus Sacerdos, qui est Episcopus, 
dehinc Presbyter! et Diaconi ; non tamen sive Episcopi auctoritate, 
propter ecclesiae honorem ; quo salvo, salva pax est." De Baptismo, 
cap. xvii. p. 263. 

t " Haberaus et Joannis alumnas ecclesias. Nam etsi Apoca- 
lypsin ejus Marcion respuit, ordo tamen Episcoporum ad originem 
recensus, in Joannem stabit auctorem." JUkc. Marcionem, lib. iv. 
cap. v. p. 505. 

t Blondel, in his usual bold off-hand way, refers them to about 
the year 280 ; Ayolog. -pro Sentent. Hieron. 3. p. 157. 



APOSTOLICAL CANONS. 149 

composition of these canons to Clement, or to the Apostles 
themselves has been rejected even by writers of his own 
Church,* they are almost universally admitted to have been 
received in .the second and third centuries, and to represent 
truly the discipline of the Church in those days.f 

The use, indeed, which I intend to make of them in this 
place does not require any accurate determination of their 
date. For if it can be proved, which is all that I design in 
quoting them, that their authority, or at least that of the 
rules which they enunciate, was admitted and acted upon 
by various classes even of heretics from the very earliest 
age so that some even attempted to interpolate them,f in 
order to plead them in their own behalf, it will not be a 
question of much moment whether they were formally de- 
nned a few years earlier or later. And that the first of these 
famous canons, to which our attention will be confined, was 
so esteemed, by the enemies as well as the servants of the 
Church, is what I am now to show. 

The words of the canon are these : " Let a Bishop be 
ordained by two or three Bishops. " It will be important, in 

* Bellarmin. De Verio Dei, lib. i. cap, xx. ; cited by Bp. Cosins, 
History of the Canon of Scripture. Of. Pet. De Marca, De Concord. 
Sac. ct Imp. lib. iii. cap. ii. torn. ii. p. 16. 

t Mosheim says, " They contain a -view of Church-government 
and discipline received among the Greek and Oriental Christians 
in the second and third centuries." Ecc. Hist. vol. i. ch. ii. 19. 
Jablonski, that " they faithfully represent the form, discipline, and 
rites of the Primitive Church." Institut. Hist. Christian, secul. i. 
cap. iv. 2. Cf. Pfaffii Histor. Ecclesiast. secul. i. cap. i. Beveridge 
shows that they seem to have been admitted by St. Athanasius, Cod. 
Canonum, lib. i. cap. iii. 2 ; but Dupin thinks there is an earlier 
allusion to them in one of St. Cyprian's epistles ; see~his 2d Disser- 
tation, p. 99 ; to which may be added the saying of St. Basil, Epist. 
"cccxxi. torn. iii. p. 314. Albaspinanis supposes them to have been 
compiled by some of those " apostolic men" spoken of by Tertullian, 
and then, in process of time, improperly referred to the Apostles 
themselves; Albaspina?i De Vet.Eccles. Kit. Observat. lib. i. obs. 13. 
Van Espen shows that they were received by the early Councils 
amongst the other authoritative canons of the Chnrch ; Juris Eccle- 
siast. Ujiiv. torn. ii. ; DC Can. Apost. pars iii. cap. iii. Estius leaves 
their date uncertain ; Comment, lib. iv. p. 2. 26. Walafridus 
Strabo refers them in genefal terms " primis temporibus ;" De Rebus 
Ecclesiasticis, cap. xviii. 

t Vide Pet. De Marca, ubi supra. 

ETrfir/coTroj ^fsipoTOvciaQta into iiricrKoircav duo n rpicSv. " Quare prohi- 
bitum sit uni hoc facere, Innoccntius Papa monstrat in Decretalibus, 



159 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

the first place, to observe precisely what this canon decrees. 
Does it prescribe that the office and order of Bishops shall 
be established ? Far from it it resolves merely the mode 
of appointment. It does not say, " Let there be Bishops ;" 
it would have been as wise to say, " Let there be sacra- 
ments," or " Let there be Scriptures :" it only says, " Let 
Bishops be ordained after such a form." It takes for granted 
the order, and enjoins the fashion of its perpetuation. As if 
it should be decreed now, " Let churches be built on such a 
plan," or " Let the altar be constructed after such a model ;" 
the church and the altar being, in their original appointment, 
divine.* 

At what period the ministration of three Bishops was 
first required in order to the valid ordination of one of their 
own order, we are not able certainly to determine. It has 
been suggested that the consecration of St. James of Jeru- 
salem, by St. Peter, St. James, and St. John, is to be re- 
garded as the earliest instance. However this may be, the 
custom referred to in the first Apostolical Canon seems to 

cap. ix. ; ne unus Episcopum ordinare praesumat, ne furtim benefi- 
cium prsestitum videatur." Pseudo-Alcuiu. De Dimnis 0$cus, in 
cap. " qualiter episcopus ordinetur in Ecc. Rom." Pope Gregory 
also assigns a reason for it ; vide Bedae Histor. Ecc. lib. i. cap. 
xxvii. ; and Amalarii De Ecc. Off. lib. ii. cap. i. 

* Councils do all presuppose Bishops," says Hooker ; " nor can 
there any Council be named so ancient, either general, or as much 
as provincial, sithence the Apostles' own times, but we can shew 
that Bishops had their authority before it and not from it." E. P. book 
vii. vol. iii. p. 191. Which fact has of course supplied Catholics with 
the irresistible argument, that " if Bishops had been superior to 
Presbyters by^human right only, some period would have been 
assignable, later than the Apostolic age, in which the new institution 
was established." Bellarmin. De Clcricis, lib. i. cap. xiv. How- 
very different in this respect is the modern claim of the Bishop, of 
Rome. In all the voluminous writings of the first three centuries 
there is not found a single argument in favour of Episcopacy ; its 
origin is every where silently assumed. And when, at length, Epi- 
phanius and Augustine speak of the new heresy of ' presbyterianisrn,' 
as introduced by Aerius, accustomed as they were to deal with the 
manifold forms of error, they content themselves with barely noticing 
this, as being too extravagant and absurd to need refutation. But 
when the papal supremacy began to be urged, how carefully and 
elaborately is it defended, how ostentatiously put forth e. : even 
.by sp good a man as Leo the Great as if men could not venture to 
leave it to itself, but were conscious that it stood upon another foun- 
dation than Episcopacy. 



APOSTOLICAL CANONS. 151 

have prevailed from the most remote antiquity ; and this, as 
I have said, beyond, as well as within, the fold of the Church 
Catholic. And it is not so much for the sake of proving 
this, important as the fact is, that the following evidence is 
now offered, as with the view of establishing a far wider and 
more extensive proposition, which is based upon it. That 
proposition is this: that even if the testimony of catholic 
antiquity upon the subject of these pages were supposed to 
be withdrawn, there would still be reserved to us an host of 
competent and independent witnesses ; and those witnesses 
would be the turbulent and implacable enemies of the primi- 
tive Church, who, while they spent their lives in blaspheming 
her doctrines, were so far from venturing to impugn her dis- 
cipline, that they confessed almost without exception either 
by their silence, as in the case of the heathen, or by openly 
imitating and adopting it, as in that of the heretical sects 
that it was that very discipline which was framed by the 
Apostles at the first foundation of the Church. This, then, 
using the Apostolical Canons only as a suitable text, I shall 
now attempt to prove. And with a view to such a measure 
of clearness as may be consistent with our narrow limits, 
these new witnesses shall be spoken of under four classes, 
including all the most bitter and watchful enemies of the 
Church the Heathen, the Jew, the Apostate, and the 
Heretic. I am to show that the first Apostolical Canon was 
tacitly acknowledged even by these. 

That the two first were accustomed to scrutinize with 
jealousy the ecclesiastical movements of the early Christians, 
it is scarcely necessary to prove. So much might, perhaps, 
have been taken for granted ; and at all events is sufficiently 
certain from the " Acts of the Apostles," the " Apologies " 
of the most primitive Fathers, the rescripts of heathen Em- 
perors, and the writings of historians, both pagan and Chris- 
tian. I will cite only two authors in evidence. 

The first is St. Justin Martyr ; who, anxious, as it seems, 
to justify "the sect of the Nazarenes" to a keen-eyed by- 
stander of the Jews, is solicitous to inform him " that tBere 
were some who went indeed by the name of Christians, but 
who, in truth, were profane and impious sectaries ;"* in 
which remarkable saying the motive of the Saint is too ob- 
vious to need comment, 

* . . . . Xeyo/iivov; filv Xpioriovoos, OVTHS at dJiovs Kaid 
Dial, cum Tryphone Judteo^ Opp. p. 306. 



152 EVIDENCE OP ANTIQUITY. 

In another place he thinks it necessary to apologize to 
the heathen for the same unworthy heretics, with a particu- 
lar reference to the followers of Marcion,* who, of course, 
were only known to them as professing Christians. Why 
take any pains about the matter at all, unless the heathen 
watched them ?t 

Not less explicit is the testimony of St. Athanasius, who, 
speaking of Arian violence and simony, complains that it 
not only " violated the ecclesiastical canons, but compelled 
the heathen to blaspheme, and to suspect that their appoint- 
ments were regulated, not by the divine law, but by purchase 
and patronage ;"$ which is so much to the point, as to ren- 
der further citations superfluous. This, then, proves the 
scrutiny, a scrutiny, let it be observed, which embraced 

* JipoL ii. p. 70. 

t The following extract from the historian shows that they not 
only watched them, but that their scrutiny even led to the adoption 
of portions of their ecclesiastical system. "The Emperor (Maximin) 
was devoted to the worship of the gods, to the study of magic, and 
to the belief of oracles. The prophets or philosophers, whom he 
revered as the favourites of heaven, were frequently raised to the 
government of provinces, and admitted into his most secret councils. 
They easily convinced him that the Christians had been indebted for 
their victories to their regular discipline, and that the weakness of 
polytheism had- principally flowed from a want of union and sub- 
ordination among the ministers of religion. A system of govern- 
ment was therefore institu.ed, which ^cas evidently copied from the 
policy of the Church. In all the great cities of the empire the tem- 
ples were repaired and beautified by the order of Maximin ; and the 
officiating priests of the various deities were subjected to the author- 
ity of a superior pontiff, destined to oppose the Bishop, and to pro- 
mote the cause of paganism. These pontiffs acknowledged, in their 
turn, the supreme jurisdiction of the metropolitans or high priests 
of the province, who acted as the immediate vicegerents of the 
emperor himself. A white robe was the ensign of their dignity ; 
and these new prelates were carefully selected from the most noble 
and opulent families." Gibbon, Decline and Fall, chap. xvi. vol. i. 
p. 581. 

t ToCro yap TOVS piv /c(cXfjo p iaan/fOti? Kavtivas 7rapaXCo p i ' ra SE eOvti /?Xa- 
<7<i>tjjjTi> dvayKa^Et, KOL {JTTOVCEIII on /ii"; Kara OeTov Becftov, dXX' i iftiropiag KOI 
Tipaaraaiag al Karatrraaets yiyvovrai. Ad Orthodoxos Epist. tom. i. p. 945. 
We could hardly doubt, indeed, that they would be acute observers, 
who were so skilful, or at least so zealous, in defending themselves 
and their own errors. Vide Zosimi Histor. Nov. lib. iv. 59, pp. 
495, 6. ed. Jenae, 1729 : where the senate is described as rejecting 
the arguments of Theodosius, and complaining of the decay of their 
own worship, owing to the spread of Christianity ; and again, 33, 
the false-and angry account which he gives of Theodosius. 



APOSTOLICAL CANONS. 153 

the discipline of the Christians, and their observance of the 
canon law. 

Next, as to the sort of arguments used both by Jews and 
heathen : with these also we are not unacquainted. The 
Epistles of St. Paul contain replies to the first ; and the elab- 
orate apologies of Tertullian, Origen, Minucius Felix, Lac- 
tantius, and others, have preserved specimens of the last. 
From these we learn that the reasonings of these men were 
usually subtle, and directed which it is very important to 
notice against details as well as against the System as a 
whole. Every objection which wilful misapprehension, ma- 
lignant cunning, and implacable hatred, could suggest, ap- 
pears to have been freely used.* They were unscrupulous, 
for truth was not their object; restlessly eager to detect errors, 
for these would prove their own defence; and no way im- 
peded in finding them, for they had abundant opportunity. 
Yet these skilful, unwearied, and unrelenting enemies were 
never able to detect, what is asserted by certain moderns, 
tliat the whole Christian sect had, in the grand matter of 
discipline and government, departed from the laws of their 
Founder and first teachers ! In all their writings which re- 
main, and in all the diffuse replies of the great Christian 
advocates, there is not so much as a hint, not one transient 
allusion, to a change so vast in its character, and so palpa- 
ble to all beholders. I do not know upon what principles of 
evidence it can be denied, that this fact is con elusive against 
the possibility of its occurrence. 

But the argument is by no means exhausted. Neither 
Jew nor heathen, we see, witnesses against us : let us try 
next the case of the Apostate. Here was one who had been 
trained, so to speak, in the very camp of the Christians, knew 
all their whole system, offensive and defensive, and had been 
familiar from infancy with every weapon of their armory. 
Here was a fatal witness indeed against any secret wrong, 
any politic invention, if only he had been minded to reveal it. 
And that he was so, and zealous to make his own advantage 
of it, is not difficult to prove. 

* And when they could do nothing else, nor make any impression 
upon the united and immovable phalanx of the Christian host, they 
cried out in fury using words which modern sectaries have uncon- 
sciously borrowed " Eruenda hzec et execranda consensio!" Minu- 
cius Felix, cap. ix. p. 90. ed. Gmnov. 



154 KVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

The Emperor Julian, so infamously notorious as the apos- 
tate, was one of the most crafty and deadly enemies of the 
Holy Church in any age of her history. Both his will and 
his power to do her injury were many ways manifested during 
his guilty career. And, as if to lift him to a higher emi- 
nence above his fellows in wickedness, it was .by him that 
the monstrous scheme was first devised, which, by blending 
together all shades of belief, and crushing into one shape- 
less mass every conflicting sect of believers, was intended 
to pave the way for the ruin of Christianity, and the rebuild- 
ing the tottering edifice of Paganism. To all the common 
arts of the enemy, which he freely used, Julian added this 
master-stroke of fiendish ingenuity ;* yet even this man will 
witness for us. 

" Ye have been so ill-fated," said he tauntingly to our 
forefathers, " as not even to have continued in the precepts 
delivered to you by the Apostles ;"t and then he goes on, in 
words too shocking to be repeated, to malign the orthodox 
faith in the Son of God. " Ye have not kept the Apostles' 
doctrine," said this man to the Christians ; it was the saying 
of a blasphemer, but it becomes in the issue only a testimo- 
ny against later enemies of the same everlasting Church. 

* After stating that Julian caused the heathen temples to be re- 
opened, and the heathen worship renewed, the historian proceeds 
thus : " Utque dispositionum roboraret effectual, dissidentes Chris- 
tianorum Antistites cum plebc discissa in palatium intromissos mone- 
bat, ut civilibus discordiis consopitis quisque, nullo vetante, religioni 
suse serviret intrepidus. Quod agebat ideo obstinate, ut dissensiones 
augente licentia, non timeret unanimantem postea plebcm." Ammian. 
Marcellin. lib. xxii. cap. v. p. 301. ed. Valesii. Valesius refers, in 
his note on the passage, to the saying of St. Austin on this policy of 
Julian : " Eo modo putans Ckristianum nomen posse pcrire de terris, 
si unitati Ecclesiae, de qua lapsus fuerat, invideret, et sacrilegas 
dissensiones liberas esse permitteret." Epist. clxvi. And yet this 
scheme of universal toleration, thus plotted by the apostate for the 
overthrow of Christianity, is regarded by some amongst ourselves as 
the very perfection of Christian liberality. 

t OVTU <5J OTt (Suaru^sTj, WOTS oiiSs ToT; viro raiv (JTroordXwv vftiv Trapatie- 
oopzvois iiintfiEvfiKa-e. Vide Cyril. Alex. Contra Julianum, lib. x. torn, 
vi. p. 327. Observe, too, that even this man could appeal to the 
Scriptures, and to the Apostles themselves ; and could say, TOV 
'Ir/ffowv ovrs ITafiXoj r<5X^i?<ri' eiircti/ QEOI', OVTE IMarflaioj, oiVe AovxSs, OVTS 
MapKos. "Christum confitetur," says Hilary, "utneget; unitatem 
procurat, ne pax sit ; hsereses comprimit, ne Christian] sint ; sacer- 
dotes honorat, ne Episcopi sint ; Ecclesise tecta struit, ut fidem de- 
struat." Contra Constantium Jlugustum, p. 324. 



APOSTOLICAL CANONS, 155 

For consider: if this Julian could charge them with having 
swerved from the Apostles' doctrine, did he not know, who 
had been baptized and dwelt among them, that they had de- 
parted also from the Apostles' discipline ? and was he so 
forbearing as not to taunt them with this also 1 If he had 
known of any such change, how would he not have rung it 
in their ears with bitter and malicious scoffing ; and if he, 
that subtle and cruel enemy, had never heard of it, where did 
our moderns discover if? If this apostate had no suspicion 
of any purer and ancienter discipline from which Christians 
had fallen away, where do these find any trace of it 1 Per- 
haps it is too much to expect that they should ever answer 
this question. 

We have still another class of witnesses, differing from 
the above in this respect, that whereas their testimony was 
negative only, that now to be produced is both positive and 
negative. It is the " motley group" of heretics who are to 
furnish their unwilling testimony ; alike in this at least, that 
they are compelled by a law which they cannot resist, to pay 
homage to the Church against which they vainly rebel.* 
We must, however, be brief in our enumeration of them. 

We find, then, that all the larger sects the Manichseans, 
Macedonians, Arians, and Donatists as well as many others 
of less note and scantier numbers, were so far from pretend- 
ing to alter the external form of the Church, that they all 
lived under the rule of pseudo-bishops. Profane as these 
separatists were, they still affected to have their Bishops, 
Priests, and Deacons.f And why, but that those sacred or- 
ders were then counted in all the world as a part of Chris- 
tianity ; so that while they were able to deceive some by a 
novel doctrine, they would have gained only derision if they 
had invited their allegiance to a new constitution'? The 
discipline appointed by Apostles was infallibly known to all 
men ; it was before their eyes ;| they or their fathers had 

* " Uterque hostis Ecclesiae res Ecclesise agit." S. Hilar. Fictav. 
De Trinitale, lib. vii. p. 134. 

t See the eloquent description of their inconstant ordinations in 
Tertullian, De Prescript. Hteret. cap. xli. HOes kpcfarXoi. says Naz- 
ianzen, in his account of their doings, KO! cfi^poy kpcfs xOis T&V ayiuv 
e$ca, Kal fttxrraycjyoJ aijpcpov' miXatoi riiV Kojciay, cat tr^<Jcoi TJJV titsifistav. 
Orat. xxi. p. 378. 

For the primitive doctors taught, as Cc-.ssiodorns says, " non 
tam suis lingnis, qnam vcstris potitis ocnli?." Jnstitut. Dimn. Lee- 



156 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

lived with Apostles, and knew too well what orders Christ 
had appointed in His Church for any new scheme to have 
even a chance of success. To innovate in such a matter 
was then impossible. The very heretics themselves dreamed 
not of such unprofitable folly ; not because of the sin they 
cared little for that but because they would have gained 
nothing by it : a ' presbyterian ' or an ' independent ' in those 
days would have been taken either for a heathen or a jester ; 
and his jest would have been pointless, as being altogether 
too clumsy and extravagant. And so the heretics, as we 
shall see yet further, were as careful to obey the first apos- 
tolical canon " A bishop shall be ordained by two or three 
bishops," as the Catholics themselves. And thus even these 
men, aliens and outcasts as they were, become witnesses 
against the error of our own deceived brethren. A few 
particular instances shall be added by way of exemplifica- 
tion ; and first, of the Arians. 

That they retained the three orders, and made much of 
the Episcopal Succession, is well known ; and it can only 
be supposed that they appropriated these portions of the 
Catholic system, because it never entered their heads to 
question them, or because it would have been hopeless to do 
so. What other account of the matter can we give 1 Their 
animus was shown plainly enough ; especially when they 
came, as they did in progress of time, to charge the Ni- 
cene Fathers with having changed the faith ;* yet not a 
hint of their having changed the discipline of the Church. 
What an advantage to their cause, if they could have invited 
the people to return to a more primitive form ! what a wea- 
pon against their enemies the Catholics ! And yet these 
misbelievers, who would have turned the earth upside down 
if they might have overwhelmed the Church in its ruins, 
never hit upon this obvious idea of an elder and purer that 
is an apostolical discipline. 

Nor is this all. It would have been a strong fact if they 

tion. Prafiit. ; and that saying of Jerome can hardly be disputed, 
"Multoplus intelligitur, quod oculis videtur, quam quod aure per- 
cipitur." Epist. ad FaMolam, torn. vi. p. 366. 

* Vide S. Athanas. AtL Africanos Episcopos, Epist. torn. i. p. 937; 
and his description of Arian tyranny, Ad sotit. vitam agcntcs, p 855. 
On the co-operation of the Jews with the Arians and other heretics 
in their warfare against the Church, vide Filesaci Opp. Select, torn, 
i. p 189; find Basnage. Histoire de VEglise., livro xiii. chap. ii. 



APOSTOLICAL CANONS. 157 

had only tacitly adopted the Church-polity ; but they did 
more ; they even contended, after their evil fashion, for its 
integrity. It was a favourite complaint of theirs against the 
Catholic party, that these had broken -the ecclesiastical 
canons. Thus Philostorgius, himself a member of the Eu- 
nomian sect of Arians, using the popular calumny against 
the great Athanasius, says, that he was " unlawfully "* con- 
secrated Bishop. What did it matter that his ordination was 
uncanonical, unless Philostorgius, who asserted it, judged 
the canons to be binding 1 On the other hand, Athanasius 
himself, replying to the charge,f boldly and earnestly retorts 
it upon his adversaries, and exclaims, " Not such as these 
were the appointments of St. Paul ; it was not these which 
the Fathers delivered to us ; this indeed is a new form, and 
this a novel institution."! Here were two great parties 
vehemently debating this very question of ecclesiastical disci- 
pline, and each professing to be jealous for" its due observ- 
ance. What shameless and incredible trifling, if they had 
known that, after all, that discipline was itself only a corrup- 
tion of the primitive government ! And if neither the one nor 
the other, neither the Church nor her enemies, had ever con- 
ceived such an idea, how comes it now, in the end of the 
world, to find acceptance 1 

The same unconscious testimony to the origin of the three- 
fold Ministry of the Church is yielded, in a very remarkable 
way, by the Manichaeans, Macedonians,^ Luciferians, Mon- 

* Philostorg. Hist. Eccles. lib. ii. cap. ii. 

t Ad Imperat. Constant. Apol. torn. i. p. 726. 

+ Oi% oi'ras al Hav\ov Siard^ets, oiij^ oi'rwj of irarepes itapaSeS&Kaaw, 
SXXoj TUTTOS itrrlv OVTOS, Kai KO.IVOV ro emrfiiEVfia. Ibid. p. 753. Cf. p. 693; 

and Ad solit. vitam agentes, pp. 817, 844, 852. As an illustra- 
tion of the animus of the Arian party, which is obviously of some 
importance in this argument, see the story, told by Theodoret, 
Ecclesiast. Histor. lib. ii. cap. xii. p. 86. The Arians had desired 
the Emperor to set apart a church for those in Alexandria who did 
not communicate with Athanasius. Athanasius proposed in return, 
that, by the same rule, the persecuted Catholics at Antioch, where 
the Arians prevailed most, should be allowed a church for their 
use. The Arians thereupon requested that neither petition should 
be granted ; preferring to lose their own suit at Alexandria, rather 
than that the orthodox should gain theirs at Antioch. On the state 
of the Church at this latter place, vide S. Basil. Epist. ad Athana- 
sium, torn. iii. p. 76. 

For the Macedonians, vide Socratis Hist. Ecclesiast. lib. iii. 
cap. x. p. 182. The testimony of the Manichaans to the primitive 

8 



15S EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

tanists, and other heretics ; but most conspicuously and de- 
cisively by those early sects whose objections against the 
Church were taken on the modern puritan ground : even 
these never thought of amending the Church discipline, but 
only how they might best imitate it.* The Donatists, the 
largest and most powerful sect of ancient * puritans,' and 
whose enmity against Catholics was of the same violent char- 
acterf as that which has marked their disciples in later 
times, are a curious instance indeed in this point ; and it 
would seem, from some observations of Optatus, who wrote 
against them, that they even paid some peculiar reverence to 
their bishops, "swearing by them" and exalting their per- 
sons in an unseemly manner.! The ' puritan 'followers of 

discipline is most convincinglyj though tacitly, set forth in the con- 
ference between Archelaus, Bishop of Mesopotamia, and the heresi- 
arch Mapes, in the year 278. " Appellati sumus ex Salvatoris de- 
siderio Christiani," says Archelaus, " sicut universus orbis terrarum 
testimonium perhibet, atque Apostoli edocent; sed et optimus archi- 
tectus ejus, fundamentum nostrum, id est Ecclesiae, Paul us posuit, et 
legem tradiciit, ordinatis Ministris, et Presbyteris, et Episcopisin ea ; 
describens per loca singula quomodo et qualiter oporteat JVIinistros 
Dei, quales et qualiter fieri Presbyteros, qualesque esse debeant qui 
Episcopatum desiderant ; qua? omnia bene nobis et recte disposita, 
usque in hodiernuni statum suum custodiunt, et permanet apud nos 
regula discipline. " Archelai et Manetis Disput.^ ap. Reliq. Sacr. 
torn. iv. p. 266. It is impossible to exaggerate the value and impor- 
tance of this interesting passage, which Dr. Routh calls " locus no- 
tandus de Hierarchiae Ecclesias ordine ab Apostolis institute." 

* And as some of them imitated the whole external system, so 
did others affect to copy even the ritual observances. Thus Mr." 
Beaven notices, that they " imitated the form of invocation in the 
Holy Communion;" quoting St. Irenaeus, who refers to the Gnostic 
Marcus, IKTBIVUV rdv Xoyoj; TJJJ ErriKAjjottos. Account of St. IrenfEus^ p. 200. 

t Augustine says that " the ravages of the barbarians were milder 
than the outrages of the Donatist Clergy." Epist. cxxii. Ad Victo- 
rianum, torn. ii. p. 240. And the description of their doings so like 
are these men in all ages might serve very often for a history of the 
presbyterians and others of our own country in the days of the com- 
monwealth. " Ut omnia sacrosancta vestri Episcopi violarent," says 
Optatus, "jussi sunt Eucharistiam canibus fundi .... Ampullam 
quoque chrismatis per fenestram, ut frangerent, jactaverunt." Adv. 
Parmenian. lib. ii. p. 55. ed. Albaspinaei. 

t Adv. Parmenian. lib. ii. p. 58 and p. 56. He notices that they 
petitioned Julian for favour and countenance, and adds, as well he 
might, "Rubescite, si ullus est pudor." St. Austin, too, notices 
how they complimented the Apostate, and consented to receive their 
churches from him. Contra Lit. Petiliani, lib. ii. cap. xcii. torn vii 
p. 117. 



APOSTOLICAL CANONS. 159 

Audius, who left the Church in disgust at some errors of 
conduct and discipline, perpetuated their schism by appoint- 
ing bishops.* The followers of Theodotus (Coriarius) ex- 
communicated by 'Pope Victor, " persuaded one Anatolius 
to become their bishop."! The fanatical disciples of one 
Quintilla, a sect of women, in order that they might annihi- 
late the distinction "of sexes, us fir t d&v diacptgsw, " elected 
bishops, presbyters, and the other orders of the clergy ! say- 
ing, that ' in Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female.' "f 
And lastly, for we must hasten to a conclusion, the No- 
vatians, who, if any, might have been expected to have cho- 
sen new ways for themselves, still adhered to the same form 
of Church-polity, and that under circumstances so extraor- 
dinary as to require a separate notice. 

Novatian, the founder of this sect, had begun by opposing 
himself to the teaching of the Church on a question of peni- 
tential discipline ; taking umbrage, as is usual with- such 
persons, at the merciful gentleness which was shown to those 
who had lapsed under persecution. This was only his first 
step in disobedience, and at length he went so far as to set 
himself up as a rival to Cornelius, the then lawful bishop of 
Rome. The next act of this haughty ' puritan ' is a very 
curious chapter in the history of spiritual pride. Procuring, 
from a remote part of the country, three bishops,- who are 
described as very simple men av&Qtonovg aygolxovg %ut om- 
iovffiuTovg and causing them to be intoxicated, he com- 
pelled them by force to impose their hands upon him, in or- 
der to his consecration as a bishop.^ Now, without dwell- 
ing tediously upon this revolting story, let us ask only, what 
are we to conclude from it? What but that Novatian took 

* Vide S. Epiphan. Hares. Ixx. torn. i. p. 827. 

t Vide Timothei Constantinop. De Theodoto Coriario, ap. J. 
Meursii Vir. Div. Lib. Opp. torn. viii. p 733. 

% S. Epiphau. Hares, xlix. pp. 418, 19. 

Euseb. H. E. vi. 43. " This champion of the Gospel did not 
know," said Cornelius, "that there ought to be one Bishop in the 
Catholic Church." Epist. ad Fabian. ; and yet at this time there 
were in the single church of Rome 46 presbyters, 7 deacons, as many 
subdeacons, 42 acolytes, exorcists, readers, widows, and, lastly, more 
than 1500 poor. On the size and extent of the primitive dioceses, 
which heretical ingenuity has laboured to misrepresent, it is enough 
to refer to Maurice's Defence of Diocesan Episcopacy ; in which this 
subject is considered in such a satisfactory and conclusive manner as 
to leave no room for further controversy. 



160 EVIDENCE OP ANTIQUITY. 

all this trouble to obtain canonical ordination from three 
bishops, because he had no hope of procuring followers with- 
out it 1 and again, that the modern theory of lay, or ' presby- 
terian,' ordination for the revival of which, supposing it to 
have slumbered, that had been so favourable a crisis had 
not even entered his thoughts 1 Surely this one act of an 
adversary of the Church in that early age is enough to con- 
demn all the inventions of her new enemies in this."* 

And here I shall close this branch 8f evidence ; from 
which it appears, that, so far as respects the subject of these 
pages, the practice of those who " went out" from the Church 
is an undesigned confirmation of her own holy teaching. If I 
could have thought of any severer tests by which to assay 
that teaching, I would have applied them. 

XII. There still remain to be heard not a few of the 
most distinguished doctors of catholic antiquity. Of these, 
the first in order of time is one who has been styled " the 
light of all the saints, bishops, and martyrs, the most blessed 
CYPRIAN.''! Born about the close of the second century, 

* And proofs of the same character abound in the early annals of 
schism. I will add only -another. One Sabbatius appears to have 
made a new sect in the Novatian camp, affecting to be indignant that 
unworthy .persons should still be admitted to communion. His 
friends, shrewdly suspecting his object, and resolved, perhaps, that 
he should not get before them, make him swear that he will never 
become a bishop; he does so, and afterwards breaks' his oath, and 
becomes the founder of a new sect. Yet this acute " reformer," 
-whose very boast it was to revert to a. purer discipline, had never 
heard of the presbyterian scheme ! Vide Socratis Hist. Ecclcsiust. 
lib. v. cap. xxi. p. 231. Vide also Muratori, Antiq. Med. JEti, Dis- 
sert. Ix. cap. xvi. torn. v. p. 139; and, for later instances, J. Canta- 
cuzeni Histor. lib. iv. cap. v. torn. iii. p. 759. ed. Gretser. 

t " Q,uis ille tana demons est, qui illud sanctorum omnium, et epis- 
coporum, et martyrum lumen, beatissimum Cyprianum, cum czeteris 
collegis suis, in a3ternmn dnbitet regnaturum esse cum Christo?" 
Vincent Lerins. Commonitor. cap. vi. " Quid ? parva nobis de apos- 
tolicis viris, parva primis sacerdotibus, parva de bbatissimo Cypriano 
martyre atque doctore currit auctoritas ? An volumus docere docto- 
rem?" Pacian. Epist. i. Ad Sympronianum. And it is thus that 
they all speak of him. " He was one," says Augustine, " cujus 
laudem consequi non valeo, cujus multis literis scripta mea non com- 
paro, cujus ingenium diligo, cujus ore dilector, cujus caritatem miror, 
cujus martyrium veneror." Contra Crcsconium, lib. ii. cap. xxxii. 
Even heretics used to quote his writings " tanquam firmamenta 
canonical auctoritatis." Aug. ubi supra, torn, vii.p. 177. St. Jerome, 
giving instructions to a certain person as to what might profitably 



ST. CYPRIAN. 161 

St. Cyprian was consecrated Bishop of Carthage A. D. 248, 
and martyred A. D. 258. His lot was cast in troublous times, 
when to be a Christian was not so safe and easy as now. In 
his day they who believed in the Cross bore it too ; and men 
not only trusted in its strength, as we profess to do, but felt 
its weight. And this gives force to their testimony. They 
were something more than mere talkers; and when we 
hearken to their words, we feel that we are in very truth 
listening to men to whom it was given in their day to be the 
Lord's chosen witnesses. 

It cannot be, then, but that we hear this illustrious mar- 
tyr with respect, as one "highly favoured" of God; with 
affection, as hoping one day to see him face to face ; with 
something of awe, considering his present lot ; and with 
serious hearts, lest he should be found to repudiate that fel- 
lowship which we would fain enjoy with him and all saints. 
If to reject the witness of one whom God has appointed to 
speak in His Name be in any case perilous, it is hardly pos- 
sible to exaggerate the danger of rejecting it in this. 

We may begin by referring to his letter of congratula- 
tion written to some who had witnessed for the Name of 
Christ in a recent persecution. He rejoices in contemplat- 
ing the probable effect of their fortitude upon his whole 
flock, but claims for himself a peculiar interest in it. " For 
while," he says, " it is meet that the whole brotherhood ex- 
ult in this, yet greater is tJie Bishop's share in the common 
joy. For the glory of a Church is the glory of him who 
rules it"* 

During the persecution here alluded to some had fallen 
away, and by their weakness in the time of trial had earned 
the title of " the Lapsed." Their offence was scarcely 
accomplished when they sought to wipe it out by repent- 
ance, and a return to the Church which they had dishon- 
oured. This return was permitted only upon certain con- 
ditions ; and without exacting these, and even before the 

be read, and having said, " let all apocryphal books be eschewed," 
presently adds, " let the works of Cyprian be ever in your hand." 
Ad LtBtam, Epist. vii. torn. i. p. 19. Cf. Prudent, mpl cTsAavuv Hymn. 
xiii. p. 298. 

* " Nam cum gaudere in hoc omnes fratres oporteat, turn in 
gaudio communi major est Episcopi portio. Ecclesiae enim gloria 
Praepositi gloria est." Epist. vi. Ad Rogatianum, p. 11. ed Baluzii. 
Paris. 1726. 



162 , EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

persecution was over moreover, without any sanction from 
the Bishop some of the presbyters of the Church in Car- 
thage had disobediently and presumptuously admitted these 
lapsed persons to communion. Their absent Bishop, zealous 
for the true peace and welfare of these penitents, and indig- 
nant at the " rash and impetuous conduct" which was soon 
developed into open schism, wrote as follows to his clergy at 
Carthage : " I have long refrained myself, but it becomes 
me no longer to keep silence. For what danger have we 
not cause to apprehend from the anger of the Lord, when 
certain presbyters, unmindful both of the Gospel and of their - 
own station, regarding neither the future judgment of the 
Lord nor the Bishop now set over them, have ventured, in 
disdain of their Ruler, and with a boldness never attempted 
under any of our predecessors, to assume to themselves unli- 
mited poioer ?"* The holy Martyr adds, that to have ad- 
mitted the lapsed to communion " without due penance per- 
formed, confession made, and the customary imposition of 
hands by the Bishop and clergy," was to put them in the 
condition of those who were " guilty of the Lord's Body 
and Blood."t His remonstrance, therefore, was in the true 
spirit of divine charity ; and it is important to notice this, 
lest we should think he was merely vindicating the dignity 
of his own office.^ He then postpones his final decision 
" till the Lord should bring him to them again ;" and con- 
cludes thus : " Meanwhile, should certain rash, impetuous, 
and self-confident persons among you, who regard not man 
nor fear God, knowingly persevere yet further in the same 

* " Diu patientiam meam tenui, .... sed tacere ultra non opor- 
tet. Quod enim non periculum metuere debemus de offensa Domini, 
quando aliqui de presbyteris, nee evangelii nee loci sui memores, sed 
neque futurum Domini judicium neque nunc sibi prsepositum episco- 
pum cogitantes, quod nunquam oinnino sub antecessoribus factum 
est, cum contumelia et contemptu praepositi totum sibi vindicent ?" 
Epist. ix. Ad Clcrum, p. 18. 

HAid. pp. 18, 19. 

Which the whole tone of this very letter sufficiently contradicts. 
We find him too elsewhere even pleading for those who had fallen, 
and defending their claim to absolution. Epist. Hi. JltL Antonianum ; 
where observe the gentle and charitable distinction which he draws 
between the libcllatici and the sacrificati, p. 70 ; and again the tone 
of meekness and moderation in the Epist. ad Cornelium, pp. 87, 88. 
But it cannot be necessary to enlarge upon that which has been 
noticed as his peculiar and eminent grace. 



ST. CYPRIAN, 163 

conduct, I shall resort to those admonitions which the Lord 
commands me to employ,"* 

The divine authority of the Bishop is here so ener- 
getically asserted, that what is yet to follow will appear 
superfluous. Using the same tone in his next letter, " to 
the Confessors," he speaks of these presumptuous presbyters 
as men " who have no respect either to the fear of God or 
the honour of the Bishop ;"t and again, writing " to the 
people," he condemns -the same persons as " neither mind- 
ful of the Gospel, nor conceding to the Bishop the honour of 
his priesthood and chair "\ 

Let us see next whether this assumption of authority was 
recognized by others. " Although," says Caldonius, writing 
to St. Cyprian, " they (the lapsed) have in a body sued for 
peace, professing, We have recovered the faith which we 
had lost, by the performance of penance and public confes- 
sion of Christ ; although they seem to me to merit the gift 
of peace, nevertheless I have remitted them to your judgment, 
lest I should seem rashly to presume in aught. " And again, 
the " Confessors" of his flock they who had nobly despised 

* " Interim temerarii et incauti et tumidi quidarn inter vos, qui 
hominem non cogitant, vel Deum timeant, scientes quoniam si ultra 
in iisdera perseveraverint, utar ea admonitione qua me uti Dominus 
jubet." p. 19. With which compare his calm but uncompromising 
severity at a later stage of the same miserable proceedings j Epist. 
Iv. Ad Cornelium, p. 89 ; and see 2 Cor. x. 8. 

t "Qui nee timorem Dei, nee Episcopi honorem cogitantes," &c. 
Epist. x. p. 20. 

t " Nee evangelii memores, nee Episcopo honorem sacerdotii sui 
et cathedrae reservantes." Epist. xi. Ad. Plebem, p. 21. 

" Cum ergo universi pacem peterent, dicentes, Recuperavimus 
fidem quam amiseramus, poenitentiam agentes, et Christum publice 
sumus confess! ; quamvis mihi videantur debere pacem accipere, 
tamen ad consilium vestrum eos dimisi, ne videar aliquid temere 
prffisumere." Epist. xviii. p. 27. This deferential submission to the 
bishop's authority, in this case offered by a suffragan to his metropo- 
litan, is thus recognized as a duty by two of the most distinguished 
presbyters of the Church Catholic. St. Jerome is speaking of the 
errors of a certain bishop, and suddenly udds, " Nee hoc dico, quod, 
de Episcoporum sententiis judicem, aut eorum cuipiam statuta rescindi ; 
sed quod unusquisque suo periculo faciat quod sibi videtur." S. 
Hieron. Apolog. Adv. Ruffinum, cap. v. torn. ii. p. 256. And St. 
Bernard, being challenged to dispute with a false teacher, tells Pope 
Innocent, " Dicebam sufficere scripta ejus ad accusandum eum, nee 
mea referre, sed Episcoporum, quorum essetministerii de dogmafibus 
juilicare" Epist. clxxxix. Opp. p. 1547. ed. Paris. 1632. 



164 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

danger in their Lord's name after thanking him most lov- 
ingly for the letters which they had received from him, as 
" their chiefest solace" during their afflictions, and praying 
" that the Lord would render to him the due reward of his 
charity," and professing that all their own zeal was to be 
attributed " to his teaching and exhortation," proceed to 
express, in the most fervent and touching language, their 
grateful acknowledgments to God, who had given to them 
" so illustrious a Bishop."* " We desire," so they conclude, 
" most blessed and most honoured father (or pope), that 
thou mayest ever fare well in the Lord and be mindful of 
us."f It is pleasing, as well as instructive, to observe how 
dear this famous Bishop was to his own flock, for whom, 
having yielded up all things, in due time he laid down even 
his life.! 

The Martyr wrote also to the lapsed, of whom mention 
has been made. His letter begins thus : " Our Lord, whose 

vss * Epist. xxvii. p. 36; with which compare the character given 
of him by S. Gregory Nazianzen, as mi^ivtav bnpaTiaros KM <W(/*c5ra-oj. 
Orat. xviii. torn. i. p. 281. 

t Perhaps the most remarkable testimony of the Cyprianic age 
to the divine origin of Episcopacy is that which is supplied by the 
famous letter of the Roman clergy, addressed to the Bishop of Car- 
thage himself. Having lost their" own bishop, Fabian, in the perse- 
cution then raging, they write to St. Cyprian, lamenting their defec- 
tive condition, professing themselves at a loss how to direct the 
affairs of their Church, and confessing in the" most emphatic lan- 
guage the truth of the doctrine, Ecclesia in Episcopo. Had these 
Christians ever heard of any such discipline, what an opportunity 
was this for vindicating presbyterian claims ! Their Bishop dead, 
persecution raging, none to restrain or condemn them in whatever 
they put their hands to, how easy had it been to exercise authority 
if they wished to assume it, how natural if they thought they pos- 
sessed it ! Their Church seriously embarrassed for want of some 
authoritative counsel, if they had judged presbyterian government to 
be lawful, they were bound to have recourse to it; if they deemed 
Episcopacy less than divine, they might justly supersede it. And 
what did they do ? They confessed themselves unable to conduct 
the discipline of their Church, " until a Bishop should be provided 
for them by God;" and write for advice, in the interim, to a famous 
Prelate in Africa ! Vide Epist. xxxi. Cleri Romani ad Cijprianiim, 
pp. 44, 45. 

| " Confessores ad martyrium ipse perduxit, et ne minor esset 
prasdicationibus suis, ipse quoque martyrii corona, Domino pras- 
stante, decoratus est." Cassiodor. lib. i. cap. 19. De S. Cypriano. 
On St. Cyprian's tone of mind at the prospect of his passion, see 
Epist. Ixxxiii. p. 166. 



ST. CYPUIAN. 165 

precepts and injunctions it is our duty to observe, founding 
in the Gospel the honour of the Bishop and the structure of 
His Church, says to Peter, 'I say unto thee, thou art Peter, 
and upon this Rock I will 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 whatsoever 
thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven ; and 
whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in hea- 
ven.' From thence the ordination of Bishops and the order 
of the Church flows down through the course of generations 
and successions ; so that the Church is founded upon Bishops, 
and by the same Rulers her every act is controlled. Thus 
was it established by the divine law."* 

And this may suffice; for surely no words could speak 
more emphatically the mind of St, Cyprian. Again and 
again throughout his writings the same sentiments are ex- 
pressed ;t not timidly or uncertainly, as is the habit of those 
who introduce new opinions, but with a holy boldness, and 
a perpetual reference on the one hand to "the Gospel," and 
on the other to " the customs of antiquity." To oppose the 
Bishop was, in the judgment of this Martyr and his contem- 
poraries, to rebel against God ; and to separate from him 
was to be cut off from salvation.! Nor does he even take 
into account the accidents of circumstance, or prejudice, or 
education ; he speaks of separation in the abstract ; and he 
says of all separatists, that " not even if they were killed 
for confessing the Name of Christ could they be saved : 
their sin is inexpiable, and can be purged by no sufiering." 

* " Dominus noster, cujus pnEceptaetmonitaobservaredebemus, 
Episcopi honorem et ecclesias suse rationem disponens in evangelic, 
loquitur, et dicst Petro, * Ego tibi dico,' &c Inde per tempo- 
rum et successionum vices Episcoporum ordinatio et ecclesise ratio 
decurrit, ut ecclesia super episcopos constituatur, et omnis actus eccle- 
siae per eosdem praepositos gubernetur. Cum hoc itaque divina lege 
fun datum sit," &c. Epist. xxvii. Lapsis, pp. 37, 38. 

t Vide Epist. xxxviii. Ad Caldonivm, p. 51 ; Epist. xl. Ad Ptebem, 
p. 53; Epist. xlii. Jld Cornelium, p. 57; Ep. xlix. Ad eundem, p. 64 ; 
Ep. liL Ad, Antonianum, pp. 68, 73 ; Ep. Ixy. Ad Rogatianum, p. 112 ; 
Ep. Ixix. Ad Pupianum, p. 123; &c. 

t " Scire debes Episcopum in Eeclesia esse et Ecclesiam in Epis- 
copo, et si yuis cum Episcopo non sit, in Ecclesia non esse." Ep. Ixix. 
Ad Pupianum. 

" Tales etiam si occisi in confessions nominis fuerint, macula 
ista nee sanguine abluitur. luexpiabilis et gravis culpa discordise, nee 

8* 



1C6 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

" They cannot dwell with God, who have refused to be of 
one mind in God's Church ; though they be given over to 
be burnt in flame and fire, or yield their lives a prey to wild* 
beasts, theirs will not be the crown of faith, but the penalty 
of unfaithfulness ; not the glorious issue of dutiful valour, 
but the death of despair. A man of such sort may indeed 
be killed ; crowned he cannot be."* 

And it should be observed, that in using this awful lan- 
guage St. Cyprian had in his mind a certain definite sin. 
He was contemplating the case of separatists who, like the 
" carnal " Christians of Corinth, were still orthodox in the 
faith. Their error was simply that they had despised the 
authority of their lawful Bishop ; it was " in the gainsaying 
of Core," as he admonishes them,t that they were " perish- 
ing." Yet even these men were so far from denying the 
office of the Bishop, that they added sin to sin in order to 
procure one who might seem to have been lawfully ap- 
pointed ! What St. Cyprian, and the other primitive Saints 
and Martyrs, would have said of our separatists, we need 
not stay to inquire. 

VIII. ST. JEROME uses the same language with those 
who have been already heard. A few passages only need 
be quoted from his writings; for, like the rest of his bre- 
thren, he has spoken so emphatically, that in a single sen- 

passione purgatur. Esse martyr non potest qui in ecclesia non est." 
De Unitate Ecclesia:, pp. 198, 199 ; in which treatise the same 
sentiment is several times repeated. 

* " Cum Deo manere non possunt qui esse in Ecclesia Dei 
unanimes noluerunt. Ardeant licet flammis et ignihus traditi, Tel 
objecti bestiis animas suas ponant, non erit ilia fidei corona, sed pcena 
perfidise, nee religiosae virtutis exitus gloriosus, sed desperationis 
introitus. Occidi talis potest, coronari non potest." Hid. p. -199. 
And again, "si extra ecclesiam fuerit occisus, ad ecclesiae non potest 
prajmia pervenire." p. 201. 

t It is to be noticed, that St. Cyprian, as well as the other great 
teachers of the first ages, always compares the act of separation 
among professing Christians with the sin of Korab, Uzzah, and 
others, whose punishment is lecorded " for our example" in the Old 
Testament. Thus Gregory Nazianzen asks a certain sectary, Tf <>;, 
co Ttiii Aa0ui> KOI 'A0etpiay t Kai orparijyt daoxppdvKrre j b fa a jMa>ftrea>; roA^j} 
oas, K.T.\. Orat. xxx. torn, i p. 495. So St. Chrysostom, Qv* IOTE n 
xsTtovQoLviv Kept Kopl Kai Afi9aj> at 'Afcipuv ; Horn. xi. in Ephcs. Cf. Aug. 
Contra Donat. ci Rogat. Ep. xlviii. torn. ii. p. 73. And such language, 
it must be admitted, agrees exactly with that of the Apostle, St. 
Jude, verses 11 and 19. 



* ST. JEROME. 16? 

tence he often declares all which could be asserted in many 
volumes. The following is an instance. 

A brother Presbyter had sought his advice how he should 
rule his life : in St. Jerome's reply we find these striking 
\vorJs : " Abide in subjection to your Bishop, and regard 
Aim as the father of your soul;" and he confirms this charge 
by saying, " What Aaron and his sons were, the same we 
Must acknowledge the Bishop and his Presbyters to be."* 
- Elsewhere, in the well-known passage already quoted, he 
says : " That we may understand the apostolical traditions 
gathered out of the Old Testament, what Aaron, and his 
sons, and the Levites were in the Temple, the same let the 
Bishops, Presbyters, and Deacons claim to be in the 
Church ;"t a saying which might indeed supersede any 
further citations, because to have uttered it without a pro- 
found conviction of the divine origin of the three orders 
would have been very gross profaneness, not to say blas- 
phemy. 

His notion of the Bishop's exalted rank was in accord- 
ance with this account of their position in the divine 
scheme. " It is lawful," he says, " to the people to weep ; 
to the King it is not becoming to do so. As with the King, 
so with the Bishop ; or rather, still less to the Bishop than to 
the King, since the one rules over willing, the other unwil- 
ling subjects."f A kind of language which we do not hear 
in our day. 

With this compare his recognition of the Bishop's 
power. He speaks thus of one who had set himself against 
certain Catholic usages : " I marvel that the holy Bishop, 
in whose diocese he is said to be a presbyter, should yield to 
his madness, and not rather break with his apostolic rod, 
with a rod of iron, this unprofitable vessel, and deliver him 

* " Esto subjectus Pontifici tuo, et quasi animse parentem suscipe. 
Quod Aaron et filios ejus, hoc Episcopum et presbyteros esse noveri- 
mus." A& Nepotian. Epist. ii. torn. i. p. 5. So St. Austin, also 
writing to a Presbyter : " Episcopo tuo in hac re noli resistere, et 
quod facit ipse, sine ullo scrupulo vel disceptatione sectare." Epist. 
Ixxxvi. Casulano, torn. ii. p. 149. 

t Evagrio, Epist. Ixxxv. torn. ii. p. 311. 

$ " . . . licet lacrymare plebi, regi honeste non licet. T7t regi 
sic episcopo, immo minus episcopo quam regi ; ille enim nolentibus 
praest, hie volentibus." Epitaph. Nepotian. cap. vii. p. 11. 



168 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 



up to the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit may be 
saved."* 

No wonder that a saint who could speak thus should say, 
" With us Bishops occupy the place of the Apostles ;"t for 
how otherwise could his language he justified 1 No wonder 
that he should add, "Whosoever is baptized but hy the 
hands of the Bishop, receives not the Holy Spirit, which, in 
valid Baptism, we believe to be imparted. The integrity of 
the Church Jiangs upon the dignity of the Chief Priest ; to 
whom if men do not concede a certain peculiar and emi- 
nent authority, there toil! spring up in the Church as many 
schisms as priests. Hence it come?, that without the chrism 
and commandment of the Bishop, neither presbyter nor dea- 
con has the power to baptize"^ 

And his reverence for the successor of the Apostles was 
not a matter of words only. Writing, with a just indigna- 
tion, against the errors of a certain Bishop, he still feels con- 
strained to say, " We are not so puffed up in our hearts as 
not to know what is due to the Priests of Christ ; for he 
who receives them, does not so much receive them as Him 
whose Bishops they are ; but let them be content with their 
honour ; let them know themselves to be fathers, notlords." 

* " Miror sanctum episcopum, in cujus parochia esse presbyter 
dicitur, acquiescere furori ejus, et non virga apostolica, virgaque 
ferrea, confringere vas inutile, et tradere in interitum carnis, ut 
spiritus salvus fiat." Adv. Vigilant, ad Riparium, Ep. liii. pp. 188, 9. 

\ " Apud nos Apostolorum locum Episcopi tenent." Ad Mar- 
cellam, Adv. Montanum, Ep. liv. p. 193. 

| " .... in ecclesia baptizatus, nisi per manus Episcopi, non 
accipiat Spiritum Sanctum, quern nos asserimus in vero baptismate 
tribui . . . Ecclesia? salus in Summi Sacerdotis dignitate pendet, cui 
si non exors quasdain, et ab hominibus emincns delur potestas, tot, 
in ecclesiis efficientur schismata, quot sacerdotes. ' Inde venit ut sine 
chrismate, et Episcopi jussione, neque presbyter, neque diaconis jus 
habeant baptizandi." Adv. Luciferian. cap. iv. torn. ii. p. 199. Cf. 
Tertullian. Do Baptismo, cap. xvii. p. 263. 

" Non sumus tarn inflati cordis ut ignoremus quid debeatur 
Sacerdotibus Christ! ; qui enim eos recipit, non tarn eos recipit quani 
Ilium cujus Episcopi sunt ; sed content! sint bonore suo, patres se 
sciant esse, non dominos." Ad Theopbilum, Adv. Errores Joan. 
Hicrosol. torn. ii. p. 227. Elsewhere he says that he was restrained 
from venting his indignation at this unworthy Bishop by that word 
of St. Paul, " I wist not, brethren, that it was the High Priest; for 
it is written, Thou shalt not speak evil of the ruler of thy people." 
Ad PamttiacJiiumj cap. iv. p. 215. 



ST. JEROME. 



160 



And as he witnesses against the error of modern secta- 
ries, so does he against the more ancient and venerable cor- 
ruption of others. " Wheresoever a Bishop may be," he 
says, " whether at Rome, or at Eugubium, or at Constanti- 
nople, or at Rhegium, or at Alexandria, or at Tanis, he is, 
both in respect of merit and of his Priesthood, one and the 
same. Neither the power of wealth, nor the low estate of 
poverty, renders a Bishop either more or less distinguished. 
They are all the successors of the Apostles."* 

In all his innumerable comments he shows the distinc- 
tion of Bishops and Presbyters to be set forth both in the 
Old and New Testaments ; and the manner in which he de- 
rives the order and authority of the former from the Psalms 
and the Prophets is one of the most solemn and peculiar 
features of his \vrhings. Yet this "Saint has been quoted 
against Episcopacy ! 

It is difficult to speak with due calmness of the treat- 
ment which St. Jerome has received at the hands of the 
Church's adversaries; and I shall not do more here than 
mention it as an instance of the humiliating tyranny of 

* " Ubicunque fuerit Episcopus, sive Roma, sive Eu^ubii, sive 
Constantinopoli, sive Rhegii, sive Alexandria, sive Tanis 5 ; ejusdem 
meriti, ejusdem est et sacerdotii. Potentia divitiarum, et pauper- 
tatis humilitas, vel sublimiorem vel inferioretn Episcopum non facit 
Czeterum omnes Apostolorum successores sum." Evagrio Epist 

Ixxxv. p. 311. St. Cyprian asserts in a well-known passaW Jid 

Antonian. Epist. lii. p. 72 the same perfect completeness of the 
Episcopate in each of its separate portions ; and his language is 
justly regarded as favouring the Anglican doctrine on that subject. 
It must be observed, however, that the condition expressed in the 
important words, " Manente concordiae vinculo et pcrseverante catJio- 
UCCB ccclesicr, individuo Sacramento," is declared by him to be essential 
to this completeness. Would that we might even yet see that con- 
dition fulfilled ! Meanwhile both St. Cyprian and St. Jerome would 
seem to defend us in our lonely and isolated lot, so far as this, that 
neither of them appears to have even so much as heard of the peculiar 
claims of the Bishop of Rome. Thus we find St. Jerome replying 
to an argument urged upon him from the practice of the Church at 
Rome, in these words : " Wliy do you tell me of the custom, of one 
city?'" ' ; Quid mihi prefers unius urbis consuetudinem ? quid pau- 
citatem, de qua ortum est supercilium in leges Ecclesiae, vindicas? 
Omne quod rarum et plus appetitur." ubi supra. Is it possible that 
this saint could have spoken in such a way, if the later notions of 
the court of Rome had been known in his day, or he had received 
them ? 



170 



EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 



error.* It is not necessary to dwell upon so painful a sub- 
ject, as it has exercised some of the greatest divines of 

modern times. With what incredulous amazement, we may 

suppose, would a simple-minded inquirer, ignorant of sec- 
tarian bitterness and fraud, hear the statement, that the au- 
thor of the passages above quoted was a witness against the 
divine institution of Bishops ?f 

In one of his writings an epistle to Evagrius St. Jerome is 

censuring with much vehemence the presumption of the Deacons t' 

Rome, who, by reason of their limited number, had affected to rank 
themselves above the Presbyters of the same Church. Anxious *> 
raise to its greatest eminence the dignity of the latter, Bt. Jerome 
compares them with the highest order of all, and exclaims, "What 
can the Bishop do which the Presbyter cannot, except ordain ? 
And this is one of the passages which certain moderns have been 
accustomed to quote from this Father against Episcopacy. So that 
when St. Jerome emphatically says that Presbyters cannot ordain, 

he must be understood to assert as distinctly that they can. (Vide 

J. Morisani, De Protopapis, cap. v. pp. 62 and 73 ; who enumerates 

various canons of councils in wliich the presumption of the Deacons 

was reproved.) Upon another place often quoted out of the same 

Father by presbyterians, see Cornelius a Lapide, In Epist. ad Phil. 

cap. i. ; who very justly observes that it is, in fact, directly opposed 
to their error. One thing is plain, that these men would gladly 
quote the Fathers if they could be made to speak for them. For, as 
Bishop Downame notices, " If any of these, as, namely, Jerome, 
shall but seetne to favor any of their assertions, though in their 
sense he contradict himself, and gainsay all others, both Councils 

and Fathers, against such a testimonie no exception, either of 

minorfzie of age or singularitie of opinion, will be admitted, but 

that authorise must ovenveigh all that himself and others say to the 

coritrarie. It is a world to see how Jerome in this case is magnified 

and preferred before all antiquitie. ' Who can better tell than 

Jerome ?' ' Who better acquainted with the history of the Church 

than Jerome ?' &c. But when most pregnant and plain testimonies 

are produced out of Jerome, proving the superioritie of Bishops, 

agreeable with all antiquitie, then Jerome is ' a youngling and under 

age ! ' " Def. of Serin, book iii. ch. ii. p. 35. 

t A little acquaintance, however, with these persons would go far 
to diminish his surprise. The following illustration, for instance, of 
their policy would tend not a little that way. We have read above 
the saying of St. Jerome, that " the Bishops, Priests, and Deacons 
of the Christian Church correspond to the High Priest, Priests, and 
Levites of the Jewish Synagogue." It is curious to see how three 
of the most learned and distinguished of the adversaries handle this 
passage, so fafal to the inventions of Geneva. The writers alluded 
to are Blondel, Salmasius (or Walo), and Louis Capelle. " Of these 
three," says the revered Hammond, " the last was soon discovered 
to have dealt most prudently, setting down the other testimonies out 



ST. AUGUSTINE. 171 

XIV. ST. AUGUSTINE has been cited already in these 
pages ; and so far as respects the identity of the episcopal 

with the apostolical office, it is needless, perhaps, to add any 

thing from him.* It may, however, be useful to set down a 
few passages in which the judgment of this famous bishop 
and confessor is expressed on the doctrine of spiritual com- 
munion with Christ only through His Churcli. 

" The Catholic Church alone," says he, " is the Body of 
Christ. Out of this Body the Holy Spirit gives life to no 

."t It must be confessed that, at least, his language is 

not more peremptory and severe than that of the Scriptures; 

for, as he himself observes, " That word of Christ, ' If a 

man hear not the Church, let Mm be unto tkee as an heathen 
man and a publican, 3 is more grievous than if he were smit- 
ten with the sword, or consumed by flames, or cast to wild 
beasts."| 

Again he says : " If you receive Baptism, see that it be 
within the Church, lest that which you receive become un- 
profitable. Without the Church, Baptism tends only to de- 
struction; within it, it is the first step towards salvation."^ 

of Jerome, but wholly omitting this. The other two, having not 

been so wary, made use of another dexterity, set down the words, 

but deferred their observations on them till some fitter season. Blondel 

put it off to his sixth section ; whereas, upon examination, he hath 
but three in his whole book, and so is certainly never likely to speak 
of it, nor can be justly believed to have in earnest designed any such 
thing. The other, Walo, saith, ' he expects more and better notes 
on it from Salmasius (. e. from himself) in another book,' viz. De 
Ecclesiastico Or (Line ; and after a great volume come out of that 
subject eight or nine years after, he yet never takes this place, nor 
his own promise, into consideration.' Hammond's Vindication of 
his Dissertations, ch. iii. 6, pp. 173, 4. 

* One passage only shall be added. " Nemo ignorat," says he, 
" Episcopos Salvatorein ecclesiis instituisse. Ipse enim priusquaiu 
in coclos ascenderet, imponens munum Apostolis, ordinavit eos Epis- 
copos. JVov. Test. QuiBst. xiv. 

t " Ecclesia Catholica sola corpus est Christ! .... extra hoe 

corpus neminem vivificat Spiritus Sanctus." Epist. 1. De moderate 

coercend. Haret. torn. ii. p. 88. 

t " Illud enim quod ait, ' Si nee ecclesiam auderit,' &c. gravius 

est quam si gladio feriretur, si flamrais absumeretur, si ferii sub- 

jiceretur." Contra. Advvrsar. Leg. et Prophet, lib. i. cap. xvii. 
torn. vi. p. 250. 

" Si baptismum habes, esto in columba, ne non tibi prosit quod 
habes. Foris enim habebas baptismum ad perniciem ; intus si habn- 
eris, incipit prodesse ad salutem." InEvang. Joannis Expos. Tract. 
vi. torn. ix. p. 23. 



172 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

" Whosoever shall be found without tJie Church, will be 
cut off from the number of sons. He will not have God for 
his Father, who refused to have the Church for his Mother."* 
To separate from the Church, he says, "is to deny that 
Christ came in thejlesh ; because it is to scatter that which 
He gathered together in one. TJiis is to be Anti-Christ /"t 

"Whosoever shall be separated from this Catholic 
Church, however unblamea&ly he may deem himself to live, 
for this one crime, that he is separated from the Unity of 
Christ, shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth upon 
him."$ Here, too, he refers to the Sacred Scriptures, as he 
ever does, and his remarks are very solemn. " You think," 
said he to the Donatists, " that schism is an inconsiderable 
offence. Well, let us not judge in such matters for our- 
selves, but take counsel from the Holy Scriptures. Select 
certain crimes of the gravest character, and see how God 

* " Si quis absque ea (Ecclesia) inventus fuerit, alienus erit a 
numero filiorum. Nee habebit Deum patrem, qui Ecclesiam nolu- 
erit babere matrem." DC Symbolo, AA Cateckume'nos^ lib. iv. cap. 
xiii. torn. ix. p. 310. Observe that this doctrine was then intro- 
duced into the catechetical instructions. 

t " Q-uomodo non negas Christum in carne venisse, qui disrum- 
pis Ecclesiam quam Ille congregavit ? Contra Christum ergo venis, 
Antichristus es. Intus sis, foris sis, Antichristus es. Sed quando 
intus es, lates ; quando foris es, manifestaris. Solvis Jesum, et negas 
Eum in carne venisse; non cs ex Deo." In Epist. Joannis, Tract, vi. 
torn. ix. pp. 254, 5. In like manner St. Cyril of Jerusalem expresses 
his fears Jest the divisions of the Churches -a o-^-e'tr/iara r&v WKXrjo-iwv 
in his day should prove a token of the coming Antichrist; Catcch. 

XV. p. 167. So St. Basil : ra vvn yu'dfiEi/a Troufyia Etrri rijj EiVdJou TTJJ roC 
dvTiypiyrov Epist. cccxxvi. torn. iii. p. 321. So Nazianzcn, torn. i. 
p. 2lS. Even a Jew could refer to the history of Cain and Abel 
,as a divine warning against schism, and an example of the heinous- 
ness of spiritual division. So deeply impressed have men always 
been, until these last days, with the magnitude of this crime. Vide 
Phil. Jud. Quod dct. potiori insid. soleat, Opp. p. 161, ed. Paris. 
1640. 

| " Quiquis ergo ab hac Catholica Ecclesia fuerit separatus, 
quantumlibet laudabiliter se vivere existimet, hoc solo scelere, quod a 
Christi unitate disjunctus est, non habebit vitam, sed ira Dei manet 
super eum." J1A Donatistas, Ep. clii. torn. ii. p. 265. Elsewhere 
he says, "sacrilegium schismatis omnia scelera supergraditur." 
Contra Epist. Parmeniani, lib. i. cap. iv. torn. vii. p. 7. With 
these sayings compare the 10th and llth Canons of the English 
Church, wherein all who separate from her communion, on what 
plea soever, are adjudged " to be excommunicated, and not restored 
until they repent, and publicly revoke their wicked errors." 



ST. AUGUSTINE. 173 

punished them. Then compare the judgments which He 
passed on schismatics; and thus you will know how to 
make a true estimate of the heinousness of either in His 
sight." It will not be denied that this was prudent advice. 
He then chooses for the required examples the sins of idola- 
try, which provoked the heavy wrath of God, and the sacri- 
legious burning of the sacred books recorded by Jeremiah ; 
and he concludes thus: " The idolatry was avenged by the 
sword, the burning of the book by slaughter and captivity ; 
but schism was punished by the opening of the earth, and the 
burying alive of its authors, they who were consenting to it 
being consumed by the fires of heaven ! WJio nmo will 
doubt tJiat that was the deepest crime wJiicTi drew upon it tJie 
most grievous chastisement ?"* At least we must confess that 
the startling anathemas of the meek Saints of old are as 
nothing to the mysterious jealousy of the Almighty Himself: 
and we shall then only venture to despise their sayings 
when we are prepared to scorn and defy His judgments. 
Certainly the acts of God and the words of His servants. are, 
if it may be said, in exact accordance with each other. 

The writings of St. Augustine will be found to abound 
with passages similar to those already quoted. Nor was it 
after a hasty or random way, but with the calm, severe, un- 
deviating consistency of a matured saint, that this eminent 
person was accustomed to teach or rather to witness to the 
ancient truth that communion with the One Catholic 
Church is necessary to salvation.f It is important, too, to 
observe, in the same proportion in which it is important to 
know his judgment at all, that this was mainly enforced by" 
him against certain separatists, who not only did not con- 
demn any of the Catholic tenets, but who appear to have 
openly professed their cordial reception of the whole body of 

* Cf. Contra Donatist. Pcrtinac. Ep. clxii. p. 981, with Epist. 
clxxii. p. 295, and De Baptismo, lib. i. cap. viii. Optatus uses 
exactly the same way of reasoning. He compares the sins of murder 
and idolatry with that of schism, and observes, " that Cain lived, 
the Ninevites were pardoned ; but schismatics were cut off by a new 
and strange death." Mo. Parmenian. p. 43. 

t A truth never questioned till of late years. Thus Ridley could 
say of the "Holy Catholic Church" of the Creed, "This is the 
Mother of us all ; and by God's grace I will live and die the child 
of this Church. Forth of this, I grant, there is no salvation." Con- 
ference with Latimer, Answer to 5th Object, p. 123. 



174 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

Church-doctrines.* This, I say, it is important to notice, as 
showing the exceeding practicalness of St. Austin's testi- 
mony in relation to the unhappy controversies of our own 
day. It is plain that the charitable anathemas of this Saint, 
as of all the holy brethren, would find an application among 
ourselves ; and it is also plain upon whose heads they would 
fall.t 

The last passage which I will quote here affords a strik- 
ing illustration of this. St. Cyprian, it will be remembered, 
had said, that " if a separatist should even lay down his life 
for the Name of Christ, he would die unblest." It seems to 
have been with an allusion to some such saying, that St. 
Austin spoke as follows of a class of sectaries, who, as 
respects their doctrinal teaching, were avowedly orthodox. 
" I do not assert," said he, " that if a Donatist should pro- 
fess to have suffered any injuries in the cause of his party, 
or to have endured temporal losses, it would profit him no- 
thing ; I say more. I say, that if he should suffer without 
the pale of the Church, it will be as the enemy of Christ ; 
and if one of Christ's enemies should say to him, being with~ 
out the Church, ' Offer sacrifice to our idols, worship our 
gods,' and he, through refusing to worship, should be slain 
by the enemy of Christ, his blood he may pour out, a crown 
he cannot receive. "$ 

* " Confess! sunt enim contra Ecclesiam Catholicam, qua? toto 
ten-arum orbe diffunditur, nihil se habere quod dicerent." Aug. 
Contra, Donat. Epist. clii. torn. ii. p. 265. Cf. J. A. Fabricius In 
S. Philastr. cap. Ixxxii. p. 157, where it is expressly said of them, 
" sicut Ecclesia Catholica credebant." 

t Bishop Bull notices, that our modern sectaries " must upon the 
same account have been separatists and schismatics if they had lived 
in any other settled Church of Christ since the days of the Apostles." 
Sermon xiii. vol. i. p. 340. " The same principles they insist on for 
justifying their present contempt of the Ecclesiastical government, 
and their present separation, would have obliged them to separate if 
they had lived in those times, or would have excused and justified 
those who did then separate." Dodwell, One Altar, chap. xiii. 4. 
p. 375. Or, as it has been said in fewer words, " The reasons for 
separation are such as will justify the greatest schismatics that ever 
were in the Christian Church." Stillingfleet, Unreasonableness of 
Separation, part ii. 25. 

t " Ego iion dico, si aliquas injurias quasi jactet se passum esse 
pro parte Donati, aut aliqua damna terrena, nihil ei prodes. Ego 
plus dico ; si patiatur foris . . . . et dicat ei foras ab ecclesia Christi 
Corpus Christi, Pone thus idolis, adora deos meos, et non adorans 



EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 175 

There is one way of meeting these fearful statements of 
Augustine and all Saints ; and it is, at least for the time 
present, an effectual one. I mean, by referring them either 
to levity and intemperance, or to an utter and uniform mis- 
conception of divine truth. There is, however, so much 
implied in such a notion, that few only amongst the disci- 
ples of the modern schools have hitherto ventured to pro- 
pound it; whilst the rest, by the sort of convulsive eagerness 
with which, from time to time, they have claimed commun- 
ion with the holy Fathers of the Church, have betrayed their 
reluctance to maintain a proposition which, though essential 
to the defence of their errors, is perceived to be injurious to 
the Divine honour, and, when pressed to its legitimate con- 
clusions, nothing less than positive blasphemy. For our- 
selves, we are more than ever solicitous, in a licentious age, 
to follow on in the path, and search out the footprints, now 
almost erased, of the old Saints ; and we think it a work of 
Christian charity to invite others to do the like. 

XV. The evidence which it was proposed to collect in 
this chapter might here be closed. Much which deserved a 
place in it has, for the sake of brevity, been omitted ; and 
much still remains. So authentic, indeed, and varied, is 
the testimony which it has pleased God to provide for us, in 
relation to the primitive order and structure of His Church, 
that, as has been truly said, " no fact in all history admits 
of more copious -and infallible demonstration." You can 
scarcely open a page of any ecclesiastical record, or the 
writings of any ecclesiastical person of the first four centu- 
ries, without meeting some incontrovertible proof of the suc- 
cession of Bishops from Apostles, and the identity of their 
Office. So that, as might have been expected, many ages 

occidatur ab inimico Christi, sanguinem fundere potest, coronam 
accipere non potest." Concio de Gestis cum Emerito, torn. vii. p. 
249. And severe as such a sentiment may appear, in contrast with 
our lax notions, it was in earlier ages the common belief. " Etiam 
si passus est aliquid Novatianus," says Pacian, "non tamen etiam 
occisus. Etiam si occisus, non tamen coronatus. Quidni ? Extra 
EccIesitE pacem, extra concordiam, extra earn inatrem cujus portio 
debet esse, qui martyr est ? Audi Apostolum Et si habuero," &c. 
Epist. ii, apud Bibliotkec. Patrum, torn, iii p 425. They all, it will 
be observed, found this doctrine upon the express warrant of God's 
word. 



176 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

passed away before any man could be found so much as to 
question it. Under what circumstances this^ extraordinary 
attempt was first made will be presently considered. Mean- 
while, there are still four of the greatest ornaments of our 
race conspicuous even amongst the wisest and holiest of the 
servants of God, the glory of their own age, and the bright 
examples of every other whose evidence it is impossible 
wholly to omit. A single sentence, however, from each of 
them is all which shall be set down here. 

" Who confers," asks St. Ambrose, in a certain place, 
" the Episcopal grace God or man? Without doubt you 
will reply, God. Yet still God gives it by the instrumentality 
of man. Man lays on the hand, but God bestows the grace. 
The Priest in supplication imposes his hand, God in His 
might pours out the blessing. The Bishop admits to the 
Order, and God annexes the excellency."* 

St. Basil the Great iiumoTHav TVTIOS explaining, in one 
of his writings, how the originators of schism may themselves 
have received spiritual gifts by a lawful ordination, goes on 
to say, " but they who are severed (from the Succession) 
become laymen ; nor do they retain the power either of bap- 
tizing or laying on of hands, being no longer able to com- 
municate to others that grace of the Holy Spirit, from which 
they themselves have fallen away :"t where he refers to 
separation from the one true Bishop ; the idea of repudiating 
Bishops altogether, he does not even contemplate. 

" Nothing," says St John Chrysostom, " so provokes the 
indignation of God as the division of the Church; and 
although we may haye wrought ten thousand righteous acts, 
yet shall we receive, if we cut in sunder the fulness of the 

* " Q,uis dat, frater, Episcopalem gratiam ! Deus, an homo ? 
Respondes sine dubio, Deus. Sed tamen per hominem dat Deus. 
Homo imponit manum, Deus largitur gratiam. Sacerdos imponit 
supplicem dexteram, et Deus benedicit potent! dextera.' Episcopus 
initial ordinem, et Deus tribuit dignitatem." DC Dignitate Sacer- 
dotali, cap. v. citat. a Petavio, De Ecclesiast. Hierarck. lib. i. cap 
iii. 5. Jn the same work, cap. ii., St. Ambrose says, " Honor et 
sublimitas Episcopalis nullis poterit comparationibus adffiquari;" 
and elsewhere, "Omnis Episcopus Presbyter, n<m tamen omnis Pres- 
byter Episcopus." In 1 Tim. iii. 

'" Oi Jfi airappayitnts, AaiVrot ytvdpEvot, ovre TOV fiairrifyiv OVTE 

TOV xetpOTOi'~v six. 01 ' T ' 1V f^ovalav, OVKETI dvv&pevot X<ipu> irveufiarof ayiuv 

tTEpois Tiaplxfiv, fa UVTOI t-KTTj-r&kaa-i. Epist. ad Jlmphilochium^ torn. iii. 
p. 21. 



EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 177 

Church, no less chastisement than theirs who mangled His 
Body."* And he presently quotes as his own sentiment 
the saying of St. Cyprian, that " not even martyrdom can 
wash out the sin of schism." 

Lastly, the blessed Athanasius, writing to one who had 
fled from the duties of the episcopal office for fear of perse- 
cution, says, " How wouldest thou have become a Christian, 
if there had been no Bishops ?"t And then he proceeds to 
assert, in the uniform language of the primitive saints, from 
the martyrs Ignatius and Irena?us down to Basil and Am- 
brose, that the Church is in such sort built upon the Bish- 
ops that is, the Apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ that 
the one cannot even be contemplated as distinct from the 
other ; a Church without Bishops being, in the judgment of 
these ancients, not "defective" or "imperfect" merely, 
but, as they speak, " no Church at //."| 

XVI. We have now received the evidence of the first 
four centuries of Christianity ; and here our inquiry may ter- 



* 



QvSlv OVTOJ; tKK\riviav SvvrjtreTai StatpeTvy us <^i\aoj(ia' oiiSlv ovria -irapo- 
6vci rSii Qeov, o>ff rfjv SKK^riaiav SiaipeOfjvai ' KO.V ftvpia S>ftcv epyaadpevai KaAii, 
T(Sv TO crtSpa {TUTOV SiaTe^ovTUiV OVK iXarrova <J<oc-o/ci' SIKIIV ol TO TrXrjpoj/m <cara- 
reiivwTcs TO eKK\ritriaaTiKw. Horn. xi. in Ephe.s. torn. iii. p. 822. So 
St. Bernard, speaking of the holy Angels, says, " Nihil aeque offen- 
dit et ad indignationem provocat eos, quomodo dissensiones et scan- 
dala, si forte inveniantur in nohis:" and he supposes them to confer 
with one another thus ; " Nos de regno unitatis et pacis sumus, et 
homines istos in eandem unitatem et pacem sperabamus esse ventu- 
res. Nunc autem qua rationc nobis cohiercant, qui dissident a scip- 
sisf In Festo S. Michadis, serm. i. Opp. p. 279. 

t AtL Dracontium, torn. i. p. 955 ; in which epistle the divine 
origin ot" Episcopacy is declared with the most earnest iteration. IIcS 
fl eaTO.1 b hpeiis, says another, el /(>/ dpyieoEVS avruv xstpuTovT\cei ; Georg. 
Pachymeris in Pseudo-Dionys. De Ecclesiast. Hierarch. cap. v. p. 
323: and thus they all speak. "Non obscurum est," says the 
Canonist, "Patribus persuasum fuisse, plenitudinem Sacerdotii in 
Episcopis residere ; qui forti.one.rn illius in Presbyteros aliosque in- 
feriores ministros, prout necessitas aut utilitas EcclesitE requirere 
videntur, ita difFundunt, seu potius iis communicant, uti tamen ipsi 
plenitudinem ejus in se retineant." Van Espen, DC Can. Ancyran. 
torn. ii. part. ii. 8. 

} " For if Bishops only have received a Divine power from Christ 
and His Apostles to ordain Priests, he that hath not the Divine power 
of Ordination can no more ordain a Priest than a man without the 
Divine power of Creation can create a Star ; both are impossible 
in nature." The True State of the Primitive Church, p. 47 (1675) 
" Potestas ecclesiastica de necessitate fundatur in dono supernatural!." 
Gerson, De Potest. Ecclesiast. Opp. torn. i. p. 111. 



