^ PRINCETON, N. J. 
 
 BX 5175 .M6 1897 
 Moberly, Robert Campbell, 
 1845-1903. 
 Shelf Ministerial priesthood 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2015 
 
 https://archive.org/details/ministerialpriesOOmobe 
 
I 
 
MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
O;cfor& 
 
 HORACE HART, PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY 
 
MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 CHAPTERS 
 
 (preliminary to a study of the ordinal) 
 
 ON THE RATIONALE OF MINISTRY 
 AND THE MEANmG OF CHRISTIAN 
 PRIESTHOOD 
 
 WITH AN APPENDIX UPON 
 
 ROMAN CRITICISM OF ANGLICAN ORDERS 
 
 By R. C. MOBERLY, D.D. 
 
 REGIUS PROFESSOR OF PASTORAL THEOLOGY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD 
 CANON OF CHRIST CHURCH 
 
 JOHN 
 
 LONDON 
 MURRAY, ALBEMARLE 
 1897 
 
 STREET 
 
PREFACE 
 
 Perhaps it may be convenient to say, first, that the 
 following pages, though not serving as lectures in their 
 present form, have largely grown out of lectures de- 
 livered in the Chapter House of Christ Church ; and 
 secondly that, as they here stand, they by no means 
 correspond with their original design. They had been 
 meant to form part of a much larger whole. The prin- 
 cipal object of the whole would have been a study of 
 the Anglican Ordinal, in the light of the Ordinal forms 
 of the earlier Church. Various circumstances, however, 
 have induced me to offer these pages by themselves, as 
 a sort of introduction to such a study. 
 
 The first six of the following chapters were intended 
 as an introduction to the whole. The inquiry into the 
 meaning of ' priesthood ' would have come at a much 
 later point. It was meant to follow after some sketch 
 of the steps of the gradual growth of the fully 
 developed forms of the Sarum Ordinal, and to have 
 formed one portion or aspect (no doubt the most crucial 
 one) in a consideration of the meaning of the transition 
 
vi 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 from the unreformed to the reformed Ordinal of the 
 Enghsh Church. 
 
 The particular application to recent controversy of 
 the principles reached in this inquiry about priesthood 
 was, under the circumstances of the moment, inevitable. 
 Being however less constructive, and more incidental 
 and controversial in character, than the other chapters 
 had been intended to be, it is added as an appendix 
 rather than as a substantive part of the whole. 
 
 Perhaps, under all the circumstances, it is right for 
 me to say in explicit language that I am perfectly 
 conscious of having no claim, through any special 
 learning, to write upon the subject. But valuable 
 beyond words as the special learning of the expert is, 
 I must still believe that in discussions of this kind there 
 is ample room for those who may only hope to deal in 
 an intelligent way with comparatively ordinary data of 
 knowledge, as well as for those who can advance the 
 data of knowledge by exceptional learning of their 
 own. At all events it is in the former of these two 
 characters, and in the strength of this belief as to its 
 place and value, that I have ventured to speak at all. 
 
 I am conscious, however, that this very disclaimer, 
 necessary as it may be in itself, makes it the more in- 
 cumbent on me to say a few words in explanation of 
 the extent to which I have ventured to criticize others, 
 in some cases even those whose learning is monumental ; 
 most of all the late Bishop of Durham, Bishop Light- 
 foot. Believing, however, as I do that his famous 
 utterance upon the Christian ministry has been upon 
 the whole very misleading, it was impossible for me 
 
PREFACE 
 
 vii 
 
 not to attempt to deal with it directly. Upon the face 
 of it I believe that I am entitled to claim that the 
 essay must be confessed to be ambiguous. For it is 
 quite obvious that inferences, which the Bishop himself 
 repudiated, were on all sides largely drawn from it, 
 alike by those who welcomed and those who criticized 
 it, and it is at all events not equally obvious that the 
 inferences were not, as inferences, legitimately drawn. 
 It can hardly be denied then that the essay failed to 
 express perfectly what the Bishop himself had in mind. 
 But if so, I am entitled to press the question, why ? 
 Bishop Lightfoot did not lack the power of lucid ex- 
 position. Why did his essay seem to say what he did 
 not mean ? The very fact of the ambiguity requires 
 some explanation. Where does the explanation lie ? 
 
 In the answer to this question I believe will be found 
 the true key to the criticism of the essay itself. The 
 fault is not, of course, in Bishop Lightfoot's learning. 
 If it were, there would be need of a critic singularly 
 unlike the present writer to say so. But the fault lies 
 rather in a sphere which was less distinctively the 
 sphere of Bishop Lightfoot's unrivalled eminence. 
 It lies in the mental presuppositions, the unchallenged 
 assumptions, the hypotheses or postulates with which 
 he approaches the examination of the evidence. There 
 are flaws in these which will, I believe, account both 
 for the superficial ambiguity (which is obvious), and 
 also for what I, at least, must endeavour to represent 
 as the really unsatisfactory character of his argument 
 upon the evidence. 
 
 I should like to formulate some half-dozen proposi- 
 
viii 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 tions, several of them of an abstract character, which 
 seem to belong to what I may call the unconscious 
 substructure of the Bishop's essay. Thus : Ends are 
 greater than means, and means exist for ends ; therefore 
 whatever belongs to the category of means can in no 
 case be rightly regarded as essential. Again : The out- 
 ward represents the inward, and the inward which is 
 represented is far higher than the outward which repre- 
 sents it ; therefore while the inward is essentially 
 necessary for the reality of the outward, the outward 
 is only conventionally necessary for the reality of the 
 inward. Again : The literal and real meaning of the 
 words sacrifice and priesthood is that which they bore 
 in the Old Testament ; by this all other applications 
 of the words must be measured and judged. Again : 
 If ministry is representative of the Body as a whole, 
 then the Body as a whole, and every member thereof, 
 must implicitly possess the right to minister. Again : 
 A corporate or universal priesthood and a divinely and 
 exclusively specialized priesthood are mutually incom- 
 patible ideas. Again: It will follow as a corollary that 
 if there is for convenience a separated ministry, it 
 cannot be matter of any crucial moment whether the 
 ministerial authority of new ministers grows by a sort 
 of evolution out of the life of the general Church Body, 
 or is devolved ministerially through the action only of 
 those Avho themselves have been similarly accredited as 
 ministers before. Again : The Church is, in the first in- 
 stance, a plurality of individual units, and by aggregation 
 of these it becomes, in the second instance, subordinately, 
 and as it were accidentally, an articulated unity. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 ix 
 
 I do not say that other propositions similar to these 
 might not also be formulated, but these are what occur 
 to my own mind. Nor of course do I mean that these 
 assumptions are in anyway peculiar to Bishop Lightfoot. 
 On the contrary, it is the more important to notice them, 
 just because they are the characteristic assumptions 
 of many minds, both of theological writers and of the 
 general public. Meanwhile, if it would be perhaps too 
 much to say in sweeping fashion that every one of 
 these propositions is absolutely false, at least it may 
 safely be said that even the best and truest among 
 them would require much careful interpretation and 
 guarding before it could be safely accepted as true. 
 And most of them on examination would have to be 
 rejected altogether. 
 
 Of course I do not suggest that principles such as 
 these are to be found asserted as principles, totidem 
 verbis, in Bishop Lightfoot's essay on the Ministry. 
 Had they been explicitly asserted they would have 
 been less dangerous. Moreover, in order to be ex- 
 plicitly asserted they would have had to be consciously 
 recognized, and so recognized they would have been 
 cross-examined by the Bishop, and under cross-ex- 
 amination they could not but have been seriously 
 modified. But I do believe that, though without 
 explicit recognition, every one of these principles is — if 
 unconsciously, only so much the more absolutely — taken 
 for granted throughout the essay, as a secure assump- 
 tion beyond reach of question or argument, as a 
 fundamental hypothesis, as an axiomatic postulate. 
 
 At this moment I am not concerned to scrutinize 
 
X 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 them further. To a considerable extent at least they 
 will be found to be scrutinized in the following pages. 
 But I should like to suggest that there could hardly 
 be an instance which would justify with more striking 
 completeness the singular wisdom of the method of 
 Hooker's argument in the Ecclesiastical Polity, when 
 he devotes no less than four entire books, before 
 reaching the apparent subjects of dispute, to the pre- 
 liminary task of scrutinizing the underlying assump- 
 tions or mental postulates with which his antagonists 
 approached the handling of the evidence that was before 
 them ; and, on the other hand, of slowly building up and 
 explaining and justifying the counter-postulates which 
 he, on his side, desired and claimed the right to use. 
 
 To me it seems always a congenial task, and I be- 
 lieve that it is very generally a necessary one, to dwell 
 upon the supreme importance, for the insight of real 
 understanding, of the underlying postulates or principles 
 which ordinarily precede conscious argument. Prin- 
 ciples of this kind are indeed indispensable. But 
 though they cannot be dispensed with, it is most 
 desirable that they should be examined — most desir- 
 able that they should be criticized. Such criticism, it 
 is to be hoped, will often, not unimportantly, modify 
 them. But the evidence cannot be approached with- 
 out them. Examination of evidence, without postu- 
 lates, would be profitless, — if it were possible. It is 
 mere delusion to suppose that, in the absence of con- 
 stitutive first principles, a study of details will lead to 
 exceptionally unbiased, or indeed even to intelligent 
 conclusions at all. The cogency of evidence — nay, its 
 
PREFACE 
 
 xi 
 
 whole value, and even meaning — depends absolutely on 
 the mental convictions with which we approach it. 
 
 Thus, to take a leading example : If I am really 
 convinced, in heart and conscience, that ' miracles never 
 happened,' I shall of course so view the evidence, not 
 legitimately only but inevitably, as to reconstruct it, if 
 need be from beginning to end, upon the principles of 
 the modern humanitarian theology. But if I am really 
 convinced, in heart and conscience, that Jesus Christ is 
 the incarnation and manifestation of the eternal God, 
 then what we call ' miracles ' will be to me little less 
 than an inherent necessity of thought, a consequence, 
 necessary and natural, of that central reality of 
 ' nature ' which a real absence of ' supernatural ' powers 
 would almost if not quite belie. 
 
 It is idle to pretend to approach the evidence in 
 detail with neither conviction, or to build up conviction 
 on such a point only out of the evidence in detail. 
 The central convictions themselves, which are part, as 
 it were, of the very structure of the personal conscious- 
 ness, will be the result of the widest possible range of 
 experience, and intelligent reflection, and habitual 
 character ; and the meaning of the particular evidence 
 will depend almost wholly upon its relation to the 
 central personal convictions. The very same events 
 will be to one personality a positive experience of 
 God's love, and to another a proof that there is neither 
 love nor God. If I endeavour so to confine the range 
 of my life's consciousness as to deduce a ruling prin- 
 ciple on the highest questions from the particular evi- 
 dence taken alone, the result will be, not that I shall 
 
xii 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 succeed in doing so, — that is impossible ; but that 
 my ruhng principle will be a sort of paradox reached 
 by way of accident, instead of being itself the true out- 
 come of reasonable thought. But if, as I must submit, 
 everything in a matter of this kind — even the meaning 
 of the evidence — depends upon the mental presuppo- 
 sitions with which the evidence is approached, it is 
 necessary to plead for a more explicit recognition of 
 this most important principle of truth. 
 
 Unhappily we are not quite unaccustomed even to 
 that extreme reductio ad absurdum of the principle of 
 (so-called) ' impartiality,' which would refrain from 
 inculcating upon children the fundamental truths of 
 God and man — in order that they may find them out 
 ' impartially ' for themselves ! There is only one 
 hypothesis which would save such a course from 
 fatuity ; and that is the hypothesis that the truths of 
 the Creed are themselves unimportant conjectures upon 
 subjects neither known at all nor at all necessary to be 
 known. And this no doubt is what the advocates of 
 such a course do in fact, either explicitly or uncon- 
 sciously, hold. But suppose for a single moment that 
 the truths of the Christian Creed are what they claim 
 to be ; and it would be at least as reasonable to leave 
 children to shape out their own unguided experience 
 as to principles about ' picking and stealing, evil- 
 speaking, lying and slandering, temperance, soberness 
 and chastity,' as about sin, and atonement, and love, 
 the revelation of the fatherhood of God in the incarnate 
 life of Jesus Christ, or the transfiguring of personality 
 by the presence and the power of the Holy Ghost. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 xiii 
 
 But to put out of sight what is mere extravagance 
 of paradox, there are instances of a somewhat similar 
 principle far more moderate in kind, which perhaps 
 will come nearer home. No doubt immense service 
 has been done in this generation by the detailed work 
 of exegetical scholars ; and especially by work in which, 
 and for which, those scholars laid aside, as far as 
 possible, for a time and for a purpose, the directive 
 influence of their own theological preconceptions. But 
 it is only up to a certain point that this is either 
 possible or desirable ; and it may be doubted whether 
 prevailing fashions of thought do not exaggerate the 
 scope and power of work which is conducted upon this 
 basis. Such work is corrective, not creative ; it cross- 
 examines most valuably, but it cannot really construct. 
 If it puts its presuppositions out of sight in order to 
 make inquiries which shall test and correct them, it 
 may be said to assume the presuppositions themselves, 
 as well as the cross-examining purpose, as the very 
 motive for putting them momentarily out of sight ; 
 and undoubtedly, as it puts them aside only in order 
 to test them, so having tested (perhaps corrected) them 
 in various particulars, it must fall back upon them 
 again. It is the presuppositions themselves (as cor- 
 rected, no doubt, in detail ; but it is certainly not the 
 corrections in detail apart from the presuppositions) 
 which are really illuminative. It is the old ideas, 
 commonplaces of the thought and faith of the Church, 
 to which insight belongs. Their expression may be 
 modified by criticism. But criticism can neither sup- 
 plant nor dispense with them. 
 
xiv 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 I am pleading that the interpretation of the text of 
 the New Testament should be throughout theological 
 as well as exegetical ; or rather that theological beliefs 
 should be recognized as legitimately present in, and 
 for, the exegetical processes. Of course it is true that 
 the theological beliefs themselves have their basis also 
 in the text of the New Testament. But just as every 
 action done by Christ, or every Avord spoken by His 
 lips, requires for its perfect apprehension the realization 
 of the Person whose word or act it was ; so the 
 theological truths which we have gathered (so far at 
 least as we have rightly gathered them) from medita- 
 tion (say) upon the Gospel of St. John, — ought really 
 to be present as a necessary, and determining, quality 
 of the thought with which we apprehend the real 
 significance of historical details in the Acts or the 
 Epistles. If, for a purpose, the words of Christ are 
 often taken as if they were ' the words of any other 
 man,' it will at least be recognized that something of 
 their fullness is left aside so long as that hypothesis is 
 maintained. It is a method legitimate, for a purpose, 
 as method ; but it is not the condition upon which the 
 completest apprehension is possible. 
 
 Now I cannot help suggesting that it is a somewhat 
 characteristic temptation of careful textual interpreters 
 to try to work what are called the historical or exe- 
 getical methods, as if it were possible that they should 
 yield their best results apart from the light of the truths 
 of dogmatic theology. Something perhaps of this 
 tendency we recognize even where we might little have 
 expected it. It would be hard to find a scholar of graver 
 
PREFACE 
 
 XV 
 
 or more solid judgement than Dr. Hort. Often there 
 is upon his words the touch of a Hving and illuminating 
 enthusiasm. Yet even Dr. Hort appears sometimes 
 so to interpret the history as if the narrative detail 
 of historical passages could yield their fullest meaning 
 apart from the doctrinal verities which underlie, and 
 find partial expression in, historical detail : as if, that 
 is, the true exegesis of Church history could be non- 
 theological. This comes most clearly into view, when 
 he draws negative conclusions from his text, and offers, 
 by them, to correct traditional belief. If for example, 
 by this method, he claims to show that the Apostles 
 received from our Lord no authority to govern in the 
 Church ; that there were no ' ecclesiae ' as a result of 
 St. Paul's first missionary journey in Europe ; that 
 a SiuKouos had nothing to do with teaching ; or that 
 the connexion between ' laying on of hands ' and 
 ' ordination to ministry ' was rather accidental than 
 important ; is he not, so far, misunderstanding the 
 scope of his own method, and carrying it into exactly 
 the kind of conclusions which it is inherently unable to 
 bear ? The full evidence for or against such principles 
 as these can never be found in a textual exegesis from 
 which theology, as such, is excluded by hypothesis. 
 
 It maybe said, perhaps, that I am pleading for what 
 would be both retrograde and perilous ; that I am 
 asking to go back from a scientific to an a priori 
 method of interpreting history. It is true that I am 
 asking to go back from an exaggeration of the so- 
 called scientific method, to so much as was true in the 
 method described, or misdescribed, as a priori. That 
 
xvi 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 this (like ever)- conceivable method) is liable to abuse, 
 I have no doubt whatever. I should admit also that 
 the abuse of it is the besetting sin of whatever is 
 artificial or narrow in ecclesiastical professionalism ; 
 and therefore that it is in this direction that the temper 
 which is before all things orthodox and dutiful is most 
 characteristically liable, when not perfectly balanced, to 
 be betrayed into mistake. Nevertheless, I must still 
 plead that the reading of history in which great vital 
 facts, like the Incarnate Life, or the nature and mean- 
 ing of the Church of Christ, are contained, does and 
 must always so essentially depend upon the funda- 
 mental convictions of the reader, that for the adequate 
 interpretation of the written history correct mental 
 presuppositions and principles are as indispensable as 
 is a scholarly fidelity to the letter of the text. Spiritual 
 narrative, as well as spiritual philosophy, is for the 
 seeing eye and for the hearing ear ; which means that 
 something else is needed for discernment of their truth 
 than the merely intellectual impartiality of the secular 
 scholar or historian. I do not really need to plead 
 for reading in the light of mental presuppositions ; for 
 I am convinced that it is impossible to read otherwise : 
 but inasmuch as the whole effect of the reading will 
 depend upon the quality of the presuppositions, whether 
 they be true or whether they be false, I do plead that, 
 instead of being covered up and ignored, or denied, 
 these should themselves be most carefully measured 
 and informed. To read with wholly erroneous pre- 
 suppositions is (unless they be abandoned) necessarily 
 to end in a perverse conclusion ; whilst so to ignore 
 
PREFACE 
 
 xvii 
 
 the place of the presuppositions as to affect to read 
 with none at all — even if all perversity be avoided — 
 is almost to ensure an element, at least, of accident or 
 of paradox in the result. 
 
 To return, however, to the contents of the following 
 pages. I should like to say that the question of the 
 relation in general between ' inward ' and ' outward,' in 
 this world of body and soul, which I have tried ex- 
 plicitly to raise in the second chapter, appears to me 
 to be the fundamental question of the book. I may 
 have been quite unsuccessful in the attempt to throw 
 any useful light upon this relation ; but if so, I would 
 only say the more emphatically, that inasmuch as it is 
 this which certainly, if not obviously, lies at the root 
 of an immense amount of apparent discrepancy of 
 thought upon all sacramental or quasi-sacramental 
 subjects, it is exactly this which in a very special and 
 urgent sense stands in need of true and wise treatment. 
 Perhaps there could hardly be a greater boon than 
 a treatment of this subject which should be philoso- 
 phically and theologically adequate. 
 
 The first part of this volume deals with what appears 
 to be an excessive depreciation of the outward, upon 
 the Protestant side. The later part deals rather with 
 the counter-tendency, with which Romanism has more 
 and more identified itself, to overstate the outward. 
 The one seems to me so to subordinate, as really to 
 sacrifice, the outward to the inward. The other more 
 and more merges inward in outward. But if outward 
 can have no reality save as outward of an inward, it 
 is no less true that inward can have no expression, and 
 
 b 
 
xviii 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 therefore in this world at least cannot realize itself 
 after all, save in and through outward. The truth is, 
 in this respect, delicately balanced : and neither the 
 one nor the other strikes the balance of truth. 
 
 What I have been led to say upon the subject was 
 primarily the outcome of an attempt to criticize such 
 imperfect conceptions as are to be found perhaps at 
 their best in Bishop Lightfoot's essay. But I could 
 not but feel that the principles which had been 
 gradually emerging out of this attempt to criticize an 
 exaggeration upon the side of protestantism, were 
 themselves the very principles upon which to deter- 
 mine the controversies which have more lately de- 
 veloped themselves upon the opposite side. The clue 
 was ready at hand by which to discern between what 
 was true and what was merely formal or distorted in 
 theories as to the reality of Christian priesthood. 
 And certainly anything like insight into the reality 
 of Christian priesthood seemed to carry with itself 
 the real refutation of all Roman attempts to in- 
 validate the priesthood of the Anglican Church. 
 Such attempts have been kaleidoscopic and shifting 
 enough. But below all such surface variations, the 
 true issue, I am convinced, will ultimately turn upon 
 no superficial logic or technical details, but upon the 
 profounder discernment of the answer to the question, 
 ' What does Christian priesthood really mean } ' 
 
 The main thought of the second (which is the most 
 cardinal) portion of the essay on Priesthood (ch. vii) is 
 of course not new. Striking expression was given to 
 it, some years ago, by the Rev. J. R. Illingworth. It 
 
PREFACE 
 
 xix 
 
 is worked upon in considerable detail by Dr. Milligan. 
 But neither of these writers was using it exactly as the 
 key to the true interpretation of Priesthood. Indeed, 
 it is rather, perhaps, a matter of surprise that there 
 have not been more endeavours than there have to 
 expound the doctrine of priesthood, as a whole, upon 
 what may be called the distinctively Anglican hypo- 
 thesis, which is also, I believe, the inclusive and 
 balanced truth. Meanwhile, if the exposition of this 
 seventh chapter should commend itself, on its own 
 grounds, to any of those who may read it, I should 
 certainly venture to suggest that (as the Appendix has 
 endeavoured to show) this is also the true standpoint 
 from which to view the various controversies that 
 have been raised both about Anglican priesthood, and 
 about the true basis and standing of Anglicanism. 
 
 There is only this further to add : that it is certainly 
 not in any blindness as to their immense inadequacy, 
 in manifold directions, that I have nevertheless con- 
 vinced myself that I do right, under existing circum- 
 stances, in commending these pages to the judgement 
 of the Church ; not certainly without abundant cause 
 for misgiving, yet in hope that (with whatever qualifi- 
 cations or corrections) the real effort of their thought 
 will be found to be ' according to the proportion of the 
 faith,' — ' the faith which was once for all delivered unto 
 the saints,' — ' the faith which is in Christ Jesus ^' 
 
 Christ Church, 
 Feast of St. Michael and All Angels, 1897. 
 
 ' Rom. xii. 6; Jude 3; i Tim. iii. 13. 
 
 b2 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 The Nature of Church Unity. 
 
 Conceptions of Church ministry are found to be dependent upon 
 conceptions of Church Unity i 
 
 Is the ' unity ' of the Creed a gradual result of secular uniting, or 
 a dominant and necessary principle of religion ? . . . . 2 
 
 Different ideas or forms of unity — unity of accidental circum- 
 stances — unity developing into a practical ideal — unity as a philo- 
 sophical conception — unity as a theological verity. These are not 
 really antithetical, but combined in the Church : and no one of 
 them is untrue except so far as it is used to deny the truth of the 
 others 3 
 
 Dr. Hatch's Bampton Lectures. Their apparent effort so to 
 press the lower as to discredit the higher conceptions of unity. 
 Arguments from Hebrews x. 25, Jude 18, Hermas, Barnabas, and 
 Ignatius 10 
 
 What is the real outcome of the passages . . . . . 19 
 
 Note upon ' The Chrisiian Ecclesia ' by the Rev. Dr. Hort, late 
 Margaret Professor in the University of Cambridge ... 22 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 The Relation between Inward and Outward. 
 
 Is, then, the unity only ' spiritual ' ? Relation between spirit and 
 body. The apostolic Church corporate and organized — witness of 
 excommunication — St. Paul's struggle for corporate unity . . 30 
 
 It is in proportion to failure that the inner idea and its outward 
 expression are discordant or antithetical. The Church militant 
 
 b3 
 
xxii 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 and the Kingdom triumphant are the same Church. The saint in 
 imperfection, or in beatitude, is one personality. Spirit does not 
 supersede body; but body is the method of spirit ; and spirit is the 
 
 meaning of body 36 
 
 The place of the bodily and outward misconceived by Bishop 
 Lightfoot— and the character of Church unity. The mistaken 
 antithesis of Montanism. Ignatius and Tertullian. Dr. Hatch 
 and Montanism. The same misconception lies at the root of 
 ' Quakerism,' and is part of the instinct of modem Puritanism . 43 
 
 Ends and means — ' inherent ' value of means. Distinction be- 
 tween 'essential' and 'of the essence.' Divine use and moral 
 indispensableness of media 56 
 
 CHAPTER ni. 
 
 The Relation between Ministry and Laity. 
 
 If ' means,' as the methods of God's condescension, are ' essential,' 
 in what sense is ministry an indispensable means ? Is it a real 
 
 intermediary between God and His people ? 64 
 
 The Church is a ' body ' : the body means not some, but all : but 
 the body performs specific actions through specific organs. The 
 Bampton Lectures for 1868— Canon Gore — Dr. Milligan. Fallacy 
 of the inference that if the empowered organ represents all, all must 
 have the power to represent 66 
 
 The distinction, nevertheless, wholly missed by Dr. Hatch — his 
 meaning otherwise a noble one — and by Bishop Lightfoot. Their 
 use of Tertullian. TertuUian's misconception a necessary result 
 of his Montanism. Origen — Clement of Alexandria. Bishop 
 Lightfoot's use of them illegitimate. Their real position that of 
 
 every rational ' high Churchman.' Irenaeus and Justin Martyr . 73 
 
 Church people in general have a real relation to ordination : 
 but ministers, if representatives, are not delegates. Fallacy of the 
 word 89 
 
 On the other hand, ministerial distinction, whatever else it may 
 be, does not of itself alter personal character, or essential conditions 
 of right and wrong. There is a real priestly character and obliga- 
 tion which is shared by all. The development of ' vicarious ' 
 ideas of priestly capacity and separateness — due more to spiritual 
 indolence of laity than to spiritual ambition of ministry. Canon 
 Gore and Dr. Liddon on the universal priesthood. Spiritual 
 dignity of a ' layman ' 91 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 xxiii 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 The Basis of Ministry— Divine Commission. 
 Authority to minister in spiritual things must rest upon reality of 
 
 commission — not from men but from God. The only practical 
 question is, How is this divine commission conferred ? . . . loo 
 
 _I. Is it through merely individual inspiration? practically, rather 
 than abstractly, incredible : antecedent improbabilities : the case of 
 Old Testament prophecy : the case of St. Paul : the Didache. 
 Would the method be credible now, even if it had been true then ? . 105 
 
 II. Is it through Church appointment by any — or no— outward 
 ministry ? Involves denial of the whole ministerial and sacra- 
 mental principle : but ultimately must be determined by Church 
 history. Cannot rationally emerge as a new principle in the later 
 centuries no 
 
 III. The principle of apostolic succession, as principle — the 23rd 
 Article in exact accord with it. Enormous strength of the witness 
 
 of Clement of Rome. Importance of the issue . . . . 113 
 
 The real issue never recognized by Bishop Lightfoot. Contra- 
 dictory indications of his meaning. Is ministerial authority evolved 
 or devolved ? The question turns historically upon the origin of 
 the episcopate . . . . . . . . . . .117 
 
 Apostolic succession a question, in each generation, ol \.\\^ prese7it 
 rather than of the past. It is distinguishable in abstract principle 
 from episcopacy, but not in practice, if episcopacy be right . . 123 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 Gradations of Ministry in the New Testament. 
 
 I. Apostolate. Dependent on personal mission from Jesus Christ. 
 The case of St. Paul. Its awful authority — neither based upon, 
 nor merged in, the mutual love of the apostle and his flock. 
 Apostolate the basis and background of everything in the Church. 126 
 
 II. Diaconate. Its secular work — its spiritual character. The 
 secular aspect apt to be exaggerated 1 36 
 
 III. Presbyterate. No notice of its institution. The names 
 'bishop' and 'presbyter' interchangeable. Ruling — teaching — 
 indications of deeper mysteries — solemn pastoral care. A /oca/ 
 leadership, but always assuming the background of apostolate . 140 
 
 IV. Apostolic men or delegates. The case of St. James — in the 
 first instance personal and unique. He ' personifies' the Church 
 
xxiv 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 of Jerusalem. The case of Timotheus and Titus ; ruling, teaching, 
 control over services and teachers ; jurisdiction over the whole 
 Church, including presbyters or bishops. The connexion between 
 authority and ordination in the case of Timotheus .... 146 
 
 V. Prophets. Who are they ? — Acts xiii. i seqq. ; i Cor. xii-xiv : 
 three inferences from the picture in i Cor. xiv : Ephes. iv. Prophecy 
 a divine endowment rather than a ministerial office ; but a natural 
 (perhaps necessary) qualification for the higher possibilities of 
 ministry 158 
 
 Recapitulation of results 167 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 Gradations of Ministry in Sub-apostolic Times. 
 I. TheZJ/V/f?;://^— itsjewish character and questionable authority — 
 
 its picture of Church ministry. Conception of the ' apostolic back- 
 ground ' ; its likeness — and unlikeness — to the New Testament. 
 Limited insight of the writers ........ 170 
 
 II. Clement of Rome. Authority and character of his letter. 
 What has become of the ' prophets ' ? In relation to ministry, at 
 all events, they have no place at all. Has the apostolic background 
 disappeared Clement's own position really episcopal. Indications 
 in the letter that ' presbyters ' (in the ordinary sense) are not ulti- 
 mately supreme 1 79 
 
 III. Ignatian letters — their witness to unity. This unity sacra- 
 mental ; ministerial unity, represented by the bishop, the symbol 
 and seal of it. Vagueness of Ignatian witness to episcopacy in any 
 aspect but this one. Episcopal references in the letter to Rome . 190 
 
 IV. The letter of Polycarp. Its silence about episcopate. Its 
 episcopal character 200 
 
 V. Hermas. Unity of the Church. Ministerial distinctions. 
 ' Bishops ' quite discernible ; yet perhaps verbally included within 
 the title ' presbyters.' The prophets in Hermas. Hermas' own 
 position as prophet — his date ; if tei/ip. Pius, episcopacy is assumed ; 
 if temp. Clement, his indications important as supplementing 
 Clement's letter 206 
 
 Summary. Was the episcopal background of the second century 
 newly evolved, or lineally descended from the ' apostolic back- 
 ground ' ? The former view irreconcilable with Clement's doctrine 
 of apostolic succession, as well as with Ignatius. Both Polycarp 
 and Hermas really on the same side 215 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 XXV 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 What is Priesthood in the Church of Christ ? 
 I. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The counter-exaggerations of the sixteenth century, Roman and 
 Puritan, reach their climax on this subject 220 
 
 The unreformed conception. Its popular exaggeration part of 
 what the Reformers had to deal with. The Sarum Pontifical — 
 its ancient prayers. Proportion of their teaching altered by de- 
 velopment of ceremonial actions — development all in one direction 
 — disproportioned results. The Council of Trent — its caution — 
 yet failure to restore proportion 223 
 
 The Anglican Reformation— retention of the priestly title. Sig- 
 nificance of this. Bishop Lightfoot's mistaken relation to the 
 terms sacerdotium and sacrijicium ....... 234 
 
 II. 
 
 These words only properly intelligible in the Person of Jesus 
 Christ. Not Calvary alone, but the eternal presentation of Him- 
 self in heaven (as * the living One ' who ' was dead ') is the con- 
 summation of His sacrifice. Analogy of the Levitical law . . 243 
 
 I. What is sacrifice in Him? Not inherently suffering, but 
 rather that which becomes suffering under human circumstances. 
 It is Divine Love, within conditions of sin. Its outward necessity 
 crucifixion ; its inward, and atoning, reality, infinite love. The 
 outward is not separable from the inward, it is merely the inward 
 
 in utterance 246 
 
 II. What Christ is, the Church must be. She is priestly by 
 outward enactment, in the Eucharist, which is her ceremonial 
 identification with the Atoning Sacrifice : inwardly, through the 
 correlative reality, in her, of the spirit of sacrifice, the self-expen- 
 diture of Divine Love 251 
 
 III. The priesthood of the ministry is the priesthood of the 
 Church specialized and personified in certain representative instru- 
 ments—outwardly as authorized enacters and leaders of Eucharistic 
 worship — inwardly as set to embody personally the spirit of 
 priestly sacrifice, which is love 257 
 
 The outward fails in reality after all, except so far as it is the 
 outward of the inward. No account of priesthood can be adequate 
 which rests in terms of ceremonial enactment only .... 260 
 
xxvi 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 III. 
 
 These two aspects of Christian ministry have never rightly been 
 separated. Why the ' sacrificial ' language is not more explicit in 
 the New Testament. All the conceptions essential to it shown to 
 be there. They are involved in the doctrine of the Atonement. 
 Acts XX. St. Paul. The Epistle to the Hebrews .... 263 
 
 Corroboration of this view of Scripture from the Didache, Clement 
 of Rome, Ignatius, Justin Martyr, and others. Bishop Lightfoot 
 misled by false antitheses 272 
 
 IV. 
 
 The Anglican position. Restoration of true proportion of outward 
 and inward. Priestly executive privilege, and pastoral self-devo- 
 tion, two aspects of one reality. Acts xx and the Ordinal. No 
 perfection claimed for the Anglican Ordinal ; but it is a real 
 recovery of the scriptural — and the true — relation .... 283 
 
 Reply to two objections: — i. ' That pastoral devotion, however 
 necessary, is a wholly distinct thing from priesthood.' It is not so 
 verbally, if the priesthood is the title of the whole office ; it is not 
 so essentially, because the priest who is in no sense pastor is inade- 
 quate as priest. 2. ' That even though pastoral devotion inhere 
 in fullness of priesthood, yet definitions and formulae can move 
 only in the sphere of outward distinctions.' Fallacy involved in 
 defining by distinctive outwardnesses, illustrated by the case of 
 a viceroy. The Church should be always on her guard against 
 this very tendency to externalize ; and nowhere more importantly 
 than in the language of her Ordinal 290 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 Upon the recent Roman Controversy as to the 
 Validity of Anglican Orders. 
 
 Technical questions of validity turn rather upon the ceremonial 
 outwardness than the inner meaning of priesthood. Four require- 
 ments of outward technicality— apostolic succession, intention, 
 laying on of hands, and prayer 300 
 
 The real question turns upon the Roman claim to have priest- 
 hood and intention exclusively defined in her own sense. It is 
 manifest that Anglicanism challenges the correctness of Roman 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 xxvii 
 
 PAGE 
 
 definitions and proportions. No argument possible between dis- 
 putants on the assumption that one of them has been throughout, 
 and is, infalHble. Almost all Roman argument based ultimately 
 
 on the assumption that Rome is infallible 304 
 
 Character of the efforts of recent writers. 
 
 I. M. Dalbus. His striking admissions; his strangely inadequate 
 reasons for an adverse decision ....... 310 
 
 II. M.Duchesne. Criticism of Dalbus. Character of the posi- 
 tion really occupied by MM. Dalbus and Duchesne. Their help- 
 lessness 315 
 
 III. M. Boudinhon, No. i, answers M. Dalbus. His argument 
 about intention ; warning to M. Duchesne 319 
 
 IV. M. Boudinhon, No. 2, constructs a new argument to prove 
 the Anglican 'forms' inadequate; three fallacious assumptions 
 underlying his major premiss ; his curious conclusions ; new 
 position about intention ......... 324 
 
 V. M. Delasge. His criticism on the controversy; disallows 
 the objections ; would recognize Anglican orders as valid, though 
 irregular. General position of the argument 333 
 
 VI. The Papal intervention ; expectations and possibilities ; 
 pathos of the result ; the Encyclical ; character and effect of its 
 claims 337 
 
 VII. The Bull; its decision; its argument; takes apparently 
 two objections, {a) to 'form,' {b) to ' intention.' Both reducible to 
 intention only; and to the two simple assumptions — i. Rome is 
 infallible ; 2. Rome has divine right to implicit and universal 
 obedience. No argument outside these assumptions . . . 341 
 
 The Anglican position neither understood nor affected at all. If 
 Rome be not infallible, the entire Roman argument collapses . 349 
 
 Grave prospect on the side of Romanism. Its self-identification 
 with mechanical externality. Character and function of the 
 Anglican Church 351 
 
 Index 355 
 
MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 
 
 The basis of a true understanding of Church ministry is 
 a true understanding of the Church. The Church is hkened 
 to a body ; her ministers to certain specific organs or members 
 of the body ^. If, in the material body, one member differs 
 from, or is related to, another, these mutual differences, or 
 relations, at once serve to explain, and receive explanation 
 from, the unity of the body as a single articulated whole. So 
 when we inquire into the rationale of Church ministries, we 
 are inquiring into the principle of the differentiation of func- 
 tions within a single unity. If there are differences of 
 ministries, if ministry, as a whole, is different from laity, these 
 differences at once illustrate, and depend upon, the unity of 
 that whole in which, and for which, they exist. It is a funda- 
 mental truth that the differentiation is a differentiation of, 
 and within, unity. If then we are to reach an intelligent view 
 of the nature of the differentiation, we must begin with an 
 intelligent view of the nature of the unity. Till there is some 
 agreement as to the meaning of Church unity, a discussion of 
 
 ' Cf. Romans xii. 4-8 with i Cor. xii. 12-30. 
 B 
 
2 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 the rationale of Church ministry would be a discussion in 
 the air. 
 
 That the question of the nature of the unity of the Church 
 is no merely speculative but the necessary practical basis of 
 an intelligent theory of Church ministry, is sufficiently illus- 
 trated by a comparison of two of the more recent expositions 
 of ministry. Dr. Hatch and Canon Gore, however otherwise 
 they may differ, are alike in this. Each begins his explana- 
 tion of ministerial organization by a theory of the nature and 
 being of the Church. No doubt the conclusions of the two 
 writers differ widely. But the conclusion reached by either 
 writer in respect of ministry is in sufficiently accurate cor- 
 respondence with the theory from which either sets out as to 
 the character of the Church, and the meaning of the organiza- 
 tion which protects and expresses her unity. 
 
 It is not the fact of the unity which is in question. The 
 words of the Nicene Creed, ' I believe in one Catholic and 
 Apostolic Church,' contain an assertion of unity which would 
 not be challenged on either side. But it may be worth while 
 to distinguish some of the different ideas which such acknow- 
 ledgement of unity may represent. In what sense is it part 
 of the Christian Creed that the Church is One ? 
 
 The most obvious distinction to draw is between unity 
 acquired by degrees from below, and unity revealed as 
 inherent from above. Take the two cases in their simplest 
 and barest forms. In the first case certain historical con- 
 ditions tend towards the realization of unity as a fact ; and 
 out of the fact of unity is developed the idea. In the second 
 case the unity is first in idea, a necessary element in the 
 meaning of the life of the Church, and remains, as such, equally 
 fundamental and constant, whether it is more, or is less, 
 realized in fact. 
 
 The first of these two appears, in its origin at least, to be 
 a purely accidental unity. If this is the true account of the 
 unity of the Church, then in the first instance there was no 
 
I] 
 
 THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 
 
 3 
 
 such thing, either in fact or idea, as Church unity ; but 
 Christians were merely individual units, whom pressure of 
 circumstances drove more and more to coalesce into a society, 
 until by degrees the idea of the society became a leading idea 
 of the Christian life. If this is historically true, then the idea 
 of the society, exactly so far as it became among Christians 
 religiously dominant or peremptory, is convicted of being a 
 false idea. For dominant or peremptory in the sphere of 
 conscience is just what a politic convenience, so evolved, has 
 no right to become. 
 
 No doubt, however, it is true that in any society, however 
 accidentally evolved, when it once has reached self-conscious- 
 ness as a society, the maintenance of the social conception 
 becomes a sort of instinctive necessity of self-preservation. 
 Even therefore the merely politic method of association tends 
 to produce an ideal of unity, which, as ideal, does constrain 
 the imagination, even if it has no right to command the 
 conscience. The history of the society is human, is in origin 
 accidental : but the ideal, when produced, outstrips and ignores 
 the accidental origin. Such an ideal, so produced, may be 
 less, or more, noble and inspiring. But it has no right to 
 claim to be transcendental, essential, divine. Trade guilds in 
 the older, and trades unions in the newer, world, may serve 
 perhaps as examples of such unity, coalescing, at first, out of 
 separateness, and yet afterwards (in some cases) speaking to 
 separateness with the prophet-like tones of an ideal which 
 may claim to be obeyed. 
 
 But even in associations purely human and politic it is the 
 case, quite as often as not, that the coalescing is not accidental 
 in kind ; that the idea comes first, and that the association 
 which follows, follows only as a realization, more or less com- 
 plete, of the formative idea. To say that an association is 
 deliberately formed, is to say that the idea precedes the act. 
 It is recognized that if an idea is to be made dominant in the 
 imaginations and characters of men, the effective way to pro- 
 
 B 2 
 
4 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 pagate an idea is to organize a society. Without the brother- 
 hood of a living society it is useless, it seems, to preach either 
 political or social, either moral or religious, ideals. Political 
 clubs, Christian (or other) social unions, temperance or white 
 cross societies, attest on all sides the efificacy of the corporate 
 method of giving life to ideas, the essential dependence (as 
 perhaps we may venture to say) of the inward life upon the 
 outward organism, of spirit (under this world's conditions) 
 upon body. To suggest that the Church is an association 
 parallel with these, though for a higher or more inclusive 
 purpose, would be indeed to make it, in its origin as associa- 
 tion, on the level of the merely human and politic ; but it 
 would be by no means identical, as interpretation of history, 
 with the theory that Christians, as individual units, gradually 
 coalesced under pressure of circumstances into corporate life, 
 and, out of union, acquired the conception of unity. 
 
 We have then, so far, two quite distinguishable forms of 
 the theory of Church unity as being, in the main, human and 
 politic. 
 
 But by degrees we recognize that our thought is challenged 
 by conceptions which go beyond these. There rises, more or 
 less explicitly, the consciousness that men. after all, however 
 much we have learned to regard them instinctively as in- 
 dividuals, are neither quite so distinct, nor so separately 
 complete, as they seemed. From the ^j/Vet -noKiTiKov of 
 Aristotle down to the scientific formula ' solidarity of 
 humanity,' or the overt efforts or latent instincts of modern 
 socialism, there is a gathering witness to the fact that unity 
 in humanity is no merely politic uniting, that there is a sense 
 in which unity is an ultimate and necessary predicate of 
 humanity, a truth which is not inconsistent with, but which 
 lies back behind, individual separateness. The man is not 
 exclusively himself. Even in the conditions of his own in- 
 dividuality, he too is, to an unknown and indefinite extent, 
 the product of the lives and minds of others ; nor is there 
 
I] 
 
 THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 
 
 5 
 
 anything which he can do, or be, or say, which begins and 
 ends wholly in himself. With and for others he is blest ; 
 with and for others he suffers ; as others, inextricably, suffer 
 or are blest with him. The most selfish, the most separate, 
 really stands only to an infinitesimal degree, alone. Nay, it 
 is only in relation to others that he is himself in any adequate 
 sense. Not in abstraction, or isolation, but in communion, 
 lies (it may be) the very meaning of personality itself. As 
 such conceptions as these assert themselves in human con- 
 sciousness, whether from the metaphysical, or the scientific, or 
 the practical moral side, they can hardly fail to affect, and 
 that profoundly, the meaning of the idea of the unity of the 
 Church. For whatever may be the failures of Church history, 
 it is plain that, by the very nature of her being, the Church, 
 in idea at least, intends and aspires to be universally inclusive. 
 If any are left out or sundered from the Church, it is not from 
 the narrowness of the basis on which the Church is conceived. 
 In her own conception at least the Church is Catholic. Even 
 on the most individualistic theory of the Church, it would be 
 admitted that she ought ideally to include all individuals. 
 Her ideal basis is as wide as humanity. Now, however little 
 the conception of the mutual interdependence or solidarity of 
 humanity might affect the idea of an association framed for 
 some highly specialized and narrow purpose, it can hardly 
 fail to give a new depth of meaning to an association which, 
 even without it, and on any showing, was anyhow — just so 
 far as it realized its own ideal — not a specific corporation 
 within humanity, but the corporately articulated unity of 
 humanity itself, and that, just in the widest inclusiveness, just 
 for the highest possibilities, of which human being is capable. 
 Beyond then the merely politic conceptions of the meaning 
 of Church unity, there rises what may be distinguished per- 
 haps as the philosophic conception — based upon the demon- 
 strable incompleteness of the individual life, and appealing to 
 the intellectual imagination with all the grandeur of an eternal 
 
6 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 principle, which can wait for its reahzation with majestic 
 patience, just because — before realization or without it — its 
 own ideal truth remains immovable. 
 
 It is plain, of course, that behind the philosophical concep- 
 tion there remains the theological. Thus far at least the 
 theological conception does not differ from the philosophical, 
 that there is nothing in the philosophical which is not in the 
 theological. But theology has something further to add as to 
 the origin and nature of the unity which, in their different 
 ways, both philosophy and science have recognized. To her, 
 all being is ultimately, not an abstract personification, but 
 a Personal Unity. The unity which the Church represents is 
 the Unity of God. It is true therefore of the Church, in the 
 highest conceivable sense, that her unity is not to be under- 
 stood as a growth which begins from below, and gradually 
 coalesces : her unity is not the crown of an evolution which 
 starts from disunion ; the Church is one in idea whether she 
 is one in fact or not ; her ideal unity from the first is in- 
 herent, transcendental, divine : she is one essentially, as and 
 because God is One. 
 
 In an age whose Trinitarian thought is so superficial as 
 to run, at many points, into Tritheism, it may be that even 
 the appeal to the unity of God has lost part of its meaning. 
 The unity of God is not an accidental, it is much more 
 than a merely arithmetical, unity. It is not merely the 
 negation of dualism. It is the unity of all-comprehensive- 
 ness. It is the unity of inherent self-completeness. The 
 unity is a positive, a necessary, an inherent quality of the 
 essence. To doubt the unity, would be to deny the essence, 
 of Deity. But it is an unity which must not be stated only 
 in abstract terms. It is a living unity, a moral unity, nay, it 
 is goodness, it is life. It is no more capable of plurality 
 than are the idea of moral goodness or the idea of Life ; the 
 meaning of either of which is not amplified, but in an instant 
 altered, limited, and degraded by being expressed in the 
 
I] 
 
 THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 
 
 7 
 
 plural. An unity so complete, an unity which cannot even be 
 viewed from without, is necessarily only in part capable of 
 expression. Words do but indicate, they can never compass 
 it. It is plain, however, neither words nor thought can be even 
 approximately adequate to the truth, which ignore the scrip- 
 tural conception of the Spirit as the constituting and realizing 
 of unity, or the revelation of the Spirit as Love. 
 
 The expression of unity, in this transcendental sense, as the 
 meaning of the life of the Church, is in Scripture direct and 
 complete. It is there as ideal, not implicit only but expressed, 
 not in the early aspirations of the Church only, but in that 
 which was divinely set before the Church, before as yet the 
 Church had begun to be. It may be desirable to quote in 
 full the concluding words of the great High Priestly Prayer of 
 our Lord Jesus Christ, wherein the exposition and aspiration 
 of His work are summed up, at the close of the last evening 
 before He died : ' As Thou didst send Me into the world, 
 even so sent I them into the world. And for their sakes 
 I sanctify Myself, that they themselves also may be sanctified 
 in truth. Neither for these only do I pray, but for them also 
 that believe on Me through their word ; that they may all be 
 one : even as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they 
 also maybe in Us: that the world may believe that Thou didst 
 send Me. And the glory which Thou hast given Me I have 
 given unto them ; that they may be one, even as We are one ; 
 I in them, and Thou in Me, that they may be perfected into one ; 
 that the world may know that Thou didst send Me, and lovedst 
 them, even as Thou lovedst Me. Father, that which Thou 
 hast given Me, I will that, where I am, they also may be 
 with Me ; that they may behold My glory, which Thou hast 
 given Me : for Thou lovedst Me before the foundation of the 
 world. O righteous Father, the world knew Thee not, but 
 I knew Thee ; and these knew that Thou didst send Me ; and 
 I made known unto them Thy Name, and will make it known ; 
 that the love wherewith Thou lovedst Me may be in them, and 
 
8 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 I in them If any of us should feel that there are points at 
 which we imperfectly understand these words, that is cer- 
 tainly not a reason for explaining away so much as we do 
 understand. Plainly at least they set forth, from the beginning, 
 unity, — the transcendental unity, the divine unity, — as the 
 ideal meaning of the society which Christ came to found ; and 
 which, when He was gone, should remain to the end, as His 
 temple, and the representation of His Person, on earth. 
 
 With this ideal, as set forth in Christ's consummating 
 prayer, we take the practical appeal of the Apostle to members 
 of the Church : ' I therefore, the prisoner in the Lord, beseech 
 you to walk worthily of the calling wherewith ye were called, 
 with all lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing 
 one another in love ; giving diligence to keep the unity of the 
 Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one Body, and one 
 Spirit, even as also ye were called in one hope of your calling ; 
 one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism, one God and Father of 
 all, who is over all, and through all, and in all -.' 
 
 It may seem at first sight superfluous to pause at this 
 point and ask which of these views of unity we are ourselves 
 to accept as the meaning of the unity of the Church. Yet it 
 is worth while, if only that we may observe to how very small 
 an extent the different views are really exclusive of each other. 
 It is plain that the theological conception simply absorbs, 
 while it transcends, the philosophical. How far is it incon- 
 sistent with the politic? If by the ' politic ' view of Church 
 unity should be meant (i) that there were various conditions 
 observable in the world eighteen centuries and a half ago 
 which tended towards and facilitated the corporate organization 
 of Christians ; or (2) that the method adopted by the Apostles 
 for the spread of Christian doctrine was, as a matter of history, 
 the corporate method ; that from the first they went every- 
 where proclaiming a ' kingdom,' enrolling ' members ' into it, 
 and organizing for it officers, discipline, and government ; or 
 
 ' St. Jolin xvii. 18-26. ' Eph. iv. 1-6, 
 
I] 
 
 THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 
 
 9 
 
 (3) that the more Christians realized their corporate coherence 
 as a matter of fact, so much the more paramount, even to the 
 natural instinct of Christians, did the corporate ideal become ; 
 then it is plain that the higher view of unity as a theological 
 doctrine is not traversed by such a politic view as this in any 
 particular whatever. Things such as these, as matters of 
 historical study, are as interesting upon the theological, as 
 upon any other, theory of the unity of the Church. 
 
 If at the beginning of the Christian era historians can 
 trace, as one (so to speak) of the characteristics of the social 
 atmosphere, a striking ' tendency towards the formation of 
 associations ^ ' ; this, as an element in the general Praeparatio 
 Evangelica,y^\\\ be no less significant to the Christian theologian, 
 than it would be to any one who should, by its help, desire to 
 explain away the divine conception of the Church. Meanwhile 
 that the Apostolic method of propagating Christianity was, as 
 observed from the outside — whatever might be their own inner 
 theory about the method — parallel, in its main features, with that 
 of other moral and religious societies, is not open to question. 
 Every organization framed among men for the spreading of 
 an idea, illustrates pro taiiio, and is illustrated by, the method 
 of the preaching of the Gospel on earth. Whatever the 
 description may, or may not, leave unsaid, undoubtedly the 
 Christian Church can be truly described as an organized 
 ' association for personal holiness.' It will be observed there- 
 fore that such human or politic accounts of Church unity 
 only begin to be in conflict with the deeper theological theory, 
 if or when they are used for the express purpose of super- 
 seding or contradicting that theory. The antithesis between 
 the two is neither necessary nor natural ; it is an artificial 
 antithesis. To the theologian, these more external and secular 
 aspects of the growth of the Church are not in any sense 
 
 > The Organization of the Early Christian Churches, by Dr. Hatch, p. 26. The 
 Bampton Lectures for 1880. 
 
lo MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 untrue, but they are most incomplete : in much the same sense 
 in which we should most of us regard as valuable, so far as it 
 went, but ludicrously inadequate, any explanation of man's 
 being which should be content to describe him by a chemical 
 analysis of the elements, or a history of the development, of 
 his body. So long as any such explanation of man ignores 
 entirely the question whether the body is all, or whether there 
 is any meaning — transcending, even if interpreting, body — in 
 such words as ' soul ' or ' spirit,' we maj'- simply smile at the 
 immense inadequacy. But if, whether tacitly or deliberately, 
 the explanation is in fact in any measure made use of, to 
 deny, or to discredit, the ideas ' soul ' or ' spirit ' ; or, at the 
 least, to suggest that soul and spirit are ideas so remote and 
 incommensurable, that the chemical body cannot be the 
 expression of them, nor they the animating reality which 
 constitutes and interprets the true meaning of the body ; we 
 should most of us instinctively feel, in the presence of such an 
 assumption, much as the theologian feels if, tacitly or openly, 
 the secular conditions of the development of the Church are 
 used to discredit the idea of her transcendental unity; or at 
 least to suggest that, whether as facts or ideas, her unity on 
 the one hand, and her organization on the other, are, and must 
 be, mutually incommensurable and unrelated. 
 
 Now it seems to me hardly doubtful that the opening posi- 
 tions of Dr. Hatch's Bampton Lectures would, to the great 
 majority of readers, distinctly convey the impression that the 
 writer meant so to use the ' politic ' and ' voluntary ' as to 
 deny, first the original or inherent existence, and therefore in 
 the last resort the ultimate rightfulness, of the claim of the 
 ' transcendental ' or 'peremptory' theory of Church unity, as 
 a doctrine which must be realized in Christian practice. In 
 the first lecture, sketching beforehand his intended work, he 
 says of it, ' We shall see those to whom the Word of Life was 
 preached gradually coalescing into societies ^.' In his synopsis 
 
 > p. 21. 
 
i] THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY ii 
 
 he sums the opening thoughts of his second lecture thus : 
 * There was a general tendency in the early centuries of the 
 Christian era towards the formation of associations, and espe- 
 cially of religious associations. It was consequently natural 
 that the early converts to Christianity should combine 
 together : the tendency to do so was fostered by the Apostles 
 and their successors, and at last, though not at first, became 
 universal \' In the second lecture itself he says: 'Such an 
 aggregation does not appear to have invariably followed belief. 
 There were many who stood apart ; and there were many 
 reasons for their doing so ' The chief purpose ' of the Igna- 
 tian Epistles, he says, ' seems to be to urge those who called 
 themselves Christians to become, or to continue to be, or to be 
 more zealously than before, members of the associations of 
 which the bishops were the head From certain passages 
 in the Ignatian Epistles, he says, 'it is clear' (i) that 'there 
 were Christians ' in the cities addressed ' who did not come 
 to the general assembly or recognize the authority of the 
 bishop, presbyters, and deacons'; (2) that 'this separation 
 from the assembly and its officers went to the extent of 
 having separate eucharists ' ; and (3) ' consequently, that 
 attachment to the organization of which the bishop was the 
 head was not yet universally recognized as a primary duty of 
 the Christian life *.' It is difficult to see what is meant in all 
 this, unless it be, by dwelling on the natural and secular genesis 
 of the Church, and especially by this insistence upon passages 
 which are supposed to carry the conclusion that external unity 
 was not a primary Christian idea, to throw at least more or 
 less of discredit and doubt over any theological postulate of 
 essential unity. 
 
 I do not forget that Dr. Hatch was endeavouring to 
 explain the ' organization of the Christian Churches ' without 
 so much as ' touching ' the ' Christian faith.' ' With doctrine, 
 
 ^ p. XX. ' p. 29. ^ p. 30. 
 
 * In a note (loj on p. 30. 
 
12 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 and with the beliefs which underlie doctrine,' he refuses to be 
 concerned \ But I must say at once that the attempt to 
 explain Church organization or ministry without reference to 
 Christian doctrine or belief appears to me to be an obviously 
 impossible task. I have in mind moreover a phrase which 
 I have marked by italics, which makes it difficult to say pre- 
 cisely how much he himself intended in this part of his 
 argument. Speaking of the subapostolic insistence upon 
 Church unity, he says : ' We consequently find that the union 
 of believers in associations had to be preached, if not as an 
 article of the Christian faith, at least as an element of Christian 
 practice But this very sentence suggests to me a remark 
 which I should have anyhow to press in reference to the 
 passages quoted above. He hints here, somewhat uncertainly, 
 at a possible contrast between the requirements, on the one 
 hand, of the Christian faith, and the attainment, on the other, 
 of the Christian practice. Was there then such a contrast, 
 or was there not ? If, or so far as, it can be shown that there 
 was still in apostolic or subapostolic days some tendency on 
 the part of some individuals on the fringe of Christ's Church 
 to try to be ' Christians ' without necessarily being ' Church- 
 men.' was this, or was this not, really compatible with the 
 essential and inherent nature of Christianity ? This is the 
 very first question which ought, upon the hypothesis, to be 
 raised. And this is just the question which he has not raised 
 at all. When he says, ' There were many who stood apart : 
 and there were many reasons for their doing so,' the first 
 thing we want to be told is ' were there ever any who were 
 allowed to stand apart ? were there, or could there have been, 
 any lawful or adequate reasons for their doing so ? ' He adds, 
 'A man might wish to be Christ s disciple and yet shrink from 
 
 ' Lect. ii. p. 23. 
 
 ' Lect. ii. p. 29. Is the verbal implication in these words to the effect that as 
 ' faith ' it was already accepted, but as ' practice ' it still needed to be preached ? or 
 is it that, though as ' practice ' it was desirable, yet it was ?iot to be preached as 
 an article of faith ? 
 
I] 
 
 THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 
 
 13 
 
 hating father and mother and wife and children and brethren 
 and sisters, yea and his own life also.' Of course he might. 
 But Dr. Hatch does not say a word as to whether he might 
 legitimately so wish. Still less does he make a point of re- 
 minding us that in these very words which he is in fact 
 quoting, Christ Himself had laid down, long before subapo- 
 stolic times, that upon such conditions a man ' cannot be My 
 disciple.' 
 
 Are we then, upon the other hand, to understand that 
 it is admitted by Dr. Hatch that all lax exceptions were 
 necessarily disloyal and untrue to the Christian ideal ? Is 
 there no suggestion that the instances quoted are, or may be, 
 indications of an earlier Christian ideal which was gradually 
 superseded by a later ? Is it assumed that evasion of Church- 
 manship was of course, and always, faultiness of Christianity ? 
 In whichever way we may choose to interpret his thought, the 
 point is that this is the question which Dr. Hatch does not 
 raise. But we cannot tell, without raising it, how to interpret 
 the passages which he adduces. And it must be added that 
 unless he means at least in part to suggest that the Christian 
 ideal might at first have dispensed with Church membership, it 
 is difficult to understand the emphasis which he lays upon the 
 matter at all. If lapsing from effective membership was ipso 
 facto Christian failure, and was, so far, like any other lapsing into 
 worldliness or self-indulgence, the few passages which indicate 
 that there were Christians who so failed are of no importance 
 at all as illustrating any process of ' gradual coalescing ' into 
 corporate life : they show only that the requirements of cor- 
 porate Christianity were from the first irksome to the flesh, and 
 that the necessary coherence of the Church, though from the 
 first an indispensable element in the Christian ideal, was yet 
 in the earliest years of Christian experience less completely 
 inwrought into the universal Christian consciousness than it 
 very speedily became. 
 
 Such a view as this of the meaning of the passages is com- 
 
14 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 pletely borne out, when we turn to examine the passages them- 
 selves. Dr. Hatch quotes from five writers altogether — two 
 within, and three without, the canon of Scripture. The New 
 Testament writers are the author of the Epistle to the 
 Hebrews and St. Jude. Take these first. The crucial words 
 in the Epistle to the Hebrews are these, ' not forsaking the 
 assembling of ourselves together, as the custom of some is 
 Now it may be very difficult to draw from these words any 
 exact historical inference as to the extent of the erroneous 
 ' custom,' but what is perfectly certain upon the passage as 
 a whole, is that this ' custom ' of ' some ' — whatever it amounted 
 to — involves, to the mind of the writer, a total failure to 
 discern the necessary bearing of Christian faith upon prac- 
 tical life. He has been expounding with elaborate care, 
 in the light of the Levitical sacrifices which led up towards it, 
 the nature of the great Christian sacrifice, which was the 
 culmination of the work of the incarnate Redeemer, and was 
 therefore cardinal to the whole system and meaning of a Chris- 
 tian believer's life. From the doctrine of the Atonement it 
 absolutely follows, to him, that the Christian life is a life which 
 is perpetually being presented — with the presenting of the 
 Blood of Jesus — into the holiest place, in and through the way 
 of His consecrated flesh ; and this truth of doctrine, exhibited 
 upon the side of practical life, involves at least these two prac- 
 tical consequences. First, it involves the perpetual consecra- 
 tion of the individual life, with discipline and purifying of the 
 individual conscience. And secondly, since the relation to the 
 Blood of Jesus, through His flesh, is a common, not a private 
 relation, and the great appointed act of communion therewith 
 is a social act, — is the act, is the life, of the brotherhood 
 (the union, not of each with Him severally, but of all with 
 Him corporately, of each therefore necessarily with each, just 
 as truly as of each with Him), it follows that there is also 
 involved both the witness of a corporate worship, and the 
 
 ' Hebrews x. 25. 
 
i] THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 15 
 
 emulation of a mutual devotion and service of love ^ The 
 ' some ' who do not perceive this have never caught the 
 real significance of the doctrine of Atonement, or its bearing 
 upon personal life. Such seems to be the meaning of the 
 passage. Whether the ' some ' were many or were few, the 
 one thing which seems to come out with perfect clearness is 
 that they were fundamentally and altogether wrong. 
 
 But if the bearing of the passage to the Hebrews is suffi- 
 ciently unmistakable, in St. Jude there is no reserve at all-. 
 The most bigoted ecclesiastic could hardly denounce schism 
 in more scathing or unsparing language. ' These are they who 
 make separations, sensual, having not the Spirit.' The whole 
 epistle is an eloquent one, and a terrible, in denunciation. But 
 it might be quoted just as reasonably to show that there was 
 room for profligacy, as for disunion, in the Church of the 
 Apostles. In a sense perhaps neither assertion might be liter- 
 ally false. Yet either would be — and on St. Jude's evidence, 
 at least, would be equally — the essential contradiction of the 
 truth. 
 
 To these two singularly unfortunate passages of Scripture 
 there are added references to three uncanonical writers. First 
 there are five passages in the Shepherd of Hermas, and one 
 in the Epistle of Barnabas. The passages of Hermas are 
 all very similar, and all very slight. What seems to be con- 
 templated in them is neither, on the one hand, a view of 
 
 ' The passage rtjns thus ; — 
 
 ' Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holy place by the Blood 
 of Jesus, by the way which He dedicated for us, a new and living way, through the 
 veil, that is to say, His flesh ; and having a great priest over the house of God ; let us 
 draw near with a true heart in fulness of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an 
 evil conscience, and our body washed with pure water : let us hold fast the con- 
 fession of our hope that it waver not ; for he is faithful that promised : and let us 
 consider one another to provoke unto love and good works ; not forsaking the 
 assembling of ourselves together, as the custom of some is, but exhorting one 
 another ; and so much the more, as ye see the day drawing nigh.' Hebrews x. 
 
 19-25- 
 
 Jude 18-20. 
 
1 6 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 Christianity which ever was, or could have been, in itself the 
 right view ; nor yet, on the other, any deliberately reasoned or 
 consistently completed form of schism from the Church, but 
 rather a certain spirit of worldliness among baptized Christians, 
 which made them wish overmuch, as far as their daily routine 
 was concerned, to live on as part of the secular social life 
 which was going on round them (and which was of course, in 
 fact, a heathen life) ; instead of fearlessly devoting themselves, 
 out and out, to the comparative unworldliness of the social 
 life and social burthen ^ of the Christian brethren. But here 
 again, as in the Scripture, this desire to stand, whether more 
 or less, apart, is consistently condemned as incompatible with 
 the Christian calling. So to be worldly and separate is to 
 desert the truth, to be sundered from the saints, to be value- 
 less unsightly stones, left out of the fabric of the temple of 
 Christ. It is to be self-approved, and therefore self-blinded, 
 undisciplined, unloving, unspiritual. 
 
 The passage in the Epistle of Barnabas is just similar to 
 these. It is a reproof of the selfishness of isolation from the 
 efforts of what ought to be a corporate life. But it is evident 
 that the isolation thought of is, not a rival theory of Church 
 life, but an ordinary piece of moral indolence or cowardice^. 
 Such an impulse towards worldliness is of course perfectly 
 
 ' The same verb occurs in every case : ol iyvwKoTfs Trjv d\rj6iiai', ixrj (nifjeivavTe^ 
 5f iv avrfi fJ-rjSe KoWwfiiVoi rois ay'iois, Vis. iii. 6. oi tv rafs irpaynaTetats iixirecpvp- 
 litvoi KoX HTj KoXXwutvoi Tois aflois, Sim. viii. 8. viprjXoippoves iyevovTO, /cat Kar- 
 iKiTTov TTjv a\Tj0iiav, koX ovk iKoX\r]6r)aav Tofs Siicaiois, dWa. fieTO, twv lOvuiv 
 avvt^riaav, Sitn. viii. 9. ol kv rafs wpa-ffiarelais rats iroiKtXais ifj-impvpnivoL . . . ov 
 KoWSivrai ToTs Sov\ois tov 6eov . . o'l 5e vKovaioi Sva/coKais koWSivtcu. Tofs tovXois 
 ToC 0€oS, Sim. ix. 20. n)} koWwiuvoi rofs SouA.ois tov 0eoC, aXXa /xova^ovTH 
 diToWvovai rds iavrSiv Sim. ix. 26. Compare Clem. Rom. i Cor. xlvi : 
 
 yiypaTTTai yap' Ko\Kdcr0e roh aylois, on ol KoKKdinevoi aiiroTs ayiaaOriaovTai. Cp. 
 also below, ch. vi. p. 206. 
 
 2 ^vyajpi(v airo Traarjs piaTatoTTjTos , luarjaajxfv TtAfiojs rd epya Trjs novijpas oSov. 
 fifj Kad' eavTovs (vSvvovTe? ixovd^€Te ojs rjSrj SeSiKaioj/xti'oi, dXK' enl to avTu avvepxo- 
 ixivoi (Tvv^r]TUT( TT(pi TOV noivfj OV fiifif povTos . X(y(i ydp Tj ypacpTj' Oval ol avverol 
 kavTots Kal kvw-niov iavTUiv imaTrjiiovts. ytvwjXtBa irvivpLaTiKoi, y(vwix(0a vaus 
 TtXdos tSi Q(.S>, Barn, iv, 10, 11. 
 
I] 
 
 THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 
 
 17 
 
 natural. It is hardly conceivable that it should have been 
 absent. Yet the references to it are not such as to suggest 
 that it was largely prevalent in the Christian communities ; 
 still less that it represented any such obstinate instinct or deep- 
 seated conviction of disapproval as we might expect to find, 
 if the principle of organized unity were itself only gradually 
 gaining possession of the minds of those who had been 
 Christians individually before they constituted a Christian 
 Church. 
 
 What these writers really feel is that there were men who 
 did not make their Christian life sufficiently a life of mutual 
 service. They did not understand the extent to which mutual 
 interdependence and corporate self-sacrifice were to be the 
 necessary expression of the Christian spirit. If this lesson 
 was quickly learned as far as the mere external conformity 
 went, and if few Churchmen of later days would doubt that 
 the Church is corporate, it must perhaps still be owned that 
 the reality of mutual service, as expressive of Christianity, is 
 almost as far from being fully realized in an age which takes 
 the corporate theory for granted, as it could have been in any 
 earlier form of Church experience. 
 
 The last witness is the Ignatian Epistles. Now here no 
 doubt we are met with an insistence upon the doctrine and 
 duty of unity, which if upon one side it may be quoted as an 
 emphatic witness to the ecclesiastical idea, pours itself out 
 withal in strains of such vehement earnestness as naturally 
 to suggest, upon the other side, that both the duty and the 
 doctrine of unity seemed in some way to the mind of the 
 Bishop of Antioch to be seriously challenged and brought 
 into peril. This in itself is a condition of things which is 
 hardly compatible either with the earlier indications of the 
 Epistle to the Hebrews, or St. Jude, or with the vaguer 
 moral reproof of Hermas. Decisive as their language in its 
 own way is, it must have been differently conceived if they 
 had been thinking, not of a secular looseness of membership, 
 
 C 
 
i8 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 but of a deliberate separation, of theory and practice, from 
 the Church ; no longer that is of a separatist tendency, but 
 of an organized schism. It is this no doubt which explains the 
 earnestness of the language of Ignatius. In his case, but in 
 his case only, it is fair to infer the presence of an imminent 
 peril of disunion. To recognize the community ordered under 
 bishop, priests, and deacons, and to refuse it ; to substitute an 
 alternative practice based on an alternative theory ; to institute 
 private Eucharists over against the Episcopal Eucharist ; this, 
 if connected in any way with earlier tendencies, is at least an 
 audaciously new development of them. This is no conserva- 
 tive protest against a novel conception of uniting ; but rather 
 a novel audacity of separation from the familiar methods of 
 the unity of the Church. It is a revolt against the community 
 itself. And so it is regarded by St. Ignatius, as a question 
 not between one or another complexion of Christianity, but 
 between the true and the false, between reality and pretence, 
 between being Christians in fact, or only in name ^. 
 
 There is one point more. ' After the subapostolic age,' 
 writes Dr. Hatch, ' these exhortations cease. The tendency 
 to association has become a fixed habit How shall we best 
 represent the meaning of such truth as these words express ? 
 Perhaps in some such statement as this. The unity of the 
 Church was, from the first, a necessary theological principle, 
 and was, as such, put into practice from the first to the utmost 
 extent that circumstances would allow. But this principle 
 (a) was not in every case present, as axiomatic, to the con- 
 science of average Christians, and (b) was in various excep- 
 tional cases, for moral or other reasons, imperfectly realized in 
 practice. As, however, the mind of Christians realized the 
 principle, as principle, more sweepingly, the results reached 
 were (a) that the external organization, as such, became more 
 essentially a matter of course, and (b) that, in proportion as it 
 was matter of course externally, the real meaning of the prin- 
 
 ' jjL^l fluvov KaKiiaOu Xpicmavoii dAXd uat eivai, Magn. iv. ^ p. 30. 
 
I] THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 19 
 
 ciple expressed by it sank in moral value. Secularity of 
 mind — which no age of the Church has yet uprooted — instead 
 of prompting men (as at first) to hold loosely to the conception 
 of corporate life, led them rather, in accepting, to materialize 
 and degrade it. They learned to separate its right to 
 theoretical acceptance from its claim on the moral life. If 
 they had shrunk from it while it pinched them, they learned 
 how to explain, in accepting, it, so that it should cease to 
 pinch. Worldliness, instead of refusing, adopted and inter- 
 preted it. Thenceforward the idea was, to Christian conscious- 
 ness, fundamental. There might be schisms and heresies and 
 false views as to what was the Body : there might be secular 
 emphasis upon the external organization merely as external 
 and organized ; but doubt as to whether the Christian Church 
 carried necessarily a corporate life or no, which had meant 
 from the first a hopelessly inadequate grasp of Christian truth, 
 could not, even as a misconception, survive the earliest forms 
 of Christian consciousness. Church unity, just because it 
 could not but be universal and imperative, found a way of 
 becoming external and unexacting. The corporate idea (it 
 may be said) had to be unduly carnalized, just because it 
 could not be denied. Such perversion does not discredit — 
 it bears witness to the truth of — the perverted principle ; just 
 as Ananias and Sapphira bore witness to the truth of the ideal 
 which they dishonoured. However perverted in practice, the 
 idea at least, as idea, was beyond all challenge. 
 
 It has seemed worth while, in deference to the prestige of 
 Dr. Hatch's name and memory, to glance at these passages ^ : 
 
 ' The argument is lightly treated by Canon Gore, The Church and the Ministry, 
 P- 63 = ' This mode of conceiving the progress of Christianity is in direct violation 
 of the evidence. The only evidence produced for the supposed first stage which 
 preceded obligatory association consists in the fact that the earliest Church teachers 
 found it necessary to preach the duty of association " if not as an article of the 
 Christian faith, at least as an element of Christian practice." This is evidenced by the 
 warning in the Epistle to the Hebrews against forsaking the Christian assemblies ; 
 by St. Jude's denunciation of those who " separate themselves " ; by the passages in 
 the Shepherd of Hermas about those who "have separated themselves" and so 
 
 C % 
 
20 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 but it is, in truth, characteristic of the more paradoxical side 
 of Dr. Hatch's mind that they should have been adduced at 
 all as evidence to prove that the idea of Church unity was an 
 aftergrowth. The two things which the passages most clearly 
 prove are (i) that any infringement of corporate unity was 
 sternly denounced, from absolutely the earliest times of all, as 
 incompatible with a true Christianity ; and (2) that the Church 
 contained, in respect of this (as, indeed, of the fundamental 
 requirements of the moral law), some unworthy and ignorant 
 members. There is in them absolutely nothing whatever to 
 justify the statement that they show Christians 'gradually 
 coalescing into societies.' To say, in reference to them, that 
 the apostles ' fostered ' a ' tendency ' towards combination 
 which was ' natural ' to early Christians — however true — is to 
 describe the apostles' work by an under-statement so immense 
 as to have the effect of a very positive mis-statement. To 
 say that this tendency ' at last, though not at first, became 
 universal,' is to make a statement which, for its purpose, has 
 hardly even a consistent meaning. In the sense in which it 
 was not universal at first, that is, in the literal, historical sense, 
 Church unity never has been perfectly realized at all. In the 
 sense in which it was universal at last, that is, in the doctrinal 
 and ideal sense, it never could be, and has never been, less 
 than universal. 
 
 The distinction here made is one which it is necessary to 
 insist upon positively. ' I believe one Catholic and Apostolic 
 Church ' is no statement about the accidents of history, but 
 a profession of essential doctrine. If it were a statement 
 only about the de facto history of the Church, it would be 
 more than difficult to subscribe it as true. Can I look abroad 
 and find the unity of the Church as a historical phenomenon ? 
 
 "lose their own souls." What do such utterances really go to prove? A separatist 
 tendency on the part those who had been Christians — a sin of schism, denounced 
 like any other sin. But the idea is nowhere discernible that every Christian was 
 not, as such, a member of the Church, bound to the obligations of membership. 
 Schism is a sin in Scripture as really as in Ignatius' letters.' 
 
I] 
 
 THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 
 
 21 
 
 To explain the meaning of her unity as the de facto realization 
 in history of a natural secular tendency would be only the 
 preliminary to discovering that the word ' unity ' was in fact 
 a mistake. If this is the nature of its meaning in the Creed, 
 the Creed would be both safer and truer without it. It is 
 just because its meaning is not of this character ; because, 
 whether realized or unrealized, its truth remains inherent, 
 ideal, immutable ; because the unity which it represents, 
 whether more perfectly or less, is the essential unity of the 
 One God, that this doctrine of the uniqueness and unity of 
 the Church could stand as a necessary element in the truth 
 from the very beginning ; and that it must remain to the end 
 inseparable, by inherent necessity, from the Christian Creed. 
 
22 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [note to 
 
 NOTE. 
 
 In reference to the subject of the first chapter, and to Dr. Hatch's 
 contention, I should hke to refer, with great satisfaction, to much 
 of the exposition contained in The Christian Ecclesia by Dr. Hort, 
 the late Margaret Professor at Cambridge. To me at least it 
 appears that Dr. Hatch's position is completely destroyed by state- 
 ments such as are represented in the following quotations 
 
 St. Paul ' goes on to warn them [the Corinthians] against the 
 natural abuse of these gifts, the self-assertion fostered by ghbness and 
 knowingness, and the consequent spirit of schism or division, the very 
 contradiction of the idea of an Ecclesia. The habit of seeming to 
 know all about most things, and of being able to talk glibly about 
 most things, would naturally tend to an excess of individuality, and 
 a diminished sense of corporate responsibilities. This fact supplies, 
 under many different forms, the main drift of i Corinthians. Never 
 losing his cordial appreciation of the Corinthian endowments, 
 St. Paul is practically teaching throughout that a truly Christian life is 
 of necessity the life of membership in a body ^ . . . Again he points 
 out ^ that the party factions which rent the Ecclesia, while they seemed 
 to be in honour of venerated names, were in reality only a puffing up 
 of each man against his neighbour.'. . . ' Then comes the familiar 13th 
 chapter on love, which in the light of St. Paul's idea of the Ecclesia we 
 can see to be no digression, this gift of the Spirit being incomparably 
 more essential to its life than any of the gifts which caught men's 
 attention . . ' Almost the whole Epistle [to the Romans] is governed 
 by the thought which was filling St. Paul's mind at this time, the 
 relation of Jew and Gentile, the place of both in the counsels of God, 
 and the peaceful inclusion of both in the same brotherhood ^'. . . 
 ' The apparently ethical teaching of chapters xii and xiii is really for 
 the most part on the principles of Christian fellowship.'. . . ' The xvth 
 
 ^ Which might be almost indefinitely multiplied. 
 ^ In ch. iv. 6, p. 130. * p. 132. 
 
 " p. 129 
 ' P- 133- 
 
CH. i] THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 23 
 
 and parts of the xvith chapter illustrate historically, as other chapters 
 had done doctrinally, St. Paul's yearnings for the unity of all Christians 
 of East and West ^' To all such teaching he represents the Ephesians 
 as the theological climax : ' Here, at \a.s,t.,/or the first time in the Acts 
 and Epistles we have " the Ecclesia " spoken of in the sense of the 
 one universal Ecclesia, and it comes more from the theological than 
 from the historical side ; i. e. less from the actual circumstances of the 
 actual Christian communities than from a development of thoughts 
 respecting the place and office of the Son of God : His Headship was 
 felt to involve the unity of all those who were united to Him. On the 
 other hand, it is a serious misunderstanding of these Epistles to suppose, 
 as is sometimes done, that the Ecclesia here spoken of is an Ecclesia 
 wholly in the heavens, not formed of human beings With this last 
 sentence may be compared the following : ' Membership of a local 
 Ecclesia was obviously visible and external, and we have no evidence 
 that St. Paul regarded membership of the universal Ecclesia as 
 invisible, and exclusively spiritual, and as shared by only a limited 
 number of the members of the external Ecclesiae, those, namely, whom 
 God had chosen out of the great mass and ordained to life, of those 
 whose faith in Christ was a genuine and true faith. What very plausible 
 grounds could be urged for this distinction, was to be seen in later 
 generations; but it seems to me incompatible with any reasonable 
 interpretation of St. Paul's words 
 
 Of the similitude of the Body he says : ' In Ephesians the image is 
 extended to embrace all Christians, and the change is not improbably 
 connected with the clear setting forth of the relation of the Body to 
 its Head which now first comes before us. . . . The comparison of 
 men in society to the members of a body was of course not new. 
 With the Stoics in particular it was much in vogue. What was 
 distinctively Christian was the faith in the One baptizing and Hfe-giving 
 
 ' P- 134- 
 
 ^ I venture to italicize these words, in order to draw attention to the fact that 
 Dr. Hort is speaking of the exposition of Ephesians — not as the first Christian 
 realization of the idea of unity, but as the first scriptural insistence upon its 
 theological significance since tlie teaching of our Lord Himself, as recorded in the 
 Gospels. 
 
 ' p. 148. * p. 169. 
 
24 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [note to 
 
 Spirit, the one uniting bod}- of Christ, the one all-working, all-inspiring 
 God \' 
 
 And of the marriage similitude : ' Again, the unity of the Ecclesia 
 finds prominent expression in various language used by St. Paul on 
 the relation of husband and wife. ... St. Paul's primary object in 
 these tsvelve verses is to expound marriage, not to expound the 
 Ecclesia : but it is no less plain from his manner of writing that the 
 thought of the Ecclesia in its various higher relations was filling his 
 mind at the lime, and making him rejoice to have this opportunity of 
 pouring out something of the truth which seemed to have revealed 
 itself to him. If we are to interpret " mystery" in the difficult 32nd 
 verse, as apparently we ought to do, by St. Paul's usage, i. e. take it 
 as a Divine age-long secret only now at last disclosed, he wished to 
 say that the meaning of that primary institution of human society, 
 though proclaimed in dark words at the beginning of history, could 
 not be truly known till its heavenly archetype was revealed, even the 
 relation of Christ and the Ecclesia -.' 
 
 The loftiest passage of all is an admirable statement (which 
 unfortunately does not appear to be made cardinal to the thought 
 throughout the volume) from the sermon preached in Emmanuel 
 College Chapel [pp. 272-3]. ' One Body, One Spirit. Each implies 
 the other. In the religious life of men the Bible knows nothing of 
 the Spirit floating, as it were, detached and unclothed. The operation 
 of the Spirit is in the life and harmony of the parts and particles of 
 the body in which, so to speak, it resides. And conversely a society 
 of men deserves the name of a body in the scriptural sense in 
 proportion as it becomes a perfect vehicle and instrument of the Spirit.' 
 
 But striking as much of this teaching appears to be, I must be 
 allowed to comment, on the other hand, on what looks like a some- 
 what determined refusal on Dr. Hort's part to allow his own arguments 
 to carry him the whole way to their own theological and practical 
 conclusions. 
 
 In spite of the glowing emphasis which his language reaches at 
 times about the inward ideal of the unity of the Body, it may be 
 permissible to doubt whether he can be said to have stated, with any 
 adequacy, the true relation between this inward ideal which he recognizes 
 ' pp. 146, 147- ' PP- 150-152- 
 
CH. i] THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 
 
 25 
 
 and the organization on earth of a visible Church. I would call 
 attention in particular to the following quotations, which I have 
 grouped together; and I cannot but very seriously question that 
 which appears to be their outcome on the whole. In the first of them 
 it is not so much perhaps the things said, as the apparent drift of the 
 things said, which will raise doubts : ' At first the oneness of the 
 Ecclesia is a visible fact due simply to its limitation to the one city of 
 Jerusalem. Presently it enlarges and includes all the Holy Land, 
 becoming ideally conterminous with the Jewish Ecclesia. But at 
 length discipleship on a large scale springs up at Antioch, and so we 
 have a new Ecclesia. By various words and acts the community of 
 purpose and interests between the two Ecclesiae is maintained ; but 
 they remain two. Presently the Ecclesia of Antioch, under the 
 guidance of the Holy Spirit speaking through one or more prophets, 
 sets apart Barnabas and Paul and sends them forth beyond Taurus to 
 preach the gospel. They go first to the Jews of the Dispersion, but 
 have at last to turn to the Gentiles. On their way home they recognize 
 or constitute Ecclesiae of their converts in the several cities and choose 
 for them elders. Thus there is a multiplication of single Ecclesiae. 
 We need not trace the process further. We find St. Paul cultivating 
 the friendliest relations between these different bodies, and sometimes 
 in language grouping together those of a single region ; but we do not 
 find him establishing or noticing any formal connexion between those 
 of one region or between all generally. He does however work, 
 sedulously to counteract the imminent danger of a specially deadly 
 schism, viz. between the Ecclesiae of Judaea (as he calls them) and the 
 Ecclesiae of the Gentile world. When the danger of that schism had 
 been averted, he is able to feel that the Ecclesia is indeed One. 
 Finally, in Ephesians, and partly Colossians, he does from his Roman 
 habitation not only set forth emphatically the unity of the whole body, 
 but expatiate in mystic language on its spiritual relation to its unseen 
 Head, catching up and carrying on the language of prophets about 
 the ancient Israel as the bride of Jehovah, and suggest that this one 
 Ecclesia, now sealed as one by the creating of the two peoples into 
 one, is God's primary agent in His ever-expanding counsels towards 
 mankind \' 
 
 ' pp. 227, 228. 
 
26 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [note to 
 
 It is very difficult to be sure how much is meant, or impHed, in this 
 refusal to see St. Paul either ' establishing or noticing any formal 
 connexion' between the different Churches. And the difficulty is by 
 no means diminished when we take this first passage in connexion 
 with another, \vhich is not easy to follow, either as to its main thought, 
 or as to the extent to which its main thought may perhaps be 
 qualified (perhaps in more than one possible direction) by the final 
 sentence : ' We have been detained a long time by the importance 
 of the whole teaching of " Ephesians " on the Ecclesia, and especially 
 of the idea now first definitely expressed of the whole Ecclesia as 
 One. Before leaving this subject, however, it is important to notice 
 that not a word in the Epistle exhibits the One Ecclesia as made 
 up of many Ecclesiae. To each local Ecclesia St. Paul has ascribed 
 a corresponding unity of its own ; each is a body of Christ and 
 a sanctuary of God ; but there is no grouping of them into partial 
 wholes or into one great whole. The members which make up the 
 One Ecclesia are not communities but individual men. The One 
 Ecclesia includes all members of all partial Ecclesiae ; but its relations 
 to them all are direct, not mediate. It is true that, as we have seen, 
 St. Paul anxiously promoted friendly intercourse and sympathy 
 between the scattered Ecclesiae ; but the unity of the universal 
 Ecclesia as he contemplated it does not belong to this region : it is 
 a truth of theology and of religion, not a fact of what we call ecclesi- 
 astical politics. To recognize this is quite consistent with the fullest 
 appreciation of aspirations after an external ecclesiastical unity which 
 have played so great and beneficial a part in the inner and outer 
 movements of subsequent ages. At every turn we are constrained to 
 feel that we can learn to good effect from the apostolic age only 
 by studying its principles and ideals, not by copying its precedents 
 
 In this passage he appears to be drawing distinctions which are 
 hardly intelligible, and to be drawing them almost for the express 
 purpose of avoiding acceptance of the unity of the Church as a really 
 dominant idea. How can the One Ecclesia be made up of all the 
 members of the many Ecclesiae, and yet not be made up of the many 
 Ecclesiae.'' If he were speaking of denominations in the modern 
 sense, which are doctrinally discordant, and if he intended to sacrifice all 
 
 1 p. 168. 
 
CH. i] THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 
 
 27 
 
 idea of external unity, tiie distinction might be intelligible. But when 
 the difference of ' Churches ' is local only — not of doctrine, nor of 
 organization, at all ; and when all alike are dependent upon Apostles ; 
 and the Apostles are not discordant, but are the focus and symbol 
 of the one indivisible Church, is there any real meaning left in 
 the distinction ? 
 
 Again, the distinction between a truth of theology and a fact in the 
 region of ecclesiastical politics is, no doubt, for many purposes, a real 
 distinction ; yet it passes almost at once into a meaning and use 
 which are not real. That which is a truth of theology may be most 
 imperfectly realized in ecclesiastical fact; but, however imperfectly 
 realized, it is nevertheless an ecclesiastical fact — it has its place, that 
 is, a rightful and necessary place, in the region of outward things ; 
 and any mode of speech or thought which should seem to imply that 
 it does not belong to the region of outward things, or that it is not 
 properly to be looked for there, would be, so far, misleading. To put 
 it in another way, a ' study ' of principles or ideals is, no doubt, 
 possible which makes no attempt to realize them : but how can you 
 attempt to realize them — how, that is, can you study them to any 
 effect, study them with the character as well as with the abstracted 
 intellect, without aspiring to translate them into practical outwardness ? 
 No principle is really alive which is not already on the way to 
 realization in fact. On the other hand, no fact in the region of 
 ecclesiastical politics, nor suggested moral or inference from such 
 fact, can be other than tentative or partial, unless or until it is seen as 
 the embodiment of a theological principle. Only essential principles of 
 the theology of the Incarnation are, to the Christian intellect, really 
 sure or luminous truths. 
 
