THE
DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD
IN THE
CHURCH OF ENGLAND,
p\ ineoi
4*
THE
DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD
IN THE
CHURCH OF ENGLAND.
BY
THOMAS THELLUSSON CARTER, M.A.,
SECTOR OF CLEWEB.
Secontr "Button, rcbtstU.
LONDON :
JOSEPH MASTEES, ALDEESGATE STEEET,
AND NEW BOND STREET.
MDCCCLXIII.
LONDON :
PRINTED BY JOSEPH MASTERS AND CO.
ALDEBSGATE STREET.
TO HIS BRETHREN
THE MEMBERS OP THE CLERICAL SOCIETY
IN
THE DEANERIES OF BURNHAM AND BRAY,
IN THE DIOCESE OF OXFORD,
THESE PAGES ARE AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED,
IN THANKFULNESS FOR HAVING BEEN TAUGHT BY THEM
HOW MUCH UNITY OF EARNEST FAITH
LINGERS STILL AMIDST OUR MANY DIVISIONS*
AND HOW EVEN VARIETIES OF OPINION BECOME VALUABLE LESSONS
OF HUMILITY, FORBEARANCE, AND MUTUAL KINDNESS.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
PAGE
The Peesbttee View of the Ministby .... 1
CHAPTER II.
The Etymology of the Teem Peiest .... 7
CHAPTER III.
The Histoey of the Teem Peiest in the English Chttech,
feom the time of the refoemation . . . .13
CHAPTER IV.
The Conteast between the English and Fobeign Refob-
MATIONS 23
CHAPTER V.
The Commission and Functions of the Peiesthood in the
Chttech of England 30
CHAPTER VI.
Testimony of the Post- Apostolic Chttech, oe the Peeiod
subsequent to the Fiest Centuey of Cheistianity . 52
Vlll CONTENTS.
CHAPTEE VII.
PAGE
Testimony of the Apostolic Age, ob Fiest Centuby of
Cheistianity 69
CHAPTER VIII.
Testimony of the Holy Scbiptubes 75
CHAPTER IX.
The Peincifle of Peiesthood 96
CHAPTER X.
Aegument of the Epistle to the Hebeews . . . 108
CHAPTER XI.
Reasons why the teem 'IEPEY2 (Peiest) is not applied to
the Cheistian Ministey in the New Testament . .118
CHAPTER XII.
Of the Teems "Impeopee," " Spieitual," etc., as applied
to the Peiesthood and its Seevices .... 129
CHAPTER Xin.
The Connection between the Chubch and the Synagogue 137
CHAPTER XIV.
Thb Peiesthood of the People 146
CHAPTER XV.
The Chief Function of the Ministeeial Peiesthood . 155
APPENDIX 165
INTRODUCTION.
TWO different views are held of the meaning of the
•*- name, and of the character of the ministry, of a
Priest. They may be distinguished as the Presbyter,
and the Sacerdotal view. As one or other prevails, an
entirely different idea of the Church system is the
result. On a question important, not merely for its
own sake, but in its connection also with other kindred
doctrines, especially with the whole sacramental system
of the Church, as well as many practical details of the
spiritual life, it is of great moment to ascertain what
the Church teaches. Our inquiry is limited to the doc-
trine of the Church of England on the point in ques-
tion ; but inasmuch as the Church of England refers to
Holy Scripture, and the early undivided Church, for the
groundwork of its judgments, and the meaning, when-
ever doubtful, of its rules and services, it becomes ne-
cessary to extend the scope of the argument, so as to
embrace the records of antiquity and the Word of God.
X INTRODUCTION.
The line proposed to be pursued is, first to state the
Presbyter view, together with the authority on which
it rests, and then to contrast with it what the writer
believes to be the uniformly fixed, and only possible
Church view of the question. The conclusions to be
gathered from the teaching of the Church of England
will first be considered, and afterwards the traditions of
the Catholic Church, and the revelations of the Holy
Scriptures. In conclusion, some considerations will be
offered as to the principles of a priestly ministry, and
an answer to certain leading objections which are com-
monly taken against the existence of such a ministry
in the Christian Church.
An apology is needed for venturing to deal with a
question on which such men as Thorndike and Hickes,
&c, have written with so much learning ; x but different
ages require different modes of advocating the same
truths, and the labours of former ages give facilities to
those who would otherwise have been incompetent for
the task. The necessity of a renewed study of the
question, moreover, must be evident to any one who
considers the religious controversies and doubts which
1 Of the Government of Churches : a Discourse pointing at the
Primitive Form. (1641.) Of Religious Assemblies, and the Public Ser-
vice of God : a Discourse according to Apostolical Rule and Practice.
(1642.) By Herbert Thorndike, sometime Prebendary of the Collegiate
Church of S. Peter, Westminster.
The Christian Priesthood. (1695.) By George Hickes, D.D., some-
time Fellow of Lincoln College, and Dean of Worcester.
INTRODUCTION. IX
perplex thoughtful persons in the present day ; and if
what is here brought forward should lead any, anxious
for the truth, to search more deeply into the mysteries
of the kingdom of God, or to see more clearly their
own personal interest in them, the writer of these pages
requests of such persons to overlook his great deficien-
cies in treating upon so momentous a subject, and to
pray for him, that, after having thus expressed his con-
victions of the unearthly powers of the ministry in
which he bears a part, he may not "himself be a
castaway."
THE
DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
CHAPTER I.
THE PRESBYTER VIEW OF THE MINISTRY.
THE Presbyter view of the ministry rests chiefly on
etymological considerations. The argument may
be thus shortly stated. Priest is the abbreviated form
of Presbyter, which is the term employed in Holy Scrip-
ture, to denote the second order of the Christian minis-
try. Presbyter, or Elder, is the name of an officer of
the Jewish Synagogue. Therefore the term Priest
implies what that office comprehended. The description
of the Priestly office, when viewed according to this
theory, embraces teaching, discipline, and generally the
administration of religious rites and ceremonies. It is
assumed that this combination of offices corresponds
with the functions of the Jewish Elder, and this corres-
pondence is urged as a further proof of the supposed
substantial identity of the two offices.
The etymological argument will be discussed in the
next chapter. The argument from Scripture will be
considered in a later stage of our inquiry. The descrip-
b
2 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
tion of the ministry of the Elder, and its correspondence
with that of the Priest, is a separate question, and is
alone considered here.
The chief offices of a Jewish Synagogue, consisted of
the Ruler, the Elders, the Collector of Alms, and the
Angel or Legate, a name given indifferently to the re-
citer of the prayers, or to the messenger employed on
commissions, whether to proselytise, or to carry alms,
&c. There was no special officer appointed to read or
teach in the regular services. The custom was to invite
any person present to officiate for the occasion. 1
The Elders acted as assistants to the Ruler in the
1 Dr. Jahn, in his " Manual of Biblical Antiquities," thus enumerates
the officers of the Synagogue. (Sec. 371. Translated by J. C. Upham.)
I. The " Euler of the Synagogue," who presided over the assembly
and invited readers and speakers.
II. The " Elders of the Synagogue," who acted as counsellors of the
Euler, took part in its internal management, and punished transgressors
of the laws.
III. The " Collectors of Alms," or Deacons.
IV. The " Servants of the Synagogue," who delivered the books to
the readers, &c, and performed other subordinate offices.
V. The " Messenger or Legate of the Synagogue," who was sent from
one synagogue to another to carry alms, or commissioned to propagate
religious knowledge.
The "Synagogue Preacher" is an officer introduced in later times.
In the time of Cheist, the person who read, or preached, was selected
for the occasion from among those present.
The person selected to recite the prayers was called the messenger
(&yy eXos), as well as the regular officer known by that name. He is
called by the Jews of modern times the " synagogue singer," or can-
tilator.
The Jews anciently called those persons who, from their superior
erudition, were capable of teaching in the synagogue, " shepherds, or
pastors." They applied the same terms, in more recent times, to the
elders and deacons.
THE PRESBYTER VIEW OF THE MINISTRY. 3
management of the concerns of the Synagogue, in
procuring readers or speakers, and in preserving Eccle-
siastical discipline among the members. They had not,
strictly speaking, any religious office. If an elder hap-
pened to be learned in the Scriptures, which was not
necessarily the case, he might expound, as any other
person present in the congregation ; but such ministra-
tion was entirely accidental to his distinctive office.
Teaching and saying prayers, were separate functions,
discharged by other persons.
The supposed parallelism, therefore, between the func-
tions of the Christian Presbyter and the Jewish Elder,
does not hold good ; the theory is forced to assume the
combination of offices ordinarily kept distinct, as though
they co-existed in one person. The question at issue
is as to the distinctive character of one — the second
order — of the Apostolic ministry, and the* Presbyter
theory proceeds on the assumption, that this order is
represented by the officer bearing the name of Elder in
the Jewish Synagogue. But in drawing the comparison
of their respective functions, the comparison is made to
lie, not with the single office which the name properly
represents, but with a combination of offices discharged
by several different persons. In order to establish the
theory, it is necessary to supplement the simple view of
the Elder, who was properly only an Ecclesiastical
Judge or magistrate, with the addition of a ministry of
religion.
It is most important to bear this in mind, because
the objection urged against the sacerdotal view of the
Christian ministry is this, that it assumes the addition
of elements of service incompatible with the original
b 2
4 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
meaning of the term Presbyter ; an objection which
cannot be fairly urged by the upholders of the Pres-
byter view, inasmuch as their own theory likewise re-
quires an addition of functions, not properly belonging
to the proposed prototype. Both the Presbyter and the
sacerdotal views alike assume the addition of elements
which the office of the Jewish Elder did not represent.
The only question between the two theories, therefore,
regards the amount of addition to the meaning of the
original term, not to the principle of addition in
itself.
The Presbyter theory is based mainly on the authority
of Vitringa, a Dutch Presbyterian of the last century, 1
though it did not origiuate with him. The theory was
advanced first by Grotius, his fellow-countryman, also a
Presbyterian, from whom it was adopted by Selden, a
lay-elder in Cromweirs Council of Divines. Vitringa
appeals to these two writers in support of his views ; he
also adduces, among English divines, the respected
names of Thorndike and Lightfoot, as authorities favour-
able to his theory. In referring however to Thorndike,
Vitringa omits to state, that while the writer mentions
the resemblance existing between the Christian minister
and the Jewish Elder, he asserts at the same time the
yet closer correspondence between him and the Jewish
Priest. Nor does Vitringa explain that Thorndike uses
the term Synagogue in its widest sense, including the
entire Jewish economy.
It is of the utmost importance to distinguish the two-
1 Vitringa took his Doctor's degree in Divinity, at the University of
Leyden, in 1759. The book referred to, is his treatise, " De Synagoga
Vetere."
THE PRESBYTER VIEW OP THE MINISTRY. 5
fold sense of the term Synagogue, which means some-
times the entire Jewish system, sometimes the special
place of assembly. Unless this distinction is clearly
kept in view, the mere mention of the term may appear
to favour the Presbyter view, when in reality the author
may be tracing the Christian ministry to a very different
part of the Jewish system. Bishop Andrewes e.g. employs
the term in its wider sense in his " Summary View of
the Government of the Old and New Testament," where
he is tracing the correspondence exclusively between the
Christian minister and the Jewish Priest.
When referring to Lightfoot, Vitringa, with a naive
simplicity, acknowledges this fact of the double mean-
ing of the term, and Lightfoot' s use of it in its wider
sense, thus contradicting the apparent support which he
claims. "It cannot be dissembled, that this learned
man uses the word Synagogue in its widest acceptation,
for the whole Jewish economy, including the Temple,
as well as the Synagogue proper." Even in the passage
which Vitringa quotes from Lightfoot, there occurs the
mention of " Sacrifices, Priests, (sacerdotes), Deacons
or Levites," as marks of correspondence between the two
systems. Lightfoot and Thorndike are the only autho-
rities of the English Church, whom Vitringa claims in
support of his view.
The reasons which induce Vitringa to rest satisfied in
this supposed derivation of the Christian ministry from
the Jewish Synagogue, need to be considered in order
to appreciate the weight of his authority. The following
are the only reasons which he gives, and they occur in
the order stated. 1
1 See Prolegomena, c. t.
b THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
1. A Synagogue might be built anywhere; the Temple
only on one spot.
2. In the Synagogue there was no distinction of per-
sons or ministers ; any one present might be appointed
to officiate for the occasion. In the Temple, only certain
ordained persons could officiate. The same liberty, he
adds, nourishes in our Churches.
3. In the worship of the Temple, a particular dress
was required. In the Synagogue, an official dress was
used, and there was even a slovenliness in this respect,
(aliquando nimius etiam videri possit vestium esse neg-
lectus) .
4. There was greater liberty in regard to the age of
those who officiated in the Synagogue.
5. Some minute points are enumerated, as e.g. that
no one maimed in body could be a Priest, but he could
officiate in the Synagogue.
6. The Temple had its gradations among its minis-
ters, (sanctitatis religione gradus,) its altars, vessels,
furniture, &c, but they are wanting in the Synagogue
and the Church.
7. The Temple worship consisted more of sacrifices,
benedictions, &c. ; that of the Synagogue of congre-
gational prayer.
It is evident from what point of view Vitringa looks
at the question, and how he regards the Church. A
real Churchman from his point of view, must have drawn
a precisely opposite conclusion from every one of the
same premises.
CHAPTER II.
THE ETYMOLOGY OF THE TEEM PRIEST.
IT has been observed that the presbyter view of the
Christian Ministry depends on the etymology of the
term; the argument being that because Priest is the
abbreviated form of presbyter, it consequently bears the
same meaning, and implies the same kind of ministry.
The consideration, therefore, of the etymological bearing
of the question is of primary importance.
To trace the origin of a word in a foreign language,
and under a foreign system, from whence it has been
transferred many hundred years ago, must always be an
uncertain method of ascertaining its meaning in current
use. Words are not fossils, which, transplanted from
one bed of matter to another, preserve their primaeval
forms from age to age ; but rather like fluid atoms they
are ever running into fresh shapes and combinations.
When transferred, they come into contact with new
ideas, and then become representatives of those new
ideas. They are as true representatives of the new ideas
to which they are thenceforward attached, as they were
before of the ideas which previously belonged to them ;
for words are mere conventional representatives of what-
ever the creative mind chooses to express by their means.
They are the " counters" of thought, and are changed
8 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
about at will, now standing for one, now for another
combination of ideas. This happens more or less in the
case of every transferred word, for no two nations, or
two systems are precisely alike, and the more pregnant
with meaning, the more vitally associated with the in-
terests of humanity any term may be, the deeper is the
new impression stamped upon it.
Terms of religion, beyond .all other terms, are liable to
be changed in their meanings, because they are associated
with ideas which touch upon the deepest springs of
thought, and are symbols of the outgoings of the Infinite.
And the deeper the revelations which any religion con-
tains, the more sure it is that the terms it borrows from
other sources will be clothed in the transference with new
and greater mysteries. What notion, e.g., would be ob-
tained of the word Bishop, by simply referring a student
to its etymological meaning, " overseer?" Apostle, again,
was the name of a subordinate officer of the Sanhedrim,
and S. Paul held this office, when he was charged with
letters to Damascus, to destroy the disciples of our
Lord. But who could discern any resemblance be-
tween Saul starting from Jerusalem for Damascus, and
S. Paul traversing Asia Minor, or standing on Mars'
hill ? What notion of a Sacrament could one have, on
being taught that the word among the ancient Romans
meant a regimental oath; or of Holy Baptism, by
learning that it etymologically meant washing by water ?
That, like to these and all other transferred words,
Priest has changed its meaning, and now truly repre-
sents the same idea, which was conveyed of old, among
the Hebrews by Cohen, among the Greeks by Uge6$,
among the Romans by Sacerdos, and among the Gothic
THE ETYMOLOGY OF THE WORD PRIEST. 9
nations by Gudi, is only one instance of an universal
law.
Moreover, the synonymous words in the ancient lan-
guages underwent in their day precisely the same change,
as is here supposed to have happened to the term Pres-
byter. 'Cohen' originally meant, according to some
authorities, f one who ministers or transacts business
for another/ or, as in the margin of our Bible (Gen. xli.
45), * a prince/ or as Simoni, comparing it with its cor-
responding Arabic root, prefers, f a prophet/ 'hpsvg,
Sacerdos, and Gudi, (from Gud or God,) meant simply,
1 one employed about holy things/ The distinctive at-
tributes of Priesthood were superadded to the original
meanings of those words, in consequence of their asso-
ciation with the special doctrines and offices of religion,
which by common use they came to represent. 1
The term Presbyter has itself undergone many changes.
Originally denoting an elder by birth, like 'senator*
among the Romans, it had before the time of Moses
acquired the meaning of a ruler or judge. It is used in
the Pentateuch and the historical books of the Old Tes-
1 The term Priest (Upe6s) does not appear in the Bible, till it is ap-
plied to Aaron and his sons, (except in reference to Melchisedek, Poti-
pherah, and Jethro), and yet there was a Priesthood in the Patriarchal
line from the time of the fall, when sacrifices were first instituted. It
does not clearly appear what name was used to denote the office. Per-
haps the term ' Prophet' was so used, as in Gen. xx. 7, where the act of
intercession spoken of is a priestly act. This gives countenance to
Simoni's explanation of the etymology of Cohen. The union of the
offices of Priest and Prophet appears to have been common in patri-
archal times, and the exercise of the priestly office by prophets, as by
Samuel (1 Sam. ix. 13, and xiii. 13), and by Nathan (2 Sam. xii. 13),
even under the Mosaic law, is probably a lingering prolongation of
patriarchal customs.
b3
10 THE DOCTRINE OE THE PRIESTHOOD.
tament, to denote indifferently ecclesiastical or civil
authority. We read of the " elders of the people," the
" elders of every city," the " elders of the Priests/' as
well as the " elders" of the Synagogue. It was a lay,
not a clerical term. In the language of the Apostles
"elder" became the name of a minister of religion, and
it underwent another change when the Apostolic Fathers
of the first century selected it as the technical appella-
tion of the second order of the Christian ministry,
contrasted with Bishop and Deacon. Through this as-
sociation, as in the case of the ancient names above
mentioned, it then acquired the meaning of a sacer-
dotal office exercised by that order in the Church.
As Christianity spread in the West, Presbyter was
adopted in the native languages, and became in Germany,
1 Priester f in France, * Pretre f in Spain, ' Presbytero f
in England, ' Priest ;' and these words in the Western
Church, were used synonymously with 'sacerdote' in
Italy and Spain ; Upz6$ in the East (in modern Greek
pronounced ' ee-e-renV) ; ' Hieree' or ' Sviashennick/
i.e., one consecrated, in Russia ; * Kamanaij/ i.e., one
who sacrifices, in Armenia ; f sagart/ (pronounced sag-
gurt,) from 'sacerdos/ in Ireland, and offeiriadd, offerer,
in Welsh. 1
The philological argument is very remarkable. In
1 An uniform law, worthy of notice, has guided the mind of the
Church in the choice of appropriate names for the priesthood. One or
more names hare been employed officially, and are found in the Service
books ; other names implying reverence, but of a more familiar kind,
have been used in colloquial language. The names given in the text are
the official and more solemn appellations. The following are the familiar
terms which have been employed : — In the East, ' Papas,' father ; in
Eussia, c Pope,' evidently derived from Papas, or f Batushka,' my dear
THE ETYMOLOGY OF THE WORD PRIEST. 11
the East 7rp£<rfiuTepo$ existed as the appellation of the
second order in the ministry, long enough to give rise
to its many derivatives in the West, and then gradu-
ally fell out of use. The term passed into the West
impressed with the idea of Upe4$; for the German, French
and English languages have no term to represent a
sacerdotal ministry, except the derivatives from presby-
ter, and these derivatives have been used in intimate
association with that idea from the earliest period of the
Christian life of those nations. This association is
proved by the prevailing use of sacerdos in the service-
books of the Western Church, as of Upe6$ in those of the
East. The name and idea of sacerdos was so established
in the West at the time when Ireland was Christianised,
as to furnish the derivative, sagart, without any trace of
the Presbyter in name or idea. The Church thus sealed
the derivatives of wpw&umpQf with its sanction, as fitted
to be used indifferently with the ancient sacerdotal
terms and their derivatives.
It becomes evident, therefore, that the etymology of
father, the more respectful term ; in Italy and Spain, ' Padre ;' in France,
1 Pere ;' in Germany, ' Gteistlicht,' ghostly man.
The custom of the English Church is strictly according to Catholic
rule. When Sacerdos was the title in the office books, Priest was the
colloquial term. But when, on the translation of the Service books,
Priest became the official title, another term was required for familiar
use, and Clergyman, an ancient name derived from K\ijpos, * the lot of
the Loed,' as opposed to AaJs, ' the people of the Loed,' and meaning,
therefore, ' one of the sacred lot,' was adopted for common use. A re-
markable instinct rules the minds of men, even when ignorant of the
principle at stake, and perhaps even opposed to it. Scarcely any one
would use the term Clergyman, except of a minister of the Church of
England. Terms such as • minister,' • pastor,' which have no distinctive
meaning, are employed to designate religious teachers out of the Church,
thus marking the want of any distinctive or priestly character.
12 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
the term, Priest, is no guide to its interpretation, and
that the long-sanctioned usage of the term has become
its real, and only true meaning. If this be not the case,
it lies with objectors to account for two striking pheno-
mena; (1) how it happened that modern Europe, in
the formation of some of its chief languages, should
have failed to produce words representing an idea so
well known, and so universal. And (2), what involves
a far more serious question, how the Church, notwith-
standing its subtle elaboration of the Creeds, and accu-
rate distinctions of theological phrases on all disputed
points of doctrine, should in this case have gone on
using a misnomer, "deceiving and being deceived."
This latter supposition is a necessary consequence of the
presbyter view, and it attributes to the Church a want
of distinction in language which could not fail to pro-
duce a lamentable and most injurious want of distinction
in thought. Another, and surely the more probable
conclusion is, that neither those nations of modern
Europe, nor the Church, needed to coin another word,
simply because this transferred term, following the
common law of language affecting all borrowed words,
had with sufficient certainty acquired the meaning
which needed to be expressed.
We are in truth dealing not with words, but with
things; with a living reality which is daily revealing
itself in acts of unearthly power and benediction to all
them that believe. And the true mode of ascertaining
the meaning of the word Priest consequently must be,
, by considering the ideas which it actually represents,
and the nature of the ministry which by common con-
sent it designates.
CHAPTER III.
THE HISTOEY OF THE TERM PRIEST IN THE ENGLISH
CHURCH, FROM THE TIME OF THE REFORMATION.
WE are naturally led to the Reformation as the crisis,
at which the mind of the Church of England
upon the point in question was specially manifested.
For the Service Books at that period being translated
into the mother tongue, the Church was free to select
the most suitable term, as the designation of the
officiating minister.
Sacerdos had been in use in the Latin Service Books
up to the time of the Reformation, and Priest was the
familiar term to express its meaning. This term had
become fixed in the mind and conscience of the people
of England, as the only native word to denote a sacer-
dotal ministry. If it had been the purpose of the Re-
formers to reject the ideas universally attached to the
name, they must of necessity have abandoned the name
itself. And there were other names ready to their
hand. They might have employed throughout the
Prayer Book, as they did in some places, the term
Minister or Pastor, then, as now, the favourite appella-
tions of the foreign Reformers : or, taking the language
of Scripture as their rule, they might have used the
14 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
unabbreviated term, Presbyter. When, on the con-
trary, they adopted the term, Priest, of the meaning of
which at the time there could be no doubt, they must
have intended to preserve also the ideas attached to it.
Having enshrined the popular term in the sacred books
of the Church, they could not have expected the ideas,
which it represented, to die out, or that the people
would go back for its interpretation to Jewish times
and the usage of the synagogue.
It cannot be urged that the English Reformers acted
in this matter blindly, and without consideration of the
grave questions involved. The Presbyterians at the
same time rejected the term, Priest, simply because of
the popular ideas attached to it. Moreover, the ten-
dency of the English Reformers was to go to the ex-
tremest limit of conciliation, in hopes of winning as
many as possible to unite in one common cause. No
greater instance of this tendency can be given, than the
removal of the term, Altar, from the Prayer Book. The
term was used throughout the first Prayer Book of Ed-
ward VI.; it disappears from the second. 1 Though its
removal is deeply to be regretted, yet there was no real
change of doctrine involved, for where there is a Priest,
there must needs be an altar ; and the terms altar and
holy table were indifferently used by the Fathers. To
have retained the term, Priest, under such circum-
stances, is the more striking, and must be regarded as
an unmistakeable testimony to the conviction of our
1 The term ' altar' remains in use in the Coronation Service as well as
in several Acts of Parliament (see Dr. Phillimore's speech on the appeal
of Liddell versus Westerton, in the case of SS. Paul and Barnabas) ; and
also prevails universally in the mind and familiar language of the people.
THE HISTORY OF THE TERM PRIEST. 15
Reformers, that while some popular errors had to be
corrected, no change was needed in this respect.
But besides the pressure against the use of this term,
arising from the Ultra- Reformers, the question was
thoroughly mooted between the English Divines and
the advocates of the Church of Rome. There were
warm disputes at the time as to the validity of our ordi-
nations, whether or no our Clergy possessed full sacerdotal
powers. If sacerdotal powers had not been claimed by
the advocates of the English Reformation, the argument
would have been at an end. But the assertion of the
validity of our ordinations, as involving such powers,
was peculiarly strong and decided. "I answer again/'
says Archbishop Bramhall, " that in our very essential
form of priestly ordination, priestly power and autho-
rity is sufficiently expressed. We need not seek for a
needle in a bottle of hay. The words of- our ordinal are
clear enough." (Discourse v. 486.) The question
turned on the doctrine of the Eucharistic Sacrifice, and
the Real Presence in the Blessed Sacrament. The line
of the discussion may be gathered from BramhalPs
treatises, and the writings of Bishop Andrewes. 1 Tak-
ing their statements as our guide, we learn that the
question was, not as to the truth of these mysterious
doctrines, on which both parties were agreed, but as to
the mode of defining them. The Church of England
advocates opposed the particular definition of doctrine,
1 Bramhall and Andrewes were the two great writers, who during the
reigns of Elizabeth and James I., when the principles of the English
Reformation had attained a settled form, conducted the controversy with
the Church of Rome, the former against the Bishop of Chalcedon, the
latter against Cardinal Bellarmine.
16 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
known by the term, Transubstantiation, and whatever
might be strictly consequent upon that definition ; but
they were willing to accept any form of explanation which
had the warrant of Holy Scripture, and a true Catholic
tradition. They only rejected words which implied the
denial of the true existence of the symbols of bread and
wine after consecration, or any idea of a repetition of
the Sacrifice of the Cross, or a sacrifice of the same
kind. They sought to preserve the idea of a Sacrifice
commemorative of the Sacrifice of the Cross, pleading
and obtaining its merits, under the symbols of bread
and wine, and to cast around the consecrated elements
the veil of the simpler faith of early days ; not seeking
to define too minutely the manner of the Divine opera-
tion, content to adore a Presence of the Incarnate God
in intimate association with the elements, but accord-
ing to supernatural laws of being, which no logical de-
scription could grasp, or human thought or language
reduce to any known form.
The doctrine of the Sacrifice in the Holy Eucharist
will come to be considered more fully in a later stage
of the inquiry. It is only necessary now to observe
the bearing of these discussions on the claim made by
our Reformers to a true Priesthood, and how in retain-
ing the name they intended to use it in a real sense ac-
cording to the then prevailing view of priestly functions.
The following extracts from Archbishop Bramhall
will show the mode in which that great writer, and other
like defenders of the Reformation in England, met the
charge of having lost a true Priesthood from the sup-
posed denial of essential truth as to the doctrine of the
Blessed Sacrament:
THE HISTORY OF THE TERM PRIEST. 17
" We acknowledge," he says, u sl Eucharistical sacri-
fice of praise and thanksgiving ; a commemorative sa-
crifice, or a memorial of the Sacrifice of the Cross ; a
representative sacrifice, or a representation of the Pas-
sion of Christ before the eyes of His heavenly Father ;
an impetrative sacrifice, or an impetration of the fruits
and benefits of His Passion, by way of real prayer ; and,
lastly, an applicative sacrifice, or an application of His
merits unto our souls. Let him that dare, go one
step further than we do, and say that it is a sup-
pi etory sacrifice, to supply the defects of the Sacrifice of
the Cross ; or else let them hold their peace and speak
no more against us in this point of sacrifice for ever."
(Discourse iii. sec. vi.)
In another passage Bramhall first states the objection
of the advocates of Rome, and then answers it :
" The form, or words," said the Archbishop's oppo-
nents, "whereby men are made priests, must express
authority and power to consecrate or make present
Christ's Body and Blood (whether with or without
Transubstantiation is not the present controversy with
Protestants) ." To which Bramhall replies : " Thus far
we accord to the truth of the Presence of Christ's
Body and Blood, so they leave us this latitude for the
manner of His Presence. Abate us Transubstantiation,
and those things which are consequent of this deter-
mination of the manner of Presence, and we have no
difference with them in this particular. 1 They who are
1 Bishop Andrewes gives the following answer to Bellarmine in terms
precisely according with Bramhall :
" We believe a Real Presence no less than you ; concerning the mode
of the Presence we define nothing rashly."
And again : " Chbist said, ' This is My Body,' not ' This is My Body
18 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
ordained priests ought to have power to consecrate the
Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ; that is,
to make them present after such manner as they were
present at the first institution, whether it be done by
the enunciation of the words of Christ, as it is observed
in this mode.'' We agree with you concerning the object ; all the dis-
pute is concerning the mode (de modo lis omnis est)."
And again : " De hoc est, fide firma tenemur quod sit ; de hoc modo
est, ut sit per, sive in, sive cum, sive sub, sive trans, nullum inibi yerbum
est." "We hold by a firm belief, that * This' (the consecrated Bread)
is the Body of Christ ; of the manner how it is so, whether c by,' or
1 in,' or ' with,' or * under,' or changeably with,' there is nothing said
in the Scripture." (Casaubon, Epist. 393.)
Speaking generally, only one question on the subject of the Blessed
Sacrament was agitating Christendom, — whether aReal Objective Pre-
sence of the Blessed Body and Blood of Christ was associated with the
consecrated elements, or no ; for the Zuinglian belief of a Presence to
the soul of the worthy communicant cannot, in any true sense, be
termed a Real Presence, as these words are theologically understood.
The Roman, Lutheran, and English communions agreed in this main
doctrine of the Real Objective Presence ; the difference only regarded
the manner. What the Church of England guarded against in denying
Transubstantiation, is evident from the words of the Article. " Tran-
substantiation, or the change of the substance of bread and wine." The
Real Objective Presence is left perfectly untouched by these words ;
neither is it denied that there is a change of the elements ; only it is
not a change of their substance.
Another idea, which had popularly grown up, was also guarded
against, where it is said, at the close of the Eucharistic Office, " that no
adoration is intended, or ought to be done, unto any corporal Presence
of Christ's natural Flesh and Blood." These words were used to ex-
clude the idea of a natural Presence after some material law of being.
The terms are technical, and were employed to meet this peculiar po-
pular idea, then, as it appears, current. But these words by no means
affect the question of a Real Objective Presence after a heavenly
manner suited to spiritual substances. "In the Supper of the Lord,"
as our Homily says, "is no vain ceremony, no bare sign, no untrue
figure of a thing absent" &c. (Sermon on Sacrament, First Part.)
THE HISTORY OF THE TERM PRIEST. 19
by the Western Church, or by prayer, as it is practised
in the Eastern Church, or whether these two be both
the same things in effect ; that is, that the form of Sa-
craments be mystical prayers and implicit invocations.
Our Church for more abundant caution useth both these
forms, as well in the consecration of the Sacrament, as
in the ordination of priests." (Consecration of Protes-
tant Bishops Vindicated. Discourse v. c. xi.)
After summing up the whole question, he dismisses it
with the following brief and conclusive assertion :
" He who saith, Take thou authority to exercise the
office of a priest in the Church 6f God (as the Protes-
tant consecrators do), doth intend all things requisite
to the priestly function, and among the rest, to offer a
representative Sacrifice, to commemorate and apply the
Sacrifice which Christ made upon the Cross." 1
In the year 1662, a slight, though, as marking the
anxiety with which the Church of England has sought
to remove any doubt, or ground of opposition on this
point, an important, change was made in our Ordination
Service. The form of the commission originally stood
simply thus : " Receive the Holy Ghost : whose sins
ye remit, they are remitted," &c. The advocates of
Rome urged a defect, because the term Priest was not
expressed. It was felt to be a captious objection ; for
the words in which our Lord had ordained the Apostles,
and the words originally used in our Ordinal are but a
simple repetition of them, could hardly with reason be
deemed deficient. But in order to obviate any possible
misapprehension, the term Priest was introduced, and
1 Protestants' Ordination defended against the objection of S. N.
Discourse vii. 3.
20 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
the form of the commission altered, as it now stands :
" Receive the Holy Ghost for the office and work of a
Priest now committed to thee, by the imposition of our
hands. Whose sins thou dost forgive," &c.