178 



EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 



minate. The few .words' which have been cited from each 
of the holy witnesses, imperfectly and inadequately as they 
exhibit the peculiar features of that rare and unearthly wis- 
dom which it would be a high privilege to examine with 
scrupulous minuteness, are yet more than sufficient for our 
immediate purpose. That purpose was, primarily, the col- 
lection of testimony upon a certain matter of fact, with re- 
gard to which they who offer it were beyond even the possi- 
bility of misconception or error ; and secondarily, the illus- 
tration of a characteristic tone and temper in which that 
fact was uniformly urged by the Saints and Martyrs of the 
primitive Church. That twofold purpose has now been at- 
tained ; and we have seen that all the Catholic witnesses are 
accordant not only in the matter of their allegations, but also 
in the spirit with which they are delivered ; not only in de- 
claring the fact that Bishops are the successors of the Apos- 
tles, but also in asserting the doctrine that communion with 
them is, by the immutable law of God, a condition of salva- 
tion. . And this their judgment has been religiously main- 
tained by the whole company of the faithful, unquestioned 
and undisputed, even by the enemies of the Church, during 
fifteen successive ages. 

Unspeakably great, then, is the disadvantage of their 
cause, who can only prove themselves right by convincing 
the Saints of error ; who throw scorn upon the discipline in 
which their fathers lived, and mock the Church for which 
they rejoiced to die; whose strife is not with us their fellow- 
men, but with the elect of God in every nation and in every 
age : whose defence is nought, till they have shown that all 
whose warfare is done have lived and died in error ; who are 
condemned out of their own mouth, unless they prove that 
" the noble army of Martyrs" battled for a lie, and " the. 
Holy Church throughout all the world " believed it. 

And even this is but a small part of the complicated 
heresies and irreligious opinions which the modern sectary 
is driven by his unhappy position to maintain. He must not 
only, by the profession of his own wild and incoherent in- 
ventions, cast reproach upon all who have ever called upon 
the Name of Christ before him, and assume that to have been 
palpable error which was counted by all saints to be saving 
truth ; he must not only put aside, as, at best, an unreal and 
visionary polity, the universal Church of God during its first 



EVIDENCE OP ANTIQUITY. 179 

and purest ages ; but is further compelled, if he would not 
stand self-condemned, to deny the fulfilment of the gracious 
promises of God, as well as the prophecies of His Holy 
Spirit. He must defend Christianity with the "reasonings of 
a Jew, and " contend for the faith " with the arguments of a 
heathen. He must begin by rejecting at least one af ticle of 
the Apostles' Creed, and make his boast that he has no share 
in " the Communion of Saints ;" and when "he has proved 
that the sacred Scriptures are no true revelation, that all the 
dead were deceivers, and nearly all the living deceived ; 
when universal Christendom shall be convinced of error, 
and we be left only to share with our fathers an inheritance 
of shame and sorrow; then at length shall a new faith 
be proposed to us in the place of the old, and a new creed 
set before us, of which the articles shall be such as these : 
" That the ' Author of peace and Lover of concord' hath 
yielded up His Church to ' confusion ' from the very hour 
in which He suffered to exalt her ; that the Jew, whom He 
cast out, had a worship and priesthood of His own appointing, 
but Christians, whom He hath called ' brethren,' shall have 
neither, or find both for themselves ; that prophets have seen 
visions which come not to pass, and apostles delivered warn- 
ings which had no meaning ; that saints have believed that 
system to be divine which was not only human, but needless 
and corrupt ; and martyrs declared that to be vital truth 
which is disowned by the Master in whose Name they died ; 
that it is idle to ' mark toell the bulwarks of Zion,' for they 
have no strength, or to ' consider her palaces,' which have no 
beauty; that peace is not to be ensued, division not to be 
abhorred ; that concord is not lovely, nor schism hateful ; 
obedience no merit, and rebellion no offence." 

That the persons in question would formally enunciate 
these essential principles of their " new gospel-" is not, of 
course, asserted ; though some few have ventured to do even 
this. It seems, on the contrary, to be true, that, with cer- 
tain rare exceptions, they have always shrunk from avowing 
openly the shocking assumptions upon which their theology 
is based. The conscience is not often so effectually seared, 
but that, at times, like the patient beast of the desert, it will 
start aside from the burden laid upon it. And thus men, 
whose daily attitude is a sort of haughty defiance of the 
whole body of the Saints, and a disdainful repudiation of the 



J80 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

faith of all past ages, will yet strive to hide the nakedness of 
which they affect to boast, claim kindred with the ancient 
servants of God,* and even profess to be descended from 
that noble ancestry whose tradition they utterly reject, whose 
customs they have changed, and whose creed they have 
trodden" under foot. 

The existence of this instinctive sympathy has been cu- 
riously evidenced by the sort of language usually employed 
by the chief men among the modern religionists, when 
speaking of the holy Fathers of blessed memory. So far 
from asserting in words the opposition, or vindicating the 
estrangement, which in act they manifest without even a 
show of reserve, they seem to contend with each other in the 
use of a reverent and respectful phraseology towards the 
sacred dead. And so solicitous are they to conceal their 
alienation from that sainted company, that many of them 
have not scrupled even to modify, with a dangerous cour- 
tesy, the reproachful language which others would employ 
against the living representatives of the ancient Catholic 
Church. It is not as enemies that they would accost us 
now.- They content themselves with saying, that we who 
imitate the primitive Christians are right, only they claim to 
be right too " we are both right," they say. They have 
some misgiving, it seems, in openly reviling men whom, if 
ever they see heaven, they are likely to meet again ; and 
therefore they put their hands on their mouths. But this 
will not serve them. They must give or take reproach, and 
either reject the Saints, or be cast out by them.f And for 

* "On ne pent nier que Calvin n'eut du respect pour les Peres, 
puis qu'il les alleguoit souvent pour les t6moins de sa doctrine." 
Basnage, Histoirc de I'Eglise, livr. xxv. p. 1492. " Luther mesme, 
qui est asseftrement celui, de tous cez revoltez cbntre 1'Eglise, qui fait 
le moins d'estat de 1'autorite des Peres, qu'il traite assez souvent 
d'une maniere tres indigne, se glorifie neanmoins de 1'avoir entiere- 
merit de son coste." Maimbourg, tome i. livre i. ann. 1524. 

t Ei ra ixsivuiv Kr&tSs -pdy^ara, ra fijtirepa KaK&s.' si oe. TO. fijiiTtpa KaAwj, 

ra sKeivwv Kwajf. S. Chrysost. Horn. ix. in Ephes. torn. iii. p. 822. 
" Neque enim possunt laudare nos," says another, " qui recedunt a 
nobis." S. Cyprian. Ep. Jii. Ad Antonian. " Si nostra communio," 
says Augustine, "est ecclesia Christi, non est ecclesia Christi ves- 
tra communio. Una est enim, qusecunque ilia sit, de qua dictum est, 
Una est columba me a, &c. Nee possunt ccclesicE tot csse quot schis- 
mata." De Baptismo, Contra Donatistas, lib. i. cap. ii. torn. vii. p 
36. 



EVIDENCE OP ANTIQUITY. 181 

this reason : because the questions in dispute between them 
were never held, on either side, to be included within the com- 
pass of things indifferent ; .because they were at no time em- 
braced passively, as mere matters of opinion, but declared 
from the first to be DE FIDE, and delivered by all Saints, in 
all ages, as apart of divine necessary truth."* 

In proof of this I need only refer to the citations given 
above. There is no escaping from the downright positive- 
ness of such statements. They are not capable of two in- 
terpretations. The theology of Athanasius and Chrysostom, 
of Basil and Ambrose, Augustine and Jerome, Cyprian and 
Irenseus, is not of the chameleon-hue of modern doctrine. 
It is, on the points at issue, essentially dogmatic. It may 
be devoutly received, or boldly rejected ; it cannot be per- 
verted. The theory of these lukewarm men will not hold. 

Thus Cyprian, saint and martyr, would say to these also, 
" Ye set Bishops at naught, ye desert the Priests of God, ye 
dare to build another altar, to offer another prayer with un- 
licensed words, to profane by false sacrifices the truth of the 
Lord's sacrifice" And Ignatius, saint and martyr too, would 
- tell them, " he who does any thing without the Bishop's sanc- 
tion, worshippeth the devil." And Clement, another saint and 
martyr, " fellow-labourer " of Apostles, whose name was in 
the book of life, would advise them " rather to transport 
themselves to the furthest corner of the world, than to create 
a schism in the flock of Christ." What will they answer ? 
That they care not what these men thought ? Yes, it is as 
I said : they have nothing to do with " the Communion of 
Saints." 

And it has been shown that they have as little sanction 
for their inventions, if they carry the appeal to the Holy 
Scriptures. This, indeed, would follow from the other. 
For, it might be naturally asked, if the faith and practice of 
all Christians from the days of St. John were wrong, how 
could the Bible be right? If truth was never discovered till 
now, in what sense can it claim to be truth at all 1 x or what 
security shall the living feel in its possession, if it has es- 

* " Calvinism, such as it existed in the 16th century, amidst all 
its errors had two truths. Though its Articles of Faith were erro- 
neous, yet it asserted that a true faith was necessary to salvation ; 
and though its discipline was a human invention, yet it asserted that 
Church-authority was from God." Froude's Remains, partii. vol. i. 
p. 394. 

9 



182 EVIDENCE OF ANTIQUITY. 

caped all the search of the dead ? These are questions of 
deep moment to the adversary. And even if he should make 
up his mind to despise at once the declarations of Prophecy, 
the evidence of the Apostles, and the testimony of all Saints ; 
if he should venture to reject the combined authority of 
Scripture and Antiquity, and to cast away with his own hand 
the blessings which no man could have taken from him, 
then at length he must be referred to the judgment of his 
own masters and teachers ; and from, them he may learn, 
that that human scheme which he is resolved to maintain at 
such a fearful hazard, they would have rejoiced to resign ; 
that what he deems a privilege, they counted a misfortune ; 
and that he has miserably forsaken the true Ark of God, to 
search for an habitation without roof or walls, which proved 
a feeble shelter to them when they could find no other, and 
which, having scarcely survived the ruin of its first framers, 
has long since been shattered into a thousand fragments. 
That this is his real position, the adversaries themselves 
being judges, we shall see in the next chapter. 



CHAPTER I\ r . 



ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

I. THE position occupied by the Calvinistic and Lu- 
theran communities of the present age differs in many re- 
spects from that which was taken up by their predecessors 
in the sixteenth century. They are not the same even in 
their formal professions. And so far from recognizing the 
one at first sight as identical with the other, or acknowledg- 
ing the latter as legitimate representatives of the^ earlier 
Protestants, it is only when we come to observe that certain 
symbols and watchwords, with which we are familiar, are 
common to both, that we are able to trace any points of. the 
similitude which is by some so warmly asserted. 

It seems probable that much of the prevailing misap- 
prehension on this subject is owing to an extremely imper- 
fect acquaintance with the very principles and sentiments 
with which such indiscriminate sympathy is expressed; and 
in a measure, perhaps, to the extraordinary vagueness and 
contradictoriness of the writings in which they are con- 
tained. The theology of Calvin and Luther, of Zuingle and 
Melancthon, was not, it must be confessed, remarkable for 
stability ; and their statements were as fluctuating as their 
creeds. In their own day they used to be claimed by the 
most conflicting religionists ;* and they are still appealed to 
by many, who, whatever their differences may be, seem to 

* As their adversaries did not fail to remind them. " How," 
asked Cardinal Farnese, " are your desires to be complied with, 
when you cannot even agree among yourselves what they are ? If 
we concede to Luther, what shall be said to Zuingle ? And if to the 
latter, what to the former, from whom he differs as much as from 
us ?" Sleidan. De Temporibus Caroli V. Imperat. Comment, lib. xiii. 
ann. 1540. p. 215. ed. Argentor. 1557. 



1S4 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

agree instinctively in seeking their countenance and sup- 
port. It is, however, in their supposed character as the re- 
formers of a false and corrupt discipline, and the revivers of 
- an earlier and apostolical polity, that they are most com- 
monly applauded by the various separatists of our own day. 
And it is in this character only that I intend to speak of 
them. 

The opinion of the separatists in question those of the 
present age is founded, so far as it is heretical, upon three 
assumptions : (1) that the government of Christ's Church 
was originally administered by the common council of co- 
ordinate presbyters, between whom there existed an abso- 
lute parity ; (2) that this government was changed a few 
years after its institution, by ecclesiastical consent, and arbi- 
trarily transferred to an order of men who were thenceforth 
styled Bishops ; and (3) that at the time of the 'reformation 
these two facts were distinctly asserted by those who were 
leaders in that movement, the government by Bishops uni- 
formly condemned as an usurpation, and the supposed primi- 
tive form consistently vindicated and restored. It is noto- 
rious that all these points are assumed as undoubtedly true 
by the teachers of the modern schools ; and it is as certain 
that they are all completely and extravagantly false. 

The first two assumptions have been already proved to 
be so. The third, however, is sometimes supposed to rest 
upon better grounds. It will be the business of the present 
chapter to show that it is no less erroneous than the others ; 
that the persons who are commonly called " reformers " did 
not venture to repudiate the authority of Bishops ;* that 
they constantly professed their desire to continue in subjec- 
tion to them ; that they actually did so in many remarkable 
instances ; that they justified their final separation only on 
the plea of invincible necessity ; that their original quarrel 
was solely about matters of doctrine; and that the idea of 
searching the Scriptures for any other than the catholic sys- 
tem of discipline was altogether an after-thought. In a 
word, that the testimony of these professed adversaries of 
the One Catholic Church is not less emphatically opposed 

* ' Deceived greatly they are," says Hooker, " who think that 
all they whose names are cited amongst the favourers of this (the 
puritan) cause, are on any such verdict agreed." Preface, ,ch. iv. 
p. 200. 



ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 185 

so far as it relates to the subject of these pages to the wild 
and confident novelties of our own times, than that combined 
teaching of Scripture and Antiquity which has been already 
so largely cited. 

The most obvious method of proving this statement would 
be of course to allege specific admissions from the formal 
" Confessions" of the great Continental sects, as well as the 
individual writings of their most distinguished divines ; and 
this shall presently be done. But it seems extremely im- 
portant, in order to a due appreciation of the evidence which 
will be adduced under this head, to notice one or two char- 
acteristic features by which the writings in question are 
marked. No one, I think, who is at all versed in them, can 
have failed to observe the apologetic tone with which they 
are commonly pervaded. Now this tone, of which some 
illustrations shall be given, was not the indication only, but 
the undisguised confession of a certain consciousness of im- 
perfection and error. It was not as an accurate resemblance 
of the primitive type that these teachers presumed at first 
to speak of their new system. It was only as the best which 
they could, in their circumstances, contrive; and again, as 
at least something better than that from which they had sepa- 
rated. Protestantism was asserted to be pure and true, in 
comparison with Romanism. 

Consistently with this theory, we find the vocation of the 
first " reformers " almost uniformly defended as extraordi- 
nary, the irregularity of their ministrations excused on the 
plea of necessity, and all defects of their condition laid to 
the charge of their enemies. The supposed apostacy of 
Rome was assumed as an ample justification of measures 
which were not even pretended to be lawful in themselves. 

Several passages shall now be quoted in proof of this. 
And with a view to avoid the awkwardness and confusion 
of a mere collection of extracts, these shall be so arranged 
as to illustrate in the following order the statements made 
above: (1) First it shall be shown, that the reformers, 
unlike their modern disciples, did not hesitate freely to 
acknowledge that their condition was a defective one ; (2) 
that they admitted the value of the ordinary vocation in the 
Church by reiterated apologies for that which was extraor- 
dinary in, themselves ; (3) that they professed to justify their 
acts, not as inherently lawful, but as simply " necessary," 



186 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

by reason of the enormous corruptions and inflexible ty- 
ranny of Rome ; and (4) that Romanists themselves have 
made concessions, which, while they tend to excuse the 
separatists of that age, and to give plausibility to their line 
of defence, are an additional condemnation of the secta- 
ries who profess to succeed them in this, but who neither 
vindicate themselves with their reasonings, nor have any 
such concessions to plead. It is obvious, that when these 
statements shall have been proved, the two classes in ques- 
tion will be already widely separated from each other, even 
in respect of those first principles which are usually thought 
to be common to them both. And when this has been ac- 
complished, we may then adduce with better effect the evi- 
dence of that further and special distinction which it is the 
main object of this chapter to trace. 

(1.) The confessions of the Master himself, by whom 
the new theology was chiefly framed, are so various and un- 
reserved, that it may suffice in this place to set down a few 
only by way of example. One, indeed, such as the follow- 
ing, might very well have been allowed to stand by itself. 
" That the discipline which the ancient Church used is want- 
ing to us" said Calvin, in reply to the reproaches of Car- 
dinal Sadolet, " we ourselves do not deny"* Our brethren 
now would tell us that this honest confession was a mistake, 
and that their discipline is that " which the ancient Church 
used ;" or, at all events, that they have no mind to submit 
to any other. 

" I know" said the same teacher elsewhere, " how many 
things might be required as lacking in us. And truly, if 
God should presently summon us to a reckoning, our de- 

* " Disciplinam, qualem habuit vetus Ecclesia, nobis deesse, 
neque nos diffitemur." And the words which follow this admission 
are no less remarkable. " Sed cujus erit sequitatis, nos eversae dis- 
ciplinae ab iis accusari, qui et earn soli penitus sustulerunt, et cum 
postlimino reducere conaremur, nobis hactenus obstiterunt ?" To 
understand which, it must be remembered that Calvin charged them 
with having violated the ecclesiastical canons of the primitive Church; 
Ad. Cardinal. Sadolet. Responsio. John Sturmius uses the pa me way 
of reasoning. Describing minutely the ancient and primitive sys- 
tem, he adds, " Haec olim Pontificum disciplina ; hanc nobis Sadolete, 
restituite, si Pontificum auctoritatem esse vultis. Neque enim quen- 
quam nostrorum hominum esse credo, qui Pontifices rejiciat, modo 
Pontificalia disciplina possit recuperari." Card. Sadoleto Respons. 



THEIR CONDITION DEFECTIVE. 187 

fence would be a difficult one."* This Candour and humility 
in such a man as Calvin is not less remarkable than the ab- 
sence of those qualities in his scholars. 

In another place, describing to the King of Poland, in 
whose dominion the reformed doctrine was then beginning 
to spread, the " extraordinary" vocation which he and his 
contemporaries conceived themselves to have received, and 
having exhorted him to sanction an " extraordinary" method 
of discipline in his territories, he proceeds thus : " But this 
would be a temporary office, for so long as matters should 
continue disordered and unsettled, not a reformation of the 
Church, but a certain preparation only. And when things 
should be matured, then, by the king's authority and the 
counsels of the state, a more proper order for the creating of 
Pastors might for the future be appointed."t And with these, 
as we shall hear Calvin again, we may pass on to another.^ 

Melancthon appears to have delivered quite as plainly the 
same sentiments. " It is a greater scandal," said he, " to 
forsake Churches for any thing short of the most weighty 
causes, than merely to give our adversaries the opportunity 
of censuring our moderation. Judge whether of the two is 
the evil-doer, the obstinate and inflexible man, who, that he 

* " Scio quammulta desiderari a nobis possint. Et certe, si hodie 
nos Dens vocaret ad calculum, difficilis esset excusatio." De Re- 
formanda Ecclesia. Peter Viret makes the same confession. " Multa 
adhuc apud noa merito desiderari possunt ad plenam absolutamque 
Ecclesise et Christianas discipline restitutionem." In Sacr. et Eccles. 
Minis t. Praefat. 

t " Esset autem hoc temporale munus, quantisper res incom- 

positae manerent ac suspensae. Neque enim fieri potest, &c 

Denique, non reformatio esset Ecclesia?, sed quaedam solum praepa- 
ratio. Rebus autem maturis, regia auctoritate et suffragiis ordinum 
constitui posset in posternm certior ratio de Pastoribus creandis." 
Epist. cxc. Sereniss. Regi Polonies, pp. 351, 2. ed. Bezae, 1597. 

| One passage only shall be added. " Primum cum ministri," says 
the same reformer, " certa quadam inter se disciplina opus habeant, 
non hoc quaerejidum est qualiter sine legibus vivamus, sed ineunda 
potius oeconomiae et ordinis ratio, quae apta sit ad nos in officio reti- 
nendos, et ad aedfficationem serviat. Nunquam autem sic comparator 
erunt res homiqum, ut aliquid perfectum reperiatur. . . . Jam veroin 
hac nostra infinnitate fieri nequit, quin aliqua in nobis desiderentur." 
Here surely are abundant admissions. There is no pretence of going 
back to the "old paths," but some new way is to be " sought for,'' 
which may be, " suitable" for present need; yet still, as being a 
" human" device, it must not be expected that it should be "per- 
fect." Calvini Epist. Iv . Neocomensibus, p. 120. 



188 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

may preserve the reputation of constancy, would rather desert 
a Church than change a vestment ; or he who, more patient 
in subjection, would endure even offensive burdens, that he 
might be profitable to the Church. For it often happens that 
these very inexorable and immoderate men neglect, nay, hinder 
the Gospel, and meanwhile make an uproar about little mat- 
ters" Melancthon seems to have appreciated these " reform- 
ers ;" and he freely admits that there were many of them in 
his day, " even rulers and elders," as well as " many teachers, 
who gave too much license to their own private notions : but 
we should all," he adds, and this is my reason for quoting 
him, " submit the more humbly to subjection for this very 
reason, that we have abused tlie plea of liberty."* 

" Some, however," he continues, " object that saying of 
Paul, ' If I build again the things which I destroyed, I make 
myself a transgressor.' Paul did not commit any errors in 
destroying," was Melancthon's noble reply. "But in this 
our infirmity, when first the ancient religious rites were 
abolished, there was a vast incongruity of teachers, and of 
opinions, and of circumstances. We confess that we are 
men, and that we may have both said and done things rashly 
and unadvisedly."^ 

Again, he could make earnestly the confession which 
we for the most part forget to make : " many are the sins 
of the Church, and for these is it chastised ;"| and he 
speaks of still seeing, amid the common ruin for so he did 
not hesitate to describe it " some vestiges of the Church, 
which, while they are providentially preserved, show that 

* " . . . ac servitutem eo modestius feramus, quia prastextu liber- 
tatis nos abusi sumus omnes." Vide Consilium Ph. Melancthonis, 
Ad, Marchiacas Ecclcsias, pp. 45-47; cf. Epist. ad T. Matthiam, 
p. 251 ; and Ad, G. Bucholtzer, p. 283. See also the strong state- 
ment of Bullinger, quoted by Strype, Life of Grindal, p. 112. 

t " Objiciunt autem aliqui dictum Pauli, ' Si qua? destruxi, ea 
restituo, prevaricator fio.' Non erravit Paulus in destruendo. At 
in hac nostra infirmitate, cum primum veteres ritus aboliti sunt, 
magna fuit et docentium et opinionum et locorum dissimilitude 
Fateamur nos homines esse, et potuisse qusedam temere et incircum- 
spec'te dicere et facere." Consil. p. 47. In like manner, all that 
Dai lie ventures to say in behalf of "lay-elders" is, "that though 
it may certainly seem a new thing, and different to the order estab- 
lished by the Apostles, yet, if it be narrowly considered, it will not 
be found so widely different from their form of government." Vide 
Thes. Salmur. part ii. p. 353. ed. Salmurii, 1641. 

$ Epist. ad Myconium, p. 317. 



THEIR CONDITION DEFECTIVE. 189 

even we are not cast off by God."* This, it will be admit- 
ted, is not the language of our moderns, nor any thing like 
it. Yet it is but an imperfect representation of the submis- 
sive and self-reproaching tenor of Melancthon's common 
discourse. 

" Think not," said another of these teachers the learn- 
ed Theodore Beza " that we are so arrogant as to desire to 
abolish that which is eternal, namely, the Church of our God. 
Think not that we search after arguments by which we would 
depress you to this our wretched and vile condition in which, 
however, we cordially acquiesce. Do we imagine ourselves 
wiser than so many Greek and Latin doctors? Are we so 
self-conceited as to suppose that we have first discovered 
truth 1 or so inflated as to condemn the whole world of error ? 
Far,, far be that from us."t 

Again : having assured Bishop Grindal that, both in re- 
spect of doctrine and discipline, he was ready to submit to 
the word of God, he adds, '^Nevertheless, that we are as 
yet widely removed from that which ought now to have been 
constituted, we do willingly confess."! 

The above writers may be regarded as representing the 
German and Swiss communities : the French Protestants may 
be heard next. " No wonder," says the son of the celebrated 
Dr. Peter Du Moulin, " that the common people, that see no 
Bishops but such as are foul heretics, and their persecutors" 
(it was thus they spoke of the Roman Catholic Prelates) 
" can hardly conceive of a Bishop under another notion. 
But the generous and illuminate souls make no difficulty to 

* Arnica cuidam, p. 330. Elsewhere he passionately laments " the 
subversion of the apostolic discipline ;" Domino Gallo, p. 68. Claude 
too, like Melancthon, could bear to speak of the imperfections of his 
own communion. " Les uns," he says, contrasting Romanists with 
Lutherans, " nous paroissent comme un corps couvert d'un grand 
nombre de pjayes, qui toutes ensembles arretent les fonctions de la 
vie ; et les autres comme un corps qui n'en a qu'une ou deux, qui 
n'empiichent pas qu'il ne vive et qu'il n'agisse." Defense delaRc- 
formation,ch. vii. p. 170. 

t "Ne existiraate nos ita arrogantes esse ut velimus abolere 
quod sempiternum est, nempe Ecclesiarn Dei nostri. Ne putate nos 
rationes qnasrere," &c. Vide Comment, de Statu Rcligionis sub 
Carolo IX. lib. iii. pp. 122 and 127. 

t " Quamvis ab eo quod jam constitutum oportuit, nos multimi 
adhuc abesse, ultro fateamur.'" Epist. viii. J3d Grindallum, Episc. 
Londinens. 

9* 



190 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

acknowledge openly the scantiness of their Church-govern- 
ment, and that their bed is shorter than that they can stretch 
themselves in it, and their covering narrower than that they 
can wrap themselves in it. But as short and narrow as it is, 
they must keep it by an invincible necessity."* 

Hugo Grotius, speaking in the name of another Section of 
Protestants those of the Low Countries after warmly pro- 
fessing his belief that the Anglican Church had arranged 
itself according to the primitive model, and in exact conform- 
ity with the most ancient customs, adds : " from which, 
that we in France and the Netherlands have departed, it is 
not possible for us to deny"^ 

* Dr. Peter Du Moulin 's Novelty of Popery ; Preface, by his son 
the translator, who says, " The condition of the French Protestant 
Church, living under the cross ever since the Reformation, is an 
interregnum as for the ecclesiastical power. Whereof, if they have 
neither the right order, nor the full exercise, all that defect is the 
vice of the times, not of the perspns, which ought no more to be 
blamed for it than a workman that is manacled for doing a piece 
of work as well as he can, not as well as it should be." Ibid. John 
Hales says the same thing : " The French Church being suit cruce 
cannot well set up Episcopal jurisdiction." Golden Remains, p. 446. 
ed. 1688. So Archbishop Bramhall, who spent some time with them : 
" I know there are many learned persons among them who do 
passionately afl'ect Episcopacy ; some of whom have acknowledged 
to myself, that their Church would never be rightly settled until it 
was new moulded." Just Vindication of the Church of England, 
Works, vol. i. p. 164. One of their own members earnestly protests, 
" ce seroit une cruelle sentence de priver du benefice de 1'Evangile 
et de 1'union avec Christ toutes les Eglises qui vivent sous la croix, 
et qui ne pen-cent jouir du benefice de 1'ordre episcopal." Histoire 
des nou-ccaux Presbyteriens Anglois et Ecossois, par M. F., Membre 
des Eglises Reformees de France, chap. xiii. 

t " .... si quibus in Gallia et Belgio recessum negare non 
possumus." Vir. Erudit. Epist. no. 257. ed. Limborch. So the 
Remonstrants from the Synod of Dort, being censured for speaking 
disrespectfully of the Genevan polity, reply, in a work which used 
to be attributed to Grotius himself, " We did not mean that this 
government which the reformed Churches have adopted is unlawful 
and to be condemned, only that it is not the Apostolical form." 
Remonstrantium A-polog. Contra Ccnsuram, Exam. cap. xxi. p. 231. 
The Confession of Faith of the French communities makes a similar 
admission ; for, speaking in the 7th canon of Elders and Deacons, it 
says, " The office of Elders and Deacons, as it is now in use amongst 
us, is not perpetual" Quick's History of the Reformed Churches in 
France, vol. i. p. 28. It is hard indeed, amid the rapid and unceas- 
ing changes which these religious bodies underwent, to know at any 
given time what they did profess. These men, for instance, like all 



THEIR VOCATION EXTRAORDINARY. 191 

And this, which might be indefinitely increased, may 
suffice in proof of the first assertion, " that the reformers 
did not not hesitate to acknowledge freely that their condi- 
tion was a defective one." 

(2.) It is to be shown, in the next place, that they also 
recpgnized the ordinary and lawful vocation, by choosing to 
represent their own calling as altogether extraordinary. On 
this point, too, Calvin and his confederates will appear to,be 
widely separated from their successors in the present age, 
who, as is well known, do not scruple to assert, without any 
hesitation, the claims which their forefathers were so reluc- 
tant to urge. 

" This office," said Calvin, " which God committed to 
us when He made use of our labours in the forming of 
Churches, was altogether extraordinary."* In which} one 
sentence we have a full surrender of the whole question in 
dispute. And the admission is repeated by most of his breth- 
ren. 

" Who are lawful Pastors 1" said Beza, in conference 
with some of the Catholic party. " They who are lawfully 
called. It remains, then, to determine what is a lawful vo- 
cation. Now we assert, that there is one kind of vocation 
which is ordinary, and another which is extraordinary." t 

the rest, went on by degrees. The earlier Gallic Synods, as those of 
Paris, A. D. 1559, and Poictiers, A. D. 1560, decreed the observance 
of certain forms on pain of severe censures. By the year 1594, at 
the Synod of Montauban, they had advanced a little further, and 
resolved, " that there is no need of an express and particular form of 
prayer at the ordination of Ministers," having some time before 
decreed the same even of the order of the Holy Communion ! Quick, 
Catalogue of French National Synods, p. 161. But this was only the 
beginning of their mutations ; what they came to at last, we shall 
see hereafter, dXX' ovSl TO-STOIS ivi^ivav, as S. Athanasius says of some 
of their predecessors ; De Synodis Arim. et Seleuc. torn. i. p. 906. 

* " Atque omnino extraordinarium fuit hoc raunus, quod Dominus 
nobis injunxit, dum opera nostra ad colligendas Ecclesias usus est." 
Calvini Epist. cxc. Sereniss. Regi Polonies, p. 351. " Calvin himself," 
says Scrivener, " being created a Pastor without any lawful authority, 
was reduced to such deplorable straits, as to endeavour to fortify his 
own and his followers' mission with the plea of an * extraordinary 
calling.' In these times, said he, God stirs up extraordinary Pastors 
and Prophets." Apolog. pro Patribus Ecclesiee, contra JDallteum, 
Praefat. Cf. Bay le, art. Calvin. 

t " Dicimus unam esse ordinariae vocationis formam, et aliam 
vocationem extraordinariam." Comment, de Statu Relig. sub Cafolo 
IX lib. in. p. 145. 



192 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

And then, being desired by the learned Despence " to refer to 
a single example like his own duringfifteen centuries," he pro- 
fessed openly, that God's dealings at that time by the hands 
of teachers like himself was " a certain extraordinary and 
unusual dispensation."* The instances of " extraordinary" 
vocation which he cites are those of the calling of Moses and 
the Prophets ; which, he says, is sufficient proof that there 
may be such a departure from the ordinary method. So 
that he, in common with Calvin and the whole school of in- 
ventors, did not even pretend that their preachers were call- 
ed by the ordinary divine appointment ; but would have it 
believed, that it was just possible they were called after the 
fashion of Moses and the Prophets ! 

But Beza sometimes forgot to maintain this high charac- 
ter, and was content to pass for a common man. In one of 
his writings he uses the figure of a house on fire, and rea- 
sons from it thus : " Just as, at such a time, one thing alone 
is thought of, and every one runs to put out the flames, nor 
is it much heeded either who the assistants may be, or whence 
they come ; so, and much mere at this moment, when all 
Christendom is on fire with intestine divisions, I judge that 
he is not to be censured who lends his aid in these difficulties 
of the Christian world, even though he go beyond his call- 
ing."^ So that, after all, these pseudo-successors of the 
prophets are nothing more, by their own confession, than a 
sort of ecclesiastical firemen.J 

* " Inusitata quasdam et singularis ratio." Ibid. p. 158. So far 
were they, at first, from using the language now commonly employed 
by their disciples. 

t De Pace Ecclesia, ap. Scrivener. Act. in Schismaticos Angli- 
canos, p. 42. 

They seem to have resolved, however, with more prudence 
than consistency, to keep even this inferior office in their own hands. 
Thus we find Beza admonishing a Jess distinguished " reformer" 
who was inclined to act upon this theory, and set up on his own 
account as a healer of the Church's troubles that he had fallen into 
a mistake. He tells him that this was all very well when the faith 
was in peril through popery, but it is quite out of order now, when 
a " regular" ministry was established. " If there had been such an 
order," he informs his ambitious friend, " when Luther and Zuingle 
first began to teach, they would never, unless by command of the 
Church, have opened their mouth; nusquam, nisi ab Ecclesia jussi, 
os in Ecclesia aperuissent;" and they, he adds, possessed moreover 
the ordinary vocation. Bezae Epist. v. Mamanno Lugdunensis 
EcclesitB turbatori. 



THEIR VOCATION EXTRAORDINARY. 193 

The celebrated M. Claude, in his " Defence of the Re- 
formation," uses similar reasoning. He quotes, out of The- 
odoret,* the answer given by a monk to the emperor Valens, 
to whom he excused himself for going beyond his office in 
opposing the Arian heresy, by saying that " even a girl, if her 
father's house were on fire, would be justified in running for 
water to put it out." And then, far from attempting to de- 
fend the mission of his friends as an ordinary one,'' he main- 
tains expressly, that the obligation which compelled them to 
witness against Romish corruptions constituted their voca- 
tion to witness/or the truth.t 

He was obliged, as their advocate, to say something, and 
perhaps this was the best he could say. His own convic- 
tions, however, were too strong to be controlled; and he 
concludes his argument by endeavouring to prove that, after 
a , many of them had the lawful ordination. "Is it not 
true," he asks, " that the majority of those who laboured in 
thig reformation were ecclesiastics, whom the duties of their 
office obliged more especially" (every sentence is an admis- 
sion) "to purify religion ? Every one knows that Luther 
and Zuingle were not only priesto, but also ordinary preach- 
ers, the one at Wittemberg, the other at Zurich, and that 
the former was a professor of theology. And the world is not 
ignorant that they who joined themselves to them to promote 
this design, were also in public offices in the Church, as, 
the whole University of Wittemberg, a great number of 
priests and of other ecclesiastics, with bishops and archbish- 
ops in Germany, in Sweden, and in Denmark, some even in 
France, and the whole body of the bishops in England."!: 
And he concludes the chapter by saying, that their voca- 
tion was " ordinary," in respect of the obligation upon all 
men, both lay and clerical, to preserve the faith from de- 
struction ; and " extraordinary," in regard of the extreme and 
urgent necessity which compelled them to act as they did :" 
" a 1'egard," to use his own words, " de la necessite extreme 
et indispensable qu'ils out cue de faire ce qu'ils ont fait." 

Now, if he or his friends had thought as our moderns do, 
why take all this needless trouble ? Why not say boldly at 
once, " we had the true apostolical ordination, and we want- 

* Hist. Eccles. lib. iv. cap. xxiv. 

t Defense de la- Reformation, 2<te partie, chap. iii. pp. 111-122. 

t Ibid. pp. 123, 4. Ibid. p. 125. 



194 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

ed no other ?" But it is evident that they did feel their want 
most acutely ; and it was not till their first righteous emotions 
of doubt and distress had passed away, that they found cour- 
age to teach new doctrines and contradict themselves.* 

Moses Amyraut adopts the same line of defence. " Sup- 
pose," he says, " some Christian in a private station should 
find himself alone amongst barbarians, whom he might con- 
vert to the knowledge of Jesus Christ ; we are of opinion 
that he would be sufficiently authorized, by the necessity of 
the case, to exercise the pastoral office. The consent of 
those whom he should convert being superadded, we should 
account his vocation complete and authentic."f He adds, 
that if afterwards he should be able to be confirmed in his 
charge, by communicating with some regular church, it 
would be very profitable ; but if this could not be, then " the 
law of charity, which compels every man to save his neigh- 
bour from the peril of destruction," would be a sufficient call. 
And even then as if not quite satisfied himself with that 
opinion which he proposed to others he says, that if " the 
ordinary ministers" choose to undertake the work, " we must 
always yield to that order of things which has been already 
legitimately established." He goes on with more of the 

* " Till at length," as Hooker observes, " the discipline which 
was at the first so weak, that without the staff of their approbation, 
who were not subject unto it themselves, it had not brought others 
under subjection, began now to challenge universal obedience, and 
to enter into open conflict with those very churches which in des- 
perate extremity had been relievers of it." E. P. Preface, p. 173. 
And even Robertson gives a similar account of the progress of the 
new opinions in our own country. Having remarked that "the 
first Puritans did not entertain any scruples with respect to the law- 
fulness of Episcopal government, and seem to have been very umvil- 
ing to withdraw from communion with the Church," he shows how 
bitter and violent feelings gradually took possession of them, until, 
" by degrees, ideas of ecclesiastical policy altogether repugnant to 
those of the established church gained footing in the nation. The 
more sober and learned Puritans inclined to that form which is 
known by the name of Presbyterian." He goes on to say that 
others " reprobated" parts of this system " as inconsistent with 
Christian liberty," and to describe the gradual decline from one 
folly and extravagance to another. History of America, book x. 
Works, vol. ix. pp. 305, 6. 

t " . , Nous tiendrions sa vocation pour parfaite et pour au- 
thentique." Moyse Amyraut, Jlpologie, p. 277. ed. Saumur, 1647. 

i " Asseurement cela serviroit a 1 'edification commune." Ibid. 

p. 279. Claude makes the same remarkable admission. "II 



THEIR VOCATION EXTRAORDINARY. 195 

same kind ; and is as good a witness for us as if we had put 
the words into his mouth. 

Prince George of Anhalt says, that he once sent his cham- 
berlain to the Bishop of Brandenberg, " to request ordination 
at Jiis hands ;"* and that the bishop, who leaned to the re- 
formed doctrines, "would have performed that office for him, 
as he had with great good will promised to do, if God had 
not taken him away. And then," the Prince adds, "there 
was no other bishop in these parts who would consent to 
do this."t They must, therefore, ordain themselves, or go 
without ministers. And they chose the former course.^ 

Labesse, a French minister, defending a thesis before the 
learned Lewis Capelle, at one of the conferences of Saumur, 
supposes the case of all the bishops and presbyters of a prov- 
ince, or of some particular church, being either taken away 
or scattered ; and then he asks, whether the people ought to 
be left to perish, or some extraordinary remedy used to meet 
the case? whether the failure of the apostolical succession 
might not in such a crisis be disregarded 1 He then emphat- 
ically denies that all the " reformers" wanted the due voca- 
tion why ? unless he judged its loss worthy of regret 1 and 
proceeds thus : " many things are lawful, and are commend- 
ed and approved, in great convulsions, whether of the civil 
or ecclesiastical body, which otherwise, in a peaceful, tran- 
quil, and well-ordered state of things, would not be lawful, nor 
might be lawfully attempted."^ Referring to what he calls 

est vray neanmoins que ce n'est, ni ne doit estre, la pratique com- 
mune, et que cela n'a lieu que dans des cas d'absolue necessite." 
Defense, 4 e " e partie, chap. iv. p. 366. Cf. Viret, De Minist. VerU 
Dei et Sacrament, lib. v. cap. xxiii. 

* " Per sacellanum meum D. Jacobum Styrium, ordinanduui 
me rogavi." Citat. ap. Durell. Vindic. Eccles' Anglican, cap. vii. 
p. 52. 

t Others seem to have been more fortunate. " Both the Prince 
of Turenne (a Protestant) and the Due de la Force had their chap- 
lains ordained by a Bishop." And then the writer, Lewis Du Mou- 
lin, adds, " let that stand as an undoubted truth, that Episcopacy 
is of Apostolic institution, and tberefpre of Divine right. It is ac- 
knowledged even by them that want it." Novelty of Popery, Preface. 

t " They ordain ministers without Bishops, because they have no 
Bishops." L. Du Moulin, ubi supra. And so, in their own " Con- 
fession of Faith," they excuse themselves by saying, " the state of 
the Church being interrupted, God hath raised up some persons 
in an extraordinary manner.'' Art. xxxi. Quick's History, vol. i. 
d,13. 

Vide Thes. Salmur. pars ii. De Ministrorum Evangelicorum 



196 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

with too much truth, as we shall see "the horrible cor- 
ruptions" of Rome, he asks, who would not justify the power 
assumed by his friends, " although it bebeyond and contrary 
to the received order 1" 

One example more. " We do not deny," say the advo- 
cates of the Synod of Dort, " that in the first institution of the 
Church, when there is no order, or during its restoration, 
token that order has fallen into ruin, some new method, 
which shall take the place of the ordinary vocation, may be 
attempted'; but this will be out of order ; and that which is 
extraordinary, whether wholly or in part, cannot in any de- 
gree prejudice that which is ordinary."* 

And now, if our second proposition be not yet proved, it 
cannot at least be for lack of evidence. It is plain enough, 
surely, what these divines, who did not even pretend to claim 
the ordinary calling in their own case, would have said of 
the " vocation" of certain persons amongst ourselves.t 

Vocations,, pp. 283, 286, 292. No opinion has been expressed upon 
the kind of defence here alleged by these persons, nor is it necessary 
to offer one. The tendency of their principles is now a matter of 
history. The limitations under which they were first proposed, how- 
ever sagaciously contrived, were not very likely to be accepted by 
men who had no concern in framing them. And this the event 
almost immediately proved. The countless sects which were gene- 
rated in the rank soils from which Calvinism and Lutheranism had 
already sprung, were willing enough to accept their example, but 
only so far as it might serve to extenuate their own more extrava- 
gant lawlessness. " Proclivis est enim malorum aemulatio,"says St. 
Jerome ; " et quorum virtutes assequi nequeas, cito imitaris vitia " 
And when the Anabaptists appealed to Luther, " not doubting," as 
the historian says, " that he who had first preached ' the liberty of 
the Gospel' would pronounce in their favour," Maimbourg, ann. 
1526 they had certainly some reason to be astonished at a reply 
which seemed to involve the formal renunciation of one of the first 
principles of his " reformation." " Let the Senate ask this man," 
said he, when giving advice about the pretensions of Muncer, " who 
called him ; and if he shall answer, God; let them, charge him to prove 
his calling by some manifest sign" which, added Luther, if he can- 
not do, let him be repudiated as an impostor. Sleidan, lib. v. ann. 
1525. This surely was an unkind judgment upon his own friends 
and associates : but they who teach novelties cannot venture to be 
consistent. 

* Censur. in Remonstrant^ Synodo de* Dort. in cap. xxi. pp. 
274,5. 

t Or if there be still any doubt, we may judge by what they 
actually have said. 

We find Calvin, for instance, rebuking the English sectaries at 
Francfort, and asking indignantly, " what cause for quarrelling they 



THEIR PLEA Of NECESSITY. 197 

(3.) Our third assertion that the acts of the " reform- 
ers" were nevertheless defended as necessary, by reason of 
the intolerable corruptions and tyranny of Rome has been 

could have, unless it was that they were ashamed to yield to their 
betters." Epist. cc. p. 377. And again, advising the Protector 
Somerset to make short work with " the seditious" fanatics in Eng- 
land, and "to coerce them with the sword of justice." Epist. Ixxxvii. 
Protectori AnglicE, p. 181 . 

Beza not only condemned the " ordinations" of the same secta- 
ries, but protested that " the idea of iheir exercising the ministry 
against the will of the King and the Bishops was monstrous j" with 
much more to the same effect. Epist. xii. Jld quosdam Anglicanos. 
Cf. Epist. xxiii. Jld Grindallum. 

Gualter and Bullinger pointedly " disowned the Puritans" of 
England, defending the Church against them, and calling them 
"schismatics." See Strype's Life of Parker, vol. ii. p. 112} and 
Histoire dcs nouveauz Prcslijttriens, chap. xv. p. 137. Grotius 
defined them to be " certain obstinate fellows, who think nothing 
right but what they do themselves." Ordin. Holland, et West- 
frisicB Pietas, pp. 65 and 113. John Diodati wrote from Geneva, in 
the name of that community, and in reply to the Presbyterians of 
the Westminster Assembly, rejecting their offers of friendship, and 
sternly condemning their principles ; or, as one has briefly described 
.it, " Diodati -wrote firm for Episcopal government from Geneva, and 
accused the Presbyterians of, schism." Life of Bishop Hacket, p. 25, 
ed. 1675. Diodati's letter, which contains enthusiastic commenda- 
tions of the Anglican Church, is entitled Responsum-ad Conventum 
Ecclesiasticum Londini congregatum, 1647. Another Genevan Pro- 
fessor, the learned Turretin, repeats the charge of "schism." His- 
tor. Ecclesiast. Compend. secul. xvi. p. 384, Genevae, 1736. Lewis 
Capeile, who was represented to Cardinal Barberini by M orin as 
a very champion of Protestantism Morini Epist. Ixxxii. p. 431 
speaks with open contempt of their doings, especially of their "so- 
called Directory," and' of their rejection of Bishops : apud Durell. 
Jld Jtpologista Prtefat. Respons. Bochart, De 1'Angle, Amyraut, 
Vincent, Heraut, and' many others, " wrote publicly," to use the 
strong words of a writer already quoted, " against these men, to 
testify the horror in which the Reformed Churches of France held 
their sentiments and their actions." Histoire des nouveaitx Presby- 
t&riens, chap. xii. Cf. Regii Sanguinis Clamor ad Ccelum, cap. vii. 
p. 118, ed. Hagae, 1652. Even the violent Salmasius derided these 
people, openly ridiculed their affectation of sanctity, and declared 
that " the French and Swiss Protestants regarded the state of Eng- 
land under their rule as Jlntichristian, and worse than the papistical 
religion itself," which was the severest reproach such a man could 
speak ; Jld Miltonum Respons. cap. i. pp. 43 and 101, cap. iii. 
p. 326. And lastly, the * Remonstrants' from the Synod of Dort 
protest against being thought " so presumptuous as to reject the 
Anglican polity, or so schismatical as to justify the Puritan." Jjppl. 
contra Censuram, p. 233. So much for the sympathy of the foreign 



198 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

already partly proved, and will no doubt be very readily ad- 
mitted. Yet there is no circumstance, perhaps, in their 
whole history which serves more effectually to distinguish 
them from the separatists of our own age than the fact of 
their having so strenuously urged this simple and obvious 
plea ; and for this reason some further illustrations shall now 
be added, of the use which they were accustomed to make 
of it. I will quote first some additional remarks of the elo- 
quent M. Claude. 

After professing an earnest desire for the restoration of 
Catholic Unity, and lamenting the. subtleties with which the 
Court of Rome was still combating the almost universal 
prayer for ecclesiastical reform,* he says : " But what could 
be expected from a body which had almost entirely aban- 
doned the care of religion and the salvation of souls, which 
was absorbed in intrigues and secular pursuits, and which 
studiously kept the people in ignorance of the mysteries of 
the Gospel 1 Our fathers were persuaded that Christianity 
was tending to utter decay, and, moreover, they had no 
longer any hope of remedy, neither from Rome nor from the 
Prelates ; for the Court of Rome, with all its partisans, had 
firmly pronounced against the Reformation, asserting that' 

communities with English Presbyterians. Next for the Indepen- 
dents. 

Diodati calls the title assumed by these sectaries " teterrimum 
nomen;" ubi supra. Even Blondel says they were a scandal to 
the Protestant name;" Apolog. Praefat. p. 71. Morell, the leader t 
of the Independents, was excommunicated by Calvin, Beza", and the 
whole of the Genevan doctors; Durell, cap. xxxi. p. 414. The en- 
tire sect was similarly condemned by the French communion with 
terms of extreme indignation, in the 3d Synod of Charenton ; quoted 
by Bingham, The French Church's Apology for the Church of 
England, Works, vol. viii. book i. ch. i. And even the Lutheran 
Stoekmann puts the Brownists in his catalogue of " heretics :" vide 
'Pauli Stockmannt Lexicon Heeresium, p. 856. So that whereas 
Milton, in his Defensio Populi, endeavoured to identify the prin- 
ciples of foreign Protestants with those of his own party, Bishop 
Horsley does not hesitate to say, " a grosser falsehood never fell 
from the unprincipled pen of a party writer ;" Appendix to his Ser- 
mon before the House of Lords, quoted in Todd's Life of Milton, 
p. 129. And it is a very significant fact, that when the Presbyterian 
Assembly of Westminster sent letters to seventeen foreign. communi- 
ties, the replies which they actually received for by some of these 
bodies no answer was vouchsafed were almost all carefully hushed 
up : vide Hist, des nouveaux, Presb. ch. xiii. p. 112. 

* Defense de la Reformation, Epitre. 



THEIR PLEA OF NECESSITY. 199 

the Church of Rome could not err ; and as to the Prelates, 
they had all a servile attachment to the will of the Popes."* 
There was nothing, therefore, to hope from either quarter. 
But what if there had been 1 " I confess," says Claude, " that 
if the Court of Rome and its clergy would have joined with 
good faith in the work of the Reformation, our fathers ought 
to have received it at their hands. ,"t Now it was uniformly 
maintained by these divines, as we shall see, that that " work" 
was gloriously consummated in England, and the Prelates of 
that Church were lauded by them as the ornaments of Chris- 
tendom. Let it be considered, then, what sort of sympathy 
they would have professed with men who are schismatics 
from that very Church which they so warmly commended ; 
whereas they themselves would not have separated even from 
Rome, if a Reformation had been granted them. 

Again ; having protested that it was " neither upon ques- 
tions of discipline, nor upon scholastic questions, nor upon 
personal interests," that their separation had been founded, 
he adds, " the articles which se'parate us are such as, in our 
judgment, affect the very substance of the faith." And 
then that there may be no room for doubt as regards the 
point upon which he is here cited, after enumerating certain 
matters of belief, in which is included " the superiority of 
bishops over presbyters by divine right" he says expressly, 
" these could not have sufficed to produce a rupture of unity." j 

Lastly, when engaged in the formal defence of the final 
act of separation, the precedent upon which he professes to 
rely for justification is this, that the Catholics of the fourth 
century thought it their duty to separate from the Arians ! 
" And if," he adds, " it should be replied, that that move- 
ment was sanctioned by many Bishops, we may say the very 
same thing of the party of the Reformation, in which it is 

* 2ie partie, ch. i. p. 90, and ch. iii. pp. Ill, 12. 

t Chap. iv. p. 122 ; and Peter Viret, much to the same effect, De 
Minist. Verb. Dei et Sacrament, lib. viii. cap. iii. 

f 3 e me partie, chap. i. p. 210. 

Ibid. pp. 218-222. And the comparison, whatever we may 
now think of it, was in those days considered a just one. Coelius 
confidently applies it ; Hteret. Papal, p. 161, ed. Basilex : and 
Pfeffinger defends the application of Gal. i. 8, and kindred passages 
of Holy Scripture, to the Roman Church; Disput. de Grad. Minist. 
Art. xxxi. Cf. Melancth. Script, in Convent. Sckmalcaldens., and 
Calvin, Institut. lib. iv. cap. ii. 9. 



200 ADMISSIONS UF ADVERSARIES. 

well known that there was a great number of pious and learn~ 
ed Prelates."* For ourselves we have no wish, as we have 
certainly no need, to appeal to M. Claude, or to any of his 
school ; what others will answer to him, who have been ac- 
customed to claim his alliance, is their concern. 

Melancthon may be heard next. " That I may avow my 
own opinion," said he, " I wish that I were able, not indeed 
to confirm the tyranny, but to restore the government of the 
Bishops ; for I see what sort of a Church we are likely to have, 
if the Ecclesiastical Polity be dissolved. I see that there 
will be hereafter a far more intolerable tyranny than there 
ever was before."t He then refers to the judgment of cer- 
tain distinguished and influential Protestants as coinciding 
with his own, and adds, " how, indeed^ can we lawfully vio- 
late the government of the Church, if the Bishops grant to us 
what it is just that they should concede ?"| Now Melancthon 
declared that the English Bishops 7toc?done this; and judged 
that, " if there were more such Bishops, there would be no dif- 
ficulty in maintaining unity, nor in preserving the Church."^ 
Our brethren, however, are of another mind. 

" That we have not received the imposition of hands," 
was Beza's answer to the Catholics, " nor were appointed by 

* p. 122. 

t It is scarcely necessary to say that Melancthon's prediction has 
been fulfilled in every country where the Genevan discipline has 
been set up. And so well was this characteristic of the presbyterians 
understood by their kinsfolk in schism, that we find Brown, the 
inventor of ' Independentism,' saying, " As for the Episcopal govern- 
ment, though he did not approve of it, yet that being well settled by 
a long continuance, he did not think it was rashly and of a sudden 
to be abolished ; and that this was a burthen so much the more 
easily to be borne, by how much men's necks had been long accus- 
tomed to it ; but to be lorded over by Classes and Elders was not 
only a new but an intolerable yoke." Quoted by Dr. Nicholls, De- 
fence of the Church of England, p. 35. And when, in their turn, the 
Independents got the upper hand, then the Presbyterians complained, 
that " whereas formerly this nation was called the Pope's and Pre- 
late's asses, we may now justly be called the Independents' mules." 
Bastwick's Utter Routing of Independents and Sectaries, Epistle to 
the reader. 

J Hist. Confess. August, ap. Durell. Cf. Art. xx. of that Con- 
fession . 

"... quales si haberet Ecclesiaaliquantoplures, non difficulter 
et concordia orbis terrarum constitui, et servari Ecclesia posset." 
Episcopo Cantuaricnsi, p. 193. Cf. Epist. ad Campegium Cardi- 
nalem, p. 147. 



THEIR PLEA OF NECESSITY. 201 

those whom ye style the ordinary gastors, ought not to ap- 
pear at all wonderful, seeing that in so great disorder of all 
things in the Roman Church, we were unwilling to receive 
imposition of hands from them, whose vices, superstition, and 
false doctrine we condemned, and who were the open ene- 
mies of the truth."* But this same Beza said of the Eng- 
lish Church, " As to what concerns your faith and doctrine, 
received by public consent and confirmed by royal authority, 
I suppose there is no man that thinks rightly of these matters 
but will embrace it as true and certain/'f And further, 
" he inveighs against those, as ' impudent slanderers,' who 
should report him to have detracted any thing from the dig- 
nity of Episcopacy in this Church." J 

J. Brentius, a leading man amongst the same Arsons, 
referring to the decree of Theodosius, that " men should 
embr4ke that religion which was taught by the Apostles, and 
confessed by. holy Bishops," says, " this was wise, for the 
Bishops alluded to Pope Damasus and Peter of Alexandria 
were holy men ; but we now speak of Pontiffs and Bish- 
ops who teach and profess an impious religion. Let them 
give us men like Damasus and Peter, who follow the true 
and pure doctrine of the Apostle Peter, and they shall find 
us not only hearers, but fellow-workers too." And that if 
the Roman Bishops had been such men, this controversy 
about discipline would never even have been raised, is plain 
enough from the next words of Brentius. " The Theodo- 
sian law," he says, " commends that Apostolic discipline 
which the Apostle Peter delivered, and which Damasus and 
Peter of Alexandria followed ;"\\ but Damasus and Peter, 
who administered what Brentius truly calls this " apostolic 
discipline," were both of them Archbishops. 

* Vide Comment, de Statu Relig. suo Carolo IX. lib. iii. p. 157. 
t Epist. viii. cited by Bingham, vol. viii. bk. ii. ch. i. 
t See Morton's Episcopacy asserted Apostolical, ch. i. 1. 
J. Brentii De Offlcio Principum, Prolegom. p. 77, ed. Franco- 
furt. 1556. 

J) Ibid. p. 80. And in accordance with this, their Apologist, in 
y to the question, "If they allow the state of Bishop, why then 
did they banish their Catholic Bishops?" says, "they banished the 
Popish Bishops, not because they were Bishops, but because they 
were Popish." The notion of rejecting Bishops altogether, he says, 
they utterly repudiated. See Francis Mason's Ordinations of the 
Ministers of the Reformed Churches beyond the seas maintained 
against the Romanists. Cf. Davenant. De Pace Ecclesiastica, p. 8. 



202 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

"If they wish to be acknowledged for Bishops," said 
Calvin, " let them discharge their office by feeding the peo- 
ple. If they would retain the power of institution and ordi- 
nation, let them restore that just and grave scrutiny of doc- 
trine and manners which has now for many ages ceased to 
be practised among them."* And if they had done this, as 
the English Bishops did, Calvin would have " acknowledg- 
ed " them, or else he must have stood convicted out of his 
own mouth. 

Again : at a conference appointed by the Emperor, at 
which Bucer, Melancthon, and John Pisterius assisted, the 
question of Episcopacy was one of the six subjects upon 
which they came to full accord with the Catholics ; it was 
on others, as the true doctrine of the Eucharist, that they 
differed.? The whole controversy, from first to last, turned 
not upon discipline, but upon doctrine. || 

"The Bishops," says another document, which was ve- 
hemently approved by Calvin, Luther, Melancthon, and all 
the heads of their party, " may easily retain the submission 
due to them, if they would not compel us to keep traditions 
which cannot with a good conscience be observed."^. 

" I wish," said another eminent person, in very similar 
language, " that as they bear the names and titles, so they 
would in very deed show themselves to be Bishops of the 
Church. How willingly, if they would faithfully rule the 
Churches, and with what joy fulness of heart, should we (in 
that case) consent to acknowledge them as Bishops, to rev- 
erence them, to comply with their authority, to recognize 
their rightful jurisdiction and ordination, and without any 
reluctance to make use of it. J ' 

The Bishops being, however, such as they were, or as 
they were conceived to be, " unless we separate ourselves," 
said Bucer/ " from such false and impious rulers of the 

fc De Reformanda Ecclesia. 

t Vide Maimbourg, Histoire du LutMranisme, ann. 1541. 

t Confess. Augustan, cap. De Potestate Ecclesia. Seckendorff 
quotes Luther's approval of this Confession, as a token of his will- 
ingness to submit to the Bishops; and says, that it was only " when 
he despaired " of procuring their sanction of his opinions, that he 
" asserted the right of choosing ministers without them." Histor. 
Lutheranismi, torn. ii. p. 156 ; and see torn. i. p. 115, for some strong 
language on the same point. 

Georg. Princ. Anhalt. De Ordinal. Preefat. 



THEIR PLEA OF NECESSITY. 203 

Church, whose whole life is defiled with the most infamous 
crimes,* we should transgress the commandment of the 
Lord. So judged and wrote with great severity that blessed 
martyr and bishop, Cyprian ; and in this all the holy Fathers 
agree with him, as well in the decrees of the Councils as in 
their own private writings."t But what said Bucer of our 
spiritual rulers ? " We shall diligently supplicate the Lord," 
was his declaration to one of their number, " that your happy 
lot, in rejoicing in true Bishops, He may both daily confirm 
in your own realm, and also extend it in common to other 
kingdoms."^. 

" Our churches," writes another distinguished Protestant 
teacher, " did not embrace the presbyterian discipline from 
dislike of Episcopacy, or because it seemed to us to be oppos- 
ed to the Gospel, or to be less profitable to the Church, or less 
suitable to the condition of the Lord's true fold " all these 
modern heresies he rejects " but because they were corn- 
petted by necessity. If the Bishops would have sanctioned 
the Reformation, that their order would have been preserved 
" in the government of the Church, T hold for certain."^ And 

* Although we must make great allowance for the intemperate 
exaggerations of these writers, yet it is rather the coarseness and 
virulence of their language than the truth of their statements against 
which exception is to he taken. We are, however, only concerned 
here to show that they did make these statements in their own 
defence. That the corruptions of the Roman Church at the period 
of the Reformation were unspeakably great, it is not, indeed, diffi- 
cult to prove ; but this fact, whether it justified the first Protestants 
or not, serves only the more to condemn our modern sectaries, 
because they do not even pretend to such a defence of their separa- 
tion. On the way in which it used to be urged, see Brentii Prole- 
gom. p. 75; Calvini Institut. lib. iv. cap. ii. 10; Viret De Minist 
Verbi Dei et Sacrament, lib. viii. cap. iii. ; Zuinglii De Vera et Falsa 
Religione, p. 303 ; Bucan. Institut. Theolog. De Ministerio, loc. 48 ; 
CEcolampadii Epist. Gaspar. Hedioni, p. 13 ; Apolog. Confess. Duds 
Wirtenberg. De Ordine, p. 648 ; Chemnitz. Exam. Decret. Condi. 
Trident, cap. viii. torn. iii. ; De Ccd. Saeerdot. cap. ii. 

t De Aidmarwm. Cura, Prscfat. p. 162. 

I In Sacra Evangelia Prcefat. ; and see his Gratulatio ad Eccle- 
siam Anglict. 

Drelincourt, Letter to Brevint, quoted by Durell, cap. xxxiv. 

Ep. 51 7, 18. So Luther, as a modern writer notices, " urged Me- 
mcthon to restore Episcopacy in every place where the Bishop 
granted the free use of the Protestant doctrine." Bampton Lecture 
for 1832, Sermon ii. p. 85, note. " And generally,'^ says BramhalJ, 
" all Reformed Churches were desirous to have retained Episcopacy, 



204 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

then he gives the best possible reason for his opinion, by 
showing that when the Bishops did consent to that movement, 
they were gladly received as their rulers by the Protestant 
party. 

And here not for lack of witnesses, but of leisure to her 
them we must conclude.* And the only comment on their 
evidence shall be in the words of one of their own friends. 
" They who read with attention," says Le Clerc, " the his- 
tories of that century (the sixteenth) are fully satisfied that 
this latter form of government (the presbyterian) was intro- 
duced for this reason only because the bishops would not 
allow to them, who contended that the doctrine and manners 
of Christians stood in need of necessary amendment, 
that those things should be reformed which they complained 
were corrupted. Otherwise, if the Bishops every where, at 

if the Bishops that then were would have joined with them in the 
Reformation. This is evident for the German Churches, by the 
Augustan Confession and Apology, that Bishops might easily retain 
their places if they would ; they protest they are not guilty of the 
diminution of Episcopal authority," &c. The Serpent Salve, p. 604. 
* Because it would be endless even to refer to the unnumbered 
admissions on this point. There is a remarkable passage in the 
writings of Chemnitz which may be consulted Harmon. Evans;. 
cap. clxxiii. pp. 836, 7. ed. Gerhard ; the whole chapter pointing at 
Romish corruptions. Arminius, too, professes to grieve at the schism, 
and, like all the rest, to justify it by the "idolatry " of Popery, and 
the " tyranny " of the Pope ; Arminii Disput. Theolog. thesis xxii. 
13, 14, 15. pp. 213-15. See also Expos. Exact. Synod. Witeberga, 
De Ministris Ecclesiaa, where it is professed on the part of all the 
divines of that city and neighbourhood, that " all Bishops who teach 
the word of God, and suffer it to be taught, ought to ordain, and to 
receive the submission and obedience ofall.tJte other Ministers of the 
churches." The same thing was declared in the name of the whole 
Protestant party at the Ratisbon Conference, in the year 1541 ; and 
the language then employed in recognizing the Episcopal pre-emi- 
nence is so emphatic, that it would abundantly suffice for the pur- 
pose of this argument to refer to that one example alone : vide 
Goldast. Constitut. Imperial, torn. ii. p. 204, ed. Francofurt. 1673. 
" Seckendorff gives it as the general sentiment of the Protestant theo- 
logians, that the Bishops must retain their office, if they would dis- 
charge -'it purely ; Histor. Lulheranismi, torn. i. p. 176. Cf. Sleidan. 
lib. xiii. ann. 1540. p. 213. And see the Prqfessio Fidei Fratrum 
Waldensium, De Sacerdotii Ordine ; and the Confess. Fratr. Bohe- 
morum, apud F. Spanhemii Epitom. Isagog. ad Hist. Eccles. torn. ii. 
p. 827 : but, in truth, they never dreamed of rejecting Episcopacy, 
until it became a question, whether the Bishops should eject them, 
or they preserve their own power by casting out the Bishops. 



THEIR PLEA OP NECESSITY. 205 

that time, had been willing to do, of their own accord, what 
was not long after done in England, that Government had 
prevailed even to this day amongst all those who separated 
from the Romish Church; and the numberless calamities 
which happened, when all things were disturbed and con- 
founded, had then been prevented."* 

These earlier separatists, then, did not even pretend to 
use the- reasonings of our moderns, nor to assert any other 
ground of justification but that of invincible necessity. " We 
do embrace all faithful Bishops with all reverence," was their 
own repeated declaration ; " neither do we, as some falsely 
object against us, propose our example to any other Church 
to be followed."f And so well was this understood, both by 
Romanists^ and Anglicans, that we find intelligent and well 

* On the Choice of an Opinion amongst the different Sects of 
Christians, book i. 11 ; appended to Dr. Clarke's translation of 
Grotius, De Veritate, &c. p. 318. 

t Bezse Respons. ad Sarav. De Divers. GraA. ' Minist. cap. xxi. 
To which may be annexed, as a final testimony, the well-known 
confession of the Protestant divines at the Synod of Dort; who, 
when Bishop Carleton frankly, told them, that the want of Episco- 
pacy was the source of all their evils and divisions, made the fol- 
lowing reply : " That they had a great honour for the good order 
and discipline in the Church of England, and heartily wished they 
could establish themselves upon this model; but since they had no 
prospect of such a happiness, and since the civil government had 
made their desires impracticable, they hoped God would.be merciful 
to them." Vide Collier'^ Ecclesiastical History, part ii. book viii. 
p. 718. The author of the Remonstrant " Apology " says, that John 
Polyander, Thysius, and Wala?us all men of note at that time 
were present, and joined in making this confession to Bishop Carle- 
ton ; Apolog. contra Censuram, p. 233. 

i Vide Maimbourg, ann. 1530 ; Spondani Annul. Ecclesiast. ann. 
1530; Bossuet, Histoire des Variations des Eglises Protestantes, 
Pref. p. 31 ; and Gregory De Valentia, who says, "all the Protest- 
ants but the Anabaptists acknowledge three orders tres saltern of 
ministers;" and then he describes their notions of them ; Comment. 
Theolog. Disp. ix. De Sac. Ord. torn. iv. p. 1645, ed. Lugdun. 1603. 
De Mezeray, too, seems to have been so little suspicious of their 
desire to reject all Bishops, that, speaking of the affair of the Arch- 
bishop of Cologne, he says, it concerned the reputation of the Prot- 
estant party to maintain him in his archbishopric ; ann. 1583. p. 766. 
And lastly, when it was proposed at the Council of Trent, that the 
divine origin of Episcopacy should be formally asserted, it was 
answered by one of the Cardinal Legates, that it was unnecessary 
to do so, as that point was not amongst those which were dis- 
puted by the Lutherans. Vide Ruchat, Histoire de la Reformation de 
la Suisse, tome vi. p. 527; and Father Paul's History, lib. vi. ch. xi. 



206 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

informed persons expressing their astonishment at the rise 
of the new opinions. " I have often wondered," says Sir 
Henry Yelverton, " how comes it to pass that the sacred or- 
v der of Bishops should in this island meet with so many un- 
reasonable adversaries, when in all the reformed churches 
beyond the seas we are counted the only happy nation who 
enjoy the purity of doctrine with the primitive government."* 
And Hadrian Saravia who, by his familiar acquaintance 
with the continental divines, and his long residence amongst 
them, was still better qualified to speak on this subject 
professes himself quite taken by surprise, when Beza first 
ventured to defend on principle that Genevan polity which, 
as he observes, " was avowedly contrived only as a tempora- 
ry makeshift."! But enough, surely, has now been said to 
show, that in this respect, as in others already noticed, the 
separatists of our age are almost as far removed from those 
of the sixteenth century as they from the Catholic Church. 

(4.) It remains to be shown, in the last place, that the 
line of defence adopted by the first leaders of the Calvinistic 
and Lutheran sects, and illustrated in the foregoing citations, 
has received the only sanction of which it was capable, in 
the copious and humiliating confessions of the most devoted 
adherents to the cjiair of Rome. 

And keenly painful as it must be to Catholic sympathies 
to dwell, even for a moment, on such a subject, it would be an 
additional grief to be supposed to do so in that temper of un- 
reasoning hostility which has so long prevailed 'amongst us. 
If the errors which we have been taught to discern in the 
Roman Church be suqh as the widest charity cannot conceal 
or deny ;| if her degenerate sons have, as we suppose, dis- 

* See his Preface to Bp. Morton's Episcopacy asserted Apos- 
tolical. 

t De Divers, ftrad. Minist., Lectori. Saravia remarks, cap. vii., 
that he had always suspected " this device of mere necessity would 
in time be put forward as the true primitive discipline;" and so he, 
in common with Grabe and others, forsook his uncongenial asso- 
ciates, and sought refuge in the bosom of the Anglican Church. 

t " We do not (however) maintain that the Roman Church itself 
is fallen to ruin and desolation ; we grant it a true metaphysical 
being, though not a true moral being; we hope their errors are 
rather in superstructures than in fundamentals ; we do not say that 
the plants of saving truth, which are common to you and us, are 
plucked up by the roots in the Roman Church, but we say that thev 



THEIR PLEA OF JUSTIFICATION. 207 

honoured the Holy Fathers of blessed memory, profaned by 
irreverent definitions the " tremendous mysteries " of our 
religion, and in their zeal to expose " the fair beauty " of 
the Spouse of Christ, torn away the veil which screened her 
comeliness from common eyes ; if they have substituted a 
particular Church of the day for the Church Catholic of all 
ages, and the decrees of individual Popes for " the faith once 
delivered to the saints ;" if they have multiplied devices " to 
slay the souls that should not die, and to save the seuls alive 
that should not live," we at least in all this have no cause 
for rejoicing. Our own position, as a lonely and isolated 
people,* is without parallel or precedent in the history of the 
Church of Christ. We have reason enough ourselves, if we 
did but know it, to be putting on the vestments of mourn- 
ing."t And if we are ever again to be at one with our breth- 
ren, whom no estrangement can separate from our affections, 
it must be by mutual confession and mutual repentance, 
by laying aside, like our fathers of old,J the instruments of 
mirth, and desiring, like them, in the day of their penance, 
to "prefer Jerusalem " above every joy, and for her sake to 
resign the vain and carnal fancies which have beguiled us 
of our true riches, and darkened for a while the glories of 
our inheritance. 

In citing the following passages, t\ien, it is designed 
chiefly to explain and account for the reasonings which, as 
we have seen above, were so confidently urged by the " re- 
formed" teachers. And this, surely, is a sufficient object. 
Because it is evident, that the very admissions which tend, 

are overgrown with weeds, and in danger to be choked." Bram- 
hall, Jlnsicer to De la Militi&re, vol. i. p. 30. 

* Moi-os i0i. was the expressive rebuke once addressed to men 
with whom we have nothing in common but our unwilling separation 
from the rest of Christendom. Vide S. Cyril. Alex. Adv. Nestor. 
lib. ii. torn. vi. p. 60. " Non enim separatio facit schisma," says 
Cassander, " sed causa ;" and we comfort ourselves with the assurance, 
" aliud esse statum, aliud crhnen schismatis." Thorndike, De Rat. 
ac Jure finiend. Controv. p. 372. 

t " Lugent cuncta, tu latus es ; non miror plane, non miror, tibi 
evenisse mala qua? consecuta sunt " Salvian. De Gulernat. Dei. lib. 
vi. p. 144. " Noli ergo," was the admonition of another, " in com- 
paratione multitudinis gentium catholicarum de vestra paucitate glo- 
riari?' Aug. Contra Cresconium^ lib. iv. cap. liii When shall we 
learn to confess, that separation from the whole Christian world, even 
though it be our duly to abide in it, is not a matter of rejoicing? 

t Psalm cxxxvii. 



208 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

in whatever degree, to their justification, do but augment, in 
exactly the same proportion, the wilfulness of later sectaries. 
The concessions which serve to palliate the reluctant sins 
of the first Protestants are only an additional condemnation 
of their more lawless descendants, who " run" eagerly into 
"the same excess of riot," but who in this country at 
least have no such concessions to plead. 

The proximate cause of the great schism of the sixteenth 
century, the fans et origo mail, was the famous decree of 
Leo X. about Indulgences, in the year 1517, and the. mode 
in which that decree was carried into effect by the officials 
of the Roman Obedience. That the remonstrances of Lu- 
ther on this matter were, in the outset, just and wise, has 
been generally admitted by Romanists themselves. 

"Martin Luther," says one of their distinguished annal- 
ists, " taking occasion from no small abuses, which, in the 
promulgation of these Indulgences, and the collection of 
money-payments, were accustomed through avarice and im- 
prudence to be committed, began to inveigh against them. 
And from these sparks burst forth the flames, which, either 
by the revocation of the money-exactions, which were in no 
degree diminished, but, on the contrary, augmented by these 
events, or by a moderate sprinkling of water, might have 
been extinguished. And this the celebrated Cardinal Sa- 
dolet acknowledged and lamented ; saying, that much was 
done in this cause by the Catholic party which was ill-suited 
to such a crisis, neither was recourse had to any of the pru- 
dent remedies which were necessary in so great an evil" 
Sponclon adds his own confirmation of the Cardinal's sen- 
timents, and frankly admits that the vast corruption of the 
manners of the clergy was Luther's chief auxiliary"* 

A similar account of the same event is given by the his- 
toriographer of France. " The questors who were ap- 
pointed to sell the Indulgences furnished Luther," saysDe 
Mazeray, " with but too much matter. For they made traf- 

* Spondan. Annal. Ecdcsiast. ann. 1517. torn. ii. pp 327, 8 : - 
" Patrocinante ei maxime grand i morum Cleri corruptione," are the 
words used by Spondon Elsewhere he describes the same body as 
" Clerus corruplissimus," ann. 1524 : and again he speaks of " the 
Bishops and Clergy, who, by their profligate living, indolent sloth, 
or gross ignorance, were the occasion of this catastrophe ;" ann. 
1525, p. 375 : and these heavy charges he repeats again and again. 



THEIR PLEA OF JUSTIFICATION. 209 

fic and merchandise of those sacred treasures of the Church, 
they kept their courts or shops in taverns, and consumed 
great part of what they gained or collected in debauches. 
And it was certainly known besides, that the Pope intended 
to apply considerable sums to his own proper use."* This 
is an evil picture; but that which follows is far worse. 
"And truly," continues the same writer, "the extreme ig- 
norance of the clergy, many of them scarce able to read, the 
scandalous lives of the pastors, most of them concubinaries, 
drunkards, and usurers, and their total negligence, gave 
him a fair advantage to persuade the people that the religion 
they taught was corrupt, since their lives and examples were 
so bad."f It was not indeed wonderful, that the people, not 
accustomed to discriminate between the office and the indi- 
viduals who thus defiled it, should have made the reflection 
for themselves, which is here made for them by another. 

Again : the corruption which was so deep and extensive, 
appears also to have been of long standing. It was the com- 
plaint of the Ambassador Du Ferrier, on the part of France, 
in the year 1563, that " there are more titan one hundred and 
Jifty years past since the most Christian kings have de- 
manded of the popes a reformation of the ecclesiastical dis- 
cipline.";!: And the reformation said to have been so long 

* " A suscitargli nuovamente in Germania aveva dato occasione 
1'autorita della Sedia Apostolica, usata troppo licenziosamente da 
Leone, il quale seguitando nelle grazie, che sopra le cose spiritual!, 
e benefiziali concede laCorte, il consiglio di Lorenzo Pucci Cardinale 
di Santi Quattro, aveva sparso per tntto il mondo, senza distinzione 
di tempi, e di luoghi, indulgenze amplissime non solo per poter 
giovare con esse a quegli, che ancora sono nella vita presente, ma con 
faculta di potere, oltre a questo, liber are le anime dei defunti dalle 
pene del Purgatorio. Le quali cose non avendo in se ne verisimili- 
tudine, ne autorita alcuna, aveva concitatc in molti luoghi indegna- 
zione, e scandalo assai. Ma non si astenne da molte cose di pessimo 
esempio, e che dannate ragionevolmente da lui, erano molestissime 
a tutti." Guicciardini, Istorie d'ltalia, lib. xiii. 

t De Mezeray, History of France, ann. 1517, pp. 562, 3, ed. 
Bulteel. The same writer, referring to the well-known confessions 
of Marillac Archbishop of |Vienne, Montluc Bishop of Valence, and 
others, says, that " in France the Bishopricks, the Abbeys, and Col- 
legiate Churches, were often in the hands of military officers ;" and 
that these words used to be heard in their mouths, ' My Bishoprick,' 
* my Abbey,' my Canons,' &c. p. 960. Cf. Hallam, Europe during 
the Middle Jiges, ch. vii. vol. ii. p. 248; and Histoire dcs derniers 
Troubles de France, livre iv. p. 162 (ed. 1604). 

\ Father Paul's History of the Council of Trent, book viii. p. 



210 



ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 



desired, had been admitted to be necessary by Pope Alexan- 
der IV. so far back as the year 1259; that pontiff having re- 
buked at that time the "fcedissima scandala" of the Church, 
and bidden the rulers not to suffer the inferior clergy " to 
become examples to the people of public iniquity."* And 
things had obviously been getting worse and worse since 
that period, until at length another pope was constrained 
to make from his chair the miserable confession : " I know 
for how many years past there has been much to be abhor- 
red in the holy see, abuses in spiritual things, excesses 
even in things lawful, and, in fine, all things perverted to 
evil ; nor is it wonderful that sickness in the head should 
have extended to the limbs, and been communicated from 
the supreme pontiffs to the other inferior prelates." And so 
Adrian goes on to promise that he would give his zealous 
co-operation " nos omnem operam adhibituros" towards 
effecting the required reformation.t It is painful to know 
that this good resolve was thwarted; the prelates and the 
Roman court generally having taken great disgust at a pon- 
tiff with such unusual views ; and his successor, Clement 
VII., being of a very different character-! 