 There is a paragraph, again, in the sermon at Bishop Westcolt's 
 consecration, which repeats the same somewhat puzzling denial of 
 a ' unity of Churches,' even while asserting that the unity of the 
 Church is universal : ' The foundation of the teaching now poured 
 forth by the Apostle to the beloved Ephesian Church of his own 
 founding, and doubtless to other Churches of the same region, is laid 
 in high mysteries of theology, the eternal purpose according to which 
 God unrolled the course of the ages, with the coming of Jesus as 
 Christ as their central event, and the summing-up of all heavenly and 
 
28 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [note to 
 
 earthly things in Him. That universal primacy of being ascribed to 
 Him suggests His Headship in relation to the Church as His Body. 
 Presently unity is ascribed to the Church from another side ; not 
 indeed a unity such as was sought after in later centuries, the unity of 
 many separate Churches, but the unity created by the abolition of the 
 middle wall of partition between Jew and Gentile in the new Christian 
 society, a unity answering to the sum of mankind. Thus the Church 
 was the visible symbol of the newly revealed largeness of God's 
 purposes towards the human race, as well as the primary instrument 
 for carrying them into effect. Its very existence, it seems to be hinted 
 in the doxology which closes this part of the Epistle, was a warrant for 
 believing that God's whole counsel was not even yet made known.' 
 There is much throughout this sermon which is of very stirring 
 character. And yet even at the end of this sermon it must be said 
 that it is not at all easy to determine what is the exact relation which 
 the mind of the author intends between the inner or ideal unity, and 
 the necessary outward and secular organization, of the Church. 
 
 All these passages are coloured by the ruling, early in the volume, 
 to which, in the light of my second chapter, I cannot but directly 
 demur : ' Since Augustine's time the Kingdom of Heaven and the 
 Kingdom of God, of which we read so often in the Gospels, has been 
 simply identified with the Christian Ecclesia. This is a not unnatural 
 deduction from some of our Lord's sayings on this subject taken by 
 themselves ; but it cannot, I think, hold its ground when the whole 
 range of His teaching about it is comprehensively examined. We 
 may speak of the Ecclesia as the visible representative of the Kingdom 
 of God, or as the primary instrument of its sway, or under other 
 analogous forms of language. But we are not justified in identifying 
 the one with the other, so as to be able to apply directly to the 
 Ecclesia whatever is said in the Gospels about the Kingdom of Heaven 
 or of GodV 
 
 In spite, therefore, of the stirring character of many passages in The 
 Christian Ecclesia, and of the great authority which is inseparable 
 from Dr. Hort's writings, I hope it will not seem presumptuous to 
 suggest that the volume, in its total effect, still lends itself more than 
 
 ' p. 19- 
 
CH. i] THE NATURE OF CHURCH UNITY 
 
 29 
 
 enough (on what is, after all, a very important point of Christian 
 intelligence) to what may be called the temper of theological hesitation 
 and reserve. Under certain conditions there may be, it is true, an 
 important place and function for the hesitating and balanced mind on 
 questions of theology. But after all, it is not unseasonable at the 
 present time to insist that this is only a condition of preliminary 
 discipline. It is, after all, conviction, not balance ; it is enthusiasm, not 
 reserve ; it is theological insight, not theological hesitation ; it is the 
 discernment (even, indeed, in things that are outward and practical) of 
 essential principles of the theology of the Incarnation, which — all perils 
 and pitfalls notwithstanding — is the true illumination and glory of the 
 theologian. 
 
 Much of what Dr. Hort says in the earlier part of the volume 
 about the representative character of the apostleship \ and (as I must 
 venture to think) all that he ought to mean by it, will I hope be 
 satisfied by the principle insisted on in the 3rd chapter below. But 
 I must suggest that he makes in some passages a somewhat serious 
 misapplication of the legitimate 'argument from silence^'; and when 
 he asserts that there is ' no trace in Scripture of a formal commission 
 of authority for government from Christ Himself [to the Apostles] ' ; 
 or distinguishes in them (by what is surely, in reference to the cir- 
 cumstances, an unreal antithesis) ' a claim to deference rather than 
 a right to be obeyed * ' ; or describes their exercise of ' powers of 
 administration ' as ' not the result of an authority claimed by them but 
 of a voluntary entrusting of the responsibility to the Apostles by the 
 rest ; or when he says, of the laying on of hands for ordination, 
 that ' as the New Testament tells us no more than what has been 
 already mentioned, it can hardly be likely that any essential principle 
 was held to be involved in it V I hope that I may be forgiven for 
 suggesting that he is in such wise attempting to read history apart 
 from presuppositions, as in fact to read it with negative presuppositions 
 of a seriously misleading kind. 
 
 ' See pp. 30, 33, 47, 52, &c. 2 pp. 95, 201, 202. 
 
 ' p. 84. * p. 85. » p. 47. « p. 216. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 THE RELATION BETWEEN INWARD AND OUTWARD 
 
 It will not improbably occur to the minds of some who 
 have in the main agreed with what has hitherto been said, 
 that the real drift of the argument is towards — not a principle 
 of unity, expressing itself in the organization of a visible 
 Church, but rather an invisible unity, independent of, and 
 indifferent to, all external appearance of disunion. Unity, 
 it may be said ? — Yes, indeed. But this unity, by the very 
 terms already used, is distinguished as spiritual not me- 
 chanical, as ideal not externalized — as lying behind diversity, 
 as unifying diversity, as therefore implying, nay, requiring, 
 the diversity which it unifies ; certainly not as incompatible 
 with it. It is the ' unity of the spirit ' : and unity of spirit 
 is made real, not in proportion as it is expressed by — rather 
 as it is frankly contrasted with — unity of body. 
 
 It seems to be therefore worth while, if the conception of what 
 we mean by unity is to be, after all, consistent and practical, 
 to examine more fully this question as to the true relation 
 between the outward and the inward, between the ideal and 
 the real, in the Church of our Lord Jesus Christ. 
 
 Now it is undoubtedly true that, in one sense, the unifying, 
 even as ideal, implies a diversity : but the diversity so implied 
 is only a diversity of subjects — a variety of personalities 
 agreeing in one — a diversity sufficient to constitute agreement 
 — certainly not a diversity implying, or consisting in, dis- 
 
RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 31 
 
 agreement. Putting aside, however, this merely abstract form 
 of argument, it still always remains that, in this matter, the 
 ideal and the realization are; to say the least, distinguishable. 
 It is true, moreover, that even upon the very best and most 
 sanguine interpretation, the realization always has halted 
 behind, never has attained, indeed under human conditions 
 as we know them is never likely to attain, its own ideal. 
 In this sense we may truly say that the external and the 
 ideal never have been, never on earth are likely to be, 
 identified. To this extent we are with those who discern 
 that the ideal unity lies behind, and is so far compatible with, 
 that it is not overthrown by, a great deal of de facto diversity. 
 But does it therefore follow that the expectation of, or the 
 insistence upon, external unity of organization, is from the 
 point of view of the ideal unity, either mistaken or indifferent? 
 Or, if there be an externally coherent unity, in some relation 
 to the ideal unity, what is the proper nature of this relation? 
 These are the two questions to which, in the present chapter, 
 I desire to attempt to give an intelligible answer. 
 
 It cannot but occur to us in the first place that the contrast 
 between unity of spirit, and unity of body, is not scriptural. 
 ' One Spirit ; therefore not one Body ' says the argument. 
 ' One Body and one Spirit ' says the Scripture. Nor, apart 
 from dogmatic phrases, can there be any doubt that, in the 
 history which the New Testament records, the Apostles 
 did enrol Christians into a Body, which at least aimed at 
 unity ; and did make most explicit provision for their cor- 
 porate government and discipline. The very existence of 
 apostolic authority — a background which is never absent 
 from the Church of the New Testament — is in fact a striking 
 witness to unity, both of fact and idea. The practical 
 relation of St. Paul to the corporate life and discipline of the 
 Church at Corinth will occur to every one. It has indeed 
 been often pointed out that there could hardly be a stronger 
 witness to the conception of external and corporate unity 
 
32 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 than is implied in the very idea of excommunication. The 
 extreme Christian penalty, a penalty which transcended all 
 penalties known to the experience of the world, was ex- 
 pulsion. Expulsion from what ? From the unity of a visible 
 Church? or from the invisible unity of a Church which 
 existed as ideal only? It might truly be urged in answer 
 that the terror of excommunication lay really in this ; that 
 whatever the immediate form of the penalty, its ultimate 
 significance implied the invisible and ideal exclusion. Most 
 true : the visible unity expressed and represented something 
 much greater than itself. But it is quite impossible to deny 
 that that which immediately signified the invisible exclusion 
 was a literal exclusion from a very visible body. The ideal 
 unity was so immediately represented by the visible, that 
 exclusion from the visible human unity carried with it at 
 once all the terror of a Divine exclusion from the invisible 
 and ideal. Excommunication which did 7iot mean exclusion 
 from external relations in a body visible and organized, is 
 a form of penalty which certainly never has been, and was 
 never likely to be, tried. 
 
 But if this thought is familiar, it may be doubted whether, 
 in relation to the question of external order, sufficient weight 
 is usually attached to what may perhaps without exag- 
 geration be called the lifelong struggle of St. Paul on behalf 
 of the corporate unity of the Church. Many aspects of his 
 struggle with the Judaizing Christians are most familiar. Is 
 it as familiar as it deserves to be in this aspect, as a life and 
 death struggle against the principle of an externally divided 
 Christianity ? Upon the gravity indeed of the struggle there 
 is little need to dwell. 
 
 From the days of the first serious controversy at Antioch, 
 from the first great victorious field-day at the council of 
 Jerusalem, we pass on in thought to the conflicts of his 
 subsequent work in Gentile cities ; we watch him followed 
 with the deadly enmity of Judaistic emissaries — Jews no 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 33 
 
 doubt (as he was himself a Jew) but believing, ' Christian ' 
 Jews^ — who dog his steps with implacable hostility from city 
 to city, denouncing his teaching, denying his apostleship, 
 traducing his character ; and in his own language of un- 
 sparing denunciation we read the appalling nature of their 
 enmity towards him. Or we think of the politic side of 
 St. Paul's great conception of a collection of offerings throughout 
 the Gentile Churches for the Jewish Christians^ ; we watch at 
 one time his eager hopefulness, at another, the depth of his mis- 
 givings, about this great peace-offering from Gentile to Judaic 
 Christianity ; his hope as culminating in words of triumphant 
 anticipation to the Corinthians ^ ; his anxiety, as when he 
 appeals for the prayers of the Roman Church * that the saints 
 in Jerusalem may accept the offering for which he had worked 
 so long. And when the crisis comes, we know how grave the 
 peril in Jerusalem — not from Mosaic only but from Christian 
 Jews — was felt and was found to be. And what, after all, 
 is it all about ? It may be worth while, from our present 
 point of view, to consider how simply this great anxiety of 
 his life might have been composed, if the things which he 
 had to urge about unity of Spirit could have frankly dis- 
 pensed with unity of Body, or such doctrinal agreement as 
 is necessary for unity of Body ; if he had felt it consistent 
 with Christianity to recognize two types of faith, and two 
 organizations of Christians, who while agreeing in most of 
 the articles of the Christian creed, should yet agree to differ 
 in certain important conceptions of practical life, and be, as 
 Christians, content to remain distinct. If he could so have 
 interpreted his own insistence upon One Lord, One F'aith, 
 One Baptism ; if he could so have understood the One Body, 
 and the One Bread, as to allow of a Judaic Church over 
 against the Gentile, and a Gentile Church over against the 
 
 ' Acts XV. I, 2 sqq. ; cp. 2 Cor. x. 10; xi. 5, 12-15 ^11-; 7) 8 ; ii. 4; 
 
 iv. 17; V. 2-12 ; vi. 12, 17. 
 
 ^ Acts xxiv. 17. ^ 2 Cor. ix. 12-15. * Rom. xv. 26-33. 
 
 D 
 
34 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH, 
 
 Judaic ; the Judaic Church believing in Jesus Christ very 
 nearly as the Apostles had believed in Him in the early 
 Pentecostal days, that is, with a full observance of the law 
 and a practical ignoring of Gentiles ; the Gentile Church 
 believing in Jesus Christ equally, but with a more Catholic 
 inclusiveness of conception, and without any specific reference 
 to Judaism, — how would the sting have been taken out of 
 a struggle which was to St. Paul, in fact, as a lifelong mar- 
 tyrdom ; how simply might the great controversy which 
 shook the Apostolic Church have been — not composed so 
 much as avoided altogether from the first 1 
 
 It seems then to be clear that the idea of a unity which 
 was in such sense transcendental as to dispense with the 
 necessity of any outward expression of its ideal in the form 
 of a practically organized and disciplined union, is an idea 
 which never presented itself to the minds of Apostles at all. 
 On the contrary, the more transcendental their conception 
 of the Divine unity of the Church, so much the more did 
 it follow, as a matter of course, that the Church which 
 expressed that unity, must be, if divinely then also humanly, 
 if in Spirit then in Body, if inwardly and invisibly then 
 visibly and outwardly, One ^ It is true of course that the 
 
 ^ The following passage from Dr. Milligan {The Resurrection of otir Lord, 
 pp. 195-202) is quoted by Canon Gore. Its enthusiasm is so directly to the 
 present purpose that I cannot but transcribe it. ' If it be the duty of the Church 
 to represent her Lord among men, and if she faithfully performs that duty, it 
 follows by an absolutely irresistible necessity that the unity exhibited in His 
 Person must appear in her. She must not only be one, but visibly one in some 
 distinct and appreciable sense — in such a sense that men shall not need to be told 
 of it, but shall themselves see and acknowledge that her unity is real. No doubt 
 such unity may be, and is, consistent with great variety — with variety in the 
 dogmatic expression of Christian truth, in regulations for Christian government, in 
 forms of Christian worship, and in the exhibition of Christian life. It is un- 
 necessary to speak of these things now. Variety and the right to differ have many 
 advocates. We have rather at present to think of unity and the obligation to agree. 
 As regards these, it can hardly be denied that the Church of our time is flagrantly 
 and disastrously at fault. The spectacle presented by her to the world is in direct 
 and palpable contradiction to the unity of the Person of her Lord ; and she would 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 35 
 
 Divine ideal of unity did not disappear because the outward 
 expression corresponded with it imperfectly : and the thought 
 of Judaic Christianity (even though St. Paul's great effort 
 was so far successful) may serve still as a reminder how 
 imperfectly, even from the first, the ideal was realized : but 
 it was the case, as emphatically then as afterwards — and 
 as always — that the way to make spiritual ideas real, is to 
 give them expression of reality in bodily life. The bodily 
 expression may, and will, be inadequate : there will always 
 be a contrast — discernible at least, too often deplorable — 
 between its meaning and itself: but even so, underneath 
 whatever weight of failure, until it traitorously disowns its 
 own significance, the imperfect outward will represent, will 
 aspire towards, will actually in a measure express, that perfect 
 
 at once discover its sinfulness were she not too exclusively occupied with the 
 thought of positive action on the world, instead of remembering that her primary 
 and most important duty is to afford to the world a visible representation of her 
 exalted Head. In all her branches, indeed, the beauty of unity is enthusiastically 
 talked of by her members, and not a few are never weary of describing the precious 
 ointment in which the Psalmist beheld a symbol of the unity of Israel. Others, 
 again, alive to the uselessness of talking where there is no corresponding reality, 
 seek comfort in the thought that beneath all the divisions of the Church there is 
 a unity which she did not make, and which she cannot unmake. Yet, surely, in 
 the light of the truth now before us, we may well ask whether either the talking or 
 the suggested comfort brings us nearer a solution of our difficulties. The one is so 
 meaningless that the very lips which utter it might be expected to refuse their 
 office. The other is true, although, according as it is used, it may either be 
 a stimulus to amendment, or a pious platitude ; and generally it is the latter. But 
 neither words about the beauty of unity, nor the fact of an invisible unity, avail to 
 help us. What the Church ought to possess is a unity which the eye can see. If 
 she is to be a witness to her Risen Lord, she must do more than talk of unity, more 
 than console herself with the hope that the world will not forget the invisible bond 
 by which it is pled that all her members are bound together into one. Visible 
 unity in one form or another is an essential mark of her faithfulness. . . . The 
 world will never be converted by a disunited Church. Even Bible circulation and 
 missionary exertion upon the largest scale will be powerless to convert it, unless 
 they are accompanied by the strength which unity alone can give. Let the Church 
 of Christ once feel, in any measure corresponding to its importance, that she is the 
 representative of the Risen Lord, and she will no longer be satisfied with mere 
 outward action. She will see that her first and most imperative duty is to heal 
 herself, that she may be able to heal others also.' 
 
 D 2 
 
36 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 ideal which is waiting still to gain, in outward expression, its 
 consummation of reality. 
 
 There is, and there will be, a contrast. Often it will seem 
 almost immeasurable. Thus it is that in the New Testament 
 we seem to recognize two, more than distinguishable, pictures : 
 and men may perhaps be excused if sometimes there has 
 seemed to them to be little correspondence between the two. 
 On the one hand, there is the living community of the Church, 
 visible, militant, humanly organized, and subject to all the 
 conditions and experiences of a secular organization of most 
 imperfect humanities : on the other, there is the Kingdom of 
 Heaven, without spot or flaw, transcendent, ideal, the per- 
 fection of holiness, the heavenly Bride, the Body of Christ. 
 It would be impossible to deny that (however different their 
 mode of presentment may be) each of these conceptions is, 
 in the pages of the New Testament, most familiar. But 
 what is the true relation between the one and the other? 
 Will any one say that it is a relation merely of contrast ? Or 
 will it be said that the relation is so far one of likeness as 
 well as of contrast, that the Church, though it never attains, 
 is at least always aspiring after, and working towards, the 
 ideal of the Kingdom ? that the Church — though essentially 
 different — is yet a sort of representation, clumsily executed 
 indeed, and in rough material, of an idea which is never 
 realized by it ? that the relation therefore between the Church 
 and the Kingdom may be not unaptly compared to that 
 between an artist's finished sculpture, and the inspiring vision, 
 which it at once reveals, and yet fails to attain ? It seems 
 to me that this, even though in part true, is nevertheless 
 a comparison quite inadequate to the truth. For it altogether 
 omits the crucial fact, that the Church is, even on earth, 
 through experience which includes real failures and fractures, 
 still growing, and will (though not under present conditions) 
 so grow as to realize actually and perfectly the whole ideal 
 character of the Kingdom of God. If the artist's sculpture 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 37 
 
 were only the present stage of a work which, through all 
 vicissitudes, would never cease to grow on and on, until it 
 was actually the ideal vision, then and then only would 
 it afford a true measure of comparison. 
 
 The Church militant does not merely represent the Church 
 triumphant. The Church on earth will not be abolished and 
 ended in order that the Kingdom of Heaven may take its 
 place. But the Church which Christ founded on earth, which 
 from Pentecost onwards, under all its failures and wicked- 
 nesses, has yet been really the temple on earth of the Spirit, — 
 the Church disciplined, purified, perfected, — shall be found to 
 be the Kingdom ; the Kingdom of Heaven is already, in the 
 Church, among men. Scripture, which knows so well both 
 the Church and the Kingdom, knows nothing of any anti- 
 thesis between the two. The ' Kingdom of Heaven ' was the 
 phrase under which the first announcement of the Church 
 was made. The parables which portray the growth of the 
 Church, even under human and secular conditions, even with 
 reference, the most express, to the necessary presence and 
 working of evil, not only round about but within the life of 
 the Church, are the ' parables of the Kingdom.' Yet the 
 full and characteristic picture of the Kingdom is not reached 
 till the vision of the twenty-first chapter of the Revelation 
 of St. John. 
 
 After all, then, for all our admission of the actual difference 
 — too often the terrible contrast — between the Church as 
 it practically is, and the ideal beauty of the Kingdom, 
 we must claim that the proper relation between these two 
 is not a relation of contrast, not even a relation of re- 
 semblance, but is, in underlying and ultimate reality (if the 
 paradox of the phrase may be allowed), the relation of 
 identity. 
 
 There is an illustration which seems to me to make this 
 very clear — an illustration more pertinent by far than that 
 of the ideal and the attainment. It is the illustration of the 
 
38 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 continuous personality of an individual saint. What is the 
 relation between Simon Bar-Jona, the affectionate but pre- 
 sumptuous disciple — St. Peter, the leader of the Apostles, 
 the pillar of the Church, who yet (on one occasion) could 
 be 'condemned^' — and St. Peter, as we may reverently try 
 to conceive of him, throned, crowned, glorified, in the glory 
 of his Lord, in heaven? Difference there is indeed, no 
 question — more than we can measure. Yet no vastness of 
 difference impairs the far deeper truth, that they are one and 
 the same. The rash Simon was not destroyed that St. Peter 
 might be created in his stead. But the enthusiast became 
 the saint — with imperfection ; and the saint, with imper- 
 fection, became the saint in glory. Look backward in 
 retrospect from the beatified saint ; and he, even himself, 
 was — Andrew's brother Simon. Look back in retrospect 
 from the consummated Kingdom ; and it, even itself, was — 
 the visible, humanly organized, struggling, imperfect, society 
 of the Church. As, to scripture language, the individual 
 Christian is, from the first, a ' saint' ; so, to scripture language, 
 that is, to the language of the divinest truth, the struggling 
 organization and polity of the Church is, from the first — ■ 
 even when to us such words seem almost terrifying — all that 
 the ideal vision of the Kingdom is. 
 
 There is another way in which this illustration will be 
 helpful for our present purpose. Why does Scripture — that 
 is, why does Truth — call a sinful man a saint ? or a very 
 human society the Kingdom of God ? Not certainly as denying 
 the humanness, or the sin ; but because, in those whom God 
 is drawing and perfecting, even the true fact of sin is not 
 the truest fact of the character. Sinful and human they truly 
 are : but they more truly are that which, by God's grace, they 
 are even now becoming. There are grades of truth : truth 
 more essential, and truth more accidental ; truth more ex- 
 ternal, and truth more profound ; a more transient, and 
 
 • Kari'^vaiafiivos, Gal. ii. ii. 
 
II] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 39 
 
 a truer, truth. So with man, in the bodily life. What is he ? 
 It is the simple truth that he is flesh and blood. It is also 
 true that he is a spiritual being. He is Spirit, of Spirit, by 
 Spirit, for Spirit. Even while the lesser and the lower 
 continues true, the higher is the truer truth. That man is 
 spirit, is a deeper, more inclusive, more permanent, truer 
 truth than that man is body. In comparison with this truth, 
 the truth that he is body (though true) is as an untruth. It 
 is a downright untruth, whenever or wherever, in greater 
 measure or less, it is taken as contradicting, or impairing, 
 or obscuring the truth that he is Spirit. Thus St. Paul does 
 not hesitate roundly to deny the truth of it — ' Ye are not 
 in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God 
 dwelleth in you' — denying it, of course, in the context of 
 his thought, with absolute truth ; even though the proposition 
 that the Roman converts were in the flesh might seem to 
 be, in itself, one of the most undeniable of propositions. Of 
 course this is an inversion of the verdict of natural sense. If 
 natural sense would say, Man's bodiliness is the fundamental 
 certainty, man's spirituality is only more or less probable ; 
 there is another point of view to which man's spirituality is so 
 the one overmastering truth, that even his bodily existence 
 is only a truth so far as it is an incident, or condition, or ex- 
 pression, of his spiritual being. As method of Spirit, it is true, 
 and its truth is just this — to be method or channel of Spirit. 
 
 Such is the case of the individual man ; he is obviously 
 bodily, he is transcendently spiritual. His bodily life is no 
 mere type, or representation of his spiritual ; it is spiritual 
 life, expanding, controlling, developing under bodily conditions. 
 The real meaning of the bodily life is its spiritual meaning. 
 The bodily is spiritual. 
 
 And conversely, the spiritual is bodily. Even when he is 
 recognized as essentially spiritual, yet his spiritual being has 
 no avenue, no expression, no method, other than the bodily ; 
 insomuch that, if he is not spiritual in and through the body, 
 
40 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 he cannot be spiritual at all. Is he then bodily or spiritual ? 
 He is both ; and yet not separately, nor yet equally both. 
 If his bodily being seems to be the primary truth, yet, on 
 experience, the truth of his spiritual being is so absorbing, 
 so inclusive, that his bodily being is but vehicle, is but 
 utterance, of the spiritual ; and the ultimate reality even of 
 his bodily being is only what it is spiritually. He is body 
 indeed, and is spirit. Yet this is not a permanent dualism, 
 not a rivalry of two ultimate truths, balanced over against 
 one another, while remaining in themselves unrelated. More 
 exactly, he is Spirit — in, and through. Body. 
 
 Just so it is with the Church. The visible Body is the 
 spiritual Church — is so really, even while it most imperfectly 
 is ; as the living man (in himself too truly a sinner), while he 
 is, at the best, only most inchoately and imperfectly, yet to 
 the eye of the Almighty Truth, which sees the blossom in the 
 bud, the fruit in the seed, the end in the beginning, is truly, 
 because he is truly becoming, a saint ^. In external truth, the 
 most primary, the most obvious to the eye, the Church is a 
 human society, with experience chequered like the experi- 
 ence of human societies ; in its inner reality, it is the presence 
 and the working, here and now, of the leaven of the Spirit ; 
 it does not represent — but it is — the Kingdom of God upon 
 earth. The real meaning of all the bodily organism and 
 working of the Church is the spiritual meaning. Whatever is 
 not expression of Spirit is failure. And conversely, here as 
 everywhere, the working of the Spirit must be looked for in 
 and through organisms which are bodily. In the world of our 
 
 ^ The expression of Clement of Alexandria is striking : OCto; to iriaTevcrai fiovov 
 Kal avayevvrjO^vai TeAfiniCTi's (CTtv ev {^oi^- ov yap iroTf daOtvfi 6 0eds. 'fls yap to 
 Blkrjua avTov epyov tart, Kal tovto Ko<r/ios ovofia^eTaf ovrwi koX to 0ov\rjfia avTov 
 dv0 pwiTwv earl awTrjpia, Kal tovto 'EKKKrjaia KtKXrjTai. OiSev ovv ovs KtKXTjKfV, ofis 
 aeaaiKfV KeKKrjKiv hi ajia Kal aiaaiKev, Paedag. i. p. 1 14. Cp. the Augustinian 
 phrases, ' Tales nos amat Deus, quales futuri sumus, non quales sumus . . . Per 
 [fidem] perveniemus ad speciem, vt tales amet, quales amat ut simus, non quales 
 edit quia sumus,' de Trin. i. 21. 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 41 
 
 experience at least, body, rightly understood, means spirit : 
 neither is there any working of the spirit which is not through 
 body. The visible body then, of the Church, is real, and 
 its outward process and history, as body — the history (so to 
 speak) of its chemical analysis, or the history of its material 
 development — are real : yet the truth of these is' as untrue, in 
 comjoarison with the over-mastering truth of its spiritual 
 reality, which alone gives, even to these, their real signi- 
 ficance : and even the very truth of these becomes a down- 
 right untruth, in so far as it ever is used, in greater measure 
 or less, to contradict, or impair, or disguise the truth of its 
 essential being as Spirit. So worse than idle is it — so 
 positively misleading — to try to analyze the material history 
 (so to speak) of the body of the Church, as if it were an 
 explanation of what the Church is. It would be as profitable 
 for the chemist or the anatomist, as such, to pronounce upon 
 the ultimate meaning of the being of man. 
 
 It will be observed that what has now been insisted upon is 
 the full, and (in a sense) the balanced statement of a truth 
 which has two aspects. It is fatal to the understanding of 
 the being of man either to deny that he is bodily, or to deny 
 that he is spiritual ; either to deny that the meaning of the 
 bodily is its spiritual meaning, or to deny that the method of the 
 spirit is through body. I speak of this as iti a sense a balanced 
 statement, because the balance is not precisely equal. If in 
 a sense it is true that the body and the spirit are, as predi- 
 cated of man, both equally true ; it is, as already explained, 
 a truth deeper and truer to deny that the truths are ultimately 
 equal. They are not balanced : the one gradually disappears 
 in the other. Yet, for present purposes at least, they stand out 
 against one another as mutually indispensable aspects of one 
 complex truth. For any real understanding of the Church, or 
 its ministries and sacraments, it will be found, in like manner, 
 indispensable to realize to the full the two aspects of this 
 truth and their mutual relation. 
 
42 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 What has been said enables us to insist, with the utmost 
 possible emphasis, upon the essential character of the Church 
 as Spirit. If the spiritual work of the Church has instruments, 
 organs, ordinances ; if these have an existence which may be 
 described as mechanical and material, yet their entire reality 
 of meaning and character is spiritual. ' It is the Spirit that 
 quickeneth ; the flesh profiteth nothing : the words that I have 
 spoken unto you are Spirit, and are Life^.' The whole reality 
 is Spirit. If any of those who are inclined to protest against 
 external ordinances lay all their stress upon this principle, 
 we desire on our part to lay it down with an emphasis so 
 sweeping that they may find it impossible to say it more 
 sweepingly than we. If they demur to the idea that there 
 can be any absolute value or reality in formal practices — 
 including in this phrase the whole sacramental or ministerial 
 system — we too echo every such word to the very uttermost, 
 we sympathize to the full ; nay, we lay down this principle 
 for ourselves, and build upon it as an indispensable foundation 
 of truth. There is no true meaning or reality whatever but 
 Spirit. Only just as, in man's life, the Spirit, which alone is 
 the essential meaning and reality of human life, must have 
 expression through bodily organs and actions ; and the over- 
 mastering truth of Spirit does not diminish the truth, in its 
 subordinate place and degree, of body : so in the life of the 
 Church, the very reality of the Spirit cannot but express itself 
 through definite methods and processes ; which orderly forms 
 and methods, so far from having in themselves any absolute 
 reality or value, only exist for this, in order that they may 
 be — only are real after all just so far as they really are — not 
 formal realities, arithmetical, ponderable, measurable, but 
 reflexions, expressions, activities of Living Spirit. The Spirit 
 is the meaning of the Body ; the Body is the utterance of the 
 Spirit. The Body is not therefore an unfortunate condescen- 
 sion, an accidental and regrettable necessity. However gross 
 
 ^ John vi. 63. 
 
II] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 43 
 
 it may be apart from its animating meaning ; yet as vehicle 
 of Spirit, which is its true function, it rises to the full dignity 
 of that which it expresses ; nay, it no longer merely expresses, 
 in its true essence already it may be said to be Spirit. It is 
 an error, somewhat Manichaean in character, to treat Body, 
 the Body of Spirit, as mere condescension. The Body of 
 Christ, whether Personal or Mystical, is what Christ is, in 
 respect of dignity. ' A body didst thou prepare for Me ^ ' is 
 a word which has true significance in reference to the Body 
 of the Church. 
 
 It is from this point of view that we cannot but criticize 
 the opening position of Bishop Lightfoot's famous essay upon 
 the ' Christian Ministry.' He insists, truly in the main, upon 
 the Church's essential existence as spiritual. But he uses 
 this truth to deny the reality of her proper existence as 
 bodily ; and then, being forced to deal with her existence 
 as bodily, he treats it, not (in analogy with every experience 
 of this world, an experience consummated and consecrated in 
 the Incarnation for ever), as the living, proper method and 
 utterance of Spirit, but as a lower, politic, condescending, 
 accidental necessity : not as something to be identified with, 
 interpreted by, more and more absorbed into, but rather as to 
 be contrasted with, and (if it were possible) disowned by, its 
 own spiritual meaning. He contrasts the ideal and the actual of 
 the Church : not, as in any age he well might do, on the ground 
 that in the Church as it is, the outward order expresses its 
 own animating Spirit so imperfectly, but because its Spirit is 
 expressed in any outward order at all ^. It is necessary, with 
 
 ' Hebrews x. 5. 
 
 ' Bishop Lightfoot's essay opens thus : ' The kingdom of Christ, not being 
 a kingdom of this world, is not limited by the restrictions which fetter other 
 societies, political or religious. It is in the fullest sense free, comprehensive, 
 universal. It displays this character, not only in the acceptance of all comers 
 who seek admission, irrespective of race or caste or sex, but also in the 
 instruction and treatment of those who are already its members. It has no 
 sacred days or seasons, no special sanctuaries, because every time and every 
 
44 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 all respect, to insist that this position cannot be either 
 philosophically or theologically maintained. Accepting for 
 the moment the imagery which the word ' ideal ' suggests 
 .(though I have tried already to show that for the purpose 
 
 place alike are holy. Above all it has no sacerdotal system. It interposes no 
 sacrificial tribe or class between God and man, by whose intervention alone 
 God is reconciled and man forgiven. Each individual member holds personal 
 communion with the Divine Head. To Him immediately he is responsible, and 
 from Him directly he obtains pardon and draws strength. 
 
 ' It is most important that we should keep this ideal definitely in view, and 
 I have therefore stated it as broadly as possible. Yet the broad statement, if 
 allowed to stand alone, would suggest a false impression, or at least would 
 convey only a half truth. It must be evident that no society of men could 
 hold together without officers, without rules, without institutions of any kind ; 
 and the Church of Christ is not exempt from this universal law. The conception 
 in short is strictly an ideal, which we must ever hold before our eyes, which 
 should inspire and interpret ecclesiastical polity, but which nevertheless cannot 
 supersede the necessary wants of human society, and, if crudely and hastily 
 applied, will lead only to signal failure. As appointed days and set places are 
 indispensable to her efficiency, so also the Church could not fulfil the purposes 
 for which she exists without rulers and teachers, without a ministry of reconcilia- 
 tion, in short, without an order of men who may in some sense be designated 
 a priesthood.' 
 
 And two pages later he writes : ' This then is the Christian ideal ; a holy season 
 extending the whole year round — a temple confined only by the limits of the 
 habitable world — a priesthood coextensive with the human race. 
 
 ' Strict loyalty to this conception was not held incompatible with practical 
 measures of organization. As the Church grew in numbers, as new and hete- 
 rogeneous elements were added, as the early fervour of devotion cooled and 
 strange forms of disorder sprang up, it became necessary to provide for the 
 emergency by fixed rules, and definite officers. The community of goods, by 
 which the infant Church had attempted to give effect to the idea of an universal 
 brotherhood, must very soon have been abandoned under the pressure of cir- 
 cumstances. The celebration of the first day in the week at once, the institution 
 of annual festivals afterwards, were seen to be necessary to stimulate and direct 
 the devotion of the believers. The appointment of definite places of meeting in 
 the earliest days, the erection of special buildings for worship at a later date, -Mere 
 found itidispensable to the working of the Church. But the Apostles never lost 
 sight of the idea in their teaching. They proclaimed loudly that " God dwelleth 
 not in temples made by hands." They indignantly denounced those who 
 "observed days and months, and seasons and years." This language is not 
 satisfied by supposing that they condemned only the temple worship in the one 
 case, that they reprobated only Jewish sabbaths and new moons in the other. 
 It was against the false principle that they waged war; the principle which 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 45 
 
 this imagery is inadequate), we must certainly insist, with the 
 utmost emphasis, that the ideal would be, not a Church 
 without holy times and holy places, without ministries or 
 sacraments, without order or expression, without (in a word) 
 all that we have hitherto tried to express by ' body ' ; but 
 a Church whose entire outward expression as 'body' did at 
 every point simply express, and perfectly correspond to, its 
 spiritual import ; a Church whose outward order so perfectly 
 revealed and expressed, that it could, not untruly, be said to 
 be, Spirit. 
 
 The analogy with the individual is still the most instructive 
 analogy. An ideally spiritual man is not a man without 
 body ; but a man whose whole bodily life is a perfect ex- 
 pression of spirit. Nor indeed is there any form of expres- 
 sion, other than the bodily life, by which, under any conditions 
 intelligible to us, the most perfectly spiritual man could act, 
 speak, or live spiritually at all. 
 
 It is, then, the greatest possible mistake to imagine that if 
 the Church on earth could for one moment be ideally spiritual, 
 special seasons, or places, or ordinances, or ministries, or 
 sacraments, would, in that atmosphere of perfect spirituality, 
 dwindle into comparative insignificance. On the contrary, 
 being, as they would by hypothesis be, the perfectly un- 
 dimmed and faultless expression of the highest spiritual 
 possibilities, they would be — not merged but accentuated, 
 
 exalted the means into an end, and gave an absolute intrinsic value to subordinate 
 aids and expedients. These aids and expedients, for his own sake and for the 
 good of the society to which he belonged, a Christian could not afford to hold 
 lightly or to neglect. But they were no part of the essence of God's message 
 to man in the Gospel ; they must not be allowed to obscure the idea of Christian 
 worship. 
 
 ' So it was also with the Christian priesthood. For communicating instruction 
 and for preserving public order, for conducting religious worship and for dispensing 
 social charities, il became necessary to appoint special officers.' 
 
 The italics in this second passage (except the word essence) are mine. They 
 illustrate the Bishop's conception of external expression or method as an un- 
 fortunately inevitable necessity of condescension. 
 
46 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 not obscured but illumined ; they would be more conspicuous, 
 more dominant, more profound and august in their reality 
 than they are in any form of the Church that now is. 
 
 Now this opening position of Bishop Lightfoot's may be 
 said to be the basis of his whole conception of ministry : and 
 this one criticism, if accepted, as I must submit that it needs 
 to be accepted, would affect the entire balance of his argu- 
 ment. 
 
 There is another criticism also, which belongs rather to the 
 argument of the first than of the present chapter, which is to 
 be made upon the opening pages of the essay. It will be 
 observed that Bishop Lightfoot's initial statement of the 
 ideal reality of the Christian Church is conceived in a wholly 
 individualistic form. ' Each individual member holds per- 
 sonal communion with the Divine Head.' This is the keynote. 
 Everything else is more or less an ' economy ' subordinate to 
 this. Practical measures of organization were only ' not held 
 incompatible with ' an ideal, to which, as it seems, humanity 
 as a collective term — ' man ' — was never a corporate unity at 
 all. Each individual severally, and therefore (as it were, by 
 accidental consequence) all — this is what the ideal seems to 
 mean. Again I must submit that the other mode of thought, 
 viz. humanity, as a total unity — in Adam, or in Christ — and 
 therefore each individual as an item within the total unity, 
 would be. whether philosophically or theologically, a con- 
 ception far more vitally true. Of course either aspect of the 
 thought will ultimately, in a sense, imply and include the 
 other. But the inferences which follow from the one or 
 the other mode of statement, in respect of the meaning of 
 corporate unity in the Church, and the dignity, in a spiritual 
 reference, of articulated order and coherence of mutual rela- 
 tion, will be almost immeasurably different. 
 
 It seems, then, that there is a disproportion in Bishop 
 Lightfoot's initial position ; and that the disproportion is 
 in the direction of so magnifying the inward and spiritual 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 47 
 
 meaning as to undervalue the outward and bodily expression 
 of the Church. If so, this may be said to be a very restrained 
 and gentle form of a tendency of mind v/hich has been not 
 unfamiliar in Church history, and which has more than once 
 been carried, with unrestrained logic, to destructive practical 
 conclusions. Unbalanced insistence upon the spiritual, to the 
 prejudice of the bodily, pressed home with a fierceness more 
 relentless than spiritual, we recognize it as the animating 
 temper of Montanism. Montanism would be in any case too 
 directly relevant to the present purpose to be passed over 
 altogether in silence : and the language which has been 
 recently used about it, on some sides, makes it the more 
 imperative to refer to it. From being a mere heresy, it has 
 come to be spoken of as though it were the conservative 
 retention of a more original conception and practice of Church 
 life — almost as though the Catholic Church were the heretic, 
 and only Montanism truly orthodox ^ 
 
 ^ These words may not unfairly describe the tone of various Church writers 
 upon the subject. Dr. Hatch's statement upon the subject is in part quoted 
 below, p. 51 sqq. The extreme conclusion is itself formulated in the Expositor, 
 third series, vol. v. p. 231 (March, 1887), by Professor Rendel Harris : ' The few 
 surviving notes which we have with regard to the Montanists would have told 
 us the whole story, if we had been willing to read them, without the prejudice 
 and persistent misunderstanding which we have inherited from the Church of 
 the second century. Even now, with the master-key in his hand. Dr. Sanday does 
 not seem to see that the only legitimate conclusion from his admissions is that 
 Montanism was primitive Christianity. . . . When. Dr. Sanday goes on to say, " there 
 was an element of conservatism in it," he seems to me to altogether understate 
 the case, and to take his key out of the lock and throw it back again into the 
 swamp from which a good genius had fetched it. . . . Sound in morals (for no one 
 now believes the ridiculous and contradictory scandals with which they were 
 besmeared), and pure in faith (for even the Catholics admitted their orthodo.xy), 
 inspired in utterance and expression (perhaps even to a fault), their only error 
 is found in discipline ; that is, in their continuity zvith primitive times. It is 
 no reproach to them that, in their desire to save the Church, they themselves 
 became cast away on the rocks of the new organization. St. Paul might have 
 suffered the same if he had been the junior of Ignatius instead of his predecessor.' 
 I quote this passage as somewhat significant in its place in the discussion in the 
 Expositor ; but it is not upon the position of Professor Rendel Harris that 
 I intended to comment in the text. 
 
48 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 I have no wish to speak with any impatience of this altered 
 conception of the spiritual aspirations of Montanism. But 
 if it may, in some respects, be discerning and instructive, 
 I cannot doubt that it is ill-balanced ; and that, like all 
 exaggerated statements of truth, it leads speedily to error. The 
 positive truth which TertuUian desired to emphasize, in his 
 somewhat scornful attack upon the authority of the organized 
 Church, is a truth which is always necessary and important. 
 The essence of the Church is the Personal Presence of the 
 Spirit. Upon this truth, in this form, it is impossible to insist 
 too emphatically. ' Ecclesia proprie et principalitcr ipse est 
 Spiritus, in quo est Trinitas unius Divinitatis Pater et Filius 
 et Spiritus Sanctus.' But TertuUian does not rest here. From 
 this positive he infers a negative — the very negative which, 
 as has been argued above, it does not contain. He infers 
 that therefore the Church, in respect of its visible organiza- 
 tion and officers, is not the proper Body of the Spirit. He 
 draws, on the contrary, an antithesis between the one and 
 the other. If the Church is the Spirit, it follows, to him, 
 that the episcopate is not the mouthpiece or government 
 of the Church. If the episcopate is accepted, the Church is 
 no longer the Spirit. It is either ' Ecclesia Episcoporum ' 
 or ' Ecclesia Spiritus They stand in antithesis as alter- 
 natives. To choose either is to lose the other. This is not 
 merely a complaint that the bishops were in fact too often 
 unspiritual. It is a repudiation of the episcopal system, 
 as antithetical to spirituality. 
 
 Now it is necessary in the first place to insist unreservedly, 
 in exact accordance with the position already stated, that this 
 is altogether a false antithesis : and that while Tertullian's 
 main positive is a truth immovable and of priceless value, 
 his negative inference is an exaggeration and an untruth. 
 This being clear, it is of interest to ask what leads him 
 into exaggerating ? Montanism is characterized by Bishop 
 ' De Pudic, xxi. fin. (p. 574). 
 
II] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 49 
 
 Lightfoot as being in this regard ' a rebound from the aggres- 
 sive tyranny of hierarchical assumption.' The * extravagant 
 claims ' which provoked this ' strong spirituah'st reaction ^ ' 
 he recognizes principally in the ' Ignatian letters ' on behalf of 
 Catholicism and in the Clementine writers in the interests of 
 Ebionism. Now it may be perfectly true that in the genera- 
 tions which followed the Ignatian letters there was an 
 exaggeration of the external organization of the Church, and 
 an overstatement of its intrinsic value. It may be perfectly 
 true that the correlative ' spiritual ' exaggeration of Mon- 
 tanism was provoked by natural and, to a certain extent, 
 healthy reaction. How far Ignatius would himself be re- 
 sponsible for this, whether his own letters were unbalanced 
 and misleading or not, is a question for our present purpose 
 of minor importance. That his own mind or language was 
 untrue would certainly not follow from an admission of the 
 fact that it was the occasion of untruth in others. That 
 when he pleaded for unity with the bishops everywhere and 
 always, his words were ardent words, fired with a genuine 
 fervour of enthusiasm, is obvious. That he dwelt upon the 
 truth which was aflame within him, without staying simul- 
 taneously to relate it in exact proportion with all other aspects 
 of the truth, is certain. 
 
 But all these qualities, it is to be remembered, are con- 
 sistent with divine truth. One and all, they are characteristic 
 of the mind and writing of St. Paul. Truth, which is many- 
 sided, cannot wholly be conveyed at once. The insistence, at 
 one moment, upon one side of truth only, even to the extent 
 of apparent paradox, and with the apparent effect of con- 
 founding the advance towards truth of minds which, having no 
 touch of illumining moral ardour, were just rationally balanced 
 and nothing more, belongs to the familiar methods of the 
 teaching of Jesus Christ Himself That St. Paul's doctrine 
 of justification by faith was the occasion of Antinomian 
 
 ' Lightfoot, p. 237; Hatch, p. 122. 
 E 
 
V 
 
 50 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 extravagance in others is patent even on the evidence of the 
 pages of the New Testament. Vehement as the appeals of 
 St. Ignatius are, and in this — the true scriptural — manner one- 
 sided, it may yet be doubted whether they contain anything 
 which is in itself untrue. 
 
 We justly complain of one-sidedness, and call it error, in 
 TertuUian : not because he enlarges, with ardour, upon his side 
 of the truth, but because he so uses his truth as to deny the 
 truth which is its proper complement. If Ignatius misused 
 his insistence upon episcopal order, to deny that the essence 
 of the Church was the presence of the Living Spirit, we 
 should at once convict him of an error, similar in kind, but 
 more serious than that of Tertullian. It would be more 
 serious for this reason : because of the two mutually supple- 
 mentary truths — the Ignatian truth of outward order, the 
 Tertullianist truth of inward spirit ; we can have not a 
 moment's hesitation in asserting that the spiritual truth is the 
 deeper, the more transcendent, the one which ultimately, in 
 a sense, includes and absorbs the other. But it absorbs it — 
 not by abolishing or denying, but by establishing, informing, 
 characterizing it with itself. Though Spirit be higher than 
 Body, yet Body also is true ; and Spirit is through Body. 
 Now Tertullian so affirms Spirit, as to deny Body. Ignatius, 
 fervent as is his vindication of Body, never uses it for the 
 denial — never tends towards denial, or in any sense under- 
 valuing — of Spirit. Still whatever may be said in this way 
 about St. Ignatius himself, it may be admitted, if the 
 admission is desired, that his letters were calculated to pro- 
 duce, in the popular mind of ordinary Christians, an excessive 
 idea of the formal and (as it were) independent value of 
 external order ; calculated, at least in the sense, and to at 
 least the extent, in which St. Paul's letters were calculated to 
 suggest ' to the unlearned and unstable ' a new opening for 
 Antinomian excess. 
 
 Dr. Hatch, when he comes to Montanism, introduces it 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 51 
 
 thus : ' Then came a profound reaction. Against the growing 
 tendency towards that state of things which afterwards firmly 
 estaWished itself, and which ever since has been the normal 
 state of almost all Christian Churches, some communities, first 
 of Asia Minor, then of Africa, then of Italy, raised a vigorous 
 and, for a time, a successful protest. They reasserted the 
 place of spiritual gifts as contrasted with official rule. They 
 maintained that the revelation of Christ through the Spirit 
 was not a temporary phenomenon of apostolic days, but 
 a constant fact of Christian life. They combined with this 
 the preaching of a higher morality than that which was tend- 
 ing to become current' I quote these words because (apart 
 from the apparent implication that real discipline and govern- 
 ment, as from above, was only a growing novelty in the 
 Church) they strike a note which will come home to every 
 Christian as of deep and enduring value. But unfortunately 
 even these words describe, more literally than they appear 
 to do, the vice as well as the virtue of the spiritual protest. 
 To protest, on behalf of spiritual Christianity, against every 
 touch of formalism in official rule, is a necessity of every 
 generation of the Church. But to protest against ' official 
 rule ' is to protest in fact against the conditions divinely and 
 inextricably attached to every movement of life within human 
 experience. 
 
 Further on Dr. Hatch writes : ' In theological as in other 
 wars the tendency is to cry " Vae victis ! " and to assume 
 that the defeated are always in the wrong. But a careful 
 survey of the evidence leads to the conclusion that, in its 
 view of the relation of ecclesiastical office to the Chris- 
 tian life, the Montanism, as it was called, which Tertullian 
 defended, was theoretically in the right, though its theory 
 had become in practice impossible. It did not make suffi- 
 cient allowance for changed and changing circumstances. It 
 was a beating of the wings of pietism against the iron bars of 
 organization. It was the first, though not the last, rebellion 
 
52 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 of the religious sentiment against official religion ^' There 
 is so much, both in these words and in the pages from which 
 they are quoted, with which it is impossible not to feel 
 a strong underlying sympathy of sentiment, that it may 
 seem to be the more invidious, but perhaps is in truth the 
 better worth while, to try to distinguish in them what is said 
 in due proportion and what is not. Perhaps the ' Vae victis ' 
 warning is most serviceable to us in the form of a reminder 
 that while no form of false theory is wholly without truth, 
 it is sometimes the case that the amount of truth in theories 
 which the Church has justly repudiated as a whole is at once 
 very large and very important. But what is really meant by 
 saying that Tertullian's ' spirituality ' was theoretically right, 
 yet in practice impossible ? To admit that it was in practice 
 impossible is at least to impair the sense in which it could be 
 pronounced theoretically right. An ideal which is out of rela- 
 tion with possibility is likely to be an ideal misconceived. The 
 thought appears to be like that of Bishop Lightfoot's opening 
 paragraphs — as though outwardness were, even in this world, 
 an unfortunate condescension, diplomatically necessary, in- 
 stead of being the inevitable condition, to inwardness. Any 
 way, the practical necessity is admitted in fact. But it would 
 have been better and truer to have laid it down, not as a de- 
 grading concession, but as a divinely ordered principle of life, 
 that in this world the expression of Spirit is Body, and that 
 inward unity is revealed and lives in the harmony of visible 
 union. 
 
 The last sentence quoted will carry us a little further. 
 I must insist again that when Dr. Hatch speaks of the re- 
 
 ' In the page which intervenes between these two quotations Dr. Hatch 
 represents the Montanist theory and claim about Church organization as if it did not 
 differ from the Catholic Church at all except in its view of cases of emergency ; 
 claiming in the absence of clergy, and then only, an extreme and exceptional 
 possibility of lay ministry. This may be true in the main ; and it certainly fairly 
 repi esents one well-known passage. But the phrase ' non ecclesia numerus Epis- 
 coporum ' implies really much more than this. 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTIVARD 53 
 
 bellion of ' religious sentiment against official religion ' he is 
 bound to mean, not official religion simpliciter, but ' officialism 
 in religion,' or whatever other phrase would imply that the 
 'official' has unduly asserted itself to the prejudice of the 
 ' spiritual ' character of religion. With this correction I have 
 already agreed that the statement may very probably repre- 
 sent a historical truth about Montanism and Tertullian. With 
 rich allusiveness Dr. Hatch speaks of it as ' the first, though 
 not the last ' such protest. Here again, with the statement 
 of fact and with the sentiment which lies behind the state- 
 ment, every serious Christian will be in eager accord. Indeed, 
 it is important to insist that, as long as human frailty 
 remains in the Church and her ministries, the spiritual protest 
 which asserted itself (and went astray) in Montanism will 
 continue to be urgently needed. In every age of the Church 
 human imperfectness, in its use even of the simplest and the 
 sacredest forms, tends naturally, more or less, towards 
 mechanical formalism. Therefore human imperfectness 
 always keeps, and will keep, alive the necessity for earnest 
 protest against mechanical adherence to form. On some 
 sides, and in some ages, the whole fabric of Christian faith 
 and worship has seemed to become such a lifeless weight of 
 formalism that spiritually minded men might well be excused 
 if their indignant protest on behalf of spiritual life took the 
 shape of unrelenting attack upon forms which had seemed to 
 have become irremediably formal. It may be true, perhaps, that 
 there is no age, nor place, in which the protest is not needed. 
 Yet it is a protest which too easily overreaches itself. And 
 in fact the protest, if made against not formalism only but 
 form (however provoked and therefore in individuals morally 
 excusable), is really a demand for conditions of spiritual life 
 which are literally and absolutely impossible. There is much 
 in the feeling which underlies Dr. Hatch's sympathetic and 
 interesting pages about Montanism that is really attractive. 
 So far as this spirit of Montanism is a reaction against 
 
54 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CK. 
 
 mechanical officialism, it will have high place and value in 
 the Christian character just as long as man is imperfect. Yet 
 even in this particular — without going into any question 
 either of its more audacious claims about the possession and 
 utterance of the Holy Ghost or of its Puritan conception of 
 discipline — we must take leave still to maintain that the 
 instinct of the Catholic Church which rejected Montanism 
 was the instinct of abiding truth. 
 
 The protest which in the ancient world is so far identified 
 with the name of Tertullian is at least as familiar in the 
 modern world as in the ancient. Probably it comes out for 
 us into strongest prominence in the history of Quakerism. 
 But the doctrine which is most characteristic of the Society 
 of Friends does in fact lie at the root, not only of a very large 
 part of pious nonconformity in many denominations, but also 
 of the critical and separatist tendency which is so very 
 familiar a characteristic, in our parochial congregations, of 
 many even of those who do conform. Certainly we do not 
 need to speak of this at all less sympathetically than either 
 of Montanism or of Dr. Hatch's conception of Montanism. 
 It is perhaps the first instinct of a piety which, while genuine, 
 is inexperienced and ill-informed, to try to realize its new- 
 found earnestness, not by means of, but in contrast with, the 
 traditionally received expressions of piety. The man who, 
 living in the midst of Christian traditions and customs, wakes 
 up for the first time to a real sense of personal religion, does 
 often, not quite unnaturally, identify the whole fabric of 
 Christian traditions in the practice of which he himself had 
 religiously slumbered, with the slumber in which he had prac- 
 tised them ; and seems to himself to find, in his very revolt 
 against traditionally orthodox faith and practice, a pledge of 
 his personal reality. With all this' instinct, as with the 
 Montanist spirit in its best form, it is possible to feel a great 
 deal of sympathy. 
 
 Nevertheless the reactionary protest is extravagant, and 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 55 
 
 the practical outcome of its extravagance is in a high degree 
 desolating and destructive. To get rid of form is of course 
 impossible. The attempt to do so ends really in the substitu- 
 tion of such forms as seem to be least like forms — forms, 
 that is, the most unintelligent and uninspiring — in the place 
 of those which are most venerable, and which, if they had 
 been richly animated, not swept away, by the newly inflowing 
 tide of spiritual life, would have been found to be the most 
 significant, the most edifying, and the most abiding. For 
 a while indeed the new piety lives on in spite of its isolation 
 from Christian history and its poverty of outward expressive- 
 ness. But the fire which sustains the first enthusiasts does 
 not sustain their successors : there is lack of fuel to replenish 
 it, lack of historical continuity, lack of adequate expressive- 
 ness or authority of form : in the long run spirit corre- 
 sponds with body, as body with spirit ; and those who have 
 tried to cut loose from what seemed to them merely outward, 
 find more and more, in fact, that in losing reality of body 
 they have been losing reality of spirit too. 
 
 Take the words in which Canon Curteis describes the 
 central aspiration which animated the thought of George 
 Fox : ' His first great doctrine is this (and it is also the 
 doctrine of the Catholic Church) ; that the visible and out- 
 wardly organized Church, with all her hierarchy, her canons, 
 her ritual, her creeds, her sacraments, is nothing more than 
 the shell (as it were) of the living creature, the scaffolding of 
 the real building, the means and not the end, the casket 
 and not the jewel \' Without staying to consider whether 
 every one of these four metaphorical parallels will hold, it 
 is worth while to say that the obvious meaning which they 
 are endeavouring to express is one with which we cannot 
 too cordially sympathize. God the Holy Spirit — the Spirit 
 of the Incarnate Son, who is the Revelation of the Father — 
 is the end, the reality, the essence, the life of the Church. 
 
 ' ' The Church and Dissent.' Bampton Lectures for 1871, pp. 258, 259. 
 
56 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 Everything outward is outward ; and the outward, at best, 
 is the mere expression of the inward. But no insistence on 
 this truth will get rid of the necessity — nay the sanctity — if 
 not inherent, yet real, of the expressing outward. Nay, the 
 more profoundly the one central truth is grasped, so much 
 the more august, and profound, because really and utterly 
 spiritual, will be felt to be whatever belongs to the due and 
 authorized representation or conveyal of that one supreme 
 inward reality, which is God Himself Whether it be urged 
 by Montanist, or Quaker, or Plymouth brother, or any other 
 variety of pious Nonconformist or over-scrupulous Church- 
 man, the antithesis between spirit and body — true as it is for 
 certain purposes, and up to a certain point — breaks down 
 utterly and disastrously when pushed on to the point, not 
 only of significant distinction, but of real antagonism. The 
 disavowal of body will not hold of the Body of the Church, at 
 least until it holds of the body of the individual saint. 
 
 The passage from Canon Curteis expres.sly contrasts 
 ' means ' with ' end,' and this phrase of his, at least, w^e may 
 unreservedly adopt. The same distinction occurs in the early 
 pages of Bishop Lightfoot's essay. After conceding the prac- 
 tical necessity of external organization and ordinances, the 
 Bishop argues that 'the Apostles never lost sight of an ideal 
 to which these were foreign. ' They proclaimed loudly that 
 " God dwelleth not in temples made by hands." They in- 
 dignantly denounced those who " observed days and months 
 and seasons and years." This language is not satisfied by 
 supposing that they condemned only the temple worship in 
 the one case, that they reprobated only Jewish sabbaths and 
 new moons in the other. It was against the false principle 
 that they waged war ; the principle which exalted the means 
 into an end, and gave an absolute intrinsic value to sub- 
 ordinate aids and expedients. These aids and expedients, 
 for his own sake and for the good of the society to which he 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 57 
 
 belonged, a Christian could not afford to hold lightly or 
 neglect. But they were no part of the essence of God's 
 message to man in the Gospel : they must not be allowed 
 to obscure the idea of Christian worship 
 
 Now we should desire to protest as strongly as Bishop 
 Lightfoot or any one could do, against any confusion of 
 means with ends ; or against giving to methods, however 
 divinely appointed, what could be in strictness called an 
 ' absolute ' or ' intrinsic ' value. These last phrases, however, 
 would require to be carefully discriminated ; for though the 
 value of such methods belongs to them wholly and only as 
 they truly represent, and by Divine Grace are empowered to 
 convey, a spiritual which is not themselves ; yet when they 
 do so truly represent and convey, the language of Scripture 
 (which comes nearer after all to the living truth than do 
 the distinctions either of science or of logic) speaks of them 
 absolutely as ' being ^ that which, in the particular relation, 
 they are made in effect to be. There is therefore a sense, 
 and a supremely true one — even though it be distinct from 
 either logical or scientific exactness — in which, under cir- 
 cumstances, their value may be called inherent, and even 
 'absolute': just as 'body,' whenever regarded (by impossible 
 abstractness of logic) as mere body, means, in strictness of 
 the term, ' not Spirit ' ; and yet, in proportion as Body attains 
 its true meaning, behold its animating character, its vivifying 
 reality, after all, therefore, its essential meaning — simply is 
 Spirit. 
 
 That Bishop Lightfoot completely ignored this distinction 
 is obvious, not only from the general use which he makes of 
 the thought of this passage, but, in the passage itself, from 
 the sudden introduction — where we should have expected 
 such a word as ' methods ' in the sense just indicated — of the 
 alternative and very depreciatory phrase ' subordinate aids 
 and expedients.' Neither ' aids ' (to what ?) nor ' expedients ' 
 
 ' p. 182. 
 
58 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 are adequate words ; but the word ' subordinate ' begs the 
 whole question at once, and begs it in the wrong sense. The 
 clause should rather run, ' the principle which exalted the 
 means into an end per se, or gave any value {apart from 
 the Spirit expressed by them) to methods whose one real 
 meaning was the Spirit they expressed.' It could not then 
 have been added that the Christian's respect for such methods ^ 
 was based upon considerations which appear to be regarded 
 as human and politic ; though the phrase ' for his own sake 
 and for the good of the society to which he belonged ' is 
 capable of expressing a sanction far more august than the 
 text appears to intend. 
 
 ' But,' Bishop Lightfoot adds — though not to be despised 
 or neglected — ' they were no part of the essence of God's 
 message to man in the Gospel.' Now upon this phrase 
 I have two comments to make. First, I have tried already 
 to make clear a sense in which I should submit that all 
 Christians must agree in saying that neither ministries nor 
 sacraments can properly be called the essence, or even a part 
 of the essence, of the Life of the Church. The ' Spirit of the 
 Incarnate ' alone is the essential Life of the Church. But to 
 deny that ' methods,' taken in their detail, are, properly, even 
 a 'part of the essence of the Church's Living Being, is one 
 thing ; to deny that they are even a part of ' God's message 
 to man in the Gospel ' is another. This second phrase, which 
 is the one used by Bishop Lightfoot, appears to be a much 
 vaguer one, and might well be considered to include not only 
 the theological exposition of what is the essentia of the 
 Church's Life, but also such pi'ecepts or practices as are, in 
 the Gospel Revelation, prescribed to man, with a view to the 
 
 ' It is to be remembered that at this stage of the argument the word ' methods ' 
 would have to contain any methods, however divinely commanded, simply as 
 being methods. Whether there are any divinely ordered methods or not, or, if 
 any, what methods are ordered divinely, is an inquiry not yet opened. What is 
 here said by the Bishop is said of methods or means simply because they are 
 such ; and, as such, belong to the world of outward and visible ordinances. 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 59 
 
 Life of the Church. If so, whatever is part of the divinely 
 ordained method, is part of the essence of ' God's message to 
 man in the Gospel.' 
 
 But there is another consideration of some value, based 
 upon the practical difference of meaning between the noun 
 'essence' and the adjective 'essential.' If I am asked, are 
 ordinances part of the ' essentia ' of the Church's being, I may 
 well hesitate : there is a sense in which they are ; and there is 
 a sense in which they are not. If I am asked, are ordinances 
 essential to the Church's life, I can have no hesitation at all. 
 Most assuredly they are. But they may be indispensable 
 conditions of the essence ; the appointed — conceivably even 
 the only possible — methods of the essence ; in the second 
 instance, therefore, in their practical working, by God's will 
 identified with the essence : and yet, after all, so distinguish- 
 able from the essence, that I might hesitate to assert that 
 they 'were' the essence itself. Nor, in that case, would the 
 phrase ' part of the essence ' help me. In the sense in which 
 I should shrink from calling them ' the essence,' I could not 
 possibly admit that they were ' part of the essence ' ; for God 
 is not divisible into parts. But though there be this hesitation 
 about the word ' essence,' the meaning practically borne by 
 the adjective 'essential' does not correspond to this. It does 
 not mean, in effect, ' constituting the essentia,' but ' indispen- 
 sable ' — as condition or otherwise — with a view to the essentia ; 
 which is precisely the meaning which we pointedly retain at 
 the very moment when (it may be) we let the word ' essence ' 
 go. Canon Gore, in his criticism of the passage, assumes 
 outright, that when Bishop Lightfoot denies that methods 
 are any ' part of the essence ' he intends to assert that they 
 are ' non-essential \' In reference to the practical course of 
 the argument, this assumption is perhaps not unreasonable. 
 
 ' Appendix A, p. 355 : ' He is not, of course, using essence in any metaphysical 
 sense, but in such sense as that what is essential is equivalent to what is necessary.' 
 The distinctions of this Appendix are very valuable. 
 
6o MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 Yet, since Bishop Lightfoot's statement is in the former shape, 
 and not the latter, I would prefer to suggest that, not having 
 the distinction before his mind, he passes (at most), by im- 
 perceptible and unconscious transition, from his actual state- 
 ment, which thus far is tenable, to an untenable meaning, 
 which appears to be, but is not, practically identical with his 
 statement. Moreover, he does not altogether so pass. It 
 may well be that he would not actually have used the word 
 non-essential. But if so, the ambiguity which remains between 
 the two forms of thought is not otherwise than characteristic 
 of an essay which has notoriously been open to so much 
 doubtful and mistaken interpretation. 
 
 Now, having drawn this distinction, and insisted that ordi- 
 nances, whether asserted or denied to be ' of the essence ' of 
 the Church's Life (either of which methods of speech is tenable), 
 are at all events ' essential,' in the sense of being God's own 
 appointed and imperative conditions and methods of the 
 essence, it becomes necessary for us still to ask in what 
 sense this ' essential ' necessity is asserted. Is the necessity, 
 in every conceivable case, self-acting and absolute ? Is it 
 incapable of exception? The question is enough to carry 
 the answer ; and the answer is thoroughly familiar. They 
 are essential in the sense that, in so far as we are commanded 
 by God to use them, we have no power of dispensing with 
 the use of them, or of obtaining, otherwise than by the use of 
 them, the gifts which God has bidden us find in and through 
 their use. So far, at least, the old instance of Naaman's 
 leprosy is strictly applicable. If God prescribed the use of 
 Jordan water, the use of Jordan water became by God's 
 command, as, on the one hand, efficacious with the efficacy 
 of almightiness, so, on the other, indispensable with the 
 necessity of God. If God has ordained Christian ordinances, 
 then Christian ordinances have become — just in proportion as 
 He has laid them upon us — both ' essential,' and (though in 
 a secondary sense) even ' intrinsically ' efficacious. As it would 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 6i 
 
 have been obviously futile for Naaman to have drawn a distinc- 
 tion, either, in respect of his own duty, between bathing in 
 Jordan on the one side, and obeying God on the other, or, in 
 respect of his own blessing, between bathing in Jordan on the 
 one side, and recovery from leprosy on the other, for in either 
 case, when God had spoken, the distinction had absolutely 
 ceased to be, — so, in respect of Christian ordinances, if or in 
 so far as they are divinely ordained, it would be futile, and 
 even meaningless, for a Christian to try, as it were, to cut in 
 either between such ordinances, spiritually used, on the one 
 hand, and, on the other, Christian homage of faith, or obedience, 
 or love ; or between such ordinances, spiritually used, on the 
 one hand, and, on the other, the very richness of the presence 
 and life of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. It is the old distinction. 
 If God is not in any way bound to His own appointed methods 
 of grace, yet we are. Outside His appointed ' media ' of what- 
 ever kind — ministries, sacraments, ordinances — He can work, 
 if He will, as divinely as within them. He can cleanse with 
 Abana, or with Pharpar, or with nothing, as effectually as 
 with Jordan. But that is nothing to us, if He has bidden us 
 to wash in Jordan. So, if there are, in His Church, divinely 
 prescribed ministries and ordinances, the consideration that 
 He is not bound to ministries and ordinances, even though it 
 be true, becomes nothing — but a snare — to us. It may serve 
 indeed somewhat to the lowliness of our thoughts ; it may 
 abash us from the presumption of even imagining, at any 
 time, anything like a judgement of others, whose case before 
 God is known to Him, not to us. But used as a guide to our 
 own conception or conduct, it could have no effect, except to 
 mislead. 
 
 The necessity, then, which is asserted (contingently upon 
 there being Divine ministries, &c. at all) is a necessity not 
 simply self-acting, like the operations of a physical quality ; 
 it is a necessity, not of a material but of a moral kind ; 
 a necessity which, by its inherent character as moral, cannot 
 
62 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 but have real relations to varying conditions of understanding 
 and of opportunity; a necessity which appeals alike to our 
 belief and our obedience, with a moral power indefinitely the 
 greater, just because it is not either in all cases literally 
 universal, or in any case visibly demonstrable. 
 
 The gradations, the exceptions, are not for us to define. 
 The fact that they exist modifies the sharp logic of our 
 abstract theory of necessity : it holds us back, even in 
 thought, from the concrete judgement of individuals. But it 
 does not alter, in the least, the moral obligation which rests 
 upon us who understand, to make clear to ourselves, and to 
 those to whom we can make clear, what belief and obedience 
 require — of them and of us. To those who have eyes to see 
 and hearts to understand, the dutiful use of Divine ' methods ' 
 (if any such there be) is a necessity ' essential ' to obedience, 
 and to faith. It is a necessity, like all moral necessities, not 
 stupidly inexorable, but characterized and informed by the 
 inherent attribute of equity \ It is a necessity which itself is 
 part of the revelation of God — so far as God is revealed. It 
 is a necessity therefore, not of blind law, as the order to 
 Naaman first seemed to be, but of the Supreme perfection of 
 Wisdom and Equity, as the order to Naaman was. It is part 
 of the wisdom of the Spirit to understand the necessity — what 
 it is, and what it is not. It is a necessity, in so far, at least, as 
 there is insight to discern its necessity, not to enable God, but 
 to authorize and to enable us. To discern and to characterize 
 the necessity aright, is to determine the question, not so much 
 
 ' It is interesting in this reference to contrast the position of Hooker and his 
 opponents in reference to the necessity of Baptism. Both were dealing with the 
 fact of the existence of ' equitable' exceptions. The opponents said, Because 
 equity requires the admission of exceptions, therefore the necessity of Baptism 
 is an untenable doctrine. Hooker, reversing the argument, replied, Because equity 
 is inherent, as of course, in the ' necessity ' of a Divine command to intellect or 
 character, therefore the only objection to the doctrine of the necessity of Baptism 
 falls to the ground. Equitable interpretation, in his view, is not a qualification, 
 far less the negation, but rather an inalienable attribute or element, of a moral 
 necessity. 
 
ii] RELATION OF INWARD AND OUTWARD 63 
 
 of Divine possibility as of Divine revelation, and therefore of 
 human validity and obedience. We want to know, not within 
 what limits God can work, but by what methods He has 
 revealed that He does ; and therefore wherein and whereby 
 we ourselves may, dutifully and securely, meet and find Him, 
 and live and grow into Him, in Spirit and in Truth. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THE RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 
 
 The discussion in the last chapter was quite general in 
 kind. It referred to ' media ' as such. It was only hypotheti- 
 cally assumed that there are such things as divinely ordered 
 ' media ' in the Church of Christ. To any specific method 
 or ordinance there was no reference at all. An attempt was 
 made, however, to vindicate the idea of such divinely ordered 
 media ; to maintain their necessity as essential to the valid 
 security — of the rendering of human faith and service upon 
 theonehand — of the receiving of Divine grace upon the other ; 
 and to relate this doctrine of 'essential means' with the 
 unmeasured freedom of the goodness of God. Such means 
 in truth are no limiting of the goodness of God : they are 
 a defining to man. in terms humanly intelligible, of the 
 methods by which his access, and his blessing, may securely 
 be realized, while they emphasize, in this defining, the reality 
 of man's corporate life, as brotherhood. At no point, at no 
 moment, are they a substitute for service spiritual and per- 
 sonal : but they say. Combine to render your spiritual service 
 thus : thus believe : and thus do, individually alike and corpor- 
 ately : for thus God is pledged to receive you. and to enrich. 
 They are a reaching out of infiniteness to finiteness, an accom- 
 modation of the invisible to the visible ; they are (since to 
 our senses the invisible and the infinite mean the indefinite and 
 the uncertain) a condescension of heaven to conditions of earth; 
 
RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 65 
 
 an anticipation — in terms of faith, yet in circumstances of 
 material life — of the interpenetration of Humanity with Deity. 
 Their apparent limitation constitutes, to us, being such as we 
 are, their definiteness, and their security ; the sure certainty 
 of their comfort, the glory of their condescension. 
 
 But the subject more immediately before us is not sacra- 
 mental ordinances in general, but in particular the rationale 
 of an apostolic ministry. Now any serious discussion of 
 ministry may seem to imply, and the preface to our Ordinal 
 expressly asserts, alike the perpetuity and the necessity of 
 ministerial order within the Church. Assuming, then, in 
 the light of the last chapter, the fact of the necessity, 
 it is important to ask what, and how much, is meant by 
 asserting that it is necessary. What is the relation that 
 results between this Ministry and either the Body as a whole, 
 or the Laity, if the Laity be regarded apart ? How much is 
 contained, or implied, in the principle of an indispensable 
 ministry ? 
 
 Would it mean that, in the Church of Christ, which is the 
 very home of Divine privilege and perpetual possibility of 
 access to God, this access and these privileges are committed 
 not to the Body of the Church as a whole, but only to a few — 
 a caste, or a class, through whom, and through whom only, 
 all others, as outsiders, must be content to have their mediated 
 access ? Is our ministerial order, in this sense, a sanctified 
 intermediary, higher in official status, nearer in Divine 
 intimacy, holier in the sanctity of personal life, and, as such, 
 set to stand, and to mediate, between the mere plebs 
 Christiana and their God ? Is the immediate possibility of 
 access of all human spirits to the Father of Spirits, through 
 the Person of Jesus Christ, either denied in it, or in any 
 way qualified ? 
 
 It is, I conceive, matter of quite capital importance that 
 those who consider the meaning of Christian ministry should 
 raise clearly, and fully answer, this question to themselves. 
 
 F 
 
66 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 The question, as just put, contains phrases tenable and unten- 
 able ; but almost all of them, whether untenable or tenable, 
 would require to be carefully discriminated before the answer 
 given would be clearly intelligible. It would be compara- 
 tively easy to answer the question with a negative, and the 
 simple ' no ' would be, no doubt, much nearer to the truth 
 than a simple 'yes.' But a simple 'no' after all neither 
 illumines, nor explains, anything at all. Moreover, it would 
 probably deny much truth as well as untruth. To make 
 then our answering position really clear, it is desirable to 
 express it rather more fully, in the form of certain principles, 
 which appear to be fundamental to an understanding of what 
 is properly meant by any assertion, on the part of Church- 
 men, of the indispensableness of consecrated 'order.' 
 
 I. First, then, the Church is, in Scripture language, a Temple, 
 and a Body. It is the Body of Christ. It is the Temple of 
 the Holy Ghost. The truth which is expressed under either 
 image is that its inner life is the Presence of the Spirit ; 
 and that the outer fabric of its articulated corporate movement 
 and growth is but essentially the expression of a Presence, 
 the Body of a Spirit. What then, exactly, is this spiritual 
 Body ; and of whom does it consist ? Most emphatically we 
 reply, that it consists of, and means, not in any way the 
 clergy as such, but the whole corporation or Church of 
 Christ ; into which Christian Baptism primarily admits ; 
 in which, by laying on of hands, members pass to full 
 exercise of that spiritual franchise or privilege of Divine 
 citizenship (in real sense, even, of Divine priesthood), to the 
 whole of which, from the moment of Baptism, they already 
 possessed an inherent and implicit right. The spiritual 
 privilege, the Divine access, the life of, and with, and by, 
 and unto God, are essentially the possession of all, not 
 of some ; of the whole Body, primarily, as a whole (for 
 the corporate life precedes and transcends the individual) ; 
 of individuals, as they are true members of the Body, not 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 67 
 
 as they are members to whom this function, or that, in 
 the organism of the Body, is assigned. The language in 
 which Scripture insists on this principle of the oneness of the 
 total Body, and of the necessity of the total Body for oneness, 
 is reiterated and emphatic : ' For even as we have many 
 members in one body, and all the members have not the 
 same office ; so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and 
 severally members one of another ' For as the body is one 
 and hath many members, and all the members of the one 
 body, being many, are one body ; so also is Christ In 
 
 ' Romans xii. 4. 
 
 ° I Cor. xii. 12. The passage goes on : ' For in one Spirit were we all baptized 
 into one Body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether bond or free; and were all made 
 to drink of one Spirit. For the body is not one member, but many. If the foot 
 shall say, Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body ; is it therefore 
 not of the body? . . . And if they were all one member, where were the body? 
 But now they are many members, but one body. . . . And whether one member 
 suffercth, all the members suffer with it ; or one member is honoured, all the 
 members rejoice with it. Now ye are the Body of Christ, and severally members 
 thereof. And God hath set some in the Church, fir=t apostles, secondly prophets, 
 thirdly teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, governments, divers 
 kinds of tongues. Are all apostles ? are all prophets ? are all teachers ? are all 
 workers of miracles ? have all gifts of healings ? do all speak with tongues ? 
 do all interpret? But desire earnestly the greater gifts. And a still more 
 excellent way show I unto you. If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, 
 but have not love, I am become sounding brass, or a clanging cymbal,' &c., &c. 
 Take with this Eph. iv. 11-16 : ' And He gave some to be apostles ; and some, 
 prophets ; and some, evangelists ; and some, pastors and teachers ; for the per- 
 fecting of the saints, unto the work of ministering, unto the building up of the 
 Body of Christ : till we all attain unto the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge 
 of the Son of God, unto a fuUgrown man, unto the measure of the stature of the 
 fulness of Christ ; that we may be no longer children, tossed to and fro and 
 carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, in craftiness, 
 after the wiles of error ; but speaking truth in love, may grow up in all things into 
 Him, which is the Head, even Christ ; from whom all the Body fitly framed and 
 knit together through that which every joint supplieth, according to the working 
 in due measure of each several part, maketh the increase of the Body unto the 
 building up of itself in love.' And i Pet. ii. 4, 5 : ' Unto whom coming, a living 
 stone, rejected indeed of men, but with God elect, precious, ye also, as living 
 stones, are built up a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual 
 sacrifices, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.' And 9, 10: 'But ye are 
 an elect race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, 
 that ye may show forth the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness 
 
 F 3 
 
68 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 both passages, and with great fullness in the latter of them, 
 the principle is expressly applied to the thought of differences 
 of function, and of dignity of function, in the body, which, 
 despite all difference of function and apparent dignity, is none 
 the less itself one coherent unity of parts which are mutually 
 dependent, severally incomplete. 
 
 II. If the Body is not some, but all ; and the powers and 
 gifts inherent in the life of the Body are the powers and gifts 
 which, so far, belong to all ; and the Spirit which is the 
 Body's life, is the Spirit of all ; what is the relation of 
 ministers specifically ordained, to this total life and power of 
 the total Body ? Clearly they are not intermediaries between 
 the Body and its life. They do not confer life on the Body, 
 in whole or in part. But they are organs of the Body, 
 through which the life, inherent in the total Body, expresses 
 itself in particular functions of detail. They are organs of 
 the whole Body, working organically for the whole Body, 
 specifically representative for specific purposes and processes 
 of the power of the life, which is the life of the whole body, 
 not the life of some of its organs. ' They are for public 
 purposes the organs of the Body s life : but the great life 
 itself, the great deposit of the spiritual life remains in the 
 Body at large This is the truth, which gives a touch of 
 enthusiasm to much of the language of the fifth of Dr. Hatch's 
 Bampton Lectures : an enthusiasm with which, so far as it 
 really rests upon this truth, it is impossible not to sympa- 
 thize. But it is important to distinguish this truth most 
 sharply from an inference which it does not contain. We 
 therefore explicitly la)'' down 
 
 III. The fact that the organs represent, and live by, the 
 life of the whole body, does not mean that the rest of the 
 body can dispense with the organs. If any organs are 
 
 into His marvellous light : which in time past were no people, but now are 
 the people of God : which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained 
 mercy.' 
 
 ' Bampton Lectures, 1868 ; Lect. ii. p. 60. 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 69 
 
 missing, it does not follow that all the rest of the body put 
 together can discharge the special functions which the missing 
 organs were made to discharge. A body however otherwise 
 complete cannot see without eyes, hear without ears, or run 
 a race without legs. Still less does it follow, because the eye 
 (say) is an organ of the whole body, living and seeing by, 
 and not apart from, the body's life, that therefore any and 
 every other member of the body severally has the same 
 functional power as the eye for seeing. Nor again does it 
 follow, because the life of the eye is the life of the body, 
 specialized for a particular functional purpose, that therefore 
 its sight-capacity is conferred upon the eye at the will or by 
 the act of the body. Neither any other member in detail, 
 nor the body as a whole, conferred upon the eye its capacity 
 of seeing, or can transfer that capacity to any other organ, 
 or can itself in any other way exercise the capacity of vision, 
 if it should lose the eye. The eye is but an organ of the 
 body by which the body sees ; the hand is but an organ of 
 the body by which the body strikes. But the body did not 
 confer upon hand or eye their capacity of striking or of 
 seeing for the body. It is therefore abundantly plain that, 
 whatever may be true upon other grounds, it most certainly 
 is not contained as a logical inference within the principle 
 that Church ministers are organs of the life of the Body of 
 the Church, and not intermediaries between the Body and life ; 
 that therefore the rest of the Body, even all put together — 
 much less that any and every individual member of it — is 
 already de jure a minister, or that the authority of the 
 ministers to minister is derived from, or is conferred by, the 
 mere will or act of the Body. 
 
 For the fuller illustration of this distinction and its con- 
 sequences, I may be allowed to refer to the entire argument 
 of my father's Bampton Lectures \ It is there stated directly 
 
 ' Administration of the Holy Spirit, by the late Bishop of Salisbury ; the 
 Bampton Lectures for 1868, pp. 60, 61. 
 
70 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 as follows: 'The analogy so much presented to us in Holy- 
 Scripture, of the natural body of a man, can hardly, as it 
 seems to me, be pressed too far in its strong and close bearing 
 upon my present point. One vitality diffused over the whole, 
 special organs for special services of general and indispensable 
 use. all needful for each, each needful for all ; — does not the 
 likeness seem to fit in ever}' particular, showing by an example 
 of which every one of us is fully capable of judging how 
 " the whole " spiritual " body fitly framed together, and com- 
 pacted by means of everj^ joint of the supply, according to 
 the working in the measure of each several part, maketh the 
 growth of the body unto the building up of itself in love? " 
 The strength and health of the whole natural body is needed 
 to enable each separate member and limb, each bodily organ 
 and faculty, to discharge its own proper functions success- 
 fully; and yet no one of these separate members or organs 
 derives its own peculiar functions nor the power to exercise 
 them in the first place from that strength and health. The 
 ner\'ous sensibility helpful to the eye as the organ of sight, 
 or to the ear as the organ of hearing, or to the other organs 
 for the discharge of their respective offices, is diffused over 
 the whole body ; yet not only do these organs not derive 
 their peculiar powers from that diffused sensibility, but if the 
 organs themselves be from any cause inoperative, no such 
 diffused sensibility can restore them. The body is absolutely 
 blind if the eye cannot see, and entirely deaf if the ear 
 cannot hear. The case appears to be closely, I might say 
 singularly, parallel to that of the spiritual body, and may 
 very justly, as it does most forcibly, illustrate the case of 
 a priesthood, strictly representative in its own proper being, 
 yet receiving personal designation and powers, not by original 
 derivation from the body which it represents, or continual 
 reference to it, but by perpetual succession from a divine 
 source and spring of authorizing grace.' 
 
 The thought thus expressed appears to be exactly reflected 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 71 
 
 by Canon Gore, when he is speaking of the relation of 
 ministry, as such, to the Body as a whole : ' It is an abuse of 
 the sacerdotal conception, if it is supposed that the priesthood 
 exists to celebrate sacrifices or acts of worship in the place of 
 
 the body of the people or as their substitute The 
 
 ministry is no more one of vicarious action than it is one of ex- 
 clusive knowledge or exclusive spiritual relation to God. What 
 is the truth then ? It is that the Church is one body. The 
 free approach to God in the Sonship and Priesthood of Christ 
 belongs to men as members of " one body," and this one body 
 has different organs through which the functions of its life 
 find expression, as it was differentiated by the act and appoint- 
 ment of Him who created it. The reception, for instance, 
 of Eucharistic grace, the approach to God in Eucharistic 
 sacrifice, are functions of the whole body. " We bless the 
 cup of blessing," " zue break the bread," says St. Paul, 
 speaking for the community; "w^ offer," "we present," is the 
 language of the liturgies. But the ministry is the organ — 
 the necessary organ — of these functions. It is the hand 
 which offers and distributes ; it is the voice which consecrates 
 and pleads. And the whole body can no more dispense with 
 its services than the natural body can grasp or speak without 
 the instrumentality of hand or tongue. Thus the ministry is 
 the instrument as well as the symbol of the Church's unity, 
 and no man can share her fellowship except in acceptance 
 of its offices^.' 
 
 It is a cognate thought which is in Dr. Milligan's mind 
 
 * The Church and the Ministry, pp. 85, 86. I refrain from quoting, but must 
 make reference to, a similar passage on pp. 93, 94, whicii substitutes a Christianly 
 corporate, for Bishop Lightfoot's individualistic, basis of Cliurch polity (see 
 above, p. 46) : ' Each Christian has in his own personal life a perfect freedom 
 of access. But he has this because he belongs to the one body. . . . The individual 
 life can receive this fellowship with God only through membership in the one 
 body and by dependence upon social sacraments of regeneration, of confirmation, 
 of communion, of absolution — of which ordained ministers are the appointed 
 instruments. A fundamental principle of Christianity is that of social de- 
 pendence.' 
 
72 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 when he says, of the prophetical office of the Church, ' It 
 may, for the sake of order, be distributed through appropriate 
 members ; but primarily it belongs to the Church as a whole, 
 the life of Christ in His prophetical office being first her life, 
 and her life then pervading and animating any particular 
 persons through whom the work of prophesying is per- 
 formed It is hardly necessary, at this point, to canvass 
 the precise meaning or adequacy of the phrase ' for the sake 
 of order.' Dr. IVIilligan is engaged rather in vindicating the 
 priority of the corporate life and powers of the Church than 
 in distinguishing the exact nature or sanction of the autho- 
 rity of those who, ministerially, exercise her powers. And it 
 is plain, I imagine, that his thought, even when emphasizing 
 most the priority of the collective Church, never, as if by 
 necessary logic, infers that ministerial authority must needs 
 be either conferred by those who themselves have it not, or 
 implicitly possessed, de Jure, by all Christians alike. 
 
 It would not be very good logic to confound the universal 
 with the distributive 'all.' If 'all Englishmen,' i.e. univer- 
 sally, the total nation, could abolish rights of property, it 
 does not follow that 'all Englishmen,' i.e. distributively, any 
 one who is English, has authority to abolish property ; nor, 
 if the rights of ' all Englishmen,' i. e. universally, are, for 
 certain purposes, representatively exercised by the sovereign, 
 does it follow either historically that the sovereign was 
 appointed by popular vote, or even that there could not be such 
 a thing as a sacred succession and Divine right to be king. 
 
 The distinction, then, between these two thoughts, the 
 thought on the one hand that the ministry represents the 
 whole Body, and (under whatever sanction) wields, minis- 
 terially, authority and powers which, in idea and in truth, 
 inherently belong to the collective life of the Body as a 
 whole ; and the thought, on the other hand, that every 
 member of the Body is equally of right a minister, or that, 
 
 ' The Ascension of our Lord, p. 236 ; cp. also pp. 222, 223, 229, &c. 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 73 
 
 if there be a distinctive right to minister, it is conferred by the 
 voice of the Body simply, untliout authorizing or enabHng 
 empowerment of directly and distinctly Divine ordaining, is 
 a distinction of absolutely vital importance for the under- 
 standing of the rationale of ministry. 
 
 This distinction, however, is one which, for whatever 
 reason, is not before the mind either of Dr. Hatch or of 
 Bishop Lightfoot at all. I said just now that it was im- 
 possible not to sympathize with the generous warmth which 
 seems to underlie much of Dr. Hatch's language upon the 
 priestly character of the Church as a whole. But it was 
 not easy to quote language which would express this without 
 ipso facto implying that, in the original and ideal Church, one 
 and all had the implicit right of ministering alike in sacred 
 things ; an idea which, I venture to think, even the New 
 Testament alone is sufficient to disprove ^. I may now 
 however venture to quote some of his sentences, strongly 
 commending the one half of his meaning, whilst as strongly 
 protesting against the ambiguous inclusion (as I must hold) 
 of untruth in the other half. ' In those early days — before 
 the doors of admission were thrown wide open, before chil- 
 dren were ordinarily baptized and men grew up from their 
 earliest years as members of a Christian society, before 
 Christianity had become a fashionable religion and gathered 
 into its net fish " of every kind," both good and bad — the mere 
 membership of a Christian Church was in itself a strong pre- 
 sumption of the possession of high spiritual qualifications. 
 The Christian was in a sense which has often since been 
 rather a satire than a metaphor, a " member of Christ," a "king 
 and priest unto God." The whole body of Christians was 
 upon a level ; " all ye are brethren." The distinctions which 
 St. Paul makes between Christians are based not upon office, 
 
 ' Cp. e.g. Acts xiv. 23; xx. 28 ; i Cor. xii. 29 ; to say nothing of the pastoral 
 Epistles. 
 