But at the Savoy Conference of this same year, held
for the revision of the Prayer Book, the most striking
and conclusive testimony was given of the deliberate
judgment of the Church of England. There could be
no doubt at this time as to the real question at issue
between the Church and the Nonconformists. Priest-
craft had been the loudest cry of the enemies of the
Church during the reign of Charles I. It had heralded
the way to the desecration of every altar in England,
the, suppression of the Prayer Book, and the prostra-
tion of the Church itself, which closed that disastrous
period. The enemies of the priesthood and of the
crown obtained their temporary triumph. The Presbyter
had his day ; and Cromwell's lay elders were the hiero-
phants of the Great Rebellion. When therefore the
Nonconformist divines asked the Bishops to remove the
term Priest from the Prayer Book, and as minister was
used in some, so it should be in all, places, the Bishops
knew well what their request meant. As in a former
generation, James I. coming out of Scotland, under-
stood better than they in England the working of the
presbyter theory, and expressed the results of a sorely
won experience in his well known apothegm, "No Bishop,
no King;" so the Bishops, who survived the Great
Rebellion, must have learnt by a yet sadder experience,
the truth which S. Jerome had expressed many years
before in a corresponding apothegm, "No Priest, no
THE HISTORY OP THE TERM PRIEST. 21
Church." 1 It is amusing, if we consider the recollec-
tions which must have been present to the minds of
both parties in that eventful conference, to observe the
quaint quietness and simplicity with which the Bishops
put aside the request : " It is not reasonable/' they said,
"that the word minister should be only used in the
Liturgy. For since some parts of the Liturgy may be
performed by a deacon, others by none under the order
of a priest, viz., absolution and consecration, it is fit
that some such word as priest should be used for these
offices, and not minister, which signifies at large every
one that ministers in that holy office, of what order
soever he be." (Cardwell's Documentary Annals, ch. vii.
prop, ii.) The Nonconformists had better have left the
matter alone. The Bishops, like Solomon when Queen
Bathsheba pleaded for Adonijah, awakened to a quicker
sense of impending danger, saw that there was no safety,
except in the removal of the aspirant. They not only
refused to displace the term Priest in favour of minister,
but, on the contrary, introduced the term Priest in the
stead of minister in two important places where doc-
trine was at stake, and entirely cast out the term pastor,
the favourite appellation of the Nonconformists, from
the only place in the Prayer Book where it seemed to
challenge to itself a distinctive meaning. In the rubric
before the Absolution, minister was displaced and Priest
substituted ; and in the Litany, the suffrage which had
previously been for " Bishops, pastors, and ministers,"
1 S. Hieron. adv. Lucif. c. 8. Ecclesia non est, qu® noxi habet Sa-
cerdotes. (Where there is no Priesthood, there is no Church.) Quoted
by Dr. Wordsworth. Theoph. Anglic, p. 214.
22 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
was changed into " Bishops, priests, and deacons." 1 It
is impossible to conceive a more decisive proof of the
mind of the Church of England. The question had
come to a complete issue, with full knowledge of all
the circumstances involved, and a powerful opposition
in favour of the presbyter view. In the face of this
opposition the Bishops decided, (and there was no dis-
sentient voice among them,) to reject "minister," which,
according to the presbyter view, is the correct term,
and uphold " priest," which it condemns as unscriptural.
In consequence of disagreements on this and other
similar points of doctrine, the Nonconformists separated
from the Church. Since that time the question has been
at rest, and no occasion has been given to reassert these
repeated decisions. 2
1 The term Pastor occurs twice, in the Collects for S. Matthias' and
S. Peter's Day ; but in both cases it is used in a general sense, as in
Scripture.
2 Among those who were appointed to conduct the Savoy conference,
who thus decided the question as to the term Priest, may be mentioned
Sheldon, Cosin, Morley, Sanderson, "Walton, Ghinning, Pearson, Sparrow,
Thorn dike.
It is more than a matter of curiosity to remark, that in the rubrics of
the first Prayer Book of Edward VI.'s reign, the term Priest occurs
ninety times ; in those of the second, fifty-five times ; in those of our
present Prayer Book, eighty-eight times. It will be readily observed
by any one who may investigate this Church usage, that the term is
used on principle, and that wherever " Priest" is the term employed,
more or less of sacerdotal authority is implied. The term, minister, on
the contrary is used, where the office is simply ministerial, although this
term also appears to have sometimes a specific meaning synonymous
with Priest. . See note, p. 46.
CHAPTER IV.
THE CONTRAST BETWEEN THE ENGLISH AND FOREIGN
REFORMATION.
THE course pursued by the Church of England be-
comes clearer, when contrasted with that of the
foreign Reformers. The choice of the terms, which they
respectively adopted as the designation of the ministry,
hinged upon the difference of their respective systems.
It is therefore important to advert, though briefly, to
the different principles of the contending parties.
The Reformation proceeded on three separate lines,
readily distinguishable one from the other. In Eng-
land the Bishops and Clergy combined in the move-
ment. There was therefore no break in the Apostolic
succession, and the grace of the Sacraments flowed on
uninterruptedly. There was no change, and no temp-
tation to change, in this respect. The Church system
remained entire in all its vital elements, and with the
same original powers of perpetuation.
It was not so abroad. No Bishop supported the Re-
formation in Germany. Luther was a Priest, and he
was joined only by some of his own order. They con-
tinued, as before, to administer Sacraments, and taught
their efficacy. The Confession of Augsburg, which em-
24 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
bodies the principles of the German Reformation, asserts
Regeneration in Baptism, private confession to a Priest,
the grace of Absolution, and the Real Presence in the
Holy Eucharist. 1 It also fully recognises the Priest-
hood (sacerdotium) . What may be called the Church
system, as a matter of mere doctrine, remained un-
changed in the Lutheran scheme. The loss was of a
practical kind. Without an episcopate, how was it pos-
sible to continue the succession ? Luther, yielding to
the necessities of his position, introduced the perfectly
novel doctrine of Priests ordaining Priests. Thus a true
sacramental system was retained, with true Priests to
administer it for a time ; but without the only ordained
means of transmitting the same powers to the succeed-
ing generation.
The Reformation assumed yet another phase in Swit-
zerland. Calvin, its leader, was not in Priest's orders.
He had, consequently, no authority to administer sacra-
ments. The question in his case was, how to preserve
Christianity without priesthood or sacraments. Influ-
enced both by temper and position, he took the bold
line of rejecting the traditionary doctrine of the Priest-
hood altogether. He taught that Christ alone is the
Priest of the New Testament ; that to attribute a Priest-
hood to any other, is a disparagement of our Blessed
Lord, except so far as all Christians are called priests ;
and that Christian ministers are only what their
1 See Dr. Pusey's notes to his sermon, lately published, in which he
proves that the early Lutheran view of the Beal Presence was identical
with that of the Church of England ; and that Consubstantiation, as it
has been called, was a perversion of their creed, and not taught by the
first Lutherans.
THE ENGLISH AND THE FOREIGN REFORMATION. 25
Scriptural names — presbyters, pastors, and teachers —
denote.
These views are exhibited in detail in the Helvetic
Confession, which contains the views of the Swiss Re-
formers, as the Confession of Augsburgh contains those
of the German Reformers. Calvin accordingly insti-
tuted a new order of ministry, without any claim to
sacerdotal powers. But how then to dispose of Sacra-
ments ? Calvin taught that they were signs symbo-
lizing, not conveying, grace, though grace followed in
the use of them by the elect. He thus separated the sign
from the thing signified, making the one independent
of the other. The outward elements, according to his
view, only exhibit to the soul the truth of which they
are the symbols, while the grace promised is to be sought,
not through their instrumentality, but direct from
heaven, and may be given or not, according to the con-
ditions of the partaker. The difficulty still remaining
was, how to ensure the promised grace, when Calvin's
ministry laid no claim to a Divine commission, and,
according to the universal tradition of the Church, the
promises are ordinarily conveyed only through those
who possess it. To obviate this difficulty, Calvin con-
ceived and taught, that the faith of the receiver, not the
act of consecration, is the instrumental cause of grace
in sacraments. 1 Thus he constituted every man his
1 Strong expressions are to be found in Calvin's writings as to the
grace which may be received through the Holy Eucharist. And such
passages may lead the reader to suppose that he harmonises with Ca-
tholic doctrine, unless he is careful to compare them with other state-
ments which clearly shew that he considers the grace of God to depend
only on the act of the mind stimulated by the outward symbol. Thus,
7 °
26 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
own priest. The Christian ministry accordingly be-
came, in Calvin's system, nothing but an organ of
government and instruction, which the term elder, the
characteristic feature of Presbyterianism, sufficiently
denotes.
History has shown the result of these two foreign sys-
tems. Presbyterianism, the bolder and more consistent,
has lived. Having made no pretensions to a Divine com-
mission, and formed independently of priestly ministra-
tions, the Presbyterians, losing nothing in the lapse of
time, have preserved unchanged the traditions of their
founder. Calvinism is at this day a living and a pow-
erful idea ; though still, as at its commencement, essen-
tially human in its organisation. Lutheranism, on the
other hand, betrays the inevitable consequences of an
inconsistent position ; of an attempt to live without the
means of life. With the Priests of Luther's generation
died out the means of ministering sacraments ; and with
the reality the very idea and name of Priesthood gra-
e.g. lie says, " Cheist does not address the bread, to command it to be-
come the Body, but enjoins His disciples to eat, and promises them the
communication of His Body and Blood. Nor does Paul teach any
other order than that the promises should be offered to the faithful,
together with the bread and cup. And this is the truth. We are not
to imagine any magical incantation, or think it sufficient to have mut-
tered over the words, as if they were heard by the elements ; but we
are to understand these words, by which the elements are consecrated,
to be a lively preaching, which edifies the hearers, which penetrates
their minds, which is deeply impressed on their hearts, which exerts
its efficacy in the accomplishment of that which it promises." — Inst,
book iv., chap. 17. sec. 39.
Calvin evidently rejects the idea of an external objective Presence in-
dependent of the faith of the communicant, as well as the instrumen-
tality of the consecrated elements in the conveyance of the gift.
THE ENGLISH AND THE FOREIGN REFORMATION. 27
dually disappeared. The Confession of Augsburg is no
criterion of the Lutheranism of the present day. It is
a remarkable instance of the true connection existing
between the language and mind of a people, that while
the Lutheran Priest has become the pastor, the term
Bishop yet lives amongst them ; the reason being, that
while they have lost the idea of Priesthood, they have
retained a quasi- episcopal form of church government.
Such is the general case ; though exceptions are to be
found in the Scandinavian peninsula, and some remoter
districts, where lingers still the semblance of an external
religion, with the names of Priest, sacrament, and ritual.
The main difference, therefore, between the English
and foreign Reformation, lay in this — that we retained,
and they lost, the sacramental system. The name, Priest,
which they have consistently rejected, and we as con-
sistently have preserved, is the token and seal of that
system, and so of our distinctiveness.
It is evident, then, from what source there first arose
in England any opposition to the Catholic doctrine of
the Priesthood. Urgent and persevering were the en-
deavours of the Swiss Reformers to advance their views
amongst us. The second Prayer-Book of Edward VI.,
compared with the first of that reign, indelibly marks
their fatal influence for a time. 1 But even while other
1 See, among other accounts of the times, Card well's Preface to the
" Two Liturgies of Edward VI. compared," in which many interesting
details, bearing expressly on the point, are brought together by a philo-
sophical and accomplished scholar. Cardwell proves that it was Cal-
vinism, the extreme anti-Church element of the Eeformation, not Lu-
theranism, that marred (may it not bo added, without imputing evil
motives to the agents, helped to desecrate?) the natural progress of
the Reformation in England.
c2
28 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
truths were temporarily suppressed during these sore
and critical struggles, the name and idea of Priest re-
mained undisturbed. The name was preserved in the
second Prayer-Book of Edward VL, when Church prin-
ciples were at their lowest ebb, and Calvinism had ob-
tained its greatest influence, equally as in the first, or
in the third, that of the reign of Queen Elizabeth,
which we now use.
Calvinism has failed to rob us of our legitimate he-
ritage ; but it has succeeded in largely leavening the
popular mind, so as to make in great measure practically
inoperative, or a matter of reproach, much of what it
could not remove. Under the specious guise of honour-
ing the religion of the heart, and the souPs secret com-
munings with God, it has really dwarfed and im-
poverished the spiritual life of multitudes, by destroying
the popular faith in the Priesthood and in sacraments ;
thus loosening the hold of those "joints and bands" by
which the Church, "having nourishment ministered,
and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God."
The popular arguments now prevailing, with the sem-
blance (for, as hereafter will be shown, it is no more
than the semblance) of Scriptural authority, are pre-
cisely those which are found in the Helvetic Confession
of faith, as the self-asserted plea of Presbyterianism.
It is but a consistent succession of doctrine, when the
Presbyterian Vitringa gives the weight of his extensive
learning to sustain what Calvin originated. 1
1 It is a remarkable instance of the uniformity of the laws which
regulate the human mind, that in the struggles which attended the Ee-
formation of the Church in Russia, two communities were formed, re-
sembling the Lutherans and the Calvinists in the very point which we
THE ENGLISH AND THE FOREIGN REFORMATION. 29
are now considering. They both separated from the orthodox commu-
nion in 1656. The greater division, having among them some Priests,
preserved the idea and functions of the Priesthood, with creeds and
ritual. The other division, having neither Priest nor deacon, instituted
a new and irregular ministry, to whom no semblance of a sacerdotal
character belonged. The followers of the one are called " Pop6fchins,"
i.e., sectaries having priests; the others, "Bez-popofchins," i.e., secta-
ries having no priesthood.
But here the resemblance ceases. The Pop6fchins, unlike the Lu-
therans, never conceived the possibility of their Priests ordaining their
successors ; yet Priests, they said, must be had, for without Priests there
could be no sacraments. An extraordinary course was adopted, and
has been continued to this present day. Whosoever of the Priests of
the old Church is known to be discontented, or in danger of punish-
ment, or deprived, they offer him a stipend if he will abandon his Church
and join them, and be their Priest. If he consent, the Priests that are
among them first put him to penance, and give him absolution, and then
use his ministrations ; and thus the service of their altars has been sus-
tained uninterruptedly to this present day. The other body of sectaries,
which had no Priests, have never since sought them. But, unlike the
Calvinists, they never admitted the idea that, by an inward act of their
own mind, they could make a sacrament ; for a sacrament, they felt,
needed a Priest. The expedient to which they had recourse was this :
they have persuaded themselves that there are preserved among them
holy mysteries, — i.e., consecrated bread, moistened from the chalice and
dried, as is usual for the communion of the sick. The blessed Sacra-
ment thus preserved, they take and mix perpetually with fresh dough
and fresh wine, so as to multiply to any extent, as they need, the ele-
ments, thus, as they suppose, already consecrated. (Twenty-first Dis-
sertation on subjects relating to the Orthodox Communion. By the
Eev. "William Palmer.)
CHAPTER V.
THE COMMISSION AND FUNCTIONS OF THE PRIESTHOOD
IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND.
IT has been shown how the term, Priest, was employed
in the translation of our Prayer Book, in the face
of a powerful opposing influence, which denounced the
term as un- Scriptural and superstitious, and was thus
clothed with the full authority of the Church. Nothing,
however, has as yet been said of the distinctive ministry
which this term designates. In order to ascertain this,
the commission of the Priest, and the rules of our Service
books determining his functions, are to be considered.
The Priest's commission runs in those awful words,
which, being but an enlargement of the original words
of institution, seem to prolong the accents of His Voice,
Who breathed the grace of ordination on His Apostles.
" Receive the Holy Ghost for the Office and Work of
a Priest in the "Church of God, now committed unto
thee by the Imposition of our hands. Whose sins thou
dost forgive, they are forgiven; and whose sins thou
dost retain, they are retained. And be thou a faithful
Dispenser of the Word of God, and of His holy Sacra-
ments j In the Name of the Father, and of the Son,
and of the Holy Ghost. Amen."
THE COMMISSION AND FUNCTIONS OF A PRIEST. 31
Three ideas are embodied in the terms of this com-
mission; (1), the power of absolution; (2), authority to
teach; and (3), the administration of the Sacraments.
Though these distinctive functions are expressed only in
the commission given to the second order of the ministry,
yet they are not limited to that order ; for a measure
of the grace of the Priesthood extends to the Diaconate.
The grace of the Priesthood in its fulness resides in the
Bishop alone, and in passing through his hands, it is
restrained or enlarged according to certain known laws
of the Church. One sacramental rite, Confirmation,
has always been reserved to the Bishop. On the other
hand, the administration of Baptism, and authority to
teach with the Bishop's licence, are committed to Dea-
cons. 1 The Deacon so far acts as a Priest; the only
difference being, that the authority to teach is inherent
in the second order by virtue of the office, and is not
dependent on licence from the Bishop.
The celebration of the Holy Eucharist, absolution,
and the authority to bless in the Name of God, which
is included under the administration of Sacraments,
have never been extended beyond the second order.
These three functions are the characteristic attributes
of that order, or of the Priest properly so called, and to
1 The rule of the "Western Church extended the power of administer-
ing Holy Baptism to laymen in cases of extreme necessity. The Eng-
lish Church for many years after the Eeformation continued the custom,
but to prevent possible irregularity, at the last revision of the Prayer
Book, this permission was withdrawn, and our Church, though not dis-
allowing the validity of lay baptism, yet requires by her rule that the
Sacrament be administered by " a lawful minister," i.e., one ordained
according to the laws of the Church. — See the Eubrics in the Office for
private Baptism.
32 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
these alone, therefore, our attention may be confined.
The nature of these ministries, and the rules under
which they are exercised, are determined by the rubrics
and offices of the Prayer Book.
And first, with regard to absolution. Before every
communion the Priest is directed to offer to all whose
consciences are burdened, or beset with scruples, the
opportunity for private confession and absolution, which
to such persons the Church recommends. "If there
be any of you, who cannot quiet his own conscience,
but requireth further comfort or counsel, let him come
to me, or to some other discreet and learned minister of
God's Word, and open his grief; that by the ministry
of God's Holy Word he may receive the benefit of ab-
solution/' &C. 1 Again, in the service for the Visitation
of the Sick, the Priest is directed even to " move" the
sick person " to make a special confession of his sins, if
1 A strange interpretation has been adopted by some persons of the
meaning of " absolution" in the exhortation before Holy Communion;
as though it were intended only that the Priest should give to one who
has " opened his grief," an assurance of the mercy of God, by repeating
the promises of Holy Scripture, and encouraging him to believe them.
But why is a Priest necessary to do what any intelligent Christian might
do equally well? This interpretation, moreover, cannot possibly satisfy
the meaning of the expression, "benefit of absolution." When we pray
in the Post-Communion that we may receive " all the benefits of His
Passion," does it mean merely that by seeing the broken Bread we may
be assured of the truth of His Passion ? The Prayer Book, like every
other book, ought to be interpreted by itself, and if, in the Visitation
of the Sick, it directs the Priest to give absolution, specifying the form
in which it is to be given, and meaning consequently not the mere as-
surance of divine mercy, but the act of absolving from sin, we must
conclude that the same act is intended, and the same form is to be used,
whenever private confession is made, if the penitent desire it, and the
Priest judge it to be applicable.
THE COMMISSION AND FUNCTIONS OF A PRIEST. 33
he feel his conscience troubled with any weighty mat-
ter;" and then after confession "to absolve him, if he
humbly and heartily desire it."
Absolution remits actual sin, as Baptism remits
original sin in infants, and in adults both original and
actual sin alike. It is the instrument of restoration
and peace, as Baptism is of initiatory life and union
with God. Absolution is the essential correlative of
Baptism ; for as the grace of Baptism may be forfeited
by sin, there needs other means of grace to restore what
is lost. To supply this need Absolution was ordained
of God. It is the restorative and remedial, as Baptism
is the regenerating, element in the sacramental system,
and the blessed Eucharist the food and sustenance of
previously existing life.
The form of words with which Absolution is to be
given, after private confession, is expressly appointed
by the Church, and closely corresponds with the terms
of the priest's commission, on which the authority of
the act is grounded. The words do not merely imply a
promise, or declaration of God's mercy : nor are they
an expression of power as properly belonging to the
person who speaks. Actual forgiveness is imparted, but
it is not the gift of the Priest. It is God Who forgives ;
but He forgives by His minister. The words of Abso-
lution involve an act done, pardon really bestowed ; but
at the same time they show, that the Priest who conveys
it, acts only as an instrument, in the name and authority
of God, as Christ's commissioned representative. In
the words used, therefore, reference is made to the com-
mission which Christ gave, as the ground of the validity
of the act, and to true repentance on the part of the re-
c3
34 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
cipient as the indisp en sable condition required by Him.
"Our Lord Jesus Christ, Who hath left power to
His Church to absolve all sinners who truly repent and
turn unto Him, of His great mercy forgive thee thine
offences ; and by His authority committed unto me, I
absolve thee from all thy sins, in the Name of the Fa-
ther, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen."
Under the head of the ministry of Absolution is in-
cluded, as a further charge, intimately connected with
it, the special guidance of souls. Together with " the
benefit of Absolution," the priest is directed to offer
(t ghostly counsel and advice," so that by this twofold
ministry may be obtained "the quieting of the con-
science, and avoiding of all scruple and doubtfulness."
The ministry of the Holy Eucharist, from its pre-
eminent importance, requires a more detailed considera-
tion. The specially sacerdotal part of this office com-
mences with the offertory. The offerings of the people
are made to God in acknowledgment of their dependence
upon Him, and especially of the inestimable benefits of
redemption. They consist of two parts ; alms for the
relief of Christ's poor, and bread and wine, which are
to be set apart from all other use, to be made the Sacra-
ment of the Body and Blood of Christ, and consumed
by the worshippers. They are separately offered by the
celebrant, who is "humbly to present" them before
God, and place the sacred vessels containing the gifts
for the Eucharist in order upon the altar. He presents
them as one ordained of God to offer gifts and sacrifices
for men, and as the representative of the flock of Christ,
acting on their behalf. The oblations, which are to be-
come the materials of a sacrifice, must first be offered ;
THE COMMISSION AND FUNCTIONS OF A PRIEST. 35
for every sacrifice supposes a previous offering of the
thing to be sacrificed. The prayer that follows ex-
pressly distinguishes between the " alms" for the poor,
and the " oblations," or gifts of bread and wine. 1 "With
these oblations, as yet unconsecrated, a solemn remem-
brance is made in prayer of the needs of the whole
Church on earth, together with a commemoration of the
dead who are at rest : thus fitly expressing the unity of
the offerers with the whole mystical Body of Christ,
while they offer the gifts in token that they, " being
many, are one bread and one body ; for we are all par-
takers of that one bread."
Three separate acts of ministry follow : (1) the con-
secration of the elements ; (2) the oblation of the con-
secrated elements ; (3) the administration.
(1.) Consecration does not here mean setting apart,
or dedicating to God : this has been already done. The
gifts of bread and wine were dedicated and set apart when
they were presented on the altar, and in prayer offered
1 " And if there be a Communion, the Priest" is then also " to place
upon the Table so much bread and wine as he shall think sufficient," —
" which rubric, being added to our own Liturgy at the same time with
the insertion of the term, ' oblations' in the prayer following, (i.e., at
the last review,) it is clearly evident, as Bishop Patrick has observed,
that by that word are to be understood the elements of bread and wine,
which the Priest is to offer solemnly to God, as an acknowledgment of
His sovereignty over His creatures ; and that from thenceforth they
might become properly and peculiarly His. For in all the Jewish sacri-
fices, of which the people were partakers, the viands or materials of the
Feast were first made God's by a solemn oblation, and then afterwards
eaten by the communicants, not as man's, but as God's provision ; Who,
by thus entertaining them at His own Table, declared Himself recon-
ciled and again in covenant with them." — Wheatley, Illustration of tin
Common Prayer.
36 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
to the Divine Majesty. The object now is to effect,
through the power of the Holy Ghost, that further
end which our Lord effected at the first institution, viz.,
to connect " the inward, invisible grace/' with " the out-
ward and visible sign," and thus make the Sacrament.
Every fresh act of consecration is commanded to be for
the same end, aud with the same intention, which charac-
terised oar Lord's own act when He H blessed/' " gave
thanks/' and said, "This is My Body," "This is My
Blood /' for He commanded us to do as He had done.
The act is based on the belief that the inanimate crea-
tures lying on the altar are capable, through God's
power, of being changed from their natural state, and
becoming, after some supernatural manner, yet without
losing their own substance or properties, the veils and
organs of a true, substantial Presence of the Body and
Blood of Christ. How it can be that a real, substan-
tial Presence of Christ is possible on our altars, while
yet He abides in the natural substance of His Flesh and
Blood at the Right Hand of His Father ; or how bread
and wine, remaining in their natural substances, become
associated with a new and Divine Substance, is not
given to us to know. Both are true. The elements are
real bread and wine ; and they are the Flesh and Blood
of Christ truly, but in a mystery. All that we know is,
that the Presence of the Lord in the Sacrament is not
effected by His moving from one place to another, nor
is It after such a manner as is proper to material sub-
stances ; but spiritually, — i.e., after a manner proper to
spiritual substances. We believe that His Body and
His Blood are, through ineffable union with His Di-
vinity, capable of being made present elsewhere than in
THE COMMISSION AND FUNCTIONS OF A PRIEST. 37
the heavens ; and present not merely by virtue and
effect, Himself being absent, but Himself present, and by
reason of His Presence imparting that virtue and effect.
Human sense recognizes the reality of the consecrated
symbols. Divine faith pierces the veil, and recognizes
within it the Real Presence of Him Who is invisible.
This is no explanation of the mystery ; it is a mys-
tery, and we cannot explain it. For we know nothing
of the manner in which spiritual substances are present
in any place; or how that mode of presence which is
proper to spiritual substances can become the property
of material substances; or how our Blessed Lord's
sacred Body, being material, is, through union with His
Divinity, capable of such a Presence on earth, as we
believe. Of the change, therefore, which passes on the
natural substances of bread and wine, or of the Presence
of Christ under the forms of the sacred symbols on the
altar, we can give no account or sensible proof. " We
believe it, because the Truth has spoken it ; because the
shadows of the Law have passed away, and the Body is
come, even the Body of Christ ; and there are no more
empty forms, and the Holy Ghost abides with us, and
is able to change nature into grace." The bread which
we see, and hold, and eat, is the Figure of His Body,
but of His Body present, not absent ; for He tells us,
" This is My Body;" and in simplicity of faith we be-
lieve the words, believing that He is able to effect what
He says, " without doing any violence to the natural
laws of material substances, or to the conclusions of the
human understanding."
The whole order of the Institution implies that the
elements acquire their new properties by God's act,
38 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
through the instrumentality of the Priest by consecra-
tion, and not through the faith of the communicant at
a subsequent part of the service, or by the effect of the
whole service generally. For until the prayer of con-
secration the elements are simply bread and wine. In
that portion of the consecration prayer, which com-
mences, " Hear us, O Almighty God, we most humbly
beseech Thee, and grant," &c, the Priest prays that
receiving the bread and wine may be the same as re-
ceiving the Body and Blood of Christ; and by the
repetition of the words of institution, "In the same
night that He was betrayed He took bread," &c, our
Lord's own act is renewed. Immediately afterwards
the Sacrament is administered, and what is administered
is not mere bread and wine, but as the Catechism de-
clares, "the Body and Blood of Christ, which are
verily and indeed taken and received ;" and the Article
more strongly still, "The Body of Christ is given,
taken, and eaten." If the Body and Blood of Christ
are " given, taken, and received," they must have been
made present before the communicant approaches.
Thus two momentous facts are determined by the
express teaching of the Church, witnessed by the
Liturgy, the Catechism, and the Articles, — (1) that
" the inward, invisible grace" of the Sacrament is at-
tached to its "outward and visible form;" (2) that
this change is effected through the act of consecration.
(2) The act of consecration is accompanied with the
further act of oblation ; for as there was a first oblation
of the gifts, that they might be set apart to God's ho-
nour and use, so, after their change by consecration,
there is a second oblation, known as the Great Oblation,
THE COMMISSION AND FUNCTIONS OF A PRIEST. 39
in order to represent before the Father the Death and
Passion of His Son. Two distinct uses are commanded
by Holy Scripture to be made of the consecrated ele-
ments. By them we are to " shew forth the Lord's
Death till He come/' and afterwards to receive them in
Holy Communion. We make of them a Sacrifice, and
then they become our Food. This Oblation is involved
in the very nature of the institution ; for our Lord first
offered Himself in the Eucharist as a Victim, before He
was " delivered into the hands of wicked men to be
crucified and slain/' and as He continues to offer Him-
self now in the heavens. The words He uttered express
that offering of Himself at that time'. For He said,
" This is My Body, which is given 1 for you." So also
with the cup, — " This cup is the New Testament in My
Blood which is shed" (lit. as a libation, or drink-offering,
poured forth) " for you." He first offered Himself to
the Father for us, and then gave Himself to us as our
1 SiSSfievov, S. Luke ; /cAcfyif iw, S. Paul ; 4kxw6(1€vov, S. Matt.,
S. Mark, S. Luke, — the present tense, equivalent to is being. See Words-
worth on S. Matt, and S. Paul, in loc.
Some seeking to remove a supposed difficulty have considered this tense
as a present-future, equivalent to about to be . . . They have limited their
idea of the Oblation to the Crucifixion, and thought that our Loed could
therefore have spoken at the time of the Supper only of a future Offering.
The truer view is, that our Loed' 8 offering of Himself commenced with
His first coming, His Life being a perpetual Sacrifice ; that in the Eucha-
rist, when He instituted It, He first sealed this Offering of Himself in a
mystery directly applying Its benefits ; that on the Cross He con-
summated the Offering in Death which constituted Its meritorious effi-
cacy and power to redeem ; that in Heaven He continues the Offering
of Himself to perpetuate its benefits, even as His Priests on earth con-
tinue to plead the Same Offering on the altars of the Church.
The tense which our Loed employs embraces all time, because the
one Offering is ever before God as an everlasting Present.
40 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
Food. And since He commanded us to do as He had
done, therefore this same Oblation is to be perpetually
renewed after the same manner.
The view taken of the Sacrifice in the Eucharist fol-
lows upon the view taken of the effects of consecration.
We believe not the bread and wine to be mere figures,
and thus reduce the Blessed Sacrament to a Jewish rite ;
nor do we believe that Christ is present after the na-
tural laws of material substances, so that He can be
sacrificed again, as He was sacrificed on the Cross.
But we believe His Body and His Blood to be really
present, under the forms of the consecrated symbols ;
and therefore, when we offer them, we offer His Body
and His Blood really, though in a Sacrament or mystery.
It is not a repetition of the sacrifice of the Cross, — thus
He has been offered " once for all ;" but it is a repe-
tition of His offering Himself in the first celebration of
the mystery, and a representation 1 of His continual offer-
ing of Himself now in heaven, and by it we point to and
plead before the Father the one perfected Sacrifice of
the Cross, through the merits of which alone we can ap-
proach and make our offering. This is the " unbloody
Sacrifice" of the Church ; " unbloody/' because the Body
and Blood of Christ are present after spiritual, not ma-
terial, laws of being ; and yet true and real, because the
material things which are offered, are become true sym-
bols and organs of the Real Presence of the One atoning
Victim.
This Oblation, moreover, is made for the same ends
and purposes for which our Lord offered Himself. And
1 This term is used in its proper sense; i.e., rem prcesentemfacere,
not reprsesentare.
THE COMMISSION AND FUNCTIONS OF A PRIEST. 41
as He offered Himself for all for whom He was about
to die, — not for the living only, but for those also who
had gone before, and those who were to come afterwards,
— so our Sacrifice is offered, not merely for those present,
or those only who are alive on earth, but for those also
who have " died in faith," and for the children yet un-
born ; for the whole body, or for individual members of
the body whom we would specially remember before
God. This Oblation is made in act and by implication
only, at this part of the celebration ; but in the prayer,
known among ritualists as u the prayer of oblation," —
which, in the first Prayer Book of Edward VL, as in
the ancient service-books, formed part of the prayer of
consecration, but now follows the administration, and
forms part of the Post-communion office, — the Oblation
is expressed in words ; " O Lord, Heavenly Father,
we, Thy humble servants, entirely desire Thy Fatherly
goodness, mercifully to accept this our sacrifice of praise
and thanksgiving" — the ordinary phrase used by the
Fathers to denote the sacramental Offering of the Body
and Blood of Christ. 1
Then also is expressed the object and desire with
1 Mede thus sums up the various synonymous terms used by the
Fathers : — " The names by which the ancient Church called this service
are — Oblation, Sacrifice, Eucharist, Sacrifice of Thanksgiving, Sacrifice
of Praise, Seasonable and Unbloody Sacrifice, Sacrifice of our Mediator,
Sacrifice of the Altar, Sacrifice of our Ransom, Sacrifice of the Body
and the Blood of Chbist." (Christian Sacrifice, lib. ii. c. iv.) As
under the Old Covenant the term sacrifice was used in a twofold sense,
denoting either that which was specially offered, or the whole service
and ceremonies which accompanied the offering j so, in its application
to the Holy Eucharist, it meant either the Sacramental Oblation itself,
or the entire Liturgy, though primarily the former.
42 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
which the Oblation is made, — " most humbly beseeching
Thee to grant that, by the merits and death of Thy Son
Jesus Christ, and through faith in His Blood, we, and
all Thy whole Church, may obtain remission of our sins,
and all other benefits of His Passion." In making our
first oblation of bread and wine, the petition was con-
fined to the u whole state of Christ's Church militant
here on earth ;" only at the close of the prayer com-
memorating the dead, blessing God for their memories,
and stirring up ourselves to imitate their examples.