The admissions of Pope Adrian are, however, the more 
important, because, as a modern historian observes, in some- 
what disrespectful terms, " no pope was ever more bigoted 
or inflexible with regard to points of doctrine than Ad- 
rian," to which, this writer adds, " he adhered with the zeal 
of a theologian, and with the tenaciousness of a disputant." 
And yet even such a ruler did not hesitate to " acknowledge, 
in the most explicit terms, the corruptions of the Roman 

721, Brent's translation ; and see the proofs in De Thou, quoted by 
Claude, Defense, partie ii. ch. i. p. 95. Dr. White quotes " their 
own friends, as testifying that their Church had been for many ages 
notoriously defiled with the enortnitie of vices ;" Answer to a Jesuit, 
pp. 111,112: and Tillotson refers to Genebrard, Chronic, lib. iv., 
who says, " that for almost 150 years together, about 50 Popes did 
utterly degenerate from the virtue of their ancestors ;" Rule of Faith, 
part iii. 7. p. 718, Works, ed. 1699 : and the Archbishop produces 
many similar testimonies, from Roman Catholic writers, from the 
10th to the 16th century inclusive. 

* " Publici sceleris exemplum in populos transfundere." Vide 
Raynaldi Annal. Eccles. ann. 1259. 

t Citat. ap. Seckendorff, torn. i. pp. 254, 5. 

t Vide Onuphrius, De Vita Pontif. Hadriani VI. p. 355. There 
is a very gracious letter of Adrian's to Zuingle in the Life of the 
latter by Oswald Myconius. 



THEIR PLEA OF JUSTIFICATION. 211 

court to be the source from which had flowed most of the 
evils which the Church now felt or dreaded."* 

Nor was he alone in his honest but humiliating confes- 
sion. "How shall we pretend," was a question addressed 
to PopePaul III. by men no less eminent than the Cardinals 
Contarini, Caraffa, Sadolet, and Reginald Pole, "how 
shall we pretend to heal in other men the faults which are 
conspicuous amongst ourselves far beyond all others ?"f 

" I do not deny," said another, after offering an apology 
for the Roman Church, " that that same Church is far gone 
from her ancient beauty and splendour, deformed by many 
disorders and blemishes, and at times miserably oppressed 
by the tyranny of her rulers."! 

" There is at this day," said Cardinal Otho, " a vast 
number of pastors in the Church who are ' workers of ini- 
quity ;' men who attain to the Episcopate rather by the fa- 
vour of princes than their own merits; such as the prophet 
spoke of when he said,"^ &c. 

* Robertson's History of Charles V. book iii. vol. ii. pp. 244, 5. 

t Citat. ap. Sleidan. lib. xii. ann. 1537, p. 193. Spondon mentions 

the appointment of the same persons, with others, as a commission 

to reform " the depraved manners of the clergy." Ann. 1537, 

p. 446. 

\ " Quamvis non inficior, eandem illara Ecclesiam a prisco suo 
illo decore et splendore noti parura diversam, multisque morbis et 
vitiis deformatam, nonnunquam et gube/natorum tyrannide misera- 
biliter pressam." Cassander, De Officio Pit Viri, p. 786, ed. Paris. 
1616. So Onuphrius speaks of the " Apostolica? Sedis decus piene 
obscuratum ;" In Vita Pontif. Marcelli II. : and generally, of the 
Church, at the epoch of the reformation, as " fcedis abusibus corrupta." 
The same testimony, for earlier periods, may be seen even in Platina, 
Vit<B Pontijicum. 

See his Preface to Peter De Soto, De Institut. Sacerdot. Epist. 
The reader who wishes to see more on this melancholy subject may 
consult the Fasciculus Rerum Expetend. et Fugiend. Orthuin. Grat. 
edited by E. Brown, particularly the following documents : Julian! 
Cardinal. Jld Eugenium IV. Epist. torn. i. p. 59 ; the account of the 
general corruption by the University of Paris, pp. 68-71 ; Adrian's 
letter to the German Princes, p. 345; Pet. De Alliaco, Cardinal. 
Camerecens. De Reformatione Ecclesia, pp. 407-16 ; the strong 
statements of John Picus Mirandula, addressed to Leo X. De Mori- 
bus Reformandis, pp. 418, 19 ; Matt. De Cracovia, De Squaloribus 
Romance Ecclesite, lorn. ii. p. 585; Lindani Ruremundensis Episcopi 
De Perditissimis Cleri Moribus, p. 667 ; Geo. Wicelii Elench. Abu- 
suum, p. 745 ; the very titles of which compositions sufficiently 
indicate the nature of their contents, and the worst enemies of the 
Roman Church never gave a more dismal picture of her condition 



212 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

So much on the evils which produced the " reformation ;" 
the progress of that movement is accounted for, even by a 
Jesuit, on this ground, " that the ecclesiastics, who were 
for the most part greatly corrupted, and the monks, who 
were weary of their profession, heard with extreme satisfac- 
tion the preaching of that doctrine of liberty, by which their 
passions were so agreeably flattered."* An account of the 
matter which this writer does not seem to have understood 
was at least as disgraceful to the communion which they 
left, as conclusive against that which they joined. 

At length, however, for we must hasten to an end, the 
council was summoned which was to deal with these mighty 
evils. The very summoning of such an assembly was of 
course, in itself, a large concession ; but it led to others 
which were more precise and specific. The congregated 
fathers were first exhorted, by the legates of the holy see, 
"to address themselves to a serious reformation of man- - 
ners," in order to " take away from the heretics the pretext 
which they assigned for their revolt."t The persons so 
styled did therefore assert that pretext, and justly ; or why 
should these be admonished to remove it? And the whole 
question so far as the argument of these pages is con- 
cerned was finally settled, when the president himself, sit- 
ting in that council, did not scruple to condemn, as " the 
very source and origin of the new heresies, those disorders 
and corruptions w?tic7i had then so long prevailed." $ 

With these few citations, as being amply sufficient for 



than is set forth in these lamentations of her own servants. See also 
Andrew Fricius, De Ecclesia, lib. iv. cap. v. p. 241 ; and the Con- 
stitution of Pope Julius II. of the year 1505, referred to by De 
Mezeray, p. 945 ; and again, for the complaints of the civil authori- 
ties, see Goldast. Constitut. Imperial, torn. ii. p. 183 and p. 325; and 
Formul. Reform, ed. Lovanii, 1548. , 

* Maimbourg, ann. 1520. A similar statement is made by Flori- 
mond De Remond, L'jlnti-Papesse, ch. xvii. p. 134 , and see Alfons. 
De Castro, Jldv. Hcsres. lib. i. cap. xii. 

t Maimbourg, ann. 1545. 

$ " Qua? jam diu depravata atque corrupta, harum ipsarum 
haeresium, magna ex parte, causa origoque extitet." Orat. Prasid. 
Condi. Trident, sess. xi. ; cf. sess. xxv. Decret. de Indulgent., where 
the admission is repeated. The same thing is said by Cardinal 
Campeggio, Constit. ad removendos Abusus ; and by the Cardinals, 
Bishops, and others, at the conference of Poissy : De Mezeray, ann. 
1561, p. 676. 



TUE1R PLEA OF JUSTIFICATION. 213 

the present purpose,* this distasteful part of our subject 
might be closed. -There is, however, one writer, esteemed, 
I believe, amongst the most zealous and accomplished advo- 
cates of Rome in modern times, to whose remarkable lan- 
guage on this delicate point I wish to refer. Having, in 
many places of his useful and admirable writings, admitted 
without "reserve the grievous and widely spread corruptions 
of the period to which reference has been made, M. Moahler 
appears to have summed up, as it were, his reflections in 
the following affecting and deeply interesting passage, with 
which these remarks .shall be concluded. 

"It cannot be denied," he says, " that priests and bishops 
and popes, trampling under foot the most sacred duties, suf- 
fered too often the heavenly fire to be extinguished ; that 
many even quenched, by their disorders, the yet smoking 
brand. Catholics have nothing to fear from such confes- 
sions, and they never have shrunk from making them.t 

* Which is not to produce all that could be collected of this kind 1 
from such a task one might well shrink but only so much as 
would serve to distinguish, in an important particular, between the 
present race of Calvinists and Lutherans, and the first founders of 
those sects. I will add only one more confession, from the pen of a 
living writer ; who, describing the reaction of Catholicism in the latter 
part of the 16th century, says, " Many rallied round the standard 
of that primitive Church, which, with its accustomed prudence and 
calm, had already entered on several great measures of reform, which 
a certain relaxation of ecclesiastical discipline and the exigency of 
the times required;" Dublin Review, vol. x. p. 455; a statement 
(and this is my reason for quoting it) which obviously concedes 
much more than the writer intended. For how could an evil so 
slight as to be adequately described by the ambiguous phrase, " a 
certain relaxation of discipline," demand for its cure "several great 
measures of reform ?" 

t This we may admit ; but there are errors of another sort, against 
the faith of the ancient Church, which they cannot so easily excuse. 
Was it well, for instance, to use the very arguments of Aerius, as 
many of the Italian Bishops were taught to do at the Council of 
Trent, and, in order to elevate the Bishop of Rome, to refer the 
office of all other Bishops to a merely human institution ? Were 
these unfaithful teachers in a position to speak very severely of Pro- 
testant follies ? Vide Spondan. ann. 1562, pp. 628, 9 ; Leo Allatius, 
DC Ecc. Oecid. et Orient. peTpet. Conscns. lib. i. cap. iv. 14, who 
tries to derive the whole order from the Pope ; or Barbosa, De 
Epist. Offic. par. i. tit. i. cap. i. 32, 33, who even attempts to limit 
the succession to the same Patriarch. And so well was it under- 
stood that the Roman Court had taken this heresy under its protec- 
tion, that one could even dare to say of that once glorious see, 

10* 



214 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

How, indeed, is it possible to question the profound decay of 
the ministry, when the very existence of Protestantism is an 
irrefragable proof of it ? No ! never would such extrava- 
gances have seen the light, still less would they have been 
able to gain popularity, if the teachers of the people had 
been faithful to their calling. Learn, then, O Protestants, 
to measure the vastness of the abuses with which you re- 
proach us, by the enormity of your own errors. This is the 
ground upon which the two Churches will one day meet 
and become united. In the consciousness of our common 
sins, we ought to exclaim, both the one and the other, ' We 
have all failed, the Church alone could not err; we have all 
sinned, the Church alone is pure from every blemish. As 
for her, she remains for ever without spot."* 

The evidence which has now been offered upon each of 
the four points proposed for consideration might have been 
indefinitely extended. It is, however, sufficiently plain from 
. what has been already said, that the sectaries of our age 
and nation have wandered very far indeed from the princi- 
ples which their first masters and teachers thought it neces- 
sary to profess. This, of course, was to be expected. But 
it remains still to be shown, that, as in the general grounds 
of their separation with which alone we have been hitherto 
concerned the modern religionists have almost nothing in 

" Vescovado di ragion divina, opinione abhorrita a Roma .''' Istoria 
del Concilia Tridentino, di Pietro Soave, lib. ii. p. 406 ; who relates 
elsewhere lib. vii. p. 622 the shameless arguments of the Jesuit 
Lainez on the same subject. Or again, what shall be said of that 
body of which Lainez was the head, who, in France at least, were 
often the open enemies of the bishops, and were allowed to boast, 
" se sine Episcoporum approbatione ac benedictione uonscendere 

pulpita, conciones habere, suscipere poenitentes, &c Quomodo 

subsunt Episcopis ?" Hospinian, De Doctrina Jesuitarum, p. 249. 
Archbishop Bramhall had surely some reason to say, " Episcopal 
rights and papal claims are inconsistent." Vindication of Grotivs, 
ch. iv. p. 619. 

* La Symbolique, tome ii. pp. 33, 34. Cf. tome i. p. 361, where 
he admits that the Protestants were " engages dans 1'erreur par de 
nombreuz et de deplordbles abus, specialement par 1'indifference et la 
tiedeur des Catholiques." All this should at least teach the advocates 
of Rome a little more gentleness of tone, when they undertake to 
rebuke those whose present condition has been mainly caused by 
the very errors and corruptions, which they are willing enough to 
confess, but not willing to amend. Has Rome alone a dispensation 
to sin without repentance ? 



CALVIN. 215 

common with the contemporaries of Calvin and Luther, ex- 
cept their violence and self-will ; so, in the particular ques- 
tion of the submission due to the Bishops of the Church, as 
governors appointed by the ordinance of God, they are no 
less at variance with them than with the whole body of the 
saints during the first fifteen ages of Christianity.* On this 
point, too, Calvin shall be first heard. 

II. And in searching for the judgment of this " re- 
former," it seems right to refer in the outset to some part of 
his writings in which the subject of Church-polity is for^ 
mally considered. It is in such a place that we may expect 
to find his mature and deliberate sentiment. And it would 
be unfair, perhaps, to take advantage of concessions made 
at other times, until we had first tried him by this test. Let 
it be applied at once. It was, then, whilst discussing mi- 
nutely and elaborately the constitution of the Christian 
Priesthood, when we may suppose him to have been espe- 
cially on his guard, that Calvin wrote as follows. 

" It will be profitable in these questions to review the 
form of the Ancient Church, which will exhibit to our glance 
a kind of representation (or image) of the divine institution. 
For although the bishops of those times promulgated divers 
canons, in which they may appear to set forth more than is 
expressed in the Sacred Scriptures, yet with such heedful- 
ness did they arrange their whole system according to that 
one prescript form contained in the word of God, that you may 
easily perceive that they held in this particular almost no- 
thing which varies from that word."i" This is indeed a full 
and unreserved admission, nor does it want the confirmation 
which is supplied by the reiteration of similar statements. 

Thus far we see only that Calvin defended in general 
terms the conciliar decrees of the primitive bishops, and their 

* " Non a nobis longiua, et ab Apostolica Catholica Christi Ec- 
clesia, quam a doctissimis fratribus suis, sat scio, a magno Isaaco 
Casaubono, et optimo sene Petro Molinaeo, abeuntes." Hammond, 
Dissert. Quatuor, Prsefat. The learned Durell, who had travelled 
in foreign countries, and taken great pains to investigate this very 
matter, says, of his own knowledge, " that the Puritans differ in 
their notions of ecclesiastical polity from all the reformed commu- 
nions, whose members teach and affirm, uno ore, that the faithful 
are bound to be in subjection to the Bishops of the reformed Church " 
Vindic. Eccles. Anglican. Prsef. 

t Citat. ap. Hadrian. Sarav. ad Bezae Satan. Episcopal, p. 87 



216 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

whole system of Church-discipline, as harmonizing with 
the records of Holy Scripture. The next passage will show 
more exactly what form of polity he had in his mind when 
he pronounced this opinion. He describes it, in his own 
words, as follows : 

" That every province had among their bishops an arch- 
bishop, and that patriarchs were appointed by the Council 
of Nice who should be in order and dignity above the arch- 
bishops: this was done for the preservation of discipline. 
It must, however, be observed, with reference to this point, 
that the usage was of rare occurrence. For this cause, there- 
fore, especially were those degrees appointed, that if any 
thing should happen in any particular church, which could 
not be safely resolved by a few, reference should be made to 
a provincial synod. If the importance or difficulty of the 
case required yet further consultation, then the patriarchs 
were added to the synodal congress, from which there was 
no appeal but to a general council. This order of govern- 
ment some have termed hierarchy an improper name, in 
my judgment, and certainly not to be found in the Scrip- 
tures ;.-... but if, omitting the phrase, we shall consider 
the thing itself, we shall fold that those ancient bishops sought 
to frame no other mode of church-government than that which 
God hath prescribed in His Word. 3 '* We have only to 
add, that the English 'hierarchy' received no less energetic 
commendation from the same person ;t and Calvin becomes 
a fatal witness indeed, as against his own inventions on the 
one hand, so against the more licentious novelties of his dis- 
ciples on the other. 

But his admissions do not stop here. It is not only as in 
no degree contrariant to the word of God that he eulogizes 
the discipline of the early Church he goes further, and af- 
firms openly that Episcopacy was of divine institution. 
" The Episcopate itself," said he, referring to the uncan- 
onical customs and uncatholic traditions of modern Rome, 
" had its appointment from God. The office of a bishop was 

* " Verum si rem, omisso vocabulo, intuemur, reperiemus veteres 
Episcopos non aliam regendae Ecclesiae for mam voluisse fingere ab 
ea quam Deus verbo suo prascripsit." Institut. lib. iv. cap. iv. 4. 

t Even Daille confesses that " Calvin honoured all Bishops that 
were not subjects of the Pope, . . . such' as were the Prelates of 
England." Quoted by Bingham, ubi supra, ch. iv. vol. viii. pp. 211, 



CALVIN. 2J7 

instituted by the authority and defined by the ordinance of 
God."* And there can be no question made as to the na- 
ture of the office which he here contemplates, because he 
is addressing himself in this very passage to one of his for- 
mer friends, who had lately been consecrated a bishop of 
the Roman communion. And how disingenuous and unreal 
would such language have been, if he were covertly alluding 
to some new theory of the Episcopate, with which that pre- 
late must have been utterly unacquainted ! It is plain that 
he could not make such a statement to a bishop, unless he 
meant it of his office. This, I suppose, would have been 
quite certain, even if he had said no more ; but he fully ex- 
plains and limits his own meaning when he adds, in the next 
sentence, " Thou hast been appointed a bishop ; with thce is 
present the authority of the Apostle Paul." And he adds, 
" Either do the work of a bishop, or resign your Episcopal 
chair." Again, in his letter to the King of Poland, which has 
been already cited, as he recommends to the sanction of that 
prince a new and " extraordinary " ministry, on the avowed 
understanding that it should be regarded as a " merely tem- 
porary " institution, and should give way, on the accom- 
plishment of certain definite objects, to a "more proper 
order" so he consistently describes to the same monarch 
the office of the archbishops and patriarchs of the primitive 
Church, and the ends for which those officers would serve in 
Jiis kingdom. 

Again, being consulted as to what must be done if any of 
the Roman bishops should join the party of the reformation, he 
says not a word about robbing him of his sacred dignity, 
which, as he knew, the hoJy councils, for which he pro- 
fessed so great reverence, had declared to be " sacrilege;"! 
but simply enjoins that such bishop " must purge all the 
churches belonging to Ids bishopric from all errors and from 
the worship of idols," whilst he himself, by his example, 
should point out the way to all the clergy of Ids' diocese " (he 
was, therefore to retain his office and authority), " and per- 
suade them to receive the reformed doctrine.":!: And accord- 

* " Epjscopatus ipse a Deo profectus est. Episcopi rnunus Dei 
auctoritate constitutum est et legibus definitum." Veteri jSmico mine 
Prtesuli, Epist. 

t 'En-tmrajrov sis irpetrflvrepoT} jSattycSv estpsiv tzpoa>v\!a larl. Concil. Chttl- 
cedon. can. xxix. 

\ Cf.. Epist. cclxxii. Episcopo Wiadislaviensi, p. 499 ; and his in- 



218 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

ingly, in the famous conflict between the archbishop of Co- 
logne and the canons of that church, Calvin took part 
warmly and vehemently, as was his wont, with that prelate, 
and, in common with the whole Protestant party, would have 
kept him in his office, if the power of Rome had not proved 
too strong for them.* 

Nor was this the only instance in which he attempted to 
vindicate the authority of the Episcopate from the usurpa- 
tions of Rome. We have heard his admiration of the an- 
cient episcopal decrees ; he was accustomed, as we shall 
now see, to appeal to them in the same controversy. 

vocation to all the Catholic Bishops, Praifat. in edit. Gallic. Nov. 
Test. p. 142. 

* Maimbourg relates, after his manner, that when the Archbishop 
Gebhard desired to marry the Countess Agnes of Mansfeld, it was 
represented to him by his friends the Counts of Solms and Nieuver, 
that " to accomplish his desires he had only to turn Lutheran, after 
the example of the Bishops of Germany, Sweden, and Denmark ; 
to whom it had been permitted to marry, and yet to retain their 
bishoprics ;" livre vi. ann. 1581. I notice this to show, that men in 
those days were so far from supposing that the reformed party re- 
jected Episcopacy on principle, that they even joined that party, in 
some cases, lest they should lose their bishoprics. Other Prelates did 
so, no doubt, from purer motives, and in every case were continued 
in their offices, until, not the Protestants, but the Romanists turned 
them out. A remarkable instance, among many others,' is that of 
Bishop Michael Sidonius ; and again, that of John Antony Caraccioli, 
Bishop of Troyes,\who, as De Thou relates, continued to govern his 
diocese till the King forcibly ejected him. The same writer adds, 
" that this example of Caraccioli was looked upon by the adverse 
party to be a matter of such dangerous consequence, that they 
laboured with all their might to ruin him, and never ceased till 
they had prevailed with the King to force him to quit his station." 
ducted by Bingham, -ubi supra-. Du Moulin, who notices other in- 
stances, adds, " the Archbishop of Vienne and the Bishop of Orleans 
were once about to have done as much, and would have found the 
like obedience from the Protestant party, but the great stream of 
the state proved too strong for them." And he goes on to show, 
from examples, that " nothing had been more eagerly opposed by 
the Pope and his creatures than that the Protestants should have 
Bishops." So that when " some of their prime men," seeing the 
evil consequences of presbytery, applied to Cardinal Richelieu to 
permit the appointment of Bishops, " pretending that it would bring 
them nearer to the Roman Church, he flatly denied to give way to 
it, and told them, ' if you had that Order, you would look too like a 
Church." Novelty of Popery, Praef. A similar answer was given 
by Cardinal Barberini ; see Stillingfleet, Unreasonableness of Separa- 
tion, Preface, p. 9. 



CALVIN. 219 

" Show us," was his challenge to Cardinal Sadolet, " if 
there be any traces amongst you of that holy and just disci- 
pline which the ancient bishops administered in the Church. 
Have ye not treated all their appointments with contempt ? 
Have ye not trodden under foot all the canons?"* And 
then, that we may know to what canons he alluded, he 
asks, " Where are those ancient canons, with which, as 
with bands, the bishops and presbyters used to be restrained 
in their office? After what manner are bishops elected 
amongst you ?"t And he goes on to assert, what they could 
not themselves gainsay, that they had long since reduced 
those canons to a dead letter. 

And the same charge he proposes, in another place, as a 
sufficient answer to their claims to the true succession ; of 
which, far from denying its intrinsic value, he says, " I 
would in truth that this possession of which they boast, they 
had preserved hy their own merit."^ And as he thus dis- 
owned whether justly or not, is no part of our present 
inquiry the force of their appeal to the unbroken succes- 
sion, so he replied to their claim of alliance with the primi- 
tive Fathers in a similar way. " As if," said he, " the holy 
Fathers, when they lauded the ecclesiastical hierarchy and 

* Atl Cardinalem Sadoletum Responsio. Men might well despair 
of procuring a return to ancient customs, when a Pope had said, 
" Cavendum est ne obtentu renovandi pristinos Ecclesiae canones, 
quidquam in Synodo stutuatur, quod contrarium sit posteris legi- 
bus !" P. Benedict. XIV. De Synod. Diascesan. lib. xi. cap. iv. 4. 
While, on the other hand, Cardinal Cusa quotes the saying of Pope 
Zozimus ; " contra statuta Patrum aliquid condere vel mutare, nee 
Jiuj'tismodi sedis potest auctoritas." De Concordant. Cathol. lib. ii. 
cap. xx., between these two authorities there would be some per- 
plexity in coining to a decision. 

t Utii supra. John Sturtnius even appeals to the judgment of 
the Cardinal himself " conscientiam tuam appello" whether the 
Canons were not utterly despised by the Romish party, and prays 
that a reformation may be conceded according to them." " Reddite 
Pontifices," he says, " concedite Episcopos, date diaconos, permittite 
metropolitanos, revocate patriarclias,instauretur vetus disciplina, cor- 
rigatur doctrina, nos manus libenter dabimus, etiam cervices si sit 
opus," &c. Surely there is not much in common between this 
Genevan doctor and our modern. * presbyterians ?' Yet Sturmius 
was in such honour with his own party, that they employed him 
as a legate in France and elsewhere. Sleidan, lib. xviii. ann. 1546. 
p. 322., 

- i " TJtinam veto quam jactant possessionem, suo merito retinuis- 
sent." De Reformanda Ecdesia. 



220 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

the spiritual rule, as it was derived to them by succession 
from the Apostles, dreamed of such a chaos of ruin and 
desolation !"* Again and again he calls upon them to ex- 
amine themselves by their canons, as he knew, unhappily, 
their own wisest rulers feared to do. " It is against these 
modern inventions that we contend, not against those holy 
and edifying constitutions of the Church which tend either 
to the preservation of discipline, or purity, or peace ;"t 
and these venerable constitutions he had declared to be 
" the canons of the primitive bishops." The bishops them- 
selves, as distinct from the pope, he did not, then, to use his 
own word, " dream" of rejecting: how could he, when his 
v very challenge was, that their rightful jurisdiction should be 
restored to them, and he had himself subscribed the Augus- 
tan Confession, which professed the most earnest solicitude 
for the preservation of their order ? His whole argument, 
whatever may be thought of its cogency, is a plea for . the 
restoration of that pure and primitive government which 
was then so miserably corrupted. It is you, he protests, 
who have fallen away from the customs of the primitive 
bishops. You are enemies of Christ, you have defiled even 
your blessings, you have changed the ancient and holy order. 
The Fathers never countenanced, nor would they tolerate, 
this shameless usurpation of one bishop over all the rest. 
And then he sums up all, and declares his own judgment, in 
the well-known passage : " Let them give us such an Hie- 
rarchy, .in which the Bishops may so bear rule, that they 
refuse not to submit to Christ, and to depend upon Himuas 
their only Head" (referring to the assumed headship of the 
Bishop of Rome) ; "let them be so united together in a 
brotherly concord, as that His truth shall be their only bond 
of union : then, indeed, if there shall be any who will not 
reverence them, and pay them the most exact obedience, there 
is no anathema but I confess them worthy ofit."$ 

* Institut. lib. iv. cap. v. 13. 

t Institut. lib. iv. cap. x. 1. 

t De Reformanda Ecclesia. And " this is the more remarkable,' ' 
as Bishop Morton observes, " because the tractate wherein those 
words are, is written professedly concerning the reformation of 
churches." Some have tried to weaken their force, fay supposing 
that the writer spoke here under the influence of some unusual and 
transient feeling: "but ^Calvin," as a very acute judge has re- 
marked, " was no enthusiast 5" Archbishop Lawrence, Tracts, vol. ii. 



CALVIN. 221 

Conclusive as these various passages must be confessed 
to be, so far as respects the purpose for which they are 
here cited, there is one circumstance in the history of Calvin 
which adds tenfold weight to the impression which they are 
calculated to produce. And to this circumstance some 
reference shall now, in the last place, be made. 

It was not, we shall find, only in the outset of his career 
when his concessions might be referred to the - lingering 
prejudices of habit and education, or he might seem, to be 
too much occupied in the work of pulling down to have lei- 
sure for the more arduous task of building up again that 
Calvin offered this fatal testimony against his own errors. 

p. 8. Others, again, have used a different method, and cut it out 
of his writings ! " That most perspicuous passage of Calvin, wherein 
he declareth, ' they deserve to be anathematized who reject Episco- 
pacy where k may be retained' which is really to pronounce an 
anathema on all A our English sectaries is quite purged out in the 
two later editions of Beza and Gelasius!" Shaw's JVo Reformation 
of the established Reformation, p. 172 ; and again, " What was 
to be found in the Argentorate edition of Bucer is left out in the 
Genevan, as Grotius informs us." Ibid. The same author quotes 
other like cases of the Puritans in England; and it seems to have 
been a favourite policy with these religionists in every country. 
Gerard Voss tells Grotius that Calvin himself cut out of Bucer's 
works what displeased him, and published at Geneva a ?' castrated" 
edition; Vir. Erudit. Epistolce, no. 571. p.- 818. A Polish Socinian 
complains, that one of the editors of Calvin's letters did the same 
by them ; Lubieniecii Hist. Reformat. Pulonicts, lib. ii. cap. ii. 
p. 44. Mcehler re'fers to passages of Melancthon's writings similarly 
omitted; La Symbolique, tome i. pp. 25,26. BramhaJI says that 
" Blondel, in his needless apology for St. Hierome, made a very 
necessary apology for himself, and sent it to Mr. Rivet to be added 
as an appendix to his book in the impression of it, by whose neglect 
it was omitted." Vindication of Grotius, ch. iv. p. 621. "Monsieur 
Amyrald," says another, " declared himself a friend to Episcopacy 
in a select tractate sent hither, which one of that party (the puritan) 
borrowed, and would never restore, and so it could not be printed." 
Life of Bishop Hacket, p. 55. See Nelson's Life of Bishop Bull 
p. 217, for another example of this ingenuity. Wesley's application 
of Numbers xvi. to those of his preachers who should presume to 
exercise the functions of the sacred ministry, has been prudently 
omitted, in like manner, by recent editors of his works. / And it 
appears that formerly sectaries used even to intercept writings likely 
to be disadvantageous to their cause. A person writing from Ger- 
many, A. . 1534, to Ridley and another, complains that this was a 
common trick. See the letter prefixed to the Antwerp edition "of 
S. Isidore, De Ecc. Off. (1534). Such a warfare, it may be pre- 
sumed, would hardly prosper in the long run. 



222 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

Even in that case, it would have been effectual to confound 
both himself and his more audacious scholars. But it was 
after his work was done, so far as he prevailed to accomplish 
it, and his ambition sated to the full ; "after his own new sys- 
tem had been firmly established, and he had ascended the 
throne of that empire which he prudently permitted his fol- 
lowers to call a republic, but in which he ruled alone with 
more than regal or pontifical sway ; it was after he had 
tasted the sweets of almost unlimited power, that he was 
compelled once more, either by the secret sting of con- 
science, or the impulse of that Power which " taketh the 
wise in their own craftiness," to bear fresh witness to the truth 
which by bold acts he had ventured to contemn. The- cir- 
cumstances of his application to the English Church for the 
restoration of the divine office of the Episcopate are related by 
one who, as is well known, was deeply imbued with his own 
principles. Archbishop Abbott was no enemy to Calvin ;* 
and it is in his words that the following account is given. 

" Perusing some papers," he says, " of our predecessor 
Matthew Parker, we find that John Calvin, and others of 
the Protestant Churches of Germany and elsewhere, would 
Tiave had Episcopacy if permitted, but could not upon seve- 
ral accounts ; partly, fearing the other princes of the Roman 

Catholic faith would have joined with the Emperor and the rest 

of the Popish Bishops, to have depressed the same ; partly, 

being newly reformed, and not settled, they had not sufficient 

wealth to support Episcopacy, by reason of their daily per- 

secutions.t Another, and a main cause was, they would 

* " Abbott considered Christian religion no otherwise than as it 
abhorred and reviled popery, and valued those most who did that 
most furiously .... and having himself made very little progress in 
the ancient and solid study of divinity, he adhered only to .the doc- 
trine of Calvin." Clarendon's History, vol. i. p. 157. Benzelius 
calls him " magnus ille presbyterana: sectcs fautor e't indulgentis- 
simus patronus." Dissert. Historico-Theolog. de J. Dureco, p. 18. 
ed. Helmstad. 

t Another reason which they assigned in their own behalf de- 
serves notice. Gerard- Brandt reports that the magistrates of Ant- 
werp were especially averse to the creation of the new Bishops in 
the Netherlands by Pope Pius IV., because " the infallible fruit of 
it (the presence of a Bishop) would be the "Inquisition." History 
of the Reformation in the Low Countries, book v. vol. i. p. 134, 
English edit. Cf. Famian Strada De Bella Belgico, lib. ii. ; Davila 
Delle Guerre Civili di Francia, lib. ii. p. 61. The two were not 
unusually connected together ; so that De Meteren, speaking of 



CALVIN. 223 

not have any Popish hands laid over their clergy. And 
w,hereas John Calvin had sent a letter in King Edward VI' s 
reign, to have conferred with the clergy of England about 
some things to this effect, two Bishops, viz. Gardiner and 
Bonner, intercepted the same, whereby Mr. Calvin's over- 
ture perished ; and he received an answer, as if it had been 
from the reformed divines of those times, wherein they 
checked him and slighted his proposals ! From which time 
John Calvin and the Church of England were at variance on 
several points, which otherwise, through God's mercy, had 
been qualified, if those papers of his proposals had been dis- 
covered unto the Queen's Majesty during John Calvin's life. 
But being not discovered until or about the sixth year of her 
Majesty's reign, her Majesty much lamented they were not 
found sooner ; which she expressed before her Council at 
the same time, in the presence of her great friends, Sir 
Henry Sidney and Sir William Cecil."* 

With this curious and interesting narrative our reference 

to the testimony of Calvin may very appropriately be con- 
cluded. How far these passages in his life may have availed 
towards his own justification, it is beyond the province of 
his fellow-men to judge. One thing is certain, that when 
they who have not feared to defend and perpetuate, upon 
wholly new grounds,! that human system which he first de- 

such appointments of new Bishops, notices as the popular objection, 
" qu'on ne devoit pas en un tel temps introduire . . . quelques Eves- 
ques, et quelque changement, beaucoup moins quelque nouvelle In' 
quisition, si odieuse au peuple." Histoire des Pays Bas, liyre ii. 
fol. 32. And this is confirmed by Cardinal Bentivoglio in his His- 
tory of Flanders, p. ii. ch. i. p. 63. No wonder, then, that the 
people were afraid of Bishops. 

* Vide Strype, Life of Parker, vol. i. p. 140. The same diligent 

compiler has recorded how the foreign Protestants " took such great 
joy and satisfaction in this good king (Ed ward VI.) and his estab- 
lishment of religion, that the heads of them, Bullinger, Calvin, and 

others, in a letter to him, offered to make him their defender, and to 

have Bishops in their churches, as there were in England, with the 
tender of their advice to assist and unite together." And then 
Strype describes the arts by which the Romanists strove to prevent 
this union, and to bring Episcopacy into discredit. Life of Cranmer, 
vol. i. pp. 296, 7. 

* t Compare, for instance, the language of the Scotch presbyterians 
with that which has been quoted in this chapter. " This cursed 
Papistrie" is the phrase applied to Episcopacy in the First Booke of 

Scottish Discipline. " Archbishops and Bishops," thev say, " are 



224 ADMISSIONS OF -ADVERSARIES. 

vised, but afterwards desired to abandon, shall have followed 
him to his present abode, they, at least, will have no such 
justification to plead.* 

III. Theodore Beza, Calvin's successor at Geneva, may 
be heard next ; and as so much space has been allotted to 
the founder himself of the new discipline, the confessions of 
his disciples must be set down in as few words as possible. 

To have wrested Beza from the adversaries would in- 
deed have been an easy task, even if his admissions had 
been much more wary than we shall find them to have been. 
Take, for instance, the two following passages. He is 
speaking in the first of the holy cecumenic Council of Nicaea, 

unlawful!, unnatural, false, and bastardlie governors of the church, 
and the ordinances of the devil." Presbyterian sayings, quoted 
by Bancroft, Dangerous Positions, chap. xii. Ames declares of the 
English puritans, " they hold that inequality of churches and church- 
officers in ecclesiastical jurisdiction and authority was that princi- 
pally advanced Antichrist unto his throne." Ames' English Puritans, 
ch. ii. 9. Dr. Owen calls Episcopacy, " a mere antichristian en- 
croachment on God's inheritance." Thanksgiving Sermon, Oct. 1651. 
And this vast difference of opinion between the British and conti- 
nental Protestants seems to have been noted with good effect in the 
very beginning of this controversy : see The Aberdeen Demands . 
about the Covenant, with Answers and Replies, 13th Demand, p. 32, 
ed. 1638. Dr. Hacket, in his famous speech before the long Parlia- 
ment, told them, that the foreign Protestants were all accustomed to 
acknowledge the superior felicity of the English Church, and to envy 
it : and Dr. Steward, with the same plainness, reminded the Par- 
liamentary Commissioners, of whom Henderson was one, at the 
treaty of Uxbridge, 1644, that " the most learned men of the foreign 
churches had lamented that their reformation was not so perfect as 
it ought to be, for want of Episcopacy." Clarendon, book viii. vol. v. 
pp. 52 and 55. ed. Oxon. Could they have made such statements in 
the very presence of their adversaries, if there had been any possi- 
bility of denying them ? 

* It is easy, however, to foresee that our brethren will resign 
their great Master as soon as he is found to witness against then). 
Indeed some of them appear to have done so already. " When I 
quoted the admission of Calvin about the Episcopate," says an Eng- 
lish clergyman who visited Geneva in the year 1835, " they said at 
once, ' We go much further now than Calvin did, and do not call him 
or any other our Master.' " Vide Palmer's Illustrations of the Lati- 
tudinarian development of the original Calvinistic community, p. 45 
Observe, too, how like these men are in all ages: "Ego non a 
Manichaeo didiei," said the Manichasan Felix, when referred to his 
Master's words, " sed a Cliristo didici !" Aug. DC Metis cum Felice, 
lib. ii. cap. xx. torn. vi. p. 216. 



BEZA. 225 

of which he declares, " No man was ever yet found to have 
opposed himself to this Council, whom God did not by some 
tremendous judgment destroy"* In the second, his subject 
includes the Councils of Ephesus and Chalcedon ; and of 
these again he professes, that " from the departure of the 
Apostles themselves the sun never looked upon any assembly 
more holy or more majestic."t Now, in each of these holy 
Councils of the primitive Church the authority and pre- 
eminence of the Bishops of Christ, and the allegiance due to 
them by the other orders .of the clergy, is asserted in lan- 
guage such as in these days we hardly venture even to 
repeat.! Beza, therefore, in speaking against Episcopacy, 
has displayed a hardihood and levity which it is painful to 

* " Nicenum Concilium sacrosanctum, .... cui nemo adbuc 
inventus est qui sese opponeret, quern Deus horrendo judicio non 
perdiderit." Epist Ivi. The 8th canon of this Council decrees, Ira 
pi iv TIJ TrdXti <Fuo iiriaKOTt-n uaiv. 

t " Amplissimus ille Nicense, Ephesinse, Chalcedonensis Synodt 
consessus, quo nihil unquam sanctius, nihil augustius ab Apostolo- 
rum excessu sol unquam aspexit." Epist. Ixxxi. Elsewhere, writing 
against an Arian, he says, that even to question whether the Fathers 
of Nicaea, Ephesus, and Chalcedon, held the true knowledge of God, 
is to be unworthy a place in the Church ; Libell. de Valentin. Gentil. 
Praefat. p. 19. Cf. DC Ecclesia, cap. v. Martin Bucer says of these 
early Fathers, that " Christ lived, taught, and wrote in them in eis 
vixit, docuit, et scripsit;" In Sacra Exang. Prsefat. ; and see his 
Apolog. de Casna Domini, Opp. p. 670 : as also Cranmer, Works, 
vol. ii. p. 14. ed. Oxon. 1833. The Synod of Paris in 1559 says, on 
behalf of the French Reformed Churches, Art. vi., " We allow of 
that which those four ancient Councils have determined ; and we 
detest all sects and heresies condemned by those holy ancient doc- 
tors, St. Athanasius, St. Hilary, St. Cyril, and St. Ambrose." Quick's 
Synodicon,\o\.i. p. 7: and part of the confession required of the 
students at the academy of Geneva, previous to its apostasy, was, 
" I abhor all the heresies which have been condemned by the first 
Council of Nice, the first of Ephesus, and that of Chalcedon." Vide 
Kuchat, Histoire de la Reformation de la Suisse, torn. vii. p. 291. 
With such confessions, the refutation of ' presbyterianism ' is not a 
very difficult task. 

See, for instance, the 6th canon of Constantinople 70 years 
earlier than Chalcedon which ranks separation from the Bishop 
with the most heinous heresies ; the 29th of Chalcedon, as has been 
noticed, makes it "sacrilege " to degrade a Bishop to the rank of a 
presbyter; and see can. iv. and can. viii. The historian says of the 
Nicene Canons, "Imperator decretum Episcopale complectitur ;" 
Sulpicius Scverus, Hist. Sac. lib. ii. p. 138: and see the remarks of 
John of Salisbury upon the conduct of the Emperor during the ses- 
sion of that Council ; De Nugis Curinf.ium, lib. iv. cap. iii. 



226 ADMISSIONS OF AI>VERSARIES. 

contemplate. But it must be confessed that, in spite of 
much heretical argumentation and the strangest inconsis- 
tency, he never seems to have quite forgotten that he had 
written such words as the above. 

Thus it will be observed, I think, that in all his writings 
he has not once ventured to defame the discipline of the 
Church, without the addition of some qualification restricting 
his censures to RomisJt corruptions. " In all which I have 
written against the Romish Hierarchy," he says himself, in 
a letter of May, 1591, quoted by Durell, " I have not even 
alluded to the Polity of the Anglican Church, which to im- 
pugn, or even to notice, was at no time in my thoughts."* 
How far this assertion may have been strictly true, is per- 
haps no concern of ours. If he chose to separate our 
branch of the Catholic Church from others, and to concede 
to us the perfection which he denied to them, it was open to 
him to do so. And though we shall willingly acknowledge 
that his testimony in our favour is worth nothing, yet it 
must be admitted to fall heavily upon our enemies ; it may 
do us no good, but it does them serious harm ; they are 
cast, to use the world's language, by a jury of their own 
choosing. <- 

The distinction between primitive and papal Episcopacy, 
so commonly noticed by the first Protestants, finds a fre- 
quent place in Beza's writings. The latter he characterized 
as a corrupt and tyrannical system ; but he adds, " We do 
not accuse all Archbishops and Bishops of the present day 

* Vindic. Eccles. Anglican, cap. xxxiv. p. 529. " If we some- 
times speak against the authority of Bishops," saysDu Moulin, " we 
condemn not Episcopal order in itself, but speak only of the corrup- 
tion which the Church of Rome has introduced into it." Buckler of 
Faith, p. 345, quoted by Bingham, vol. viii. p. 204. The same thing 
is said by Andreas, Hyperaspist. in Prolegom. J. Brentii, p. 61 ; by 
Lubbert, De Papa, lib. vi. cap. i. p. 483 ; by Wbittaker against Bel- 
larmine, as Bramhall notices, Serpent Salve, p. 597 ; and even by 
some of the promoters of the Scotch Covenant, though of course they 
could not have been sincere in saying so : see Gauden's Analysis of 
the Scottish Covenant (1660), who adds, that "the most learned and 
godly Presbyterians >: of his time were favourable to " that ancient, 
noble, and venerable fabric of Episcopacy ;" pp. 21, 22. See also 
the collection entitled Confessions and Proofes of Protestant Divines 
of Reformed Churches, p. 9. How well did Tertullian describe such 
' reformers ' as these : " timet damnare, quod damnat ; timet odisse, 
quod noh amat ; factum sinit, quod fieri non sinit !" Adv. Marcio- 
nem, lib. i. cap. xxvii. p. 450. 



BEZA. 



227 



of this tyranny. What arrogance would such a charge im- 
ply ! Nay rather, if they follow the example of those holy 
Bishops (of former times), and seek to restore the house of 
God, now miserably decayed, by the rule of His word, what 
hinders us to acknowledge them as faithful pastors of the 
Christian Church, to obey, and to honour them with all re- 
verence 1 We do not, as some most falsely and most impu- 
dently object to us, propose our own peculiar example to 
be followed by other Churches, like those rash men who 
think nothing right of which they are not themselves the 
authors."* 

Again : " If your English Church be supported by the 
authority of Bishops and Archbishops and it has possessed 
many of that order, who were not only illustrious martyrs of 
God, but also most eminent- pastors and doctors, let it en- 
joy that singular benefit of God, which I trust He may pre- 
serve to it for euer."f 

Again : " If there be any which, however, you will not 
easily induce me to believe who reject the whole order of 
Episcopacy, God forbid that any man in his senses should 
'assent to their madness."J 

And once more for if words mean any thing, the strength 
of such vehement professions cannot be augmented by re- 
petition : " We exhort, and most humbly beseech with tears, 
our right good brethren of the English Churches, and most 
respected in the Lord, that all bitterness of mind being laid 
aside (which we fear this evil hath greatly increased on both 
sides), the truth of doctrine itself remaining safe, and con- 
science safe, men patiently bear with one another, heartily 
obey the Queen's Majesty, and all their Bishops ; and lastly, 

* Triplex Episcopatus, cap. xxi. p. 207 (ed. 1610). 

t " . . . fruatur ista singular! Dei beneficentia, quse utinam sit 
illi perpetiia." De Divers. Grad. Minist. contra Saraviam, cap. xviii. 

t " Si qui sunt autem (quod sane miht non facile persuaseris) qui 
omnem Episcoporum ordiuem rejiciant, absit ut quisquam satis sance 
mentis furoribus illorura assentiatur." De Divers. Grad. Minist. 
cap. i. In another passage, which Bramhall takes the pains to no- 
tice Serpent Salve, p. 604 Beza defends himself from "the impu- 
dent arrogance " of speaking disrespectfully of the English Bishops : 
and this sort of language, which was quite common with him, was 
the more remarkable in a person of his temper, who, as HeyJyri 
says, "drove on so furiously, like Jehu in the Holy Scriptures, as if 
no kings or princes were to stand before him." History of the Pres- 
byterzans, p. 37. 



22S ADMISSIONS OP ADVERSARIES. 

constantly resist Satan, who seeketh all occasions of tumults 
and infinite calamities,"* &c. 

Such are a few of Beza's sayings which may be most 
suitably cited in this place. It would be tedious to add to 
them. It appears, moreover, that he, as well as Calvin, re- 
pented in after-life of the support which he had once given 
to a system of human invention. " At Geneva," says Dow- 
name, " while Calvin lived he was the perpetuall President 
of their ecclesiasticall Senate, differing rather in name than 
authoritie from a Bishop. And Beza likewise for the space 
of ten yeares had the like authoritie, till Danaeus coming 
thither, that course was altered. Since which times Beza, 
finding some inconveniences which he knew not how to 
redresse, hath sometimes signified his desire to some whom 
I know, wishing with all his heart, that, with the reformation 
of religion, the Episcopall government in that Church had 
been retayned."^ 

IV. Melancthon's desire to retain Episcopacy, and the 
efforts which he made with that object, were so notorious in 

* Epist. xii. quoted by Strype, Life of Archbishop Grindal, Ap- 
pendix, p. 515. 

t Defence of Sermon, book iv. ch. vii. p. 165. Dr. Brett remarks 
Church Government, ch. v. p. 123 upon this extraordinary cir- 
cumstance in the position of our English sectaries, that even " by 
the sentence of Calvin and Beza, whom they pretend to be followers 
of, they are anathematized and counted as madmen;" and this judg- 
ment has been confirmed by most of the famous divines of Geneva. 
Farel, Rivet, Vedelius, and Viret, may be instanced. " Before Cal- 
vin," says Bramhall, " Farellus offered the Bishop of Geneva terms 
to retain his bishopric, if tie would give way to the Reformation" 
(and see on this point Bancrolt, Dangerous Positions, chap. ii.). Of 
Rivet the same Prelate says, " he himself did entreat a noble Earl 
yet living to procure him a dignity or prebend in England, as his 
brothers Moulin and Vossius had. The Earl answered, that he could 
not hold any such place in England without subscribing to Episco- 
pacy, and the doctrine and discipline of the English Church. And 
he replied, that lie was most * eady to subscribe to them both with his 
hand, and heart.'" Vindication af Grotius, ch. iv. p. 621. For -the 
sentiment of Vedelius, see Exercitat. iii. in Epist. S. Ignat. ad Phi- 
ladelph. cap. xiv. p. 138 ; and for that of Viret, De Minist. Verbi Dei 
et Sacram. lib. viii. cap. iii. Bramhall adduces similar testimony 
so great was their inconsistency from Zuingle and ten other Swiss 
divines. Ruchat says that Zuingle made a formal application to the 
Bishop of Constance, " afin que ce Prelat prenant a co3ur une affaire 

de si grande importance on put prevenir heureusement les 

troubles, et faire que tout se passdt en ban ordre;" tome i. livre i. 7. 
p. 101 : and see Moreri's Diclionnaire Historique, in voc. Geneve. 



MELANCTHON. 229 

his own day, that it would be enough to refer to the writings 
of his contemporaries in proof of a fact of which they make 
frequent mention.* He himself even complained to Luther, 
that he was on this very account " hated" by all the lovers 
of novelty; and his biographer Camerarius, who commends 
his zeal for the preservation of the ancient ecclesiastical 
polity, and " his endeavours to restore the authority of the 
Bishops if they would permit the use of sound doctrine, not- 
withstanding he was violently opposed by many," adds, 
" that Luther not only stood by him in this matter, but also 
put him upon it."f 

It cannot, however, need many words to prove that the 
author and defender of the Augustan Confession! was a 

* Prateolus even makes him the founder of a new sect, to which 
he gives the title of " Semi-Lutherani ;" Elenck. H&ret. omn. Cf. 
Spondon. ann. 1530. p. 404; and Basnage, liv. xxv. ch. v. Of his 
^xpressed desire to retain Episcopacy another says, " Ad hsec iiihil 
aliud concessimus adversariis, praeter ea, qua Lutherus censuit esse 
reddenda^ie bene ac diligenter deliberata ante conventum." Casau- 
boniana, p. 23. ed. Wolf. 

t Quoted by Brett, ch. v. p. 121. It will be observed that no 
separate place has been assigned to the testimony of Luther ; and 
this may seem to require explanation. Enough has been said else- 
where to show that he might have been included in this catalogue ; 
but it seemed better to resign him altogether, and for this reason. 
The contradictions which mark the writings of almost all the foreign 
Protestants are in those of Luther so extraordinary, that I believe 
he has uttered few sentiments' which he does not himself somewhere 
undertake to refute. His temper, too, was so unbridled, that most 
of his words may be supposed to have been spoken almost at random. 
" I wish," said his fellow-reformer, Calvin referring to what he 
calls the " atrocious invectives which he scattered all around him " 
"that Luther would be more careful to bridle this intemperance 
with which he every where rages ; I wish he would bestow more 
pains in detecting his own vices." Calvini Epist. Ivii. Ad, Bullin- 
gerum. His friend Erasmus makes a similar complaint ; Epist. ad 
Ph. Melancthon. p. 469. Claude apologizes for the same ferocity ; 
Defense, partie ii. ch.. v. p. 136: and others were accustomed to 
speak of it in still stronger language. If, then, his greatest admirers, 
even when praising him, speak of him thus, what have we to do with 

him ? 

$ In which it is expressly affirmed, that the Bishops might retain 
the obedience of the Protestant party, if they would. " Non petunt 
Ecclesiae, t Episcopi honoris sui jactura sarciant concordiam, .... 
tantum petunt, ut injusta onera remittant, quse nova sunt, et prater 
consuetudinem Ecclesia Catholica recepta . . . Nunc non id agitur, 
ut dominatio eripiatur Epispppis, sed hoc unum petitur, ut patiantur 
Evangelium pure doceri." Art. xxi. With which compare the strong 

11 



230 ADMISSIONS OP ADVERSAniES. 

sorrowful and reluctant advocate of " presbyterianism." 
Repudiating, as that famous document does, the doctrine of 
disobedience to the ecclesiastical Rulers, and professing, on 
the part ( of all who subscribed it,, the. most unfeigned desire 
both to submit to the existing Bishops, and to preserve in 
perpetuity the sacred order to which they belonged, it has 
been commonly regarded as a sufficient token of the deep- 
rooted unwillingness with whichMelancthon co-operated with 
those violent men amongst whom it was his unhappy lot to 
dwell.* His emphatic avowal of willingness to submit to 
the jurisdiction of the Bishops, provided they would suffer 
the Gospel to be freely preached, has been already quoted ;t 
and the remarkable passage in which it occurs is a fair il- 
lustration of his tone and temper. He seems, unlike most 
of his brethren, to have regarded the question in its true 
light, viz, as a matter of conscience. " With what con- 
science," he asked, " can we violate the Ecclesiastical polity, 
if the Bishops will make concessions to us 1" In those days, 
when the extravagance of a man's creed was only limited by 
the power of his imagination, and the Holy Scriptures were 
searched, not for what they actually taught, but for what 
they could be made to teach,! this way of reasoning was as 
uncommon as it was just and reverent. The following ex- 
tracts seem to indicate the influence of this peculiarly reli- 
gious temper : 

" It is my desire," said he, " that the form of Church- 
polity should be preserved. Perhaps I am of a servile dis- 
position be it so ; nevertheless it is my sincere judgment 
that humility becomes pure minds, and that the gradations 
of Ecclesiastical rule ought not to be done away." 

statement of one of Melancthon's noble patrons : Marchionis Bran- 
deburgensis Electoris Ad Sigismund. Rcgem Polonitc Epist., inter 
Epist. Melancthonis, p. 520. 

* He says of himself, " Puer etiam in templis singular! voluptate 
ritus pmnes observavi ; et natura mea alienisslma est ab ilia Cyclo- 
pica yita, quze ignorat ordinem actionum, et odit ritus communes 
velut .oarcjerem." Epist . ]ji. Cf. Epist. ad Leonardum, pp. 187, 392 
where he speaks with great severity and earnestness of the " pre- 
sumption" and " fanaticism " which were so common in his davs 

t See page 200. - ' J ' 

J " His qufE volv.rn.us, rationem conquirimus, et his quse studemus 
doctrinatn coaptamus." S. Hilarii De Trinitate, lib. x. p. 234. ' 

" Politiam Ecclesiasticam conservari opto. Fortassis sum 
jngenio seryili ; sed tamen vere modestiam esse convenientem bonis 



MELANCTHON.- 

Again : "I would that it might be believed both of my- 
self and many others, that, peace being restored, we desire 
that the authority of the Bishops should continue unimpaired, 
and judge that this authority would be most advantageous 
to the Church." And upon this he adds an appeal to " Epis- 
copal clemency " on behalf of " those who refuse not to 
obey," confirming his professions by the declaration, that 
there were then many monstrous opinions ready to start forth 
whenever an occasion should offer ; and that if no counsels 
were entertained for the speedy and effectual suppression of 
divisions, new heresies would arise, which would render the 
unity of the Church in after-times an impossibility." " These 
evils (he continues) might in times of tranquillity be guard- 
ed against, especially if the authority of the Bishops should 
prevail, and they should undertake the charge of ecclesias- 
tical affairs. But if we shall obtain peace, I promise, in my 
own name, and in that of many others, that we will employ 
all our diligence in enforcing the doctrine of Christ."* 

To Cardinal Campeggio, after premising the anxiety of 
his friends to concede to the Bishops their full authority, he 
thus explains the motive for such obedience : " If even then 
there should still be, in one or other particular, some slight 
defect of uniformity-, nevertheless, inasmuch as the Churches 
would be in subjection to the same Bishops, no signs of dis- 
cord would be seen, especially when an agreement should be 
come to in matters of doctrine. The Bishops, too, might 
heal by their authority most of the prevailing disorders, 
when they should again possess the obedience of the minis- 
ters ;"* that is, " Let the corrupted doctrines be amended, 
and there will be no' question made of submission to lawful 
rulers." 

Once more. To a Prelate of that Church in which, by 
the good providence of God, our own lot has been cast, he 
writes as follows: "Often do I congratulate your Britain 

rnentibus, gradus gubernationis non labefactari, existimo." Epist. 
p. 51. 

* Episcopo Jlugustanp, pp. 58, 59. 

t " Ita enim si levis dissimilitude essct in una atque altera re, 
tamen quia iisdem Episcopis parerentEcclesiffi, ntilla videri discordia 
posset, preesertim cum de dogmatibus conveniret. Et Episcopi 
auctoritate sua pleraque incommoda tempore sanare possent, cum 
jam iterum haberent obedientes pastores." Epist. ad Campegium 
Cardinale.m, p 147. 



232 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

upon the possession of such a Bishop ; of whom if the 
Church haul but a few more, such, there would be no difficulty 
in preserving its integrity, and in confirming the unity of 
the whole world."* 

Such is the testimony of another " reformer " against the 
wilful lawlessness of modern sectaries. And if, in spite of 
many signal merits, Melancthon did not wholly escape the 
influence of the times in which he lived, it should be re- 
membered that few men have ever been more unhappy in 
their associates. It is impossible, however, to detract so 
much from his authority, but that it will still be effectual to 
condemn the guilt and folly of those who revile the sacred 
order which he strove so vainly to restore, and forsake the 
Church in which he would have rejoiced to live. 

V. Martin Biicer, who has been regarded even by some 
amongst ourselves as a high authority, speaks on this sub- 
ject in the same orthodox tone. " Immediately, in the very 
beginning," he says, " these perpetual orders of Ministers 
were appointed by the Holy Ghost, Bishops, Presbyters, and 
Deacons."t 

Again : "In all the principal Churches from the times 
of the Apostles, it was so ordered, that a certain kind of 
overseership was committed to all the Presbyters. Never- 
theless, even in the Apostles' days, one of the Presbyters was 
always chosen and ordained to be a governor and a prelate 
in the discharge of this office. He presided over all the 
others, and specially, and .in the most exalted rank, was en- 
trusted with the cure of souls, and administered the episco- 
pal office."| 

Again : in his most careful work, the Kingdom ofCJirist, 
he says, ".It is proper that an oath should be taken of the 
Presbyters and Deacons, that, with all fidelity, and the ut- 

* " Reverendissime Praesul, . . . saepe gratulor Britannia? vestrae 
talem Episcopum ; quales si haberet Ecclesia aliquanto plures, non 
difficulter et concordia orbis terrarum constitui, et servari Ecclesia 
posset." Episcopo Cantuariensi, p. 193. 

I " Itaque hi ordines ministrorum in Ecclesiis perpetui, et a 
Spiritu Sancto statim initio constituti sunt, Episcoporum, Presby- 
terorum, Diaconorum." Explicat. de Vi et Usu S. Minist. Opp. p. 
565. Cf. De Ordinal. Legit. Minist. ~E.cc. p. 259. 

t De Animarum Cura, p. 280. 



MARTIN BUCER. PETER MARTYR. 233 

most respect, they will, in executing their office in the 
Churches, obey their Bishop."* 

Consistently with this view of the Episcopal or Apostolic 
discipline, Bucer congratulated the Anglican Church, as 
we have seen above, upon its singular felicity in possessing 
true and lawful Bishops, and expressed his earnest desire, 
that " the goodness of God might extend to other kingdoms 
the same privilege."t 

Peter Martyr, who was also elevated to a distinguished 
office in one of our own Universities, is, like all the rest, a 
witness against the strange error of " presbyterianism." 
Describing, with great satisfaction, in one of his letters to 
Beza, the defection of the Bishop of Troyes from the Ro- 
man communion, and the willing obedience rendered to him 
by the reformed presbyters in his diocese the Bishop hav- 
ing refused to govern them until they had first deliberated 
and agreed to obey him Martyr tells his brother reformer, 
that " he was received by all unanimously; and acknowledg- 
ed as a true Bishop." He then speaks of " the great 
advantage which would accrue to the Church from his au- 

o 

thority " so far was he from assenting to the extravagances 
of later times and adds, " God be praised, who ruleth and 
ordereth after such a manner the kingdom of His Son."! 

In another place, he even seems anxious to claim for the 
foreign religious bodies a participation in the blessings of 
that Apostolic discipline, which, on the plea of necessity, 
they Jiad so unhappily subverted. " There is not a diocese 
or state amongst us," he says, " in which one is not chosen 
out of many pastors, eminent for his learning and experience, 
whom the churches style " Superintendent." This person 
summons together all the rest, admonishes, and rules them, 
according to the word of God." 

And what this officer was, who is here called by so new 
and barbarous a title, we are informed by another Protestant 
divine of great repute, who succeeded Martyr himself at 
Strasburg, when the latter came over to England. The 

* De Regno Christi, lib. ii. cap. xii. p. 70. 

t See p. 203 ; cf. Gualter. Homil. in 1 Epist. ad Cor. Prsefat. 

\ Apud Durell, cap. xxxiv. p. 517. 

" Nulla est enim apud nos dicecesis, aut civitas, ubi non a multis 
pastoribus deligatur quispiam, doctrina et experientia excellens, quern 
EcclesiiB Superintcndcntcm vocant. Ille caeteros omnes congregat, 
monet, regit juxta verbum Dei." Defens. Doctr. Vet. de Eucharist. 
pars i. p. 208- (ed. 1559). 



234 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

learned Jerome Zanchy thus speaks of him : " As for the 
tiling itself, there are not wanting in the Protestant Churches 
Bishops and Archbishops, whom changing a good Greek 
word into a bad Latin one they call ' Superintendents' and 
' General Superintendents. 3 "* It seems, therefore, from their 
own declarations, that they were only imitating, in their 
uncouth way, that holy order of the primitive Church which 
our moderns affect to despise, but from which the first Pro- 
testants, if we may believe their own solemn assertions,f 
would never have departed, if they could have shared that 
happy lot which they so much envied in the English Church. 

VI. The testimony of the celebrated Dr. Peter Du Mou- 
lin, which shall be cited next, deserves a separate notice. 
Learned beyond most of his contemporaries, and called to 
fill successively the theological chair in the Protestant schools 
of Paris and Sedan, he seems to have been in many respects 
one of the most conspicuous divines of his age. At the 
synod of Dort, though he was not personally present, his 
written judgment on the five Articles of the Remonstrants 
was read by Diodati before the whole assembly . And so 
great was his reputation, that we are informed, on the au- 
thority of his son, that the Bishop of Poictiers, the President 
of Bourdeaux, and others, " were instruments of the Court 
of Rome and the popish Clergy, to tempt him from time to 
time, with great preferments, to forsake the Protestant 
cause." The same writer adds, " that he was the object of 
the public hatred of the Romanists."^ 

* In Confess. Fidei. Mason, in his defence of their ordinations, 
says, " how can they disallow the pre-eminence of Bishops, seeing 
their Superintendents are nothing but Bishops? For when the name 
Bishop was grown odious, by reason of abuses in the Popish Prelates, 
they, retaining the dignity itself, changed the word Bishop into 
Superintendent, which is equivalent in signification." 

t As, for instance, the profession of the whole Protestant body 
in the year 1530. " Quantum in nobis fuit, auctoritatem et jurisdic- 
tionem Episcoporum hactenus fulcire et stabilire conati sumus." 
And again ; " Opera etiam dabitur, ne Episcoporum auctoritati ac 
honori aliquid detraheretur seu derogetur." And once more ; " Epis-. 
coporum jurisdictio, ad res spirituales spectans, nequaquam appugne- 
tur." Vide Seckendorff. Hist. Lutheran, t. i. 179. If the Bishops 
had granted a reformation and no one denies that it was needed 
would the ' presbyterian' scheme have ever been invented ? 

t Vide Act. Synod. Dordrecht, sess. 143. p. 334. 

Novelty of Popery, Preface. "Petrus Molinaus Calmnlstarum 
hodic signifer ;" Albaspinasus, In S. Optat. M'devit. obs. iv. 



FETEU DU MOULIN. 235 

If eyer, therefore, there was an advocate who might be 
trusted to speak in behalf of the cause to which he was at- 
tached, and the party of which he was so distinguished an 
ornament, Du Moulin is surely such a person. Private in- 
terests could not sway the judgment of a man who had re- 
jected the most splendid offers of the Roman Court, and his 
own writings will show that he was as little influenced by 
personal resentments. To these, as the safest expositors of 
his real opinions, we will at once refer ; and first to his 
famous correspondence with our great and good Bishop 
Andrewes. 

Du Moulin had been reproached, it seems, for the use 
of certain objectionable phraseology in speaking of the go- 
vernment of the Church. To this serious charge he offers 
to the Bishop the following reply : " That the ''Episcopal 
order and authority was rather of ecclesiastical than of di- 
vine institution, I confess myself to have said. But besides 
that I spoke otherwise than I believed, do you yourself judge 
whether it was possible for a prudent and discreet man, be- 
ing himself a Frenchman, and living under the polity of the 
French Church, to speak in any other way, unless he wererea- 
dy to incur the condemnation of our Synods, and to be forced, 
under the penalty of rejection from his office, to recant his 
words."* It is quite unnecessary, and would be painful, to 
offer any comment upon such a confession.t One observa- 

* Pelri MolinEei Epist. i. Saravia tells a story of Peter Villerius, 
who happened at a certain clerical meeting to drop some expressions 
of regret at the suppression of the Episcopal order, aud who was 
greeted thereupon with angry reproaches for his * ambition ;' and he 
adds, " what could 1 do ? / was afraid to defend him, although I 
was of the same opinion, lest I should incur a similar charge myself." 
Da Divers. Minist. Grad. Lectori. The truth seems to be, that in 
the reformed communities the boasted " right of private judgment" 
was prudently permitted only to a few ; the leaders in the different 
' churches ' kept it all to themselves. " In France," says the learned 
Maurice, " while the reformed Religion stood there, if any departed 
from the established order of those churches, they were excommu- 
nicated ; and if they should attempt to set up separate congregationsj 
they would have been accounted no churches .... Nor is it other- 
wise in Holland or Germany, or wherever the reformed Religion is 
received ; they unchurch all who, upon such frivolous pretences as 
our dissenters use against us, would leave their communion." 
Defence of Diocesan Episcopacy, p. 451. 

t Unless we may apply the defence which Lactantius offers for 
Cicero's false philosophy: "Verum hooc non cst Ciceronis culpa, 
scd scctai." 



236 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

tion, however, may be made. We have seen above, upon 
various testimony, that the most eminent of the foreign Pro- 
testants disowned, on its first institution, the human system 
under which they reluctantly lived. From this remarkable 
saying of Du Moulin's it appears, further, that many others, 
who endured the same bondage at a later period, would have 
disowned it too, if they had dared. 

Again: Bishop Andrewes had referred Du Moulin to 
the uniform witness of antiquity, in proof of the divine in- 
stitution of Episcopacy. " I do not contest the matter," 
was his answer; " for so indeed the ancients declare."* 
And then, admitting that this was a truth which could not 
be gainsayed, he adds as before, that he could not openly 
assert it, nor act upon his own principles, lest he should be 
forced to condemn the Church to which he belonged. 

Elsewhere he desires the Bishop to remember how, in 
one of his writings, he had " honourably mentioned the 
Bishops of England. I have there derived the Episcopal 
dignity," he continues, " from the very earliest origin of 
the Church. I have pronounced condemnation upon Aerius. 
I have confessed that James himself was Bishop of Jeru- 
salem, from whom, in a long series, the succession of Bishops 
in the same city is deduced. One thing only I have left 
undone I have not pronounced my own Church to be here- 
tical"^ This, perhaps, it was too much to expect him to 
do, and his verbal testimony against it was sufficiently con- 
clusive, without the overt act of separation. He sums up 
all by professing his anxious wish that his venerable cor- 
respondent might know " how ardently desirous he was of 
unity, and that all the Reformed Churches, which were 
united by the same faith, should be also bound together by 
the bonds of the same Ecclesiastical government."^. 

It only remains to be added, in justice to a man who pos- 
sessed the esteem of the wise and holy Hammond, that Dr. 
Du Moulin did not always keep back, from those amongst 
whom he laboured, the avowal of his real sentiments. In 
one of the Acts of the University of Sedan, he proposed and 
publicly defended the following thesis : " We affirm that the 
Bishops of England, after their conversion and abjuration 
of popery, were faithful servants of God, and that they ' 

* " Non pugno; sic enim loquuntur veteres." Epist. iii. p. 180. 
t Ibid. p. 184. | p. 185. 



HUGO CJROTIUS. 237 

ought not to forsake the office or title of Bishop"* And 
his son has reported that " he was a known friend, not only 
to the doctrine, but also to the discipline, of the Church of 
England, which he hath commended in many places of his 
published works, and even in his private annotations to his 
Bible, which. I keep by me."f 



VII. Of Hugo Grotius, whose judgment we will now 
hear, it is altogether needless to say any thing by way of in- 
troduction. The language in which this great man spoke 
of the miserable ecclesiastical system under which he was 
compelled to live, and which he had once admired, is some- 
thing more than disrespectful. The arguments of the " pres- 
byterians" among whom his lot was cast, he does not even 
notice, contenting himself with the declaration, that " they 
were so absurd and repugnant to Holy Scripture as to be 
unworthy of confutation."! The divine origin of the Epis- 
copal office and order he regarded as an unquestionable fact, 
demonstrable from the Scriptures and the teaching and 
practice of the primitive saints.^ And it was his serious 
admonition to the foreign Protestants, to employ their ut- 
most diligence in reviving those holy ordinances of the 
Apostolic Church, the observance of which they had so 
rashly and unadvisedly neglected. || 

His admiration of the English Church has been noticed 
elsewhere. Dr. Hammond did not think his praises unwor- 
thy of an acknowledgment, and has remarked upon "the 
signal value and kindness which, in his lifetime, he con- 
stantly professed to pay to this Church and nation ; express- 
ing his opinion that ' of all Churches in the world, it was 
the most careful observer and transcriber of Primitive An- 
tiquity,' and more than intimating his desire to end his days 

* Vide Tlics. Sf-danens. torn. i. p. 884. t Ubi supra. 

t Discuss, de Primatu Papce. 

De Imper. Summ. Potcst. circa Sacra, cup. xi. 5. 

|| And we find them angrily answering his rebukes for having 
cast out their Bishops. Vide Sibrand. Lubbert. JResp. ad Pietutcm 
H. Crrotii, Prsefat. In one place Grotius says very plainly, " Protes- 
tantes vere moncndos censeo . . . ut Canones Apostolicos, et alios 
aevi proxirni, in usura revocent, turn in rebus aliis, turn maximc circa, 
elcctiones Episcoporum ac Prcsbijterorum. Jltinot. ad Cassand. Con- 
sult, p. 50. ed. Amsterdam, 1642. 

11* 



238 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

in the bosom and communion of our Mother."* On this 
point, for more reasons than one, some further evidence 
shall be offered. 

Le Clerc, in the appendix to his edition of a work of 
Grotius before referred to, quotes, amongst other papers, a 
letter of Francis Cholmondely, which contains the following 
account of that eminent statesman and divine : " That which 
you desire to know of me concerning Hugo Grotius, who 
was one of the greatest men that ever any age produced, 
is this. It happened that I came to Paris a little after the 
transaction of that matter. Being very well acquainted 
with Dr. Crowder, he often told me with assurance, that it 
was the last advice this great man gave to his wife (as he 
thought it was his duty), that he declared he died in the com- 
munion of the Church of England, in which Church he 
wished her to livc."i And this advice, as Cholmondely prc- 
ceeds to relate, his wife acted upon ; and Sir Spencer Cornp- 
ton, son of Lord Northampton, " told him (Cholmondely) 
that he was present when Grotius's widow professed this, 
and received the Sacrament." Archbishop Bramhall at 
whose hands Grotius had recommended some of the foreign 
divines to receive ordination for the office of a Bishcp, 
" that they might afterwards be qualified to ordain other 
Pastors" confirms this account of his own personal know- 
ledge.! 

" Both myself," says that great Prelate, " and many 
others, have seen his wife, in obedience to her husband's 
commands, which she declared publicly to the world, to re- 
pair often to our Prayers and Sacraments, and to bring at 
least one of his grandchildren to Sir Richard Brown's 
house, then resident for the king in Paris, to be baptized 
into the faith and communion of the Church of England, 
and be made a member thereof, as it was accordingly."^ 
And yet a great authority of the Roman Catholic Commu- 
nion, in this age and country moved, as it seems, by the 
natural desire to procure for the novelties of his Church the 
sanction of so deeply learned a writer has ventured to as- 

* Defence of Grotius, continuation, p. 29. 

t Letter of F. Cholmondely to A. Forrester, apud Le Clerc, pp. 
350-2. 

J And. Pierce gives the statement of the Lutheran minister who 
attended liis death-bed. JVczo Discoverer, p. 2i>. 

Vindication of Crotius, ch. ii. p. 612. 



DAVID BLONDEL. 239 

sert, that, if he had not been prevented by an untimely 
death, Grotius intended to have embraced the Romish faith.* 
To persons of this class, as well as to the other sectaries in 
this kingdom against whose errors Grotius is as valuable 
a witness as any mere modern can be it seems enough 
to reply with the venerable Bramhall, " If any man think 
that he knoweth Grotius his mind better by conjectural 
consequences than he did himself, or that he would dis- 
semble with his wife and children upon his death-bed, he 
may enjoy his own opinion to himself, but he will find few 
to join with him."f 

VIII. Of foreign Protestants two more only shall be 
quoted ; and these, that we may conclude with an extreme 
case, both strenuous advocates of " presbyterianism." The 
names of David Blondel and Salmasius the most zealous, 
unscrupulous, and certainly the most learned of all the de- 
fenders of the Genevan platform are identified with the 
cause with which they were so prominently connected. 
Yet even these men ol asl o^o/itrnxokf: as they were a're 
witnesses against the error which they were hired to main- 
tain, and were constrained, like Balaam of old, to resign 
the wages which were proffered to them, and to pronounce 
a blessing where they were bid only to curse. 

Whether BlondeJ's original intention was to write, as 
there is reason for'supposing, not against but in favour of 
Episcopacy, is not perhaps worth debating.^ He did, at 
all events, at the call of the English " presbyterians," com- 
pose the wqrk which bears his name. Of its general con- 
tents there is no need to speak here.j| It is enough to say, 

* Vide Pulilin Revicio, vol. x. 

t Casaubon's admiration of the Anglican Church was quite as 
enthusiastic as that of Grotius. See the valuable remarks in the 
dedication of his Exercitat. do Rebus Sacris (Genevae, 1555) ; and 
in his letters to' Heinsius, pp. 84 and 103, and to Grotius, p. 266, 
ed. Hags, 1638. 

J The term applied by St. Athanasius to the Meletians Apolog. 
torn. i. p. 739 who were first Puritans and then Arians, as our 
modern sectaries now sink into Socinianism. 

Of his laborious readings Sir H. Yelverton says, " if fame be 
true, collected at first to be the materials of a discourse he intended 
for Episcopacy." Prefatory Epistle, p. 15. 

||, Though it is worth noticing, that, as Bishop Lloyd observes, 
" in that laborious collection of Blondel's, which was made for the 



240 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

that that work, written under such auspices, and with such 
an object, concluded, when it first came from Blondel's 
hands, with these notable words : " By all that we have 
said to assert the rights of the presbytery, we do not intend 
to invalidate the ancient and Apostolical constitution of 
Episcopal pre-eminence. But we believe that wheresoever 
it is established conformably to the ancient Canons, it must 
be carefully preserved ; and wheresoever, by some heat of 
contention, or otherwise, it has been put down or violated, it 
ought to be reverently restored."* 

What a cause is this, which is compelled to confront 
even its own champions, and to sustain itself by pulling 
down to-day the very supports by which yesterday it was 
kept from falling ! Blondel had ventured to praise what he 
had been hired to condemn, and his sentence must be re- 
versed. " I pray thee, curse me this people," was the ve- 
hement entreaty of his employers, and, as he himself con- 
fessed, it prevailed. The Paris agents of the Assembly of 
Westminster, with urgent and repeated expostulations, be- 
sought him not to mar, by his last words, the wholesome 
doctrine of his previous statements ; and the passage which 
commended Episcopacy as an " Apostolical constitution" 
was cancelled ! . 

The case of Salmasius is, perhaps., still more remarkable. 
Impetuous and self-confident even to a proverb,t the boast of 
his party, and the very Atlas of ' presbyterianism,' after con- 
suming a whole life in controversies, into which his acrid 
humours infused an intensity of bitterness unknown even in 
that age of strife, it would be strange indeed if such a man 
had ever stooped to make concessions. The error which 
he had once maintained was sufficiently depressed without 

service of our Presbyterians, he, with all his vast reading, could not 
find one undoubted example of a church of their way in ancient 
times, but only that of the Scots. And yet for this case he very well 
knew that he had no author for it who lived within a thousand years 
of the time he asserts." Bp. Lloyd's (St. Asaph) Church Govern- 
ment^ Preface, p. 5. Vide Natalis Alexandri Dissert. Ecclcsiast. i. 
p. 156, who learnedly exposes Blondel's fable ; and Bramhall, Just 
Vindication of the Church of England, ch. ix. pp. 134, 5. 

* Quoted by Bishop Skinner, of Aberdeen, in his Primitive Truth 
and Order Vindicated, pp. 332, 3. 

t " A Senate of Fathers moves him not a hair; a right Monothe- 
lite, he opposeth his own will against them all I" Sir H. Spehnan's 
, Analogy. 



SALMASIUS. ' 241 

this. It was not from such a hand that its partisans looked 
for further indignities. But the full measure of their humil- 
iation was still lacking; their first masters had left them, one 
after another, to shift for themselves, and the catalogue of 
deserters would have been incomplete without the famous 
name of Claude De Saumaise.* It is from his final reply 
to Milton, the last work of his life, that the following pas- 
sages are taken. . 

In a former rejoinder he had severely condemned the 
English Parliament for casting out the Bishops, even saying, 
that " the Bishops were necessary, and ought wholly to have 
been preserved, lest a thousand pestilent sects and heresies 
should be hatched in England." For this Milton had charged 
him, as might be expected, with shameful vacillation. His 
answer is strikingly characteristic. 

" When I condemned the order of Bishops/' he said, " I 
did it because, by means of its various steps and gradations, 
Episcopal ambition had attained to that climax of tyranny 
which the Bishop of Rome now usurps. And I then wrote 
in my own person. When I defended the order, I wrote in 
the king's person, and how could I write against his mind T'f 
This position, however, he seems to have found uneasy, and 
so he goes" on to give other reasons for speaking so respect- 
fully of Episcopacy : " experience," he says, had taught him 
to change his mind. " For from the abolition of Episcopacy 
there followed horrible confusion and disorder of religion ; 
innumerable sects, which till then, as if condemned to hell, 
had lurked in darkness, rushing on a sudden 'from every side 
into the light by the door now opened, tJiefear of the Sis fl- 
ops, by whom they were formerly kept in check, being removed. 
More than one hundred and fifty monstrous and unheard-of 
sects are at this hour raging in England. Never could this 
have been, if the Churches had continued under the govern- 

* " M. De Saumaise, etant meme jeune, passoit pour le plus 
grand homme de toute 1'Europe, selon Scaliger el Casaubon." 
Chevrteana, ou Pens&es d'Histoire, de Critique, &c. tome i. p. 129. 

t A(L Joannem Miltonum Resp. p. 41, opus posthumum, ed. Ph. 
Chauncc, 1660. This language is an illustration of the proverb, 
" extremes meet." " Et quoi, mon pere ! dites moi en conscience, 
etes-vous dans ce sentiment-la. ? Non, vraiment, me dit le pere. 
-Vous parlez done, eontinnai-je, centre votre conscience ? Point du 
tout, dit-il. Je ne parlois pas, en cela, selon ma conscience, raais 
selon celle de Ponce et du P. Bauny." Pascal, Lettrcs Promnciales 
num. 5. 