74 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 but upon varieties of spiritual power Again: 'There was 
 a vivid sense, which in later times was necessarily weakened, 
 that every form of the manifestation of the religious life is 
 a gift of God — a xaptayi.a, or direct operation of the Divine 
 Spirit upon the soul. Now while this sense of the diffusion 
 of spiritual gifts was so vivid, it was impossible that there 
 should be the same sense of distinction between officers and 
 non-officers which afterwards came to exist. Organization 
 was a less important fact than it afterwards became ^.^ Upon 
 the exaltation of the ideal of the lay life, which clearly 
 ennobles these passages, I shall have something to add 
 presently. Meanwhile, Dr. Hatch, after speaking of the 
 growth of Church organization (in the second instance 
 as he thinks, and in exaggerated form), goes on : ' Then 
 came a profound reaction^' (i.e. Montanism). 'They' 
 (Montanists) ' reasserted the place of spiritual gifts as con- 
 trasted with official rule*.' ' The view which he (TertuUian) 
 took of the nature of office in the Church was that it does 
 not, as such, confer any powers upon its holders which are 
 not possessed by the other members of the community ''.' 
 ' The fact of the existence of Montanism, and of its consider- 
 able success, strongly confirms the general inferences which 
 are drawn from other evidence, that Church officers were 
 originally regarded as existing for the good government of 
 the community and for the general management of its affairs : 
 that the difference between Church officers and other baptized 
 persons was one of status and degree : that quoad the spiritual 
 life, the two classes were on the same footing: and that the 
 functions which the officers performed were such as, apart 
 from the question of order'', might be performed by any 
 member of the community'^.' 
 
 ' p. 121. ^ p. 122. ^ p. 122. p. 123. ° p. 124. 
 
 ° i. e. no doubt, orderliness, rd^is, ' propter ecclesiae honorem'; not technically 
 ' Ordo ' or ' Orders.' It is like Bishop Lightfoot's phrase ' has for convenience 
 entrusted ' ; see below, p. 76. 
 
 ' p. 125. 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 75 
 
 I have italicized two of these clauses because (as will 
 presently appear) they are as admirable upon the principles 
 advocated in these pages as upon Dr. Hatch's own. But it 
 is the final clause which shows what Dr. Hatch's distinctive 
 position really is. He proceeds in the same lecture to exhibit 
 in part, and give the explanation of, the very real and serious 
 disproportion in the way of over-statement of ministerial 
 distinction and power which has been only too familiar in 
 some parts of Church history ; and he concludes it in words 
 whose solemnity of feeling and aspiration we can re-echo with 
 hardly the less of sympathy because we are convinced that 
 they are exegetically misconceived : ' But in earlier times there 
 was a grander faith. For the kingdom of God was a kingdom 
 of priests. Not only the "four and twenty elders" before the 
 throne but the innumerable souls of the sanctified upon whom 
 " the second death had no power " were " kings and priests 
 unto God." Only in that high sense was priesthood predi- 
 cable of Christian men. For the shadow had passed ; the 
 Reality had come; the one High Priest of Christianity was 
 Christ ^' 
 
 It will be remembered that the thought which is still im- 
 mediately before us is the thought of ministers, as organs of 
 the whole Body, specialized for certain particular functions, 
 which are necessary for the life of the whole ; in function, so 
 far, distinct ; not dependent simply upon any act or will of the 
 whole for their functional empowerment and authority ; yet 
 being none the less, even in their most distinct functional 
 activity, organs representative and expressive of the living 
 capacity or inherent prerogative of the whole. Now when, 
 with this leading thought, we turn to Bishop Lightfoot's essay, 
 it is impossible not to be struck with the extent to which 
 this thought, if he admitted it, would modify large sections 
 of his argument. The last twenty-five pages of the essay he 
 devotes to discussing and exposing ' Sacerdotalism.' It would 
 
 • p. 142. 
 
76 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 be quite premature to enter upon any discussion of that word 
 here. But this is perhaps the time to notice that, at least in 
 large part, sacerdotalism seems to Bishop Lightfoot to mean, 
 or at all events (amongst other things) to imply, the precise 
 contradictory of our present principle — the doctrine that 
 ' sacerdotal ministry ' is not representative of, but is something 
 exclusive and apart from, the life of the Body as a whole. He 
 sets the two ideas, of sacerdotalism on the one hand and 
 representative ministry on the other, in sharp antithesis, as 
 alternatives. An account of ministry (however otherwise 
 ' sacerdotal '), which began by insisting on the harmony of 
 the two, as a position fundamental for understanding the 
 rationale of ministry, would cause at once the larger part of 
 his argument to fall as irrelevant to the ground. 
 
 Thus he says (speaking of what he regards as an earlier and 
 purer ministerial conception), ' Hitherto the sacerdotal view 
 of the Christian ministry has not been held apart from a 
 distinct recognition of the sacerdotal functions of the whole 
 Christian body. The minister is thus regarded as a priest, 
 because he is the moiitJipiece, the representative of a priestly 
 race^. ... So long as this important aspect is kept in view, 
 so long as the priesthood of the ministry is regarded as 
 springing from the priesthood of the n'hole body, the teaching of 
 the Apostles has not been directly violated.' It will be observed 
 that these two sentences (and particularly the phrases which 
 I have italicized), though capable of misinterpretation, would 
 stand as the natural expression of the ver)^ view which has 
 been maintained above. But that, to Bishop Lightfoot, they 
 contain and mean the very thing which has been protested 
 against above, is clear from the sentence which in his paragraph 
 intervenes between the two. It is this : ' Such appears to be 
 the conception of Tertullian, who speaks of the clergy as 
 separate from the laity only because the Church in the exercise 
 of her prerogative has for conve7tience entrusted to them the 
 
 ' rhilipf ians, p. 256. The italics throughout these sentences are mine. 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 77 
 
 performance of certain sacerdotal functions belonging properly 
 to the whole congregation, and of Origen, who giving a moral 
 and spiritual interpretation to the sacerdotal office, considers 
 the priesthood of the clergy to differ from the priesthood 
 of the laity only in degree, in so far as the former devote 
 their time and their thoughts more entirely to God than 
 the latter.' 
 
 Of Tertullian and Origen I will speak a little further pre- 
 sently. Meanwhile compare the way in which the two sen- 
 tences quoted below are written by Bishop Lightfoot together, 
 as if they were but two ways of conveying practically the same 
 thing. After having said, ' In such cases (viz. the weekly 
 alms, oblations, prayers, thanksgivings, &c.) the congregation 
 was represented by its minister, who thus acted as its 
 mouthpiece and was said to "present the offerings" to God : 
 so the expression is used in the Epistle of St. Clement of 
 Rome : but in itself it involves no sacerdotal view ; ' he adds 
 these two sentences : 'This ancient father regards the sacrifice 
 or offering as the act of the whole Church performed through 
 its presbyters. The minister is a priest in the same sense 
 only in which each individual member of the congregation 
 is a priest^' It is difificult to see on what ground the Bishop 
 makes the assertion of the latter sentence at all, except on 
 the assumption that it is identical with that of the earlier. But 
 this at least it certainly is not. Even the earlier assertion, 
 though true, is not capable of being deduced from the phrase 
 (to which he refers) in Clem, ad Cor. 44. 
 
 One more sentence may be quoted : ' The point to be 
 noticed at present is this ; that the offering of the Eucharist, 
 being regarded as the one special act of sacrifice and appear- 
 ing externally to the eye as the act of the officiating minister, 
 might well lead to the minister being called a priest and 
 then being thought a priest in some exclusive sense, where 
 the religious bias was in this direction and as soon as the 
 
 ' p. 260. 
 
78 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 true position of the minister as the representative of the 
 congregation was lost sight of ^' Here, it will be observed, 
 the idea of ' representing the congregation ' is in express 
 terms made directly antithetical to the idea of an ofificial 
 priesthood, a priesthood, that is, appertaining to the ministers 
 more than to other individual members of the congregation. 
 This is precisely the confusion of which we complain. That 
 a 'representative' priesthood (which we strongly assert) 
 implies, in a real sense, the priestly character of the Church 
 as a whole, we should altogether insist : that it implies that 
 any other members of the Church than her ordained ministers 
 are authorized to stand as the Church's representative 
 pcrsonae, in order to exercise ministerially the functions by 
 which expression is given to her priestly character, we both 
 repudiate as inference, and also deny in fact. 
 
 That TertuUian, as especially in the well-known passage, 
 quoted both by Bishop Lightfoot and Dr. Hatch, went too 
 far in the direction of this false inference, may be admitted ^ ; 
 
 ' p. 261. 
 
 ^ De Exhort. Cast, vii : ' Vani erimus si putaverimus quod sacerdotibus non 
 liceat, laicis licere. Nonne et laici sacerdotes sumus ? Scriptum est Rcgnum 
 quoque nos et sacerdotes Deo et Patri suo fecit. Differentiam inter ordinem et 
 plebem constituit ecclesiae auctoritas et honor per ordinis consessum sanctificatus. 
 Adeo ubi ecclesiastic! ordinis non est consessus, et offers et tinguis et sacerdos 
 es tibi solus. Sad ubi tres, ecclesia est, licet laici. . . . Igitur si habes ius sacer- 
 dotis in temetipso ubi necesse est, habeas oportet etiam disciplinam sacerdotis, ubi 
 necesse est habere ius sacerdotis. Digamus tinguis ? digamus offers ? quanto 
 magis laico digamo capitale erit agere pro sacerdote, cum ipsi sacerdoti digamo 
 facto auferatur agere sacerdotem.' 
 
 These are the words which have been held to be so capital. I have been 
 content to take them in their ordinary interpretation : but must own that their 
 meaning does not seem to me so absolutely clear. ' Sacerdos es tihi solus' seems 
 to represent a very different thought from any right, under supposed necessity, 
 to minister congregationally. It sounds more like wliat any modern High 
 Churchman would say of a Christian secluded from all access to Church ordi- 
 nances. It will be said no doubt that the 'et offers et tinguis' exclude such 
 an interpretation. Perhaps they do : but it does not seem to me at all impossible 
 that a writer, who can be so rhetorical as Teitullian, would express himself thus, 
 without meaning necessarily more than that ' your own prayers and spiritual 
 communings take the place of preaching, praising, baptizing, confirming, com- 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 79 
 
 that in so doing he rather overstated a truth than stated 
 what was wholly an untruth^, is implied in the position as 
 set forth above : that he should have, just in this way, 
 overstated his truth, seems to be the most natural consequence 
 in the world from his admitted Montanism ; from the im- 
 perfect perception of the relation between 'outward' and 
 'inward' which is a basis of Montanism ; and from the atti- 
 tude of conscious depreciation of the sacredness of external 
 order, and even of protesting opposition against it, into which 
 his Montanism necessarily drew him'-^. It is difficult to see 
 
 municating — everything whatever.' Such a rhetoric, and the precise form it here 
 takes, would be made all the more probable, because there would anyhow be 
 a limited sense in which both the 'offers' and the 'tinguis' might seem to be 
 literally predicable of occasions in domestic lay life: the 'tinguis' as representing 
 the ultimate possibility ' si necesse est ' of baptizing ; the ' offers ' as not wholly 
 inapplicable to the habitual reception in private of the sacrament reserved. After 
 all, it is Tertullian vi-ho says, de Baftismo, 17, 'Alioquin [sc. salvo Ecclesiae 
 honore] etiam laicis ius est [sc. dandi baptismum] ' ; and again, it is Tertullian 
 who writes of the Christian wife of a heathen man {ad Uxorem, II. v), 'non 
 magiae aliquid videberis operari ? non sciet maritus quid secreto ante omnem 
 cibum gustes ? et si sciverit panem, non ilium credit esse qui dicitur ? Et haec, 
 ignorans quisque rationem, simpliciter sustinebit ? sine gemitu ? sine suspicione 
 panis an veneni?' Such a familiar possibility as these words contemplate must 
 form part of the atmosphere through which we distinguish the meaning of 
 Tertullian. I am not suggesting, however, that Tertullian is here so much 
 speaking, directly and literally, either of Baptism in extremis, or of private 
 self-communicating ; but rather that, in a passage which is primarily rhetorical, the 
 possibility of these two things enters in, partly to give a sense of justification to, 
 partly to determine the precise form of, the rhetorical phrases. 
 
 It will be understood that these remarks affect the meaning of TertuUian's 
 apparent assumption that a layman, as such, was admittedly capable of ad- 
 ministering sacraments. They affect it particularly as evidence of contemporary 
 custom or thought. But they do not affect the use which Tertullian makes of 
 the assumption, whatever the assumption itself may mean. He undoubtedly uses 
 it for the purpose of wiping out all real distinction between ministry and laity, 
 and reducing it to a mere arrangement of ecclesiastical orderliness. It is curious 
 to see how he helps himself herein by the word ' priests,' and the quotation from 
 Rev. v. 10. The word 'priest' lent itself to this ambiguity, as the words 
 ' apostle,' ' bishop,' ' presbyter,' ' deacon,' had never done. 
 
 ' In the sense explained in chapter ii. p. 50. 
 
 * Cp., as in the last chapter, p. 48, the distinction drawn between the 'ecclesia 
 cpiscoporum ' and the 'ecclesia spiritus,' in the de Budiciiia, x.x.i. Cp. also the 
 
8o MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 how, under these conditions, he could have dwelt upon the 
 'universal priesthood' — as he does to noble and valuable 
 purpose — without shaping it in just this false way. That 
 Bishop Lightfoot should put aside the fact that the treatise 
 was written by Tertullian the Montanist^, as a fact of no 
 importance to the character of his evidence, is astonishing : 
 it would have been impossible, if Bishop Lightfoot himself had 
 had his eyes fixed on the truth, that it is not the ' scriptural 
 doctrine of an universal priesthood' (which 'was common 
 ground to [Tertullian] himself and his opponents'), but rather 
 the perverted statement and misuse of this doctrine (which 
 was to a Montanist practically inevitable), that really 
 stands in any antithesis against the ' sacerdotal view of the 
 Christian ministry.' To Tertullian's own characteristic 
 assertion of this view, under other circumstances, the Bishop 
 himself draws sufficient attention ^ / 
 
 Before leaving Tertullian it may be well to call explicit 
 attention to the fact that the references to him have un- 
 avoidably mixed up two questions that are really distinct. 
 Our proper subject at present is the distinction and mutual 
 
 opening of the de Monogat)iia : ' Haeretici nuptias auferunt, Psychici ingerunt 
 .... Psychicis non recipientibus spiritum ea quae sunt spiritus non placent. Ita 
 dum quae sunt spiritus non placent, ea quae sunt carnis placebunt, ut contraria 
 spiritui. Caro inquit adversus spiritum concupiscit, et spiritus adversus camem.' 
 Here ' Psychici ' means ' Churchmen,' as opposed to the ' Paracletus,' i. e. 
 ' Montanus.' 
 
 ' Cp. Canon Gore, p. 206, note i, for a proof of the fact that the treatise 
 is Montanistic. 
 
 For a far juster view of what is involved in the Montanism of Tertullian, 
 see Canon Gore, p. 204 sqq. 
 
 ^ e. g. the de Praescr. Haeret., xli : ' Inprimis quis catechumenus, quis fidelis, 
 incertum est ... . simplicitatem volunt esse prostrationem disciplinae .... ante 
 sunt perfecti catechumeni quam edocti .... Ordinationes eorum teraerariae, leves, 
 mconstantes .... Nusquam facilius proficitur quam in castris rebellium, nbi ipsum 
 esse illic, promereri est. Itaque alius hodie Episcopus, eras alius : hodie Diaconus, 
 qui eras Lector : hodie Presbyter qui eras Laicus, nam et Laicis sacerdotalia 
 munera iniungunt;' i.e. to Tertullian, the Catholic Churchman, 'carelessness 
 about sacerdotal distinctions' had been, in Canon Gore's phrase, ' the very charac- 
 teristic of heretical bodies.' 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 8i 
 
 relation between ministers and laymen. Tertullian's language 
 has combined this with the further question of the titles 
 ' priest ' and ' priesthood.' But if it is impossible to examine 
 the evidence about the first question without being partly 
 drawn into the second, it will help clearness of thought to 
 insist that the second is only here incidentally touched, 
 because it cannot be wholly disentangled from the other. 
 We are as yet only directly concerned with the relation, in 
 Christ's Church, between ministers (whatever they may be 
 called) and those who are not ministers. 
 
 When we turn to Origen, there seems no reason for admitting 
 any exaggeration at all. The fact that in some contexts he 
 speaks of ' priests ' in the ordinary ministerial sense is not 
 cancelled, nor even affected in the slightest degree, by the 
 fact that in other contexts, where he is not discussing the 
 regulated order of this world, but looking onwards to the 
 spiritual consummation of all things, he finds the true 
 spiritual counterpart of the Levites, the Priests, the High 
 Priest of the Levitical covenant, not so much in the minis- 
 terial grades of Christian ' Order ' — however real, or even 
 exclusive for their appointed purposes — but in the degrees 
 of devotion and nearness to God in the inward spiritual life. 
 What reverent Churchman would decline to do the same ? 
 What Christian in his senses would suppose, either on the 
 one hand that the orderly precedence of Bishops, Priests, 
 Deacons, Lay people in the Church on earth, carries a similar 
 precedence of souls in Heaven : or that the fact that it does 
 not, constitutes any argument at all against such grades of 
 ecclesiastical office on earth? 'The last shall be first, and 
 the first last.' Spiritually it may well be, that he who was 
 but a pauper shall be found as a bishop, and he who was 
 held in high reverence on earth as theologian, and bishop, 
 and saint, never cease from praising, if he be but admitted 
 as the poorest and the lowest. What spiritual mind ever 
 failed to dwell on such a truth ? But if a theologian should 
 
 G 
 
82 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 dwell on it ever so much, it would be grotesque to infer that 
 he thereby denied the sacred character of ' Order ' on earth. 
 There is, then, no warrant for saying, with Bishop Lightfoot, 
 that ' in all these passages Origen has taken spiritual enlighten- 
 ment and not sacerdotal office to be tJie Christian coimtcrpart 
 to the Aaronic priesthood.' For the words which I have 
 italicized it would be perfectly right to substitute ' the ulti- 
 mate spiritual counterpart ' : and then the sentence would no 
 longer make Origen contradict himself, by implying that he 
 ever denied the existence of a counterpart to Aaronic priest- 
 hood in the ministry of the Christian Church 
 
 ' When expounding Le\-itical ordinances of priesthood in reference to Christian 
 ministry, Origen is apt to mark the transition by substituting ' sacerdos Ecclesiae ' or 
 ' sacerdos Domini ' for the simple ' sacerdos.' So e.g. in the passage in Levit. Hom. 
 V. iv. (Delarue, vol. ii. p. 208 : ' Discant sacerdotes Domini, qui ecclesiis praesunt, 
 quia pars eis data est cum his quorum delicta repropitiaverint. Quid autem est 
 repropitiare delictum ? Si assumseris peccatorem, et monendo, hoitando, docendo, 
 instruendo, adduxeris eum ad poenitentiam .... si ergo talis fueris sacerdos, et 
 talis fuerit doctrina tua .... intelligant ergo sacerdotes Domini .... sciant se in 
 nullo alio partem habituros apud Deum, nisi in eo quod offerunt pro peccatis : id 
 est, quod a via peccati converterint peccatores.' No doubt all this passage may be 
 said to be primarily metaphorical — in the sense, at least, that he is interpreting 
 Leviticus, and that he starts from the Levitical text, to find analogies to its 
 meaning elsewhere : but at least one of the most familiar analogies is that of 
 the ministry of the Church. For a different analogy see in Levit. Hom. II. iv. 
 (p. 190): 'In morali atite?n loco potest pontifex iste sensus pietatis et religionis 
 videri, qui in nobis per orationes et obsecrationes quas Deo fundimus velut 
 quodam sacerdotio fungitur' ; where the Levitical High Priest corresponds to 
 the spiritual element in a man. ^ 
 
 He is passing however beyond the region of mere metaphor or analogy when he 
 says, Hom. V. iii. (p. 207 : ' Consequens enim est ut secundum imaginem eius qui 
 sacerdotium Ecclesiae dedit, etiam ministri et sacerdotes Ecclesiae peccata populi 
 accipiant, et ipsi imitantes magistrum remissionem peccatorum populo tribuant. 
 Debent ergo et ipsi Ecclesiae sacerdotes ita perfect! esse, et in officiis semper 
 sacerdotalibus eruditi, ut . . .' Or again, when he is speaking of penitence in the 
 Church of Christ : ' Est adhuc et septima, licet dura et laboriosa, per poenitentiam 
 remissio peccatorum, cum lavat peccator in lacrymis stratum suum, et fiunt ei 
 lacr}mae suae panes die ac nocte, et cum non erubescit sacerdoti Domini 
 indicare peccatum suum et quaerere medicinam .... in quo impletur et illud quod 
 Jacobus Apostolus dicit : Si quis autem infirmatur, vocet presb3'teros Ecclesiae, et 
 imponant ei manus, ungentes eum oleo in nomine Domini, et oratio fidei salvabit 
 infirmum, et si in peccatis fuerit, remittentur ei.' Hom. H. iv. ^p. 191). Here the 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 83 
 
 What Bishop Lightfoot should have said here of Origen, 
 is illustrated by what he docs in part say of Clement of 
 Alexandria. He quotes from Clement the following sen- 
 tence^: 'It is possible for men even now, by exercising 
 themselves in the commandments of the Lord, and by living 
 a perfect gnostic life in obedience to the Gospel, to be in- 
 scribed in the roll of the Apostles. Such men are genuine 
 presbyters of the Church and true deacons of the will of 
 God, if they practise and teach the things of the Lord, 
 being not indeed ordained by men, nor considered righteous 
 because they are presbyters, but enrolled in the presbytery 
 because they are righteous ; and though here on earth they 
 may not be honoured with a chief seat, yet shall they sit 
 on the four and twenty thrones judging the people.' The 
 Bishop goes on : 'It is quite consistent with this truly 
 spiritual view, that he should elsewhere recognize the pres- 
 byter, the deacon, and the layman, as distinct orders.' 
 Consistent ? of course it is consistent. The ' truly spiritual 
 view,' which entirely coincides with what I understand 
 Origen to mean, seems to be precisely what Mr. Keble — 
 amongst ten thousand others — would have said. But neither 
 
 simple 'sacerdoti' might have been explained as mere metaphor: but the 
 'sacerdoti Domini' is not so much a metaphor as a title. (This, at least, must 
 be capable of being referred directly to ' presbyters' : and will therefore qualify 
 any too great breadth of generalization as to the reference of ' sacerdos ' or 
 'sacerdos ecclesiae ' to 'bishops,' in early writings. See Bishop Taylor on 
 Episcopacy, end of § 27, vol. vii. p. 113.) It is difficult to see on what grounds 
 Bishop Lightfoot asserts (p. 256 note) that in Origen's opinion the confessor to 
 the penitent need not be an ordained minister. He is referring to Horn, in Ps. 
 xxxvii. 6 (p. 688), where all that Origen does is to advise the penitent to choose 
 a really skilled ' physician ' as his confessor. Such advice cannot possibly prove 
 that he might choose a layman. Canon Gore's reference to the passage seems 
 to correspond with it far more exactly. It is, he says, a ' strong exhortation 
 to confession, which is to be private or public at the confessor's discretion.' 
 Canon Gore adds a reference to Horn. V. xii. (p. 214), where the unworthy priest 
 ' non est sacerdos nec potest sacerdos nominari.' Does Origen here mean more 
 than we should all join in saying, if, apart from questions of technical validity, 
 we were contrasting the ' true ' and the ' nominal ' priest ? 
 ' Strom. VI. xiii. p. 793. 
 
 G 2 
 
84 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 Mr. Keble would have said it, nor Clement of Alexandria, if 
 they had felt any doubt about the divine commission of the 
 ministry on earth. It is precisely those to whom this, as 
 a fact in Christ's Church, is most completely a matter of 
 course, beyond all reach of denial or misunderstanding, who 
 can most naturally, and do most freely, pass beyond the 
 definite fact into those more indefinite spiritual analogies ^, of 
 which, to them, the fact is full. Whilst, then, the clear 
 apprehension of the fact is, of course, consistent with this 
 ' spiritual ' application of the fact, it is to be observed, on 
 the other hand, that the terms in which the fact is spiritually 
 applied would be quite inconsistent with any uncertainty as 
 to the truth of the fact. ' It is possible for men even now' — 
 ' such men are genuine presbyters of the Church and true 
 deacons of the will of God ' — ' being not indeed ordained by 
 men nor considered righteous because they are presbyters ' — 
 ' though here on earth they may not be honoured with a chief 
 seat ' — these phrases unmistakably imply that there was, in 
 
 ' Take the following stanzas from The Chi-istian Year (Wednesday before 
 Easter) : — 
 
 ' Nor deem, who to that bliss aspire, 'And there are sonls that seem to dwell 
 Must win their way through blood Above this earth — so rich a spell , 
 
 and fire. Floats round their steps, where'er 
 
 The writhings of a wounded heart they move, 
 
 Are fiercer than a foeman's dart. From hopes fulfilled and mutual love. 
 
 Oft in Life's stillest shade reclining. Such, if on high their thoughts are set, 
 
 In Desolation unrepining, Nor in the stream the source forget, 
 
 Without a hope on earth to find If prompt to quit the bliss they know, 
 
 A mirror in an answering mind. Following the Lamb where'er He go. 
 
 Meek souls there are, who little By purest pleasures unbeguiled 
 
 dream To idolize or wife or child 
 
 Their daily strife an Angel's theme, Such wedded souls our God shall 
 
 Or that the rod they take so calm own 
 
 Shall prove in Heaven a martyr's For faultless virgins round His 
 palm. throne.' 
 
 Who could have written these lines except on the basis of a \A\\^ realization, 
 first of all, of the meaning and blessedness of literal virginity, and literal martyrdom ? 
 or what would be thought of a commentator who should adduce them to prove 
 that the words 'virgin' and 'martyr' had, to Mr. Keble, only a 'spiriinal' 
 significance ? 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 85 
 
 the visible Church, a regularly constituted and authorized 
 order of ministry, and that the men here spoken of did not 
 belong to it ; and that to call them presbyters, &c., however 
 spiritually and invisibly true, was to the obvious sense, and 
 in the outward order, a paradox ^, challenging attention as 
 such ^. 
 
 This truth requires no further emphasizing. If it did, it 
 would find it in the phrase at the beginning of the chapter, in 
 which Clement says that it is possible for pious Christians to 
 be 'inscribed on the roll of the Apostles^.' It is quite plain 
 here that he starts from the ordinary sense of the word 
 Apostles. They, he says, did not become Apostles (I quote 
 Canon Gore's translation) 'because they were chosen for some 
 special peculiarity of nature, for Judas was chosen with them ; 
 but they were capable of becoming Apostles on being chosen 
 by Him who foresaw even how they would end.' Thus it is 
 that personal fitness is ultimately more than outward election. 
 Thus Matthias, who did 7iot share their election, when he shows 
 himself worthy, takes the place of Judas. And thus (he goes 
 on) it is possible for men of holy life, &c. to be enrolled in the 
 chosen body of the Apostles. The transition from Matthias 
 who was ' numbered with the eleven ' in one sense, to those 
 who may be numbered with the twelve in another sense, is 
 curious : but the general meaning is plain. It is, if possible, 
 even clearer when he speaks of Apostles than when he speaks 
 
 ' But less sharp as paradox when -rrpfcrfivTepoi and StaKovoi, though bearing 
 a technical sense, were not yet exclusively technical. ' Church elders and true 
 servants ' is still a large part of what the words say to the ear. 
 
 ^ In the very same chapter Clement gives expression to this underlying 
 assumption which his language all along has implied, descending from the 
 spiritual analogy to the external earthly fact : eirel /cat ai ti/Tav6a Kard. rr)v 
 'EKKXrjctav iTpoKoirai, tTiiaKovav , irp€<j(3vT€paip, ZiaKuvcuv , pufirjixaTa, ol/J-ai, ayyeXiKrjs 
 S6^r]s, KCLKelvrji Trjs oiKovo/xlas Tvyxo-vovav, . , . . kv v«p(Kats tovtovs apBtvTas 
 •fpa<pet 6 'Awd(7ToAos, ZiaKovrjaav fiiv ra vpwra, indra iyKaTaTayfjvai ru> irpea- 
 ^vT(pla) KarcL ■npoKO-nr)v So^ijs (So^a yap Sij^rjs Sia^e'pei) d'xpiJ av (Is reKtiov dvSpa 
 av^-qatuaiv. 
 
 ^ Or ' included within the election [kyypacpTjvai ds TTji/ (KXoyriv) of the 
 apostles.' 
 
86 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 of presbyters that he is declaring, as apparent paradox, the 
 spiritual possibility, that those who ofificially and ministerially 
 rank as lowest in Christ's Church on earth, may be, before 
 God, on an equality with even the highest of the highest in 
 Heaven. Would any one argue from this that Clement did 
 not believe in the earthly apostolate at all ? His exposition 
 does not weaken for a moment — it emphatically presupposes — 
 the reality of that hierarchy on earth from which the whole 
 thought starts. 
 
 To Clement the Bishop comes from Irenaeus, and to Irenaeus 
 from Justin Martyr. The Bishop's immediate object is to 
 show that sacerdotal terminology does not, in all these 
 writers, belong properly to Christian ministry. But as the 
 crucial passage from TertuUian has shown us, this thought 
 is closely interwoven with another, viz. that Christian minis- 
 try (under whatever title) is not the exclusive right of the 
 ordained. It is in pursuance of the second of these thoughts, 
 not of the first (which I have not yet properly reached), that 
 I have been following his quotations — from Tertullian back- 
 wards — here. It may be conceded at once that neither 
 Irenaeus nor Justin call Christian ministers ' priests.' But 
 will any one venture to claim that the line of ministerial 
 distinction between ministers and laymen is in the least 
 blurred by either of them ? Indeed, it is not a little curious 
 that it is not until the nominal identification of 'ministry' 
 and ' priesthood ' is complete that there is any symptom of 
 uncertainty as to the distinction between ministry and laity ; 
 and that, when it appears, it appears as it were in dependence 
 on the priestly nomenclature, and shelters itself under the 
 possible ambiguity of the word Upei/?. Not that the doubt 
 rises really from this ambiguity. Rather it rises out of the 
 pseudo-antithesis between ' ecclesia episcoporum ' and ' eccle- 
 sia Spiritus ' which is a characteristic of Montanism. But 
 having arisen it shelters itself for the moment under the 
 'kingdom and priests' — the ^aaiXdav Kal Upds — of Rev. v. lo. 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 87 
 
 But however possible it mij^ht be in the time of Tertullian 
 to slur in this way the distinction — first between ministerial 
 and universal ' priesthood,' and so, by consequence from this, 
 between ministry and laity altogether, the real principle of 
 the matter had in fact been settled long before, when the 
 title ' priest ' was still used only tentatively, partially, and 
 semimetaphorically of the Christian celebrant. For from the 
 passages of Justin Martyr three points of teaching very clearly 
 emerge : first, that the Jewish sacrifices and priesthood being 
 rejected as unreal, the reality of priesthood and sacrifice be- 
 longed only to the Christian Church ; secondly, that the 
 overt and ceremonial presentment of this priestly sacrifice in 
 the Christian Church was to be found in the Eucharistic cele- 
 bration, which is the fulfilment of the prophecy of Malachi ; 
 and thirdly, that this Eucharistic ' sacrifice ' was not ' offered ' 
 by any miscellaneous Christians at random, but that he who 
 was head of the Christian body stood as the celebrant, and 
 that distribution was made by the hands of deacons. In 
 thus sweeping in unhesitatingly the whole Christian people 
 as the real ' high priestly race,' while he finds the ministerial 
 exercise of the Church's high priesthood in the Eucharist, 
 and assumes that the Eucharist is celebrated by ministerial 
 hands, Justin has really beforehand covered all the ground. 
 Though the word ' priest ' is not yet used as a title for the 
 Christian minister ; though when it comes to be used, half 
 a century later, as a familiar title, it can be made to serve as 
 cover for an attack on the ministry of the Church ; yet in 
 fact Justin has really given beforehand — and perhaps all the 
 more simply and naturally just because the word ' priest ' has 
 none as yet of the associations of a mere title — something 
 like the true rationale and the true distinction (within the 
 inclusive priesthood of the Christian Church Body), at once 
 of the priesthood of the Christian layman, and of the priest- 
 hood of the Christian minister. He greatly fortifies our 
 characteristic position that the minister is so the representa- 
 
88 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 tive of the community that what he does they do, and what 
 they do they do through him ; but where is any word or 
 hint to imply (what would really be required for the Bishop's 
 argument) that what they corporately did through the act of 
 their president they could equally do through any member 
 whatever? While we cordially concede that Justin bears 
 witness to the truth that the Christian people, as contrasted 
 with the Jewish priests, possess the true and abiding priest- 
 hood upon earth ; we must still insist that Justin knows 
 nothing of any ministerial exercise of this priesthood, save in 
 and through the act of those who are authorized to stand as 
 the ministers and instruments of the priesthood of the 
 Church \ 
 
 ^ Dialogus cum Tryphone, ll6, 117, p- 209: Outojs t]hu% . . . apxtepariKov to 
 a\r]9iVov fivoi tfXfilv rov Qfov, us Kai aiirbs 6 ©fos piapTvpe?, flTiut/ on kv iravri 
 TOTTw iv rots 'iBvtai Ovalas tvapiarovs avrSi Kai KaOapds ■npoa(pipovT(s. ov Stxerat 
 St nap' ovStvbs 9v(jias 6 Qtos ft ptfi Sid rSiv Upiaiv avrov. 
 
 nduras ovv 01 Sid [Q)'. ? ndaas ovv 5id] rov 6v6/jiaTos tovtov Ovalas as naptSuKtv 
 'irjcovs 6 Xpiarus •ylviaSai, rovrtariv tni rri evxapiarla tov dprov koI tov norrjplov, 
 rds iv navrl ronco TTjs fTjs yivopievas tinb ruiv XpiaTiavuiv vpoXa^wv 6 Qtos, piapTvpti 
 tvapiarovs vndpxtiv avrcu- rds St v<p' vpiSiv [i. e. the Jews] Kai Si tKtlvaiv vpiuiv rwv 
 itptwv yivo/jitvas dnavalvtrai, Ktyaiv, Kai rds 9vaias vpiuiv ov npoaSt^oiiai tK ruiv 
 Xtipuiv V/J.WV Siori and dvaToXjjs ■^Klov tais SvapJhv ro ovopa p-ov StSu^aarat, Xtytt, 
 
 iv ToTs tOvtatv vpitis Si fitfirjXovrt avro on pitvovv Kai tvxat Kai 
 
 tvxo-pi-arlai vnb rwv d^laiv yivopitvai rtKtiai /lovai Kai tvdptarol tiai rSi Qtai Ovalai 
 Kai avros <prjpu. ravra yap piova koI Xpiariavoi naptXa^ov -noitiv, Kai in dvapLVqati 
 St rrjs Tpo(pTjs avrwv ^rjpds rt Kai vypds, iv rj Kai rov ndSovs b ■rrinov9f Si' avrov 
 6 ©fos TOV Qtov fif/^VTjrai [Qy. ? 6 vlbs rov Qtov fxtfivrjTai], 
 
 Apologia, i. 65-67 (p. 82) : 'Kfitts Si . . rbv irtntiapitvov . . ini rovs Xtyo/xivovs 
 d5tX<povs dyofitv . . . Koivds tvxds TroiTja6p.tvoi . . . onws KaTa^iw9wpitv . . . dXXriXovs 
 <piXrj fj-ari dana^upit9a . . . tntira npoa<piptrai rw npotarSiri rwv dStXtpuv dpros Kai 
 ■noriipiov vSaros Kai Kpa/xaros, Kai ovros Xa^wv aivov Kai So^av , . . dvantpinti' Kai tv- 
 Xapiarlav . . . iroitirac ov avvrtXiaavros rds tvxds Kai rfjV tvxapiariav, nds 6 
 irapuiv Xabs intvcfirjpLtT Xtyuv d/zijv. . . . tvxapiarrjaavros Si rov npotarwros, Kot 
 intv<pr]fir)aavros navrbs rov Xaov, 01 KaXovpitvoi nap' yfiiv SiaKovoi SiSoaaiv tKaartt) 
 . . . [Then follows an account of the Institution by Jesus Christ] : 'Upitts Si pitrd 
 ravra Xombv dti rovraiv dXXijXovs dvapupiVrjaKopitv . . , ini wdal rt ois Trpoa<ptp6fit9a, 
 tvXoyovfitv TOV .... Kai rfj rov fjXiov XtyopitvTj ■fj/itpq . . . rd dnoiiv-qnovtvpiara ruv 
 dnoaroXuv . . . dvayivuaKtrai , . . tlra navaajiivov rov dvayivu/aKovros, 6 -npotaruis 
 Sid Xoyov rrjv vov9talav Kai npoKX-qaiv rrjs rwv KaXwv rovruv pup-qatais noitirai. 
 tntira dviardpitOa KOivri ndvrts, Kai tvxds irtfinofjitv Kai us Trpotcprfpitv, navaapiivuv 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 89 
 
 It has been necessary to dwell at some length upon this 
 principle — that the ministry is at once the true representa- 
 tive, and yet neither the accidental representative nor the 
 mere delegate or nominee, of the total Christian body — 
 because its truth has been so seriously obscured. But whilst 
 we emphatically deny that mere popular appointment can 
 constitute a minister, or that distinction of ministers is mere 
 matter of politic convenience, it is true of course that even 
 considerations of politic convenience bear, in their own 
 way, witness that the Divine ordinance of ministers is (like 
 other ordinances of God) no arbitrary superfluity, but the 
 Divine consecration of a natural and secular need. Moreover, 
 though that which constitutes men Christ's ministers, is (as we 
 shall see) a solemn setting apart, not by merely human but 
 by Divine methods and sanctions, it is true at the same time 
 that, in such things as electing and presenting for Ordination, 
 the general Church body has a responsible work of preparing 
 for and concurring with the Divine act. Though ministerial 
 appointment is certainly not human in place of being Divine, 
 yet neither is it Divine quite apart from being human also. 
 The Church as a whole has its selecting and consentient 
 voice ; and even what is most distinctively Divine in ordi- 
 nation is still conferred through the Church. So far as 
 the general or lay voice is concerned, the circumstances of 
 popular election and public approbation have at many times 
 in the Church presented to view much more emphatically 
 than they nowadays do the aspect of the priesthood as 
 representative of the congregation. It might perhaps be 
 
 Tjpiuiv TTj'S (vxh^ aproi Trpoacpipfrai Kal olvoi Kal vSaip' Kal o irpofarihs fuxas o/iolais 
 Kal (vxapiarias oarj Svva/Mi avTw dvaireixtrd, Kal 6 Aaos (Ttivcprjpet Ktyajv to dprjv. 
 Kal Tj SidSoats Kal -rj pLirdKrjy^is lirro ruiv (vxapiaTrjOlvraiv (KadTW y'iv(Tai, Kal roh ov 
 vapovoi Sid Tuv SiaKovwv ■nipLTTtrai. ol (vnopovvTfs Se Kal ^ov\6fj,€voi Kara -npoaipfaiv 
 tKaaro'i rrjv eavTov 6 0ov\(Tai StSaaf Kal to avWiyofifvov vapd rS> irpofaTuiTt 
 aTTOriOiTai, Kal auTos iniKovpu up(pavois t( Kal xvpais, Kal toU 5id vuaov ij St' dXKrjv 
 aiTtav \(ino/x(vot9, Kal tois iv StafioTs ovai, Kal rots TapcniSr}noi% ovai pivots, Kal 
 dirXuis 1x5.01 TOIS iv XP"? '^^'^^ KTjS(puiv y'lvtrai. 
 
90 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 wished that this aspect might be more emphasized amongst 
 ourselves. But the clear witness to it in the forms of the 
 Ordinal, whether unreformed or reformed, has never been 
 lost^; and the idea which is expressed by it is of value 
 too permanent to be overthrown even by attempts made 
 from time to time to exalt it into the constitutive reality of 
 Ordination. 
 
 Now in this sense it is possible that a very limited accep- 
 tance may be granted to the word ' delegate,' which is used 
 more than once by Bishop Lightfoot as if it were synonymous 
 with ' representative.' But how risky a word it is at the 
 best, and how naturally it misleads into the wrong inference, 
 is clearly shown by the use which the Bishop makes of it. 
 After recalling the representative character of the minister's 
 function, he goes on : ' He is a priest, as the mouthpiece, the 
 delegate ^, of a priestly race. His acts are not his own, but 
 the acts of the congregation. Hence too it will follow that, 
 viewed on this side as on the other, his function cannot be 
 absolute and indispensable. It may be a general rule, it may 
 be nnder ordinary circumstances a practically universal law, 
 that the highest acts of congregational worship shall be per- 
 formed through the principal officers of the congregation. 
 But an emergency may arise when the spirit and not the 
 letter must decide. The Christian ideal will then interpose 
 and interpret our duty. The higher ordinance of the tmiversal 
 priesthood will overrtile all special limitations. The layman 
 will assume ftinctions which are otherzvise restricted to the 
 ordained minister 
 
 This paragraph appears to combine two somewhat incon- 
 sistent lines of thought. The first runs thus. The layman 
 is inherently a priest : and the universal priesthood is a 
 
 ' See more fully in Canon Gore's Church and the Alinistry, pp. 100-104. 
 
 ^ Cp. p. 180 : ' The priestly tribe held this peculiar relation to God only as the 
 representatives of the whole nation. As delegates of the people, they offered sacrifice 
 and made atonement.' On which see Gore, p. 72, note. 
 
 ^ Philippians, p. 266. The italics are mine. 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 91 
 
 ' higher ordinance ' than the ministerial. It is therefore 
 essentially laivfnl for the layman to perform all priestly func- 
 tions ; even though this essential and ' higher ' right may 
 ordinarily submit, on lower grounds of convenience and ex- 
 pediency, to restriction. The second runs thus. Inasmuch 
 as he has never received any commission which would warrant 
 his doing so, it is essentially unlaivfjil for the layman to 
 minister. Nevertheless extreme emergencies may so over- 
 ride all law as to make it spiritually right sometimes to do 
 even what is, as long as law holds at all, positively and 
 peremptorily forbidden. This second position has its own 
 very obvious questions — and dangers. Still I do not care at 
 present to argue the second position, provided it is kept quite 
 distinct from the first. As to the first, I can only repeat my 
 protest against the falsity of the logic which would tacitly 
 assume it, as if it were contained, as inference, within the 
 truth that the actions of the priest are not his own, but cor- 
 porate actions, which he has been authorized to perform as 
 the representative persona of the Church. 
 
 For some time past we have been engaged practically in 
 protest against an overstatement, which would ultimately 
 merge all distinction, so far as concerns any special character, 
 or graces or powers for ministerial authorization or capacity, 
 between ministry and laity. Before leaving the subject it is 
 necessary also to protest against exaggeration of the opposite 
 kind. If we are not unaccustomed to theological theory 
 which explains the reality of ministerial commission overmuch 
 away, Christian history has perhaps been even more accus- 
 tomed to another disproportion, which first falsely enhanced, 
 and then falsely conceived and explained, and so both in 
 theory and practice spoiled, the distinction between lay and 
 clerical life. The priest and the layman do not differ ulti- 
 mately in kind, as far as their personal prerogatives of spiritual 
 life are concerned. The distinction is of ministerial authority, 
 
92 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 not of individual privilege. Even the technical word ' char- 
 acter ' as applied to ministry lends itself easily to mistake. 
 If we assert that Holy Order confers 'character,' or that 
 ' character ' is ' indelible,' character in the current sense of the 
 word, the total moral quality of the individual man is exactly 
 what we do not mean. That which in himself he is in 
 personal moral quality or capacity before God, is exactly 
 what is unchanged ; he is neither better nor worse in personal 
 value than he was before. The "character' which is conferred, 
 and is indelible, is a status, inherently involving capacities, 
 duties, responsibilities of ministerial life, yet separable from 
 and, in a sense, external to the secret character of the personal 
 self, however much the inner self may be indirectly disciplined 
 or conditioned by it — for good or for evil ^. The priesthood 
 of the layman is no merely verbal concession. It is a doctrine 
 of importance, essential (as we shall see when the time comes 
 for discussing ' priesthood '} for a due understanding of the 
 priesthood of the ministry. It was said above that TertuUian 
 pushes this thought into overstatement. But what he pushes 
 by overstatement into error is in itself truth. Thus in the 
 opening of the passage whose conclusion was criticized just 
 now, he argues with perfect truth that there can be but one 
 standard of moral and spiritual life for members of the Body 
 of Christ : in no case one for the priest, and another for the 
 layman. Differences there may of course be in circumstances, 
 and in such expediency as is dependent on circumstances. 
 But what is essentially right or wrong for either, is so of 
 necessity for both. Both alike — apart from empowerment 
 for active exercise of representative ministerial functions on 
 
 * Of course the self is very largely conditioned by its reception and use of the 
 ministerial — as of every other responsible — gift. As the self is identified more 
 and more with the ministry and its possibilities, the distinction between the two 
 becomes one rather of logic than of fact : while in the bad priest, still authorized 
 as priest, the contrast may be increasingly terrible. But all these things belong 
 rather to the consequential results, than to the direct content, of the divine gift 
 of ministr)', regarded as a gift of ' indelible character ' once for all conferred. 
 
iiij RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 93 
 
 behalf of the Body — are, in the private inner life of the Spirit, 
 consecrated Kings and Priests to God. 'Vani erimus, si 
 putaverimus quod sacerdotibus non liceat laicis licere. Nonne 
 et laici sacerdotes sumus ? Scriptum est Regnum quoque nos 
 et sacerdotes Deo et Patri suo fecit ^' There is no shadow of 
 exaggeration here. 
 
 But such a conception as this has no doubt been largely- 
 obscured, and the notion has been widespread, that a priest, 
 as compared with a layman, had in his own personal life a more 
 intimate relation with God, a deeper intensity of spiritual 
 privilege, a higher standard and necessity of holiness. In 
 proportion as it became a familiar conception that the priest 
 was altogether on a different level of holiness, the idea of 
 the priesthood as repj^esentative of all in the corporate service 
 of God, acquired (not quite unnaturally) a further and very 
 perilous development, — small at first in appearance but 
 ultimately revolutionizing the whole idea ; and the priesthood 
 was conceived of as working with God vicariously on behalf 
 of all. That the priest was holy, while the layman was not ; 
 that the priest performed God's service in the layman's stead ; 
 that the priest propitiated God on the layman's behalf ; that, 
 when the layman's time came, the priest could come in and 
 make right his relation with God — here was indeed a distorted 
 development of ministerial theory. To what causes is such 
 a development due ? Something no doubt is to be allowed 
 for pretensions, through ambitious motives, on behalf of the 
 clergy. But these, if lay Christianity had maintained its true 
 standard, would by themselves, at the most, have had com- 
 paratively little effect. The true cause is to be sought far 
 more on the lay than on the clerical side. 
 
 Bishop Lightfoot connects its early beginnings with the 
 large preponderance of imperfectly Christianized Gentile 
 
 ' Cp. Jerome's well-known ' Sacerdotium laici id est baptisma ' ; and Canon 
 Mason on Confirmation as especially symbolized by unction in The Relation of 
 Confirmatiott to Baptism, p. 11. 
 
94 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 feeling, still characterized largely by Gentile — that is practi- 
 cally by Pagan — modes of instinct. 'It is,' he says, 'to 
 Gentile feeling that this development must be ascribed. For 
 the heathen familiar with auguries, lustrations, sacrifices, 
 and depending on the intervention of some priest for all the 
 manifold religious rites of the state, the club, and the family, 
 the sacerdotal functions must have occupied a far larger 
 space in the affairs of every-day life than for the Jew of the 
 dispersion, who of necessity dispensed, and had no scruple at 
 dispensing, with priestly ministrations from one year's end to 
 another ^' But in large part, after all, the explanation needs 
 no special knowledge of accidental historical conditions. It 
 is to be found in the natural slackness of semi-religious life. 
 If, to the natural instinct of the laity, a claim to superior 
 dignity in ministerial life is, as dignity, wholly unwelcome ; it 
 is nevertheless true that the idea of a vicarious service or 
 holiness of ministers (though it be in truth the most supremely 
 exaggerated form of ministerial dignity) is to the carnal lay 
 instinct strangely agreeable. The Divine consecration of lay 
 life — such consecration as is implied' for instance, as part of 
 the inherent meaning of Christianity in Christ's Church, in 
 every line of the First Epistle of St. John — seems like an 
 intolerable strain to the natural sense. Every natural instinct 
 of spiritual indolence is flattered and soothed by a practice 
 which, tacitly remitting true religious consistency to the pro- 
 fessional minister, seems to justify for lay life an inferior 
 standard of holiness. 
 
 In this context we cordially welcome every word in 
 which — putting aside, of course, the question of authority 
 to stand forward and represent the congregation by public 
 functions of ministry — Dr. Hatch makes protest on behalf 
 of the underlying, spiritual equality of lay and clerical 
 life-. On this point at lca.st there need be no discordant 
 voice. The distinction drawn by Bishop Lightfoot (though 
 
 ' Fhilifpians, p. 259. See above, pp. 73-75. 
 
in] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 95 
 
 he follows it by an inadmissible corollary) is fully echoed by 
 Canon Gore and Dr. Liddon. ' The minister's function,' says 
 the Bishop, ' is representative without being vicarial.' ' The 
 chief of the ideas commonly associated with sacerdotalism, 
 which it is important to repudiate ' — so writes Canon Gore — 
 'is that of a vicarious priesthood. It is contrary to the true 
 spirit of the Christian religion to introduce the notion of a class 
 inside the Church who are in a closer spiritual relationship to 
 God than their fellows. " If a monk falls," says St. Jerome, ^y 
 " a priest shall pray for him ; but who shall pray for a priest 
 who has fallen ? " Such an expression construed literally 
 would imply a closer relation to God in the priest than in 
 the consecrated layman, and such a conception is beyond a 
 doubt alien to the spirit of Christianity ' So far as there 
 is gradation in the efficacy of prayers, it is the result not of 
 official position but of growing sanctity and strengthening 
 faith. It is an abuse of the sacerdotal conception, if it is 
 supposed that the priesthood exists to celebrate sacrifices or 
 acts of worship in the place of the body of the people or as 
 their substitute. This conception had, no doubt, attached 
 itself to the 'massing priests' of the Middle Ages. The 
 priest had come to be regarded as an individual who held, 
 in virtue of his ordination, the prerogative of offering sacrifices 
 which could win God's gifts. . . . Now this distorted sort of 
 conception is one which the religious indolence of most men, 
 in co-operation with the ambition for power in " spiritual " 
 persons, is always tending to make possible. It is not only 
 possible to believe in a vicarious priesthood of sacrifice, but 
 also in a vicarious office of preaching, which releases the 
 laity from the obligation to make efforts of spiritual appre- 
 hension on their own account. But in either casei the 
 conception is an unchristian one. The ministry is no more 
 one of vicarious action than it is one of exclusive knowledge 
 or exclusive spiritual relation to God. . . . The difference 
 
 ' p. 84. 
 
96 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 between clergy and laity " is not a difference in kind " but 
 in function I have purposely placed this sentence last 
 because in it Canon Gore is quoting from Dr. Liddon ; and 
 Dr. Liddon's words are so directly to our purpose that it is 
 desirable to quote from them a little more fully. 
 
 ' Certainly,' Dr. Liddon writes -, 'if Christian laymen would 
 only believe with all their hearts that they are really priests, 
 we should very soon escape from some of the difficulties 
 which vex the Church of Christ. For it would then be seen 
 that in the Christian Church the difference between clergy 
 and laity is only a difference of the degree in which certain 
 spiritual powers are conferred ; that it is not a difference of 
 kind. Spiritual endowments are given to the Christian lay- 
 man with one purpose,, to the Christian minister with another: 
 the object of the first is personal, that of the second is corpo- 
 rate. . . . The Christian layman of early days was thus, in his 
 inmost life, penetrated through and through by the sacerdotal 
 idea, spiritualized and transfigured as it was by the Gospel. 
 Hence it was no difficulty to him that this idea should have 
 its public representatives in the body of the Church, or 
 that certain reserved duties should be discharged by Divine 
 appointment, but on behalf of the whole body, by these 
 representatives. The priestly institute in the public Christian 
 body was the natural extension of the priesthood which the 
 lay Christian exercised within himself ; and the secret life of 
 the conscience was in harmony with the outward organization 
 of the Church. . . . Where there is no recognition of the 
 priesthood of every Christian soul, the sense of an unintelli- 
 gible mysticism, if not of an unbearable imposture, will be pro- 
 voked when spiritual powers are claimed for the benefit of the 
 whole body by the serving officers of the Christian Church. 
 
 ' That is to say, of course, not in kind, apart from functional capacity; not in 
 kind except just so far as distinctive authority to represent the Church by public 
 performance of her corporate functions, of itself constitutes, in a limited sense, 
 a difference of kind. 
 
 ^ University Sermons, Second Series, sermon x. on ' Sacerdotalism,' pp. 198, 199. 
 
Ill] RELATION BETWEEN MINISTRY AND LAITY 97 
 
 But if this can be changed ; if the temple of the layman's 
 soul can be again made a scene of spiritual worship, he will 
 no longer fear lest the ministerial order should confiscate 
 individual liberty. The one priesthood will be felt to be 
 the natural extension and correlative of the other ^' 
 
 Perhaps it may be remarked in conclusion that it is only in 
 the light of considerations like these that we see the full 
 mischief of that mischievous current phrase ' going into the 
 Church,' when what is meant is 'receivingHoly Order within the 
 Church.' Many phrases, though on analysis untrue or absurd, 
 are yet harmless in effect. Others, however innocently used 
 by the individuals who use them, none the less spread a poison 
 of untruth in the air. It is difficult to measure the contribu- 
 tion to untruth, and, though very indirectly, to moral and 
 spiritual laxity, which is rendered by such a phrase, so long 
 as it remains in possession of men's lips and minds. It is, 
 regarded in itself, a most noxious untruth ; — and if it is not 
 a lie on the part of those who utter it, there is only so much 
 
 ^ Cp. the following passage from Dr. Milligan, Ascension, pp. 245-6: 'As in 
 the fundamental vision of [the Revelation of St. John] we are taught that Christ 
 exalted in glory is a Priest, ... so we are taught that in Him all His people are 
 also priests. They have been made " to be a kingdom, to be priests unto His 
 God and Father," and the white robes which they wear throughout the book 
 are the robes of priests. The idea of priestly function cannot be separated from 
 the Christian Church. All the Lord's people are priests. . . . Let the priestliness 
 of the whole Church, not that of any particular class tvithin her, be brought 
 prominently forward ; let it appear that the very object of insisting upon the . 
 Church's priestliness is to restore to the Christian laity that sense of their 
 responsibility and privilege of which Protestantism, hardly less than Romanism, 
 has practically deprived them.' We need make only two slight criticisms on this 
 language, and none on its general meaning. ' All the Lord's people are priests,' 
 though true, is not true in quite the same sense in which the whole Church is priestly ; 
 and the phrase which I have italicized should rather run, ' Let the priestliness of 
 the whole Church, and of any particular class within her only in reference to, and 
 as expressive of, the priestliness of the whole' The 'not' of the text may well 
 mean no more than this (as frequently in Scripture, e. g. 'I will have mercy and 
 not sacrifice,' &c.), but it is open to misconception. The relation between a 
 'priestly Church' and priests ordained within the Church, is discussed more fully 
 below in chapter vii. 
 
 H 
 
g8 ' MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 the more reason for denouncing it as a lie successfully 
 imposed on men's language, by him whose purpose it only 
 too insidiously helps. 
 
 The word laity, on the other hand, is a far nobler word than 
 people imagine. It is apt to be thought of as a merely 
 negative term. The 'layman ' is one who is not a clergyman, 
 or (in other contexts) not a medical man, not a lawyer, not, in 
 this or that, an expert. He is a ' mere ' layman ; and a lay- 
 man is a mere ' not.' But to Israel of old, to be ' the People ' 
 of God was the height of positive privilege : and to be a lay- 
 man means to be a member of ' the People ' — not as in modern 
 phrase contrasted with privilege, nobility, government, &c., 
 but as in the mouth of a devout Israelite, — ' the People,' 6 Aao's 
 — in contrast with the nations, the Gentiles, the heathen. It 
 is the word of most positive spiritual privilege, the glory of 
 covenanted access to and intimacy with God. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE BASIS OF MINISTRY DIVINE COMMISSION 
 
 We think, then, of ministry, not as a holy intermediary, 
 wielding powers peculiar and inherent, because it is Spirit- 
 endowed on behalf of those who are not. But Christian 
 ministry is the instrument which represents the whole Spirit- 
 endowed Body of the Church ; and yet withal is itself so 
 Spirit-endowed as to have the right and the power to represent 
 instrumentally. The immense exaltation — and requirement — 
 of lay Christianity, which in respect of its own dignity cannot 
 be exaggerated, in no way detracts from the distinctive 
 dignity of the duties which belong to ministerial function, 
 or from the solemn significance of separation to ministry. 
 
 Upon the dignity of Christian ministry, as dignity, there is 
 no occasion now to enlarge. At least we have behind us all 
 that is implied in the exegesis of the 3rd chapter of 2 Corin- 
 thians. At least the ' ministration of the Spirit,' the ' minis- 
 tration of righteousness ' does still, in its true significance, 
 outdazzle that which was in itself too dazzling for the eye of 
 man to endure. But leaving thoughts like these, or the 
 meaning of them, we turn next in order to the other thought, 
 that of the meaning of separation to ministry, and the ideas 
 involved in, or necessary for, that. 
 
 If, then, we insist that some, and not all, have the right, as 
 organs and instruments, to represent the Church, and wield 
 ministerially the powers that are inherent in her, of what 
 
 H 2 
 
loo MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 nature is that which makes such ministerial distinction between 
 the few and the many ? Of the answer to this question, at 
 least so long as it is in an abstract form, there can be no 
 doubt. The work is God's work, and the authority to under- 
 take it must be God's authority. Even if we should hold 
 that nothing is required except a popular approval, the ' call ' 
 of the Church or of a congregation, or, more simply still, 
 a man's own inner sense of capacity and of inclination ; yet 
 even these, if they are to have the semblance of adequate 
 warrant for a life of ministry, must be conceived of as the 
 immediate methods through which God appoints and enables. 
 The first and most cardinal principle, then, for a ministry 
 which can possibly claim to be valid or authorized, is adequacy 
 of commission ; that is, commission understood to proceed 
 from God. 
 
 This principle is in Scripture abundantly expressed and 
 illustrated. To pass by all lessons derivable from the Old 
 Testament ministry (which might be validly urged in support 
 of this principle, however much we believed that the Levitical 
 distinctions of ministry had themselves no counterpart what- 
 ever in the Church of Christ) ; to omit even the broader 
 emphasis upon the principle in such passages as the denun- 
 ciation of the prophets who were not sent in the 28th of 
 Jeremiah, or the ' Here am I, send me,' following upon the 
 ' Lo, this hath touched thy tongue,' of the 6th of Isaiah ; it 
 emerges as a principle no less cardinal in the Church of the 
 New Testament. Compare our Lord's commission to the 
 twelve, 'As the Father hath sent Me, even so send I you,' 
 with the argument of Romans x, ' How then shall they call on 
 Him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they 
 believe in Him whom they have not heard? and how shall 
 they hear without a preacher? and how shall they preach, 
 except they be sent ? e-ven as it' is written, How beautiful are 
 the feet of them that bring glad tidings of good things ! ' 
 
 Our Lord's words base the 'sending' of Apostles upon His 
 
iv] BASIS OF MINISTRY— DIVINE COMMISSION loi 
 
 own ' sending.' This sending, or commission, regarded (aiong 
 with human capacity of sympathy) as an essential principle of 
 priesthood, even in the Person of Christ, is the basis of the 
 argument in the 5th chapter to the Hebrews: 'Every high 
 priest, being taken from among men, is appointed for men in 
 things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and 
 sacrifices for sins : who can bear gently with the ignorant and 
 erring, for that he himself also is compassed with infirmity ; 
 and by reason thereof is bound, as for the people, so also for 
 himself, to offer for sins. And no man taketh the honour 
 unto himself, but when he is called of God, even as was Aaron. 
 So Christ also glorified not Himself to be made a high priest, 
 but He that spake unto Him, Thou art My Son, this day have 
 I begotten Thee : as He saith also in another place, Thou 
 art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.' And 
 again, that these words, because they apply to Christ, do not 
 therefore apply to every Christian in the same sense, is clear 
 from 2 Cor. ii-v amongst other places : ' Thanks be unto God, 
 which . . . maketh manifest through us the savour of His 
 knowledge in every place. . . . And who is sufficient for these 
 things ? . . . Such confidence have we through Christ to God- 
 ward ; not that we are sufficient of ourselves to account 
 anything as from ourselves ; but our sufficiency is from God ; 
 who also made us sufficient as ministers of a new covenant ; 
 not of the letter, but of the Spirit ; for the letter killeth, but the 
 Spirit giveth life. . . . Therefore seeing we have this ministry, 
 even as we obtained mercy, we faint not ; . . . but we have 
 this treasure in earthen vessels, that the exceeding greatness 
 of the power may be of God, and not from ourselves ; . . . 
 wherefore we faint not ; ... all things are of God, who recon- 
 ciled us to Himself through Christ, and gave unto us the 
 ministry of reconciliation ; ... we are ambassadors therefore 
 on behalf of Christ, as though God were intreating you by 
 us ^' It will be observed that, in these passages, the sense of 
 
 1 Cf. Rom. xii. 6-8; i Cor. xii. 29; Eph. iv. 11, &c. 
 
I02 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 Divine commission is the backbone of ministry; partly in the 
 more negative sense that, without it, no man durst presume 
 to exercise ministerial functions at all ; partly in the more 
 positive sense, that to those who have it, it alone, that is to 
 say the overshadowing consciousness of Divine command, 
 Divine companionship. Divine empowering, constitutes all the 
 reality of what they do, and is to them all their courage and 
 their strength. In other words, any aspiration to ministry in 
 Christ's Church, or attempt to discharge its duties, however 
 otherwise well-intentioned, would be a daring presumption at 
 the first, and in practice a disastrous weakness, in proportion as 
 it was lacking in adequate ground to believe in its own defi- 
 nitely, validly, divinely received authority to minister. 
 
 ' Even so send I you ' — nothing short of this can bear the 
 strain of ministry. ' When He had said this,' the text of 
 St. John proceeds at once, ' He breathed on them and saith 
 unto them, " Receive ye the Holy Ghost." ' I am not now 
 discussing these words as a formula in the Ordinal ; but 
 looking at them in a more general way, it is plain that valid 
 authority to minister (whatever the methods which convey or 
 assure it) means such gift of Spirit as enables — by Divine 
 warrant and in Divine power — to a real ' ministration of the 
 Spirit.' If the first point to lay down is that authority to 
 minister must be felt to come to the individual soul from God, 
 the second is that the differentiating character and essential 
 meaning of ministry is ' Spirit.' This essential ' Spirit,' 
 character of ministry, and its dependence alike for its valid 
 inception, and for its maintenance throughout, upon ' Spirit,' 
 receives careful expression in the address in our Ordinal to 
 all candidates for priesthood. ' Forasmuch then as your 
 Office is both of so great excellency, and of so great difficulty, 
 ye see with how great care and study ye ought to apply 
 yourselves, as well that ye may show yourselves dutiful 
 and thankful unto that Lord who hath placed you in so 
 high a dignity ; as also to beware, that neither you yourselves 
 
iv] BASIS OF MINISTRY— DIVINE COMMISSION 103 
 
 offend, nor be occasion that others offend. Howbeit, ye 
 cannot have a mind and will thereto of yourselves ; for that 
 will and ability is given of God alone : therefore ye ought, and 
 have need, to pray earnestly for His Holy Spirit. . . . You 
 will continually pray to God the Father, by the mediation of 
 our only Saviour Jesus Christ, for the heavenly assistance of 
 the Holy Ghost.' That the Ordinal subsequently purports to 
 convey an exceedingly solemn charisma of the Holy Spirit, 
 and that this solemn charisma for ministry is conceived of 
 as constituting the essential distinction and capacity of 
 ministerial life, is of course, upon the face of the service, 
 obvious. 
 
 I am not now discussing the Ordinal in itself, only glancing 
 at its coherence in this matter with the scriptural principle 
 that Divine commission, whose constitutive character is endow- 
 ment of ' Spirit,' is the one warrant for, and the one strength 
 of, any form of self-sufficing or independent Church ministry. 
 But it may be worth while to emphasize this particular point 
 of view by quoting the striking expression of it in words which 
 will be widely accepted as authoritative. 
 
 ' Now, besides that the power and authority delivered with 
 those words is itself xaptc^a, a gracious donation which the 
 Spirit of God doth bestow, we may most assuredly persuade 
 ourselves that the hand which imposeth upon us the function 
 of our ministry doth under the same form of words so tie 
 itself thereunto, that he which receiveth the burden is thereby 
 for ever warranted to have the Spirit with him and in him for 
 his assistance, aid, countenance, and support in whatsoever he 
 faithfully doth to discharge duty. Knowing therefore that 
 when we take ordination we also receive the presence of the 
 Holy Ghost, partly to guide, direct, and strengthen us in all 
 our ways, and partly to assume unto itself for the more 
 authority those actions that appertain to our place and calling, 
 can our ears admit such a speech uttered in the reverend 
 performance of that solemnity, or can we at any time renew 
 
I04 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch, 
 
 the memory and enter into serious cogitation thereof but with 
 much admiration and joy? Remove what these "foohsh" 
 words do imply, and what hath the ministry of God besides 
 wherein to glory ? Whereas now, forasmuch as the Holy 
 Ghost which our Saviour in His first ordinations gave doth no 
 less concur with spiritual vocations throughout all ages, than 
 the Spirit which God derived from Moses to them that assisted 
 him in his government did descend from them to their 
 successors in like authority and place, we have for the least 
 and meanest duties performed by virtue of ministerial power, 
 that to dignify, grace, and authorize them, w'hich no other 
 offices on earth can challenge. Whether we preach, pray, 
 baptize, communicate, condemn, give absolution, or whatso- 
 ever, as disposers of God's mysteries, our words, judgements, 
 acts, and deeds, are not ours but the Holy Ghost's. Enough, 
 if unfeignedly and in heart we did believe it, enough to banish 
 whatsoever may justly be thought corrupt, either in bestowing, 
 or in using, or in esteeming the same otherwise than is meet. 
 For profanely to bestow, or loosely to use, or vilely to esteem 
 of the Holy Ghost we all in show and profession abhor 
 
 Now in everything that has hitherto been said, or quoted, 
 on the subject, it has been clearly implied that commission, 
 to be commission in any sufficient meaning of the term, must 
 be commission not from below but from above. Only as it 
 is clearly understood to be from above — from God essentially 
 and not man — can it spiritually authorize or empower ; how- 
 ever much such authorizing may be accompanied by, or even 
 may require, as a regular preliminary, acclamation or accep- 
 tance from below. It never can be conferred by those who 
 have not authority to confer it. Even on the extreme sup- 
 position that either popular choice or individual impulse were 
 the sufficient witness and method of God's appointment, it 
 would still be God's act and not the popular voice, God's 
 
 1 Hooker's Eccl. Pol., Bk. V. Ixxvii. § 8. p. 462. 
 
iv] BASIS OF MINISTRY— DIVINE COMMISSION 105 
 
 inspiration and not the individual's response thereto, which 
 conveyed the authority. No doubt the use or sanction of 
 processes Hke these might be very unHke the method of 
 God's deahng with men in His Church. They might be 
 a very extreme instance of the old maxim Vox poptili vox 
 Dei. But it would still be only as vox Dei that the vox 
 popitli could be supposed to suffice. 
 
 The one idea, then, which is altogether incompatible with 
 the passages quoted is the idea that the difference between 
 ministry and laity is a difference merely of secular or politic 
 convenience. Even on the extremest form of anti-ecclesiastical 
 theory I must venture to repeat that the belief that the con- 
 gregation could constitute a minister must mean a belief that 
 that which speaks through the choice of the congregation is 
 God's voice ; that it is Himself pronouncing and appointing 
 through this particular means. The idea of a secular appoint- 
 ment as secular, a distinction of convenience drawn on the 
 basis of convenience, without reference to the Divine purpose, 
 or consciousness of being instrumental to a Divine act, is the 
 one idea which may be regarded as wholly untenable. It is 
 not too much to say that any theory of ministry such as this 
 stands condemned beforehand as an impossibility. 
 
 But if this be put wholly aside, there remain, it seems, three 
 alternative forms which the idea of a Divine designation might 
 take. First, there is the view that Divine appointment mani- 
 fests itself solely within the individual conscience of a man who 
 is called, because he feels that he is called, by God to minister. . 
 Secondly, there is the view that the witness in the individual 
 conscience must be accompanied by appointment on the part 
 of the general Church body, or some adequate portion of it, 
 but without reference to any particular ' ministerial ' method, 
 or continuity, of transmission. Church appointment to 
 ministry, on this view, is not to be dispensed with. But the 
 Church is in no way bound. She can provide herself minis- 
 
io6 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 ters and instruments wherever, or however, she thinks fit. 
 And, thirdly, there is the familiar Church view that none can 
 be held to be divinely commissioned until he has received 
 commission on earth from those who themselves had received 
 authority to commission from such as held it in like manner 
 before them ; that is, when the matter is pressed home, that 
 valid ministerial authority depends, upon its earthward side, 
 upon continuous transmission from the Apostles of Jesus 
 Christ. 
 
 It seems to me worth while to consider these alternatives to 
 some extent separately. As to the first alternative, I am hardly 
 perhaps concerned to deny so much its abstract possibility, as 
 its practical possibility under Church conditions. At the least, 
 I am persuaded that the presumption against its credibleness 
 in any particular case is for practical purposes overwhelming. 
 The principle that inward acts through outward, grace through 
 means of grace, Spirit through Body, is a principle which in 
 the great vital fact of the Incarnation seems to have received 
 its full and final consecration ; and thenceforward to abide 
 for ever, as what may truly be called at once an essential 
 principle, and a revealed law, of the life of Christ's Church. 
 The principle requires, first of all, and finds its expression in, 
 the fact of the organization, or Body, of the Church of Christ. 
 But that the Church should be an organized Body at all, 
 and yet that this principle should be set aside in a matter 
 of importance quite cardinal to the entire administration of 
 the Church, is, to the theology of the Incarnation, nearly 
 inconceivable. If the principle of the consecration of the 
 material and the outward has no place in the public autho- 
 rization of ministers to minister in spiritual things, the entire 
 method which pervades the life of Christ's Church, the whole 
 rationale of the sacramental system, is pj-o tanio invalidated. 
 Baptism by water. Communion in Bread and Wine, cease 
 to be of one piece with the entire revelation of the religion 
 of the Incarnate, and become rather isolated and fragmentary 
 
iv] BASIS OF MINISTRY—DIVINE COMMISSION 107 
 
 observances, imposed upon an obedience which is no longer 
 intelligent. 
 
 In spite however of considerations like these, there are still 
 three points, I imagine, which might be urged in support of 
 the theory. These are, first the precedent of the Old Testament 
 prophets, in the light e. g. of Amos vii or Jeremiah i ; secondly, 
 the precedent of St. Paul, according to his own determined 
 insistence in Galatians i and ii ; and thirdly, the picture of 
 the Christian prophets as portrayed in the Didache. 
 
 If appeal is made to the precedent of Old Testament 
 prophecy, it must be answered that the very contrast of the 
 Old Testament bears emphatic witness, in this matter, to the 
 character of the New. Broadly, in the old dispensation, the 
 material and the spiritual were still kept apart — the spiritual 
 being still, itself, symbolically rather than directly spiritual. 
 But in the new covenant all reality is spiritual ; the material 
 is nothing but the direct expression of spirit. Thus in the 
 Old Testament it may perhaps be said that the formal 
 regularity of the outward or material is represented by the 
 hereditary priesthood ; the transcendency of the spiritual 
 inward by the occasional and variable inspiration of prophets. 
 In the New Testament these two principles coalesce. The 
 ministry is not of hereditary descent, but of personal vocation : 
 its outwardness lacks full reality except it be the outward of 
 an inward, the representation of a Spirit ; yet its succession 
 is not casual but orderly, not inscrutable but through regu- 
 larity and solemnity of method. In this it exactly accords 
 with all the fundamental methods of the earthly revelation 
 of the kingdom of heaven. 
 
 If appeal be made to the instance of St. Paul, and his 
 claim in the Epistle to the Galatians, it must be answered 
 that the very case of St. Paul, in proportion as it was 
 exceptional, bears exceptional witness to the strength of 
 the principle contended for. That spiritual reality was not, 
 in the kingdom of heaven, to supersede, but rather to be 
 
io8 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 guaranteed by, outward form, is a principle made sufficiently 
 clear in the normal Church processes : but it is stamped with 
 greater emphasis still in a few instances which are abnormal. 
 The principle that Spirit-baptism was not to be without 
 water, is never enforced quite so strongly as when Cornelius 
 and his companions, even after they had first (for special 
 reasons) received the presence of the Holy Ghost — a presence 
 made manifest by miracle — were nevertheless ordered to be 
 baptized. So the principle that commission to ministry is 
 by laying on of hands, while it is illustrated, comparatively 
 incidentally, by the positive instances recorded in the New 
 Testament, is nowhere made quite so emphatic as when 
 St. Paul, with Barnabas — after his Divine call, his mission to 
 the Gentiles and his courageous preaching, and with all his 
 sense of vocation to apostleship direct from Jesus Christ 
 personally — yet with fasting and prayer, is set apart by the 
 laying on of hands of his brother ' prophets,' for the great 
 missionary work to which the Holy Ghost was calling him. 
 Such exceptional instances emphasize most strongly the 
 place which was to belong to the ' outward ' in the Church 
 of Christ. 
 
 But it may be said that even if individual inspiration be not 
 the regular mode of appointment to ministry, yet it may 
 validly stand side by side with a ministry of more regular 
 method. Does not the Didachc, it may be asked, show 
 clearly that it did so at the first? and if at first, why not now, 
 if men really feel themselves to be inspired ? I am not pre- 
 pared to admit, on the authority of the Didache^ that it was so 
 at the first. But of that there will be occasion to speak by- 
 and-by. Meanwhile, even supposing that this premiss were 
 granted, I should deny the scqiiiUir. Whatever there may be 
 supposed on any side to be, either of abstract possibility or of 
 actual evidence, for a merely supernatural setting apart in the 
 earliest days — and there are the gravest doubts about either, 
 even apart from the great improbability constituted by the 
 
iv] BASIS OF MINISTRY — Dill NE COMMISSION 109 
 
 case of St. Paul— I shall submit that not even the supposition 
 that it existed then, would carry us any material distance 
 towards a belief in its credibleness now. If it be granted, for 
 the sake of argument, that the prophets of the Didache were 
 unordaincd men, who superseded the ordained in the highest 
 functions of their ministry ; yet I should certainly not allow 
 the principle to pass unchallenged, in abstract form, that what 
 God did then He might at any time do. Some things which 
 of old He praised, or commanded, or did, became, in the 
 process of His development of man, inherently incredible and 
 impossible. If we cannot say as much as this of a Divine, 
 but non-ministerial, ordination to ministry, it would none the 
 less be doubtful whether there could be evidence adequate to 
 convince us, in any individual case, that He had so ordained. 
 God does not contradict His own revelation of Himself. 
 Direct interposition of the kind supposed might with perfect 
 consistency be conceived of as a consolidation of the infantine, 
 and yet as a dissolution of the organized, Church. In pro- 
 portion as Church order is apprehended as itself a part of the 
 revelation of the character of God, a great change comes over 
 the evidence which should convince us that it has been over- 
 ruled by the act of God. The presumption against such 
 overruling becomes by degrees so enormous that it is open 
 to question whether — say in the nineteenth century, any con- 
 ceivable evidence would be adequate to rebut it. Evidence 
 after all, if offered, can only be valid as evidence if it has 
 a certain relation of admissibleness to the fundamental con- 
 victions of the apprehending mind. There are cases in which 
 any amount of apparent evidence would be felt to be delusive, 
 and that even in proportion to its very appearance of con- 
 vincingness. On such a ground some minds — on their own 
 essential hypothesis consistently enough — reject beforehand 
 any conceivable evidence for miracle. On such a ground 
 a Christian, with the highest intellectual cogency, condemns 
 before examination, as manifestly contradictory and immoral, 
 
no 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH 
 
 anything which tends to prove that God Himself could 
 perpetrate wickedness, or the visit of an angel warrant, to 
 a Christian conscience, the sacrificial murder of a son ^. 
 
 It is certain that nothing is more apt to be manifestly 
 self-deceiving than the fancies of a man's own brain about 
 himself or his own inspiration. If, then, we are challenged to 
 believe in an Ordination which is merely supernatural on any 
 evidence which could be produced from a man's inner 
 consciousness, we should justly say that all the conditions are 
 conspicuously wanting, which, in respect of such a claim as 
 that, would make even evidence reasonably credible. And if 
 his personal claims should seem to be vindicated by external 
 corroborations, even to a miraculous sign made manifest in the 
 heavens, it is at least an open question, on New Testament 
 principles, w^hether the whole should not be treated far rather 
 as an inscrutable delusion than as a veritable sign from God. 
 
 This thought will, I believe, be further fortified by the con- 
 siderations which immediately follow. I pass then to the 
 second of the three alternatives, the idea (which forms a large 
 element in the unexpressed thought of many who do not give 
 form to it) that the voice of God's designation to ministry is 
 to be recognized in the act of the appointing Church, but 
 without any limitation whatever in respect of such matters as 
 ministerial succession or sacramental method. The whole is 
 a matter of unfettered and indefinite discretion, on the part 
 of the corporate Church, or some portion thereof Here is 
 a position which is felt to be eminently plausible. It sounds as 
 if it loyally believed in the Church. It sounds as if it magnified 
 
 ' It was in reference to Abraham's obedience in the sacrifice of Isaac that this 
 argument was made by Dr. Mozley an abiding possession of the Christian intellect. 
 See Ruling Ideas in Early Ages, particularly the second Lecture. Perhaps I may 
 be excused for mentioning that, some years ago, I had occasion to discuss (on the 
 basis of this argument of Dr. Mozley's) the abstract proposition ' what God has 
 once done God may at any time do,' in relation to the Le\'irate law, and the 
 marriageableness of a sister-in-law. The proposition looks axiomatic — but only 
 till it is examined. 
 
iv] BASIS OF MINISTRY— DIVINE COMMISSION iii 
 
 the spiritual principle. It seems at first sight to withhold 
 nothing but technicalities, involved and obscure, while con- 
 ceding to the full everything that could possibly be asked 
 upon the side of what is spiritual or real. 
 
 But let us distinguish a little further what, on this view, is 
 held, and what is denied. It is admitted that there must be 
 a sort of setting apart by the act of the Church : but it is not 
 admitted that there are any special instruments in the Church 
 through whom alone she is to act ministerially in setting apart, 
 or any specific sacramental method according to which (through 
 such instruments or otherwise) she is, in dutifulness, compelled 
 to act. Observe then, in the form of this statement, what is 
 really denied. It is a denial, not, as was supposed, of some 
 insignificant or remote details ; it is a denial of the ministerial 
 principle itself. The very point of the ministerial principle 
 is this, that whilst it is always the corporate Church which 
 acts through its representative instruments, it is only through 
 instruments, empowered to represent, that the corporate 
 Church does act. To claim, in this case (upon which every 
 possible act, ministerial or sacramental, depends), that the 
 Church may act through any one, any how, is not merely 
 to give up a certain musty ecclesiastical prejudice about the 
 detail of ministerial succession ; it is to make all ministry 
 unmeaning everywhere. 
 
 It is certainly relevant to urge against such a view that it 
 does not square with the analogy of the relation, in the human 
 body, between the general corporate power and the organs 
 specifically endowed, which was dwelt upon in the last chapter ; 
 and the analogy is not without weight, however little, as mere 
 analogy, it can be conclusive. There is also against it a much 
 more formidable weight of presumption from all that has been 
 urged about the ministerial principle, and the sacramental 
 relation between outward and inward in the principles of the 
 theology of the Incarnation,and therefore in the experience of the 
 Church of Christ. But after all it is mainly a question of history. 
 
112 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 The true answer to it will lie in an examination of the methods 
 of Ordination to ministry in Christ's Church from the day of 
 Pentecost onwards ; an examination which, for the present, it 
 is necessary to defer. If the theory be true as theory, it is 
 on the field of history that it must establish itself It must 
 show that the supposed necessity of episcopal laying on of 
 hands came in, as an aftergrowth, upon an earlier simplicity. 
 If it cannot make good its place in history during the early 
 centuries of the Church, it is useless to ask us to accept it as 
 theoretically true. 
 
 It is impossible at this point to enter seriously upon a dis- 
 cussion which belongs rather to another branch of the subject 
 — the question as to methods of ordaining: but perhaps I may 
 say at once (as this volume does not reach the further subject) 
 that there does not seem to me to be a prima facie case in 
 history for the theory that is before us. It is true that a dis- 
 cussion of methods would have to examine a few cases alleged 
 to show (a) that the ordinary practice of laying on of hands was 
 in some cases varied, at least in respect of its literal detail ; and 
 [b) that it was in some instances performed by non-episcopal 
 presbyters ^ But for the present purpose it is to be observed 
 that such variations as these, even if they were established, 
 would show indeed that an unexpected latitude had been, in 
 rare cases, allowed in the sacramental administration of Ordina- 
 tion : but they would not tend at all to show that Ordination 
 was regarded as otherwise than a sacramental act ; or could be 
 conve3'ed sacramentally except by instruments ministerially 
 empowered to convey it. Even the claim of TertuUian that 
 every layman is a priest in posse, and may so act in case of 
 necessity (whatever its merits or demeiuts may be), would not 
 carry us far towards supposing either that, necessity apart, 
 every layman has the same right as a priest to minister in 
 sacred things, or that the distinction which makes one man 
 
 ' They are alleged by Dr. Hatch, Bampton Lectures, pp. 133, 134; and dis- 
 cussed by Canon Gore, Appendices B and E of The Church attd the Ministry. 
 
iv] BASIS OF MINISTRY — DIVINE COMMISSION 113 
 
 'priest' or 'bishop,' and another not, is a distinction which 
 can be conferred, apart from all sacramental method or 
 representative spiritual authority, by the mere designation of 
 lay Church members. 
 
 I return, then, to the traditional view as to the ' ministerial ' 
 transmission of ministry : and I conceive that it is a matter of 
 some importance to emphasize this principle, in its abstract 
 form, as principle, quite apart from, and prior to, any more 
 particular questions, either as to degrees or distinctions of 
 ministry, or as to methods in detail by which ministerial 
 authority is conveyed. It is precisely this which appears to 
 be done in the 23rd of our Articles, and done in exactly 
 right order. The question as to the metJiod of ' Consecra- 
 tion of Archbishops and Bishops, and Ordering of Priests 
 and Deacons ' as represented by the Ordinal of the reign of 
 King Edward VI, is not reached till the 36th Article. But 
 long before any reference to the method of the Ordinal — 
 which carries with it the threefold distinction of Order — the 
 principle in the abstract form is correctly laid down. ' It is 
 not lawful for any man to take upon him the office of publick 
 preaching, or ministering the Sacraments in the Congregation, 
 before he be lawfully called and sent {vocatiis et missus) to 
 execute the same. And those we ought to judge lawfully 
 called and sent, which be chosen and called to this work by 
 men who have publick authority given unto them in the 
 Congregation, to call and send Ministers into the Lord's vine- 
 yai'd.' It is possible that it may be contended — and if so, we 
 need not be greatly concerned to deny — that the phraseology 
 of this Article may have been in part determined, not indeed 
 by a desire expressly to endorse (which is not at all probable), 
 but by a certain unwillingness to be explicit in condemning, 
 under the then existing circumstances, the system of the con- 
 tinental Protestants. But whether there be in the language 
 any such side reference, or no, it is none the less clear that 
 what results is a statement of principle in precise accord with 
 
 I 
 
114 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 the proportion of truth. It is the principle in the abstract. 
 Those only are duly commissioned who have received com- 
 mission from such, before them, as were themselves com- 
 missioned to commission others. 
 
 Now while we have the principle before us just in this form, 
 it is desirable to call attention, as emphatically as possible, to 
 the exceeding strength with which it is insisted upon in the 
 letter of the Church of Rome to the Church of Corinth, 
 written within the first century, which bears the name of 
 St. Clement. It is of course to be understood that we have 
 not yet come, either to distinctions of orders of ministry, or to 
 the question of exact methods of ordaining ; but that (what- 
 ever there may be to be said about these) ministerial office 
 depends upon orderly transmission from those empowered to 
 transmit the authority to ordain, that is upon a real apostolic 
 succession, is maintained by St. Clement as strongly as it is 
 possible for man to maintain it. The whole passage, from 
 the 37th chapter to the 44th. absolutely depends upon it. He 
 appeals to the orderliness of an army, and the absolute 
 necessity of military obedience, for order : ' All cannot be 
 captains or generals, but all are arranged, from the emperor 
 downwards, in a completely articulated hierarchical system. 
 So it is with the body and its members, in the language of 
 St. Paul to the Corinthians. And such must be the unity of 
 the Body of Christ — based upon mutual submission, de- 
 pendence, subordination. Self-assertion and pride are the 
 characteristics of fools. There is order everywhere — order of 
 place, times, persons — as the sacrifices of old had appointed 
 places and times ; and high priest, priests, levites, people, 
 their distinct and co-ordinate offices. Everything, then, and 
 every one in place and order. God sent forth Christ. 
 Christ sent forth His Apostles. The Apostles, from their 
 converts, constituted bishops and deacons. So INIoses of old 
 established a graduated hierarchy, and silenced the voice of 
 
IV] BASIS OF MINISTRY— DIVINE COMMISSION 115 
 
 jealousy against the priesthood by the blossoming rod of 
 Aaron laid up in the ark of God. In parallel-wise the Apostles, 
 foreseeing the jealousies which should arise about ministerial 
 office (fVt Tov ovoixaros rr^j (TncTKOTrrji), did not merely, as has 
 been said, constitute bishops and deacons, but afterwards also 
 made provision, in case of their decease, for a continuous 
 succession of ministerial office. Those, then, who have once 
 been duly constituted ministers, either by Apostles, or by 
 other faithful men after them, with the consent of the whole 
 Church, can never justly be deposed from the ministry which 
 they have so long and blamelessly exercised. Such deposition 
 of men who without scandal or irreverence have exercised the 
 presbyteral office, and offered the gifts of the Church, would 
 involve the Church in grave sin Such in brief paraphrase 
 is the substance of what is urged in these seven chapters. 
 Now however much it maybe questioned whether St. Clement's 
 letter bears witness for or against the presence of episcopacy 
 in Rome or in Corinth, or in both ; I must submit that it 
 would be difficult to find a stronger assertion than this, of the 
 principle that ministerial office is an outward and orderly 
 institution, dependent for its validity upon transmission, con- 
 tinuous and authorized, from the Apostles, whose own com- 
 mission was direct from Jesus Christ. 
 
 Whether bishops, priests, and deacons are or are not 
 scriptural or exclusive orders of ministry, is on its own grounds 
 fair matter for argument ; but antecedently to any such 
 
 ' The paraplirase, as given above, is not greatly affected by the uncertainty of 
 the word «77ij'o/j77J' I ?). Canon Gore translates it ' gave an additional injunction,' 
 adding, with a query, or ' establislied a supervision.' Bishop Lightfoot adopts the 
 reading (m/xovriv, and translates ' have given permanence to the office.' There is no 
 doubt that Bishop Lightfoot's view of the phrase brings it into singularly exact 
 accord with the context and its argument. The point in that case emphasized by 
 the sentence would be that they provided permanetice (cf. imy.ovo% at the end of 
 ch. 46) by means of succession. Nothing then could be more apt than the expression, 
 just at that point, of the word permanence. But of course, even if it be unexpressed, 
 the idea of permanence is implied in provision made for transmission of succession 
 by the prescience of Apostles. 
 