But now, having the profound consciousness of our
Lord's Presence before us, and pleading the full merits
of His Sacrifice, mystically represented before the Fa-
ther, our hearts are enlarged, so as to comprehend all
the needs and the longings of the entire communion of
His elect ; and we pray that both the departed, now at
rest, their struggles over, may, whereinsoever they are
wanting, be perfected, and those present, and all now
on earth passing along their course of trial, may be ful-
filled with grace. The expressions employed are of the
widest possible extent, — "all Thy whole Church" being
the subject of the prayer; and " the remission of sins,
and all other benefits of the Passion," — those which are
necessary for the consummation of the bliss of the de-
parted, as well as for the perfect cleansing of the living,
— its object. The propitiatory virtue of the Holy Eu-
charist consists in this, — that it is the appointed means
of pleading and applying the efficacy of the Cross ; not
as making a fresh atonement, or adding anything to the
efficacy of that Sacrifice which is " finished," but as a
means bringing out into act and effect its all- availing
power, and thus communicating its benefits.
THE COMMISSION AND FUNCTIONS OF A PRIEST. 43
(3.) The administration of the Holy Communion
follows. The Priest says to each communicant, " The
Body (or the Blood) of our Lord Jesus Christ, Which
was given (or shed) for thee," &c. And these words can
bear no other interpretation than that the elements have
been changed, and become the symbols of the Real Pre-
sence, before they are given ; the communicant respond-
ing with an act of faith, that their full virtue may be
received. The Communion is the consummation of
the Sacrifice ; for, as in the types of the Old Covenant,
the sacrifice was partaken of and consumed, in token
that it had been accepted, and the worshipper recon-
ciled to God, so the same effect is produced in the Holy
Eucharist, only with this difference, that there is now
received, not the mere shadow, but " the very image
of those things," which had been foreshadowed, even
the Flesh and Blood taken of the Virgin's womb, which,
having been transformed through union with God, and
once for all sacrificed, is now perpetually presented
before the Father, here veiled in mystery, openly in
heaven, and given to us to become our own, a source of
pure, supernatural, and endless life, so that we may be
made, not only of one Spirit with Christ, but " bone
of His Bone, and flesh of His Flesh."
After Communion, the offering of the Sacrifice of
Christ is followed by the offering up of " ourselves, our
souls and bodies ;" that as the Son of God in our body
made the willing offering of Himself for us, so we,
through His mighty transforming power, being united
to Him, should offer up ourselves " a reasonable, holy,
and lively sacrifice unto" God ; that through Him now
dwelling in us, and we in Him, the " offering up of the
44 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
Church may be acceptable/' and our union of nature
and of will with Christ complete.
The benediction closes this mystical and life-giving
act of our religion, in which, through the ministry of a
Priest, and, according to the universal law of the Church,
of a Priest alone, by authority transmitted through the
Apostles from Christ Himself, the Real Presence, Ob-
lation, and participation of His very Body and Blood,
for the remission of sins, and all other benefits of His
Passion, are continually renewed ; and the Church, in
return, offers itself to God in a blessed, mutual com-
munion.
The third specific ministry of a priest is that of bless-
ing in the Name of the Most Holy Trinity. The act of
blessing is one of the sacramental mysteries of the king-
dom of God. It is connected with the act of sacrifice,
or rather is a consequence of the same ministry ; for to
bless is solemnly to set apart and dedicate, by invoking
the grace of God on what is thus dedicated to Him.
Under former dispensations, special acts of blessing
were generally preceded by sacrifice. In the ordinary
daily service of the temple, " the people waited without"
till the Priest, after offering the sacrifice, came forth to
bless them. Throughout our public services, wherever
a benediction is given, or implied, a Priest is, by express
rubric, appointed to minister. 1 Although such acts as
1 In the Marriage service, the first blessing is to be given by the
" minister ;" but this term is frequently used as synonymous with Priest.
In the first rubric in the Marriage service, as well as in giving the final
blessing, the priest is expressly mentioned as the person officiating. In the
Confirmation service, the blessing is given by the Bishop, who is a priest,
THE COMMISSION AND FUNCTIONS OF A PRIEST. 45
the solemnisation of marriage, or the burial of the dead,
(which service implies the last blessing of the Church
on the departed members of Christ's Body,) are some-
times performed by deacons, yet this is an irregularity,
and has arisen only in consequence of the too great
pressure of constraining duties on Priests in large
parishes. In our Marriage and Burial services alike
the rubrics throughout speak of the Priest, implying
that he is present and officiating.
That the ministry of blessing is connected with the
ministry of sacrifice, appears from the fact, that the
fullest and most solemn Christian blessing, " The peace
of God, which passeth all understanding, &c," is di-
rected to be given only at the close of the Eucharistic
Sacrifice ; not as though it may not fitly be given at
other times, but as being then most peculiarly appro-
priate — the highest act of Christian benediction flowing
forth from the highest act of Christian sacrifice.
Taking, then, the terms of the commission, inter-
preted and illustrated by the rules and services of the
Prayer-Book, as a guide to the meaning of the word,
and more than a priest. In the Churching of women, which includes
an offering, and in the Burial service, the rubrics mention the priest
throughout as the person intended to officiate.
The distinctive sense of ' minister' appears in the 32nd Canon, " Thafc^
none be made deacon and minister both in one day." This title is ex-
plained in the body of the Canon to mean, that " there may ever be
some time of trial of their behaviour in the office of deacon, before they
be admitted to the order of priesthood." As the greater contains the
less, so minister, a more general term than priest, is often employed in
rubrics to denote offices which may be also performed by deacons, as,
e.g., in reciting prayers.
46 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
Priest , and the distinctive character of his ministry,
we obtain the following description : — A Priest is one
who teaches the Word of God with authority ; receives
confessions, absolves and guides souls ; consecrates the
symbols of the Passion; offers the commemorative Sa-
crifice ; dispenses the Sacred Food of the Sacrifice, even
the blessed Body and Blood of the Lord ; blesses in the
Name of the Most Holy Trinity; and administers all
offices in which either offerings or special intercessions
are made to God, or Divine benedictions are bestowed. 1
1 The following extracts from commentators and devotional writers
on the English Communion Office will serve to confirm the explanations
given in the text. The extracts are confined to the doctrine of the Sa-
crifice, and propitiatory efficacy of the Holy Eucharist : —
Bishop Overall. Notes on the Common Prayer in Nicholls' Com-
mentary. " If we compare the Eucharist with Cheist's Sacrifice made
once upon the Cross, as concerning the effect of it, we say that that was
a sufficient Sacrifice ; but withal that it is a true, real, and efficient Sa-
crifice, and both of them propitiatory for the sins of the whole world.
And therefore, in the oblation following," (the " prayer of oblation" is
alluded to,) " we pray that it may prevail so with God, as that we and
all the whole Church of Christ, (which consists of more than those
that are upon the earth,) may receive the benefit of it. Neither do we
call this Sacrifice of the Eucharist an efficient sacrifice, as if that upon
the Cross wanted efficacy ; but because the force and virtue of that
Sacrifice would not be profitable unto us, unless it were applied and
brought into effect by this Eucharistical Sacrifice, and other the holy
Sacraments and means appointed by God for that end : but we call it
propitiatory both this and that, because they have both force and virtue
in them to appease God's wrath against this sinful world. Therefore
this is no new Sacrifice, but the same which was once offered, and which
is every day offered to God by Cheist in heaven, and continueth here
still on earth by a mystical representation of it in the Eucharist ; and
the Church intends not to have any new propitiation, or new remission
of sins obtained, but to make that effectual, and in act applied unto us,
which was once obtained by the Sacrifice of Cheist upon the Cross.
Neither is the Sacrifice of the Cross, as it was once offered up there,
THE COMMISSION AND FUNCTIONS OF A PRIEST. 47
modo cruento, so much regarded in the Eucharist, though it bo com-
memorated, as regard is had to the perpetual and daily offering of it by
Cheist now in heaven in His everlasting Priesthood ; and thereupon
was, and should be still, the juge Sacrificium observed here on earth as
it is in heaven, the reason which the ancient Fathers had for their daily
sacrifice."
Bishop Cosin. Notes on the Common Prayer : on the " Prayer of
Oblation." "In the celebration of the Sacrament of the Eucharist,
God's Son and His Son's Death (which is the most true Sacrifice) is
represented by us to God the Fatheb, and by the same representation,
commemoration, and attestation is offered ; and that (as will appear
from what will be afterwards said) for the living and for the dead, i.e.,
for the whole Church : for as Cheist Himself, now He is in heaven,
does appear in the Presence of God for us, making intercession for us,
and does present and offer Himself and His Death to God ; so also the
Church upon earth, which is His Body, when it beseeches God for His
sake and His Death, does also represent and offer Him and His Death,
and consequently that Sacrifice which was performed on the Cross. No
one is so blind as not to see the difference between a ' proper offering,'
which was once performed by His Death on the Cross, and between an
'improper offering,' which is now made either in heaven by that His
appearance on our behalf, or here on earth by prayer and representation,
or attestation, or commemoration ; there being only the same common
name for these, but a very wide difference in the things themselves
" ' That we and all Thy whole Church may obtain remission of our
sins, and all other benefits of His Passion :' where by all ' the whole
Church' is to be understood, as well those who have been heretofore,
and those who shall be hereafter, as those that are now the present
members of it. And hereupon my Lord of Winchester, Bishop An-
drewes, propounded his answer to Cardinal Perron, when he said, ' We
have and offer this Sacrifice both for the living and the dead ; as well
for them that are absent, as those that be present,' or words to this
purpose, for I have not the book now by me."
Bishop Sparrow. Kationale upon the Book of Common Prayer.
" Now that no man take offence at the word ' altar,' let him know that
anciently both these names, ' altar,' or ' holy table,' were used for the
same tilings, though most frequently the Fathers and Councils use the
word ' altar.' And both are fit names for that holy thing : for the
Holy Eucharist, being considered as a Sacrifice, in the representation of
the breaking of the bread and pouring forth the cup, doing that to the
48 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
holy symbols which was done to Christ's Body and Blood, and so
showing forth and commemorating the Loed's Death, and offering
upon it the same Sacrifice that was offered upon the Cross, or rather
the commemoration of that Sacrifice, (S. Chrysostom in Heb. x. 9,) it
may fitly be called an ' altar ;' which again is as fitly called an ' holy
table,' the Eucharist being considered as a Sacrament, which is nothing
also but a distribution and application of the Sacrifice to the several
receivers."
BisJiop Taylor. Worthy Communicant, ch. i. sect. 4. " Now what
Christ does in heaven, He hath commanded us to do on earth, — that
is, to represent His Death, to commemorate His Sacrifice, by humble
prayer and thankful record ; and by faithful manifestation and joyful
Eucharist, to lay it before the eyes of our Heavenly Father, so minis-
tering in His Priesthood, and doing according to His commandment
and example : the Church being the image of heaven ; the priest the
minister of Christ ; the holy table being a copy of the celestial altar ;
and the Eternal Sacrifice of ' the Lamb slain from the beginning of the
world' being always the same. It bleeds no more after the finishing of
it on the Cross ; but it is wonderfully represented in heaven, and
graciously represented here ; by Christ's action there, by His com-
mandment here. And the event of it is plainly this, — that as Christ,
in virtue of His Sacrifice on the Cross, intercedes for us with His Fa-
ther, so does the minister of Christ's Priesthood here ; that the virtue
of the Eternal Sacrifice may be salutary and effectual to all the needs of
the Church, both for things temporal and eternal. And therefore it was
not without great mystery and clear signification that our Blessed Lord
was pleased to command the representation of His Death and Sacri-
fice on the Cross should be made by breaking bread and effusion of
wine."
Dean Comber. Companion to the Altar. "When can we more
effectually intercede with God for the whole Church, than when we re-
present and show forth that most meritorious Passion on earth, by the
virtue whereof our great High Priest did once redeem, and doth ever
plead for His whole Church even now that He is in heaven ? This Sa-
crament, therefore, hath been accounted the 'great intercession;' and,
accordingly, all the ancient Liturgies did use such universal interces-
sions and supplications while this mystery was in hand ; and in the time
of S. Cyril there was a prayer used, exactly agreeing with this of our
Church. S. Chrysostom also saith, that the priest, standing at the
altar, did • offer prayers and praises for all the world, for those that are
THE COMMISSION AND FUNCTIONS OF A PRIEST. 49
absent and those that are present, for those that were before us, and
those that shall be after us, while that Sacrifice is set forth.' "
Nelson. Great Duty of Frequenting the Christian Sacrifice. " When
our Savioue Jesus Cheist celebrated the Jewish Sacrifice of the Pass-
over, with His disciples, a little before His sufferings, He substituted
the Sacrament of His Body and Blood as the true Christian Sacrifice, in
the room of the Passover ; and ordained it as a rite to invocate His
Fathee by, instead of the manifold and bloody sacrifices of the Law,
and to be a means of supplication and address to God in the New Tes-
tament, as they were in the Old. . . . We thereby represent to God the
Fathee the Passion of His Son, to the end that He may, for His sake,
according to the tenour of His covenant with Him, be favourable and
propitious to us miserable sinners ; that as Cheist intercedes continually
for us in heaven, by presenting His death and satisfaction, so the
Church on earth, in like manner, may approach the Throne of Grace, by
representing Cheist unto His Fathee in these holy mysteries of His
Death and Passion."
Sherlock. Practical Discourse on Religious Assemblies. " Now for
this end was the Loed's Supper instituted to be ' a remembrance' of
Cheist, or of the Sacrifice of the Cross, to ' show forth the Loed's
Death till He come,' which, as it respects God, is to put Him in re-
membrance of Cheist' s death, and to plead the virtue and merit of it
for our pardon and acceptance. It is a visible prayer to God to remem-
ber the sufferings of His Son, and to be propitious to His Church, His
Body, and every member of it, which He has purchased with His own
Blood. And for this reason the Loed's Supper was called a commemo-
rative Sacrifice, because we therein offer up to God the remembrance of
Cheist's Sacrifice ; and therefore, in the ancient Church, the altar, or
the place where they consecrated the elements, was the place also where
they offered up their prayers, to signify that they offered up their prayers
only in virtue of the Sacrifice of Cheist, and that the very remembrance
of tliis Sacrifice in the Loed's Supper, by virtue of its institution, did
render their prayers prevalent and acceptable to God ; and, therefore, in
the very first account we have of the exercise of Christian worship, we
find ' breaking of bread and prayers' joined together. The efficacy of
our prayers depends on the merit of Cheist's Sacrifice ; and the way
Cheist hath appointed to give our prayers an interest in His Sacrifice,
is to offer them in the Holy Supper, with the sacramental remembrance
of His Death and Passion."
Bishop Wilson. Sacra Privata : Loed's Supper. A Prayer for
D
50 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
Priests before the Service begins : " May it please Thee, O God, Who
hast called us to this ministry, to make us worthy to offer unto Thee
this Sacrifice for our sins, and for the sins of Thy people."
Prayer to be used immediately after the Consecration : " May I atone
Thee, O God, by offering to Thee the pure and unbloody Sacrifice which
Thou hast ordained by Jesus Christ."
!Holy Bible, with Notes— On S. Matt. xxvi. 28 : ' Which is shed,'—
" i. e., He then, at that instant, gave His Body and Blood a Sacrifice for
the sins of the world. He then offered, as a Priest, Himself, under the
symbols of bread and wine : and this is the Sacrifice which His Priests
do still offer. And let it be observed, that Jesus Christ did this before
He was apprehended, when He was at His own disposal ; it was then
that He offered Himself a Sacrifice to God."
Johnson. Primitive Communicant. " Praise the Lord, O my soul,
all the days of thy life, for such a Priest (our Lord Jesus Christ), and
for the oblation of His Body and Blood, which He commanded for ever
to be continued in remembrance of Him ; for the mysterious Bread given
for the life of the world, for the Cup poured out for the remission of the
sins of men. . . . Praise the Lord, O my soul, for this High Priest, ac-
cording to the order of Melchisedek, and for this pure oblation of bread
and wine, by which we serve all the ends, and obtain all, and more than
all the benefits procured by the manifold sacrifices under and before the
Law : of that bread and wine in the offering whereof Christ consigned
Himself to the Cross, there to suffer death, and make a full satisfaction
for the sins of all who should, with true, penitent hearts, apply them-
selves to Thee, through His all-sufficient Death and Sacrifice."
Wheatley. Illustration of the Common Prayer. On the Prayer
of Consecration : " And this (the repetition of the words of institution)
is certainly a very essential part of the service. For during the repe-
' tition of these words, the priest performs to God the representative Sa-
crifice of the Death and Passion of His Son. By taking the bread into
his hand and breaking it, he makes a memorial to Him of our Saviour's
Body broken upon the Cross ; and by exhibiting the wine, he reminds
Him of His Blood then shed for the sins of the world ; and by laying
his hand upon each of them at the same time that he repeats those
words, ' Take, eat, this is My Body,' &c, and ' Drink ye all of this,' &c,
he signifies and acknowledges that this commemoration of Christ's
Sacrifice, so made to God, is a means instituted by Christ Himself to
; convey to the communicants the benefits of His Death and Passion . . .
For the Holy Eucharist was, from the very first institution, esteemed
THE COMMISSION AND FUNCTIONS OF A PRIEST. 51
and received as a proper Sacrifice, and solemnly offered to GrOD upon
the altar, before it was received and partaken of by the communicants."
See the 81st number of the Tracts for the Times ; to which is sub-
joined a complete catena of the principal English theologians since the
Eeformation, who have written in support of the doctrine of the Eu-
charistic Sacrifice, from which the few extracts above given have been
selected.
It is to be observed, as a striking circumstance, in harmony with this
doctrine, that the term, sacrifice, does not occur in the prayers of any
Office of the English Prayer Book except that of the Holy Eucharist.
d2
CHAPTER VI.
TESTIMONY OF THE POST-APOSTOLIC CHUKCH, OR THE
PERIOD SUBSEQUENT TO THE FIRST CENTURY OF
CHRISTIANITY.
IF any doubt remain whether the Church of England
considers her ministry to be clothed with a true
sacerdotal character, its solution must be sought ac-
cording to the principles of the Reformation, in the
records of Holy Scripture and of the early undivided
Church. And although, after the facts adduced, there
can be no reasonable doubt upon the question, yet as
the Church of England is not an ultimate authority, but
only an organ or channel of the teaching of the Ca-
tholic Church and the Word of God, it is requisite for
the full confirmation of the truth, to view the subject in
the light of these higher authorities.
A distinction is to be made, for reasons which will
subsequently be explained, between the evidence to be
derived from the Apostolic period, or first century of
Christianity, and that of succeeding ages. For the
present our inquiry is confined to the latter period.
In order to obtain a full view of the mind of the
Church, three points need to be considered, (1.) the
names by which the Christian ministry and its functions
TESTIMONY OF THE POST-APOSTOLIC CHURCH. 53
were denoted; (2.) the principles of the chief public
service celebrated ; and (3.) the primitive doctrine of
the propitiatory efficacy of the Holy Eucharist.
(1.) The question of names is of considerable im-
portance, when we bear in mind that the Church was
free to choose either the New Testament names for the
ministry, to which as yet no sacerdotal meaning had
been attached in the usage of mankind, or the ancient
names, to which the world had been long accustomed,
as denoting such a character. And as we believe that
the Church was guided in these questions of essential
truth by the Holy Spirit, it must follow that the choice
made was the fittest to represent the idea which was to
be permanently inwrought into the Christian mind.
As to the usage of the period to which our present
inquiry is confined, there can be no surer authority
than that of Vitringa himself. His extensive learning,
directed assiduously to this very subject, and his zeal as
a partizan, make his testimony to be peculiarly con-
clusive. In the * Prolegomena" (cap. 2) already re-
ferred to, he states the result of his researches in the
following words :
" That Tertullian, in the beginning of the third cen-
tury, calls the Bishop, Chief Priest (summus Sacerdos) ;
that before his time, in the second century, Irenseus
calls the gifts made at the holy Eucharist, oblations
(oblata), and when consecrated by the prayer of the
Bishop, a sacrifice (sacrificium) ; and that in Justin
Martyr, a still more ancient writer, the gifts are called
offerings (7rgocrpopa»), — are facts so certainly known to the
learned, that it is needless to speak of them at greater
length. In the subsequent writings of the Fathers, the
54 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
terms, Priesthood, Priest, Levites, altars, offertories, sa-
crifices, oblations, used in reference to the Church of
the New Testament, are so obvious and frequent, that
it can escape no one who has even cursorily examined
their writings. In Eusebius, moreover, and the rest of
the ecclesiastical historians, and the Canons of Councils,
such frequent mention occurs of these phrases, that it
is evident they must have struck deep root (altas egisse
radices) into the minds of men in those ages." One
passage he moreover quotes from S. Jerome, who in his
famous letter to Evagrius, speaks of " the Apostolical
tradition, that what Aaron and his sons and the Levites
were in the Temple, that our Bishops, Priests, and Dea-
cons claim to be in the Church." It would be needless
to multiply proof on such a point.
It has been objected, however, that the ancient Fathers
introduced the terms in question, in consequence of their
prepossessions in favour of the sacerdotal system, to
which before their conversion to Christianity they had
been accustomed ; and that, being men of intellect and
power, they succeeded in leavening the mind of the
Church with an idea which was but a perversion of the
Scriptural and primitive view of the ministry. To
judge of the probability of such a supposition, it must
be borne in mind that, independently of man's natural
tendency, in the case of conversion from one system to
another, to take an extreme line in opposition to that
which they have forsaken, the extant writings of these
very men contain the strongest possible appeals against
the heathen ceremonial; that, moreover, they ardently
laboured by word and deed to destroy any reverence for
the system of idolatry ; and that they were subjected to
TESTIMONY OF THE POST-APOSTOLIC CHURCH. 55
frequent persecutions at the hands of the heathen. It
seems inconceivable that sincere men, under such cir-
cumstances, should have agreed together (for their unan-
imity in the use of these terms is the very point which
Vitringa notes as so remarkable) to borrow from a sys-
tem thus reprobated, and thus still dangerous and per-
sonally hostile, terms which could only have been a
perpetual snare to their disciples, perplexing and hinder-
ing the whole course of their teaching. The other and
more reasonable explanation of the fact is, that there
is a real principle, on which both heathens and Chris-
tians were agreed, — the principle of a sacerdotal system,
of which the heathen was a perverted image, and which
was to be realized according to the Divine mind only in
Christianity.
Moreover, the consequences of such a supposition
must be borne in mind. If those primitive Fathers
were led astray on such a vital point, Satan having so
far prevailed as to introduce heathen notions into the
Church at the very time when the Catholic creeds were
being formed, and in a matter which affected the inner
life and entire system of the Church's devotion, and the
very means of communicating the benefits of Christ's
Incarnation and Death, how could we, under such cir-
cumstances, appeal to the Body of which these men are
the recognized exponents and witnesses, as " the pillar
and ground of the Truth," or feel any reliance in its
testimony on any question whatever ?
But however unscrupulous other communities of
Christians who have systematically cast off all respect
for Catholic testimony, might be, even under such a
view of the case, it is impossible for an English Church-
56 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
man to admit such a suspicion ; for the Homily on the
Blessed Sacrament (second part), speaking authorita-
tively, says : " But before all things, this we must be
sure of especially, that this Supper be in such wise done
and maintained, as our Lord and Saviour did and
commanded to be done, as the Holy Scripture used it,
and as the good Fathers of the primitive Church frequented
it" And who are meant by w the good Fathers of the
primitive Church," is explained in another authoritative
record, which states them to be u the most notable Fa-
thers who lived during the first five hundred years after
Christ, such as Justin, Irenseus, Tertullian, Cyprian,
Basil, Chrysostom, Jerome, Ambrose, Augustine," 1 the
very men who the most frequently and uniformly em-
ployed the terms in question.
It must be carefully borne in mind, in order to give
full weight to this argument, that these terms thus used
by the ancient Fathers, u offerings" (^oer<po^a/) and
"sacrifices" (0u<na<), are the very same which S.Paul
in his Epistle to the Hebrews applies to our Lord's
offering and sacrifice of Himself for the sins of the
world. 2 The connection between His sacrifice and our
sacrifice, and therefore the reality of a propitiation in
the one as in the other, though the virtue of our Eucha-
1 In the dispute between the advocates of the Church of England
and those of the Church of Rome, in Westminster Abbey, in the reign
of Queen Elizabeth, the former argued thus — " It is against the Word of
God, and the custom of the primitive Church, to use a tongue unknown
to the people. By these words (the Word) we mean only the written
Word of God, or canonical Scripture ; and by the custom of the pri-
mitive Church, we mean the one most generally used in the Church for
the space of five hundred years after Cheist, in which lived the most
notable Fathers, as Justin," &c.
3 Hcb. ix. 14, 25, 26, 28 ; x. 10, 12, &c.
TESTIMONY OF THE POST-APOSTOLIC CHURCH. 57
ristic offering rests wholly on the connexion, which by
our Lord's ordinance exists between it and His one
meritorious sacrifice, is in harmony with this use of the
same terms as applied to both, and can scarcely be
otherwise understood.
There is moreover a separate and peculiarly impor-
tant line of evidence to be drawn from the ancient
Liturgies'. Even were it supposable that the Fathers,
regardless of their tendency to mislead, used such terms
as extreme expressions, or as mere metaphors, there
is yet further and more momentous evidence to be
drawn from the Church's Service Books.
Liturgies are acted creeds. As there are no human
documents, in which words once introduced are less
likely to be changed, so there are none in which the
introduction of any term is made with more mature
deliberation. There are four Liturgies which Mr.
Palmer has shown to have been reduced to writing in
the course, one of them in the earliest part, of the fourth
century. 1 They are beyond comparison the most valu-
able witnesses we possess to the early Church's living
faith and hope. These four Liturgies were used re-
spectively at the central sees of the four great Patri-
archates of Christendom and their subordinate branches,
and through them pervaded the whole Catholic world.
" The first," to use Mr. Palmer's own words, 2 " is the
great Oriental Liturgy, as it seems to have prevailed in
all the Christian Churches from the Euphrates to the
Hellespont, and from the Hellespont to the southern
1 " Disputation on Primitive Liturgies," by the Rev. Wm. Palmer.
3 Ibid.
D 3
58 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
extremity of Greece. The second was the Alexandrian,
which from time immemorial has been the Liturgy of
Egypt, Abyssinia, and the country extending along the
Mediterranean Sea to the west. The third was the
Roman, which prevailed throughout the whole of Italy,
Sicily, and the civil diocese of Africa. The fourth was
the Gallican, which was used throughout Gaul and
Spain, and probably in the Exarchate of Ephesus until
the fourth century." (Page 8.)
The remarkable phenomenon exhibited by these litur-
gies is, that in their general structure, their component
parts, and even in their forms of expression, they corre-
spond so closely one with another, as to leave no doubt
of their having proceeded from one and the same source.
Mr. Palmer observes : " The uniformity between these
liturgies, as extant in the fourth and fifth centuries, is
such as to bespeak a common origin. Their diversity is
such as to prove the remoteness of the period at which
they were originated. To what remote period can we
refer, as exhibiting a perfect, general uniformity of
liturgy, except to the Apostolic age?" Subsequently,
he adds with regard to the Oriental liturgy : " Let us
remember, also, that existing documents enable us to
trace this liturgy to that period ; and that in the time
of Justin Martyr, to whose writings I allude, the Chris-
tian Church was only removed by one link from the
Apostles themselves." (Sect, iii.)
Nor is this all ; for there exists a fifth liturgy, of a
still earlier date than either of the four already men-
tioned, — the Clementine. Its striking characteristic is,
that it agrees with the four great liturgies in all points
in which they agree with each other, as well as in their
TESTIMONY OF THE POST-APOSTOLIC CHURCH. 59
general structure. The supposition of ritualists is, that
the Clementine liturgy was never actually used in any
church, but that "it represented the general mode, pre-
valent throughout the Christian world during the first
three centuries, of celebrating the Holy Eucharist;"
and it seems highly probable, due allowance being made
for changes that would naturally occur in the lapse of
time, that this liturgy embodies the original form used
by the Apostles themselves. 1
Now in all these liturgies alike, the ancient sacer-
dotal terms in question are ordinarily used. In reading
them we open upon a scene, which represents a priest-
hood of different degrees, with a complete ritual, minis-
tering before God on behalf of the people, offering
sacrifices, and communicating heavenly gifts and bene-
dictions. It would be to anticipate a view of the sub-
ject which falls more naturally under our notice at a
later stage of the inquiry, if we were here to follow out
what has been suggested as to the probable source of
these liturgies ; but it is impossible to exaggerate the
importance of the facts adduced, leading to the conclu-
sion that the introduction of these disputed terms may
• It is the general opinion of ritualists, that the Church's Liturgy
was not committed to writing for many generations, but that her priests
were accustomed to recite the prayers from memory. The supposed
reason was, to prevent the possibility of any records of the Holy Eucha-
rist falling into the hands of persecutors. It is well known that the
mode of celebrating the Holy Eucharist, was the special subject of in-
quiry by the heathen, and of special reserve on the part of the Church.
They sought to cast the utmost mystery around the central life of their
communion with the Lord. It is a remarkable circumstance, often
noted, and tending to this conclusion, that while copies of the Holy
Scriptures are known to have been seized in times of persecution, there
is no record of any liturgy having met with the same fate.
60 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
be traced to Apostolic men, if not to the Apostles
themselves.
(2.) These ancient liturgies fulfil a yet more impor-
tant end, in support of the sacerdotal system, by exhi-
biting the original idea of the Church's service. For in
order to ascertain the character of the ministry, its daily
acts and living forms are of more importance than the
mere names by which it was called. This further in-
quiry, moreover, is necessary, because the same theory
which represents the Jewish elder as the prototype of
the Christian minister, supposes also the Church's ser-
vice to be the offspring, not of the temple, but of the
synagogue.
The term liturgy, in the language of the Church,
properly denotes, only the Office of the Holy Eucharist.
The five great liturgies above alluded to, are confined
to this service ; and the prominent fact brought out by
their history is, that the Eucharist was the primary and
fundamental idea of Christian worship, — the centre
around which all its other offices of prayer and praise
were formed. It has been already stated, that the
structure and component parts of these liturgies are,
for the most part, alike in all ; the only variation being,
that some parts are missing in one which appear in
another, and that the relative positions of the several
parts vary. The following brief digest may give some
idea of this system of devotion, into which the mind of
Christendom was habitually casting itself in its com-
munion with God. It will be readily seen, how the
outline corresponds with our own Eucharistic Office.
One or more collects ; lessons from Holy Scripture ;
a sermon, sometimes preceded by a hymn or anthem ;
TESTIMONY OF THE POST-APOSTOLIC CHURCH. 61
prayers for the catechumens, penitents, &c, who with a
benediction were then dismissed ; the creed ; the offer-
tory, with the oblations of bread and wine; thanks-
givings and intercessions, with a commemoration of the
dead in Christ, formed the earlier part of the service.
Afterwards the more mystical portion of the liturgy
commenced, and in all cases with the very same words,
"Sursum corda," ("Lift up your hearts"); and then
followed a thanksgiving closing with the Tersanctus;
intercessory prayers ; the consecration of the Elements,
with the repetition of our Lord's words of institution ;
a second oblation of the now consecrated elements (this
was not always expressed in words, — sometimes silently,
and in act only) ; an invocation of the Holy Ghost
(this is not found in the Roman, nor in the Gallican
Liturgies) ; intercessory prayers for the whole Church,
the dead as well as the living ; the Lord's Prayer ; a
benediction ; the administration or communion ; thanks-
giving ; the Gloria in Excelsis ; and the final benediction.
It is evident how such a service, composed mainly of
oblations mingled with intercessions and benedictions,
the consecration, offering, and administration forming
its central features, implies a ministry of a strictly sacer-
dotal character. It will hereafter be shown how impos-
sible it is to trace up its complicated structure and deep
mystery to the simple service of instruction and con-
gregational prayer, which characterized the worship of
the synagogue.
It would be wandering too far from our special object,
to trace the history of the other services of the Church.
It is only possible to point out the important additional
evidence which is to be derived from Mr. Freeman's
62 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
valuable researches into the " principles of Divine ser-
vice." 1 The first volume of his work relates to the
minor offices of daily prayer ; and he has established the
fact of their dependence upon the Eucharistic service,
circling around it as satellites around their central orb.
Mr. Freeman's volume must be studied to obtain a full
knowledge of this most deeply interesting subject, the
more interesting and valuable from his having treated it
in a very earnest and devotional spirit. His conclu-
sions, and their bearing upon the subject before us, may
be judged of by the following brief extract :
" There is a natural impulse, in the case of any one
who has recently participated in the Eucharist, to view
prayer, praise, and other devotional actions in connec-
tion with that great rite, as modes of realising and car-
rying out the Eucharistic frame and position. The
Church, by her daily offices, both recognises and formal-
ises this rightful conception. Her ordinary public de-
votions are designed to be, to those who are in a position
to use them as such, an expansion and carrying on of
the Eucharistic functions and relations. To such the
general act of public worship is but a further cementing
of the Eucharistically imparted union with Christ, and
with His Body, the Church : . . . a view, it may surely
1 " The Principles of Divine Service. An Inquiry concerning the
true manner of understanding and using the Order for Morning and
Evening Prayer, and the Administration of the Holy Communion in
the English Church. By the Eev. Philip Freeman, M.A."
In expressing his obligations to Mr. Freeman for his work, the writer
would not be understood to subscribe to his position, that the daily
celebration of the Eucharist was not the primitive practice, or that it
is not good to restore it, where possible. The proofs given by Mr. Free-
man seem to the writer, though he would express his dissent with great
deference, to be inconclusive.