242 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

mcnt of the Bishops, by tohom tJiey were formerly ruled. 
Wherefore, then, might not Salmasius, taught by such expe- 
rience, change his opinion? Who is. there that knows not 
the 'Retractions' of Augustine ?"* 

With this example of the Saint having, as it seems, eased 
his conscience, Salmasius now casts away all reserve, and 
becomes the eloquent apologist of the Bishops. " All that 
he could do," says he of the martyr Charles, " to preserve 
the Bishops, he did. Would to God that he had preserved 
them ! Then, indeed, most justly would he have been styled 
the Protector of religion. Then so many hydras of impious 
and impure religions would not now be overrunning and lay- 
ing waste England. For in what single particular were the 
Bishops enemies of religion? Or did they ever maintain any 
doctrine contrary to the truth? You dare not say so."f 

Once more. He is again mocked by Milton for his change 
of sentiment, and he now plainly tells him, " Salmasius did 
not write against every kind of ecclesiastical primacy, but 
only against that which was tyrannical, and resembled mon- 
archical sovereignty. The Church never was without a 
primacy. That which Salmasius. could not endure was, 
that the Pope of Rome, under the name of a primacy in the 
Church, should arrogate a lordship overall king&and princes. 
This was the primacy against which he wrote "\ 

How far Salmasius could make such statements salif&jide, 
is not, as was said in the case of Beza, our concern. He did 
make them ; and if they do seem to be utterly inconsistent 
with his former opinions, we must remember that they were 
written at a time when " the lofty looks of man are humbled, 
and the haughtiness of man bowed down ;" when men are 
coming to their last hour, they instinctively speak the truth. 
Would that some among us might learn to anticipate the day 
when they will be fain to imitate the " retractions" of Salma- 
sius ! 

IX. We have now heard the most distinguished foreign 
advocates of the Genevan system. From Calvin himself, 
who in an evil hour of extreme necessity invented it, to the 
pious men who groaned under it in secret sorrow during the 

* Ibid. pp. 42, 43. 

t Ibid.-p. 117. Edwards, though a presbyterian, makes the same 
comparison in favour of the Bishops. Gansrcena, p. 143. 
} Chap. Hi. p. 346, 7. 



ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 243 

seventeenth century, there is an unbroken continuity of evi- 
dence. Each in his day protests, with more or less earnest- 
ness, how humiliating was his condition ; and each, with a 
fervency of language which seems to reproach her own chil- 
dren, celebrates God's bountiful mercies to the Church of 
England.* " Surely there is no enchantment against Jacob, 

* The learned Samuel Bocliart says, that he had often received 
the Holy Communion at the hands of English Bishops, and that all 
the French pastors would have thought it a privilege to do the same ; 
Epist. ad Meridian, p. 13. Amyraut makes a similar profession ; 
Irenic. p. 351. Durell quotes many others, of whom a few shall be 
mentioned. Drelincourt, speaking of France, says, " in this king- 
dom, as in other countries in which there is not a Bishop who is not 
in communion with the Bishop of Rome, and a zealous maintainer 
of popish errors, the very name of a Bishop has become hateful. 
But it ought not to lie so in England, where Bishops have abounded 
who were eminent examples both of rare piety and orthodox doc- 
trine, as well as distinguished instruments in the reformation of 
the Church." Durell, pp. 520, 21. Maximilian Langlet, who was 
President, together with Daille, of many provincial synods, and 
appointed Professor of Theology by the National Synod of France, 
wrote as follows to Dr. Brevint : " My heart was filled with joy 
when the news was brought to me of the restoration of your Liturgy 
and ancient Discipline. It is impossible not to augur well of that 
Discipline under which the English Church has been for so many 
years so largely blessed. It matters little what is said by those 
haters of the Church's peace who go about murmuring every where 
that the French Churches are inimical to the order of Bishops, as if 
it were repugnant to the kingdom of Christ, and a relic of Antichrist. 
Far be from us so senseless and unadvised a notion, which neither 
Daille, nor Amyraut, nor Bochart, nor any other of my colleagues 
at Rouen, ever countenanced." Ibid. Daille himself, when charged 
by a Jesuit with this very crime that he was a despiser of Bishops 
answered, " So far am I from despising Bishops, as you reproach 
me, that, on the contrary, I am vehemently indignant as often as I 
revolve in my mind the injury which the Pope has done them, in 
depressing them so far below the rank which they enjoyed in the 
primitive Church .... It is plain that Calvin himself reverenced 
those Bishops who, after throwing off the yoke of the Roman Pon- 
tiff, taught the pure doctrine of the Apostles such as were the 
Anglican Prelates." pp. .521, 22. " The learned Mr. Turretin, Pro- 
fessor of Church-history at Geneva, asserts that Episcopacy is of 
Apostolical institution." Vide An Apology for the Foreign Pro- 
testant Churches, &c. p. 5 (ed. 1717). Lastly, the Ministers and 
University of Geneva, as late as the year 17C6, in a letter addressed 
to the University of Oxford, and dated the 25th of September, 
'' complain of their being misrepresented, as if they were enemies 
to the constitution of the Church of England and her liturgy, of 
both which they profess a great esteem, and blame those who, being 
disaffected to the discipline and liturgy of our Church, make use of 



244 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

neither is there any divination against Israel." The very 
aliens are constrained to honour the Mother in whose bosom 
x they were not nurtured ; and when her own sons forget their 
duty and their happiness, then, according to the word of pro- 
mise, " the sons of strangers build up the walls of Zion." 

But it is not only from the dwellers in other countries that 
this tribute of homage has been received. Not even those 
disobedient men who in our own land deliberately withstood 
God's teaching by,His Church, and having " forsaken the 
fountain of living waters, hewed them out cisterns, broken 
cisterns, that could hold no water," not even these were 
able to withstand that power of God, by which His enemies 
are compelled to acknowledge with their own lips those eter- 
nal verities which they have vainly laboured to subvert. 
With a few examples of the more remarkable confessions ex- 
torted from such men, this chapter shall be concluded. 

The name of Richard Baxter is, I suppose, generally as- 
sociated with disrespect for the holy order of the Catholic 
Church, and resistance to her authority.* Even if he had 
not openly defamed her ordinances by hard speeches, yet the 
whole course of his life would have made it impossible to 
free him from this reproach. Yet Baxter, like all the rest, 
is a witness against himself. For, first, he confessed that 
"the reception of Bishops in all the churches was so early 
and so general, that he \vasfrce to admit them"^ And again, 
he even assured Lord Clarendon, "that his chief reason for 
refusing the Episcopate when it was offered to him, Calamy, 
and Reynolds, and accepted by the latter, was the hope that 
he should more effectually advance the cause of peace, by 
retaining a station where his arguments in favour of Episco- 
pacy could be liable to none of those suspicions, to which 
they must be exposed were he himself exalted into the office 
for which he became the advocate."^ In this case, as in others 

th'e name of Geneva as favouring tlteir pretence?" They go on to 
commend, like all the rest, the "faith" and "ceremonies" of this 
Church, and say of themselves, that " they have such rites as the 
government of a commonwealth and necessity do require." Quoted 
by Leslie, Rehearsals, no. 182. 

* " The bitterest adversary of truth, reviling the Fathers of the 
Church, and the Church herself, more than any Presbyterian I ever 
met with." Pierce's New Discoverer, Advertisement. 

i Life, Calamy's Abridgment, &c. chap. vii. vol. i. p. 112. ed. 
1713. 

} Quoted by Short, History of the Church of England, vol. ii. 



. CART Will GUT. 245 

noticed above, it is no part of our office to be reconciling 
the jarring testimony of words and deeds. If there was, as 
will not be denied, a conflict between these, it does not con- 
cern us to explain it : of this the witnesses themselves are 
gone long since to give account.* All that we need to ob- 
serve is, the puerile inconstancy, the marvellous and as it 
seems judicial fatuity, which forced from the adversaries 
such confessions. If both the Church and the Scriptures had 
been silent upon their error, these strange men have been 
forward to pronounce sentence upon it themselves.t 

The next instance is an extreme one. The history of 
Cartwright, the learned antagonist of Hooker and Archbishop 
Whitgift, is familiar, at least in its outline, to most of us. 
Sir Henry Yelverton, in his Preface to Bishop Morton, thus 
describes the origin of the unhappy proceedings in which 
this famous sectary was a chief agent: " The reason of 
Cartvvright's first discontent was, that in the exercises that 
were done before Queen Elizabeth at Cambridge, Dr. Tho- 
mas Preston got all the applause, and a pension from the 
Queen, when he, who was the better scholar, was not taken 
notice of. This begat in him great discontent and anger ; 
first, at the Queen's supremacy in ecclesiastical s ; and o/ifer- 

p. 233. Tillotson, whose prejudices were all in favour of presby- 
terianism, says, that when King Charles II. offered a bishopric to 
Calamy, then an old man, he " deliberated about it some consider- 
able time, professing to see the great inconvenience of presbyterian 
parity." Vide Lawson's History of the Scottish Episcopal Church, 
p. 3. 

* Grotius speaks very scornfully of such men, who talked of 
11 reverencing the Bishops," and yet disobeyed them; and asks of 
one of them, " quid dixit, quod non diceret rGv KaBapSv KaOapuraros ? 
they pretend to honour Bishops too, and I doubt not, if they could 
make any advantage of them, they would be ready enough to use 
their assistance." Ordin. Hollandia et WestfrisitR Pietas, p. 118. 

t For other confessions of B&xter, see Stillingfleet, Unreasonable- 
ness of Separation, part. ii. 27. "The Presbyterian dignities," says 
one who appears to have known them, " were offended because they 
could not obtain the chiefest dignities of the Church. Mr. Stephen 
Marshal, a principal Presbyterian, and ringleader of the impious 
.Smectymnuans, did once petition the King for a Deanery, and at 
another time for a Bishopric ! Which because he could not obtain 
as the King told him at Holdenby, where he attended upon the 
Commissioners therefore he would overthrow all." Vide Jin Apo- 
logy f&r the Bishops to sit and vote in Parliament, p. 44 (1660). Cf. 
Foulis' History of the wicked Plots and Conspiracies of our pretended 
Saints, book iii. ch. i. 



246 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

wards, at all the orders of the Church." Something of this 
kind, it is to be feared, is the history of all the self-pleasers 
who, in these late times, have fallen into Cartwright's sin. 
Some private interest or personal resentment, something to 
be either gained or avenged, such is in every age and place 
the motive of schism. Men who have never learned to rule 
their own spirits, or to bridle their own tongues, undertake to 
govern the holy Church of Christ ; and while their own heady 
passions are gathering strength day by day, propose them- 
selves as competent reformers of those divine ordinances, in 
the use of which their wiser forefathers, meekly accepting 
and adoring the goodness of God, attained unto life and sal- 
vation. Cartwright was doubtless a learned man ; but other 
qualifications for the office of a reformer he had none. With 
him ancients and moderns were equally insignificant. The 
authority of Clement, Anacletus, Anicetus, Epiphanius, Am- 
brose, and Sozomen, being urged against him^ he calls it 
"the moving and summoning of hell ;" others were " rogues," 
and " counterfeit," " ignorant," " overmastered of their af- 
fections." Even the continental reformers, Luther, Bullin- 
ger, Bucer, and others, were but poor sort of people when 
they differed from him and his brother separatists.* Of such 
a spirit was the most eminent " non-conformist" to use the 
world's soft phrase in an age which was not barren of such 
pernicious fruits. And it is against such " raging waves" 
that we are compelled, for our sins, to be still erecting bul- 
warks from the writings and examples of the old Saints. 

But it is not for the sake of recording the extravagances 
of these men, that their names are mentioned here. We 
are only concerned with their recantations ; and Cartwright's 
is not less instructive than others already noticed. 

During his life he seems to have been more than once vis- 
ited with compunction at his own doings ; and at such sea- 
sons of half-repentanoe " professed and protested" to Arch- 
bishop Whitgift who is said to have been at these times 
"very courteous unto his old antagonist" that he would 
" take no other courses but to draw all men to the unity of 
the Church :" nevertheless, continuing his schismatical pro-, 
ceedings at Warwick, he was committed to the Fleet prison. 
At length this famous adversary of the Church came to his 

* Vide Strype's Life of Whitgift, vol. i. p. 106 ; and Whttgift's 
Defense of the dnsioere to tliz Admonition, p. 403. 



CARTWRIGHT. 247 

end ; of which, on the authority of a " sober person present 
at his death," the following account has been preserved. 
" When he came to die, which he did at Warwick, at the 
hospital of which. Robert Dudley Earl of Leicester" the 
great patron of " non-conformists" " had made him master, 
he did seriously lament the unnecessary troubles he had 
caused in the Church, by the schism he had been the great 
fomenter of ; and wished he was to begin his life again, that 
he might testify to the world the dislike he had of his former 
ways. And in this opinion he died."* 

Lord Clarendon has noted, in his history, more than one 
remarkable instance of the same kind.f The ' presbyterian ' 
Henderson was a chosen agent of the Long Parliament to 
confer about matters of religion with King Charles the Mar- 
tyr. It was from him that his Majesty received the propo- 
sal, by which peace was offered to him on condition that he 
should resign the ancient faith, and consent to favour the 
new religion, of which Henderson was an eminent professor. 

The task imposed upon this teacher of novelties seems to 

* Sir H. Yelverton's Epistle, p. 45 ; and Life of Wfiitgift, vol. ii. 
p. 27. 

t And many others might be mentioned. Dr. Cornelius Surges, 
a preacher notorious beyond most of his confederates, as having 
sacrilegiously possessed himself of the revenues of the see of Bath 
and Wells, fell at length into poverty and misery, and, as was much 
noted at the time, was devoured by "a cancer in his body, answer- 
ing to the cancer of his schism." One who knew him says, " Dr. 
Barges died a very penitent man, frequenting with great zeal and 
devotion the divine service of the Church of England till his death, 
which happened about two years ago." See Dr. Isaac Basire, On 
Sacrilege, Preface to 2d edition, 1668. It was usual at that time to 
notice the extraordinary judgments which overtook many of the 
Puritans. Thus a person writing in 1644 to a minister of one of the 
French protestant communities, calls his attention to many " infal- 
lible testimonies of a divine vengeance ;" and having mentioned 
Hampden, who died in the very field in which he first trained the 
militia against his king, and Lord Brooke, who was shot while 
storming the house of God, says, " I might adde to the list of such 
examples that horrible disease of Pym. At the same time that his 
conscience was gnawed with the vermine of ambition, affecting a 
tyrannicke power, God gave him lice for food, and made him perish 
by such a kind of death as once He did those monstrous tyrants 
Herod and Philip the Second." See A Letter concerning the pre- 
sent Troubles in England, p. 15, English translation. A like judg- 
ment is said to have befallen the heretic Nestorius, who died from 
his tongue being" gnawed by worms. Vide Evagrii Ecclesiast..Histor. 
lib, i. cap. vii. 



248 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

have been performed with zeal and fidelity. " But the King," 
says Clarendon, " was too conscientious to buy his peace at 
so profane and sacrilegious a price as was demanded ; and 
he was so much too hard for Mr. Henderson in the argu- 
mentation, as appeared by the papers shortly after communi- 
cated to the world, that the old man himself was so far con- 
vinced and converted, that he had a very deep sense of the 
mischief he had himself been the author of, or too much con- 
tributed to, and lamented it to his nearest friends and confi- 
dents ; and died of grief and heart-broken, within a very 
short time after he departed from his Majesty."* 

The case of the celebrated Hales deserves a place in this 
catalogue. Of his approximation to the. error of the secta- 
ries, his own writings afford sufficient demonstration. It is, 
however, unjust that any man should be judged by writings 
which he has himself desired to recant. " I am by genius 
open and uncautelousj" was his own general apology to 
Archbishop Laud ;t and of the particular errors of his dan- 
gerous " Tract on Schism," still much in vogue with those 
who are willing to imitate every thing but the virtues of this 
great man, he said expressly, " I could heartily wish, for 
in the case I am, I have nothing but good wishes to help me, 
that they into whose hands that paper is unluckily fallen, 
would favour me so much as to sponge them out. ,"J 

Having mentioned Laud, it will not be out of place to 
notice the account given by Hales himself to Dr. Heylyn of 
his interview with that Prelate, in which, by the force of 
reasoning and argument, or rather, by the good providence 
of God, he was so happily reclaimed from his low and sect- 
arian views. He relates, in recording a conference which 
lasted the whole day, " that he found the Archbishop to be 
as well versed in books as business ; that he had been ferret- 

* Clarendon's History of the Rebellion, vol. iii. pt. i. p. 31. Dr. 
Short says that Henderson's whole argument with the King went no 
further than, " it is not settled in Scripture." History of the Church of 
England, vol. ii. p. 153. Clarendon mentions elsewhere the case of 
Lord Pembroke, who had co-operated so zealously in the evil deeds 
of that day, but afterwards confessed how heartily he and his friends 
repented of what they had done, and how powerless they were to 
stem the torrent which had begun to flow. History of the Rebellion, 
book viii. vol. v. p. 72. 

t Hales' Tracts, p. 217, ed. 1721. 

\ Ibid. Yet this very tract is referred to in our days, just as if 
the retractation had never been written. 



SIR EDWARD DEERING. 249 

ed by him from one hole to another, till there was none left 
to afford him any further shelter. That to this end he had 
obtained leave to call himself his grace's chaplain, that nam- 
ing him in his public prayers for his lord and patron, the 
greater notice might be taken of the alteration."* 

With one more example, and that a notable one, these 
admissions'of adversaries shall be ended. The person whose 
words are to be quoted was not only, as Dr. Brett observes, 
" a professed enemy to the established Church of England," 
but also the author of the Act commonly entitled the Root 
and Branch Sill, or "Act for the utter abolisJiing and taking 
away of all Archbishops and Bishops, their Chancellors and 
Commissaries, Deans, Deans and Chapters, Archdeacons, 
Prebendaries, Canons, and all their under officers."t That 
such a man should ever have discerned his error, was not 
much to be expected ; that he should confess and forsake it, 
was indeed wonderful. Yet in the same place in which Sir 
Edward Deering had advocated so monstrous a proposition, 
he lived to make the following confession: "They who 
deny that ever any such Bishops, that is, Bishops presiding 
over Presbyters, were in the best and purest times, I en- 
treat some one of them, if any such be here, to stand up and 
show me, teach me, how I may prove that ever there was an 
Alexander of Macedon, or a Julius Caesar, or a William the 
Conqueror, in the world. For, sir, to me as plain it is that 
Bishops president have been the constant, permanent, 
and perpetual Governors of the Church of God in all ages. 
And this being matter of fact, I do 'hope that historical proof 
will be sufficient adequate proof in that which, in its fact, is 
matter of history. But proofs herein are so manifold and 
clear, that I borrow the free and true assertion of a worthy 
and learned gentleman : ' It may be thought want of will, 
rather than want of light, which makes men deny the antiquity 
of Bishops in the primitive times.' Therefore, answer not 
me : but answer Ignatius, answer Clemens, Tertullian, Ire- 
naeus nay, answer the whole undisputed concurrence of 
the Asian, the European, and the African Churches, all 
ages, all places, all persons ; answer, I say, all these, or 
do as I do, submit to the sufficient evidence of a truth."^. 

* Heylyn's Cyprianus Anglicanus, part ii. book iv. p. 362. See 
also Hales' Letter to Laud, p. 227. 

t See his passionate speech against tbc Bishops, in Rushworth's 
Historical Collections, part iii. voJ. i. p. 55. 

t Quoted by Dr. Brett, Church Government, chap. v. p. 83 ; who 



250 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

X. It only remains now to sum up the foregoing evidence. 
And surely of all the errors which, from the foundation of the 
Church to the present hour, have possessed the minds of 
professing Christians, there was never any, at least in the 
particular feature under notice, like to this of which we are 
here speaking. That it should have lingered on through 
nearly three centuries, in spite of these protests of its own 
leading advocates, is among the chief marvels of modern his- 
tory. Without one clear text of Scripture in its behalf,* or 
a solitary example in any Church throughout all ages,t its 
first maintainers were willing, as we have seen, that it should 
appear in its true character, content to excuse it only as a 
necessary evil, and to plead as its sole but sufficient apology 
the unparalleled disorders which gave it birth.J Abandoned 

adds, ' Surely nothing but a most demonstrative truth could have 
extorted such a speech frdtu a declared enemy to all the Bishops in 
England, and a professed foe to the Hierarchy." 

* ." Sentences out of the word of God ye allege divers ; but so 
that when the same are discussed, thus it always in a manner falleth 
out, that what things by virtue thereof ye urge upon us as altogether 
necessary, are found to be thence collected only by poor and marvel- 
lous slight conjectures. I need not give instance in any one 
sentence so alleged, for that I think the instance in any alleged 
otherwise a thing not easy to be given." Hooker, E. P. Preface, 
p. 193. 

t " A very strange thing sure it Were, that such a discipline as 
ye speak of should be taught by Christ and His Apostles in the word 
of God, and no Church ever have found it out nor received it till 
this present time ; contrariwise, the government against which ye 
. bend yourselves be observe?! every where throughout all generations 
and ages of the Christian world, no Church ever perceiving the word 
of God to be against it. We require you to find out but one Church 
upon the face of the whole earth that hath been ordered by your 
discipline, or hath not been ordered by ours, that is to say, by episcopal 
regiment, sithence the time that the blessed Apostles were here 
conversant." Ibid. Our brethren would do better to answer this 
challenge, than to content themselves with repeating, one after 
another, the puerilities which have been so often refuted. But we 
are sure it will receive no reply from them, any more than it did from 
their predecessors in an earlier age ; to whom St. Austin was used to 
say, " Auferantur chartcs humanie, sonent voces divinae. Ede mihi 
unam Scriptures vocem pro parte Donati ; audi innumerabiles *pro 
orbe terrarum." De Pastoribus, cap. xiii. torn. ix. p. 281. 

t The argument which Melancthon allowed himself to use, when 
it had become necessary that the unordajned preachers should either 
defend their vocation upon some new ground, or confers themselves 
to be only laymen, was this : " The power of the keys and of 
ordination must reside in the whole Church. If, therefore, the 
Bishops become enemies of the Church, or withhold ordiria,tion, 



ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSAKIES. 251 

since that time by the very men who invented it, and shuffled 
as far as possible out of sight by its unwilling advocates in 
later times, like some infirmity of which they could not rid 
themselves, but which they were ashamed to acknowledge, 
the present existence of what is called ' presbyterianism ' 
is one of the most humiliating facts which these latter days 
offer to our contemplation. Originating in rebellion, and 
established by violence, in every land where it has hitherto 
been set up,* it was to be expected that this device of hu- 
man ingenuity shoujd still be upheld by the profane and dis- 
obedient. But that it should number amongst its willing 
captives the gentle and the good, that it should usurp the af- 
fections of many to whose virtues we bear willing testimony, 
arid by whose pure examples we would gladly profit, this 

EcclesicB retinentjus suum." De Potestate Episcoporum. Dangerous 
and mistaken as such a notion is, it would not, even if it were true, 
help our brethren ; because their Bishops Melancthon commended 
as the Church's best servants, and they do not withhold the imposition 
of hands. The language of the Magdeburg Confession agrees with 
the above. " Retinet Ecclesia administrationem in necessitate, sicubi 
ministrorum copia fieri in partibus necessariis non potest." Cap. vi. 
De Ecclesia et Ministris ejus. Every one sees that the theory of this 
article was suggested by the case to which it was intended to apply. 
Still it is fatal to our sectaries, who can of course pretend to no such 
" necessity." These men too, we may suppose, would not have 
used such an argument unless they had some esteem for that which, 
as they themselves protest, they were forced to resign. They did 
not resign it willingly, or why should they plead necessity 9" Why 
not, like our separatists, affect to rejoice in being rid of it ? 

* England, Scotland, Holland, Germany, France, Sweden, 
Denmark, Poland, and Switzerland, have all the same tale to tell of 
the origin of this form of discipline. Its history in the first five 
countries here named "is sufficiently notorious. In Sweden and 
Denmark it was by a decree of the civil power that Episcopacy was 
abolished, after the Catholics had been subdued by force of arms. 
In Poland the opposition to the Bishops seems to have been originated 
by the nobility, who hated them for their efforts to maintain discipline, 
and especially for their punishment of those who violated their vows 
of chastity. Vide Regenvolscii Histor. Ecclesiast. Slavonic. Provinc. 
lib. ii. p. 209. In Geneva itself, the Bishop, M. Pierre de la Baunie, 
who was also, as Prelate of that city, a temporal prince, was forcibly 
expelled, and an army raised in opposition to his authority as the 
supreme civil governor. Whether they could have procured a 
reformation without this violence, is another matter ; any how it is 
a significant fact, that the presbyterian ' reformation' was also, in 
every place, a revolution. On the complex character of the Bishop 
of Geneva, which is a point of some importance in this controversy, 
see the anonymous Hlstoire de France, tome ii. livre v. p. 424. 



252 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

indeed is a thought to awaken sorrowful indignation. And 
whither will our brethren, who are not ashamed to renew 
these discarded follies, and to feed upon the husks which 
others have flung aside, whither will they turn for sympa- 
thy in their lot of needless and voluntary penury 1 Not to 
those Holy Oracles of which almost every page is an admo- 
nition upon their error ; not to that long line of saints and 
martyrs whose reproaches we are loath, for the love we bear 
them, even to repeat ; not to the example of those few mod- 
erns who submitted to the same lot only because they could not 
escape from it, and who, almost without exception some at 
one period of life, some at another confessed and repented 
their error ; from none of these can they gather comfort. 
To whom, then, will they go ?* On every side they find a 
waste and a solitude. In the common forefathers of the 
flock of Christ they see only that sainted company by 
whom their inventions have been branded as sacrilege, and 
themselves as aliens and rebels, and against whom, in turn, 
every act of their religious life is a proclamation of contempt 
and defiance. And when they turn to their own masters 
and teachers, from whom at least they might expect sympa- 
thy, they too refuse to accept their unwelcome alliance, and 
bid them coldly shift for themselves. 

It is to the illustration of this last circumstance, peculiar, 
I believe, to the strange error under consideration, for 
what heresy but this was ever condemned by its own author 1 
that the present chapter has been devoted. Of the later 
sections several might, without prejudice to the argument, 
have been omitted, because it was upon the confessions of 
the Jirst ' Presbyterians ' only that it was founded. If they 
chose to witness against their own scheme, even at its first 
setting up, it was of less moment that their disciples did so 
after them. Yet this later testimony is not without its value ; 
and for this reason : 

As long as the vocation of unordaiued persons was de- 
fended as " extraordinary," and Calvin and Beza claimed to 
represent, not the lawful and ordinary pastor, but the old 
prophets of the Jewish Church, the Genevan or any other 
form of polity might be maintained even by men professing, 
as they did, the utmost reverence for antiquity without any 



w elai K\ripov6uai KOI BiaSoy^oi ; S. Athanas. Ad, Africanos 
Episc. Epist. torn. i. p. 937. 



ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 253 

great embarrassment. Example and precedent were no 
stumbling-blocks in their case, even though they admitted 
their authority in that of others ; because the obligation of 
these was assumed to be suspended, so far as they were con- 
cerned, by the very claim which they asserted to an immedi- 
ate and supernatural calling. It was not, therefore, an ab- 
solute surrender of their cause when they admitted, as they 
did so freely, the pre-eminence of Bishops. The independ- 
ent ministry of the old Prophets did not imply any antago- 
nism to the established ecclesiastical order ; the two were 
perfectly consistent, and they were admitted to be so. Only 
the one was framed for continuance, " an ordinance for 
ever;" the other was designed merely for a temporary object. 
And here the Calvinistic system, in spite, or rather because 
of its bold pretences, failed. The day arrived when it was 
necessary that the first " reformers " should devolve upon 
others the office which they had themselves ventured to ex- 
ercise. But it was not to be expected that men should con- 
cede to this new race of teachers the rank of " Prophets." 
They must be content to take a lower station. And now the 
difficulties, which the audacity of Calvin's theology had 
eluded for the moment, began to be felt. It was no disadvan- 
tage in his own case, or that of his contemporaries, that they 
had lauded the ancient hierarchy, because they professed to 
act, not against, but independently of it ; but what ground 
were their successors to take 1 They could not lay claim to 
the ordinary vocation, without abandoning their first pre- 
tence, and convicting themselves of imposture. Yet the al- 
ternative was, to resign their station ; and this they had no 
mind to do. Authority and power, which they acquired un- 
der the sanction of imperious necessity, was of too pleasant 
a savour to be easily resigned ; they had possessed them- 
selves of it on one plea, and they must frame a new one in 
order to retain it. If the Bishops at this critical moment 
would have consented to confer ordination, all might have 
been well ; but they would not, and it became necessary to 
proclaim thenceforward that the Church could do without 
them. The fatal admissions of Calvin and Luther, of Melanc- 
thon and Beza, must be blotted out; and from that time the 
new doctrine of ' Presbyterianism ' was added to the thou- 
sand errors to which a too-violent reaction from the intoler- 
able abuses of a corrupt Church had already given birth, 

12 



254 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

It is in the writings of the first generation of " re- 
formers'" that he statements are found by which the 
truth of this history of the rise and progress of ' Pres- 
byterianism ' is proved ; and to their writings it would 
have sufficed to appeal. But, as I have said, the confessions 
of its later advocates if they can be styled advocates who 
claimed for it little more than charitable forbearance are 
not without value. The distinction to be noticed between 
their admissions and those of their predecessors is this, that 
whereas the bold pretensions of the latter were not immedi- 
ately compromised by their professed admiration of the pri- 
mitive discipline, it was impossible for others, who affected 
no immediate or extraordinary calling, to repeat the same 
admissions without pronouncing with the same breath their 
own condemnation. Yet they did repeat them they did 
acknowledge Episcopacy to be of Apostolical institution; 
and accordingly they were compelled to ask that they might 
not be reproached with their own words, nor forced to ac- 
cept the conclusions to which their own premises led. 
" One thing only I have left undone," said the learned Du 
Moulin, after frankly conceding every thing, " I have not 
pronounced my own Church to be heretical." Permission 
to be silent on that point was the sum of his desires ; and 
not to be put to open shame was the humble request of the 
most accomplished and distinguished ' Presbyterian' of his age ! 
Such is the extraordinary error which men, no way de- 
barred from informing themselves of the history of the 
Church, are still found to maintain. That it should have 
survived so long in any community Avhatever, is surprising ; 
but that it should seek to pass for truth, and even assume an 
attitude of complacent superiority, amongst a people who 
were regarded by its own authors as greatly blessed, because 
they retained those very ordinances with which this new re- 
ligion ventures to dispense this, indeed, even when we 
have made the largest allowance for the tyranny of self-love, 
and prejudice, and passion, is both a perplexing and humili- 
ating fact. "If there shall be any who will not reverence 
true Bishops," said Calvin, "there is no anathema but I 
confess them worthy of it." And " if there be any, which 
you will not easily persuade me to believe," adds his disciple 
Beza, " who reject the whole order of Episcopacy, God for- 
bid that any man in his senses should assent to their mad- 



ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 255 

ness." Yet there are some amongst ourselves who have not 
feared to avow openly the silly profaneness which even these 
men affected to regard as " incredible," and to lift up their 
heel against the Church which they thought it necessary to 
commend as the purest and happiest in Christendom.* 

One remark in conclusion. It is plain that, whatever 
else may be taken for granted by those who occupy so new 
and strange a position in relation to the Church of God, this 
must be included amongst their necessary postulates that 
they are, beyond all other men, in any age or place, the ob- 
jects of His special favor and guidance. Painful as such a 
tenet must be to humble minds, they cannot shrink from as- 
serting it. It is assumed in every article of their new faith, 
of which the substance is, in a few words, as follows. That 
after suffering, during fifteen centuries, the suppression of 
His own original Institution, and the erection in its stead of 
a mere human system, God was pleased, at length, to vindicate 
His appointment from this corruption which had overlaid it. 
His saints and martyrs He had indeed permitted, during 
so many ages, to live and die in error ; evea allowing them 
to condemn with dreadful censures that which was all the 
while, though they knew it not, the true form of His Church, 
and to laud with extravagant praises that which was only, 
though they knew not this either, a departure from it. At 
length the generation arose to which, on this hypothesis, the 
new revelation was vouchsafed. The pure ordinances and 
the holy order of the Apostolic Church were again restored, 

* " Here then let us consider and beware of the fatal progress of 
error ! Calvin, and the reformers with him, set up presbyterian 
government, as they pretended, by necessitj', but still kept up and 
professed the highest regard to the episcopal character and authority : 
but those who pretend to follow their example have utterly abdicated 
the whole order of episcopacy, as unchristian and an insupportable 
grievance; while at the same time they would seem to pay the 
greatest reverence to these reformers, and much more to the first and 
purest ages of Christianity, whose fathers and councils spoke all the 
high things before quoted in behalf of Episcopacy, far beyond the 
language of our later apologists for that hierarchy, or what durst now 
be repeated, except from such unquestionable authority. In this 
they imitate the hardness of the Jews, who built the sepulchres of 
those prophets whom their fathers slew,-while at the same time they 
adhered to and outdid the wickedness of their fathers in perse- 
cuting the successors of those prophets." Leslie, On the Qualifica- 
tions necessary to administer the Sacraments, Works, vol. vii. p. 182. 
ed. Oxon. 



256 ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 

and the blessings which had been withheld, in spite of mani- 
fold promises, from the men of every other age, were granted 
to their more favoured successors in this. 

It was, indeed, somewhat strange that they who were 
distinguished by these peculiar favours should have been 
themselves unconscious of their own privilege ; and that, in 
entering upon their new state, they should ignoraatly speak 
of it as one which they embraced only from hard " neces- 
sity," and which they hoped shortly to exchange for a bet- 
ter. It was an unthankful perverseness, that they persisted 
still in commending the corrupt ecclesiastical polity, and in 
eagerly desiring that it might be retained. But if they did 
not know their own happiness, no doubt they ought to have 
done so ; and our brethren who judge that all former Chris- 
tians were so miserably deceived, need not hesitate to add 
these few to the number. But this by the way. 

Whether men were at first aware of it or not, we are 
bid, at all events, to understand, that the setting up of the 
' presbyterian' form of government in the sixteenth century 
was. in fact, the revival of the apostolical polity, and there- 
fore an inestimable blessing. Now it is not too much to 
expect, that this wonderful dispensation should have been 
attended with some corresponding benefits to mankind and 
to the cause of religion. It is not unreasonable to suppose, 
that so distinguishing and unparalleled a mercy as, by hypo- 
thesis, this must have been, should have been accompanied 
by a revival of holiness, and a zealous maintenance of that 
pure faith with which holiness is inseparably connected. Our 
brethren, we may suppose, will admit this, unless they are 
content to be regarded of the whole world as mere triflers. 
And now, what have the facts been 1 This shall be our next 
arid final inquiry. 

And since the adversary rejects as insufficient the clear 
evidence of Holy Scripture, the uniform and unvaried testi- 
mony of Antiquity, and even the witness of those .moderns 
whom he has chosen for his proper masters and teachers, it 
remains only to refer him, in the last place, to the develop- 
ment of his own principles ; to use a test from which he 
would not be thought to shrink, and to show that, in every 
land throughout the world, and under every modification of 
external circumstances under which this boasted revival of 
the primitive polity has been set up, it has declined with 



ADMISSIONS OF ADVERSARIES. 257 

greater or less rapidity, but by an unfailing law of retrogres- 
sion, to one or other form of unbelief or apostacy ; sad is at 
this moment in close alliance, in every quarter of the globe, 
with the God-denying heresy of Socinus. We do not expect 
that ordinary considerations of prudence or duty will pre- 
vail with those who have been once entangled in the snares 
of error ; but this is a fact which, when it shall be proved, 
even they may be unwilling to despise. 



CHAPTER V. 

DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

I. THE criterion by which we are about, in the last place, 
to try the religious systems of modern days, is one from 
which, as I have said, the adversaries themselves would not 
willingly be supposed to shrink. The least suspicion of re- 
luctance on their part to encounter a test at once so fair and 
so searching, would be an evil omen for their cause. And it 
must be confessed that they have not refused, in times past, 
so long as the ordeal was comparatively a safe one, to be 
judged by the visible tendencies and historical developments 
of the principles which they have been accustomed to pro- 
fess.* It is to these developments, as they are exhibited 
throughout the world at the present hour, that we are now 
going to refer. 

Nor have we any reason to suppose that the judgment 
founded upon them will be regarded as fanciful or unjust. 
It is indeed to visible results that religious no less than politi- 
cal empiricism has ever been eager to point attention. To 
these it still professes to appeal; and studiously to cast a 
veil over them, and to insist, in this particular case alone, 
upon confining controversy within the limits of abstract or 
speculative reasonings, would be a departure from their 
usual method too significant to be ventured upon by the. 
religionists with whom we have to do. It would, moreover, 
be fatally inconsistent with the claim to a special illumina- 
tion, and the hypothesis of a new revelation, which, as I have 
noticed above, their whole case requires and presuppcses.t 

* Witness the replies made by Easnage and others, in the name 
of the Protestant party, to Bossuet-'s celebrated Histuire dcs Varia- 
tions dcs Egliscs Protcstantes. 

t See Hooker, Preface,, ch. iii. p. 166. 



DEVELOPMENT OF aiODERN SYSTEMS. 259 

It might even be said, that the argument, upon which it 
is here proposed to enter, is only borrowed from the forefa- 
thers for they have an ancestry, though it be of yesterday 
of the present race of sectaries. It was often in the mouth 
of their predecessors of the Caroline era. " The tree is 
known by the fruit," said the ' presbyterian' Edwards, quot- 
ing Scripture against men who had ventured to improve upon 
the example which he and his party had set them : " a good 
tree cannot bring forth evil fruit ; and so we may judge of 
the ' Independent' way by these fruits. . . . We may by 
this catalogue of heresies" (which the 'Independent' doc- 
trine had generated) " see the truth of that spoken of by 
many divines, both fathers and modern writers, that sofiism 
makes way to heresy, and separation from the Church to 
separation from the Plead."* An edifying remark, on many 
accounts, and one which we need not hesitate to adopt even 
from such a source. 

" The hand of God is gone out against you," was the 
confident reproach of Baxter using precisely the same ar- 
gument against those who separated from the " conventi- 
cles of vanity"t within which he would have restrained them. 
" You see," said he, with the full assurance of his class, 
" you do but prepare yourselves for a further progress. 
Seekers, Ranters, duakers, and too many professed infi- 
dels, do spring up from among you."f 

This reasoning, then, I repeat, is not new ; it was fa- 
miliar, not very long since, to the enemies of the Church, 
and why should it not be employed in her defence? It was 
once used by them in their struggles against each other : 
let us see what it may effect in our behalf against them all. 

* GangrcEna, chap. v. p. 125. Sir R. L'Estrange has collected 
many such observations -in his Dissenters' Sayings against Toleration. 

t Aug. Contra Ep. Parmen. lib. iii. cap. v. 

t "Parties will arise in the separated churches," he adds, " and 
separate themselves from them, till they are dissolved." See JVo 
Protestant, lut the. Dissenters' Plot, p. 185, ed. 1682. " We cannot," 
says anothci-, " but sadly look upon and lament over the wofull 
effects of the separation. How hath God born witnesse against it 
in our sight, as heretofore in Germany ! Into 'what errors, heresies, 
blasphemies, &c. have thousands run ! We call these, and might 
name many particulars under these, effects of the separation ; we 
think they are more than consequences." Fowler's Dtcmonium 
Meridianum, p. 178 (1655) : and this was addressed to Cromwell 
himself. 

" Presbyteriall government," said Edwards, " as soon as an 
error doth but peep out will find it, and take it single before it grows 



260 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

Now there are, in fact, two distinct methods in which 
an inquiry into the development of religious systems of hu- 
man origin may be conducted, and the oneness of schism 
and heresy demonstrated. The first is, by the use of a 
priori arguments only by tracing what a modern writer 
calls the " philosophical connexion" between the two, and 
the identity of their primary principles; and this has often 
been done with great power and effect, though not perhaps 
with the accuracy and minuteness which the subject de- 
serves. The other is simpler, and takes the reverse or- 
der ; pointing, wherever it can, to the actual history of 
separation, marking its gradual declension to misbelief, its 
rapid and silent but uniform progress from innovation in 
Discipline to corruption in Doctrine. This latter method 
deals with facts rather than principles, and is perhaps 
the more practical of the two ; and as it may be pursued 
with more facility, as well as with far greater effective- 
ness, it is the one to which I intend here mainly to con- 
fine myself. 

The history of the Church, to which we must refer 
for these facts, presents to us, at different epochs, three 
remarkable heresies, which appear, each in its respective 
era, to have either wholly absorbed into themselves, or at 
least to have powerfully affected and modified, the various 
minor sects which were contemporaneous with them. Of 
these the earliest, which arose in the time of the Apos- 
tles and prevailed throughout the following age, was Gnos- 
ticism ; it was succeeded, at a somewhat later period, by 
Arianism ; and now, in our own day, Socinianism maintains 
a kindred relation to, and exerts a similar influence over, 
the ever-shifting and fluctuating communities which occupy 
with respect to the Church the position of the ancient sepa- 
ratists. 

(1.) Of the first of these it would be inaccurate to speak 
as affording an instance of the operation of that uniform law 
of declension from schism to heresy, which we are about to 
trace ; because it was not originated, like the others, by 

into a body, and crush it in the egg before it comes to be a flying 
serpent:" and then he instances as follows ; "Where have we ever 
heard of or found in the church of Scotland, France, &c. such things 
as in the Independent churches ?" p. 177. We are going to take him, 
therefore, at his word, and try 'presbytery' by his own test. 



DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 261 

separation from the one Catholic Church.* I shall pass 
over it, therefore, altogether ; remarking only that, at least 
in two particulars, its history exhibits the invariable features 
of subsequent ecclesiastical schisms namely, the practice 
of all headstrong and licentious disobedience under the 
plea of spiritual liberty ,t and the gradual progress from bad 
to worse. Hateful as it was even in its outset, this system 
seems to have assumed by degrees, as it received the acces- 
sion of sect after sect Carpocratians, Menandrians, BasiJi- 
dians, Marcionites, Valentinians, and others an aspect of 
yet more fearful and unmingled evil.| In this respect we 
shall see hereafter an exact parallelism between its course 
and that of the modern sects. 

(2.) The history of Arianism supplies more precise and 
remarkable instances of the same downward progress. The 
full extent of the fatal influence which this heresy exerted 
over various bodies of early separatists, it -would be very 
difficult to trace ; and the attempt to estimate it accurately 
would carry us if indeed it could be accomplished at all 
far beyond our proposed limits. Enough, however, of its 
mischievous course may be noticed, and that in very few 
words, to show that inseparable connexion between schism 
and heresy, which was asserted even in the earlier ages of 
Christianity, and which later and fuller developments have 
finally confirmed and demonstrated. 

The progress of the famous Meletian schism is the one to 
which, as illustrating this connexion, I shall first refer. Its 
history is, briefly, as follows. Peter, the Bishop of Alexan- 
dria, had been compelled, during the persecution of Maxi- 
minus, to avoid death by flight. His patriarchate being thus 
deprived of its chief ruler, as well as of other bishops, to 
whom the storm proved yet mere fatal than to himself, be- 
came exposed to manifold evils. Meletius, Bishop of Lyco- 
polis in Lower Egypt, taking advantage of the absence of 
Peter and the other prelates, assumed to himself the exer- 

* Bishop Bull, however, was of opinion that the Arians were 
derived from the Gnostics. Def. Fid. Me. vol. v. p. 100. 

t " Ilp'orov autem ibsvSos^ sive fundamentum, tarn absurdis dog- 
matibus substructum, fuisse contendit prsetextum libertatis credentibus 
per Christum acquisitse." F. Buddei De Statu Eccles. Christ, sub 
jlpost. cap. v. 3. p. 598. 

t Grabe remarks particularly of Valentinus, " eum non omnes 
ab initio errore ssimul protulisse." Spicileg. torn. ii. p. 48. 

12* 



DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

else of authority over the vacant dioceses. The remon- 
strances and expostulations of the absent and imprisoned 
bishops produced no effect ; and upon the death of those who 
were confined in that city, his ambition carried him to Alex- 
andria, the chief of the now deserted sees. Having cor- 
rupted some of the presbyters who had been left there by 
Peter, he became the head of a powerful party. His own 
safety during the persecution he is said to have purchased 
by consenting publicly to offer sacrifice before the heathen 
magistrate. After the lapse of some years Peter returned, 
and Meletius was deposed : from that, time the Meletian 
schism was fully organized. It is only necessary to add, 
that the Meletians affected, like the puritans in later times, 
to charge their separation upon the corrupt and lax state of 
the Church; and that, like them also, they were treated, so 
long as there was any hope of their repentance, with the 
utmost gentleness and forbearance.* 

Thus far we have only the story of every ordinary schism. 
First, lust of power and authority ; then, treachery and fraud 
to obtain them; and, in the end, open violence and rebel- 
lion, justified by some specious plea, or glcssed over by some 
abused text of Scripture. It is the progress and final ter- 
mination of this schism which deserves special notice; and 
that because of its exact agreement with the history of later 
sects. The Meletians, finding it difficult to contend single- 
handed, formed a political alliance with the Arians. Hav- 
ing been formerly at variance, they were now, as St. Atha- 
uasius observes,f like Pilot and Herod, made friends toge- 
ther. Counting the integrity of the faith which they still 
professed to hold of less moment than the indulgence of 
their malice and revenge, they banded together, like their 
successors in our own day, in common warfare against the 
Church; from unwilling allies they became fast friends; 
and were finally swallowed up in the vortex of that heresy 
against which they had once zealously contended-! 

* Vide Socratis Hist. Ecc. lib. i. cap. vi. ; and S. PhiJastrii De 
Hceresibus, cap. xc. p. 173. 

t Orat. i. Contra Jlrianos, torn. i. p. 304, and Apolog. p. 731. 
Sozomen says they joined themselves to the Arians, <uy iiSov TrMjOog 
i-xojievov roTs lepcvvi T>JS >ca86\oT> tiwAiyo-iaj that is, from envy. Hist. Ecc. 
lib. ii. cap. xxi. p. 471. 

On this curious and instructive development of schism, see 
S. Joan n is Damasceni De Hcr.res. p. 242, ed. Coloniae, 1546; Aug. 
Hcurcs. xlviii. ; and Epiphan. Hares. Ixviii. torn. i. pp. 605 and 721 



.DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 203 

The case of Aerius, the first " presbyterian," is different 
in no respect from that of the Meletians. Having failed to 
procure for himself a bishopric which he coveted, he began 
to teach, in the bitterness of baffled ambition, that there was 
no distinction between a bishop and a presbyter, asserting 
that both were of equal rank and power. The origin of his 
opinion was so notorious, and its novelty so extravagant, in 
those days, that the holy Fathers who notice it speak of him 
rather as an " insane" person than as one to whose petulant 
folly it was necessary to offer any serious reply.* He fell 
into many heresies, and at length became an Arian.f 

Another instance, marking still more strongly the true 
nature of schism, its instability, and essential oneness with 
heresy, is that of the Donatists. The trifling circumstances 
in which the separation of this famous sect from the Church 
originated, and the principles upon which it was so per- 
versely justified, have rendered their case so very similar to 
that of modern sectaries, that some of these latter have felt 
constrained openly to avow their sympathy with them. At 
the outset of their career the Donatists held, as St. Austin 
admits, the orthodox faith.J " The doctrines which they 
maintained at the time of their separation," to use the words 
of a modern writer, " were those of the Catholic Church. 
Whatever difference of opinion they 'professed afterwards, 
.... this arose in the course of the dispute."^ The final 
results of the schism, in the case of the founder of it him- 
self, are exposed by Augustine, who says, " We possess the 
writings of Donatus, from which it appears, that he did not 



* T PIv As airou o Xoyoj fiaviialiis juaAAov, rivep KOLTCUrraaeais 
Epip'ifin. Ifceres. Ixxv. p. 906. 

t Aug. Hares. liii. ; Epiphan. Plcercs. Ixxv. p. 905. Fuller no- 
tices a like, case in later times, book iv. cent. 14 ; and in our own 
days such examples have abounded. " Dr. Priestley was once, as 
he himself informs us, a Calvinist, and that of the straitest sect. 
Afterwards he became a high Arian, next a low Arian, and. then a 
Socinian." Andrew Fuller's Calvinistic and Socinian Systems com- 
pared, letter xv. p. 81. 

$ Emerito, De Schismate Donatist. Ep. clxiv. torn. ii. p. 285. 

Vide Nott's Hampton Lectures, sermon vi. note, p 347. " The 
Donatists of old did not at first dissent in matters of faith from the 
Catholic Church, but their 'schism did soon produce heresies, as an 
ulcer or wound being inflamed, doth soon beget a fever." Norris's 
Discourse concerning the pretended Religious Assembling in private 
Conventicles, argument iii. p. 104. 



264 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

maintain the catholic doctrine of the Trinity; but although 
he., confessed a unity of substance, he made the Sen to be 
inferior to the Father, and the Holy Spirit inferior to the 
Son."* 

Such, in ancient times, have been the uniform accom- 
paniments of schism. And if these developments were, as 
the Fathers appear to have considered them, indications of 
a general law, they ought to attend the revival of similar prin- 
ciples in every age.t If schism be so closely connected 
with heresy in its primary principles, that the one is only 
the first step to the other, their identity must admit of being 
traced in our own days as well as in those which have gone 
before. In claiming the advantage, then, of earlier expe- 
rience and more ancient reasonings upon this subject, we 
must be content to abide by them still. We do not refuse 
to do so. And if, amcng all the various sects which the last 
three centuries have produced, a single exception to the 
operation of that uniform law of which I have spoken can 
be pointed out, let all the different cases in which I am 
now about to prove it go for nothing. 

The course which I propose to take in thus testing the 
principles upon which the modern religious systems have 
been framed is at least a simple and intelligible one. It is 
to compare, one after another, the present aspect of all the 
principal communities in which those systems have been 
received with their condition at an earlier period of their 

* " Extant scripta ejus (Donati), ubi apparet eum etiam non 
catholicam de Trinitate habuisse sentcntiam, scd quamvis ejusdcni 
substantial, minorem tamen Patre Filium, et minorcm Filio putasse 
Spiritum Sanctum." Hares. Jxix. This Father mentions that the 
sect soon split into various parties, of which he gives some account, 
Contra Crcsconium, lib. iv. cap. Ix. and elsewhere. 

t " Nullum schisma non sibi aliquam confingit hoeresim, ut recte 
ab ecclesia recessisse videatur." S. Hieron. In cap. iii. Epist. ad 
Titum. Indeed, perseverance in schism was regarded as tantamount 
to heresy. "If schism be permanent and lasting, it comes at length 
to be styled heresy, according to the. Canon-law ; because a schis- 
matic, by persisting in his schism (say the Canonists), supposes and 
believes that he has made this departure from the Church upon a 
right and solid foundation of faith, and is therefore by that law 
deemed a heretick." Ayliffe's Parergon, p. 480. " Kajretici cen- 
sentur qui ab Ecclesias Catholics Saccrdotilus dissentiunt, et illicilo 
coeunt." Gothofred. Cod. Thcodos. xvi. tit. v. DC Ilccrclids^ torn, 
vi. p. 167. 



DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 265 

history ; and to examine, so far as I have the means, the 
tenets of their existing theology, with the doctrines professed 
and maintained by their first founders. And this, with only 
one additional remark, I now proceed to do. I have said, 
in the preceding chapter, that we should have been enti- 
tled to anticipate, regard being had to the peculiar assump- 
tions upon which their case rests, not merely that they 
would be able to maintain an equality, in respect both of 
faith and practice, with that ancient Communion from 
which they had severed themselves, but that they would 
exhibit such a marked superiority, such a vigilant guar- 
dianship of the restored primitive faith, and such a conspic- 
uous example of renovated primitive practice, as should 
consist with the lofty claims upon which their separation 
was based. If they had only contended in a decent rivalry 
with the Church which they had so lightly esteemed, and 
whose laws they had so disdainfully subverted, I think we 
might fairly have denied that the justice of those high 
claims had been established. Professing to restore to the 
world the possession of truths which had been obscured 
during fifteen ages, and to " reform," after the full integ- 
rity of the Apostolic pattern, a Church which had been 
corrupted during the like period, men had a right to expect 
from them, as the issue of such magnificent promises, some- 
thing more than an imitation, however successful, of that 
exploded institution which they had been taught to despise. 
But if, failing even to appropriate to themselves this low 
degree of merit, it shall be found that the religious bodies in 
question have long since abandoned not only the " faith once 
delivered to the saints," but even that peculiar modification 
of it which their own teachers so confidently proposed as its 
substance and counterpart ; if it shall appear that they have 
fallen, one after another, into a condition of such deplorable 
confusion, and a profession of such undisguised apostacy, as 
makes the defects and corruptions of the Catholic Church, 
putting them at the worst, harmless and insignificant ; in 
that case, I believe, we shall be justified in regarding them 
as detected impostors, and their pretended reformation of 
the everlasting Church of God as not merely a total failure, 
and deprived of every token of the divine sanction which 
the semblance of prosperity is commonly supposed to imply, 
but as clearly visited by His awful judgments beyond the 



2G() DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

examples of His ordinary dealings with human folly and pre- 
sumption. What has actually been their progress, and what 
is their real condition throughout the various countries of 
the world, I am now to show. I shall begin with Germany, 
both because it was thence that the new modes of faith and 
discipline first issued, and because its present state has 
already excited so much attention, that I shall be able, in 
describing it, to confine myself entirely to the statements 
and representations of others. 

II. When the new theories of religious belief, whose 
disastrous issue is to be the subject of our present inquiry, 
were first promulgated by the German reformers, it is ad- 
mitted that the holy doctrines of the Trinity, the Incarna- 
tion, and the Atonement, were maintained, without doubt 
or question, throughout the whole world. This fact can- 
not be too emphatically declared.* In spite of the manifold 
corruptions of the Church of Rome and these, perhaps, it 
is not easy to . exaggerate -the fundamental verities of the 
Christian faith had been hitherto preserved unimpaired. 
That there was a tendency then, as now, in some of the 
popular novelties of that Church, to obscure the office of the 
One Mediator, need not be denied; but even these ori- 
ginated, in many instances, in a professed reverence for 
His Person. If the Blessed Virgin, for example, was ap- 
proached in language of unseemly and fanatical fervour, or 
even of idolatrous worship, it was still as " the Mother of 
God ; " and even the honour paid to the Saints, Avhich was 
too often of the same character, was studiously vindicated 
as not only consistent with, but, in some sense, correlative 
to, that greater honour which, in theory at least, was re- 
served only for " the King of Saints." The thrones which 
certain late teachers of that Church, in despite both of 
Scripture and Antiquity, had presumptuously assigned to 
created' beings, were still supposed to be in subordination 
to that more glorious throne which had been occupied from 

* " The ancient controversies on the Trinity had long subsided ; 
if any remained whose creed was not unlike that of the Arians, we 
must seek for them among the Waldenses, or other persecuted sects. 
But even this is obscure ; and Erasmus, when accused of Arianism, 
might reply with apparent truth, that no heresy was more extinct." 
Hall am 's Introduction to the Literature of Europe^ &c. chap. v. vol. 
i. p. 507. 



IN GERMANY. 267 

all eternity by the Son of God. To doubt whether He was 
" God of God, Light of Light, Very God of Very God," One 
from everlasting and to everlasting with the Father, or even 
to tolerate any speculation whatsoever on the awful truth 
this was an impiety too revolting to the catholic mind to be 
endured by the rulers of the Church in any period of her 
existence. To such blasphemies the Church of Rome never 
did, and, as we are most firmly assured, never would have 
consented to hearken.* At the time of the Reformation 
they had been for ages unknown and unheard of.t 

Hardly, however, had the opinions and sentiments which 
accompanied and marred that movement begun to prevail, 
when the execrable impieties which had so long slumbered 
again revived. The fact of their simultaneous growth is 
beyond dispute ; and it elicited at the very outset, both from 
those who espoused the doctrines of the Reformation and 
those who opposed them, exclamations of sorrow and dismay. 
" It is most certain," says one who adhered to the latter party, 
" that from the moment that Luther and Calvin published 
their opinions, it was predicted to them, that in overthrowing 
the foundation upon which the faith of mankind reposed, the 
ancient decisions of the Church would find no better accep- 
tance with men than those of a later period."! " The Socin- 
ian disputations," says the same writer, "had already com-' 
raenced in the time of Melancthon ; but he clearly discerned, 
from his own observation of the character of the movement, 
that they would one day be pushed to a far greater extent. 
' Good God,' said he, ' what a tragedy will posterity witness, 
if men should come hereafter to debate again the questions, 
whether the Word or the Holy Spirit be a Person !' " " I 
cannot weep enough," was another lament of the same 

* " Est-ce lorsqu'on ne croit rien," was the fine saying attributed 
to one of her clergy, " qu'on doit exaggerer les dangers de tout 
croire ?" Quoted by Chiniac, De la Tolerance et du Fanatisme en 
matiere de Religion, p. 61, Paris, 1803. 

t Having observed that "it does not appear that the churches in 
communion with the papal see are ever likely to become an infidel 
body," Mr. Gladstone notices, with his usual earnestness and elo- 
quence, the very different course of those Calvinistic bodies which 
have become rationalistic, and " utterly lost the doctrine of grace." 
See his Church Principles in their Result, pp. 184, 5. 

i Bossuet, Histoire des Variations des Egliscs Protestantes, vi ema 
avertissement, tome iv. pp. 510, 511. 

Bid. p. 152. 



26S DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

reformer, " over the infelicity of the Reformation, and its 
inconsistency with itself. The people will never again sub- 
mit to a constraint which the desire of liberty has led them 
to throw off. Our partisans are contending, not for the Gos- 
pel, but for power. The ecclesiastical discipline is annihi- 
lated. Men are doubting about the most fundamental truths. 
The evil is beyond cure."* " You see yourselves,' 3 said 
Luther to some of his contemporaries, " what confusion Sa- 
tan stirs up in the Church : there are almost as many opin- 
ions prevailing as there are individual teachers."t And at a 
later period, after the benefit of some experience, another 
was led to make the remarkable confession, " I will not 
dissemble that the wide difference between our own faith 
and that of the ancient Church gives me deep concern. For, 
not to speak of other articles, Luther has departed from the 
ancients in the matter of the Sacraments ; Zuingle has gone 
beyond Luther ; Calvin has abandoned both the one and the 
other ; and the later writers have abandoned Calvin. If we 
proceed after this fashion, what ^cill the. end of all this be ?"| 
To this question the lapse of further time, and the posses- 
sion of more ample experience, have enabled us to furnish a 
reply ; and we are about to do so. Meanwhile, let it be 

* Quoted by Starck, ThcoduVs Gastmahl, p 246, cd. Kentzinger. 
" Vides quo tendat petulontia multoruin," says Melancthon in an- 
other place, ThomcB MatthitB Epist. p. 252 ; cf. p. 276. His let- 
ters are full of such complaints. 

t " Videtis ipsi qu-intas in Ecclesia turbas excitet Sathan ; tot 
scilicet opinionibus fere regnnntibus, quot sunt niiuistrorum capita." 
M. Lutberi Epist. Ministris in Northusio, inter Epist. Ph. Melancth. 
p. 289. " Expcrientia tandem didicisti," said his adversaries, " quid 
monstri monstrosa ista contrarietas in Gerniania. produxit." Cocb- 
Iseus Contra Lutlicrum, cap. xviii. " Inter vos non solum per pro- 
vincias, sed per civitates ejusdem provincial, imino per domes ct 
faniilias ejusdem civitatis, de fide conlendatis et discrepctis." Tur- 
rian. DC Ecclcsia, lib. i. cap. iv. When men talk of the unity which 
results from consenting to appeal to the Scriptures as a common 
standard, apart from the compulsory influence of systems and creeds, 
it seems enough to refer them to this period of history. As a scheme 
for the promotion of unity, of any sort or kind, the German Reform- 
ation is perhaps the most signal failure on record. 

t Cassauboni Epist. 670. Ad J. Wittembogard., quoted by Remy 
Ceillier. Apoiogic des Peres dc I'Eglise, contre Barbeyrac, Dissert. 
Prcliminaire. 

" For first, Luther, forsaking the aultar of Chryste's Church, 
framed himself 'another aultar. But Carolostadius, Zuinglius, and 
CEcolampadius, not liking either the aultar of the Church or of 



IN GERMAN . 269 

observed, that two very important facts have been already 
brought forward, namely, that the Arian heresy had no 
existence at the time of the German reformation, and that 
its revival was exactly synchronous with the origin of that 
celebrated movement.* 

Attended from the first by these fearful signs, which, as 
we have seen, alarmed both himself and ethers, the preach- 
ing of Luther had attracted notice during little more than 
four years, when another phenomenon arose, which arrested 
immediately the attentive observation of both the conflicting 
parties. Within so brief an interval of time there was 
exhibited to the world the strange spectacle of a distinct and 
ulterior reformation, based upon Luther's own principles, 
embodying the main articles of his teaching, appealing un- 
hesitatingly to the same Scriptures, and differing from the 
religious scheme which it professed to complete and amend, 
only by removing to a greater distance the boundaries which 
Luther had set up as its natural and unalterable limits. It 
was in the year 1521 that the Anabaptists whose origin 
must of course be referred to a still earlier period began in 
many different places to divide with Luther the attention of 
the people.f And it is beyond dispute that, even at that 

Luther, framed to themselves after their phantasie another aultar. 
The Anabaptists framed themselves another aultar after their devise. 
The Svvenckfeldians, misliking all that was done before them, framed 
after their conceit a newe aultar altogether spirituall. The Calvin- 
istes, thinking to passe them nil, have invented another manner of 
aultar, even altogether after the manner of the Arian's aultar, or not 
much unlike, as Richerus, Calvine's preacher, hath in France plainly 
declared." Ileskyn's Parliament of CJtryste, book iii. chap. Ix 
p. 399. 

* Even Tuvretin, the Genevan professor whose words involve 
an important admission only says, that the 16th century produced 
more Photinianism and Sabellianism than Arianism ; Histor. Ecclcs. 
Compend. secul. xvi. p. 389, Genevze, 1736. The existence of various 
forms of heresy, even from the very beginning of the movement, is 
evident enough, if only from the vain efforts of Luther, Calvin, and 
others to oppose and destroy them. 

t Vi(ieHoltlnger,Histoiredcs-Suissesarcpoquede la Reforma- 
tion, traduite par Vulliemin, tome ii. p 31. Sir Simonds D'Ewes, 
who was yet a great admirer of Luther, says, that he " had scarce 
planted the Gospel in Germany, in the yeare 1517, but within the 
space of some five yeeres after, JMelchior Hofman, Thomas Muncer, 
Bernard Rothman, and other Anabaptists, planted there also, as 
may be strongly collected, divers Pelagian blasphemies." Their 
progress was very rapid j and D'Ewes says, " their numbers are at 



270 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

date, many of their leaders who had, with scarcely an ex- 
ception, already passed through and abandoned Lutheranism 
were deeply infected with the Arian and other impieties.* 
Of the progress and subsequent state of these sectaries, 
whose apostacy became so general as to be indicated by the 
proverbial saying, " an Anabaptist is an unlearned Socinian, 
and a Socinian a learned Anabaptist,"t it is not my purpose 
to speak. It is the original connexion^ of this heresy with 
Lutheranism, and their mutual relation a relation which 
appears to have been not less intimate than that of parent 
and child which it is important to notice ; because it is 

this day so increased, as they constitute or make a considerable 
party in divers parts of Christendome." The Primitive Practice for 
preserving Truth, ix. xviii. 

* Amongst other leading Anabaptists, Hetzer, Campanus, and 
Claudius, are mentioned as Arians ; Encyclopedic Mcthodiquc, art. 
Sociniens. Servctus himself, as Calvin notices, Defcns. ii. DC Sa- 
cramcjit., was first an Anabaptist. See other instances in Ruchat, 
Histoire, &c. tome v. p. 401. Houbmeyer was put to death as an 
Anabaptist, at Vienne,in 1527; Hottinger, tome ii. p. 38. Zeltner 
says, " Commixtos certe cum his (Anabaptistis) Socini in Batavis 
asseclas vixisse, et adhuc istic delitescerc, nemo ignorat." Histor. 
Crypto-Sociuianismi Jtttorfini, cap. ii. 6. p. 171, note. It was 
common with those who embraced the doctrines of Calvin and 
Luther to speak of them as so united. Vide F. Junii Prafut. In 
Sac. Parallel. Loc. Opp. p. 1371. The same language was used by 
the Socinians themselves : " A Reformatis ad Unitarios Clmstianos 
transierat ;'' Vita Lubienccii. " Antea Calvinianus, TJnitariorum sen- 
tentiam amplexus est ;" Wissowat. Narrat. Compcnd. p. 214. And 
one who had passed through every grade declared, " nullum se nosse 
Arianum facttim qui non antea Calvinista fuerit j" vide Hartmanni 
Condi. Illustr. Exercitat. xxxii. torn. iii. p. 5GO. 
i Zeltner, uli supra. 

i On which see Pluquet, De VOrigine des Anabaptistcs, Diction- 
naire. des Htr&sics, tome ii. pp. 60 et seq. 

A writer of the present day, who makes it a sort of boast to 
be " impartial," does not. hesitate to connect Lutheranism with the 
heresies by which it was so speedily followed. " A more immediate 
effect of overthrowing the ancient system," Mr. Hallam says, " was 
the growth of fanaticism, to which, in its worst shape, the anti- 
rioniian extravagancy of Luther yielded too great encouragement." 
Introduction to the Literature of Europe, ch. vi. vol. i. p. 485: and 
again, he speaks of Anabaptism particularly, as " generated in great 
measure by the Lutheran tenet of assurance ;" p. 502. And when 
it was urged by the Armiuians of Holland, in their sufferings, " that 
the liberty of the country in matters of religion should be no more 
straitened unto them than unto the Lutherans and Anabaptists, who 
have their meetings and preachings by public permission, 11 it was 



IN GERMANY. 271 

the identity of their source, and the sameness of their ele- 
mentary principles, which will best explain what we are 
shortly to describe, namely the present aspect of Lutheranism 
itself. 

That the appearance of unity between the Lutherans and 
Anabaptists did not, however, last long, is most true. Irri- 
tated and confounded by so premature a development of his 
own principles, Luther keenly discerned that it would be 
safer to have such men for enemies than friends ; and, with- 
out a moment's pause, he turned the whole force of his pow- 
erful mind against these new " reformers."* The writings 
which were published in quick succession by himself and 
his able allies, in condemnation of their tenets, are almost 
as numerous as those which were provoked by the corrup- 
tions of the Church. But it is these very writings which 
afford the most convincing proof of the fact which Luther 
was so anxious to disguise, and demonstrate the intimacy of 
relationship which they were intended to disclaim. No one 
can have read them, or indeed any of the numerous writings 
which were directed by the reformers against the various 
misbelievers of their age, without noticing this very signifi- 
cant circumstance, that their authors appear to have aban- 
doned altogether, for the time, their usual course of reason- 
ing, and to have adopted without reserve precisely that which 
was uniformly employed against themselves by the Catholic 
writers. Of their peculiar and habitual mode of argument- 
ation, their confident appeals to Holy Scripture, their 
haughty defiance of the Church, their contempt for catholic 
tradition, of this we no longer find any trace. And the 
fact is so singular, and leads so directly to certain important' 
conclusions, that it ought not to be overlooked in the pres- 
ent inquiry. 

When Luther and Melancthon challenged the Anabap- 

ansvvered on the part of the state, " The Lutherans and Anabaptists 
are no innovators, b.ut began and continued with the beginning and 
increase of the state." See Sir Dudley Carleton's Letters, p. 372. 

* They were even put to death in numerous instances, and that 
with the consent of Melancthon, the mildest of the " reformers," 
to whom they were evidently an odious source of embarrassment. 
The Lutherans had said to the Catholics, " You have renounced the 
Scriptures, to hear the Church ;" and the Anabaptists said to them 
in turn, "You have rejected the Holy Spirit, to amuse yourselves 
with the Scriptures." Moehler, La Symbolique, 59. tome ii. p. 195. 



272 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

lists to prove a ' lawful vocation , to the ministry which they 
had usurped, and exalted ordination as a ' sacrament,' and 
spoke fluently of the decisions of the ancient Church ; when 
Calvin appealed angrily to * councils ' and ' synods,'* and 
Beza inveighed against " the despisers of ancient canons," 
or admonished his new adversaries " either to convict the 
whole ancient Church of error, or to relinquish their own opin- 
ions ;"f in a word, when they employed against others the 

* And even went so far as to say, " Impositionem manuum in 
veris Icgitimisque ordinationibus sacramentum esse, concede." In- 
stitut. lib. iv. cap. xix. 31. 

t Resp. ad Nicol. Selneccer. p. 88 (Genevae, 1572). Elsewhere 
he appeals against the rising Socinians to "all the blameless Bishops 
inculpates throughout the whole world ;" Epist. xviii. Domino 
Scadcomo : and again to " the perpetual consent of the Catholic 
Church !" Libell. de Valentin. Gcntil. Pro-fat, p. 16. So CEcolam- 
padius tells the Anabaptists, that they " put a wholly neAv sense 
upon the Scriptures, contrary to that of all the ancient Doctors ;" 
Chauffepie, Supplement toBayle, art. (Ecolampade. So Peter Viret, 
in a passage of which the inconsistency is really ludicrous, " Si 
itaque nobiscum facit totius veteris Ecclesia consuetudo atque con- 
sensio, quanta ha?c nostra causa plausibilior haberi debet, Catabap- 
tistarum calumniis toti veteri Ecclesiae adversantibus ;" De Minist. 
et Sacrament, lib. xiii. cap. iii. p. 144. So Chemnitz : " Amamus 
enim et veneramur veteris et purioris Ecclesiaj testimonia, cujus 
consensu et adjuvamur et confirmamur ;" Exam. Dccrct. Condi. 
Trident, torn. i. p. 191. And Chamier : " Sed hallucinates Patrcs, 
nemo ei crediturus est sanae mentis ;" De (Ecum. Poniif. lib. ix. 
cap. iv. 8. And Hoornbeeck : " Eja, qaam egregia ex tuo sensu 
nobis Ecclesia Christiana depingitur ! Quam ea nulla fere nnquara 
fuit, hsec si vera sint! Q,uot animarum myriades deceptoe ! M &c. 
Jlpolog. pro Ecclcs. Christian. &c. p. 20 This is exactly what we 
say ;. and how will a 'presbyterian' answer the argument ? Bucer, 
again, uses the same language, In Sacra Evangel. Prstfat. And 
Du Moulin, Answer to Cardinal Perron^ book i. ch. xlvi. p. 120 
(1664). Melancthon professes the same judgment in innumerable 
places : and Philippe de Mornay says, " Nous admettons scricusc- 
ment et rdveremment les ecrits des Saints Peres ;" Prcf. a Messieurs 
de VEglise Romainc, p. 7. Cf. Act. Convent. Thoruniens. sess. iii. 
p. 70 (Warsaw, 1646). Jerome Zanchy writes, " A communi Patrum 
consensu nulla cogeute necessitate dissentire mild religioest;' apud 
Scrivener. Jljwlog. -pro Pair. Ecclcs. cap. viii. p. 53. And see Cal- 
vini Institut. Pra3iat., and lib. iv. capl v. 10. Ridley, who is often 
quoted by men who have very little in common with him, says, 
" cum orthodoxis Patribiis sic loquor et sentio ;" Protcstatio Ridleii, 
apud Randolph. Encliirid. Thcolog. torn. i. p. 53: and even Jewel 
professes, "Nos cum antiquissimis Patribus affirmamus ;" Juelli 
Jlpolog. p. 1C6, ed. 1838. Lastly, Chillingworth himself declares it 
to be "a mere calumny that Protestants condemn all kinds of tra- 



IN GERMAN Jf. 273 

very arguments which they had affected to make light of 
when urged against themselves, they did not merely become 
personally ridiculous,* and as individual teachers unworthy 
of the least respect or attention, but they pronounced judg- 
ment at the same time upon their own general principles, 
and saved the world the trouble of proving that they were 
themselves included in the very same condemnation which 
they were so forward to pronounce upon others. In assum- 
ing for a special purpose the attitude and borrowing the sen- 
timents of catholic teachers, they reluctantly confessed, that 
the weapons which they had been accustomed hitherto to 
use might be good indeed for the purpose of attack, but were 
utterly powerless to defend, that upon their principles truth 
might be successfully opposed, but could not for one hour be 
maintained. Lutheranism, they thus acknowledge, might 
lead men to the error of the Anabaptists, but it had no pow- 
er to bring them back again ; and for this reason, that men 
might continue Anabaptists, or any thing else, without doing 
violence to its fundamental principles. And therefore, when 
they desired to recall those who had strayed from their ranks, 
or to silence their blasphemies, they clearly understood, as 
we see from the course which they adopted, that it was only 
in proportion as they departed from their oion principles, and 
consented to act upon those of others, that they could hope 
to effect their object. Their mode of arguing with heretics, 
I say, showed this ; they must cease, for the time, to be 
Lutherans, i. e. Lutheranism could not oppose heresy. We 
might have expected, then, from a consideration of the facts 
thus presented to us in the early history of the German re- 
formation, that the system then devised was not destined to 
preserve long its original form. It was evident from the 
first that. Lutheranism had no power to maintain its own ex- 

ditions, who subscribe very willingly to that of Vincentius Lerin- 
ensis ;" Answer to some Passages in Rvshworth's Dialogues, p. 53. 

* "Et quidem cum Calvini de paedobaptismo adversus Ana- 
baptistas librum lego, ridere soleo, videreque mihi videor hominem 
haereticum, dum suis, nan Ecdesiai armis, adversus illos lizereticos 
pugnare vult, turpiter in pugna succumbentem." Maldonat. Com- 
ment, in cap. xxviii. S. Matt. torn. i. pp. 692. On Calvin's difficulty 
in answering Socinian and other heretics, see the Bitiliotheque Uni- 
verselle, tome xxiv. p. 22 ; and Pluquet, Dictionnaire, tome ii. p. 580. 
A remarkable instance of the same embarrassment on the part of the 
Lutherans may be seen in Vedelins, De Arcanis Arminianismi, lib. i. 
cap. vi. p. 45J. 



274 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

istence as a positive institution. Running water, or shifting 
sand were its truest types. Heresy was not so much a state 
to which it tended, as one of the aspects under which it ap- 
peared from its birth. Socinianism was the other side of 
Lutheranism.* 

And if this be a true account of it even from its origin ; 
if Luther and his friends, in spite of their own unquestionable 
abhorrence of the impious errors which arose in their day, 
were unable to restrain them ; if they could be defended by 
their own scholars, and in spite of their own protests, as le- 
gitimate and even necessary conclusions from the elemen- 
tary theological maxims upon which their own teaching had 
been based ; if wherever Lutheranism made away for itself, 

it was found to have levelled a path for heresies without 
number, and all its efforts to withhold such evil attendants 
from following in its steps were vain and fruitless ; if, on the 
other hand, that more ancient Institution, against whose un- 
happy corruptions it so justly protested, was even then, and 
ever had been, free from these more fearful evils, and able, 
by some secret virtue, and almost without an effort, to repel 
them, then have we no reason to feel surprise, either that 
that Institution still remains exactly what it was three centu- 
ries ago, or that Lutheranism has arrived, after manifold 
changes, at that awful state of apostasy which was predicted 
from the- first, and which we are now, at length, about to 
describe. 

The principal works on the state of Protestantism in 
Germany, which have appeared in the English language, are 
those of the late lamented Mr. Rose, and Professor Moses 
Stuart, of Andover in the United States. I shall refer 
chiefly, in the few extracts which my limits will allow, to 
those writers. By way of preface, however, to their more 
minute and detailed statements, and in order to convey in a 
single sentence an idea of that appalling development of 
German Lutheranism which Professor Stuart justly describes 
as containing " a most affecting and awful lesson," I will 
first quote a few words from another author, who is perhaps 

- " L'histoire des Sociniens fcra connoitre que ceux-ci qui out 
quitte TEglise Catliolique pour embrasser le Socinianisme, out passe 
presque tous par le Lutheranisme, le Calvinisme, et 1'Anabatisme." 
Histoirc du Socinianisme, Avertissement, p. 4, Paris, 1723. Cf. liart- 
mannni Conc.il. IHustr. Pericop. xvi. Exercitat. xxxii. torn. iii. p. 556. 



IN GERMANY. 

the best living authority on this subject, and who tells us, 
that " even in 1825, a theologian, in recounting the profess- 
ors who could any how be considered orthodox, i. e. those 
'who in any way contended for the doctrines of the gospel or its 
very trut\, counted, in all Protestant Germany, seven- 
teen !"* Such has been the accomplishment of the mourn- 
ful presages of those who favoured, and the confident pre- 
dictions of those who condemned, the beginnings of the 
German Reformation. 

The well-known work of Mr. Hugh James Reset opens 
as follows : " The theology of the Protestant Churches of 
Germany presented a very singular spectacle during the last 
half of the preceding century and the commencement of the 
present. A very large majority of the divines of these 
Churches rejected, in a word, all belief in the divine origin 
of Christianity, and anxiously endeavoured to instil into 
others the opinions which they had embraced themselves. 
They had possession of far the greater number of divinity- 
professorships in the many universities of Germany; and 
they had almost- exclusively the direction of the literary and 
religious journals, a class of publications of more influence 
and importance in Germany than among ourselves. By the 
unsparing use of the means thus afforded them, and by an 
infinite quantity of writings,! addressed to men of all classes 
and all ages, they succeeded in spreading their views over 
the surface of society. How deep the disease went among 
the lower orders it is not easy to ascertain. But it appears 
that, after a time, a spirit of almost entire indifference to re- 
ligion manifested itself among all classes. The churches 
were thinly attended, the sabbath little honoured, the Bible 
much neglected.^ These melancholy phenomena appear to 

* See A Letter to the rfrchlishop of Canterbury, bv Dr. PUSPV 
p. 123. J 

"t The State of Protestantism in Germany. It is the second 
edition which is referred to here. 