 I 2 
 
Ii6 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 argument, I must submit that the principle in abstract form — 
 that ministerial authority depends upon continuous trans- 
 mission from the Apostles, through those to whom the Apostles 
 transmitted the power to transmit — must be recognized as 
 being, from the time of St. Clement onwards, a principle 
 implanted in the consciousness of the Christian Church. 
 When it is remembered in what position St. Clement stood, 
 and with what tone and claim of authoritative remonstrance 
 he wrote, as the ' persona ' of the Church of Rome, to the 
 Church of Corinth ; and again to what date he and his writing 
 belong, he himself in greater or less degree a companion of 
 Apostles, and his letter written as early as the dying years 
 of the first century, very little after — if after — the close of the 
 life of St. John ^, the significance of this exceedingly strong 
 assertion of the principle of apostolic succession in this earliest 
 of authoritative post-apostolic writings becomes overwhelming 
 indeed. Not Ignatius himself is a stronger witness to 'apostolic 
 succession ' than is the Church of Rome in the person of 
 St. Clement. 
 
 After what has been said, it will be evident that (to put this 
 matter at the lowest) it becomes at least a question of crucial 
 importance to determine whether Christian ministry does or 
 does not depend upon such a continuity of dev'olution from 
 Apostles as St. Clement describes. Must true ministerial 
 ' character ' be in all cases conferred from above ? or may it 
 sometimes, and with equal validity, be evolved from below ? 
 Is uninterrupted transmission from those who had the power 
 to transmit a real essential ? or can the Church originate, at 
 any point, a new ministry whose commission of authority 
 should exceed or transcend what had been ministerially 
 
 ' The limits of the possible variation of date are not very wide. The year 
 actually fixed by Bishop Lightfoot (and Dr. Salmon) is A.D. 96. Bishop Westcott 
 is expressly of opinion that St. Clement's letter was written and sent while the 
 Apostle St. John was still living at Ephesus. S^Spcaker's Commentary, Introd. to 
 St. John, p. xxix.] 
 
iv] BASIS OF MINISTRY— DIVINE COMMISSION 
 
 received? It is difficult to exaggerate the importance of this 
 question, and of the answer which is to be made to it. 
 
 Now, strange to say, it is one of the principal complaints 
 against Bishop Lightfoot's famous essay, that he appears to 
 ignore this question altogether. He never really answers it : 
 he never raises it : he shows no consciousness that there is any 
 importance in it : it never presents itself to his mind at all. 
 That he does not intend to contradict the principle of 
 St. Clement might possibly be inferred from the very ambiguity 
 of the statements in the essay itself, and still more from the 
 Bishop's repudiation of views about his own meaning which 
 he found to be current. But not even in demurring to mis- 
 taken views of his meaning does he ever put his finger upon 
 our present point, or express his own judgement about it. 
 And meanwhile there are in the essay not a few statements 
 which no one who had the question before his mind at all 
 could possibly have made, unless it were with the purpose, 
 which appears not to be the Bishop's purpose, of controverting 
 the principle. Thus : ' The episcopate properly so called would 
 seem to have been developed from the subordinate office. In 
 other words, the episcopate was formed not out of the apostolic 
 order by localization but out of the presbyteral by elevation \' 
 ' If in some passages St. James is named by himself, in others 
 he is omitted and the presbyters alone are mentioned. From 
 this it maybe inferred that though holding a position superior 
 to the rest, he was still considered as a member of the 
 presbytery ; that he was in fact the head or president of the 
 college ^.' ' Though remaining a member of the presbyteral 
 council, he was singled out from the rest and placed in a 
 position of superior responsibility^.' St. Clement 'was rather 
 the chief of the presbyters than the chief over the presbyters 
 ' Even as late as the close of the second century the bishop of 
 Alexandria was regarded as distinct and yet not distinct from 
 
 ' p. 194- ' P- 195- 
 
 ^ p. 205. * p. 219. 
 
Ii8 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 the presbytery i.' The bishop, ' though set over the presbyters, 
 was still (after the lapse of centuries) regarded as in some 
 sense one of them''.' 'In the investigation just concluded 
 I have endeavoured to trace the changes in the relative position 
 of the first and second orders of the ministry, by which the 
 power was gradually concentrated in the hands of the former. 
 Such a development involves no new principle and must be 
 regarded chiefly in its practical bearings. It is plainly com- 
 petent for the Church at any given time to entrust a parti- 
 cular office with larger powers, as the emergency may 
 require V 
 
 These passages are not quoted as necessarily erroneous 
 (though the first and the last of them seem to approach 
 so near to a contradiction of the principle of 'apostolic 
 succession ' that they could certainly not have been ex- 
 pressed in this way by any one who thought that it represented 
 a truth of the least importance in the Church), but rather to 
 illustrate the absence of the particular question from Bishop 
 Lightfoot's mind. We may set against them if we will other 
 passages, from the essay and elsewhere, which seem to carry 
 us far in the opposite direction : such as, for example, these 
 three : ' If the preceding investigation be substantially correct, 
 the threefold ministry can be traced to apostolic direction ; 
 and short of an express statement we can possess no better 
 assurance of a Divine appointment, or at least a Divine 
 sanction The result has been a confirmation of the state- 
 
 ment in the English Ordinal : " It is evident unto all men 
 diligently reading the Holy Scripture and ancient authors that 
 from the Apostles' time there have been these orders of 
 Ministers in Christ's Church, Bishops, Priests, and Deacons ^" 
 . . . We cannot afford to sacrifice any portion of the faith once 
 delivered to the saints ; we cannot surrender for any immediate 
 advantages the threefold ministry which we have inherited from 
 
 ' p. 224. " p. 226. ' p. 242. * p. 265. 
 
 ^ Dissertations on the Apostolic Age, p. 243. 
 
iv] BASIS OF MINISTRY— DIVINE COMMISSION 119 
 
 apostolic times, and which is the historic background of the 
 Church But it will be observed that in the passages on this 
 side, as in those on the other, the principle in the form in 
 which we found it practically in St. Clement is never really- 
 raised or touched at all. 
 
 Even the statement that the episcopate was ' not formed 
 out of the apostolic order by localization ' may mean practi- 
 cally little more than that the office of the bishop was never 
 wholly identical with that of the Apostles. Bishop Lightfoot, 
 in denying this identity, almost seems to think that he is 
 denying the current sense of ' apostolic succession ^ ' ; but in 
 truth it may be doubted whether any of those who maintain 
 succession would thereby intend identity ^ The correlative 
 statement that the episcopate was formed ' out of the presby- 
 teral order by elevation ' may be perfectly true, but does not 
 necessarily affect the matter at all. The really crucial question 
 is untouched by these words. It would still have to be asked 
 ' formed by whom ? ' and ' on whose authority ? ' It may be 
 urged that what Bishop Lightfoot says about the ' competence 
 of the Church at any time to entrust a particular office with 
 larger powers ' shows that according to his view the episcopal 
 authority was, in principle, rather originated by the general 
 authority of the Church, than authoritatively devolved by the 
 Apostles ; and probably the words would, in strictness, contain 
 this conclusion. And yet, upon the whole of the passages, it 
 is greatly to be doubted whether this was in fact the Bishop's 
 meaning ; and it may certainly be said that, if he desired to 
 
 ^ Dissertations on the Apostolic Age, p. 246. 
 
 2 ' It is not therefore to the Apostle that we must look for the prototype of 
 the Bishop. How far indeed and in what sense the Bishop may be called a suc- 
 cessor of the Apostles, will be a proper subject for consideration ; but the succession 
 at least does not consist in an identity of office,' p. 194. 
 
 ^ Both Dr. Liddon and Canon Gore make reference to the passage in which 
 Bishop Pearson distinguishes, in the apostolic office and authority, the 'temporary 
 and extra-ordinary' from the ' ordinary and permanent'; — the former expiring with 
 the Apostles, the latter perpetuated in the Episcopate. See The Church and the 
 Minis tiy, p. 70, note i. 
 
I20 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 take his stand upon this, as the ultimate basis of all ministry 
 in the Church of Christ, the principle needed a much clearer 
 statement and fuller justification, theological as well as 
 historical, than he has attempted to give. 
 
 The question whether ministerial status is evolved or 
 devolved only directly suggests itself in Bishop Lightfoot's 
 essay in connexion with the episcopate. Presbyterate and 
 diaconate would have been originally devolved by commission 
 from Apostles as a matter of course. But attention can hardly 
 be drawn too emphatically to what is, on a little consideration, 
 the very obvious fact that, throughout the history of the 
 Christian Church, presbyterate and diaconate have in fact 
 been made wholly to depend upon episcopate. It is epis- 
 copate alone which has been understood to have received the 
 power to transmit. It is episcopate alone which has in fact, 
 at any time, conferred either presbyterate or diaconate. 
 Now if the other orders depend upon episcopate, and if 
 episcopate is itself, in its ultimate rationale, ' evolved from 
 below,' then it follows that the basis of all these orders alike 
 is not apostolic devolution or succession, but evolution out of 
 the general spiritual life and consciousness of the Church. 
 
 Is it not a curious paradox ? The Apostles ordained both 
 presbyters and deacons, and provided (as St. Clement says) for 
 their transmission to the after-ages. Devolution by succession, 
 that is to say, was the apostolic principle, carefully pre- 
 arranged. But the Apostles' principle was frustrated and their 
 prevision and precaution nullified by the insertion of a new 
 order, itself unauthorized apostolically, as that upon which 
 the two others should depend for their very existence. 
 
 The only escape from the difficulty is to deny that epis- 
 copate has any separate existence at all. There is in fact, on 
 this theory, no room for it. The Church is really presbyterian. 
 Episcopate is either not distinguishable from presbyterate, or 
 it is self-condemned in distinguishing itself. Episcopate may 
 be just tolerated, so long as it is clearly understood that the 
 
iv] BASIS OF MINISTRY— DIVINE COMMISSION 121 
 
 bishop is not really different, in any essential particular what- 
 ever, from what every presbyter is. But the moment it is 
 claimed that episcopate can do anything whatever that pres- 
 byterate cannot, episcopate becomes a false usurpation and 
 delusion. In other words, episcopate, in the only sense in 
 which it has ever been received or regarded anywhere, has 
 been, and is, an accretion so deluding that it ought not to be 
 tolerated. 
 
 Considering how entirely, if episcopacy be retained or 
 believed in as having any reality at all, the rationale of 
 ministerial office rests ultimately upon the decision between 
 the devolution and the evolution of episcopate, it is quite 
 extraordinary how completely the point of the question is 
 ignored by Bishop Lightfoot. It is in this form that the 
 question must be asked and answered. To this, the question 
 whether the episcopal office is identical with the apostolical, 
 or in what respects it differs, is an irrelevant detail. To this, 
 again, all such evidence as goes to show that the episcopal 
 presbyter was in some sense a presbyter still, though he was 
 over the presbyters, is of no real importance whatever. That 
 so much as this was at least in some sense true, even of an 
 apostle and (in many ways) the leader among apostles, is 
 emphasized for us by St. Peter when he claims to write as 
 fellow-presbyter to presbyters ^. So far is the theory of the 
 presbytership of the bishop from militating in any way against 
 the most stringent doctrine of apostolic succession, that this 
 very doctrine, that the bishop is presbyter, was before the 
 Reformation for a thousand years throughout the West, and is 
 in the Roman Church to this day so habitually exaggerated, 
 that it has become a settled and formal part of the Roman 
 theological teaching, that there is no distinct ' order ' of bishops 
 at all ^. If the bishop was ' set over ' the presbyters, if 
 
 ' I Pet. V. I ; see below, ch. vi. p. 187, note 4. 
 ' Quamvis unus sit sacerdotii ordo, non tamen unus est sacerdotum gradus ' is 
 the heading of qu. xxv, in cap. vii. p. II. of the Tridentine Catech. ad Paroch. The 
 
122 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 St. Clement was ' chief either ' over ' or ' of ' the presbyters, 
 if St. James was ' singled out from the rest and placed ' in 
 a position of superior responsibility, the real question is by 
 wlioin, and through what method, and under what sanction, 
 were they so ' set ' or ' singled ' or ' placed ' ? 
 
 So long as no one presumes to exercise powers except they 
 be within the four corners of the commission which he has 
 formally received, the principle of apostolic succession is not 
 violated. Thus it has been pointed out by Canon Gore ^ that 
 if Apostles or their successors ordained in any place not a 
 single episcopal presbyter, but a whole college of presbyters 
 with episcopal commission and capacity, the principle would 
 remain intact. Such a college of presbyters-in-episcopal- 
 orders (to use modern phraseology) if they confirmed, or 
 ordained, or consecrated diocesan bishops, would not be 
 travelling outside the powers committed to them. It is the 
 claim to originate (as it were) capacities for ministerial 
 function which have not been expressly received, which denies 
 the principle. Could John Wesley ordain? Could the 
 American Church of the last century, without the intervention 
 of bishops, have conferred episcopacy upon itself? Such as 
 these are the questions which directly raise it. It is perfectly 
 compatible with episcopate, which whilst authorized to wield 
 the prerogatives of episcopate, remains also a presbyterate 
 still. It is not compatible with episcopate purporting to be 
 conferred by those who held no commission authorizing them 
 to confer it ^. 
 
 'grades' of priesthood enumerated are (i) sacerdotes simpliciter, (2) episcopi or 
 pontifices, (3) archiepiscopi or metropolitani, (4) patriarchae, (5) Romanus pontifex 
 maximus, totius orbis terrarum pater et patriarcha. 
 ' P- 7.3- 
 
 ^ ' This is the Church principle : that no ministry is valid which is assumed, 
 which a man takes upon himself, or which is merely delegated to him from below. 
 That ministerial act alone is valid which is covered by a ministerial commission 
 received from above by succession from the Apostles. This is part of the great 
 principle of tradition. . . . What heresy is in the sphere of truth, a violation of the 
 apostolic succession is in the tradition of the ministry. Here too there is a deposit 
 
iv] BASIS OF MINISTRY— DIVINE COMMISSION 123 
 
 There is another point which it may be worth while to put 
 expressly. The theory of apostolic succession is one against 
 which a prejudice is often raised by the form in which it is 
 stated. Objectors object to it, or those who should be its 
 defenders with a light heart surrender it, as though its chief 
 purpose were to satisfy a certain craving for logical symmetry, 
 or perhaps for the natural pride in an immemorial pedigree, 
 by making dogmatic assertions, in themselves regarded as 
 doubtful, perhaps even as impossible, as to the detail of events 
 of a thousand or of fifteen hundred years ago. How can you 
 tell, it is asked, or what can it matter, whether there was or 
 was not a link missing in the chain, somewhere perhaps in the 
 thirteenth — or in the third — century? 
 
 Now if any one wishes really to measure what is meant, he 
 should raise the question not in the dim perspective of the 
 past, but in the foreground of the immediate present. It is in 
 respect of its own time that each generation has its practical 
 concern in, and charge of, the principle. Those who speak 
 lightly of what may have happened long ago, are they 
 indifferent to the things which concern themselves ? Would 
 they accept as their bishop one who was consecrated to 
 episcopate by laymen ? or receive absolution in their hour of 
 
 handed down, an ecclesiastical trust transmitted ; and its continuity is violated, 
 whenever a man " takes any honour to himself" and assumes a function not com- 
 mitted to him. Judged in the light of the Church's mind as to the relation of the 
 individual to the whole body, such an act takes a moral discolouring. The indi- 
 vidual of course who is guilty of the act may not incur the responsibility in any 
 particular case through the absence of right knowledge, or from other causes which 
 exempt from responsibility in whole or in part ; but judged by an objective standard, 
 the act has the moral discolouring of self-assertion. The Church's doctrine of suc- 
 cession is thus of a piece with the whole idea of the Gospel revelation, as being 
 the communication of a divine gift which must be received and cannot be originated, 
 — received, moreover, through the channels of a visible and organic society ; and 
 the principle (this is what is here emphasized) lies at the last resort in the idea of 
 succession rather than in the continuous existence of episcopal government— even 
 though it should appear that this too is of apostolic origin, and that the Church, 
 since the Apostles, has never conceived of itself as having any power to originate 
 or interpolate a new office.' Ibid., pp. 74, 75. 
 But see the whole passage, from p. 69 onwards. 
 
124 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 anguish, or the eucharistic gifts in their highest worship, from 
 one who had received his ordination at the hands only of the 
 unordained ? Behef in apostolic succession really means a 
 belief that this has been a practical question to each genera- 
 tion severally in its turn ; and that each generation severally 
 has cared about, because it has believed in, the dutiful answer 
 to the question. Those who care now that Ordination should 
 be received from those only who have themselves received 
 power to ordain, care really for all that apostolic succession 
 means. Certainly there was no foolish pride in dim remote- 
 ness of pedigree (though there was a deep sense of the religious 
 value of authority duly received because lawfully transmitted), 
 nor was there any mere craving for symmetry of logic, on the 
 part of those who, within the first century of the Church, 
 made the solemn remonstrance of the Roman with the 
 Corinthian Christians turn upon the question of apostolic and 
 continuous transmission of ministry. 
 
 Whether ministry received from Apostles is transmissible 
 only through bishops, or through presbyters also, is no doubt 
 a question of the utmost importance. But the theory of 
 apostolic succession may be, in itself — and is — affirmed on 
 both views alike. 
 
 The principle, in its abstract form, is quite capable of 
 being detached from any theories about episcopacy. On the 
 other hand, if episcopacy be, in any real sense, accepted, the 
 principle of apostolical succession can no longer be kept in 
 detachment from it. To a presbyterian theory of succession, 
 episcopate (as was suggested above) would become something 
 less tolerable, more positively erroneous, than any mere sur- 
 plusage. If there are, and rightly are, bishops as the centres 
 of Church government, then the principle of apostolical succes- 
 sion, however in the abstract distinguishable, must become in 
 fact vitally identified with episcopal theory. 
 
 But for the present I have tried to speak rather of the 
 abstract principle. In respect of almost all that has been 
 
iv] BASIS OF MINISTRY— DIVINE COMMISSION 125 
 
 hitherto said, the constitution of the Church may be conceived 
 of either as episcopal or presbyterian ; but whatever it be, as 
 far as concerns the foi-nis or distinctions of Orders, I must 
 submit that the evidence of the scriptural quotations given 
 above, linked as they are to the subsequent course of Church 
 history by the massive authority of the Church of Rome, 
 speaking within the first century in the person of St. Clement, 
 makes sufficiently clear to us the meaning of the principle, 
 which since the days of St. Clement has never been success- 
 fully challenged in the Church ; the principle, namely, that 
 ministerial validity is provided for, on the human and material 
 side, and in that sense is dependent upon, a continuity of 
 orderly appointment and institution, received in each genera- 
 tion from those who themselves had been authorized to 
 institute by the institution of those before them ; that is, on 
 analysis, by uninterrupted transmission of authority from the 
 men whose own title to authority was that they too were 
 ' Apostles,^ ' sent ' by Him who, even Himself, was 'sent' to 
 be the Christ ^ 
 
 ^ The word Apostle is itself used of Him in Hebrews iii. i. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT 
 
 What has been said hitherto has been said of the general 
 idea of ministry. We pass now to what is really quite 
 a different department, — the question of distinctions of 
 ministerial office. Obviously we begin with the New Testa- 
 ment. What then is the evidence which meets us within the 
 pages of the New Testament itself as to ministerial distinctions 
 in the Church of Christ ? 
 
 I. First and foremost, on every principle, stands the 
 apostolate. The original basis of the apostolic distinction is 
 found in the solemn selection by our Lord of twelve of His 
 disciples, to whom He gave ' authority over unclean spirits, to 
 cast them out, and to heal all manner of disease and all 
 manner of sickness.' But this, however significant of their 
 essential relation to Himself, and of the authority which 
 should inhere, by virtue of that relation, in apostleship, is 
 itself as yet only preliminary and tentative. For the full 
 apostolate, in its Pentecostal sense, our Lord's personal 
 training of His selected disciples would be gradual and com- 
 plete. Whatever aspect such a fact may give to the subsequent 
 apostolate of St. Matthias or St. Paul \ or whatever (in the 
 
 ' But St. Matthias was expressly chosen out ' of the men which have companied 
 with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and went out among us, beginning 
 
GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 127 
 
 case of St. Paul at least) may have been the exceptional 
 compensation for this gradual shaping of character under the 
 hand of Christ, of the fact itself there can be no question 
 whatever. It is perhaps not always remembered quite as 
 clearly as it deserves to be that the real lessons in pastoral 
 training within the New Testament are not to be found 
 nearly so much in the so-called Pastoral Epistles, which are 
 (by comparison) accidental and accessory, as in the four 
 Gospels, in the history of the companionship of the chosen 
 disciples with their Lord ^ 
 
 The apostolate then was already formed and fashioned for 
 the Church before the Church began, at Pentecost, to be alive. 
 Church without apostolate never existed for a moment. If 
 it might be thought an exaggeration to say that the Church 
 without the apostolate would be inconceivable ; at all events 
 it is true to say that from the Church as it is sketched in 
 fact, whether in the early records or in the apocalyptic 
 visions of the New Testament, the apostolate is altogether 
 inseparable. 
 
 Of apostolate, the fundamental character and warrant is 
 before us in the words already referred to, in St. John : 
 ' Peace be unto you. . . . Peace be unto you : as the Father 
 hath sent Me, even so send I you. And when He had said 
 this. He breathed on them, and saith unto them. Receive ye 
 the Holy Ghost : whosesoever sins ye forgive, they are for- 
 given unto them ; and whosesoever sins ye retain, they are 
 retained 
 
 from the baptism of John, unto the day that He was received up from us ' (Acts i. 
 21) ; and even St. Paul connects his claim to apostleship expressly with the thought 
 of having ' seen Jesus Christ our Lord ' (i Cor. ix. i ; xv. 8). 
 
 ' This is the thought which is worked out with so much valuable detail in 
 Mr. Latham's Pastor Pastorum. 
 
 " John XX. 19-23. Dr. Hort, in reference to this passage, writes as 
 follows : — \Ecclesia, pp. 32-34.] 
 
 ' Much stress is often laid on the supposed evidence afforded by the words of the 
 evangelists that they [i.e. the words in Matt, xxviii. 16-20 and John xx. 19-23] 
 were addressed exclusively to the Apostles. Dr. Westcott has shown how, when 
 
128 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 With the words of this awful commission we may set the 
 record also of His parting utterances : ' These are My words 
 
 we look below the surface, indications are not wanting that others were not impro- 
 bably likewise present, at all events on the occasion recorded by St. John, when 
 his narrative is compared with that of St. Luke (xxiv. 33 ff.). 
 
 ' But in such a matter the mere fact that doubt is possible is a striking one. It 
 is in truth difficult to separate these cases from the frequent omission of the evan- 
 gelists to distinguish the Twelve from other disciples ; a manner of language which, 
 as we have seen, explains itself at once when we recognize how large a part disciple- 
 ship played in the functions of the Twelve. 
 
 ' Granting that it was probably to the Eleven that our Lord directly and 
 principally spoke on both these occasions i^and even to them alone when He spoke 
 the words at the end of St. Matthew's Gospel\ }'et it still has to be considered in 
 what capacity they were addressed by Him. If at the Last Supper, and during the 
 discourses which followed, %\hen the Twelve or Eleven were most completely 
 secluded from all other disciples as well as from the unbelieving Jews, they repre- 
 sented the whole Ecclesia of the future, it is but natural to suppose that it was 
 likewise as representatives of the whole Ecclesia of the future, whether associated 
 with other disciples or not, that they had given to them those two assurances and 
 charges of our Lord, about the receiving of the Holy Spirit and the remitting or 
 retaining of sins (howsoever we understand these words\ and about His universal 
 authority in heaven and on earth, on the strength of which He bids them bring all 
 the nations into discipleship, and assures them of His own presence with them all the 
 days even to the consummation of the age.' 
 
 Dr. Hort's apparent drift is (i) to minimize the distinction between the Apostles 
 and other Christians ; and ^2) to suggest that the charge in verses 21-23, spoken 
 ' directly and principally' to the Apostles, was not spoken to them in any exclusive 
 sense : and it is apparently in reliance upon this that he afterwards says, ' There is 
 indeed, as we have seen, no trace in Scripture of a formal commission of authority 
 for government from Christ Himself [to the Apostles] ' (p. 84). I cannot but submit 
 that this is quite the wrong way of putting it. To say indeed that the commission of 
 authority for government formally given to them was given to them not exclusively 
 but representativel}', that is, to them as representing the Church, and as ordained 
 to exercise ministerially the authority of the Church, is the very view which the 
 previous chapters have endeavoured to explain. So far as Dr. Hort is feeling after 
 this, we shall fully sympathize with him. But this view, instead of denying, pre- 
 supposes, and instead of explaining away, bases itself upon, a real com?nissioii of 
 authority for government, delivered to the Apostles as representing the Church, and 
 delivered to the Church to be administered through the Apostles — and through those 
 after them who should in other generations be similarly ' sent.' Does Dr. Hort 
 really mean that the Church was anarchical ? or that the powers spoken of in the 
 text could be exercised by, or through, any one ? or that the ministerial distinction 
 of Apostles, if it existed, depended upon anything else except the selection, and 
 preparation, and commission of Jesus Christ? I cannot but submit that the view 
 given in the previous chapters is what he ought to mean, and that he has no right 
 
vJ 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 129 
 
 which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, how that all 
 things must needs be fulfilled, which are written in the law of 
 Moses, and the prophets, and the psalms, concerning Me. 
 Then opened He their mind, that they might understand the 
 Scriptures ; and He said unto them, Thus it is written, that 
 the Christ should suffer, and rise again from the dead the third 
 day ; and that repentance and remission of sins should be 
 preached in His name unto all the nations, beginning from 
 Jerusalem. Ye are witnesses of these things. And behold, 
 I send forth the promise of My Father upon you : but tarry ye 
 in the city, until ye be clothed with power from on high \' 
 ' All authority hath been given unto Me in heaven and on 
 earth. Go ye therefore ^, and make disciples of all the 
 nations, baptizing them into the Name of the Father and of 
 the Son and of the Holy Ghost : teaching them to observe 
 all things whatsoever I commanded you ; and lo, I am with 
 you alway, even unto the end of the world ' He was 
 received up, after that He had given commandment through 
 the Holy Ghost unto the Apostles whom He had chosen : 
 to whom He also showed Himself alive after His passion 
 by many proofs, appearing unto them by the space of forty 
 days, and speaking the things concerning the kingdom of 
 
 to mean more. Upon this view it is not very material whether others besides the 
 Apostles were present or no ; though we certainly cannot suppose (in Dr. Hort's 
 phrase) that such others were included 'directly' or ' principally' within the scope 
 of Christ's words. See more particularly Canon Gore, The Church and the 
 Ministry, p. 229, n. 4. 
 
 It certainly would seem to be the truth de facto, that from the time when that 
 commission was given (whether you like to say ' to the Apostles ' or ' to the Church ') 
 (l) there was an order of men, distinguished as a-noaToXoi, who did in fact, both 
 corporately and individually, exercise such a ministerial power of binding and 
 loosing ; and (2) that no others ever did so — save as the ' Amen ' to the Apostles — 
 except in virtue of authority understood to be delegated and derived to them from 
 Apostles. 
 
 ^ Luke xxiv. 44-49. 
 
 ^ For an (indirect) comment upon the word 'therefore' in this context, compare 
 Milligaii's Ascension, p. 198 sqq. 
 ' Matt, xxviii. 18-20. 
 
 K 
 
X30 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 God : and, being assembled together with them, He charged 
 them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the 
 promise of the Father, which, said He, ye heard from Me : 
 for John indeed baptized with water ; but ye shall be baptized 
 with the Holy Ghost not many days hence. . . . Ye shall 
 receive power, when the Holy Ghost is come upon you : and 
 ye shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea 
 and Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth ^. 
 The Apostles' understanding of these words receives no small 
 illustration from St. Peter's argument after the death of Judas : 
 ■' For he was numbered among us, and received his portion in 
 this ministry. ... It is written in the book of Psalms, . . . His 
 office let another take. Of the men therefore which have 
 companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went 
 in and went out among us, . . . of these must one become 
 a witness ^ with us of His resurrection 
 
 It is to be remembered that the selection of St. I\Iatthias 
 is before the day of Pentecost. It has nothing therefore 
 directly in common with the methods of the Pentecostal 
 Church. What the Apostles actually did, pre-pentecostally, 
 was neither themselves altogether to appoint, nor wholly to 
 leave it for a Divine intimation : but they put forward the 
 two whom they believed to be likeliest, and then made appeal 
 by prayer to their ascended Lord to determine between the 
 two in casting of lots. It is not necessary for the present 
 purpose to make any further comment upon the method. 
 But whatever may be otherwise thought about it, this at 
 least is plain ; that we are here as far as possible from 
 any conception which could have imagined apostleship 
 as otherwise than a matter of most solemn and Divine 
 ' sending.' 
 
 ^ Acts i. 2-5, 8. 
 
 - Compare the ' Ye are witnesses of these things ' ^Luke xxiv. 4S and ' \Vhereof 
 we are witnesses ' (Acts iii. 15}. 
 ^ Acts i. 17-22. 
 
V] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 One more case must be referred to expressly — that of St. 
 Paul. Nothing can be clearer than his claim to be an Apostle, 
 in the full sense, in the sense in which the Twelve were 
 Apostles. He is hardly exactly a thirteenth, for we see him 
 exercising no apostleship until after the death of St. James, 
 the one Apostle whose death is solemnly recorded in Scripture. 
 Of the relation between his exceptional appointment by 
 Christ, and his receiving of a solemn laying-on of hands, 
 I have already spoken \ and of the emphatic witness thus 
 given to the principle of external ordination. But it is quite 
 certain that his claim to apostleship is based not upon the 
 ' ordination ' as such, but upon his unique vision of and 
 mission from Jesus Christ. 
 
 It is certainly not that St. Paul slurs the distinction or 
 minimizes the office of apostleship. ' God hath set some in the 
 Church, first apostles, secondly prophets ' Are all apostles ? 
 are all prophets ' How shall they hear without a preacher? 
 and how shall they preach except they be sent ■* ? ' ' And who 
 is sufficient for these things^?' 'Such confidence have we 
 through Christ to Godward : not that we are sufficient of 
 ourselves, to account anything as from ourselves ; but our 
 sufficiency is from God ; who also made us sufficient as 
 ministers of a new covenant These and other such phrases 
 do not come from a man to whom apostleship was any 
 tentative or human economy. But this is the man who asks, 
 'Am I not free? am I not an apostle? have I not seen 
 Jesus our Lord? are not ye my work in the Lord? If to 
 others I am not an apostle, yet at least I am to you : for 
 the seal of mine apostleship are ye in the Lord ' Truly the 
 signs of an apostle were wrought among you in all patience, by 
 signs and wonders and mighty works*.' 'Paul, an apostle, not 
 from men, neither through man, but through Jesus Christ . . . 
 
 ' See above, p. io8. ^ i Cor. xii. 28. ^ i Cor. xii. 29. 
 
 * Rom. X. 15. '2 Cor. ii. 16. ^ 2 Cor. iii. 4-6. 
 
 ' I Cor. ix. I, 2. * 2 Cor. xii. 12. 
 
 K 2 
 
132 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 neither did I receive [the gospel] from man, nor was I taught 
 it, but it came to me through revelation of Jesus Christ . . . 
 but when it was the good pleasure of God, who separated me, 
 even from my mother's womb, and called me through His grace, 
 to reveal His Son in me, that I might preach Him among the 
 Gentiles ; immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood : 
 neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which were apostles 
 before me ^' . . . ' Contrariwise, when they saw that I had 
 been entrusted with the gospel of the uncircumcision, even as 
 Peter with the gospel of the circumcision (for He that wrought 
 for Peter unto the apostleship of the circumcision wrought for 
 me also unto the Gentiles)/ &c. ^ 
 
 It is the more important to be clear that St. Paul classes 
 himself quite unreservedly with 'them which were Apostles 
 before ' him, because, with the records which are in fact before 
 us, it is in the person of St. Paul rather than that of any or 
 all others that we are enabled to see what apostleship 
 practically meant. 
 
 Not to dwell now upon the thought of its spiritual magnifi- 
 cence ^ or of its material disabilities *, or of its fatherly yearn- 
 ing and self-sacrifice ^ or on other possible aspects, we shall 
 feel that St. Paul at least is clear about its inherent and (if need 
 be) tremendous authority. ' Now some are puffed up, as though 
 I were not coming to you. But I will come to you shortly, 
 if the Lord will ; and I will know, not the word of them which 
 are puffed up, but the power. For the kingdom of God is not 
 in word, but in power. What will ye? shall I come unto you 
 with a rod, or in love and a spirit of meekness? .... For 
 I verily, being absent in body but present in spirit, have 
 already, as though I were present, judged him that hath so 
 wrought this thing, in the name of our Lord Jesus, ye being 
 gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord 
 
 ' Gal. i. I, 12, 15, 17. ^ Gal. ii. 7, 8. ^ As in 2 Cor. iii. 
 
 * As in I Cor. iv. 9-13; 2 Cor. xi; Col. i. 24, &c. 
 
 * As in I Cor. ix. 19-23 ; 2 Cor. vii ; xii. 14, &c. 
 
v] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 133 
 
 Jesus, to deliver such a one unto Satan for the destruction of 
 the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord 
 Jesus ^' . . . ' Yea, I beseech you, that I may not when present 
 show courarre with the confidence wherewith I count to be 
 bold against some, which count of us as if we walked according 
 to the flesh. For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war 
 according to the flesh (for the weapons of our warfare are not 
 of the flesh, but mighty before God to the casting down of 
 strongholds ^). ' . . . ' For this cause I write these things while 
 absent, that I may not when present deal sharply, according 
 to the authority which the Lord gave me for building up, and 
 not for casting down 
 
 It belongs to the nature of the New Testament record that 
 this authority, of which St. Paul speaks so plainly, should be 
 comparatively little dwelt upon except by St. Paul. But it is 
 surely the very same tone which speaks in the Third Epistle of 
 St. John : ' Therefore, if I come, I will bring to remembrance 
 his works which he doeth, prating against us with wicked 
 words For myself, I should add that the first four verses of 
 I Pet. v. appear to be characteristically animated by the con- 
 sciousness of an overruling authority which it is the very 
 object of the Apostle so to waive at the moment as not even 
 expressly to refer to it: and I must add that the same inherently 
 tremendous power seems to receive an awful — if somewhat 
 staggering — emphasis, in what I will not call the act of 
 St. Peter, but the act of God in significantly awful relation 
 with the person and ministry of St. Peter, in the scene of the 
 death of Ananias and Sapphira ^. 
 
 In this same connexion we might fairly appeal also to the 
 thought of the disciplinary authority which St. Paul calls upon 
 
 ' I Cor. iv. 18 sqq. ; v. 3, 4. ^ 2 Cor. x. 2-4. 
 
 ' 2 Cor. xiii. 10. * 3 John 10. 
 
 ' Acts V. 5, 6, 9. There is nothing even remotely approaching to a decision on 
 St. Peter's part to punish (as there is on St. Paul's part in i Cor. v), much less to 
 punish by death. He does not decree anything ; he does but discern the awful 
 working of the judgement of God. 
 
134 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 Timotheus and Titus to exercise : ' For there are many unruly 
 men . . . whose mouths must be stopped ; . . . for which cause 
 reprove them sharply . . . these things speak and exhort and 
 reprove with all authority. Let no man despise thee^.' If we 
 be reminded that their authority is not strictly apostolical, this 
 gives only an d fortiori character to the argument. Such 
 authority as they have is simply derived to them from the 
 apostolic authority of St. Paul : or does any one suppose that 
 St. Paul recognized in them an authority independent of him- 
 self? No doubt such authority in them, in proportion as they 
 are perfectly successful, will seem to be merged in the moral 
 influence of a mutually devoted affection ; but it is clear that 
 St. Paul is thinking of an authority in them which (a) is not 
 the less a real, even if it fails to become a ' moral,' authority ; 
 and (b) derives its origin and inherent rights, not from the 
 ' spontaneous homage ' towards them of the Christians of 
 Ephesus or Crete, but from the commission they had 
 ministerially received from himself 
 
 It is of course perfectly consistent with all this profound 
 reality of authority, and of power to vindicate the authority, 
 that, as St. Paul indicates in the last six verses of 2 Cor. x, the 
 Apostles should exercise the greatest possible reserve in any 
 exercise of authority over one another's converts : or again 
 that the apostolic Church at Jerusalem, in restraining the 
 pardonable zeal of its converts at Antioch, should studiously 
 abstain from the use of merely authoritative language. It is 
 also no doubt perfectly true that, in the ordinary relation 
 between an Apostle and his converts, any sense of submission 
 on the one side and jurisdiction on the other would be entirely 
 merged in the far more obvious reality of mutual devotion. 
 But the most passionate intensity of mutual loyalty between 
 a king and his servants, or a master and his disciples, or 
 a father and his sons, does not really qualify the fact that the 
 master and the father and the king, in their different ways and 
 
 ' Titus i. 10, 13 ; ii. 15. Compare i Tim. iv. 12, 14; v. 11, 17, 19, &c. 
 
V] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 135 
 
 degrees, do, on analysis, hold authority too. It is not that 
 authority is really merged in moral influence : both are present 
 still in undiluted fullness : only, in the atmosphere of love, the 
 antithesis between the two is dissolved \ 
 
 On the whole, then, I must venture to submit the following 
 proposition, if not as scientifically proved, yet at least as the 
 natural outcome of what has been said ; as a basis, then, which 
 it is reasonable at least to accept provisionally and test by 
 acceptance, viz. that, in the history and government and 
 development of the Church, everything depends upon the 
 apostolate ; everything emanates from the apostolate ; nothing 
 comes into existence on a basis independent of the apostolate; 
 the Apostolate is, throughout, the assumed condition which 
 lies behind as the basis and background of everything. When 
 it is said that everything emanates from apostolate, what is 
 particularly meant in the present connexion is that neither 
 the perpetuation, in any form, of apostolate, nor the creation 
 of any other ministerial offices, different from itself, could rest 
 upon any other than an apostolic basis. And this indeed 
 appears to be the one aspect which is, for our present purpose, 
 really important. We do not really need so much to explore 
 
 ' I cannot therefore but deprecate, as a seriously misleading understatement, 
 Dr. Hort's mode of putting it, when after denying that the Apostles had received 
 from Christ any formal authority for government, he goes on to say [p. 84], ' But 
 it is inconceivable that the moral authority with which they were thus clothed, 
 and the uniqueness of their position and personal qualifications, should not in all 
 these years have been accumulating upon them by the spontaneous homage of the 
 Christians of Judaea, an ill-defined but lofty authority in matters of government 
 and administration ' : and applying this to the question of Acts xv about the 
 Gentiles [p. 83]: 'A certain authority is thus implicitly claimed. There is no 
 evidence that it was more than a moral authority ; but that did not make it less 
 real.' And again [p. 85] : ' Hence in the letter sent to Antioch the authority even 
 of the Apostles, notwithstanding the fact that unlike the Jerusalem elders they 
 exercised a function towards all Christians, was moral rather than formal ; a claim 
 to deference rather than a right to be obeyed.' No one need desire to deprecate 
 anything that is here said about the reality of the moral authority in itself; but 
 it is surely illegitimate so to use the 'moral,' as to deny that Apostles possessed 
 any other possibility of, authority. Authority is not the less authority because 
 it is fused in love. 
 
136 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 exactly what Apostles, as Apostles, did. But we do need to 
 conceive of apostolate as constituting, in the literal sense of 
 the word, the universal and unvarying hypothesis underlying 
 all ecclesiastical organization and life ^. 
 
 II. Proceeding chronologically, the first extension or varia- 
 tion of any kind which we meet with in the history of 
 ministerial ofifice, is the institution of deacons in Acts vi. 
 Great attention is drawn in the narrative of the Acts to the 
 new departure in Church ministry which this institution 
 involves. It is presented as one of the great steps in the rapid 
 process of the widening of the Church. The institution of the 
 diaconate ^, with the circumstances which had necessitated it ; 
 the work and death of St. Stephen ; the history of the con- 
 version of Saul of Tarsus ; the circumstances, first and last, of 
 the baptism of Cornelius, and the defence of St. Peter ; these 
 are the great successive moments which separate the Church 
 of the early Pentecostal days from the Church of the apostolate 
 of St. Paul. 
 
 As to the conception of the office, two things are made very 
 
 ^ It is hardly necessary to discuss in this connexion the wider use of the word 
 airoaToXos in the New Testament : for it is plain that the existence of a wider does 
 not destroy the significance of the narrower application of the title. This possi- 
 bility of ambiguous use is perfectly natural in the case of a word which did not 
 cease to express its own et}TQological meaning because it was also acquiring, or had 
 acquired, a special and technical sense. The same is certainly true of the words 
 TTpta^vTepos and SiAkovos ; perhaps even of xhp"- On the wider use of avooToXo^, 
 see Lightfoot, Galat., p. 95 sqq. 
 
 ^ On the identity of the ' seven ' with ' deacons ' (which the instinct of the 
 Church has never doubted), see Bishop Lightfoot's Essay, p. 186. He adds : 
 ' The nari-ative in the Acts, if I mistake not, implies that the office thus created 
 was entirely new. Some writers, however, have explained the incident as an ex- 
 tension to the Hellenists of an institution which already existed among the Hebrew 
 Christians, and is implied in the ' younger men ' mentioned in an earlier part of 
 St. Luke's history (Acts v. 6, 10). This view seems not only to be groundless in 
 itself, but also to contradict the general tenor of the narrative. It would appear, 
 moreover, that the institution was not merely new within the Christian Church, but 
 novel absolutely. . . . We may fairly presume that St. Luke dwells at such length 
 on the establishment of the diaconate because he regards it as a novel creation.' 
 Lightfoot, /. c, p. 187. 
 
v] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 137 
 
 clear on the face of the history of its institution. The first, 
 that ' the work primarily assigned to the deacons was the 
 relief of the poor.' The second, that, by contrast with the 
 apostolate itself, this work of diaconate was looked upon as 
 comparatively external and secular. It was to release the 
 apostolate from a ministry 'of tables'; and to enable them 
 to be given more continually to ' prayer ' and to ' the ministry 
 of the word.' It is probable, however, that this aspect of the 
 office has been somewhat exaggerated in the Christian idea — 
 though hardly in the practice — of diaconate. Bishop Light- 
 foot points out the closeness of the connexion which naturally 
 existed between these duties of diaconate and some of the 
 most valuable of ministerial opportunities. ' Moving about 
 freely among the poorer brethren and charged with the relief 
 of their material wants, they would find opportunities of in- 
 fluence which were denied to the higher officers of the Church, 
 who necessarily kept themselves more aloof. The devout 
 zeal of a Stephen or a Philip would turn these opportunities 
 to the best account ; and thus, without ceasing to be dis- 
 pensers of alms, they became also ministers of the word ' 
 [p. 188]. It may be doubted, however, whether this account, 
 which describes the diaconate as affording opportunities of 
 spiritual work to deacons who happened to be spiritually 
 minded, does adequate justice to the spiritual side of diaconate 
 itself. For it is to be remembered, first, that to be ' full of the 
 Spirit and of wisdom ' was among the qualifications to be 
 required as preliminary to election to diaconate ; secondly, 
 that men elected upon that qualification, and presented to the 
 Apostles for consecration to their work, were so consecrated 
 by the very same method by which all other ministers were 
 consecrated to distinctively Christian ministry ; and thirdly, 
 that from the very moment of that consecration, the actual 
 work which we hear of as discharged by the deacons is work 
 of most essentially spiritual character ^. This last fact is 
 
 ' So much so that it is, in fact, the deacon protomartyr who gives the lead to 
 
138 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 mentioned by Bishop Lightfoot : but he adds at once, ' still the 
 work of teaching must be traced rather to the capacity of the 
 individual officer than to the direct functions of the office.' Is 
 this quite the right way of putting it ? Would it not be in 
 truer proportion to say that spiritual teaching and influence 
 were always understood and intended to be elements in the 
 office, to which spiritual men were spiritually set apart, even 
 though they were so far incidental to an external duty rather 
 than themselves primary, that diaconate still could stand con- 
 trasted in spiritual character with apostolate, and might even 
 be blamelessly discharged where the direct work of teaching 
 was quite subordinate? 
 
 Bishop Lightfoot appeals to the qualifications for diaconate 
 as sketched by St. Paul in the First Epistle to Timothy^. It 
 is true, no doubt, that there is a distinction observable even 
 there between the qualifications for diaconate and for pres- 
 byterate ; but the effect of Bishop Lightfoot's appeal to the 
 passage is a good deal qualified when we remember to how 
 large an extent both pictures, as there sketched, are pictures 
 of the antecedent qualifications, in domestic and general life, 
 of those who might become good deacons or presbyters, 
 rather than descriptions of the life or work of those who have 
 already entered upon office ^. 
 
 the whole college of Apostles in the conception of the true catholicity of the 
 Church. Compare also Acts viii. 5 sqq., and the account of Philip the Evangelist 
 ' who was one of the seven,' and his four daughters ' which did prophesy,' in 
 Acts xxi. 8, 9. 
 
 ' 'St. Paul writing thirty years later, and stating the requirements of the diaconate, 
 lays the stress mainly on those qualifications which would be most important in 
 persons moving about from house to house and entrusted with the distribution of 
 alms. VVhile he requires that they shall hold the mystery of the faith in a pure 
 conscience, in other words that they shall be sincere believers, he is not anxious, 
 as in the case of the presbyters, to secure " aptness to teach," but demands especially 
 that they shall be free from certain \'icious habits, such as a love of gossiping and 
 a greed of paltry gain, into which they might easily fall from the nature of their 
 duties' [p. 188]. What, it may be asked, is exactly signified by the statement that 
 those who have served well in the diaconate ' gain to themselves . . . great boldness 
 in the faith which is in Christ Jesus' ? i Tim. iii. 13. 
 
 ^ Thus Dr. Hort, accounting for the fact that ' we learn singularly little about 
 
V] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 139 
 
 The further references to diaconate in the New Testament 
 are thus summed up by Bishop Lightfoot : ' From the mother 
 Church of Jerusalem the institution spread to Gentile Christian 
 brotherhoods. By the " helps ^ " in the First Epistle to the 
 Corinthians (a. D. 57) and by the "ministration-" in the 
 Epistle to the Romans (a. d. 58) the diaconate solely or 
 chiefly seems to be intended ; but besides these incidental 
 allusions, the latter epistle bears more significant testimony to 
 the general extension of the office. The strict seclusion of 
 the female sex in Greece and in some Oriental countries 
 necessarily debarred them from the ministrations of men : and 
 to meet the want thus felt, it was found necessary at an early 
 date to admit women to the diaconate. A woman-deacon 
 belonging to the Church of Cenchreae is mentioned in the 
 Epistle to the Romans ^. As time advances, the diaconate 
 becomes still more prominent. In the Philippian Church 
 a few years later (about A. D. 62) the deacons take their rank 
 after the presbyters, the two orders together constituting the 
 
 the actual functions ' of the ministers in these passages, says, ' Doubtless it was 
 superfluous to mention either the precise functions or the qualifications needed for 
 definitely discharging them. What was less obvious and more important was the 
 danger lest official excellences of one kind or another should cloak the absence of 
 Chriitian excellences. To St. Paul the representative character, so to speak, of 
 those who had oversight in the Ecclesia, their conspicuous embodiment of what 
 the Ecclesia itself was meant to show itself [on this see below, pp. 258-260], was 
 a more important thing than any acts or teachings by which their oversight could 
 be formally exercised;' p. 195. None the less, he thinks himself at liberty to argue 
 negatively, from the absence of any reference to teaching in the passage in 
 I Tim. iii ; and considers that the whole facts are adequately met when he adds, 
 ' On the other hand, we may safely say that it would have been contrary to the 
 spirit of the apostolic age to prohibit all teaching on the part of any hiaKovoi who 
 had real capacity of that kind ;' pp. 201, 202. It may be granted that ' teaching,' 
 at least in any formal shape, was no part of the ' official ' duty (in the strictest 
 sense of the word official) of the seven as originally set apart. But there was that 
 in diaconate which, from the very first, outran the merely external occasion of its 
 institution. And, ever since St. Stephen himself, Christian instinct and practice has 
 seen in it something more than a merely administrative office to which, in excep- 
 tional cases, the ' teacher's ' influence was ' not forbidden.' 
 
 ' 1 Cor. xii. 28. ^ Rom. xii. 7. ^ Rom. xvi. i. 
 
I40 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 recognized ministry of the Christian society there ^. Again 
 passing over another interval of some years, we find St. Paul 
 in the First Epistle to Timothy (about A. D. 66) giving express 
 directions as to the qualifications of men-deacons and women- 
 deaconesses alike ^. From the tenor of his language it seems 
 clear that in the Christian communities of proconsular Asia at 
 all events the institution was so common that ministerial 
 organization would be considered incomplete without it. On 
 the other hand, we may perhaps infer from the instructions 
 which he sends about the same time to Titus in Crete, that 
 he did not consider it indispensable ; for while he mentions 
 having given direct orders to his delegate to appoint presbyters 
 in every city, he is silent about a diaconate 
 
 It need only be added that the word hiaKovos is itself a very 
 general one ; that it only gradually acquires any technical 
 character (it is not used directly in Acts vi at all), and that 
 even when most accepted as a technical term it shows no sign 
 of losing its general use 
 
 III. The next variety of ecclesiastical ofifice which we meet 
 with is the presbyterate. In striking contrast with the 
 diaconate, the presbyterate can hardly be said to be introduced 
 at all. By a casual glimpse we see incidentally that there are 
 Christian ' presbyters '; that is all. If to institute an order of 
 deacons marked a step in development, it is evident that, to 
 the mind of the historian of the Acts, the appointment of 
 presbyters did not mark anything at all. It seems to have 
 been too much of a matter of course to be even worth men- 
 tioning. It is indeed mentioned, as a simple historical fact, 
 that in their first missionary journey in the provinces of Asia 
 Minor, Paul and Barnabas made a point of constituting 
 presbyters there in every city in which they had converts ^ ; 
 
 ' Phil. i. I. I Tim. iii. 8 sqq. ~ p. 1S9. See Tit. i. 5 sqq. 
 
 * On the words hiaxovoi and SiaKovia see more fully Dr. Hort's Ecclesia, 
 p. 202 sqq. 
 
 ^ 'And when they had appointed for them elders in every Church, and had 
 
v] GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 141 
 
 but that apart from, and before, the beginning of those 
 missionary journeys presbyters were already a regular institu- 
 tion of the Christian Church in Jerusalem is disclosed only by 
 an accidental phrase, when the disciples at Antioch, ' every 
 man according to his ability, determined to send relief unto 
 the brethren that dwelt in Judaea: which also they did, sending it 
 to the elders by the hand of Barnabas and Saul So curiously 
 unobtrusive is this phrase that, if the passage stood alone, 
 we could hardly fail to understand that the word ' elders ' was 
 a word of general description, and that what it meant in 
 particular was the ' Apostles ' ; but if the rest of the New 
 Testament forbids such an explaining of the title away, we 
 naturally fall back upon the supposition that officers under that 
 title were already so much a matter of course in the Jewish 
 communities and synagogues that a similar organization of 
 the Christian brethren was a matter to be taken for granted. 
 
 After these two passages we hear that those who were 
 delegated from Antioch to the first Church council went 
 ' up to Jerusalem unto the apostles and elders,' where they 
 were received of ' the Church and the apostles and the elders-'; 
 and (keeping to Jerusalem) that when St. Paul came up there 
 for the last time he ' went in with us unto James, and all the 
 elders were present V The book of the Acts gives us also the 
 famous occasion when ' from Miletus he sent to Ephesus, and 
 called to him the elders of the Church. And when they were 
 come to him he said unto them . . . Take heed unto yourselves 
 and to all the flock, in the which the Holy Ghost hath made 
 you bishops, to feed (irot/xaiVeti') the Church of God, which He 
 purchased with His own blood If this passage from the Acts 
 does not wholly prove that the titles ■upf.aftvTepoL and k-nLa-KOTioi 
 were used interchangeably, on the ground that though the 
 
 prayed with fasting, they commended them to the Lord, on whom they had 
 believed.' Acts xiv. 23. 
 ^ Acts xi. 29, 30. 
 
 * Acts XV 2 4 ; so also 22, 23 (' the Apostles and the elder brethren ') ; xvi. 4. 
 ' Acts xxi. 18. * Acts XX. 17, 28. 
 
142 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 same men here bear both titles they might bear them in 
 respect of different functions ; and that the functions might be 
 sometimes but not always united, so that not all ' presbyters ' 
 might be ' bishops ' nor all ' bishops ' ' presbyters '; it is hardly 
 possible to maintain even this distinction in the passage at the 
 beginning of the Epistle to Titus. He is not there speaking 
 of specific individuals, who were (perhaps accidentally) both 
 ' bishops ' and ' presbyters '; he is speaking, without reference 
 to individuals, of the office in the abstract, and describes it by 
 either term indifferently. ' I left thee in Crete, that thou 
 shouldest . . . appoint elders in every city, as I gave thee 
 charge ; if any man is blameless ... for the bishop must be 
 blameless as God's steward ^' The absolute clearness of this 
 passage rules for us the interpretation of the passages, clearly 
 parallel to this, in the First Epistle to Timothy, and the meaning 
 of the words k-nia-KOTxri and eTrto-KOTros as there used ; and the 
 comparison of these two passages together rules also the 
 interpretation of ' the bishops and deacons ' who are saluted 
 by St. Paul in the opening of his Epistle to the Church at 
 Philippi. 
 
 As to the meaning of presbyterate, and the character of the 
 presbyter's work, it is plain from the pastoral epistles, first, 
 that he must be a man of blameless life in all ordinary social 
 relations : secondly, that he will have to be a ruler in the 
 community, — ' if a man knoweth not how to rule his own house, 
 how shall he take care of the Church of God ^ ? ' 'let the elders 
 that rule well be counted worthy of double honour ' thirdly, 
 that he will have to be a teacher in religious things, — ' the 
 bishop ' must be ' apt to teach ■*'...' the bishop must be . . . 
 holding to the faithful word which is according to the teaching 
 that he may be able both to exhort in the sound doctrine, and 
 
 ' Tit. i. 5-7. On the practical equivalence of the terms, however much they 
 may express distinct ideas, reached through different associations and from different 
 sides, see Dr. Sanday in the Expositor for 18S7, p. 104. 
 
 I Tim. iii. 5. ' Ibid. v. 17. * Ibid. iii. 2. 
 
v] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 143 
 
 to convict the gainsayers Let the elders that rule well be 
 counted worthy of double honour, ' especially those who 
 labour in the word and in teaching The ' especially ' of this 
 last passage has been interpreted as implying that to labour 
 in the word and teaching was not a natural part of an elder's 
 work. When, however, we put it in conjunction with the 
 other two passages (the second of which, it is to be remem- 
 bered, is the one in which the words ' presbyter ' and ' bishop ' 
 are used synonymously), it would seem impossible to conclude 
 more, at the most, than that there might, under some con- 
 ditions, be presbyters who did but little teaching, though 
 teaching was normally one of the principal duties of the office. 
 
 The ' ruling ' and the ' teaching ' are mentioned in the 
 Pastoral Epistles in very general terms. But that they include 
 leadership in, and responsibility for, the whole spiritual worship 
 and spiritual life of the community, and that that responsi- 
 bility and leadership were of the most solemn kind conceivable, 
 is plainly shown in the passage in Acts xx. For the present, 
 however, these deeper implications may be said to be rather 
 below than upon the surface of the obvious evidence. More 
 will be said below, in connexion with the exposition of 
 ' priesthood,' as to the conceptions to be found by necessary 
 implication in this place. 
 
 There are a certain number of other passages also, in which 
 presbyterate (whether named or not) is plainly spoken of, the 
 imphcations of which should be carefully considered. Such 
 as, ' But we beseech you, brethren, to know them that labour 
 among you, and are over you in the Lord, and admonish you ; 
 and to esteem them exceeding highly in love for their work's 
 sake ' Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit 
 to them : for they watch in behalf of your souls, as they that 
 shall give account ; that they may do this with joy, and not with 
 grief: for this were unprofitable for you*.' 'Is any among 
 
 ' Tit. i. 9. I Tim. v. 17. 
 
 ^ I Thess. V. 12, 13. * Heb. xiii. 17. 
 
144 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 you sick ? 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 him that is sick, 
 and the Lord shall raise him up ; and if he have committed 
 sins, it shall be forgiven him. Confess your sins one to 
 anotlier, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. 
 The supplication of a righteous man availeth much in its 
 working ' The elders therefore among you I exhort, who 
 am a fellow-elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, 
 who am also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed : tend 
 the flock of God which is among you, exercising the oversight, 
 not of constraint, but willingly, according unto God ; nor yet 
 for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind ; neither as lording it over 
 the charge allotted to you, but making yourselves ensamples 
 to the flock. And when the chief Shepherd shall be mani- 
 fested, ye shall receive the crown of glory that fadeth not 
 away 
 
 Putting, then, passages such as these together, it appears 
 that we may lay down these principles about the presbyters of 
 the New Testament. First, the name irpecrlBvTepos and the 
 name kuLa-Ko-nos are practically interchangeable. To say this 
 is not to deny that they may, as no doubt they do, express 
 different aspects of the office, or that the two expressions have 
 different histories ; but it means that, in New Testament 
 language, the two ideas are so far identified in one Christian 
 office that every ' bishop ' might be called also a ' presbyter,' 
 and every ' presbyter ' might be called also a ' bishop.' 
 Secondly, the ■npealBvTepoL (otherwise called eTrtcTKOTTot) appear as 
 the regular rulers and representatives of what may be called the 
 domestic religious life of the Church in every place ; that is to 
 say, of any local body of the Christian brethren, as locally consti- 
 tuted and organized. Those who send gifts to a local Church 
 
 ^ Jas. V. 14-16. 
 
 ' Cf. also the opening of St. John's Second and Third Epistles. 
 ^ I Pet. V. 1-4. 
 
V] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 145 
 
 send them to the presbyters there. Those who go to visit 
 a local Church present themselves to its presbyters. Those 
 who write to a Church (if within the Church they specify any 
 officers at all) address themselves primarily to the bishops, 
 that is, to the presbyters. More particularly it comes out 
 (often as it were incidentally) that to teach, to withstand error, 
 to govern the life of the community, and to lead it by 
 example, to admonish, to watch for souls, to anoint and pray 
 over the sick, and lead the way to confession of sins, and 
 generally, as shepherds \ to tend and feed the flock, are 
 among the scriptural characteristics of the presbyter's office 
 But, thirdly, we are also to observe that this local organiza- 
 tion and leadership of 'bishops' or 'presbyters ' never, within 
 the New Testament at least, exhausts the conception of the 
 completeness of the Christian Church anywhere, or its 
 machinery, or authority, even for purposes of local and 
 practical discipline. In other words, the local presbyterate 
 is never anywhere, for a moment, independent or supreme. 
 It is always itself under discipline. There is always an 
 authority behind it and above it, unquestioned and supreme. 
 Whatever we may have to say about diaconate or presby- 
 terate, it is of primary importance to remember that, at least 
 from end to end of the Acts and Epistles, the backgyo7ind of 
 apostolate is always assumed. In time no doubt the Apostles 
 must pass away. The question as to their apostolic supremacy, 
 whether it, or any elements of it, are to be perpetuated, or on 
 what terms, or by what means, must rise no doubt before the 
 mind of the Church, and must receive somehow its settlement. 
 But however inevitable this question might be, or however 
 far-reaching in importance, my point at this moment is that, 
 within the limits of the canonical writings, it has never yet 
 
 ' Whatever may have been the leading idea of ' shepherds ' in the Old Testament, 
 at least in the Christian Church the word can never be dissociated from the 
 meanings which were stamped on it for ever in the teaching of the loth chapter 
 of St. John. 
 
 L 
 
146 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 been at all conclusively dealt with. It has hardly as yet fully 
 risen. The apostolate still is everywhere assumed as a back- 
 ground to everything in the Church, a background still avail- 
 able, present, and living. It appears to me that a great deal 
 of disproportion is introduced into the inquiry into ministerial 
 offices in Scripture, if anything is allowed, even for a moment, 
 to obscure the significance of this primary fact. 
 
 IV. But although, naturally enough, in the earlier years 
 apostolate stands as a matter of course behind everything, 
 and although even up to the furthest limits of the apostolic 
 writings, the problem of the disappearance of the apostolate 
 seems still to remain imperfectly determined, it is also part 
 of Church history, within the New Testament, that under the 
 immediate shadow of apostolate there did begin to grow, not 
 perhaps quite at first everywhere, nor (within St. Paul's life- 
 time at least) more than tentatively, partially, gradually, 
 something which stood between apostolate and presbyterate, 
 having much apparently in common with either office ; some- 
 thing therefore which, as apostolate faded gradually away, 
 might not improbably perpetuate in the Catholic Church 
 whatever was capable of being perpetuated of that apostolic 
 background, out of which all other Christian ministries had 
 proceeded, and in front of which, and under which, they had 
 always worked. 
 
 The first example of this newly developing function is 
 found in the position of ' James the Lord's brother ' in the 
 Church at Jerusalem. The points which we notice about 
 it within the New Testament are these. First, that what- 
 ever it exactly is, or means, it dawns upon our perceptions 
 very gradually. No attention whatever is attracted to it — 
 any more than to the institution of presbyters at Jerusalem, 
 of whom, as Bishop Lightfoot repeatedly insists (and we need 
 have no quarrel with the insistence so far), St. James both was, 
 and continued to be, one, albeit the principal one. Secondly, 
 
V] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 HI 
 
 that which thus gradually dawns upon us is that, for some 
 reason or other, when the local Church at Jerusalem is referred 
 to, it is apt to be represented by the name of St. James. His 
 name, ev^en by itself, seems to signify that Church. He seems 
 to have become, in familiar and as it were unconscious usage, 
 the veritable ' persona ecclesiae Hierosolymitanae.' Thus 
 St. Peter, delivered from prison, leaves word before his flight, 
 ' Tell those things unto James, and to the brethren ' Before 
 that certain came from James, Peter did eat with the 
 Gentiles -.' ' The day following Paul went in with us unto 
 James ; and all the elders were present ^' 
 
 Thirdly, so marked is this local eminence, that (whilst it 
 seems to retain its contrast with the apostolate specially so 
 called, in the very fact of being distinctively local) St. James 
 appears by virtue of it to take a position, in the local Church of 
 Jerusalem, not inferior in dignity to that of the Apostles them- 
 selves. This appears first on the very notable occasion of the 
 Council of Jerusalem, where the order of proceedings strongly 
 suggests that St. James occupied the position of chairman or 
 president. The first part of the meeting, it seems, was difficult ; 
 there was a good deal of disputation. Then a strong speech and 
 appeal from St. Peter secures a hearing, respectful and attentive 
 (which till then it seems had not been possible), for the story 
 of the wonderful facts which Paul and Barnabas had to pre- 
 sent. Finally, St. James reviews what has passed, re-enforces 
 the argument of St. Peter, and puts forward what we should call 
 the draught of a practical resolution*, which is forthwith adopted 
 and becomes the decision of the Council. Such a view of 
 St. James' relations to the Apostles is further enforced by the 
 language of St. Paul in the second chapter to the Galatians. 
 He is speaking of the Church of Jerusalem, of the strong 
 tradition among Jewish Christians of circumcision and legal 
 
 ' Acts xii. 17. 2 Gal. ii. 12. ' Acts xxi. 18. 
 
 * Aio €70; Kpivoj is more than the language of a private member, hazarding an 
 individual and unofficial resolution. 
 
 L 2 
 
148 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 obligation, and of the apostolic authority upon which this 
 tradition either did, or was supposed to, rest. But, he says, 
 this very supreme authority in the Church of the Circumcision 
 in Jerusalem itself accepted the Church of the Gentiles upon 
 equal terms ; and he expresses this by three names — ' when 
 they perceived the grace that was given unto me, James and 
 Cephas and John, they who were reputed to be pillars, gave to 
 me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, that we should 
 go unto the Gentiles and they unto the circumcision.' On any 
 interpretation this position of the name of St. James, along 
 with St. Peter and St. John, a7id before either of them, is most 
 remarkable. It is in the sequel to this passage that emissaries 
 from Jerusalem are described as'certain'who 'came from James.' 
 
 The fourth point to be noticed about St. James is that 
 St. Paul appears somewhat pointedly to include him within 
 the apostolic title. It is quite true that the existence 
 of other passages in the New Testament where it is more than 
 doubtful whether the word ' Apostle ' can imply what we mean 
 by apostolic rank, may seem somewhat to blunt the signifi- 
 cance of this fact. The passage, however, is one in which 
 a vague use of the term Apostle, even if elsewhere quite 
 possible, would be irrelevant. The whole thought is emptied 
 of its obvious meaning if St. Paul is not using the word of 
 a rank which, whether it contained twelve names or fifteen, or 
 whatever precise number more, was at all events perfectly 
 definite and exclusive. ' Other of the Apostles saw I none, 
 save James the Lord's brother ; ' the importance of the pro- 
 test is lost unless by ' Apostles ' he means those whose position 
 in the Church was regarded as on a level with his own : 
 'neither went I up to Jerusalem to them who were Apostles 
 before me.' Whatever inference we may draw from this 
 passage as to his own Divine call, and its relation — or lack of 
 relation — to any external commission to apostleship, it is 
 difficult to resist the conclusion that St. James is intended 
 to be included within the limits of the apostolic name, not 
 
V] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 149 
 
 necessarily for ev'ery purpose whatever, but so far at least as 
 to be set, in his own Church, upon the apostolic level of 
 dignity ^ 
 
 Such are the facts which the New Testament supplies about 
 the position of St. James at Jerusalem. Now what do these 
 facts amount to ? Bishop Lightfoot writes, ' James the Lord's 
 brother alone, within the period compassed by the apostolic 
 writings, can claim to be regarded as a bishop in the later and 
 more special sense of the term.' Now this phrase, I own, 
 seems to me to be going somewhat beyond the actual evidence 
 of the Scripture. A bishop in the later sense of the term 
 should mean a member of a well-defined and well-understood 
 episcopal order. St. James' position in the New Testament 
 would rather appear to be exceptional and personal. It will 
 be observed that what the passages go to establish is the 
 eminence in respect of position and dignity of this man, who, 
 if he was (as he may have been) a presbyter and chief re- 
 presentative of presbyters, is nowhere actually himself styled 
 ' presbyter ' or ' bishop,' but is, somewhat pointedly, classed as 
 an apostle. In respect of position and dignity, as standing 
 first within the local Church, and personifying it in relation 
 to those without — particulars just parallel with those which 
 would be conceded of St. Clement at Rome — the evidence is 
 complete. But there is otherwise no evidence as to the nature 
 of his duties or capacities in respect of other members, whether 
 ministers or laymen, within his Church. Moreover, when we 
 consider on the one hand the place and the date at which we 
 find this eminence established, as early as the Council of 
 Jerusalem, and in Jerusalem itself; that is to say, at a time 
 when the actual apostolate was in undiminished fullness of 
 
 ' It is here assumed that 'James the Lord's brother,' is not identical with 'James 
 the son of Alphaeus ' who was one of the Twelve. Of course, if that identification 
 be accepted, the case of St. James ceases to be relevant to the present argument. 
 In that case, however, the picture of an Apostle ' localized,' and ' personifying ' 
 a local community, would become in another way instructive iu reference to the 
 transition from apostolate to episcopate. 
 
I50 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 vigour, and in the place of all others which was most com- 
 pletely within the view and the reach of the government of 
 the Apostles themselves ; and on the other hand the significance 
 of the phrase which seems to be the distinctive title of the 
 man, ' James the Lord s brother' ; it is difficult not to feel that 
 the position occupied by such a man, in such a place and at 
 such a date, is a position of eminence, in its origin mainly 
 personal, conceded to the nearness of his earthly relationship 
 with the Lord Jesus Christ. 
 
 To call it mainly personal is not to imply that it was 
 a mere dignity without official prerogatives or duties, but 
 rather to suggest that St. James is not so much the primary 
 instance of a certain official class, as an individual standing 
 in a position which was at the time, and was meant to be, 
 wholly exceptional. The very fact, no doubt, of this excep- 
 tional position of his indirectly afterwards suggested and 
 led the way towards the existence of the official class ; to 
 which he therefore stands in the relation rather of an ante- 
 cedent suggestion and pattern, than of the earliest specimen. 
 This is perfectly consistent with pronouncing, upon a retro- 
 spective view, that he is to be reckoned as the first Bishop of 
 Jerusalem. This was the unhesitating view of the second 
 century : and from the point of view of subapostolic times, 
 when episcopate had grown, with the fading of apostolate, 
 into real and vital existence, was the absolutely true view. 
 But it is one thing to say, looking back from fifty years after, 
 ' We see now that James was in point of fact the first 
 bishop, and on his death Symeon became the second ; ' it 
 would be another thing for a historian to pronounce of 
 James, in the early vigour of apostolic times, when as 
 ' the Lord's brother ' he held a position side by side with 
 the Apostles which appeared to be wholly unique, that he is 
 to be regarded as then being ' a bishop in the later sense of 
 the term.' 
 
 These considerations seem to explain the fact that whilst 
 
V] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 what may be retrospectively claimed as the first development 
 of episcopate is found in the very centre of the apostolic 
 Church, almost at the beginning of St. Paul's apostleship, it is 
 not till St. Paul is consciously in sight of the close of his work 
 that we meet even the tentative beginnings of anything like 
 a machinery for the maintenance of apostolic government, 
 through men who governed as apostolic deputies because 
 Apostles themselves were out of reach. Even when we do 
 find such officials, their position seems to be at first strangely 
 uncertain, temporary, and experimental, in comparison with 
 what St. James had already held nearly fifteen years earlier in 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 The instances of apostolic deputies or delegates are, of 
 course, Timotheus in the Church at Ephesus, and Titus in 
 Crete. Here again the retrospective language may be amply 
 justified which speaks afterwards of Timotheus and Titus as 
 the first ' bishops ' of Ephesus and of Crete respectively ; and 
 yet the position occupied by either at the time may not have 
 been that exactly of a diocesan bishop. It cannot indeed 
 possibly have been so, as long as each was primarily the 
 representative of an absent but still living and governing 
 Apostle. And this even apart from the question whether the 
 position held locally by either was regarded by St. Paul as 
 more than temporary. On the other hand, however much it 
 may then have been regarded as temporary ^ ; however much 
 either, for the time, may have been rather the instrument of 
 an absent than the wielder of an inherent authority ; yet if 
 the necessities which they were set to meet in Crete or in 
 Ephesus were permanent and progressive, while the Apostle 
 whom they represented was as it were even now passing 
 out of sight, the temporary mission might have quickly 
 become a permanent one, with or without the purpose — 
 we might almost say the consciousness — of any one con- 
 
 ' But such passages as 2 Tim. iv. 9, 21, Tit. iii. 12, fall far short of establishing 
 its temporary character. 
 
152 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 cerned. Temporary however or permanent, the positions 
 of Timotheus and Titus, as representing by deputy those 
 functions of apostolate which could be and which needed 
 to be discharged by deputy, throw a flood of Hght upon the 
 necessary meaning of the ' episcopal ' office now dimly 
 beginning to exist, such as we do not gather at all from the 
 case of St. James. 
 
 As a preliminary we may observe that there is, at this 
 point, no indication whatever of anything like a special title 
 for the position which these two representatives of the Apostle 
 held. The word 'bishop' is unreservedly interchangeable 
 with ' presbyter.' It is possible that the total absence of any 
 title may be another indication that St. Paul's mind was not, 
 even now, directly occupied with the thought of a permanent 
 provision for the absence of apostolate. Nor need such absence 
 of provision strike us really as strange if we remember that 
 St. Paul, as he drew towards his death, was leaving behind 
 him, no longer only in connexion with the Churches of the 
 East, but already probably in personal presence amongst his 
 own Churches in the provinces of Asia and Galatia, not less 
 than three of the twelve Apostles, with St. John himself at 
 their head. The real absence of Apostolate was not imme- 
 diately in sight ; and the expectation of an early second 
 Advent was hardly yet dead. Before St. John passes away, 
 the indefinite, tentative stage of the development of ' epis- 
 copacy ' is over. 
 
 To return, however, to the functions of Timotheus and 
 Titus, as evidenced by the Pastoral Epistles. The follow- 
 ing points emerge. First they were to exercise a general 
 discipline over the community as a whole : ' These things 
 write I unto thee, hoping to come unto thee shortly ; but if 
 I tarry long, that thou mayest know how men ought to 
 behave themselves in the house of God ^ . . . These things 
 also command, that they may be without reproach ^. . . . Them 
 
 ' I Tim. iii. 14, 15. ^ Ibid. v. 7. 
 
V] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 153 
 
 that sin reprove in the sight of all, that the rest also may be 
 in fear^ . . . For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou 
 shouldest set in order the things that are wanting ^. . . . These 
 things speak and exhort and reprove with all authority ^. . . . 
 A man that is heretical after a first and second admonition 
 refuse Let our people also learn to maintain good works 
 Secondly, they were emphatically teachers of the people : 
 ' I charge thee in the sight of God . . . preach the word, be 
 instant in season, out of season ; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with 
 all longsuffering and teaching*^. . . . These things command and 
 teach ' . . . . Till I come, give heed to reading, to exhortation, 
 to teaching*. . . . Take heed to thyself and to thy teaching^. 
 . . . Do the work of an evangelist, fulfil thy ministry . . . The 
 Lord's servant must ... be gentle towards all, apt to teach, 
 forbearing, in meekness correcting them that oppose them- 
 selves . . . Speak thou the things which befit the sound 
 doctrine, that aged men be . . . that aged women likewise 
 be . . . the younger men likewise exhort to be . . . exhort 
 servants to be in subjection,' &c.^^ 
 
 Now these first two particulars, ruling in the community 
 and teaching, are exactly the two which characterized the 
 office of presbyters (or bishops) ; though it may not un- 
 naturally occur to us that, even in respect of these two, what 
 is meant by the ruling and the teaching appears to be some- 
 thing of wider scope and deeper responsibility in the case of 
 the direct representatives of the Apostle than in that of the 
 regular holders of the presbyteral office. Moreover, it is just 
 in respect of these two that there is no fundamental distinction, 
 no distinction other than that of width of horizon and ultimate- 
 ness of responsibility, between the ordinary presbyteral office 
 as sketched in 1 Tim. iii or Titus i, and the work not only 
 
 ' I Tim. V. 20. 2 jitus i. 5. 3 Ibid. ii. 15. 
 
 * Ibid. iii. lo. ' Ibid. iii. 14. ^ 2 Tim. iv. i, 2. 
 
 ' I Tim. iv. II. ' Ibid. 13. " Ibid. 16. 
 
 2 Tim. iv. 5. " 2 Tim. ii. 24, 25. " Titus ii. 1-9. 
 
154 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 of the later episcopate, but even of the very chiefest of the 
 Apostles. 
 
 From these two we pass to two other particulars, less 
 obviously characterizing presbytership as such, but still not 
 inconsistent with it. These are, control over other teachers 
 and their teaching, and control over the arrangement of the 
 public worship of the community. The first is represented 
 by 'I exhorted thee to tarry at Ephesus, that thou mightest 
 charge certain men not to teach a different doctrine and 
 ' there are many unruly men, vain talkers and deceivers, 
 specially they of the circumcision, whose mouths must be 
 stopped ; men who overthrow whole houses, teaching things 
 which they ought not, for filthy lucre's sake The second is 
 implied in the passage, ' I exhort therefore first of all that 
 supplications, prayers, intercessions, thanksgivings, be made for 
 all men : for kings and all that are in high place ; that . . . 
 I desire therefore that the men pray in every place, lifting up 
 holy hands, without wrath and disputing. In like manner 
 that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shame- 
 fastness and sobriety. . . . Let a woman learn in quietness 
 with all subjection. But I permit not a woman to teach 
 
 Finally, we meet with two more particulars, which bring 
 the office of Titus and Timotheus into direct comparison and 
 antithesis with that of ordinary presbyters. These are the 
 exercise of jurisdiction over all other grades of Church 
 ministers, as such : that is, in express terms, over bishops or 
 presbyters, deacons, deaconesses, and widows ; and secondly 
 that which, in the light of all subsequent history, we not un- 
 naturally think of as a climax, the responsibility of approving 
 and the power of constituting fit persons to each of these 
 several offices in the Church. The meaning of the somewhat 
 
 ' I Tim. i. 3. 
 
 ' Titus i. 10, II. Compare also what is said about those who teach a different 
 doctrine in i Tim. vi. 3, and the refusal of a heretic in Titus iii. 10. 
 ^ I Tim. ii. 1-12. 
 
V] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 155 
 
 ambiguous phrase ' Rebuke not an elder ^ ' is determined later 
 in the same chapter by the words ' Against an elder receive 
 not an accusation, except at the mouth of two or three 
 witnesses The other side is expressed in ' Let the elders 
 that rule well be counted worthy of double honour^.' For 
 censure, as for commendation, the apostolic representative is 
 to exercise judgement upon the official work of the presbyter. 
 The same is implied, less directly, in all that is said about the 
 other point, namely, selection and ordination of presbyters : 
 ' I left thee in Crete that thou shouldest . . . appoint elders in 
 every city, as I gave thee charge ' Lay hands hastily on no 
 man"';' 'the things which thou hast heard from me among many 
 witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be 
 able to teach others also and in the insistence upon qualifi- 
 cations which must be regarded as necessary in those who are to 
 be admitted to the presbyteral (or episcopal) office : ' If a man 
 seeketh the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work. The 
 bishop therefore must be . . .' These directions are addressed 
 to both. It is only to Timotheus that the charge about the 
 ' bishops ' is followed by ' deacons in like manner must be . . . 
 women ^ in like manner must be . . . Honour widows that 
 are widows indeed. . . . Let none be enrolled as a widow 
 under threescore years old, having been . . . but younger widows 
 refuse 
 
 However tentative, then, or temporary the circumstances 
 may be considered to be, Timotheus and Titus stand as the 
 first instances of the deliberate delegation of the powers of an 
 absent Apostle to men, not themselves entitled or ranked as 
 Apostles, who nevertheless exercise not a little of the sub- 
 stantial authority and prerogatives of Apostles. 
 
 Before we pass from them, there is one other point which 
 both its own importance, and the emphasis laid upon it by 
 
 1 I Tim. V. I. ^ Ibid. 19. ^ j^^jj 4 -Yiim i. 5. 
 
 I Tim. V. 22. ^ 2 Tim. ii. 2. ^ i Tim. iii. l sqq. 
 
 ' i.e. presumably deaconesses. '•' i Tim. iii. 8, 11, and v. 3, 9, n. 
 
156 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 St. Paul, forbid us to pass over in silence. For whatever 
 reason, it emerges directly only in the Epistles to Timotheus, 
 which are in other ways also, as we have had occasion to 
 notice, considerably fuller than that addressed to Titus. We 
 observe then the way in which, throughout the letters to 
 Timotheus, all that St. Paul has to urge about the discharge 
 of official duties is interwoven with the ever-recurring appeal 
 to Timotheus' own memory and consciousness of what we can 
 only describe as official consecration. Timotheus is one who 
 has received, by ministerial consecration, a solemn and sacred 
 and responsible trust. At every turn he is reminded of this. 
 Every exhortation to official duty is dependent upon this. It 
 is not to any natural or ordinary motives, not to his ambition 
 or his opportunities, or his interest in the Ephesians, or his 
 sense of duty towards or his love for St. Paul, that St. Paul 
 appeals. He does perpetually appeal — does earnestly conjure 
 him — not by things like these, but by his own consciousness 
 of an awful trust, solemnly and therefore exactingly laid upon 
 him. It is a deposit (TrapadrjKr]) : ' O Timothy, guard that which 
 is committed unto thee ^. . . . That good thing which was 
 committed unto thee guard through the Holy Ghost which 
 dwelleth in us -.' It is a charge — ■jrapayy^kLa. It is a gift of 
 grace — a xapiaixa. It was conveyed by a solemn act of the 
 Apostle and of the Church ; an act in which the leading 
 memories are the ceremonial laying-on of hands, and the 
 attendant outpouring of prophetic inspiration ^. ' This charge 
 [■napayyiXLa) I commit unto thee, my child Timothy, according 
 to the prophecies which went before on thee*. . . . Neglect not 
 the gift {xapia-ixa) that is in thee, which was given thee by 
 pi'ophecy, with the laying-on of the hands of the presbytery ^. 
 ... I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift 
 
 ' I Tim. vi. 20. 2 Tim. i. 14. 
 
 ^ Whether regarded as accompanying the consecrating ceremony, or as designat- 
 ing Timotheus beforehand for consecration. See Hort's Ecclesia, p. i8i. 
 '' I Tim. i. 18. '1 Tim. iv. 14. 
 
v] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 157 
 
 (xapLcrfjia) of God which is in thee through the laying-on of my 
 hands 
 
 We have no means of knowing the detail of the processes 
 of Timotheus' ordination to ministry. Had he been set apart, 
 or ordained, as a presbyter before ? Did he afterwards receive 
 any further setting apart, or consecration, when he went to 
 wield apostolic jurisdiction over presbyters ? What ordination 
 is it to which St. Paul so solemnly and repeatedly appeals ? 
 We have not the historical knowledge to answer these questions. 
 So direct, however, appears to be the connexion between the 
 ordination thus appealed to, and the special responsibilities 
 and duties which St. Paul is calling on him to discharge, and 
 which — by virtue of the ordination — he ought to feel himself 
 both empowered and compelled to discharge without shrinking, 
 effectively, that it seems almost impossible for us to deny or 
 to doubt that the ordination in question, whenever, wherever, 
 or however conferred, was one which, in the power of its com- 
 mission, covered the whole ground of his office as apostolic 
 representative at Ephesus. For this purpose the words of the 
 appeal in the opening of the Second Epistle are very signifi- 
 cant ^. It is in respect of the snares which beset the path 
 rather of a governing apostle than of a governed presbyter ; 
 it is as against timidity — timidity in the exercise of what 
 ought to be Power, timidity in the administration of what, if 
 it is on one side the spirit of Love, is no less directly the 
 spirit of Discipline ^ — that St. Paul conjures Timotheus to 
 remember his ordination, and to kindle its xapiaiia into living 
 flame. In these words indeed, taken in themselves, there is 
 nothing inconsistent with the simple presbyteral office. But 
 we cannot consistently understand the courage, the power, 
 
 ' 2 Tim. i. ft. 
 
 ^ 'Avafu/jfTjaicaj ae dva^anrvptiv to x^p'o'A"' Tov @(ov, o iariv iv dot hioL t^s im- 
 6((T(ws Twv xftpwv fiov' oi yoip (SwKfv ijiuv 6 06or Trvtv/Mi StiX'tas, aXKcL Swajitus Koi 
 dyamjs Kal caKppovnT/xov. 
 
 ' This seems to be the proper meaning of the irc«C/<a aoiippoviafiov. 
 
15S MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 and the discipline which are spoken of here, except in the 
 Hght of the contents of the First Epistle ; except that is with 
 the meaning and in the context in which in fact St. Paul 
 was calling upon Timotheus for these very qualities. 
 
 It is not uninteresting to add as a detail that St. Paul 
 applies to him also in these Epistles the designations both 
 of ' deacon ^ ' and ' evangelist Both words no doubt are 
 capable of being wholly untechnical. But it is also a possi- 
 bility that Timotheus may have been either, or both, and 
 that his higher functions may have been thought of rather as 
 reinterpreting and reinforcing than as cancelling the lower. 
 
 V. Now, so far, all the offices which we have been study- 
 ing — apostolate, diaconate. presbyterate, together with the 
 indications or steps towards an exercise of quasi-apostolic 
 jurisdiction and prerogative (whether wholly or in part) by 
 men who were not actually Apostles — may be said to be 
 homogeneous and progressive. They are, so to say, in pari 
 materia. They supplement each other. They fall quite 
 naturally into a harmonious, not to say hierarchical, relation 
 with each other. There is no conflict of principle, no incon- 
 gruity of kind. They are all unmistakably offices, to which 
 men are solemnly set apart, upon regular conditions, by orderly 
 methods. They belong to the organization of a regularly 
 constituted polity. Possibly it might be satisfactory to us if 
 the evidence of the New Testament ended here. But on this 
 subject, as on many others, Scripture evidence is a little less 
 clean cut, it has rather more of indeterminate fringe, than we 
 might, some of us, at first sight have desired. We pass on, 
 then, to consider some other indications, not quite co-ordinate 
 with these. Whether they can be properly described as 
 indications of ministerial office may be open to argument. At 
 the least they have a not unimportant bearing upon the 
 
 ' I Tim. iv. 6. 
 
 ^ 2 Tim. iv. 5. 
 
v] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 159 
 
 question of the conception of ministerial office in apostolic 
 times. 
 
 In Acts xiii. x we read that there were in the Church at 
 Antioch certain ' prophets and teachers.' Five names are 
 specified, including those of Barnabas and Saul. We find 
 these men 'ministering to the Lord [KeiTovpyovvTcav) and fasting.' 
 ' The Holy Ghost ' bids them set apart to Him Barnabas and 
 Saul. This they do by fasting and prayer and laying on of 
 hands, and forthwith the missionary journeys of the Apostle 
 of the Gentiles begin. More questions than one may be 
 raised upon this account. For the present we are only con- 
 cerned with the one. What is the meaning of the ' prophets 
 and teachers ' ? The indications which rise out of the passage 
 itself are not clear. On the one hand, the prophets and 
 teachers appear to stand, in spiritual place and importance, 
 very high. They are, subject of course to the apostolate, 
 which was not on the spot, the chief ministers and rulers of 
 the Church at Antioch. To them comes the command of the 
 Holy Ghost. They consecrate Barnabas and Saul for their 
 special calling. On the other hand, that to which Barnabas 
 and Saul are commissioned appears to be something beyond 
 the scope of the ordinary work of prophets. For they are 
 themselves prophets before they receive this special call and 
 consecration. It is to be remembered, however, that what- 
 ever may be, in other aspects, the significance of this laying 
 on of hands ^, it is plain that it is not to it that St. Paul in 
 thought refers the basis of his apostolate In this respect 
 the contrast between St. Paul himself, and Timotheus, his 
 apostolic delegate, is very marked. If we were to draw a con- 
 clusion upon the data which have been hitherto before us, 
 I suppose that we should be inclined to infer that these men 
 occupied the position ofificially of ' bishops ' or ' presbyters/ but 
 that their official position was enhanced by their possession 
 of a special gift of inspired wisdom, the ' prophecy ' of the 
 
 ' See above, p. loS. ^ Gal. i. I. 
 
i6o MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 New Testament ^ But how far do other passages of the 
 New Testament elucidate the position of the prophets ? 
 
 There are two notable passages to be considered, i Cor. 
 xii and Eph. iv ^. The chapter to the Corinthians is the 
 first of three chapters which are primarily about spiritual 
 endowments. They begin with what may be called a 
 formal heading or title — 'Now concerning spiritual gifts, 
 brethren, I would not have you ignorant ^' They constitute 
 a discourse upon irvevixaTLKa. The leading thought of the 
 discourse is the variety of the Trv€viJ.aTiKd — the oneness of 
 the -nvivixa so variously manifested. There are diversities of 
 yapi(T}xaTa, diversities of hiaKoviai, diversities of ivepyrmara ; 
 the instances specified are wisdom, knowledge, faith, healings, 
 miracles, prophecy, discerning of spirits, kinds of tongues, 
 interpretation of tongues ; but diverse as these are, one Spirit 
 is the fountain of them all. This is the thought which St. Paul 
 proceeds to illustrate by the likeness of the many members 
 in one body ; and so returns once more to the diversity which 
 he is illustrating: 'Are all apostles? are all prophets? are all 
 teachers ? are all workers of miracles ? have all gifts of 
 healings? do all speak with tongues? do all interpret? But 
 desire earnestly the greater gifts. And a still more excellent 
 way show I unto you' — namely. Love, which transcends 
 
 ^ They are called irpoKprjTai Kot StSdaKaXot. Compare below, p. 208, on Hermas, 
 Vts. iii. 5. If the phrase occurred there, I should not hesitate to suggest that the 
 phrase might be literally translated ' prophetic presbyters.' The suggestion is that 
 the same meaning is, even here, substantially true in fact, though not directly 
 deducible from, nor allowable as a translation of, the words. 
 