TESTIMONY OF THE POST- APOSTOLIC CHURCH. 63
be said, which dignifies, while yet it duly subordinates,
the act of ordinary worship." (Chap. xi. p. 204.)
The conclusion to which we are thus brought is this,
that the Eucharist is the primary and essential idea of
Christian worship, and that this service, containing a
true sacrifice, involves the necessity of a sacerdotal
ministry j and that thus, practically, every thought of
communion with God, must have been associated, more
or less, with those sacerdotal functions, through which
it had been ordained that the very Bread of Life/ of
which " a man shall eat and not die," should be given.
(3.) But in order to realise the full force of the evi-
dence derived from the principles of the Church's ser-
vice, it is requisite to consider further the belief uni-
versally prevailing of the propitiatory virtue of the Holy
Eucharist; for propitiation is popularly and justly held
to be an essential attribute of priesthood.
It is to be observed, that the term " propitiatory " is
used here, as before in reference to the English Eucha-
ristic service, not as introducing a fresh ground of
acceptance with God, but as a means or instrument,
effectually applying the virtues of that perfect and suffi-
cient Atonement which was " finished" on the Cross.
The idea is grounded on the conviction, that what our
Lord once did in offering Himself, needs, according to
His own appointment, a sacramental system in the
Church on earth, in order to perpetuate and apply its
benefits.
The idea of propitiating God by sacrifices, which could
have no virtue in themselves, irrespective of the Divine
appointment, has universally prevailed amongst man-
kind. Sacrifices were originally ordained as the means
64 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
of obtaining for the offerer, an interest in the " Lamb
slain from the beginning of the world ;" and so far as
they effected this, they were propitiatory. This was the
primary idea of worship. " He builded an altar unto
the Lord, and called on the Name of the Lord," is the
view that opens upon us in the earliest records of the
Book of Genesis; and the complicated ceremonial of
the law of Moses, was but an expansion of this primaeval
idea of sacrifice and prayer combined.
The ancient Church believed that the Sacrifice of
Christ made no change in this system of intercourse
between God and man. They believed that, as sacri-
fice was the means of propitiating God, because of its
covenanted relation with the promised Atonement be-
fore it was accomplished, so, after it was accomplished,
the same system was to be continued, to connect man
with the Atonement which had been completed. They
saw an identity of principle pervading the ancient pre-
figurative, and their own commemorative, systems; only
with this momentous difference, exalting beyond mea-
sure the whole ministry and service of the Church, that
what had been of old exhibited only in type or shadow,
was now substantially, and in very truth conveyed to
them, — the Divine Victim, Who had been but prefigured
and anticipated of old, being now actually present and
imparting Himself. Hence to their mind it followed,
that if the typical sacrifices of the ancient world were
propitiatory, because of their relation to Christ, still
more must their Eucharistic service be thus availing.
But it is simpler, and to an English Churchman will
be more conclusive, instead of making an independent
inquiry into the doctrine of the early Church, to accept
TESTIMONY OF THE POST-APOSTOLIC CHURCH. 65
the conclusions of an English divine, who, in regard to
this view of the subject, more fully than any other writer
within our communion has recorded the results of his
researches into the records of antiquity. Mede, in his
" Christian Sacrifice," thus states his conclusions :
" They" (the ancient Fathers) " believed that our
Blessed Saviour ordained the Sacrament of His Body
and Blood, as a rite to bless and invocate His Father
by, instead of the manifold and bloody sacrifices of the
Law. . . . The mystery of which rite they took to be
this : that as Christ, by presenting His death and sa-
tisfaction to His Father, continually intercedes for us
in heaven, so the Church semblably approaches the
Throne of Grace, by representing Christ unto His Fa-
ther in these holy mysteries of His Death and Pas-
sion." (Lib. ii. c. iv.) Among other authorities, Mede
quotes, in proof of his conclusions, S. Cyril of Jeru-
salem, whom he represents as " a sure witness of that
which was said and done in the celebration of the Eu-
charist, according to the use of his time." (a.d. 350.)
"After that spiritual sacrifice," says S. Cyril, " that un-
bloody sacrifice, (i.e., after the thanksgiving and invo-
cation of the Holy Ghost upon the bread and wine, to
make them the Body and Blood of Christ) was done,
we do over that propitiatory sacrifice (Itti ttj$ 0u<na$ exelvrjg
tou (Xacr/AoD) beseech God for the common peace of the
Churches, for the good estate of the world, for their
armies, &c, &c." Mede then proceeds : " And this is
the manner of the Greek Liturgies, immediately upon
the consecration of the gifts (viz., the bread and wine)
to be the symbols of the Body and Blood of Christ,
and the commemoration thereon of His Passion, Resur-
66 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
rection, and Ascension, to offer to the Divine Majesty,
as it were over the Lamb of God then lying on the table,
their supplications and prayers for the whole state of
Christ's Church, and all sorts and degrees therein, to-
gether with all other their suits and requests ; and that
ever and anon interposing the word f we offer' (irpoo-Qepopsv)
unto Thee for these and these ; that is, we commemo-
rate Christ in this mystical rite for them. This prayer,
therefore, our author, Cyril, in the place before quoted,
calls ' the prayer of the holy and most worthily dreaded
Sacrifice (Ova-lug) lying then upon the table/ and saith,
1 it is a most powerful prayer, as that wherein we offer
unto the Divine Majesty Christ, that was once slain
for our sins, propitiating (e&Xeovfxsvoi) the merciful God
for ourselves and others we pray for/ " (Lib. ii. c. 6.)
Mede also quotes Eusebius, commenting thus on the
23rd Psalm, " Thou hast anointed my head with oil."
" Herein," saith he, u are plainly signified the mystical
unction and the venerable sacrifices of Christ's Table,
whereby, propitiating God, {V wv xaAXiepouvrej, litare, i.e.
propitiare, placare numen,) we are taught to offer up all
our life long, unto the Lord of all, unbloody and rea-
sonable sacrifices, most acceptable to Him, by His most
glorious High Priest, Jesus Christ." (Lib. ii. c. x.)
As an instance of the manner in which this great
truth was brought out in the ancient liturgies, the fol-
lowing extract from the prayer of consecration in the
Liturgy of S. Mark may be added : "Make, O Lord,
this bread the Body, this cup the Blood of the New
Testament of our Lord and God, that they may be to
us who partake of them, for the gift of faith, for so-
briety, and healing, and wisdom, and holiness, and re-
TESTIMONY OF THE POST-APOSTOLIC CHURCH. 67
newal of soul, and body, and spirit ; for the communion
of the blessedness of eternal life and immortality ; for
the glorifying of Thy holy Name, for the remission of
sins," &c, &c. ; and then follow prayers for the Church
at large, for all its members, whether on earth or de-
parted hence.
To show further how the conviction of the propitiatory
efficacy of the Holy Eucharist was associated even with
minute details of life, Mede quotes a passage out of
S. Augustine (Lib. xxii. De Civitate Dei) : " But for
the more full understanding," he says, " of the notion
and practice of this age, take also a passage of S. Austin
concerning one Hesperius, who, by the affliction of his
cattle and servants, perceiving his country grange liable
to some malignant power of evil spirits, entreated our
Presbyters, in my absence, that some of them would go
to the place, through the perseverance of whose prayers
he hoped the evil spirits would be forced away. Ac-
cordingly, one of them went thither, and offered there
the Sacrifice of Christ's Body, praying earnestly with
all his might for the ceasing of the sore affliction ; and
it ceased forthwith through God's mercy." (Lib. ii.
c. i.) Mede, in conclusion, adds the following brief
testimony from Origen, (Horn. xiii. in Levit. c. xxiv.,)
who, comparing the Eucharist to the showbread which
every Sabbath was set for a memorial before the Lord,
saith : u That," meaning the Eucharist, u is the only
commemoration which renders God propitious to men."
" Where note," says Mede, " both that this commemo-
ration is made unto God as that of the showbread ; and
that the end thereof is to make Him propitious to men ;
according to that of S. Augustine, Lib. ix. c. xiii.,
68 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
' Those things which Christ exhibits in His Supper,
faith having received them, interposeth them as a satis-
faction and propitiation between our sins and God's
wrath/ "
The ancient Church, therefore, evidently regarded the
Holy Eucharist as the great means whereby on earth
the Divine Presence of the Lord was continually
brought near, and His Sacrifice represented and re-
newed in all its effects and purposes. There was in
truth present to the mind of the faithful in those ages
a living, intense conviction, fed by a childlike faith on
the words of institution, that the symbols were one with
the thing symbolized ; the broken bread undistinguish-
able to faith from the crucified Body, through the mys-
tical consecration; the commemorative sacrifice iden-
tified with the Sacrifice of the Cross, as one offering ever
afresh presented before the Father ; and with confidence
of love, like that of the diseased woman, who clung to
the garments as the instruments of healing virtue, not
for their own sake, but because of His Form Whom that
clothing enveloped, in Whom was Life, so the Church
believed, that through the outward elements, which the
Lord had vouchsafed to assume to Himself by the power
of the Holy Ghost to be the organs of His Living Pre-
sence, there flowed forth the fulness of His Incarnation,
and all the benefits of His Passion. Thus adoring in the
Blessed Sacrament His very Presence, and feeling the
Fount of Life thence streaming into their souls, and all
this effected by Divine power acting through a human
ministration, how could they regard the line of the
ministry, through which such grace was given, otherwise
than as a priestly line ?
CHAPTER VII.
TESTIMONY OF THE APOSTOLIC AGE, OE FIRST CEN-
TURY OF CHRISTIANITY.
THE advocates of the Presbyter view of the ministry,
unable to meet the overwhelming evidence against
them in the ages, the records of which we have been
considering, take refuge in the thought, that their
theory was realized in the first century. They admit
that the sacerdotal view had taken complete possession
of the mind of the Church subsequently to the Apos-
tolic age, but assert that it was a foreign principle
superinduced upon primitive Christianity. They rest
their argument upon the supposed fact that the term
Presbyter, not Priest, was applied to the second order
of the ministry throughout the Apostolic age, and refer
to the writings of the Apostolic Fathers, S. Clement,
S. Ignatius, &c, in proof of their assertion.
There is great difficulty in obtaining evidence as to
the usage of the Church during the age in question,
and this rendered it necessary to consider the testimony
of the first century separately from that of succeeding
ages. The difficulty arises from the paucity of mate-
rials : for if we except the " Shepherd of Hernias," a
purely allegorical work, the extant writings of the Apos-
70 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
tolic Fathers would not occupy more than an octavo
volume of about thirty pages. If then it could be
proved that the term, Priest, does not occur as the proper
designation of the Christian minister in these records,
no conclusion could be founded on the fact, for the
amount of evidence is too small to prove anything as to
the usage of the great body of Christians. The evi-
dence moreover which has been adduced from the pri-
mitive liturgies touches upon this first century, and the
probability shown to exist of the introduction of the
sacerdotal terms into these liturgies during the Apos-
tolic age, is to be set against any negative evidence
drawn from the silence of the few extant writings
referred to.
Moreover the real question is not whether the name,
but whether the idea of Priesthood is found to exist in
the extant writings of the Apostolic Fathers. The
name may not have been as yet in common use, and
yet the idea may have prevailed, as in patriarchal times
the idea of Priesthood existed long before it obtained
any peculiar or fixed appellation. It has been already
shown that the Hebrew title of Priest, Cohen, does
not appear in the Bible as applied to a single minister
of the patriarchal line, and yet undoubtedly there ex-
isted a true line of priests from the beginning. Priest-
hood, moreover, is but one part of a complete system,
and if other portions of the system are found to exist,
it may be implied that the entire system was in being,
ana 1 so the Priesthood also. It was a living system in
the ages immediately succeeding the first century.
And as in the case of a living creature, the discovery of
any one organic member of the structure is a true
ground-work for building up the entire form, and
TESTIMONY OF THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 71
proves its existence at the time when that one member
was in being, so a similar mode of reasoning may be
employed in regard to the sacerdotal system of the
Catholic Church.
The term, altar, may be taken as an instance. It is
the term uniformly employed in connexion with the
blessed Sacrament during the three first centuries.
The word Table is only employed once in the extant
writings of that period, and in the Apostolic Fathers
not once. So likewise the terms ' offerings/ ' sacrifices/
are used equally by the Apostolic, as by the later
Fathers. In the few epistles which remain of S. Igna-
tius, while the term altar is used occasionally, as a
metaphor, to imply personal sacrifice, it occurs four
times with express reference to the blessed Sacrament.
One striking instance of the kind is to be found in the
epistle to the Philadelphians (v.) : " Be zealous to fre-
quent one Eucharist : for there is one Flesh of our
Lord Jesus Christ, and one Cup for the union (eWnv)
of His Blood, one altar, as there is one Bishop, with
the Presbytery, and deacons my fellow labourers, that
what ye do, ye may do according to God." Here we
find combined in one view the altar, the Real Presence,
the Communion of the Flesh and Blood, and the three
orders of ministry ; and all this declared to be " of
God." The complicated and majestic structure of the
Catholic liturgies was but a detailed exposition of the
ideas embodied in these few striking words. A Priest
was in later days the indispensable celebrant of the
Church's liturgy ; where is the difference between this
later system and the principles exhibited in the writings
of S. Ignatius?
There is moreover a passage in S. Clement's Epistle
72 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
to the Corinthians, which bears more directly on the
question at issue. 1 He is exhorting the Corinthians to
observe better order in their religious assemblies, es-
pecially in the celebration of the Eucharist, and he
thus, enforces his exhortations: "We ought therefore
to do in order whatsoever the Lord commanded us to
do at appointed seasons, and duly perform the oblations
and sacred services (vpoa-fopas x°" AsiToogy/aj) : and where
and by whom He wills them to be done, Himself hath
determined. They who make their offe rings at the
appointed seasons, are accepted and blessed; for fol-
lowing the ordinances of the Lord, they do not err.
For to the High Priest proper services have been
assigned, and the priests have their proper place ap-
pointed, and on Levites proper ministrations have been
laid. The layman has been bound by lay ordinances.
Let each one of you, therefore, in his own order, offer
the Eucharist (sv^upKyreirai) to God, living in good
conscience, without transgressing the appointed rule of
his ministry."
Professor Jacobson, in his late edition of the Apos-
tolic Fathers, quotes Wotton, expressing himself thus
as to the application of the terms High Priest, Priest,
and Levite, which occur in this passage, to the threefold
Christian ministry : — " That the Jewish Church was the
type of the Christian, and that the same orders were re-
ceived among the Jews by the institution of God, which
were admitted into the Church of Christ when the
Mosaic dispensation was abolished, is the opinion of all
ancient authors. Had the Jewish Church an High
Priest, Priests, and Levites? The Christian also has
1 Sec. 40.
TESTIMONY OF THE APOSTOLIC AGE. 73
Bishops, Presbyters, and Deacons." Wotton adduces,
in confirmation of his views, the well-known passage of
S. Jerome already referred to, and also a passage of S.
Cyprian quoted in the following chapter, and then
adds : " Although Christ alone is the High Priest of
both covenants, yet the Bishop bears His office (ejus
vices gerit) in the Church, not otherwise than the
High Priest in the Temple." 1 Among modern scholars,
Dr. Wordsworth, in his "Theophilus Anglicanus,"
adduces the passage as direct evidence of the priestly
character of the ministry.
According to this interpretation, the sacerdotal terms
in question are applied by S. Clement, as proper desig-
nations of the Christian ministry. If, however, it
could be proved, what the advocates of the Presbyter
theory urge, that the terms are here used only by
analogy, yet the passage evidently implies an analogy
of the closest and most intimate kind ; the terms being
employed without any guarding, or limitation. One
can hardly conceive it possible that an advocate of the
Presbyter theory should have used the terms, without
some intimation to guard against the otherwise inevi-
table conclusion, that the same idea was understood to
be embodied in both ministries. S. Clement was the
disciple and companion of S. Paul, and his epistles are
the purest and earliest evidence we can obtain, second
only to that of the New Testament itself.
We have thus traced the idea of a sacerdotal ministry,
together with the correlative ideas of altar, offerings,
sacrifices, &c, in one unbroken line, up to the very age
1 Editio tertia, denuo recognita. Oxonii, e typographeo Academico,
1847.
74 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
of inspiration. We have also seen that at least from
the second century, the term, Priest, in its sacerdotal
sense, was applied as the common distinctive appellation
of the Christian minister; that during the first century-
it was thus applied, though not so commonly ; and that
there are even grounds for believing, that it was used
from the beginning as the official name of the celebrant
in the sacred offices of the Church. We have more-
over seen, that the opposite view of the Jewish elder
being the prototype of the Christian minister, arose
only within the last three hundred years, as the justi-
fication and instrument of a schism, invented by one
who was forced by his position to form a system inde-
pendent of an ordained ministry ; and this as part of
a line of teaching which avowedly cast off all allegiance
to primeval tradition, and to the Church, us "the
keeper and witness of Holy Writ ;" and, further, that
this schismatical theory, when it was propounded, was
rejected by our Reformers, and has uniformly been re-
jected by the Church of England, in spite of violent
persecutions specially raised on account of the disputed
doctrine, and with many inducements and much dispo-
sition on the part of some for peace* sake to surrender
it, but resisted with the greater energy and determina-
tion, as increasing years showed more and more clearly
its unsoundness and evil consequences. 1
1 The Presbyterian system of the preaching elder and the ruling
elder, is grounded on 1 Tim. v. 17 : " Let the elders that rule well be
counted worthy of double honour, especially they who labour in the
Word and doctrine." It is an uncatholic system, inasmuch as it makes
spiritual authority to bo a lay function, but far more so, because it
ignores everything in Holy Scripture, which represents the Christian
minister as being by his ordination the consecrated instrument or
channel of Divine grace.
CHAPTER VIII.
TESTIMONY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES.
THE most momentous part of our inquiry yet re-
mains; for unless the conclusions at which we
have arrived, are found to be in accordance with the
Word of God, there has been some error in the process
of the investigation. But supposing no doubt to exist
as to the doctrine of the Church, and believing that,
according to the promise of the Holy Ghost vouch-
safed on the day of Pentecost, a doctrine so universally
received from the beginning, can be none other than
the voice of God, we may expect to find our con-
clusions verified in the Divine revelations. There must
of necessity be entire accordance between the teaching
of the Catholic Church and Holy Scripture, in order to
constitute any doctrine the truth of God, and so
binding on the soul.
It may seem to militate against the teaching of the
Church, that the term Priest (lepsug) is not applied in
the New Testament to the Christian minister, but only
to our Lord Himself, and to the members of His Body
in general. This is the very stronghold of the Pres-
byter theory. The real question, however, it must be
borne in mind, is not whether the ancient name was
e 2
76 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
then so applied, for we have seen that it has been the
usage of Holy Scripture, especially when a new dispen-
sation was given, as was the case also among the heathen,
to adopt fresh names and clothe them with fresh mean-
ings, — but whether the idea of a Priesthood be not ne-
cessarily involved in the Scriptural representation of the
Christian ministry, and whether the same sacerdotal
system of Divine service, which we have seen in after
ages pervading the entire Catholic Communion, was not
in active operation during the period of the New Testa-
ment history, even from the Day of Pentecost. The
reasons which may be suggested for the temporary disuse
of the term in question, will hereafter be considered.
It is sufficient here to observe, that the fact of a true
Priesthood attaching to Christians generally, is in no
respect incompatible with the doctrine of a true minis-
terial Priesthood; for the Israelites were all priests,
while yet the separate consecration of the sons of Aaron
was always definitively marked. (Comp. 1 S. Pet. ii. 9
with Ex. xix. 6.) Nor again is the application of the term
to our Blessed Lord, as in a special manner the Priest
of the New Testament a contradiction to the idea of a
continued line of Priests following His Advent, any more
than it was a contradiction to the fact of a line of Priests
preceding it. A Priesthood to carry on His work of
atonement, may be as truly a part of the Divine purpose,
as a Priesthood " to prepare the way of the Lord."
Even in the case of our Lord it is the idea, not the
then accustomed name of Priest, which is urged as of
such vital importance. S. Paul contrasts our Lord with
the Upsvg of the Old Testament under a new name
which has ever belonged to the Christian Priest, that of
TESTIMONY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 77
Xeirovpyos, or celebrant. " We have such an high Priest,
who is set on the right hand of the throne of the
Majesty in the heavens; a minister of the sanctuary
(tcov ay low \siTovpyo$) , and of the true tabernacle, which
the Lord pitched, and not man .... For if He were
on earth, He should not be a Priest (Upe6$), seeing that
those are Priests that offer gifts according to the law, who
serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things. ' n
And again ; " And now hath He obtained a more excel-
lent ministry (\eiTovpyia$) , by how much also He is the
Mediator of a better covenant." 1 The old name, Upsu$,
is for the occasion discarded, that it may make way for
the coming in of the higher idea of a truer priesthood,
and be disengaged from the shadowy typical charac-
teristics of the Levitical idea of the Priest. And to
mark the difference another and a new name is given.
That the idea of a ministerial Priesthood exists in the
Gospel, may be proved (1) from incidental notices;
(2) from the terms of the ministerial commission, and
(3) from direct statements.
Among the incidental notices which occur in the New
Testament, the following may be mentioned. S. Paul,
speaking of the support of the ministry, refers to the
law which provided for the sons of Aaron. (1 Cor. ix.
13.) "Do ye not know, that they who minister about holy
things, live of the things of the temple ; and they who
wait at the altar, are partakers with the altar ? Even so
hath the Lord ordained, that they who preach the Gospel
should live of the Gospel/ ' Tithe is the homage of the
world to a claim which has been felt to be grounded on
the original grant of God to His Priests. Again, when
1 Heb. viii. 1—5, and 6.
78 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
S. Paul speaks of the consequences of separation from
the Christian ministry, the reference is to the same
source, and the effect of schism under the Christian
covenant is " the perishing in the gainsaying of Core."
(S. Jude 11.)
Further, the symbolical language of the New Testa-
ment has been moulded after the same idea. Though
the modes of interpreting the Book of Revelations have
been very various ; yet it is generally received as a prin-
ciple of interpretation, — that the symbolic visions are
heavenly representations of what takes place on earth.
The opening vision (Rev. iv., v.) pictures forth the
Church in the act of adoration. The assembled con-
gregation of the elect are represented united in adora-
tion with the ministry, under images manifestly borrowed
from the temple. The Throne, and " He that sat upon
it," is the Shekinah of the Holiest of all. " The seven
lamps of fire," correspond with the seven-branched
candlestick ; u the sea of glass" with the brazen sea.
" The altar of incense," and " the harps," the instrument
used in the temple service, are parts of the same hal-
lowed scene. The altar of sacrifice alone is wanting ;
but that could have had no place, where the very Lamb
was Himself visible " in the midst of the Throne," * a
Lamb as it had been slain." Around the Throne with
these accompanying objects appear " the four and twenty
Elders, clothed in white raiment." If these Elders,
which here evidently represent the ministry, are the
elders of the synagogue, they are transplanted from
their proper sphere, and surrounded with all the ele-
ments of the temple service; and thus the passage
proves the change which was passing over the idea of
TESTIMONY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 79
the Presbyter, and altering the meaning of the word.
But it must be borne in mind that the number, twenty-
four, corresponds with the number of courses into which
the Aaronic Priests were divided ; and each of those
courses had a President, who was called "the Elder." 1
The Aaronic Priest, therefore, as well as the other ele-
ments of the temple, may have had his part in the
imagery under which the Divine worship of the Chris-
tian Church is here symbolized.
There are other passages which, to a mind impressed
with the traditionary teaching of the Church, appear
equally to speak of a sacerdotal ministry and offices ;
although the interpretation is more doubtful, and there-
fore they cannot fairly be pressed in argument with an
opponent. Such, e.g., is our Lord's mention of an
altar, — "If thou bring thy gift to the altar," &c. ;"
(S. Matt. v. 23) — implying its continued existence in
His Church; coupled with S. Paul's assertion of an ex-
clusive altar with sacrifices to be fed upon, * We have
an altar, whereof they have no right to eat, which serve
the tabernacle." (Heb. xiii. 10.) 2 Again, when S.
1 " Of priests, Zadock was the chief, of the family of Eleazar, and
Ahimelech the second, of the family oflthamar. (1 Chron. xxiv. 3.)
" Under these were twenty-four other courses,
. f Eleazar, sixteen, l
of the posterity of { Ithamar) eight J 1 Chron. xxiv. 4,
which twenty-four are called, in the fifth verse, rulers of the sanctuary,
and rulers of the house of God : and to whom the learned interpreters
think the twenty-four elders, Apoc. iv. 4, have relation, c elders of the
priests.' Jer. xix. 1 ; 2 Kings xix. 2." " A Summary View of the Go-
vernment both of the Old and New Testament, by Bishop Andrewes."
2 The same word (Qvaiaoriipiov) is used both for the Christian and
Jewish altar alike in the New Testament, and for the altar of sacrifice,
as well as the altar of incense, as in S. Luke xi. 51 ; Heb. vii. 13 ; 1
80 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
Paul is correcting the misuse of the gift of tongues
among the Corinthians, and says; "Else when thou
shalt bless with the Spirit, how shall he that occupieth
the room of the unlearned, say Amen at thy giving of
thanks, seeing he understandeth not what thou sayest?"
(1 Cor. xiv. 14,) the allusion appears to be to some
well known prayer, to which it was of the first import-
ance that the congregation should be able to respond ;
and the prayer supposed to be alluded to, is the prayer
of consecration in the Eucharistic Office, there being
no other known prayer in which " blessing" and " giv-
ing thanks" are combined. If this be so, S. Paul is
here speaking of that act of ministry, to which he
had alluded previously in the same Epistle, as his own
habitual office ; " The cup of blessing which we bless,
is it not the communion of the Blood of Christ?"
(1 Cor. x. 16.) Again, when S. Paul, writing to the
Cor. ix. 13 ; x. 18. Schleusner says of the word : " Altare, locus in quo
sacrificia et oblationes fiunt : a Ovaidfa, sacrificio, speciatim ara holo-
caustorum : Hebr. mizbach." The same word is commonly used in the
Septuagint, as e.g. Gen. viii. 20 ; xii. 7, 8 ; xiii. 10. A different word,
fioo/xos, is used in the New Testament in reference to heathen altars, as
in Acts xvii. 23.
The passage from the Hebrews (v. 10) was interpreted to mean the
altar of Christian sacrifice by Theodoret, Theophylact, and CEcumenius,
among the Greeks, Primasius, Sedulius, and Anselm, among the
Westerns ; and they suppose the passage to correspond with 1 Cor. x.
21 ; " Ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's Table and the table of
devils." S. Thomas Aquinas interpreted it of Christ crucified, i.e. the
Victim Himself, and Estius prefers this interpretation. Modern com-
mentators, equally as the ancient, are divided. Whichever interpreta-
tion is to be preferred, it is evident that the passage could not have been
interpreted by any to refer to the altar of sacrifice in the Church, unless
such an altar was believed to exist. So that the very dispute proves the
existence of a real Christian sacrifice.
TESTIMONY OP THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 81
Romans, dwells on the grace that is given to him as
an Apostle, he uses throughout terms of Priesthood;
" that I should be the minister (XeiTovpyov, lit. a Priest,
so used, itself or its derivatives, Heb. viii. 2, 6 ; ix. 21 ;
x. 11 ; S. Luke i. 23) of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles,
ministering (UgovpyovvTot, lit. as a Priest) the Gospel of
God, that the offering up (Ttpoo-Qopa, a sacrificial offering)
of the Gentiles might be acceptable, being sanctified
(again a sacrificial term, ^yiao-ju-gvij) by the Holy Ghost.
(Rom. xv. 16.) l
A most important passage, however, which is not
open to the doubts attaching to the texts alluded to,
occurs in S. Paul's Epistle to the Corinthians, where
the Apostle urges the necessity of entire separation
from idol worship. The words employed evidently show
the identity of the principle of heathen and Christian
sacrifices, while yet they assert their entire distinct-
ness of object and effect, the same terms being used as
equally applicable in both cases. It cannot be sup-
posed that language, so liable to convey a false impres-
sion on vital doctrine, would have been employed, unless
the idea of sacrifice, and consequently that of Priest-
hood, were truly applicable to the Christian system.
The words occur immediately after S. Paul's allusion
to the "cup of blessing" and "the bread which we
1 Vitringa feels the weight of this text, admitting " that the Apostle
here refers to the prophecy of Isaiah" (lxvi. 21), and that the passage
certainly marks the existence of a Priesthood in the Christian Church :
but he gets over the difficulty by supposing it to refer not to the minis-
try, but to the exercise of priestly powers by the people at large. It is
evident however that S. Paul is here speaking not of the people, but of
himself as an Apostle : " the grace that is given unto me of God, that
I should be," &c.
E 2
82 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
break," and are as follows : " Behold Israel after the
flesh : are not they which eat of the sacrifices, partakers
of the altar ? What say I, then ? that the idol is any-
thing, or that which is offered in sacrifice to idols is
anything ? But I say that the things which the Gen-
tiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God ;
and I would not that ye should have fellowship with
devils. Ye cannot drink the Cup of the Lord and the
cup of devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's
Table, and the table of devils." (1 Cor. x. 18—21.)
Here the table and cup of devils are opposed to the
Table and Cup of the Lord : sacrifice to devils to sacri-
fice to God ; fellowship with devils to fellowship with
the Lord. The terms are opposed as falsehood to truth ;
but the very comparison implies in both cases one idea
common to mankind in reference to sacrifice and union
with God. It was the prevailing notion that the demon
was personally, though invisibly, present at the feast, a
dark and awful type of a real Truth which is our con-
tinual blessing in the Church of God ; and that par-
taking of the feast was a real union with the supposed
Deity, equally a type of our mysterious bliss in the
Holy Eucharist. This heathen notion S. Paul repre-
sents as a perverted, but still an exact, image of a great
and real mystery, — that what the heathen worshipper
supposed to be the object and end of his sacrifice, is
realised in its Truth in ours. That even the Jewish sa-
crifices are represented by S. Paul in this passage only as
emblematic of our ever present Blessing, is thus brought
out by S. Chrysostom in his comment on v. 18 : "But
do thou, I pray, consider how, with regard to the Jews,
he said not ' They are partakers with God/ but they are
TESTIMONY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 83
partakers of the altar ; for what was placed thereon was
burnt : but in respect to the Body of Christ, not so.
But how ? It is the Communion of the Lord's Body. For
not of the altar, but of Christ Himself, are we made
partakers."
• The singular prominence which the Holy Eucharist
obtained from the beginning, has a very important bear-
ing on our inquiry. It has been shown how this mys-
tical service formed the central and fundamental idea of
Divine Worship in the Early Church. This was equally
true during the time when the New Testament was
written. The Acts of the Apostles open with the fol-
lowing scene of the Church's earliest worship: "And
they continued steadfastly in the Apostles' doctrine and
fellowship, and in (the) breaking of (the) bread, (t>j
xkcicrsi tou oipTov,) and in prayer." (ch. ii. 42.) The
combination of Eucharist and prayer corresponds with
that of sacrifice and prayer, which marked the com-
mencement of patriarchal worship. That the Eucharist
should thus at once become the leading feature in the
worship of the Church, is readily accounted for, when
we consider that it is the only service which our Lord
commanded, and which Himself first celebrated.* It is
the one essential act of worship which He personally
ordained as the vital bond between Himself and His
Church. In " the upper chamber," " the same night
that He was betrayed," there were revealed the outline,
the main features, and, it may be far more than we are
in the least aware, the very words of the Church's un-
dying liturgies. Whatever passed that night must have
been fixed indelibly in the minds of the Apostles, and
was through them by the Spirit transfused into the
84 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
living action of the Church. Nor is it difficult, even
after this lapse of time, to trace out the points of re-
semblance in our own Eucharistic service. The long
discourses recorded by S. John, the intercessory prayer,
and the hymn that was sung, are perpetuated in the
readings of Scripture, the sermon, the lengthened in-
tercessions, and the singing of hymns, which have
always formed parts of the liturgy, the 'blessing' and
' giving of thanks' being then, as now, its central
features.
What words our Lord used, as He took the bread and
the wine, and " blessed," and u gave thanks," and of-
fered Himself to the Father, are not recorded, though
they could not have escaped the notice of the Apostles,
and were no doubt among the remembrances which the
Holy Ghost recalled to their minds. We may even now
be using, unknowingly, our Lord's own words of bless-
ing, oblation, and thanksgiving, even as we use His
words of consecration.
Nor is it of little moment to our inquiry to observe,
that the original words, translated in our version, " Do
this in remembrance of Me," had in the ears of a Jew a
fixed meaning, long hallowed in the usage of the people,
as connected with sacrifice. " Do (noiius) this," in the
language of the Septuagint, means, as it meant among
heathen writers, " offer as a sacrifice." 1 So also the term
1 For this use of the term in the Septuagint, see, among numberless
passages, Exod. xxix. 36 — 39 ; Lev. vi. 22 j ix. 7, where it is translated
in our version " offer ;" Exod. x. 25, where it is translated " sacrifice ;"
Lev. iv. 20, where it is translated, as in the Gospels, " do," — " He shall
do with (iroiVei) the bullock (i.e. offer) as he did with (^rohjce, lit.
offered) the bullock for a sin-offering." As applied specially to the
TESTIMONY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 85
" hi remembrance of Me," (el$ tyjv gjaijv avaju,v>jcriv,) or
rather, "for a memorial of Me," is sacrificial; the
memorial in a sacrifice being that portion of the Victim
which is laid on the altar and offered to God, in order
to bring the whole oblation to remembrance before
Passover, see Numb. ix. 2 ; Deut. xvi. 1 ; 2 Kings xxiii. 21 ; 2 Chron.
xxx. 1, 2 ; xxxv. 1 ; Ezra vi. 19, where it is translated " keep" or cele-
brate. S. Paul uses the term, Heb. xi. 28, " Through faith he kept
(&roi7j<re, offered) the Passover and sprinkling of blood, lest He that
destroyed the firstborn should touch them." Compare also S. Luke ii.