\ "Germany has produced," says Professor Stuart,' "in half a 
century, more works on criticism and sacred literature than the 
world contains besides." Letters to Dr. Channing, letter v. p. 143. 

Even the Rationalist Bretschneider quoted by Mr. Rose, 
P- 197 admits "that this indifference is spread among all classes ; 
that the Bible used to be found in every house ; that very many 
made it a law to read a chapter every day, or at least every Sunday ; 
that it must have been a very poor family where a Bible was not 
part of the marriage-portion ; but that now very many do not pos- 



276 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

me to deserve and demand the attention of every Christian 
community; and I am convinced that, in this country, it is 
very little known how far the evil extended."* 

So much on the general character of the apostasy, of 
which Mr. Rose says, in other words, "My -allegation 
against the German Protestant Divines is, that the peculiar 
and positive doctrines of Christianity had lost all value in 
their eyes, and that they sought to depress Christianity itself 
to the level of a human invention, and its doctrines, at best, 
to a repetition of the doctrines of natural religion. "t Such 
being their design, it is obvious to inquire next into their 
treatment and use of Holy Scripture. Of this a few exam- 
ples shall be given ; and first, of their estimation cf the Sa- 
cred Volume. " For myself," says Rrehr, after describing 
the general sentiments of the Rationalists, " I also regard 
the Scriptures in the same light us any other book. I re- 
cognise in them no authority, except so far as they are in 
accordance with my own individual convictions. I do not 
regard them as the rule of my faith, but only as supplying 
me with a proof that, in ancient times, there were wise men 
who thought as I do."! And this man was not, as we might 



sess one, or let it lie neglected in a corner ;" and more to the same 
effect. Huflell, another Rationalist, says, "In most towns the me- 
chanics are busy with their trade on Sunday mornings, as by degrees 
people have forgotten entirely all care of the celebration of Sunday. 
The afternoon is given to amusements, and so there is no time left 
for the Church. One hears fathers and mothers of families urge 
their families to go to Church ; but they themselves, who ought to 
set the example, prefer reading the last newspaper to attending the 
sermon, or pretend to have other business." Rose, Additional Notes, 
p. xlv. 

* " It is clear that there is a philosophy in Europe, which mny 
soon visit ourselves, which has already in some departments begun 
to visit us, a philosophy which regards God and nature in a light 
utterly irreconcilable with Christianity, which rejects all notion of 
a Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier, above and beyond ourselves, 
which discards all faith in the unseen, all hope of an individual 
immortality of being, to which the Idea is God, and humanity at 
large is the Christ, while the records of faith are 'dreamy visions' 
and legends, the only reality admitted in any system of tracli 
tional religion being the identity of our own highest reason with 
the Essence that is all-pervading and indestructible." Mill On the 
Pantheistic Theory, Preface, p. 12. 

t State of Protestantism, &c. p. 93. 

t Lfittrcs sur le Rationalisme, p. 15, quoted by Moshler, La Sym- 
l>olifjur.,jome ii. p. 2. 



IN GERMANY. 277 

have supposed, some outcast or excommunicate person, but 
a "Superintendent-General ;" i. e., one of the highest ec- 
clesiastical rulers in Protestant Germany ! 

" Schleiermacher, professor at Berlin," says Mcehler, 
"maintains that the Scripture undergoes a change in its 
signification every fifteen years. Let us give an example. 
In 1820, the Scripture, agreeing with Schleiermacher, 
taught the divinity of Jesus Christ; but in 1835, it seemed 
good to our doctor to reject this truth, and so at the present 
time Scripture teaches that Jesus Christ is not God." Mreh- 
ler then refers to his own words.* 

Some instances of their mode of interpreting and ex- 
plaining Scripture shall be given next. According to 
Eichhorn, the account of the creation and fall of man is 
merely a poetical, philosophical speculation of some ingeni- 
ous person on the origin of the world and of evil. The 
offering up of Isaac by Abraham was " a horrible crime, 
which the Godhead could not have require^. Abraham 
dreamed that he must offer up Isaac, and, according to the 
superstition of the times, regarded it as a divine admonition. 
He prepared to execute the mandate which his dream had 
conveyed to him. A lucky accident probably the rustling 
of a rarn who was entangled in the bushes hindered it ; and 
this, according to ancient idiom, was also the voice of the 
divinity."f 

The prophecies of the Old Testament are, according to 
the same writer, and Kunol, whose commentary is much 
used in this country, "patriotic wishes, expressed with all 
the fire and eloquence of poetry, for the future prosperity 
and a future deliverer of the Jewish nation." J 

In like manner, C. F. Ammon, professor of theology at 
Erlangen (these are the instructors of the youth of Germa- 
ny !), says of the miracle of Christ's walking on the water, 
that " to walk on the sea, is not to stand on the waves as on 
the solid ground, as Jerome dreams, but to walk through the 
waves so far as the shoals reached, and then to swim !" So 
of the miracle of the loaves and fishes, St. Matthew xiv. 15: 
"Jesus probably distributed some loaves and fishes which he 
had to those who were around him ; and thus excited by his 

* La Symbolique, 42. tome ii. p. 80. 

t Vide Stuart, Letter v. p. 144. 

+ Stuart, ulii supra. Cf. Rose, Additional JVutes, pp. xlii. xliii. 

13 



278 DEVELOPMENT OP MODERN SYSTEMS. 

example others among the multitude, who had provisions, to 
distribute them in like manner."* 

Scherer, a' clergyman' in Hesse Darmstadt, "calls all 
the predictions respecting the person of the Messiah non- 
sense ; accuses the prophets of being cunning deceivers ; 
and says that the belief of those prophets brought and has 
preserved incredulity on the earth."f Wegscheider says 
thatSt. Paul "was much inclined to visions and ecstacies." 
Heinrichs, in explaining the death of Ananias, suggests that 
he was stabbed by St. Peter, " which," says he " dees not at 
all disagree with the vehement and easily exasperated temper 
of Peter." Examples without number of these revolting 
blasphemies the ' commentaries,' not of a few reprobate 
spirits, such as may be found in any land, but of the Profess- 
ors of Theology in the Lutheran and Calvinistic schools of 
Germanyf might be added, and many more may be seen 
in the authors whom I have quoted ; but we may spare our- 
selves the s%me and grief of referring to them. 

It is well, however, to notice that, like the ancient here- 
tics, these men have fallen by degrees. "In the course of 
the discussions which these principles have excited in Ger- 
many," says Stuart, "the question about Christ's divinity 
has been entirely forgotten. When the contest first began, 
this point, among others, was warmly contested. But the 
fundamental questions, whether the Scriptures are divinely 
inspired, and whether the doctrine of accommodation can be 
used in all its latitude in interpreting them, soon took the 
place of this." 1 1 

It is true, as the same writer observes, that " the best 
part of the German critics" have abandoned the evil princi- 
ples of interpretation of which some examples have been 
given. Rationalism has not been able to maintain its ground. 
" All that was holy, and healthful' and true," as Mr. Rose 
eloquently writes, " has turned away from the Rationalists, 

* Stuart, p. 146. t Rose, p. 151.' 

| " Very few of the distinguished Rationalists have been laymen." 
Rose, Letter to the Bishop of London, in reply to a work "on the 
causes of Rationalism in Germany, p. 86, note. 

The late Mr. Conybeare describes the system of biblical criti-* 
cism of which these are specimens, as having " very widely, it 
might he said almost universally, obtained in the prolestant churches 
of continental Europe." Hampton Lectures, Lecture i. p. 8. 

|| Stuart, p. 146. 



IN GERMANY. 279 

and has demanded, with a voice which admitted of no truce 
and no parley, that bread which came down from heaven, 
and that living water ' of which whosoever drinketh shall 
never thirst again.' The very weakness of humanity has 
been too strong for the advocates of Natural Religion, in all 
the pride of philosophy, and learning, and station, and 
strength. Their outcry has been silenced by the still small 
voice which came from the chamber of disease, the house of 
mourning, and the bed of death. ' Miserable comforters 
were they all ' in the day of suffering and sorrow ; and the 
support which they could not give, the sick and the sorrow- 
ful sought elsewhere. They have used their utmost efforts to 
convince the world that Christianity is a human invention, 
and they have failed."*" 

'They have failed' indeed, as such teachers ever must 
do,f and have been compelled to take up a different position : 
but, " in the mean time, they have not returned to the prin- 
ciples of their Lutheran Symbol. Very far from it. While 
many of them allow that John, and Peter, and Paul, did be- 
lieve and teach the doctrine of Christ's divinity and of the 
atonement, they liold tJiemselves under no obligation to re- 
ceive them. De Wette, who has recently published a System 
of Theology, and is Professor of the same at the University 
of Berlin, maintains that the Pentateuch was composed 
about the time of the captivity ; that the Jewish ritual was 
of gradual formation, accessions being made to it by super- 
stition ; and that the book of Chronicles, which is filled with 
scraps and inconsistencies, was foisted into the canon by 

* Advertisement to the second edition, pp. ix. x. 

t But though Rationalism has given way in some degree, the 
prospect is almost or quite as bad as ever the reaction, where it 
lias begun, being only in the direction of fanaticism. " Une nou 
velle erreur,'" says M. Merle D'Aubigne, " a pris naissance parmi 
les debris de 1'ancienne. C'est cette erreur que nous avons appelee 
Idealisme" which he then describes as coming between Orthodoxy 
and nationalism. ISIMulisme en Mlemagne. For instances of the 
Mystic, in contradiction to the Rationalistic exegesis, see the remarks 
on the Christus im Alien Testament of J. A. Kanne, in the Melanges 
de Religion, tome i. p. 160. On this new development of error, and 
the successive alternations of infidelity and fanaticism which this 
country appears likely still to exhibit, Mcehler observes, " Telle est 
la triste destinee du siecle ; on verra les eprits malades, exaltes, se 
repaitre de chimeres et d'illusions ; et si bientot la foi de 1'Eglise ne 
reprend son empire, le fanatisme le plus funeste viendra s'asseoir a. 
la place de 1'incroyance detronee." tome ii. p. 354. 



280 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

some of the priesthood, who wished to exalt their own order. 
His Bdtrdge, which contained these sentiments, was pub- 
lished before the death of Griesbach, and came out re.com- 
mtndcd by him ; who says, ' If you object to the young 
literary adventurer (De Wette), that he has endeavoured to 
bring Judaism into disrepute, my answer is, this is no more 
than Paul himself has laboured to do.' Pref. to Beitrdge. 
This from an Editor of the New Testament ! In his book 
De Morte Christi ezpiatoria (on the atonement of Christ), 
he represents Christ as disappointed that the Jews would 
not hearken to him as a moral teacher simply, which was 
the first character he assumed. Christ then assumed the 
character of a prophet, and asserted his divine mission, in 
order that the Jews might be induced to listen to him. 
Finding that they would not do this," &c. the rest it is 
impossible to repeat. " Yet De Wette holds a most exalted 
rank in Germany. I doubt whether Germany can boast of 
an Oriental scholar or a literary man who has more admirers 
than De Wette. What shall we say now of De Wette 1 
That he is not a Christian? He would look with astonish- 
ment on any man who should think of such an accusation, 
and would tax him with a great degree of illiberality and su- 
perstition."* 

With one more example, bringing the description of 
Lutheranism down to the present hour, we may conclude. 
The name of Neander, one of the most distinguished of all 
the German theologians, is almost as well known in this 
country as in his own. He is supposed to be one of those 
eminent divines whom the King of Prussia designed, by the 
help of the English Church, to have raised to the Episcopal 
office. It is well to know the character of the persons with 
whom the rulers of that Church were solicited to form alli- 
ance. The most recent writer upon the new development 
of German Rationalism tells us, that " the Nicene and 
Athanasian Creeds are by Neander fairly set aside."t The 
decisions of his own ' church ' he estimates at the same rate. 
" Of the Augsburg Confession he only admits what he con- 
siders to be the essential points ;" and these appear to be, 
justification by faith, and the depravity of human nature! 
" This supercession," Dr. Wolff says, " of Lutheran doc- 

* Stuart, p. 147 ; and see Conybcare, Lecture i. p. 24, note. 
t Wol ft', Mystic Rationalism in Gennamj, p. 10, ed. 1842. 



IN GERMANY. 

trines in a Lutheran University, by one of its most distin- 
guished members and professors, will rather startle the Eng- 
lish reader, and open his eyes to the convulsed and distracted 
state of religious opinions in Germany."* Having then 
quoted language from the writings of Neander quite as mon- 
strous and offensive as any that has been already cited,f 
this author adds, " What more, or what worse, could have 
proceeded from the pen of Dr. Strauss, or Professor Paulus, 
or the veriest infidels that can be named among the German 
Professors of the last half century 1" Yet this is an existing 
form of German Protestantism, as professed at the present 
day by one of its most popular and admired advocates ! 
This is the latest aspect of religion in a country which pro- 
duced, in 1530, the boasted Confession of Augsburg ; and, 
in 1825, numbered amongst the whole body of its Professors 
just seventeen who were not utterly apostate !J 

* Ibid. Such a " supercession," however, is no new thing. The 
very men who composed the symbolical writings of the reformed 
party set the first example of depising them. "An nos Zuinglii," 
says Beza, " an Calvini, an cujusquam hominis auctoritate niti con- 
suevimus ? Num ipsatn nostram confessionem, ac non potius unicum 
ex quo desumpta est Domini verbum proferimus ?" Duel Saxoniae, 
PrcE/at. In Resp. ad JV. Selneccer. 

t The pool at Bethesda was, according to Neander, a reservoir of 
mineral water. The transfiguration was "a dream." St. Matthew's 
account, chap, iv., is incorrect, because it is contradictory to Herod's 
character ! " He may justly be suspected of heterodoxy," Dr. Wolff 
says, " even with regard to the divinity of Christ." Mystic na- 
tionalism, p. 34. 

$ The view taken by Lutherans themselves of the present aspect 
of their communion is thus stated by Mr. Rose. " Counsellor Becken- 
dorf says, ' There is no church among his party, but merely parties; 
the old church is in ruins.' Boll says, ' The dissolution of the Pro- 
testant church is certain.' The Hallische Literatur-Zeitung, * that 
there is no Protestant church, but only now Protestant churches ;' 
and so Dr. Planck. Professor Lehmann, ' one sees Protestantism, 
but no Protestant church.' Superintendent General Schlegel, ' the 
greatest part of the Evangelical churches may be asked, if they can 
make any pretence to the name of a Christian church.' " See also 
Clarisse, Encyclopaedia Theologies Epitome, Praefat. p. xiv. for a 
description of the German youth ; and 55. p. 226. for his account 
of the Rationalistic philosophy. Cf. Wegsch eider, Institut. Theolog. 
Prolegom. cap. i. 12; and, for a much earlier statement of its real 
character, Weismann, secul. 17. torn. ii. p. 1117. Such are the con- 
fessions of the varying parties themselves ; and we find an adversary, 
though under the disguise of a friend, reminding them of their true 
condition in the following words : " La decadence de votre societe 



282 DEVELOPMENT OP MODERN SYSTEMS. 

III. Switzerland is the next country to which, in pur- 
suing the present inquiry, it seems natural to turn our atten- 
tion. It was here that the system first devised in Germany 
found its earliest counterpart. The movement in the two 
countries was, indeed, almost simultaneous ; and, at least in 
one important particular, which I am especially anxious to 
notice, was marked from the outset with the same charac- 
ter. In Switzerland, as in Germany, the leaders of the 
Reformation were warned that their principles must lead to 
infidelity ; and in both cases the prediction has been amply 
and fearfully accomplished. 

Of the warning, and the grounds of it, there is no space 
to say much here. It was at the close of the year 1536, so 
far as I have been able to discover, that the Swiss reformers 
were first publicly charged with Arianism. Caroli, joint 
pastor with Viret of the city of Lausanne, was the author of 
the charge; in which many of the ministers of Geneva, as 
well as of other cantons, were implicated. True or false, 
there was something significant in the very nature of the im- 
peachment it was a startling novelty in those days, how- 
ever common it may have become since. A synod, sum- 
moned by general request, was held at Berne ; and Calvin, 
Viret, and Farel vehemently defended themselves from the 
imputation, which, there can be no doubt, was in the main 
untrue.* That it was not, however, altogether vexatious 

religieuse augmente de jour en jour, et Ton peut meme dire que, 
consideree comme corps ecclesiastique, ellcacessd <V t.xister ; ce n'est 
plus qu'une agregation d'hommes ayant des opinions diverses, et 
meme diametralement opposees, sans ordre, sans harmonic, et sans 
liaison." Starck, Tfieodul's Gastmahl, p. 264. 

* That is, as far as they themselves were concerned. Prateolus 
reports, however, that Calesius, a colleague of Calvin, declared in 
the synod of Berne, " that Christ was not distinguished from the 
Father ;" and that although others at the very time censured his 
blasphemy, neither the theologians of Berne nor of Geneva noticed 
it. Elcncli. Haret. omn. lib. xviii_ hoeres. 24. p. 489. Calvin him- 
self was more than suspected, and is said to have been " accused by 
almost all the Lutherans of the Arian heresy." Vide Pierce's JVezo 
Discoverer, Advertisement, p. 19. The Lutheran Stockmann con- 
firms this statement expressly ; Lexicon HtEresium, p. 223. At the 
Synod of Lausanne Calvin said, that " he neither believed nor dis- 
believed the Athanasian Creed." Prateolus, ubi supra. Fowler 
admits that " this never-enough accursed doctrine of a typicall 
Christ did spread like a gangrene in Calvin's time ;" Deamonium 
Meridianum, p: 45 : and at least he was abetting the more open 



IN SWITZERLAND. 283 

and unfounded, is plain even from the defence which it pro- 
voked. Being challenged by Caroli to sign the- three 
Creeds, Calvin refused to do so ; and the only motive 
which he assigned for so strange a refusal was, that it was 
tyrannical to force a man to avow his faith in terms pre- 
scribed by another. But it is certain that a mere negative 
did not express his real feelings. To have refused to assent 
to those holy symbols would have been a bad sign in one 
who was on his trial for heresy ; but he was not content 
with this. The Athanasian Creed was treated with open 
disrespect, and the sacred phrases, " God of God, Light of 

heretics by his dangerous and profane language. Both Luther and 
Calvin rejected the "word 'Trinity' the former as "a human in- 
vention," the latter as also " savouring of barbarity ;" and their 
remarks are greedily quoted by Socinians of the present clay vide 
Monthly Repository, vol. xxi. p. 622 as formerly by their prede- 
cessors ; vide Eniedin. In S. Trinitatem, pp. 138, 9. I shall not, 
however, in a note, enter upon the serious question here glanced at. 
Thus much may be said, that they constantly charged each other 
with the worst heresies, and there are good reasons for supposing 
that the charge was more often true than false. With respect to 
Calvin himself, Maldonat has collected avast number of his sayings, 
which savour almost of infidelity ; see his Comment, in S. Matt, 
cap. vi. torn. i. p. 147, and p. 170 ; in cap. ix. p. 210 ; in cap, xiv. 
p. 301, p. 307, and p. 310 ; in cap. xix. p. 395 a specimen of Lu- 
ther's notious ibid. p. 397, p. 400, and p. 401 ; in cap. xxi. p. 444, 
is a. saying of Calvin's exactly such as the Socinian Jacob Abbott 
uses when speaking of God the Son as though he were merely 
man ; in cap. xxvii. p. 646, where Calvin is quoted as referring our 
Lord's exclamation on the cross to " despair" a sentiment, as Mal- 
donat justly says, almost too shocking to be repeated, even for the 
sake of admonition : and there is a host of such evil comments no- 
ticed by the same writer, in his remarks upon the other Gospels. See 
also Petavius, De Trinitate, lib. iii. cap. iv. 7, who shows that the 
expositions of Calvin led to the most dreadful blasphemies : and 
Feuardent, Tkcomach. Calvinist. lib. ix., DC Sanctis C&lestibus, who 
gives instances of the astonishing manner in which the same " re- 
former" allowed himself to speak of the saints of the Old Testament. 
Beza, too, was charged, by Andreas and others, with the most 
deadly heresies : and he replies as these men usually did by 
retorting the accusation upon them. Vide Beza? Ad Acta Colloquii 
Monlisbelgardensis Resp. Praf. p. 11 ; and Cornelius a Lapide In 
Epist. ad fle.h. cap. v. Upon the whole, it seems impossible to 
doubt, after due consideration of the facts which the history of that 
period supplies to us, that when these persons, who best knew each 
other's real sentiments, bandied about from one to another the ac- 
cusations of blasphemy and misbelief, they had some reason for what 
thev said. 



284 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

Light, Very God of Very God," were pronounced by this 
reformer to be "vain repetitions."* The character of his 
accuser, and even the nature of the imputed crime, are not, 
then,, to be considered the objects of our attention in this 
case it is only the words of the accused which it is impor- 
tant to notice. Surely it needed no great sagacity to predict 
what the end of all this must be ! 

The very steps by which that end has been reached, we 
need not minutely examine , enough that it is in accordance 
with this beginning. The tide of blasphemy which begun 
to flow in the very lifetime of Calvin, which he vainly strove 
to withstand even to shedding of blood, and which swept 
away, one after another, all the barriers by which it was 
attempted to stay its progress, has swelled into a torrent, and 
flows on now unresisted, in a broad and deep channel, 
through the heart of the land. For a long period its course 
was hidden ; during a whole century the principles of evil 
which have at length obtained the mastery in the, Swiss 
communities were professed in secret.1i In vain did pious 
and good men, who knew not the Church to be the appointed 
Ark of truth, contend for the integrity of the faith. A curse 
was upon the human system to which they had given their 
unrequited affections a curse which not even their virtues 
could avert. The land in which it had been set up was 
doomed, and " though Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in it, 
they should deliver but their own souls by their right- 



eousness." 



The infidelity long cherished and now openly proclaimed 
in the Swiss cantons appears to have been developed at two 
distinct periods, first, about the middle of the last century, 
and again at the beginning of the present. The witnesses 
to the former development are, besides the parties immedi- 
ately concerned, men who were themselves professed infi- 

* Vide Ruchat, Histoirc de la Reformation en Suisse, 2 de partie, 
livre i. tome v. p. 30. Kromayer shows, Loc. Jlnti-Syncrctis 1 - p. 262, 
that the language of professed unbelievers-en the subject of the Creeds 
is precisely such as Calvin's; and modern Socinians assert, that " his 
zeal for the doctrine of the Trinity, which he but half believed, may 
be suspected to have been but a pretence." Monthly Repository, 
vol. i. p. 526. 

t " Le protestantisme genevois, apres avoir clandestinement pen- 
dant un siecle professe le spcinianisme, a leve le masque." Histoire 
des Sectes Religieuses^ par M. Gregoire, Obs. prelim, p. 4. 



IN SWITZERLAND. 285 

dels, as Voltaire, Rousseau, and D'Alembert, who had 
sought Geneva as a congenial soil. The later movement is 
also attested by persons of whose hostility to Catholic prin- 
ciples no doubt can be entertained. The testimony, there- 
fore, in both cases, is as unsuspicious as we shall find it to 
be complete and fatal. 

The earliest intimation which was given to the world of 
the actual state of religion in Geneva was contained in an 
article by D'Alembert, in the famous Encyclopedic des Sci- 
ences. The description there presented rests on the autho- 
rity of Voltaire, who at this time had been a three years' 
resident at Geneva. " It is not," says the article, " a slight 
proof of the progress of human reason, that it has been pub- 
lished at Geneva, with the public approbation, that Calvin 
was as savage in temper as he was subtle in wit. The mur- 
der of Servetus (put to death by Calvin as a Socinian) is 
now regarded as execrable."1L 

The article proceeds to speak of the theological senti- 
ments in vogue there. " To sum up all in one word," says 
the author, " a large number of the Pastors of Geneva have 
no ether religion than mere Socinianism, rejecting all those 
things to which the term mysteries is applied, and maintain- 
ing that the first principle of a true religion is, to propose 
nothing as a matter of faith which clashes with reason.t 
Religion is there almost reduced to the adoration of the one 
God. Respect for Jesus Christ, and for the Scriptures, is 
perhaps the only thing which distinguishes from pure Deism 
the Christianity of Geneva." 

Having, in another place, said that they no longer hold 
the same opinions even with respect to points elsewhere re- 
garded as the fundamental truths of religion, and added, 
that " many believe not in the divinity of Christ, of which 
Calvin, their leader, was so zealous a defender," D'Alembert 
exclaims, in the triumph of his unbelieving heart, " O Bos- 

* Encyclopedic, art. Geneve. 

t Which is no less their doctrine at the present time. " Pins 
votre raison sera forte, mieux vous comprendrez et sauroz faire com- 
prendre 1'csprit de la revelation/' This was pronounced at the Con- 
secration au Saint Mystere de M. Arnaud Saintcs, Geneve, 1828 ; 
and does not seem to differ very much from the sentiment of tho 
more plain-spoken heathen, 
; " Quare Relligio pedibus subjecta vicissim 

Obteritur, nos execquat Victoria ccclo." Lucretius, \. 86. 
13* 



286 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

suet, where art thou? Eighty years have passed away 
since you predicted that the principles of the Protestants 
would lead them to Socinianism : what gratitude do you not 
owejx> the author of an article which has attested to all Eu- 
rope the truth of your prophecy !"* 

It is true that the full extent of the terrible charge made 
against these Genevan pastors was denied ;t but so confident 
were their accusers, who indeed knew them too well to be 
deceived, that they were content, in justification of the 
accusation which they had brought, to refer them to the 
judgment of all their brother Protestants. And even this it 
was unnecessary to do, since the pastors themselves admit, 
in their defence, all the primary principles of Socinianism, 
and do not shrink from using its familiar language even 
while they deny that they have adopted its creed. But it is 
time to speak now of that later development, which differs 
from that which we have thus far considered in one respect, 
namely, that its real character is no longer concealed or 
denied even by those who have been the agents in bringing 
it about. 

The immediate cause of the shocking disclosures with 
regard to the religious state of Geneva, which created a few 
years back such a powerful sensation on the neighbouring 
continent, was the publication at that place, in 1816, of a 
pamphlet which was entitled, " Considerations upon the 
Divinity of Jesiis Christ,"| and addressed to the students of 
the theological schools of Geneva. In this pamphlet, the 
Venerable Company of Pastors the ecclesiastical senate of 
that city were plainly charged with denying the divinity of 
our Lord. The charge was not even noticed ; the College 
contenting itself, under these critical circumstances, with 
requiring all young ministers, and candidates for the minis- 
try, to maintain a total silence within the canton of Geneva 

* CEuvrcs de D'Alemlcrt, tome v. pp. 272, 283, ed. Paris, 1805. 
"On abolit unc religion ridicule," was the sentiment of the class of 
men represented by Frederick II. of Prussia, " et 1'on en introduit 
une plus extravagante." Correspon&ance avec D'jttcmbert, torne i. 
p. 136. 

t Grosley, author of Observations sur I'ltalic, says that " there 
were still some old ministers who were attached to the ancient 
forms, but that they were little esteemed." D'Alembert, p. 308. 

t Considerations sur la Divinite du Jesus- Christ, adressees a MM. 
Jes Etudians de VJluditoire de TMologie de VEglise de Geneve, par 
Henri Louis Empaytaz. 



IN SWITZERLAND.* 287 

upon (1) the manner in which the divine nature is united to 
the person of Jesus Christ ; and (2) upon original sin ! 

It Was of course impossible that the dispute should ter- 
minate thus. The few who still retained some reverence for 
the ancient faith began to complain yet more earnestly ; and 
at length the Venerable Company of Pastors was compelled 
to speak out. Their ' Defence ' exhibits a very curious and 
instructive development of Calvinistic Protestantism. " In 
order to maintain the principle of Protestantism," they say, 
" it was absolutely necessary that the Venerable Company 
should renounce those opinions, the abandonment of which 
is objected to them as a crime. The right of examination 
is the foundation of the Protestant religion, and is the only 
element of fixedness which belongs to it." They go on to 
say, that to reject the doctrine of the Trinity, as incompre- 
hensible, is necessary on their principles ! and that the ortho- 
dox ought to go to Rome !* 

There was now no longer any hope of concealing their 
real sentiments, nor was any attempt made to do so : from 
that time they spoke and acted without reserve. M. Cesar 
Malan, the foremost of their opponents, was suspended from 
the exercise of his office. On his protesting that he could 
henceforth " only belong to the Church of Geneva as it 
existed in the 16th century," he was asked, " if the Com- 
pany of Pastors chose to receive a Confession of Faith in the 
16th century, why should not the same Company modify or 
reject it in the 18th ?"t and we do not hear what was his 
reply. He was at length removed altogether from his 
office ; and the reason assigned was, that " he made use of 
the Bible in the religious instruction of his class." The 
subsequent conduct of the Venerable Company and their 
subordinates was not inconsistent with this beginning. The 
Abbe de la Mennais reports, on the authority of an eye- 
witness, that the rabble of Geneva, instigated or taught by 
the Venerable Company of Pastors, raised in the streets the 
horrible' cry, A bas Jesus Christ !$ The orthodox began to 
be openly ridiculed, and even the most astounding ribaldry 

* Defense de la Venerable Compagnie des Pasteurs de Geneve, & 
Voccasion d'un ecrit intitule, " Veritable Histoire des Momiers." 

t Melanges de Religion, tome iii. p. 94. 

$ Histoire Veritable des Momiers de Geneve, CEuvres de M. de la 
Mennais, tome viii. pp. 392-4. 



288 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

poured out upon them by journals in the influence of the 
Venerable Company* Nor was Geneva unrivalled in this 
pre-eminence of infamy. 

The " orthodox ministers '' of the Canton de Vaud 
having addressed a letter to the members of the Council of 
State, declaring their resolution to separate themselves from 
the established community, as had been done in Geneva, be- 
cause of the infidelity of that body, they were- in despite of 
the ' fundamental principle of Protestantism ' committed to 
prison, t 

By the Council of Lausanne the same class of remon- 
strants were condemned as a " new sect," and jested upon as 
hypocrites and methodists.f The course of argument which 
was adopted by the framers of this decree deserves also 
special notice : they are indignant chiefly at the circum- 
stance that these men should presume to separate from " the 
national church," and " the religion of the state," the very 
arguments which had excited the scorn of their founders. 
This history of the development of ' Presbyterianism ' in the 
very city of its famous author, and the ' metropolis of Pro- 
testantism,' is sufficiently important to justify some further 
details. The following appear worthy of notice. 

It was in 1788 that is, just thirty years after the reply 
of the Genevan Pastors to the article of D'Alembert that 
the Catechism of Calvin, hitherto the most approved class- 
book, was withdrazon. 

* Fcuillc ft Avis dc Geneve, I,e 7 Octobre, 1818, quoted in the Me- 
morial Catholique, tome i. p. 117. 

t Melanges de Religion, tome ix. p. 342. Upon this exhibition 
of ' toleration' a Catholic writer observes, " Elle permet qu'on at- 
taque la Trinite, qu'on nie I'lnearnation, que 1'on conteste 1'eternite 
des peines ; la tolerance le veut ainsi : mais professer la divinite 
de Jesus-Christ, c'est une licence .qui ne doit pas rester impunie 
dans la metropole du proteslantisme !" L'Ami de la Rclin-ion, t. xix. 
p. 164. 

t Memorial Catholique, tome i. p. 117. 

UAmi dc la Religion, tome xix. p. 161. " The Catechism of 
Calvin has been changed for one on the Socinian system, which is 
now generally taught. M. Vernet's System of Theology, which 
affirms that our blessed Lord was a mere man, is the standard work 
of divinity used in the university. It will be remembered that it 
was at Geneva that M. Vernet was Professor of Divinity ; and not 
long since his successor in the chair proclaimed to his scholars, ex 
cathedra, 'Faites de Jesus-Christ tout ce que vous voulez; mais ne 
Ten faites pas Dieu.' " See A Sketch of the Religious Discussions 
which have lately taken place at Geneva, pp. 4, 5. 



IN SWITZERLAND. 289 

In 1807 a Liturgy, expurgated upon Socinian principles, 
was substituted for that formerly in use.* 

Again : the profession of faith in the divinity of our 
Lord was once used by all the reformed communities of 
France, adopted from them by the Pastors of Geneva, and 
printed together with the Bible, being affixed to the Gospels, 
the Psalms, and the Liturgy. It is found in the Bibles of 
1605 and 1723 ; but it is suppressed in the edition of 1805. 
It is in .the Genevan edition of the Psalms of 1713 ; it has 
disappeared in the edition of 1780. It was joined to the 
New Testament of 1570 ; it is not to be found in that of 
1802.t The translation of the Bible published at Geneva in 
1805, which occupied ninety years, has altered many of the 
passages relating to our Lord's divinity. Thus, instead of 
Verbum crat apud Dcum, they put, La parole etait avcc 
Dieu ; and the other instances are often much worse than 
this4 

Such are some of the startling facts which the history of 
Protestantism in Switzerland presents to us. It may be 
well to notice, in conclusion, the remarks which its present 

* Chronique Religieusc, tome iii. p. 599. 

t L'Jfmi de la Religion, tome xi. p. 357. M. Sismondi says, that 
" the Church of Geneva suppressed, as early as the year 1705, the 
practice of compelling the members of her clergy to sign the same 
confession of faith." Review of the Progress of Religious Opinions 
during the 19th Century, p. 62, English edit. 

t But this is not a new device. The learned Dean of Westminster 
observes, that " in Campbell's Dissertations some circumstances are 
mentioned which bear haid upon Beza's integrity as a translator;" 
and he adds, "I fear there is too much justice in them." Dean Turton 
On the Text of the Bible, p. 109, note, 2d edition. Cf. Feuardent. 
Thcomach. Calvinist. lib. xiv. cap. 1. * 

"You have entirely abandoned the principles of your Church 
at the Reformation," says a very zealous Protestant, addressing the 
Venerable Company, " and your complaint now is of the revival of 
Calvinism, the very doctrine which was then taught ! . . . The 
doctrine which you preach is not the Gospel of the grace of God, 
but, on the contrary, subversive of it : in a word, you have become 
Brians." Haldane's Letter to M. J. J. Chenevicre, pp. 3, 4. And 
their morals appear to be almost as bad as their religion ; see the 
statement of M. Raoul Rochette, in his Lettres sur la Suisse ; and 
the remarks of an English dissenter, Dr. J. Pye Smith, quoted in 
the Monthly Repository, vol. xx. p. 331. Nor does their political 
condition appear to be much better : see the Tableau Historiquc et 
Politique de la* dernier e Revolution de Geneve, p. 38, ed. Geneve, 
1782. 



293 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

condition has elicited from persons of various and opposite 
sentiments. 

"They have-been careful," says one, "to remove from 
their church every thing which might disturb a Socinian 
peace : their translations of the Bible, Liturgy, and Cate- 
chisms, have been systematically reduced to the level of that 
view of Christianity ; they have formally prohibited the pro- 
mulgation of those articles of belief which it rejects ; they 
have indefinitely suspended a minister for faithfully preach- 
ing the doctrines of all orthodox churches : and, lastly, they 
have now deposed the same individual from his office in the 
University, because he made use of the Bible in the religious 
instruction of his class."* 

" The Church of Geneva," writes another, whose sympa- 
thies are wholly Calvinistic, " which shone with such efful- 
gence to the limits of Europe, while illumined by a Calvin 
and a Beza, is now in a state of degradation lower and viler 
than that deadly thraldom which in former times roused the 
righteous indignation and called forth the manly energies of 
her elder, her nobler sons."f 

A Socinian preacher thus describes the state of religion 
in Geneva in 1827 : " In their opinions they are not altogether 
what we are ; but they are not many degrees removed from 
us. I asked one of them what, in general, were the senti- 
ments of his church respecting the person of Christ. He 
replied, ' You will find among us a few Trinitarians, and 
many Arians.'J .... The candidates for holy orders, he 
told me, are only required to profess their belief in the Bible, 
not in any particular creed. " This unhappy man goes 
on to distinguish "the reformed clergy of Geneva" with his 
praise of their impious sentiments. 

Lastly, the feelings excited by these events in the minds 

* Documents relative to the Deposition of the Rev. C. Malanfrom 
his Office in the College of Geneva, Preface, p. xi. (1829). 

t Sermons of Cesar Malan, Transliitor's preface, pp. 5, 6. 

| " At the present time the twenty-seven pastors of the established 
church of the canton (of Geneva) are understood, with two or three 
exceptions, to hold to Unitarian opinions." Encyctyiedia Americana, 
vol. xiv. Appendix, p. 599. " Le corps des pasteurs de cette ville," 
says one of their own number to a protestant teacher at Montauban, 
" ne sera bientot plus qu'une agregation philosophique et une societe 
litteraire." I? Ami de la Religion, tome xiii. p. 229. 

Vide Monthly Repository, vol. i. pp. 641-3. 



IN SWITZERLAND. 291 

of Catholics are such as the following : " The Venerable 
Company of Pastors," says De la Mennais, " faithful to that 
principle of protestantism which recognises no other rule of 
faith than reason, or the Scriptures interpreted by reason, 
has been compelled to abandon by degrees the profession of 
a fixed faith, and to deny all the fundamental doctrines of 
Christianity, original sin, and consequently the redemption, 
the necessity of grace, eternal punishments, and, at length, 
the divinity of Jesus Christ. We say that it denies these 
doctrines ; for to prohibit the promulgation of them is surely 
to deny them very emphatically. And from this it appears, 
that the centre of the Calvinistic reformation has become the 
centre of deism, and that there no longer exists in the Pro- 
testant Rome, I do not say any Christian faith, but any faith 
whatsoever ; since a minister who has powerful confederates 
in the Company has publicly avowed his desire* that every 
creed should be renounced even that of the Apostles, 
which begins with the words, I believe in God."^ 

Once more. " It is long," says another, " since D'Alem- 
bert exulted in the apostacy of the Venerable Company of 
Geneva, which believed no longer in the divinity of Jesus 
Christ. At that time, however, a" decent exterior was still 
preserved ; and all the world was not in the secret. Times 
have changed ; and, thanks to the lights of the age, Geneva 
has deemed that men's minds are sufficiently prepared^ to 

* The minister referred to is M. J. Heyer, and his publication is 
entitled Coup-d'ceil sur Ics Confessions dc Foi, Geneve, 1818. Cf. 
De I' Usage des Confessions de Foi dans les Communions Reformecs, 
par Etienne Chastel, 1823 ; and Considerations sur I' Unite de la Foi, 
par J. Martin, 1S22. 

t Histoirc Veritable des Mom.ic.rs de Geneve, p. 391 . 

t M. de Fernex, one of the pastors of Geneva, on the 14th Jan. 
1819, actually pronounced the following discourse in the consistory : 
" Geneve jouissait depuis pres d'un siecle du calme religieux ; elle 
pouvoit hardiment soutnettre sa croyance a. 1'examen de sa raison, 
separer les verites fondamentales, incontestablement enseignees dans 
I'Evangile, de celles qui .... ne sont pas d'une egale importance ; 
elle pouvait, en s'attachant fortement aux unes, suspendre son juge- 
ment sur les autres, attendre que dcnouvelles lumieres lui permissent 
de prononcer avec plus de maturite. Mais cette heureuse privilege 
elie le possedoit comme a Vinsu des autres Eglises ; contente de jouir 
de la paix, ella n'aspirait point a. paraitre avoir secoue un joug 
auquel, partout ailleurs, on etait encore trop asservi pour qu'elle put 
esperer de fidre gouter ses principes. Cependanf on J 'accuse de 
s'ecarter de la doctrine reque, de mettre moins d'importhnce a cer- 



292 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

receive a doctrine which might justify the haughty inscrip- 
tion on her arms, Post tcncbras lux. This light is evan- 
gelical deism. The Company of Pastors has proclaimed it ; 
and the great reformer Calvin is now nothing but a misera- 
ble Momier, whom they jeer and persecute in the persons of 
his true disciples, the Momier s of Geneva and Lausanne. 
This Calvin caused Servetus to be burned, who taught 
three centuries too soon that which is now taught by the 
Venerable Company. But such are the capricious varia- 
tions of the reformed doctrine, that in the very place in 
which the funeral pile was lighted for Servetus, he is hence- 
forth to be exalted as a martyr to the true faith !"* 

IV. We have traced thus far the development of Prb- 
testantismt in those countries only in which it may be said to 

tains dogmes . . . On la presse de repondrc, die hesitc ; elle crainl 
d'engager des querelles : on insiste ; et quoique decidee a demeurer 
fidele au silence que les circonstances et 1'autorite des chefs de 1'etat 
lui imposaient, elle laisse en quelque sorte echapper son secret, qui, 
revele a eertaines epoques cut revolte Ics csprits, et a d'antres ri'eut 
fait aucune sensation." Quoted by M. A. Bost, in his Geneve reli- 
gieuse en Mars 1819, pp. 12 et seqq., Geneve, 18J9. This extraor- 
dinary document is in itself proof enough of these two instructive 
facts, that Calvin's ecclesiastical community is now a mere company 
of philosophical atheists, and that it has become so in secret and by 
degrees. 

* Memorial Catliolique, tome i. p. 116. 

t It may be right to offer some explanation of the use which has 
been made of this word throughout these pages. To have rejected 
it lightly or inconsiderately, without regard to the prejudices of the 
many excellent persons amongst us who would still retain it, were 
no sign of wisdom. But the reasons for laying it aside are, indeed, 
so weighty, the term is now so seriously objectionable, both as being 
the symbol, for the most part, of undisguised heresy, and a needless 
cause of offence to Catholics in other lands, as well as in itself 
savouring strongly of the humana nocdbula of mere modern sects, 
that we may well be anxious to be rid of it without further delay. 
Nor does the rejection of this now almost unchristian phrase need 
any apology in the case of a member of the English Church, because 
that Church has ever discountenanced its use, and on more than one 
occasion, emphatically refused to employ it ; the members of the 
lower house of Convocation even protesting against it, on the avowed 
principle that they disowned all communion with foreign (protestant) 
churches." See Cardwell's Conferences, ch. ix. p. 424 ; and Palmer's 
Ecclesiastical History, ch. xxi. I know it may be said, that our own 
most revered divines have not scrupled to use the phrase in question ; 
but this argument appears to me disingenuous, for the developments 
of ' protestantism' which we are now contemplating, were not, of 



IN ENGLAND. 293 

have first' originated ; and if the principles of that celebrated 
movement may be fairly judged of by the results to which, 
in both countries, they have led, then certainly the present 
condition of the disciples of Luther and Melancthon, of 
Calvin and Zuingle, and the aspect of the communities of 
which they were the founders, leave us no room for doubt 
or hesitation as to the judgment which we should pronounce 
upon them. Without, however, anticipating the remarks 
which it may be right to defer until we have examined the 
history of those principles in many other lands, we may 
proceed at present with our inquiry ; and the next country 
which claims our attention is France. 

It was in 1555 that " the first avowed French Church, on 
the principles of the Reformation, was established at Paris." 
This position had only been attained by the French Protes- 
tants after many years of anxious struggle and severe suffer- 
ings. At length the day of repose and tranquillity had ar- 
rived ; and we are told by those who have studied this branch 
of history minutely, that " day by day the Reformation em- 
bedded itself more firmly in France, and secretly or openly 
a very large proportion of the population embraced its doc- 
trines."* By the end of the 16th century, so great had been 
their progress, that " there were seven hundred and sixty 
parish-churches belonging to the Protestants of France, all 
in good order;" and so far from the members of these 
churches being confined, as is usual when new religious 
opinions are received, to the lower orders of men only, it ap- 
pears that about the year 1600, no fewer than " four thou- 
sand of the nobility of France belonged to that confession. "f 

But it seems that neither the power of the noble nor the 

course, included in their notion of it ; and when they spoke of 
' protestants' and ' protestantism,' they had something else in their 
minds than those repulsive forms of error and blasphemy which ;ire 
now designated by those terms. Perhaps it may even be questioned 
whether many of those venerable persons, if their voices could be 
heard amongst us at this day, would not say of some whom they 
were used to commend, as St. Jerome did in the like case, "Decepit 
nos bona de mails existimatio ;" Jldv. Lucifcrian. cap. vii. torn, ii 
p. 201. 

* Smedley's History of the Reformed Religion in France, chap. ii. 
vol. i. p. 62. 

t Vide Ranke's History of the Popes, book vii. chap. i. 7. vol. 
ii. p. 439, English edition. See also Soulier, Statistique des Eglises 
' tformees de France, Introd; 



294 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

affections of the people, neither the learning and virtues of 
one class nor the fiery zeal of another, could long preserve 
a communion which had ventured to change the Polity of 
the Apostles, from the curse which, in every age, has attach- 
ed to those who have divorced that union between the Faith 
and the Discipline of the Church which the law of God has 
made inseparable.* Another century had not passed away, 
before the awful tokens of this curse began to be manifested. 
.It is enough, in a mere sketch like the present, to refer for 
proof of this to the controversy between the famous Bossuet 
and the protestant champion Jurieu. The latter, in very 
wantonness, as it seems, had accused certain French Catho- 
lics of Socinianism. Bossuet replies by a single denial of 
the statement, and adds these words: "It is true indeed 
that there are certain churches in France which have been 
accused, and with good reason, of a leaning towards Socin- 
ianism but then these arc the reformed Calvinistic 

churches, a circumstance which ought not to surprise us. 
It is said that the greater- number of their ministers follow 
rather the opinions ofArminius and the Remonstrants his 
disciples, than those of Calvin or of Beza, and that there are 
those amongst them who embrace Socinianism ; which has 

C3 . * 

occasioned a great sensation in the Consistories."t Up to 
this period, then, there, still remained in the governing bo- 
dies, even upon the testimony of Bossuet, the will at least to 
struggle with this heresy ; but they had broken down " the 
hedge of discipline" with which "God's enclosure" was 

* " It is remarkable that" the denial of the great essential articles 
of the creed, the incarnation, the ascension, and other doctrines con- 
nected witk the divinity of our Lord, and the rejection of episcopal 
government, " have always been closely linked together; from Aerius 
to Sncinus, the same persons who were zealous in propagating false 
views of the Episcopacy of the Church have also been remarkable 
for erroneous opinions in regard to our Lord's Person and Divinity." 
Todd's Discourses on the Prophecies relating to Antichrist, p. 294- 
Tlie author of tho work entitled JV.? Protestant, but the Dissenters 1 
Plot (1682), takes notice accordingly, that " the original of congrega- 
tional episcopacy is by some ascribed to Socinus himself, who, 
knowing that the Synods of the reformed churches in Poland, &c. 
.... thought on this model of Independent Churches which Mr. 
Baxter and the Dissenters contend for." p. 118. 

t Histoire des Variations ties Egliscs Protestant es, part i. chap, 
xxxvi. p. 176. Bossuet was able, too, to quote Jurieu's own words, 
that "the Trinity of Persons was not from all eternity." l er Aver- 
tissement, p. 1 and see tome iv. p. 38. 



IN FRANCE. 295 

ever surrounded ; they had cast away the divinely-appointed 
safeguard of truth ; and to such a struggle there could be 
but one issue. What it has been, we are now to hear. 

So complete has been the downfall of the. Protestant reli- 
gion in France, so universal the apostacy of its professors, 
that there are at this moment certain societies, of recent 
organization, which owe their origin to the laudable desire of 
redeeming from their present condition the descendants of 
Calvin and Beza in that country ! Connected with these 
societies iheSocietesEvangeliques of Geneva and France 
by unity of sentiment and purpose, is the " Foreign-Aid Socie- 
ty" of our own country. It is from the quarterly publication 
of that society, for December, 1841, that the following ac- 
count of French Protestantism is extracted : 

"The consistorial churches," which are protected and 
maintained by government, " were reorganised without a 
creed, and, in most cases, without any formulary whatever, 
so that there were no means of ascertaining what the faith 

O 

was which was couched under the general name of Protest- 
antism ; but as inquiries were made by individuals interested 
in the purity of the reformed religion, it was gradually dis- 
covered that the great body of the salaried pasteurs was 
infected with the neologism of Germany and the infidelity of 
the age of Louis XV.: it was hardly possible to fold twenty 
pasteurs icTio confessed the doctrine of the Trinity and the 
Atonement. At this time the established (that is, the state- 
paid) Protestantism of France is for the most part Socinian- 
ism ; and therefore it is not to be wondered at that the ortho- 
dox minority should feel anxious either to reform the major- 
ity or to recede from it. If they seek to reform by insisting 
upon the introduction of their ancient creeds and formula- 
ries, the Socinian majority tax them with intolerance, call 
them Methodists, Calvinists, and Exclusists. If they recede 
(as in some few instances they have done), they call them. 
Separatists and Dissenters. Such, however, has been the 
progress of orthodox doctrines, that within the last ten years 
the Trinitarians have received an acquisition of more than 
100 pasteurs, making in all an estimated number of 159 out 
of the 404 who faithfully preach Jesus Christ and Him cru- 
cified, and whose lives adorn the doctrine of God their Sav- 
iour." The foregoing account has reference only to the 
ministers of the ' reformed ' religion : "the Lutheran pas- 



296 DEVELOPMENT OP MODERN SYSTEMS. 

teurs," it is added, " with afeio exceptions, are neologists or 
Socinians." 

It may appear superfluous to add any thing to such a state- 
ment, coming as it does from persons who would probably be 
far enough from assigning what we consider the true cause of 
these miserable results of Protestantism. Before, however, 
I proceed, as in the former cases, to give some illustrations 
from their own writings of the theology of modern French 
Protestants, it may be well to confirm what has been already 
said by the striking and eloquent account of another writer, 
.who seems to have examined in person the system which he 
describes. He speaks of" the general character of French 
Protestantism " in the year 1836 in the. following terms : 
" The character which the reformed Church has acquired in 
France is altogether peculiar, peculiar, not from its rejec- 
tion of evangelical doctrines, but from its indifference to all 
doctrines. Christianity must appear to the great majority of 
Frenoh Protestants to have in it nothing positive or defined 
at all. A certain laxness of opinion, and a considerable 
abatement of fervour, may characterize, perhaps, all long- 
established churches. With us, for instance, the early enthu- 
siasm and zeal of the Reformation has subsided into a con- 
centrated feeling of respect and reverence for the Christian 
religion, which, even where there is nothing more, has a 
powerful and beneficent influence. But this state of feeling 
does not describe the reformed population of France. Their 
sentiments are much more negative. As the effect of their 
long proscription,* they have brought their vagabond habit 

* Such is the explanation of their present condition suggested by 
this writer; but we must look much deeper for the true causes of it. 
Itiswell known that during the period of the revolution the French 
protestants were protected rather than depressed ; see Gregoire's 
Histoirc dcs Scctes Religieuses, Obs. prelim, p. 5. Rabaut, presi- 
dent of the national assembly, speaks of " the signal protection 
granted to the reformed and protestant churches by the great 
Napoleon ;" Cobbin's Historical, Vieio of the Reformed Church of 
France, p. 105 : and I find certain English Socinians rejoicing, in 
the year 1808, at the favour which was then shown to those com- 
munities by the same person; Monthly Repository, vol. iii. p. 160. 
And no wonder that the French protestants experienced such partial 
treatment, when we consider what sort of men they proved them- 
selves at that season. " I am sorry to say," observes Mr. Burke, 
" that they (the French protestants) have behaved shockingly since 
the very beginning of this rebellion, and have been uniformly con- 



IN FRANCE. 297 

of neutrality among all opinions into religious worship. 
This gives to it an appearance singularly revolting. There 
is in it neither conviction, nor that venerating and hallowing 
attachment to a creed which is its best substitute. On en- 
tering a French temple, one experiences the same sensation 
as on entering a Jewish synagogue. Its services appear like 
a wretched effort, not to serve, but to keep up the memory 
of an abolished religion. They would indeed resemble a 
funeral requiem over defunct Protestantism, if they had the 
solemnity and decency of so touching a ceremony. The only 
symptom of religious feeling I have seen among the old 
French Protestants is one which, taken by itself, shows that 
superstition, or an inclination to trust in external rites, is the 
last relic of devotional sentiment that renlains among them. 
They have a most indecent eagerness to receive the sacra- 
ment. Droves of persons utterly ignorant and careless of 

religion crowd to this ceremony.* I was told by an 

old pastor, that fifteen years ago he could not count six min- 
isters of the established worship who preached the gospel. 
He thinks that at present, out of the six hundred belonging 
to the national temple, there may be two hundred who, with 
more or less effect and sincerity, uphold Christian princi- 
ples. At the former epoch he assured me that the preaching 
of Socrates instead of Christ was almost universal !f Act- 

cerned in its worst. and most atrocious acts. Their clergy are just 
the same atheists with those of the ' constitutional' catholics, but 
still more wicked and daring." Remarks on the Policy of the Mlies, 
Works, vol. vii. p. 177, ed. 1808. Contrast with this the conduct 
of the catholic clergy at the same period, of whom 135 Bishops, and 
many thousands of Priests, preferred exile or death to a denial or 
suppression of the truth ; only four prelates being found to apostatize. 
De la Mennais, Reflexions sur VEtat de VEglise en France, tome vi. 
p. 65. The truth is, that men being driven to give some account 
of the present state of protestantism in France, as elsewhere, have 
gladly pointed to the Revolution as its cause : thus the writer in 
Rees' ^Encyclopedia, art. Geneva. Whereas even M. De Sismondi 
expressly denies with regard to Switzerland, Holland, and Ger- 
many that the number of infidels in the protestant bodies was 
increased by that event. 

* Of the profane administration of the sacrament at Geneva to 
any body whatever, see the account in the Memorial Catholiquc, 
tome viii. p. 151. 

t Mr. Haldane says of the students at Geneva, " had they been 
trained in the schools of Socrates or Plato, they could scarcely 
have been more ignorant of the Doctrines of the Gospel." Letter to 
M. J. J. Chenevi&re, p. 21 ; cf. Chronique Religieuse, tome ii. pp. 



298 DEVELOPMENT OP MODERN SYSTEMS. 

ually, in the great majority of pulpits, an insipid dilution of 
the truisms of moral philosophy takes the place of Christian- 
ity. Still, a progress has been made, and is making. It 
must spread, however, much wider before the French Re- 
formed Church can be other than a very melancholy and dis- 
heartening object of contemplation."* 

Such being the actual status of this community, a few 
examples may be added of the mode in which its present 
members are accustomed to defend their adherence to it, and 
to propose the principles of their religious belief; because 
these will serve to show what is, perhaps, of more impor- 
tance in this inquiry than even the facts themselves that 
these men, widely as they differ in some respects from those 
celebrated reformers, have arrived at their present advanced 
position in the course of blasphemy and unbelief, simply by 
following on in the broad and beaten path which Luther and 
Melancthon, Calvin and Beza, had opened to them. 

Now it is frequently admitted by the French Protestant 
writers, without the least reserve, that Socinianism was the 
direct and necessary consequence of their Reformation ; and 
this fearful condemnation of that movement they pronounce 
as if it were no condemnation at all. "The freedom of in- 
quiry," say their ablest advocates, " could not but inevitably 
produce these results.^ This liberty occasions indeed cer- 

470, 71. We cannot be surprised, indeed, at the similarity of devel- 
opment in the two countries, as well because the point of departure 
of all the protestant bodies was of course the same, and so could not 
but lead to the same results, as from the particular connexion which 
always subsisted between the protestant schools of France and 
Switzerland'. See the Jlnnalcs dc la Religion, tome xv. p. 290. The 
sympathy between them is still unbroken, and it embraces also their 
brethren in Germany. Thus M. Cellerier recommends the study of 
the German theology to the French protestants ; Religion et Chris- 
tianismc, tome i. p. 163, DCS Thcologiens Mlcmands : and in the 
controversy between the Socinians and the more orthodox of Geneva, 
the French divines so to call them sided, for the most part, with 
He3'er and Cheneviere, abusing Malan, Haldane, and Calvin. See 
Religion et Christianisrne, tome iv. p. 159 ; and De Sismondi, ubi 
supra, p. 60. Perhaps there is no more melancholy feature in the 
whole affair, than that the very few who strove for the truth, and 
witnessed against the blasphemies of the rest, did so upon principles 
which must inevitably lead to them again. 

* Blackicood's Magazine, April 1836, pp. 470,71. 

t " C'est beaucoup," says De la Mennais, " que d'avoir obtenu 
un pareil aveu, d'ou il resulte que le protestantisme n'est point une 



IN FRANCE. 299 

tain disorders and evils, which do not appear consistent with 
the holiness, the wisdom, and the goodness of God. But in 
order to restrain these, you must suppress at the same time 
all which elevates man, his communion with the Creator, and 
the honour of the earthly creation you must annihilate the 
moral world."* 

" Far from blushing," says another writer, " at the vari- 
- ations which their religious creed has undergone, Protestants 
do not hesitate openly to acknowledge them ; and in an age 
such as ours, when the processes of investigating and dis- 
covering truth are now familiar, they expect to derive glory 
from them !"f Plancke even says, in reply to the charge 
which is here made a subject of congratulation, that the first 
Reformers, if they could come amongst their successors, 
would be ashamed to find it otherwise !f and he connects 
this, as he is explained by M. Goepp, a French pastor, with 
the " fundamental principle" of Protestantism in a very cu- 
rious way. " The right," he observes, " which Luther exer- 
cised of purifying the doctrines of his day, and rendering 
them more conformable to the letter and true sense of the 
Gospel, this right all his successors possess in an equal 
degree." Upon which his French annotator consistently 
remarks, " It follows that Protestants cannot consider them- 
selves as limited by the authority of Luther's sayings, nor 
those of the other reformers, nor even by that of their symbol- 
ical writings, and that their theology both can and ought to be 



religion, mais 1'amas incoherent de toutes les pensees qui peuvent 
monter dans 1'esprit de 1'homme." (Euvres, torne viii. p. 399. 

* See the reply to the Abbe Gregoire's History in the Melanges 
de Religion, tome ii. 

t Melanges de Religion, tome i. p. 84 : and M. Coquerel says 
" la diversite des sectes qui partagent le protestantisme forme son 
plus beau titre de gloire.'' See L'Jmi de la Religion, tome xxii. 
p. 208. Our Fathers used to think, and they had the Scriptures on 
their side for this opinion at least, that such divisions portended the 
coming Antichrist: ibofer /( , says S. Cyril, ru o-^iVfiara T<3i> ixubriaiiSv 

<j>n@tT jie. ft [ita-aS\<j>la TWV uJsA^tuK . . . pfi -yevuiro SI, 'iva i(j>' fi/jiSv Tt).ripuOjj. 
Cateck. xv. p. 167. We have surely at least as much need to remind 
ourselves of that most awful event, the coming of Antichrist; and 
to take heed, lest, by countenancing heresy and division, we be 
found at last to have accelerated the evil day. 

t " They boast of it," says Mr. Rose, speaking of the Germans, 
" as their very highest privilege, and the very essence of a Protestant 
Churck,that its opinions should constantly change." 



300 DEVELOPMENT OP MODERN SYSTEMS. 

tending towards perfection"!* And to the objections of 
Bossuet and others, that this is the very principle of Socin- 
ianisni, he only answers by saying, " that does not prove it 
bad in itself." 

M. Coquerel, the able editor of the Revue Protestante,i 
says, " The great error which so many persons commit 
arises from their desire to make men of one mind upon a 
crowd of subjects and systems, of which not even the name 
is mentioned in the Gospel, such as" and then he actually 
instances " original sin," "expiation," "freewill," "incar- 
nation" " consubstantiality," and others, which he calls 
" merely human words."! " It is absolutely necessary," 
he says, " to reduce Revelation to what it is, and no more." 
The Socinians he openly defends,^ maintaining that their 
admission of "the divine mission of a Saviour" comes to 
the same thing as if they attributed to Him a personal divi- 
nity ; and he adds, speaking in behalf of all who bear the 
name of Protestants, " Unity reigns among us upon the 
capital doctrine of the nature of Christ. Our sects, indeed, 
understand his divinity in different ways, they make it reside 
in different modes ; but they have a right to do so, seeing that 
it is a mystery." He adds, further, that " confessions of faith," 
" decrees," " councils," " doctrinary synods," are the real 
causes of disunion and sources of evil, " because they seek to 
define that which is mysterious " ! And so he proposes to 
unite all sects whatsoever in what he calls a " fundamental 
Christianity ;" and what sort of a creed that is, we learn from 
one of his confederates, who says, " Original sin, the doctrine 
of grace, predestination, the Lord's Supper, the nature of 
Jesus Christ and His union with God these are obscure sub- 
jects, upon which it is possible to hold many different opinions, 
not one of which shall be chargeable with absurdity." 

M. Coquerel concludes his apology for Protestantism with 
these words : " The opinions of which I have given a sum- 
mary are those of Huss, of Knox, of Luther, of Melancthon, 
of all the reformers. They do not hinder us from frater- 

* Archives du Christianisme, tome i. pp. 330, 331. 

t This journal has, I believe, since become avowedly a sup- 
porter of the Socinian tenets. See the Monthly Repository, vol. iii. 
p. 780. 

t Lcttrc de M. Charles Coquerel a M. O'Eggcr, sur une Profes- 
sion generate de toute VEglise Protestante, Paris, 1827, p. 20, note. 

pp. 27 j 39, and 42. 



IN FRANCE. 301 

nizing with Newton, the honour of our race, although he 
was a decided Unitarian or Socihian :"* it is only, he says, 
such as Pascal who are excluded from communion with Pro- 
testants as to that man, " he had no real faith, his faith 
having been imposed upon him by authority. "f - 

I will conclude these extracts, which it would be incon- 
venient to extend, with a remarkable saying of another very 
eminent champion of French Protestantism. After quoting 
with admiration a Genevan writer, who had gone so fair aa 
to say, " We only refuse to recognise as Christians those 
who themselves refuse to take that title," and who was wil- 
ling to include even the faith of Romanists within the com- 
prehensive limits of " fundamental Christianity," M. De 
Sismondi pronounces the following sentence upon himself 
and his co-religionists : " Thus it is ho longer the reproach 
of heresy or idolatry" (the rash charges of the original re- 
formers!) " that one division of Christians repeats against 
the other it is not even an accusation of error ; for the 
Protestant Church admits that she herself may be mistaken : 
she claims only that liberty of thought which the Catholic 
Church renounces." J With these words/as containing the 
most ample though unconscious confession of th.e true cha- 
racter of this Protestantism, we may terminate our inquiry 
into the development of the reformed doctrines in France. 

i ... 

V. And if we had determined to sum up at this point the 
historical notices which it is still proposed to pursue much 
more extensively, the conclusions intended to be founded 
upon them could 'hardly have been rejected as arbitrary or 
inconsequent. The most enthusiastic disciples of the mo- 
dern schools of religion, however unsuspecting their attach- 
ment to a certain system of teaching may hitnerto have been, 
cannot be supposed to be capable of regarding with apathy 
or indifference, much less of deliberately dismissing as in- 
. significant, facts so arresting and so appalling as these. Nor 

* It is scarcely necessary to say that this statement is false. See 
M.Biot. 

t Cf. Lettre it, M. Charles Coquerel, par M. Arnaud Saintes; 
Paris, 1727. " Quod intelligimus," says St. Augustine, on v the other 
hand, " debemus rationi ; quod credimus, auctoritati ; quod opi- 
namur, errori." De Utilitate Credendi, cap. xi. torn. vi.'p. 42. 

J Progress of Religious Opinions during the Nineteenth Century < t 
p. 79. 

14 



302 DEVELOPMENT OP MODERN SYSTEMS. 

will the results, which they obtrude upon our- attention ap- 
pear less startling to such persons, because, so far as they 
are concerned, such consequences must have been altoge- 
ther unexpected. By others they were foreseen and pre- 
dicted from the first, but by them every warning of these 
possible developments has been laughed to scorn; and now 
the melancholy truth, which they have been so unwilling to 
believe/has come abroad at last, and cannot be hid. They 
have themselves cried aloud for a sign from God, and 
here it is ! 

Nor is it in one or two countries only that it has seemed 
good to Him to justify His own Institution, and, by aban- 
doning ,the haughty devices of man to a swift and shameful 
decay, to admonish His people of the allegiance due to His 
appointed Ordinance ; in every place the same solemn les- 
son is set before us, in every land the progress has been the 
same resistance to the Church has developed into rebellion 
against God, and schism has terminated, by an unfailing 
course, in apostacy and unbelief. 

The history of the new. religions in England to which 
country, in pursuance of our subject, we will now refer 
admits of being considered under three aspects, which, at 
three distinct periods, they happen to have assumed. (1) 
The first is that which they presented when as yet only strug- 
gling for existence; (2). the next, when triumphant, for a 
brief season, over the ancient faith ; (3) the last, the hum- 
bler form under which, enjoying the most ample toleration, 
they still survive amongst us. It is obvious that this diver- 
7 sity of. external circumstance, which, did not belong to either 
of the examples previously noticed, constitutes a severe trial 
of the rigid test'which we have bound ourselves to apply, with- 
out exception,. to every possible modification of the modern 
systems. That test will be found, however/ to succeed, in 
this case as in the others, in faithfully detecting . their real 
character. ^ 

Now, it must be observed, with reference to the first 
period of the history, of whicH some few particulars are here 
to be mentioned, that, even when lurking in secret, the un- 
happy errors, which have since spread so extensively in this 
country, appear to have been fully developed in many minds, 
and their open promulgation only reserved for a more fa- 



IN ENGLAND. 303 

vourable opportunity than could be found under that system 
of watchful discipline which the Church had hitherto main- 
tained. Thus we are told by one writer, that he had met 
with works published between 1550 and 1640, " full of as 
bold and impious railing expressions against the lawful power 
of the Crown and the order of Bishops as ever were uttered 
during the rebellion, or the whole subsequent tyranny of 
that fanatic anarchy :"* and what is this but to say, that 
for ninety years the latent principles of rebellion were coun- 
teracted, and the poison of heretical doctrine neutralized, by 
the virtue of that divine Institution to which, by the ap- 
pointment of God, the chastisement of error and the conser- 
vation of sound doctrine had been committed ?f During all 
that period it is plain that the Church had answered this 
grand purpose of her being ; and we shall find this striking 
fact so clearly demonstrated in the next interval of the his- 
tory upon which we are engaged the season, namely, of 
the temporary triumph of her adversaries that we may 
proceed to consider at once the evidence upon which it 
rests. Had the office of -the Church in restraining error 
during the century preceding the great rebellion been as- 
serted only by her own members, it might .perhaps have been 
fairly questioned by her enemies ; but when we find, as we 
are now to do, that they are themselves the witnesses to this 
important truth that, so long as her authority was recog- 
nised; heresy and lawlessness were every where restrained, 
and that their dominion is to be dated from the very moment 

* Swift, The Presbyterian's Plea of Merit, Works, vol. viii. p. 
393, ed. 1824. Sir W.Raleigh told the House of Commons in 1593, 
"that there were then' near 20,000 Brownists in England." Quoted 
by Sir Peter Pett, Happy Future State of England, p. 280. Yet, 
while the .Church stood, they were kept under : see Felling's Good 
Old. Way, p. 105 ; and Dr. Is. Basire On Sacrilege, p. 231. 

t " So long as the Bishops were not molested in their function," 
says one who was apparently a member of another Communion, 
f the kingdoms was- not. disquieted with any schismes or disorder? 
in the Church. - There durst not a sectarie'show his head, till those 
Christian guides were overborne with. violence, and all superioritie 
among Pastors decryed :" and then he shows what followed" in one 
short year after their removal. See A Letter concerning the present 
Troubles in England, pp. 37, 38, English translation. I have quoted 
above, see page 242, the very remarkable admissions of Salmasius 
upon this 'subject ; and I find Weismann also admitting that the 
state of England under the Protectorate fully justified the arguments 
of the Episcopal divines : secul. xvii. torn. ii. p. llOO.. 



304 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

of her downfall we shall have advanced another step towards 
proving the argument of these pages, and found additional 
reason for believing, from the admissions of their own ad- 
vocates, that .the modern systems of religion had never 
strength to contend with, much less to! overcome, the pow- 
ers and principles of evil which the Church had so easily 
overmastered because, in fact, they have always failed to 
do so.* . 

During the course of a whole century the unchristian 
doctrines which, from various parts of Europe, had found 
their way into England,f although greedily received by no 
inconsiderable portion of the people, were yet unable, as has 
been already observed, to subvert the foundations of holy 
truth. At length, in the days of King Charles the Martyr, 
the sacred barriers which had stood so long unharmed, and 
against which all the floods of error had vainly raged, were 
in an evil . hour removed. The Church, by the mysterious 
judgments of God, was first taken captive, and then com- 
pelled to flee away as a fugitive her rivals were left alone. 

(2.) The second period of their history was now arrived 
the period of their triumph. The plea upon which their 
rebellion was justified was, of course, the old one of a " re- 
formation.": The doctrine and discipline of the Catholic 
and Apostolic Church was declared to be false and corrupt, 
and the new religion of " Presbyterianism" set up in its 
place. And now was the proper season for the manifesta- 
tion of its real character. If it was indeed that very system 
of the Apostles which its champions represented it to be, 
the days were come in which to prove it so; and all men 
might now expect to behold, under its beneficent influence, 

* " No form of Government was ever so absolute as to keep out 
all abuses. Errors in religion are not presently to be imputed to the 

)vernment of the Church ; Arius, Pelagius, &c. were no Bishops, 
ut, on the other side, if Bishops had not been, God knows what 
Churches, what Religion, what Sacraments, what Christ, we should 
have had at this day. And we may easily conjecture by that inun- 
dation of sects, which hath almost quite overwhelmed our poor Church 
on a sudden, since the authority of Bishops was suspended. The 
present condition of England doth plead more powerfully for Bishops 
than all that have writ for Episcopacy since the reformation of our 
Church." Bramhall, The Serpent Salve, p. 605. 

t Sir Dudley Carleton says, " Most of the puritan book's sent over 
of late days into England " were written by Brownists at Leyden ; 
Letters, p. 379. 



. : IN ENGLAND. 305 

such a severe and abiding purity, both of doctrine and man- 
ners, as the world had not witnessed for at least fifteen ages. 
What, then, are the facts to apply the test which no error 
can long baffle or elude connected with this period of its 
history, this season of its strength and power ? This is what 
we are next to inquire. 

And unless the evidence had been so complete as it is, 
we might have regarded the statements which have reached 
us as to the condition of England under the short reign of 
the Presbyterians as absolutely incredible. Within four 
years, upon the confession of some of their chief men, after 
the destruction of the Church, the whole land was over- 
flowed, from one end to the other, with a deluge of heresy. 
More than one hundred blasphemous errors are enumerated 
by their own writers, " all of them," as they speak, " vented 
and broached within these four years last past."* " Every 
day," says the writer here quoted, himself a zealous Pres- 
byterian and fluent railer at the persecuted Bishops, " things 
grow worse and worse, and you can hardly conceive and 
imagine them so bad as they are; no kind of blasphemy, 
heresy, disorder, and confusion, but either is found among 
us, or coming in upon us ; for tee, instead of a reformation, 
are grown from one extreme to another, fallen from Scylla to 
Charybdis, from popish innovations, superstitions, and pre- 
latical tyranny, to damnable heresies, horrid blasphemies, 
libertinism, and fearful anarchy ; our evils are not removed 
and cured, but only changed ; one disease and devil hath 
left us, and another as bad is come in the room; yea, this 
last extremity into which we are fallen is far more high, 
violent, and dangerous in many respects."^ . 

As a general description of the state of the times, this 
account, from a witness so well qualified, might seem suffi- 
cient; but he enters presently into particulars. "Within 
these four last years in England," he says, " there have been 
blasphemies uttered of the Scriptures, the Trinity, each Per- 
son of the Trinity, both of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, 
of God's eternal election, of the Virgin Mary, the. Apostles 
and holy penmen of Scripture, of Baptism, Prayer, the Min- 
istry of the Word, and the Ministers of all the Reformed 

* Edwards' Gangreena, p. 1 ; and see Ross's View of all Reli<nons, 
14, p. 422, ed. 1673. ' 

. t Epistle dedicatory to the Parliament. 



306 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

Churches, of the Government of the Church, and of the 
Christian Magistrates :"* and then he gives various instances 
of these crimes. . 

Such were the attendants upon Presbyterianism even in 
its day of unlimited power, when, if ever, it ought to have been 
able to restrain them ; such were the consequences which 
ensued immediately upon* the casting out of the Bishops of 
the Chiirch."t This witness does not, indeed, say that the 
one was a nec.essary result of the other, nor could he be ex- 
pected to do so; but he does, unintentionally of course, say 
something very like it. " We have overpassed," he con- 
fesses, "in these last four years, the deeds of the prelates, 
and. justified the Bishops, in whose times never so many nor 
so great errors were heard of, much less such blasphemies or 
confusions ; we have worse things among us than ever were 
in all the Bishops' days, more corrupt doctrines a?id unheard- 
of practices ;"f and then he refers to the horrible tenets and 
opinions which were then so common. Nor does he appar- 
ently suspect that they were, after all, only another form of 
his own principles of pride and rebellion, and that these 
wretched people had just as much right, to say the least, to 
abuse him and his novelties, as he to blaspheme the Bishops 
of God's Church. 

* Gangreena, p. 37. 

t And this result has often been predicted as the operation of a 
general law. "The Christian religion," says Harrington, "was 
first -planted by Bishops, hath been preserved and continued with 
Bishops, and will fall and decay without Bishops." Nugcc Jlntiquce, 
voll. ii. p. 10. 

t Page 143. Sir Peter Pert quotes the confession of Crauford, 
an eminent presbyterian preacher, that "in eighty years" there did 
not arise so many horrid.opinions and blasphemous heresies under 
Episcopacy, a government decried as antichxistian,. as. have risen in 
these few years since we have been without a government." Future 
State of England, p. 240. Another zealous presbyterian, and reviler 
of the Bishops, says, " The corruptions of our days exceed those of 
the Bishops as far as the waters of the ocean exceed those of the 
.Rhine." Hornii Hist. Ecclesiast. et Politic, p. 333, ed. Roterod. 
See also Goodwin On the Divine Authority of the Scriptures, To the 
Reader (1648) ; Case's Morning Exercise, Preface (1655) ; and the 
Jus Divinum Ministerii Evangelici, Preface by the Provincial Assem- 
bly of London, 1654. 

" You have put down the Common Prayer," was his own say- 
ing to the, revolutionary Parliament, "and there are many among 
us have put down the Scriptures; you have cast out the Bishops 
and their officers, and we have many that cast down to the ground 



IN ENGLAND. 307 

As this writer was a person of note in his own day, and 
has been much quoted since, a few more of his remarkable 
sayings may be added. In one place he observes, " that per- 
sons who would not be endured nor suffered in other coun- 
tries andfthurches, but were cast out arid banished for their 
errors, heresies, and turbulency, do here in England vent and 
spread their opinions, gather churches," &c. ; and that 
"England has become the common shore and sink to receive 
the filth of heresies and errors from all places." And as if 
he had riot already sufficiently exposed the guilt of his own 
party, he even adds, that their very " victories and successes 
turned to the increasing and growth of errors ; every taking 
of a town or city is a further spreading over this kingdom 
the gangrene of heresy and error ; where these errors were 
never known or heard of before, upon our .taking of towns and 
cities they come to light ; every enlarging of otif quarters is 
an enlargement of sectarianism and a multiplying of 
schisms."* Such is the testimony as to the working of 
Presbyterianism which is supplied by its own advocates. 

Thus far, however, we have only heard an individual 
teacher of that sect ; we may now refer to the collective evi- 
dence of one of the most influential and important of its sub- 
divisions. " The Ministers within the Province of London," 
at the same period, in their Testimony to the truth of Jesus 
Christ, thus speak of the results of the presbyterian ' reform- 
ation.' They declare to the world "that instead of true 
piety and power of godliness, they (the ejectors of the Bish- 
ops) had opened the very floodgates to all impiety and pro- 
fan eness; and that after they had removed the prelatical 
yoke from their shoulders by their covenanted endeavours,- 
there : was a rueful, deplorable, and deformed face of the af- 
fairs of religion, swarming with noisome errors, heresies, 
andjblasphemies, instead of faith and truth j torn in pieces 

all ministers in all the reformed Churches." So Baxter : " We had 
taken down the superfluous honour of Bishops as antichristian, upon 
which the devil set them to cry down also as antichristian, tythes, 
maintenance, priests, and ministers." And why'not ? r They were 
only employing the very arguments with' which he and his party 
had already attacked many other ordinances of- God ; arid, as Bram- 
hall remarks, " there is not a text which they wrest against Episco- 
pacy, but the Independents may, with as much colour of reason and 
truth, urge it against their presbyteries." Fair' Warning of Scottish 
Discipline, ch. viii. vol. ii. p. 506. * P. 149. 



DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

with destructive schisms, separations, divisions, and subdi- 
visions, instead of unity and uniformity. That instead of a 
reformation, they might say with sighs what their enemies 
said with scorn, they had a deformation in religion ; instead 
of extirpation of heresie, schism, profaneness, &c^|hey had 
an impudent and general inundation of all those evils."* 

This is sufficiently circumstantial ; but, as the evidence 
is abundant, something more maybe added. The notorious 
Owen thus speaks of the same awful period in the history of 
our country. " This I am compelled to say, that unlesse the 
Lord in His infinite mercy lay an awe upon the hearts of 
men, to keep them in some captivity to the simplicity and 
mystery.of the. Gospel, who now strive every. day to exceed, 
one another in novel opinions and philosophical apprehen- 
sions of the things of God, 1 cannot but fear that this soule- 
destroying abomination (he is speaking of Socinianism) will 
one day break in as a flood upon us." And again; " Doe 
not look upon these things as things afar off, wherein you are 
little concerned; the evil is at the.doore; there is not a 
Citty,a Towne, scarce a Village, in England, wherein some 
of this pay son is not poured forth ."t 

It is this last-mentioned phenomenon the sudden appear- 
ance of the Spcinian heresy in every part of England, within 
a few years of the abolition of Episcopacy which, in con- 
nexion with our present subject, deserves special attention. 
The almost unparalleled crimes which marked the ascend- 
ency of Presbyter ianism, though a sufficient and significant 

*. Upon which Pierce, in his controversy with Baxter, asks, " Can 
you possibly have more, sir, against the change in the Church than 
is here publickly attested by them that made it ? There were no 
such things in the Bishops' times ; nay, none such could be. God's 
enclosure was then so mounded with a hedge of Discipline and 
Order, and even the hedge was so fenced with a double wall of Law 
and Canon, that either no unclean beasts could enter in, or, if they 

did, they were soon cast out and impounded You now profess 

you are all for Bishops ; but when you had them, you would have 
none." Pierce's New Discoverer, pp. 335, 6. 

t Owen's VindicitE ' Evangelica, or Sp'cinianisme examined, '-Pre- 
face, pp. 45 and 69. Even Fowler calls it " this hour of apostasie ;" 
DtEirionium Meridianum, Dedication. And see The Attestation of 
the Ministers of the 'County of Norfolk and City of Norwich, in 
vindication of the ancient . Truths of Jesus Christ, and prosecution 
of the Solemn Covenant, against the spreading errors and prodi- 
gious blasphemies that are scattered abroad in these licentious- dayes. 
(1648.) 