 ^ It is not easy to get much assistance from the case of Agabus. He (with others) 
 comes down from Judaea to Antioch (Acts xi. 27 sqq.) ; he comes down again from 
 Judaea to Caesarea (Acts xxi. 10) ; and each time apparently in order to deliver pre- 
 dictions of coming events. [It is quite possible that similar predictiveness may be 
 implied in the rdj Tipoayovaas Inl ere vpo(pTjT('ias of I Tim. i. 18.] We are warned 
 perhaps hereby against excluding prediction from the idea of New Testament 
 ' prophecy' ; but can draw little inference as to the position of these prophets. But 
 the impression would rather be that they were ' gifted men,' than ruling officers. 
 
 ' Tlfpl 5( Tuiv wtviiariKuiv, aZtK(poi, ov 6i\ai ii/xas dyvouv. 
 
V] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 i6i 
 
 prophecy, mysteries, knowledge, faith, everything. There- 
 fore ' follow after Love ; — yet desire earnestly spiritual gifts, 
 but rather that ye may prophesy.' Now the general course of 
 the context as here exhibited would not lead us to suppose 
 that the mind of St. Paul was at all occupied in this passage 
 with grades of ministerial rank, but rather with the infinite 
 variety of personal spiritual endowment. On the other hand, 
 when at the end of the twelfth chapter he returns from the 
 figure of the members in the body to the varieties of spiritual 
 endowment in the Church, he begins his list with three words 
 which sound like grades of ministry, and he appears to rank 
 them in a deliberate order — ' apostles, prophets, teachers.' 
 Here at least, it may be contended, even if (as it were) by 
 accident, he is speaking hierarchically : whether apostles, 
 prophets, teachers can be made to correspond to the orders 
 of apostles, presbyters, and deacons, or whether the unexpected 
 enumeration of a new set of orders is to be taken as showing 
 that neither the one nor the other form of hierarchy ought 
 to be understood to have any stereotyped or exclusive or 
 permanent character. To which again perhaps it might be 
 replied that even in these three words he is not speaking really 
 of hierarchical office, but of individual endowment ^ (he goes 
 on at once to miracles, healings, tongues, &c.) ; or only at 
 most, so far half-glancing at official distinctions as they corre- 
 spond, or might be supposed to correspond, or to approximate 
 towards corresponding, with certain familiar types of personal 
 gifts and capacities. If apostolate was, in fact, exceptionally 
 endowed with spiritual capacities (as it clearly was in the person 
 of St. Paul), apostolate would stand naturally first as well in 
 a list of endowments as of offices. The inspired insight of 
 ' prophecy,' the 'gift ' of teaching, whether especially possessed 
 by appointed presbyters or no, might have a place in such 
 a catalogue no less legitimate and only less eminent than that 
 
 • It is hardly open to doubt that for himself, in his own person, he would have 
 claimed all the seven specified gifts. 
 
 M 
 
l62 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 of the apostolic inspiration. And this is in fact the position 
 occupied by ' prophecy ' in the early part of the chapter. 
 It is one of a list of ' gifts ' — preceded by ' faith,' ' healings,' 
 ' miracles ' ; followed by ' discerning of spirits, speaking with 
 tongues, interpretation of tongues.' Just so in the fourteenth 
 chapter, which is the third and last of this discourse upon 
 spiritual gifts, the idea of ' prophecy ' seems to be as remote 
 as possible from constituted office ; it has rather (as we shall 
 see) the merits, and the defects, of a personal endowment of 
 genius or of inspiration. 
 
 Before going on to this fourteenth chapter, it may be well 
 to have the verses from the Ephesians before us \ The leading 
 thought of this passage is an earnest moral appeal, from the 
 imprisoned Apostle, for the suppression of selfish individualism. 
 ' Lowliness and meekness, longsuffering, forbearance, love,' 
 this is the theme ; and this he preaches in the name and for 
 the sake of unity — ' the unity of the Spirit ' : ' There is one 
 Body and one Spirit . . . one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism,' 
 &c. Then comes the thought of variety in unity — ' unto each 
 one of us was the grace given according to the measure of the 
 gift of Christ. And He gave some to be apostles ; and some 
 prophets ; and some evangelists ; and some pastors and 
 teachers : for the perfecting of the saints, unto the work of 
 ministering, unto the building up of the body of Christ ; till 
 we all attain unto the unity of the faith,' &c. This passage is 
 undoubtedly reminding of that to the Corinthians : probably 
 it reminded the Apostle when he wrote, quite as much as it 
 reminds us who read. But though the other passage in 
 a sense is in this ; and though this, like the other, seems to be 
 speaking immediately of variety of 'gifts ' ; there can be little 
 doubt that this passage carries the thought of special endow- 
 ments much more directly than the other did. to the case of 
 endowments for the work of distinctive ministries. The list, 
 then, apparently ministerial, which emerges from this passage 
 ^ Eph. iv. 1-16. 
 
v] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 163 
 
 is this : apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers. 
 There is no reason for taking ' apostles ' in any other than the 
 usual sense. ' Pastors and teachers ' would correspond, with 
 perfect exactness (and the other two terms would not corre- 
 spond), with the description of the local ' presbyters or bishops.' 
 The appearance, then, of this passage is that it inserts between 
 apostolate and presbyterate two other orders — prophets and 
 evangelists. Are we, then, to find in the New Testament 
 a graduation of five orders ? 
 
 About evangelists we need trouble ourselves comparatively 
 little. One of the chief characteristics of the presbyterate was 
 that it was settled and local. The presbyters are the heads 
 of a local community. Qtid presbyters, they are anything 
 but travelling missionaries. Now ' evangelists ' is no doubt 
 a missionary term ; and it is obvious that in the condition of 
 Christianity in the time of St. Paul, the missionary ofiicers 
 were in no sense less important than the officers of settled 
 communities. We may fairly assume that any duly authorized 
 missionary ministers who were not apostles might be called 
 evangelists. Timotheus, as we have seen, as apostolic delegate 
 is exhorted to ' do the work of an evangelist ^' Philip the 
 Deacon, in the very phrase which says that he was ' one of the 
 seven,' is entitled 'Philip the Evangelist^.' It would be the 
 simplest of suppositions to suppose that if a presbyter from 
 any city became a missionary, he would, qiid missionary, be 
 called ' evangelist ' ; while evangelist would be the most direct 
 and natural term for those who would have been presbyters if 
 their work had been (as it was not) in a settled community. 
 To find therefore ' evangelists ' thus mentioned, and to find 
 them, at such a date, inserted in mention between apostles and 
 presbyters, would be perfectly natural. Apostles no doubt 
 would be thought of as characteristically non-local. That 
 their non-local subordinates should be named with them 
 (whether constituting an Order or not) before the local officers 
 
 ' 2 Tim. iv. 5. ^ Acts xxi. 8. 
 
 M 2 
 
164 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 of communities would in itself raise no difficulty or question 
 at all. But how, we should desire to ask, did a man, did 
 Philip, for instance, become an evangelist ? We know how he 
 had been made a deacon. Was there anything similar which 
 conferred on him the status of evangelist ? We may be little 
 able to answer the question directly. But v.-e are entitled, 
 perhaps, to point to the total absence of any suggestion of any- 
 thing like a solemn conferring of ' evangelist' status: and, in 
 its absence, to add that the view of the word as rather the 
 description of an employment than the title of an office, at 
 least thoroughly agrees with its application in Scripture to 
 ' Philip, one of the seven,' and to Timotheus, in his apostolic 
 delegacy at Ephesus. 
 
 Once more then we return to 1 Cor. xiv upon the question 
 what was -pocpijTsia and who were these highly honoured 
 upoi^riTaL ? Now through the greater part of the chapter 
 St. Paul is emphasizing the excellence of ' prophecy ' in com- 
 parison with other spiritual endowments, and particularly with 
 the gift of tongues. The whole passage implies that, even at 
 that date, the special endowments were too often apt to be 
 direct causes of disorder in the Church. It is a great insistence 
 upon the paramount dut}- of 07-da' ; and it is upon grounds 
 which are closely allied to this, its edification and its orderli- 
 ness, that, for the first twenty-five verses, the endowment of 
 prophecy is hy comparison so highly extolled. But in the 
 last twelve or fifteen verses St. Paul turns the same preaching 
 of subordination and orderliness round upon the irpocpijTai. them- 
 selves. From what he says to them on this score, I would 
 suggest three, as it seems to me, very pertinent inferences. 
 First, in the Church community at Corinth, as it then stood 
 (and it is worth while in connexion with this to remember the 
 evidence of the earlier chapters of the Epistle as to the extent 
 of the prevalent anarchy, corruption, and unspirituality), it 
 might, according to the showing of the passage, be quite 
 naturally assumed that there would be a somewhat indefinite 
 
V] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 number of ' prophets ' actually present in the congregation 
 Sunday by Sunday. ' When ye come together, each one hath 
 a psalm, hath a teaching, hath a revelation ... let the prophets 
 speak by two or three, and let the others discern. But if 
 a revelation be made to another sitting by, let the first keep 
 silence. For ye all can prophesy one by one.' It is of 
 course quite impossible to suppose that the prophets, of whom 
 an indefinite number might appear from any part of the 
 ordinary Corinthian congregation any Sunday, could them- 
 selves be a superior and almost apostolic grade of hierarchical 
 ministry. Secondly, the ' prophets ' need to be sharply ex- 
 horted to restrain themselves, and in particular to be reminded 
 that they are perfectly well able to do so if they like. In other 
 words, it is implied that though the gift may be quite real and 
 divine, the possession of this gift was often accompanied by — 
 nay not unnaturally had a tendency towards — a very self- 
 deceiving and carnal lack of self-restraint. ' The spirits of the 
 prophets are subject to the prophets ; for God is not a God of 
 confusion, but of peace ; as in all the Churches of the saints. . . . 
 If any man thinketh himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let 
 him take knowledge of the things which I write unto you, that 
 they are the commandment of the Lord. But if any man is 
 ignorant, let him be ignorant. Wherefore, my brethren, desire 
 earnestly to prophesy, and forbid not to speak with tongues. 
 But let all things be done decently and in order.' The third 
 inference is that the whole matter of individual gifts of 
 TTpo(j)r)T€ia, respectfully as St. Paul conceives of them in com- 
 parison with such other capacities as the ' kinds of tongues,' 
 so far from being — either from the side of responsible ordina- 
 tion or from the side of Divine inspiration — an orderly guidance 
 and government of the Church, whether local or Catholic, is 
 rather itself a matter of constant anxiety to the rulers of the 
 Church, having to be restrained by peremptory rule, because 
 itself naturally tending to disorder. 
 
 So far the upshot of the evidence of these three chapters to 
 
i66 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 the Corinthians is fairly clear. They do appear to me to 
 dispose of the idea that prophets as such were a dignified order 
 of ministry ; and to make it quite certain that 7:po(^r\Tda was 
 rather an individual inspiration than a ministerial status ; an 
 inspiration which could be recognized as such even in the 
 midst of a great deal of disorder and ignorance. To say this 
 is not at all inconsistent with recognizing the pre-eminent 
 honour which seems to attach to the ' prophets and teachers ' 
 as at Antioch\ or to 'prophets' as ranking next to apostles 
 in Eph. iv -. But it is to be observed that if the word ' prophet ' 
 is itself quite a neutral word as far as formal office is con- 
 cerned, expressing rather ' inspiration ' than ' official character,' 
 and, as such, is applicable alike to private Christians, or to the 
 leaders and rulers ^ of Christian communities, or even to 
 apostles ^, then it would become no longer a mere matter of 
 conjecture, but an almost necessary inference, that, n'/ieji 
 prophets are spoken of as Church rulers, what is meant must 
 be men who, being constituted as Church rulers, are also 
 prophetically inspired, and not merely men who, because they 
 are prophetically inspired, must therefore be taken ipso facto ^ 
 as rulers in the Church. 
 
 ' Observe how emphatically these men appear to be spoken of as the local 
 leaders and rulers of a local commmiity : ' Xow there were at Antioch, in the Church 
 that was there, prophets and teachers. Barnabas and Symeon,' &c. 
 
 - It is just possible that in such passages as i Cor. sii. 28 and Eph. iv. 11, we 
 might be right in recognizing some, perhaps indirect, traces of what (in the retro- 
 spect at least with its sharper differentiation of ideas and of titles) we should call 
 'Apostolic men.' For these, wherever or however they were recognized at all, 
 would be sure to be, in fact, npo<pT[Tai. This would at once explain the ' almost 
 apostolic ' position of some of the prophets. 
 
 I should like to say that I owe this and the following note to the kindness 
 of a friend, to whom indeed I owe very much more than these, — or indeed than 
 I can say. 
 
 ^ The upoiaTafievot, yyoviicvoi, &c. 
 
 * As would seem to be clearly implied (if indeed the implication is needed' in 
 I Cor. xiv. 18, 19. 
 
 ' It is, however, probable enough that such possession of upocprjTf'ia, though 
 certainly not ipso facto conferring the status of a ruler, may have been an important 
 qualification — if not, in many cases, a necessary prerequisite — for ordination to 
 
v] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 167 
 
 We put then aside all idea of finding, in the prophets, an 
 ' Order ' correlative to apostles or presbyters ; and, in doing 
 so, recognize it as a matter no longer of vague possibility, but 
 of the strongest presumption, that those prophets who are re- 
 cognized in the Church as nearest to apostles — seeing that they 
 cannot be an Order of prophets as such — would be found to be 
 such regularly constituted leaders of settled congregations or 
 of missionary enterprise, that is, such presbyters or evangelists, 
 as by God's grace adorned their official status with a signal 
 measure of divinely inspired wisdom. 
 
 The results, then, which emerge on the whole from an 
 examination of scriptural data as to gradations of ministry, 
 taken now in order not of chronology but of official importance, 
 would appear to be these. First and foremost there is the 
 background of apostolate, unquestioned, supreme, everywhere ; 
 itself based absolutely upon the principle, which its name 
 expresses, of mission from Christ— KaSws aTriffraXKev [xe 6 Ylarrip 
 Kayw TTifjLTTOi inas. This is a new and exclusively Christian 
 ministry. Secondly, there are unmistakable indications, 
 though fragmentary, gradual, and uncompleted — at first in 
 the person of a single individual under circumstances wholly 
 special, and afterwards in the case of two companions of 
 St. Paul whose cases were necessarily rather typical than 
 singular — of a recognition of quasi-apostolic rank, jurisdic- 
 tion, and prerogative in men, bearing as yet no distinctive 
 title whatever, who may, on the evidence, not unfairly be 
 
 rulership. We can hardly doubt that all Apostles had the gift of ' prophecy.' 
 ' Apostolic men,' at least, were hardly likely to be chosen without it. It is likely 
 that npo<(ir]Tela consisted largely in TrapaK^-qais, or a ' gift for preaching.' Barnabas 
 had been sent to Antioch (Acts xi. 22) apparently because of his power of irapd- 
 KXrjaii in the Holy Ghost, and in faith. Does this phrase practically mean ' because 
 he was a prophet' ? He certainly was so in fact before Acts xiii. i. By Acts xiv. 
 14 he is reckoned as, at least, an ' apostolic man.' It is likely enough that it was 
 his eminence in ' prophecy ' which qualified him for ' Apostolic ' character. Again, 
 when Timothy is exhorted vpoatx^ rrj irapaKXriaei (i Tim. iv. 13), may not the 
 phrase refer to his responsibilities as a preaching TrpotjniTtj?! 
 
i68 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 described as apostolic, while it is certain that they were not 
 apostles. 
 
 Thirdly, we recognize, almost from the very beginning, 
 the appointment of presbyters everywhere, as (under the apos- 
 tolate) the established rulers, teachers, and representatives of 
 the local communities of Christians. Such appointment, just 
 mentioned by the historian in relation to the early Gentile 
 Churches, seems not to be, in his eyes, in the case of the 
 mother Church of Jerusalem, a fact either significant enough 
 or novel enough to need to be recorded at all. In its origin 
 it seems to be a Jewish ministry. 
 
 Fourthly, among the earliest incidents of the first expansion 
 of the Christian Church in Jerusalem there is recorded, appa- 
 rently as a new and significant step, the solemn institution of 
 the diaconate. It may be added that there are some clear 
 indications of the inclusion, under this title, of women ; 
 though with women, even more than with men ^ it is hard to 
 distinguish between the ' officer ' and the ' servant ' aspect of 
 ministry. The primary associations of this office are, appa- 
 rently, Hellenistic. 
 
 Fifthly, more or less cutting across these regularly con- 
 stituted ministerial offices, there is a great variety of special 
 spiritual graces or endowments in individual Church members 
 — on the one hand fading off into what we should call merely 
 personal capacities for illustrating good qualities of the 
 Christian life, on the other hand culminating in what the 
 first Christians recognized as an over-ruling inspiration, under 
 the title ' prophecy.' But even of this, the highest form of 
 personal endowment, we have to observe that, whilst, ^rj^, it 
 might in some cases mean so much as to raise its possessor to 
 almost apostolic prominence of dignity in the Church ; yet, 
 secondly, -whditQwer its possessors might be, in status or dignity, 
 their endowment of ' prophecy ' was matter rather of individual 
 
 ' John Mark in Acts xiii. 5 is the Apostles' tnrr]p(TT]s. The distinction seems 
 wholly to be lost in the case of Church widows. 
 
v] 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY 
 
 169 
 
 inspiration than of regular, constituted, Church machinery or 
 order (the whole mention seems inconsistent with any idea 
 that men were ecclesiastically ordained to be ' prophets ') ; 
 and, thirdly, this inspiration, even when real, was compatible 
 with — if not even conducive towards — such a letting go of 
 the self and spiritual self-discipline as was already near of kin 
 to disorder. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 GRADATIONS OF MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 If these be the indications within the New Testament, what 
 do we find when we pass beyond the hmits of the Canon ? 
 
 Immense interest has been excited in recent years by the 
 discovery of the AtSax?;, or Teaching of the Twelve Apostles ; 
 and to this for various reasons it will be convenient to make 
 reference first. Of course such interest would largely attach 
 to any newly discovered document which was generally 
 supposed to go back in date as far as the first century. It 
 has been in this case not a little enhanced by the new light 
 which the Didaclic is supposed to throw upon subapostolic 
 Church polity, and particularly upon the ' prophets ' of the 
 Corinthian and Ephesian Epistles. Before considering, how- 
 ever, what the DidacJie says, it is necessary to ask a little 
 about the Didaclic itself, and the sort of authority with which 
 it speaks. It would be beyond our scope to discuss all that is 
 involved in such a question ; but it will be well to point out 
 certain positions which seem to have been made sufficiently 
 clear in respect of it ^ 
 
 First, then, the Didache, whilst part of it appears to stand 
 in the relation of an original to the seventh book of the 
 
 ^ It may be sufficient to make reference to Dr. Taylor, in his edition of the 
 document itself; Dr. Salmon, in his Introduction to the New Testament, lect. 
 xxvi ; and Canon Gore, in Appendix L. to The Church and the Ministry. 
 
MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 171 
 
 Apostolic Constihiiions, and (in some respects) to the passages 
 in the Epistle of Barnabas which are parallel with it, is itself, as 
 we have it, not an original document. It is Jewish in origin, 
 not merely in the sense that it emanates from Palestinian 
 Christianity, but that it has its source in non-Christian and 
 prae-Christian Judaism. It is an altered and Christianized form 
 of what was originally a Judaic manual, with no Christian 
 reference at all, for the instruction of Gentile converts to 
 Judaism. Of course it follows from this that its date is at 
 least twofold. Even if we assume that the alterations were 
 all made at once, at all events the date of the Christian 
 adaptation is later than that of the original Jewish manual. 
 
 For the indications which justify this assertion I must refer 
 to the authorities already quoted. But I may say that the 
 view itself seems to account, as no other would, {a) for the 
 language in the DidacJie about Baptism, which is natural if 
 it is the Jewish view of the Baptism of proselytes, just 
 Christianized in phraseology, but almost inconceivable as 
 a Christian exposition of Baptism : and (/;) for the strange 
 ambiguity as to whether the Christian Eucharist is referred 
 to, or not, in chapters jo and 11. These chapters become 
 intelligible enough if we accept them as being, in the first 
 instance, simply Jewish benedictions over meals ^, whose 
 character is only obscured not altered by their quasi-Eucharistic 
 reference ^. But as a ' liturgical ' form of apostolic or sub- 
 apostolic antiquity they are totally inconceivable. 
 
 ' This indeed, on any showing, would almost certainly be their primary origin. 
 
 ' See Gore, loc. cit., particularly the following sentences: — 
 
 ' Sabatier says truly : " Our document cannot but surprise those who read for 
 the first time its liturgy of the Eucharist. We have here a form without analogy 
 anywhere. It separates itself much less from the Jewish ritual than from the 
 Christian." " It is an ordinary repast just touched by a breath of religious 
 mysticism, such as is the outcome of the importance which belongs, in Jewish and 
 Oriental idea, to repasts taken in common." There is, in fact, nothing to recall to 
 our mind our Lord's words in the institution of the Eucharist, of which, we must 
 remark, we have the form given us in St. Paul's Epistle to the Corinthians — 
 nothing to recall to us St. Paul's language about the significance of the Communion. 
 
172 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 Secondly, the DidacJie as a Christian document is not of 
 very high authority. A Jewish manual veneered with 
 Christianity could hardly be very authoritative in the Church. 
 Moreover, apart from internal evidence, we know nothing of 
 whence it emanates, or how ; while there is no pretence at 
 all that it issues from an Apostle, or a Church, or any other 
 body authorized to pronounce among Christians. On the 
 other hand, that either it, or at all events a great body of the 
 teaching which it incorporates, was of considerable popularity 
 in the early Church, seems to be clear. If we assume that the 
 book as we have it is the one referred to by Eusebius and 
 Athanasius \ we must certainly admit its widespread popularity, 
 whilst we explain as best we may in what sense Athanasius 
 thought it of value, along with the Shepherd of Hermas, in the 
 instruction of catechumens. But the assumption itself is at 
 best uncertain. The vagueness in character of the title makes 
 the identification insecure : and if it could be shown that the 
 seventh book of the Apostolic Constitutions is an expansion, 
 not directly of the Didache, but rather of a common form of 
 sub-apostolic teaching about Christian morality, which the 
 Didache in its own way embodies or represents, such a view 
 would fit Athanasius' account at least as well as our Didache, 
 and would probably fit the description of Eusebius better ^. 
 
 It is a Jewish feast Christianized in a measure by the recognition of the Messiahship 
 of Christ and the expectation of His second coming.' 
 
 ^ 'There is a writing mentioned by Eusebius {H. E. iii. 25) as t!uv airoaTuXoiv ai 
 Xfyo/^fvat SiSaxai ', there is also a SiSax^ KaKovfiivq tuiv a-nocrToKwv whicli Athanasius 
 {JEpist. Fest. 39) classes among " the books not admitted into the canon, but ap- 
 pointed by the Fathers to be read to those who are just coming to us and desire 
 to be instructed in the doctrine of godliness " ; but it is difficult to feel certain 
 whether these references are to the Didache as we have it.' Gore, p. 412. (See 
 his references to Dr. Salmon.) 
 
 Dr. Taylor (p. 72, cf. p. 112), while pointing out the familiarity of Barnabas 
 and Justin Martyr with the subject-matter of the Didache, decides that both of 
 them refer rather to an oral tradition of apostolic teaching (comparing Titus i. 9 
 a.vTi'xojj.tvo'i ToC KaTo. Ttjv SiSaxw wiffToC \6yov) than to the written document. This 
 would suggest that our Didache is but one representation of a certain body of 
 
VI] 
 
 MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 173 
 
 Thirdly, putting aside its Judaic, local, and unauthoritative 
 character in the Church, it is in any case of the nature rather 
 of a manual for the instruction of converts and lay beginners, 
 than of anything like liturgical or authoritative direction to 
 the officers of the Church. This consideration adds enormously 
 to the improbability that chapters 9 and 10 can be meant 
 as a liturgical direction ; and yet the proviso at the end that 
 the ' prophets ' (as distinguished from others) are to be allowed 
 to ' give thanks ' at discretion, would at once make these forms, 
 with all their immeasurable inadequacy, liturgically binding 
 on all uninspired celebrants, if the chapters are, properly 
 speaking, concerned with Eucharistic forms at all. 
 
 But even these immense deductions are far from destroying 
 the interest of the picture which the DidacJie presents. If 
 indeed the document be brought down to a much later date 
 than that usually assigned to it, the interest will largely 
 evaporate, for in that case it could give us only a picture of 
 a heretical body in definite schism from the Church. Its 
 conditions could not have existed in the Catholic Church at 
 any time later than the earlier part of the second century. 
 But as a picture, local and in some respects ignorant, of the 
 Church of the first century, it is not only possible, but in 
 many ways interesting and instructive. Our present concern 
 is with the phenomena of the ministry of the Church. The 
 points, then, which we actually find are as follows : — 
 
 I. There are two sets of what may be called ministers: 
 
 popular teaching : and that references like those of Eusebius and Athanasius can 
 only, at most, with great caution be taken as having any direct reference to our 
 document. So far, however, as they are understood to refer to what is represented 
 within our document, it will still be, in the nature of the case, almost inevitable to 
 suppose that the serious commendations of fourth-century theologians must refer 
 rather to the moral teaching of the 'Two Ways,' than to what is said about the 
 sacraments or the ministry. It must be positively doubtful whether they referred 
 at all to a document containing a representation of Christian ministry so incongruous, 
 from the point of view of their own experience, as those of our Didache must have 
 been. But if they did, at all events this part of the document must have been to 
 them, in effect, wholly obsolete. 
 
174 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 the first, Apostles, Prophets and (apparently) Teachers : the 
 second, Bishops and Deacons. 
 
 2. Apostles and Prophets appear to become so by virtue of 
 a Divine inspiration : Bishops and Deacons are regularly 
 appointed by the Church. 
 
 3. The terms ' Apostles ' and ' Prophets ' are apparently 
 interchangeable and synonymous ^. 
 
 4. Apostles or Prophets are non-local. Their perpetual 
 itineracy is a characteristic as essential as their claim to be 
 inspired. Nevertheless, the possibility is contemplated of the 
 permanent local establishment, in some cases, of a prophet. 
 
 5. Bishops and Deacons are the local officers of settled 
 communities. 
 
 6. The class of Apostles, or Prophets, is overrun with (more 
 or less self-deceiving) impostors. Thus a large proportion of 
 what is said about them consists of provisions for detecting 
 ' false prophets.' Thus whoever stays more than one day in 
 a place, or, at most, two ; whoever takes away with him any- 
 thing more than bread to last till his next resting-place ; 
 whoever asks for money — or for anything else ; whoever, 
 though he speak in the Spirit, is not Christlike in conduct ; 
 whoever does not do the things which he teaches ; whoever, 
 having ordered a ' table,' ventures himself to partake of it, is, 
 ipso facto, an impostor. 
 
 7. On the other hand, Apostles or Prophets, if gcmiine, are 
 regarded as supreme in the Church. Thus, they are to be 
 
 ' No doubt this will be disputed. But it is clear, I think, that every apostle is 
 regarded as ' prophetic ' ; and the condemnation of an unreal apostle or an unreal 
 prophet is, alike and equally, that he is a \(/(vSonpo((>rjT7]s. The antithesis to 
 sptvSoTrpo<l>rjTTji is naturally TtpocpijTTjs aXrjOivus. CAtto tuiv rpovaiv •yvajcB-qafrai 6 
 jp(v5oTTpo(pTjTrjs Kal 6 TTpo<pTiTr]9.) The word used throughout the passage is generally 
 ' prophet.' Of apostles (if distinguished from prophets) nothing is said except that 
 they must itinerate, and must not beg. Both these things are plainly true also of 
 prophets. Throughout what is said of prophets in chapters xi and xii, it is difficult 
 not to feel that the mind of the writer has in view a class of men who are, to him, 
 supreme and ultimate in the Church — the highest — not a subdivision of the 
 highest, nor the highest but one. 
 
vij MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 175 
 
 received as the Lord, and not to be judged ; they (unhke 
 others) are to ' give thanks ' according to forms which their 
 own inspiration suggests ; they are compared to the ' high 
 priests,' and, as such, they are to receive the first-fruits of 
 everything ; while it is evidently considered that Bishops and 
 Deacons are honoured by being said to share in the ministry, 
 and to deserve a part in the honour, of the Prophets and 
 Teachers. 
 
 8. The Bishops and Deacons are mentioned subordinately, 
 but in express connexion with the weekly eucharistic sacrifice. 
 That this may be duly offered Sunday by Sunday, every 
 community must have its own ' Bishops and Deacons ' ; ' for 
 they also minister the service {XeiTovpyovcn ti]v KeLTovpyiav) of 
 the Prophets and Teachers.' This last phrase seems to imply 
 (what the whole spirit of the context would lead us to expect) 
 that the ' Bishops ' would be superseded in the Eucharistic 
 sacrifice, whenever a genuine ' Apostle ' or ' Prophet ' was 
 present ; though, as said above, it is greatly to be doubted 
 whether the reference of the earlier chapters (9 and lo) is, 
 except improperly, confusedly, and nominally, to the Christian 
 Eucharist. 
 
 When we begin to comment upon this picture, wc shall feel, 
 in the first place, that many of the leading features in the 
 conception of Church polity are not at all unlike those which 
 were familiar to us in the New Testament. The Didache 
 carries some of them a little further, and exhibits what we can 
 recognize as a period of transition, but with a singular absence 
 of insight into the underlying principles of either past or 
 future. Just as in Scripture, the word eVto-KOTros plainly means 
 what wc mean not by ' bishop ' but by ' presbyter ' ; just as 
 in Scripture, these bishops (or presbyters) constitute, with the 
 deacons, the settled ministries of all local communities ; 
 just as in Scripture, these local communities, with their 
 regularly appointed (as distinct from irregularly inspired) 
 ' bishops and deacons ' are not self-sufficing or independent. 
 
176 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 The communities stand, and their ofificers govern and minister, 
 in the face of, and in dependence upon, a background of 
 higher authority, which, as non-local, represents the apostolic 
 government of the Catholic Church. So far, the conditions 
 are singularly like those of the New Testament. 
 
 But what is this background of catholic, overruling authority ? 
 Is it, as in the New Testament, the apostolate? It still 
 retains the name of apostolate ; but it is very obviously not 
 the apostolate of the Twelve. Meanwhile its apostles hold 
 that title interchangeably with the title ' prophets,' and the 
 conception of the ' prophecy ' of the ' prophets,' though in 
 some respects altered and developed, is in its main features 
 singularly like that of the Epistle to the Corinthians. It is 
 altered by having become more formulated and more dignified ; 
 and, for this purpose, having dropped off what we may call its 
 own fringe of more subordinate manifestations. Thus while 
 St. Paul expects an indefinite number of the local Corinthian 
 congregation to be prophets more or less, the DidacJie knows 
 no prophets except the apostolically itinerating dignitaries. 
 Meanwhile the ofiice of these, regarded as a development from 
 T Cor. xii or Ephes. iv, is a development which emphasizes, 
 most forcibly of all, these two things, both already familiar 
 in the New Testament ; first, the character of the prophetic 
 gift as irregular, though inspired, rather than as an orderly 
 function of calculable and constituted polity ; and secondly, 
 as a matter of history, its conspicuous and enormous abuse — 
 an abuse so striking that we can hardly think of it as less 
 than a positive demonstration of the inherent tendency of the 
 original ' prophecy ' to run towards abuse. It is difficult to 
 read the DidacJic, and not to feel, that while prophets or 
 apostles must have been a numerous class in the Church, an 
 apostle who could be accepted as a genuine prophet must 
 have been rare and difficult to find : rather, in point of fact, 
 a cherished ideal than a familiar phenomenon. 
 
 Now it is just at this point that we feel that, like as the 
 
VI] 
 
 MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 177' 
 
 facts of Church polity in the Didache seem at first sight to be 
 to those of the New Testament, there has nevertheless come 
 over these facts such a change as transforms seeming likeness 
 into essential contrast. Behind the regularly constituted pres- 
 byters and deacons there seems at first sight to be the old 
 apostolic background. But behold ! this background of apo- 
 stolate is like a ghost. It is rather an idea than a fact. It is 
 becoming more and more (though it clings — perhaps even 
 because it clings so tight— to the old form and title), not only 
 an unreality, but an imposture. There may be a core some- 
 where still of really apostolic and prophetic reality. But, 
 so far as the evidence of the Didache goes, it is involved 
 and rapidly disappearing in a cloud of illusory vagueness. 
 The fact of this, as fact, cannot be said to escape the 
 mind of the Christian writers of the Didache. But the signi- 
 ficance of it escapes them totally. They have no conception 
 as to the points in which the old apostolate was, and those in 
 which it was not, to live on in the Church. The idea of 
 apostolate in the Didache is a sort of rambling representation 
 of Catholicity, non-local before all things, and august primarily 
 by virtue of a direct endowment of special inspiration. 
 But in fact it is certain that such a special gift of inspiration, 
 if it was true of the real apostolate, was never its main or con- 
 stitutive essence ; and it is plain on the face of the Didache, 
 that apostolate, so conceived, is a dying thing ; justly dying, 
 because it is a form, and an illusory form, not a reality. 
 It has an outward resemblance to the old apostolate, an 
 outward appearance of perpetuating it. But of the true 
 perpetuation of apostolical authority under conditions of a 
 Church organized for permanence of constitutional life in 
 the world ; of the system which was both suggested and 
 begun in the case of St. James, rehearsed in the persons 
 of Timotheus and Titus, brought to completeness under 
 St. John in Asia Minor in that representative embodiment, at 
 once of apostolicity and of unity, which has been known, ever 
 
 N 
 
178 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 since St. John, under the distinctive title of ' episcopacy ' ; — 
 of this the Didacke knows nothing. Or, if it has heard of any- 
 such thing at all, the Didache misconceives it, fancying that 
 as St. John may have settled at Ephesus without forfeiting 
 apostleship, so elsewhere an apostolically commissioned 
 governing bishop is to be explained as a prophet exception- 
 ally permitted to desist from itinerating. At all events it 
 seems to me quite as likely that the localized prophet, whom 
 the Didache rather inconsistently recognizes, was really a 
 ' bishop ' whom the Didache imperfectly understood, as to 
 suppose that the Didache is ecclesiastically right in its repre- 
 sentation of the status and character of its prophets, and that 
 such prophets, so portrayed, did in the second instance, by 
 the act of settling, become bishops in the sense of St. Ignatius 
 or St. John. 
 
 After all, whatever we may think of these or other details 
 in the Didache, it is necessary to remember, first, that it is in 
 no case a particularly intelligent or authoritative interpreter 
 of the ecclesiastical phenomena which it reflects, and secondly, 
 that the phenomena, even as phenomena, could only appear 
 to be, as the Didache portrays them, within the limits of the 
 Catholic Church, at a time when the Apostles themselves, 
 though few perhaps and remote, had not as 5'et completely 
 died away ; and when therefore the true substitute for the 
 original background of apostolate, which itself solidified grad- 
 ually under apostolic direction and appointment, was by no 
 means as yet fully organized, still less fully understood, through 
 the length and breadth of the Church. 
 
 It is necessary to emphasize this character of the Didaclie, 
 as we pass from it to such evidence as the letters of Clement 
 and Ignatius ^. There is simply no comparison at all between 
 
 ' It seems hardly worth while to speak in any detail of the Epistle of Barnabas, 
 which may, in point of date, rank with or even before the Didache or the Roman 
 letter ; because it gives so little indication upon the points in question. It may be 
 
VI] 
 
 MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 179 
 
 it and them in respect of authority. The letter of St. Clement, 
 itself within the first century of our era, is the formal remon- 
 strance of the Church of imperial Rome, addressed under the 
 highestsenseofresponsibilityina grave ecclesiastical emergency, 
 to the Church of the provincial capital of Achaia. It is diffi- 
 cult to imagine a document, not actually apostolic or inspired, 
 which could take higher rank in respect of authority. More- 
 over, this solemn remonstrance of the Church of Rome is 
 entirely concerned, from the first page to the last, with a 
 question of ecclesiastical order. A faction in the Corinthian 
 Church, under the influence of two or three individuals, had 
 displaced its regularly constituted presbyters, some or all, 
 from their office. The dishonour, the danger, and the sin 
 herein involved, constitute to the mind of the Roman Church 
 a crisis of the utmost possible gravity. If the Roman letter 
 does not tell us all we should like to know, it is obvious that 
 such a document, under such circumstances, must yet be, for 
 our present purpose, of capital importance. 
 
 Now in one respect the evidence of the Roman letter exactly 
 corresponds with the usage both of the Didache and of the 
 New Testament. By St. Clement the word iuia-Koiros is still 
 used, without reference to what we call episcopacy, as verbally 
 interchangeable with tt pea i3vT epos. In other respects the con- 
 trast with the Didache is amazing, and shows conclusively, 
 either that the state of things pictured in the Didache belongs 
 already, by the year 96, to a practically forgotten antiquity ; 
 
 well, however, to point out that it knows nothing of the ' prophet and apostle ' 
 nomenclature of the Didache. The prophets mean the writers of the Old Testa- 
 ment (ch. v) ; and the apostles are twelve in number, according to the number of 
 the tribes of Israel (ch. viii). The Church is a ' Kingdom of the Lord ' from which 
 even ' the called ' are liable to be driven out (iv. 1 1). There is a distinct — though 
 in no way emphasized — note of warning against any separation of, or seclusion 
 from, the common life and unity of the body (ch. iv. lo and xix. 12) ; and, finally, 
 there is a certain interest in the concluding appeal to the heads of the Church (ot 
 v-n(pkxovTt%), whose position is regarded as involving counsel, legislation, govern- 
 ment, with the necessity of sincerity, of understanding, of wisdom, of insight, of 
 patience, and the inspiration and guidance of God (ch. xxi). 
 
 N 3 
 
i8o MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 or else that, however things may have appeared to the eye in 
 some ' out of the way district ' of Palestine or Syria, it was 
 never a fair description of the general aspect of the Catholic 
 Church. Christian prophets or prophecy nowhere appear at 
 all in St. Clement's letter. This is especially remarkable when 
 we remember that the letter is addressed to the Corinthian 
 Church, the very place in which they are most conspicuous 
 (and perhaps we may add most threatening to order) in the 
 time of St. Paul. The word ' prophets' occurs indeed in the 
 letter more than once, and in connexion with apostles. But 
 the word refers —and seems to be u.sed as if it could only 
 refer — to the prophets of the Old Testament ; ' prophets and 
 apostles ' stand together, as it seems, quite naturally, for the 
 Old revelation and the New. 
 
 It has been conjectured indeed^ that the whole revolt against 
 the presbyters was a prophetic revolt ; that it is a climax 
 of the old contrast and antagonism between ' bishops ' and 
 ' prophets ' (in the sense of the Didache) ; and that the one or 
 two individuals who chiefly inspired it were the leaders of the 
 class or order of prophets. This view, if true, would be 
 certainly interesting, and would work together for us some 
 indications which at present remain rather fragmentary and 
 unharmonized. But if this is the secret of the matter, we 
 should certainly have expected St. Clement to give some 
 more explicit indications of it. It is true that when we last 
 saw below the surface of the Corinthian Church, there was 
 a dangerous tendency to make Xoo much of individual spiritual 
 gifts, a tendency which threatened to destroy both the spiritual 
 balance of their possessors, and the peace and order of the 
 Church. It is true that we might expect a priori that the 
 antithesis between this self-inflating sense of spirituality on 
 the one hand, and the self-subjecting orderliness of submission 
 to constituted office on the other, would develop until it came 
 to a head in the form of a sharp antagonism between the two. 
 
 ' See Dr. Salmon's Introduction, &c., p. 585. 
 
VI] 
 
 MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 i8i 
 
 It is true that a disorderly outbreak against constituted office, 
 as represented by the local presbyterate, is the one fact con- 
 spicuously certain about the Corhithian Church at the moment. 
 It is true moreover that such inferences as we can draw from 
 the epistle about the character of those who were in revolt 
 against the presbyterate, quite agree, as far as they go, with 
 what we should expect as the development of unbalanced 
 ' prophecy.' This movement of theirs is a headstrong wilfulness 
 (ch. j); it is a characteristic example of the jealousy which 
 has ever led to the death of martyrs (5) ; it is fed by vain and 
 empty imaginings, worshipping self rather than God — whose 
 revelation in Christ was the self-sacrifice of Calvary (7) ; it is 
 puffed up with pride and hot feeling (13), running recklessly 
 into estrangement and feud (14) ; not afraid to have made, 
 aye and perpetuated, a manifest schism (46) ; it is self- 
 exalting, in contrast with the self-repression of the ministry of 
 Christ (16) ; it plumes itself on the sense of special faith, know- 
 ledge, discernment, wisdom, energy, holiness (48, cp. 13 and 
 38); it is immoderate of tongue, and knows not the moral 
 value of silence (21) ; it is self-confident, daring, pleasing and 
 praising itself (30). 
 
 Considerations like these may not carry us so far as 
 Dr. Salmon's suggestion. But when we raise, as we cannot 
 help raising, the question, ' what has come of prophecy and 
 prophets in the Church of Corinth since the time of St. Paul ? ' 
 I think there are two things which will occur to us in this con- 
 nexion as elements which a full answer would contain. First, 
 that whatever may have been the better development of 
 Tipo<\)r\Tda, its worser tendencies, if they had a development at 
 all, must have gone to swell (even if it were in a subordinate 
 degree) the un-Christlike temper which culminated in the 
 schism against the presbyters. And secondly, that however 
 much its main development may be conceived by us, if we 
 please, to have been religious and orderly, yet still, just so far 
 as it is characteristically a matter of personal spiritual endow- 
 
l82 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 ment, as distinct from orderly ecclesiastical appointment, it 
 is, by St. Clement, unreservedly set aside and disallowed as 
 a formal ministry of the Church. If he sets it aside without 
 once referring to it, such ignoring is only a more emphatic 
 form of disallowing. I need not repeat what I said in a 
 former chapter about St. Clement's extreme insistence upon 
 the principle of subordination to ministerial authority, or upon 
 the principle of orderly succession of appointment from the 
 apostles as constitutive of ministry. It would, be, I think, 
 impossible to read his letter and to suppose either that side by 
 side with presbyterate and diaconate (still less as superseding 
 them) he equally recognized a valid ministry of merely indi- 
 vidual spiritual endowment ; or that, if he recognized in Corinth 
 or elsewhere such a class as gifted ' prophets ' in the Church 
 of Christ, he considered a discussion of their endowments to 
 be so much as seriously relevant at all, in a crisis about Church 
 order, and the constituted authority of Church ministers. 
 
 Before leaving St. Clement's letter we can hardly fail to ask 
 the question, however hard it may be to answer quite certainly, 
 what, if anything, can be gathered from it as to the existence, in 
 Rome or in Greece, of ' episcopacy'? That th.t name 'EuLo-ko-ttos 
 has not yet emerged, has already been stated ; are there any 
 traces of the thing ? 
 
 Or rather, this is not quite the form in which the question 
 should be put. I have insisted that, within the New Testa- 
 ment, presbyterate and diaconate always presuppose a back- 
 ground of higher apostolical authority. The Didache bears, 
 in its own way, abundant witness to this assumption of an 
 apostolical background. In the letters of St. Ignatius it is 
 plain that the apostolical background, though changed in form, 
 is no less present still. It has become the localized ' episco- 
 pate.' The question then should rather be whether St. Clement's 
 letter so far differs from these documents which precede and 
 which follow it, that in it alone, for the first time (perhaps also 
 for the last), the presbyterate Jias no background behind it at 
 
vi] MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 183 
 
 all. To me it seems that there can be no hesitation in answer- 
 ing, first that the letter certainly gives no kind of warrant for 
 such a negative conclusion as this ; and secondly, that the 
 evidence of the letter, though obscure, makes not for, but 
 against, the conclusion. 
 
 The argument from silence is no doubt in itself a precarious 
 argument. The mere possibility of using it, throws us back 
 upon general presumptions from history. What, then, upon 
 such general data as we have had before us, should we expect 
 episcopacy at this date to mean ? It is to be remembered 
 that, at the date of this letter, St. John, the last of the Twelve, 
 has, at the most, only very recently passed away. Bishop 
 Westcott explicitly holds, that St. John was still alive in the 
 province of Asia. Now the sense of the withdrawal of the 
 background of the apostolate would hardly be complete in 
 the Christian world so long as St. John was still, or had only 
 just ceased to be, living and accessible. The episcopal substi- 
 tute for apostolic government would still, at such a time, retain 
 something of its old provisional and relative character. It 
 would not be forced into the sharpness and stiffness of pro- 
 minence which, when it stood alone as the highest form of 
 government in the Church, it could by no possibility after- 
 wards avoid. The silent modesty, which to St. Ignatius 
 is plainly one of the best characteristics of the bishop, would 
 come perhaps more naturally and easily to those whose office 
 still seemed to have something almost tentative about it. The 
 real authority of the governing presbyter who, in the place of 
 apostles, had become the symbol and centre and mouthpiece 
 of the unity of the Church's corporate life, the de facto ordainer 
 and governor even of presbyters, might well be a most un- 
 ostentatious authority. If it be urged that this would be 
 chiefly true of the bishops of Asia where St. John was, but not 
 of Achaia or of Rome, whence apostolate had long been prac- 
 tically absent, we may well hesitate to accept the argument. 
 The persistent reference to St. John of the formal organization 
 
i84 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 of ' episcopacy ' would appear to mean that no one realized so 
 clearly as the last of the apostles what the definiteness, the 
 permanence, and the importance of the ' episcopate ' was to 
 be. We can hardly doubt that the use of the distinctive title 
 grew up under his influence. We should quite consistently 
 suppose that he set himself to formulate and extend, to nurse 
 and to educate, the episcopate, eo nomhie, as such. The bishops 
 who felt his personality would be thereby not dwarfed so 
 much as strengthened and encouraged as bishops. They 
 would be (if anything) less tentative, more definite, than those 
 in other parts of the Church, who had not as yet even a separate 
 title ; whose position might therefore in many respects be still 
 very imperfectly defined, even while they felt their commission 
 to represent and to rule. 
 
 This brings us more immediately to the question, what was 
 St. Clement's own relation to the Church community in Rome ? 
 The leading fact is that when the Church of Rome solemnly 
 addressed the Church of Corinth, it addressed them through 
 St. Clement as its m.outhpiece. The only two quite natural 
 explanations of this are either that Clement was a mere secre- 
 tary, or that he was the representative ' persona ecclesiae.' 
 The very fact that his name is not mentioned in the text, as 
 the name of St. Paul's amanuensis is frequently mentioned 
 in his epistles, would be some presumption against the first. 
 The reference of Hermas ^ is much more than a presumption. 
 Stronger than either, and conclusive as deciding between the 
 two alternatives, is the testimony of tradition. ' The reason 
 for supposing Clement to have been a bishop,' says Bishop 
 Lightfoot, ' is as strong as the universal tradition of the next 
 ages can make it ^,' 
 
 But if Clement wrote rather as the representative ' persona ' 
 
 ' TliiJLif/ei ovv KKrjiitjs th rds (^01 iroKeis, (Ktivw foLp (TTiTeTpairTai. Vis. II. 4. 
 Compare Polycarp's ovk e/iavr^ kmrpitpai Kiyoi v/uv irfpl rfji diKaioavvrjs, as below, 
 p. 209. 
 
 ^ Phil. p. 219. 
 
VI] 
 
 MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 185 
 
 than as a mere amanuensis, how much does this carry ? 
 This first, that the arguments of the letter are Clement's 
 arguments. Now there is nothing which St. Clement 
 emphasizes more than the appeal to apostolical order, based 
 upon apostolical succession ; and he speaks of this as no 
 accidental fact, but as part of the foresight of the apostles, 
 and their careful provision for perpetuity of ministerial office 
 by devolution from themselves. Did this include — with or 
 without a name, with or without ostentatious assertion of 
 pre-eminence — what we understand to be the essential 
 substance of diocesan episcopacy? From the text of the 
 letter we can hardly perhaps decisively reply. But suppose 
 for a moment that to the mind of Clement it did 7iot. In that 
 case, of course, we reach no merely neutral or indefinite, but 
 a positively negative result. With so strong a theory about 
 provision for apostolical succession, St. Clement must either 
 have included (what we call) episcopacy, or he must have 
 excluded it. Either he must have believed that presbyters as 
 such were the final rulers and ordainers, or he must have 
 believed that in the last resort they ruled and ordained only 
 with and through one who, if he was in any sense apart from 
 or over them at all, could only conceivably (on his principles) 
 have been so by virtue of being apostolically commissioned to 
 be so. And if he were himself, according to the universal tra- 
 dition, the leading and official figure of his Church, he must 
 himself have acted, as matter of fact, either in such a way as 
 illustrated substantially the principle of an apostolic unity 
 embodied in a single representative persona, or in such a way 
 as to negate and exclude it, and, so far as in him lay, to 
 stamp it, if ever after him the idea should be introduced, with 
 the brand of unapostolic novelty and falsehood. His theory of 
 apostolic devolution, as the essential condition of any authorized 
 ministry, is too definite and too peremptory to admit of the 
 subsequent insertion of a new ecclesiastical office, behind and 
 above the highest which he recognized himself. We cannot 
 
i86 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH, 
 
 in fairness approach the consideration of his phrases without 
 such presuppositions as these. But if we look at them in the 
 hght of any such considerations, we can hardly doubt that, 
 indefinite and ambiguous as they seem to be, even his actual 
 phrases do agree better with the assumption of the presence 
 than of the absence of a government in the Church beyond the 
 merely presbyteral ; while their verbal mistiness will perhaps, 
 on second thoughts, seem rather a natural than a strange 
 result of a condition of things in which realities were in advance 
 of words, in which the inner substance of episcopacy had an 
 existence without a title, and therefore also as yet without 
 perfectly adequate definition and distinction of thought. 
 
 Such are the passages in chapters i and 21 in which 
 Clement exhorts the Corinthians 'to obey (chapter 21 'to 
 reverence ') such as bear chief rule over them,' and ' to honour 
 their presbyters.' The word for chief rulers {rjyovjxevoL) is a 
 familiar word either for secular ^ or for ecclesiastical ^ rulers. 
 It would not be impossible to understand it in chapter i of the 
 imperial magistrates, but in chapter 21 the compound form 
 Tovs irpo-qyovij.evovs rjix&v does not lend itself to this very easily, 
 and its place in the context, between the worship of the Lord 
 Jesus Christ and the honour to the presbyters, almost excludes 
 it ^. Bishop Lightfoot, on the ground that in each passage 
 the context goes on at once to vioi and yumiKcj, interprets 
 7Tpor]yoviJL€voi of the spiritual rulers, i. e. the presbyters, and 
 denies that the word -npio-^vTepoi means presbyters at all. It 
 is only ' seniors,' in relation to the juniors, who follow next in 
 thought. Now, without denying the verbal possibility of this 
 translation, I must submit that it does not at all well agree 
 with the probabilities of the letter. From the first page to the 
 last the motive of the letter is to protest against dishonour to 
 
 1 As in ch. 37, 55, 61. 
 
 ^ As in Heb. xiii. 7, 17 ; Herm. Vis. II. ii. 6, c&c. 
 
 ' For, of course, if vporjyovixivoi means magistrates, TTpfcrffvTfpot cannot but mean 
 the presbyters. 
 
vi] MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 187 
 
 the presbyters, and to persuade the Corinthians into repen- 
 tance and reparation to them. There is not a shadow of 
 doubt what he means by factious opposition against the pres- 
 byters in chapter 47 ^ ; or being at peace with the duly 
 constituted presbyters in chapter 54 ^ ; or obedience to the 
 presbyters in chapter 57 ^. If, then, he opens such a letter as 
 this by recaUing the time when they were lowly- minded and 
 orderly, obeying their j/yoi//xez'ot and rendering the honour 
 which was due to their 7rpeo-/3i5repoi, the fact that the thought 
 goes on to the training of the young and modesty of the 
 women does not seem to me to suggest anything so para- 
 doxical as that he uses the word 7rpeo-/3wrepot without the 
 slightest reference to the presbyters. The truth, as it seems 
 to me, is that as yet he partly veils the directness of his 
 rebuke by deliberately letting the other possible meaning and 
 reference of the word emerge for a moment upon the current 
 of his sentence *. Upon this view it is natural that there 
 should be some ambiguity. The word does retain, in part, its 
 double reference ; and it is part of the k-nidKua of the writer to 
 intend that (for the present) it should. It is really a strong 
 argument against Bishop Lightfoot's translation that it shuts 
 out all ambiguity, and with it the characteristic mental trait 
 which the ambiguity, just because it is ambiguous, delicately 
 represents. According to the Bishop, the meaning ' pres- 
 
 ' SraffiafeiJ' Trpos tous rrpe<70VT(povs. 
 
 ^ HlprjVfveTcu /icra tSjv KaQtaranivaiv vpajfivripwv. 
 
 ' "ttiOTayrjTf roh -npfa^VTepois. 
 
 * Compare the language of i Pet. v. I, 5, where trptafivrtpoi would almost 
 certainly be pronounced to mean merely ' old men,' if the intermediate verses did 
 not make this impossible. Dr. Hort, writing of that passage {Ecclesia, p. 222), 
 says, ' The first four verses of chap, v must be addressed to " elders " in the usual 
 official sense, for they speak of " the flock of God " and of " the chief shepherd,'* 
 and lay down instructions for the right tending of the flock. But St. Peter seems 
 to join with this the original or etymological sense when he calls himself a fellow- 
 elder, apparently as one who could bear personal testimony to the Christ's sufferings, 
 and when (v. 5) he bids the younger be subject to the elder. (For a similar 
 combination see Polycarp, 5, 6, where vtuirtpos comes between deacons and 
 elders.)' 
 
i88 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 byters ' is so ' exhausted in rois 7]yov\j.ivois ' that we are to 
 understand that such a phrase as ' rijUTji' tt]v KaO^Kova-av 
 airovi^iovTis rots Trap' vixiv TrpeajSvTipoLs ' in the opening thought 
 of St. Clement's grand remonstrance about dishonour to pres- 
 byters, contains no allusion to presbyters at all. Far truer to 
 life is the view which recognizes that St. Clement's thought is 
 here really upon the presbyters, though (as yet) he half veils 
 his thought by deliberately accepting the semi-unconsciously 
 suggested verbal antithesis between ■npf.a-^vTepoi and le'ot ^ . And, 
 if so, the phrase r]yovp.ivoi remains, not perhaps as a title which 
 could, with any reasonableness, be directly translated ' bishops,' 
 but at all events as a word which, both in itself and in its 
 place in the context, is suggestive of a conception of Church 
 government such as, to say the least, is imperfectly exhausted 
 in the technical ' presbyterate,' taken alone. 
 
 There is again an ambiguous expression in chapter 44. 
 The apostles, St. Clement says, in perfect orderliness, gave 
 mission to ' bishops and deacons ' under themselves. Fore- 
 seeing, moreover, that there would be jealousies about this 
 office of bishopric, they made permanent provision for the due 
 succession of others if those first appointed should die. Those 
 then who have been duly constituted either by apostles, or, 
 since the apostles, t'^' kripoiv iWoyip-wv ai'hpav k.t.X., are pres- 
 byters indeed. Who are these ere/jot eAAoyt/xoi avhpe^ who 
 since the times of apostles, have ' constituted presbyters and 
 deacons,' as the apostles did before ? Our not unnatural 
 inclination to lay emphasis in this passage upon the word 
 eAA.oyt/iot, as though it meant men of exceptional eminence, is 
 indeed, as it seems, entirely prohibited by an examination of 
 its use in the 57th, 58th, and 62nd chapters of the same 
 epistle But when we have reduced the word eAAo'yt//oi to 
 
 ' In ch. iii I should certainly infer from the phrase ol veoi iir\ rovi wpeaffvTtpovs 
 that the presbjters were felt to be in fact elderly men. 
 
 - "Afietvov kariv v/uv . . . fuicpovs Kcu eWoyi/xovs vfids ttipfS^vai ^ Ka6' vire/Jox^", 
 
 K.T.\. 
 
VI] 
 
 MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 a colourless meaning, something equivalent (say) to ' other 
 faithful men,' the question essentially remains unchanged. 
 Who are these ' other faithful men ' who, in the apostles' place, 
 when apostles were gone, so ' constituted ' presbyters and 
 deacons that the men whom they ' constituted ' could no more 
 be removed than if they had been constituted by apostles 
 themselves? And by what authority did these ' other faithful 
 men' presume so far to enact the part of apostles, in a Church 
 whose first principle was that the one essential condition of 
 any lawful ministry was delegation, by orderly succession, 
 from the apostles? Either they were simple presbyters, in 
 which case St, Clement presents us with a theory of succession 
 through presbyters, so formal, exact, and complete, as to leave 
 no room for that system of episcopacy which at this very 
 moment was already, on any showing, quite completely for- 
 mulated and organized — distinctive title and all — throughout 
 Asia Minor and Palestine, under the immediate superinten- 
 dence of St. John ^ ; or if there is not to be this sharply 
 antithetical — nay irreconcilable — contradiction of principle 
 between the formulated episcopacy of Asia, and the formu- 
 lated presbyterianism of Greece and Italy, then these men 
 of whom St. Clement speaks represent, through whatever 
 vagueness of phrase, with whatever uncompleted definiteness 
 of thought, the essential substance of episcopacy already 
 in existence and working in the Western Church, while it 
 was only in the full sense articulate and self-conscious in 
 the East. It is said by Bishop Lightfoot that ' the recog- 
 
 'O iroiTjCas Iv raTtuvocppoavvr) . . . xmb rov Qeov hehojitva . . . ovtos ivrtra-y- 
 niuos Kal eWoyi/ios earai tls rhv a.pi9fi&v tuiv aa^ofiivwv, k.t.\. 
 
 Sa<pws TiSft/ifv ypa<peiv fjims dvSpaat maroTs koX (Woyi/MDrarois kol (yKeicvcpoatv, 
 
 K.T.X. 
 
 1 In which case it is difficult to see how the Roman Church polity could have 
 been superseded by the Asiatic without a controversy which would have shaken the 
 Church to its foundation ; and impossible to believe that to Hegesippus in the 
 middle of the second century the full list of bishops of Rome, from the Apostles, 
 should have been complete matter of course. 
 
190 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 nition of the episcopate as a higher and distinct office must 
 have synchronized roughly with the separation of meaning 
 between bishop and presbyter.' His suggestion is that those 
 who have not the name cannot have the thing. A more 
 exact inference, I submit, would be that those who have 
 begun to have the thing before they have acquired the 
 name must be expected to show meanwhile not only that 
 their language about that which they have is inarticulate, but 
 that even their idea of it is indistinct. So it is in Rome and 
 in Corinth. Whilst we recognize dim traces of a more than 
 presbyteral authority without separation from the presbyteral 
 name, we are not perplexed if the distinction which the lan- 
 guage has not yet defined seems often imperfectly present — 
 though yet present imperfectly — even to the thought. 
 
 When we turn from the letter of St. Clement to those of 
 St. Ignatius we may seem at first sight to have crossed a wide 
 interval. But if the Ignatian letters be genuine at all, the 
 interval of time can be but short. According to Bishop 
 Lightfoot, St. Clement's letter was written in 96. The martyr- 
 dom of St. Ignatius is 'within a few years of 110, before or 
 after.' Thus the interval in time would be only about, not 
 improbably within, 15 years. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch in 
 Syria, is on his way to martyrdom in Rome. He writes four 
 letters while detained in Smyrna, three more before leaving 
 Troas. From Smyrna he writes to the Ephesians, Magnesians, 
 Trallians, and then to Rome. The first three letters we may 
 consider first. It is to be remembered that they are written 
 practically together ; and it is not to be supposed that what 
 his mind is full of in any one of them, can be far from his mind 
 in either of the other two. The letter to the Magnesians is 
 coloured by the earnestness of his warning against Judaizing 
 error. That to the Trallians is no less emphatic against 
 Docetism. To the Ephesians he is more general, as to those 
 who had rather refused than been infected by specific forms of 
 
vi] MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES rgi 
 
 heresy. But whether on general grounds, or by way of remedy 
 against Judaic or against Docetic heterodoxy, that which he 
 positively urges in all three letters is the same. His great 
 theme is, in a word, unity, the corporate unity of a Church 
 which is ever one, in body and in spirit. His mind is full of 
 the living glory and power of the one life, one faith, one love, 
 one bread, one altar. The one altar is perhaps the culmina- 
 tion, on the earthward- side, of the thought. But the one altar 
 primarily involves one ministry, and the unity of the ministry 
 is most concretely expressed in the bishop who is its culmina- 
 tion, and in closeness of adherence to him. Thus it is that 
 though there is no indication that he is setting himself to 
 preach ' episcopacy ' as such, and certainly no consciousness 
 whatever of preaching anything novel or unusual, the main- 
 tenance of the unity which the bishop represents, and adherence 
 to the bishop as the expression of the unity which is vital to 
 the Church, becomes the distinctive thing upon which his 
 earnest endeavour practically turns. 
 
 Nothing indeed can exceed the earnestness of his appeal, 
 but it is, as I read it, though fervent, though enthusiastic, 
 yet fervent with the enthusiasm of an assured, and therefore 
 ultimately even a tranquil, conviction, deep and joyous and 
 confident — not passionate with anything like the wildness 
 of a partisan. ' Let no man be deceived. If any one be 
 not within the precinct of the altar, he lacketh the bread 
 of God. For if the prayer of one and another hath so 
 great force, how much more that of the bishop, and of the 
 whole Church. Whoever therefore cometh not to the con- 
 gregation ... let us therefore be careful not to resist the 
 bishop ^ . . .' ' Do your diligence therefore to meet together 
 more frequently for thanksgiving to God (eiy ^vxapicnLav 0eou -), 
 
 ' Lightfoot's translation — Ephes. v. 
 
 ^ Eph. 13. It may be doubted whether the word (vxaptcrTta could be used in 
 such a context without a consciously direct, even if secondary, verbal reference 
 to the ' Eucharist.' 
 
192 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 and for His glory. For when ye meet together frequently 
 the powers of Satan are cast down ; and his mischief cometh 
 to nought in the concord of your faith.' This, in fact, is no 
 less than the difference between real and nominal Christianity. 
 ' It is therefore meet that we not only be called Christians 
 (iu.rj jxovov KoXiia-Qai Xpto-rtarovj akXa kox eivat), but also be such ; 
 even as some persons have the bishop's name on their lips, 
 but in everything act apart from him ^.'. . . 'Therefore as the 
 Lord did nothing without the Father, being united with Him, 
 either by Himself or by the Apostles, so neither do ye any- 
 thing without the bishop and the presbyters, and do not try to 
 persuade yourselves that anything is right or proper which 
 you do by and for yourselves ; but let there be one prayer in 
 common, one supplication, one mind, one hope, in love and in 
 joy unblameable, which is Jesus Christ, than whom there is 
 nothing better. Hasten to come together all of you as into 
 one temple of God, as to one altar, even to one Jesus Christ, 
 who came forth from One Father and is with One and departed 
 unto One -.' ' Be obedient to the bishop and to one another, 
 as Jesus Christ was to the Father according to the flesh, and 
 as the Apostles were to Christ and to the Father, that there 
 may be union both of flesh and spirit ^' ' He that is within 
 
 ' Magn. iv. 
 
 ^ !Magn. vii. I have thought it wise to follow Bishop Lightfoot's translation in 
 almost every instance. In this particular sentence I have merely substituted the 
 translation given in his commentary', because his continuous translation hardly ex- 
 plained itself completely. 
 
 ' Magn.'xiii. ' " Both in flesh and spirit " is a very favourite phrase of Ignatius, 
 and he uses it with more applications than one. But if we remember that his 
 main yearning is for fullness of corporate unity, when we read in Magn. i 
 how he prays for the Churches that they may realize the " oneness of flesh and 
 spirit of Jesus Christ " {%vwaiv aapKos kcu TrvfvuaToi 'Irjaov Xpiarov), and again 
 in Magn. xiii hear him preaching the spirit of obedience, both to the bishop and 
 to one another mutually, that their oneness may be of flesh as well as of spirit 
 (iVa (vojais 77 aapKiKrj tc koi TrvevfrnriKri), it is diflicult not to think that the phrase 
 does, in these cases, express the idea of " unity of outward order as well as of 
 inward spirit." And if this is so at the beginning and end of the Magnesian letter, it 
 seems probable that the phrase tip-qvtvovaTi iv aapKi kcu, iryevfiari, in the superscription 
 
VI ] MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 the sanctuary (6 etToj dva-Laarriptov) is clean, but he that is 
 without the sanctuary is not clean ; that is, he that doeth 
 aught without the bishop and presbytery and deacons, this 
 man is not clean in his conscience 
 
 I think these passages will sufficiently show that Ignatius' 
 main thought is the priceless value of unity, corporate and 
 sacramental ; and that the strong things which he says about 
 the ministry, strong as they are, are yet secondary and as it 
 were incidental to this. This fact by itself would at once 
 suggest the inference that the constitution of the ministry 
 — viz. as bishop, presbyters, and deacons — was neither to 
 St. Ignatius' own mind a novelty, nor such as he would expect 
 to be challenged, as novel or as doubtful, by others. And 
 this inference is fully confirmed by his phrases in Ephes. iii, 
 where he speaks of the bishops as ' settled in the farthest 
 parts of the earth ' (ol ^-nidKOnoL ol Kara to, -nipara opiadevres), 
 and in Trail, iii, where after exhorting that all should ' respect 
 the deacons as Jesus Christ,' the ' bishop as being a type 
 of the Father,' and the ' presbyters as the council of God 
 and as the college of the Apostles,' he adds, ' apart from 
 these there is not even the name of a Church ' (x^/'is- tovtcov 
 eKKA7)(Tta ov /caAetrat). 
 
 It will be noticed also that emphatic as is his language about 
 the bishop, when viewed from the lay side as the concrete 
 symbol of Church unity, it is still characteristically the bishop 
 a/ong' zvith tJie presbyters and deacons : — ' The presbytery is 
 attuned to the bishop, as its strings to a lyre,' Eph. iv ; ' the 
 presbyters are the type of the council of the apostles,' Magn. vi ; 
 'be united with the bishop and with them that preside over 
 you,' Magn. vi ; ' your bishop with the fitly-wreathed spiritual 
 circlet of your presbytery,' Magn. xiii ; ' the presbyters as the 
 
 to the letter to Tialles, along with its more immediate reference to freedom from 
 persecution, would also refer to a unity of Church order which (despite some 
 schismatic tendencies) was not really broken by schism.' 
 ' Trail, vii. 
 
 O 
 
194 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 council of God and the college of the apostles,' Trail, iii ; nor 
 is there anything in these letters to indicate the nature or 
 conditions, or indeed (strictly speaking) even the existence, of 
 a jurisdiction over presbyters exercised by the bishop. So far 
 are they from being a polemic to enhance episcopal jurisdic- 
 tion or dignity, that — except in respect of the one fact that 
 adherence to the bishop. presb>i:ers and deacons, or (more 
 shortly) adherence to the bishop, is the concrete test of reality 
 of proper Church fellowship — the letters are not as they stand 
 incompatible with a working theory of episcopacy in which 
 jurisdiction over presbyters could hardly be said to exist. I do 
 not mean to suggest that there was no such jurisdiction, but 
 that it certainly need not have been the full-fledged thing that is 
 sometimes supposed. The letters are compatible with its being 
 still inchoate and undefined to almost any degree. Indeed it 
 is from the New Testament, or from the nature of the case, or 
 from the subsequent history, from anything rather than the 
 Ignatian letters themselves, that such a jurisdiction is to be 
 inferred at all ^. 
 
 There are two points more to be noticed in connexion 
 with this thought. The first of them is the remarkable value 
 which Ignatius attaches to silence and modesty on the 
 bishop's part. 'In proportion as a man seeth that his bishop 
 
 ^ Perhaps the phrases in SmjTn. viii (jirjiih X^P'-^ '''"^ tirKT/conov ri vpaaaeroj twv 
 olvijkoi'tojv eh rfjv eKKXr^alav. ene'ivr] liefiaia evxapiaria ^yel<j9a>, rj vno ruv imaKowov 
 ovaa, y <S av avrbs eniTpeifrj), especially the last five words, might seem to be as 
 strong a passage as any. But after all it is really taken for granted in such 
 a passage that the bishop and presbyters are one whole. The words do not 
 necessarily imply in the bishop any more authority than would be possessed among 
 us by any chairman or president of any authoritative council. The ' authority of the 
 chair ' means in fact the authority of the council as a whole. But it is compatible 
 with the existence of almost nothing that can be properly called 'jurisdiction ' over 
 the other members of the council. All the statements about ' nothing without the 
 bishop ' are addressed, it is to be remembered, to the general community, not to 
 presbyters or deacons specifically. These are always assumed to be an essential 
 part of the unity which is emphasized. In fact, ' the bishop ' in such contexts is 
 only a short lormula tor (what is always implied) ' the bishop and presbyters and 
 deacons.' 
 
VI] 
 
 MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 195 
 
 is silent, let him fear him the more,' Eph. vi. This sentence 
 should be taken in connexion with two remarkable passages, 
 not about the bishop, which occur later in the same Epistle. 
 'It is better to keep silence and to be, than to talk and not to be. 
 It is a fine thing to teach, if the teacher practise. Now there 
 is one teacher who spake and it came to pass ; yea, and even 
 the things which He hath done in silence are worthy of the 
 Father. He that truly possesseth the word of Jesus is able 
 also to hearken unto His silence (r;(7i>xias), that he may be 
 perfect ; that through his speech he may act, and through 
 his silence he may be known' (ch. xv). 'Hidden from the 
 prince of this world were the virginity of Mary and her 
 child-bearing, and likewise also the death of the Lord — three 
 mysteries to be cried aloud — the which were wrought in the 
 silence of God ' (ch. xix) (jp'ia ^va-rripLa Kpavyrji ariva iv ijcrvxia 
 ©eoS (TTpdxOr]). Compare what he says about the bishop of 
 Philadelphia in Philad. i : ' And I am amazed at his forbearance ; 
 whose silence is more powerful than others' speech (oS Kara- 
 TreTrATjy/xat T-t]v iHLUK^Lav, 0? (riyCiv nXiiova hvvaTai rdv Xa\ovvTO)v). 
 For he is attuned in harmony with the commandments, as 
 a lyre with its strings ^' The second point is that Ignatius, 
 being bishop of Syria (Rom. ii and ix), has no sense what- 
 ever of incongruity in describing himself as the last of all the 
 members of the Syrian Church, and unworthy to be even 
 reckoned amongst them^. There is of course nothing un- 
 usual in his language, which is, in this connexion, clearly 
 Pauline. But it would hardly be — at that date — the language 
 of autocratic pretension. 
 
 When we turn to the Epistle to the Romans we pass at 
 once to a document of an entirely different kind. There 
 are no exhortations, no perils, no warnings, no local con- 
 ditions, or colourings, of any sort. There is no approach 
 
 ' Cp. also his commendation of the Magnesians, both presbyters and people, 
 for their respect to their bishop Damas, in spite of his obvious youthfulness. 
 '' Eph. xxi ; Magn. xv ; Trail, xiii. Cf. Eph. xii ; Magn. xi ; Rom. ix. 
 
 O 2 
 
196 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 to any ' pastoral ' note at all. He does not urge unity. 
 He does not urge anything. It is all about himself. There 
 is therefore, and there could be, no reference whatever to 
 the ministry of the Roman Church. From the first line 
 to the last the one object is to beg the Roman Christians 
 not to use their influence to prevent his martyrdom. This 
 being the character of the letter, it would seem to be some- 
 what absurd to argue negatively from it that there was no 
 bishop in Rome. From a letter so markedly different in 
 scope and tone from the others, which never so much as 
 approaches the topics in connexion with which he had been 
 in the habit of emphasizing episcopal unity, and never 
 glances in any way at the conditions of the Church he is 
 writing to, save to deprecate the exercise of their political 
 power, we can simply draw no presumptions about the 
 Roman Church at all. The nearest approach to such a pre- 
 sumption would point fas far as it goes) the other way. It 
 is plain from the superscription that the Roman Church is, 
 to Ignatius, an august model of Christian eminence, wholly 
 One, in flesh and spirit \ with every ordinance of Christ, and 
 free from the least tinge of irrelevant colouring. This it is 
 to be observed is the language of a man who from the very 
 same place, and as it were at the same moment, is writing 
 to the Ephesians that as Jesus Christ was, or is, 'the mind 
 of the Father,' so are the bishops established to the ends of the 
 earth ' within the mind of Jesus Christ' ; and to the Trallians 
 that 'apart from these' (bishop, priests, and deacons), 'there 
 is not the name of a Church.' I must certainly submit that 
 the presumption which these phrases suggest that Ignatius 
 regarded the Roman Church as episcopal, or, at the least, 
 that he did not regard it as, even in the faintest degree, 
 unepiscopal or anti-episcopal, is of far more effective weight 
 
 ' Kara onpua Kal uvtv/jia ^voj/iivots Ttdcrrj ivToKri avTov, ireirKrjpafilvois x'^P''''^^ 
 0eov dSiaicptTaji Kal dTToSivXifX/iivots dtro rravTus dWoTp'iov XP^I^"'-'''''^- On first of 
 these phrases compare the note on p. 192. 
 
VI] MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 197 
 
 than any negative inference that can be drawn from his not 
 urging the subject of episcopal unity in a letter which urges 
 nothing, save about himself personally, at alP. Meanwhile 
 it is certainly to be remembered, first, that the whole strain 
 of the letter takes absolutely for granted that the Roman 
 Christians know all about himself, who and what he is, and 
 whence and under what circumstances he is being brought to 
 Rome ; takes for granted, that is, a degree of knowledge 
 about persons and things in Asia Minor which would quite 
 exclude the idea that the episcopacy so fully established 
 there, could be otherwise than in full view, to say the least, 
 of Rome ; and, further, that Ignatius assumes, quite naturally 
 and of course, that the Roman Church will be ready to sing 
 praise to God for the martyrdom of the ' bishop of Syria,' 
 and also that they will condole with and intercede for the 
 Church of Syria, on the ground that it is deprived of its 
 bishop or pastor, and therefore, under Jesus Christ^, depen- 
 dent for episcopal care on the love of other Churches ^. In 
 other words, he clearly assumes as of course their full inti- 
 macy and full'sympathy in Christ with that which he means 
 by episcopacy. In passing from the letter I cannot but ask 
 once more in what possible manner either this or the full 
 tradition of episcopacy, only one generation later, in Rome, 
 can be reconciled with the stringent theory of apostolic 
 devolution and succession as set forth in the Roman letter 
 of St. Clement, except on the one supposition that the 
 
 ' If it be said that he would have surely saluted, or at least mentioned, the 
 bishop, it is to be noticed that in 7tone of his letters does he salute the bishop, as 
 though this were — or were a necessary accompaniment of — the salutation to the 
 Church ; and that in writing to the Smymaeans he does not so much as mention 
 Bishop Polycarp at all. 
 
 ^ Who, with the Father, is ever the true, invisible Bishop. Cf. Magn. iii with 
 the superscription and concluding words of the letter to Polycarp. 
 
 ^ ^vmLovtvtrt tv rfj vpoatvxv ii/Miv t^s kf Svpiq. (/cxKijcias, rjris aurl ffiov noinivi 
 TO) ©fey xpfjrai. fiovoi avrrjv 'Itjcrovs Xpiards iniaKOTfqad Kai fj vp.wv dydm], ch. ix. 
 In ch. iii he had called himself rdv iirlaKO-nov 'Svp'tas. 
 
198 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 episcopal office was de facto, with whatever indeterminateness 
 of style or name, already contained in St. Clement's principle, 
 and already in operation in St. Clement's person ? 
 
 It is not necessary to dwell at any length upon the three 
 remaining letters, which were written from Troas. because 
 the phenomena are in no important respect different from 
 those of the first three. The letter to the Philadelphians is 
 like a more emphatic version of that to the Magnesians. In it 
 he speaks for the first time as to a Church in which he is 
 personally known : and for the first time also as in the face 
 of a systematized heterodoxy which schismatically refuses the 
 unity of the Church. Similarly the letter to the Smyrnaeans 
 re-echoes that to the Trallians. As to the IMagnesians and 
 Philadelphians, it is Judaism : so to the Smyrnaeans and 
 Trallians it is Docetism, which is the enemy ^. In each case 
 the later letter shows the more organized schism. The 
 schism does not in either case appear to be primarily of the 
 nature of a revolt against episcopacy. It is primarily doc- 
 trinal. But the doctrinal heresy organizes itself as schism. 
 Thus it is that ' unity ' is preached as the remedy for false 
 doctrine. ' As many as are of God and of Jesus Christ they 
 are with the bishop ; and as many as shall repent and enter 
 into the unity of the Church, these also shall be of God, that 
 they may be living after Jesus Christ. Be not deceived, my 
 brethren. If any man followeth one that maketh a schism, 
 he doth not inherit the kingdom of God. If any man walketh 
 in strange doctrine, he hath no fellowship with the Passion. 
 Be ye careful therefore to observe one Eucharist (for there is 
 one flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ and one cup unto union 
 in His blood ; there is one altar, as there is one bishop, 
 
 ' Bishop Lightfoot would make it a 'Docetic Judaism,' and in all four cases the 
 same. This may be so : but considering how closely all the letters are connected 
 together, we could hardly draw this inference from the fact that when he is writing 
 against Judaism incidental phrases show that Docetism too is in his mind, and vice 
 versa. This phenomenon could hardly fail to appear anyhow. 
 
VI ] MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 199 
 
 together with the presbytery and deacons my fellow-servants), 
 that whatsoever ye do, ye may do it after God 
 
 The ' strange doctrine ' which destroys ' fellowship with the 
 Passion' is a phrase which becomes much clearer in the light 
 of what he says to the Smyrnaeans about Docetism. ' They 
 believe not in the blood of Christ.' ' Far be it from me even 
 to remember them, until they repent and return to the 
 Passion.' ' They abstain from evxapLa-Tia because they allow not 
 that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ. . . . 
 Shun divisions as the beginning of evils. Do ye all follow 
 your bishop, as Jesus Christ followed the Father, and the 
 presbytery as the apostles ; and to the deacons pay respect, 
 as to God's commandment. Let no man do aught of things 
 pertaining to the Church apart from the bishop -. Let that 
 be held a valid Eucharist which is under the bishop, or one 
 to whom he shall have committed it. Wheresoever the bishop 
 shall appear, there let the people be ; even as where Jesus 
 may be, there is the universal Church. It is not lawful apart 
 from the bishop either to baptize or to hold a love-feast ; 
 but whatsoever he shall approve, this is well-pleasing also 
 to God ; that everything which ye do may be sure and valid.' 
 The foundation of the evil is a heresy which destroys the- 
 reality of the Atonement, and therefore of the Christian 
 Eucharist, and which therefore systematically substitutes 
 something else, on principle, for the true valid eucharistic 
 Life and Oneness of the Church. 
 
 The Epistle to Poly carp of Smyrna echoes the general 
 teaching of the two letters before it, though without direct 
 reference to heresy. It suggests also that contracts of 
 marriage should be made with the knowledge and consent of 
 the bishop, and that private resolutions of celibacy should on 
 the one hand be consecrated by being made known to him, 
 and, on the other, preserved from carnal pride by being made 
 
 ' Philad. iii, iv. 
 
 ^ Smyrn. v, vi, vii, viii. 
 
200 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 known to no one else ; a suggestion which would only seem 
 to cohere with a very early condition of Church life. 
 
 The testimony then of St. Ignatius' letters to the threefold 
 ministry needs no sort of emphasizing. But in passing from 
 them I cannot but repeat, what I have endeavoured to indicate 
 above, that there is, in their portraiture of episcopacy, nothing 
 whatever that is inconsistent with its earliest, and even (in 
 a sense) most tentative stage. It is only as the symbol of 
 unity that the bishop is magnified. If St. Ignatius' expressions 
 are compatible with an episcopally autocratic jurisdiction, they 
 are no less compatible with an episcopacy which wields no 
 jurisdiction save as chairman and symbol of the presbyteral 
 body. Whatever more there was, or was to become, must be 
 looked for elsewhere than in these letters ^. 
 
 It is difficult to dissociate the Ignatian Epistles as a whole 
 from the Epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians, which is. in 
 time and circumstances, almost of one piece with them ^. The 
 interest of considering them together is not diminished but 
 enhanced by the fact that they seem at first sight to bear the 
 most diverse testimony on the point which is now immediately 
 before us, the episcopal constitution of the Church. The 
 mention of a bishop, or episcopacy, in respect of the Philippian 
 Church is conspicuously absent from St. Polycarp 's Epistle. 
 
 ' In view of the very wide variations of apocalyptic interpretation, I have not 
 introduced the ' angels of the churches ' (Rev. ii and iii) into the argument of this 
 chapter. It is impossible, however, not to notice that the whole imagery which 
 the language implies is closely bound up with the Ignatian conception of corporate 
 unity summed up in an individual personality ; of an individual personality as 
 the symbol and the guardian and the expression of corporate imity. Unlike the 
 •princes' of Dan. x and xii, the 'angels' appear not only to be the spiritual 
 champions, or to represent the spiritual idea, of their churches, but also to have, 
 vested in themselves, the duty, and the responsibility which is involved in the duty, 
 of a personal jurisdiction. 
 
 ^ Polycarp has not yet heard, and begs the Philippians to let him hear, any 
 exact tidings of what actually befell Ignatius and his companions in Rome ; 
 ch. xiii. 
 
VI J MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 201 
 
 The fact is indisputable. Does it point to any inference that 
 the Philippian Church was non-episcopal ? I think that it 
 does not. And it may be worth while to try and explain 
 why. 
 
 In the first place there is no doubt that Polycarp who 
 writes the letter, writes himself as bishop of Smyrna. We need 
 not go for this to the letters of Ignatius to his Church or him- 
 self, recent and decisive as they were. His own opening 
 words, 'Polycarp and the presbyters who are associated with 
 him,' are sufficient ^ But of course these cannot be read 
 without the Ignatian comment ; especially as Ignatius' own 
 letters — that is, it is to be presumed, at least those to the 
 Smyrnaeans and to Polycarp personally — are(atthePhilippians' 
 request) actually enclosed by Polycarp with his own letter, 
 and strongly commended by him as ' comprising every kind 
 of edification which pertaineth unto our Lord' (ch. xiii). 
 When it is remembered what these letters, thus enclosed and 
 commended, contained, and what moreover was the geo- 
 graphical nearness and frequency of intercourse between cities 
 like Smyrna and Ephesus and Philippi, it is clear at least both 
 that the letter itself comes in all respects out of the full com- 
 pleteness of the atmosphere and assumptions of the Ignatian 
 letters, and also that this atmosphere and these assumptions 
 must have been thoroughly and intimately familiar to the 
 Philippian Church. 
 
 But did the Philippian Church, though familiar with 
 Asiatic episcopacy, and its relation to St. John, remain itself 
 deliberately non-episcopal ? that is to say, had it gone on, 
 since the practical withdrawal of the background of apostolate, 
 with a presbyterate which, without background, was itself 
 ecclesiastically final or supreme ? Perhaps the apostolic back- 
 
 ' XloXvKapTTOS Kol ol avv avToi -nptalivTfpoi. Cp. also ch. xiii : kypaipare fxoi icai 
 ii/ith Koi I'va iav tij onr(p\r]Tai (Is Svp'tav, Kal ra trap' v/^tv dvoKO/iicrij 
 
 fpannaja' oncp Troirjaai, lav Ka.0(ii Kaipuv (v6(Tov^ (it( tyoj, fire vv -ntpL^^ai npea/ifv- 
 aovTa /cat -nepi ii/xuv. 
 
202 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 ground can hardly have been said to have been lost by such 
 a city as Philippi, so long as St. John still lived in the province 
 of Asia. But of course so far as Philippi fell in this way under 
 the guidance of the last of the apostles, there is a strong pre- 
 sumption that it would not have been left out of the episcopacy 
 which his old age so strongly shaped and watched, and 
 finally left in full and articulate completeness. On the other 
 hand, if Philippi is regarded as having had no background 
 behind its presbyters for a quarter of a century, I must submit 
 that the principle of presbyterism would have become so 
 stereotyped, that the evolution of a higher order, having 
 inherent supremacy and jurisdiction over presbyters, would 
 have involved not development but 'dislocation' and 'reversaP.* 
 Here, as in Rome (where Clement's theory of apostolic 
 devolution must either have contained, or have been over- 
 thrown by it), such a change could only hav^e been the 
 stormy change of a revolution, not a merely silent and im- 
 perceptible growth. 
 
 But to come to the Epistle. I admit not only that there is 
 no hint of a Philippian bishop, but that this is so in spite of the 
 fact that the circumstances and topics of the letter seem, at first 
 sight, specially to call for some reference to him. But this is 
 only a part of the fact. For what is the letter itself, and what 
 is the occasion of it ? ' The Epistle of Polycarp,' says Bishop 
 Lightfoot, ' was written in reply to a communication from the 
 Philippians. They had invited him to address words of 
 exhortation to them (§ 3) ; they had requested him to forward 
 by his own messenger the letter which they had addressed to 
 the Syrian Church (§ 13) ; and they had asked him to send 
 them any Epistles of Ignatius which he might have in his 
 hands.' Of course these statements are true : but are they 
 an adequate account of the letter which he wrote ? The 
 most characteristic thing about it, as it seems to me. is that 
 it is not of the nature of a letter of general friendliness, or 
 
 ' See Bishop Lightfoot, Apostolic Fathers, Paxt II. vol. i. p. 475. 
 
vi] MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 203 
 
 neighbourly interchange, or encouragement, or even warning, 
 but of a ' pastoral ' or ' episcopal ' letter. It takes just the 
 place and tone that their own bishop's letter would have 
 taken. For the moment, its writer is himself in the attitude 
 of pastor to the Philippians. In this respect there is a marked 
 contrast between it and any of the letters of Ignatius. Its 
 specific exhortations to the different classes in the Church — 
 the general community, the women, the widows, the deacons, 
 the young men in general, that is, all up to presbyters, 
 culminating in an emphatic exhortation to submissive obedience 
 to the presbyters and deacons ' as to God and Christ ' ; then 
 the vigorous address to presbyters, as to the exercise of their 
 pastoral discipline, their firmness, their justice, their gracious- 
 ness and compassionate sympathy ; still more his clear 
 statement about the fallen presbyter Valens, the impossibility 
 of his being allowed to continue in the discharge of his office, 
 his own concern for the man himself and his wife, and his 
 prayer that they may be brought to a real penitence ; the 
 caution that he adds, withal, against the overstraining of 
 discipline, his pleading for Christian tenderness even towards 
 the culprits and his insistence upon the limitation of Christian 
 anger, — all this is exactly episcopal. 
 