27, where simply " to do (iroirja-ai) after the custom of the law," cor-
responds with v. 24, " to offer a sacrifice (dovvcu Qv&iav) according to
that which is said in the Law of the Lord." Throughout the Septua-
gint ircneiv is used as synonymous with UpoTroietv or Upovpysiv. It is
used also for dressing or preparing the sacrifice, as in Lev. vii. 9, 10,
&c, &c.
A friend has suggested to the Author that the use of these sacrificial
terms may explain the much-questioned passage ; Gen. iv. 7. " If thou
doest (irpo(T€V€yKT}s LXX.) well, shalt thou not be accepted ? and if
thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door :" in other words, " If thou
offerest the appointed sacrifice, shalt thou not be accepted, as Abel ?
if thou offerest not the appointed sacrifice, the opportunity of redeeming
the error, the true sacrifice of expiation, is ready at hand."
The corresponding Latin word, " facere," had the same meaning ; and
as ttoicIv was used by the Greek Fathers to denote the oblation in the
Eucharist, so " missam facere" was the phrase commonly used to express
the same by the Latin Fathers. " Facere" in the Vulgate is the version
of iroiuv in the Septuagint, and both correspond with " do" in our ver-
sion. (See Hickes, c. ii. s. 7.)
S. Chrysostom contrasts the Sacrifice of the Passover with that of the
Holy Eucharist, and employs the same word in both cases to express
the offering. " See how he weans and draws them from Jewish rites :
* For,' says he, ' as ye offered that (i.e. the Passover, 4kuvo 4iroi(?Te) in
remembrance of the miraculous deliverance from Egypt, so offer (xoitlrf)
this in remembrance of Me : that blood was shed for the preservation
of the first-born, this for the remission of the sins of the whole world."
(S. Chrysost. on S. Matt, xxvi., lxxxii.)
86 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
Him. (See Levit. ii. 2, 9.) 1 The idea implied is not
that of an act of memory on the part of man, but a
memorializing of God.
It must be considered, moreover, that the institution
of the Blessed Sacrament was commanded to the Apos-
tles as a new Passover. The Paschal Lamb had been
eaten in token that the dispensation of the Law had
reached its close, and our Lord took the bread and
wine which remained after the feast, to make of them
the materials of a new sacrifice, — a new system arising
out of the ruins of the old. He delivered Himself
openly unto death before the eyes of the disciples, under
the external forms of the elements, which He thus as-
sumed, and then gave Himself to them as their Food.
" And the bread which I will give is My Flesh, which I
will give for the life of the world." The mystery at
once took the form of a sacrifice ; and the truest, as well
as the simplest, comment on the history of the whole
transaction is to be found in the words of S. Cyprian :
" If Jesus, our Lord and God, is the High Priest of God
the Father, and first offered Himself a sacrifice to the
Father, and commanded that this should be done in
remembrance of Him, doth not he who doeth as Christ
did, truly act as a Priest in the place of Christ, and
then offer a true and proper sacrifice in the Church to
1 }i.vi\ii.o<rvvov is the word used in Levit. ii. ; but avdfivrjffis is used
in a similar sense in Numb. x. 10, and Levit. xxiv. 7. In this latter
place it is used in reference to the shewbread, which has been considered
to be specially a type of the Eucharistic elements. The only place
where avdfxvricris is used in the New Testament besides its use in the
institution of the Eucharist, is Heb. x. 3, and there also it expresses the
idea of a commemoration made before God, and not a remembrance in
a man's own mind.
TESTIMONY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 87
God the Father, when he offers in the same manner in
which he may perceive Christ Himself offered V (Epist.
lxiii. ad Csecil.)
2. We have hitherto considered only partial or inci-
dental passages touching the ministry and its services.
The terms of the Apostolic commission are, however, the
most complete guide to the determination of the ques-
tion. As in the Old, so in the New Testament, the
ministerial commission was not given in one formal
statement, but is to be gathered from the scattered no-
tices which occur in the course of the Revelation. These
notices, when brought together, fall under the following
heads ; and it is to be observed how closely the Apos-
tolic commission, both in its general scope and in its
details, coincides with that of the sons of Aaron : —
APOSTOLIC COMMISSION. AARONIC.
Admission to the Covenant.
By Holy Baptism. The offerings appointed after
"Go ye and teach (lit. make dis- childbirth, and for the redemp-
ciples of) all nations, baptizing Hon of the first-born in connec-
them in the Name of the Father, Hon with the rite of Circum-
and of the Son, and of the Holy cision.
Ghost." (S. Matt, xxviii. 19.)
Authoritative Teaching.
" Teaching them to observe all " The Priest's lips should keep
things whatsoever I have com- knowledge, and the people should
manded you." (S. Matt, xxviii. seek the Law at their mouth."
20.) (Mai. ii. 7.)
Judgment in Conteoveest.
" He that heareth you, heareth " And the Priests tho sons of
Me." (S. Luke x. 16.) Levi sliall come near . . . and by
88
THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
APOSTOLIC COMMISSION.
"If he neglect to hear the
Church, let him be unto thee as a
heathen man and a publican." (S.
Matt, xviii. 17.)
"The Council of Jerusalem."
(Acts xv. 6.)
AARONIC.
their word shall every contro-
versy and every stroke be tried."
Ecclesiastical Rule.
" Whatsoever ye shall bind on
earth shall be bound in heaven :
and whatsoever ye shall loose on
earth shall be loosed in heaven."
(S. Matt, xviii. 18.)
"According to the sentence
of the Law which they shall
teach thee, and according to the
judgment which they shall tell
thee, thou shalt do : thou shalt
not decline from the sentence
which they shall show thee, to the
right hand nor to the left. And
the man that will do presump-
tuously, and will not hearken to
the Priest that standeth to minis-
ter there before the Lobd thy
God, or unto the judge, even that
man shall die, and thou shalt
put away the evil from Israel."
(Deut. xvii. 11, 12.)
Reconciliation and Excommunication.
" Receive ye the Holy Ghost :
Whosesoever sins ye remit, they
are remitted; and whosesoever
sins ye retain, they are retained."
(S. John xx. 22, 23.)
"And all things are of God,
Who hath reconciled us unto Him-
self, and hath given unto us the
ministry of reconciliation." (2
Cor. v. 18.)
" For though I should boast
somewhat more of our authority,
" The Priest shall look on him,
and pronounce him unclean."
(Lev. xiii. 8, 11, 20, 22, 25, 30—
44.)
"The Priest shall pronounce
him clean." (Lev. xiii. 6, 17, 23,
28, 34.)
" The Priest that maketh him
clean." (Lev. xiv. 11.)
TESTIMONY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES.
APOSTOLIC COMMISSION. . AAKONIC.
which the Loed hath given us
for edification and not for your
destruction, I should not be
ashamed." (2 Cor. x. 8 j 1 Tim.
i. 20.)
89
Offering Sacrifices and other Oblations.
" This do (TroteTre) in remem-
brance of Me." (1 Cor. xi. 25.)
"This do ye (7roieiTe), as often
as ye drink it, in remembrance of
Me." (1 Cor. xi. 25.) N.B.— The
same word (iroi€?v) is used here, and
translated " do," which is used in
the contrasted passage of Levi-
ticus, and translated " offer."
" And Moses said unto Aaron,
Go unto the altar and offer (iroirj-
<rov) thy sin offering and thy
burnt offering, and make an
atonement for thyself and for the
people, and offer {iroi-qaov) the
offering of the people, and make an
atonement for them as the Lord
commanded." (Lev. ix. 7.)
Intercession.
Is any sick among you ? Let
him call for the elders of the
Church ; and let them pray over
him, anointing him with oil in the
Name of the Lord ; and the prayer
of faith shall save the sick, and the
Lord shall raise him up j and if
he have committed sins, they sliall
be forgiven him." (S. James v.
14, 15.)
" And Moses said unto Aaron,
Take a censer, and put fire therein
from off the altar, and put on in-
cense, and go quickly unto the
Congregation, and make an atone-
ment for them ; for there is wrath
gone out from the Lord, the
plague is begun .... And he
stood between the living and the
dead, and the plague was stayed."
(Numb. xvi. 46, 48.)
Benediction.
" Tho grace of the Lord Jesus
Christ, and the love of God, and
the Communion of the Holy
Ghost, be with you all. Amen."
(2 Cor. xiii. 14.)
"Speak unto Aaron and his
sons, saying, On this wise ye shall
bless tho children of Israel, saying
unto them, The Lord bless thee
and keep thee : the Lord make
His face to shine upon thee, and
90 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
APOSTOLIC COMMISSION. AAKONIC.
be gracious unto thee. The Loed
lift up His countenance upon thee,
and give thee peace." (Numb,
yi. 23—26.)
The two ministries are obviously co- extensive, cover-
ing corresponding spheres of action, and moving along
similar lines, which converge and meet all at one centre.
The one precedes, the other succeeds, the Sacrifice of the
Son of God ; the one is the instrument of the typical,
prefigurative Law, the other of its antitype and fulfil-
ment. God in both cases appointed the mode whereby
He would be approached. The Law contained in its
ordinances the types and " shadows of good things to
come," and " not the very image of the things." (Heb.
x. 1.) The Church, which is the temple of the Holy
Ghost, the very " Body of Christ/' contains in its rites
and ministries the " image" itself, — the living form in
which the Substance is enshrined, through which It
breathes and imparts Itself. 1 Not that the things done
1 The term " image," as contrasted with " shadow," is used in Scrip-
ture to denote *a living form, having a real, substantial existence.'
Thus it is used to express our Blessed Loed's Personality in the flesh :
" Cheist, Who is the image of God," (2 Cor. iv. 4) : " the express
image of His Person" (Heb. i. 3). And, again, it is applied to the living
body of man : "As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also
bear the image of the heavenly." (1 Cor. xv. 49.) As applied to ordi-
nances, it means outward forms which contain grace, as their substance
and life, in contradistinction to mere types or signs, as the Jewish ordi-
nances were. This distinction is made by S. Paul between Jewish and
Christian ordinances. (Heb. x. 1.) The Fathers employed the word as
noting the distinction between the Jewish rites on the one hand, and the
full blessedness of unveiled glory in heaven on the other. Thus S.
Ambrose speaks of Jewish rites as the " shadow," Christian sacraments
the " image," and future glory the " truth."
TESTIMONY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 91
in the Church are formed upon the model of the Law of
Moses, they are rather the embodiments and organs of
those " heavenly things unto the example and shadow"
of which the rites of the Law served. The Law was a
copy of existing realities in the heavens, and those very
realities have now assumed a body in which they live,
and through which they manifest themselves. The
ministries of the Church not merely express and image
forth, they contain and convey, what the rites of the
Law shadowed. Signs are become sacraments. The
one all-sufficient Sacrifice is not, as of old, typified, but
is commemorated in the Oblation of the Church, and its
substance is u verily and indeed given." " The Law was
given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus
Christ." Is it possible that they who ministered those
carnal ordinances, " which could not make him that did
the service perfect, as pertaining to the conscience,"
should be the real priests, and they who minister
" through the offering of the Body of Jesus Christ once
for all," have no priestly character?
Nor is this all. There are expressions which prove
that the Apostolic ministry is co-extensive with that of
our Lord Himself. When Scripture speaks of the Ca-
tholic Church as a household, the minister is the
steward ; and a steward, unlike the other servants, has
entrusted to him all his unseen Master's goods, to be
distributed through his hands. And Christian minis-
ters are " stewards," not of the Word only, but " of the
mysteries of God," which our Church, in unison with
the Church Catholic, has understood to mean sacra-
ments, in which is lodged the manifold grace of God.
Again, when the Church is spoken of as a kingdom, the
92 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
minister is the ambassador ; and an ambassador, unlike
all other ministers of the crown, is the complete repre-
sentative of the unseen sovereign. The fulness of a dele-
gated charge is implied in both expressions. The latter
metaphor, more especially, implies a Priesthood in the
ministry; for the very characteristic of our Lord's
kingly character is, that He is a a Priest on His Throne."
(Zech. vi. 13.) If, then, the priestly office were elimi-
nated from the Apostolic commission, the very dis-
tinctiveness of Christ's kingdom would have no true
representation upon earth, and His ministers could not
be rightly termed " ambassadors for Christ." (2 Cor.
v. 20.)
A remarkable intimation of the ministerial power
about to be committed to human agency was given by
our Lord in the act of absolving the " man sick of the
palsy, lying on a bed." The mystery involved in His
words, as He reasoned with the Scribes, was the delega-
tion of the Divine gift of the pardon of sin to Himself as
Man: " That ye may know, that the Son of Man" (the
title specially distinguishing His Humanity) "hath power
upon earth to forgive sins." It was the announcement
of a new order of ministry arising through His Incar-
nation, to apply the gifts of Divine grace. The by-
standers dimly perceived the amazing consequences of
this new dispensation ; or they unconsciously bore wit-
ness to the truth involved in our Lord's act as to the
priestly commission to be bestowed through Him on
men who should minister the same gifts among their
brethren. " When the multitude saw it, they marvelled,
and glorified God, which had given such power unto
men. 3 ' (S. Matt. ix. 1—8.)
TESTIMONY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 93
Moreover, the express words which preceded the so-
lemn act of ordination are most conclusive as to the
extent of the ministry then committed unto men. " As
My Father hath sent Me, even so send I you. And
when He had said this, He breathed on them," &c.
(S. John xx. 22.) These words can admit no reserva-
tion of any characteristic part of our Lord's ministry.
His mission was to be Prophet, Priest, and King. The
kingly office is discharged by the exercise of ecclesiastical
judgment and discipline; the prophetic by teaching.
The priestly office must, in like manner, be dispensed
by a subordinate human agency, or one essential part of
the mission fails in its fulfilment. It is the more re-
markable that there should be any doubt, whether the
priestly office were committed unto men, when it is
acknowledged that the regal and prophetic functions
are so committed ; because, when our Lord after His
Resurrection, ordaining the Apostles, selected one special
mark of their ministry to be expressed in words and
thus openly sealed upon them, He chose not the office
of ruling, nor that of teaching, though both are avowedly
characteristic attributes of their ministry, but He chose
for special mention that one branch which of necessity
involves a priestly character, viz., that of the remission
of sins : " Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remit-
ted," &c.
Nor is it possible that these high terms should be
limited to, and fulfilled in, the Apostles themselves;
for our Lord accompanied the commission with the
promise, " Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end
of the world." (S. Matt, xxviii. 20.) These words,
from their connection with the commission preceding
94 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
them evidently applying to an earthly ministry, could
not be fulfilled in the persons of the Apostles, but only
in the successive line of an order which was to take its
rise from them, and perpetuate their being on the earth
to the end of time. Again, if these high terms do not
apply still, but had their fulfilment in the lifetime of the
Apostles, then it would follow that there is now no Di-
vine mission of a ministry in the Church at all. The
alternative lies between the full Apostolic commission,
and Congregationalism ; between the one Divine and a
simply human organisation. But English Churchmen,
at least, cannot doubt the living and perpetual applica-
tion of the Apostolic commission, because in our
Ordinal we employ the very words used by our Lord,
when He breathed on the Apostles, as our form of
commission, with the awful accompaniment, "Receive
ye the Holy Ghost," which would be blasphemy, if
it were not true, according to the universal tradition
of the Church, that Holy Orders are sacramental,
conferring grace for the work committed; and that
every fresh ordination is an ever-renewed act of Christ
Himself.
The distinction between the extraordinary and the
ordinary, the temporary and the abiding elements in
the Apostolic commission, need be no difficulty. For
a simple rule has ever guided the mind of the Church
in this respect, viz., that whatever concerns the welfare
of souls and the communication of grace, is ordinary,
and to abide for ever ; but that gifts or powers external
to the soul are not necessarily conveyed by the terms
of the commission. To use Jeremy Taylor's words,
where he is speaking of the power of inflicting diseases
TESTIMONY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES. 95
and death, which the Apostles possessed, in " binding"
sinners, or on the contrary, healing sicknesses in
u absolving" them, — " It was in this, as in all other
ministries, something miraculous and extraordinary
was for ever to consign a lasting truth and ministry
in ordinary." 1 If any function of the ministry con-
cerns the peace and life of souls, it is the means of
reconciliation and communion with God, and must
therefore fall under the head of ordinary ministra-
tions. And these are the very points involved in the
idea of a priestly commission.
Taking the Holy Scriptures, then, as our guide, — by
many incidental notices, by symbolical as well as direct
statements, by the terms of the commission, and the
special prominence given to the idea of a ministry of
reconciliation and forgiveness of sins, — by our Lord's
associating His ministers with Himself in the Eucha-
ristic Oblation, and by the co-extensiveness of the
Apostolic mission with that of our Lord, which com-
mission has descended in its fulness along the line of
the ministry of the Catholic and Apostolic Church, —
we conclude that ministers who inherit this grace are
endued, not merely with functions of spiritual rule and
authority to teach, but are also, in Jeremy Taylor's
words, "ministers of Christ's Priesthood," and thus
themselves, in Him, true Priests.
1 Jeremy Taylor's Treatise on Eepentance. Of Ecclesiastical Pe-
nance, sect. iv. 49.
CHAPTER IX.
THE PKINCIPLE OF PKIESTHOOD.
IT will tend to elucidate the subject, and also confirm
the conclusions at which we have arrived, if we
consider the root or essential principle of a sacerdotal
ministry, i.e. that which specially distinguishes a Priest
from other ministers in the things of God.
The slaughter of an animal victim in sacrifice is not,
as some have supposed, the essential characteristic of a
Priest ; for by the Levitical Law it was appointed that
the victim should be put to death, not by the Priest,
but by the worshipper (see Lev. i. 2, 5) . In later years
the custom grew for the Levites, or subordinate attend-
ants, to slay and prepare the victim. (See 2 Chron. xxix.
24, 34.) The Priest's office was to offer on the altar,
sprinkle the blood, and distribute the consecrated food
of the sacrifice.
Nor again were sacrifices of blood essential to a true
Priesthood. Hickes (lib. 1 1, sec. iv.) has shown by a
large collection of evidence, as e.g., from the customs
of the early Romans and Persians, who had no animal
sacrifices, and, in modern times, from the case of the
Mahometans, that the ministers of such religions have
been always regarded as true Priests. According to the
THE PRINCIPLE OF PRIESTHOOD. 97
Levitical law the sin-offering of a poor man was blood-
less, of fine flour only (Lev. v. 1 — 4) ; yet was it equally
a true sacrifice, " to make atonement" for his sin. The
material or nature of the offering therefore cannot be
the determining point as to the character of a priestly
ministry.
The laws which regulated the Levitical sacrifices,
being evidently typical in all their details, give the true
key to the principle which underlies the system in all
its variations. In regard both to burnt-offerings, and
sin-offerings offered by private individuals, the same
general course of proceeding was ordained. The victim
was brought before the door of the tabernacle, and the
offerer laid his hand on the head of the victim, " that it
might be accepted for him." By this act he symbolized
the open acknowledgment of his sin before God, and
of the justice of its appointed doom, together with a
humble profession of faith in the true vicarious Sacri-
fice, upon Whom " the Lord hath laid the iniquities of
us all." The victim was then taken by the offerer to
the north side of the altar, and was there bled to death.
By this was typified the acknowledgment of»death being
the proper desert of sin, and a pleading of the merits of
the death of Christ, the north side being emblematic
of the region and shadow of death in the natural world,
and so of the miserable state to which sin had reduced
mankind, into which the Lord voluntarily descended,
that He might share it with us, and so redeem us from
it. The Priest, and the Priest alone, received the blood
of the victim, and sprinkled it upon the altar. This
typified the act of absolution following upon the confes-
sion, with the application of the merits and virtues of
F
yb THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
the most precious Blood of the true " Lamb of God,
that taketh away the sins of the world." The principle
was the same, when Aaron, taking his censer and burn-
ing incense therein, " stood between the living and the
dead, and the plague was stayed" (Numb. xvi. 48) ; and
again, when the life of Abimelech hung upon Abraham's
prayer : " for he is a Prophet, and he shall pray for
thee, and thou shalt live." (Gen. xv. 7.)
In all these cases alike, the intervention of the com-
missioned agent, applying the appointed means with
the promises of a special covenant, was the principle on
which the expected blessing depended j and it is this in-
tervention which constituted the sacerdotal act. Gro-
tius, therefore, in his commentary on Heb. ii. 17, has
given the true definition of the Priest's office, founded
on this deeper view of the subject. " It was the Priest's
office," he says, " to be in God's stead (Dei vice fungi)
to the people, and the people's stead (populi vice) to
God." Estius, commenting on ch. viii. ver. 6 of the
Epistle to the Hebrews, gives the same definition, though
in fuller detail : " It is the office of a priest to mediate
between God and men, to confirm compacts between
them by offering sacrifice, and by his offices to provide
that men become partakers of the Divine promises."
Again, Hickes, in his " Christian Priesthood Asserted,"
(chap, ii., sec. 1,) expresses the same idea, grounding it
on S. Paul's statement (Heb. v. 1), when he describes a
Priest, as one who " among men stands in the presence
of God to perform Divine offices for them, and for their
benefit and good, to reconcile them to God and God to
them, or to obtain graces and favours to them from Him,
and as it were to interpose between Him and them."
THE PRINCIPLE OF PRIESTHOOD. 99
Mediation, or ministerial intervention between God
and man, is in all these statements represented to be
the principle of Priesthood. A Priest is one who, not by
any merit, or virtue, or power of his own, but by the will
of God, has been made a necessary link in the chain-
work of the Divine purposes. Himself as ineffectual as
the words he speaks, or the inanimate creatures he may
employ in his ministrations, he has nevertheless re-
ceived, no necessary superiority indeed over his fellow
men, but an attribute of grace, distinct from them,
though given for their sakes, by virtue of which they
are brought into such relationship with God, that
through his instrumentality, they obtain the promised
blessings of the covenant under which they live. His
office has a twofold aspect ; on the one hand, the acts
of his brethren through him become acceptable with
God, and through him, on the other hand, the acts of
God reach unto them.
The doctrine of the Priesthood can be no difficulty
to one who considers the law of intermediate causes
prevailing throughout the creation of God. Among
the manifold forces of nature, no one can act alone.
Each needs the presence of other agents, or certain fixed
conditions must co -exist, before its powers can operate.
The powers of vegetation, e.g. need the presence of
light for their true development. The co-existence of
vegetable life is necessary for the sustenance of animal
life. The acting of various external circumstances,
again, on the formation of the human frame and cha-
racter, is one of the most prominent facts of physiology.
It has pleased the Creator thus to limit by certain
laws His own operations, and to make the infinite out-
f2
100 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
goings of His will dependent on the presence and act-
ings of His own creatures. The spiritual world is no
exception to this all pervading principle of mutual inter-
dependence and conditional instrumentality.
The law of intervention specially characterizes the
Gospel. This vital principle pervades the central truth
of the Incarnation of God: for the Incarnation is the
assumption of the Humanity, in order to become a
medium of communication between God and man.
God willed not to act on man directly, but through the
intervention of the human nature in Christ. " In Him
dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily," and
from Him flow forth all the gifts that God has willed
to impart to man. They flow, not directly from God,
but indirectly through the Manhood of Christ. It is
the same principle of interposition which characterizes
priestly attributes in created natures; the essential
difference being, that in Christ the principle of Priest-
hood exists as a self-originated attribute, inherent and
independent of all others. And therefore the Fathers
distinguished Him among all His brethren, as 6 fx.ovo$
<£v<rei apxispevs, " the only High Priest by nature ;" in
the same sense in which Holy Scripture distinguishes
Him, as the " One Mediator between God and man ;"
while yet they held that the operations of his Priesthood
and Mediation were extended from Him through subor-
dinate and dependent agents to the redeemed world.
Our Lord Himself, on many occasions, showed how
this law of intervention was not to be limited to His
own Person, but that His purpose was to associate His
creatures with Himself in the exercise of His media-
torial functions. When " He spat on the ground, and
THE PRINCIPLE OF PRIESTHOOD. 101
made clay of the spittle, and anointed the eyes of the
blind man with the clay, and said, Go, wash in the pool
of Siloam" (S. John ix. 6) j even in this act of proving
Himself the " Light of the world," He invested the
lowest creatures with the power of communicating this
precious gift. In raising the dead, an act in which,
above all others, it might have seemed no creature could
have any share with God, there must yet be interme-
diate agents. One who stands by must " take away the
stone," before the Dead can come forth ; and others
must "loose him and let him go," before he can be
free. (S. John xi. 39, 44.) A yet more apposite in-
stance of the truth here sought to be established, occurs
in the two remarkable miracles of feeding the many
thousands with the few loaves. " Jesus took the loaves,
and gave thanks ;" but they were distributed by " the
disciples to them that were set down." (S. John vi.
11.) In these cases human instrumentality was employed,
not merely, as in the case of the raising of Lazarus, in
the accidental accompaniments of the miracle, but in
the miracle itself; for even in passing through the
hands of the Apostles the bread mysteriously grew, and
was multiplied according to the need of the recipients.
The miracle was evidently symbolical, and when imme-
diately afterwards our Lord spoke of giving His Flesh
and Blood for the life of the world, it suggests itself as
an inference involved in the type, that this true Bread,
His very Body, would pass miraculously through human
hands.
It must be borne in mind, moreover, that the inter-
vention of a human ministry, to bring into act, and ex-
tend to mankind, the Priesthood of our Lord, is only
102 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
one portion of a vast sacramental system. It has been
the uniform teaching of the Church, that Christ or-
dained sacraments, whereby to communicate the graces
of His Redemption. " The Church and the Sacraments
are, like man himself, compounded of body and spirit ;
and the body of them, though inferior and for the sake
of the spirit, is yet so necessary, that it is made by God
to be the instrument and channel of His gifts : so that,
except through their outward parts, we can neither
possess ordinarily, nor even conceive or name, the dis-
tinctions and relations of spiritual things." The same
Will which ordained that through the intervention of
water and the Sacred Name regeneration should be
vouchsafed, and that bread and wine should become the
Body and Blood of Christ our Lord, has willed also, as
part of the same system, that an order of men, " taken
from among men, should be ordained for men," to be
the agents in this system of instrumentality, and so
fellow-workers with God. Sacerdotal mediation is a
necessary correlative of sacraments, and is itself sacra-
mental.
Moreover, the principles already stated show what
constitutes a true Priesthood, and wherein its strength
lies. A true Priesthood is one ordained of God ; for
no man " taketh this honour unto himself, but he that
is called of God, as was Aaron." And the strength of
a Priesthood lies in the closeness of its relation to the
One Mediator. The Priests of the heathen world bear
witness to the efficacy of human mediation, themselves
possessing no efficacy. In its commencement, idolatry
assumed a power which was given only to the Patriar-
chal line; and now, still a mere shadow, it bears a
THE PRINCIPLE OF PRIESTHOOD. 103
world-wide evidence to the reality of a true dispensation
of God. The truth and efficacy of the Patriarchal and
Aaronic Priesthoods rested on their being the only or-
dained types of our Lord. Their life hung on this con-
nection. When, therefore, the Jewish Priests rejected
Christ, by that very act they sealed the doom of their
order, and ceased to be true Priests, as their sacrifices
ceased to be acceptable sacrifices. They continued their
ministrations during many years, unconscious, as Sam-
son, that their strength had departed from them j but
it was only the mechanical clinging to forms of which
the life had all passed away, as ghosts are thought to
linger still amidst the ruins of their former glory. The
Jewish Priests became thenceforward the untrue shadows
of their former selves, as the Priests of the heathen had
been of their progenitors of the Patriarchal line. They
lingered on awhile, as Balaam standing beside " the
seven altars and the seven rams ;" their prayers and
their imprecations alike utterly rejected, while yet they
gave to the world an unwilling testimony to a mystery
of love now resting on another race.
The ordination of the Apostles instantly followed the
completion of the act which involved the rejection of
the Levitical Priesthood. Our Lord ordained them on
His return from the grave. On his first reappearance
among the twelve, " then said Jesus unto them, Peace
be unto you. As My Father hath sent Me, even so
send I you," &c. They had before been " called." (S.
Matt. x. 1.) It had been already foretold that the keys
of the kingdom of heaven should be given unto them
(S. Matt. xvi. 19) ; but till that hour the keys of the
kingdom were in other hands. Moreover the powers of
104 THE DOCTRINE OP THE PRIESTHOOD.
ordination had been conveyed in part in the commission
to offer the Eucharistic sacrifice, and from that hour
therefore dates the most momentous attribute of the
Apostolic ministry ; but it was not then complete.
It was when the apostasy of the Jewish Priesthood
was accomplished in the crucifixion of the Lord of
glory, that another Priesthood arose in its fulness.
It was still the same ministry, if viewed as to its
essential life ; for both the Levitical and the Christian
ministries lived through the relationship which God had
formed between them and His Blessed Son, — the one,
a Priesthood of hope in Him Who was to come, the
other, a Priesthood of faith in Him Who was present.
Only there was this momentous distinction in favour of
the Christian Priesthood, that, through Christ's Pre-
sence abiding in the Flesh, the relation was become
more intimate ; and, not figuratively, or in manner of
speech, but by distinct promise and covenant, never
made before, an identity of ministration was established
between Himself and His ministers, Himself accom-
panying them in their service, — " Lo, I am with you
always/' — so that their acts, if done under the prescribed
conditions, are His acts ; their sacrifice, His sacrifice of
Himself; their distribution, His communion of His
Flesh and Blood; their absolutions and benedictions,
His voice of pardon and peace.
This view of the sacramental character of the Christian
Priesthood serves to explain the language of the Fathers,
which to many appears hyperbolical and unreal. They
who habitually realized the Invisible Presence in visible
forms, understood in a literal sense such Scriptural
words as these : " He that receiveth you, receiveth Me ;
THE PRINCIPLE OF PRIESTHOOD. 105
and he that receiveth Me, receiveth Him that sent Me." 1
They understood how Christ had vouchsafed to borrow
from the creature place and time and instrumental
agency, as the modes of His Presence and His actings ;
and therefore it was in them natural to look on the
ordained symbols and instruments, as the embodiments
of Christ Himself. S. Ignatius could use the follow-
ing words, not as a singular instance, but as his habitual
manner of speech ; (Ep. ad Smyrnseos, c. viii.) " Flee
divisions, as the root of evil. Let all follow the Bishop,
as Jesus Christ the Father : and the Presbytery, as
the Apostles ; and reverence the deacons, as the ordi-
nance of God." And again S. Polycarp ; (Ep. ad Philip.
v.) " Be subject to the Presbyters and Deacons, as to
God and Christ."
Long bitter controversies and multiplied divisions,
chilling love, and undermining the life of faith ; habits
of subjectiveness of thought, withdrawing the soul from
the contemplation of the Invisible ; above all, sins in
the Priesthood itself — have marred both the vividness
and the simplicity of a belief once intensely realized.
Ages of coldness and infidelity have drifted us away
from the land of visions, most real and deeply consoling,
in which the forefathers of our faith once lived, and
have separated the Invisible from the visible, explain-
ing away into metaphor and hyperbole expressions of
Holy Scripture itself, which undoubtedly identify the
sign and the thing signified, those who are sent with
Him Who sends them.
Yet the covenant stands unrepealed, and " the gifts
and calling of God are without repentance." The com-
1 S. Matt. x. 40.
F 3
106 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
mission of the ministry, and the results of a participa-
tion in its appointed acts, are the same now as at the
beginning. It is still, and must continue to be, even
to the end, the only ordained means of bringing out
into effect the virtues of the Death and Passion of
Christ; the consecrated channel of communication
through which in Christ God and man, heaven and
earth, are made one. Nor is it only High Church doc-
trine which involves the necessity of a Priesthood.
Whatever may be the precise definition of such doc-
trines, as Absolution, or the Real Presence in the
Blessed Sacrament, yet if it be held that the act of the
minister is in any real sense essential by Divine appoint-
ment in order to the reception of the blessing sought,
and that the faith of the receiver is not the only con-
dition, the minister must in such case be held to be a
Priest. Ministerial intervention constitutes the priestly
nature of the act. And the promise of God binding
the inward grace to the ministration, constitutes it a
priestly service of a true and life-giving character.
The oidy possible view of Christianity, according to
which there is no Priesthood, is that which represents
Absolution simply as preaching, or reading aloud general
promises of mercy, which any one may read for himself;
and the Eucharist as a mere commemorative rite, the
benefit of which depends simply on the act of the re-
ceiver's mind. One proof of this assertion is to be
found in the uniform history of language ; for where-
ever the sacramental idea of the Church has been
broken down, the term " Priest" has been discarded, as
no longer appropriate in the conscience of mankind, and
it has been superseded by terms such as " minister" or
THE PRINCIPLE OF PRIESTHOOD. 107
u pastor/' which involve only a general, indefinite idea of
religious service. And wherever the sacramental idea
is held only formally, and without any consciousness of
its reality, the term Priest also is held in doubt and
with an implied protest, or explained away as a popular
confusion of terms. Only in the Catholic communion
has the term Priest lived on, indissolubly bound up with
the whole cycle of her ministrations, and within the
Church only where the deep mystery of her being and
her oneness with " the powers of the world to come"
are apprehended, does the term carry home to the mind
its full meaning and expression. 1
1 The writer of the article on the term Priest, in the Encyc. Britann.,
speaking popularly, takes a similar view, as to the application of the
term, considering it to be rightly employed in the Church, except by
those who, like the Presbyterians, hold the Eucharist to be of " no other
moral import than the mere commemoration of the death of Cheist."