IN ENGLAND. 309 

token of its real nature, and therefore not to be overlooked 
in this argument, are still not in the immediate. direction. of 
our inquiry. That system may exist, and has existed, with- 
out such disgraceful accompaniments. What we are rather 
concerned to prove is, the fact implied in the above citation, 
viz., that it has never existed without generating that pecu- 
liar form of heresy, of which Owen speaks in such emphatic 
language. This has been already proved as respects those 
countries in which it first originated ; and the present chapter 
will not be concluded without extending the proof to other 
lands throughout the whole world. Meanwhile, to return to 
the development of the modern systems in England. 

The fact of the strange and silent growth of Socinianism 
under the circumstances shown above did not fail to attract 
the notice of Catholic writers : and the observations which 
they made upon it are too instructive to be omitted here. 
"It hath bin," says Dr. Edwards, in his excellent Preserv- 
ative against Socinianism, "as the occasion of trouble to all 
good men, so likewise matter of wonder and enquiry to 
all considering men, to find the nation pestered with such 
numbers of Socinian books, which have siearm'd all upon a 
suddain* and have been industriously dispersed through all 
parts of the kingdom, whereby many weak and unstable souls 
have been beguiled, and their minds corrupted from the 
simplicity which is in Christ. 

" Who they are, who have bin the secret abettors and 
promoters of these antichristian doctrines, as it is variously 
discoursed, so I shall not curiously enquire ; lest by reaving 
and uncertain conjectures, the innocent may be mistaken for 
the criminals. Only this, I. think, is so evident, that it may 
be taken for granted, that since there have bin no consider- 
able numbers of men formerly that we know of, who have 
openly and avo\vedly professed the impious tenets of Socin, 
they must have lain lurking under some other outward name 
and profession, watching the first and most convenient oppor- 
tunity to divulge their opinions, which, for some just and 
weighty reasons no doubt, they thought fit for some time to 
stifle and conceal. I think there are scarce any among us 
so foolish as to imagine that, like Cadmus, his offspring 

* It was just while the famous schism of the Remonstrants was 
raging, that Socinian publications began to swarm in Holland. Vide 
Cloppenburg, De Orig. et Progress. Socinianismi, p. 27. 

14* 



310 DEVELOPMENT. OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

(though, without .doubt, the old serpent hath had no small 
hand in this affair), these men should spring out of the 
ground. It is therefore beyond all dpubt thai they have lain 
hid and disguised -under the denomination' of some other sect 
or party and profession.* 

" Bat whatsoever the causes have bin of this sudd aine 
appearance of Socinianisme,t or whoever were the authors 
that have secretly and in masquerade abetted and encour- 
aged it much of which lies yet in the dark the pernicious 
effects of it have been and are at this day too visible. The 
minds of men, as we said before, throughput the nation 
being strangely corrupted ; infidelity and skepticism univer- 
sally prevailing." He then describes the various aspects in 
which this prevailing apostacy was exhibited, noticing par- 
ticularly those who still "professed to believe the, Bi.ble," 
and even to hold " all the great mysteries, of. our faith con- 
tained there ;" and concludes by saying, " all which are the 
effects of Socinianisme, and which seem to have diffused 
themselves among all orders and ranks of men among us, 
beyond the example of former times." 

Enough, perhaps, has now been said from which to form 
something like an adequate notion of the horrors of those 
evil days which ensued upon the downfall of the Reformed 
Catholic Church in this land, and the erection of a human 
system in its place.J To those who desire a more minute 

* We shall find hereafter that this is just the account which the 
Socinians give of their pvyn position, at the present time, in relation 
to the various protestant sects of America. 

+ See Lathbury's History of the English Episcopacy, chap. xxii. 
p. 252 ; and Russell's History of Modern Europe, vol. v. pp. 436, 
437. ...-.. 

| See further A Vindication of the Preslyteriall Government and 
Ministry, by the Provincial Assembly, 1649 ; Judge Jenkins' ac- 
count of the presbyterian acts and opinions, in his Scourge for Ike 
Directorie and the revolting Synod ; and Nicholls' Defence of '.the 
Church of England, Introd. p. 63. For the general character of the 
preaching of those days, see Hickes' Three Treatises, Modest Plea, 
ch. vii. p. 54 ; Bp. Hurd, Sermon i. Works, vol. vi. p. 16, London, 
1811 ; Bp. Sanderson, Sermon ii. p. 129 ; Bp. Taylor, book xv. 
Preface, pp. 4, 5. "Alas, rhy Lords," said Bishop Hall, "I beseech 
you to consider what it is, that there should be in London, and the 
suburbs and the liberties, no fewer than fourscore congregations of 
several sectaries, as I have been credibly informed, instructed by 
guides fit for them cobblers, taylors, felt-makers, and such-like 
which are all taught to spit in the face of their mother the Church 



IN ENGLAND. 311 

and accurate description of them which, of course, cannot 
even be attempted here the .sources of information are 
open. Certainly what has been said may at least suffice to 
sustain the argument of these pages ; and to do more is be- 
yond the purpose for which they are written. Further de- 
tails are easy to be procured; but in this place they are not 
necessary. And indeed, as Doctor Nichblls has observed, 
"it would be infinite to relate the names, the opinions, the 
madnesses, the blasphemies 'of the sects and heresies of this 
time, by which the poor Church was torn in pieces ; so that 
the name of Christianity, where these raged, was almost lost. 
Oh, what a 'purity ' was now restored to the Church ! This 
was the gospel light which was so earnestly desired ! These 
were the godly and edifying ministers that were so much 
called for, and to whose care so many of the common people 
Would be entrusting their souls, when their lawful Pastors 
were thrown out of their livings ! But I appeal to the annals 
of all ages of the Church, and to the judgment of all wise 
and good men, if any opinions so impious, so abominable, so 
accursed as these, were ever brought into the Christian 
world."* Great plagues had indeed wasted the Church in 
former days; and many a scheme had 'been devised for her 
destruction : but it was reserved Tor this new extravagance 
of ' Presbyterianism ' to engender, even while professing to 
expose them, evils so enormous and so deadly, as perhaps no 
church and no land has ever witnessed, save the Church of 
England in the 17th century. 

Presbyteriariism was not, however, destined to maintain 
long the position which by treachery and rebellion it had 
obtained."! The principles which it had been necessaryto 

of England, and defy and revile her government." Speech -in the 
House of Lords, in his Remains. Edwards states that there were 
eleven different religions in one parish in London ; and mentions a 
family consisting of four persons, every one of whom professed a 
distinct form of belief. GangreBna^fart ii. ; which contains a great 
number of instances of the progress of individuals from schism to 
heresy. . 

* Defence of the Church of England, p. 70. 

t "After all this, the peremptory reign of Presbytery, which 
cost this church and nation so deare, was not long lived, nor could 
be well established, though at first it looked so big, and grasped in 
the sudden even at three kingdoms. For before it was warm in its 
nest, or well seated in its throne, we see Independency got hold of 
one end of its sceptre, or quarter-staffe rather, threatening, in the 



312 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

propagate so widely before its triumph could be achieved, 
were soon found to be progressive. . Nor was it likely that 
the fierce men, whom it had stirred up to do its work, would 
consent to stay their hands just when that work was accom- 
plished. They had been taught to kill and gather spoil 
in the name of religion, and they had no mind to do these 
things only for the benefit of others ; the fight which their 
arms had won was over, and they were not the, men. to 'fore- 
go their share in the booty. The contest with their former 
masters was a short one ; and Presbyterianism, already worn 
out,* gave way to Independeniism. . 

(3.) We enter now upon the third period of its history. 
After a course of crime which, even at this distance, it is pain- 
ful to contemplate, the Presbyterians,' deprived of the honours 
which they had purchased at such fearful cost, were con- 
tent to ask, as the only remedy for' the now intolerable evils 
of the country, for " Episcopal Government and a tolera- 
tion !"t The lawful governors of the Church restored once 
more, the impious and profane slunk back to their hiding- 
places, conscious that their day was over. And now Pres> 

right of Christ Jesus, and in the behalf of all Christian common 
people, to wrest it quite out of the hands of Presbytery, either by 
legerdemaine or maine force, unlesse it might go at least halfe with 
it in the spoiles of Episcopacy." Gauden's Ecclesia Anglicance, Sus- 
piria, book iv. chap, iii: pi 445. ' 

* " 'Tjs true at present the herd or Sock of Presbytery is not so 
numerous and strong as they were twenty years ago, by the dwin- 
dling of a great part of their gang into other conventicles of separa- 
tion; some of them being since turned Anabaptists, others Inde- 
pendents, some Quakers, others Fifth-monarchy men ; and others 
run themselves .into such grosse absurdities, that there is scarce an 
heresie in Prateolus, but some branches of this disciplinarian tree 
doth embrace and shelter." Foulis' History of ', the wicked Plots and 
Conspiracies of our pretended. Saints, book iii. ch. ii. p. 172 (1674). 

t Gqngrtzna, p. 54. So another reports, that the sectaries, worn 
out with the tyranny of their self-elected guides, would exclaim, 
. *' Episcopos et tolerationem sibi satisfacturam .'" Hornii Hist. EC- 
elesiast. et Politic, p. 325. " The Presbyterians," says one of the 
baffled rebels, "finding the tyde to be against them, agreed with the 
Bishops in many particulars, desiring only to.be dispensed within 
wearing the surplice, reading some parts of the .Liturgy, and using 
some ceremonies; on which . condition they promised to subject 
themselves to the Bishops, as Superintendents of the Church, if some 
ministers might be joyned with them in the act of ordination " 
which they very well knew the Church had always required and 
appointed. See Ludlow's Memoirs, vol. iii. p. 57. 



IN ENGLAND. 3] 3 

byterianism, willingly accepting the toleration which it had 
vehemently denied to all other sects,* took up a new posi- 
tion, and appeared in another character. Henceforth it 
promised to be peaceable and submissive. Authority and 
power it had confessed itself unable either to use or pre- 
serve, even when it had the best chance of doing so. It still 
remained, however, to see how it would behave itself under 
its altered circumstances : and we come now, in Che last 
place, to inquire into the history of its development in times 
of peace and quietness, when there was nothing to influence 
its course either in this direction or that, save its own natu- 
ral and inherent properties. 

And although the consideration of its earlier history may 
have prepared us for some such results as those which the 
Calvinistic and Lutheran communities had already exhibited, 
and has served to confirm the uniform connexion between 
schism and heresy which their progress had so fully demon- 
strated, yet we could hardly, perhaps, have anticipated the 
startling fact, that of all the Presbyterian congregations 
established in England during and subsequent to the times 
of the rebellion, there are few, if any, at the present day 
which have not lapsed into the Socinian apostacy !f Such 

* Even Mr. Hallam speaks of " the remorseless and indiscrimi- 
nate bigotry of Presbyterianism." Dean Swift refers to " many 
hundred quotations " from Presbyterian writers " against allowing 
any liberty of conscience,"- their objection being, " that allowing 
such a liberty would be to establish iniquity by law." The Presby- 
terian's Plea of Merit, vol. viii. pp. 408, 9. Edwards, whom I have 
so often cited, told the Parliament, that " a. toleration was the grand 
design of the devil, and the most compendious, ready, and sure way 
to destroy all religion." And so warmly, whilst their power lasted, 
did they maintain this view, that Cromwell himself, at the dissolu- 
tion of the Parliament in 1654, observed to them, " Is it ingenuous 
to ask liberty, and not to give it ? -What greater hypocrisie than for 
those who were oppressed by the Bishops to become the greatest 
oppressors themselves so soon as the yoke was removed ?" Quoted 
in The Second Part^oftke History of Separation, p.. 94. 

--"* - * - s it is call< 

Of 




acknowledged Unitarians . . . The Presbyterian churches throughout 
England are understood to be, with scarcely an exception, occupied 
by congregations of this sort. Their number was reckoned ten years 
ago at more than two hundred." Unit, in Ang. Fid. Hist. Stat. 
prasent. brev. Expos, apud Encycloped. American, vol. xii. App. p. 
599. Sir Richard Philips says, " Most of the English Presbyterians, 



314 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

has been the rise, the progress, and the termination of 
this unhappy sect.* 

/ 

and many Independents, have joined the Unitarians;" and he 
adds, that "in England and Wales there are 1663 Independent 
congregations, and 258 Presbyterian, and that one'third'of them- are 
Unitarian. It is also greatly to be feared that a. large proportion of 
the Quakers are sinking into Deism :" the writer who quotes this is 
himself a Wesleyan Methodist ; see Ten Letters on the Church and 
Church Establishments, by an Anglo-Canadian, Letter vi. pp. 43, 44. 
The progress throughout the Channel Islands appears, from informa- 
tion communicated to me, to have been very similar. The only 
definite fact, however, in illustration of this progress, which ; I am 
able to state,- is in relation to Guernsey,-; of the'.Socinians of which 
place it is said, by a very competent authority, " before they adopted 
the sentiments they now hold, they formed a part of the society of 

Methodists.'" Monthly Repository, vol. iv. p. 134 

. , . * To enter into the details of -its. history is manifestly beyond the 
scope of the present work, the general fact being the only proper 
object of our inquiry ; yet such details would be highly instructive, 
especially as considered in .relation to that remarkable law.of-declen- 
sion which we are. here noticing. A few may be mentioned. The 
Dissenter quoted above, who appears as the advocate of. establishments 
solely from his own observations of the downward progress of schism, 
says, " If I mistake not, at this very hour the pulpit of even the 
devoted and orthodox Matthew Henry is filled by a Socinian teacher." 
The fact is, or was, as he supposes : Henry's meeting-house at Chester is 
thus described 'by another dissenting writer : " Built forth'e celebrated 
Mr. Matthew'Henry and his congregation j about the year 1700. In this 
chapel a copy of Mr. Henry's Exposition of the Bible had been placed 
on desks for general perusal, probably eVer since its first publication. 
A gentleman who visited the chapel some years ago', observed that 
one of the volumes of the New Testament was missing, and that 
several leaves were' torn out of another ; while the JVcw Unitarian 
Version w'as in the pulpit and in several of the pews." The 'Man- 
chester Socinian Controversy, p. 122, London, 1825. The meeting- 
house built at Knutsford for Henry's " biographer, Mr. Tong," is also 
Socinian : p. 123; So of that built at Nantwich for Mr. Samuel 
Lawrence, " his bosom friend :" p. 124. So of the one-built' by 
Coward, " the friend of Watts and Doddridge." So of those built 
by Doddridge himself. These are surely significant facts. Of 
Doddridge the Dean of Westminster says, " Although he was himself 
a believer in the Trinity and the Atonement, he never seems to have 
considered Arian or Socinian sentiments as any bar to the admission 
of individuals to his bouse and lecture-room. In fact many young 
men holding sentiments of that kind were his pupils." Dean Turtoh 
On the Text of the Bible, p. 8. See also the Dean's Review of the 
principal Dissenting Colleges in England during the last Century. 
The instinctive sympathy with heresy which has always been a 
characteristic of sectarians, might be copiously illustrated. Thus of 
Baxter,. who in the course of his life professed a greater variety of 



IN SCOTLAND. 31 

VI. Scotland has for some time past appeared to present 
an exception to the rule which we are here tracing. The 
members of the establishment in that country have not, like 
their co-religionists in Geneva, repudiated . Christianity ; 
they still profess to adhere, to their original formularies ; and 

religious opinions than could easily be numbered, it has been noticed, 
that in his writings on church-government, in which the Bishops are 
plentifully reviled, " he hath assembled all the Arian and heretical 
authors that he could hear of, such as Philostorgius, Sandius, &c., 
and out of them quotes only the worst things, omitting what is left 
on record concerning the learning, piety, courage, patience, charity, 
and condescension of those Fathers and Martyrs . : .Contrariwise, 
speaking of their adversaries, whether Arians, Nestorians, Donatists, 
Novatians, &c., he commends them as good and well-meaning men, 
mistaken only in the manner of expressing themselves, applauding 
them for their holy and' strict lives, without any notice of their 
damnable errors, though they denied the Lord that 'bought them!" 
The Second, Part of the History of Separation, p. 23; and see p. 113, 
where Baxter openly defends the Arians, and condemns St. Athana- 
sius. So, to give a later instance, Wesley, in his improved Liturgy, 
" mutilated above 60 of the Psalms, discarded 34 others, and newly 
rendered many of the remainder. Of the Psalms which he has 
discarded, six at least are admitted to be eminently prophetic of- our 
Saviour of His incarnation, His- sufferings, and His ascension; 
whilst the reason assigned for their .expurgation is, their being 
' improper for the mouth of a Christian congregation !' But this is 
not all, . . . the two Creeds, the Nicene and4\thanasian, are totally 
discarded ..... The general character of the rejected Articles and 
Psalms will pretty clearly establish what has been alleged as to the 
nature of the opinions which Mr. Wesley and his followers maintain, 
or, at least, of the doctrines which they reject. The 18th Article, 
which pronounces, that ' eternal salvation is to be obtained only by 
the name of Christ ;' and the 15th, which asserts, ' that Christ alone 
' was without sin,' are two of those which the founder of Methodism 
has declared to be unfit objects of a Christian's belief. Thus it 
appears that the Sopinian is not the only sectary that would degrade 
the dignity of Christ." Magee On the Monem,ent, vol. i. pp. 159, 
160. Both Adam Clarke and- Wesley preached in Socinian 'high 
places ;' but the former, considering that, as he said, he ' could not 
preach their. doctrine, and was afraid to preach his own," got so far 
as to say, " I do not like this business, and have nearly made up my 
mind to have done with it." Vide British Magazine, No. 127,.p. 660. 
These various circumstances are such as can scarcely fail to produce 
some effect upon bumble and serious minds ; and they might be 
confirmed almost without limit. I will add only a single example of 
the actual progress which they are intended to illustrate. It is taken 
from a paper transmitted to me from Warminster, in the county of 
Wilts, entitled ' Memorandum relating to the Old Meeting, called 
of late years the Unitarian Chapel^ and supplies the dates; at 



316 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

they give no countenance, as a body, to the op'en avowal 
of Socinianism. The law, therefore, which has been repre- 
sented as of universal application, seems in this case to fail. 

Now, it must be acknowledged at once that Presbyteri- 
anism in Scotland has not hitherto, by God's " mercy, 
assumed the form into which in so many other lands it has 
been developed. Let this be freely and thankfully admitted. 
That its present state, however, is really such as to consti- 
tute an exception to the cases already or hereafter to be 
considered, this is far indeed from being true, as it will 
not be difficult to show. 

And in truth, if the test which we have used so success- 
fully thus far had failed for the first time in this instance, we 
should have had peculiar reason for surprise. It might even 
have been anticipated, from a comparison of its early history, 
that the religious system now established in Scotland would 
have betrayed sooner than any with .which it owned a com- 
mon origin its real character. The extraordinary means by 
which in neighbouring kingdoms the kindred systems were 
first erected, were confessedly exceeded and overpassed in 
this. "The reformation in Scotland," observes King James, 
and he knew what he was saying, " was far more disor- 
derly than in England, Denmark, &c. ; whilst the mayne 

which the various developments in this particular community 
occurred : 

In the year 1687, a Presbyterian congregation occupied the meeting- 
house in question. 

" 1703, a new meeting-house was built, which was called 
the ' House of Service.' This seems already to indi- 
cate some change. 

" 1719, Mr. Bates, the ' minister,' was openly charged with 
Arianism, and a secession of several members took 
place. This new body still exists, its present repre- 
sentatives occupying the ' Independent Chapel.' In 
the course of 32. years, therefore, Presbyterianism had 
generated Arianism and Jndependentism. 
" 1800, Mr. Theophilus Browne, " a very clever man," had 

become the preacher ; and 
" 1804, the meeting was called, at the suggestion of this 

" very clever man," JEdicula Monotkeistica /' 
" 1826, one Waterhouse preached there. ; and at the present 

time it is openly styled "the Unitarian Chapel." 
Being in possession of other examples, forwarded to me""from dif- 
ferent parts of the country, I am able to say that this is the usual 
character of the progress, no far as England is concerned, from schism 
to heresy, from dissent to blasphemy. 



IN SCOTLAND. 317 

affaires there were unduly carried by popular tumults, and 
by some fiery-spirited .ministers, which having gotten .the 
guiding of the multitude, and finding the relish of govern- 
ment sweet, did fancie to themselves a democratic forme of 
policy," wherein they were likely to be tribuni plebis."* 
And during the whole of what may be called the first period 
of its history from the time of Knox, namely, to the revo- 
lution of 1688 it certainly did not lose the impress which 
was thus stamped upon it from the first.f 

Its course subsequently to that era has been lately traced 
with much accuracy, and deserves a more minute considera- 
tion. The popular notions with respect to it appear likely to 
be completely revolutionized by the researches of the writer 
referred to. Far from being embraced, as has. been com- 
monly supposed, by an unanimous and enthusiastic people, 
Presbyterianism was in fact most unpopular in Scotland, 
upheld for a long time only by the zeal of " the trading and 
inferior sort," and its establishment the result, so far as any 
thing can be, of the merest accident. It was not until he 
had solicited, and failed to obtain, from the rulers of the 
Church in that country the support which he needed, that 
King William reluctantly concurred in the establishment of 

* See A Discourse concerning Puritans, p. 15 (1641). And the 
most ' liberal ' writers agree in this account. " The nobility of Scot- 
land," says a modern historian, " invited by the example of Eng- 
land, had cast a wishful eye on the ecclesiastical revenues; hoping, 
if a change in religion should take place, to enrich themselves with 
the plunder of the Church." Russell's History of Modern Europe, 
vol. ii. p. 277. Cf. Russell's History of the Church in Scotland, 
ch. iv. 

t " Such a church," says Dr. Hickes of it, " I think altogether 
as unworthy of the name of a church, as a band of rebels in any 
country, who had overthrown the civil constitution of it, would be 
of the name of a kingdom, state, or republick; because such a pre- 
tended church is not only a variation from the Catholick Apostolick 
. Church, but a sworn destructive confederacy against it, even the 
abomination of desolation in the house or kingdom of God, of which 
their Pastors are not Ministers, but by principle most malicious 
enemies ;' not Pastors, .but .wolves'of the flock ; to many , of both 
which, notwithstanding, I trust that God, .who can make dispensa- 
tions and allowances for the greatest ignorances, mistakes, and pre- 
judices of His frail creatures, which men cannot make, will show 
mercy in the great day, according to the prayer of our Lord upon 
the cross, Father, forgive them ; they know not what they do.'" 
Hickes, Three Treatises, Preface, p. cc. : and see Bramhall's Fair 
Warning of Scottish Discipline, ch. xiii. vol. ii. p. 514. 



318 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

Presbyterianism ; and " if the Scottish prelates and clergy," 
says Mr. Lawson, " had followed the example of the Church 
of England, and recognized William as the sovereign, the 
Episcopal C/iurch would have been at this moment estab- 
lished in Scotland"* Here was another circumstance, 
then, from which we might have anticipated for the new 
religion in Scotland at least an equally disastrous issue as in 
any other land in which it had been set up. For here it 
was not only, as in the other cases, a human system sup- 
planting the divine, but the change being made in spite of 
the indifference or opposition of the better portion of the 
people. * 

And there is accordingly quite enough, as might have 
been predicted from these facts,f in the present religious 
condition of Scotland, to show that the evil principles, the 
full triumph of which, from the operation of certain causes, 
has been hitherto impeded in that country, are even now 
tending towards their natural development. In an earlier 
period it had been declared, by one of her own sons, to be 
true of Scotland, as of England, that " so long as the Epis- 
copal government stood in vigour, there was nothing but 
comely order in the Church; fathers honoured as fathers, 
ministers agreeing in pleasant unitie, without any schisme 
among them ; singular peace betweene the king his majestic 
and the Church, they going together like Moses and Aaron 
to doe the worke of God, without grudging, anger, or divi- 
sion ; then the Gospell flourished, and no professed papist 
was in the land; but with decay of the one ensued a lamenta- 
ble change of the other, 'which cannot, be mentioned without 
grief e."^. And the .contrast here so pathetically recorded is 
far more striking at the present hour. 

* See Lawson's History of the Scottish Episcopal Church, p. 45 ; 
Burnett, History of his own Times, vol. iv. p. 41, note f ; and Rus- 
sell's History of the Church in Scotland, ch. xiv. vol. ii. p. 244. 

t A writer who had been himself a presbyterian, says, " Many 
times in my younger yeares have I heard famous and auncient 
fathers of our church, who had seene the first beginnings thereof, 
affirrae that our church could not consist unlesse Episcopall governe- 
raent was restored againe : this they spake when there was no ap- 
pearance of it, and when Episcopal I governement was in greatest dis- 
daine ; and at that time being unacquainted with church-discipline, I 
thought strange to heare it." See The Bishop of Galloway his De- 
fence against the Paralogie of Mr. D. Hume, p. 140. 

t Ibid. pp. 133, 134. 



; : IN SCOTLAND. 319 

'* It is much to be feared," says the excellent Bishop 
Skinner, " that in many parts of the kingdom the seeds of 
irreligion and licentiousness have been so plentifully dissemi- 
nated, that unless their growth be checked by a returning 
sense of duty, or some powerful interposition of Providence, 
before they come to full maturity, inevitable ruin must be 
the consequence. Already dp the presages of such fatal con- 
sequences begin to exhibit themselves. In some of the 
most populous districts of Scotland, where the middling 
and lower ranks of the people were, some years ago, exem- 
plary in the discharge, of their religious duties, not occa- 
sional neglect only, but a constant derision, and an avowed 
contempt of these duties, have now taken place. The rites 
and ordinances of the Gospel are exposed to' every species of 
scorn and ridicule. Children are wilfully withheld from the 
'laver of regeneration;' and. men and women 'count the 
blood of the covenant wherewith they are sanctified an 
unholy thing,' in pure despite of the Spirit of grace."* 

It is a consolation to knew, in connection with these mis- 
erable facts, which represent a state of things so similar to 
that already described in Germany and Switzerland, that 
the Apostolic Church of Scotland has not failed, in spite of 
feebleness and oppression, to speak its appointed word of 
warning and protest. After noticing a certain theological 
teaching, and its unhappy effects, the writer just quoted adds, 
"In the midst of all this confusion, this melancholy depar- 
ture from Primitive Truth and Order, we of the Episcopal 
Communion have the credit and comfort of reflecting, that 
nothing has been said or done on our part to promote or en- 
courage such wild deviation from the paths of true religion, 
the ways of unity, peace, and love, which our blessed Re- 
deemer marked out for all His faithful followers."! While, 
on the other hand, " Such as I have now described it," he 
says, reverting to the general condition of the people, " is 
evidently the situation of the land in which we live, with 
respect to the religious character of a great majority of its 

* Bishop Skinner (of Aberdeen), Primitive Truth and Order Vin- 
dicated, Introduction, pp. 12, 13. 

t " In Scotland no member of the Church has fallen off to Ro- 
manism or any of the heresies which have distracted it ; in Edin- 
burgh alone, the Romanists boast of 100 converts from Presbyterian- 
ism yearly." Dr. Pusey's Letter to the Bishop of Oxford, p. 221, 
note 2; 4th edition. 



320 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

inhabitants ; very much resembling the state of things in the 
Jewish Church at the time .of our Saviour's first coming in 
the flesh, when the true religion was either totally set aside 
by tlie infidelity of the Sadducees, or sadly corrupted by, the 
vile hypocrisy of self-conceited Pharisees."* 

To those who are familiar with the professions and the 
external character of the earlier presbyterians, and who have 
been accustomed, as most of us have, to regard Scotland as 
a land in which the ordinances of religion, mutilated and 
earth-stained as they were, were honoured with at least out- 
ward reverence, the present state of that country: must be a 
significant and impressive fact.t Frofaneness with regard to 
holy places and things, was indeed, always one of the char- 
acteristics of the religious system there established ; but it 
seems latterward to have reached a climax. Desecration of 
churches and of sacred days is now carried to an extent 
which is almost incredible even to those who, like our- 
selves, are not altogether unacquainted with some of its 
forms. Even .their own advocates are. constrained to bear 
witness against this evil. Thus one of their more eminent 
preachers, speaking somewhat tenderly of the extreme irrev- 
erance of their so-called " reformers," who taught the people 
to enter God's holy house with their hats on, and the like, 

* Ubi Supra, p. 18. 

t And one admitted even by the parties who are most interested 
to conceal it. In a sermon on " The necessity of a Revival of Re- 
ligion," by Mr. James Burns, a presbyterian preacher of Brechin, 

that writer says, " It may be proper and useful to show what 

need there is of a revival of religion among us. .And in general it 
may be observed, that there is such an appearance of indifference or 
deadness in spiritual concerns, that the need of a revival is very evi- 
dent. The marks of this indifference or deadness are too plain and 
numerous to be mistaken by any ;" and then he goes on to specify 
some of them; as, amongst others, "the neglect of the worship of 
God in families, which indeed is, alas! very common among us," 
and, as he adds, "is a striking proof of the need of a revival." See 
The Scottish Christian Herald, vol. ii. p. 728. We are told, indeed, 
by another, that " in one region of Scotland we have the great hap- 
piness of exhibiting a spiritual work, in the Revival form, steadily 
going forward at the present hour, which ought to stimulate the 
prayers," &c. History of Revivals of Religion, Preface, p. 2. The 
narrator seems jealous of the American doings in this way, of which 
we shall have to speak presently, and the effects of which in that 
distracted country will not diminish our apprehensions as to the 
results of the same " spiritual work " said to be " steadily going for- 
ward " in Scotland. . 



IN SCOTLAND. 321 

says, that there is no need of any such suggestions now, be- 
cause there is " little risk of there being generated too deep or 
hallowed a feeling for the house of prayer. The whole current 
runs in an opposite direction" The same writer " earnestly 
entreats" these professing Christians " to enter the Sanctuary 
with at least the respect with which they would enter a pri- 
vate house" it seems they need the admonition ; and, after 
more of the same kind, adds, as softly as might be, " many 
admit and deplore the practice of too many Scottish Chris- 
tians in this matter."* And as in their external demeanour, 
so in their esoteric principles, are these men in strict agree- 
ment with the worst and most wilful of their predecessors. 
" It is a very melancholy fact," says the presbyterian already 
quoted, " that too many of the Church " (establishment) 
" people of Scotland direct their minds to the days preced- 
ing and during the Covenant for the true character and sen- 
timents of their church." Nor are the tokens of this sympa- 
thy with the bold and unscrupulous men of that evil age con- 
cealed from us. " It is curious," observes Mr. Lawson, 
" that in many parts of Scotland the people to this day have 
a very great objection to hear the Lord's Prayer said, or the 
Scriptures read, in public, alleging that they can do so at 
home themselves ! We need not be surprised," he adds, 
" at this folly, to say the least, on the part of an illiterate 
peasantry, when we find a Presbyterian minister "of great re- 
putet gravely maintaining that the Lord's Prayer is a Jewish 
and not a Christian Prayer, and cannot with propriety be in- 
troduced into Christian worship" ! j This piece of criticism 
serves again to remind us of the modern German divines. 

* Cumming's Preface to John Knox's Liturgy, pp. 6, 12, 13. 

t He refers to Sermons by Andrew Thompson, D. D., Minister 
of St. George's Church, Edinburgh. 

$ Lawson, p. 51. Both the use of the Lord's Prayer, and the 
public reading of the Scriptures, incredible as it appears, were 
strongly protested against by the first presbyterians. See Lawson, 
chap. vi. p 96. An earlier writer tells us, that " no sooner had the 
Presbyterians excluded the Bishops, and their Directory the Liturgy, 
but the Lord's Prayer is also exploded as a thing of no use either for 
matter or form ; for the men of that age thought it not spiritual 
enough for such overgrown Christians as they were, but adapted only 
to the nonage of the first disciples. Nor was it sufficient to disuse it, 
but they poured out all the contempt they could upon it, both from 

their pulpits and in the press And this antichristian practice 

prevailed so far, that the people generally refused to teach it to thoir 



322 DEVELOPMENT OP, MODERN SYSTEMS. 

Further illustrations of this coincidence of thought and 
language might be added ; but we have only space here for 
one other fact in relation to the working of the Genevan sysr 
tern in Scotland : it is this, that whereas in other coun- 
tries the separated and schismatical bodies are altogether di- 
verse, both in doctrine and discipline, from the Church with 
w.hich they refuse to dwell, in Scotland they are as much 
' presbyterians' after their separation as they were before. 
And it is an extraordinary fact, that although the! large ma- 
jority of the people are still presbyterians, " the Establish- 
ment cannot claim much more than one third of the popula- 
tion as belonging or attached to its communion, . while the 
great mass of the Presbyterian Dissenters, who have emanat- 
ed from .its own bosom, are now its avowed and determined 
enemies. There is not a country in Europe which abounds 
more with sectaries and dissenters from the Establishment of 
its own alleged choice than Scotland."* 

It -is not to Scotland, then, that we shall be referred any 
longer for an example of the felicitous working of Calvin's ec- 
clesiastical scheme.t Already, there are symptoms, too plain 
to be overlooked, of the results to which that scheme is surely 
tending. "Already do the presages," as Bishop Skinner 
speaks, " begin to exhibit themselves." And if it be said, 

children ; some gave God thanks that they had forgotten it; and if 
any 'sober clergyman did conclude his own prayer with it, a great 
part of his auditory would .presently depart out of church, as if it 
were impossible: for them to be edified by such a preacher as had no 
better gift of prayer." The Second Part of the History of Separation, 
P-34. 

* Lawson, pp. 3l5, 316. " Arnot mentions, in the year 1779; 
that ' in Scotland there are lew towns, whether of importance or 
insignificant, whether populous or otherwise, where there are- not 
congregations of sectaries..' If this writer had -witnessed -the state of 
Scotland at the present day, his observations could not have been 
more accurate." Ibid. And the remarkable circumstance in all 
this is, that "the country is filled with numerous and powerful sects, 
of their own polity and principles, who are their deadliest opponents." 
Id. pp. 169, 170. 

t At the very first setting up of presbyterianism in Scotland, we 
are told of " the revolt of many leading Presbyters to Independency ; 
their supplanting and defaming each other; the emulations and. con- 
tests among themselves, as that between Melvill and Buchanan at 
the first planting of presbytery in Scotland, which was so great, that 
the one set up a presbytery at St. Andrews, the other at Coupar, in 
opposition to each other!"' See No Protestant but the Dissenters' 
Plot, p. 159. 



JN SCOTLAND, 323 

that Socmianism is still discouraged,* we cannot forget, 
thankful as we are to acknowledge the fact, that this was 
the case at Geneva too, and that for a whole century after its 
poison had begun to work in secret.f As late as the year 
1632, men convicted of heresy \vereput to death in that city 
for their error ;J nay, in 1696, we find its rulers taking se- 
vere notice of even the tendencies to Socinianism^ which they 
were able to detect ; yet within a few years Socinianism 
was almost the only form of religion at Geneva ! And how 
.serious does this reflection become, when we turn our atten- 
.tion to the actual state of Scotland at this very hour.J) That 
.country .has no longer ..even the semblance of unity and 
strength which Geneva, in spite of internal disease, so long 
boasted. The Establishment, weakened already by innumer- 
able schisms, is now at last divided against itself, and fallen 
.asunder into two parts. And that neither of these portions 
has yet arrived at its ultimate condition we need not attempt 
.to prove, because the members of both are themselves eager 
to assert it. Each declares .vehemently of the : other, that it 
cannot long maintain its present existence ; one has already 

. . .* There is, however, a nucleus to which future accretions of error 
. may hereafter be attached. : f ' In. Scotlan.d. there are Unitarian Chap- 
els in Edinburgh, Glasgow, and other principal places. Among the 
leading periodical publications devoted to the cause in Great Britain 
is the Christian Pioneer in Glasgow. .There is a Scottish Unitarian 
Association lately formed. . . . The principal supply of Ministers is 
from Manchester College, at York; others come from the Scotch 
Universities, and from that of Dublin." Encyclopedia Americana, 
voI..x.ii.'App. p. 599. ... 

t Gregoire, Histoire des Sectes Rcligieuses, p. 4. And this is true 
of others also. " II est constant quela/plupart des Arminiens sorit 
devenus Sociniens sans faire ouvertement profession de cette heresie." 
Encyclopedic Methodique, Theologie, tome iii. p. 514. . 

t Vide Spon, Histoire de Geneve, tome ii. p. 514. ' 

Fragmens Biographiques et Historiques sur Geneve, extraits des 
Registrcs Origindux du Conseil d' Etat de la Republique de Geneve. 
pi 213 (Geneve, 1815). . 

|| " iVinay be doubted whether many of the laity of that country, 
and especially whether the leading schools of education, have not 
been all along gradually verging towards something like Genevan 
profan.eness. A little time will probably show : certainly there are 
symptoms, in Scotland at this moment, which would make an ortho- 
dox Englishman more than ever unwilling to part with that outwork 
of Apostolic Faith, which England, under circumstances in many 
respects peculiarly untoward, has hitherto found in the Apostolical 
Commission of her Clergy." Tracts for the Times, no. 57. 



324 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

fallen from its original position, and consented to fraternize 
openly with all the heterogeneous forms of schism, adopting, 
and even surpassing in some cases, its most lawless and ex- 
travagant phraseology ;_and therefore, when we profess our 
belief that we have still to see the final development of Scot- 
tish Presbyter ianism, we are, in fact, only repeating the lan- 
guage and echoing the predictions of its own most zealous 
advocates.* 

VII. In extending our inquiry from Scotland to Ireland, 
we are not, in fact, losing sight of the development of the " 
religious system in the former country, because it is its de- 
rivatives in the latter which become the subject of our inves- 
tigation. The growth, in the direction of error, of these 
offshoots of Scottish Presbyteriahism appears to have been 
rapid and spontaneous, unchecked, as it seems; by any of the 
influences .which have exercised hitherto so salutary a power 
over the Establishment in Scotland. " In the Presbyterian 
churches of the North of Ireland," says one writer, " a ve- 
hement controversy has been carried on within the last two 
or three years, the' event of which is understood to have been 
to detach about forty churches from the body of that commun- 
ion, and unite them, as professed Unitarians, into a society 
of their own, consisting of several presbyteries. There are 



* No attempt has been made here to trace the gradual declension 
of doctrine which took place in Scotland during the 18th century, 
not for want of materials", but because 'such an attempt would carry 
us far beyond the proposed limits of this volume. A few references 
may, however, be added. The first direct proof that I know of, is 
the process against Professor Simson, of Glasgow, for teaching hereti- 
cal doctrine in the Divinity class, begun in the year 1717, and visited 
with very slight censure by the ecclesiastical authorities. . The Mar- 
row Controversy, in 1720-1-2, when the Assembly did appear as im- 
pugners, not of false doctrine, but of the orthodox faith, is another 
symptom of what was going on. An account of it may be found in 
Boston's Memoirs, and the Marrow of Modern Divinity itself is wor- 
thy to be studied. The writings of the two Erskines, and those of 
Witherspoon, afford information as to the downward progress going 
on at their respective dates. About 1780 the writings of Taylor of 
Norwich became very popular in the West of Scotland ; and a few 
years later Dr. M'Gill, of Ayr, published a work of a similar nature, 
and of so heretical a character that he was compelled to recant some 
of its contents. But it is, perhaps, inexpedient to enter into details, 
conclusive as their evidence would undoubtedly be as to the ten- 
dencies of the Scotch system, because to pursue them with accuracy 
would require an entire volume. 



IN IRELAND. 325 

also congregations of this character in Dublin,* and in other 
southern cities of the kingdom."! 

And as a proof that heresy was not confined to the ranks 
of those who have thus openly avowed their impiety, and set 
up a new society, it is only necessary to refer to what has 
taken place amongst those with whom they formerly asso- 
ciated. In the Presbyterian Synod of Ulster, for example, in 
spite of a strong effort and some very strong language too, a 
professed Arian has been maintained, after long deliberation, 
in his connexion with that body. The reasons assigned for 
this compromise with the worst form of heresy were, that 
" as the removal of their clerk" (who was the guilty person) 
" from office on this account might be construed into perse- 
cution for the sake of opinion, .... they do not consider 
it expedient to move him from it !"f And it is said, that it 
was not until the interference of the civil government, of 
which they are the stipendiaries, began to be feared, that 
the Ulster Presbyterians discontinued the employment of 
Socinian officers.^ 

This declension of Irish Presbyterianism is, however, as 
respects its origin, to be referred to a much earlier date. It 
was in the year 1721 that the secession of the Remon- 
strants, or Socinians, took place. About the middle of the 
century, eight congregations withdrew, of which two still 
exist in Belfast, the others being in adjoining counties. And 
it is to be noticed of the members of these congregations, 
that they did not in the outset avow themselves to be Socin- 
ians, but separated on the ground of non-subscription to the 
Westminster Confession of Faith. \\ In consequence of the 

* There was a time when such assemblies would not venture to 
congregate there. " The Socinians," says Leslie, " hare now for a 
long time had an open meeting-house in Cutlers' Hall, in London ; 
their preacher one Emlin, formerly a dissenting preacher in Dublin, 
but forced to fly out of Ireland for his open and notorious Socinian- 
ism." On the Socinian Controversy, Dialog, vi. p. 40. 

t Encyclopedia Americana, vol. xii. Appendix,'p. 599. 

t Monthly Repository, vol. i. p. 712 (1827). 

Ibid. p. 805. The English Socinians seem to look for the 
spread of their impiety in Ireland, p. 879; but I am informed that 
the children of many of the Arians of the north of Ireland have been 
received into the Church. Some years ago a large number of the 
wealthier inhabitants of Belfast are said to have been Arians. 

|| See the Minutes of the Synod; and, for the connexion between^ 
the Synods of Ulster and Munster, Monthly Repository, vol. ii,* 
p. 599. 

15 



326 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

Synod having afterwards relaxed in some measure the rule 
which required a bond fide subscription to that Formulary 
on the part of all candidates for the ministry, it is supposed 
that persons were admitted from time to time unsound on 
other points of the Faith besides those which the Presbyte- 
rian theology rejects ; and these persons, gradually dissem- 
inating their heretical opinions, formed a party of.considera- 
ble influence. This state of things continued for a time, 
until the Synod saw the necessity of applying a test to prove 
the orthodoxy of its members, and at the same time required 
subscription to the Confession of Faith on the part of all who 
should aspire to be teachers of Presbyterianism. The 
application of this test revealed at once the lurking evil which 
it was designed to remedy. No fewer than seventeen ' min- 
isters ' remonstrated against the new resolutions, and ulti- 
mately withdrew altogether from the communion of the 
Synod, under the name of the Remonstrant Synod of Ulster. 
They have since been joined by others, though 1 am not 
aware to what extent, and are now, as it is scarcely neces- 
sary to say, avowed Socinians. 

VIII. Returning again from the islands of our own em- 
pire to the countries of continental Europe, the religious 
state of the Netherlands becomes the next subject of our 
inquiry. And in this case there is no need to pursue it so 
far as to our own times, because in Holland the development 
of the reformed doctrines reached long since its ultimate 
form. A very few references to its past history will suffice 
in proof of this. 

The period of the famous schism of the " Remonstrants " 
from the Synod of Dort is that to which I shall first refer.* 
That the rigorous decrees of that Synod were wholly inef- 
fectual to stay the progress of heresy is now a matter of his- 
tory ,f and was soon evidenced by the torrent of false and 
conflicting opinions which began to prevail, and continued 
to spread, throughout almost all the United Provinces during 
the seventeenth century. The character of the " Remon- 

* Though it is quite certain that heretical opinions had spread far 
and wide long before the time of that Synod. See Weismann, secul 
xvii. torn ii p. 1301 ; and the History of Poland, in the Universal 
Htstory, yol xn. p. 440, note A ; from which it appears to have 
fcpreadin Holland even before it reached Poland. 

t See the Encycloptdie M&thodique, art. Sociniens. 



IN HOLLAND AND BELGIUM. 327 

strant" or Arminian theology, on the other hand, though not 
fnlly denned at the time when its professors first came into 
collision with the assertors of the Genevan doctrine of Pre- 
destination, appears to have deserved the severe judgment 
which from the first was pronounced upon it. The " Re- 
formed" theologians of the Academy of Leyden, by whom 
the " Censure" upon the Remonstrants was composed, do 
not hesitate, even at that date, to connect these latter with 
the Socinians,* and to justify the heavy charge by a refer- 
ence to their own writings. And the Remonstrants in their 
reply, which is much to be noticed, retort upon the Caldnistic 
divines, as they themselves bitterly complain, the charge "not 
only of errors, but of heresies and blasphemies/'f It is this 
circumstance which reveals very evidently the real condition 
of all the various schools of disputants the circumstance, 
namely, that the charge of impiety which was urged by one 
class of these religionists was always met by the antagonist 
party with this retort, that their accusers were themselves 
involved in doctrinal errors at least equally glaring, and that 
their own written statements proved it.| 

The controversy between the learned Grotius and Si- 
brandus, and the later writings of Rivetus, afford a striking 
illustration of this. Sibrandus having censured severely the 
Dutch authorities for their appointment of Conrad Vorstius 
to the professorship formerly held by Arminius, Grotius tells 
him, that his censure was only the expression of the malice 
which he felt towards them on account of the contempt 
which they had evinced for his own false opinions. The 
famous jurist adds, and his words are cited here as impor- 
tant testimony to the general fact which we are tracing, 
" Why do not you turn your attention to the province of 
Friesland, which is indeed full of heretics, who openly pro- 
fess their opinions ;" whereas Vorstius had denied those 

* Ccnsur. in Remonstrant. Synodo de Bart, cap. xxi. ad finem. 
Cf. N. Vedelius, De Arcanis Jlrminianismi, Jib. i. p. 7. 

t Censura, Prsefat. 

t Thus the Remonstrants, alluding to the monstrous lengths to 
which the Gomarists and others carried their notions on the doc- 
trine of Predestination, asserted, "that the Calvinists made God 
the author of sin." Jlpolog. Contra Censuram, Examen, cap. vi. 
and see on this subject a writing of the famous peace-maker John 
Dury, entitled A Discourse tending to Peace Ecclesiastick. p. 3 
(1641). ' * ' 



328 DEVELOPMENT OP MODERN SYSTEMS. 

with which he was charged. And he gives similar evidence 
with respect to the progress of heresy in other parts.* 

The history of Vorstius supplies additional proof of the 
truth about which so much has already been said, that the 
modern system of religion had never the power to contend 
against, even when detected, the principles of evil, upon the 
tacit recognition of which they had themselves been origi- 
nally founded.^ It does not seem difficult to determine 
whether the real opinions of Vorstius were generally known, 
as was asserted, at the time of his appointment by the states. 
On the one hand, indeed, Grotius speaks of him as a divine 
of great reputation, and much approved as a writer against 
the Jesuits, and not even suspected by those who knew him ;| 
but, on the other, the theologians of the Synod of Dort say 
expressly, that he was " for many years justly suspected of 
Socinianism ;" and D'Ewes reports, that his election to the 
divinity-chair was emphatically condemned at the time in 
England, and he himself branded as " a blasphemer." |[ Yet, 
as Rivetus warmly complains, he was appointed without any 
protest. Sibrandus adds, speaking of the beginnings of 
Socinianism in Holland, that all the churches in Germany, 
France, and Britain, looked on with amazement, and those 
of the Low Countries bewailed their own condition ; that 
none, however, stirred hand or foot to resist what was com- 

* H. Grotii Ordin Holland, ct Westfrisia Pietas, pp. 8, 23, and 
123. The dying confession of Vorst, in winch he avowed his error, 
is given by Gerard Brandt, History of the Reformation in the Low 
Countries, vol. iv. p. 420. 

t " Vse Belgio a petulantia ingenionim i" said Melancthon, who 
seems to have discerned that all the barriers by which the overflow- 
ings of error must be icstrained, were already removed in his day. 
Weismann admits (torn. ii. p. 106), that the results have proved the 
truth of his prophecy. Huber calls attention to this circumstance, in 
relation to the history of religion in Holland, "que depuis la Refor- 
mation il n'ajamais 6t6 le meme plus long terns que Vespace de trentc 
ans ;" which will be admitted by most men to be a conclusive fact as 
to the true nature of that mutable theology. See the Bibliothdque 
Universelle, tome xxiv. p. 181. 

J Ordin. Holland, et WestfrisicB Pietas, p. 9. 

Act. Synod. Dordrecht. Praefat. ad Ecclesias. Cf. Biographic 
Universelle, art. C. Vorst. 

|| The remonstrance against his appointment was made by King 
James, who added, "that if they did not in time prevent the grow- 
ing of that pestilential sect, it would in the issue prove the utter 
ruin of their, flourishing commonwealth." See D'Ewes' Primitive 
Practice for Preserving' Truth, 3. 



IN HOLLAND AND BELGIUM. 329 

ing on, and even when some offered warning and counsel, it 
was rejected.* 

By the time of Bossuet, towards the close of the same 
century, we find it admitted even by the protestant Jurieu: 
" At this day every place is full of these ' Indifferentists ;' 
and in these provinces especially, $ the Socinians and Re- 
monstrants are of that class by profession, and thousands of 
others-by inclination." || 

In describing their condition at a still later period, I 
avail myself of the unsuspicious testimony of Mr. Candlish, 
a Scotch Presbyterian teacher of our own day. 

" The four Protestant denominations of Holland," he 
says, " are Presbyterian in their form of Church-government. 
They differ in their standards of doctrine, approaching more 
or less near to the sound system of evangelical truth, but all 
originally holding the fundamental and essential articles of 
the Christian faith. It is said, that in all of them there has 
been a great departure from the orthodoxy of their creeds, 
and a great decline of spiritual life, especially in the national 

'* Respons. ad Pietatem Hvgonis Grotii, p. 28. "Accuse illos," 
says this writer, speaking of Vorst, " qui Consulibus et Curatoribus 
suaserunt, ut hunc hominem vocarent." p. 22. It does not appear, 
liowever, that any bod}' was at all moved by such accusations. 
"The states of Holland and West Friesland" the words refer to 
the year 1653 " have published a proclamation against the meet- 
ing together of the Socinians and their teachers; as also against the 
printing and selling of Socinian books, upon great penalties." Thur- 
loejs State Papers, vol. i. p. 508 : yet two years later, and in spite of 
continued vigilance upon the part of the magistrates, they are said 
to " very much increase." Id. vol. iii. p. 50; and again, in the 
same year, " the sect of Socinian ism bears great sway in the Pro- 
vince of Holland, and is assented to by most there." p. 51. Another 
writer, who dates from the Hague, about 40 years earlier, says, 
" We have under the press many answers to Vorstius his Apologies, 
which come forth so much the more slowly, because in Holland inhi- 
bitions are made to write against him, but for him free liberty and 
permission is granted." Winwood's Memorials, vol. iii. p. 340. 

t "Q.ui enim exignam cognitionem rerum prasentium habent, 
non ignorant celeberrimas Belgicas Ecclesias his Socini furoribus 
conturbari." Lubbert. De Jesu Christo Servatore, contra Socinum, 
Prafat. So Grotius of Flanders, " de qua vere dici potest, quod de 
Grascia olim periisse earn libertate immodica et licentia concionum." 
Ordin. Holland. &c. p. 123. So Pluquet of the Flemings; Diction- 
naire, tome i. pp. 78, 79. 

i Quoted in the Histoire des Variations des Eglises Protestantes 
6 em e Avertissement, tome iv. pp. 510-11." Cf. Sibrand, Resp. p. 20. 



330 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

(' reformed ') Church. The taint of liberal and latitudiria- 
rian principles has extensively pervaded the ministers of that 
community." The explanation of this change which the 
writer assumes to be the true one, is as follows : " The po- 
litical agitation of men's minds in these eventful times, the 
contagion of liberal opinions on religion spreading from 
Germany and France, and other agencies and influences, 
which in the inscrutable providence of God seem to have 
been permitted for a season to spread a wide and wasting 
leaven of spiritual apathy and unbelief throughout almost the 
whole of the Protestant Churches, these, and similar facts 
and observations, may go far to account for any hiding of the 
Lord's countenance, and any withdrawing of the Lord's 
spirit, which His professing people or their pastors may have 
experienced in Holland. But however this may be, [he 
seems to have suspected that this would hardly be accepted 
as a sufficient account of the matter,] it is certain that there 
has been in the Dutch Church a grievous declension and 
departure from her first faith and her first love. Laxity in 
doctrinal views has for a considerable time prevailed among 
a large proportion of the clergy, and even the standard of 
orthodoxy has been modified. . . . The sentiments of many 
of the ministers are tainted with the Arminian and Socinian 
heresies, and with the neological spirit of skepticism."* 

* See The Scottish Christian Herald, vol. iii. pp. 199, 200(1838). 
Nor is the case at all otherwise in modern Belgium. " To oppose 
the wealth, the numbers, and the power, which Popery arrays on its 
side, there is but a small and apparently insignificant band o the 
devoted servants of Christ. There are eight French Protestant Min- 
isters, paid by the State, who afford religious instruction to thirteen 
different congregations; hut of these Ministers" and then conies 
the same uniform tale "there are only four who know the truth ; 
the rest, either Rationalists or Socinians, hate it with their whole 
heart." The Scottish Christian Herald, vol 3. p. 504 : 2d series. So 
in Transylvania, Socinianism followed so fast upon the heels of the 
new discipline, that within twenty years of its establishment, "some 
hundreds of congregations were infected." Fr. CheynelFs Rise, 
Growth, and Danger of Socinianisme, ch. ii. p. 22 : and now we are 
told that " the number of Unitarians in Transylvania and Hungary 
in 1827, is stated to be between 40 and 50,000." Monthly Repository, 
vol. i. p. 243. Of the Waldenses, again, the same authority records 
the 'saying of one of their own preachers, that " he did not think 
that there was an essential difference between the Unitarians and the 
Vaudois." Vol. i. p. 876 ; and see p. 808. " M. Limborchsoutient," 
says another, " que les Albigoois etoient dans la plupart des erreurs 
des Manicheens. Pour les Vaudois, notre auteur conclut des erreurs 



IN SWEDEN AND DENMARK. $3J 

IX. Of the development of the new systems in Sweden 
and Denmark, I have hitherto found little opportunity for 
collecting any accurate account. In those countries a quasi 
Episcopate has indeed been maintained ; but even if the form 
of their ecclesiastical polity had been much less dissimilar to 
the apostolic type than it is,* the history of its origin would 
have taught us to apprehend the most unfavourable results.f 
The event, I believe, has fully justified such an apprehension. 

" The doctrines of Socinianism," we are told, " are no 
longer regarded as strange in Sweden ; and they are admired 
there, as a proof of the elevation of thought at which the 
human mind can arrive."! The Catechisms, one of the 
surest tokens of a people's faith, are said to change fre- 
quently, and to suppress fundamental truths which even the 
Confession of Augsburg contained. The sacraments of 
Baptism and the Eucharist are commonly regarded as mere 
forms ; the first being often indefinitely postponed from care- 
less indifference, the result of doctrinal error. 

A writer at Stockholm, in the year 1819, says: "The 
' efforts of the Lutheran doctors of Sweden to refute Socinian- 
ism show plainly enough that its impious doctrines are wide- 
ly spread in that country. But there is nothing more feeble 
than the arguments which men, reasoning upon the princi- 
ples of the reformed doctrine, are compelled to make use of 
in controversy with the Socinians. They accuse them of 
interpreting according to their own caprice, against the tes- 

qu'on leur importe, qu'ils ressembloient plus a ces Chretiens d'au- 
jourd'hui qu'on appelle Mennonites, qu'a aucune autre societe CJire- 
tienne." Bibliotheque Universelle, tome xxiii. p. 407. See also 
Mai Hand's Albigenses and Waldenses, 12. 

* " En effet les principes du Luther sont incompatibles avec cet 
ordre hierarchique ; et 1'episcopat de Suede et de Danemarck est 
essentiellement different de celui d'Angleterre." Moahler, La Syin- 
bolique, 51, tome ii. p. 146. The authors of these countries appear 
indeed to speak of the Episcopate in much the same language as 
those of France and Geneva : " Ab aristocratia Episcopali in Pon- 
tificalem despotismum regimen Ecclesias transiit." Eric. Gustav. 
Geyer. Dissert. Academ. Upsal. Preside E. M. Fant. (1806.) Cf. 
Beiizelii Dissert, de Can. Apost. torn. i. pp. 138 et seq. : and see also 
Mtlnter De Schola Antiochena. 

t Vide Maimbourg, ann. 1523; and Sleidan, lib. viii. ann. 1531. 

\ Memorial Catholique, torn. vi. pp. 130, 131 ; De I'Etqt Reli- 
gieux de la Subde. These notices of Sweden are taken from a journal 
published at Strasbourg, and entitled Der Katkvlik, eine religiose 
Zeitschrift zur Belchrung und Warming. 



332 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

timony of past ages, various texts of Scripture, and of wrest- 
ing them arbitrarily to their own sense. The Socinians are 
not much embarrassed in furnishing a reply."* " The 
edicts which condemn the Socinians," says Pluquet, speak- 
ing in genera] terms of the impossibility of a solid refutation 
of heresy by a Lutheran divine, " are no condemnation of 
their principles. "t And so long as these are identical, as 
they evidently are, with those of the first " reformers," those 
heretics will not be overcome by such antagonists as they are 
likely to meet with amongst protestants, whether in Sweden 
or elsevvhere."| 

X. Of the state of Prussia, in relation to Rationalism 
and the other forms of error which have been generated 
during the last three centuries, something was said under 
the head of Germany; and a few words in addition may 
now suffice. " We have all been engaged in free inquiry 
for upwards of fifty years," says a writer from that country, 
whose testimony is the less liable to suspicion because he 
himself appears to favour the Rationalists, " and we have 
now few amongst us who conform exactly to our own nomi- 
nal creeds.^ It is indeed impossible in Prussia, where, 

* Chroniquc Rcligieuse, tome ii. p. 495. Their sermons are said 
commonly to exclude all doctrinal questions ; upon which charac- 
teristic of their teaching it is well observed, "on pent juger de ce 
qu'est devenue la croyance, par le silence presque general des predi- 
cateurs sur les dogmes, et le discredit dans lequel sont tombes les 
livres symboliques, les confessions de foi ; dont 1'adoption obligatoire 
heuriait directement le grand principe de la reforme, de ne recon- 
naitre aucune autorite infaillible, et d'interpreter la Bible a. sa 
maniere." Ibid. pp. 277, 8. 

t Biographic Universellc, art. F. Socin. 

$ It may be added, that a modern, and apparently an ultra-pro- 
testant traveller, has said, " As regards the influence of religion on 
morals and conduct in private life, I conceive the Reformation has 
not worked beneficially in Sweden . . . the Reformation, as far as 
regards the moral condition of the Swedish people, has done harm 
rather than good." Laing's Tour in Sweden in 1838, chap. iv. pp 
124,5. 

Even Mosheim, speaking of the gradual declension of the Lu- 
theran symbolical writings, says, " hence arose that unbounded liber- 
ty, which is at this day enjoyed by all who are not invested with the 
character of public teachers (and not by them only), of dissenting 
from the decisions of these symbols or creeds, and of declaring this 
dissent in the. manner they judge most expedient. The case was 
very different in former times. Whoever ventured to oppose any of 



IN PRUSSIA. 333 

since the union of the Lutherans with the other Reformed 
Churches, we no longer know what creed we profess.* Here, 
every one who thinks on the subject has his own private 
opinion ; and it would be impossible to say where rational 
Christianity begins, or where it ends. Every one has 
formed his individual conclusion as to the essentials of 
Christianity, and as to what is essential."f And, as we 
have, seen elsewhere, each individual Lutheran asserts his 
own proper right to do this, as an inalienable portion of the 
inheritance which was bequeathed to him by the founder oi 
the Protestant religion. 

" The miracles of our Lord," says a very different 
writer, speaking of the same facts, " are denied to this day 
by some of the Professors in Prussia." And again : " They 
(in Prussia) have but lately recovered Christianity; rather, 
Christianity and Infidelity in its extremest form of Pantheism 
are still struggling for the mastery in the minds of their 
very teachers."^ 

the received doctrines of the Church, or to spread new religious opin- 
ions among the people, was called before the high powers to give an 
account of his conduct, and very rarely escaped without suffering in 
his fortune or reputation, unless he renounced his innovations. But 
the teachers of novel doctrines had nothing to apprehend, when, 
towards the conclusion of this century the 17th the Lutheran 
churches adopted that leading maxim of the Arminians, that a man 
may think what he likes, if he leads a moral life." Ecclesiastical 
History, vol. v. pp. 294, 5. Compare the account given by Weis- 
inann of .the general slate of the Reformed communities in the same 
century; torn. ii. p. 1116. 

* " Enfin les protestans ne savent pas metne dire qu'elle est leur 
religion; ils n'ont ni dogme, ni morale, ni culte commun : chacun 
croit et pratique ce qu'il veut ; il rejette aujourd'hui ce qu'il avoit 
ad mis la veille, ct n'en demeure pas moins tonjours protestant ! 
Systeme commode, ii est vrai, tnais qui n'est pas tres propre k 
unir les esprits, a. maintenir la paix parmi les liornmes, a for- 
mer enfin une veritable societe.'' Memorial Catholique. tome ii 
p. 122. 

t Letter from Berlin to the Editor of the Revue Protestante, 
dated 1 April, 18.30 ; quoted in Monthly Magazine, vol. iv. p. 431 : 
see Voyage en Mlemagne et en Suede, Par J. P. Calteau, torn. ii. 
ch. xlyii. p. 82 ; and Statistique Ecdesiastique dcs Etats Prussiens, 
tome ii. p. 54, fromwhich it appears that the Anabaptists, once so 
numerous, have been in a great measure absorbed into the other 
sects. 

+ See A Letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury, by Dr. Pusev, 
pp. 123, 126. The Abbe Gregoire says, "en Prusse les Sociniens 
meme out obtenu une existence legale j" Histoire des Sectes, torn. iii. 

15* 



334 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

XI. In Russia, that we may consider the progress "of the 
new doctrines under every variety of outward circumstance, 
the same startling phenomenon is observed. " The Luthe- 
rans and Calvinists" of that country, we are told, " are now 
really no better, the majority of them, than infidels."* 

" The English," says another grave and learned writer 
of the same nation, charitably lamenting the sympathy which 
they too often manifest towards these fallen Christians, 
" the English (in Russia) will go any where to the Calvin- 
ists, for instance, who generally deny or doubt about the 
Trinity, and the Divinity of Christ, and who really have no 
worship, neither Priest, Altar, Liturgy, Consecration, nor 
Sacraments."! 

Once more. " The English will go to the temples of the 
Lutherans, or even of the Calvinists, and indeed do go 
there freely ; whereas I should just as soon think," says an 
eminent Russian, " of going to pray with the Mohammedans 
as with men who have no fixed principle of belief, and most 
of whom, if I am rightly informed (speaking of the Calvin- 
ists), now deny the Divinity of our Saviour, or regard it as 
a sort of open question /"J Such have been the results in 
this country also of what is still commonly called the " refor- 
mation" such the fatal consequences of substituting a 
human invention in the place of the ordinance of God. 

p. 363. I am not aware what is meant by ' une existence legale,' 
unless it be that they are paid by the State, which seems hardly 
possible, even in Prussia. 

* See the Count Prsitsisoir", quoted in Palmer's Illustrations of the 
Latitudinarian Development of the original Calmnistic Community, 
&c., p. 96. 

t The historian Monravieff, in Palmer, p. 96. 

I Vide Palmer, p. 311. 

It is worthy of notice, too, that the same law appears to have 
marked the course of the various native sects of Russia. Grcgoire 
says of the sect of the Doukhobortses, that their separation from the" 
national church turned wholly upon a point of ecclesiastical disci- 
pline, and they soom to have reached a wonderful state. Tzschirner, 
as the Abbe quotes him, says they have rejected the doctrine of the 
Holy Trinity. They too, like our brethren at home, are puritans ; 
see the Histoirc des Sectes, tome iv pp. 178, 180. The same writer 
refers to Jules Kiaproth for an account of a community of persons 
in the range of the Caucasus, who have also discarded the doctrine 
of the Trinity, and of whom a large number have altogether quitted 
Christianity for Judaism, this is another extreme, tome iii. p. 351, 
with which compare the account of the Seleznextschini, who have 
also become Jews,, in Piukerton's Greek Church, Appendix, p. 3G7. 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 335 

XII. The next country of whose present religious con- 
dition some account shall now, in the last place, be given, is 
the United States of America. And in this concluding case 
it may be expedient, for obvious reasons, to enter rather 
more into detail than in some of those which have been 
already noticed. 

It is, indeed, only at a disadvantage that such a topic 
can be handled at all in these pages. Introduced merely as 
the foundation of a subsidiary argument, without system or 
method, and left to tell their own tale, the facts which are 
here collected, strange and startling as they undoubtedly 
are, cannot but lose much of their impressiveness from the 
very mode in which they are adduced. Had it been possible 
in this place, as it would certainly have been most useful, 
to trace minutely their sequence and mutual relation ; had 
there been space to examine accurately their history, and to 
connect them in every case with the principles of which 
they are the expression and result, then, perhaps, it is not 
too much to say, that this extraordinary series of facts would 
have gone far to convert into an axiom the great verity of 
which they are here rather designed to form a supplemen- 
tary illustration, than as in truth they adequately mightr-- 
a complete and independent demonstration. . 

And this remark applies especially to the particular case 
which is now about to be considered. To arrange and 
comment upon, within the compass of a few pages, the large 
mass of facts with regard to the existing religious condition 
of the United States, which has been collected during an 
inquiry prolonged through almost five years, this, of 
course, would be altogether impossible. A few separate 
and detached specimens are all that can be given ; and the 
advantage which would result from a more extended and 
careful arrangement must, in this place at least, be aban- 
doned. 

Although almost all the schismatics, or Raskolniks, of Russia, dis- 
sented originally on the same ground, they are said to be now 
divided into 30 or 40 different sects ; King On the Greek Church, 
p. 439, note : and another writer, himself a Russian, tells us that 
those who have embraced Popqftshinism, or Presbyterianism, " have 
divided, according to their individual peculiarities of opinion, into a 
number of sects, mutually hostile to each other" a fact already 
noticed in speaking of the same class of religionists in Scotland: see 
MouraviefFs History of the. Russian Church, chap. iiv. p. 251, 
English translation . 



336 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

It is in America, if in any country in the world, that the 
principles of non-episcopal Protestantism may be said to 
have had fair play. And to America, accordingly, it has 
been the fashion with the advocates of those principles to 
refer for an illustration of their genuine results. In accept- 
ing the appeal which has thus been made to the aspect of 
religion in that powerful republic, we must acknowledge 
that it has been frankly and openly offered. We are going 
to meet them, therefore, upon the ground of their own 
choice. And if, as the puritan hypothesis assumes, the 
theology of the teachers of the sixteenth century was based 
upon the eternal principles of truth ; if the religious systems 
( then established were framed according to the type and 
model of the Apostolical Institution, then may we confi- 
dently expect at least in America to witness the evidence of 
these assertions. For it is 'in the highest degree unrea- 
sonable to imagine, as even the adversaries will readily 
admit, that a revival so divine and wonderful as that which 
their theory supposes, should be accompanied by no results; 
or that God, having ordained a new system for the restora- 
tion of those Scripture-truths which the Church during 
fifteen ages had only corrupted and obscured, should again 
permit this further and special dispensation utterly to fail 
in effecting its purpose; and, having interfered for the pre- 
servation of sound doctrine, should if one may dare to say 
it have interfered in vain. In this case, therefore, as in 
those already considered, we are to inquire into the results 
of the religious principles in question, and to examine their 
actual development ; and this we may ptoceed to do with a 
just expectation, founded upon the representations of their 
advocates, that they will be found to be in the direction of 
truth, fixedness, and order, and to exhibit the accomplish- 
ment of the grand purposes of an ecclesiastical organization 
assumed to be of Divine appointment, namely, purity and 
constancy of doctrine, and an approximation at least towards 
unity the most complete and unbroken. 

The facts, however, connected with the history of secta- 
rianism in America are the direct reverse of all this, and 
present a picture of confusion, heresy, and impiety, of which 
no words can exaggerate the hideous features.* Shocking 

* "A spirit of misrule, of impiety, of infidelity, of licentious 
ness," says Bishop Onderdonb, " is stalking throughout the length 



IN THE UN1TE> STATES. 337 

as are the accounts already given of the progress of error in 
other lands, they are altogether exceeded and surpassed in this 
case. And so early did the real character of this theology be- 
gin to show itself in this country, that we are able to trace some 
of -its worst and most evil results to the very persons who first 
introduced it. It was in New England, as is well kn&wn, 
that the Puritans who fled out of their own land from impa- 
tience of godly discipline and wholesome restraint, or, as 
they phrased it, from abhorrence of " religious persecution,' 3 
and in order to enjoy the " rights of conscience," first 
sought and found a refuse. The earliest form which their 
religion, no longer subject to control, assumed, was Presby- 
terianism ; this, however, soon gave way to Independency, 
which in its turn was superseded by the scheme of the Ana- 
baptists.* And we are told that when the men had exhaust- 
ed their skill in invention, and none could be found to 
devise any additional extravagance, then " the women under- 
took a further reformation," and proposed new plans.f And 
if we' go "on to inquire into the present condition of the vast 
body of the descendants of these Puritans who first settled 
in New England, it appears, from the unsuspicious state- 
merit of one who is described to me as " an eminent con- 
gregational minister and a friend of Dr. Taylor," the 
author of what is called the " New-Haven Theology," rthat 
of all the congregational ministers in New England, there 
are not probably, at this day, twenty-five who believe the 
doctrines of the Nicene Creed. "| 

and breadth of our land, threatening ruin to every interest con- 
nected with individual, domestic, social, and civil welfare. It must 
be resisted, it must be kept at bay, it must be crushed, or ice are 
a ruined people ." Sermon preached at the consecration of Christ 
Church. Professor Stephens, of the Nashville University, echoes, 
in very eloquent terms, the same prediction. See the New York 
Churchman, vol. ix. no. 12. Even a dissenter, reviewing the poli- 
tical and religious condition of Canada, is constrained to ask, " What 
have we gained ? Why, confusion, and trembling, and infidelity 
if not eventually ruin. See Ten Letters on the Church and Church 
Establishments, by an Anglo-Canadian, Letter ix. p. 66. 

* " Q,ui religionis expertes sunt," says Salvian, " cum mutave- 
runt sectam, mutare incipiunt disciplinam." De Gubemat. Dei 
lib. vi. p. 147. 

t Robertson has given a very true account of these sectaries, in 
his History of America, book x. p. 324 : they sunk at last into 
Antinomianism ; p. 328. 

t " Men are astonished and dismayed to find," says a distin- 



338 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

It is impossible, as I have already observed, to attempt 
to trace here the progress of the apostacy through all its va- 
rious stages. The best course, perhaps, which can be pur- 
sued, consistently with the limits of these pages, will be to 
notice (1) the origin of some of the leading sects of the 
Unifed States ; (2) to describe the actual condition of these 
communities at the present moment ; and (3) to give some 
account of the -general progress and prevalence of Socin- 
ianism, and other extreme forms of error into which reli- 
gion in that country has been developed. This is all which 
can be attempted in the way of systematic arrangement. 

(I.) We may begin with the sect of the Baptists, said 
to be " the prevailing denomination" in the United States, 
and numbering at the present time nearly four millions of 
adherent. " The Baptist ministry in this country, as we 
learn from Benedict, the Baptist historian, originated in the 
following manner. Roger Williams, a presbyterian mem- 
ber, adopted baptist sentiments, and urged them upon others, 
till he persuaded several men to embrace them. They 
formed themselves into a church, chose him for their min- 
ister, and two other men for deacons." Having advanced 
thus far, the founders of this " church" appear to have 
got into a difficulty ; and the way by which they escaped 
from what certainly threatened to be a fatal embarrassment 
to their infant community is worthy of notice. " None of 
them," continues their historian, " had ever been immersed. 
So the deacons baptized Williams, and ordained him, and 
then he baptized the deacons and the others. He after- 
wards formed other churches, and ordained ministers ; that 
order has descended down, and branched out into a variety of . 
denominations; and" (the writer adds) " the ministers 
have as much right now to ordain or administer ordinances 
as the first two deacons had before they were baptized, or as 
any unbaptized persons have at this day."* That such a 
history should be true might seem absolutely impossible to 

guislied modern witness to catholic truth, " that the Calvinistic 
churches of Geneva, of England, of Ireland, and of Germany in 
part, and of New England, having set out with the very highest 
doctrine of grace, have in the course of a few generations utterly 
lost it, and the fire upon their altars is indeed extinct." Gladstone, 
Church Principles in their Result, p. 185. 

* Quoted in the Church Advocate, vol. i. no. 7. p. 28 (Lexing- 
t>n, Kentucky). . 



: IN THE UNITED STATES. 339 

persons unacquainted with the nature of the modern reli- 
gions ; yet such was indeed the origin of a community of 
Christians now numbering nearly four millions ! 

The " Episcopal Methodists," the next sect to he no- 
ticed, are said to include about two millions. Their origin 
is thus described : " About fifty years ago, Coke persuaded 
Wesley, then past eighty years old, to constitute him super- 
intendent of the Methodists in America. In a private cham- 
ber of a public-house at Bristol in England, with but a few 
individuals present, he laid his hands upon Coke, and in- 
voked a blessing upon him, as he was in the habit of doing 
with his preachers. Coke came to this country, called 
himself a Bishop, ordained others, and spread the order 
extensively in our land. After he had done this, Mr. 
Wesley wrote him a letter of severe reproof, told him 
that he never pretended to be a Bishop himself, nor in- 
tended to make him a Bishop, and charged him with pride 
and presumption in assuming the title. Coke appears to 
have been so moved by this letter, and by his own sense 
of propriety, as to propose that he and his brother bishops 
would come and be ordained by our Bishops. But our 
Bishops required that, in that case, all their clergy should 
be ordained again ; this they would not promise ; and so 
the negotiation ended."* And now, says an American 
writer, " the Methodists are numerous in all parts of the 
country. They have more than three thoitsand travelling 
preachers, who are under the superintendence of six bish- 
ops,"t and " their numbers are increasing." Such is the 
statement of one of the most trustworthy writers of their 
own land;J and thus this vast body of religionists traces its 
origin to a pseudo-bishop, severely rebuked for his pride and 

* Church Advocate, ubi supra. 

t "It turns out, that the Episcopal principle is the pervading 
and ruling element of our whole religious public at this moment 
the announcement of which, no doubt, will take many by surprise. 
But a single glance at facts will shows that it is indeed so .... we 
find the entire religious population, including every denomination of 
importance, associated and organized into systematic bodies, super- 
vised and controlled by a few individuals, and all based on the Epis- 
copal principle, and that in most cases in the most absolute and 
energetic form." Colton's Thoughts on the Religious State of the 
Country, chap. in. p. 98 ; New York, 1836. 

See Cas wall's America and the American Church, chap, xviii. 
p. 317. r 



340 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

folly by the very man from whom alone he professed to de- 
rive his orders, admonished by that person that he himself 
neither possessed nor pretended to communicate any such 
authority, and a witness against his own sin in having 
sued at the hands of others for that very office to which he 
thus acknowledged himself to have no claim. 

Of the origin of Presbyterianism and Congregationalism, 
both systems being mainly referrible to the old Puritans, it 
is not necessary to speak particularly. We may proceed, 
therefore, at once, to give some account of the working of 
these sects, as well as of the other two just noticed. 

(2.) And in describing the working of Presbyterianism 
in America, I gladly avail myself of the testimony of a writer 
to whose qualifications as a witness no exception can be 
made ; who has been, in the course of his " ministry," both 
a Congregationalist and a Presbyterian, and who, speaking 
of his intimate knowledge of " the practical operation of 
Presbyterianism in all its parts," says, " I had seen it in 
all its forms in a pastoral life of ten years .... I was inti- 
mately concerned in the revision of the statutes of the 
Presbyterian Church, as a member of the General Assembly 
for two years while that business was in hand; and I have 
sat as Moderator of different courts employed in public in- 
vestigations and trials under these laws, in all, many weeks, 
not to say months, and in some instances several days in 
succession."* The evidence of such a person must be ac- 
cepted, then, by, both sides. 

Now I have said that one of the effects of such a system 
as, by hypothesis, that of Calvin is represented to be, ought 
to be fixedness and uniformity of doctrinal teaching, A spe- 
cial revelation would hardly be made only to teach different 
creeds. Let us, therefore, hear our author first on this 
point. 