 But why should Polycarp write thus to Philippi ? Im- 
 mediately indeed because they had referred themselves to 
 him. This no doubt is why Polycarp of Smyrna, rather, e.g. 
 than Onesimus of Ephesus. But why any other Church, or 
 bishop, at all ? Because Philippi knew nothing of episcopate ? 
 and had never accepted a bishop ? This does not sound at 
 all probable as an answer. A Church which had never had 
 a bishop would not be likely to feel that sort of need or desire. 
 A Church which maintained presbyteral constitution, as such, 
 would quite certainly not. But a Church which had just lost 
 its bishop, would. It would stand then exactly in the position 
 in which Ignatius describes the Church of Syria as standing — 
 looking, that is, for its episcopal oversight, at a moment of 
 
204 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 orphanhood, to Jesus Christ and to God, the supreme invisible 
 bishop, and, on earth, to the prayer and the love of other 
 Churches \ It is then a quasi-apostolic or episcopal attitude 
 in which Polycarp writes. And this seems to me to be ex- 
 pressed in his own words in ch. iii. It is not he who has 
 taken on himself so to write. Neither he nor any one like 
 him is really fit to claim the wisdom or wield the place of the 
 apostle St. Paul. St. Paul taught them face to face ; St. Paul 
 wrote them letters when absent, and by such letters they were 
 built up indeed in the faith. Does not all this reference to 
 St. Paul and his apostolic letters imply in itself that Polycarp 's 
 letter was something far more than a neighbourly courtesy ? 
 So perhaps does his rather curious phrase when he describes 
 it not as a letter about them, or the things they had asked of 
 him, but as about ' righteousness -.' Thus then it is not his 
 own assumption but their reference to him that causes Poly- 
 carp to stand for the moment as the concrete representative 
 of the ' intercession and love of other Churches,' bishoping 
 them, when their own bishop was lost. I cannot but say that 
 this view seems to me to account for the actual phenomena 
 of the letter far more exactly than any view which simply sees 
 in it a witness to the non-episcopal character of the Philippian 
 Church, and a sharp antagonism, unconscious indeed but none 
 the less difficult to reconcile; between the Asiatic and European 
 Church theories ^. 
 
 * Moi/os avTTjV 'It](Tovs Xpiarot tTricKoirfjaei Kai Tj vfiSiv ayamj. Rom. ix. 
 
 - OvK efMVTo) imrpi^as ypatpoj vjuv irtpl riji SiKCuocvvrjs, oAA' kirel v/xeTs irpo- 
 (TreKaXiaaadi fif. ch. iii. 
 
 ^ If Philippi, like S3'ria, has jnst lost its bishop, one is naturally tempted to ask 
 whether the words of ch. xi do not contain a still more explicit reference to the 
 fact. The Church at Philippi has just seen before its eyes — as of old in St. Paul 
 and the other Apostles, as since then in many of its own confessors — so at this 
 moment in the persons of the blessed ' Ignatius and Zosimus and Rnfns,' a model 
 of the discipline of Christian character. Who were Zosimus and Rufus ? It is 
 almost certain that the)- were sharers in Ignatius' martjTdom. It is probable i,fiom 
 the total absence in his own letters of reference to them, or to atiy fellow prisoners) 
 that they were not sharers in his journey, sooner than at Troas ; perhaps not until 
 
vi] MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 205 
 
 It may be doubted, then, whether anything would adequately 
 explain the letter as it stands, except the theory of an invitation 
 from the Church at Philippi to the Bishop of Smyrna, to take 
 for the moment the position not so much of a friendly 
 Christian neighbour as of a pastoral or episcopal supervisor ; 
 and I must repeat that this in itself appears to be an invitation 
 which would not have proceeded from a presbyteral Church, 
 but only, with perfect naturalness, sede vacantc, from a Church 
 which was accustomed (as of course) both to feel, and to 
 value, episcopal oversight. 
 
 It is hardly, perhaps, necessary to add that episcopal over- 
 sight at this stage would be far from having all the associations, 
 of pomp or awe, which afterwards belonged to it. But it did 
 mean that one who was chief amongst and behind the pres- 
 byters — with distinct title or without, but always on the 
 principle, and by the right, of apostolic devolution and 
 empowerment — did exercise dc facto the same sort of apostolic 
 functions of government which Titus and Timotheus had 
 exercised, for the absent St. Paul, half a century before. The 
 apostolic pedigree, the first place in whatever functions or 
 rights were involved in presbyteral office, and especially in 
 the Eucharist, the right and practice of ' constituting,' and (if 
 need were) of exercising discipline over, even presbyters and 
 deacons, as well as the general representative leadership and 
 care of the community — these are the points which seem to 
 be directly involved or implied in the actual evidence about 
 bishops which has been before us. 
 
 Philippi. Had either of these been 'bishop of Philippi ' ? Had either name been 
 put before that of Ignatius or specifically distinguished as vtieripo), the positive 
 probability would have seemed very strong. In this case, moreover, inasmuch as 
 the see would not actually be vacant, we should see at once why it is treated 
 as vacant practically, and yet no reference is made to the fact — or to the tilling — • 
 of the vacancy. No doubt, both here and in ch. xiii, the name of Ignatius is 
 treated as being, even to the Philippians, the name that is clearly pre-eminent. 
 Perhaps if we knew the circumstances more exactly, we should see at once why this 
 was. But of course the serious considerations urged in the text are wliolly inde- 
 pendent of any suggestion so utterly precarious as this. 
 
2o6 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 When wc turn to the Shepherd of Hcrmas, the first thing 
 in relation to the present subject which can hardly fail to 
 impress us is the position occupied in the writer's thought by 
 the Church. The Church is the great primal, fundamental, 
 and final unity. The Church was before the world, and the 
 world was created for the sake of the Church So in the 
 third Vision, the Tower four-square, founded upon the baptismal 
 water, is the Church. It is everything to be built into the 
 Church, to be rejected from the building is death. This is 
 elaborated in great variety of detail both in the third Vision 
 and in the ninth Sim. (a city to be entered by a single gate, 
 p. 200). Nothing could be more alien from any theory of 
 Christian individualism, or a gradual coalescing of Christians, 
 more or less, towards oneness. That the Church is ' one Body ' 
 is hardly urged at all ; it is rather an underlying postulate of 
 thought Thus such exhortations as there are towards unity 
 never appear even to contemplate anything like disunion on 
 schismatic principle, but exclusively the natural tendency, 
 on the part of the Christians who were rich and respected in 
 society, to withdraw themselves in selfish isolation from the 
 life and the burthens of the poorer brotherhood. He is 
 constant and urgent about this peril of the disuniting of 
 wealth ^. 
 
 ' ViavTwv irpuiTTj (KtIctOt]' Sia tovto irp«jl3vT(pa, Kai Sia ravTrjv 6 Koa/xoi 
 KaTfaradr]. Vis. ii. 4; cf. Vis. i. i. 
 
 Cp. OVTOJ Tjv wKoSofirjuivos iiaav If Ivus \'i$ov fii) ixuiv fuav ap/j.oyTjV ev kavTw. 
 i<paiveTO 5e 6 X'ldos uis Ik t^j Trirpas iKK(Ko\a^ixivo%' novoXidos yap fiot tSo/cei fivai. 
 Sim. ix. 9 ; cp. Vis. iii. 2. This, no doubt, is ideal — looking on towards the final 
 consummation, as Sim. ix. 17 sqq. But though it is only at the end that it becomes 
 a perfect monolith, it is obviously throughout a compacted building, realizing 
 more or less and representing the 'monolith' ideal. 
 
 ^ AvTi] ■f] aavvKpaa'ia ^Ka^fpa vjjuv Tois cxouffi Kai nrj /ieraStSovaiv toTs varepov- 
 /ie'foij. Vis. iii. 9. of trKovaiOL Sua/cdAoij KoWwvrai rots SovKots tov @€ov. Sim.ix. 20. 
 I^Tj KoXXwjxtvoi Toh SovXots tov Qtov dKXa /xovd^ovTfs diroWvoviXi ras eavTuiy xfvxa^. 
 Sim. ix. 26. ovTol tlaiv ol Iv rafs tt pay ixar dais kfi-necpvpnivoi Kai /ii) KoXXwufvot rots 
 07(015. Sim. viii. 8. ovtoi ewiv TTiarol fitv yeyovuTts, TrKovTrjaavres 8e «ai yeyufxevoi 
 tvdo^oi vapa rots iOvtaiV vnep-rjifiavtav fi€ydXyv (yeSvcavTo koi v\pr]\u<ppov€i iyivovro 
 Kol KariXmov TTjV aXijBtiav Kai oiiK tKoWrjSrjaay tois StKalots, dWa fitra twv iOvuiv 
 
VI] 
 
 MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 207 
 
 In the second place, we may ask what indications does the 
 book supply on the subject of ministerial constitution or dis- 
 tinctions ? To begin with, there are, as it seems, three positive 
 things to be said in answer to this question. First, it is clear 
 that there are leaders and governors, sitting in the place of 
 Church dignity. It is largely to them that Hermas' own 
 mission is addressed. The terms by which he describes them, 
 though plainly marking their dignity, are often quite general. 
 They are, ' those who have the rule over the Church ^ ' ; ' those 
 who have the rule and sit in the chief seats Secondly, it 
 may probably be said that the word which he instinctively 
 uses of specific office is the word iTpea-jSvTepoL. Thus the 
 command just quoted, ' Thou shalt say to those who have 
 the chief rule over the Church,' is taken up by the question 
 in the next page, asked by the Church herself, whether he 
 had ' already delivered the book to the presbyters ^ : ' and the 
 phrase about the chief seats receives an instructive comment 
 in his exclamation, ' Let the presbyters sit down first 
 Thirdly, it is nevertheless true that the most nearly formal 
 list of offices or dignities which the book contains is in 
 a passage which declares that the great stones of which the 
 tower is built, four-square, and shining white, and joined so 
 
 <jW(^r](xav, Hal avTr] ij oSos Tjhvripa avroh i<pa'iviro' dwo 6c tov ©coC ovk dntaTqaav, 
 dXX' ivindvav tj; n'laTd, ixr] fpya^upevoi rd tpya Trji itiarKUi. Sim. viii. 9. 
 
 The opposite ideal is sketched in Mand. viii : x'fjpai^ vnrjptTeTv, upipavovi Kai 
 vaTepovpifvovs (ntaKeirTfadai, avayKwu KvTpovadai toxjs oovKovs tov Q(ov, (/nXo^fvov 
 (ivat (ci' y \pTfi (piXn^evia (vpl(jK(Tai dyaOuTroirjais ttotc) p.T}5ivl dvTiTdaaiaOai, r/nvx'ov 
 ftvai, ivhdaTipov yii/taBai irduTwv dvOpwirwu, ■nptajiiTa's ai^iadat, SiKaioovvijv doKUv, 
 dS(K((>uTi]Ta avVTTjpiTv, vlipiv viroipipeiv, paKp69vp.ov tlvai, up-vrjaiKaKov, Kapvovras rij 
 i/'i'X!? TapaKa\(iv , eaKavSaKia/xivovs dno Trjs nioTews prj dno0dWfa9ai, dK\' imarpt- 
 tpeiv Kai fvOvpovs iroietv, afxaprdvovTai vovOtTftv, xpfiiaras prj dX't^dv Kai ivStfis, Kai 
 fi Tiva TOVTOIS opoid ioTtv. 
 
 ' 'Epcrs ovv Toti nporjyovpifvois Tys fKKKrja'ias, Vis. ii. 2. 
 
 ' 'tpiv kiyai Tois irporjyovpevois T^s (KKKijaias Kai rots ■npcuTOKaSdpi.Tais, 
 Vis. iii. 9. 
 
 ^ El fibr) TO (iijiXiov StSwKa Toh np€CT0vT(pois. Vis. ii. 4. 
 
 ' 'A<pis TOUS vpfirBvTtpovs npvTov Kadtaai (tliough it is not irpuiTovs) in Vis. iii. I ; 
 and so puid tcuc vpealivTtpaiv twv Trpoiarapivwv t^j iKK\rja'ias. Vis. ii. 4. 
 
2o8 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 perfectly as if they were all of one piece, are 'the apostles and 
 bishops, and teachers, and deacons, who have walked in the 
 reverence of God and served the elect in bishopric, teacher- 
 ship, diaconate, holily and reverently — some of them still 
 living, some fallen asleep.' 
 
 It will be observed here that after the apostles, who are 
 mentioned first and once only, the other three technical names 
 are given twice over. It seems to me that ' apostles ' are 
 regarded herein as all fallen asleep, the three other orders as 
 partly dead and partly alive. It is noticeable also, especially 
 after what we have observed about the word 7rpeo-/3?;repot, that 
 just when he seems to be distinguishing grades of ministry the 
 word TTpe(T(3vTep(n drops out and bibdcrKaXoi appears instead. 
 But I cannot but suggest that this verbal change becomes at 
 once wholly natural, if we imagine (what would be perfectly 
 consistent with an ecclesiastical condition intermediate between 
 that of the letters of Clement and of Ignatius) that the title 
 e-tcTKOTTos is beginning more or less to emerge, even in Italy, as 
 the distinctive title of the apostolically governing presbyter, 
 but that he has not yet ceased to be also reckoned as a pres- 
 byter amongst, though presiding over, presbyters ; and conse- 
 quently that irpfo-lSvTepus, as verbally inchiding both orders, is 
 not for the moment a distinctive title So far, however, as this 
 passage may be said to recognize the emergence of ' bishops ' 
 (as I believe that it may), it must certainly be taken in con- 
 nexion with the well-known close of the second Vision, where 
 
 ^ If it is true that ■npta^vrepoi, to Hermas, signifies both bishops and presbyters, 
 Si5dcr«a\oi would quite naturally be the title of presbyters proper. It is a title 
 which comes familiarly from St. Paul's epistles. The hihaaKaXoi of l Cor. xii. 29 
 and Eph. iv. 11 connect themselves naturally with the npea^vrtpot who, in I Tim. v. 
 17, are distinguished as kottiuutis iv SiSaaKaKia. 
 
 It is right perhaps to add the further comment that, if there is real ground for 
 thinking that, in Hermas, the word irpea^vrepoi includes both bishops and 
 presbyters, it becomes very difficult to say whether the same may not be true, in 
 a directer sense than is commonly supposed, of the letter of Clement also. 
 np(a0vT(pot may, to Clement, include, as of course, the episcopal president, as 
 surely as (maKoiros, to Ignatius, implies, as of course, the accompanying presbytery. 
 
vi] MINISTRY IN SUBAPOSTOLIC TIMES 209 
 
 Hermas with a view to the general pubHcation of his Visions, 
 is directed to prepare two written copies, and to send one to 
 Clement and one to Grapte. Grapte represents the instruc- 
 tion of the widows and the orphans, but Clement shall send 
 the Visions to the Churches of other places,' for that has been 
 entrusted to him This little clause receives a somewhat 
 significant comment from St. Polycarp's apologetic phrase to 
 the Philippians, when he pleads that ' it is not in virtue of any 
 self-imposed trust ' that he ventures to address his Epistle to 
 them ^, and a far more decisive explanation from the actual 
 letter of the Roman Church through Clement to the Corin- 
 thians. I need not repeat anything that has been already 
 said about this. But if the things which have been urged are 
 true, it would be difficult not to admit that Hermas does 
 in this phrase implicitly recognize the de facto existence of 
 Clement's presiding office. 
 
 What was said just now about the use of hihacrKoKoi as 
 the title of the second order of the ministry receives some 
 corroboration in the language of Sim. ix. Three times over ^ 
 apostles and teachers (aTroo-ToAot Kat 8t8arrKaAot) are mentioned 
 together as those through whom the name of Jesus Christ is 
 made known to the world. The third of these three passages 
 is instantly followed by a condemnation of unworthy deacons 
 (8taKorot). On the other hand, in the first of the three passages, 
 apostles and teachers are ' a second generation ' of righteous 
 men, the first generation being God's prophets and ministers 
 (iTpo(f)TiTat Tov Qeov Kal 8taKoi'ot avTov). Both these two words 
 are curious : but the phrase ' first generation ' which is applied 
 to them seems to exclude the idea that they are to be inter- 
 preted in any New Testament sense. It is further to be added 
 that the passage about the unworthy btdKovoi shows clearly 
 
 ' 'EKflvai yap l-nirtrpa-nrai. 
 
 ^ TauTO ah(K<pol ovk k/xavTW ivtrpirpai ypa<pw vp-iv irepl t^s SiKatoavyrjS. 
 ch. iii. 
 ^ Sim. ix. 15, 16, 25. 
 
 P 
 
2IO 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 that the ' deacons ' in Hermas still had, as in the Acts, distinc- 
 tive functions in respect of distribution to widows \ and that 
 on the following page it is equally clear that hospitable enter- 
 tainment of the brethren from other Churches when travelling, 
 and general protection and shelter of widows and others in 
 want, were recognized as specially pertaining to the office of 
 bishops 
 
 So far we have observed in Hermas, first the general 
 assumption of a body of ecclesiastical rulers {i]yovp.evoL, &c.) ; 
 secondly, the apparent identification with these in a general 
 way with Trpea-^vTepoi ; thirdly, the indications of such distinc- 
 tions of office after the apostles, as iuLa-Kozoi, otoao-KaAot, and 
 SioKorot. There are a few things more to add. The first of 
 these is the picture in Mand. xi of the true and false 
 prophets, a picture w^hich is none the less interesting in itself, 
 though it seems to stand curiously alone in the book. 
 The tone carries us back in some respects to the Didache, 
 but it is plain at once that the false prophets are far less 
 numerous, pretentious, or aggressive here than there ; that 
 -po(f)r]TeLa altogether plays now a comparatively subordi- 
 nate part. The points of most importance, as I conceive, on 
 the positive side are, first, that the place of Trpocfi-qreia and 
 iTpo(pi]Tai is most explicitly recognized ; there are false prophets 
 to be eschewed, but there is a true spirit of prophecy to be 
 recognized, and believed, and obeyed ; and secondly, that there 
 is no indication of these true prophets being ranged as an 
 order either with, or instead of, the official dignitaries of the 
 Church. I do not say that this follows decisively from the 
 passage. But the indications are at least in complete agree- 
 
 ' Oi Toiis awtkovi exovres SiaKOPoi dai KaKuii iiaKovqaavTes koi BtapjraijavTei 
 X'/ptui' «ai 6p(pavwv T-qv fo'TjJ', «ai eavTois wepnToirjaa/xfvoi kx T^s hiaKOVias ^5 iKa^ov 
 OiaKovTjaat. Sim. ix. 26. 
 
 ^ 'EiriWoTTOi Kat (f>i\6^evoi, oiVii'es fjSews eh tovs oIkovs iavTuiv iravTOTt vneSt^avro 
 Toiis Sov\ovs Tov Qeov arfp vTTOKplafws' ot St ImaKOTroi navTOre tovs vanprjuivovs 
 Kol Tas xhp"-^ 'ni StaKOflq tavTuiv aSiaXelirTajs ioHe-waaav Hal ayvws dyerrTpdiprjaaf 
 navTOTf. Sim. ix. 27. 
 
VI] 
 
 MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 211 
 
 ment herein with what the letter of Clement makes practically- 
 certain, viz. that the existence and functions of 7r/)0(^?jTat in the 
 Christian body did not really come into sight or question at 
 all in a discussion about the constituted ministries of the 
 Church. 
 
 Before making any comment upon Hernias' conception of 
 the false prophet, it is well to notice at this point the position 
 occupied by Hermas himself. He is favoured with a series of 
 visions in which ' the Church ' appears to him and communes 
 with him. The things which he sees in vision are fully ex- 
 plained to him, not for his own sake, but for the sake of the 
 brethren generally, to whom he is charged to deliver them. It 
 is ' the Church ' who charges him, and he is .sent to the mem- 
 bers of the Church ^. It is not for his worthiness — others there 
 are before him, and better than he ; but revelations are made to 
 him for the glory of God, and hia tovs bixf/vx^ovs — on account of 
 the men of double mind like himself-. He is charged to de- 
 liver his message to the elect ^, to the chief rulers to the 
 presbyters °, to Clement to Grapte to all This was to him 
 a solemn charge and ministry. He is urged to stand fast in 
 his ministry like a man, and to fulfil it, that he may make it 
 a ministry well pleasing to God ''. What then was Hermas' 
 position ? He is certainly not a presbyter He sharply 
 differentiates himself from the Church rulers. Yet to them, as 
 to all, he has a divinely revealed ministry and message. These 
 things seem so completely to corroborate, as almost to estab- 
 lish, the theory that Hermas is him.self to be reckoned as 
 a ' prophet,' and that in Mand. xi he is speaking, with earnest- 
 ness of personal feeling, about the gift of revelation which he 
 
 ' Ou col /iovo) a.irtKa\v<p0rj dXA' i'va vaai SrjKujiTTis avra. Vis. iii. 8. 
 
 Vis. iii. 4. Vis. ii. i. * Vis. ii. 2. * Vis. ii. 4. 
 
 « Ibid. Ibid. « Sim. v. 5, &c. 
 
 ' ' Permane ergo inquit in iioc ministerio et consumma illud,' Sim. x. 2. ' Viri- 
 liter in ministerio hoc conversare, omni liomini indica magnalia Domini, et habebis 
 gratiam in hoc ministerio.' Ibid. 
 
 "Acpes TOVS rTpia^vTtpovs vpuTOV KaOiaai. Vis. iii. I, &c. 
 
 P 2 
 
212 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 himself claimed, and about the suspicion which he personally- 
 felt to attach in his time to the class and to the title. Cer- 
 tainly he as a prophet is as much concerned as any one to 
 guard the title against those who would assume it falsely. It 
 will probably therefore be felt that he is in the main, through 
 this chapter, upon the defensive. Even when he is stigma- 
 tizing false prophets, he is still on the whole vindicating from 
 suspicion a class and a claim which are rather unduly suspected 
 than unduly revered ^ 
 
 His picture of the false prophet is in the main an ignoble 
 one. A man who shrinks away from the assembly of honest 
 Christians, because their very presence abashes him ; who 
 consorts with the empty-minded in a corner, and gives out 
 prophesies for hire in answer to questions, and says nothing 
 unless questioned and unless paid : this is a rather pitiful sort 
 of impostor. There are two touches, however, in the whole 
 picture of a somewhat different kind. In § 12 we see the 
 false prophet exalting himself and claiming to sit on a chief 
 seat^, and living luxuriously; and in § i he is shown in the 
 vision as seated by himself on a cathedra, over against the 
 true prophets who sit together on a subscllinm or bench. In 
 exact parallelism with this language there is the curious 
 explanation in Vis. 3 why the lady personifying the Church 
 first appeared as old, and sitting on a cathedra — ' because every 
 one who is feeble sits upon a cathedra by reason of his feeble- 
 
 ' It may not improbably be felt that the view of prophets in this and the 
 preceding chapter is unduly depreciatory. I shall certainly not plead guilty to 
 depreciating the Christian gift of TrpocpTjre'ia. Do we not owe to it the New 
 Testament itself, as well as all Christian literature, and the discernment and 
 proclamation of spiritual truth in every generation, and across the inhabited world ? 
 The divine endowment of irpocprjTda has indeed been manifest in Christians of all 
 classes and kinds, and eminently, as I believe, in the Christian ministry of many 
 generations. But professional prophets are a different thing. wpoipTjTeia does not 
 involve a class of ■npo(pTjTcu. And it has to be suggested that from the earliest, as 
 well as in later, generations, ' prophets,' as such, have not been much of a success 
 in the Church. 
 
 ^ JlpuTOKaOtSpia. 
 
VI ] MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 213 
 
 ness^'; then as younger looking, and standing up; and finally 
 as altogether young and beautiful, and sitting on a subsellium, 
 ' because that is the position of strength, because the subsellium 
 has four feet and stands strongly, just as the world is made 
 strong through the four elements^.' It has been suggested that 
 this curious representation is really a covert attack upon the 
 new-fangled pretensions of an ' episcopos,' possibly even in 
 the interest of the waning predominance of the ' prophets." 
 Whether there is any element of such an innuendo, it 
 may be difficult to pronounce with absolute certainty; but 
 I cannot but submit that, even if there be (which is ex- 
 ceedingly doubtful), it would be much more like the playful 
 shaft of a comrade, or perhaps the remonstrance of an 
 anxious friend, than the serious disagreement of an oppo- 
 nent ^ This might probably be inferred from the passage 
 itself. For if any seriously anti-episcopal sense is to be put 
 upon the imagery, if there is more than some sort of passing 
 verbal allusion to the danger of sitting alone upon a cathedra, 
 or a faint touch at most of half-amused pique, the picture 
 drawn of the \l/€vboTriJO(f)r]Tris will become at once inconsistent 
 with itself. The claim to be bishop and head of the organized 
 presbytery, and the shrinking from the assembly and divining 
 in a corner at the hire of the empty-pated, cannot really be 
 parts together of a single character. And it is to be remem- 
 bered that the phrases which are thought to carry the former 
 meaning are only passing touches in what is mainly the later 
 portrait. Or, if it is thought that the strong feeling of the 
 writer impels him to introduce inconsistent touches into an 
 
 ' "Oti was dffOfvrji (h KaOiSpav KaOi^frat 5id Trjv aaOit'tiav avrov. 
 
 ^ 'laxvpa T) Biais' on reaaapas iroSas t'x*' av^iXptXiov icai lax^'P'^^ 'tarrjKiV 
 Koi yap 0 Koa/^oi SicL rtcxaapaiv aroix^f^v icpaTf'nai. 
 
 Bishop Lightfoot, putting aside as untenable the suggestion that this is 
 a presbyterian protest against episcopacy, quotes the remonstrances of Irenaeus 
 against the tendency to eiiiscopal pride : ' Contumeliis agunt reliquos, et principalis 
 consessionis (MSS. concessionis) tumore elati sunt.' The words are curiously like 
 those of Hermas. But no one would dream of suggesting that Irenaeus was making 
 an attack upon episcopacy. He quotes also Matt, xxiii. 6, &c. 
 
214 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 alien portrait, in order to strike an indirect blow at the bishop, 
 we can only say that a blow so very indirect and indetermi- 
 nate as this, if it shows some faint possible flavour of personal 
 jealousy, goes in fact much further to establish the de facto 
 acceptance, than to suggest any serious suspicion, of an institu- 
 tion which those who by hypothesis disapproved of it, could 
 only glance at so faintly and so indirectly. 
 
 This view is indefinitely strengthened when we turn from 
 internal to external indications. When did Hermas write? 
 He describes himself as ordered in Vis. 2 to send his book to 
 Clement, to be sent to other Churches. He is asserted by the 
 wholly unknown writer of the IMuratorian fragment to have 
 been the brother and to have written during the episcopate of 
 Pius, Bishop of Rome, i. e. about the middle of the second 
 century. Now personally I should be ready to accept 
 Dr. Salmon's argument that it is useless to try and reconcile 
 these statements ^. One or other must be in some way a false 
 indication. Personally also I should agree in deciding in 
 favour of the former date, which I believe to be seriously 
 given by Hermas himself, and with which the different 
 internal indications, as I have tried to represent them, seem 
 perfectly to accord. But for the present purpose it is enough 
 to say that Hermas cWier wrote about or just after the time 
 of St. Clement s Epistle to the Corinthians ; or else fifty years 
 later, when his own brother Pius was bishop of Rome, and 
 when episcopacy in Rome was in its own way as much a 
 matter of course as it is now. If any one chooses the later 
 alternative, he is I think bound to admit not only that the 
 vagueness about episcopacy in Hermas' writings is no argu- 
 ment against the completeness of its establishment ; but also, 
 as a further corollary, that no similar vagueness in any other 
 writer could constitute adequate ground, in their cases either, 
 for any negative inference. But if he chooses (more reason- 
 ably as I believe) the earlier date, I shall still submit that 
 
 ' See Introdiution. pp. 5S2-4. 
 
VI] MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 215 
 
 there is too much indication of Clement's position, both else- 
 where and in Hermas himself, to allow of our finding in this 
 curiously vague and isolated passage any serious opposition on 
 the part of a section of the Church to the principle of epis- 
 copacy. More than this, I should certainly claim Hermas, on 
 the whole, not only as strengthening the evidence in favour of 
 Clement's own de facto episcopate, but also as giving indica- 
 tion that even the title episcopos was, as title, less unknown to 
 the Roman Christians of Clement's generation than we could 
 possibly have supposed from Clement's own letter ^ Clement's 
 occasional use of the word in the older sense, and his omission 
 to use it in the newer, do not seriously conflict with this. Such 
 usage might be more surprising in another, but in the mouth 
 of the bishop himself it has an obvious moral significance of 
 its own. 
 
 It maybe well to try and sum up the results of this sketch — 
 such as it has been ; though in fact the results are already 
 upon the face of it. 
 
 It is quite plain, then, that from the earliest apostolic times 
 there were in every Church regularly constituted presbyters. 
 It is plain that, with these, deacons are habitually associated, 
 as inferior ministers. It is, I think, sufficiently plain that 
 prophets, as such, were not at any time a regularly constituted 
 order of ministers ; and that, even as a class of ' gifted ' men, 
 they passed rapidly into insignificance and even suspicion. 
 It is, however, when we assume the continuity of presbyters 
 and deacons that the question begins. The real question is, 
 what is there behind, or beyond, presbyterate ? Within the 
 New Testament, it is certain that presbyterate never was 
 complete or ultimate. Behind and above it, there was always 
 the background of apostolate. It may be taken as equally 
 certain that from the middle of the second century onwards 
 
 ' Compare what was said above on p. 197 about the references to episcopacy 
 in the Ignatian letter to Rome. 
 
2l6 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 there is invariably found, behind and above presbyterate, the 
 background of episcopate ^ 
 
 The question is then whether, between the close of the 
 New Testament and the middle of the second century, there 
 was an interval in which presbyterate had Jio background at 
 all ; and whether, by consequence, the background of epis- 
 copacy which we may certainly assume as universal and 
 unquestioned before 150 A. D., was really, without continuous 
 apostolic devolution of authority, invented and evolved from 
 below. Was one background abolished, and, when there was 
 none, was another devised in its stead ? Or was the later 
 background, with whatever modifications of condition or title, 
 itself the direct outcome, by lineal descent, from the earlier? 
 
 1 Bishop Lightfoot writes Phil. pp. 224--;) : ' The notices thus collected present 
 a large body of evidence establishing the fact of the early and extensive adoption 
 of episcopacy in the Christian Church. The investigation, however, would not be 
 complete, unless attention were called to such indirect testimony as is furnished 
 by the tacit assumptions of writers living towards and at the close of the second 
 century. Episcopacy is so inseparably interwoven with all the traditions and 
 beliefs of men like Irenaeus and Tertullian, that they betray no knowledge of 
 a time when it was not. Even Irenaeus, the earlier of these, who was certainly bom 
 and probably had grown up before the middle of the century, seems to be wholly 
 ignorant that the word bishop had passed from a lower to a higher value since the 
 apostolic times. ("The same," he adds in a note, "is true of Clement of Alexandria.") 
 Xor is it important only to observe the positive though indirect testimony which 
 they afford. Their silence suggests a strong negative presumption, that while 
 every other point of doctrine or practice was eagerly canvassed, the form of Church 
 government alone scarcely came under discussion.' 
 
 Even before Irenaeus, Hegesippns, without any hint or apparent consciousness 
 that he is entering upon ground which could possibly be controvertible, makes 
 a point of drawing up a list of the Roman bishops till the time when he himself 
 visited Rome. See Euseb., H. E. iv. 22. As the visit of Hegesippus to Rome 
 was not very different in date from that of the (now aged) Bishop Polycarp, it 
 would be within the lifetime, and perhaps within the personal knowledge of 
 Polycarp, that this list of the Roman succession was thus carefully made as 
 a perpetual monument of the unity and continuity of the Church. Polycarp was 
 already bishop of Smyrna before the writing of the Ignatian letters. To him, if to 
 any one, the great change must have been intimately known, if change there ever 
 was, by which the Church of Clement, with its tenacious hold of the doctrine of 
 apostolic succession of presbyters, became transformed — strange to say, without 
 a word, a hint, a breath even of consciousness ! — into a Church in which pres- 
 byterate depended for its very being upon apostolic episcopacy. 
 
VI] 
 
 MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 217 
 
 This question, and the answer to it, are cardinal. Upon the 
 answer that is given it is not too much to say that absolutely 
 everything, in the rationale of Church ministry, depends. If 
 episcopacy is really in its origin evolved, not transmitted, 
 then the orders which it confers, and which depend upon it, 
 are ultimately also not transmitted, but humanly devised. 
 Then the entire belief of Christendom upon the essential 
 character of Church ministry — which was true, in fact, in the 
 New Testament, and during the lifetime of apostles — died to 
 truth when they died, and has been a fundamental falsehood 
 ever since. Then the saintliest bishops and priests in Christian 
 history, whatever they might be in personal endowment, 
 differed not one jot — if we need not quite say, in respect of 
 ministerial character or authority, yet at least in respect of the 
 ultimate rationale of principle which constitutes the divine 
 foundation and security of ministry — from the good men whom 
 the last new sect has chosen to appoint to be its ministers. 
 
 It is not irrelevant to emi^hasize thus the wider effects of 
 such a theory, and the extent to which all Church conviction, 
 and every historical principle of ordination, and perhaps form 
 of Ordinal, would be shattered by it. But it is more in accord- 
 ance with the scope of the present chapter to insist that this 
 later Church theory must be understood to be already 
 established in the mind of the Church before 150 A.D. ; and 
 so established, that there is no glimmer of consciousness that 
 the belief ever had been, or could have been, otherwise. But 
 such a belief follows upon an immemorial tradition of facts. 
 When, then, were the facts really otherwise ? Certainly they 
 could not have been otherwise so long as apostolate lasted. 
 Certainly, in Asia Minor at least, episcopacy was most expressly 
 articulate, name and all, before the death of St. John. No 
 loophole appears to be left except the suggestion, itself upon 
 the broad facts not very probable, that in the non-Asiatic 
 Churches at the end of the first and the opening of the second 
 century presbyterate had a final and self-dependent authority. 
 
2l8 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 Now this is certainly not at all like the Didachc. The back- 
 ground which it portrays may be in some ways misty or 
 mystifying, but the presence of a background is unmistak- 
 able. Nor is it easy to reconcile with Ignatius's apparent 
 belief as to the universality and indispensableness of bishops. 
 Neither, I must submit, is it really sustained either by the 
 letter of Clement to the Corinthians, or of Polycarp to the 
 Philippians, or by the Shepherd of Hermas. These have 
 sometimes been thought to sustain it ; but I must submit that 
 every one of these, when weighed broadly and fairly, may be 
 said — to say the very least — to lend itself more conveniently 
 to the opposite view. 
 
 I have urged more than once that the evolution of an episco- 
 pate upon which the presbyteral office depended for its very 
 being would shatter to pieces the uncompromising theory of 
 apostolical succession in the letter of Clement, if it were not 
 already somehow implied and contained within the system 
 of the Church as Clement understood and intended it. And 
 I must say, finally, that whilst, on the one hand, I do not 
 believe that the European Churches could have become 
 silently episcopal, if episcopacy had involved any real altera- 
 tion of their constitution at all ; on the other, the actual 
 phenomena of the writings of Clement and Hermas seem to 
 point to a real de facto existence of quasi-apostolic oversight 
 over Churches and presbyters, which is none the less practi- 
 cally real because it is still perhaps imperfectly defined in 
 title and outline. 
 
 As apostolate gradually disappeared, so episcopate gradually 
 stood out into clearness of view. There is a long period of transi- 
 tion, in which episcopacy, eo nomine, may be said perhaps 
 gradually to ' emerge '■ — for that is consistent with the previous 
 existence of what, though there, yet lacked explicitness and re- 
 cognition ; but never to be ' evolved ' — for that would imply that 
 it did not, in essential completeness, exist before. That which 
 was to come (between, say, the Rome of St. Clement anjl the 
 
VI] 
 
 MINISTRY IN SUB-APOSTOLIC TIMES 
 
 219 
 
 Rome which Hegesippus visited) was the stereotyping, by- 
 titular contrast, of a difference inherently familiar, not the 
 revolutionary creation of a novel distinction. Meanwhile 
 the indefiniteness of nomenclature (such as it is) is no very 
 unnatural result of what is historically a gradual, and at first 
 semi-conscious, process of transition, from the full and unfet- 
 tered apostolate, to something which, though (in many respects) 
 far inferior, did yet really represent and perpetuate, as it was 
 essentially derived from, apostolic authority. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 WHAT IS PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST ? 
 
 The question now to be raised will seem to cany us across 
 a considerable interval of time. If we have really had the 
 foundations of it even in the earliest generations, it is rather 
 with reference to the sixteenth century, and its controversies 
 and changes, that the question of the definition of priesthood 
 becomes acute. It is from the sixteenth century that our 
 own form of Ordinal dates. We go at once to the heart of 
 the matter, both in respect of the abstract question, and in 
 reference to Anglicanism, by asking what is really the inner 
 truth which the recasting of the Sarum into the Anglican 
 Ordinal represents ? 
 
 It is not, however, simply a question between Ordinal and 
 Ordinal. The Sarum Cclcbratio Ordimnn is itself the climax of 
 a long historical process of accretion. Whatever may be thought 
 of this Ordinal as it stands, or of the history which is repre- 
 sented in it, it is certainly also to be remembered that the 
 sixteenth century Divines, when confronting the question, had 
 to deal not only with an authorized form of service which 
 had (or perhaps had not) grown in some directions gradually 
 out of due proportion, but also with a general atmosphere 
 of popular interpretation and assumption, which — to say the 
 least — certainly outran any tendency towards disproportion 
 which may be found in the text of the Ordinal itself. 
 
 There can be in fact no doubt that the sixteenth century 
 
PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OE CHRIST 221 
 
 exhibits two currents running in opposite directions, and both 
 ahke with most formidable volume and force. On both sides, 
 moreover, there is a ready tendency to extreme, and often 
 most painful, exaggeration. 
 
 On the one hand, there is what would sometimes be called the 
 ' Doctrina Romanensium,' by those who understand by that 
 phrase, not so much the doctrine of authorized Roman forms, 
 as the current conception of Romanists, more or less authorized 
 (or unauthorized), more or less truly (or falsely) deduced 
 from, more or less, in a word, interpreting, or misinterpreting, 
 the forms. Now there can I suppose be no doubt that, at 
 least to a considerable section of popular unreformed thought, 
 the Priesthood was mechanical, and the Sacraments material, 
 to an extraordinary degree ; that outward observance had 
 constantly taken the place of spirituality ; that superstitious 
 formalism, hard, cold, and unintelligent, had proved too often 
 the paralysis of personal religion ; that the Mass was too often, 
 much in the heathen sense, or the Old Testament manner at 
 its worst, a completed sacrifice, — that is an outward perform- 
 ance of intrinsic efficacy, to be so many times repeated, with 
 a value arithmetically calculable ; and so that the Priest stood 
 as a real intermediary between the plebs Christiana and its 
 God, — to make, by sacrifice, atonement for sin. I have 
 already had occasion to insist, in an earlier chapter, that 
 this literalizing and materializing tendency is never wholly 
 absent, and while human frailty remains, will never be wholly 
 absent, from the Church ^ Man's imperfectness naturally tends 
 towards mechanical formalism in the use and conception 
 even of things most spiritual. It will hardly be denied that 
 in the generations immediately before the Reformation and 
 the Council of Trent, in the age, for instance, of that sale of 
 indulgences which is symbolized for us by the name of a Tetzel, 
 this tendency, never wholly absent, was present in most 
 abnormal and appalling strength. 
 
 ' See above, p. 53. 
 
222 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 But such exaggeration on the side of mechanical formalism, 
 always and necessarily provokes a reaction on the spiritual 
 side. Too often this reaction, itself caused, and in some 
 measure excused, by the formalism it revolts against, runs 
 headlong into the counter-exaggeration of depreciating all 
 outward forms and observances whatever. Over against, then, 
 the appalling exaggeration of mechanical sacramentalism, 
 stands in the sixteenth century the fierce tide of ultra-Protes- 
 tant reaction. The one matches the other. Nothing indeed 
 short of the terrible excesses of irreligious churchmanship 
 on the Roman side could fully account for the terrible excesses 
 of virulent antichurchism on the Protestant side. This, pro- 
 testing in the name of personal religion and of spiritual 
 truth, and genuine enough in its original impulse, but ignorant 
 to an extreme degree, and prejudiced in proportion to its 
 ignorance, was eager to sweep away, in one great destructive 
 flood, all ordinances, outward and historical, whatsoever ; as 
 if the inward would best express itself without an outward, 
 or spirit be educated best by annihilation of body. The full 
 force of this eager destructiveness turned itself, most of all, 
 against everything which was connected, in popular feeling, 
 with Purgatory, and the Mass, and Sacrificing Priesthood. 
 Nothing indeed but the hideous exaggerations connected, 
 in popular feeling, with this whole phraseology could fully 
 account for the abiding savageness of the popular instinct 
 against it ; seeing that this instinct, whatever carnal passions 
 quickly became involved in it, was certainly in its underlying 
 impulse a religious, not an irreligious, instinct. 
 
 Such was the character of the counter influences — no calm 
 academic tendencies, but each embodied as a strong flooding 
 tide of fierce popular enthusiasm — between which the theo- 
 logians of the sixteenth century stood. Meanwhile on neither 
 side could the great questions be deferred for more peaceful 
 times. They must be met and dealt with in that generation. 
 And in fact they were dealt with on both sides ; by English 
 
\n] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 223 
 
 theologians, in the Anglican Prayer-book ; by Romans, in the 
 Council of Trent. 
 
 It is of considerable importance for some purposes to re- 
 member that the Tridentine definitions are not themselves 
 exactly the Romanism which the Anglican Reformers had 
 in mind. The Council of Trent was itself, as far as it went, 
 a reforming Council. Its statements are not a representa- 
 tion in full, but rather a modification, of current doctrines ; 
 a toning down and careful defining made by official theologians 
 in full knowledge of, and with reference to, the great ' Reforma- 
 tion' impulses; meaning, however,by that phrase ' Reformation' 
 not so much the Anglican Prayer-book as the German Protes- 
 tantism — and the Anglican Prayer-book only so far as it was 
 supposed to symbolize with, or be interpreted by, German 
 Protestantism. The sittings of the Council of Trent were in 
 the years 1546-7, 1551-2, and 1562-3 ; and inasmuch as all 
 the definitions which belong directly to our present subject 
 fall within the last batch of sittings, it is plain that they were 
 none of them yet in existence at the time of the Prayer-books 
 of 1549, or 1552, or 1559. Nevertheless, with this caution 
 premised, I must use the Tridentine statements along with the 
 language of the Sarum Ordinal, not forgetting that they ex- 
 press some modification — or at least a very guarded statement 
 — of what the Reformers regarded as the unreformed position ; 
 but because they nevertheless constitute the fairest and most 
 official statement of what that position can be said actually 
 to be. ^/ 
 
 What then was the teaching on this subject from which the 
 Anglican Ordinal made its departure ? Take first the official 
 language of the Sarum Pontifical. There is a sort of initial 
 definition, in six words, ' Sacerdotem ^ oportet ofTerre, bene- 
 
 ' The Pontificals of Egbert and Dunstan, as printed by Martene, contain an 
 exposition ' da septem gradibus Ecclesiae quos adimplevit Christus ' ; in the 
 course of which the words occur : ' Presbyterum autem oportet benedicere, offerre, 
 et bene praeesse, praedicare, et baptizare, atque communicare ; quia his supra- 
 dictis gradibus senior est, et vicem Episcopi in Ecclesia facit.' Similarly in the 
 
224 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 dicere, praeesse, praedicare, conficere, et baptizare.' There 
 are four standard prayers in the service — all ancient. The 
 pracfatio (' oremus ') is mainly for a blessing on those whom 
 God has called to the ' munus presbyterii.' The oratio 
 (' exaudi ') asks for them the benediction of the Spirit, and 
 the power of spiritual (or 'sacerdotal^') grace. In the great 
 prayer ' Vere dignum^' the ' dignitas presbyterii' and 'secundi 
 meriti munus ' are asked for them ; but the one leading and 
 characteristic idea of the whole is that they are to be assistants, 
 ' adiumenta,' ' cooperatores,' to the episcopal order, — as the 
 seventy to Moses, as Eleazar and Ithamar to Aaron, as 
 the ' doctores fidei ' to the Apostles. In the prayer called 
 ' consecratio ' the office is called ' honor presbyterii,' and its 
 holders are to prove themselves true ' seniores ' : it is prayed 
 that, by the blessing of God, they may meditate and live on 
 the Divine law, teach with their lips and show in their lives 
 righteousness, constancy, mercy, courage, and all virtues ; 
 maintain pure and undefiled the ' donum ministerii sui 
 and, ' per obsequium plebis tuae,' transform bread and wine 
 by their benediction into the Body and Blood of Christ, in 
 perfectness of love, — ' unto the measure of the stature of the 
 fulness of Christ.' 
 
 Now so far we have been following the ancient prayers, 
 
 modern form of the Roman Pontifical the short Sarum sentence appears as part of 
 an exhortation to the candidates for Priesthood, but with the omission of the word 
 'conficere.' The difference between this exhortation and that in the Anglican 
 Ordinal is very significant. 
 
 ^ Maskell gives it as ' spiritnalis ' in Sarum (and so York), but it is ' sacerdotalis ' 
 in Winton and Exon, and in Missale Francorum and the Pontificals of Egbert and 
 Dunstan. 
 
 ^ Which (beginning from ' Domine Sancte') is called 'Consecratio' in the 
 Pontif. of Egbert and the Missale Franc. ; and is, according to Duchesne, the true 
 old Roman ' consecratio.' 
 
 ^ Which appears in Miss. Franc, and Egb. as a ' Benedictio,' and in Pontif. 
 Dunstan (cp. possibly Miss. Franc.) as ' consummatio presbyteri ' ; and which is 
 probably, according to Duchesne, the old Gallican benedictory or consecratory 
 prayer. 
 
 ' Tui in the older documents. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 225 
 
 in substance wholly unchanged since at least the time when 
 first, as in the Missale Francorum, they stood together as 
 a single, amalgamated form of Ordinal. In them the office is, 
 characteristically, ' presbyterate ' ; though the word ' sacer- 
 dotal ' does also, quite simply and naturally, attach to it. In 
 the picture of the office which they present there is nothing 
 whatever that we should desire to challenge ; though it may 
 be felt that the phrase ' benedictione transforment ' might 
 need some guarding, in view of later controversies, in order to 
 avoid misapprehension. But, as the mediaeval office stands 
 in its completeness, it is plain that the ancient service thus 
 sketched, so far from itself explaining how 'presbyterate' 
 (or ' priesthood ') is to be interpreted, remains only as a .sort 
 of background, against which the characteristic lineaments of 
 the ' priesthood,' as mediaevally conceived, stand out. 
 
 The fact is that the idea of ' assistance to the episcopate ' 
 was in earlier days ^ quite clearly the dominating idea about 
 presbyteral office. It was so not only in the old ' consecratio,' 
 but throughout the Missale Francorum as a whole. This is 
 strongly illustrated by the ancient usage (which is very 
 marked e. g. in the Apostolical Constitutions) according to 
 which every distinctly ' priestly ' title belonged characteristi- 
 cally to episcopate, — though Presbyters also were, to a certain 
 extent, and rather in partnership with, and dependence upon, 
 Bishops than independently or iiii-e siio, capable of sharing in 
 the titles. As far as the text of the prayers alone is concerned, 
 this conception may be said to have held its ground in the 
 unreformed Ordinal to this day. 
 
 ' I say ' in earlier days ' ; but it does not at all necessarily follow that it was so 
 in the earliest. The first indications we possess of Ordinal forms seem to belong 
 to times when Bishops were exceedingly numerous, and often perhaps had only 
 an insignificant number of Presbyters under them. The position of Presbyters 
 under these circumstances could hardly be for practical purposes the same as it 
 must have been within the first century of Church life, and especially in the times 
 of the Apostles themselves. For that apostolic background, which always existed 
 as behind and above Presbyters, must (to say the least) have been to most 
 Churches, within the apostolic period, rather occasionally than normally present. 
 
 Q 
 
226 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 Now as long as the presbyteral ordination was obviously 
 in this key — admitting into a certain partnership with the 
 ' sacerdotium ' of the Bishops — it might fairly be urged that 
 the character of that to which they were admitted was to be 
 ascertained rather from the service of consecration to epis- 
 copate, than from the ordination to presbyterate, taken apart. 
 If we are thus referred to the consecration of Bishops for 
 the meaning of ' priesthood,' we shall find, whether in the 
 Apostolic Constitutions or the Missale Francorum, or it may 
 be added the Sarum or the Roman Pontificals to this day, 
 a far more truly balanced teaching about it than in the 
 mediaeval or modern ordination of Presbyters. In the con- 
 secration of Bishops the pastoral aspect of priesthood has 
 never been extinguished by a disproportioned insistence upon 
 the truth of ' sacrifice.' But in the unreformed ordination of 
 Presbyters, this earlier relation of the services (itself quite 
 explicable and satisfactory) has not been maintained. The 
 mind is no longer referred to the ' consecratio electi in Epi- 
 scopum ' for instruction about priesthood. On the contrary, 
 there is a very marked and emphatic teaching about ' priest- 
 hood ' in the ordination of Presbyters. The old prayers, 
 which were themselves in a certain sense colourless just 
 because they made Presbyters primarily adunnciita and 
 cooperatores to somebody else, have been allowed to continue 
 as a mere background, against, and in front of, which a new 
 exposition of priesthood (itself not so much untrue as most 
 lamentably out of proportion) has gradually grown into more 
 and more of emphasis. 
 
 The development of this conception finds expression — not, 
 of course, in the great prayers of the Ordinal, which remain 
 substantially unchanged throughout the centuries, but in the 
 growing complexity of ceremonial actions, each accompanied 
 by its own words of short but significant petition. In the 
 Sarum Pontifical there are six of these ^ : (i) the laying on of 
 
 ' In the Statuta {' Carthag. iv.') there had been only one— the la)nng on of 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 227 
 
 hands by the Bishop and Presbyters, before, or during, the 
 Praefatio ' oremus ' ; (2) drawing the stole over the right 
 shoulder ; (3) vesting with the chasuble ; (4) anointing of the 
 hands ; (5) delivery of the chalice and paten ; (6) final laying 
 on of hands by the Bishop alone. The last five of these six 
 have their appropriate formulae — four of them in the shape 
 of an ' Accipe.' With the stole it is ' Accipe iugum Domini 
 . • . stola innocentiae induat te Dominus.' With the chasuble, 
 'Accipe vestem sacerdotalem per quam caritas intelligitur.' 
 With the chalice and paten, ' Accipe potestatem ofiferre sacri- 
 ficium Deo, missamque celebrare tarn pro vivis quam pro de- 
 functis.' With the last laying on of hands, ' Accipe Spiritum 
 Sanctum ; quorum remiseris peccata,' &c. The formula at 
 the blessing of the hands asks God to sanctify them (a) ' ad 
 consecrandas hostias quae pro delictis atquenegligentiis populi 
 ofiferuntur, et ad caetera benedicenda,' (b) ' ut quaecumque 
 consecraverint consecrentur, et quaecumque benedixerint 
 benedicantur ..." The same note is struck once more in 
 the final benediction : ' Benedictio Dei Patris et Filii et Spiritus 
 Sancti descendat super vos, ut sitis benedicti in ordine sacer- 
 dotali, et offeratis placabiles hostias pro peccatis atque 
 offensionibus populi , . . ' 
 
 It is impossible not to feel to what an extent these accretions 
 have altered the proportions of the more primitive conception. 
 More and more, the attention becomes concentrated upon 
 a single dominant and differentiating idea. The one thing 
 which stands out at last so conspicuously that it seems to be 
 the very thing which ' priesthood ' distinctively signifies, is the 
 ' potestas offerre sacrificium,' or ' placabiles hostias.' 
 
 Unfortunately the developments were in this one direction 
 
 hands (of Bishop and Presbyters together) ; in the Miss. Franc, there had been 
 two — the laying cn of hands, and the anointing of the hand ; in Pontif. Egb. 
 there were five — the stole, the laying on of hands, the chasuble, the anointing of 
 the hand, and the anointing of the head. By the time of the Sarum Pontif. the 
 anointing of the head is dropped; but there are added {\) the porrcctio, and (2) 
 the final laying on of hands. 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 only. In the fully developed Pontifical there is no emphasis 
 whatever upon what we mean by service to, or self-sacrifice for, 
 the people. There has been no attempt to develop, by so much 
 as a single word, the correlative idea of priestly ' intercession,' 
 or indeed any form whatever of self-expenditure. There is no 
 solemn responsibility for the flock ^. The word ' flock ' does 
 not occur, nor any equivalent to it. There is personal good 
 character, indeed, and good example ; there is something 
 about preaching and teaching, and a good deal about 
 governing ; there is blessing and absolving, and, above all, 
 offering of sacrifice ; and things like these imply, no doubt, 
 the ' people ' (who are mentioned as ' populus ' or ' plebs ') ; but 
 there is no distinct expression of relation to them ; there is 
 not a word of anything like what we mean by ' pastoral ' 
 devotion, or responsibility, or suffering. 
 
 Thus it is that with the developed Pontifical we can but 
 feel that the formal definition of Pope Eugenius and the 
 Council of Florence only too naturally corresponds : ' Materia 
 est illud per cuius traditionem confertur ordo : sicut presby- 
 teratus traditur per calicis cum vino et patenae cum pane por- 
 rectionem, . . . Forma sacerdotii talis est. Accipe potestatem 
 off'erendi sacrificium,' &c. Presbyterate is indeed coming to 
 mean, only too simply and precisely, this. 
 
 The sacrifice is ' for the quick and for the dead.' This 
 phrase is not interpreted in the service itself. It is a phrase, 
 I presume, which can perfectly well be defended. But 
 its defensibleness would seem largely to depend upon its 
 remaining free from attempts at over precise definition. 
 Dogmatic teachings about purgatory, and systems of practice 
 based upon such teachings, had made it, indeed, almost intoler- 
 able. At least from all suspicion of these excesses, it needed 
 to be kept scrupulously clear. 
 
 But at this point we pass from the Pontifical to the Council 
 
 ' Though these had received, and did maintain, their position in the service of 
 the consecration of a Bishop. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 229 
 
 of Trent. At Trent, the phrase receives some authoritative 
 definition. 
 
 In Sess. xxii. c. ii. it is ruled that the sacrifice of the Mass 
 is offered not only for the quick, &c., ' but also for the dead 
 in Christ, whose purgatorial cleansing is not yet complete ^' 
 And in the opening of Sess. xxv it is decreed that there is 
 a purgatory, ' and that the souls there detained are assisted by 
 the prayers of the faithful, but most of all by the acceptable 
 sacrifice of the altar which is expressed in the Catech. ad 
 Paroch. II. cap. iv. Quaest. Ixxvii, by saying that it is offered, 
 and is effectual, for the sins of all the faithful alike, whether 
 they be still alive, or dead — with their expiation not yet accom- 
 plished (' sive iam in Domino mortui 'nondum plane expiati 
 sint '). No doubt these are, by comparison, guarded phrases. 
 But it must be noticed that the assertions made are not 
 made simply of the sacrifice of Christ ; but of that sacrifice 
 as presented upon earth, in recurring Eucharistic celebrations. 
 And they fasten, with emphasis, upon the temporal interval, 
 which the ' nondum ad plenum ' represents. Can it then be 
 said that they add nothing to the revelation which the Church 
 has received ? 
 
 Returning from this special point to the general idea of the 
 sacrifice by which priesthood is defined, it is to be observed 
 that the actual Tridentine canon de Sacramento Ordinis 
 (Sess. xxiii. can. i) is very carefully expressed. It is aimed 
 most certainly not against the Anglican Prayer-book, but 
 against an ultra-Protestant denial of all sacrifice and all 
 priesthood. It asserts that there is a priesthood of visible 
 ministry ; and that it does not consist only in preaching the 
 gospel ; but that it does possess a real power of consecrating 
 and offering the Body and Blood of the Lord, and of absolving 
 and retaining sins. Meanwhile the first sentence of cap. i. 
 
 ' ' Sed et pi o defunctis in Christo nondum ad ple7mm piirgatis^ 
 ' ' Animasque ibi detentas fidelium suffragiis, fortissimum vcro acceptabili altaris 
 sacrificio juvari.' 
 
230 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 in this session connects, in indissoluble fashion, the two words 
 ' sacrifice ' and ' priesthood ' : ' Sacrificium et sacerdotium ita 
 Dei ordinatione coniuncta sunt, ut utrumque in omni lege ex- 
 stiterit ^ ;' while in Sess. xxii. c. i. and the following canons the 
 sacrifice of the Mass is a ' real and proper sacrifice,' and ' really 
 propitiatory,' and (as above), ' for the living and the dead 
 And in the Catech. ad Paroch. II. cap. vii. quaest. xxiv, the 
 ' munus ' of the priest is said to be ' To offer sacrifice to God, 
 to administer the Sacraments of the Church And after 
 reference to the Ordinal, culminating in the ' Accipe potestatem 
 offerendi,' &c., it is added, ' By which words and ceremonies 
 he is constituted a mediator and representative between God 
 and man, which is to be reckoned the principal function of 
 priesthood "*.' Then ' ad extremum vero ' the absolving power 
 is added : ' Haec sunt sacerdotalis ordinis propria et praecipua 
 munera.' 
 
 Now I may say at once that it is no part of my object 
 to try and convict the Tridentine statements of being wrong. 
 I am quite aware that both on this and other subjects there 
 are statements of more than one kind, which are not always 
 easily reconcilable, and which may perhaps be capable, in more 
 directions than one, of a considerable, and perhaps unex- 
 pected, amount of explanation. Neither is it any part of my 
 duty to endeavour to enter upon such explanations, or to 
 determine how far explanations, which ought to be satisfactory, 
 
 ' So Morinus, Pt. III. Exercit. vii. cap. i. p. 102: 'Cum sacerdotio Dei 
 ordinatione sacrificium semper conjunctum fuit, ut nos docet Cone. Trid. Itaque 
 sacerdotium totius religionis Christianae fundamentum esse nemo dubitare potest.' 
 — Most true language — though probably not quite in Morinus' sense ! And again, 
 Exercit ix. cap. i. p. 132 : ' Diacono semel et necessario propter sacrificium et 
 sacerdotem constituto, multa alia tribuuntur in quibus praeter sacrificium Ecclesiae 
 ministrat,' — which is a rather audacious way of putting the history. 
 
 ^ ' Varum et proprium sacrificium,' ' vere propitiatorium,' ' pro vivis et de- 
 functis.' 
 
 ' Deo sacrificium facere, ecclesiastica sacramenta administrare.' 
 * ' Quibus caeremoniis et verbis interpres ac mediator Dei et hominum con- 
 stituitur, quae praecipua sacerdotis funclio e.xistimanda est.' 
 
vn] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 231 
 
 could be furnished, either of most, or even of the whole, of the 
 language I have quoted. That which concerns my task is 
 rather to see the impression which language like this was most 
 calculated to produce, and particularly when the Council of 
 Trent is regarded as a Roman Reformation, and its language 
 as either the prudent modification — or at least as the most 
 scientific and guarded statement — of popular doctrines which 
 certainly had stood in need of a guarded expression. I do 
 not forget that in Sess. xxii. c. ii. the Council had declared 
 ' That the victim offered, and the offerer of the victim, are one 
 and the very same, as in His self-oblation upon the Cross, so 
 in the ministry of His priests in the Church, the method oxAy of 
 offering being changed^'; and that each part of this statement 
 stands somewhat amplified in the Cat. ad Par. H. c. iv. quaest. 
 Ixxiv and Ixxv^ If the doctrine insisted on were to the 
 effect that the Eucharist is the Church's divinely ordered 
 ceremonial method of self-identification with the sacrifice of 
 Christ, which itself therefore may legitimately be called the 
 sacrifice with which it is divinely identified (not being a 
 sacrifice directly ' in itself,' but indirectly by virtue of that 
 
 ' ' Una eademque est hostia, idem nunc offerens sacerdotum ministerio, qui se 
 ipsum tunc in cruce obtulit, sola offerendi ratione diversa.' 
 
 ^ It will be observed that the Catechismus, going somewhat further, does in 
 fact explicitly deny that the Eucharist is a sacrifice other than the sacrifice of 
 the Cross : ' Unum itaque et idem sacrificium esse fatemur et haberi debet, quod 
 in missa peragitur, et quod in cmce oblatum est ; quemadmodum una est et 
 eadem hostia, Christus videlicet Dominus noster, qui se ipsum in ara crucis 
 semel tantummodo cruentum immolavit. Neque enim cruenta et incruenta 
 hostia duae sunt hostiae, sed una tantum ; cuius sacrificium, postquam Dominus ita 
 praecepit : " Hoc facite in meam commemorationem " in Eucharistia quotidie instau- 
 ratnr.' Qu. Ixxv : 'vSed unns etiam atque idem sacerdos est, Christus Dominus; 
 nam ministri qui sacrificium faciunt, non suam sed Christi personam suscipiunt 
 quum eius corpus et sanguinem conficiunt. Id quod et ipsius consecrationis 
 verbis ostenditur. Neque enim sacerdos inquit " Hoc est corpus Christi," sed " Hoc 
 est corpus meum " ; personam videlicet Christi Domini gerens, panis et vini sub- 
 stantiam in veram eius corporis et sanguinis substantiam convertit.' It would be 
 a fuller expression of the truth to say that it is ' the Church ' which ' Christi 
 personam suscipit ' ; and that the Priests act herein as the divinely authorized 
 representatives and organs of the Church. 
 
232 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 beyond itself with which it is made one), there would be 
 nothing to criticize. But could there in that case be any 
 emphasis upon the word ' proprium ' ? At least the apparent 
 force of the word ' proprium ' seems to be to deny the de- 
 pendence and to assert an independent character, as though 
 the sacrifice of the Eucharist were a sacrifice per se. When, 
 then, the conclusion is repeatedly emphasized, that the 
 Eucharist is a 'verum et proprium sacrificium' and that this 
 ' proprium sacrificium ' is ' vere propitiatorium,' alike for the 
 remission of sins of every kind on earth, and for souls in 
 purgatory not yet fully ' purged ' or ' expiated,' it must 
 I think be admitted that even the guarded definitions of 
 Trent in 1562 lend only too much of apparent colour to 
 certain popular views of sacrifice and priesthood which (to 
 put it very mildly) had tended not a little to exaggeration ^. 
 
 To call the Eucharist ' the Church's sacrifice ' (in the sense 
 e. g. of the Church's identification with the sacrifice of Christ) 
 is one thing : to call it ' vcruvi sacrifichnn ' may point only 
 a most legitimate contrast between it and the Old Testament 
 sacrifices which were certainly not ' vera ' : but to call it 
 (under anathema) ' proprium sacrificium ' either is, or certainly 
 may seem to be, another". Again, to point out that that 
 
 ^ Compare the exaggerations quoted in the Appendix, p. 311, note. 
 
 * It may be said, no doubt, that the Eucharist can be called a sacrifice, even 
 when regarded in itself, as the offering of our worship, or of our gifts, or simply of 
 the elements of bread and wine. Without denying the truth of such thoughts, 
 I must still urge that it is really a sacrifice in these subordinate senses, only in 
 dependence upon, and in consequence of, its being the Church's divinely ordained 
 identification with the Atoning Sacrifice of Christ. If it were not, in this far 
 deeper sense, the Church's ' sacrifice,' the word sacrifice, seriously applied to it in 
 these lesser senses only, would be a somewhat misleading overstatement. But 
 when it is realized first as the Church's ceremonial method of identification with 
 the perpetual offering of the Sacrifice of Christ, then every lesser act which, in 
 greater measure or in less, expresses or symbolizes the surrender or homage of 
 men — illumined, as it now is, by the light of the one transcendent reality — 
 becomes itself also, according to its capacity, a true mode or aspect of the spirit 
 of sacrifice in the Church. The Eucharist is a sacrifice, primarily and essentially, 
 in exactly the sense or measure in which it can be said to be the Sacrifice of Christ. 
 
VII] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 233 
 
 with which it is identified is the ofifering of Christ which 
 is the atonement for the sins of the world is one thing ; to 
 fortify by anathema the definition of the Eucharistic celebra- 
 tion as a sacrifice ' vere propiiiatorucin ' is, or at least may 
 seem to be, another. To say that the sacrifice of Christ was 
 indeed for all, for the quick and the dead, '■pro vivis ac de- 
 functis,' is one thing ; to anathematize those who hesitate or 
 decline to lay down that the earthly celebrating of the sacrifice 
 produces an effect upon souls in purgatory, can hardly fail to 
 be felt to be another. In each of these points even Trent 
 may be said to appear, and the Romanism of the Tridentine 
 generation was, without doubt, popularly understood, to 
 identify itself only too completely with the extreme and most 
 doubtful form of assertion ; and having thus tied up the idea of 
 ' sacrificium ' just to its own most questionable possibilities, 
 then to find in the ' ofifering of sacrifice,' so explained and 
 defined, the one differentiating conception and definition 
 of 'priesthood.' That, then, which was before the mind of 
 the Reformers was a completeness of view, conceived with 
 only too painful a sharpness of logical precision ; a view which 
 the Tridentine fathers either did — or did not — succeed in 
 adequately limiting ; a view according to which the ' priest- 
 hood,' consisting of the power of offering actual atoning 
 sacrifices (sacrifices which could be indefinitely repeated and 
 arithmetically appraised), constituted a real propitiatory 
 mediation between the lay people and their God. In context 
 with any such conception as this — or the suspicion of it — to 
 say, with the Catechismus, that the principal function of a 
 priest is to be ' interpres ac mediator Dei et hominum, or, with 
 Morinus, that, because it means sacrifice, therefore ' no one 
 can doubt that the priesthood is the foundation of the entire 
 Christian religion' (though both phrases in themselves may 
 
 If in relation to that sense the word ' propriunn ' is a doubtful one, it cannot, in 
 virtue of the subordinate senses taken (as they cannot really be taken) apart, be 
 made to be satisfactory. 
 
234 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 be capable of an excellent meaning), will at least be to open 
 the way to misconceptions of a very serious kind. 
 
 What then was the truth ? Was all this language about 
 the sacrifice and the priesthood wholly wrong ; and, as wrong, 
 to be wholly swept away ? Unquestionally this was the view 
 of unbridled Protestantism. Or was it, on the other hand, as 
 Romanism has maintained, not only not wrong, but altogether 
 right, and rightly proportioned ? 
 
 Beyond all question it is clear that the Anglican Reformers 
 took neither of these two lines. W^hat they did clearly im- 
 plies (i) that they did not judge it wholly wrong nomencla- 
 ture, and (2) that its conception and statement had neverthe- 
 less, in their eyes, so far fallen out of due proportion as, if not 
 to contradict, yet at least to jeopardize, the right balance of 
 Christian truth. 
 
 Take the importance of the retention of the nomenclature. 
 It requires perhaps no slight effort of imagination for us at the 
 present time fully to realize how great the pressure must 
 have been upon reformers who were themselves Protestants, 
 in the midst of the rising tide of destructive Protestantism, 
 to ' abolish priesthood ' ; and how very much more is meant 
 than might at first sight appear by the deliberate retention, in 
 the reign of King Edward VI, of the three orders of Bishops, 
 Priests, and Deacons ' as immemorial ' from the Apostles' 
 time,' and therefore perpetually to be retained and revered in 
 the Church of Christ. I say the deliberate retention, for that 
 this was no piece of inattentive conservatism the detail of the 
 circumstances makes abundantly clear. It has been several 
 times pointed out, and it is certainly well to remember, into 
 what exaggerations Archbishop Cranmer had himself been 
 prepared to go some years earlier in the direction of denying 
 the spiritual character of Order ^ Here again it requires a real 
 
 ^ ' We know as matter of history that the inadequate conceptions of ordination 
 to which Canon Estcourt alludes were before the Reformers of the Church of 
 England, and had met with considerable coimtenance among them. But they regarded 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 235 
 
 effort of imagination to judge quite fairly of a tendency which 
 to us at first sight sounds shocking and wanton enough. 
 Those, however, who have seen, in the balance between 
 revealed and rational truth, how easily those disparage reason 
 who cling to revelation or those undervalue revelation who 
 claim to be rational; or, in the equipoise between spiritual and 
 secular claims, how easily insistence on the spiritual loses sight 
 of the secular, or clear apprehension of the secular obscures 
 the spiritual ; those who, in the actual case of the mediaeval 
 rivalry between Pope and Emperor know how hard it was to 
 do justice to the true claims of each at once — will form a more 
 patient, and a fairer estimate. They will not judge too 
 harshly, or with excessive surprise, if in the earlier moments 
 of maintaining the independence of national Churches from 
 an autocracy which because it was spiritual claimed to be 
 secular, the minds of individuals even in high places reacted 
 sometimes quite extravagantly towards asserting the secular 
 and national sanction of what really was spiritual. 
 
 This tendency to disparage the true character of Order, into 
 which Cranmer himself had at one time fallen so far, was 
 
 the theory not in that timid fashion which might cause them, if they had closed 
 with it, to express it in words and in acts belonging to a different order of ideas. 
 They looked fairly in the face the real and only consistent application of these 
 notions ; which is this, the total abolition of any real form of ordination, and the 
 retention of the laying on of hands, if at all, only as a recognition of a previous 
 election. In the before-quoted discussions of 1540, which issued in the "Necessary 
 Doctrine and Erudition," and are to be found among Burnet's Records (P. i. B. 
 iii. No. xxi) we find this question proposed, ' whether in the New Testament be 
 required any consecration of a bishop or priest, or only appointing to the office be 
 sufficient ? ' And the answer of Canterbury (that is, Cranmer) is, ' that he that is 
 appointed to be a bishop or priest needeth no consecration by the Scripture.' . . . . 
 What we wish the reader to observe is, that if in 1549 Cranmer had still held 
 these opinions about Holy Orders, or, holding them, had found himself able to lead 
 the Ordinal Committee to adopt them, they would have displayed themselves in 
 the Ordinal in some thoroughly unmistakable form. Whereas, what do we really 
 find ? . . . . Bucer's draft is set aside, and words of a totally different character are 
 substituted. It is perfectly manifest that the object must have been to express 
 a wholly different idea upon Ordination.' Church Quarterly, Jan. 1878, pp. 281, 
 282. 
 
236 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 present as an immediate challenge to the Anglican divines in 
 the person of Bucer. It is well known how great and how 
 injurious an influence was exercised at this time by Bucer in 
 England, and especially upon the revision of the Prayer-book 
 of 1552. In the Ordinal itself, as published with that book, 
 there are traces of him, for which we have little cause to be 
 grateful. But these facts, however painful in themselves, only 
 bring out into sharper relief the clear decision with which, 
 in their official work, these divines, although led by Cranmer 
 and perilously exposed to the influence of Bucer, yet re- 
 sisted the Bucerian pressure, and would have none of the 
 tendency which had once been Cranmer's own. Bucer's own 
 draft was before them. He would have made short work of 
 the old language. So much indeed he would have yielded to 
 conservatism, that there should be still three ranks of ministers, 
 that there should be ' some difference made,' and the higher 
 grades appointed 'somewhat more fully and solemnly'; but 
 he proposed to designate them respectively as the ' superin- 
 tendent,' the ' presbyters of the second order,' and the ' pres- 
 byters of the third order,' or ' presbyters who help '; and he 
 proposed the same sentence of ordination in each case, a 
 sentence which, if adopted, would indeed have jeopardized the 
 historical continuity of them all ^. Is it possible, in the face of 
 
 ' 'In the winter [i.e. in the end] of the year 1549, we find that a Committee 
 was appointed to prepare an Ordinance against the ensuing April i. Now on 
 April 25 [i. e. in the beginning] of the same year 1549, Martin Bucer had reached 
 England from Strasburg. It is very well known that Bucer exercised a very 
 injurious influence upon the Prayer-book. But little or no notice has been taken 
 of the important work which we find, under the title de ordinatione legitima tninis- 
 trorum ecclesiae revocanda, at p. 238 of his Scripta Anglicana. The most 
 cursor)' perusal of this work wll prove its relationship to our Ordinal. The 
 selections of Scripture to be read are verj' nearly identical with those used in our 
 three forms. The beautiful exhortation in our Ordinal of Priests stands unmistakably, 
 though in a poor Latin style, in Bucer's work. The questions put to the ordinands 
 are in many cases identical, and of many of the prayers the same may be said. But 
 Bucer's form is only one for all the three orders. The sentence of Ordination 
 is the same whether it is a bishop, priest, or deacon that is being ordained, viz. 
 " The hand of God Almighty, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, be upon you, to protect 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 237 
 
 all these melancholy proposals, to exaggerate the significance 
 of the deliberate substitution of the clear and strong language 
 of the Anglican Ordinal ? ' It is evident unto all men dili- 
 gently reading the holy Scripture and ancient authors that from 
 the Apostles' time there have been these Orders of Ministers 
 in Christ's Church ; Bishops, Priests, and Deacons. . . . And 
 therefore, to the intent that these Orders may be continued 
 and reverently used and esteemed in the Church of England, 
 no man shall be accounted or taken to be a lawful Bishop, 
 Priest, or Deacon . . . except he be/ &c. ' Reverend Father in 
 
 and govern you, that ye may go and bring forth much fruit by your ministry, and 
 that it may remain unto life eternal." But he adds at the conclusion an account of 
 an attempt (of a quite illusory character) to keep up the appearance of Episcopacy 
 in a Church really Presbyterian ; proposing this apparently as a model for the 
 Church of England : — 
 
 "' Since there are three orders of presbyters and guardians of the Church : the 
 order of bishops, then that of presbyters, whom the ancients called cardinals, who 
 carry on the chief government of the Church in places where there are no bishops ; 
 and then that of those presbyters who help the former and are called among us 
 deacons or helpers ; thus also ordination is graduated ; that when any one is 
 ordained a superintendent, i. e. bishop, all things may be done and accomplished 
 somewhat more fully and solemnly than when a presbyter of the second or third 
 order is ordained. So also there is made some difference between the ordination of 
 presbyters of the second and third orders." ' 
 
 ' Now, regarding this work, only two theories are possible. Either it was the 
 Ordinal of 1549 translated into Latin (as the English Prayer-book was) for the 
 information of Bucer, who did not know English, and by him altered and welded 
 into one form and proposed as a " reduction of episcopacy " for the Revision of 
 1552, or else it was an original draft for the Ordinal of 1549; either drawn up 
 by Bucer himself as an account of the arrangements in his church of Strasburg 
 and proposed as a model for England, or an alteration by him of some draft by 
 Cranmer or some other of the Committee. Various indications, which we have 
 not space to recount, incline us to the first form of the latter alternative. We hold 
 that the document was a draft for the Ordinal of 1549, and moreover, that it is 
 the original work of Bucer himself But for the purpose which we have at present 
 in hand, it does not make much difference which of these theories we adopt. 
 Either the Reformers in 1 549 composed their Ordinal on the basis of a draft 
 by Bucer altered by them, or the Reformers in 1552 rejected certain proposals by 
 Bucer for an alteration of the Ordinal of 1549.' 
 
 From the Church Quarterly Review, January, 1878, pp. 269-270. It does not 
 quite appear from the context of the Scripta Anglicana why the statement quoted 
 as to the ' three orders' is described as an ' account of an attempt,' &c. 
 
238 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 God, I present unto you these persons present, to be admitted 
 to the Order of Priesthood.' 
 
 In this matter of retention of titles the chief emphasis will 
 undoubtedly lie upon the continuous use of the words ' Priest ' 
 and * Priesthood,' not only because these were the titles which 
 were thought to have been most deeply misused, and were 
 most savagely attacked, but also, and perhaps even more 
 emphatically, because a close fidelity to the language of 
 Scripture was always to the Reformers a palmary object — it 
 was their great sheet-anchor of safety and truth ; and because 
 anything like a superficial following of Scripture in this 
 matter might so easily and naturally have led, whatever might 
 be their views about the thing, to their agreeing at least in 
 ruling out the word. 
 
 On this point no doubt the attitude and language of 
 Hooker, forty years afterwards, will be well remembered. But 
 that the Church of England is not represented herein even by 
 Hooker, the language of the Ordinal and its preface bears 
 perpetual witness ^. 
 
 ' ' Seeing then that sacrifice is now no part of the Church ministry, how should 
 the name of Priesthood be thereunto rightly applied ? Surely even as St. Paul 
 applieth the name of flesh unto that very substance of fishes which hath a pro- 
 portionable correspondence to flesh, although it be in nature another thing. . . . 
 The Fathers of the Church of Christ with like security of speech call usually the 
 ministry of the Gospel Priesthood in regard of that which the Gospel hath pro- 
 portionable to ancient sacrifices, namely the Communion of the Blessed Body and 
 Blood of Christ, although it have properly now no sacrifice. As for the people 
 when they hear the name it draweth no more their minds to any cogitation of 
 sacrifice, than the name of a senator or an alderman causeth them to think upon 
 old age. . . . Wherefore to pass by the name, let them use what dialect they will, 
 whether we call it a Priesthood, a Presbytership, or a Ministry it skilleth not ; 
 although in truth the word Presbyter doth seem ttiore fit, and itt propriety of speech 
 more agi'eeable than Priest with the drift of the whole gospel of Jesus Christ.' 
 E. P., V. Ixxviii. 2 and 3. 
 
 The phrases which I have italicized show clearly that Hooker is misled by the 
 fallacy (commented on below) of conceiving that the proper reality of sacrifice is 
 to be found in the Old Testament, instead of in the New. It is, of course, one 
 thing to recognize that the office, while emphatically pronounced to be ' sacerdotal,' 
 was yet, till far down in mediaeval times, entitled ' presbyterate ' : it is quite 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 239 
 
 At the jealousy as to the title' Priesthood,' and its meaning, 
 which had carried Cranmer off" his balance; which was becoming 
 in the ultra-Protestants a simple ferocity ; which warped so 
 dangerously in the next generation even the judicial mind 
 and learning of Hooker, and which has proved, to this day, 
 so deeply rooted and inveterate, I, for one, cannot affect to be 
 surprised. There had been only too much cause to provoke 
 and to justify it. Nevertheless, those who feel how deeply 
 and perilously wrong the change of nomenclature would have 
 been, and how plausibly nevertheless it could be urged as if it 
 alone were the true and exact fidelity to Scripture, are entitled 
 not only to thank God for the firmness of the Anglican 
 language at an infinitely critical time, but also to point to the 
 very urgency of the danger itself, as immensely emphasizing 
 the significance of the language which was then so quietly 
 but so firmly retained. That these perilous tendencies are by 
 no means out of date we are reminded, not only by an immense 
 weight of familiar modern prejudice, but even by the argu- 
 ments of such a writer as Bishop Lightfoot. He too lends 
 his great authority to the opinion that the abolition of the 
 title ' might have been better ^' 
 
 It is hardly possible to pass on without lingering a little 
 upon this portion of Bishop Lightfoot s essay. Some of the 
 underlying assumptions of its earlier portions we have had 
 occasion to canvass before ^. The last twenty-five pages of 
 the essay are given up to a discussion which touches closely 
 
 another to substitute the title presbyterate for prieslhood, wilk a viein to denying 
 its sacerdotal character. 
 
 ' ' If therefore the sacerdotal office be understood to imply the offering of sacrifices, 
 then the Epistle to the Hebrews leaves no place for a Christian priesthood. If 
 on the other hand the word be taken in a wider and looser acceptation, it cannot 
 well be withheld from the ministry of the Church of Christ. Only in this case the 
 meaning of the term should be clearly apprehended ; and it might have been better 
 if the later Christian vocabulary had conformed to the silence of the Apostolic 
 writers, so that the possibility of confusion would have been avoided ' : p. 235 of the 
 Dissertations on the Apostolic Age. 
 See above, pp. 43, 75, 117. 
 
240 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 our present point. It is in the form of a historical sketch 
 of the introduction and development of what he calls the 
 'sacerdotal' ideas and phraseology; and it is, in effect, 
 a serious argument against the ' sacerdotalism ' of which he 
 speaks. 
 
 In such a sketch, or argument, everything turns upon the 
 question what exactly is meant by ' sacerdotalism.' And 
 I must submit that that which Bishop Lightfoot is found to 
 understand by it is just that which the sacerdotal language, in 
 its Christian acceptation, does not and cannot really mean. 
 But the misunderstanding, if misunderstanding it be, is one 
 which illustrates, with damning effectiveness, the tendency 
 towards error which is too truly suggested by what I must 
 call the misproportion of the unreformed language. 
 
 What does Bishop Lightfoot understand sacerdotalism to 
 mean ? He begins by a definition and distinction. ' The 
 word " priest " has two different senses. In the one it is a 
 synonym for presbyter or elder, and designates the minister 
 who presides over and instructs a Christian congregation : in 
 the other it is equivalent to the Latin •' sacerdos," the Greek 
 Upivs. or the Hebrew "^"2, the offerer of sacrifices, who also 
 performs other mediatorial offices between God and man . . . 
 The word will be used throughout this essay ... in the 
 latter sense only, so that priestly will be equivalent to 
 " sacerdotal " or " hieratic " ; ' p. 1 84 ; cp. 243 n. ' In speak- 
 ing of sacerdotalism, I assume the term to have essentially 
 the same force as when applied to the Jewish priesthood. 
 . . . Sacerdotal phraseology was certainly so used as to 
 imply a substantial identity of character with the Jewish 
 priesthood, i. e. to designate the Christian minister as one 
 who offers sacrifices and makes atonement.' Compare again 
 the comment upon the word 'sacerdotal' implied in the 
 opening paragraph of the essay : ' Above all, it [the kingdom 
 of Christ] has no sacerdotal system. It interposes no sacrificial 
 tribe or class between God and man, by whose inter\-ention 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 241 
 
 alone God is reconciled and man forgiven.' It is plain from 
 these passages that Bishop Lightfoot has (i) made the capital 
 mistake of taking the Mosaic use of the words ' priesthood,' &c. 
 as the truth and true standard of their meaning, and 
 measuring, by that, their meaning in the Church of Christ : 
 and (2) that he has gone on from this initial — and fatal — 
 mistake, to allow himself to consider (a) the sacrifices so spoken 
 of as things in themselves independent and absolute — as actual 
 offerings of atonement ; and so (b) the priests as a class really- 
 intervening, as indispensable intermediaries, between Christians 
 and their God. Thus he speaks of priests as a 'sacerdotal 
 caste ^ ' 'in some exclusive sense ' (to which the idea of 
 his standing to represent the congregation is regarded as 
 antithetical as ' an exclusive priesthood " ' ; of their claim 
 to ' sacerdotal privileges ' and ' sacerdotal sanctity * ' (phrases 
 which are not explained) ; of their claim to ' obedience ' on 
 pain of profanity and sacrilege^ ; and again, by implication at 
 least, of their being sacerdotal, and the Eucharist a sacerdotal 
 act, ' in the same sense in which the Jewish priesthood and 
 the Jewish sacrifices were sacerdotal'' '; of their ' vicarial' char- 
 acter — regarded as antithetical to being ' representative ' ; of 
 the interposing of the priest ' between God and man in such 
 a way that direct communication with God is superseded on 
 the one hand, and that his own mediation becomes indis- 
 pensable on the other And he not unnaturally concludes 
 by the position that the words themselves can only be retained 
 ' in a wider and looser sense ' than that which his argument 
 has treated throughout as if it were the one that most properly 
 belonged to them. 
 
 Now I must submit that at least half of the objections 
 which these different statements imply, are at once as mere 
 cobwebs swept out of sight by the conception which it was 
 my endeavour to emphasize in the third chapter, according to 
 
 * p. 260. ^ p. 261. ^ p. 262. * p. 250. 
 
 ° p. 257- ° P- 264- ^ P- 265. » pp. 265-6. 
 
 R 
 
242 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 which the Christian ministry is not a substituted interme- 
 diary — still less an atoning mediator — between God and lay 
 people ; but it is rather the representative and organ of the 
 whole body, in the exercise of prerogatives and powers which 
 belong to the body as a whole. It is ministerially empowered 
 to wield, as the body's organic representative, the powers 
 which belong to the body, but which the body cannot wield 
 except through its own organs duly fitted for the purpose. 
 What is duly done by Christian Ministers, it is not so much 
 that t/iey do it, in the stead, or for the sake, of the whole ; 
 but rather that the whole does it by and through them. The 
 Christian Priest does not offer an atoning sacrifice on behalf 
 of the Church : it is rather the Church through his act that, 
 not so much ' offers an atonement,' as ' is identified upon earth 
 with the one heavenly offering of the atonement of Christ.' 
 
 In the light of this one great principle, as I conceive, all that 
 the Bishop says about a sacerdotal caste, its exclusiveness, its 
 intervention, its sacerdotal privileges and sanctity, its demand 
 of obedience on pain of sacrilege, almost, or quite, totally 
 disappears. All that is said about atonement, mediation, sacri- 
 fice, is, at least, enormously modified. But this is not enough. 
 It is necessary to examine a little further where the truth 
 exactly lies about the fundamental words ' priesthood ' and 
 ' sacrifice ' ; and in so doing to show how hopeless is the 
 position which, assuming that these words have their true and 
 absolute meaning in the Levitical law, makes their meaning 
 in that the measure by which to tiy the correctness of their 
 meaning elsewhere. I pass then from all thought of the inter- 
 pretations — or misinterpretations — to which the unreformed 
 language, whether popular or official, have been, in fact, 
 unjustly or justly, liable, to the more fundamental question, 
 what do these words which are consecrated at least by well- 
 nigh immemorial Christian usage — what do 'sacrifice' and 
 ' priesthood ' really and rightly mean ? 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 243 
 
 II. 
 
 I said just now that it would be a superficial following of 
 Scripture which would lead men to strike out such words as 
 priest, priesthood, and sacrifice, from the familiar vocabulary 
 of the Christian Church. It would not only be superficial ; it 
 would be profoundly and fatally wrong. The Church of 
 Christ, as exhibited in the New Testament, is priestly and 
 sacrificial in substance, as the Church of the Old Testament 
 was only in figure. Mosaic priesthood, with its sacrifices, was 
 no more, on the one hand, a non-significant, than it was, on 
 the other, a complete or substantial, thing. It sketched out, 
 it led up to, it enacted parabolically, that which transcended 
 itself, that in which alone its detached, external, and symbolic 
 suggestions found their unity and fullness. All priesthood, all 
 sacrifice, is summed up in the Person of Christ. 
 
 It is one of the capital mistakes of those who discuss 
 Christian priesthood, a mistake which is answerable for some 
 of the most deplorable conclusions — to go back, for the 
 standard of the ' true ' or ' literal ' or ' proper ' meaning of the 
 words Sacrifice and Priest, to what they meant in the Old 
 Testament, or what they meant in the ancient pagan world, 
 or in the mouths of those who may be supposed to have first 
 devised the terms. Nothing could be more fatally misleading. 
 Not one of these. Pagan or Israelite, ever attained, ever so 
 much as conceived, the true idea of Sacrifice or Priest. They 
 were like prophets, who did not understand what they pro- 
 phesied. They never adequately realized the import of their 
 own acts or words. Considering where the real meaning of 
 
 R 2 
 
244 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 their acts lay, it was wholly impossible that they should have 
 grasped it. No, there is one standard only, and measure, of 
 the reality of the meaning of these words ; and that is, their 
 meaning in the Person of Christ. 
 
 Now the Person of Christ does not pass away from the 
 Church. The Church is the Body of Christ. The Spirit of 
 Christ is the Breath of the Life of the Church. Whatever 
 Christ is, the Church is ; as reflecting, nay, in a real sense 
 even as being. Himself. If we want to see in what the priest- 
 hood of the Church consists, or what the word priesthood 
 ultimately means, we must examine first what it means in the 
 Person of Christ. 
 
 Wherein, then, is Christ a Priest ? The answer perhaps 
 will be that He is a Priest in that He offered sacrifice ; and 
 that the sacrifice which He offered was the sacrifice of Him- 
 self. This answer of course is correct, as far as it goes. But 
 there are one or two directions in which it seems that, in order 
 to be anything like an adequate presentation of the truth, the 
 answer needs not a little supplementing. 
 