" These," he adds, " cannot consider themselves as Priests, in the rigid
sense of the word ; but only as Presbyters, of which the word Priest is
a contraction."
CHAPTER X.
ARGUMENT OF THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS.
THE Epistle to the Hebrews is the only portion of
the New Testament in which the question of the
Priesthood is fully treated of. It therefore requires
special consideration ; and the more so, because S.
Paul's expressions are not uncommonly brought for-
ward, as if they were opposed to the doctrine which is
here advocated.
The argument in the Epistle touching upon the ques-
tion, is evidently directed against an error at that time
prevailing among the Jews, and which is also met and
condemned in the Epistle to the Galatians. Generally
speaking, the Jews were not unwilling to receive our
Lord as a king, and perhaps also as a prophet ; they
rejected Him as a Redeemer. They were blinded in
the belief, that their ceremonial law was sufficient to
justify them in the sight of God, having entirely lost
sight of its typical character, and the reference it bore
to the promised Messiah. Hence arose their persuasion
of the unchangeableness of the Levitical ordinances, and
their maddened opposition to a dispensation which in-
volved, as they thought, the ruin of the only ordained
means of acceptance with God.
ARGUMENT OF THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 109
Against this error S. Paul urges, that, from the very
nature of things, u it is not possible that the blood of
bulls or of goats should take away sins" (x. 4) ; that
the fact of the constant repetition of the same sacrifices
proves their inherent inefficacy (x. 1, 2, 3), and the suc-
cession of a number of dying men, who needed to offer
for their own sins as well as for the sins of the people,
the worthlessness of their Priests (vii. 23, 28) . It was
to their Priests and sacrifices, independently of any co-
venanted relation with Christ, that the Jews trusted;
and it is in reference, consequently, to the Levitical
system in this, its naked aspect, that S. Paul argues.
In contrast with this inherently defective dispensation,
the Apostle points out the perfect sinlessness of Christ
(v. 9 ; vii. 27 ; ix. 14) ; the offering up of His own
Blood ; the impossibility of His dying any more ; and
the fact of His having entered into the heavens, and taken
His seat at the Right Hand of the Father, as proving
that His offering of Himself was perfectly availing with
God, eternal and inexhaustible in its effects, (ix. 12,
14, 26, 28 ; x. 5, 6, 7, 8, 9.)
The conclusion of the argument is, that there is One
only true Priest adequate to the wants of humanity, to
Whom there can be no successor ; and one only Sacri-
fice for the cleansing of the soul, which can never be
repeated, and has no defects to be supplied. The argu-
ment excludes the possibility of a Priesthood offering
acceptable sacrifices irrespective of the Sacrifice of the
Cross, or a fresh immolation of the One true Lamb of
God. But whether any means were ordained to apply
the virtues of the Sacrifice of the Cross, or a new order
of Priests to be the agents in administering them, are
110 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
questions wholly untouched by it. Nor can the fact
that the Sacrifice has been offered, be pleaded as an
argument against a continued system of mediation to
apply its perfected merits, if we accept the prefigurative
system as a means of obtaining an interest in its virtues
before it was offered. Nor, again, is the session of the
Eternal High Priest in the heavens inconsistent with
the appointment of a subordinate Priesthood on earth,
any more than the existence of One Almighty Ruler in
the heavens precludes the existence of subordinate
sovereigns on earth, through whom the laws of His
government are administered.
It is urged, however, that this doctrine is irreconcile-
able with certain expressions occurring in the Epistle,
such as the following : " By one offering He hath per-
fected for ever them that are sanctified" (x. 14) ; and
again, " Now where remission of these is, there is no
more sacrifice for sins" (v. 18). These words are sup-
posed to imply, that all has been already done to effect
a perfect atonement for sin, and that a personal appli-
cation to the merits of Christ suffices for every man's
salvation. Such an interpretation, however, proves
more than can possibly be intended by the objectors :
for if all has been already done that is required to re-
concile God and man, then it follows that sin is par-
doned before it is committed, and that there is no need
of prayer, or faith, or any other means of reconciliation.
Or, if it be meant that the way of sacrifice alone is ex-
cluded, then such objectors ought to show, why the
sacrifices of a race of Priests on earth availed to obtain
the benefits of Christ's Death before He came, but are
unavailing for the same end after His coming.
ARGUMENT OF THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. Ill
The doctrine of the Sacraments is in truth beyond
the scope of the Apostle's argument. He is asserting
the worthlessness of the Jewish ordinances, because the
Jews still clung to the shadow, when the Living Truth
had revealed Himself. We cling to our Sacraments,
because they are to us the manifestations and organs of
His invisible grace ; not substitutes for Him, still less
antagonistic to Him ; but, as we believe, our only or-
dained means of union with Him, — His very fulness, of
Which through them we partake.
Moreover, the argument touches not the question of
a subordinate Priesthood ministering under its own
High Priest. The comparison, on which the argument
rests, turns only on the High Priest's special ministry.
S. Paul contrasts the typical with the One Eternal High
Priest, and the annual sacrifice of the Day of Atone-
ment with our Lord's Ascension into the heavens.
The argument opens with the announcement ; " Seeing,
then, that we have a great High Priest, that is passed
into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God" (iv. 14) ; and
it closes with a repetition of the same momentous truth :
" And having an High Priest over the House of God,
let us draw near with a true heart." (x. 21, 22.) The
allusions throughout are to the Jewish High Priest, and
to his going into the Holy of Holies with the blood of
the one annual sacrifice, which the Apostle shows to
have been fulfilled once and for ever by the Ascension
of Christ into the highest heavens, with His own Blood,
" there to appear in the Presence of God for us." 1 Now
1 The only two verses in the whole course of tho argument which do
not distinctly point to the High Priest and the annual offering of
the Day of Atonement are — x. 11, and vii. 27, where occur the terms
112 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
the offering of the great Day of Atonement to which
reference is here made, had a special purpose. It was or-
dained for the annual purification of the Mosaic system ;
to cleanse away the imperfections and impurities of the
services of the past year ; remove the disabilities which
had accrued to Priests and worshippers ; repair the in-
voluntary breaches of the law, and thus re -initiate the
covenant between God and His people. (Lev. xvi. 35.)
The daily sacrifices and offices thenceforward continued
on under the shadow and seal of that annual act of re-
conciliation ; and thus, year by year, the national life
was renewed, and the acceptableness of the covenanted
people sustained.
S. Paul's argument, while it involves the comparative
worthlessness of all human Priesthood and sacrifices,
when viewed in themselves alone, has special reference to
that One Offering, and directly asserted this fact, — that
the true Day of Atonement had at length arrived, which
would not lose its efficacy, as those of old, with the ex-
piration of years, but was able itself alone to impart to
" Priest" and " daily" as applied to the sacrifices. But commentators
in general understand the term Priest in these verses to mean the High
Priest as the word is often used indifferently in the Old Testament for
either one or the other, its meaning in each passage being determined by
the context. And the term " daily," or " day by day," (kci0' ^ue'pcw,) is
explained by Rosenmuller to mean " continually, from time to time,"
(ssepenumero, quandocunque res postulat.) Most commentators, how-
ever, understand the term literally. But in order to reconcile it to
the general tenour of the passage, which so clearly alludes throughout
to the office of the High Priest, Dindorff observes, that from " Lev. iv. 3,
Theodoret, and Maimonides, we learn that the High Priest every day
offered up a sacrifice for his own sins and those of the people." But
«a0' rjfxepav is evidently opposed to itya-nal, and thus may simply mean
continually, as opposed to " once for all."
ARGUMENT OF THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 113
all future acts of sacrifice a continually availing power,
and to all Priests and worshippers an enduring accept-
ableness ; that, instead of the constant repetition of the
mere shadow, conveying an external cleansing, the Sub-
stantial Verity of God Himself had appeared in the
Flesh, pleading with God, and had gone up into the
true Sanctuary, "the heavenly places not made with
hands," there to abide, interceding for us by a con-
tinued presentation of His sacrificed Humanity before
the Father, till He had "perfected for ever" all "them
that are sanctified."
The Atonement of Christ exhausted the functions of
the typical pontiff; but the typical line of subordinate
Priests, ministering through the virtue of the High
Priest's offering, and ordained as its necessary comple-
ment for the daily reconciliation of the people, requires
its own proper fulfilment. This conclusion, which is
drawn from the types of the Law, coincides also with
the voice of prophecy, which, while it spake not of any
earthly High Priest to arise in the new covenant, dis-
tinctly foretold the continued existence of Priests and
Levites. The Holy Ghost, in Isaiah, after speaking of
the glory of God " among the Gentiles," and an " offer-
ing unto the Lord" being brought " out of all nations,"
says, " And I will also take of them for Priests and
for Levites, saith the Lord." (Isa. lxvi. 21.) So
likewise Jeremiah, immediately after the promise of
" the Branch of Righteousness to grow up unto David,"
says ; " For thus saith the Lord, David shall never want
a man to sit upon the throne of the house of Israel ;
neither the Priests, the Levites, want a man before Me
to offer burnt- offerings, and to kindle meat-offerings,
114 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
and to do sacrifice continually." (Jer. xxxiii. 17, 18.)
And this assurance is again repeated with a yet more
solemn testimony ; " Thus saith the Lord, If ye can
break My covenant of the day, and My covenant of the
night, and that there should not be day and night in
their season : then may also My covenant be broken
with David, My servant, that he should not have a son
to reign upon his throne; and with the Levites, the
Priests My ministers. As the host of heaven cannot be
numbered, neither the sand of the sea measured ; so
will I multiply the seed of David My servant, and the
Levites that minister unto Me." (iv. 10, 21, 22.) Thus
the extension and perpetuity of an evangelical Priest-
hood was bound up with the destinies of the Son of
David. The two mysteries are combined, having a per-
petual co-existence; the one, God Incarnate in the
Flesh; the other, an order of Priesthood ministering
the fruits of His Incarnation. Like to this twofold
Prophecy was the double type preserved in the ark,
where the manna and Aaron's rod lay side by side age
after age; the one, prefiguring the true Bread from
heaven, — the other, the ever-living Priesthood through
which that Bread of God was to be distributed. And
in a similar manner the Prophet Malachi couples toge-
ther the Eucharistic Offering with the new order of
Priesthood ; for, after speaking of the " pure offering"
to be offered " in every place" among the Gentiles, he
proceeds to say, " And He shall sit as a refiner and
purifier of silver, and He shall purify the sons of Levi."
The Priesthood was to be changed at the coming of the
Lord; and, therefore, not the Aaronic priests, but
those whom the sons of Aaron foreshadowed, must be
ARGUMENT OF THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 115
here meant. S. John, interpreting Malachi, and com-
pleting the chain of prophecy, represents our Lord
(Rev. i. 13) as the One High Priest, ever present in the
midst, purifying the angels of the seven churches, whilst
He wears the vestments of the legal Priesthood, " clothed
with a garment down to the feet, and girt about the
paps with a golden girdle." 1
Moreover, the one special sacrifice of the Law, which
most closely corresponds with the sacrifice of the Church,
testifies to the same truth ; for the yearly Passover, out
of which the Eucharist arose, was a commemorative
sacrifice. The first Passover only was vicarious, saving
life when the first-born of the Egyptians were slain.
All subsequent Passovers were sacrifices commemorative
of that act of redemption. Yet the successive Passovers
were equally sacrifices. 2 They were the necessary pledge
of the sustained redemption of the Israelites, as the
original Passover in " that night of the Lord" had been
of their first deliverance ; so that whosoever of the chil-
1 See Sermon ix., on "Aaron," in Mr. Isaac Williams' beautiful
volume of sermons on " The Old Testament Characters." The Hebrew
term mincha, used by Malachi to express the "pure offering," though
employed in the Levitical law specifically to denote the meat, or vege-
table, offering, yet also is used to denote a flesh-offering, as, e.g., that of
the lamb. See Gen. iv. 4 ; 1 Sam. ii. 17 ; Dan. ix. 21 ; Ps. cxli. 2.
2 Holy Scripture thus speaks of the continued Passover, as a sacrifice.
Moses, enjoining what should be done in after ages in the continued
life of the people, says ; " Thou shalt therefore sacrifice the Passover
unto the Lord thy God, of the flock and the herd, in the place which
the Lord shall choose to place His Name there." Deut. xvi. 2. And
again, in the same chapter, vv. 5, 6. On this account S. Paul, speaking
of the continued type being fulfilled, uses the terms " Sacrifice," " Pass-
over," as applied to our Lord. " Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed
(irie-n) for us." 1 Cor. v. 7.
116 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
dren of Israel failed to eat thereof, he was to be " cut
off from Israel." (Exod. xii. 15.)
The Passover was moreover a feast upon a sacrifice.
Offered in the temple, it was eaten in the house, thus
reaching into the recesses of family, as of national life,
spreading beyond the precincts of the temple, and pene-
trating into the inner chamber; a vivid token of the
all-pervading and intimate communion of the Real
Presence of the Flesh of the true Lamb. The Passover
was specially typical of our sacrifice, or rather our Eu-
charist is a transfiguration of that Sacrifice, arising out
of the remains of the last Paschal Supper, as the hea-
venly Body of the Resurrection will arise out of the
remains of the " image of the earthy." And, as in the
case of the type, so our successive Eucharists are com-
memorative renewals of our Lord's Oblation of Himself,
and the life of the Church hangs on their continuance,
as the means of perpetuating and applying His one
great act of redemption.
Moreover, all the types of the Levitical system bear
testimony to the universality of a law, that every act of
God towards man has some earthly expression ; that
every gift from heaven flows through some significant
ministry in the material world. The whole Mosaic code
was framed in order to give visible representations of the
mystery of Christ ; " See, saith He, that thou make
all things according to the pattern showed to thee in the
mount." (Heb. viii. 5.) It is in perfect accordance
with this law, impressed in manifold ways on all former
dispensations, that the Invisible still has an earthly
Body and visible expression, in symbol only of old, but
now in living truth, — that as the smitten Rock, " which
ARGUMENT OF THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 117
was Christ/' gave forth a stream flowing beside the
camp of Israel, till they reached the bourne of all their
wanderings, so according to the mystery made known,
we may believe, to S. John while he watched the Water
and the Blood flow forth from the pierced Side, a Pre-
sence and a continued communion of the sacrificed Hu-
manity, extending Itself from the Cross, is the assurance,
the solace, and the abiding life, of the Church during
its earthly pilgrimage, never to cease, till " the shadows
flee away," and He Whom we now behold and adore
under veils and symbols along our daily path, at length
reveals Himself in His beauty, Face to face, in the be-
atific Vision, Which will gladden us in u the land that
is very far away," from whence there will be no wander-
ing any more for ever. 1
1 The early Church looked upon the "Water and the Blood, which
flowed from the pierced Side of our Loed, as the sources of the Sacra-
ments of Baptism and the Eucharist, which were regarded by them as
the extension of the Incarnation.
CHAPTER XI.
REASONS WHY THE TERM 'IEPET2 (PRIEST) IS NOT AP-
PLIED TO THE CHRISTIAN MINISTRY IN THE NEW
TESTAMENT.
IT has been shown how the idea of a Priesthood re-
appearing under a new and higher form in the
Christian Church, is frequently expressed in the New
Testament ; how the Holy Eucharist, instituted by our
Lord, and forming the groundwork and centre of all
Church worship, involves the necessity of a sacerdotal
ministry, and how the terms of the Apostolic commis-
sion correspond with, while they rise beyond, the com-
mission of the sons of Aaron. The ordinary ancient
name of a Priest (Ups6$) is not, however, given to the
Christian minister in the New Testament, and it is im-
portant to consider the reasons which may be supposed
to have led to this disuse of the accustomed name.
Before entering, however, upon this fuller view of the
subject, it is necessary to set before the mind one im-
portant fact.
" It is evident," as the Church of England bears wit-
ness, ( * unto all men diligently reading the Holy Scrip-
ture and ancient Fathers, that from the Apostles' time,
there have been these orders of ministers in Christ's
MINISTERS NOT CALLED PRIESTS IN NEW TEST. 119
Church ; Bishops, Priests, and Deacons ;" (Preface to
Ordination Services ;) yet of the names used in Scrip-
ture to denote the three orders of the ministry, there
was in the beginning none specially distinguishing the
second order. Presbyter or Elder is never so applied,
but is used as a general term applicable to all the three
orders alike. S. Peter applies it to himself, " who am
also an elder" (1 S. Pet. v. 6). Where it is written,
" they sent it (i.e. the relief from Antioch) to the elders
by the hands of Barnabas and Paul" (Acts xiv. 30), the
Apostles and probably the rest of the Clergy present
are meant. Where again, it is said, " They ordained
elders in every Church" (Acts xiv. 23), it is generally
supposed that both the second and third orders of the
ministry are included. The only name which has the
appearance of being appropriated to the second order,
is Bishop (svia-xovog) , as, e.g., in S. Paul's Epistles to
SS. Timothy and Titus, where it occurs contrasted with
the deacon. But this usage of the term could not have
been intended to obtain currency, for it was soon ap-
propriated to the first order.
Again, with regard to the distinctive functions of
the second order, we gather nothing definite from Holy
Scripture. Mention is made of the " elders" who " rule
well," and "who labour in the word and doctrine" (1 S.
Tim. v. 17) ; but this description only denotes a general
spiritual charge. S. Paul's injunctions in the two
Epistles already referred to, which treat most fully upon
the subject, are wholly of a practical character. Scrip-
ture is in truth silent as to the specific ministrations,
as well as to the distinctive name, of the second order
of the ministry.
120 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
The question of the Episcopate is in precisely the
same condition. No specific term designates this order
in the New Testament, except it be the term, " angel"
(Rev. ii., iii.), which soon fell into disuse. It is only
from S. Paul's Epistles to SS. Timothy and Titus, that
we are able to infer the existence of an order to which
special powers of jurisdiction, the guardianship of doc-
trine, and the transmission of the powers of the ministry
by ordination, were entrusted. The Scriptural proof of
the Episcopate rests entirely on such inference, and yet
on this order depends the grace of Sacraments, the cer-
tainty of doctrine, and the government of the Church.
It is much the same with regard to the Diaconate.
We first read (Acts vi.) of certain persons being ap-
pointed to superintend the distribution of alms. It
afterwards appears in the history, that these same per-
sons were also commissioned to preach and baptize.
But no name is attached to the order, till in S. Paul's
Epistles to SS. Timothy and Titus, that of deacon occurs
in connection with it. More commonly the word
hccKovos, translated in our version " minister," is applied
in a general sense, as to our Lord (Rom. xv. 8), and to
the Apostles (1 Cor. v. 1 ; Eph. iii. 7) .
It is evident, therefore, that no argument can be
based on the names, which are used in the New Testa-
ment to denote the orders of the ministry. Nor, indeed,
could it be expected that distinctive names should have
been employed, at a time when the ministry had as yet
acquired so little definiteness of organisation. The three
orders had been called into existence, and the essential
ideas of their separate functions were bound up with the
Revelation. But the specific terms to denote them, like
MINISTERS NOT CALLED PRIESTS IN NEW TEST. 121
the forms of the Catholic creeds, the ritual, and other
vital portions of the Christian system, were left to be
determined as the fitting time arose, by the living action
of the Church under the guidance of the Holy Ghost,
or by unwritten tradition from the Apostles. There
were, moreover, special reasons why the particular term,
Upevs, should not have been used at the first rise of
Christianity ; and these reasons we may now consider.
Christianity arose, not as the antagonist of the Mosaic
system, but as its inner life, gradually developed under
the covering of its external forms. The infant com-
munity of Christians in some degree even recognized
the Jewish Priesthood. They observed the Levitical
Sabbath. S. Paul, at the instance of the rest of the
Apostles, "purified himself and was at charges with
four men which had a vow upon them." (Acts xxi.
24.) And of all the brethren it is said, "They con-
tinued daily with one accord in the temple." (Acts ii.
26.) Evidently the Church in the beginning was led
to cling as long as possible to the Holy City, its Temple
and its mysteries, as though the same Spirit breathed
in her, Which had hung weeping over Jerusalem, still
yearning, if it were possible, " to gather her children
together, as a hen gathereth her brood under her
wings." Not until they were violently forced away,
did the Apostles and brethren quit their hold of the
sacred precincts. It was manifestly not the design of
God to precipitate the separation, to throw scorn on
the ancient faith, to present Christianity to the world
as a rival institution, or bring out too prominently at
first all the distinctions which were in due season to
unfold themselves out of the old institutions, as their
G
122 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
hidden meanings, under new forms. To have assumed
at once the long-established name of the minister of
the Jewish temple, would have been inconsistent with
this economy, and must have placed the Gospel imme-
diately in direct and personal antagonism with the
Jewish religion ; and while the Christian converts fre-
quented the temple services, and received certain ordi-
nances at the hands of the Jewish Priests, must have
caused serious heart-burnings and confusion in the
minds of both communities. No such objection on the
other hand attached to the term, elder, which was em-
ployed by the Jews indifferently for all offices of reve-
rence and authority.
There was besides a further object to be attained.
The mind of the Jew was to be weaned from the ex-
ternal associations of his ancient faith. How he clung to
the mere " letter" of the law, is evident from the whole
history of the New Testament. To disengage the sub-
stance from the shadow, in which it had been enveloped,
and which the popular conscience had mistaken for the
substance itself, was of vital importance. But a very
little knowledge of human nature shows, how the super-
stitious and formal, rather than the essential and spiritual,
features of a system cling to long established words, and
how difficult it is to remove the ideas habitually attached
to them, so long as they continue in use. This could
hardly fail to have been the case with a term, around
which had grown up all the ideas connected with the
Levitical covenant. The disuse of the term may there-
fore be regarded as a merciful provision to facilitate the
progress of the Jewish mind to a clearer view of the
spiritual realities of the new kingdom.
MINISTERS NOT CALLED PRIESTS IN NEW TEST. 123
That such principles operated in the establishment of
Christianity, may be concluded from the fact, that a
similar destiny awaited the term " Sabbath." Like the
term Priest, it is employed no where in the New Tes-
tament in reference to Christianity. The case is even
stronger with regard to the term Sabbath, than that of
Priest. For the observance of holy days, and specifi-
cally of the Sabbath Day, is spoken of with positive
reprobation, as destructive of the simplicity of faith in
Christ. " Let no man therefore judge you in meat or
drink, or in respect of an holy day, or of the new moon,
or of the Sabbath days, which are a shadow of things
to come; but the body is of Christ." (Col. ii. 16.)
And again : " Ye observe days, and months, and times,
and years : I am afraid of you." (Gal. iv. 10.) Again,
it may seem on a superficial view, from the fourth
chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews, that all sab-
batical observances, or days of rest, had passed away
with the coming in of a deeper spiritual life, and that
the only rest contemplated by the Gospel is the soul's
inward repose on Christ. Yet coincidentally with this
rejection of the term Sabbath, and of holy days and
seasons, the Apostles and brethren were observing the
Lord's Day : and Passion-tide, Easter, and Wednesdays
and Fridays, as days of observance associated with the
Betrayal and Crucifixion of our Lord, may be traced
up through the dimness of the earliest tradition to the
age of the Apostles. In the writings of the Apostolic
Fathers the term Sabbath never occurs except in con-
nection with the Jewish apostacy, which was stigmatized
by the opprobrious name of " sabbatizing." Later still
S. Augustine speaks of the Sabbath, as observed only
o 2
124 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
spiritually, and having its fulfilment in Christ. 1 The
subsequent history of the two terms similarly coincides.
Both rose to life again after a time, and became fixed
in the ordinary language of the Church, only the term
Priest at a much earlier date than the other. The term,
Sabbath, has not been applied to the day of Christian
observance until quite modern times.
This remarkable similarity in the usage of these two
terms, forms a very strong presumption that the same
principle has operated in both cases. While there was
danger to be apprehended from Jewish ideas becoming
attached to the new system, from mere confusion, or
from the appearance of antagonism, the Jewish terms
were suspended, though the ideas of Priesthood and
Sabbath passed into the Christian system. When this
danger no longer existed, and the separation of the two
systems was complete, the terms themselves were again
freely used. The Priesthood and the Sabbath were the
two most striking and characteristic features of the
Mosaic system, penetrating the whole national life ; and
if in any case such a safeguard as has been suggested
might be expected to operate, it would have been pre-
eminently in these two cases.
Such a change of names, as is here supposed to have
taken place, where the inner life of an institution was
developed under a new aspect, occurred in other cases,
marking, as it would seem, a general law. Thus the
Passover survives in Passion- tide and Easter, Pente-
cost in Whitsuntide, the Feast of Tabernacles in Advent
and Christmas. 2
1 S. Aug. on S. John i. 18, and y. 20.
2 " In its spiritual signification, the Feast of Tabernacles prefigured
MINISTERS NOT CALLED PRIESTS IN NEW TEST. 125
There was, moreover, a further and yet deeper prin-
ciple at work in the formation of the Christian Church,
tending to the same conclusion. While the character-
istic features of the Mosaic system were being discarded,
rites which had prevailed in patriarchal times, and re-
mained only in a subordinate position under the Law,
were brought prominently forward, and became dis-
tinctive marks of Christianity. Baptism, a custom
derived from the earliest ages, becomes the outward
form of the initiatory sacrament and the instrument of
regeneration. The patriarchal sign of " laying on of
hands," is raised to be a part of the " foundations" of
Christianity. (Heb. vi. 1.) It is only according to
this same principle, that the term elder, which had
descended likewise from patriarchal times, as an ever
honoured designation of paternal rule, is selected to be
the appellation of the minister, who in Christ has
power to beget sons unto God, and to feed them with
the bread of immortality.
This reference to patriarchal times, so signally cha-
racteristic of the Gospel, which is the fulfilment of the
promises made before the Law to the Fathers, has a
special application to the case of the Priesthood. S.
the time when God was to ' tabernacle,' to pitch His tent among the
children of men It is said, by Jewish writers, that they had a
custom of singing certain songs and hymns to God while preparing the
booths ; one of which was the cxviii. Psalm, ' Hosannah, save now, T
beseech Thee, O Loed ;' whence the whole preparations and the feast
itself came in process of time to bo called Hosannas, the exclamation of
the people to the Redeemer in the only moment of triumph during His
stay on earth. ' Hosanna to the Son of David.' At this feast Solomon's
temple was dedicated, and the ark brought into it — both types of Cheibt
in His assumption of humanity." — Mather on the Types. Ch. xxviii.
" The Gospel of the Jewish Festivals."
126 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
Paul expressly declares that the Priesthood was not
destroyed, but " changed," at the manifestation of the
True High Priest ; and the Fathers generally taught,
that the change which ensued was, that the new Priest-
hood arose, not out of the Levitical order, but directly
from Christ, being formed, like His Priesthood, " after
the order of Melchizedek ; m the Levitical Priesthood
being not its source, but its type or shadow. " Our
Saviour Jesus Christ," says Eusebius, expressing the
prevailing belief, " does even to this present time cele-
brate sacrifice among men by His ministers after the
manner of Melchizedek, for as he, being a Priest of the
Gentiles, nowhere appears to have used corporeal sacri-
fices, but blessed Abraham in bread and wine, in the
same manner our Saviour and Lord, and afterwards
all priests that derive from Him, performing in all na-
tions their spiritual functions by bread and wine, do
express the mysteries of His Body and saving Blood,
Melchizedek having foreseen these things by a Divine
Spirit, and having used before these images of future
things." (Lib. v. De Dem. Evang. c. 3.)
1 S. Augustine, in the West, taught the same doctrine : as, e.g. in a
striking passage in his discourse on the Thirty-fourth Psalm (Serm 1.)
" But there was before, as yet now, the sacrifice of the Jews, after the
order of Aaron, with victims of cattle ; and that too was a mystery :
not yet was the sacrifice of the Body and Blood of the Lamb, which the
faithful know, and those who have read the Gospel ; which sacrifice is
now diffused throughout the whole world. Set then before your eyes
two sacrifices, both that after the order of Aaron and this after the order
of Melchizedek Therefore was the sacrifice of Aaron taken
away, and began the sacrifice after the order of Melchizedek
Even the people of the Jews He sent away, and He departed. For they
cleaving to the sacrifice after the order of Aaron, held not the sacrifice
after the order of Melchizedek, and so lost Cueist ; and the Gentiles
began to have Him, to whom He had not before sent preachers."
MINISTERS NOT CALLED PRIESTS IN NEW TEST. 127
It was the prevailing conviction, that the bread and
wine which Melchizedek brought forth, were first offered
in sacrifice, before they were given as food, and were
mysteriously connected with the blessing which Abra-
ham received. It accords remarkably with this convic-
tion, that cakes or wafers of " fine flour," and libations
of wine, were the ordinary accompaniments of the ani-
mal sacrifices of the temple, or substitutes for them,
when, on account of poverty, they were excused. When
the true Lamb of God offered Himself, the animal sacri-
fices, His forecast shadows, vanished away; but the
bread and wine remained. Having been only subordi-
nate features in the Levitical system, though still in-
vested with some peculiar mystery, they were, like other
elements of patriarchal religion, exalted, and became
the sacramental symbols of the Body and Blood of the
Lamb of God ; the bread and wine still accompanying
the atoning Victim, Which is present and offered with
them, though invisibly, and in a mystery. That the
Levitical name of the Priesthood should not be assumed
by the new Priesthood, until the Levitical accidents had
been disengaged, and the Jewish, as contrasted with
the Christian, accompaniments of the office ceased to be
attached to it, is in harmony with the unity of purpose
which has pervaded these progressive dispensations.
The various facts here adduced, moreover, afford a
strong confirmation of the principle on which the whole
idea of sacerdotal mediation and outward religion rests,
(Christianity being no exception, but rather a more
real expression of it) — viz. that the invisible has a visi-
ble form, through which it acts and manifests itself;
God coming near to man through organs borrowed
from the creature. And as in former covenants the
128 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
Unseen has assumed a symbolic clothing, suited to the
economy of a mere symbolic dispensation, so now
throughout the ever- expanding Catholic communion, a
mysterious Presence reveals Itself in sacraments of heal-
ing and benediction, in Liturgies and silent adorations
before the altar, — a real Presence, suited to the economy
of the actual Incarnation of God, Which only waits the
lifting of the veil, to unfold Itself into the fulness of the
mystery of a visible Manifestation in the day of His
appearing in the glory of His Father, with all His holy
angels.
CHAPTER XII.
OF THE TEEMS 'IMPEOPEE,' < SPIEITUAL,' ETC., AS AP-
PLIED TO THE PEIESTHOOD AND ITS SEEVICES.
IT is not unusual for those who reject the full teaching
of the Church, to admit that the terms ' Priest/
'sacrifices/ ' mediation/ &c, may be applied to the
Christian minister and his services, only with this quali-
fication, that the terms are used in an improper sense.
This qualification is correct, and the term ' improper'
is rightly so applied, if understood according to the
meaning which it technically bears in theology. As
employed, however, by the objectors, the term is sup-
posed to be identical with metaphorical or unreal ; and
thus, while the doctrine of the Priesthood is admitted
in words, it is virtually explained away. But the term
has its own technical, theological sense, and when thus
understood, so far from overthrowing, tends to confirm
the conclusions already obtained. Archbishop Usher
explains the theological meaning of the term ' improper/
when he says : " To forgive sins, therefore, being thus
proper to God only, and to His Christ, His ministers
must not be held to have this power communicated to
them, but in an improper sense, namely, because God
g 3
130 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
forgiveth by them, and hath appointed them both to
apply those means by which He useth to forgive sins,
and to give notice unto repentant sinners of that for-
giveness. For who can forgive sins but God alone?
Yet doth He forgive by them also unto whom He hath
given power to forgive, saith S. Ambrose and his fol-
lowers." (Answer to a Jesuit's challenge, ch. v.) Arch-
bishop Bramhall, though in other language, explains
the same distinction. He uses the term ' proper* in its
ordinary, not in its technical sense. " To forgive sins,"
he says, " is no more proper to God, than to work won-
ders above the course of nature. The one is communi-
cable as the other. The Priest absolves, or to say more
properly, God absolves by the Priest. Therefore he
saith, ' I absolve thee in the Name of the Father, and
of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost/ God remits so-
vereignly, imperially, primitively, absolutely ; the Priest's
power is derivative, delegate, dependent, ministerial,
conditional." (Protestant Ordination Defended, Part
iv. Dis. vii. sec. 3.) The teaching of both these great
writers is the same, though the language varies. ( Proper'
in Usher is synonymous with i imperial, primitive, abso-
lute/ in Bramhall ; ' improper' with f derivative, de-
pendent, conditional,' &c.
When therefore the word ' improper' is applied to the
Priesthood, it is with the view of marking the derived
and dependent character of its commission, in contra-
distinction to the Priesthood of Christ. It expresses
the truth taught by the Fathers, and already stated,
that Christ "is the only High Priest by nature," and
that all other Priests are but channels, through which
the acts and virtues of His Priesthood pass, as a foun-
OF THE TERMS 'IMPROPER/ ' SPIRITUAL/ ETC. 131
tain diffuses its waters along many ducts, or the sun
dispenses its central light through many media.