" The great diversity," he says, " and not unfrequent 
extravagance of creeds, introduced into the Presbyterian 
and Congregational connexions, is a sad and, for any thing 
I can see, an irremediable evil. I mean the creeds of every 
several commonwealth or church. I am aware that the 
principle of the Presbyterian Church of the United States is, 
that all its separate organizations or congregations shall adopt 
and subscribe to the creed of the Directory, as determined 

* Colton, chap. i. p. 28. 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 341 

and ordered by the General Assembly ; but such is not the 
fact; and the congregations have too much independence 
to conform to that rule, where they have not done it from 
the beginning. All the Congregational churches of New 
England are associated under such articles of faith as were 
drawn up for them by the clergyman who originally organ- 
ized them into a body, except, as in some instances, they 
have been remodelled. The same is the fact extensively 
through the bounds of the Presbyterian denomination. The 
diversity cannot, I think, be less than some hundreds ; and 
each one is shaped, with minute exactness, according to the 
theological model of the head that formed it as a Hopkin- 
sian, as a New-light, as a moderate or high Calvinist, as an 
Old or a New-school man, with all the grades between these 
extremes, from the time of Jonathan Edwards down to this 
present ; and some of them far higher and far lower than 
either of these. From the known scrupulosity cf divines of 
these two great denominations in all such matters, it cannot 
be a subject of surprise, that this great variety of creeds 
should be guarded and defended on certain points, most dear 
to the authors, in a manner somewhat extravagant and im- 
pressive. Such, in a great diversity of instances, have I 
found them to be. Atone time I have been pleased, at 
another amused, at another astonished, at another mortified. 
One can hardly go from one town to another, although he is 
in the same denomination, icithout Jinding a different creed ; 
unless he may happen to fall into the track of a minister or 
missionary who organized several churches, and of course 
gave to each the same; though I have actually found them 
varying even in such a case, on former missionary ground 
in the western parts of New York. 1 have myself organized 
some ten to fifteen churches, giving them creeds drawn up 
by my own hand, which varied from each other, according 
as, by more thinking on the subject, I supposed I could 
improve their forms."* After some more of this kind, the 
writer pointedly adds, " How different this from the practice 
of a Church which has the same creed throughout the land, 
and that creed in every man's, in every woman's, and in 
every child's hand !"t 



* Kai ov iravrayov Soynarifyi TOWTO, Trahivrpoiros yiif> icrt TIIV ma-riv A-OI 
oppo?. S. Eulogii Alexander. Orat. ap. Photii Biblioth. no. 230. 
t Colton, chap. ii. pp. 63-65. 



342 DEVELOPMENT OP MODERN SYSTEMS. 

Such being the working of Presbyterianism in this mo- 
mentous particular, we may inquire next into its tendencies 
to maintain unity of another sort the external bond, namely, 
of peace and good order. Of " the present state of the 
Presbyterian church " in this respect, the same author says, 
" Churches are divided ; Presbyteries are divided ; Synods 
are divided ; the General Assembly is divided ; and the 
whole denomination, composed of more than 2000 minis- 
ters, nearly 3000 churches, more than 250,000 commu- 
nicants, having allied to them a population falling probably 
not much short of 2,000,000, is in violent agitation and con- 
flict with itself party against party all originating from 
two great and leading facts, totally unlike, uncongenial, and 
meeting, as extremes frequently do, not. in this instance for 
coincidence, but for collision. It is extreme looseness in 
doctrine and practice on the one hand, and a violent at- 
tempt to coerce it into orthodoxy and order on the other. 
The first seems to me to be the natural result of such an 
organization, when the body gets to be large ; and the last 
an impracticable theory, applied to remedy the evil, but 
doomed apparently to produce only concussion and dissolu- 
tion .... It seems to be apparent that the Presbyterian 
organization has in it^the germ of perpetual strife . . . the 
essential elements of collision ; and the uniform result, as 
actually developed, is no disappointment, but a fulfilment of 
its tendencies."* 

Elsewhere the writer says, " Just at this moment, ano- 
ther grand explosion seems ready to burst upon us, and the 
Presbyterian church of the United States is in all probability 
to be rent in twain, if not broken into several fragments."! 
Without pursuing more minutely the important statements 
of this author as to the true character of the system with 
which he was so well acquainted,! we may proceed to notice 

* p. 66. t p. 204. 

t And of which he gives a description, which, in spite of certain 
peculiarities of American sentiment and language, is worthy of the 
most attentive perusal. Nothing can be more convincing than the 
temperate account of this author, as to the total failure of the Pres- 
bvterian system to effect any of the purposes for which the Church 
alone, in the strength of her divine commission, has ever been ade- 
quate. For (1) that system is shown to have no power to check 
error, however extravagant. "A woman," Mr. Colton says, speak- 
ing of what has actually occurred, " could disturb a church, and a 
man could overthrow it : a bad and viciously disposed minister could 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 343 

the fulfilment of his prediction as to the destinies of Ame- 
rican Presbyterianism. " They have just been afflicted," 
says another writer, speaking of this body only two years 
later, " with another schism, the most extensive which they 
have experienced. In May, 1838, the General Assembly 
divided into two sects of almost equal strength, containing 
about 1200 ministers respectively. The schism arose from 
the old controversy between the adherents of the old and new 
schools ; and there are now two representative bodies, each 
of which declares itself to be the General Assembly !"* 



bid defiance to his brethren, and lay waste religious societies, for 
want of authority to arrest his career ;" p. 175. (2) It is a system 
in which the teachers are slaves to the taught. " They are literally 
the victims of a spiritual tyranny, that has started up and burst 
upon the world in a new form at least with an extent of sway that 
has never been known. It is an influence which comes up from the 
lowest conditions of life, which is vested in the most ignorant minds, 
and therefore the more unbending and uncontrollable ;" p. 138. 
(3) Professing to discard forms, it is in fact a system of " common- 
place, crude, undigested forms. The Presbyterian, the Congrega- 
tionalist, the Methodist, the Baptist, all have their forms, their set 

forms It is form from beginning to end in the order and in 

the matter except, perhaps, as recently, and to a wide extent, bold 
attempts have been made to break down all order and all form 
by the habitual introduction and rapid succession of startling and 
shocking novelties." So that now the only question is, as expe- 
rience has proved, whether men shall have forms " carefully and 
prudently" (he should have said " divinely") " provided, and 
collected from such sources as the purest 'and best devotional writ- 
ings and manuals,, produced by Apostles, Saints, and Martyrs, from 
the day of -Pentecost to this time ; or shall be doomed to the far 
more defective, the much more exceptionable, and the sometimes 
offensive, startling, and shocking forms, entailed upon us by loose 
unauthorized custom, and doled out in such measure and parts as 
may be convenient to the memory, or as may suit the feelings and 
taste of the minister for the time being ;" pp. 117-20. (4) Lastly, 
Presbyterianism in America has been fruitful at once of schisms and 




swarm with religious sects. No part of Christendom has been so 
prolific in this product as our country. It might almost be said to 
be our religious staple. This land of freedom has in this particular 
proved most intolerant; and intolerance has multiplied schisms like 

the locusts of Egypt It is a singular fact, that these two 

extremes, viz., a boast of religious freedom, and a persevering effort 
to strangle it, should have characterized the religious history of this 
country ;" pp. 204, 5. 

* Caswall, chap xviii. p. 318. 



344 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

The New-school Presbyterians are now thought to be the 
most numerous of these sects ; " and they," as I am informed 
by an eminent American clergyman, writing in the year 1841 , 
" together with the Congregationalists of New England, deny 
the doctrine of the eternal generation of the Son of God." 
The development of Presbyterianism in New England appears 
indeed to have reached a climax. " The more intelligent 
class of New Englanders," says another American writer, 
" have become tired and disgusted with the shadows and 
metaphysics of religion" (alluding to the theological systems 
of the various sectarian teachers); " they have seen their 
practical tendency to run into Unitarianism, Universalism, 
or, what is perhaps still more common, into infidelity." He 
adds, that " infidelity has made rapid strides in that part of 
the country during the last twenty years; and that, at pres- 
ent, not one-half of the adult population are in the habit of 
attending any religious worship, or even belong to any 
Christian sect. I am able to state this from statistical facts 
gathered by clergymen (of all denominations) from different 
parts of the New-England states. In conversation lately 
with a physician from a county in Connecticut, whose prac- 
tice extends through nearly the whole county, and whose 
acquaintance with the people is not surpassed by that of any 
man in the state, he remarked, " I am surprised to find how 
prevalent infidel opinions are among the farmers of Con- 
necticut. It is very common to find the works of Paine, and 
other infidel writings, making up nearly the. whole of their 
libraries, and with many the French Philosophical Diction- 
ary is a sort of vade-mecum. The metaphysics of divi- 
nity, and the fanaticism of the New-school revivalists, have 
latterly tended to the rapid spread of skeptical notions ; and 
if things go on for the next fifty years as they have done for 
the last twenty, Connecticut will be as noted for infidelity as 
she has been in former days for puritanical strictness. 3 '* 
The writer proceeds thus : " I was not at all surprised to 
hear this testimony, as it coincided with my own observa- 
tion. In Massachusetts, the tendency of the popular mind 
has been more towards Unitarianism than infidelity, owing 
to the influence of a few powerful minds exerted in support 
of its doctrines ; but in other states, for the want of a half- 
way house, they have gone the whole distance, from unin- 
telligible metaphysics to open infidelity."* 

* Quoted in the JVeio York Churchman^ vol. ix. no. 25. 



TN THE UNITED STATES. 345 

The Baptist sects, although by far the most numerous of 
all, are said to have but little influence on the mass of 
society, " on account of their divisions and their uneducated 
ministry." They are divided into numerous parties, includ- 
ing the old Calvinistic Baptists, the Free-will, the Seventh- 
day, the Six-principle, the Christian, who altogether deny 
the proper divinity of our Lord, and the Campbellite Bap- 
tists. The latter sect was founded some years ago by a 
preacher named Campbell, who began to introduce among 
them the Socinian heresy. To aid in its dissemination, he 
recommended an improved version of the New Testament.* 
He has been eminently successful in drawing away whole 
congregations from the old Baptists, and it is thought that 
" the Campbellites " are now the more numerous of the 
two in the Western States.f The most prominent Camp- 
bellite preacher in the southern country was formerly a 
Presbyterian Elder. The latest improvement upon the 
Baptist heresy is Mormonism.f 

A schism took place in the Methodist denomination in 



* The Baptists having, as it seems, already one of their 
The Canadian Methodist before quoted says, " I cannot shut my 
eyes to the fact, that we have not from them (the dissenters), and 
cannot have, any security that the sacred volume will not be cor 
rupted under the pretence of more correct translations, &c. : already 
we have had to lament over a whole host of attacks on the authorized 
version, evidently manifesting, that were it not for those Christian 
enactments which in Britain prevent the ready publishing of spurious 
editions, we should have been overrun with them ; as it is, we have 
had the garbled ' New Version' of the Unitarians, and, in the United 
States, the translation by the Baptists, purposely designed to support 
their peculiar views ; besides many others of a like nature. Of the 
same stamp was the Liverpool Liturgy, published by the Presbyterians 
in 1692 ; of which Mr. Orton says, ' It is scarcely a Christian 
Liturgy; in the Collects the name of Christ is hardly mentioned, 
and the Spirit is quite banished from it.' " Ten Letters on the 
Church and Church Establishments. Letter vii. p. 45 : Toronto, 
1839. 

t " The Socinians have now spread extensively through nearly 
all the northern, southern, eastern, and western states, and are at 
this day (1823) the most numerous of all the General Baptists." 
Letter x. p. 72. 

J It is unnecessary to do more here, \vith respect to this extraor- 
dinary imposture, than to mention Mr. Caswall's History of Mor- 
monism. That gentleman refers its success, in some measure, to a 
reaction from the prevailing low sentiments, on the doctrine of 
Baptism. Bishop Kemper said, as late as Jan. 7, 1841, " Mormonism 
continues to increase." 



346 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

the year 1830 ; the separating body, who style themselves 
Protestant Methodists, going out upon the principle that 
the laity ought to be admitted to share in the government of 
ecclesiastical affairs. It is a curious fact, that the spurious 
Episcopacy of this American sect claims and exercises a 
more extensive and unquestioned authority over an immense 
body of members than perhaps any ecclesiastical rulers 
hitherto recognised among professing Christians.* I am 
informed, upon the highest American authority, that " the 
great body of Methodists, following Dr. A. Clarke, have de- 
parted from the true doctrine of the Trinity." Their 
method of keeping up the religious excitement which 
belongs to their system deserves notice. " Their camp- 
meetings," says Mr. Caswall, " often present the most extra- 
ordinary spectacles of enthusiasm. Sermons and exhorta- 
tions succeed each other in quick succession; the most 
lively hymns are sung, perhaps for an hour together. The 
people become powerfully excited ; they shout ' Glory ' and 
' Amen ;' they scream, jump, roar, and clap their hands, 
and even fall into swoons, convulsions, and death-like 
trances.t And all this is supposed by many to be the imme- 
diate work of the divine Spirit !"f 

It is to these monstrous extravagances, among other 
causes, that the spread of infidel opinions is often ascribed 
even by American writers.^ Their effects appear to be of a 
very fearful character ; and we can only hope that we our- 

* "Presbyterian and Congregational ministers must,, will, and 
do have their leaders self-appointed heads ; heads who do every 
thing by the rule of their own heads. ' God sends us Bishops, 
whether we will have them or not;' and the mischief is, when we 
refuse them, that they force themselves upon us under a system 
which often originates in their own whims; at best, a system of 
their own devising, and which changes with every new comer." 
Colton, Thoughts on the Religious State of the Country, chap. iii. 
pp. 85, 86. 

i riopi'i) yap ioriv ij a"p<Tis, rais rjyoirrtyiEi'ats i : 5ovais yoriTzvovca. S. Greg. 
Nyssen. In suam Ordinationem Oral. torn. ii. p. 43. 

J America and the American Church, ch. xviii. p. 317. Mr. Gas- 
wall seems to hope that they are ' changing for the better." 

One of them observes, that the dreadful effect of the * Religious 
revivals' " may be styled the maJadie du pays, for it is literally and 
unfortunately such." American Criticisms on Mrs. Trollope's 
' Manners of the Americans,' p. 14. See also Burder's Religious 
Ceremonies, where an account of them still more shocking and 
ludicrous is given. 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 



347 



selves are looking on at a safe distance from the wild revels 
of which this republic of sectaries is the theatre. 

The sect of Quakers has progressed according to the 
same law which marks the course of all the rest. " The 
Quaker Societies in the United States," we are told, " are 
462, among whom there has been a schism, one party being 
called orthodox, . and the other Socinians :" this writer 
makes them equal in number, and puts the Socinian preach- 
ers of the sect at 231.* I am informed that they are, at the 
present day, as three to one. 

(3.) It is time now to speak of the spread of Socinianism 
in general ; arid first, of the statements of its own advocates. 
The " Executive Committee of the American Unitarian 
Association " published in J827 the following " Report :" 
" The Committee have been gratified by the sympathy ex- 
pressed for them in the prosecution of their duties by Unita- 
rians near and at a distance. They have been favoured 
with letters from Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Connec- 
ticut, Rhode Island, from all sections in this state, from the 
city of New York, and from the western part of the state of 
New York, from Philadelphia, Harrisburg, Northumberland, 
Pittsburg, and Meadville in Pennsylvania ; from Maryland, 
from the District of Columbia, from South Carolina, from 
Kentucky, and from Indiana. In all these letters the same 
interest is exhibited in the efforts which the Association 
promises to make for the diffusion of pure Christianity." 

Again, describing their numerical strength: "Of New 
England it would be difficult to speak with certainty. 
There are, in almost every town, Unitarians ; in many 
towns of Massachusetts they constitute the majority, and in 
many more they have respectable though not large churches ; 
but in far the greater number of parishes in New England 
they are still blended with other sects. The number of these 
silent Unitarians is increasing, and, at the same time, more 
are manifesting a determination to assert their rights as 

* Vide Church and State in America, by G. C. Colton, p. 8 (1834). 
Mosheim says, " the European Quakers dare not so far presume upon 
the indulgence of the civil and ecclesiastical powers as to deny 
openly the reality of the history of the life, mediation, and sufferings 
of Christ; but in America, wliere they have nothing to fear, they 
are said to express themselves without ambiguity upon this subject, 
and to maintain publicly, that Christ never existed but in the hearts 
of the faithful." Ecclesiastical History, vol. v. p. 476. 



348 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

citizens and as Christians. The Committee conceive that 
they have sufficient evidence of the increase of Unitarians in 
New England, especially in Maine, in some parts of New 
Hampshire, and in the valley of the Connecticut in Massa- 
chusetts. They say this gladly, but not boastingly. The 
progress of correct opinions has been more rapid than their 
supporters could have expected for them. They are intro- 
ducing themselves into every village. ... In the middle 
states, also, Unitarianism is constantly acquiring new adher- 
ents. The erection of a second church in New York, the 
increased prosperity of the society in Philadelphia, and the 
commencement of a building for Unitarian worship in Har- 
risburg, the seat of government of Pennsylvania, are auspi- 
cious circumstances. From the southern and western divi- 
sions of our land, it is presumed that future correspondence 
and the communications of agents will furnish intelligence 
equally gratifying. We are assured that the society in 
Charleston, South Carolina, continues to prosper, that there 
are several churches in North Carolina, and that Unitarians 
are numerous in the states which lie west of the Alleghany 
mountains."* This is indeed a fearful statement, and it is 
confirmed unhappily by the testimony of others, who would 
very gladly deny it if they could.t 

* First Annual Report of the Executive Committee of the American 
Unitarian Association, 1827. In their third Annual Report they 
state that they have circulated, during the preceding year, 74,300 
Tracts ! 

t M. De Beaumont, on his return to France from the United 
States, observed of the Socinians, that they are " the philosophers of 
the United States ;" and then, referring to the effects of ' philosophy' 
in France, he adds, " in America it labours at the same work the 
destruction of religion and its ministers but is obliged to veil its 
operations under a cloak of religion. Its mantle is the Unitarian 
doctrine." Quoted in the Church Advocate, vol. i. p. 70. Mr. Potter 
stated in the House of Commons, August 6, 1833, that he could 
declare that the spread of Unitarian opinions in America had" been 
rapid. There was now hardly a town in that vast country in which 
there was not a Unitarian Chapel ; in the large towns two, and in the 
town of Boston there were no fewer than sixteen professing Unitarian 
belief." " In England," says the writer who quotes these words, 
" these semi-infidels are poor and weak ; in America, they are many, 
and rich, and strong." Ten Letters on the Church, fyc., Letter x. p. 
72. A writer quoted by Colton, who enumerates instances of a 
successful opposition to the ravages of this devouring heresy, says, 
" the Legislature of the State was under its control, and all important 
public offices of the commonwealth were monopolized by it; until it 
was discouraging enough for any one to think of aspiring to place 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 349 

A few words, in the last place, upon Universalism, another 
of those monstrous forms of error which the religion of 
" the Bible and the Bible only " has generated in America. 
" This strange creed maintains* that neither temporal nor 
eternal death are consequences of sin .... it denies 
that the death of Christ was properly an atonement ... it 
denies the supreme divinity of our Lord, the distinct per- 
sonality and divinity of the Holy Spirit, and the doctrine of 
the Trinity." In a word, it denies almost every article of 
the Christian faith. And to this deadly heresy, as to almost 
every other, Presbyterianism, in its various forms, appears to 
have been the stepping-stone. The founder of Universalism 
was John Murray, a Wesleyan preacher.t Its leading ad- 
vocates have been " Elnathan Winchester, a popular preacher 
of the Baptist sect ; Dr. Joseph Huntington, pastor of a Cal- 
vinistic church in Connecticut ;" and, latterly, " Mr. Balfour, 
who, bred in the Church of Scotland, next became an Inde- 
pendent, or Congregationalist, then a Baptist, and at last a 
Universalist."* The tenets of this sect, which are perpetu- 
ally fluctuating, are too absurd and blasphemous to be 
noticed in detail ; and yet such is the incredible religious 
state of America the advocates of this preposterous heresy 
" are, in their own estimation,^ the fifth, if not the fourth 
in order, in point of numbers, respectability, and talent, 
among the denominations of the land ^ among the greatest 
reading people in the Union; having no less than nineteen 
or twenty periodicals, issuing every month at least 100,000 
sheets to 25 or 30,000 subscribers, among at least thrice 
that number of regular readers." " In the southern and 
western states," they say, " the doctrine is extending its 
progress faster than preachers can follow to proclaim and 

unless he were an Unitarian." Church and State in America, p. 39. 
Cf. Remarks on the Moral and Religious Character of the U. S. of 
America, p. 51 (1831); and Capt. B. Hall's Travels in the United 
States, vol. ii. ch. vi., who observes, that " the religious institutions 
of the country harmonize with every thing else." 

* See Universalism as it is, by Edwin F. Hatfield, p. 33 ; New 
York, 1841. ^ 

t Ibid. ch. i. p. 13. " The notions of religion entertained by a 
large proportion of the disciples of Murray were derived, for the 
most part, from Calvinistic preachers and the Westminster Cate- 
chism," p. 16. 

t Chap. xxiv. p. 302. 

Life of Murray, p. 272. 

16 



350 DEVELOPMENT OP MODERN SYSTEMS. 

defend it ; while in the eastern and middle states, ministers, 
laymen, and even whole societies, are embracing this calum- 
niated doctrine, and coming over to its avowal and sup- 
port." 

" Such were the pretensions of this sect eight years 
since," i. e. in 1833 : " their statistics for the present year 

show that they have lost none They maintain,* 

that ' during the past year no less than fifty-nine new 
labourers have entered into ' their ' field of labour, of whom 
nine are converts from the Partialist ministry whilst hun- 
dreds, yea, thousands, if not tens of thousands, of the Par- 
tialist laity have embraced and avowed the faith of TJniver- 
salism during the past year. There are,' they say (p. 71), 
' in the United States alone, 1 general convention, 12 state 
conventions, 56 associations, about 853 societies, 512 
preachers,t and 513 meeting-houses owned wholly or in 
part by Universalists.' "| 

" The denomination to which I belong," says a Univer- 
salist preacher to a Socinian in this country, as far back as 
sixteen years ago, " is composed of upwards of 300 societies, 
and about 200 preachers. These numbers are continually 
receiving accessions. We have increased : most in New 
England, New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania ; though there 
are Universalists scattered all over the United States. It 
will, perhaps, be pleasing to you to learn, that this sect is, 
with indeed a very few exceptions, entirely Unitarian. I 
know of but three ministers, in the whole order, who are 
Trinitarians ; and I believe the greater proportion are Hu- 
manitarians. With the few exceptions just mentioned, we 
concur in rejecting, as absurd and unscriptural, the old idea 
of atonement,"^ &c. &>c. 

Such are a few facts, chosen out of a multitude of simi- 
lar ones, in illustration of the development of sectarian doc- 
trines and systems in America. And fearful as is the reli- 

* Universalist Companion, p. 70. 

t Only one year later (1834), Mr. Colton puts the Universalist 
preachers at 600 ; Church and State in America, p. 8. 

i. Universalism as it is, Preface. 

See Monthly Repository, vol. i. p. 177, and vol. iv. p. :775. 
Its own adherents are quoted as acknowledging that it often "leads 
to infidelity, and thence to atheism," and that " many of its strongest 
supporters are avowed infidels." Universalism. os it is. chap, xxiii 
p. 319. , 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 351 

gious condition which they indicate, we cannot even hope that 
things are yet at the worst. Professor Moses Stuart, after 
quoting some of the most extreme opinions of the German 
Rationalists, says to his Socinian correspondent, " You are 
doubtless inclined before this time to say, ' What is all this to 
us ? We do not avow or defend such opinions. 5 True, I an- 
swer ; at present, you do not. A short time since they did not. 
But as soon as their numbers increased, so that they began to 
be fearless of consequences, and their antagonists urged the 
laws of exegesis upon them, they abandoned the ground of 
defending the divine authority of the Bible at once. A few 
years since, the state, of theological questions in Germany, in 
many respects was similar to what it now is here. At present, 
the leading German critics, rejecting ' accommodation,' and 
casting off all ideas of the divine origin of the Scriptures, are 
disputing with great zeal the questions, Whether a miracle be 
possible? Whether God and nature are one and the same 
thing ? (Schelling, a divine, is at the head of a great party 
which maintains that they are the same.) And, whether the 
Jews ever expected any Messiah? Some time ago, many of 
their critics maintained that no Messiah was predicted in the 
Old Testament ; but now, they question even whether the 
Jews had any expectation of one. It would seem now, that they 
have come nearly to the end of questions on theology, at 
least I cannot well devise what is to come next. . . . . The 
persons who read their works will see what the spirit of 
doubt and unbelief can do in respect to the Book of God, 
and where it will carry the men who entertain it. It is in- 
deed a most affecting and awful lesson. But is there no rea- 
son to fear that we are to learn it by sad experience 1* Does 
not the progress of the sentiments which you defend illus- 
trate the nature of this subject? A short time since, almost 
all the Unitarians of New England were simply Arians : now, 
if I am correctly informed, there are scarcely any of the 
younger preachers of Unitarian sentiments who are not sim- 
ple Humanitarians. Such was the case in Germany. The 
divinity of Christ was early assailed; inspiration was next 
doubted and impugned. Is not this already begun here ? 
Natural religion comes next in order ; and the question be- 



* This was asked in 1819 : they have learned all this in America, 
and more, since that time. 



352 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

tvveen the parties here may soon be in substance, Whether 
natural or revealed religion is our guide and our hope."* 

Such, then, have been the results in this country also of 
the principles upon which the modern systems were found- 
ed.f And in the case of America, as has been already ob- 
served, the development of these principles may the more 

* Stuart's Letters to Dr. Channing, pp. J 47-52. 

t Which results it is easy to foresee will be urged by Roman 
Catholics as an argument in their behalf, and so may seem to be 
somewhat inconsistently referred to by a member of the Anglican 
Church. On this point I am anxious to make one or two observa- 
tions. And first, if such developments be, in any measure, a con- 
firmation of Roman Catholic views, why should we, if our love of 
truth be any thing more than a mere matter of words, deny them 
the full benefit which they claim from them ? As between the 
Church of Rome, then, and the various Protestant sects, the facts 
under consideration must no doubt be regarded as conclusive ; but 
in what way do they affect/the controversy between the same Church 
and ourselves ? The English Church, by God's gracious favour, is 
witnessing at this day to Catholic truths as heartily as at any former 
period of her history, from the Apostolic age downwards. If, there- 
fore, it be an argument in defence of Rome, that while innumerable 
sects have plunged one after another into an abyss of heresy and 
unbelief, she has still preserved the faith ; and if of the Anglican 
Church the same constancy may with no less truth be predicated ; 
then in the same proportion in which the developments of mere 
4 protestantism' are favourable to the claims of the one church, they 
are a vindication also of the other : or rather, if the English 
Church, in spite of difficulties peculiarly her own, has still main- 
tained her divine character as the mother of saints and guardian of 
the true faith, then may her children point to the downfall of the 
modern systems with even more confidence than those of the sister 
churches, and to her own present condition as a sufficient proof that 
having been once espoused to Christ, her alliance with Him is not 
yet divorced. One answer may indeed be made by our enemies 
for so, it seems, they wish us to regard them viz. that the devel- 
opment in our own case is not yet complete, and we may be re- 
minded that at this very day two antagonist principles are struggling 
for the mastery in the bosom of our distracted Church. To this 
objection let it be freely answered, that if which may God forbid ! 
the 'protestant' element in her constitution should ultimately 
prevail, it would be wholly inconsistent with all that is here col- 
lected, to deny, or even to doubt, that she too must perish and 
decay : but if, 'as there is surely just reason to expect, the catholic 
or religious element should absorb and neutralize the other, then 
may we hope, not only for the continuance and enlargement of 
her own prosperity, but even that she should be made the instru- 
ment of bringing nearer to the primitive standard the Roman Church 
herself. 



IN THE UNITED STATES. 353 

certainly be regarded as a token of their real nature, from 
the circumstance that they have there been professed from 
the first without check or restriction of any kind, and, as 
indeed their advocates boast, have been beyond the reach of 
those influences which in other lands might have impeded 
their natural growth. This circumstance of their history is 
therefore worth noticing ; but it is quite evident, from the 
facts which have been here collected, that no variety of posi- 
tion, though for a while it might modify or even correct the 
views of the modern religionists, could long avail to conceal 
or counteract the real tendencies of their religious principles. 
In an empire, a province, or a republic ; in weakness or in 
power ; triumphant or tolerated, the result has still been 
the same ; arid the lapse of a few short years has in each 
case sufficed to demonstrate, that a new discipline generates 
a new Doctrine, a new Church requires a new Gospel, and 
schism has declined, by an unfailing law, to heresy, blasphe- 
my, and unbelief.* 

And now that we may come to a conclusion if any, 
seriously reviewing the evidence which has here been ad- 
duced, should deem that that system of religion which we have 
been considering, a system which, beginning by the sup- 
pression of one truth, ends, in every case, by the denial of 
all, is in fact the most awful presage of the coming Anti- 
christ which the world has yet seen, at least he would seem 
to have some reason for the thought.! 

* As those who delight in the proofs of this declension seem very 
well to understand.'' An English Socinian, reviewing the progress 
of his own sentiments in different parts of the world, and expressing 
his confident expectation of a yet more general diffusion of them 
amongst the various sects of these latter days, speaks as follows of 
the fatal heresy which he professes. " It is the form towards which 
I believe Christianity to be tending in all sects. It will grow up 
imperceptibly in the bosom of various sects, as it did formerly in this 
country under the cover of Presbyterianism : as it has more lately 
in the Calvinistic Church of Geneva, and amongst the Independents 
in America ; first prompting a modification of the hereditary creed, 
and destroying the power before the name of orthodoxy, till some 
unforeseen occurrence shall call for an explicit declaration of opin- 
ion ; when Christians of very different denominations will be aston- 
ished to find how nearly, in their real and inward convictions, they 
were agreed." Monthly Repository, vol. i. pp. 179-181. 

t Nor would it be altogether a novel sentiment, though founded 
upon facts which are only now at least upon so large a scale 
coming under our observation. Various writers, including Bishop 



354 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

XIV. It only remains now, in the last place, to recapitu- 
late the different arguments, and combine the separate 
proofs, which have been employed or collected in these pages. 
And this may be done in a few sentences. 

(1.) The primary objection to the Catholic System, 
which lies at the root of the whole subject of Church Polity, 
and which in many minds appears to be held almost uncon- 
sciously, and quite independently of any process of reason- 
ing, is this : " that if it had been of divine appointment, it 
would have been more plainly set forth in Holy Scripture." 
To this assumption, for it does not even claim to be more, 
it was answered, in the first place, that the objection ap- 
plies to many of the acknowledged fundamentals of Christi- 
anity, and therefore proves too much; in the second, -that it 
is equally fatal to one system of Church-government as to 
another, and therefore to all systems whatever ; and in the 
third, that it was the very argument urged against the facts 
of the Gospel as the Resurrection and its essential doc- 
trines as the Holy Trinity by every class of heretic and 
unbeliever, from the Apostolic age down to our own. It is 
an objection, therefore, not so much to Episcopacy, as to 
Christianity. 

It was contended, in the next place, that not only does 
this supposed a priori objection fall to the ground, but that 
there are antecedent probabilities in favour of the Catholic 
Polity such as really determine the whole question of its ori- 
gin without the witness either of Scripture or history, and 
constitute in themselves an evidence approaching as nearly 
to demonstration as the nature of moral subjects appears to 
allow. The great fact of the Jewish Church, which was 

Jeremy Taylor, have before now intimated their belief, " that the 
existence of the Apostolic order, or, in other words, the episcopacy 
of the Church, is that which icithholdeth the revelation of Antichrist." 
See Todd's Discourses on the Prophecies relating to Jlnticlirist^ note, 
p. 244. And there is surely some reason for such a belief, if it were 
only from this consideration, that there was never an instance in 
any country of the subversion of the episcopate, which was not fol- 
lowed by the gradual rejection of all the distinctive tenets of Chris- 
tianity ; nor, on the other hand, has there been a single example, 
either in England, Scotland, or America, of the falling away of so 
much as one congregation in communion with the successors of the 
Apostles, though the reformed Catholic Church in each of those 
countries has long been contending with the most distressing diffi- 
culties and temptations. 



GENERAL SUMMARY. 



355 



confessedly typical of and introductory to a future system, is 
the first of these. The corresponding fact of a kindred In- 
stitution professing to be of divine origin and exhibiting 
manifest tokens of that character, actually taking the place 
of and assuming to represent, with the consent of all man- 
kind, this its supposed type, is another. And the necessary 
conclusion from the joint consideration of the two, that the 
later Institution, namely, was either that very one designed 
by God to succeed the former ; or else that, for more than 
fifteen hundred years, it had no successor at all, is a third. 
The Church Catholic, it is plain, was either the system pre- 
dicted by the Prophets and foreordained of God, or no sys- 
tem was predicted and foreordained; because during fifteen 
ages, no other existed. And the only answer to this which 
can be conceived, is, that during all that period prophecy 
was unfulfilled and the divine purpose frustrated. 

If, therefore, no further revelation had been made, even 
in that case the evidence was complete. The elder Dispen- 
sation had done its part, was cancelled, was superseded. 
The new Dispensation commenced, assumed a definite form 
and shape, was recognised, was obeyed : what more was 
wanted ? The setting up of the new order was in itself 
sufficient evidence of the divine sanction. That sanction 
was implied in its very existence ; it could have had no be- 
ing without it. And when the Records of the New Coven- 
ant were promulgated, it was enough that they should recog- 
nise without defining the new ecclesiastical system, which, 
being itself the accomplishment of manifold prophecies, 
needed no further witness. 

(2.) Such being the state of the argument, appeal was 
made in the next place to those sacred Records. Ajid these 
were found to contain not only the outlines which alone 
was antecedently probable but even many of the details of 
that economy which had already been several years in opera- 
tion when they were first collected together. The office of 
St. James of Jerusalem, of Timothy, of Titus, and of the 
seven Prelates of the Asiatic Churches, was minutely traced, 
and proved to be identical with that of our modern Bishops, 
upon evidence which nothing but the necessities of a coun- 
ter-theory could resist. Invested with absolute authority 
over all the churches and clergy of their jurisdiction, and 
provided with instructions which, while they formed a body 



356 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

of cfcnons for their own guidance in the execution of their 
office, serve also as an accurate representation to the faithful 
in all ages of its nature and purpose, those holy men are set 
forth to us in the divine story as the first-fruits among those 
spiritual rulers whom it was the eternal purpose of God to 
" make princes in all lands"* And that they were only the 
first of a long line of fathers to be hereafter begotten of the 
Church, is plain, not less from the express statements of the 
blessed Apostles by whom they were ordained, and by whose 
authority they were solemnly charged to ordain others, than by 
the testimony of the very men who succeeded to their chairs, 
and of the people who, in submitting to the government of 
these successors, boasted one to another, that they could 
trace through them to their predecessors St. James and St. 
John. So that, if the words of Holy Scripture be not alto- 
gether unmeaning and unsubstantial if the Church of the 
Apostles be any thing more than a phantom or vision if its 
first rulers, St. James and St. John, Clement and Epaphro- 
ditus, Ignatius and Polycarp, were really what they seem to 
have been, what they claimed to be, and what they were ad- 
mitted to be, then is it most certain that they, and all their 
successors after them, were, as universal Christendom be- 
lieved, Bishops, or Apostles, in the Church of God. And to 
this the adversary offers out of Holy Scripture a solitary ob- 
jection, which, as being the beginning, middle, and end of 
their answer, it was well to notice, but which, besides its 
utterly vain and trifling character, has not even the poor 
show of ingenuity with which heresy is fain to trace out of 
Scripture its creed of many hues. A childish play upon 
words and names, of which, of course, the signification 
might v,/ary even from age to age, but which they chose art- 
fully to confound with the unchangeable realities of which 
they were only the convenient symbols, such has been the 
reasoning with which a few moderns have thought to muti- 
late the faith of a world, such the weapon with which they 
would seek to confound and put to flight " the armies of the 
living God." 

(3.) Passing on from the evidence of the Sacred Scrip- 
tures, it was obvious to inquire next into the testimony of 
Christian Antiquity, and to ask of those highly-favoured men 
who had sat at the feet of Apostles, or been taught by their 

* Psalm xlv. 16. 



GENERAL SUMMARY. 357 

disciples, what was the ecclesiastical constitution under 
which they themselves lived. That they should be mistaken 
as to the matter of fact with which, from day to day, their 
own senses were cognisant, was impossible. And if their 
witness could avail to determine the canon of Divine Scrip- 
ture, it might be accepted with at least as much confidence 
in behalf of that spiritual polity, that present and living or- 
ganization, under which their own offices were administered, 
and by which they were visibly encompassed and girt around. 
Their testimony was cited at length, and found to be con- 
sistent, unequivocal, and decisive. The three orders or 
degrees of the sacred ministry, which they professed, with- 
out contradiction of heathen or heretic, to have received 
from the Apostles, and in which they recognised the fulfil- 
ment of many prophecies of the Holy Spirit, were not only 
maintained by them as an economical arrangement suitable 
for present need, or expedient under a particular state of the 
fortunes of the Church, and so capable of modification and 
adjustment ; such thoughts would they have abhorred, not 
enduring even to listen to notions so injurious to the com- 
mon faith ; rather did they reverently judge of them as 
ordained by a decree from everlasting, as a portion of the 
divine counsel and scheme for the salvation of sinners, a 
very type also and present figure of the Most Holy Trinity, 
and so absolutely necessary and unchangeable throughout 
all times, that those saints and martyrs of God could as 
hardly have set themselves to contemplate a religion with- 
out Christ, as a Church without Bishops.* And so con- 

* The idea xvas not indeed brought before their minds as it is 
before ours, and therefore they nowhere enter upon the discussion 
of it. Yet some of the ancients have used language upon certain 
occasions which sufficiently indicates the judgment they would have 
pronounced upon our modern religionists. A remarkable instance 

is the sentence of St. Athanasius upon Ischyras. After stating in 

his defence of Macarius, who had been charged with havin^ broken 
the mystical cup when in the hands of Ischyras that the latter had 
never been ordained a Priest by the authority of "the Church, and 
that therefore his celebration of the sacrament was only a profane 
mockery, the Saint asks, U69 V <,Z V Trp^vrepos 'lo^upuj ; rivog KaT^-r!,- 
aavros ; dpa KoAou0Ju; T ovrn yap XOIJTOI;- dXX' art KfiAoi'03? Trpsa-^vrEpos &v 
iT\Evriiae. Ischyras is only a layman, he says; for Coluthus, who is 
pretended to have ordained him, was himself no more than a pres- 
byter. Apolog. torn. i. p. 732; and see the confession of Ischyras 
himself, p. 782, and pp. 794, 5. The annulling the ordinations of a 

16* 



358 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

stant was this belief among all lands wheresoever the Gospel 
had been preached, that even those misbelievers who fled 
out of the"ark of the Church, and formed to themselves con- 
venticles apart, never dreamed of setting up any purer nor 
more primitive nay, nor any other form of government 
than this, but perpetuated their errors by a succession of 
pseudo-bishops. And when certain women, "led away 
with divers lusts," and seeking to annul even the distinction 
between the sexes, ventured to usurp the office of teachers, 
and to frame a -new company of believers, it was by 
imitating the only order which they had ever heard of, and 
appointing from their own ranks Bishops, Priests, and 
Deacons, that they attempted to execute their impious plan. 

It was in vain, then, for the adversaries to deny the cer- 
tainty of the historical fact which even the enemies of the 
Church, both by words and deeds, so abundantly confirmed. 
Truth, however, was not that which they sought; and so, 
turning away from the evidences of it which appeared on 
every side, they resorted to a device in meeting the argu- 
ment from Antiquity, which is not, perhaps, to be surpassed 
by any contrivance of deliberate unbelief since the beginning 
of the world. " True," said they, " these fathers, and 
others, do bear witness to the universal acceptance of Bishops 
in their days, and ascribe it to the appointment of the 
Apostles. But then they were mistaken that is all. It 
was not the discipline of the Apostles, though their own 
disciples and the whole world so long thought so, but a new 
office introduced into the Church a few years after they 
were withdrawn from the earth. Presbyterianism was, in 
fact, their form of discipline; and Episcopacy was substi- 
tuted for it by their followers." This was their answer. 

Having made up their mind at all events to reject Epis- 
copacy, they were obliged to assign some reason for doing 
so. The whole world, without contradiction of a single - 
fragment of all the ancient writings, testifies to its existence 

blind bishop, whose hands had been directed by certain presbyters, 
and the very severe and emphatic language of the Council which so 
decreed, 'is another instance : see the case apudBurchard. Ex Condi. 
Braggar. Decret. lib. i. cap. iii. It is upon this and other like ex- 
amples, that Bellarmine forcibly remarks, " Esse ex jure divino ut 
soli Episcopi ordinent, inde colligitur, quod habebatur irritvm si 
quid in ea re fccissent, qui veri Episcopi non essent." De Clericis, 
lib. i. cap. xiv. 



GENERAL SUMMARY. 359 

within a few years of the Apostles : this, therefore, it would 
have been hopeless to gainsay. Still, if it was to bespoken 
against with any success, its origin must needs be asserted 
to date from after the withdrawal of the inspired rulers of 
the Church. The period immediately subsequent to their 
departure was, therefore, the only suitable epoch for the 
mysterious change which their hypothesis supposes;* and 
to this period that change was accordingly referred. And 
whatever we may think of their integrity, we can at least 
make no exception to their ingenuity. t 

Ancient and holy truth is not, however, to be obscured 
by wit and subtlety, much less by an artifice so transparent 
as this. The reply which was made to this notion, which 
is still relied upon, as if it were not really too extravagant 
for any sober man to defend, was, in a few words, such as 
the following. 

The ' change ' of discipline asserted supposing, for the 
sake of argument, that its accomplishment was within the 
compass, of things possible must have been effected .either 
with the consent of the Apostles or against it. If the first, 
then Episcopacy is still confessed to be Apostolical ; but if 
not, then, as was observed in noticing the point above, we 
must believe that it was erected throughout the world under 

o 

circumstances so strange and marvellous, that the establish- 
m*it of Episcopacy upon the ruins of Presbytery would de- 
serve to be ranked amongst the most extraordinary events 
which ever excited the astonishment of mankind. For not 
only does the assumed change imply either the active fraud 
or disgraceful apathy of all. those primitive Christians in 
whose time and by whose consent or agency it must be sup- 

* " Ex falso maluit colligere quod fhlsum est, quam ex vero quod 
verum. Et cum debeant incerta de certis probari, hie probationem 
sumpsit ex incerto, ad evertendum quod erat certum." Lactantius, 
De Originc Erroris, lib. ii. p. 161. 

f Though we shall probably suspect, with Sir Guyon, 
" That all this famous antique history, 
Of some the aboundance of an ydle braine 
Will judged be, and painted forgery, 
Rather than matter of just memory, 
Sith none that breatheth living aire doth know 
Where is that (proofe) ... 

Which these so much doe vaunt, yet no where show ; 
But vouch antiquities which no body can know." 

Spenser, Faerie Queene, bk. ii. canto i 



360 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

posed to have been wrought, so that the very first genera- 
tion of believers must be asserted to have apostatized from 
their obedience to Christ and His ordinance but the pen- 
alty of this guilt was voluntarily incurred by them without 
the slightest prospect of advantage either to themselves or 
to any one else ; the carnal ambition with which these meek- 
est and holiest of men are charged only dooming them to 
be the earliest victims of persecution, and the unlawful pre- 
cedence which they so unaccountably craved, even to the 
utter subversion of the discipline of Christ, being simply a 
precedence of suffering and death ! And as the Bishops, 
on the one hand, were thus covetous of a prohibited emi- 
nence only to procure a larger share of danger and tempta- 
tion, so the Presbyters, on the other, must be understood to 
have yielded to them with a facility equally unaccountable, 
resigning one after another the lawful authority with which 
God had intrusted them, when there was not only no motive 
for so shameful a compliance, but not even the pretence of 
any power to enforce it ; and this they did silently and sub- 
missively from one end of the world to the other, not one 
solitary presbyter being found with zeal or spirit enough to 
remonstrate against it, and that, too, at the very time_when 
whole churches were agitated with keen debate upon the 
minutest points of ritual or ceremonial observance, and 
Christians were manifesting, as infidels have scoffingljfc re- 
marked, the most watchful and sensitive jealousy, upon 
every point of doctrine and discipline ! And further, this 
extraordinary revolution, one of the most extensive and im- 
portant which is pretended to have taken place in any period 
of the history of the world, accomplished in hundreds of 
places at the same moment, and acquiesced in by thousands 
and tens of thousands of men of every language and country, 
was effected amid a silence sj deep and unnatural, that not 
only were the actors in it apparently unconscious of their 
own deed, but the whole world conspired together ever after 
to suppress the very memory of it, so that in all the volumi- 
nous records of Christian Antiquity there is not so much as 
one passing allusion to it. And when men, well reputed of 
for sanctity and blameless living, ventured immediately after 
to mock themselves and others by exalting Episcopacy as 
the ordinance of Christ, and to censure with solemn anathe- 
mas all who opposed themselves to it, not one mouth was 



GENERAL SUMMARY. 



361 



opened to remind them of its true origin, nor to reproach 
them with their folly and deceit ! Such are a few of the ' 
wild and preposterous notions which men, shrewd and saga- 
cious in the conduct of their worldly affairs, are constrained 
to defend, in order that they may not be forced to resign an 
error which begins by taking for granted that all these are 
unquestionable truths ! 

(4.) That men should ever have set themselves, then, 
deliberately to impugn that form of ecclesiastical polity, to 
the divine origin of which Prophecy, Scripture, and History, 
had thus clearly and harmoniously witnessed, was very highly 
improbable. Of all the adversaries by whom the Church 
had been so rudely though vainly assaulted during fifteen 
successive ages, one only, and he convicted out of his own 
mouth,~ was found to attempt a work at once so daring and 
so absurd. And it has been shown, that not even those un- 
scrupulous men who, in the, sixteenth century, undertook 
with loud tongues and violent deeds to reform the corrup- 
tions of the Catholic Church, contemplated in the outset, of 
their movement any such extravagance as this. Animated 
in some instances by a just abhorrence of grievous and well 
nigh intolerable evils, in others only by an insatiable ap- 
petite for personal distinction and aggrandisement, but in 
none, it is to be feared, by any adequate sense of the exceed- 
ing awfulness of the work to which they put their hands, 
and the inestimable preciousness of that unity which they so 
intemperately despised, these persons vehemently demand- 
ed the reformation, which was as vehemently denied, and in 
a temper, as it appears, but too much akin to their own. 
They determined next to accomplish for themselves the 
needful work, of which the lawful rulers of the Church con- 
tented themselves with only admitting the necessity. That 
their vocation to this purpose was, at least, imperfect, they 
did not at first hesitate to acknowledge. Again and again, 
as has been shown in these pages, they professed their will- 
ingness to resign to the Bishops the task which of righfbe- 
longed to them. Any disrespect for their office in the ab- 
stract they emphatically disclaimed, the least token of sym- 
pathy or assistance from them they eagerly accepted. And 
this attitude they maintained for a long while. At length it 
became apparent that they must either take the decided step 
of casting off their allegiance to the Bishops altogether, or 



362 DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN SYSTEMS. 

resign their power and authority to them. They chose the 
former course. And this their whole history, in spite of 
certain inconsistencies, would have led us to anticipate. 
Former concessions must now be obscured, or plausibly 
explained, or boldly withdrawn. The battle henceforth was 
not for truth, but so far as sucli ' reformers ' were con- 
cerned for existence. The Scriptures, from which their 
manifold and conflicting creeds were already so confidently 
derived, were invoked again for aid; and the next doc- 
trine " wrested " out of them for the convenience of their 
party was this, that Episcopacy was a corruption of the 
Discipline of Christ. Even in this, however, they could 
not attain to be consistent ; and the Anglican Episcopate, by 
what texts of Scripture they omitted to say, was specially 
exempted from so severe a judgment. Their error in this 
respect, however, has been discerned by their later dis- 
ciples, and the English Bishops are now to be resisted, as 
no less tyrants and usurpers than their co-Apostles of the 
Western Church. 

(5.) Such is the history of the extraordinary error which 
certain moderns are still found to maintain, against the 
united testimony of Scripture and Antiquity, and even the 
confessions of their own masters and teachers. Hitherto, 
however, with more or less success, it has been disguised, 
under the pretence of zeal for the Gospel, and the reforma- 
tion of error ; and so long as it wore this mask, it has been 
able to deceive many, to whom such professions were an all- 
sufficient recommendation. This mask has at length been 
removed, and the whole truth is now revealed to the world. 
The teachers of tlds ' Protestantism ' may still amuse them- 
selves and their disciples with the phraseology of a past age ; 
but it will deceive no longer. They are detected. The 
evidence of their imposture meets us at every turn. We 
have found out at last what ' the Gospel ' and ' the truth ' 
mean in their mouths. And if they will still set themselves 
in array against the appointed gaurdians of the Faith, they 
must be content to do so henceforth in their real character. 
Their former disguise will serve them no longer. We know 
them now; and he must be deeply in love with error who 
will suffer himself to be deceived hereafter by the solicita- 
tions of so palpable a fraud. 

And now to conclude. Had it been possible at an ear- 



GENERAL SUMMARY. 363 

lier period to point to the developments which have been 
noticed in this place, or had the argument founded upon 
them been already employed in vain, no other result could 
have been anticipated for the present attempt than such as 
has attended the labours of those to whom it was given in 
past times to bear witness to holy truth. The appointed 
word would have been spoken ; but it would have been 
spoken without effect. There is, however, something so 
appalling in the facts which it has been reserved to us for 
the first time to contemplate, and which seem to indicate so 
plainly the approach of that final contest between the 
Church and the Enemy, of which Holy Scripture speaks, 
that we cannot but hope that at least some few of our bre- 
thren may learn at length to understand their true position, 
and be led to seek shelter within the Ark of God from the 
torrents which are beginning to pour themselves on every side. 
Hitherto hath the Lord " covered the deep, and restrained 
the floods thereof;" but even now the storm which shall 
strew the earth with wrecks is rising, and gathers blackness 
day by day : already there are around us the tokens at least 
of that final apostacy towards which thej world is gradually 
tending, and of which our Lord has warned all men in the 
awful words, " When the Son of Man cometh, shall He find 
faith on the earth ?" And we of this generation seem to be 
summoned to choose our side, whilst yet we may to know 
our enemies, stripped at length of every disguise, and to 
prepare our hearts for that conflict, in which, though we 
stumble, we shall rise up again, though we fall, we shall 
surely triumph ; " for their rock is not as our Rock, even 
our enemies themselves being judges. For their vine is of 
the vine of S9dom, and of the fields of Gomorrah; their 
grapes are grapes of gall, their clusters are bitter. Their wine 
is tUe poison of dragons, and the cruel venom of asps .... 
their foot shall slide in due time ; for the day of the cala- 
mity is at hand, and the things that shall come upon them 
make haste." 



INDEX. 



A. 

Abbott, 222 
Admissions of Adversaries, 183 
Adrian, . . 210 
Adversaries, admissions of, 183 
" Adversary, the " . 182 
Aerius, .... 263 
" Ages of Darkness and Er- 
ror," . . . 133 
Alfbnsus de Castro, . 19 
Ambrose, . 55, 75, 82, 176 
America, United States of, 335 
Ammianus Marcellinus, 154 
Ammon, . . 277 
Amyraut, .... 194 
Anabaptists, . . . 271 
Andrewes, ... 87 
Angel-Bishops, . . 74 
" " thrones of, . 74 
" Angelic. Glory," . . 101 
" " Imitations of, 101 
Angels and Bishops Identical, 74 
Angels and Priests, . 75 
" of the Churches, . 61 
Anicetus, ... 69 
Ansehn, .... 24 
Antichrist, coming of, 299, 354 
Antiquity, evidence of, . 90 
Apocryphal writings, . 55 
Apostasy, modern, . . 29 
Apostasy of Rome, . 185 
APOSTXES 

" and Bishops the same, 86 
" third order of Clergy, 78, 98 

" thrones of, . . 123 

" titles of, ... 81 

Apostolical Canons, . 148 

" " date of, . 149 
" " Witnesses 

for, . . . 151, 160 
Apostolical or Episcopal 

Succession, . 138, 143 

Apostolical tradition, . 138 



Aquinas, .... 37 
Archelaus and Manes, . 158 
Arianism, .... 261 
Arians, .... 21, 155 
Arminians, . . . 327 
ASIA 

" Angels of, . . 57, 60 

" Churches of, . . 56 

Asian Angels, case of, . 56 

Assumptions of Separatists, 184 

Athanasius, 144, 152, 181, 357 

Augustan Confession, . 229 

Augustin, 19, 23, 24, 30, 37, 57, 

74, 102, 139, 171 

B. 

Bacon, .... 146 
Bancroft, .... 87 
Baptists in the United States, 338 
Barnabas, .... 51 
Basil, . 18, 24, 157, 176 

Basnage, . . . 180 
Baxter, . . . 244,307 
Beaven, . . . 132 

Belgium, .... 326 
Bellarmin, . . .82, 149 
Bernard, . . . 177 

Berne, Synod of, . . 282 
Beveridge, ... 87 

Beza, 50, 59, 116, 189, 191, 

200, 224 
BIBLE 

" arrangement of, . 54 

" explanation of the term, 54 

" read in Churches, . 54 

Bilson, . 44, 50, 56, 73, 87 

BISHOPS 

" and Angels, . . 74 

" and Apostles the same, 84, 85 
" and Presbyters identical, 79 
" authority of, . . 163 
" from the Pope, . . 213 
" in the place of the Apos- 
tles, ... 168 



366 



INDEX. 



BISHOPS like the Jewish 

High Priest, . . 104 
" of Rome, . . 130 

" opposition to, . . 165 
" Rulers of the Clergy and 

People, . . . 119 
Blondel, . . .68, 239 
Bochart, . . .68, 243 
Boehmer, G8 

Bossuet, . . 267, 294 
Bramball, 50, 72, 87, 207, 

238, 304 

Brentius, ... 201 
Brett, . . 35, 59, 228 

Bucer, . . 50, 63, 203, 232 
Buddasus, . . . 261 

Bull, . . .49, 174 

Bullinger, . . 65, 197 

Burges, .... 247 
Burghley, . . . 146 

Burnet .... 52 
Burton, Lectures of, . . 109 
Butler, . . . 22, 36 

C. 

Calamy, . . . .244 
Caldonius, . . . 163 

Calixtus, ... 65 
Calvin, 42, 50, 139, 196, 202, 

215, 284 

Calvin's Ecclesiastical Re- 
public, ... 76 
Campeggio, Cardinal, . 231 
" Candlesticks, seven," . 57 
Candlish, ... 329 
Canon of Scripture, . . 54 
11 " difference 

concerning, . . 54 

Canons of the Church of 

England, . . .172 
Carleton, ... 271 
Caroli, . . . .232 
Cartwright, . . . 245 
Casaubon, . . . 239, 268 
Catechism of Calvin, . 288 
Catholic teaching, . . 135 
Chalcedon, Council of, . 48 

Chamier, . . . 68 

Channel Islands, . . 314 
Character of the evidence of 

Antiquity, ... 90 
Charles I. ... 87 

Chemnitz, . . .204 



Chillingworth, . . 272 

Cholmondeley, . . .238 

" Christian Priesthood," 97, 104 

Chrysostom, 24, 33, 82, 176 

" CHURCH," the . 13, 46 

" Accidents of, . . 13 

" Antiquity of, . . 14 

" Christian, . . 26 

" Discipline of, . . 13 

" Dominion of, . . 27 

" Endurance of, . . 27 

" Essence of, . . 13 

" Existence of, depends 

on Episcopacy, . 93 
" Founded upon Bishops, 165 
" Government oi^ . . 13 
" Honour of, . . 27 
" Impregnable, . . 28 
" Polity of, . . 13 

" Privileges of, . . 27 
" Rulers, power of, . 126 
" Union, ... 97 
" Voice of, . . 55 

" Without Bishops, no 

church, . . 177 
" Churchmen's Wrangles," 92 
Clarendon, . . . 247 
Claude, . . 189, 193, 199 
Clemens Alexandrinus, 24, 

40, 101, 133 

Clement of Rome, . 94 

" Letter of, . . 95 
" Clerus corruptissimus," 208 
Collier, .... 84 

Collinson, . . . . -97 
Colton, Calvin, . 340, 342 
Colobium, . . . 122 

Communion with Christ on- 
ly through Bishops, 119 
Concessions of Romanists, 186 
Condition of the English Es- 
tablishment, . . 207 
Confession Augustan, . 229 
Confessions of Romanists, 206 
Consecration of James of 

Jerusalem, . . 150 

Consent of mankind, . 93 

Constantinople, Council of, 225 
Conybeare, . . . 278 
Coquerel, . . . 299, 300 
Core, gainsaying of, . 166 
Cornelius a Lapide, . . 170 



INDEX. 



367 



Council of Constantinople, 225 
Council of Lausanne, . 288 
Council of Trent, . . 212 
Councils, ... 92 

Cranmer, .... 133 
Crellius, ... 50 

Cyprian, 60, 144, 160, 169, 181 
" Letter to, from Rome, 164 
Cyril, . . 22,40,143 

D. 

" Daemonium Meridianum," 259 
Daille, . . . .216 
D'Alembert, . 285,291 

D'Aubigne Merle, . 279 

Deacon, .... 81 
Deering, . . . 249 
Denmark, .... 331 
Development of Modern 

Systems, . . 258 

De Wette, . . .279 

Diodati, Letter of, . . 197 
Dionysius of Corinth, . 123 
Dionysius the Areopagite, 47 
Discipline, Primitive, . 157 
Divinite du Jesus Christ, 286 
Doctrinal faith unprofitable, 174 
Doctrines from Inference, 36 
Dodwell, ... 26 

Donatists, . . . 155, 263 
Dort, Synod of, . 196, 326 
Downame, 51, 125, 170, 228 
Drelincourt, . . . 203 
Durell, . . . .215 
Dutch Church, . . 329 

E. 

Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, 41, 98 
" Orders, . 87, 105 
" Republic, . . 76 
Edwards, . 25, 259, 305, 309 
Eichliorn, . . -v . 277 
Empaytaz, . . . 286 

Encyclopedic des Sciences, 285 
England, . . . 302 
English Establishment, iso- 
lated and lonely, . 207 
Epaphroditus, . . 84 

EPHESUS 

" Angel of, . . 58 

" Church of, . . 57 

" First Bishop of, . 63 
" Prelate of, . . 48 
Epiphanius, . . 44, 143 



EPISCOPACY 

" by divine right, . 61 
" connection of, with 

Christianity, . 90 

" corruption of the disci- 
pline of Christ, 93,362 
" essential to the Church, 93 
" establishment of, . 91 
" invention of man, 90 

" necessary to the fulfil- 
ment of Prophecy, 93 
" rejection of, . . 67 
" want of, . . 205 
Episcopal case, . . 30 

" grace, . . . 176 
" Office and Order not 
found in the New 
Testament, . . 79 
" succession, . 138, 142 
" system, ... 26 
" Episcoporum Simise," 71 

Epistles of Ignatius, . 109 
" " genuineness of, 113 

Ernesti, Biblical criticism'of, 14 
Errors of Romanism, . 210 

Errors of Romanists, . 206 
Eusebius, . . . 48, 53 
EVIDENCE . . 90 

" Mystical, ..." .76 
" of Antiquity," . 90 

" Practical, . . 76 

" Summary of, . 250 

Evidence of Antiquity, char- 
acter of, . . . 223 
Evidence of Scripture, . 32 
Excommunication of Separa- 
tists from the Church of 
England, . . 172 

F. 

False system, ... 30 
Farel, .... 228 
Farnese, Cardinal, . . 183 
Fernex, discourse of, . 291 
Ferrier, Ambassador, . 209 
Field, .... 62 

" Foedissima Scandala," 210 
France, ... 293 

French Protestantism, 295, 296 
Froude's Remains, . 181 

Fuller Andrew, , . 263 

G. 
" Gainsaying of Core," 166 



368 



INDEX. 



Gallic Synods, . . 191 

Gangrsena, . . S58, 305 

Gauden, . . . .312 

General Question, . 183 

General Summary, . . 354 

GENEVA ... 76 

" Bible of, . . .289 

" Confession of, . 287 

" Liturgy of, . . 289 

" Pastors of, . 287,291 

" University of, . 288 

George, Prince of Anhalt, 195 

Germany, . . . 274 

Gibbon, . . .68, 152 

Gladstone, . . . 267 

Gnosticism, . . . 260 

Goepp, .... 299 

Gregoire, . . . 296 

Gregory Nazianzen, 17, 21, 96 

Gregory the Great, . 75 

Grotius, . . 190, 238 

Gualter, . . . .197 

Guicciardini, . . 209 

H. 

Hacket, . . . .224 
Haldane, Letter of, . 289 
Hales, .... 248 
Hall, . . 44,61,71,310 
Hall, Basil, Travels of, 349 

Hallam, . . 209,266 

Hammond, . . . 170 
Heathens, Witnesses for the 

Apostolical Canons, 151 
Hegesippus, . . 39, 123 
Heinrichs, ... 278 
Henderson, . . . 247 
Heretics, Witnesses for the 

Apostolical Canons, 155 
Heskyn, .... 269 
Heylyn, . . . .227 
Hickes, . . 18, 59, 317 
Hilary, ... 21, 97 

HoadJey on Scriptural inter- 
pretation, . . .16 
Holland, . . . .326 
Hooker, . . 18,61,62,87 
Hungary, . . .330 

IGNATIUS, . . 39, 63, 108 
" Epistles of, not genuine, 113 
" Letter to Ephesus, . 63 
" " Philadelphia, 111 



" 

" 
" 



IGNATIUS, Letter to Polycarp, 66 
" Smyrna, . 108 
" the Magnesians, . 131 
" the Trallians, . Ill 
" Imitations of the Angelic 

glory," . . . .101 
Independentism, . . 312 
IndifFerentists, . . .329 
Indulgences, . . . 208 
Inference, doctrines of, . 36 
Interpretation of Scripture, 16 
Introduction, . . .13 
Ireland, .... 324 
IRENJEUS, . . . 127, 132 
" Letter of, to Florinus, 127 
" Workof,againstHerelics,128 
Irish Presbyterians, . . 325 
Ischyras, .... 357 

J . 

Jablonski, . . . .68 
JAMES OF JERUSALEM 

" Case of, . . .32 
" Consecration of, . 150 
" Head of the Church, . 41 
" Not an Apostle, . 84 
Jerome, 25, 36, 40, 48, 55, 83, 

101,144,166,169 
JERUSALEM 

" Bishops of, . . . 41 
" Episcopal government 

of, ... 134 

" Meeting at, . 33 

" Name of, changed to ^Elia, 35 

Jewish High Priest, . . 104 

" System, . . 26 

Jews,Witnesses for the Apos- 

tolical Canons, . . 153 
Jortin, .... 112 
Julian, Witness for the Apos- 

tolical Canons, . . 154 

" Jure divino," . . 87 

Jurieu, . . . .294 

Justin Martyr, . . 119, 151 

" " Interpretation of 

the Apocalypse by, . 121 

Kett's Lectures, . . . 115 
Knox, John, . . . 317 
Kunol, . . . .277 

L. 

Labesse, .... 195 
Lactantius, -. . . 88, 131 



INDEX. 



369 



Langlet, .... 243 
Lardner, . . . .> 42 
Laud, . . . . .87 
Lausanne, Council of . 288 
Law, Letter of, to Hoadley, 20 
Lawson, . . . 321,322 
Le Clerc, . . . .204 
Leibnitz, ... 25 

Leontius, . . .48 
Leo the Great, . . 150 

Leo X. Pope, . . .208 
Leslie, . . .27, 81, 255 
Liberius, . . . .83 
Limborch, . . 15, 52 
Lord's prayer, . . . 321 
Lowth on Church power, 24 
Luciferians, . . .157 

Lucretius, . . . 285 
Luther, . . . .229 

M. 

Macedonians, . . . 155 
Magdeburg, Centuriators of, 69 
Maimbourg, . 180, 212, 218 
Maitland's Waldenses, . 331 
Malan, . . . 287,291 
Manes, .... 158 
Manichaeans, . . . *155 
Mankind, consent of, . . 93 
Marshal, .... 245 
Martyr, Peter, . . . . 233 
" Martyrs, our two," . 87 
Maurice, . . . .136 
Meeting at Jerusalem, . 33 
Melancthon, . 187, 200, 22ei 
Meletians, . . . .262 
Meletius, . . . 261 

Mennais, De la, . . 287, 291 
Merle D'Aubigne . . 279 
Metaphysical being of Ro- 
manism, . . . 206 
Methodists in the United 

States, .... 339 
Mezeray, . . .208 

Miller's Letters, . . . 118 
Milton, . . 198 

Ministerial Office, ; 103 

Minucius Felix, . . 153 
Modern Systems, . . 258 

" ' " development of, 258 

Moehler, testimony of, . 213 
Molinseus, . . . .68 
Montanists, . . .157 



" Moral being" of Romanism, 206 
Morell, . . . . 198 
Morisanus, . . .170 
Morton, . . . 49,58 
Mosheim, . . 92, 115, 332 
Moulin, Peter Du, . 190, 234 
Mouravief, history by, . 335 
Muncer, Thomas, . . 269 

N. 

Names applied to the Apos- 
tles, .... 81 
Nature of the Evidence, . 90 
Neander, .... 280 
Netherlands, . . . 326 
New England, . . 347 

Nicephorus, . . .41 
Novatian, . . . 159 

O. 

Objections noticed, . . 76 
Observances from Inference, 36 
GEcolampadius, . . 272 
Onderdonk, Testimony of, . 336 
Onesimus, Angel of the 

Church at Ephesus, . 64 
Onuphrius, testimony of . 211 
Optatus, . . . .75 
Order, ecclesiastical, . 87 
Origen, . . 17, 20, 23 
Otho, . . . .211 
Owen, John, . . 224, 308 

P. 

Pacian, . . . . 79, 85 
Pantaenus, .... 133 
Pantheistic theory, . . 276 
Papal supremacy, . ..159 
Papias, .... 38 
Pareus, . . . 58, 65 
Parker, . . . 81,222 
Pascal, . . . .241 
Paschal Controversy, . 125 
Paul III. Pope, . . .211 
Pearson, .... 114 
Felling, . . . .49 
Pembroke j . . . 248 
Pergamos, Angel of, . 58 

Peter Martyr, . . . 233 
Pfaffius, " . . . . .63 
Photius, .... 40 
Pius, Pope, .... 122 
Plancke, . . . 299 

Platina, . .211 

Poland, .... 326 



370 



INDEX. 



Polybius, .... Ill 
Polycarp, ... 66 

" Letter of, . . .110 

" "Throne "of, . 66 
Polycrates, . . . .125 
Polycrates, Metropolitan, 127 
Pothinus, . . . .127 
Potter, .... 60 
Power of Church Rulers, . 126 
PRELATE Consecration of, 48 
" Deposition of, 48 

" Prelate's Asses," . .200 
Presbyterianism, . 251,316 

" in Scotland, . . 316 
Presbyterians in England, 312 

" in the United States, 340 
Presbyters, ... 81 
Presbyters and Bishops the 

same, ... 79 

Presbytery, ... 29 
Priesthood, Christian, . 97 

Primitive discipline, . 158 

Private judgment dangerous, 61 
Prophecy, fulfilment of, de- 
pendent on Episcopacy, 93 
" Protestant Element," 352 

Protestantism, . . 362 

" rejected, . . .292 
Prussia, ... 332 

Puritans, .... 337 
Pusey, . . . 275, 319 
" Putida objectio," . . 79 

Q. 

Quakers in the United States, 347 
Question, general, . 183 

R. 

Raynaldus, 

Rebellion against God, . 

Recapitulation, . . 354 

Reformation, causes of, 212 

Reformed Dutch Church, 329 

REFORMERS . . 185 

, " admissions of, . . 185 

" condition of, . 185 

" justification of their 

acts, . . 185, 197 
Religious reserve, . 119 

Remigius, .... 76 
Remonstrants, . . 326 
Reserve in Religion, . 119 

Revelation by John, char- 
acter of, . . 60 



210 
"165 



Revelation divine, obscure, 16 
Reynolds, . . 70,244 

Ridley, . . . . 173 
Rivet, . . . .228 
Robertson, . . . 194 
Rcehr, .... 276 
ROMAN CHURCH 

" " Corruptions of, 203 

" " Errors of, 206 

Roman Clergy, Letter of, to 

Cyprian, . . 164 

ROMANISM 

" " Metaphysical being" 

of, . . . 206 

" " Moral being " of, 206 
Romanists, concessions of, 186 

" confessions of, . . 206 
Rome, Bishops of, . . 130 
Rose, . . . . 275 

Rue bet, . . . 225 

Ruinart, .... 69 
Rulers of the Church, power 

of, . . . . 126 
Russell's History, . . 317 
Russia, .... 334 

S. 

Sabb'atius, ... 160 
Sacerdotal office, . . 103 
" Saints during fifteen ages," 119 



32, 239, 240 
87 
206 
. 278 
murder and 

. 173 



Salmasius, 

Sanderson, . 

Saravia, 

Scherer, 

Schism, like 
idolatry,. 

Schleiertnacher, 

Scotland, . . . 315 
" wickedness of, . . 320 

Scottish Presbyterianism, 324 

SCRIPTURE 

" Argument from, . 76 
" Canon of, . . 54 

" Difference concerning, 54 
" Evidence of, . 32 

" Interpretation of 15, 16 
" Obscurity of, . .17 
" Opinions concerning, 15 
" Requirements of, . 19 
" Silence of, . . 93 

" Texts of, Refer to 
" Texts of Scripture" 

Scripture Evidence, . 32 



INDEX. 



371 



Seckendorff, . . .234 
SEPARATISTS . . 166 
" Assumptions of, . 184 
" from the Church, 166 

" from the Church of 
England, excommuni- 
cated, . . 172 
Serpent Salve," . 72, 227 
Servetus, . . . 285 
Shaw, .... 73 
Silence of Scripture, . 93 
Sismondi . . . 301 
Skinner, . . . 319 
Smedley's History, . . 293 
Smith, Pye, ... 289 
SMYRNA 

" Angel of, . . 65 

" Church of, . . 58 

Socinian Philosophy, 78, 285 
Socinians in the U. States, 347 
Spondan, testimony of, . 208 
Starck, .... 282 
" Stars, seven," . . 57 

Strype, .... 223 
Stuart, Moses, 274, 278, 351 
Sturtnius, . . . 219 
Summary, . . . 177,250 
Summary, general, . 354 
Superintendent, . . 277 
Sweden^ . . . 331 
Swedish doctrines, . . 332 
Switzerland, . 282^ 288 

Symeon, ... 70 

Synod of Dort, . 196,328 

" of Ulster, . . 325 
Synods, Gallic, . . .191 
Syriac version of the New 

Testament, . . 84 

T. 

Taylor, Jeremy, . 14, 48, 87 
Teaching, divine, . 17 

Tertullian, 19, 101, 121, 134, 147 
Testament, New, . 23 

" Teterrimum nomen," 198 

TEXTS OF SCRIPTURE CITED 
Psalm xliv., . . .76, 141 
Isaiah liv. 5, 26 

Joel ii., .... 77 
Matthew xviii. 17, 18, 27 

John vii. 17, . . 14 

John x. 24, ... 20 
John xvi. 13, . 2S 



John xx. 23, 
Acts xii. 8, 
Acts xii. 17, 
Acts xv. 19, . 
Acts xxi. . 
Romans xv. 8, 
1 Corinthians ix. J6, 
1 Corinthians xi. 10, 

1 Corinthians xv. 

2 Corinthians iii. 6, 

2 Corinthians viii. 23, 
Galatians i., . 
Galatians i. 19, . 
Galatians ii. 12, 



. 27 
34 

, 35 
33 

. 34 
81 

. 81 
75 

. 32 
81 

. 85 
32 

. 85 
34 
Ephesians i. 23, and iii. 10, 

andiv.12, . . 27 
Ephesians iv., ... 83 
Philippians iv. 3, . 94 

2 Thessalonians ii. 15, 23, 37 
1 Timothy i. 3, . .44 

1 Timothy iii., . 56, 86, 176 
1 Timothy iii. 15, . 14, 27 
1 Timothy iv. 11, . . 44 
1 Timothy v. 19, . . 44 

1 Timothy v. 20, 21, 22, 45 

1 Timothy vi. 14, . . 46 

2 Timothy i. 6, . . 43 
2 Timothy ii. 2, . 38, 44 
Titus i., ... 53 
Titus i. 5, . . . .50 
Titus ii. 15, ... 51 
Titus iii. 10. ... 51 
Hebrews vi. 1, 2, . . 43 

1 Peter v. 1, . = - 81 

2 Peter iii. 2, . 23 
2 Peter iii. 16, . . . 14 
2 John 12, . . . 23 
2 and 3 John, ... SI 
Revelation i. 3, . . 57 
Revelation ii. 9, 10, . . 58 
Revelation xxi. 12, 73 
Revelation xxii. 9, .81 
Theodoret, . . 56, 83 
Theophylact, . . 83 
Thomassin, . . . 121 
Thorndike, . . 104, 142 
" Thrones" of the Angel- 
Bishops, . 74 

Thyatira, Angel of, . . 59 
Tillemont, ... 65 

Tillotson, . . 77,210 



372 



INDEX. 



TIMOTHY 

" An ecclesiastical Judge, 44 
" A Pontifex, or High 

Priest, . . 47 
" Assumption of Paul's 

office, ... 45 
" Authority of, peculiar 

and eminent, . . 45 

" Bishop of Ephesus, 46 

" Case of, . . 42 

" Gift of, ... 43 

" Ordination of, . 43 
" Power to convey his 

"gift," . . 45 

" Subject to no man, 47 

" Supremacy of, . 44 

Titles of Apostles, . .81 

TITUS 

" Admonition by, . 52 

" Case of, . . . 49 

" Excommunication by, 52 

" Interposition of, . 50 

" Ordination by, . 52 

" Ordination of, . 49 

" Power of, . . 51 

Tracts for the Times, . 323 

Tradition, . - 14,37,138 

Trent, Council of, . 212 

Trinity, type of, . . 76 

Turretin, ... 197 

Turrian, .... 14 

" Two Martyrs," . . 87 

Type of the Trinity, . . 76 

u 

Ulster, Synod of, . . 325 



UNITED STATES . . 335 
" Baptists of, . . 338 
" Methodists of, . . 339 
" Presbyterians of, . 340 
" Quakers of, . - 347 
" Socinianism, spread of, 347 
" Universalists of, . 349 
Universalism in the United 

States, ... 349 
University of Geneva, . 288 
Usher, .... 63 
Usuard, .... 64 

V. 

Vaudois ... 330 

Vedelius, . 15, 16, 65, 228 
Vernet's Theology, . 288 
Vincent of Lerins, . 31, 145 
Viret, .... 228 
Vitringa, . . . . t 61 
Vorstius, History by, - 328 
Vossius, .... 66 

W. 

Waldenses, . . . 330 

Wegscheider, . . . 281 

Westminster Confession of 

Faith, . . .325 

Whitgift, . A . . . 41, 53 

Winwood's Memorials, 329 
Woodhead, . . . 65 

Y. 

Yelverton, . . .206 

Z. 

Zanchy, ... 234 

Zosimus, , 152 

Zuingle, ... 228 



THE END. 



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THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN ENGLAND AND 

AMERICA. 

THREE LECTURES. I. The Church in England and America Apos- 
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BY 

JOHN D. OGILBY, D. D. 

(St. Mark's Church, Bowery,) Professor of Ecclesiastical History in the General 
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" I believe One Catholic and Apostolic Church." JVicene Creed. 

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GENERAL THEOL. SEMINARY, 
March 23, 1844. 

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sects ; of the great value and advantages of the Liturgy ;. and also a 
succinct account of the various Festivals and Fasts and Holy Sea- 
sons ; and to the sermons are appended notes from the writings of 
Hooker, Barrow, Taylor, Pearson, Chillingworth, Leslie, Horsley, 
Hobart, and other standard divines, illustrating and enforcing the 
doctrines contained in them. The book is well adapted to the pres- 
ent distracted state of the public mind, to lead the honest inquirer to 
a full knowledge of the trutli as it is in Jesus, and to give a correct 
view of the position occupied by the Church. 

The following is the copy of a letter of recommendation, by the 
Right Rev. Bishop Onderdonk, of the Diocese of New York : 

" Having great confidence in the qualifications of the Rev. Jesse 
A. Spencer for pastoral instruction in the Church of God, from a 
personal acquaintance with him as an alumnus of the General The- 
ological Seminary of the Protestant Episcopal Church, and as -a 
Deacon and Presbyter of my Diocese, it gives me pleasure to learn, 
that in his present physical inability to discharge the active duties of 
the ministry, he purposes publishing a select number of his sermons. 
Nothing doubting that they will be found instructive and edifying to 
those who sincerely desire to grow in the knowledge and practice of 
the gospel, I commend them to the patronage of the Diocese ; and 
this the more earnestly, as their publication may be hoped to be a 
source of temporal comfort and support to a very worthy servant of 
the altar, afflicted, at an early period of his ministry, with loss of bodi- 
ly power to be devoted to its functions." 



D. Appleton fy Co. have this day published 

SERMONS, 

PREACHED AT CLAPHAM AND GLASBURY. 

BY THE REV. CHARLES BRADLEY, A. M. 
Two volumes of English Edition in one. Price $1 50. 

This volume contains forty-one Sermons, which are thus en- 
titled : 

The End of Man's Earthly History. The Laborers Standing Idle 
at the Eleventh Hour. The Building of the Heavenly Temple. 
The Vicissitudes of Human Life. The Prayer of Moses for a view 
of God. The Two Builders. The Unbelief of the Samaritan Lord. 
The Funeral at the Gate of Nain. The Compassion of Christ for 
the Widow of Nain. The Widow's Son Restored to Life. Sins 
Remembered by God. Sins Blotted Out by God. The Character of 
the Pardoned. The Afflicted and Pardoned Sinner. The Message 
sent to St. Paul in the Storm. The Condescension of God. The 
Foolish Virgins. The Rock at Horeb. The Streams from the Rock 
at Horeb. The Flowing of the Stream from Horeb. The Duties of 
Christians towards the Heathen. The Christian in the Wilderness. 
The Multitude FerJ in the Wilderness. The Lost Sheep Brought 
1 Home. The Complaint of St. Paul. The Final Glory of the Church. 
The History of Jonah's Gourd. The Risen Jesus questioning 
Peter's Love- The Christian Taught to Pray. The Peace of God 
Keeping the Heart. The Visit of the Wise Men of the East to 
Christ. The Plague in the Wilderness. The Rich Man and Lazarus. 
The Prayer of Christ for His Church. The Baptism of Christ. 
Tie Unbelief of Thomas. The Redeemed Sinner a Temple of God. 
The Woman of Canaan. The Cities of Refuge. The Promise of 
God to the Israelites att Sinai. 