 First, then, it is of some importance to ask exactly when, 
 or how, was this priestly sacrifice offered by Him ? Does it 
 mean the moment of Calvary ? I do not stay now to dwell 
 upon the thought — true and valuable though it is — that His 
 entire life in mortal flesh was a sacrifice, a dying, a crucifying, 
 so that Calvary, however supreme as a culmination, was a culmi- 
 nation of, rather than a contradiction to, what the life before 
 had meant. But assuming that, upon the side of suffering, 
 the sacrifice of His death may be taken to be at least the 
 culmination — perhaps rather the consummation — of the sacri- 
 fice of His preceding life ; still, is it perfectly adequate to 
 point to Calvary, as, in the fullest sense, the consummation in 
 Him of all that is meant by sacrifice? 
 
 It is to be remembered that, even under the Mosaic law, 
 however indispensable death might be to sacrifice, death was 
 not in itself the consummation of sacrifice. The culminating 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 245 
 
 point of the sacrifice was not in the shedding of the blood, 
 but in the presentation before God, in the holy place, of the 
 blood that had been shed ; of the life, that is, which had 
 passed through death, and had been consecrated to God by 
 dying. It is not the death itself which is acceptable to the 
 God of life : but the vital self-identification with the holiness 
 of God, the perfect self-dedication and self-surrender which is 
 represented, in a life that has sinned, by voluntary acceptance 
 of penitential or penal death. It is the life as life, not the 
 death as death ; it is the life which has been willing to die, 
 the life which has passed through death, and been consecra:ted 
 in dying, the life in which death is a moral element, perpetu- 
 ally and inalienably present, but still the life, which is acceptable 
 to God. That blood means life, and not death, is insisted on, 
 almost paradoxically, in the Levitical law itself. ' For the 
 life of the flesh is in the blood ; and I have given it to you 
 upon the altar to make atonement for your souls ; for it is the 
 blood that maketh atonement by reason of the life. Therefore 
 I said unto the children of Israel, No soul of you shall eat 
 blood, neither shall any stranger that sojourneth among you 
 eat blood ^' 
 
 Here is the ritual, by which in the sacrifice of the Day of 
 Atonement ' sacrificial ' truth was prefigured symbolically : 
 ' Aaron shall present the bullock of the sin-offering, which is 
 for himself . . . and shall kill the bullock of the sin-offering . . . 
 and he shall take a censer full of coals of fire . . .and his hands 
 full of sweet incense, . . . and he shall put the incense upon 
 the fire before the Lord . . . and he shall take of the blood of 
 the bullock, and sprinkle it with his finger upon the mercy- 
 seat on the east ; and before the mercy-seat shall he sprinkle 
 of the blood with his finger seven times. Then shall he kill 
 the goat of the sin-offering that is for the people, and bring 
 his blood within the veil, and do with his blood as he did with 
 
 ' Levit. xvii. 11, 12. 
 
246 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 the blood of the bullock, and sprinkle it upon the mercy-seat, 
 and before the mercy-seat ; and he shall make atonement for 
 the holy place . . . 
 
 As, then, the shedding of the blood is not itself the con- 
 summation, but is the preliminary condition necessary for the 
 consummation, of the symbolic sacrifice under the Levitical 
 law ; so when we turn to the essential realities, though Calvary 
 be the indispensable preliminary, yet is it not Calvary taken 
 apart, not Calvary quite so directly as the eternal self-presenta- 
 ^ tion in Heaven of the risen and ascended Lord, which is the 
 true consummation of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. But of 
 course, in that eternal presentation Calvary is eternally implied. 
 Of that life, the is h^cpa-yixtvov the ' as it had been slain,' is 
 no mere past incident, but it has become, once for all, an 
 inalienable moi'al element. Christ's offering in Heaven is 
 a perpetual ever-present offering of life, whereof ' to have 
 died ' is an ever-present and perpetual attribute. If' Calvary ' 
 were the sufficient statement of the nature of the sacrifice of 
 Christ, then that sacrifice would be simply past and done, 
 which is in truth both now and for ever present. He is 
 a Priest for ever, not as it were by a perpetual series of acts 
 of memory, not by multiplied and ever remoter acts of com- 
 memoration of a death that is past, but by the eternal 
 presentation of a life which eternally is the ' life that died 
 
 But have we come really to an end of the ideas that are 
 involved in the word ' sacrifice ' by seeing wherein it culminates 
 in Levitical ritual, and how that ritual corresponds to the 
 sacrifice of Christ? What we see even in Him, is the form 
 which sacrifice took in a world of sin. But to see this hardly 
 
 ^ Levit. xvi. 11-16. ° Rev. v. 6. 
 
 ^ The words ' pleading,' or ' presenting,' in this connexion, must not be under- 
 stood as describing anything corresponding to specific acts done, or words spoken, 
 by Christ in His glory. His glorified presence is an eternal presentation ; He 
 pleads by what He is. Cp. Westcott on Hebrews viii. i, 2, and Milligan on the 
 Ascension, lect. iii. § 2. pp. 149-161. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 247 
 
 explains what is essentially meant by sacrifice. We see how 
 ' sacrifice ' found its expression in Him. Whatever sacrifice 
 in Him essentially meant, took the form of crucifixion. Is 
 sacrifice then identical with crucifixion? Or why did it take 
 this form ? Or what was that essential reality which uttered 
 itself in this form? The form which it took — the cross — 
 was, we cannot but be sure, the result of human sin. Is then 
 sacrifice a word which has no meaning, except in relation to 
 and as coloured by sin ? It will be observed that even if 
 we answer this question in the affirmative, there must still 
 be something behind, some essential root lower down, some 
 abiding reality, which, having no relation to sin in itself, 
 becomes 'sacrifice' as it passes within the atmosphere of sin. 
 Whether we still call it sacrifice ; or reserving the word 
 sacrifice for what sin has characterized, call it only that which 
 becomes sacrifice in the sphere of sin, is in part a verbal 
 question. But what is it ? What is that which is in no sense 
 dependent on, or correlative to, the presence of sin ? which 
 was from the beginning, and shall be to the end ? which, as 
 it passes within the shadow of sin, takes the form and hue of 
 what we call sacrifice, but which, whether it pass beneath the 
 cloud or no, whether tinged or untinged with the gloom and 
 the pain, is itself for ever the same? What is that which must 
 become sacrifice in sin's atmosphere ; and which sacrifice, as 
 it passes beyond sin's atmosphere, is found really to be? 
 There can be no doubt of the answer. It is love. Love is 
 not self-contained, but self-expending, and perfected in self- 
 expenditure. The devotion of love in the sphere of Heaven 
 is perfection of joy. But devotion of love to another in con- 
 ditions of earth — even whilst it touches the highest possibilities 
 of joy — means always more or less of pain. Devotion of self, 
 in a world of sin and suffering, to the spiritual welfare of those 
 who are enmeshed in suffering and sin, is forthwith, in external 
 aspect, sacrifice ; and, in inner essence, love. There is no 
 essential contrast between sacrifice and love. Love, under 
 
248 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 certain disabling conditions, becomes sacrifice ; and sacrifice 
 is not sacrifice, except it be love ^ 
 
 Thoughts like these are, it seems to me, of primary im- 
 portance, if we would understand the sacrifice of Christ. It 
 is the aspect which Divine love takes within the sphere of 
 certain conditions, which conditions are de facto inseparable 
 from our life on earth as it is. The heart of what it really is, 
 is the holy offering up of life, in love. Apart from sin it 
 would have been all life and all love. But life that has 
 sinned cannot offer itself perfectly to love, without dying to 
 sin. One aspect of love to God is hatred of sin. Man cannot 
 love God without hating sin ; nor love Him perfectly with- 
 out hating sin even unto death ; and since the sin is in himself, 
 surrendering himself unto death in detestation of sin, which is 
 the sinner's possibility of devotion to God. Divine love 
 then, in the nature of man, takes the form of self-surrender to 
 death. But so far from being, as death, the final object, this 
 death is only real as a mode of love, and a passage from sin 
 into holiness, which is life. If, verbally, we confine the word 
 
 ' See Dr. Milligan on the Ascension, lect. iii. p. 117, and his quotation from 
 Westcott on Hebr. ix. 9 : ' Sacrifice, in fact, in the most general form belongs to 
 the life of man, and, in the truest sense, expresses the life of man. It is essentially 
 the response of love to love, of the Son to the Father, the rendering to God in 
 grateful use of that which has been received from Him. Language cannot offer 
 a more expressive example of moral degeneration in vk^ords than the popular con- 
 nexion of thoughts of loss and suffering with that which is a Divine Service.' 
 Dr. Milligan is responsible for the capitals not only to Divine Service, but also to 
 the word Son. Bishop Westcott had printed ' of the son to the Father,' i. e. 
 of man to God, rather than of the Second to the First Person of the Blessed 
 Trinity. It may be doubted, however, whether Bishop Westcott does not go too 
 far on the verbal point : and whether the accidental alteration from son to Son — 
 utterly as it seems, at first sight, to alter the sense — may not really supply a test 
 by which to try the possibility of the Bishop's language. Could the word ' sacrifice ' 
 ever really have been used, or was it apt for use, in the mouth of fallen man, to express 
 ' offering ' save as it is conditioned by the fact of sin, i. e. as dependent upon the 
 inherent condition of death ? The reciprocity of the Father and the Son is eternal 
 love. Could it ever, with verbal propriety, be spoken of as eternal sacrifice ? Yet 
 love, under altered conditions, becomes sacrifice ; and no sacrifice can be real as 
 sacrifice which is not love. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 249 
 
 ' sacrifice ' to that which love becomes within the sphere of sin, 
 we must recognize at least in doing so that our word, so 
 defined, expresses not the central essence, but what is really 
 a secondary, if inseparable, aspect of that of which it speaks. 
 The essential heart of sacrifice is love ; pain and death are, so 
 to say, its acquired conditions. 
 
 By sacrifice then we mean Divine love ; — yet not Divine 
 love as it is in itself, but as it has become, once for all, by 
 entering within the circumstances of sin and pain : we mean 
 Divine love as it has suffered and died in the nature of man, 
 and as it is offered for ever, in the nature of man, alive from 
 sin to holiness and to God, through the consecration of death. 
 
 Such a definition of the sacrifice of Christ carries with it, 
 in effect, a corresponding definition of His priesthood also. 
 Christ is Priest in that He is the eternal offerer of this devo- 
 tion of love, which, though human, is yet living because it 
 died. Through death His priestly sacrifice is what it is ; it 
 is characterized by death ; yet it means, and is, not death but 
 living love. The act of death is never dissociable from it ; yet 
 what it really is, though inseparably characterized by death, 
 is not death, but is rather that which died and is alive. As 
 in the case of the use of the word 'sacrifice,' I would distin- 
 guish that which, because it has passed under certain conditions, 
 has now acquired, and is known by, its character of sacrifice, 
 from that which the same thing in itself essentially is, so that 
 the word sacrifice expresses a conditioned aspect of something 
 which is itself before it is sacrificial : so too with the use 
 of the words priest and priesthood, I wish to recognize that 
 since they are titles relative to sacrifice, they too describe an 
 aspect of something which is what it is before it acquires 
 this relative character to which the priestly language pro- 
 perly belongs. Sacrifice is love, within the sphere of sin, 
 suffering and dying ; and priesthood is the function of express- 
 ing and exhibiting that love which, once for all, in the Person 
 of Jesus Christ, has become, within sin's sphere, self-devoting 
 
250 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 sacrifice. The priesthood of Christ, then, is Divine love under 
 conditions of humanity. As such, it has at once a Godward 
 and a manward aspect. To manward it is the inconceivable 
 condescension and embrace of love, divinely redeeming ; to 
 Godward it is the homage, perfect and perpetual— as, primarily, 
 of human penitential atonement for sin — so also of human 
 sinlessness, and unblemished service, and response of love 
 worthy of God. 
 
 It follows very clearly from this that the so-called priest- 
 hood of the Old Testament is external and symbolic only. 
 The act of slaying a victim is a merely representative act. 
 It enacts a sort of outward parable of priesthood. It does 
 not touch the essence of what priesthood means. Willing- 
 ness, love, is of the essence of sacrifice. As the animal does 
 not willingly die, of love, but its death only presents an out- 
 ward figure of sacrificial dying, so on the part of the offerer, 
 neither the slaying of the animal, nor the sprinkling of its 
 blood, is in itself directly an act of moral import at all. 
 The enactment of the Old Testament is in itself outward 
 only. But true priesthood is an outward that is perfectly ex- 
 pressive of an inward, and is what it is by virtue of that real 
 inward to which the outward does but give utterance. It 
 seems to me of the utmost importance to insist upon this, and 
 upon the truth which corresponds immediately to this, namely, 
 that any definition of priesthood which stands in terms only 
 of what is ceremonial and outward and official is inadequate 
 and misconceived. There is an outward, but it is but the 
 shell or body or symbolic expression of an inward : only an 
 outward that is the outward of an inward is truly priestly : the 
 outward that rests in being outward — whether in the Jewish or 
 in the Christian Church — is only the symbol and shell, not the 
 truth, of priestliness. Certainly in Jesus Christ, the one true 
 and perfect Priest, it will at once be felt that what He did was 
 inseparable from its own meaning — inseparable, that is, from 
 what He Himself was. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 251 
 
 Now I have insisted that what Christ is, the Church, which 
 is Christ's mystical body, must also be. If Christ is Prophet, 
 the Church is prophetic. If Christ is King, the Church is 
 royal. If Christ is Priest, the Church is priestly. And if 
 Clirist's priesthood is. in relation to men, fundamental even to 
 His royal and prophetic aspects, then whatever tends to sup- 
 press or undervalue the essentially priestly character of the 
 mystical body of Christ, obscures a most fundamental concep- 
 tion of the truth ^ And this is undoubtedly the conception 
 of the New Testament. There pricstliness of character is a 
 consequence which outflows upon the Church from the Person 
 of Christ ; and the Church's priesthood being in its inner 
 truth the priesthood of Christ, is a substantial reality, and 
 stands therefore in contrast with that ' priesthood ' of the Old 
 Testament which did but symbolically represent reality. 
 Priesthood is not abolished, but consummated in Christ's 
 Church. 'The priests go in continually into the first taber- 
 nacle . . . into the second the high priest alone . . . the Holy 
 Ghost this signifying, that the way into the holy place hath 
 not yet been made manifest while as the first tabernacle 
 is yet standing : . . . but Christ having come a high priest 
 
 ' This thought receives a great deal of very valuable illustration in Dr. Milligan's 
 exposition of ' the Ascension and Heavenly Priesthood of our Lord,' particularly 
 the last three lectures. In lect. v. pp. 236-7, the principle is thus laid down: 
 ' From these considerations it follows that whatever function is discharged by our 
 Lord in heaven must be also discharged by His Church on earth. Is He, as 
 glorified, a prophet? The prophetical office must belong to her. It may, for the 
 sake of order, be distributed through appropriate members ; but primarily it 
 belongs to the Church as a whole, the life of Christ in His prophetical office being 
 first her life, and her life then pervading and animating any particular persons 
 through whom the work of prophesying is performed. In like manner is He 
 glorified Redeemer or King? The kingly office must also belong to the Church; 
 and if it is to be represented in any particular members rather than in the body as 
 a whole, her life must so penetrate and pervade them that they may be kingly. 
 If it be thus with our Lord's offices as Prophet and King, it cannot be otherwise 
 with that priestly office which is the foundation of both of these. All who allow 
 that our Lord is a Priest in heaven must, upon the principles now laid down, 
 acknowledge the pricstliness of the Church on earth.' 
 
252 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 of the good things to come , . . entered in once for all into 
 the holy place. . . . For the law having a shadow of the good 
 things to come, not the very image of the things, they can 
 never . . . make perfect. . . . Wherefore when He cometh into 
 the world He saith . . . Lo, I am come to do Thy will. . . . 
 By which will we have been sanctified through the offering 
 of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. . . . Having there- 
 fore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holy place by the 
 blood of Jesus . . . and having a great priest over the house 
 of God, let us draw near with a true heart in fulness of 
 faith, . , . not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together ^ 
 . . . Ye are not come unto a mount that might be touched . . . 
 but ye are come unto . . . the heavenly Jerusalem . . . and to 
 Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and to the blood of 
 sprinkling that speaketh better than that of Abel. . . . We 
 have an altar, whereof they have no right to eat which serve 
 the tabernacle. . . . Jesus, . . . that He might sanctify the people 
 with His own blood, suffered without the gate. Let us there- 
 fore go forth unto Him. . . . For we have not here an abiding 
 city, but we seek after the city which is to come 
 
 Compare all this with the language of St. Peter, ' Unto 
 whom coming, a living stone, rejected indeed of men, but 
 with God elect, precious, ye also as living stones are built up 
 a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual 
 sacrifices^ acceptable to God through Jesus Christ ^ ... ye 
 are an elect race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people 
 for God's own possession * ; ' and the parallel language of the 
 Revelation,' unto Him that loveth us, and loosed us from our 
 sins by His blood ; and He made us to be a kingdom, to be 
 priests unto His God and Father; to Him be the glory and 
 the dominion for ever and ever . . . ' Thou wast slain, and 
 
 ^ Cp. also above, ch. i. p. 14. ^ Hebrews ix. 6-xiii. 14. 
 
 ^ OiVos TTvevftariKus, teparfvfxa ayiov, dftveyKm iruevi^aTiKds dua'ias euirpoaSfKrov^ 
 Geo) 5ia 'Irjaov Xpiarov, I Pet. ii. 5. 
 
 ' Ftf OS ckXcktov, Paaiktiov hpartviia^ edvoi aytof, Kadi eh irfpnTolrjcriv, l Pet. ii. 9. 
 ° 'EiToirjatv rjnas paciXe'iav, Upus toi Qfai Hal narpl avTOv, Rev. i. 6. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 253 
 
 didst purchase unto God with Thy blood men of every tribe 
 and tongue and people and nation, and madest them to be 
 unto our God a kingdom and priests, and they reign upon the 
 earth . . . ' Over these the second death hath no power ; but 
 they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with 
 Him a thousand years-.' These passages are explicit, in the 
 use of the priestly as well as royal title ; but it may be doubted 
 whether as much might not have been legitimately inferred 
 from such more general statements of the identity of His 
 members with Christ as pervade the teaching of St. Paul. 
 ' In Him ye are made full, who is the head of all principality 
 and power : ... in baptism ... ye were also raised with Him. 
 ... If then ye were raised together with Christ, seek the 
 things that are above, where Christ is, seated on the right 
 hand of God. . . . For ye died, and your life is hid with Christ 
 in God 'God, being rich in mercy, for His great love 
 wherewith He loved us . . . quickened us together with Christ 
 . . . and raised us up with Him, and made us to sit with Him 
 in the heavenly places, in Christ Jesus . . . for we are His 
 workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which 
 God afore prepared that we should walk in them 
 
 Now it will be observed that all the passages thus referred 
 to are of general application. We need not desire to depre- 
 cate, but rather to emphasize with the utmost distinctness, the 
 essential truth that these phrases are not used of apostles or 
 of presbyters distinctively, but of the body as a whole, and of 
 it just because it is the body of Christ ; of it because of Him ; 
 and therefore of it, the whole, not of a part of it merely. The 
 
 ^ "Oti ((Tcpayrjs, «ai -i/'^upaaai tw Qfw (v tw aifiaTi aov eic Tiaarj^ (pv\fj's k. t. A. /cat 
 ino'iricra^ avTois tw ©fa) -^ixSiv fiaaiKuav kjlI Upus /cat fiaaiKiVovaiv int Trjs yrji, Rev. 
 V. 9, 10. 
 
 ^ 'EttI tovtcdv 6 StvTfpoi OdfOTOs oxiic i^ovaiav, aW' iaovrai Upeis rod Qeou 
 
 ical Tov Xpiarov, Rev. xx. 6. 
 ^ Col. ii. 10, 12 ; in. i, 3. 
 
 * Eph. ii. 4-6, 10. Cp. Rom. vi. 8 ; viii. 9 and 17 ; i Cor. ii. 16 ; Gal. ii. 20, 
 and ver. 19; 2 Tim. ii. 11, 12 ; &c., &c. 
 
254 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 whole body of Christ is priestly, with Him and in Him 
 ' raised up and made to sit in heavenly places,' ' offering up 
 spiritual sacrifices,' prepared unto 'good works.' But it is just 
 the priestly character of the Church as a whole which I first 
 desire to establish. If this be once conceded and understood, 
 I do not apprehend that much difficulty will remain about 
 the priestly character of the ministry of the Church. If those 
 be right who deprecate the use of the words priest and priestly, 
 all substantial reality in the conception of the priesthood of 
 the layman must go too ^ The priesthood of the ministry is 
 to be established not through depreciation, but through exalta- 
 tion, of the priesthood of the body as a whole. And in the 
 long run I do not believe that it is those who enter into the 
 solemnity of the universal priesthood, but rather those who 
 would eliminate priesthood and its solemnity altogether, who 
 will be the really uncompromising opponents of the priesthood 
 of the ministry. 
 
 In what then does the priestly character of the Church 
 consist ? The priesthood of Christ we found in His offering 
 of Himself as a perfect sacrifice, an offering which is not more 
 an outward enactment than an inward perfecting of holiness 
 and of love ; an offering whose outward enactment is but the 
 perfect utterance of a perfect inwardness ; an offering which, 
 whilst, so to say, containing Calvary in itself, is consummated 
 eternally by His eternal self-presentation before the pre- 
 sence and on the throne of God. The sacrificial priesthood of 
 the Church is really her identification with the priesthood and 
 sacrifice of Christ. With this priesthood and sacrifice she is 
 identified outwardly and inwardly ; by outward enactment 
 ceremonially, and by inwardness of spirit vitally. Christ Him- 
 self has prescribed for all time an outward ceremonial, which 
 is the symbolic counterpart in the Church on earth, not simply 
 of Calvary, but of that eternal presentation of Himself in 
 
 ' ' Sacerdotium laid, id est baptisma,' Jeiome, adv. Lucif. 4. Cp. Col. ii. 12, 
 quoted above. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 255 
 
 heaven in which Calvary isvitally contained. Through this sym- 
 bolic enactment, rightly understood, — an enactment founded 
 on and intrinsically implying as well as recalling Calvary, — ■ 
 she in her Eucharistic worship on earth is identified with His 
 sacrificial self-oblation to the Father ; she is transfigured up 
 into the scene of the unceasing commemoration of His sacrifice 
 in heaven ; or the scene of His eternal offering in heaven is 
 translated down to, and presented, and realized in the worship 
 on earth. Of course the outward ceremonial, as merely outward, 
 is valueless. But its use is solemn and responsible, just in 
 proportion as those who use it do, or might, enter into what it 
 means. This is her identification through outward ceremonial 
 enactment. 
 
 The correlative identification in inwardness of spirit will 
 require no doubt, first of all, an intelligence of spiritual appre- 
 hension reverently to apprehend the meaning of what is 
 outwardly done, and to adore and love what it apprehends. 
 But I should not at all like to express the meaning of the 
 inward identification only in terms of intelligent apprehension 
 of the outward ceremonial. Or if so, then intelligent appre- 
 hension means much more than it seems to mean. For this 
 identification of the Church on earth with the eternal presenta- 
 tion of the sacrifice in heaven, and with Him who presents the 
 sacrifice, means the reproduction in her of the Spirit of Him 
 who sacrificially offered Himself. It is Christ Himself who is 
 being formed in her It means therefore in her, as in Him, 
 the Spirit of Love which itself, in its outward expression on 
 earth, is self-devoting sacrifice; or conversely, the spirit of sacri- 
 fice, self-devotion, self-expenditure, which is, in the sphere of 
 human life and duty, the spontaneous and inevitable utterance 
 of the Spirit of Love, or of God. 
 
 The two aspects are inseparable aspects of one life. The 
 Church is priestly because from her proceeds the aroma of 
 perpetual offering towards God. The Church is priestly 
 
 ' Gal. iv. 19. 
 
256 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [en. 
 
 because her arms are spread out perpetually to succour and 
 intercede for those who need the sacrifice of love. Both 
 aspects are brought into relief when we think of the Church 
 as a small kernel or focus of brightness in the midst of the 
 world. Then the Church is God's priest in the world and for 
 the world, alike as presenting to God on the world's behalf 
 that homage which the world has not learned to present for 
 itself, and as spending and suffering for God's sake in ser\ace 
 to the world. I say that the thought of the Church as a spot 
 of light in the midst of surrounding darkness illustrates the 
 conception of her priestliness. But I would not so speak 
 as though the priestliness of the Church depended upon the 
 surrounding presence of the world. If all were baptized and 
 included as members within the Church, still the mutual ser- 
 vice of Christians one towards another — each for all, and all 
 for each — would be, both to Godward and to manward, a real 
 corporate priesthood ; a priesthood still, in the full sense of 
 sacrifice and suffering, as long as failure and sin, sorrow and 
 death remained ; a priesthood still, even when these were 
 gone, only transformed into that pure joy of love which had 
 been the underlying reality of priesthood all through. 
 
 The priestliness may be spoken of as essentially towards 
 God : only then this offering to God involves and contains 
 a viamvard devotion also. Or, qua priesthood, it may be 
 thought of as immediately to and for man ; only then this 
 manward devotion means the presentation of humanity as an 
 ojfering to God. The offering to God is an offering of humanity. 
 The service ' for others ' is ipso facto to Godw^ard. It is this 
 intense ' to Godwardness ' which makes the Church in the 
 world — whether surrounded by external contradiction or no — 
 a perpetual aspiration, and offering to the Father ; and there- 
 fore also, by inherent necessity, a perpetual reflection of what 
 He is, as revealed to the world in the Person of Jesus Christ. 
 It is this intense 'for-other-ness,' this marvellous spirit which — 
 Calvary apart — finds its highest expression historically in the 
 
VI I ] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 257 
 
 ' Blot me I pray Thee out of Thy book which Thou hast 
 written ' of Moses, or the ' I could wish that I myself were 
 anathema from Christ ' of St. Paul, — this spirit meanwhile 
 that has been, and still is being, so wonderfully, yet so 
 characteristically exemplified, all the world over, in great 
 things and in small, in the self-sacrificing ministrations of 
 Bishops and Pastors, in the tender, self-devotion of fathers or 
 mothers, comrades or brothers, wives or sisters, or teachers, 
 or nurses, or neighbours, or strangers, yes or even, with a 
 certain reflected fidelity, in outsiders, Samaritans, enemies, — 
 it is this, as well as reverent intelligence of Eucharistic 
 worship — this which in its highest perfectness is itself the 
 corollary and outcome of spiritually intelligent Eucharistic 
 worship— it is this which is the expression in ordinary terms 
 of human life of the true inwardness of the priesthood of the 
 Church. This is sacrifice taking practical form in the pro- 
 tectiveness of pastoral love : and there is no true pastoral love 
 without sacrifice. It is no unique fact only, but an eternal 
 principle which is recorded in the words : ' The good shepherd 
 giveth his life for the sheep.' And where is this not, in greater 
 degree or in less, continually going on ? Truly it is Christians 
 as such, it is the members of the Body — the partakers of the 
 Spirit — of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, who are the real 
 high priestly family on earth ^. 
 
 All this is the inherent privilege of the members of the 
 body of Christ. What, then, is the priesthood of Christ's 
 ordained ministers ? The priesthood of the ministry follows 
 as corollary from the priesthood of the Church. What the 
 one is, the other is. If the priesthood of the Church consist.s 
 ceremonially in her capacity of self-identification, through 
 
 ^ It is not unfair to apply to this thought the expression of Justin Martyr, oiVois 
 apxifpaTtKoy to d\T]9ivuv yivos (cr/^tev rod Qeov. But it is, far more exactly, 
 the very thought which Clement of Alexandria is upon in the passages quoted by 
 Bp. Lightfoot ; see above, ch. iii. p. 83. It is the echo of this thought which, 
 in spite of all its disproportions and negations, gives so much of nobleness to the 
 effort of Dr. Hatch's fifth Bampton Lecture. 
 
 S 
 
258 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 Eucharistic worship, with the eternal presentation of Christ's 
 atoning sacrifice, and spiritually in her identification of inner 
 life with the spirit of sacrifice which is the spirit of love utter- 
 ing itself in devoted ministry to others, so it is by necessary 
 consequence with the priesthood of the ministry. For the 
 priesthood of the ministry is nothing distinct in kind from the 
 priesthood of the Church. The ordained priests are priestly 
 only because it is the Church's prerogative to be priestly ; and 
 because they are. by ordination, specialized and empowered 
 to exercise ministerially and organically the prerogatives 
 which are the prerogatives of the body as a whole. They 
 have no greater right in the Sacraments than the laity : only 
 they, and not the laity, have been authorized to stand before 
 the congregation, and to represent the congregation in the 
 ministerial enactment of the Sacraments which are the Sacra- 
 ments — and the life — of both alike. I need not go over the 
 argument of the third chapter again. Any one who cares to 
 read that will understand that it is no part of the present 
 object to draw an essential contrast between the priesthood of 
 the Church and of the ministry. The powers, the privileges, 
 the capacities, are the powers and privileges and capacities of 
 the body as a whole. Only here, as there, we utterly protest 
 against the unauthorized scqtiittir which would conclude that 
 therefore the powers of the whole can be ministerially exercised 
 by any, or by all. It is not given to the eye to hear, nor to 
 the ear to see. Those who actually celebrate do but organically 
 represent, and act for, the whole. But the executive right, 
 the power to represent, and act for, and wield ministerially the 
 capacities of the whole, is not indiscriminate. Those w'ho stand 
 before the congregation, either as its representative organs to 
 Godward, or as the accredited ministers of God to it, must be 
 authorized and empowered so to do. We shall I believe 
 approach the truth in this matter, neither on the one hand 
 by exalting the ministry at the expense of the laity, nor on 
 the other — and even less — by dropping the distinctive words 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 259 
 
 priestly and priesthood ; but by insisting, in no metaphorical 
 sense, upon the sacred character and the solemn responsibility 
 of the priesthood of the Christian Church as a whole, and 
 (apart from its ministerial and executive sense) of every 
 individual lay-member of the Church ^ 
 
 But to return to the priesthood of the ministry. They are 
 Priests because they are personally consecrated to be the 
 representatives and active organs of the priesthood of the 
 Church. And they represent it emphatically in both of its 
 directions. In the ceremonial direction they represent it as 
 divinely empowered to be themselves its leaders and instru- 
 ments. And from this representative leadership in all external 
 enactment of worship and sacrament — itself no mean privilege 
 and responsibility — I apprehend that it follows also, on the 
 inward and spiritual side, that those who outwardly represent 
 the priesthood of the Church must no less specially represent 
 it in its true inwardness. The priest is not a priest in the act 
 of divine worship only. His personal relation to the priest- 
 
 ' Cp. the Tridentine Catechismiis ad Parochos, P. II. cap. vii. qu. 23: ' Sed 
 
 quoniam duplex sacerdotium in sacris Uteris describitur, alterum interius, alterum 
 externum ; utrumque distinguendum est, ut, de quo hoc loco intelligatur, a pastori- 
 bus explicari possit. Quod igitur ad interius sacerdotium attinct, omnes fideles, 
 postquam salutari aqua abluti sunt, sacerdotes dicuntur ; praecipue vero iusti, qui 
 spiritum Dei habent, at divinae gratiae beneficio lesu Christi summi sacerdotis 
 viva membra effecti sunt; hi enim fide, quae caritate inflammatur, in altari mentis 
 suae spirituales Deo hostias immolant ; quo in genere bonae omnes et honestae 
 actiones, quas ad Dei gloriam referunt numerandae sunt. [Then follow quotations 
 from Rev. i. 5, 6 ; i Pet. ii. 5 ; Rom. xii. i ; Ps. li. 17.] Quae omnia ad interius 
 sacerdotium spectare, facile intelligitur. Externum vero sacerdotium non omnium 
 fidelium multitudini, sed certis hominibus convenit. . . . Hoc sacerdotii discrimen 
 in veteri etiam lege observari potest ; nam de interiori Davidem locutum esse 
 paulo ante demonstratum est ; [sc. Ps. li. J 7] extemi vero nemo ignorare potest, 
 qnam multa Dominus Moysi et Aaroni praecepta dederit. . . . Quia igitur eandem 
 sacerdotii distinctionem in lege evangelica licet animadvertere ; docendi erunt 
 fideles, nunc de sacerdotio externo agi, quod certis hominibus attributum est ; hoc 
 enim tantummodo ad ordinis sacramentum pertinet.' It is only fair to bear this 
 passage in mind ; but it may be doubted whether it gives us all that we ought to 
 ask, so long as the priesthood of the layman is interpreted without reference to any 
 thought of care, or responsibility, for others. 
 
 S % 
 
26o 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 liness of the Church is something which has been conferred 
 on him once for all, and which dominates everything that he 
 does, or is. It does not cease when he leaves church. Only 
 its external opportunities are altered — not its essential 
 character — when he is withdrawn from parochial office al- 
 together. Wherever he is, he still, in his personal life, bears 
 the same relation to the Church, and to the world. He 
 cannot but be a representative pcjsoiia. He is always, in his 
 own spiritual attitude and effort — to Godward for man, to 
 manward for God — called to realize, and (as it were) to personify, 
 the characteristic priestliness of the Church. This is not 
 because he is an intermediary between Christ and His Church; 
 it is not because he is something which the Church is not ; 
 but because he is set to represent, in his own personality, with 
 an eminent distinctiveness, that which the whole Church cannot 
 but essentially be. If she is priestly because from her pro- 
 ceeds the aroma of a perpetual offering — her mystical identity 
 with the perpetual self-offering of her Lord — before the 
 Majesty of the Father's presence ; if, in corresponding necessity 
 of spirit, she is priestly because her arms are perpetually 
 lifted up to intercede for, and to succour, those who need the 
 sacrifice of love ; ever presenting to God on their behalf the 
 homage which they have not learnt to present for themselves, 
 and spending and suffering for God in service to them ; so is 
 it with him, as by God's will and act specially ordained to be 
 her ministerial representative. 
 
 The inwardness, then, of priesthood is the spirit of sacrifice ; 
 and the spirit of sacrifice is the spirit of love in a world of sin 
 and pain, whose expression in the inner soul is priestly inter- 
 cession, and whose utterance in the outward life is devotion of 
 ministry ' for others ' : — for others, from the Christ-like point 
 of view, as for those for whom Christ died. The Levitical 
 priesthood belonged distinctively to the side of ceremonial 
 function, and might be both adequately fulfilled and ade- 
 quately defined in terms of ceremonial enactment only ; but 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 261 
 
 a Christian priesthood misapprehends itself which can be 
 content to find the beginning and end of its definition or 
 meaning in terms only of what is outward and ceremonial, or 
 in any sacramental service, however intelligent it may be 
 or reverent in itself, which does not sweep in the whole heart, 
 and action, and life. There are not only priestly functions, or 
 priestly prerogatives: there is also a priestly spirit and a 
 priestly heart — more vital to true reality of priesthood than 
 any mere performance of priestly functions. Now this priestly 
 spirit — I must repeat it once more — is not the exclusive 
 possession of the ordained ministry ; it is the spirit of the 
 priestly Church. But those who are ordained ' priests ' are 
 bound to be eminently leaders and representatives of this 
 priestliness of spirit, and they have assigned to them an 
 external sphere and professional duties which constitute a 
 special opportunity, and a charisma of grace which consti- 
 tutes a special call and a special capacity, for its exercise. 
 Such opportunity and call are inseparable from the oversight 
 of the life of the Christian body to Godward, and they are 
 as wide as is the life of the Christian body. Leadership in 
 Eucharistic worship, truly understood, is its highest typical 
 expression, the mystical culmination of its executive privilege; 
 but Eucharistic leadership, truly understood, involves many 
 corollaries of spirit and life — the bearing of the people on the 
 heart before God ; the earnest effort of intercessory entreating ; 
 the practical translation of intercession into pastoral life, and 
 anxiety, and pain. Things like these are necessary elements 
 in that inwardness of spirit which should correspond to and 
 explain the outward dignity of executive function ; and apart 
 from which the outward dignity of executive function, even 
 in its highest point of mystical reality, is as the shell or the 
 shadow, the outward presentment and image, the technical 
 enacting — not the true heart — of Christian priesthood. 
 
 It is necessary, then, to emphasize unreservedly the truth 
 that the priesthood of ministry and of laity are not really 
 
262 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 antithetical or inconsistent, but rather correlative, com- 
 plementary, nay, mutually indispensable ideas ^ Magnify 
 first the solemnity of ministerial priesthood, and then from 
 that expound the dignity and power of the priesthood of the 
 laity ; or, if you will, magnify lay priesthood first, and mount 
 from thence to its concentrated meaning in those who are set 
 apart personally to represent the collective priesthood, and to 
 wield it ministerially : in either case your exposition will lead 
 to results which will be no less true than they may well be 
 felt to be amazing. But use the phrases ' priesthood of the 
 laity ' (or ' priesthood of the body ') in order to discredit the 
 idea of ministerial priesthood ; and from ministerial priest- 
 hood thus explained away turn to draw out what the universal 
 priesthood practically means ; and you will have succeeded, 
 with admirable skill, in conjuring both realities into empty air. 
 It will only remain to toss the whole nomenclature aside, as 
 an unmeaning or misleading metaphor. 
 
 I have thought it convenient, upon the whole, to leave in this place the phrase 
 ' priesthood of ministry and of laity.' But it has been pointed out to me — and the 
 observation is of some importance — that there is a certain inexactness in the collec- 
 tive phrase ' priesthood of the laity,' which cannot be alleged against Jerome's 
 ' sacerdotiuni laid.' The laity, collectively as laity, have no distinctive priesthood. 
 There is a collective priesthood of the ministry ; and there is a collective priest- 
 hood of the body as a whole. In this all members of the body, whether ministers 
 or laymen, share. But though there is assuredly a priesthood in which every lay- 
 man should claim part, yet any phrase which seems to imply that the laity 
 corporately, as laity, have a priesthood in which the ministry does not share, or 
 which may be set over against the priesthood of the ministry, is, so far, misleading. 
 
VII] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 263 
 
 III. 
 
 It will be observed that if the present contention be true, 
 if the Church of Christ is, because Christ is, inherently priestly, 
 and the ministry of the Church is the ministerial presentment 
 of the Church's priestliness, and priestliness, to be real, must 
 be the perfect outward expression of correspondingly perfect 
 inwardness, there will follow a principle of considerable im- 
 portance. It will follow that the ' priestly ' aspect of the 
 ministry, whose executive culmination is Eucharistic leader- 
 ship, and its aspect as guiding and governing with general 
 oversight (e-nia-KOTn]), or as ministering pastorally to, the Body 
 and its members, are not things substantially different : they 
 cannot be properly sundered : each in its reality requires and 
 implies the other : they differ not as two things, or as three, 
 but as several aspects of one. The true priestliness necessarily 
 carries with it the pastoral character : the real pastoral char- 
 acter is but an expression, in outward life, of priestliness. 
 And if they thus, of inward necessity^, contain and imply 
 each other, then of course they must always have done so, 
 from the very first. ' Sacerdotalism ' may have acquired some 
 disproportionate exposition, or been linked to exaggerated 
 claims : but if sacerdotalism, na7!2e and tiling, be in any true 
 sense a later accretion to the idea of Christian ministry ; if it 
 did not, in essence, belong to it inherently from the first ; if 
 oversight of the Christian body had not always this inner 
 
 ' It is not denied, of course, that either can be — and often has been — artificially 
 taken apart, in injurious and un-Christlike isolation from the other. Only in its 
 proper richness of Divine power can neither of them be realized without the other. 
 
264 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 character, and this inner character did not always imply the 
 spirit and activities of pastoral oversight — then indeed we 
 must sorrowfully admit that our entire interpretation is at 
 fault ; and with it, the mind and language of the Church as 
 a whole, for at least some seventeen centuries. 
 
 But were the two things ever separate ? Think first of the 
 Scripture. Now I shall admit that in the words of Scripture, 
 both the connexion of Christian ministry with Eucharistic 
 leadership, and the application to Eucharistic worship of 
 sacrificial and priestly language, is less explicit than we might 
 perhaps at first sight have expected. One or two reasons, 
 however, suggest themselves which constitute a perfectly 
 sufficient answer to any question on this score. First and 
 foremost. Christian life and Christian worship are essentially 
 spiritual. If the spiritual expresses itself by material means, 
 the material means are to be only expressions of the spiritual. 
 Any approach to very strong insistence, in the Scripture 
 itself, upon the means, as such, would almost inevitably have 
 resulted in an exaggeration of the intrinsic sanctity of what 
 was outward and mechanical. Considering the extreme readi- 
 ness of human nature to take refuge from spiritual reality in 
 mechanical observance ; considering the extent to which this 
 has been done, and (one may almost say) the daily difficulty 
 of preventing its being done, in this very matter of the 
 materializing of sacramental worship — we can hardly, on 
 second thoughts, feel any surprise if, in the scriptural picture 
 of the Apostolic Church, we find a marked and most im- 
 pressive reserve from any such emphasis on the external 
 ordinances of religion. But if there is, in the Acts and Epistles, 
 less direct emphasis than mere men might have laid upon 
 sacramental outwardness, it remains none the less — but rather 
 the more — emphatically to be remembered, first, that to the 
 Church and her life the atoning Blood of Christ (including 
 in that word not its shedding only, but its offering in heaven) 
 is everyt]iing ; secondly, that Jesus Christ bequeathed, when 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 265 
 
 parting from this life, an ordinance, universally prescribed to 
 Christians, as the symbolic embodiment and realization of that 
 atonement in its fullest inclusiveness ; and thirdly, that since 
 this command remained, and remains, unmodified and un- 
 modifiable, the reserve of the New Testament can never be 
 taken as throwing a doubt upon, but as assuming, this: and 
 this being assumed as the basis of distinctively Christian 
 worship and life, all that it does say belongs to the exposition 
 of the spiritual inwardness which is to be expressed and con- 
 tained in this. If there is one case more than another to 
 which Dr. Dale's half-paradoxical canon would apply — viz. 
 that the fundamental importance of any element in Christi- 
 anity is almost in inverse ratio to the frequency of its mention 
 in the New Testament — it is this. 
 
 And the second reason is this, that both Acts and Epistles 
 were written at a time when sacrificial and priestly language 
 were dc facto identified with the symbolic, ceremonial, and 
 unreal priesthood and sacrifices of the Mosaic law. To have 
 simply taken over the language while the Temple was 
 standing and its worship in full force, tJien to have called 
 Christian ministers, as such, tepei?, and the breaking of the 
 bread simply dva-La, would have led to inextricable misunder- 
 standing and confusion. What was possible without confusion, 
 and what was necessary for apprehension of the truth, was to 
 explain that that priesthood and those sacrifices were symbolic 
 only and unreal ; that Christ only was the true Priest, and His 
 sacrifice the only real sacrifice ; which, coupled with the basal 
 Christian principle, that the bread and the cup are the 
 Church's ceremonial identification with Christ in His sacrifice, 
 and that a real identification^ with Him in His sacrifice 
 is the one essentia of the Church's life, constitutes the whole 
 
 ' The real identification is very complete, and covers the whole range of life. It 
 involves, according to scripture, con-crucifixion, con-burial, cor-resurrection, co- 
 ascension, cou-session in heaven. Gal. ii. 20; v. 2.^ ; vi. 14 : Rom. vi. 2-1 1 : Col. 
 ii. 12; ill. I : Eph. ii. 5, 6. 
 
266 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 essence of sacrificial and priestly doctrine. All this the New 
 Testament does emphatically teach. 
 
 It follows, I think, that when all this came to be more and 
 more completely apprehended, and when, with the passing 
 away of Judaic priesthood and sacrifice, the pressure of imme- 
 diate ambiguity died away from the words, it was, on New 
 Testament principles, quite inevitable that the terms priest and 
 sacrifice should be more and more current in the Christian 
 Church. Of course such a growth into terms (however inevit- 
 able) which at first were, with good cause, restrained, was 
 not, and was not likely to be, a sudden thing. It was, in fact, 
 a perfectly natural growth, not a break or a change. The 
 analogy with the old order v/as impressively felt, as analogy, 
 before it was realized that the old order itself became real 
 only in the new. The terms were used as highly instructive 
 metaphors before they came to be familiar titles. Titles, 
 indeed, they could hardly be with any completeness, until not 
 only the Temple service had come to an end, but the concep- 
 tion of the Temple service had ceased to furnish the normal 
 and regulative standard by which the direct significance of 
 the terms would be measured ^. 
 
 If it be once admitted that the ' breaking of the bread ' was 
 the essential Christian service from the first, and that it meant, 
 
 ' Canon Gore says {The Church and the Elinistiy, p. 196): ' Irenaeus and 
 Clement do not speak of the Christian ministers as priests, while Tertullian and 
 Origen do.' But he is speaking of the ' regular ' use of the words as titles. Long 
 before Tertullian and Origen, the familiar use of dvataarripiov for the Christian 
 altar in the letters of Ignatius; the terms in Clement of Rome, vpoacpopai, Swpa, 
 6va'ia alviafwi for the Eucharist, dpxi^p^v^ tSiv TTpoa<popwv (of Christ), vpoatvcfKtiv 
 TO. buipa, Xdiovpyuv tSi noifiv'ia) (of presbyters) ; in the Didaclie the use of Ovala 
 (of the weekly Eucharist), and the suggestion of 01 dpx'fpf's ^i^^^v (of the prophets) ; 
 the dvcnaaTTjpiov of Hebr. xiii. 10 (on which see more fully below, p. 269); even 
 St. Paul's lepovpyuv (of his own ministry), Rom. xv. 16 — are at the least instructive 
 metaphorical suggestions, and many of them stages beyond mere suggestiveness or 
 metaphor, on the road towards the simple titular use of Ova'ta and Upds, as cor- 
 relative terms, in relation to those who enact on earth the Church's celebration of 
 the Sacrament of the Sacrifice, and to that which the Church so celebrates through 
 them. But all these are spoken of more fully below. 
 
VI I ] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 267 
 
 and was, the Church's identifying with the offering of the 
 Body and Blood of the Lord, everything follows in order 
 from this one fact. When was the Eucharist administered ? 
 or how ? or how often ^ ? or by whom ? If not, in the absence 
 of Apostles, by those who had been constituted by the 
 Apostles as elders and heads of the Church in every place, 
 then by whom ? If it were not implied of course as part of 
 the leadership of the prcsbyteral office, then we must needs 
 have good evidence^ of the existence of some other distinct 
 and necessarily higher stratum in the spiritual order for the 
 breaking of the bread. But if it were implied in the prcsby- 
 teral office, then it could not but characterize the presbyteral 
 office, seeing what a place it necessarily had in the life and 
 life's meaning of the Church. To those who governed the 
 flock, who watched for souls, and taught them and fed them, 
 and should ' give account ' for them, was not the Eucharistic 
 offering an element, and if an element, then of inherent 
 necessity the culminating element — in a sense even, if spiritually 
 apprehended in its full inwardness, the all dominating, all inclu- 
 sive element — in their official prerogative? 'Take heed unto 
 yourselves,' cries St. Paul to the elders of Ephesus, ' and to all 
 the flock, in the which the Holy Ghost hath made you bishops, 
 to feed {■noi\xaiviLv) the Church of God, which He purchased 
 with His own blood.' How much of the awful allusiveness 
 is taken out of these words if he is not, in fact, speaking to 
 those who week by week, at least, were indeed as pastors 
 feeding the Church of God with the very blood by which they 
 had been bought ! And if he is — and on the most general 
 view of the facts as a whole it is difficult even to conceive that 
 
 * As to the question ' how often,' see further below, p. 269, note 3. 
 
 * Perhaps the 'prophets' of the Didache will be offered as evidence. But in 
 face of the assumptions and terminology of Clement of Rome, Ignatius, Polycarp, 
 and Barnabas, it is impossible to rely on the ' prophets ' of the Didache. [See 
 above, ch. vi. p. 176 sqq.] Moreover, the Didache itself, with singular directness, 
 connects the local WiaKonoi with the local weekly necessity of the celebration of 
 the ' Sacrifice.' 
 
268 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 he is not — how idle to argue either that the connexion of 
 presbyterate with Eucharist or of Eucharist with thoughts, if 
 not terms, fundamentally sacrificial — and priestly in a sense far 
 transcending Aaronic priestliness — are unknown to, and alien 
 from, the Church of the Apostles ! When St. Paul says of 
 himself, ' We are a sweet savour of Christ unto God, in them 
 that are being saved, and in them that are perishing : to the 
 one a savour from death unto death ; to the other a savour 
 from life unto life. And who is sufficient for these things^? ' 
 and again, ' Our sufficiency is of God, who also made us 
 sufficient as ministers of a new covenant, . . . the ministration 
 of the spirit, . . . the ministration of righteousness,' by reason 
 of the surpassing glory whereof the dazzling glory of Moses 
 was outdazzled — it is clear that he is speaking of Christian 
 ministry as such. In order to make a plausible argument for 
 excluding from the idea of such Christian ministry the great 
 Christian sacrament, it would be necessary to show something 
 more than the merely negative fact that the New Testament 
 does not emphasize the specific connexion. It would be 
 necessary to show cithci- that, in the New Testament, the life of 
 the Church does not centre in ' fellowship with the Father, and 
 with His Son Jesus Christ'; oi- that the Holy Communion is 
 not the characteristic Christian service ; or that, — though both 
 these things in themselves be true, — yet the New Testament 
 has expressly made severance between the solemnly appointed 
 ministerial methods of tlie Church's spiritual life, and that 
 executive ministry of the Church which was, as ministration 
 of Spirit, so surpassing in glory. It is needless to say that 
 there is no shadow of justification for conclusions such as 
 these. 
 
 All this seems to me to be implicitly contained in every 
 part of the New Testament. When we come to the Epistle 
 to the Hebrews, we have an elaborate exposition of the Levi- 
 tical priesthood as both transcended - by, and consummated 
 
 1 2 Cor. ii. 15, and iii. ^ Hebr. iii-viii. ^ Hebr. ix, x. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 269 
 
 in, the priesthood of Jesus Christ ; we have, based immediately 
 upon this Christian priesthood, a solemn exhortation to keep 
 fast to the Christian assembly, the Divine access to God 
 through the Blood and Flesh of Jesus Christ ^, the sanctifying 
 ' Blood of the Covenant,' which not to reverence is to 'tread 
 under foot the Son of God ' and ' do despite unto the Spirit 
 of grace -.' There follows (in ch. xi) the noble outburst of 
 enthusiastic glorification of the spirit of faith, and (in ch. xii) 
 the a foriiori contrast of the Divine revelation of the earthly 
 Sinai and the spiritual Zion, ' the heavenly Jerusalem,' ' Jesus, 
 the mediator' of the ' new covenant,' the 'blood of sprinkling' 
 that transcendeth Abel. And so, passing to the close of the 
 whole Epistle (xiii. 10 sqq.), we come to the emphatic claim 
 to ' an altar ^,' as the distinctive prerogative of Christians. 
 
 ' Hebr. x. 19-25. Cp. also above, p. 14. ^ Hebr. x. 26 sqq. 
 
 ^ The alteration of Bishop Lightfoot's interpretation of the Ovaiaarripiov of Hebr. 
 xiii. 10 is very remarkable. In the dissertation as originally published he wrote : 
 ' The sacrifices are praise and thanksgiving and well-doing, the altar is the con- 
 gregation assembled for Christian worship.' In its ultimate form the last clause has 
 become ' the altar is apparently the Cross of Christ.' Now as to the real outcome 
 of either of these interpretations, or the word in the original, or any similar hints 
 in the New Testament, it hardly seems to be sufficiently realized how largely a true 
 exegesis must depend upon the historical question what was, and what was not, the 
 practical thought and life of the Apostolic Church. Was the Eucharist the climax 
 of their distinctive worship ? the regular symbol and channel of their spiritual 
 life? There are several indications in the New Testament which would most 
 naturally suggest (as in the Didache) a weekly, there is a phrase which seems to 
 assert a daily, Eucharist. Into the question between these two we need not 
 enter. I am not aware that any other alternative can be plausibly suggested. 
 Now either they did, or they did not, live, and work, and suffer, and adore, in the 
 continual habit of a regular Eucharistic celebration, which was to them, verily and 
 indeed, the Koivaiv'ia tov awfiaros — the Koivmv'ia tov aifmros — of Christ. If they did 
 not do so, then no doubt we may look right and left, when we meet such a phrase 
 as that of Hebr. xiii. 10, for whatever analogical or symbolic meaning may satisfy 
 our religious fancy most. But if they did, then such phrases must, in all reason, 
 be interpreted in the light of this, their liturgical practice. In this case it does not 
 follow that OvaiaaTTipiov is the direct name for the piece of wood or stone on which 
 the bread and wine stood, as 'altar' with many of us is the name which stands as 
 a label for a particular piece of historical church furniture ; on the contrary, it may 
 be of considerable importance to insist that this was a secondary, not a primary 
 usage of the word (cp. Bp. Westcott in loco) ; but it does seem to me altogether to 
 
270 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 'Through Him, then,' thus it proceeds in ver. 15, 'let us offer 
 up a sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of 
 lips which make confession to His Name I do not suggest 
 that the phrases of this verse have what would be called 
 a literal or direct — far less an exclusive — reference to the 
 Eucharistic celebration, but can any one suppose that to those 
 who were living, in fact, in the fellowship of the breaking of 
 the bread, and finding in it their communion with the Body 
 of Christ, the Eucharistic celebration could ever have been less 
 than the palmary meaning of the Christian ' sacrifice of praise 
 and thanksgiving ' ? When the writer goes on to exhort his 
 hearers, ' But to do good and to communicate forget not, for 
 with such sacrifices God is well pleased,' he is still upon the 
 expression in act of that inwardness of spirit which is itself the 
 result — not of the typical, and external, sacrifices of the law, 
 
 follow that, however much more inclusive or indefinite may be, to thought, the 
 entire connotation of the word, the Eucharistic celebration must, after all, be that 
 among concrete things which it most directly signified, and which most fully em- 
 bodies and expresses its meaning. If the main principle be once granted, both the 
 meanings given by the Bishop — and others, perhaps, besides them — may be readily 
 allowed. The 'Cross of Christ' (which seems to me essentially to concede the 
 whole point at issue) may be directer and fuller than ' the congregation assembled 
 for Christian worship' ; but both are true; and, on analysis, both will mean the 
 same thing. Either, in its highest culmination of earthly enactment, can only 
 be the celebration of the Christian Eucharist. 
 
 ' @va'iav aluiaews, from Psalm 1. (' Will I eat the flesh of bulls, or drin'K the blood 
 of goats ? Offer unto God the sacrifice of thanksgiving ; and pay thy vows unto 
 the Most High,' vv. 13, 14; and 'Whoso offereth the sacrifice of thanksgiving 
 glorifieth Me ; and to him that ordereth his conversation aright will I show the 
 salvation of God ' ; ver. 23) : so Clem. Rom. ch. xxxv ; see below, p. 273. Both here, 
 and in the passage of St. Clement, and everywhere else (as in the prayer of oblation 
 in the Pra\er-book), it is, I conceive, quite inevitable that any such phrase as this, 
 our ' sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving,' describing the distinctively Christian 
 offering of service, should have its supreme reference as well to the outward cele- 
 bration, as to the inward and spiritual character, of the sacramental Eucharist : 
 not (as I have said above) exclusively, nor always directly, but as the highest 
 embodiment, at least, and symbol of what Christian thanksgiving and praise mean. 
 To a distinctively Christian experience, Qvala olvtatwi could no more ultimately 
 fail to express the aspiration and joy of ' Holy Communion,' than ivx<^ff^ria to 
 find its consummating significance in ' the Eucharist.' 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 271 
 
 but of spiritual union with the Body and Blood of Christ. 
 And how near topics Hke these bring him to the thought 
 of their regularly constituted Christian ministry is, to say the 
 least, strongly suggested by the words which immediately 
 follow : ' Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit 
 to them ; for they watch in behalf of your souls, as they that 
 shall give account ; that they may do this with joy, and not 
 with grief : for this were unprofitable for you.' He goes on 
 to ask their prayers for himself, and ends with a form of 
 solemn blessing, the very terms of which echo still, as in 
 the language of the twentieth chapter of Acts, the implicit 
 thought of the shepherds feeding the flock which was pur- 
 chased with Christ's Blood : ' Now the God of peace, who 
 brought again from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep 
 with the blood of the eternal covenant, even our Lord Jesus, 
 make you perfect in every good thing to do His will, working 
 in us that which is well pleasing in His sight, through Jesus 
 Christ ; to whom be the glory for ever and ever. Amen.' 
 
 The only thing that seems still to hesitate at all is the 
 directness of nomenclature. I have already given reasons why 
 this could not but hesitate at the time of the New Testament, 
 but have also noticed already that even in the New Testament 
 the Christian Church is to St. Peter a new lepareu/xa, to offer up 
 spiritual sacrifices \ and Christians are to St. John Upds : to 
 which we must add that St. Paul, in a strain which is no doubt 
 for the moment largely figurative, begins to use hieratic 
 language of his own ministry : ' The grace that was given me 
 of God, that I should be a minister of Christ Jesus unto the 
 Gentiles, ministering the gospel of God, that the offering up of 
 the Gentiles might be made acceptable, being sanctified by the 
 Holy Ghost ^.' It is certainly true that ' ministering in sacrifice ' 
 
 ' 'Aveyiyicai vvivp.aTiKa^ Ovular (vnpoahtKTOvs tSi Q(ai 6id 'Irjaov Xpiarov, I Pet. 
 ii- 5- ^ 
 
 ^ Eh TIJ uva'i jxt XiiTovpyov XpiiTTov 'Irjaov th ra (ffvrj, Upovpyovvra tu (vayy(\iov 
 TOV &eov, iVa yifrjTat 77 upoaipopa. tuiv iOvuiv evnp6aSei:Tos, fjyiaajiivrj iv nvevp.aTi 
 ' ky'tw, Rom. xv. 16. 
 
272 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 (see R. V. margin) and ' ofiering ' are not in this passage used 
 directly of the Eucharist. Once grant, however, that the 
 Eucharist was what it surely must be allowed to have been to 
 the writer of the tenth and eleventh chapters of i Cor., under- 
 stood in harmony (at least) with the tenth chapter of Hebrews, 
 i. e. was at once the Christian ' proclaiming ' and the Christian 
 ' communion of the only one real sacrifice of the only one real 
 priest — which every Levitical sacrifice did but outwardly and 
 unreally symbolize — and it is hard to see how hieratic language 
 used of Christian ministry could fail to have ultimate reference 
 to the Eucharist. Often indeed it may not be spoken of the 
 Eucharist quite directly ; but however little it is to be confined 
 to any outward enactment whatever, it is hard to see how such 
 language can fail to find at least its crowning exemplification 
 and expression ceremonially in that Sacrament of the Sacrifice 
 which constituted the distinctive worship and characterized the 
 distinctive life of the Christian Church. 
 
 When we pass beyond the Scripture it is plain, even from 
 the very earliest moments, that such a strain of thought was 
 taken for granted. The earliest writers do not dream of 
 arguing it. If in some ways they are a little more explicit 
 than Scripture, they are like Scripture in this, that the propor- 
 tion of the truth in this matter is not so much a thesis insisted 
 on as a hypothesis assumed. 
 
 So it is with the writers of the Didache. The Christian 
 congregation must not fail in the perpetual sacrifice as pro- 
 phesied by Malachi. Week by week, every Lord's day, it 
 must be offered with regularity — in purity; and therefore must 
 the Church in every place provide itself with its own bishops 
 (i. e. presbyters) and deacons ^. Could there be a more 
 
 ^ Kara KvpiaKTfli Z\ Kvpwv (TvvaxOevTfs KXaaaje aprov Kai tiixapiarriaaTe 
 ■iTpoae(ofxokoyr)aafiivoi rd TrapavTui/xaTa iipSiv onus KaOapa fj Bvala TjpiSiv 77 . . . iva 
 fx-fj Koivwdrj fj Ova'ia tipwV avTrj yap iariv ij prfOuaa viru Kvp'toV iv navTi tottoj «ai 
 Xpuvw Tipoaipepnv p.01 Ova'iav uadapav otl 0aai\(vi ptiyas (Ipti, \iyei Kvpios' Kal tH 
 dvopa pov 6avpia(jTuv iv rots (dvtai. x^'/""''"''?''''''''^ "2'' io-vTols iinaiconovs Kal 
 Stanovovs d^iovs rod Kvpiov, k. t. A.. Chap, xiv, xv. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OE CHRIST 273 
 
 striking testimony than this, which, coming out so incidentally 
 in a context which can hardly be called either sacerdotal or 
 episcopal, shows quietly, without emphasis or self- conscious- 
 ness, what was at least a characteristic and leading thought of 
 the meaning of presbyteral office ? 
 
 St. Clement's letter to the Corinthians is certainly not 
 occupied with special or pointed insistence upon this aspect 
 of the ministry. And yet it is unmistakably there. The 
 thought is learning to fix itself upon Christ as High Priest, 
 and as High Priest in relation to the ' offerings ' of the 
 Christian Church, and upon the Christian service as ' the 
 offerings,' and upon the presbyteral office as the office chiefly 
 characterized (as far as outward routine of office goes) by the 
 presentation of the offerings. Thus, to put a few passages 
 together, after quoting the last eight verses of the fiftieth 
 Psalm, verses which immediately follow upon a denunciation 
 of merely external sacrifice in comparison with ' the sacrifice 
 of thanksgiving,' and which themselves culminate in the words 
 ' the sacrifice of thanksgiving (atfeo-eo)?) shall glorify me, and 
 therein is a way which I will show to him, the salvation of God ' 
 (LXX), St. Clement goes on, ' This is the way, beloved, in 
 which we found our salvation — Jesus Christ, the High Priest 
 of our offerings, the defender and helper of our weakness.' Put 
 this with the forty-first chapter, where after emphasizing the 
 discipline, order, and precision of the offerings and services 
 (irpoacpopal Kot KeLTovpyiai) of the old covenant, of high priest, 
 priests, Levites, and layman (6 Aauo's), he goes on, ' Let each 
 one of you, brethren, make his thanksgiving (evxaptoretrco) to 
 God in his own ordered place {iv 7(2 tSi'w rdyiJ-aTi), being in 
 a good conscience, not overstepping the appointed line of his 
 service (ju,?) ■nc.peK^aivoiV tov oypLajj-ivov rrjy XeLTOvpyias aiiTov 
 Kavova), in awe ^' After this we are prepared for the terms in 
 
 ^ The parallelism between the phrases and ideas used of the Levitical and the 
 Christian offerings respectively is, throughout these chapters, very close. Thus : — 
 I. To offer the Levitical service is iroiuv rds rrpocr<popds ; iTtirtkuv T<is irpoa<popds 
 
 T 
 
274 MIXISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 which he speaks of the presbyters and their office in chap. 44. 
 The Apostles, he says, had carefully provided for a perpetual 
 succession, that when those died whom they themselves had 
 ordained, others from them might take up their ministry {ti]v 
 XeiTovfjyiav avrar). ' Those, then, who were constituted by them 
 or by their successors with the assent of the whole Church, 
 and who have ministered blamelessly to the flock of Christ 
 (AetroupyTjo-aiTas afj.eix~To)^ rw ttolixvlm tov Xpiarov) in lowliness of 
 spirit, quietly and modestly, receiving for many years universal 
 testimony, these men cannot righteously be thrust out from their 
 ministry (d-o3aAAeo-^at riyy XeLTovpyiai). For we shall incur 
 no light sin if we thrust out from their presbyterate (eTrio-KOTr^s) 
 men who have blamelessly and reverently presented the gifts. 
 Blessed are the presbyters who have finished their course 
 before ... for they fear not lest any should remove them from 
 the place to which they have been appointed {a-d tov Itpvixivov 
 avToU ToiTov). For we see that there are men of good Christian 
 lives whom ye have removed from the service which they had 
 served in honour without reproach (ck r?/? apefx-Tm avTois 
 TeTip.ripiin]s KeLTovpyias).' We may notice also the phrases of 
 
 KOI KeiTovpylai. To offer the Christian sendee is (vxapiOTtiv ; vpoatpepav ra Swpa ; 
 XfiToupye?!' ; Xarovpyftv tS) Troi/iv'taj tov ^pidTov. 
 
 2. It is of necessity that the Levitical ofTerings must be ovk dKij ^ aTciKraJs ; 
 Kara Katpovs Tfray fJivovs ; ihpiapi.ii'ots Katpots «ai iiipaii ; ttoG re koI 5id t'ivojv 
 iniTtXtiaOai 6e\et aiTos wpicrev.l 
 
 So in the Christian offerings, though there is no single place or moment for 
 them, j'et eacli member of the Church must abide in his own Tayim, not over- 
 stepping TOV iipia jj-ivov TTjs XtiTovpy'ias avTov Kavuva. 
 
 3. Those who thus conform to Leritical order are tiirpoaSeKToi Tf Kal /laKaptoi' 
 ToTs yap vofjlfiois tov AtaiioTOV dKoXov9ovvTes ov Sia/xapTavovaiv. 
 
 So the Christian presb)ters who have done their part aright have served an 
 aiieffrrrcos TtTipi-qnivrj XeiTovpyia. MaKapioi are they who have been allowed to 
 live and die in that service. 
 
 The Levitical phrases are chiefly in ch. 40. The Christian in 41 and 44. It is 
 to be added that the intervening ch. 43 contains a solemn reminder to the Corin- 
 thians how peremptorily God had vindicated the Aaronic priesthood from such as 
 presumed to invade it without anthorit)'. 
 
 All this, it is to be remembered, is a _firsi century comment upon the character 
 of the Christian presbyterate. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 275 
 
 chap. 59, ' God the creator and bishop of every spirit ' ; and of 
 61, ' We acknowledge Thee through the high priest and 
 defender of our souls, Jesus Christ '; and 64 again, ' through 
 our High Priest and defender, Jesus Christ.' 
 
 To me it seems plain that the actual form taken by the 
 Corinthian insubordination and sin against the unity and 
 order of the Church ^ was an intrusive transgression, by those 
 unauthorized because unordained, beyond their appointed 
 place and line in the Christian service {SipitryLivov Kuvova r^s 
 XiiTQvpyia^) : and that this intrusion into the presbyteral office 
 meant specifically an intrusion into the ' offering of the gifts,' 
 which was itself a sin against the true high-priesthood of 
 Jesus Christ, who is called both the * High Priest of the souls ' 
 and the 'High Priest of the offerings' of Christians. It is 
 plain also that this revolt of which he thinks and speaks with 
 such exceeding gravity, was to the mind of the writer un- 
 reservedly parallel with the great revolt against the Aaronic 
 priesthood in Numbers xvi, xvii. In all this, both in his 
 assumptions and in the silent unconsciousness with which he 
 makes them as of course, St. Clement seems to me to re-echo 
 and to illustrate, precisely in the way we should most have 
 expected, the essential position and meaning, as I have tried 
 to interpret it, of the Scripture itself. 
 
 It is not of course meant that to St. Clement any more than 
 to St. Paul this one aspect of what was implied in presbyter- 
 ship swallowed up all the others. To describe a presbyter 
 simply as a ' sacrificer,' or ordination to presbytership as the 
 ' conferring of power to offer sacrifice,' would have probably 
 been as surprising to the one as to the other. Immediately, 
 no doubt, the presbyteral oflfice made demands upon its 
 holders of very varied and anxious responsibility, and there- 
 
 * Cp. 54 : Ti's oZv fv vfjiv ytwatos ; tIs (vairKayxvos ; t/s ireTrXrjpOKpoprjfiivos 
 dycnrrjs; elnaToi- El 5t' t/^i ffrdais xal ipis «ai axtaixara, (Kxojpw, dna/xt ov iav 
 ^ovXrjffOf, Kai ttoiSi to upoaiaaauufva hub tov rrKriBovs' jiuvov to noii^fiov tov 
 Xpiarov ('iprjutviroj fiera. tZv KadfOTafjiivajv TTpto^vriptuv. 
 
 T 2 
 
276 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 fore presented a prima facie appearance in which no ceremonial 
 observance, however far-reaching or profound in significance, 
 would be the one thing that first would meet the eye. But 
 what is contended is that, nevertheless, the idea of Eucharistic 
 leadership, with all the corollaries that were in fact contained 
 and implied therein, was present inherently from the very 
 first as one necessary aspect of the office. It might seem 
 almost incidental to the general conception of spiritual over- 
 sight and government, and responsibility for teaching and for 
 life. It might be thought of just as the culminating instance 
 of the executive duty and prerogative of an office which was 
 characteristically not made up of executive duty and pre- 
 rogative. But however incidental it may have looked to the 
 eye, the point is that it always was — with all the meanings 
 that really belonged to it — assumed as an inherent property 
 of presbyteral ofifice. That it must have been so of some office 
 in the Christian Church seems to be a necessary corollary 
 from the Epistles to the Hebrews and to the Corinthians. 
 That it was so of presbyterate seems to be implied with 
 sufficient clearness by St. Paul, and, without argument, tacitly 
 taken for granted alike by the writers of the Didache and by 
 St. Clement. 
 
 We find in Ignatius, as we might expect, the same strain of 
 thought with a somewhat accentuated clearness. It will be 
 remembered that he does not take the presbyteral office apart. 
 The presbyterate to him is always as a council or a ' coronal ' 
 of which the bishop is the culminating point. But what con- 
 cerns us immediately is that, to St. Ignatius, the unity of the 
 ' bishop with the presbyterate ' means always, as of course, 
 Eucharistic unity. 'Ie/jei$ is still distinctively a Jewish title ; 
 but the relation of Christianity to the Jewish lepery is not 
 that of a novelty which supersedes in the sense of abolishing, 
 but rather of an inclusiveness which supersedes in the sense 
 of absorbing them : for the presence of Christ is characteristic 
 of the Church ; and if they claim to be priests, the Christian 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OE CHRIST 277 
 
 claim outdoes theirs, on their own ground ; for the one real 
 High Priest is Christ. And so the unity of the Eucharist is 
 the unity of ' the altar.' ' Let no one be deceived. Except 
 a man be within the altar, he is deprived of the bread of God. 
 For if the prayer of one or two is of so great force, how much 
 more that of the bishop and the whole Church together ^ ? ' 
 ' He that is within the altar is pure, that is to say, he that 
 docs anything apart from the bishop and the presbytery and 
 the deacons, he is not pure in conscience ' That ye may be 
 obedient to the bishop and the presbyters with a mind that 
 cannot be moved, breaking one bread, which is the medicine of 
 immortality, the antidote against death ' One prayer, one 
 supplication, one mind, one hope in love. . . . Come ye all 
 together as to one temple of God, as to one altar, to one 
 Lord Jesus Christ ' (Lightfoot, ' as to one temple even God ; 
 as to one altar, even to one Jesus Christ, who came forth from 
 One Father and is with One and departed unto One ') 
 
 ' Be dutiful then to use one Eucharist : for there is one 
 flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup unto union of His 
 blood : one altar, as there is one bishop with the presbytery 
 and deacons 'The priesthood [i.e. of the Jews] is good; 
 but better is the High Priest to whom was entrusted the Holy 
 of Holies, to whom alone were entrusted the hidden things 
 of God — Himself the door of the Father through which enter 
 in Abraham and Isaac, and Jacob, and the prophets and the 
 Apostles and the Church. These things all of them work 
 towards the oneness of God. But the Gospel has somewhat 
 peculiarly its own, the presence of the Saviour, Jesus Christ 
 our Lord, His passion, and His rising again. For unto Him 
 the beloved prophets in their teaching looked on ; but the 
 Gospel is the perfecting of immortality. All things together 
 
 ' Eph. V. ^ Trail, vii. ^ Eph. xx. 
 
 ' Magn. vii. See also Magn. ix : ixrjKfrt aa0l3aT'i^ovT(s dWcL KarcL Kvpia/cfjv 
 (a/vT(s ev ?! koX 17 ^aitj yfuuv AvfTuKtv. Compare the phrase ' living according to the 
 Lord's day ' with Didache, ch. xiv. 
 
 '- Philad. iv. 
 
278 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [cH. 
 
 are good, if ye believe, in love^' In Smyrn. viii no Eucharist 
 is vaHd except it be under the bishop or one appointed by 
 him 2. 
 
 When all these passages are put together and dispassionately 
 viewed, it seems to me impossible to deny that eveiy essential 
 conception of the priestliness of the Christian ministry^ as of 
 the priestliness of the Christian Church, as I have endeavoured 
 to expound it above, is present — implicitly at least and essenti- 
 ally — within the New Testament; and with increasing explicit- 
 ness and familiarity to the thought and in great part to the 
 speech of the Church, by the close of the first or the opening 
 of the second century. 
 
 That the view here given is a true reading of the history on 
 this matter seems to me to be abundantly corroborated when we 
 look at the passages which Bishop Lightfoot has himself cited 
 in his essay in respect of the intervening time from Ignatius 
 to Cyprian. Thus he quotes Justin Martyr as arguing 
 against an unconverted Jew, ' We who through the name 
 of Jesus have believed, . . . having divested ourselves of our 
 filthy garments . . . are the true high-priestly race of God, as 
 God Himself also beareth witness, saying that in every place 
 among the Gentiles are men offering sacrifices well-pleasing 
 unto Him and pure. Yet God doth not receive sacrifices from 
 any one except through His priests. Therefore God antici- 
 pating all sacrifices through this name which Jesus Christ 
 ordained to be offered, I mean those offered by the Christians 
 in every region of the earth with the thanksgiving [lul rfj 
 evxapicrTia) of the bread and of the cup, beareth witness that 
 they are well-pleasing to Him, but the sacrifices offered by 
 you and through those your priests He rejecteth ^ . . .' Now 
 for what purpose does the Bishop cite this passage ? It is 
 
 1 Philad. ix. 
 
 - Observe that TroifiTjf is equivalent to bishop in Ignat. Rom. ix, Philad. ii. 
 
 ^ Dial, cum Tryph. 116, 117. The prophecy of Malachi is reminding of the 
 Didache, 14, and the antithesis evapiarovi ... 06 TrpoahtxtTai, of the tvtrpoattKTOi 
 of Rom. XV. 16 and i Pet. ii. 5. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 279 
 
 in order to show on the one hand that Justin does ' lay stress 
 on sacerdotal functions ' ; on the other, that these ' belong to 
 the whole body of the Church, and are not m any way the 
 exclusive right of the clergy ' [the italics are mine]. But is 
 this really a self-consistent theory ? If the Church performed 
 ' sacerdotal functions,' by whose instrumentality did she per- 
 form them? It is quite clear that by the Christian sacrifices 
 Justin means the celebrations of the sacramental Eucharist. 
 It is also quite clear that in Justin's own well-known descrip- 
 tion this ' sacrifice ' is celebrated in fact by the one ' president ' 
 of the congregation. But might it have been celebrated 
 equally by any other Christian ? Of course this is not 
 suggested by Bishop Lightfoot. But ought it not to have 
 been suggested, if the position is to be really a consistent 
 one ? If the Christian Church is a ' priest,' offering ' sacrifice ' 
 in the perpetual Eucharist ; if the function of representing the 
 Church in this her priestliness, and ministerially celebrating 
 the Eucharistic ' sacrifice,' is not indiscriminate, but confined 
 to instruments by ordination specially set apart, then it would 
 seem to be simply misleading to say that the ' sacerdotal 
 functions ' are not in any way the exclusive right of the clergy. 
 The sense in which they are ' the right of the clergy may be 
 less important than, and may be wholly dependent upon, the 
 sense in which they are ' the right of ' the body as a whole ; 
 but whilst the clergy constitute an order empowered to be, in 
 this matter.the Church's representative instruments oxpersonae^ , 
 there certainly is ' a way ' in which the functions may be said 
 to belong, even ' exclusively,' to the clergy. 
 
 Bishop Lightfoot has previously said (p. 244), ' A separation 
 of orders, it is true, appeared at a much earlier date, and was 
 in some sense involved in the appointment of a special 
 ministry. This, and not more than this, was originally con- 
 tained in the distinction of clergy and laity.' I do not desire 
 ' more than this.' But, read with this, the outcome of the 
 
 ^ Compare the remarks on ihe same passage above, pp. 87, 88. 
 
28o 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 passage of Justin will be that whilst only certain ministers, 
 authorized as such, could ministerially exercise the ' priest- 
 hood ' and offer the ' sacrifices,' yet the sacrifices which they 
 offered and the priesthood which they exercised were the 
 sacrifices and priesthood of the Church as a whole, and of her 
 ministers rather as the representative organs of her power, 
 than as a power apart, standing outside of her, or between her 
 and God. This of course is exactly the view which I have 
 been interpreting. But how is it relevant to the Bishop's 
 argument ? That argument seems to me to fall to the ground, 
 if it be once conceded that the ministerial celebration of the 
 Eucharist was the right of some and not of others, according 
 as they were, or were not, ordained to ministry. 
 
 Must it not then be said that the Bishop has been misled by 
 a false antithesis ? Is not his argument really based upon 
 the assumption that the priesthood of the Church as a whole, 
 and a ministerial priesthood within the Church, or at least a 
 ministerial priesthood divinely authorized and delimited, are 
 mutually incompatible ideas ? He is bound therefore to use 
 the passage in Justin in a way which will only lead to contra- 
 dictions. But the passage fits at once perfectly to our view, 
 and confirms it in every particular. 
 
 Again, when he comes to Irenaeus and Clement of Alex- 
 andria, I cannot but submit that there is another false 
 antithesis underlying his argument. He writes as if men who 
 recognized that the true heart of Christian priesthood was in 
 inward and spiritual reality were ipso facto excluded from 
 acknowledging an outward and ministerial priesthood at all. 
 Upon this pseudo-antithesis I have dwelt sufficiently in an 
 earlier chapter. But if it be swept away, there is nothing left 
 in his citations from these two fathers. They both, in fact, 
 believed in an episcopal succession continuous from the 
 apostles ; and Clement shows explicitly that he recognizes 
 the de facto ' presbyter and deacon and layman,' or, elsewhere, 
 the ' bishop, presbyter, and deacon,' none the less distinctly 
 
VII] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 281 
 
 because he knows that reahty of presbyterate — inwardly, ulti- 
 mately, in the presence of God — depends not on earthly rank 
 but on spiritual character. The same two fallacies completely 
 undermine what he says of Tertullian and Origen. But 
 I need not repeat what I have said of these before, and par- 
 ticularly of the use which he makes of the Montanist position 
 of Tertullian ^. 
 
 Whilst therefore I do not believe that Bishop Lightfoot's 
 position is true in this matter even of the apostolic epistles 
 themselves, I certainly cannot admit that he has made 
 it good in respect of either the sub-apostolic writers, or 
 those who intervene between these and St. Cyprian. From 
 St. Cyprian onwards he would admit that this ' sacerdotal ' 
 language has been the received language of the Catholic 
 Church. It has been, then, in admitted possession for at least 
 1,600 years. I must submit that its essential reality is plainly 
 discernible for over 200 years more. Even the very complete- 
 ness of its acceptance from the middle of the third century 
 might well suggest that it was rather in implicit agreement 
 than in any real contrast with that universal sense of the 
 Christian Church, into which, upon any showing, it fitted so 
 easily and so completely. We may do well to separate our- 
 selves from all language which would fairly imply a belief in 
 the existence of a distinct caste, of higher holiness or strictly 
 mediatorial power, as if by any right of its own to offer sacri- 
 fice, or in any proper sense of the word to ' atone ' ; but I must 
 venture to think that the theological judgement — or instinct — 
 of the Anglican reformers, who, in the face of the destructive 
 flood of Edwardian and Bucerian Protestantism, retained with 
 deliberate emphasis the Christian ' priesthood ' as apostolic 
 and perpetual in the Church of Christ, is at once more con- 
 sistent, more scriptural, and more profound, than any con- 
 siderations which have been or can be urged to palliate a 
 
 See above, pp. 7S-86. 
 
282 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 modification in this respect of the welhiigh immemorial 
 language, expressive as it is of the wholly immemorial mean- 
 ing, of the Christian Church. Had Bishop Lightfoot's argument 
 been directed, not (as it is) against the whole association and 
 language of ' sacerdotalism,' but rather against a certain mis- 
 conceived and disproportioned idea of sacerdotal association 
 and language, the outcome — and we must add, the value — of 
 his dissertation would have been very different. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 283 
 
 IV. 
 
 Now I have dwelt for some time upon the interpretation 
 and vindication of this ' sacerdotal ' and ' sacrificial ' phrase- 
 ology. It will, however, be obvious that it is, after all, precisely 
 in this respect that the Anglican Ordinal does make deliberate 
 and decided departure from the unreformed language and 
 thought. All direct language about the power to ' offer 
 sacrifice/ which, by a process of gradual accretion, had come 
 to be at last so continually and so emphatically reiterated in 
 the Sarum Pontifical, is removed, and other things are 
 emphasized in its place. What is the nature and meaning of 
 this crucial alteration? 
 
 Now the answer seems to me as simple as it is important. 
 It is one thing to admit the reality of sacrificial language ; it is 
 quite another to make it the one definition and measure of 
 Christian ministry. We have seen something of the progress 
 of gradual development, by which this one aspect or thought 
 — not merely colours so far the office of the Christian presbyter 
 as to justify the instinct of the Church in stamping upon the 
 word * presbyter ' whatever associations rightly belong to its 
 shortened form ' priest,' but itself — becomes the characteristic 
 essence, the one differentia, the adequate definition of ' pres- 
 bytership.' But if we go back to the really early indications, 
 still more if we go back to Scripture itself, it is impossible 
 not to be struck with a wide difference of proportions in this 
 respect. Whatever we may, by perfectly just constructiveness, 
 infer and understand about Christian ministry, it seems to be 
 perfectly undeniable that, in the New Testament, {d) the ' sacer- 
 
284 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 dotal ' idea of the ceremonial offering of Eucharistic sacrifice 
 is nowhere obviously upon the surface, as the one constitutive 
 idea of Christian ministry, whether apostolic or presbyteral, 
 and (b) certain other conceptions emphatically are. 
 
 Take the sketch of apostolate through the whole of the fourth 
 chapter of i Cor. ; or again the second and four following 
 chapters, or again the eleventh chapter, of the Second Epistle. 
 The first of these is a picture of inconceivable outward con- 
 temptibleness culminating in ' the filth of the world, the 
 offscouring of all things'; the second expressly combines 
 inconceivable glory in spiritual work upon souls with the same 
 paradoxically extreme depression, contempt, dying upon the 
 earth ; the third is, to the end of time, a most marvellous 
 picture in detail of humiliation and endurance, culminating 
 above all in ' that which presseth upon me daily, anxiety for all 
 the Churches.' Turn from these again to presbyterate as indi- 
 cated in the Pastoral Epistles or in the solemn words of St. Paul 
 in the Acts, ' I hold not my life of any account ... so that 
 I may accomplish . . . the ministry which I received from the 
 Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God.' . . . 
 ' Take heed unto yourselves and to all the flock in the 
 which the Holy Ghost hath made you bishops, to feed the 
 Church of God which He purchased with His own blood ; ' 
 words which in more ways than one recall our Lord's own 
 picture of the true Pastor : ' The good shepherd layeth down 
 his life for the sheep.' 
 
 I was myself arguing, not long ago, that the thought of 
 the Christian ' sacrifice of Eucharist,' the ' sacrament of the 
 Christian sacrifice,' is in some of those passages very near 
 at hand. But it is not upon the actual surface of any one of 
 them. What then is really the foreground of the picture ? 
 Whatever may be by just inference implied and contained, 
 what is that which stands forward as the dominant idea 
 of the whole? It is something far more general, and more 
 inclusive of all vital activities and meaning, than anything, 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 285 
 
 however mysterious and far-reaching, in the form of ceremonial 
 observance. It is the unreserved offering, the total self-dedica- 
 tion, of what is, on. the one side, wise oversight, anxious fore- 
 thought and rule, an unwearied guidance, preaching, teaching, 
 discipline, and on the other side withal boundless endurance, 
 joy only in completeness of utter sacrifice. It is the care of 
 an utterly loving pastor, a shepherd who tends, feeds, nurses, 
 rescues, and is ready to die for the souls of his flock. All this 
 belongs exactly to that inner reality of the spirit and the life 
 which, as I urged just now, should be the true inwardness of 
 the outward representation of the sacrifice of Christ. This is 
 in no sort of antithesis with ceremonial Eucharistic leadership. 
 But this is its true reflection, in spirit and life, — the inward 
 which should correspond with that outward so perfectly, that 
 that outward should be just its true utterance. 
 
 In Scripture then it is this vital inner aspect which is dwelt 
 upon so prominently ; the mode of its official enactment in 
 ceremony is rather implied than expressed. But by the six- 
 teenth century the official performance of sacraments had come 
 to be more and more the entire definition of the office ; the 
 inwardness of which that should be the outward, the pastoral 
 self-surrender, had practically ceased to be mentioned at all. 
 It is a striking fact, but in the unreformed office for ordaining 
 Priests — with all this emphasis upon the outward and cere- 
 monial celebration of mysteries — you will search in vain 
 for anything like a corresponding recognition of this pastoral 
 inwardness of priesthood. The word ' praedicare,' the word 
 ' caritas ' (neither of them enlarged upon), and such phrases 
 as ' exemplum conversationis suae,' are some of the nearest 
 approaches (see above, pp. 224-8). Of the pastoral respon- 
 sibility for the flock, expressed so awfully in the twentieth 
 chapter of the Acts, there is not one word. It is, then, not 
 the sacerdotal idea or language in itself, but this dispropor- 
 tioned emphasis upon the outward aspect of the sacerdotal 
 idea, from which the Anglican Ordinal clearly departs. It was 
 
286 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 felt that this emphasis at the least seriously jeopardized the 
 proportionate apprehension of the truth. Every over-empha- 
 sized truth is itself, in another aspect, untruth ; and the 
 untruth which was bound up with this over-emphasis made 
 itself obvious in the more and more absolute overshadowing 
 of the whole pastoral ideal ^ 
 
 Here then is the point of a real and characteristic shifting 
 of conception. And what is it that the Anglican Ordinal 
 does ? It fixes the eye, first and foremost, just as St. Paul in 
 the New Testament does, upon the thought of the self-dedica- 
 tion and surrender, the pastoral responsibility, the service of 
 the flock, the cure of souls — the life-absorbing inner and 
 spiritual relation — in which, and of which, ' administration of 
 sacraments' comes in as the highest method, the culminating 
 point of executive privilege and power. Whatever is true in 
 fact ' sacrificially ' or ' sacerdotally,' comes in as a necessary 
 aspect, or element, or part, of the Church's spiritual govern- 
 ment and leadership. In so far as these things are really 
 contained and implied in a true interpretation of Christian 
 ' priesthood,' they are given to those to whom the Christian 
 ' priesthood ' is deliberately given^ with whatever it contains or 
 means. The formal celebration of the Eucharist may be the 
 very highest of its administrative methods, the most glorious 
 and wonderful of its executive privileges ; yet priesthood itself 
 is something more vitally inclusive than any mystery of 
 formal executive privilege. Eucharistic leadership inheres in 
 Christian priesthood rather as the supreme method of priestly 
 executiveness than as a thing quite apart, a sort of separate 
 magic, in which the whole width of the priestly idea is merged. 
 Say what you will of the stewardship of the Divine mysteries ; 
 of the ghostly prerogatives of pronouncing forgiveness, or 
 
 ^ Of course, in making this criticism on the ' unreformed' Ordinal, I am making 
 no assertion as to the actual unreformed Ministry. Aspects which are far from 
 adequately represented in the official documents may receive much more justice 
 in practical life. No doubt there have been, and are, vast numbers of most 
 admirable Roman pastors. 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 287 
 
 retention of sins ; of Eucharistic celebration as the culmina- 
 tion and crown of what these things mean ; though every one 
 of these things can be materialized, degraded, vulgarized, — yet 
 in its true setting every one of these things is true, and in 
 their truest reality one and all are necessarily contained in the 
 priesthood of the Church. But, however august, all these 
 things belong to the executive machinery and method of 
 a Christlike ' cure of souls,' whose meaning can never be 
 exhausted by anything in the sphere of ceremonial method. 
 Neither does any dignity of ceremonial method, though divinely 
 prescribed, stand over against the ' care of all the Churches ' as 
 a separate or a higher thing. It is then this central meaning, 
 this spiritual inwardness of the office of Church leadership as 
 a whole, which stands in the forefront of the Anglican Ordinal, 
 as that upon which the thought is primarily centred. Through- 
 out that most solemn exhortation addressed to all candidates 
 for priesthood the ring of St. Paul's words in Acts xx is never 
 absent. It is to a ' high dignity,' to a ' weighty office and 
 charge ' that they are called ; ' to be messengers, watchmen, 
 and stewards of the Lord; to teach and to premonish; to feed 
 and provide for the Lord's family ; to seek for Christ's sheep 
 that are dispersed abroad, and for His children who are in the 
 midst of this naughty world, that they may be saved through 
 Christ for ever. Have always therefore printed in your 
 remembrance how great a treasure is committed to your 
 charge. For they are the sheep of Christ, which He bought 
 with His death, and for whom He shed His Blood. The 
 Church and congregation whom you must serve is His Spouse 
 and His Body. . . . Wherefore consider with yourselves the 
 end of your ministry towards the children of God, towards the 
 Spouse and Body of Christ. . . . ' All this is cardinal and 
 primary. But the solemn administration — and discipline — of 
 sacraments, the ' binding and loosing,' are also emphasized, 
 if no longer as the one thing which Christian priesthood 
 means, yet in their place, in perfect order, as the supreme and 
 
288 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 typical summing up of all ordinances of outward administra- 
 tion ^. ' Will you give your faithful diligence always so to 
 minister the Doctrine and Sacraments, and the Discipline of 
 Christ, as the Lord hath commanded, and as this Church and 
 Realm hath received the same ?'...' Receive the Holy Ghost 
 [for the ofifice 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 dis- 
 penser of the Word of God and of His holy Sacraments.' . . . 
 'Take thou authority to preach the Word of God, and to 
 minister the Holy Sacraments.' . . . 
 