When, again, the Christian sacrifice is said to be
1 improperly' so called, it is to show that its efficacy, or
acceptableness, is not independent, but relative to the
one perfect Sacrifice of the Cross ; or rather that it is
acceptable only because it is mystically one with that
which has been " once for all" accepted.
The term f spiritual' likewise requires to be explained.
As used by objectors to the Church's teaching, it is
supposed to imply that the only real sacrifices of Chris-
tian men are those of the heart, — prayer, praise, and
thanksgiving; and that an external system of worship,
as a necessary means of approach to, and communion
with God, has no place in Christianity. It is evident
that this view brings us back to a system of mere na-
tural religion, according to which God is to be wor-
shipped in the heart, as the sole altar of sacrifice,
according to the dictates of a man's own mind. The
Church as the Body of Christ, with its objective,
external ordinances, ceases to have any reality, and, in-
stead of being a Divine framework and organization,
formed to act on individuals as parts of it, and through
their covenanted relations with it, resolves itself into
a mere aggregate of individuals as independent atoms,
each worshipping according to his own inward light.
The whole fabric of external religion, as an ordained
system between God and the soul, instituted and ruled
by a living Spirit ever acting through it, which is the
only real idea of the Catholic Church, passes away, and
nothing but a formal exterior remains, not worth keeping,
except as a matter of social propriety and decent order.
132 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
Christian sacrifices are no doubt specially character-
ized in Holy Scripture as ' spiritual ;' but by this term
it is not meant that the worship of the heart is the only
offering of the Christian religion, but that its external
ordinances have been raised to a supernatural order by
a fuller and more gracious effusion of the Holy Ghost,
which spiritualises all our sacrifices. A corresponding
manner of speech in the Old Testament will help us to
understand such expressions when used in the New.
At the very time when the temple sacrifices were the
necessary and only available means of atonement for
any offence, Prophets and Psalmists were enjoining the
efficacy of the offerings of the heart, as alone pleasing
to God, and even condemning " sacrifice, as an abomina-
tion to the Lord." It is evident that the intention of
such expressions, however strong and frequent, was not
to do away with, or disparage, the sacrificial system j
but only to elevate the conscience of the worshipper to
the appreciation of a higher use of those sacrifices, and
to counteract the downward tendency to substitute mere
mechanical forms for a living faith. A marked instance
of this occurs in the 51st Psalm, wherein a special
inspiration conspired with the intense yearnings of a
burdened conscience, to bring out in a highly poetical
mind the strongest possible conception of the need of
the inmost heart's communion with God in secret con-
fession and prayer ; and yet at the same time the avail-
ableness and necessity of the temple sacrifices and its
ordinances of purification, are by no means lost sight of.
While David says : " Thou desirest no sacrifice, else
would I give it Thee" (I can offer nothing of myself
sufficiently availing) ; " but Thou delightest not in
OF THE TERMS ' IMPROPER/ 'SPIRITUAL/ ETC. 133
burnt-offerings" (even these are not in themselves
acceptable) : w the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit ;
a broken and a contrite heart, O God, shalt Thou not
despise/' &c. ; he was nevertheless at the same time
looking with confidence to the lustrations of the Levi-
tical law ; " Thou wilt purge me with hyssop, and I shall
be clean ; Thou shalt wash me, and I shall be whiter
than snow;" and he closes his broken-hearted confes-
sion with anticipations of a perfect reconciliation with
God through the offering of the appointed sacrifice :
" Then shalt Thou be pleased with the sacrifice of righ-
teousness" (the sacrifice offered with an intelligent
faith, and a heart rightly turned to God) ; " with the
burnt-offerings and oblations; then shall they bring
young bullocks unto Thine altar." When, again, our
Lord recalled an expression of the old Prophets to the
recollection of the Jews, and applied it to the question
of the observance of the Sabbath Day, — " I will have
mercy, and not sacrifice," — He evidently meant not to
annul or disparage the fourth Commandment. He was
only re-adjusting the terms of the covenant according
to its original spirit, and restoring the old connection
between outward and inward religion. He said in an-
other place : " These things ought ye to have done, and
not to leave the other undone."
Mede (Lib. ii. ch. v.) has shown how the Fathers
uniformly taught this same combination of outward and
inward religion to be the true idea of Christian worship.
He observes : " For this reason the Christian sacrifice
is among the Fathers, by way of distinction, called Qvo-ia,
otlve<rsa)$, sacrificium laudis, that is of Confession and In-
vocation of God ; namely, to difference it from those
134 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
of Blood and Incense." He quotes Clemens Alexan-
drinus, who says that " the sacrifice of the Church is
an oration (\6yo$), exhaled from sanctified souls," and
then explains the words as alluding to " that sacrifice
which the Church offered unto God, when she presented
herself before Him as one Body in Christ, by the mys-
tical communication of His Body and Blood." Again,
he says, that when the Fathers speak of God delighting
only in pure prayer, it is always in opposition to " the
shedding of blood and smoke of incense." He more-
over quotes a passage from Justin Martyr, usually
adduced in opposition to this view, in order to show
that such interpretation is an error arising from inat-
tention to the entire context : " That prayer and thanks-
givings," says Justin, " made by those that are worthy,
are the only sacrifices that are perfect and acceptable
unto God, I also do affirm, for these are the only sacri-
fices which Christians have been taught they should
perform." To which Mede adds : w If you ask where
and how, he tells you ' in that thankful remembrance
of their food, both dry and liquid, wherein also is
commemorated the Passion which the Son of God
suffered by Himself.' It is a description of the
Eucharist, wherein the Bread and Wine were first
presented unto God, as a kind of first-fruit offering,
to agnize Him the Giver of our food both dry and
liquid, and then consecrated to be the symbols of
the Body and Blood of Christ." It was with the
view of making this distinction between Christian
and heathen sacrifices, that the Eucharist was com-
monly designated as the a great unbloody sacrifice,"
or as it was also called " Eucharistic," because
OF THE TERMS l IMPROPER/ ' SPIRITUAL/ ETC. 135
our Lord offered it, while He blessed and "gave
thanks."
Two conclusions may be gathered from what has been
here said. (1.) The idea of personal power in a Priest
over the destinies of his fellow-men, is altogether alien
to the teaching of the Church. Heathen superstition
invested the Priest even with the attributes of Deity, a
belief that may partly have arisen from dark intimations
of the Incarnation of God cast upon the world from
primeval tradition. It may be that even the Jew, bring-
ing his offering to the temple, looked not beyond the
minister who stood between him and his God, thinking
that on his will hung the hope of forgiveness. There is
always in a degraded state of mind a tendency to attri-
bute to the outward form or instrument the power which
is manifested through its means. But notwithstanding
such misconceptions, which may have been popularly
attached to the idea of Priesthood, the doctrine which
the Church proposes to our belief is clear and definite,
viz. that the Christian Priest acts only with a delegated
authority and under conditions, in the name and person
of another, not his own. Christ is pleased to connect \
His operations with the instrumentality of His servant,
borrowing the time and outward form of His act from
the creature. The ministration of the Priest is true and
effectual only for this very reason, that it is not himself, /
but God through him, Who is fulfilling His own pro-
mise.
(2.) When Scripture speaks of spiritual sacrifices, -
such as prayer and praise, being the only true worship
of the new covenant, it is not meant to deny the ex-
istence of a mediatorial system, intervening between '
136 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
God and the soul, whereby alone ordinarily the virtues
of the Atonement are to be obtained; but that this
external system is to be used with an intelligent, living
faith j that the oblations of the altar, and the ministra-
tion of sacraments, are not to be recognised as truly
Christian acts, unless accompanied with the offering of
the heart, " for God is a Spirit, and they that worship
Him, must worship Him in spirit and in truth."
CHAPTER XIII.
THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE CHUECH AND THE
SYNAGOGUE.
IT has been already observed, that the same theory
which represents the Jewish elder as the prototype
of the Christian Priest, supposes the worship of the
Church to be derived from that of the Synagogue. It
becomes necessary, therefore, to enter more fully into
the subject, and it will be found, that while there are
points of resemblance both with the synagogue and the
tpmple, the worship of the Church, in its most important
elements, may be traced up to the latter as its true type,
just as the commission of the Christian Priest was sym-
bolised by that of the sons of Aaron.
The sacrificial system is the only part of the worship
of the Jews which was expressly ordained of God.
Human piety, guided by the Holy Ghost, subsequently
added Psalms, which were sung or chanted in the tem-
ple, and private devotions to be used by the people who
" waited without/' during the time of the offering of the
sacrifice. Occasionally the Scriptures were read and
taught in the temple; but more regular services for
religious instruction, as well as for congregational prayer,
grew up apart from the temple. The Prophets, in their
138 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
own homes, or in "the high places," assembled the
people together for these purposes. The schools of
n the sons of the Prophets" under Samuel, were organ-
ized partly in order to perpetuate these subordinate
religious services. During the Captivity these services
assumed greater prominence ; and on the return to the
Holy Land the synagogue system extended itself in
every town or village of any size, and throughout the
congregations of Jews who were scattered abroad.
The synagogue was a most important instrument for
keeping alive in the minds of the people a knowledge of
their Scriptures, and habits of congregational prayer.
But the service of the synagogue was of the simplest
possible kind. No means of atonement after sins com-
mitted could be found there; no offerings could be
made. Prayers and intercessions there offered, had not
the assurance of the promises attached to the temple.
Not even a blessing could be there given, unless a priest
happened to be present. There were not, as has been
already stated, ordained ministers to read, preach, and
pray. Any person of sufficient learning happening to
be present, was invited to officiate for the occasion. In
its whole structure and arrangement, the synagogue
bespoke its supplemental character. The building was
erected in imitation of the temple, with a court and
porches. The daily prayers were at nine a.m., and
three p.m., when the morning and evening sacrifices
were being offered in the temple; and because the
remains of the evening sacrifice were left burning all
night on the altar, a night service was held in the syna-
gogue. Special services of fast and festival were also
appointed, to correspond with the fasts and festivals of
THE CHURCH AND THE SYNAGOGUE. 139
the temple. For the acceptance therefore, of the prayers
offered in the synagogue, the Jews trusted to their
arising simultaneously with the sweet savour of sacrifice
and incense ascending from the altars, towards which
God had promised that His eyes should ever be open,
and His ears intent day and night. And this was the
meaning of the Jewish maxim, "Preces in synagoga
occupant locum sacrificiorum." To the temple, as to
the gate of heaven, the eyes of the Jews turned from all
their dwelling-places ; for there alone could be found
the covenanted means of communion with God, or of
reconciliation after any breach of their law. The syna-
gogue was valued for the knowledge which was there
obtained of the nature and promises of their covenant ;
but the links that bound them to God, and preserved
them within the graces of the covenant, were attached
to the temple alone. 1
The services of the Church grew up precisely in the
same manner as those of the former dispensation. The
Eucharist only was commanded by the Lord, as the
Levitical sacrifices alone were prescribed by the Mosaic
law. Prayer, the singing of Psalms, and public teach-
ing, were subsequently added and combined with the
Eucharistic Office, under the direction of the Apostles.
The service of the Christian assemblies, as represented
in S. Paul's Epistle to the Corinthians, is evidently an
enlargement of that which was first celebrated in the
" upper chamber" at Jerusalem. The daily morning
and evening prayers were a still later addition. The
1 For the full account of the Temple and Synagogue services, and
their relative connection, see Thorndike's " Service of God at Keligious
Assemblies," especially chapters ii., iii., vii., viii.
140 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
only difference to be noted in the two cases is, that the
portions of Divine service, which among the Jews grew
up separately, and became two distinct systems, were
in the Church combined, and formed one harmonious
whole.
It is not difficult to distinguish what portions of the
Church's ministrations correspond respectively with
those of the temple, or the synagogue. The ministries
of the Eucharist, of Baptism, of Confirmation, of Abso-
lution, of Benediction, &c, as well as the use of the
Psalter, as the main standard of devotion, find their
prototypes in the temple. The reading of Holy Scrip-
ture, preaching, and congregational prayer, though also
to be found in the temple, were more specifically within
the province of the synagogue. And as among the
Jews, the life of the covenant hung suspended on the
ministrations of the temple; so in the Church the
covenanted means of communion with God, the specially
ordained channels of communication between heaven
and earth, are to be found in those inner ministrations
which correspond with those of the Jewish temple.
These, therefore, of necessity form the leading and
characteristic features of the Church system, the other
being its subordinate and supplemental elements.
The same relation which was established between the
religious services of the synagogue and temple, operated
also in the exercise of ecclesiastical discipline. The
cognizance of offences against the Law lay, in the last
resort, with the Sanhedrim, of which the priests were a
component part. But in all ordinary matters the power
of discipline was committed to the rulers of the syna-
gogue, in the same way that the general teaching of the
THE CHURCH AND THE SYNAGOGUE. 141
people, though a part of the office of the priest, was
practically in the hands of the rabbis. Thus the minis-
tries of the kingdom of God were, among the Jews,
discharged by three different bodies of men. While
the strictly sacerdotal functions were rigidly confined to
the line of Aaron, the rabbis were the teachers of the
people, and the rulers of the synagogue the executors of
spiritual discipline in the congregations. When the
Mosaic system expired, its several ministries " returned
to Him who gave" them, and were gathered up again
into the Person of Christ. But they returned to Him
only to be transmitted again to other subordinate agents.
And in being again committed unto men, they were no
longer to be divided ; but as they had centred in Him-
self alone, so He ordained one line of ministry only to
represent Him in these His threefold offices. Thus the
functions of the Priesthood, of teaching, and of spiritual
rule, were included in the Apostolic commission, that
as they are one in our Lord, so the unity of the life of
the Church might be exhibited by the combination of
all spiritual offices in one consecrated order of men,
with whom He had promised to be always, " even unto
the end of the world."
It has been urged, on the other hand, that Holy
Scripture, in contrasting the two covenants, represents
the Christian Jerusalem, the Christian Temple, and the
Christian Priest to have been removed into the heavens,
(Gal. iv. 26; Heb. viii. 1; ix. 24.) And the conclusion
intended to be drawn is, that the Church on earth re-
sembles the condition of those Jews who, from distance
or other causes, could have no access to the temple, and
for whom the services of the synagogue were provided
142 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
as a substitute ; whose worship, therefore, though in
communion with what passed within the temple, was
not identical with it. They who argue thus forget that
the same Scriptures which represent the holy city, the
temple, and the Priesthood as having been raised to the
heavens, represent also the entire body of the faithful
as having been so translated. The Church itself,
through Christ, is exalted to a supernatural sphere,
and not Christ alone, or the temple which, by His
Spirit, He has made His dwelling-place. u Ye are
come unto Mount Sion, and unto the city of the living
God, the heavenly Jerusalem." " But God . . . hath
raised us up together, and made us sit together in
heavenly places in Christ Jesus." " Our conversa-
tion (citizenship) is in heaven." Distance has no mean-
ing in the things of the Spirit. Through Christ's
Presence pervading the Church, heaven and earth are
become really, though mystically, one.
But the Old Testament types supply the most de-
cisive answer to the objection here proposed. It has
been already shown how the act of the typical High
Priest entering the Holy of Holies was exhausted in the
Ascent of the crucified Son of God into the heavens,
while yet the ministries of the Jewish Priests have their
fulfilment in the ministries of the Church, and thus
still survive on earth in their antitypes. A similar con-
clusion is to be drawn from the typical character of the
Jewish Temple. S. Paul divides the Tabernacle into
two parts, the first and second Tabernacle, or the Sanc-
tuary and the Holiest of all, between which two divisions
hung the second vail, which vail symbolized the Hu-
manity of the Son of God. He also describes the
Holiest of all as the type of the Highest Heavens, into
/
THE CHURCH AND THE SYNAGOGUE. 143
which Christ entered, and to which the Church on
earth has now access " through the vail, which is His
Flesh," which has been rent. It follows that the Sanc-
tuary represents the Church on earth. The contents
of the Sanctuary which S. Paul enumerates, confirm
this conclusion ; it contained the seven-branched Can-
dlestick and the Table of Shewbread, symbolizing
respectively the light of the Holy Ghost, and the Eu-
charistic Presence, which are gifts to the Church on
earth. While therefore the type of the Holiest of all
is exhausted, as well as that of the vail which was rent,
that of the Sanctuary is being now fulfilled, expanded
so as to embrace within its compass the whole earth,
and its ministrations, not ceased, nor removed to another
sphere, but diffused, as the Prophet Malachi foretold,
"in every place," according to the law of a higher life. 1
Further it has been urged, that the simplicity of the
religious services of the early Christians is at variance
with the gorgeous ceremonial which characterised the
Jewish temple ; and an argument has been drawn from
1 See Heb. ix. 10. It is worthy of note, that even they who reject
the mystery of the Church system, yet recognize the symbolic reference
of the Sanctuary to the Christian state on earth. Thus Matthew Henry
(on Heb. ix. 1) says : " Now of this Tabernacle it is said, that it is
divided into two parts, called a first and a second tabernacle, an inner
and an outer part, representing the two states of the Church, militant
and triumphant, and the two natures of Christ, human and Divine."
See also Mather on the Types, c. xxii. Hammond, following more
closely Jewish tradition, considers the entire Tabernacle to be the type
of the whole world, Heaven being represented by the second or inner,
the earth by the first or outer part. (Comment, on Heb. ix. 1.)
Instead of saying that the types of the Holiest place, and the High
Priest's entering in are exhausted, it would perhaps, be truer to say that
they are being fulfilled in heaven, as the others are being fulfilled on
earth. When it is said that they are exhausted, it is only meant as far
as our Lord's meritorious sacrifice on earth is concerned.
144 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
this circumstance, in opposition to the view here advo-
cated of the Church's system. The question, however,
is not as to the comparative simplicity or gorgeousness
of the worship of the Church, which is accidental to its
real being ; but as to the essential elements of which it
is composed. Two important points, moreover, ought
to be considered in contrasting the primitive forms of
the Church's system w r ith what the piety of later ages
has sought to realise.
(1.) A persecuted community, constrained to assemble
in private chambers, u the doors being shut/' or to take
refuge in caves and sepulchres, could not develope a
splendid ceremonial ; scarcely even observe such de-
cent order as natural propriety would suggest. It was
never supposed however that God preferred poverty of
form in the scenes of His immediate Presence. The
Patriarchal rites, as being those of a wandering race,
were of the simplest character ; but as soon as the
religion of the elect people had made for itself a settled
home, the Tabernacle, and still more notably afterwards
the Temple, assumed the utmost richness and solemnity
of ritual. In like manner the early Christian Church,
fugitive and fearful of hostile intrusion, restricted itself
to what was barely necessary for life, its mysteries con-
cealed, its beauty veiled, to avoid profanation or vio-
lence, ever in readiness suddenly to move from place
to place. But as soon as persecution ceased, imme-
diately according to the same law which had directed
the adornment of the typical Church of Israel, the
Christian Church also put on " her beautiful garments,"
and arrayed herself in a state more suited to the Majesty
of Him Who had enshrined Himself in her consecrated
THE CHURCH AND THE SYNAGOGUE. 145
symbols. Primitive simplicity was not the normal state
of the Catholic Church, but a result of circumstances,
or rather the forced suspension of a law which only
waited the due season for its natural development. The
same chapter in which Isaiah foretold, that " the abun-
dance of the sea should be converted," and " the forces
of the Gentiles" enter the Church, gives the following
assurance : " The glory of Lebanon shall come unto
thee, the fir tree, the pine tree, and the box together,
to beautify the place of My sanctuary ; and I will make
the place of My feet glorious." (Isa. lx. 5 — 13.)
(2.) The second point has been already in part ad-
verted to. Until the Mosaic polity and the Levitical
ceremonial law were dissolved, the Catholic Church was
purposely withheld from its intended development, in
order that the outward structure of the Jewish system
might not be suddenly or rudely overthrown. Mede
has expressed it as his opinion, that " after the destruc-
tion of Jerusalem, it is likely that the Church received
no little improvement in ecclesiastical rites and expres-
sions, both because it was the time of the greatest in-
crease, and because, whilst the Jews' polity stood, her
polity for its full establishment stood in some sort sus-
pended." (L. ii. c. iv.)
The same law of progressive expansion, which obtains
in the growth of the forms of the material world, has
characterised the movements of the grace of God, a
unity of purpose pervading the successive dispensations,
so that there should be no violence of rupture between
that which preceded and that which followed, but a
gentle transition, as of " the shining light, which shineth
more and more unto the perfect day."
H
CHAPTER XIV.
THE PRIESTHOOD OF THE PEOPLE.
OUR inquiry has hitherto been confined to the doc-
trine of the ministerial Priesthood. But the
subject would be open to great misconception, and
imperfectly understood, unless viewed in connection
with the Priesthood which is the inheritance of all the
faithful. The two doctrines are not inconsistent, but
rather complementary the one to the other, and are
essential parts of a mixed, though harmonious, system.
Calvin's doctrine of the Priesthood of the individual
Christian was but an exaggeration of one great truth of
the Gospel, to the exclusion of another equally im-
portant. He destroyed the analogy of faith, not by
asserting error, but by denying truth. He erred from
want of harmonising in due proportions two doctrines,
neither of which can become injurious, except when
viewed separately from the other ; but both alike suffer,
when either the one or the other is denied. Calvin has
not merely injured the revelation of God by establishing
a system founded on a partial view of Holy Scripture ;
he has caused it to be believed, that the Priesthood of
the minister is incompatible with the Priesthood of the
THE PRIESTHOOD OF THE PEOPLE. 147
people, and, as a natural result of the undue exaltation
of the one to the prejudice of the other, has paved the
way to a reaction against the very doctrine, to estahlish
which he made so great a sacrifice. For it is observable,
that any real idea of the Priesthood vested in the indi-
vidual Christian is quite as much obliterated from the
popular mind, as that of the ministerial Priesthood.
Truth denied has avenged itself, and the exaggerated
doctrine has fallen in the same pit that was made for
its supposed enemy.
The true remedy is not to follow the opposite course,
and deny the Priesthood of the people, in order to claim
an exclusive right for that of the minister, but to recon-
cile the two, giving to each its full proportions. That
the two Priesthoods co-existed in the typical Mosaic
covenant, is an a priori argument in favour of a similar
combination in the new covenant, which is its true an-
titype. And when S. Peter (I. ii. 9) applies a passage
of the Old Testament to establish the fact of an in-
heritance of a royal Priesthood being fulfilled in all the
disciples of Christ, the identity of language tends to
prove, in this as in other respects, the unity of purpose
pervading both covenants, and the probability of both
Priesthoods reappearing in the same harmonious co-
operation in the Christian Church. That the two
Priesthoods do thus co-exist, will become manifest if we
consider the principles on which they are respectively
based, — principles lying deep in the relations established
between God and man, and characterising all Divine
dispensations alike.
The groundwork of the ministerial Priesthood has
been already fully considered. It rests on the fact that
h 2
148 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
God is pleased to communicate the fruits of the Atone-
ment, not by direct influence upon the soul, but through
outward means and a human agency. No account can
be given of this law of the operations of God, except
that it is His will ; but, as already observed, the law evi-
dently has respect to the transcendent mystery of the
Humanity of our Lord being made the medium of com-
munication between God and man.
The Priesthood of the individual Christian is involved
in the process of our redemption. The fall of man
worked two evils. It depraved man's nature, and it
forfeited his capacity for offering to God acceptable
service. The remedy of the one evil did not of neces-
sity involve that of the other; for the power of ap-
proaching God with acceptable service, is not the right
of any creature, however holy. There are two distinct
results flowing from the Atonement ; (I.) that man is
saved from the power of sin and death ; and (2.) that,
being saved, he has access to the throne of grace. The
capacity for offering spiritual sacrifices in Christ Jesus
is an endowment of grace, not identical with, but
granted in addition to, the gift of a renewed nature.
Christ is revealed to us as a Redeemer, and also as an
Intercessor. These two fruits of His sacrifice corres-
pond with the two separate gifts of mercy bequeathed
in and through Him. Man rises up supernaturally
transformed in Christ, and then becomes entitled again
to exercise his forfeited privilege of offering his renewed
nature and powers in the service of God. This power
of offering himself and his gifts to God, constitutes the
Priesthood of the individual Christian.
This grace of Priesthood is bestowed in Holy Baptism.
THE PRIESTHOOD OF THE PEOPLE. 149
The baptized man is consecrated for ever to the Divine
worship and service, by participating, in his measure, in
the Priesthood of Christ. This consecration is impressed
anew, and with increased fulness, in Confirmation, and
becomes what has been called an indelible character of
the soul. By this the capacity is given both for receiv-
ing other Sacraments, and for making offerings and sa-
crifices acceptable to God. And thus it appears how
the two Priesthoods mutually co-operate, and are neces-
sary the one to the other. For as the Priesthood of
the baptized Christian is bestowed through Sacraments,
so the ministration of Sacraments involves the necessity
of the ministerial Priesthood. And, on the other hand,
without this priestly character in the baptized, the acts
of the ministerial Priesthood would be devoid of their
intended efficacy. 1
Both Priesthoods flow directly from Christ. He
first glorified the Father, by offering up in His re-
newed Manhood a perfect and acceptable obedience ;
and then, having thus fulfilled all the claims of God
upon man, He offered Himself up as an Atoning Sa-
crifice, that He might communicate Himself, and sanc-
tify in like manner all His brethren. Thus in Himself
He laid the grouudwork of a twofold Priesthood. Every
individual Christian shares through Him the power of
offering up acceptable service in his own person by virtue
of the former ; the Christian minister shares through
Him the additional power of offering for, and com-
municating gifts to, his brethren by virtue of the latter.
The main objection felt to the doctrine of the minis-
terial Priesthood arises from the supposition that it
1 See the note at the end of this ohapter.
150 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
causes a man's salvation to rest, not on his own living
faith, but on the act of a fellow- creature ; thus either
diminishing the need of conversion and personal effort,
or supplying a false opiate to hearts ever ready to shift
the responsibility of their salvation off themselves. The
fear, more or less clearly realized, of an exclusive con-
cernment in religion, or a vicarious service of God, or a
monopoly of access to the throne of grace, being in-
volved in the doctrine, is the cause of the strong pre-
judice with which it is assailed. Such errors, however,
can only have arisen from neglecting to observe the
conditions under which the ministerial Priesthood acts.
They are at once obviated by considering what has been
already said of the typical ceremonial of the Old Testa-
ment. According to the terms of the Levitical law, the
process of obtaining forgiveness was a complex act, in
which the sinner who sought it had as necessary a share
as the Priest. There were two parts in the act of sacri-
fice ; one connecting the transgressor with the victim,
and the other connecting the victim with the grace of
God. The transgressor, bringing the victim to the
altar, placed his hands on its head, confessing over it
his sins, and acknowledging that the victim was substi-
tuted in his place, and about to suffer the punishment
he himself deserved. The sacrifice was then offered by
the Priest, and the appointed ceremonies were observed
by him in order to make an atonement for the sin.
Both acts were equally necessary before the atonement
was complete. It was the concurrence of the two
intermediate acts which brought into effect the promised
blessing ; and neither party in the complex transaction
could supply what was lacking in the other.
THE PRIESTHOOD OF THE PEOPLE. 151
What the law of Moses here shadowed out in visible
representation, the Gospel teaches, when it declares re-
pentance and faith to be essential conditions on the
part of the worshipper, in order to render the act of the
Priest available for the attainment of its appointed ends.
The use of miraculous power in the hand of the Apostles,
was made to be dependent on the response of faith on
the part of the recipient of the act of mercy. " And
there sat a certain man at Lystra, impotent in his feet,
being a cripple from his mother's womb, who never had
walked ; the same heard Paul speak : who stedfastly be-
holding him, and perceiving that he had faith to be
healed, said with a loud voice, Stand upright on thy
feet ; and he leaped and walked." (Acts xiv. 8 — 10.)
Faith may be said to have given the blessing as well as
the words of the Apostle's mouth ; but the latter, by
the appointment of God, were equally necessary as the
former.
The same law prevails as to the better gifts which,
through the exercise of sacerdotal power, the Apostles
were commissioned to impart. " Repent, and be bap-
tized, every one of you in the Name of Jesus Christ
for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of
the Holy Ghost/' — is one instance of this combination
of the inward condition and the ministerial act. " What
doth hinder me to be baptized ?" asked the Eunuch ;
and Philip answered : •* If thou believest with all thine
heart, thou may est.' ' (Acts viii. 34.) These conditions
on the part of the receiver of Sacraments are as neces-
sary to their due reception, as their administration by
the hands of persons duly appointed of God. Faith and
repentance were required in order to give efficiency to
152 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
the intervention of the ministerial act, but the ministry
was ordained both for the production of the faith and
repentance thus required, and for instrumentally con-
veying to those who possess these graces the promised
blessings of the covenant. For "how shall they be-
lieve in Him of whom they have not heard ? and how
shall they hear, without a preacher ? and how shall they
preach, except they be sent ?' n Sent to preach, that
men may believe ; sent, when men do believe, to remit
their sins by Baptism, or if they fall back, to reinstate
them by absolution and other means of grace ; and to
preserve and advance them in communion with God
by the Blessed Eucharist. Thus a mutual concurrence on
the part of the worshipper and the Priest, is of the essence
of Sacraments ; and as no man can ordinarily by an act
of his own mind obtain the promised blessing, so neither,
without a corresponding fitness in the receiver, can the
act of the Priest impart it. By a right understanding
of this principle of co-operation, the idea of the abuse
of the sacramental system, popularly implied by the
phrase, " opus operatum," 2 is excluded, and the doctrine
1 Kom. x. 15.
2 The phrase, " opus operatum," rightly understood, is an important
guard to the true Catholic doctrine of Sacraments. It is intended to
mark the truth, that the grace of Sacraments is the result of their admi-
nistration by virtue of Christ's institution, as opposed to the idea of
the recipient's faith being the instrument of appropriation, Moehlcr
thus explains the phrase : " Sacraments confer on us sanctifying grace,
as an institution prepared by Cheist for our salvation; (ex opere
operato, scilicet a Christo, in place of quod operatus est Christus)
i.e., the Sacraments convey a divine power, merited for us by Christ,
which cannot be produced by any human disposition, by any spiritual
effort or condition, but is absolutely for Christ's sake conferred by
God through their means." — Moehler on Symbolism, Vol. i. p. 289.
THE PRIESTHOOD OF THE PEOPLE. 153
of the Priesthood is shown to be perfectly consistent
with the cardinal truth of justification by faith.
In the services of the Church the concurrent act of
the people is expressed in the response which follows
the prayer and act of the Priest. The response of the
congregation seals his act as their own by the expres-
sion of a concordant will. Thus, in the Eucharistic
Service, the prayer of consecration is followed by the
' Amen' of the assembled people : and afterwards, by
virtue of this response, the " sacrifice" is spoken of as
"our sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving," and "our
bounden duty and service."
It is not therefore by depreciating the value of the
sacerdotal act of the minister, which is an ordinance of
God, that the possible abuse of His mysteries is to be
guarded against; but by cherishing a higher view of
congregational worship. To suppose the act of the
Priest a substitute for their own, is not likely to be the
error of those who have tasted the blessedness of a per-
sonal communion with God. Neither are they who
realize the mystery of their own fellowship in the Body
of Christ, in a condition to stumble at the mystery,
not more marvellous, of a fellow- creature sharing His
sacerdotal functions. The loss of the due appreciation
of the sacredness of the worship of Almighty God,
and of wonder at a fallen creature being admitted to
adore within the sanctuary, is the real cause of insen-
sibility to the virtue and sanctity of the ministerial
commission. How can they who value not congrega-
tional prayer as a divine expression of the inner life
of the Body of Christ, appreciate the greatness of
a ministry which speaks and acts in the Person of
h3
154 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
Christ? A state of feeling like that prevailing in the
mass of our people, which regards onr Church Service
only as an opportunity for public instruction, and the
sermon as the centre of its life, is incapable of compre-
hending the mystery either of their own, or their mi-
nister's Priesthood. But the living creatures who are
" in the midst of the Throne," and cease not, day and
night, saying, " Holy, Holy, Holy," understand the
mystery of " the four-and-twenty elders clothed in white
raiment," who in harmonious concurrence with their
cry arise from their seats, and " fall down before Him
that sitteth on the Throne, and worship Him that liveth
for ever." 1
Note.
The following definition of the term, character, is extracted from an
article which appeared in the Ecclesiastic for March, 1863.
" Sacramental character is therefore defined as being, queedam partici-
patio sacerdotii Christi in fidelibus Ejus. The reality of this character
consists in the possession of certain powers for communion with God.
" The powers may be either passive or active. Passive powers are those
by which we are capable of receiving Divine gifts ; so that an unre-
generate person, although he receives the ' Sacramentum,' or outward
sign in the Lord's Supper, has no capacity for receiving the J res sacra-
menti,' which, being of a spiritual nature, requires a spiritual nature in
the recipient.
"And as passive powers are necessary for our individual reception of
the graces of Christ's Priesthood, so active powers are necessary for
us to communicate the graces of that mediation to others.
" This further character, therefore, is what we receive at our ordina-
tion, and it is conveyed by the power of the Holy Ghost. ' Keceive
ye the Holy Ghost,' were the original words of ordination by Christ,
and the words by winch we were ordained. The reality of this recep-
tion, as something additional to what we possessed before, consists in
the communication of powers to do certain acts of Priesthood, in union
with Christ our great Mediator."