The Sermons of tliis"iJiyine are much admired for their plain, yet 
chaste and elegant sty'l;6<they will be found admirably adapted for 
family reading and preaching, where no pastor is located. Recom- 
mendations might be given, if space would admit, from several of 
onr Bishops and Clergy also from Ministers of various denomi- 
nations. 

The following are a few of the English critical opinions of their 
merit : 

Bradley's Discourses are judicious and practical, scriptural and devout." Lowndes's 
British Librarian. 

" Very able and judicious." Rev. JE. Bickcrsleth. 

" Bradlcy's. style is sententious, pithy, and colloquial. He is simple, without 
being quaint ; and he almost holds conversation with his hearers, without descending 
from the dignity of the sacred chair." Eclectic Review. 

"We earnestly desire that every pulpit in the kingdom may ever he the vehicle of 
discourses as judicious and practical, as scriptural and devout as these." Christian 
Observer. 

Preparing for Press, by the same author, 

SSIACTICAE, SERStfZOEJS, 

for every Sunday throughout the year ; two Volumes of English 
edition in one. 



D. Apphton 4* Go. have just published 

THE SACKED ORDER AND OFFICES OF 

EPISCOPACY 

ASSERTED AND MAINTAINED : 

BY THE RIGHT REVl JEREMY TAYLOR, D. D. 

One elegant Volume, 16mo. Price $1 00. 

CONTEST* OF THE SACRED OBDER AND OFFICES OF EPISCOPACY, 

By Divine Institution, Apostolical Tradition, and Catholic practice, together with 
their Titles of Honour, Secular Employment, Manner of Election, Delegation of 
their Power, and other appendant questions, asserted against the Aenans and 
Acephali, new and old. 

SECTION I. Christ did institute a Government in his Church. II. This Govern- 
ment was first committed to the Apostles by Christ. III. With a Power of joining 
others, and appointing Successors in the Apostolau._iv. The Succession into the 
ordinary Office of Apostolate is made by Bishops. V. And Office. VI. Which 
Christ himself hath made distinct from Presbyters. VIX. Giving-to Apostles a Power 
to do some Office perpetually necessary, which to others Vq gave not. V1I1. And 
Confirmation. IX. And Superiority of Jurisdiction. X. fe that Bishops are Suc- 
cessors in the Office of Apostleship, according to the general Tn e nt of Antiquity. 
XI. And .particularly of St. Peter. XII. And the Institution of Episcopacy, as well 
as the Apostolate, expressed to be Divine, by primitive Authority. xm. I n pursu- 
ance of the Divine Institution, the Apostles did ordain Bishops in several Churches 

XIV. St. Timothy at Ephesus. XV. St. Titus at Crete. XVI. St. Mark at Alexan- 
dria. XVn. St. Linus and St. Clement at Rome. XVIII. St. Polycarp at Smyrna 
and divers others. XIX. So that Episcopacy is at least an Apostolical Ordinance, of 
the same authority with many other Points generally believed. XX. And was n 
Office of Power and great authority. XXI. Not lessened by the Assistance and Coun 
sel of Presbyters. XXII. And all this hath been the Faith and Practice of Christen- 
dom. yXTTT. Who first distinguished. Names, used before. in common. XXIV. Ap- . 
propriating the word " Episcopus " or Bishop to the Supreme Church officer. XXV. 
Calling the Bishop, and him only, the Pastor of the Church. XXVI. And Doctor. 
XXVII. And Pontifex. XXVIH. And these were a.distinct Order from the rest. 
XXIX. To which the Presbyterate was but a Degree. -XXX. There being a peculiar 
Manner of Ordination to a Bishopric. XXXI. To which Presbyters never did assist 
by imposing hands. XXXII. For Bishops had a Power distinct and superior to that 
of Presbyters. As of Ordination. XXXIII. And Confirmation. XXXIV. And Juris- 
diction. Which they expressed in Attributes of Authority and great Power. XXXV. 
.Requiring universal Obedience to be given to Bishops by Clergy and Laity. XXXVI. 
Appointing them to be Judges of the Clergy, and Spiritual Causes of the Laity. 
XXXVII. Forbidding Presbyters to officiate without Episcopal License. XXXVIII. 
Reserving Church-Goods to Episcopal Dispensation XXXIX. Forbidding Presbyters 
to leave their own Diocess, or to travel, without Leave of the Bishop. XL. And the 
Bishop had Power to prefer which of his Clerks he pleased. XLI. Bishops only did 
vote in Councils, and neither Presbyters nor People. XLII. And the Bishop had a 
Propriety in the Persons of his Clerks. XLIII. Their Jurisdiction wte over many 
Congregations or Parishes XLIV. And was aided by Presbyters, but not impaired. 

XLV. So that the Government of the Church by Bishops was believed necessary. 

XL VI. For they are Schismatics that separate from their Bishop XLVII. And 

Heretics. XL VIII. And Bishops were always, in the Church, Men of great Honour. 

XLIX. And trusted with Affairs of Secular Interest. L. And therefore were enforced 
to delegate the Power and put others in substitution. LI. But they were ever Cler- 
gymen, for there never were any Lay-Elders in any Church-office heard of in the 
Church. 



D. Appleton Sf Co. have just published 

SERMONS 
BEARING ON SUBJECTS OF THE DAY. 

BY JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, B. D. 

One elegant volume, 12mo. Price S$l 25. 

This volume contains twenty-six Sermons, which are thus entitled : 
Work of the Christian. Saintliness not forfeited by the Penitent. 
Our Lord's last Supper and his first. Dangers to the Penitent. The 
Three Offices of Christ. Faith and Experience. Faith and the 
World. The Church and the World. Indulgence in religious privi- 
leges. Connexion between personal and public improvement. 
Christian Nobleness. Joshua a type of Christ and his followers. 
Elisha a type of Christ and his followers. The Christian Church a 
continuation of the Jewish. The Principle of continuity between the 
Jewish and Christian Churches. The Christian Church an imperial 
power. Sanctity the token of the Christian Empire. Condition of 
the Members of the Christian Empire. The Apostolical Christian. 
Wisdom and Innocence Invisible presence of Christ. Outward and 
inward Notes of the Church Grounds for steadfastness in our reli- 
gious profession. Elijah the prophet of the latter days. Feasting in 
captivity. The parting of friends. 

" A volume of Sermons, bearing on Subjects of the Day,' from 
one who lias done more than any other man to invest these subjects 
with absorbing interest, will naturally be sought after by persons of 
all religious parties. To us the volume is particularly opportune, as 
it gives us a good occasion to renew, in this number of our journal, all 
that we htive presumed hitherto to say in favor of Mr. Newman's 
writings ; and to add that since the American issue of the ' Parochial 
Sermons' our conviction of their excellence has been .strengthened 
by an observation of their practical effects. What influence they may 
have when they are read in the temper of cavilling criticism which 
tortures particular expressions to detect ' heresy,' we cannot tell ; but 
we have reason to believe that many honest and good hearts have 
received from them that heavenly seed which springs up and bears 
fruit to eternal life. To us they seem to express the very mind of 
CHRIST, and the reproaches which are heaped on their author merely 
remind us of the words, ' If they have called the Master of the house 
Beelzebub, how much more they of his household.' Those who have 
read the ' Parochial Sermons' with the desire of spirituai profit, will 
not be much moved by the question, * Have any of the Rulers believed 
in him ?' but will rather pray that the ' rulers' who denounce so emi- 
nent a saint be not themselves stricken with the judicial blindness of 
the Scribes and Pharisees. Thus far we are acquainted with the 
present volume, (having read but three of its sermons,) chiefly through 
the pages of hostile critics ; and as their quotations, embracing, doubt- 
less, the passages deemed by them the most objectionable, have had 
an efl'ect on us the opposite of that intended by the critics, we feel 
that we run no risk, but do much good in warmly commending the 
volume to our readers." The Churchman. 



Valuable Works published by D. Appleton 4" Co. 
GENERAL HISTORY OF CIVILIZATION 

In Europe, from the fall of the Roman Empire, to the French Revolution. By M. 
Guizot, Professor of History to the Faculty des Lettres of Paris. Printed from the 
second English edition, with Occasional Notes, by C. S. Henry, D. D., of New 
York. One handsome volume, 12mo. $1 00. 

HISTORY OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 

Translated from the French of M. Laurent De L'Ardeche, Member of the Institute of 
France. Illustrated with Five Hundred, Spirited Plates, after designs by Horace 
Vernet, and twenty Original Portraits of the most distinguished Generals of France. 
2 vols. 8 vo. $4 00 

THE NATURAL HISTORY OF SOCIETY 

IN THE BARBAROUS AMD CIVILIZED STATE. 

An Essay towards Discovering the Origin and Course of Human Improvement. By 
W. Cooke Taylor, LL. D., &c., of Trinity College, Dublin. Handsomely printed 
on fine paper. 2 vols. 12mo. $225. 

"The design of this work is to determine, from an examination of the. various 
forms in which society has been found, what was the origin of civilization ; and 
under what circumstances those attributes of humanity which in one country become 
the foundation of social happiness, are in another perverted to the 'production of gen- 
eral misery." . 

CARLYLE ON HISTORY AND HEROES. 

On Heroes, Hero- Worship, and the Heroic in History. Six Lectures, reported with 
Emendations and Additions, by Thomas Carlyle, author of the French Revolution, 
Sartor Resartus, &c. Elegantly printed in 1 vol. 12mo. Second edition. 1 00. 

" And here we must close a work such as we have seldom seen the like of, and 
one which redeems the literature of our superficial and manufacturing period. It is 
one to purify our nature, expand our ideas, and exalt our souls. Let no library or 
book-room be without it ; the more it is studied, the more it will be esteemed." 
Literary Gazette. 

SOUTHEY'S POETICAL WORKS. 

The Complete Poetical Works of Robert Southeyj Esq. LL. D. The ten volumes 
London Edition, in one elegant royal 8vo. volume, with a fine portrait and vignette. 
$3 50. 

*** This edition, which the author has arranged and revised with the same care 
as if it were intended for posthumous publication, includes many pieces which either 
have never before been collected, or have hitherto remained unpublished. 

TOUR THROUGH TURKEY AND PERSIA. 

Narrative of a Tour through Armenia, Kurdistan, Persia, and Mesopotamia, with an 
Introduction and Occasional Observations upon the Condition of Mohammedanism 
and Christianity in those countries. By the Rev. Horatio Southgate, Missionary of 
the American Episcopal Church. 2 vols. 12mo. Plates, 2 00. 

THE LIFE OF ALEXANDER HAMILTON. 

Edited by his son, John C. Hamilton. 2 vols. 8vo. $5 00. 
" We cordially recommend the perusal and diligent study of these volumes, ex- 
hibiting, as they do, much valuable matter relative to the Revolution, the establish 
ment of the Federal Censtitution, and other important events "and annals of our coun- 
try." New-York Review. 

PICTORIAL VICAR OF WAKEFIELD. 

The Vicar of Wakefield. By Oliver Goldsmith. Illustrated with nearly 200 wood 
Engravings, making a beautiful volume, octavo, of about 350 pages. $1 25. 
" We love to turn back over these rich old'classics of our own language, and rcju- 
I'inate ourselves by the never-failing associations which a re-perusal always calls up. 
Let any one who has not read this immortal tale for fifteen-or twenty years, Iry the 
experiment, and we will warrant, that lie rises up from the task the pleasure, we 
should have said a happier and a better man." Sa,v. Rep. 

PICTORIAL ROBINSON CRUSOE. 

The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. By Daniel De Foe. With a Memoir 
of the Author, and an Essay on his Writings, illustrated with nearly 500 spirited 
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ume, octavo, of 500 pages $1 75 
" Was there ever any thing wiitten by mere man that the reader wished longer, 

except Robinson Crusoe, Don Quixotic, and the Pilgrim's Progress." Dr. Johnson. 



APPLE TON'S 

TALES FOR THE PEOPLE 

AND THEIR CHILDREN. 



'Hie greatest care has been taken in selecting the works of which the collection ia 
composed, so that nothing either mediocre in talent, or immoral in tendency, is ad 
mitted. Each volume is printed on the finest paper, is illustrated with an elef ant 
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The following' are comprised in the series, uniform in size and style ' 

NO SENSE LIKE COMMON SENSE. By Mary Howitt. 37} cents. 

ALICE FRANKLIN ; a Tale. By Mary Howitt. 37} cents. 

THE POPLAR GROVE ; or, Little Harry and his Uncle Benjamin. By Mrs. Copley. 37} eta. 

EARLY FRIENDSHIPS. By Mrs. Copley. 37} cents. 

THE CROFTON BOYS. By Harriet Martineau. 37}. 

THE PEASANT AND THE PRINCE. By Harriet Martineau. 371 cents. 

NORWAY AND THE NORWEGIANS ; or, Feats on the Fiord. By H. Martineau. 37i eta 

MASTERMAN READY ; or, the Wreck of the Pacific. Written for Young Peop.e Or 

Captain Marryatt. Three volumes ; each 37} cents. 
THE LOOKING-GLASS FOR THE MIND; or, Intellectual Mirror. An elegant collection 

of Delightful Stories and Tales: many plates. 50 cents. 

HOPE ON, HOPE EVER; or the Boyhood of Felix Law. By Mary Howitt. 37} cents. 
STRIVE AND THRIVE ; a Tale. By Mary Howitt. 37} cents. 

SOWING AND REAPING; or, What -will Come of It? By Mary Howitt. 37} cent*. 
WHO SHALL BE GREATEST? a Tale. By Mary Howitt. 37 cents. 
WHICH IS THE WISER? or, People Abroad. By Mary Howitt. 37}. 
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WORK AND WAGES ; or, Life in Service. By Mary Howitt. . 37} cents. 
i.'Mti DANGERS OF DINING OUT ; or, Hints to those who would make Home Happy 

To which is added the Confessions of-a Maniac. By Mrs. Ellis. 37} cents. 
SOMERVILLE HALL ; or Hints to those who wonld make Home Happy. To which is added 

the Rising Tide. By Mrs. Ellis. 37} cents 

FIRST IMPRESSIONS; or, Hints to' those who would make Home Happy. ByMrs.Elis. 37}. 
MINISTER'S FAMILY ; or, Hints to those who would make Home Happy* By Mrs. Eilis. 37}. 
THE TWIN SISTERS ; a Tale, By Mrs. Saiidham. 37} cents. 
TIRED OF HOUSE-KEEPING ; A Tale. By T. S. Arthur. 37} cents. 

" Of late years many writers have exerted their talents in juvenile literature, with great success. 
Miss Martineau has made political economy as .'amiliar to boys as it formerly was to statesmen. Our 
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tion of thought, which shows his heart is in his work. The stories of Mary Howitt, Harriet Martin- 
eau, Mrs. Copley, and Mrs. Ellis, which form a part of ' Tales for the People and their Children,' and 
a list of which we have prefixed to this article, will be found valuable additions to juvenile literature ; 
at the same time they may be read with profit by parents, for the good lessons they inculcate, and by 
all other readers for the literary excellence they display. 

"We wish they could be placed in the hands, and engraven on the minds of all the youth in the 
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CABINET EDITION OF THE POETS. 

ELEGANTLY PRINTED, UNIFORM IN SIZE AND STYLE. 

The most complete portable series of these well known anthoer ever published. 



COWPER'S COMPLETE POETICAL WORKS. 

The complete Poetical Works of Wm. Cowper, Esq., including the Hymns and 
Translations from Mad. Guion, Milton, &c., and Adam, a Sacred Drama, from tho 
Italian of Battista Andreini, with a Memoir of the Author, by the Rev. Henry 
Stebbing, A.M. Two elegantly printed volumesSOO pages, 16mo. with heautiful 

frontispieces. $1 75. . 

This is the only complete edition which is printed in one volume. 

Morality never found in genius a more devoted advocate than Cowper, nor has moral wisdom, in 
its plain and severe precepts, been ever more successfully combined with.the delicate spirit of poetry, 
than in his works. He was' endowed with all the powers -which a poet could want who was to be 
the moralist of the world the reprover, but not the satirist, of men the teacher of simple truths, 
which were to be rendered gracious without endangering their simplicity. " 

BURNS' COMPLETE POETICAL WORKS. 

The complete Poetical Works of Robert Burns, with Explanatory and Glossarial 
Notes, and a Life of the Author, by James Currie, M.D., uniform in style with 
Cowper. $1 25. v 

This is the must complete edition which has been published, and contains the whole of the poetry 
comprised in the edition lately edited by Cunningham, as well as some additional pieces ; and such 
Eotes have been added as are calculated to illustrate the manners and customs of Scotland, so as to 
lender the whole inqre intelligible to the English reader. 

" He owes nothing- to the poetry of other lands he is the offspring of the soil : he is as natural to 
Scotland as the heath is to her hills his variety is equal to his originality ; his humour, his gaiety, 
his tenderness and his pathos, come all in a breath ; they come freely, for they come of their o\vii 
accord ; the contrast is never offensive ; the comic slides easily into the serious, the serious into the 
tender, and the tender' into the pathetic." Allan Cunningham. 

" No poet, with the exception of Shakspeare, ever possessed the power of exciting the most varied 
and discordant emotions with such rapid transitions." Sir W. Scott. 

MILTON'S COMPLETE POETICAL WORKS. 

The complete Poetical Works of John Milton, with Explanatory Notes and a Life of 
the Author, by the Rev. Henry Stebbing, A.M. Beautifully Illustrated uniform 
in style' with Cowper, Bums, and Scott. $1 25. 

The Latin and Italian Poems are included in this edition. 
Mr. Stebbing's notes will be found verv useful in elucidating the learned allusions with which 

the text abounds, and they are also valuable for the correct appreciation with which the writer directs 

attention to the beauties of the Author. 

SCOTT'S POETICAL WORKS. 

The Poetical Works of Sir Walter Scott, Bart Containing Lay of the Last Mm- 
fitrel, Marmion, Lady of the Lake, Don Roderick, Rokeby, Ballads, Lyrics, and 
Songs, with a Life of the Author, uniform with Cowper, Burns, &e. $1 25. 

" Walter Scott is the most popular of all the poets of the present day and deservedly so. He de- 
clines that which is most easily and generally understood with more vivacity and effect than anj 
other writer. His style is clear, -flowing and transparent; his sentiments, of which his style is an 
easy and natural medium, are common to him with his readers. He selects a story such as is sure n 
please, full of incidents, characters, peculiar names, costume and scenery, and he tells it in a way' thai 
can offend no one. He never wearies or disappoints you. Mr. Scott has great intuitive power of 
feelirig, great vividness of pencil in placing external objects and events before the eye. What passe' 
in h poetry passes- much as it would have done in reality " ffazHlt 



EPISCOPAL BOOK ESTABLISHMENT. 



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OF 



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INCLUDING THE 

WRITINGS OF ANCIENT AND MODERN AUTHORS. 



JfKempis's Imitation. 
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Book of Com. Prayer. 
Bradley's Sermons. 
Burners Reformation. 

XXXIX Articles 
Churton's E.E. Church. 
Christmas Bells. 
Evans's Rectory of 

Valehcad. 
Fdber on Election. 
Gresley on Preaching. 

"' Eng. Churchman. 
Hare's Sermons. 
Hooker's Works. 
Kip's Double Witness. 
Lyra Apostolica. 
Magce on Atonement. 
Manning on Unity. 




Maurice on Kingdom 
of Christ. 

Newman's Sermons. 

Ogilby on Lay Baptism. 

Paget's Tales of the 
Village. 

Pearson on the Creed. 

Palmer on the Church. 

Sherlock's Practical 
Christian. 

Spinckes's Manual of 
Devotion. 

Spencer's Sermons. 

Sutton's Learn to Live. 
" " Die. 

" on Sacrament. 

Swart's Letters to God- 
child. 

Taylor's Golden Grove. 
" on Episcopacy. 

Wilson's SacraPrivata. 

Wilberforce's Eucha- 
ristica. 



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ALSO FOR SALE BY THE FOLLOWING EPISCOPAL BOOKSELLERS . 

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Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Appleton. fy Co. 
COMPLETE WORKS OF MR. RICHARD HOOKER; 

WITH AN ACCOUNT OF HIS LIFE AND DEAXH. 
BY ISAAC WALTON. 

ARKAPTGED BY THE REV. JOHN KEBLK, M, A. 

In two elegant octavo volumes. Price $4 00. 

CONTENTS. 

The Editor's Preface comprises a general surrey of the former edition of Hooker's 
Works, with Historical Illustrations of the period. After which, follows the Life of 
Hooker, by Isaac Walton. Those articles occupy nearly two-fifths of the first volume of 
the English edition. His chief work succeeds, on the " Lavs of Ecclesiastical Polity." 

It commences with a lengthened Preface designed as an Address " to them who seek the 
Reformation of the Laws and Orders Ecclesiastical of the Church of England." 

The discussion is divided into eight books, which include an investigation of the topics 
thus stated. 

1; Laws and their several kinds in general. . 

2. The use of the divine law contained in Scripture ; whether that be the only law 
which ought to serve for our direction in all things without exception ; or whether Scripture 
is the only rule of all things, which, in this life, may be done by men. 

3. Laws concerning Ecclesiastical Polity, whether the form thereof be in Scripture so 
set down that no addition or change is lawful : or whether, in Scripture, there must be 
of necessity contained a form of church polity, the laws whereof may in no wise be altered. 

4. General exceptions taken against the laws of our polity, as being popish, and banished 
out of certain refoimed churches ; or the assertion, that our form of church polity is cor 
rapted with popish orders, rites, and ceremonies, banished out of certain reformed churches, 
whose example therein we ought to have followed. 

5. The fifth book occupies two-fifths of the whole work, subdivided into eighty-one 
chapters, including all the principal topics which, in the sixteenth century, were the sub- 
jects of polemical disputation between the members of the Established Church of England 
and the Puritans. The character and extent of the research can accurately be under- 
stood from this general delineation. Our laws that concern the public religious duties 
of the church, and the manner of bestowing that Order, which enableth men, in sundry 
degrees' and callings, to execute the same ; or the assertion that touching the several du- 
ties of the Christian religion, there is among us much superstition retained in them ; and 
concerning persons who, for performance of those duties, aie endued with the power of 
ecclesiastical orderj and laws and proceedings according thereunto, are many ways herein 
also corrupt. 

6. The Power of Jurisdiction, which the Reformed platform claimeth unto lay-elders, 
with others ; or the assertion, that our laws are corrupt and repugnant to the laws of God, 
in matters belonging to the power of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, in that we have not, 
throughout all churches, certain lay-elders established or the exercise of that power. 

7. The Power of Jurisdiction, and the honour which is annexed thereunto in Bishops, or 
the assertion, that there ought not to be in the Church, Bishops endued with such authority 
and honour as ours are. 

8. The power of ecclesiastical dominion, or supreme authority, which with us, the high- 
est governor or prince hath, as well in regard of domestical jurisdiction, as of that other fo- 
reignly claimed by the Bishop of Rome ; or the assertion, that to no civil prince or governor 
there may be given such power of ecclesiastical dominion, as by the laws of the land be- 
longeth unto the supreme regent thereof. 

After those eight Books of " The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity," follow two Sermons, 
" The certainty and perpetuity of Faith in the elect ; especially of the Prophet Habakkuk's 
faith ;" and " Justification, Works, and how the foundation of faith is overthrown." 

Next are introduced "A supplication made to the Council by Master Walter Tra- 
vers," and " Mi. Hooker's answer to the supplication that Mr. Travers made to the council." 

Then follow two sermons " On the nature of pride," and a " Remedy against sorrow 
and fear." 

Two Sermons on part of the epistle of the Apostle Jude, are next inserted with a prefa- 
tory dedication, by Henry Jackson. 

The last article in the works of Mr. Hooker is, a Sermon on Prayer. 

To render the work more valuable and adapted for reference and utility to the Student, a 
very copious Topical Index is added. 

The English edition in three volumes sells at $10 00. The American is an exact reprint, 
at less than half the price. 

From Lowndes 1 British Librarian and Book-Collector's Quide, 

"Keble's preface, like Walton's life, should precede every subsequent edition. 
" Hooker is universally distinguished for long drawn melody and mellifluence of Ian 
guage, and his works must find a place in every well chosen clerical library." 



Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Appleton fy Co. 

BURNET'S HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION. 

The History of the Reformation of the Church of England, by GILBERT 
BORNET, D. D., late Lord Bishop of Salisbury with the Collection of 
Records and a copious Index, revised and corrected, with additional 
Notes and a Preface, by the Rev. . Nares, D. D.., late Professor of 
Modern History in the University of Oxford. Illustrated with a Front- 
ispiece and twenty-three engraved Portraits, forming four elegant 8vo. 
vqls. $8 00. 

A cheap Edition is printed, containing the History in three vols. with- 
out the Records which form the fourth volume of the above. Price, 
in boards, $2 50. 

To the student either of civil or religions history no epoch can be of more importance 
than that of the Reformation in England. It signalized the overthrow, in one of its strong- 
est holds, of the Roman power, and gave an impulse to the human mind, the fall results of 
which are even now but partly realized. Almost all freedom of inquiry all toleration in 
matters of religion, had its birth-hour then j and without a familiar acquaintance with all its 
principal events, but liitle progress can be made in understanding the nature and ultimate 
tendencies of the revolution then effected. 

The History of Bishop BURNET is one of the most celebrated and by far the most fre- 
quently quoted of any that has been written of this great event. Upon the original publi- 
cation of the first volume, it was received in Great Britain with the loudest and most extra- 
vagant encomiums. The author received the thanks of both Houses of Parliament, and was 
requested by them to continue the woik. In continuing it be had the assistance of the most 
learned and eminent divines of his time ; and he confesses his indebtedness for important aid 
to LLOYD, TIU.OTSOW, and STILLINQFLEET, three of the greatest of England's Bishops. 
"I know," says he, in his Preface to the second volume, '' that nothing can more effectually 
recommend this work, than to say that it passed with their hearty approbation, after they had 
examined it with that care which their great zeal for the cause concerned in it, and their 
goodness to the author and freedom with him, obliged them to use." 

The present edition of this great work has been edited with laborious care by Dr. Nares, 
who professes to have corrected important errors into which the author fell, and to have 
made such improvements in the order of the work as will render it far more useful to the 
reader or historical student. Preliminary explanations, full and sufficient to the clear under- 
standing of the author, are given, and matginal references are made throughout the book, so 
as greatly to facilitate and render accurate its consultation. The whole is published in four 
large octavo volumes of six hundred pages in each printed upon heavy paper in large and 
clear type. It contains portraits of twenty-four of the most celebrated characters of the 
Reformation, and is issued in a very neat style. It will of course find a place in every the- 
ologian's libiary and will, by no means, we trust, be confined to that comparatively limited 
sphere. JV. Y. Tribune. 

BURNET ON THE XXXIX. ARTICLES. 

An Exposition of the Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England. 
By GILBERT BURNET, D. D., late Bishop of Salisbury. With an Ap- 
pendix, containing the Augsburg Confession, Creed of Pope Pius IV,, 
&c. Revised and corrected, with copious Notes and additional Refer- 
ences, by the Rev. James R. Page, A. M., of Queen's College, Cam- 
bridge. In one handsome 8vo. volume. . jf 2 00. 

" No Churchman, no Theologian, can stand in need of information as to the character or 
value of Bishop Burnet's Exposition, which long since took its fitting place as one of the 
acknowledged and admired standards of the Church. It is only needful that we speak of 
the labours of the editor of the present edition, and these appear to blend a fitting modesty 
with eminent industry and judgment. Thus, while Mr. Page has carefully verified, and in 
matiy instances corrected and enlarged the references to the Fathers, Councils, and other au- 
thorities, and greatly multiplied the Scripture citations for the Bishop seems in many 
casps to have forgotten that his readers would not all be as familiar with the Sacred Text as 
himself, and might not as readily find a passage even when they knew it existed he (Mr, 
P.) hag scrupulously left the text untouched, and added whatever illustrative matter he has 
been able to gather in the form of Notes and an Appendix. The documents collected in tho 
latter are of great and abiding value." 

3 - . . 



Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Appleton Sf Co 
PAROCHIAL SERMONS. 

BY JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, B. D. 

Fellow of Oriel College and Vicar of St. Mary the Virgin's, Oxford. The 
6 vols. London edition, complete in two elegant 8vo. vols. of upwards 
of 600 pages each. $5 00. 

85" Mr. Newman's Sermons hare probably attained a higher character than any others 
ever published in this country. The following are a few of the recommendatory notices of 
the press, received by the publishers : 

" It would he rather late now to praise sermons whose reputation is so well established as 
those of Mr. Newman; and it would be unpardonable vanity to suppose that any thing we 
might say could add to the very high commendations they have received from some of our 
Right Reverend Fathers in God. We quoted last week the strong language of the Bishop of 
Maryland : the Bishop of New York says, " for simplicity and godly sincerity, for humble 
and child-like reliance on the word of God, and for close, pointed, and uncompromising pre- 
sentation of {be tiuths and duties of the gospel, I know not their superiors." The Bishop 
of New Jersey thus speaks of them, in a letter to the publishers : " I have lookedand longed 
for an edition of these sermons, as your noblest contributions to the sacred literature of the 
times. Mr. Newman's Sermons are of an order by themselves. There is a naturalness, a 
pressure towards the point proposed, an ever salient freshness about them, which will at' 
tract a class of readers to whom sermons are not ordinarily attractive :" and the Bishop of 
North Carolina writes, "I do not hesitate to say, after a constant use of them in my. closet, 
and an observation of their effect upon some of my friends, for the last six years, that they 
are among the very best practical sermons in the English language ; that while they are free 
from . those extravagances of opinion usually ascribed to the author of the 90th Tract, they 
assert in the strongest manner the true doctrines of the Reformation in England, and enforce 
with peculiar solemnity and effect that holiness of life, with the means thereto, so charac- 
teristic of the Fathers of that trying age." 

The sermons are 153 in number, being an exact reprint of the London edition in six 
volumes. Banner of the Cross. 

" Of Mr. Newman's Sermons it may be safely said, that they are adapted to the besetting 
sins of the age ; that the author traces' them with a masterly hand to the most secret springs 
of intellectual pride ; and that he explains and enforces the great principles and duties of 
Evangelical holiness, with a grace and simplicity of style, and unction of manner, which are 
seldom surpassed. We therefore heartily commend his Sermons to our readers, and earn- 
estly hope they may find their way into every family." The Churchman. 

" As a compendium of Christian duty, these Sermons will be read by people of all denomi- 
nations. As models of style, they will be valued by writers in every department oflitera 
ture." United. States Gazette. 

" These Sermons must eventually be received and quoted as among the Standard Theo- 
logical Writings of this century, and that, too, within the time of this generation." Phil. 
Sat. Post. 

" They bear the marks of an original and highly catholic mind, and many of them breathe 
a deep devotional spirit. Albany Jlrgus. 

SERMONS 
BEARING ON SUBJECTS OF THE DAY. 

BY JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, B.D. 
One elegant volume, 12mo. Price $1 00. 

This volume contains twenty-six Sermons, which aie thus entitled : Work of the Chris- 
tian. Sainlliness not forfeited by the Penitent. Our Lord's last Supper and his first. 
Dangers to the Penitent. The Throe Offices of Christ. Faith and Expedience. Faith and 

the World. The Church and the World. Indulgence in religious privileges. Connexion 

between personal and public improvement. Christian Nobleness. Joshua a type of Christ 
and his followers. Elisha a type of Christ and his followers. The Christian Church a con- 
tinuation of the Jewish. The Principle of continuity between the Jewish and Christian 

Churches The Christian Church an imperial power. Sanctity the token of the Christian 

empire. Condition of the Members of the Christian Empire. The Apostolical Christian. 
Wisdom and Innocence. Invisible presence of Christ. Outward and inward Notes of the 
Church. Grounds for stedfastnesa in our religious profession. Elijah the prophet of the 
latter days. Feasting in captivity. The parting of friends. 

4 



Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Appleton fy Co. 

SERMONS 

PREACHED AT CLAPHAM AND G-LASBTTBY. 

BY THE REV. CHARLES BRADLEY, A. M. 
Two volumes of English edition in one. Price <jjjl 50. 

The Sermons of this Divine are much admired for their plain, yet chaste and elegant 
style ; they will be found admirably adapted for family reading and preaching, where no pastor 
is located. Recommendations might be given, if space would admit, fiom. several of our 
Bishops and Clergy also from Ministers of various denominations. , 

The following are a few of the English critical opinions of their merit : 

" Bradley's Discourses are judicious and practical, scriptural and devout." Lavmdes'a 
British Librarian. 

11 Very able and judicious." Rev. E. Bu&ersteth. 

" Bradley 's style is sententious, pithy, and colloquial. Ha ia simple without being quaint ; 
ilds conversation with his hearers, without descending from the dignity of 



and he almost hoi 

the sacred chair." Eclectic Review 

"We earnestly 
courses as 



amestly desire that every pulpit in the kingdom may ever be the vehicle of dis" 
judicious and practical, as scriptural and devout as these." Christian Observer. 



HARE'S PAROCHIAL SERMONS. 

Sermons to a Country Congregation. By Augustus William Hare, A. M. f 
late Fellow of New College, and Rector of Alton Barnes. One vol- 
ume, royal 8vo. $2 25. 

" Any one who can be pleased with delicacy of thought expressed in the most simple 
language any one who can feel the charm of finding practical duties elucidated and enforced 
by apt and varied illustrations will be delighted with this volume, which presents us with 
the workings of a pious and highly-gifted mind." Quarterly Review. 

THE CHRISTIAN INSTRUCTED 

In the Ways of the Gospel and the Church, in a series of Discourses de- 
livered at St. James' Church, Goshen, New York. By the Rev. J. A. 
Spencer, A. M ., late Rector. One elegant vol. 12mo. $1 00. 

This is the first volume of Sermons by an American Divine which has appeared for some 
years. Their style is characterized by clearness, directness, and force and they combine, 
in a happy degree, solid good sense and animation. The great truths of the gospel are pre- 
sented in a familiar and plain manner, as the church catholic has always held them, and aa 
they are held by the reformed branches in England and America. 

The Introduction contains a biief view of the origin, use, and advantages of the various 
festivals and fasts of the Church ; and to the sermons are appended notes from the writings 
of Hooker, Barrow, Taylor, Peai son, Chillingworth, Leslie, Horsley, Hobart, and other stand- 
ard divines, illustrating and enforcing the doctrines contained in them. The book is well 
adapted to the present distracted state of the public mind, to lead the honest inquirer to a 
full knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus, and to give a correct view of the position occupied 
by the Church. 

The following is the copy of a letter of recommendation, by the Right Rev. Bishop 
Onderdonk,of the Diocese of New York : 

" Having great confidence in the qualifications of the Rev. Jesse A. Spencer for pastoral 
instruction in the Church of God, from a personal acquaintance with him as an alumnus of 
the General Theological Seminary of the Fiotestant Episcopal Church, and as a Deacon and 
Presbyter of my Diocese, it gives me pleasure to learn, that in his present physical inability 
to discharge the active duties of the ministry, he purposes publishing a select number of his 
sermons. Nothing doubting that they will be found instructive and edifying to those who 
sincerely desire to grow in the knowledge and practice of the gospel, I commend them to 
the pati onage of the Diocese ; and this the more earnestly, as their publication may be hoped 
to be a source of temporal comfort and support to a very worthy servant of the altar, afflicted, 
at an early period of his ministry, with loss of bodily power to be devoted to its functions." 

5 



Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Appleton 

PALMER'S TREATISE ON THE CHURCH. 

A Treatise on the Church of Christ. Designed chiefly for the uae of 
Students in Theology. By the Rev. William Palmer, M. A., of Wor- 
cester College, Oxford. Edited with Notes, by the Right Rev. W. R. 
Whittingham, D. D., Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the 
Diocese of Maryland. Two vols. 8vo., handsomely printed on fine pa- 
per. $5 00. 

" The treatise of Mr. Palmer is the best exposition and vindication of Church Principles 
that we have ever read ; excelling contemporaneous treatises in depth of learning and solid- 
ity of judgment, as much as it excels older treatises on the like subjects, in adaptation to 
the wants and habits of the age. Of its influence in England, where it has passed through 
two editions, we have not the means to form an opinion ; but we believe that in this coun- 
try it has already, even before its reprint, done more to restore the sound tone of Catholic 
principles and feeling than any other one work of the age. The author's learning, and 
powers of combination and arrangement, great as they obviously are, are less remarkable 
than the sterling good sense, the vigorous and solid judgment, which is everywhere 
manifest in the treatise, and confers on it its distinctive excellence. The style of the 
author is distinguished for dignity and masculine energy, while his tone is everywhere nat- 
ural; on proper occasions, reverential; and always, so far as we remember, sufficiently con- 
ciliatory. 

" To our clergy and intelligent laity who desire to see the Church justly discriminated 
from Romanists on the one hand, and dissenting denominations on the other, we earnestly 
commend Palmer's Treatise on the Church." JV. T. Ckwrclunan. 

"This able, elaborate, and learned vindication of the claim of the Protestant Episcopal 
Church, to be considered the true Catholic Church, and the exposure which is here made of 
the grounds of difference between it and the Romish Church, and of the baseless pretensions 
of that Church to be the ' one Holy Catholic, and Apostolic Church, 1 will assuredly commend 
these volumes to the favor of Churchmen." JV*. Y. American. 

ECCLESIASTES ANGLICANUS; 

BEING 

A TREATISE ON PREACHING 

In a Series of Letters by the REV. W. GRESLEY, M. A. Revised, with 
Supplementary Notes, by the Rev. Benjamin I. Haight, M. A., Rector 
of All Saints' Church, New York. In one handsomely printed volume, 
12mo. Price $1 25. 

Advertisement. In preparing the American edition of Mr. Gresley's valuable Treatise, a few 
foot notes have been added by the editor, which are distinguished by brackets. The more 
' extended notes at the end have been selected from the best works on the subject and which, 
with one or two exceptions, are not easily accessible to the American Student. 

HEADS OP CONTENTS. 

Letter 1. Introductory. PART I. ON THE MATTER OF A SERMON. Letter II. The 
end or object of Preaching. III. The principal topics of the Preacher. IV. and V. How 
to gain the Confidence of the hearers First, By showing goodness of character. VL 
Secondly, By showing a friendly disposition towards them. VII. Thirdly, By showing 
ability to instruct them. VIII. On Arguments those derivable from Scripture. TX. On 
Arguments. X. On Illustration. XL How to move the passions or feelings First, By 
indirect means. XII. Secondly, By direct means. PART II. Ow STYLE. XIII. On Style 
general remarks. XIV. Perspicuity, Foice, and Elegance. XV. to XVIII. On Style, as 
dependent on the choice, number, and arrangement of words. XIX. The Connectives. 
PABT III. ON THE METHOD OF COMPOSING. XX. On the Choice of a Subject. XXI. 
On Collecting Materials. XXII. What Materials and Topics should generally be thrown 
aside. XXIII. On the Method of Composing. XXIV. On the Exordium. XXV. On Dis- 
cussion Lectures. XXVI. On Discussion Text-Sermons. XXVII. On Discussion 
Subject-Sermons. XXVIII. On Application. XXIX. On the Conclusion. PART IV. On 
DELIVERY. XXX. Management of the Voice. XXXI. Earnestness and Feeling. XXXII. 
Gesture and Expression. XXXIII. Extemporaneous Preaching. SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 
A. Matter of Preaching. B. Sermons to be plain. C. Texts. D. Unity. . Exposi- 
tory Preaching. F. Written and Extemporary Sermons. 

6 



Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Appkton fy & 

THE KINGDOM OF CHRIST; 

OR 

JB?M/ Keipecling the Principles, CouslilntioM, atul Or JKtutmcet t 

OF THE 

CATHOLIC CHURCH. 

BY FREDERICK DENISON MAURICE, M. A., 

Chaplain of Guy's Hospital, Professor of English Literature and History. King's College, 
London. In one elegant octavo volume of 600 pages, uniform in style vntk JVeumum's Ser- 
mons, Palmer on the Church, $c. $2 50. 

The following brief table of contents illustrates the more important topics treated on in this 

very able work. 

PART I. On the Principles of the Quakers, and of the different religious bodies which haoe 
arisen since the Reformation, and of the systems to which they have given birth. CHAPTER I. 
QUAKERISM. On the positive doctrines of the Quakers ordinary objections to these 
Doctrines. The Quaker System Practical Workings of the Quaker System. CHAPTER 
IL PURE PROTESTANTISM. The leading Principles of the Reformation Objection* 
to the Principles of the Reformation Considered Protestant Systems The Practical Work- 
ings of the Protestant Systems. CHAPTER III. UNITARIANISM its History and Ob- 
ject Illustrated. CHAPTER IV. On the TENDENCY OF THE RELIGIOUS, PHILOSOPHICAL, 
AND POLITICAL MOVEMENTS WHICH HAVE TAKER PLACE IN PBOTESTANT BODIES SINCE 
THE MIDDLE OF THE LAST CENTURY. The Religious Movements, Philosophical Move- 
ments, Political Movements. 

PART II. Of the Catholic Church and the Romish System. CHAPTER I RECAPITULATION 
CHAPTER IL INDICATIONS OP A SPIRITUAL CONSTITUTION. CHAPTER III. The Scrip- 
tural view of this Constitution. CHAPTER IV. Signs of a Spiritual Society Baptism 
The Creeds Forms of Worship The Eucharist The Ministry the Scriptmes. CHAPTER 
V. Of the Relation of the Church and National Bodies Introductory Objections of the 
Quakers The Pure Theocratist The Separatist The Patrician The Modem Statesman 
The Modern Interpreter of Prophecy. 

PART III. The English Church and the Systems which Divide it. CHAPTER I. Intro- 
ductory How far this Subject is connected with those previously Discussed. Do the Signs 
of a Universal and Spiritual Constitution exist in England ? Does the Universal Church in 
England exist apart from its Civil Institutions in Union with them ? What is the form of 
Character which belongs especially to Englishmen ? To what depravation is it liable ? 
CHAPTER II. The English Systems. The Liberal System The Evangelical System 
The High Church or Catholic System. Reflections on the Systems, and on our position 
generally. 

Mr. Maurice's work is eminently fitted to engage the attention and meet the wants of all 
interested in the several movements that are now taking place in the religious community ; 
it takes up the pietensions generally of the several Protestant denominations and of the Ro- 
manists, so as to commend itself in the growing interest in the controversy between the lat- 
ter and their opponents. The political portion of the work contains much that is attractive 
to a thoughtful man, of any or of no religious persuasion, in reference to the existing and 
possible future state of our country. 

" On the theory of the Church of Christ, all should consult the work of Mr. Maurice, 
the most philosophical writer of the day." Professor Oarbett's Bampton Lectures, 1842. 

PEARSON ON THE CREED. 

An Exposition of the Creed, by John Pearson, D. D., late Bishop of Ches- 
ter. With an Appendix, containing the principal Greek and Latin 
Creeds. Revised and corrected by the Rev. W. S. Dobson, M. A., Pe- 
terhouse, Cambridge. In one handsome 8vo. volume. $2 00. 

The following may be stated as the advantages of Ms edition over att others. 

First Great care has been taken to correct the numerous enors in the references to the 
texts of Scripture which had crept in by reason of the repeated editions through which this 
admirable work has passed ; and many references, as will be seen on turning to the Index of 
Texts, have been added. 

Secondly The Quotations in the Notes have been almost universally identified and the 
lefeience to them adjoined. 

Lastly The principal Symbola or Creeds, of which the particular Articles have been 
cited by the Author, have been annexed ; and wherever the original writers have given the 
Symbola in a scattered and disjointed manner, the detached parts have been brought into a 
successive and connected point of view. These have been added in Chronological order in 
the fbim of an Appendix. Fide Editor. 

7 



Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Appleton 6f Co. 

CHURCHMAN'S LIBRARY. 

The volumes of this Standard Series are highly recommended hy the Bishops and Clergy 
of the Protestant Episcopal Church. The Publishers heg to state, while in so short a time 
this Library has inci eased to so many volumes, they are encouraged to make yet larger addi- 
tions, and earnestly hope it may receive all the encouragement it deserves. 

The following works have already appeared : 

THE UNITY OF THE CHURCH. 

BY THE REV. HENRY EDWARD MANNING, M. A., 

Archdeacon of Chichester. Complete in one elegant volume, 16mo. Price 

$1 00. 

.CONTENTS. 

Part I. THE HISTORY AND EXPOSITION OF THE DOCTRINE OP CATHOLIC UNITY. 
Chap. I. The Antiquity of the Article, "I believe in the Holy Church." II. The Inter- 
pretation of the Article, " The Holy Church," as taught by uninspired writers. III. The 
Unity of the Church as taught in Holy Scripture. IV. The Form and Matter of Unity. 
Conclusion to the fust part. 

Part II. THE MORAL DESIGN OF CATHOLIC UNITY. Chap. I. The Moral Design of the 
ChurcJi as shown hy Holy Scripture. II. The Unity of the Church a means to restore the 
true Knowledge of God. III. The Unity of the Church a Means to restore Man to the 
Image of God. IV. The Unity of the Church a Probation of the Faith and Will of Man. 
Conclusion to the second part. 

Part III. THE DOCTRINE OF CATHOLIC UNITY APPLIED TO THE ACTUAL STATE OF 
CHRISTENDOM. Chap. I. The Unity of the Church the only Revealed way of Salvation.. 
II. The Loss of Objective Unity. III. The Loss of Subjective Unity. General Conclusion 

" This is a profound and eloquent treatise on a most interesting subject one that has of 
late received peculiar attention, and at piesent exeicises tbe minds of thoughtful Christians, 
perhaps more than any other. Thousands are beginning to be convinced that the only true 
and real bond of concoid is the kingdom of Christ, and to inquiie anxiously into the mean- 
ing of that article of the Creed " I believe ONE Catholic and Apostolic Church." All such 
will read with avidity the admirable treatise which has been so favourably received in 
England, and whose republication in such beautiful style entitles Messrs. Appleton to the 
thanks of American Churchmen. Archdeacon Manning is well known by other theological 
works: but his Unity of the Church is the most matured and celebrated production of his 
pen, and it has place'd him high in the rank of Anglican divines." Banner of the Cross. 

THE DOUBLE WITNESS OF THE CHURCH. 

By the Rev. Wm. Ingraham Kip, author of " Lenten Fast." One ele- 
gant volume, 16mo., of 415 pages. Price $1 25. 

CONTENTS. I. Introductory. Necessity for Knowing the reasons why we are Church- 
men II. 'Episcopacy proved from Scripture. III. Episcopacy proved from History. IV. 
Antiquity and Authority for Forms of Prayer. V. History of our Liturgy. VI. The 
Church's View of Baptism. VII. The Moral Training of the Church. VIII. Popular Ob- 
jections to the Church. IX. The Church in all ages the Keeper of the Truth. X. Con- 
clusion. The Catholic Churchman. 

" This is a sound, < 
one that we feel persuaded 

DOUBLE WITNESS \vhich th_ 

points out her middle path as the only one of truth and safety." Banner of Vie Cross. 

" Here we have another valuable and learned contiibution, though in a popular form 
withal, to theological literature, and presented in Appleton's best manner. 

" The Rev. Mr. Kip has embodied in this volume, and somewhat expanded and illustrated 
with notes, a series of lectures which he delivered to his congregation in Albany, last 
winter, on ' The Distinctive Principles of the Church.' These lectures, as we learn from the 
preface, were delivered ' at a season of strange excitement among different denominations,' 
and designed as a safeguaid to his own people against the injurious influence of such ex- 
citement." Jf. Y. American. . ...... 

" This volume deserves a conspicuous placo among the numerous publications which the 
discussion of Church Principles has called out. The author has a considerable powei of 
illustration, and has presented some points in a very striking light. His Lectures on the 
Antiquities and Forms of Prayer, and the History of our Liturgy, are exceedingly valuable." 
Christian Witness and Advocate. 

8 




Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Appleton fy Co. 
CHURCHMAN'S LIBRARY. Continued. 

$e ^fwrctman's <omp<mum in tfje Closet : 

OR, A COMPLETE 

MANUAL OF PRIVATE DEVOTIONS : 

Collected from the writings of Archbishop Laud, Bishop Andrews, Bishop 
Ken, Dr. Hickes, Mr. Kettlewell, Mr. Spinckes, and other eminent 
OLD ENGLISH DIVINES. With a Preface by the Rev. Mr. Spinckes. 
Edited by Francis E. Paget, M. A. One elegant volume, 16mo. $1 00 

The pious leader will require no more recommendation of this volume than that which he 
wilt .find in its title-page. A Manual of Prayers compiled from the devotional writings of 
Laud .and Andrews, Ken and Hickes, Kettlewell and Spinckes, cannot he otherwise than 
acceptable to all who love those principles which they unanimously taught, and for the 
maintaining of which, (with the exception of the good Bishop of Winter, _whose lot was cast 
in tranquil times,) they suffered according to the measure which God required of each ; to all 
who would fain follow them in the paths of self-denial, spiritnal-mindedness, meekness, and 
obedience. And that this book has been to past generations what it is hoped it may like- 
wise be to our own, is evident from the fact that it is one of the few of the devotional works 
of the seventeenth century, which continued to be in constant demand daring the eighteenth. 
Its value was appreciated, and it continued to be reprinted from time to time to the middle 
of the last century ; and it is presented to the public once more, with the anxious desire 
that as it found favour to the last, while Church principles were declining, so it may prove 
acceptable to the many, who (blessed be God) seem now to be zealously and faithfully seek- 
ing their way back to the " old paths" from which we have wandered. Editor's Preface. 

THE PRACTICAL CHRISTIAN: 

Or, the Devout Penitent; a Book of Devotion, containing the Whole 
Duty of a Christian in all occasions and necessities, fitted to the main 
use of a holy life, by R. Sherlock, D. D. ; with a Life of the Author, by 
the Right Rev. Bishop Wilson, Author of " Sacra Privata," &c. One 
elegant volume, 16mo. $1 00. 

" The Practical Christian now submitted to the reader, from the seventh English edition, 
is by fai the most important of all Dr. Sherlock's works. It was a work of gradual growth 
and progressive enlargement, and we have his biographer's testimony to the fact, that he 
made it the model of his own devotions ' strictly observing himself what he so earnestly 

recommended to others.' The following devotions, living impressions, as it were, of the 

living mould bring the tutor of Bishop Wilson again before us, and it may be devoutly hoped 
that as their author, when living, succeeded in forming one of the noblest characters in the 
Church's Modern Calendar, so now, though absent from us in body, this his work, instinct as 
it everywhere is with his own saintly spirit, may tend to produce many more such characters 
to the glory of God and the edification of his Holy Church. Editor's Preface. 

" Considered as a manual of private devotion, and a mean? of practical preparation for 
the Holy Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ, this book is among the beat, if not 
the best, ever commended to the members of our Church." The Churchman. 

OF THE IMITATION OF CHRIST: 

Four books by Thomas A Kempis. One elegantly printed volume, 16mo. 

" The author of this invaluable work was born about the year 1380, and has always been 
honoured by the Church for his eminent sanctity. Of the many pious works composed by 
him, his ' Imitation of Christ ' (being collections of his devotional thoughts and meditations 
on important practical subjects, together with a separate treatise on the Holy Communion) 
is the most celebrated, and has ever been admired and valued by devout Christians of every 
name. It has passed through numerous editions and translations, the first of which into 
English is said to have been made by the illustrious Lady Margaret, mother of King Henry 
VII. Messrs. Appletop's very beautiful edition is a reprint from the last English, the trans- 
lation of which was chiefly copied from one printed at London in 1677. It deserves to be a 
companion of the good Biabop Wilson's Sacra Privata." Banner of the Cross. 



Valuable Episcopal Works Published ly D. Appleton Sf Co. 



imur ATI'S T.TRT? ATtv. Continued, 

LEARN TO LIVE. '. 

Disce Vivere Learn to Live. Wherein is shown that the Life of Christ 
is and ought to be an express pattern for imitation unto the life of a 
Christian. By Christopher Sutton, D. D. One elegant volume, 16mo. 

Price $1 00 

" The above -work was written by its author after his ' Disce Mori,' and befoie his 
' Godly Meditations on the Lord's Supper ;' and it may be said to come between them also 
in respect to the depth and seriousness of tone in which it is written. The unusually fer- 
vent language of his last work, the Meditations, was suggested by its particularly sacred sub- 
ject ; the ' Disce Mori, 9 on the other hand, which was his first, treating on a subject which 
belongs to natural as well as revealed religion, admitted of reflections 'derived from a variety 
of sources, besides those which are especially of a Christian or gospel character. In the 
work which came next, the ' Disce Vivere.' he moulded his materials, after the manner 
of a Kempis, into an ' Imitatio Christi ;' each chapter inculcating some duty, upon the 
pattern of Him who gave Himself to be the beginning and the end of all perfection. Editor's 
Preface. 

LEARN TO DIE. 

Disce Mcri Learn to Die. A Religious Discourse, moving every Chris- 
tian man to enter into a serious Remembrance of his End. By Chris- 
topher Sutton, D. D., late Prebend of Westminster. 1 vol. Ifjmo., ele- 
gantly ornamented. $1 00 

" Of the three works of this excellent author lately reprinted in England, the ' Disce 
Mori ' is, in our judgment, decidedly the best. It was the favourite book of the Bishop of 
Joly, who (the touching incident cannot be forgotten) died with it in his hands. It was this 
fact, we believe, which first recalled the book fioni the oblivion into which it had fallen ; 
and our readers may remember, that shortly aftei its republication in England we urged an 
American reprint, on the ground that it was a book which would prove universally acceptable 
to the Church. Such is still our opinion ; we do not believe that a single journal or clergy- 
man in the Church will be found to say a word in its disparagement ; but that, on the con- 
trary, all will unite in commending it as one of the very best of our practical works, equally 
devotional and almost equally rich with the similar work of Taylor, and free from those 
features with which Taylor startles such weak minds as have a morbid dread of Romanism. 
Our columns have been, and now that the work is reprinted, will again be, enriched with 
extracts which will make the ' Disce Mori ' favourably known to our readers." Churchman. 

MEDITATIONS ON THE SACRAMENT. 

Godly Meditations upon the most Holy Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. 
By Christopher Sutton, D. D., late Prebend of Westminster. 1 vol. 
royal 16mo., elegantly ornamented. $1 00. 

" We announced in our last number the republication in this country of Sutton's ' Medi- 
tations on the Lord's Supper,' and having since read the work, are prepared to recommend it 
warmly and without qualification to the perusal of our readers. It is purely practical ; the 
doctrine of the eucharist being touched upon only in so far as was necessary to guard against 
error. Its standard of piety is very high, and the helps which it affords to a devout partici- 
pation of the holy sacrament of which it treats, should make it the inseparable companion 
of every communicant. We know indeed of no woik on the subject that can in all respects 
be compared with it ; and for its agency in promoting that advancement in holiness after 
which every Christian should stiive, have no hesitation in classing it with the Treatise on 
' Holy Living and Dying,' of Bishop Taylor, and the ' Sacra Privata,' of Bishop Wilson. 
The period at which' the book was written will account for and excuse what in the present 
age would be regarded as defects of style ; but these are fewer than might have been ex- 
pected, and are soon lost sight of in the contemplation of the* many and great excellencies 
with which it abounds. The publishers have done good service to the country in the publi- 
cation of this work, which is a beautifal reprint of the Oxford edition, and we are glad to 
learn that it will be speedily followed by the ' Disce Vivere ' and ' Disce Mori ' of the same 
author. Banner of the Cross 

10 



Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Appleton 4" Go- 

CHURCHMAN'S LIBRARY. Continued. 

THE RECTORY OF VALEHEAD: 

OR THE RECORDS OF A HOLT HOME. 
BY THE BEV. K. W. EVANS. 

From the Twelfth English edition. One elegantly printed volume, 16mo. 

75 cents. 

w Universally and cordially do we recommend this delightful -volume. We believe no 
person could read this work and not be the better for its pious and touching lessons. It is a 
page taken from the book of life, and eloquent with all the instruction of an excellent pat- 
tern ; it is a commentary on the affectionate warning, ' Remember thy Creator in the days 
of thy youth.' We have not for some time 'seen a work we conld so deservedly praise, or 
so conscientiously recommend." Literary Gazette. 

" This -work illustrates with great simplicity and beauty and variety, the privileges, bless- 
ings, and influences of the Christian home. It is rich in elegant description, in fine moral 
sentiment, and withal is happily imbued with the spirit of genuine Chiistianity. In wish- 
ing it an extensive circulation, we are sure that we are only wishing 1 well to the cause of 
domestic piety and order and happiness. Albany Advertiser. 

PORTRAIT OF A CHURCHMAN. 

BY THE REV. W. GRESLEY, A. M 

From the Seventh English edition. One elegant volume, 16mo. 75 cents. 

" The present volume is an attempt to paint the feelings, habits of thought, and mode of 
action which naturally flow from a sincere attachment to the system of belief and discipline 
adopted- in our Church. 

" Church principles have been so much discussed of late, that I would have willingly 
passed over that part of the subject ; but daily experience proves that they are still very 
impel feet ly understood, or little considered, by the mass of those who call themselves 
Churchmen. I have therefore devoted some chapters in the earlier part of the work to a 
brief, though not careless or hasty, discussion of the principles of the Church of Christ. 
Bat the main patt of the volume is occupied upon the illustration of the practical working of 
those principles when sincerely received, setting forth their value in the commerce of daily life, 
and how surely they conduct those who embrace them iu the safe and quiet path of holy 
life." Author's Preface. 

LYRA APOSTOLICA. 

From the Fifth English edition One elegantly printed volume 75 cents. 

" Here is a volume of poetiy on grave subjects ; where the taste, the sensibilities, and 
the judgment, all are interested. Some of its topics are purely imaginative, but the large 
majority are on matteis to which every thoughtful mind often recurs ; and by the consider- 
ation of which the heart and conscience are benefited. In this elegant volume, there are 
forty-five sections, and one hundred and seventy-nine Lyric poems, all shoit, and many of 
them sweet." JV*. Y. American- 

" This is a collection of Lyrical Odes, which originally were published in the British Ma- 
gazine ; and were subsequently combined in a handsome volume. They are all upon grave 
topics; and arranged under forty-five different 'heads ; and their poetical merits are commen- 
surate with the serious dignity of the subjects. It cannot be expected that one hundred and se- 
venty -nine different poems, written by an association of authors, can be equal and uniform in 
poetic ability nevertheless, they all exhibit a high degree of merit. Some of the Odes aie of a 
very superior order, and contain such pithy instruction that the woik is just fit for the pock- 
et of every lover of Christian Song, on account' of the brevity of almost all the articles. 
Johnson once stated that there could not possibly be any good poetry on sacred subjects. If 
the volumes of Milton, and Young, and Cowper, and Montgomery, had n^t shown the error 
of his decision, the Lyra Apostolica would prove that his opinion was contrary to fact. The 
beauty of the work accords with its melodious chants." JV. Y. Courier and Enquirer. 



Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Appleton Sf Co. 

CHURCHMAN'S LIBRARY. Continued. 
BISHOP JEREMY TAYLOR ON EPISCOPACY. 

The Sacred Order and Offices of Episcopacy asserted and maintained ; 
to which is added, Clerus Domini : a Discourse on the Office Ministeri- 
al j by the Right Rev. Bishop Jeremy Taylor, D. D. One elegant vol- 
ume, 16mo. Price $1 00. 



he reprini in a portable form of this Eminent Divine's masterly Defence of Episco- 
pacy cannot fail of being welcomed by every Churchman. 

'With the imagination of a Poet, and the fervor of an Apostle, Jeremy Taylor cannot be 
republished in any shape that he will not have readers. More especially, just now will this 
treatise of his be read, when, by feebler hands and far less well furnished minds, attempts 
are making to depreciate that sacred order and those sacred offices which are here with tri- 
umphant eloquence maintained. 

" The publishers have presented this jewel in a fitting casket" JV. T. American, Feb. 
17, Jo44 

" Jeremy Taylor was not simply an ornament to the English Church, but in his Christian 
walk and conversation an example to Christians of all denominations. His style hits in it all 
the elements of eloquence, earnestness of purpose, comprehensiveness of thought, and de- 
votional fervor. The work under notice is particularly adapted to the study of such Epis- 
copalians aa would understand the grounds of their recognized orders. U. S. Saturday 
fast. 

" On the merit of Bishop Taylor it would be absurd and useless to expatiate. His piety 
has been the subject and admiration, and his eloquence the theme of praise, to our best writ- 
ers. "British Critic. 

THE GOLDEN GROVE: 

A choice Manual, containing what is to be believed, practised, and de- 
sired, or prayed for; the prayers being fitted for the several days of the 
week . To which is added, a Guide for the Penitent, or a Model drawn 
up for the help of devout souls wounded with sin. Also, Festival 
Hymns, &c. By the Right Rev. Bishop Jeremy Taylor. One vol. 
16mo. $0 50. 

" The name of Jeremy Taylor will always be a sufficient passport to any work on whose 
title page it appears. Of no writer of his period, or indeed of any other period, could it be 
more truly said, that he has given ' thoughts that breathe in words that burn.' The present 
little work may perhaps be regarded as among the choicest of his productions. While it is 
designed to be a guide to devotion, it breathes much of the spirit of devotion, and abounds 
in lessons of deep practical wisdom. Its author was an Episcopalian, and Episcopalians may 
well be proud of him ; but his character and writings can no more be the property of one de- 
nomination than the air or the light, or any other of God's universal blessings, to the world." 
Albany Advertiser. 

SACRA PRIVATA. 

The Private Meditations, Devotions, and Prayers of the Right Rev. T. 
Wilson, D. D., Lord Bishop of Soder and Man. First complete edi- 
tion. One vol. royal 16mo., elegantly ornamented. $>1 00. 

"The Messis. Appleton have brought out, in elegant style, Wilson's ' Sacra Privata' 
entire. The reprint is an honour to the American press. The work itself is, perhaps, on the 
whole, the best devotional treatise in the language, and it now appears in a dress worthy of 
its character. It has never before in this country been printed entire. We shall say more 
another time, but for the present will only urge upon every reader, from motives of duty and 
interest, foi private benefit and public good, to buy the book. Buy good books, shun the doubt- 
ful, and burn the bad." The Churchman. 

A neat Miniature Edition, abridged for popular use, is also published. 
Price 31 1-4 cents. 

12 



Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Appleton <$ Co. 

CHURCHMAN'S LIBHARY Continued. 

THE EARLY ENGLISH CHURCH; 

Or, Christian History of England in early British, Saxon, and Norman 
Times. By the Rev. Edward Churton, M. A. With a Preface, by 
the Right Rev. Bishop Ives. One vol. 16mo. elegantly ornamented. 

$1 00. 

" The following delightful pages place before us some of the choicest examples both 
clerical and lay of the true Christian spirit in the EARLY ENGLISH CHURCH. In 
tiuth, these pages are crowded with weighty lessons. Heie oar laity will find that these no- 
ble foundations of charity in the mother country the existence of which_ they have been 
accustomed to ascribe to the credulity of ignorance, 01 the fears of superstition, successfully 
practised upon by the arts of priests, had a higher 1 and holier origin that they sprung into 
being under the warm impulses of that divine and expansive benevolence of which the con- 
straining power of Christ's love made his early followers such large partakers at the pe_riod 




our spirits wnicn are Jus.' Here, too, our clergy may learn a lesson onrue seii-oevouon 10 
their Master may see, strikingly and beautifully illustrated, that love for Christ, and that 
zeal for his kingdom, which alone can bear us tranquilly and successfully^ through the la- 
bours and trials of the holy ministry may see the operation of the true missionary spirit 
the spirit of endurance and self-sacrifice, which shrinks from no obstacles when the salva- 
tion of sinners is to be achieved under the command and the promise of the Almighty God 
may see, in short, an impressive and instructive exemplification of that child-like submission 
to God, that pure and simple trust in him, which, at bis bidding, performs duty, and leaves 
the result to his providence and grace. 

" But, to read these pages with profit, we must pray to God for a portion of that spirit 
which indited them, and which so manifestly control the events which they record must 
read them with a spiritual eye ; with an eye intent upon discovering, not that which may 
belp to sustain some preconceived notion, but that which, prompted by the spirit of Christ, 
and accomplished through the power of his saving truth, exhibits to us some great principle 
of Christian action, and some powerful motive to go and do likewise. 9 ' Vide Preface. 

TALES OF THE VILLAGE; 

In which the Principles of the Romanist, Churchman, Dissenter, and In- 
fidel are contrasted. By the Rev. FRANCIS' E. PAGET,M. A. In three 
elegant vols. 18mo. $1 75. 

" These three handsome little volumes constitute series of Tales, purporting to be the 
record kept by a country clergyman, of scenes passing under his own view, in the discharge 
of his parochial duties. They have had great success in England, as, we doubt not, this first 
American edition of them will have here. 

" They are well contrived s tales to interest the reader, and skilfully used as vehicles 
for setting forth the sound doctrines of the Church, which, while 'protesting against Borne, 
remains Catholic, and while protesting against Geneva, is Reformed ; whose hand is against 
all error, and all error against it.' 

" The first series or volume, presents a popular view of the contrast in opinions and 
modes of thought between Churchmen and Romanists ; the second sets forth Church princi- 
ples, as opposed to what, in England, is termed Dissent; and the third places in contrast the 
character of the Churchman and the Infidel, 

" At any time these volumes would be valuable, especially to the young. At present, 
when men's minds are much turned to such subjects, they cannot fail of being eagerly 
sought for." New-York American. 

" The first, second, and third series, in as many small volumes, of these popular tales, are 
now offered to the American public. At present, we have only loom to commend them, and 
we do it most heartily, to all who desire edification combined with amusement." Tko 
Churchman. 

THE CHRISTMAS BELLS; 

A Tale of Holy Tide, and other Poems. By the Rev. J. W. BROWIT, au- 
thor of " Constance," " Virginia," &c. One vol. royal 16mo., elegantly 
ornamented. $0 75. 

" Many of the smaller pieces in this volume have appeared from time to time in various 
journals and magazines, and have been received with unqualified favour. The lea-ing poem 
was written for the most pait during the season whose enjoyments and happy ind < ences it 
is designed to commemorate. The plan of it was suggested by the perusal of Washington 
living's delightful Essays on the Christmas season, in the Sketch Book." Preface. 

lo 



Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Apphton Sf Co. 

A MANUAL FOR COMMUNICANTS; 

'Or, the Order for Administering the .Holy Communion ; conveniently 
arranged with Meditations and Prayers from Old English Divinei, 
being the Eucharistica of Samuel Wilberforce, M. A., Archdeacon of 
Surry, (adapted to the American service.) Convenient size for the 
pocket. 37 cents ; gilt leaves, 50 cents. 

" The order of this work is as follows : First, " The Exhortation ;" comprising the two 
eshoitations which are inserted in the Communion Office ; then the " Ante-Communion ;" 
next, "The Canon of the Holy Communion," beginning with the Offertory and ending with 
the Form of administering the elements ; and lastly, the Post-Communion. This part of the 
work is the Communion Office as contained in the Prayer Book, slightly altered in its 
arrangement, and accompanied with a few short devotional meditations in the margin. After 
this is the Introduction by Archdeacon Wilberfotce, chiefly on the importance of attendance 
at the Lord's Table, and the causes of the present neglect of the privilege. 

" We have next a brief notice of the writers from whose works are taken the extracts 
which form the body of the volume. These are Colet, Cranmer, Jewel, Hooker, Andrews, 
Sutton, Laud, Hall, Hammond, Taylor, Leighton, Brevint, Patrick, Addison, Ken, Sparrow, 
Beveridge, Hicks, Comber, Kettlewell, Wilson, and Potter ; whose names are arranged in 
chronological order, with a mention in few lines of their lives and characters. The remainder 
of the work is divided into three paits ; of which the first consists of Meditations on the 
Holy Communion ; the second of Prayers before and after Communion ; to which are added, 
Bishop Wilson's Meditations on Select Passages, and Bishop Patrick's Prayer for one who 
cannot publicly communicate ; and the third of select passages explanatory of the Holy 
Sacramentand the benefits of its woithy reception. 

" These meditations, prayers, and expositions, are given in the very words of the illus- 
trious divines above mentioned, martyrs, confessors, and doctois of the Church; and they 
tbim altogether such a body of instructive matter as is nowhere else to be found in the same 
compass. Though collected from various authors, the whole is pervaded hy a unity of spirit 
and purpose 5 and we most earnestly commend the work as better fitted than any other 
which we know, to subserve the ends of sound edification and fervent and substantial devo- 
tion. The American reprint has been edited by a deacon of great promise in the Church, 
and is appropriately dedicated to the Bishop of this diocese." Churchman. 

THE PRIMITIVE DOCTRINE OF ELECTION: 

Or, an Historical Inquiry into the Ideality and Causation of Scriptural 
Election, as received and maintained in the primitive Church of Christ. 
By George Stanley Faber, B. D., author of " Difficulties of Roman- 
ism," " Difficulties of Infidelity," &c. Complete in one volume, 
octavo. $1 75. 

" Mr. Faber verifies his opinion by demonstration. We cannot pay a higher respect to 
his work than by recommending it to all." Church of England Quarterly Review. 

LETTERS TO MY GODCHILD. 

BY THE REV. I. SWART, A. M. 

One elegant miniature volume. Price 37 1-2 cents. 

"The design of this little work dedicated by permission to Bishop Onderdonk, ' and 
commended by Bishop Delancey, to whom while in preparation the MS. was submitted is to 
enable those whom distance or other circumstances prevent from adequately discharging 
their sponsorial duties, to place in the hands of their godchildren a treatise which shall 
elucidate the relations between the sponsor and his godchild, and supply, as far as may be, 
the want of immediate and constant personal supervision. 

" The commendation of this Diocesan is an all-sufficient introduction of Mr. Swarfs nse- 
ful little book." JV. Y. American. 

OGILBY ON LAY BAPTISM. 

An Outline on the Argument against the validity of Lay-Baptism. By 
the Rev. John D. Ogilby, D. D., Professor of Ecclesiastical History. 
One volume, 12mo. $0 75. 

" We have been favoured with a copy of the above work. From a cursory inspection of 
it, we take it to be a thorough, fearless, and, able discussion of the subject which it proposes 
aiming less to excite inquiry, than to satisfy by learned and ingenious argument inquiries 
already excited." Churchman, ... 

14 



Valuable Episcopal Works Published by D. Appleton $p Co 

MAGEE ON ATONEMENT AND SACRIFICE. 

Discourses and Dissertations on the Scriptural Doctrines of Atonement 
and Sacrifice, and on the Principal Arguments advanced, and the 
Mode of Reasoning employed, by the Opponents of those Doctrines, as 
held by the Established Church. By the late most Rev. WILLIAM 
M'GEE, D. D., Archbishop of Dublin. Two vols. royal 8vo. beauti 
fully printed. $5 00. 

"This is one of the ablest critical and polemical works of modern times. Archbishop 
Magee is truly a maleus Iieretinolum. He is an excellent scholar, an acute reasoner, and is 
possessed of a most extensive acquaintance with the wide field of argument to which his 
volumes are devoted the profound Biblical information on a variety of topics which the 
Archbishop brings forward, must endeai his name to all lovers of Christianity." Orme. 



tracts on QftrCgtian Boctrttte antr $racttce 

Under this general head it is proposed to publish a series of Catechetical 
Works, illustrating the Doctrine, Discipline, and Practice of the Protest- 
ant Episcopal Church in the United States. The followingcommence the 
Series : 

A HELP TO CATECHISING; 

FOR THE USE OP 

CLERGYMEN, SCHOOLS, AND PRIVATE FAMILIES. 

BY JAMES BEAVEN, D. D. 

Professor of Theology at King's College, Toronto. 

Revised and adapted to the use of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the 

United States. 

BY HENRY ANTHON, D. D. 

Rector of St. Mark's Church, New- York. 

Price single copies, 6 1-4 cents 50 copies, $2 50 100 copies, $4 00. 

Numerous testimonies have been received of the usefulness of this Catechism, and the 
very moderate price affixed leads the publishers to hope for it a very extensive circulation. 
Its sale has already exceeded 12,000 copies. 

CATECHISMS ON THE HOMILIES OF THE CHURCH. 

I. On the Miseries of Mankind. II. Of the Nativity of Christ. III. 
Of the Passion of Christ. IV. Of the Resurrection of Christ. 

BY HENKY ANTHON, D. D. 
Price single copies, 6 1-4 cents 50 copies, $2 50 100 copies, $4 00. 

The object of these Catechisms is to present the Homilies in a shape in which they can 
be learned, marked, and digested, by the youthful members of the Church. 

THE BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER; 

AND 

Administration of the Sacraments and other Rites and Ceremonies of the 
Church, according to the use of the Protestant Episcopal Church in 
the United States of America, together with the Psalter or Psalms of 
David illustrated with six steel engravings, rubricated, in various 
bindings, as follows : 

Morocco, extra gilt leaves, $2 25. With clasp, do., $3 00. Imitation of Morocco, gilt 
loaves, 1 75. Plain do. $1 25. Without rubrics, in led Morocco, extra, $2 00 Imita- 
tion do., $1 50. Sheep, plain, $1 00. 

It may also be had in rich silk velvet binding, mounted -with gold, gilt borders , clasp, &c. 
price $8 00. 

15 



D. APPLETON & COMPANY, NEW YORK, 

Keep constantly for sale, on the most favourable terms, a choice stock of 

ENGLISH THEOLOGICAL WORKS: 

Including modern editions of the Sterling Old English Divines of the 
Sixteenth, Seventeenth, and Eighteenth Centuries. Among their re- 
cent importations will be found new and beautiful editions of 

BISHOP ANDREWS' SERMONS. 5 vols. 8vo. $14 00. 
ARCHBISHOP BRAMHALL'S WORKS. New edition now publishing. 
BISHOP BERKELEY'S WORKS. 1 vol. 8vo. $2 50. 

Do. do. 2 vols. Edited by Wright. $4 50. 

BISHOP BEVERIDGE'S WORKS. New edition now publishing. 
BISHOP COSOT'S Complete Works. New edition now publishing. 
DR. THOMAS FULLER'S Works. 8 vols. Svo. $21 00. 
REV. JOSEPH BINGHAM'S Complete Works, with all the Quotations. 9 vols. 

Svo. $33 00. 

BISHOP BULL'S Works. 8 vols. Svo. $22 00. Do. translated. 4 vols. Svo. 
DS. ISAAC BARROW'S Complete Works. 8 vols. Svo. 24 00. 

Do. . do. . do. Cheap edition. 3 vols. Svo. $6 50. 

DR. EDWARD BURTON'S Complete Works, 5 vols. Svo. $16 00, 
BISHOP BUTLER'S Complete Works. 1 vol. Svo. $2 50. Do. 12mo. $1 50. 
RICHARD BAXTER'S Practical Works, with Introductory Essay. 4 vols. imp, 

Svo. $20 00. 
JEREMY COLLIER'S Ecclesiastical History of England, with copious notes. 9 

vols. Svo. $25 00. 

DR. WM. CAVE'S Works, edited by Carey. 5 vols. Svo. $11 00. 
DEAN COMBER'S Complete Works. 7 vols. Svo. $14 00. 
W. OHILLINGWORTH'S, M. A., Complete Works. 1 vol. Svo. $3 00. 
ARCHBISHOP CRANMER'S Complete Works. 4 vols. Svo. $14 00. 
DR. JOHN DONNE'S Complete Works. 6 vols. Svo. $21 00. 
DEAN GRAVES'S Complete Works, edited by his Son. 4 vols. Svo. $13 00. 
BISHOP HALL'S Complete Works. 12 vols. Svo. $38 00. 
BISHOP HORSELEY'S Complete Works. 8 vols. Svo. $24. 
BISHOP HURD'S Complete Works. 8 vols. Svo. $14 00. 
BISHOP HORNE'S Complete Works. 4 vols. Svo. $14 00. 
BISHOP HOPKINS'S Complete Works. 1 vol. imp. Svo. $4 50. 
EICHAHD HOOKER'S Complete Works. 2 vols. Svo. $4 50. 

Do. do. do edited by Keble. 3 vols. Svo. $10 00. 

DR. MATTHEW HALE'S Practical Discourses on the Liturgy. 4 vols. Svo. $12 00 
REV. W. JONES'S (of Nayland) Complete Works. 6 vols. Svo. $14 00. 
REV. CHARLES LESLIE'S Complete Works. 7 vols. Svo. $18 00. 
ARCHBISHOP LEIGHTON'S Complete Works. 1 vol. Svo. $2 50. 

Do. ' do. with Life by Pearson. 2 vols. Svo. $5 50 

DR. NATHANIEL LARDNER'S Complete Works. 10 vols. Svo. $22 00. 
BISHOP LOWTH'S Works. 3 vols. Svo. $5 00. 
BISHOP MANT'S History of the Church of Ireland. 2 vols. $12 00. 
W. PALMER'S M. A. Origines Liturgies. 2 vols. Svo. $450. 
BISHOP STILLIN&FLEET'S Origines Sacra. 2 vols. 8vo. $5 00. 
BISHOP. JEREMY TAYLOR'S Works. 3 vols. $1800. 
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DR. JOHN SCOTT'S Complete Works. 6 vols. Svo. $16 00. 
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ARCHBISHOP USHER'S Works translated. 6 vols. Svo. 
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BISHOP WARBURTON'S Complete Works. 13 vols. Svo. $2800. 
WALL'S History of Infant Baptism. 4 vols. Svo. $12 00. 

PATRICK, LOWTH, WHITBY, ARNALD and LOWMAN'S Critical Commentary 
and Paraphrase on the Old and New Testament and the Apocrypha, with the 
Text at large: A new edition. 4 vols. imp. Svo. $22 00. 
HOLY BIBLE, with Doyle and Mant's Commentary. A beautiful edition. 3 vols. 

imp. Svo. $14 00. 

POOL'S Annotations on the Bible. " New edition, 3 yols. imp. Svo. $18 00. 
DR. WATERLAND'S Complete Works. New edition. 6 vols. Svo. $20 00. 
DR. SOUTH'S Sermons. New ed. 4 vols. Svo. $10'pO: Oxford ed. 5 vols. Svo. $15 00. 
Also, the beautiful Paris editions of ; 

ST. AUGUSTINI, Opera Omnia. Complete in 22 vbis. imp. Svo. $50 00. 
ST. CHRYSOSTOM Opera Omnia, Gr. et Lat. In 26 vols. imp. Svo. $75 00. 

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