1 Eev. iv. 8, 10.
CHAPTER XV.
THE CHIEF FUNCTION OF THE MINISTERIAL PRIEST-
HOOD.
rpHE question is sometimes asked, What is the chief
J- function of the Ministerial Priesthood? or, in
other words, What is the chief supernatural power
which, through Holy Orders, is committed unto men ?
For Holy Orders are, as has been said, sacramental, 1
certain powers derived from the Priesthood of Christ
being through them communicated to baptized men for
the good of their brethren, together with grace for the
due exercise of the powers thus conveyed. To compare
the value of the several acts of a ministry, which in all
its functions is accompanied with the outgoings of the
infinite love of God, may seem like the attempt of one
who would measure the relative depths of the unfa-
thomed sea. But it is natural to man to attribute to all
human actions a value proportioned to the ends which
they respectively subserve, or the results which they
1 It is not the sacramental character of Holy Orders which our Re-
formers questioned, but the classing them as a like Sacrament with
Baptism or the Eucharist. " We deny not Ordination to be a Sacra-
ment, though it be not one of those two Sacraments, which are ' gene-
rally necessary to salvation.' " — BramhalL Consecration of Protestant
Bishops Vindicated. Disc. v. vol. iii. p. 81, Anglo-Cath. Lib.
156 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
tend to produce ; and under this view a comparison may
be instituted between the several functions of the Priest-
hood.
The judgment formed upon such a comparison will
necessarily depend on the theory which we adopt of the
ministerial commission. The upholders of the Pres-
byter view, consistently with their principles, would
attribute the chief weight to the acts of ruling and
teaching; while in the estimate of those who follow
what has been shown to be the view of the Church,
these will be regarded only as subordinate acts, instru-
mental to yet higher purposes. For it is evident that
ecclesiastical discipline and religious instruction are but
means to prepare the soul for the remission of sins and
union with Christ ; and therefore the administration
of Sacraments, through which these blessings are ordi-
narily vouchsafed, will be esteemed as the highest func-
tion of the ministry. On the other hand, according
to the supposition which characterises the Presbyter
view, that the grace of remission of sins, and of union
with Christ, depends only on the soul's secret commu-
nion with God, the administration of Sacraments, which
become in this theory mere signs, sinks into a subordi-
nate position. Taking, however, the Church's view of
the subject as our guide, the remission of sin in Holy
Baptism and Absolution, and the Holy Eucharist, are
to be regarded as the chief functions of the Priesthood,
or the special powers which, to use the language of
the Church, impress an indelible character or seal upon
the soul, as in the most intimate manner associating
the person exercising them with Christ in His minis-
terial Priesthood. Jeremy Taylor expresses, in his own
THE CHIEF FUNCTION OF THE PRIESTHOOD. 157
striking words, this view of the comparative value of
the act3 of the Christian Ministry : (t And certainly
there is not a greater degree of power in the world,
than to remit and retain sins, and to consecrate the
sacramental symbols into the mysteriousness of Christ's
Body and Blood ; nor a greater honour than that God
in heaven should ratify what the Priest does on earth,
and should admit him to handle the Sacrifice of the
world, and to present the Same Which in heaven is pre-
sented to the Eternal Father." (Clerus Domini, Heber's
edit. vol. xiv. p. 452, 459.) This judgment of Jeremy
Taylor accords entirely with the deliberate decision of
the Bishops in the Savoy Conference, already referred
to, when they asserted the necessity of the priestly
office, because to it, and to it alone, were committed
the two ministries of absolution and consecration.
Judging by the same rule, — that the higher the end
obtained by the action, the higher will be the value of
the act, — it is evident that of the two ministries which
are thus distinguished above all others, that of the Holy
Eucharist is the more exalted and eventful. For the
remission of sins and reconciliation with God is not the
final end in which the yearnings of the soul find their
full repose ; this only prepares the way for the yet fur-
ther blessedness, which alone adequately meets the
wants of fallen humanity, that of union with the Eter-
nal God through a perfect incorporation into Christ.
This ultimate end is the special gift of the holy Eucha-
rist ; and therefore it follows, that our ministry finds its
crowning glory and perfectness of satisfaction, when the
assembled hosts of the people of God, having been pre-
pared through teaching and prayer and the ministry of
158 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
reconciliation, for the final act of communion, are ga-
thered around the altar, and, with Angels and Archangels,
and the whole company of heaven, the Presence of the
Lord descending, and the dread Sacrifice being repre-
sented before the everlasting Father, through the
Holy Ghost uniting the earthly and the heavenly
ministrations, " The Bread of God Which cometh down
from heaven, and giveth life to the world," is beheld
with the eye of an adoring faith, and is distributed " to
all them that love His appearing." What remaineth
beyond, but the vision of the Blessed, when He, Whom
we now behold veiled and in mystery, will manifest His
Glory with open Face ?
The same conclusion follows as to the surpassing dig-
nity of the Holy Eucharist, if we contrast it with the
Sacrament of Baptism. Although in Holy Baptism
the grace of a new Divine Nature, and fellowship in the
virtues and merits of the Incarnation and Sacrifice of
Christ, are first imparted, and only an increased and
fuller gift of the same incorporation with Christ is
bestowed in the Holy Eucharist ; yet these two Sacra-
ments are not on this account to be classed as of equal
dignity. For there is this distinguishing feature in the
celebration of the Holy Eucharist, that in it not only is
grace given, but the great Sacrifice, through the merits
of which all grace is vouchsafed, is, in some deep mystery,
therein contained and applied ; and not merely do our
Lord's virtues and merits flow forth through it and reach
the soul, but He therein exhibits before us, really and
substantially, though after a heavenly and incomprehen-
sible manner, the very Flesh and Blood from Which life
is imparted to the world. It is, therefore, upon this act
THE CHIEF FUNCTION OF THE PRIESTHOOD. 159
of our Priesthood that Hooker chiefly dilates, when
enumerating its more prominent characteristics, in lan-
guage which rises even above his usual grandeur of
style, he thus expresses the view of the Church as to
the special seal or indelible character which the power
of this ministry conveys. " The power of the minis-
try of God translateth out of darkness into glory;
it raiseth man from the earth, and bringeth God Him-
self down from heaven ; by blessing visible elements, it
maketh invisible grace ; it giveth daily the Holy Ghost ;
it hath to dispose of that Flesh which was given for the
life of the world, and that Blood which was poured out
to redeem souls. When it poureth malediction upon the
heads of the wicked, they perish ; when it revoketh the
same, they revive. O wretched blindness, if we admire
not so great power; more wretched if we consider it
aright, and notwithstanding imagine that any but God
can bestow it ! To whom Christ hath imparted power,
both over that mystical body which is the society of
souls, and over that natural, which is Himself, for the
knitting of both in one (a work which antiquity doth
call the making of Christ's Body), the same power is,
in such, not amiss both termed a kind of mark or cha-
racter, and acknowledged to be indelible." (Eccles.
Pol. lib. v. ch. lxxvii. s. 1.)
That a frail creature, himself sinful, should thus be
made a representative of Christ to the world, and minister
that wonderful Sacrament, in which mysteriously and
invisibly, His very Body is made to be present, offered,
communicated and diffused, would be altogether beyond
comprehension, were it not also a part of the mys-
tery of God, to glorify Himself in the worthlessness
160 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
of the instrumentality which He vouchsafes to em-
ploy. If we may venture, without irreverence, so far
to explain this mystery, it would appear that, it being
the will of God to employ an outward as well as
an inward ministration, the weakest instrument is the
fittest, because there is the less possibility of resting
in the instrument, instead of going beyond, and rising
up to Him Who thereby invisibly works. Even such
as Daniel and S. John were overpowered with the
transcendent majesty of ministering Angels, and for a
while were absorbed in the entranced contemplation of
the minister, to the forgetfulness of the Unseen Pre-
sence. How much more would this be our case, if
Angels were our ministers. But when one who is
known to be of like passions and infirmities with one-
self, ministers what is manifestly supernatural and mi-
raculous, the mind at once passes from the fellow-
creature into the consciousness of the Higher Being,
Who is thus revealing Himself through what can be no
more than an external form. Such would seem to be
the meaning of S. Paul, when seeking to reconcile his
disciples to the greatness of the Apostolic commission, he
says, " We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the
excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us." 1
The only question which can remain, in order to es-
tablish the ministry of the Eucharist as the chief and
crowning dignity of the Priesthood, ,is to make it clear
and indisputable, that, upon consecration by the Priest,
the Body and Blood of Christ become present in the
Sacrament ; and, being thus, through his ministry, ex-
hibited before God and man, are distributed as the
1 2 Cor. ir. 7.
THE CHIEF FUNCTION OF THE PRIESTHOOD. 16]
Food of life and immortality. This momentous point,
on which so much hangs, for a right understanding of
the Christian Priesthood, and the true doctrine of the
holy Eucharist, can only be determined by the authority
of the Church, the true interpreter of Scripture.. As
the fittest conclusion, therefore, to this chapter, is an-
nexed a short catena of authorities on the point in ques-
tion, selected from those who have most fully expressed
the mind of the English Church as it is embodied in
her Eucharistic service.
Bishop Overall. (Additional Notes on the Book of Common
Prayer.) " These holy mysteries with the spiritual food of the most
precious Body and Blood" &c. " Before consecration we called them
God's creatures of bread and wine ; now we do so no more after conse-
cration, . . . though the bread remain there still to the eye. . . . And
herein we follow the Fathers, who, after consecration, would not suffer
it to be called bread and wine any longer, but the Body and Blood of
Christ."
Bishop Taylor. (Discourse of Transubstantiation, in Dissuasive from
Popery. Vol. ix. p. 99.) " We (the Church of England) say, as they
said, Christ's Body is truly there, and there is a conversion of the ele-
ments into Christ's Body ; for what, before consecration, in all senses
was bread, is, after consecration, in some sense, Christ's Body."
Bishop Cosin. (Notes on the Book of Common Prayer. First series.)
" It is confessed by all divines, that, upon the words of consecration, the
Body and Blood of Christ is really and substantially present, and so ex-
hibited and given to all that receive It j and all this, not after a physical
and sensual, but after an heavenly and incomprehensible manner ; but
yet there remains this controversy among some of them, whether the
Body of Christ be present only in the use of the Sacrament, and in the
act of eating, and not otherwise. They that hold the affirmative, as the
Lutherans (in Conf. Sax.) and all Calvinists do, seem to me to depart
from all antiquity, which place the Presence of Christ in the virtue of
the words of consecration and benediction used by the priest, and not in
the use of the eating of the Sacrament, for they tell us that the virtue of
that consecration is not lost, though the Sacrament be resorved for sick
persons or other."
162 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
Thomdike. (Laws of the Church. Book iii. s. 5.) " It is not here
to be denied that all ecclesiastical writers do with one mouth bear wit-
ness to the Presence of the Body and Blood of Christ in the Eucharist.
Neither will any of them be found to ascribe it to anything but the con-
secration, or that to any faith but that upon which the Church pro-
fesseth to proceed to the celebrating of it. And upon this account,
when they speak of the elements, supposing the consecration to have
passed upon them, they always call them by the name, not of their bodily
substance, but of the Body and Blood of Christ, which they have
become."
Bishop Bull. (Answer to Bossuet.) " We are not ignorant that the
ancient Fathers generally teach that the bread and wine in the Eucha-
rist, by or upon the consecration of them, do become and are made the
Body and Blood of Christ."
Bishop Lake. (Sermon on S. Matt. xxvi. 26.) " What good came
to the elements by consecration ? Surely much ; for they are made the
Body and Blood of Christ."
Wheatley. (On the Common Prayer : of the Prayer of Consecration.)
" By these (words) the elements are now consecrated, and so become the
Body and Blood of our Saviour Christ."
Bishop Burnet. (Article XXYIII.) " It is not to be denied, but
that very early both Justin Martyr and Irenseus thought that there
was such a sanctification of the elements, that there was a divine virtue
in them ; and in those very passages which we have urged from the
arguings of the Fathers against the Eutychians, though they do plainly
prove that they believed that the substance of bread and wine did still
remain, yet they do suppose an union with the elements to the Body of
Christ, like that of the human nature being united to the divine.
Field. (Of the Church. Append. Part i. vol. iv.) " Touching the
manner of this consecration, there is a great variety of opinions ; yet all
agree in this, that they understand such a mutation and change to be
made, that that which before was earthly and common bread, by the
word of institution, the invocation of God's Name and Divine Virtue,
is made a Sacrament of the true Body and Blood of Christ, visibly sit-
ting at the Eight Hand of God in heaven, and yet after an invisible and
incomprehensible manner present in the Church ; and that the Body
and Blood of Christ are in the Sacrament, so exhibited and given as
spiritual meat and drink for the salvation and everlasting life of them
that are worthy partakers of the same. Thus much we doubt not but
a thousand and a thousand miracles may confirm."
THE CHIEF FUNCTION OF THE PRIESTHOOD. 163
Nelson. (Festivals and Fasts.) " Q. In what manner was the con-
secration of the elements of bread and wine performed in the Primitive
Church? A. The priest that officiated not only rehearsed the evan-
gelical history of the institution of the Sacrament, and pronounced those
words of our Saviotjb, ' This is My Body, this is My Blood ;' but also
offered up a prayer of consecration to God, beseeching Him that He
would send down His Holt Spieit upon the bread and wine presented
to Sim on the altar ; and that He would so sanctify them, that they
might become the Body and Blood of His Son Jesus Chbist, not
according to the gross compages and substance, but as to the spiritual
energy and virtue of His holy Flesh and Blood, communicated to the
blessed elements by the power and operation of the Holy Ghost de-
scending upon them ; whereby the Body and Blood of Chbist is verily
and indeed taken by the faithful in the Lobd's Supper."
Bishop Wilson. (Sacra Privata, Parker's edit. p. 107.) " He then
offered Himself to God in the symbols of bread and wine, as a pledge of
His real and natural Body, which He was just going to offer to God for
the sins of the world. His sacramental Body was given, offered, before
He suffered. It was made His sacramental Body by His Almighty
Word ; none but God could do it. We therefore invoke the Holy
Ghost, one God with Him, to make the elements what Chbist Himself
made them — His sacramental Body ; it being the Spirit that quickeneth,
the flesh profiteth nothing. It is the Spibit, i.e., the Holy Ghost,
sent upon them in the prayer of the priest, which conveys to us the seed
of eternal life."
Nichols. (Book of Common Prayer.) "And so, again, whereas
there was a contention what it was that made a change in the elements ;
whether, as the Roman Church would have it, the bare pronouncing of
the words, * This is My Body,' or as some Protestants say, only the
prayer to God to sanctify them for a spiritual use, our Church has
ordered both a prayer to God, and also the words of institution, to bo
repeated."
Knox. (B^mains, Vol. ii. On the use and import of the Eucharistic
Symbols.) " In a word, appealing to the Apostle, and that universal
belief to which he appeals, the commemorative celebration of the Eucha-
rist, as a devotional act, is not that which makes it peculiarly beneficial
and venerable ; but it is so, because in this ordinance the aliments which
Chbist has appointed become, through His designation and blessing,
the direct vehicles of His own divine influences, to capable receivers.
Nothing short of this notion would accord with the ascribing of spiritual
164 THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRIESTHOOD.
virtue specially to each risible sign ; and what is still more, to each, not
as becoming efficacious through the act of receiving, but as endowed
with efficacy through the act of consecration. For we must observe, it
is not the cup of blessing which we drink, nor * the bread which we eat,'
that are declared to be the Communion of the Blood and the Com-
munion of the Body of Cheist : but it is said, ' The cup of blessing
which we bless,' and • the bread which we break,' — clearly indicating
that the Eucharistic elements, when once solemnly sanctified according
to our Lord's appointment, are to be regarded as being in an inexpli-
cable, but deeply awful manner, the receptacles of that heavenly virtue
which His Divine power qualifies them to convey."
Bishop Mant (quoting Archdeacon Yardley, in his Book of Common
Prayer). "After the consecration of the elements, immediately follows
the reception and distribution of them, which continue still in their
natural substance of bread and wine, though they are changed in their
value and efficacy into the sacramental Body and Blood of Cheist."
N.B. It is remarkable, that in the last revision of the Prayer Book,
the rubric was added, which provides that " if the consecrated Bread
or Wine be all spent before all have communicated, the priest is to con-
secrate more according to the form before prescribed, beginning at" the
words which express the act of Cheist as He took the Bread and Wine,
and not at the commencement of the prayer, " Hear us, O merciful Fa-
thee." The Church of England by this decision has expressed its
accordance with the rest of the Western Church, which has always
believed the repetition of our Loed's act and words to be the special
time and form of consecration. It is supposed by Archdeacon Yardley
that the previous prayer, though not repeated, is presumed still to have
force, and to concur with the words of institution, in the case of a
second consecration. — (See note in Mant's Prayer Book.)
APPENDIX.
The following extracts from English Divines of chief note
among us, are selected from among others, to be added to
those already adduced in the course of the argument, in
proof of the unvarying doctrine of the Priesthood held in
the later, as in the earlier, ages of the Church of England.
Bishop A^dbewes.
" The ancient Fathers seem to be of one mind that the
same form should serve both, (the Jewish and Christian
system of government).
" They ground this their opinion upon that they see,
" 1. That the synagogue is called the type or shadow, and
the Church the very image of the thing. Heb. x. 1.
" 2. That God Himself saith of the Christian Church
under the Q-entiles, that He will take of the Gentiles, and
make them Priests and Levites to Himself (Esay lxvi. 21),
there calling our Presbyters and Deacons by those legal
names.
" And their often interchange and indifferent using of
Priest and Presbyter, Levite or Deacon, showeth they pre-
sumed a correspondence and agreement between them.
166
APPENDIX.
" Thus, then,
Aaron
Eleazar
Princes of Priests
Priests
Princes of Levites
Levites
Nethinims
should be
answerable
unto
Christ,
Archbishop,
Bishops,
J Presbyters,
Archdeacons,
Deacons,
Clerks and Sextons.
[N.B. The term ' synagogue' is here used in its wider sense,
including the entire Mosaic economy.] — A summary view
of the government both of the Old and New Testament :
among the minor works. Anglo-Cath. Lib., p. 350.
G-EOBGE HeBBEET.
" Cheist being not to continue on earth, but, after He
had fulfilled the work of reconciliation, to be received up
into Heaven, He constituted deputies in His place, and
these are priests Out of this charter of the
Priesthood may be plainly gathered both the dignity
thereof and the duty : the dignity in that a priest may do
that which Cheist did, and by His authority, and as His
vicegerent. The duty, in that a priest is to do that which
Cheist did, and after His manner, both for doctrine and
life." — Country Parson, Chap. I.
Aechbishop Ushee.
" The government of episcopacy is derived partly from
the pattern prescribed by God in the Old Testament, and
partly from the imitation thereof brought in by the Apos-
tles, and confirmed by Cheist Himself in the time of the
New, The government of the Church of the Old Testa-
APPENDIX. 167
ment was committed to the Priests and Levites, unto whom
the ministers of the New do now succeed, in like sort as
our Loed's Day hath done unto their Sabbath, that it
might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Prophet, touch-
ing the vocation of the G-entiles, ' I will take of them for
Priests and for Levites, saith the Loed.' (Isa. lxvi. 21.)"
— The Original of Bishops, &c. Vol. vii. p. 43. Van Mil-
dert's edition.
Bishop Peaesof.
" There were various orders under the law in the ancient
temple ; and there are likewise various orders under the
G-ospel. Prophecy, uttered indeed during the time of the
law, but to be fulfilled in the times of the G-ospel, altogether
confirms this. Por thus it was written in Isaiah (lxvi. 21),
1 1 will take of them for Priests and for Levites, saith the
Loed.' And thus it was fulfilled by Cheist. For He
called to Himself (1.) Apostles, (2.) the seventy disciples.
Thus also, as we know, the Apostles did, for they ordained
Presbyters and Deacons." — Minor theological works. Vol.
i. p. 274.
Bishop Tatloe.
" The Christian ministry having greater privileges, and
being honoured with attraction of the Body and Blood
of Cheist, and offices serving ' to a better covenant,' may,
with greater argument, be accounted excellent, honourable,
and royal ; although the Church be called a royal ' Priest-
hood,' the denomination being given to the whole, from the
most excellent part, because they altogether make one body
under Cheist the Head, the medium of the union being
the priests His people is ' a peculiar people,' the
Clergy ' a holy Priesthood,' and all in conjunction and for
168 APPENDIX.
several excellencies ' a chosen nation.' The priests
being enumerated distinct from the people, ' the priests of
the kingdom,' and ' the people of the kingdom' are all holy
and chosen, but in their several manner : the people of the
kingdom, to bring or design a spiritual sacrifice, the priest
to offer it ; or all together to sacrifice ; the priest by his
proper ministry, the people by their assent, conjunction,
and assistance chosen to serve God, not only in their own
forms, but under the ministrations of an honourable Priest-
hood." — The Divine institution of the office ministerial.
Sec. 9, vol. xiv. pp. 457, 458. Heber's edition.
Herbert Thorkdike.
After noticing the two parts of the Bishop's office, (1.)
" to rule the Church and (2.) perform Divine service," he
proceeds : " So must we inquire the correspondence of the
Church with the synagogue in both respects : reflecting
from the Bishop and Presbyters, in regard of Divine ser-
vice to be performed by their hands, upon Aaron and his
sons, or the High Priest and the rest ; as Jerome hath done
before us, writing in these terms (Epist. ad Evangel.) :
* What Aaron and his sons and the Levites were in the
temple, that let the Bishop, Presbyter, and Deacons chal-
lenge to themselves in the Church.' But in respect of
government and discipline .... we must reflect upon the
Sanhedrim, as the same S. Hierome hath done in another
place, upon the first to Titus, saying of Bishops in respect
of their Presbyters, ' Imitating Moses, who having in his
power to be over the people of Israel alone, chose seventy
with whom he might judge the people.'" [N.B. The term
synagogue is used here, as by Andrewes, in its wider sense.
Vitringa, not adverting to this use of the term synagogue,
cites Thorndike as in favour of his views.] — The Primitive
APPENDIX. 169
Government of Churches, c. viii. s. 4, 5. Anglo-Cath. Lib.
vol. i. pt. 1.
Isaac Barrow.
" We may therefore upon these grounds solidly and safely
conclude, that this promise — ' I will clothe her priests with
salvation, — doth principally belong, and shall therefore in-
fallibly be made good, to the Christian Priesthood, to those
who in the Christian Church, by offering spiritual sacrifices
of praise and thanksgiving, by directing and instructing the
people in the knowledge of the evangelical law, by implor-
ing for and pronouncing upon them the Divine benedictions,
do bear analogy with, and supply the room of, the Jewish
Priesthood.
" From which discourse we may by the way deduce this
corollary : that the title of priest, although it did (as most
certainly it doth not) properly and primarily signify a
Jewish sacrificer (or slaughterer of beasts), doth yet nowise
deserve that reproach which is by some inconsiderately (not
to say profanely) upon that mistaken ground cast upon it ;
since the Holy Scripture itself, we see, doth here, even in
that sense (most obnoxious to exception) ascribe it to the
Christian pastors. And so likewise doth the Prophet Isaiah
(lxvi. 21), and the Prophet Jeremiah (xxxiii. 18),
' Neither shall the priests the Levites want a man before
Me to offer burnt sacrifices, and to do sacrifice continually ;'
which prophecy also evidently concerns the same time and
state of things, of which the Prophet Malachi thus foretells,
* For from the rising of the sun to the going down of the
same, My Name shall be great among the Gentiles ; and in
every place incense shall be offered unto My Name, and a
pure offering.' " — Sermon xii. s. ii. on Ps. cxxxii. 16, fol.
edit. vol. i.
170 APPENDIX.
Daniel Waterland.
" From hence likewise may we understand in what sense
the officiating authorised ministers perform the office of
proper, evangelical priests in this (the Eucharistic) service.
They do it in three ways : 1. As commemorating, in solemn
form, the same Sacrifice here below, which Christ our High
Priest commemorates above. 2. As handing up (if I may
so speak) those prayers and those services of Christians to
Cheist our Lord, Who as High Priest recommends the
same in heaven to God the Father. 3. As offering up to
God all the faithful who are under their care and ministry,
and who are sanctified by the Spirit. (Eom. xv. 16.) In
these three ways the Christian officers are priests, or liturgs,
to very excellent purposes, far above the legal ones, in a
sense worth the contending for, and worth the pursuing
with the utmost zeal and assiduity." — The Eucharist Con-
sidered in a Sacrificial View. C. xii. vol. vii. p. 350. Van
Mildert's Edit.
Bishop Beveridge.
" When our Lord, therefore, was upon earth, foreseeing
that all the Mosaic orders would cease, in course, upon His
death, and knowing that His Church could never subsist
without some such orders of men set apart for the adminis-
tration of His Word and Sacraments, before He died, He
took care to lay the platform of others, suitable to His own
religion. For which purpose, out of the many disciples that
followed Him, He first chose twelve Apostles, to whom He
gave commission to baptize, to preach the Gospel, and to
work miracles for the confirmation of it ; and afterwards He
sent out seventy other disciples, and gave them power also
to preach the Gospel, and cast out devils in His Name. So
APPENDIX. 171
that He still kept up the same number of orders in His
Church, whilst Himself lived, that was in the Jewish
Church ; for He Himself was truly the High Priest, of
Whom they, under the Law, were only types. Then there
were the twelve Apostles, answerable to the priests of the
second order ; and the seventy disciples, resembling the
great number of Levites.
" But all this while, we do not read that the Apostles had
any solemn consecration to their office during our Saviour's
life. It is said, indeed, in S. Mark iii. 14, that He ordained
twelve ; but the words are, eVo/^e Swdeica, He made or ap-
pointed twelve to be His Apostles or messengers. But we
do not find that He ordained them, so as to confer any sa-
cerdotal power upon them. He promised, indeed, S. Peter,
and the rest of the Apostles with him, that He would give
them the keys of the kingdom of heaven. But they were as
yet in the hands of the Levitical Priesthood ; and He would
not take them from thence to give them to His Apostles, so
loug as that priesthood continued in force. But He was no
sooner dead, and risen again, but He presently performed
His promise. For then, the Levitical priesthood being ex-
pired, and by consequence, the keys, which He had before
committed to it by His servant Moses, returning in course
into His own hands, He then, according to His promise,
gave them to His Apostles.
" For upon the same day that He rose again in the even-
ing, His Apostles being met together, He came to them,
and said to them, ' Peace be unto you : as My Father hath
sent Me, even so send I you. And when He had said so,
He breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the
Holt G-iiost : whosesoever sins ye remit, they aro remitted
unto them ; and whosesoever sins ye retain, they are re-
tained.'
" ' As My Father hath sent Me, even so send I you ;'
172
APPENDIX.
that is, As My Father sent Me to preach the Gospel, by
anointing Me with His Holt Spihit, even so, after the self-
same manner, I send you. ' Eeceive ye the Holt Ghost ;'
at the speaking of which words He breathed upon them,
and so issued forth the Holt Spirit from Himself into
them ; which, as it is an undeniable argument of the Spirit's
procession from the Son, as well as from the Father, so it
was the highest and truest consecration of the Apostles
that could be, far beyond that of Aaron and his sons. For
they were anointed only with material ointment, which was
poured upon Aaron's head, and sprinkled afterwards upon
his and his sons' garments, together with the blood of the
sacrifice. But this was only a type of that Holt Spirit
wherewith the Apostles were anointed by our Lord, when
He breathed it immediately from Himself into them.
" And now were the keys of the kingdom of heaven, ac-
cording to the promise before mentioned, given to the Apos-
tles ; and therefore our Lord, after He had breathed upon
them, saying, ' Eeceive ye the Holt Ghost,' presently adds,
1 Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them ;
and whosesoever sins ye retain, they are retained.' Whereby
all sacerdotal power was now conferred upon the Apostles,
even whatsoever is necessary to the government and edifica-
tion of the Church, to the world's end." — Serm. ii., on the
Institution of Ministers.
Eichard Hooker.
Hooker is usually cited as the one great teacher amongst
us who deviated from this unbroken line of doctrine, and
was willing to adopt the term Presbyter, instead of that of
Priest.
It is necessary, however, to consider under what view,
and in what sense, of the terms in question, Hooker was
APPENDIX. 173
prepared to make this concession to the popular clamour
of his day.
(1.) It should be remembered that the full designs of the
Puritan party were not developed in Hooker's time, and
there were still hopes of reconciling them to the Church's
doctrine. Hooker, therefore, with others, was disposed to
go the greatest lengths of conciliation, in order to remove
any possible stumbling-block in the way of peace.
(2.) Whatever term Hooker was willing to employ, it is
probable, from the extract quoted in Chap, xv., that he held
the full principle and idea of priesthood in the sense in which
it has been attempted to be set forth in these pages ; for no
more striking passage could be selected, out of any ancient
or modern divines, to express the priestly character, and
powers of the Christian ministry. In another passage, also,
(Eccles. Pol. 1. vii. ch. v. 7, vol. ii. p. 345, Keble's edit.,) he
cites the well-known passage of S. Jerome, which is one of
the clearest and fullest testimonies of antiquity to the truth
of the doctrine. " And to the end we may understand that
these apostolical orders are taken out of the old Testa-
ment, what Aaron and his sons and the Levites were in the
Temple, the same in the Church may Bishops, and Pres-
byters, and Deacons challenge unto themselves." If, there-
fore, Hooker was willing to accept the term Presbyter, to
be consistent with himself he must have understood it, as
the ancient Fathers, to be in Christian use synonymous
with the term Priest.
(3.) "When Hooker says " that sacrifice is now no part of
the Christian ministry," and again, " It (the Church) hath
properly now no sacrifice," and distinguishes between
" heathenish and Jewish service" in this respect on the one
hand, and Christian service on the other, on this account
thinking that the term Priest might be surrendered, we may
believe that he used the term in a popular sense, which
174 APPENDIX.
Barrow, in the passage above quoted, expresses, of a Jewish
sacrificer, or a slaughterer of beasts."
(4.) When Hooker accepts the term Presbyter, it is by
no means in the sense of an " elder," as the Presbyterians,
and in particular Vitringa, understand it. He uses the
term in its sacramental idea of one ordained to convey the
graces of the spiritual life, as a natural father the powers of
the natural life. On weighing the following passage, it will
be evident that Hooker's mind was embracing this enlarged
view of the ministry, in its manifold bearings on the super-
natural life, and the communications of Divine grace, — thus
including all that has been contended for in these pages, —
when he recommends the term to our adoption :
" For what are they that embrace the Gospel, but the
sons of G-od ? What are churches but His families ? See-
ing, therefore, we receive the adoption and state of sons by
their ministry whom GrOD hath chosen out for that purpose,
— seeing, also, that when we are the sons of G-od, our con-
tinuance is still under their care which were our progenitors,
— what better title could there be given them than the re-
verend name of Presbyters, or fatherly guides? ... A
Presbyter, according to the proper meaning of the New
Testament, is, ' He unto whom our Saviour Christ hath
communicated the power of spiritual procreation.' Out of
the twelve Patriarchs issued the whole multitude of Israel,
according to the flesh. And according to the mystery of
heavenly birth, our Lord's Apostles we all acknowledge to
be the patriarchs of His whole Church. S. John therefore
beheld, sitting about the throne of GrOD in heaven, four-and-
twenty Presbyters, the one half fathers of the old, the other
of the new Jerusalem. In which respect the Apostles like-
wise gave themselves the same titles, albeit that name were
not proper but common unto them with others." — Eccles.
Pol. b. v. ch. lxxviii. 4. vol. ii. p. 180, Keble's edit.
APPENDIX. 175
If Hooker's view of the ministry were to be taken as the
standard of interpretation, there would be little room left
for controversy as to the name to be employed to designate
it. And coupling together his expressed opinions of the
Sacraments, and his idea of the ministry, with his known
disposition to go the utmost length of comprehension for
peace' sake, we may perhaps understand how far he intended
to yield in these his words of charity : " I rather term the
one sort Presbyters than Priests, because, in a matter of so
small moment, I would not willingly offend their ears to
whom the name of Priesthood is odious, though without
cause." Yol. ii. p. 178.
To these testimonies of divines may be added that of an
honoured layman —
Eobeet Nelson.
" Q. How was the Priesthood esteemed among the primi-
tive Christians ?
" A. The primitive Christians always expressed a mighty
value and esteem for their Clergy ; because they were sen-
sible there could be no Church without Priests, and that it
was by their means that God conveyed to them all those
mighty blessings which were purchased by Cueist's death.
" Q. Why are the ministers of Gk)D called the Clergy ?
" A. Because those who have been peculiarly appropriated
to the service of God, and devoted to wait at the altar, have
always been esteemed God's lot and inheritance, which the
word signifies in the Greek. Thus God says, ' The Levites
shall be Mine ;' and our Savioue calls the Apostles the gift
His Fatiiee gave Him out of the world. Now though the
word at first comprehended the whole body of the Jewish
176 APPENDIX.
nation, and may in the same sense be attributed to the com-
munity of Christians whom G-od has purchased to Himself
as a peculiar people ; yet this title was afterwards confined
to narrower bounds, and distinguished that tribe which G-od
made choice of to stand before Him in the administration of
holy things ; and after the expiration of that economy, was
accordingly used to denote the ministry of the Grospel, and
those that were invested with the Priesthood in the Chris-
tian Church."
JOSEPH MASTERS AND CO., PRINTERS, ALDERSGATE STREET, LONDON.
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