 Now I do not feel in the least bound to maintain that in 
 every particular the Anglican Ordinal represents the highest 
 perfectness of proportion or expression that is ideally possible. 
 I do not feel in the least concerned to deny that some traces 
 of the great influence of the Protestant reaction are discernible 
 in it too ; that the excision, for instance, of the formal delivery 
 of the chalice and paten and of all direct mention of Euchar- 
 
 ^ Compare the proportion of these thoughts in Apost. Constitutions, VIII. xvi : 5os 
 Svvamv wpos TO KOTTiav afirouj Xoyw Kai €pyw ci's oiKoSofMr)v tov \aov aov . . . tov 
 avTiXafiPavtaBai Kai Kvfi(pvav tov Xaov aov . . . Kai vvv Kvpn Trapaaxov aviXXmts 
 TTjpuiv iv Tipiv TO TTVtvixa T^? x°P"'°' ^o"' oTtttis TiXTjoBth ivepyrj/xaTwv iaTiKuv Kai 
 Xoyov SiSaKTtKov, iv TrpauTr]Ti iraiSevri aov tov Xabv Kai SovXevrj aoi elXiKpivui iv 
 KaBapa Siavola Kai ipvxy OtXovari, Kai rcis VTtep tov Xaov tepovpy'ias afJUjipLOVs tKTtXy 
 5ia TOV HpiaTOv aov. . . 
 
 ^ I have put these words in brackets in recognition of the historical fact that 
 they were inserted in this place in 1662. In spite, however, of the emphasis which 
 has often been laid on this fact, and which the Pope has been sufficiently mis- 
 informed to re-emphasize, I must confidently assert, not only that the addition of 
 the words made no difference at all to the sense, but that no one who should read 
 the Ordinal of 1552 as a whole, with a judicial mind and with adequate historical 
 knowledge, could doubt for one moment — either what was the character of the 
 office for which the ordinands were bidden ' Receive the Holy Ghost,' or by what 
 name the office, which the Ordinal intended, was, in the Ordinal, uniformly 
 called. 
 
 That Canon Estcourt, twenty-five years ago, should seriously have argued that 
 the inserted words themselves clinch finally the unsacramental intention of the 
 Anglican Ordinal, is a paradox perhaps worth remembering. 
 
VII] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 289 
 
 istic ' offerings ' or ' sacrifice ' is a result of reaction going 
 further than really was necessary ; and that the restoration of 
 a somewhat richer and more generous fullness in some of these 
 respects would enhance the beauty of the Anglican service 
 alike from the historical and from the theological points of 
 view ^ But, after all, these are trifling matters comparatively, 
 questions only of a little more or less of richness and beauty 
 of expression. On the other hand, I cannot withhold my 
 conviction that the Anglican Ordinal has gained something 
 far more vital and substantial than anything that it can be 
 supposed to have lost ; it has restored, in the main, what had 
 been gradually lost in the accretions of the mediaeval Ordinal, 
 the true proportion between the outward and the inward ; it 
 has restored the essential relation and harmony between 
 Eucharistic leadership — with all that it involves — and a right 
 conception in Christ's Church of the meaning of ministerial 
 priesthood as a whole. If upon some of these points its 
 expression is less rich and full (for obvious historical 
 causes) than one might desire, I do not undervalue the loss 
 which necessarily accrues from this — as from every other — 
 incompleteness of statement ; but putting this loss even at its 
 highest, I cannot admit that its deflection from the most 
 perfect proportions of truth is so much as seriously comparable, 
 either in itself or in its unfortunateness of effect, with that 
 disproportion of the unreformed office from which it none the 
 less rightly reacted, even if its reaction may be thought to 
 be in some details unnecessarily complete. Thoughtful men 
 will not be greatly attracted by any claim, from whatever side, 
 to absolute perfection of achievement ; but if, on the one 
 side, the retention of the old word ' offer,' and a richer em- 
 phasis, in symbol or otherwise, upon the large significance 
 which belongs to Eucharistic offering, if ftdly and spiritually 
 
 ' Of course this was not a really ancient rite (cp. above, p. 227, and note), as 
 the Reformers well knew. Yet it was venerable and, when rescued from its 
 disproportion, valuably expressive. The omission of it, in 1552, is real matter for 
 regret. 
 
 U 
 
290 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [CH. 
 
 nttdcrstood, might have constituted a somewhat more generous 
 expression of a great truth, which is far from being really- 
 suppressed or disowned ; on the other side, I must hold that 
 everything which goes to emphasize very pre-eminently in 
 ' priesthood,' still more to define ' priesthood ' altogether by, 
 the power ' offerre sacrificium ' or ' offerre placabiles hostias 
 pro vivis ac defunctis' — does tend directly,in spite of all denials, 
 to separate unduly between the outward and the inward of 
 priesthood, as well as (perhaps) between the priestly organ 
 of the Body, and the Body of w^hose priestliness he is the 
 organ; just as every assertion that the Eucharistic celebration 
 on earth is a ' sdi.cr\^c\\xm propritim' and vere propitiatorium^ 
 both ' pro fidelium vivorum peccatis, poenis, satisfactionibus 
 et aliis necessitatibus,' and ' pro defunctis in Christo nondum 
 ad plenum purgatis ' does, in spite of all disclaimers, directly 
 tend to an undue separation between the ever-repeated 
 sacrifice of the Eucharist and the one sacrifice of Jesus 
 Christ. 
 
 Now upon the general position which the last few pages 
 have been trying to set forth I rather anticipate one or two 
 comments, which it may be worth while to consider. It may 
 be urged then that whilst it is perfectly true that the pastoral 
 disposition is needed in Christian ministers as well as the 
 priestly character, and whilst it is obvious enough that the 
 Anglican Ordinal dwells with quite a new emphasis upon 
 pastoral ideals, it is nevertheless a mistake to speak of the 
 pastoral aspect as an aspect of priesthood, or to suppose 
 that the fullest or most admirable emphasis upon it would 
 compensate for any defect in the priestly character, or consti- 
 tute an answer of any relevancy to those who doubt whether 
 Anglican ministers are, after all, really ' priests.' Thus it 
 may be urged that the ' priest ' language means one thing, and 
 the ' pastoral ' another ; that both are good, both necessary ; 
 but that it is a confusion, in thought, of things which language 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 291 
 
 has historically kept distinct, to try to read the one into the 
 other, or make them in any direct sense the same thing. 
 
 Now there is a certain truth in this plea. It is true that 
 within the office of the Christian minister we do, both in 
 language and thought, make a certain distinction between the 
 ' priestly ' and the ' pastoral ' aspects. It is impossible not to 
 speak in detail — as I have repeatedly spoken above — of the 
 ' priestly ' or ' sacerdotal ' in particular reference to certain 
 specific functions. It is also true that no amount of emphasis 
 upon the ' pastoral ' character would confer ' priesthood,' if all 
 those things were effectually set aside which have reference to 
 the sacramental presentation of the Blood of the Atonement. 
 It is certainly possible so to distinguish between priesthood 
 and pastorate, as in continuing the second to deny and to 
 drop the first. Nor, if the question rises whether this has 
 been done or no, in any particular case, does it constitute any 
 answer to argue that the ' priest ' associations have ipso facto 
 been maintained — or the loss of them compensated — by the 
 extra emphasis upon pastoral care, unless the pastoral care 
 has itself a very particular significance and method. The 
 loss, or the maintenance, of that whole range of administrative 
 prerogative which St. Clement would have summed up as the 
 ' offering of the gifts ' depends upon the abandonment, or the 
 reverent conferring and use, of the Christian sacraments. 
 
 But though, in this sense, I admit that a particular aspect of 
 the Christian ministry is that to which the peculiar associations 
 of the words ' priest ' and ' priesthood ' specially belong, and 
 though I claim that the ancient Church in so far as she called 
 her ministers ' sacerdotes ' or tepets, and the Church of 
 England in her refusal to abandon the title ' priests ' (by 
 that time identified verbally with sacerdotes and Upds), did 
 emphasize the truth that all the true associations of ancient 
 priesthood had so far, through the High Priesthood of Jesus 
 Christ, a direct place within the functions of Christian minis- 
 ters, that the new ofiice might rightly inherit the old name, 
 
 U 2 
 
292 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 and to deny the admissiblencss of tlie old name zuonld involve 
 a misunderstanding of the new office ; yet it is to be remembered 
 that it was only very gradually, and at a comparatively late 
 time, that the sacerdotal title became the exclusive title of the 
 second order of the ministry, and that, as it became so, there 
 was, or ought to have been, a corresponding widening of the 
 signification of the word. In the Apostolical Constitutions, in 
 the ' Statuta antiqua ' (Carthag. iv), in the Missale Francoriini, 
 the Pontificals of Egbert and Dunstan, in the more ancient 
 portions of the Sarum, and even (it may be added) of the 
 modern Roman Cclcbratio Oi'dinuvi, the most natural and 
 spontaneous title is ' presbyter.' If ' sacerdos ' is also trnc, 
 sacerdos is certainly by no means the one and only title 
 of the office. Now so long as ' priesthood ' is a title of the 
 ' presbyterate,' the connotation of the word may well be 
 limited to that particular aspect which its own associations 
 specially suggest ; if the word 'priesthood' tends towards super- 
 seding ' presbyterate,' it does so because it is felt that there is 
 a spiritual sense in which the 'priest' associations may not unin- 
 structively constitute the dominant element in the thought of 
 the office ; but from the moment when it becomes, simply and 
 exclusively, the one formal and official title of the ofifice as 
 such, it is necessary to insist that the word which designates 
 the office must no longer be confined to any one — however 
 dominant — aspect of the office, but must connote and contain 
 whatever the office contains and means as a whole. Even on 
 these grounds then it is only with considerable reserve that we 
 can admit that the word ' priest ' now has one meaning and 
 ' pastor ' another. It is, unhappily, true if the two aspects of 
 one thing are wrongfully divorced. But while they remain 
 what they ought to be, two aspects of one thing, it is. even 
 as matter of words, not properly true. When the Church is 
 clear that from the Apostles' times there have been ' these 
 Orders of Ministers, Bishops, Priests, and Deacons ' — or when 
 she has constituted any one among us a 'Priest in the Church 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 293 
 
 of God ' — what has she done ? or what is the meaning of this 
 title in her mouth ? I must answer that the title of the whole 
 office means the whole office, not a part of it. If priesthood 
 were still a thing distinct from pastorate, then priesthood and 
 pastorate ought to be separately conferred. But the Church 
 ordains men to be ' priests ' — not ' priests ' and ' pastors '; even 
 whilst, in ordaining them ' priests,' she stamps with so solemn 
 an emphasis the ' pastoral ' aspect of their ' priesthood 
 
 But this contention, though true, is not the whole truth. If 
 the 'priest' associations become prominent in the title of the 
 ' presbyteral ' office, and to deny that ' presbyter ' does legiti- 
 mately mean ' priest ' would be to deny some fundamental 
 truths in the Christian faith ; yet the ' presbyteral ' office must 
 not so be explained as to mean nothing but the distinctively 
 ' priest ' associations, — not only because, for purposes of 
 practical use and need, we require to have included in the 
 ministry all the things which belong to pastoral care ; but also 
 because, as has been pleaded above, the conception even of 
 the ' priest ' functions themselves will become attenuated and 
 externalized if they be not the outward of an inward ; which 
 inward will never have its complete development without in- 
 volving the pastoral character. I do not say that the priest 
 who merely celebrates is not a priest validly ordained. I am 
 not discussing the question of ' validity.' But I do say that 
 he who finds the whole meaning of his priesthood in the act 
 of celebrating does not at all understand what Christian 
 priesthood truly means ; and that if any Church should teach 
 that Christian priesthood simply meant this, she would teach 
 the meaning of priesthood definitely amiss. The ' inwardness ' 
 of a true priesthood requires the dedication of the inner life to 
 Godward ^ ; of which again a necessary aspect or corollary is 
 dedication of self on behalf of ' the others ' — interceding for 
 
 ^ In connexion with this thought, the verbal identity of ' priest ' with ' presbyter ' 
 has its own significant suggestiveness. 
 ^ Cp. Rom. xii. i, 2. 
 
294 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD [ch. 
 
 them thinking for them, living for them, enduring for them. 
 It is not that this ' for other-ness ' will always take the same 
 form. Plainly the priest who is permanently invalided may 
 illustrate perfectly the priestly spirit in his intercession for his 
 brethren, which is perhaps the directest correlative of his right 
 to present before them their ceremonial • offering.' It may be 
 in preaching, or in writing ; in counselling or teaching ; in 
 organizing or visiting; or just in maintaining an integrity, 
 and, in love, suffering for doing so ; in any average parochial 
 sphere it will probably be in some measure of every one of 
 these things : but however opportunities and conditions may 
 differ, some correlative measure there must be of the utterance 
 of that inwardness which is as the breath of every priesthood 
 that is not self-condemned as merely official and formal ; and 
 which, however indirectly, is itself already an illustration of 
 the meaning of pastoral love. I do not think it is anything 
 like a fanciful analogy to say that the perfect outward and 
 the perfect inward, the ideal pastorate and ideal priesthood, 
 are blended together as one indivisible reality in the words of 
 St. John, ch. X, ' I am the good shepherd : the good shepherd 
 layeth down his life for the sheep.' 
 
 But there is another form which criticism may probably 
 take. It may be admitted that external functions in them- 
 selves are merely formal and official things ; that they are, in 
 God's sight, unreal and only condemnatory, except there be 
 in the officiants an inward corresponding to the outward ; and 
 that the inward, in priesthood, does contain much of the 
 things which have been said. Nevertheless it may be urged 
 that when we are engaged in distinguishing an office from not 
 an office, we must needs differentiate function from non-function 
 in respect of its outward performances. It is a question of 
 doing or not doing, of having a right or not having a right to 
 do, certain things. The things done, as such, are external 
 things of course. But the defining distinction cannot but be 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 295 
 
 made in terms of such things as these. Thus if you distin- 
 guish the office of a lieutenant from that of a midshipman, 
 you do it in terms of what a lieutenant does, or has to do, or 
 may do — and a midshipman does, or may, not : you say nothing 
 about the qualities which go to make him do it well. In 
 either case the difference is assumed to exist between a good, 
 or a bad, midshipman or lieutenant : and the nature of the 
 difference between good and bad will in either case be 
 approximately the same. But when you are defining the 
 difference between office and office, you are dealing exclusively 
 with external duty of action. So, whatever may be the inward 
 truth of priestliness, it is both right and inevitable that its 
 distinguishing definition should be in the sphere of ceremonial 
 function, and that its formal conferring should be just a con- 
 ferring of official prerogative. 
 
 There are two points in this statement ; and it may be 
 useful to comment upon each. There is the question of 
 the terms in which the office ought to be, or can be, defined ; 
 and there is the question as to the ceremonial method 
 and interpretative language with which it is appropriate 
 that the office shall be conferred. First as to definition. 
 The immediate reply, then, will be that the contention 
 described is only perfectly true in respect of pursuits (if 
 any such there be) which are wholly outside the personal 
 character. It may be true, approximately, of different sets of 
 mechanics, doing different works in detail, in a huge factory. 
 But the more complex and responsible the work, and the 
 more inclusive it is of the whole life and mind and character, 
 the less can it be defined by its outward operations. How 
 far the statement is true of midshipmen or lieutenants I leave 
 it to others to say. But I have no doubt at all that the 
 higher you go in the grade of responsible office, the less is it 
 true. It is less true of a captain than of a lieutenant ; less 
 true of a commander-in-chief than of the colonel of a regiment. 
 When you turn from things like these to what is no longer 
 
296 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 an office primarily of external duty, though involving vital or 
 spiritual qualities ; but an office essentially spiritual, though 
 expressing itself in certain external duties ; there is hardly 
 any truth left in the contention at all. The character is no 
 longer a moral condition valuable because it leads up to the 
 right discharge of practical duties : but the duties — though 
 in the practical sphere they are duties, and have to be done — • 
 can only be done, even as duties, aright, in so far as they pro- 
 duce and express the right moral character. To condescend 
 to define such an office as this simply by the ceremonial func- 
 tions which are involved in it, is not only to depose from their 
 proper relative position the qualifications and duties which 
 are not ceremonial, but is to misinterpret the true meaning 
 and character even of the ceremonial functions themselves. 
 
 Indeed I must maintain that no inconsiderable fallacy 
 underlies — and has historically throughout these controversies 
 underlain — this assumption that the definition of an office is to 
 be found in the methods, even in the most characteristic and 
 highest methods, of its exercise. Take for instance the case 
 of a great viceroyalty. What is the truth of the office which 
 a viceroy receives? If he thinks and plans for the people, 
 and tries to direct and arrange, by upright administration 
 and wise legislative provision at home, by prudent direction 
 of policy abroad, there is no element in this general respon- 
 sibility, forethought, fatherly anxiety and care, which is not 
 also shared, though in somewhat different degree, by a host of 
 others, councillors, and lieutenant-governors, judges, and com- 
 missioners — his subordinates in a vast variety of spheres and 
 degrees. It is at least conceivable that the only things which 
 could be found which the viceroy could do, and no one but 
 the viceroy, might be such things as signing death-warrants 
 or free pardons, subscribing assent to statutes, or heading the 
 most august ceremonials of state. Moreover, I should certainly 
 not deny that the power of life and death, represented by the 
 jirerogative of signing death-warrants or free pardons, might — 
 
vii] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 297 
 
 if largely enough understood- -be said, with considerable truth, 
 itself to symbolize and represent the whole range of sovei'eign 
 responsibility. But would any one dream of really defining 
 the sovereignty as the prerogative of signing pardons, or of 
 subscribing statutes, or anything whatever of the kind ? Is it 
 not manifest that even though things like these might con- 
 ceivably be the only functions which externally differentiated 
 the office — in the sense that these, and these alone, could be 
 performed by no one but by the viceroy himself, yet these 
 never could describe what his entrusted sovereignty really 
 meant? And on the other hand, is it not manifest also that 
 the real nature of the meaning of his mighty ofifice could only 
 be described, with any approach to adequacy, by emphasizing 
 responsibilities and duties which were not strictly distinctive 
 of the personal sovereignty, because they were shared with the 
 viceroy (of course in very varying degrees) by every one of 
 those who, under him, were responsible for the welfare of the 
 country? It is, after all, the general responsibility, the unde- 
 finable width of an all inclusive anxiety and care — it is this, 
 which may indeed be symbolized here and there by certain 
 specific prerogatives of royalty, but which no specific pre- 
 rogatives come near to expressing or defining — in which the 
 truth of the viceroy's great commission lies. 
 
 So in the case of St. Paul, ' that which presseth upon me 
 daily, anxiety for all the Churches,' approaches far more nearly 
 to a definition of what he understood by apostolic ministry, 
 than could any amount of enlargement either upon preaching, 
 or celebrating, or anything else whatever in the way of specific 
 ministerial prerogative or duty. Whatever difficulty, then, 
 there may be in framing, in brief form, an adequate definition 
 of what ministerial priesthood means in Christ's Church ; 
 I must submit that the true idea of its essence is to be found, 
 not so much by picking out and exclusively emphasizing the 
 things which Christian lay priesthood may not do, as rather by 
 discernment of the quickened intensity and more representa- 
 
298 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 [cH. 
 
 live and responsible completeness which characterizes ministry 
 in qualities that are not altogether distinctive of ministry, but 
 belong, or ought to belong, alike to the body as a whole, and, 
 in a measure, to every individual member of the body. This 
 concentrated demand on the personal character and activity 
 is indeed accompanied, nay (if all be understood) is con- 
 summated, in the priestly office, by distinctive outwardnesses 
 of sublime function and prerogative ; yet even these rather 
 illustrate, and give a crowning expression to, the true essential 
 meaning of the office, than constitute its essence in them- 
 selves. 
 
 It is indeed one of the things which the Church has to be 
 perpetually on her guard against, this inveterate tendency of 
 the natural mind to measure a spiritual and living whole by 
 its own objective forms of outward expression ; to define, for 
 example, Christian life by its moral achievements, or Christian 
 priesthood by the acts it is authorized to perform. It is so 
 much easier to be mechanical than to be spiritual ! The 
 externalizing and stereotyping of the conception of priesthood 
 — that large and living reality — by making it simply identical 
 with authority to perform certain ceremonies, when the cere- 
 monial authority itself should be but as the necessary utterance 
 of that which is the essential reality of priesthood, is a danger 
 which is never far away ; a danger which it is easier to discern 
 than wholly to avoid ; a danger which too much of Western 
 Christendom appears to have forgotten even to discern. Has 
 it not run too often, almost greedily, into the external and 
 mechanical definition, as if it were the adequate exposition of 
 the truth ? It is so much easier to the natural mind to make 
 the outward the simple measure of the inward, than to keep it 
 in its place as an outward which is only ultimately real because 
 it is the oJitward of an imvard reality ! 
 
 If considerations like these are of weight in reference even 
 to a definition of what ministerial priesthood means, they will 
 assert themselves still more emphatically when the question is 
 
VI I ] PRIESTHOOD IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST 299 
 
 not of a scientific summary of the meaning of the office, but of 
 the structure and contents of the special service in which it is 
 to be conferred. The service of ordination to priesthood as 
 a whole will, after all, constitute the fullest teaching of the 
 Church as to what she means by priesthood. Of the Ordinal 
 service then I must submit that it is most emphatically true 
 that it ought to reflect and express this larger fullness of the 
 real truth of priesthood. Priesthood is a relation — to God, to 
 the Church, to the world — which touches and consecrates the 
 whole range of the personal life, so that its own technicalities, 
 however precious, its own executive possibilities, however 
 august, either must be understood to include the essential 
 pastoral relation and responsibility to the ' Spouse and Body 
 of Christ,' or else will fall far short of that deep and vital and 
 mysterious reality into which those have really been admitted 
 who are sent out as ' priests ' in the Church of God. But if 
 priesthood is essentially this, then it is just the full expression 
 of the text and ceremonial of the Ordinal which should make 
 this width of interpretation transparently obvious, in its full 
 proportion, and with ringing clearness, and should impress it 
 with the profoundest solemnity upon those who, approach- 
 ing priesthood, yet remaining most human, are in any case 
 naturally liable — in proportion as they grasp the unearthly 
 greatness of their office at all — to the peril of conceiving of 
 it too mechanically. In the text of the Ordinal, if anywhere, 
 it should be plain, that to the ideal meaning of the Church 
 the outward of administrative priestliness must be in perfect 
 correspondence with the inward ; that objective and subjective 
 are but conterminous aspects of one living reality ; that true 
 priesthood is pastorate, and true pastorate based on priest- 
 liness ; that ' cure of souls ' is itself so really a sacrifice, and 
 intercession an Eucharist, that the very ministry of the Eucha- 
 ristic sacrifice fails to understand itself, if it find no correspond- 
 ing utterance, in the secret chamber at least, as divine love 
 and ' cure ' of souls. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 UPON THE RECENT ROMAN CONTROVERSY AS TO THE 
 VALIDITY OF ANGLICAN ORDERS 
 
 It vc\]\ have been obsen'ed that the discussion just concluded has 
 not been a discussion as to what does, or what does not, con- 
 stitute a valid transmission of Holy Orders. The fact is that the 
 discussion has been directed to a deeper issue than that of validity. 
 Those who discuss the validity of what purports to confer ' priesthood,' 
 must assume, as the basis of their discussion, an understanding of 
 what priesthood in itself means. Confusion about this will make 
 a necessary confusion in the discussion of validity. But, fundamental 
 as it is to the discussion of validit}-, a real inquiry into the nature and 
 true scope of priesthood is itself of deeper and more significant 
 interest than any question of validity only. 
 
 It is, however, perfectly true that for certain purposes it is necessary 
 to take the outward apart from its inwardness, the mere shell apart 
 from all that gives it meaning. If the question is whether this man 
 is, or is not, %iceroy ; we do not for the purpose begin to ask what 
 %iceroyalty means ; we ask rather Avhether the instruments of his 
 appointment are in order. If the question is whether this ' bishop ' 
 is capahU of ordaining, or that ' priest ' of celebrating ; it is not imme- 
 diately to the point to say whether the one has any rationally Christian 
 conception of what his episcopate, or the other of what his priesthood, 
 means. The one may be materialistic, to the point of paganism; 
 the other may be rationalistic, to the point of atheism. Neither may 
 realize, even remotely, the true nature of his office ; neither may be 
 able, in the least degree, to exemplify its mystery or its dignity to 
 others. And neither — it is possible — may be recognized, in the daj' 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 301 
 
 of the revelation of Christ, as Christian minister or as Christian 
 believer, at all. And yet for the technical purposes of external order, 
 the sole question will be, 'were they duly ordained?' Though the 
 pagan bishop or the atheistic priest are an outrage to the idea of 
 priesthood or bishopric ; though it is worse than useless to look to 
 them in order to see what priesthood or bishopric mean ; yet in the 
 merely outward order of things it has certainly to be admitted that, if 
 untried and undeposed, they are ' bishop ' and ' priest.' This is part 
 of the essentially imperfect identity, in human things, between the 
 outward and the inward — between discernible expression and the 
 meaning which it only exists to express. It belongs to the failure of 
 the ordinance, not to what it means. It does not touch us in the 
 least, so long as we are trying to interpret the true meaning of priest- 
 hood. We dare not frame our exposition of priesthood with a view 
 to including those whose priesthood is the denial of what priesthood 
 means. If, as mere symbols and channels, we cannot deny that they 
 have been accredited, and can be made use of ; yet, so far from 
 expressing or interpreting, they only belie, and are themselves belied 
 by, all that their own office signifies. 
 
 On the other hand, if the ordained priest may be a priest without 
 exemplifying any one of the graces or meanings of priesthood, it is 
 no less true that even the most splendid exemplification, in mind and 
 life, of the things which priesthood ought to mean, would not of itself 
 confer on any man the right to stand before the congregation to 
 Godward in the ministry of priesthood. 
 
 There is then an outward, unhappily distinguishable, as mere out- 
 ward, from all the inner realities which it ought to symbolize. Perhaps 
 it may serve to clear the position taken in these pages, to formulate 
 at once the requirements which seem, in the outward and technical 
 sphere, to be necessary for a valid ordination. 
 
 They may be stated as four. First, the ordination must be con- 
 ferred by those who themselves have received authority to confer it. 
 This, as a principle continuous from the beginning, is what is called 
 Apostolical succession. There seems to be absolutely no warrant 
 whatever, in the New Testament or in the history of the Church, for 
 supposing that Christian ministers can either commission themselves, 
 or be commissioned by any who have not themselves been com- 
 
302 
 
 MIXISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 missioned to commission. That a layman or a gathering of laymen 
 could consecrate a bishop, is an idea which would find no warrant 
 whatever in the theology or history of the Church. Now those who 
 are commissioned to commission are what we call bishops. It may- 
 be admitted that this is a point which it would have been diflScult to 
 lay down with confidence from the very earliest evidence of all. 
 That succession from Apostles was a cardinal principle is quite clear 
 from the epistle of Clement of Rome. It may not be quite clear at 
 first through whom the succession was transmitted. But even from 
 apostolic and sub-apostolic times there are data enough to make it 
 exceedingly improbable that the transmission would have been by 
 presbyters only, apart from the apostolic or episcopal background. 
 And when such data are interpreted in the light of the universal 
 assumption of every subsequent century, we may lay it down, quite as 
 a certain principle of the historical Church, that a valid ordination 
 must be performed by those who as ' bishops ' — or, if any one prefers 
 it, as ' episcopal presbyters ' — have received a commission, from those 
 duly commissioned before them, which includes the apostolic faculty 
 of commissioning ministers. 
 
 Secondly, the ordaining bishop must have the intention to ordain. 
 He may be a bad theologian — full of misconceptions about the 
 doctrines of the Church and the ministry ; but at least he must be 
 dealing dutifully according to his conceptions (or misconceptions), 
 that is, he must have the purpose of exercising a power committed to 
 him of constituting men as ministers (bishops, priests, or deacons) in 
 the Church of Christ. In the absence of unmistakable evidence to 
 the contrary, the fact that he acts in the matter just as others, with 
 serious intention, would and do act, is sufficient presumption that he 
 means as they mean. This, as a general principle, is intelligible 
 enough. Cases can probably be imagined, in which there might be 
 a reasonable ambiguity on this head. But such cases have probably 
 rarely, if ever, occurred. 
 
 Thirdly, we may ask to be assured that the bishop has signified his 
 purpose by solemnly laying his hands on the head of the ordinand. 
 There is no controversy about the laying on of hands ; and I do not 
 desire to suggest one. Whether, however, it is as literally indispens- 
 able as e.g. the divinely commanded elements of water in Baptism, 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 or bread and wine in Holy Communion, is a point about which we 
 may hesitate to speak with confidence. Laying on of hands has been 
 practically the universal method in the Church of Christ ; and no one 
 who affects to ordain is likely to dispense with it. But it hardly 
 seems necessary for the present purpose so dogmatically to assert its 
 indispensableness (if all that it expresses were in other ways made 
 unmistakably manifest) as to decide, quite absolutely, that a bishop 
 consecrated according to the description of the eighth book of the 
 Apostolical ConstHutio7is (supposing the words to be taken ad pedevi. 
 Itierae) could not possibly be held to be consecrated at all. 
 
 And fourthly, this manual blessing must be an act of prayer. This 
 means, I presume, that the ordaining bishop, if on the one hand he 
 makes use of a ceremonial action, must obviously, upon the other, refer 
 his ceremonial action to God. It is this Godward appeal which gives the 
 significance to what would otherwise be a mere outward act. Whatever 
 mode or utterance of prayerfulness has the effect of thus interpreting 
 his act, may be said to meet the literal requirement. Of course the prayer 
 must not be wholly irrevelant to the act ; nor out of all discoverable 
 relation with the act. But whatever it be, so that it has the intelligible 
 character of interpreting before God and man the meaning of the 
 act, and thereby uplifting it as an aspiration to God, it is such 
 prayer as can make the otherwise merely physical act of laying a 
 hand upon a head into the symbolical act of blessing for ministry. 
 
 Where these four things are, there is the technical, outward, verifi- 
 able requirement. Where any of these four things can be shown to 
 be absent, there the material outward, which men who fear God dare 
 not dispense with, is lacking. 
 
 A discussion which turns upon the evidence, in particular cases, 
 as to things so far material and external as these, can hardly be a 
 very elevating discussion. Those who have to conduct it need to be 
 always on their guard against confounding the real meaning of ' priest- 
 hood ' — which has a material aspect and is (in a sense) materially con- 
 veyed — with the things which thus represent it on the material side. 
 
 Still there are times when these are the things which have to be 
 discussed. And there are occasions, no doubt, in which there is a 
 perfectly genuine ambiguity about one or more of them. In any case 
 of such ambiguity we must be content to lay aside for the moment all 
 
304 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 deeper thoughts as to the significance of priesthood, and address our- 
 selves to the points (however material or narrow) which are really in 
 doubt. 
 
 But in truth in the so-called controversy about Anglican Orders there 
 is not really any such ambiguity at all. It is no question really of 
 evidential details. The question, such as it is, is theoretical or theo- 
 logical. It turns upon such matters as e. g. (i) the precise content of 
 the Roman definition of priesthood; (2) the right of Rome to provide 
 such a definition authoritatively; (3) the logic of the Roman inference, 
 that those who do not accept her definition or acknowledge her authority 
 to define (whatever ministry they may have, or by whatever title they 
 may call it), cannot at all events have the priesthood which she vicans. 
 Often, of these three things the first and the second being assumed 
 as postulates, the discussion is found to move only within the narrow 
 compass of the third. For underlying all argument, the assumption 
 is apt to be made obvious, that the words ' Rome,' ' the Catholic 
 Church,' ' the Church of Jesus Christ,' are synonymous and conter- 
 minous words. 
 
 Now if this assumption be justified, the question of the validity of 
 Anglican Orders has no importance or meaning whatever in itself. It 
 comes in only at the moment when Anglicans give in their surrender 
 to Rome ; and then only as determining the precise manner in which 
 she is to receive their penitence. For, upon the assumption, until they 
 make their submission, all Anglicans are simply outside of the Church 
 of Christ. 
 
 On the other hand, if the assumption be not justified, the Roman 
 arguments about Anglican Orders are, for the most part, emptied at 
 once, not of cogency only, but of meaning. 
 
 Thus it is that the recent discussion about Anglican Orders, though 
 in some ways, as a phenomenon, of remarkable interest, was nevertheless 
 to Anglicans, for the most part, a singularly unreal dialectical exercise. 
 The real issue was never so much as raised at all. Perhaps it was 
 hardly possible that it should be. The question discussed was rather, 
 on the assumption that Anglicanism was of course contumacious and 
 heretical, whether that heresy and contumacy amounted to just so 
 much, or to just not so much, as to make transmission of orders 
 impossible. Now whatever motive any Anglican may conceivably 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 have for consenting under circumstances to argue upon such a hypo- 
 thesis, it is plain that the character of the hypothesis must prevent the 
 argument, to an Anglican who believes his position to be right and 
 true, from having in it any touch of vital reality at all. 
 
 If a question were really to be raised between Romans and Anglicans 
 on the subject of priesthood ; if there were to be a serious scrutiny as 
 to what exactly Romans mean by the word, and what Anglicans mean ; 
 what is the structure and rationale of the Roman Ordinal, and what of 
 the Anglican ; if both were to be impartially tried and compared, not 
 only with each other, but with the true history and theological signifi- 
 cance of ' presbyterate ' from the time of the Apostles onwards, no 
 one could possibly be more ready than we may claim to be to enter 
 upon such an inquiry ; nor should we be able to entertain a shadow 
 of doubt as to the character of the result. 
 
 But if the question be merely whether the Anglicans do, or do not, 
 intend exactly what the Romans intend, and do exactly what the 
 Romans do, the discussion is a mockery upon the face of it. It is 
 closed before it is begun. There is literally nothing whatever to dis- 
 cuss. It is demonstrably plain, upon the very surface of the history, 
 that we hold that their meaning and practice had fallen out of due and 
 balanced proportion ; that into a meaning and practice once expressive 
 of truth they had imported exaggerated interpretations and symbo- 
 lisms ; that the exaggerations, more or less seriously, distorted truth ; 
 and therefore that we, correcting their disproportions, emphatically 
 did «(?/mean exactly what they meant ; and that the detail of what they 
 did in practice we varied, not a little, on the express ground that it had 
 lost by degrees, and needed to have restored to it, the balance and 
 harmony of truth. That Anglicans are not in practice, because they 
 are not in doctrine, precisely and identically Roman, the very existence 
 of the Prayer-book is incontrovertible proof 
 
 What is a priest ? why is the Church priestly .? wherein or how 
 is Christian ministry a priesthood .? We hold that it is part of the 
 inveterate tendency, particularly of the Western mind, to treat these 
 questions, and to answer them, in too cut-and-dried, too external and 
 too material a fashion ; to treat them so as to deprive them of their 
 mystery, so that their outward and material meaning no longer repre- 
 sents, no longer as it were shades off into, a significance spiritual and 
 
 X 
 
3o6 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 infinite ; but as if their w hole meaning not only were easily, exclusively, 
 and exactly intelligible, but were understood and exhausted in the 
 sphere of outward and visible distinctions. Answers sharp, and crude, 
 and positive, and logical, are, we feel, ipso facto, as perilous as they 
 are fascinating to the mind that is spiritually imtrained. ' Oh I it is ex- 
 ceedingly simple. Ministry is priesthood just because it offers sacrifice ; 
 the Eucharist is a sacrifice ; and he who may celebrate the Eucharist 
 has the power of sacrificing. This is what to be a priest means.' 
 However profoundly such words may be representative — as indeed 
 they are — of truth, who does not feel the risk that there always is 
 to spirituality in the whole region to which such off-hand answers 
 properly belong.' It argues a certain intellectual — and specially 
 a spiritually intellectual — defect, to be too easily satisfied with clear- 
 cut externalities like these. That this defect was conspicuous, and 
 that it carried with it a fatal train of externalizing and materializing 
 consequences de facto in the sixteenth centur}-, is indeed, as matter 
 of history, not open to question. 
 
 \^"hatever peril there was of this kind was enhanced by the great 
 complication and consequent ambiguity of mediaeval Ordinals, and by 
 that which was a further result of ambiguity, the discussions technical 
 and pedantic, and the over-defined definitions, as to the ' materia ' and 
 ' forma ' of each several Ordinal ser\-ice. No doubt ' materia ' and 
 'forma' are quite legitimate, and up to a cenain point illuminative, 
 •words. There must be' an inward and an outward, a ceremonial and 
 an interpretation of the ceremonial ; but a discussion of these things 
 will have always to be on its guard against over-pressure of sharp 
 logical distinctions ; the words are not on the whole recommended by 
 the associations of their own history, and should be used for argumen- 
 tative purposes only with considerable care. It may be doubted 
 whether, even now, the minds of theologians have shaken themselves 
 quite free from the assumption that the ' forma ' must mean one 
 particular sentence, or one particular prayer, in detachment from the 
 total service of dedicarion and prayer of which it forms a part, whilst 
 even as to the ' materia ' it is possible that the usual assumptions may 
 be made a litde too absolutely \ 
 
 ' I am not prei)ared to concede that the eighth book of the Apostolical Consti- 
 tutions intends that a bishop should be consecrated without literal laving-on of 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 Now against all these forms of rigidity and over-pressure and over- 
 definition the Reformation was intended to be, and was, an unmistak- 
 able protest. Priesthood, to the conception of the ' Reformed,' however 
 truly it might mean Eucharistic offering, was no longer defined exclu- 
 sively by Eucharistic offering. Eucharistic offering, however essentially 
 it might be both supernatural and sacrificial, was expressly not defined 
 by the crude mediaeval theory of ' transubstantiation,' and was, to say 
 the least, less exclusively regarded in its sacrificial character ; whilst the 
 conception of it as ' sacrifice ' was emphatically not tied up to such 
 defining, but highly debatable, words as ' proprium,' ' vere propitia- 
 torium,' ' pro vivis et defunctis nondum ad plenum purgatis.' On all 
 these points the Anglican Reformation involved a real loosening of 
 bonds which had been by degrees too tightly tied and knotted up, 
 the bonds of over-exact, and therefore narrow, and therefore inexact, 
 definition. 
 
 Now if any one is willing to argue with us squarely on points like 
 these, and to examine whether our attitude in respect of them — with 
 the criticism which of course it involves upon mediaeval theology — is 
 itself theologically right or wrong, no doubt Anglicans would be more 
 than ready to join issue with him. But it is obvious that for the pur- 
 poses of such an argument the appeal to Scripture, to Catholic (not 
 Roman) theology, and to Church history must be free and untram- 
 melled. To propose to conduct such an argument on the basis of the 
 assumption that every practice which had been sanctioned, and every 
 explanation that had been offered by the Roman Church, ancient, 
 mediaeval or modern, was not only absolutely right, but was itself 
 the ultimate standard and norm of right and truth in all others, 
 would be obviously absurd. It would be at least as reasonable to 
 try and argue in defence of infant baptism against Baptists, on the 
 avowed hypothesis that everything they have ever said or done in 
 protest against baptism of infants is itself, alike in principle and in 
 detail, the infallible standard of truth. 
 
 It would not be true to say that this false hypothesis has been inten- 
 tionally assumed for controversial purposes by every writer on the 
 Roman side. But it is extraordinarily difficult for a Roman contro- 
 
 hands. But it is undeniable that there is something to be said even for this. .See 
 the Rev. T. A. Lacey's paper in Kevue Anglo-Komaine, Jan. 4, 1896, vol. i.p. 193. 
 
 X 2 
 
3o8 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 versialist, with the most liberal intentions, to get free from it. And 
 whatever justice may be done to indindual efforts of the kind, it must 
 still be said that the controversy, as a whole, exhibits in the first place 
 what we must regard as pathetic efforts, and in the second place a no 
 less pathetic failure, to argue the case on its merits, apart from these 
 incapacitating presuppositions. This failure, it need hardly be said, 
 has been clinched, and — so far as that can be done — made final for 
 all time by the authority of the Bull ' Apostolicae curae.' The hj'po- 
 thesis of their own infallible correctness at every point has defeated, 
 and for the present at least will continue to defeat, all attempt at argu- 
 ment. It may here and there be disguised. But it remains in fact as 
 the wall of adamant which really fences round the Roman position 
 from all intrusive approach of intelligent reasoning. 
 
 There are two forms in which this hypothesis appears in the sphere 
 of controversy upon our subject. The first is briefly represented by 
 the word ' schism.' It may be stated nakedly thus. The Papal 
 obedience is the Catholic Church. Anglicans have repudiated the 
 Papal obedience. Therefore Anglicans have repudiated, and are 
 contumaciously outside of, ' the Church.' There is therefore no need 
 to examine particularly what they hold, or why they hold it. What- 
 ever they hold, even if it resembles the truth, cannot be the truth, 
 until they submit to the Church which enshrines the truth. 
 
 The other is represented by the word ' intention.' In its barest 
 form it might perhaps stand thus. It is of no use to consider the 
 ' materia ' or the ' forma ' of the Anglican Ordinal. Even if both were 
 adequate in themselves, they would not confer Orders unless adminis- 
 tered with the right intention. The necessary intention is the intention 
 of the Catholic (i. e. of the Roman) Church. That Anglicans have 
 not precisely the Roman intention may be probably shown without 
 difficulty, at least on examination of their Ordinal services and the 
 service of Holy Communion. But even if it could not be shown from 
 any of these, the presumption of right intention can only be pleaded 
 by those who at least do what the Catholic (i. e. the Roman) Church 
 does. Now Anglicans do not follow, they have deliberately altered, 
 the Roman Pontifical. Such a de facto alteration of the Roman Pon- 
 tifical — whatever might be the intrinsic value of their substituted 
 Ordinal — is of itself palpable and final proof, not only of an imperfect 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 309 
 
 intention to do and mean, but of a positive negation, an ostentatious 
 intention not to mean, nor even to do, what the Church does. The 
 fact therefore that they have separated themselves from Rome is 
 proof demonstrative of an ' intention ' which would invalidate the 
 most perfect form of Ordinal in the world. 
 
 Once concede that ' Roman ' and ' Catholic ' are convertible terms ; 
 once assume that whatever Romans mean by Priest, Sacrifice, Sacra- 
 ment, is the true norm and standard of the meaning of the words, 
 and these consequences, sweeping as they are, may logically follow. 
 But those who are clear that Rome has pushed these true words 
 far out of their proportion ; and who can only regard with amazement 
 the audacity of her claim to be the whole and only Church of Christ, 
 are not greatly moved by pretensions which rest upon no basis at all. 
 They are but part of the audacity of an audacious major premiss ; 
 which major premiss, fairly challenged, dissolves like a tyrannous 
 dream in the morning-waking, and leaves the fair world once more 
 in the fresh air and open freedom of nature, and reason, and faith, — 
 of man undistorted and of God unbelied. 
 
 For some time past the stress of Roman attacks has been directed 
 not so much against the inherent adequacy of the Anglican Ordinal, 
 as against the sufficiency of Anglican ' intention ' ; and only in the 
 second instance against the Ordinal, as supposed to bear witness to, 
 or to become defective because it is vitiated by, this defect of ' intention.' 
 Thus the volume published by Canon Estcourt ', nearly twenty-five 
 years ago, may be said to treat as impossible the view of the intrinsic 
 inadequacy of the Anglican forms. For him this impossibility is 
 clinched by the decision pronounced in respect of Abyssinian 
 Orders in 1 704. He therefore (besides suggesting as many historical 
 ' doubts ' as could be raised, probably or improbably, about Bishop 
 Barlow's consecration, about Archbishop Parker's consecration, &c.), 
 builds an elaborate structure of argument, out of manifold details, 
 with a view to showing (i) that Anglican reformers made deliberate 
 changes, in order to eject the sacramental idea from their services, and 
 (2) that Anglicans therefore cannot possibly have, what they not merely 
 do not intend, but protestingly deny. Such an argument would no 
 doubt be formidable if it were to be assumed that the sacramental 
 
 ' pp. 188-193. 
 
MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 idea and the detailed exactness of the Roman interpretation of sacra- 
 ments are one and the same thing. But if it be conceived for a 
 moment to be possible that there was a disproportion in the Roman 
 theology, the argument falls at once to the ground. That Anglicans 
 do not accept but protest against the precise Roman proportions of 
 sacramental doctrine, it was never worth while to write a volume to 
 prove. 
 
 But Canon Estcourt is perhaps out of date. It is more important 
 to pass to the controversial experiments of the last two years. 
 
 The paper published in 1894, Les Ordinations Anglicanes, ' par 
 Fernand Dalbus,' was in many ways a remarkable document. Perhaps 
 the most striking thing about it, to an Anglican reader, was the rare 
 appreciation which it showed of the general Anglican standpoint. 
 With more than usual fairness and skill it exhibited the argument, 
 from the Anglican point of view \ on the following points; viz. First, 
 the Anglican Ordinal does not (as had been said on the other side) 
 exclude, but bases itself upon, the sacramental reality of the xapf^A"" 
 given in ordination. In this connexion the contrast is emphasized 
 between the official language of the Ordinal on the one hand, and on 
 the other (i) the words used, at an earlier date by Cranmer personally, 
 and (2) the formal proposals of Bucer, which the Ordinal set aside. 
 This argument is concluded with the words : ' Les compilateurs 
 rejetferent done de propos d^libdrd les suggestions de Bucer, pour 
 garder fidfelement I'enseignement traditionnel de la distinction des ordres 
 et de leur r^alit^ sacramentelle ' (p. 24). Secondly, the Communion 
 Office in the English Prayer-book does not contradict the truth about 
 Eucharistic sacrifice. What it is afraid of is rather the gross exaggera- 
 tion and materialistic superstition with which this doctrine was in fact 
 held and taught. Thus we read : ' II est n^cessaire, avant tout, pour 
 comprendre ce que repudie I'^glise anglicane, et juger sa maniere 
 d'agir avec impartiality, de se rappeler quelles ^taient les opinions 
 des th^ologiens et des docteurs touchant le sacrifice de la messe, 
 a r^poque oil cet article [article 31] a ^t^ rddig^, c'est-a-dire, au 
 xvie sifecle. A ce moment, des opinions bien extraordinaires, insou- 
 
 ^ Referring to the Church Quarterly Review, Jan. 1878, pp. 269, 270. See 
 above, pp. 234 n. and 236 n. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 tenables aujourd'hui aux yeux de tout le monde catholique, ^taient 
 d^fendues par certains th^ologiens non d^pourvus d'autorit^. On 
 supposait, par exemple, que le sacrifice eucharistique ^tait un sacri- 
 fice absolu, complet en lui-meme, fournissant une expiation indepen- 
 dante de I'expiation accomplie par Notre Seigneur sur la Croix. On 
 osait dire que Notre Seigneur, par le sacrifice de la Croix, avait expi^ 
 le p^chd originel ainsi que les p^ch^s commis sous I'ancienne loi et 
 ceux commis par les individus avant le bapteme ; tandis que la messe 
 expie les peches commis apres le bapteme. On disait aussi que par le 
 sacrifice de la messe les peches mortels etaient effaces, ex opere operaio ^' 
 
 ' It may be worth while to quote in full the statements which the pamphlet 
 contains in justification of this last paragraph (pp. 27, 28) : — 
 
 'Notre premiere citation est empruntee a Vasquez*. " Notat igitur Catherinusf 
 in eodem opuscule superius citato (_De veritate incruenti sacrificii) § Prinium 
 igitur, duo esse genera peccatorum expianda per sacerdotium et sacrificium : alterum 
 est originalis peccati, et eoriim quae cum eo conjuncta sunt : et haec vocat ipse 
 peccata, quae erant sub priori testamento nempe sub veteri, juxta modum loquendi 
 Pauli ad Hebraeos ix. Alterum vero peccatorum quae post Baptismum commit- 
 tuntur, et haec vocat ipse peccata quae sub novo testamento admittuntur ; et pro 
 quovis genera suum assigiiat sacrificium : quia putat fore, ut sine suo peculiari 
 sacrificio sacramenta pro quovis illo genere peccatorum expiando non consisterent, 
 sicut ait in § Cum ergo peccata. Pro peccato itaque originali, et aliis cum eo 
 conjunctis, quae ipse vocat peccata sub priori testamento, assignat Christum, et 
 sacramentum Baptismi quod virtute illius sacrificii ea remittat : et quia haec omnia 
 reputantur (inquit) unum peccatum ratione unius originalis, a quo oriuntur, et cum 
 quo conjuncta sunt, ideo pro illorum remissione satis fuit una ipsius oblatio, quae 
 nunquam esset repetenda. Atque hoc modo explicat Paulum ad Hebraeos x cum 
 ait : utia enitn oblatione consiimrnavit in seinpiterttum sanctijicatos : ubi reddit 
 causam, ob quam antiqua sacrificia in dies repeterentur, sacrificium autem crucis 
 semel tantum fuerit oblatum. At vero pro peccatis commissis post Baptismum pro 
 quibus inquit non relinqui hostiam Christi cruentam quod voluntarie committantur, 
 juxta illud ad Hebraeos x, voluntarie enim peccantibus nobis post acceptam notitiam 
 veritatis jam non reliiiquitiir pro peccatis hostia, nempe, ut ipse intelligit, cruenta, 
 quae iterum repetatur, assignat sacrificium incruentum missae, quod ideo asserit 
 quotidie repeti et iterari ; quia offertur pro peccatis, quae jam sub novo testamento 
 committuntur : nam cum haec, inquit, plura sint neque ab uno originali derivata, 
 sed singula per se considcrentur, quodlibet etiam suam expiationem sacrificii 
 postulat, ac proinde sacrificium incruentum repetendum est pro his peccatis, quae 
 
 * Vasquez : Comment, in tert.part. tome 3, quest. 83, art. I. ch. iv. Edit. Anvers, 1621, tome 
 vii. p. 479. — Vasquez combat Catharin. 
 
 "t" Catharin naquit a Sienne en 1487, entra chez les Dominicains en 1521 et se distingua au 
 concile de Trente. II occupa I'eveche de Minori en 1547, I'archeveche de Conza en 1551, et 
 mourut en 1553. 
 
 § Lis Indulgences et la Messe. 
 
312 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 The statement is concluded in the following sentence : ' Le lecteur 
 a d^ja conclu avant nous, ce que I'^glise anglicane rdprouve et con- 
 damne : ce sont ces doctrines qui aujourd'hui nous paraissent extra- 
 ordinaires, mais qui, alors, ^taient admises par quelques th^ologiens 
 et parfois meme prech^es au peuple chr^tien. L'article XXXI^, par 
 consequent, au lieu d'aller contre la vraie doctrine catholique, a pour 
 but de la d^fendre.' 
 
 Passages like these are interesting, as showing a somewhat unusual 
 attempt to do justice to the Anglican position. They belong, however, 
 only to a statement of the Anglican contention as such ; and them- 
 selves, as arguments, are neither expressly accepted nor denied. 
 
 Meanwhile, upon an examination of the English Ordinal, M. Dalbus 
 has come to the unhesitating conclusion that, in itself at least, it fulfils 
 all the conditions, of ceremonial and of language, which can fairly be 
 asked. Confuting the Pere IMonsabr^, who had supposed that the 
 Orders were vitiated by the absence of special mention of ' sacrifice ' 
 
 sub novo testamento committuntur, qiiocirca in * Deniqtie considerandum, addit 
 ad expiationem horum peccatorum non applicari nobis cruentum Christi sacrificium 
 sed incruentnm per sacramentum Poenitentiae." 
 
 ' Quand un eveque, im theologien renomme, malgre la singularite bien conuue 
 de ses opinions, parle ainsi, on peut imaginer facilement que des ecclesiastiques 
 moins instruits et des predicateurs populaires devaient parfois enseigner d'etranges 
 choses. 
 
 ' II est encore une autorite tres souvent invoquee par les auteurs de I'epoque, celle 
 d'Albert le Grand. Voici le passage qu'ils lui empruntent, tout en I'attribuant par- 
 fois a Saint Thomas: " Secunda causa institutionis hnjus sacramenti est sacrificium 
 altaris, contra quamdam quotidianam delictorum nostrorum rapinam. Ut sicut 
 corpus Domini semel oblatum est in cruce pro debito originali ; sic offeiatur jugiter 
 pro nostris quotidianis delictis in altari, et habeat in hoc ecclesia munus ad 
 placandum sibi Deum super omnia legis sacramenta vel sacrificia pretiosum et 
 acceptum f ." Les eveques d'Angleterre, en particulier Gardiner du parti romain, et 
 Latimer du parti d'Henri VIII, protestent contre cette doctrine prechee parfois au 
 peuple. Dans un discours prononce le 9 Juin 1536, a I'ouverture d'un synode de la 
 province de Cantorbery, Latimer disait, " II en est qui declament les idees des 
 hommes a la place de la parole de Dieu, prechant en meme temps au peuple que la 
 Redemption accomplie par la mort du Christ ne doit profiler qu'a ceux qui sont 
 morts anterieurement a son Incarnation ; et que, consequemment, le pardon des 
 peches et la redemption * achetee avec I'argent et inventee par les hommes est la 
 seule efficace, et non la Redemption qui nous a ete procuree par le Christ." ' 
 
 * Les hidulgences et la Messe. 
 
 t Albert le Grand, Serm. de Each. torn. xii. p. 250. Edit. Lugd. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 313 
 
 and of ' sacerdotal powers,' and quoting the Abbd Duchesne as 
 having demonstrated that nothing was required for ordination in the 
 early Church beyond ' laying-on of hands ' and ' prayer he re- 
 peatedly ^ formulates the conclusion that the Anglican is, in itself, an 
 undoubtedly adequate rite. 
 
 And yet the main conclusion, apparently almost reached, is set 
 aside, and Anglican Orders are, after all, disallowed. This is done 
 upon two grounds. The first is that though Barlow consecrated 
 Parker by a rite in itself adequate, yet Barlow had not adequate ideas 
 about the rite. It is true that he meant to do what was done by the 
 primitive Church. But he did not regard what he was doing as the 
 ' conferring of a sacrament.' Not indeed that this inadequacy of 
 Barlow's inner mind can itself be pronounced to be a certainty : 
 ' Mais les doctrines de Barlow sur le sacrement de I'Ordre suffisent pour 
 rendre cette intention positivement douteuse et, dfes lors, rendre incertain 
 I'acte sacramentel. La consecration de Parker serait done douteuse, 
 selon nous, par un vice d'intention' (p. 31). This was a sufficiently 
 surprising ground for the negative conclusion. But the second was 
 more astonishing still. It was nothing less than a deliberate theory 
 that what Pope Eugenius wrote to the Armenians in 1439 constituted 
 a formal erection of the ' Porrectio instrumentorum,' by the solemn 
 authority of the Pope, and the Council of Florence behind him, into an 
 indispensable ' materia ' for ordination to priesthood. It had not been 
 so before. At that moment the Church in her discretion made it to 
 be so. It is of course sufficiently obvious that the words of Eugenius 
 themselves betray no shadow of consciousness of thus creating for the 
 first time a new, and from thenceforth immutable and imperative, 
 ' materia ' for ordination. Quite the reverse. His avowed object is 
 to sum up in a breve compendium what is the actual teaching of the 
 
 ' Notice particularly his insistence, ' Ce ne sont done pas les mots plus ou moins 
 clairs de cette oraison qui la rendent apte k etre la forme de la consecration, mais 
 sa nature de priere'; p. 13. 
 
 ^ ' II semble done que nous sommes en droit de conclure tres legitimement que le 
 rite anglican pris en lui-meme pourrait etre suffisant. . . . Comme on le voit, non 
 seulemcnt la nature de la forme a ete respectee, mais la pensee geneiale a etc 
 empruntee k une ancienne priere usitee en France, en Angleterre, et dans bien d'autres 
 pays. Nous croyons done devoir regarder comme certain que le rite anglican, pris 
 en lui-meme, pourrait etre suffisant'; pp. 13, 14. 
 
314 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 Roman Church upon the points in question : and he does so, naturally 
 enough, by giving — in the words, as M. Dalbus shows, of St. Thomas — 
 the then received (but mistaken) theory on the subject ' ; and all this, 
 in order that he might succeed in making it perfectly clear for the 
 future, for ever — not to the Roman but to the Armenian com- 
 munities. 
 
 The authority however which affirmed the decree is, to M. Dalbus, 
 overwhelming. Pope and Council had declared that ' porrectio ' was 
 the indispensable ' materia.' Henceforth nothing less than a similar 
 authority could dispense with it ^. 
 
 Incidentally there is here another very curious point. The decretum 
 Eugenii ad Armenos, whatever be its value, would certainly appear to 
 be addressed, not to Romans at such, but to Armenians. Curiously 
 enough, it appears to be maintained that its effect was to impose, as 
 indispensable, a new ' materia ' upon the whole Western, but not upon 
 the Easter 71 Church. This, however, is by the way. 
 
 What then the whole Church had solemnly ordained, at least for the 
 West, could not be abrogated by any province, or kingdom, taken 
 
 ^ ' Expedire judicavimus, ne uUa in futurum de fidei veritate apud ipsos Armenos 
 haesitatio esse valeat, atque idem per omnia sapiant cum sede apostolica, unioque 
 ipsa stabilis et perpetua sine ullo scrupulo perseveret, ut sub quodam brevi com- 
 pendio orthodoxae fidei veritatem quam super praemissis Romana profitetur ecclesia, 
 per hoc decretum, sacro hoc approbante Florentino concilio, ipsis oratoribus ad 
 hoc etiam consentientibus, traderemus '; pp. 31, 32. 
 
 ^ ' Si le sens de ce decret est parfaitement clair, I'autorite n'en est pas contestable 
 non plus'; p. 32. — 'Pour les catholiques romains, Tautorite du Pape dans ce cas 
 suffirait, mais nous avons, de plus, I'autorite du Concile de Florence qui se cou- 
 tinuait.' — ' Un concile a done approuve un decret dans lequel il est dit que la 
 matiere du sacrement de I'Ordre est la porrection des instruments' ; p. 33. 
 
 ^ ' Voila done approuves deux rites sacramentels differents : une matiere pour les 
 Grecs, et une pour les Latins ; une matiere pour les dix ou douze premiers siecles, 
 et une autre pour la suite des ages ' (p. 33) ; and on p. .^5 he quotes Billuart thus : 
 ' Ecclesia itaque hac potestate sibi a Christo tradita utens, determinavit, seu saltern 
 consensit, quod impositio manuum cum forma illi respondente pro ecclesia Graeca, 
 et forte etiam in prioribus saeculis pro ecclesia Latina, esset signum legitimum 
 utriusque potestatis traditae ad consecrandum et ad absolvendum. At postea 
 determinavit pro ecclesia Latina quod porrectio instrumentorum cum his verbis, 
 Accipe potestatem &c., esset signum legitimum potestatis consecrandi ; impositio 
 autem manuum cum his verbis, Accipe Spiritum sanctum &c., signum potestatis 
 absolvendi : ita quod Graecus ordinauis ritu Latinorum aut Latinus ritu Graecoruia 
 sine dispensatione summi Pontificis invalide ordinaretur.' 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 315 
 
 apart. Granting, then, even that the Enghsh bishops had the most 
 unimpeachably excellent intentions ; granting that th^ir one desire was 
 to recover again primitive forms and apostolical usages ; yet they could 
 not, on these lines, establish an adequate rite ; because they had no 
 power to suppress a ceremony which, brought in by custom at first, 
 had been decreed to be essential, in the West, by the authority of 
 Eugenius IV, with the approval of the Council of Florence. 
 
 So the whole claim falls to the ground. The argument is summed 
 up by M. Dalbus, in these words : ' Nous croyons avoir demontre : 
 (i) que le rite de I'ordinal anglican, pris en lui-meme, pourrait etre 
 suflfisant ; (2) que la consecration de Parker doit etre regardde comme 
 certaine quant au fait, mais qu'un doute subsiste au sujet de I'intention 
 du consecrateur ; (3) que, par le fait des alterations introduites dans 
 les cdrdmonies de I'ordination des pretres, les ordinations anglicanes 
 sont nulles.' 
 
 In the Bulletin Criiique of July 15, 1894, there appeared a short 
 criticism of M. Dalbus' work by the Abbd Duchesne. 
 
 The first objection made to Anglican Orders — the doubt as to 
 Barlow's sacramental orthodoxy — M. Duchesne puts quietly aside as 
 irrelevant. The question is, he says, what the Church means by 
 Ordination. The heterodox teaching of an individual bishop, or even, 
 if it be so, of the Anglican Church collectively, would not invalidate 
 their act, if by a rite adequate in itself they sought to confer the Orders 
 of the Church : ' II y a eu, en dehors de I'Angleterre, des ^veques 
 incrddules ; n'oublions pas qu'une partie du clerge fran9ais derive son 
 ordination de M. de Talleyrand.' — ' Le bapteme pent etre conf^r^ 
 validement par une personne qui salt seulement que c'est un rite sacrd 
 par lequel on devient chr^tien. De meme, les ordinations anglicanes 
 ont toujours etd c^l^brdes par des personnes qui voulaient faire des 
 ^vSques, des pretres, et ainsi de suite. II n'en faut pas demander 
 davantage.' 
 
 Neither does he admit M. Dalbus' objection about Pope Eugenius 
 and the Porrectio Instrumentorum to be admissible. Granting, in 
 theory, that the Church has power to make a solemn alteration even 
 in the essential ' materia ' of a Sacrament, where is the evidence, he 
 
3i6 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 asks, that she has ever determined so to do, or been conscious of so 
 doing, at all ' ? 
 
 He adds that the objection, even if valid, would be valid only against 
 ordinations to priesthood, and not against consecrations to episcopate. 
 Inasmuch therefore as there are abundant historical instances of the 
 consecration to episcopate of those who were not in priest's Orders, 
 the argument, even if true, would make nothing against the recognition 
 of the English episcopate. 
 
 His practical conclusion is that English ordinations ^ might be 
 recognized as valid. The contrary opinion prevalent in Rome is 
 accounted for by the necessity which Rome is under to be very tender 
 to the scruples of Catholic consciences. As things stand, there are 
 few who would accept the Sacraments from a Priest who had only 
 been ordained as an Anglican : ' En ces matieres, il est naturel de 
 multiplier les garanties.' 
 
 The fact that public prejudice is as it is, is, he says, an inheritance 
 from the sixteenth century, when scholastic (but erroneous) views 
 about the ' porrectio' were in possession ; and the prejudice was fostered 
 and maintained by the ' legends ' published about the consecrations of 
 Parker and of Barlow. 
 
 Some day, he concludes, it is possible that the feeling may improve, 
 and the present attitude of authority on the subject may be changed : 
 ' Rien n'empeche de croire que, par la suite des temps, cette opinion 
 se corrige, et que I'autoritd eccl^siastique elle-meme n'en vienne 
 a modifier son attitude.' 
 
 Now it may be said that to reopen the details of this controversy is 
 to go back to things which belong already to a remote past. In 
 a sense, perhaps, they do. But this past, if already remote, is certainly 
 pregnant with instruction. 
 
 No one will deny that the two gentlemen whose writings have been 
 quoted are eminent among Roman ecclesiastics, for their large- 
 
 ' 'Oil est (i) I'acte officiel, public, explicite, par lequel I'Eglise s'est reconnu le 
 droit dont on parle? (2) Facte officiel, public, explicite, par lequel elle a declare 
 user de ce droit pour les rites essentiels de I'ordination ? J'ajouterai que I'on 
 pourrait demauder aussi dans quel interet elle aurait introduit un changement aussi 
 considerable.' 
 
 ' ' Peuvent etre considerees comme valides.' 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 317 
 
 minded effort to be fair. Assuming this, I must ask for a little further 
 attention to the intellectual difficulty in which they found themselves 
 placed. M. Dalbus had disposed of all the natural presumptions 
 against the Anglican Ordinal. Yet he disallowed it upon considera- 
 tions (i) of intention, and (2) of the overruling authority of an 
 utterance (generally supposed to have been an exceptionally unfortunate 
 one) of a Roman pontiff. Now what did he really mean by the 
 difficulty of intention .? It is hard to believe that he ever really 
 supposed that the private heterodoxy of an individual bishop would 
 invalidate his pontifical actions, or that he would have felt his objection 
 fully met by the reference which Duchesne made to M. de Talleyrand. 
 But if the gist of his objection never really lay in the greater or less 
 probability that Barlow, individually, performed a sacramental act 
 with an unsacramental conception of what he was doing, wherein did 
 it lie ? Must not the underlying suggestion be this — that Barlow not 
 only, whilst consecrating, individually held, but that, in and by the very 
 method and (taken with all its surroundings) admitted significance of 
 his consecrating, he did officially and representatively express, an 
 inadequate doctrine of what priesthood and episcopate were ? I am 
 not suggesting that this gloss would make his charge of inadequate 
 intention effectual ; but at least it would make it more intelligible. 
 But if it is Barlow representatively and publicly, rather than Barlow 
 individually and privately, wherel)y is that which Barlow represented 
 to be judged.'' His own writings may, under the circumstances, be an 
 item in the evidence ; but only so far as he and his writings may, 
 under the circumstances, be supposed to be representative of reformed 
 Anglican doctrine. It is reformed Anglican doctrine that is really in 
 question — not the vagueness of mind of an individual bishop But 
 if this is true, then the doubt which really underlay and was disguised 
 by this complaint about intention was really a doubt not how far 
 Barlow's own ' unsacramentalism ' may privately have gone, but how 
 far that corporate doctrine, which Barlow may be supposed for the 
 moment to have personified, was or was not adequately 'sacramental.' 
 By the time we get as far as this, it is plain that what the question will 
 
 • This suggestion is somewhat fortified by M. Dalbus' reference in this con- 
 nexion to Gasparri. For the passage quoted from Gasparri, see below, p. 321. 
 
3i8 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 come to, on analysis, will be, whether ' sacramental ' in an Anglican 
 context is, or is not, all that ' sacramental ' from a Roman standpoint 
 may be required to mean. It becomes, though indirectly, an instance 
 of testing Anglican meanings by their coincidence with Roman. 
 
 But if this is, as I believe, indirectly true of what Dalbus says 
 of defective intention, there can be no doubt that it is true quite 
 directly of his argument about Pope Eugenius and the ' porrectio.' 
 This is nothing but an invoking of the supreme authority of the 
 Roman pontiff. The argument depends upon the assumption that 
 Rome always was, and always must have been, right. Suppose for 
 a moment that Roman theology may have fallen into disproportion, 
 or made a mistake ; and the argument would be no argument at all. 
 It depends, in other words, on the assumption that, Rome being 
 absolutely right, everything in Anglicanism must be wrong, if, or just 
 so far as, it definitely differs from Rome. But, as I have urged 
 already, as long as Roman infallibility has to stand in the major 
 premiss, the most learned and large-minded efforts made on the 
 Roman side, to do justice to the Anglican standpoint, are made 
 necessarily in vain. It can hardly be said too plainly that if the 
 Roman Church has, at every point, been right, then the Anglican 
 Church has been, of necessity, wrong. We have condemned the 
 proportions and altered the expressions of her doctrine. The question 
 is, which is right ? It might be held indeed, without any defect of 
 logic, that whilst each was in many points right — perhaps even right 
 in the main — yet each had made mistakes and was in some points 
 open to correction : but if either is absolutely right, it follows, by 
 inexorable consequence, that the other — ^just so far as she really differs 
 — must be absolutely wrong. Neither can really argue with the other 
 so long as her own infallibility is a postulate in the argument. 
 
 When we turn from M. Dalbus to Duchesne, the fetters which 
 forbid free discussion are not removed. It is difficult to see how 
 a loyal Roman Catholic could really go further than M. Duchesne 
 went. Every argument against Anglican Orders was set aside. There 
 remained in the field not one. But what was the resulting position 
 That the Orders might be acknowledged as valid, if Rome chose to 
 acknowledge them. Perhaps Roman prejudice might die away; 
 perhaps Roman authority might pronounce their validity. Nothing 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 319 
 
 was really lacking but the will. If on one side this may look like the 
 extreme of concession, on the other it is, no less, the extreme 
 assertion of the infallibility and autocracy of Rome. 
 
 Of course I am not finding fault with either of these gentlemen. 
 Towards themselves there can be no feeling but the most hearty 
 and respectful sympathy. They did not make their position, or 
 the conditions of it. But I believe that it is worth while to point 
 out that, unless tacit concessions were allowed to them, incompatible 
 with the real nature of the position, the position itself was one which 
 made any real appreciation of Anglicanism impossible. Would such 
 concessions — could such concessions — be either expressly, or even 
 tacitly, allowed? 
 
 Some months later, in the early part of 1895, there appeared 
 a much more elaborate criticism of M. Dalbus — an '£tude th^o- 
 logique sur les ordinations anglicanes,' by ' A. Boudinhon, Professeur 
 de droit canon a I'lnstitut Catholique de Paris.' M. Boudinhon was 
 a much more hostile writer. He, at least, had no doubt, from the 
 beginning, that English Orders were null. His argument, however, 
 is of no slight interest to us. In the first place, he, like M. Duchesne, 
 only much more elaborately, pulled to pieces the reasons alleged by 
 M. Dalbus against Anglican validity. As to the ' porrectio instru- 
 mentorum,' he warned M. Dalbus of the danger to which the rest of 
 his position becomes liable, if he ventured to rest upon that — the 
 danger of being ultimately driven to admit that the Orders are real * ! 
 
 For to M. Boudinhon it was perfectly clear that the view that 
 the ' porrectio ' was essential could not be maintained. He argued 
 that, whereas the modern Roman Pontifical is, in fact, an amalgama- 
 
 ' ' Je commence par Ini signaler le danger qui resulterait inevitablement pour sa 
 these, si sa troisieme conclusion se trouvait fausse. Car si I'ordinal anglican est 
 sufifisant, cn lui-meme, pour la consecration episcopate, il doit I'etre aussi pour 
 I'ordination presbyterale si Ton admet que celle-ci ne requiert pas comme element 
 essentiel la porrection des instruments. Que s'il reste seulement un doute sur la 
 valeur de la consecration de Parker, par suite de I'intention peut-etre vicieuse de 
 Barlow, les ordinations anglicanes scraient tout au plus douteuses et on ne pourrait 
 dire qu'elles sont nulles. Que si enfin I'ordination anglicane est suffisante, en lui- 
 meme, pour la consecration episcopate, il suffira de montrer que I'^piscopat 
 pourrait bien etre valide sans le presbyterat, pour etre oblige d'admettre la valeur 
 au moins proljable de la hierarchic episcopate anglicane ' ; p. 37, 
 
320 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 tion of early Gallican and Roman Ordinals, together with added 
 ceremonies of later date, what is essential must necessarily be looked 
 for, not in the added ceremonies, but in the original rites. It would 
 be absurd to maintain that Ordinals once valid in themselves were 
 emptied of their validity because new rites were added which took 
 over, and monopolized, the 'essential' character. Ordinations to 
 episcopate, priesthood, and diaconate, are essentially all of one type ; 
 their essence consists in the consecratory prayer — with imposition of 
 hands. Only that can be essential which is universal. To call the 
 ' porrectio ' essential is out of the question ^ 
 
 As to the other difficulty — at least in the form in which M. Dalbus 
 had stated it — that Barlow's ' unsacramental' intention nullified Parker's 
 consecration, Boudinhon is no less clear and trenchant. If the 
 rite which he used was adequate, and he used it seriously, the private 
 heterodoxy of the consecrating bishop, evidenced by his teaching or 
 preaching elsewhere, could have no power to nullify or neutralize 
 what he did. This M. Boudinhon gives not as his private opinion 
 only, but as the universal judgement of theologians — ' leur enseigne- 
 ment est absolument uniforme, souvent meme con9u en termes 
 identiques. Le minimum requis. suivant I'expression du d^cret ad 
 Armenos, reproduite par le concile de Trente sess. vii. can. ri, est 
 
 ^ ' On est bien oblige de reconnaitre que les rites anciens de ces ordinations 
 comprenaient les elements essentiels, ou, si Ton veut, la matiere et la forme ; 
 d'autre part on ne saurait soutenir serieusement que I'efficacite essentielle des ordi- 
 nations a ete deplacee et attachee a des rites d'accession posterieure ' ; p. 39. 
 
 ' . . . et consistent essentiellement dans la priere ou preface consecratoire, accom- 
 pagnee de I'imposition des mains. C'est dans ce rite, le seul qui existe dans toutes 
 les liturgies, orientales et occidentales, romaine et gallicane, anciennes et recentes, 
 qu'il faut chercher la matiere et la forme des trois ordinations sacramentelles. La 
 tradition des instruments, comme matiere essentielle, est definitivement ecartee. 
 
 Le celebre decret ad Armenos, sur lequel M. Dalbus s'appuie peut-etre trop, 
 n'a pas empeche, on le salt, la diversite des opinions parmi les theologiens. 
 Jamais, que je sache, I'Eglise n'a positivement reprouve aucune de ces opinions, 
 pas plus qu'elle n'en a fait aucune sienne. Les decisions qu'on pent alleguer 
 visent surtout la pratique, et en pratique I'Eglise est tutioriste ' ; p. 40. 
 
 ' Pour motiver sa conclusion, M. Dalbus est dans la necessite de faire de son 
 opinion la seule certaine ; il doit prouver que la porreclion des instruments est non 
 seulement obligatoire, ce que personne ne conteste, mais encore seule essentielle, ce 
 qui ne resulte ni de I'enseignement commun des theologiens, ni des decisions de 
 llglise'; p. 41. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 321 
 
 I'intention de faire ce que fait I'figlise ' (p. 30). That is, he must do what 
 the Church does, meaning to produce the effect which the Church 
 means. He need not understand what the Church means. He may 
 be in serious error in respect of it. He may think most unsacramen- 
 tally of the sacrament which he performs. Still, whatever his errors, 
 if he has but the purpose, virtual and implicit, to use the Church's 
 forms for the Church's purpose, his act is a valid and effectual one. 
 In support of this position he quotes a passage from le P. Lehmkuhl 
 — embodying a quotation from Suarez — and a definition laid down by 
 Mgr. Gasparri. 
 
 Before turning to the definition of Mgr. Gasparri, upon which both 
 Dalbus and Boudinhon rely, it may be well to say that the position 
 just laid down— the need of an intention 'facere quod facit ecclesia' — 
 an intention which may be presumed, in the absence of evidence to 
 the contrary, from the mere fact of an apparently serious performance 
 of the Church's ceremony — is stated, so far as the terms themselves 
 are concerned, much as Hooker stated it in fact, on behalf of Angli- 
 cans three hundred years ago, and as it would be generally accepted 
 in all parts of the Church. But it is no less manifest that there is on 
 the face of the terms an ambiguity which must be cleared away. 
 'Facere quod facit ecclesia' by all means. But if to half of those 
 who use the phrase, 'Ecclesia' is simply identical with 'Ecclesia 
 Romana,' the definition would be obviously valueless ; for those who 
 might have agreed to use it would mean, in using it, incompatible 
 things. It is plain, then, that there must be a definition of the word. 
 What, for the purpose of the argument, is meant by 'Ecclesia'? 
 
 With this question, then, we approach the somewhat singular ruling 
 of Mgr. Gasparri. The first half of it indeed sounds studiously liberal : 
 'Ex dictis sequitur ordinationem valere, si minister intendit quidem 
 facere quod facit Ecclesia Christi, sed simul putat ilium ritum non 
 esse sacramentum, non esse ritum sacrum, nullam conferre potestatem, 
 Ecclesiam Romanam non esse veram Ecclesiam Christi,' &c. After 
 a statement so liberally conceived as this, particularly after the words 
 of its final clause, it is no small surprise to find a proviso appended, 
 as indispensable condition, that he must not have any positive purpose 
 to differ, in what he does, from the Church 0/ Rome : ' dummodo 
 aclu positive voluntatis non dicat : Nolo facere sacramentum, conficere 
 
 Y 
 
322 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 ritum sacrum, conferre potestatem, facere quod facit Ecclesia Romana, 
 &c. Sane in casu unicus est actus voluntatis, nempe faciendi quod 
 facit Ecclesia Christi, quern non destruit error concomitans, de quo 
 supra. At e contrario ordinatio foret nulla prorsus, si minister in- 
 tendit quidem facere quod facit Ecclesia Christi sed simul acta positive 
 et explicito voluntatis, non \"ult conficere sacramentum aut ritum 
 sacrum, aut facere quod facit Ecclesia Romana, aut conferre potes- 
 tatem ordinis, aut imprimere characterem, &c. Nam in casu forent 
 duo voluntatis actus positivi et contrarii, quorum posterior priorem 
 destruit, vel qui mutuo eliduntur, et ideo minister revera non vult 
 facere quod facit Ecclesia Christi ' (pp. 31, 32). Now this is a ruling 
 which certainly itself requires further explaining. How much is meant 
 by not intending to do what Rome does ? Rome for instance intends 
 to celebrate the Eucharist and, in doing so, conceives that she performs 
 a certain pecuharly defined miracle, the technical name of which is 
 ' transubstantiation.' Is it a deliberate disbelief in 'transubstantiation,' 
 involving a positive disclaimer of doing what Rome conceives that she 
 does in celebrating the Eucharist, or is it only a purpose 7wt to 
 ' celebrate the Eucharist,' which would fall within Gasparri's mean- 
 ing ? So in respect of Ordination — is it the intention ' not to make 
 a priest,' or the disclaimer of the Roman definition of a priest and 
 the Roman theory as to the precise mode of making one, which 
 would make the Orders null ? The difference is enormous. But in 
 either case the introduction of the word ' Romana,' and the assumption 
 that he who does not wish to do as the ' Ecclesia Romana ' does not 
 really wish to do as the 'Ecclesia Christi,' has the effect of com- 
 pletely destroying the value of Gasparri's statement. It comfortably 
 re-establishes Romanism, as a whole, in the major premiss, and 
 therefore sweeps every conclusion necessarily into Romanism. 
 
 It will be anticipated, then, that M. Boudinhon's repudiation of the 
 argument as to Barlow's ' intention ' was a repudiation only of the 
 form in which IM. Dalbus had stated it — with a view to its more 
 confident restatement in another form. He restates it much in the 
 form which I ventured just now to suggest as really underlying 
 Dalbus' thought. Barlow is no longer an accidentally ' heterodox ' 
 individual ; he is officiating as the public representative of ' hetero- 
 doxy.' That which clinches the proof that he is so, is the Ordinal 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 323 
 
 form which he uses Had he continued to use the Roman Pontifical, 
 no question as to his ' intention' would, according to M. Boudinhon's 
 argument, have been relevant. But he used a form which — whether 
 it could or could not have been adequate ' in itself,' on the impossible 
 hypothesis that the Church (i.e. Rome) had adopted it'* — was in fact 
 drawn up as the overt and deliberate expression of dissentience from 
 Rome. The open and representative use of such a form, under such 
 circumstances, is the demonstrative conviction — nay is the defiant 
 proclamation — of a positive intention not to mean or do what the 
 Church does and means. If 'Ecclesia' and ' Ecclesia Romana ' are 
 terms, for all purposes, simply convertible, the argument of course is 
 complete. But if this is, after all, what is meant, was it really worth 
 while to construct an argument at all 
 
 Such seemed to be the nature of M. Boudinhon's comment on 
 Mgr. Gasparri's text. It is true that a considerable section of the 
 ' etude ' had been devoted to showing the inadequacy of the Ordinal 
 as reformed, and that this inadequacy of the Ordinal is then alleged 
 as evidence of the inadequate intention of those who used it ; but it 
 is difficult to attach much importance to an argument which is so 
 very apparently circular. For the objections in the Ordinal really turn 
 upon the plea that it is an unauthorized departure from the Ordinal 
 forms of ' the Church ' ! ' It is obvious that nothing can be added by 
 an argument like this. 
 
 1 ' II est bien difficile, pour ne pas dire impossible, de conclure a la nullite de la 
 consecration de Parker par suite de I'intention heretique de Barlow, abstraction 
 faite du rite. En revanche, remploi du rite de I'ordinal ne permet pas d'admettre 
 que Barlow ait pu avoir I'intention suffisante de faire ce que fait I'Eglise '; p. 30. 
 
 ^ 'Quelle que soit la valeur de I'assertion de M. Dalbus que I'ordinal anglican, 
 pris en lui-meme, pourrait etre valable, c'est-a-dire aurait pu etre valable, si 
 I'Eglise I'avait choisi au lieu de celui qu'elle a etabli, je crois pouvoir dire, sans 
 temerite, qu'en realite il n'est pas valable. . . .' ; p. 21. 
 
 He had said before, ' J'espere avoir dissipe la confusion dissimulee dans I'asser- 
 tion de notre auteur. II n'est pas logique d'argumenter ici de I'hypothese a la 
 realite ; et s'il est possible de dire, avec M. Dalbus, que I'ordinal anglican, pris en 
 lui-meme, pourrait etre suffisant, il n'est pas permis d'en conclure qu'en realite il 
 soit suffisant ' ; p. 17. 
 
 ' ' Son premier vice est done de manquer d'autorite. . . . Toute determination 
 faite sans autorite ou par une autre autorite que celle de la veritable Eglise semble 
 done contraire au droit divin, et, par suite, depourvue de Tefficacite sacra- 
 mentelle ' ; p. 13. 
 
 Y a 
 
324 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 Before leaving the ' etude,' it may be worth while to quote one word 
 of a different kind — its final word — addressed plainly, though not by 
 name, to IVI. Duchesne : ' Si I'Eglise pouvait accepter les ordinations 
 anglicanes comme valables, elle devrait le faire ; d'abord parce que ce 
 serait son intdret, puisque cela rendrait ainsi plus facile le retour de cette 
 Eglise depuis si longtemps sdparde, retour qui est un de ses plus chers 
 d^sirs ; ce serait plus encore son devoir, puisqu'elle enseigne que les 
 rites catholiques de I'ordination, employes par un ministre heretique 
 avec I'intention requise, confbrent le sacrement de I'Ordre, lequel ne 
 peut sans sacrilege se reit^rer.' 
 
 It is unnecessary to comment further upon the argument of the 
 ' Etude.' For not the least remarkable fact about it is that, within the 
 year, a great part of it was publicly withdrawn by M. Boudinhon him- 
 self. Christmas Day, 1895, is the date of the preface to a new 
 pamphlet, larger than the first, in which he has materially reconsidered 
 his position. 
 
 In this brochure, ' De la Validity des Ordinations Anglicanes,' he 
 devotes his whole effort to bring the argument for their nullity away 
 from all considerations of ' intention ' (herein pointedly separating 
 himself from English Roman Catholics ') and to base it altogether on 
 the inherent inadequacy of the Anglican rite. 
 
 He lets go the argument which had seemed to be so conclusive in the 
 fitude — alike against the possibility of the adequacy of the rite, and the 
 possibility of the adequacy of the intention — drawn with charming 
 
 ' A priori, et avant la determination legitime faite par I'Eglise, toute forme est 
 sufifisante, des lors qu'elle iiidique I'effet de I'ordination ; mais, en realite, apres 
 la determination competente, les formules imposees par I'Eglise sont necessaires' ; 
 pp. 16, i;. 
 
 ' Ou plutot, pour conclure ainsi, il faudrait antra chose : il faudrait demontrer, 
 suivant ce que j'ai dit plus haut, qu'il n'existe pas de differences entre I'Ordinal 
 anglican et le Pontifical latin, si ce n'est des differences purement accidentelles. 
 Or la comparaison entre les deux textes — comparaison que chacun peut faire — ne 
 permet pas de reduire les differences entre I'un et I'autre a n'etre qu'accidentelles ' ; 
 pp. 17, 18. 
 
 ' ' Les catholiques anglais se font illusion, ce me semble, en s'attachant presque 
 exclusivement aux motifs de nuUite tires du defaut d'intention des ministres de 
 I'ordination, et des heresies professees par eux et par I'Eglise Anglicane, particu- 
 lierement sur I'Eucharistie et le sacrifice. Tout cela est presque completement en 
 dehors de la question' ; pp. 17, 18. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 325 
 
 simplicity from the obvious fact tiiat Anglicans had altered the 
 Ordinal of the [Roman] Church. Putting ' intention ' aside, he admits 
 that, as far as the rite is concerned, its inadequacy does not instantly 
 follow. There is still one chance ^ Though they had deliberately 
 varied the form of ' the Church,' it is still to be asked whether in 
 varying they had or had not lost the essential elements in the forms of 
 ' the Church.' The animus implied in the fact of altering at all does 
 not settle the matter by itself. 
 
 He is good enough to remind us that such a testing of the Anglican 
 rite by ' legitimate ' rites is only necessary because the Anglican rite is 
 itself schismatic and illegitimate. Had it existed within ' the Church,' 
 or even been recognized by ' the Church,' that would suffice. But 
 being schismatically ' without,' it can only justify itself by its conformity 
 with that which is 'within'; pp. 23, 24. 
 
 This is delightful. The whole of the major premiss, then, which he 
 is about to construct, avowedly depends, for its relevancy to the argu- 
 ment, upon the fundamental assumption that Anglicans, their princi- 
 ples, their ceremonies, their service books, have no place in, but are 
 wholly outside of, the history and the life of ' the Church.' So frank 
 a begging of the only question really worth arguing of course 
 considerably clears the ground. 
 
 But to return to M. Boudinhon. He grants that the Anglican 
 Ordinal fully possesses, in the laying on of hands, the one and only 
 essential materia. Everything therefore turns on the question of the 
 ' forma,' which to him is a term synonymous with the ' canon 
 cons($cratoire.' What then is essential for a consecratory forma ? 
 
 Of the answer to this his new premiss consists. Examine, he says in 
 effect, all the constitutive ' formae ' which have ever in fact been recog- 
 nized by ' the Church.' Observe what features are common to them 
 all. These features constitute the essential ' form.' A ' form ' which 
 has these is adequate. A form which lacks any one of these is not. 
 
 I cannot but point out that in this new major premiss there are 
 
 ' ' II ne reste done qu'une seule hypothese — mais il en reste une — ... si elles 
 avaient conserve ce qu'il y a d'essentiel dans les prieres des Pontificaux catholiques 
 legitimes ' ; p. 24. 
 
 ' J'avais conclu, je I'avoue, trop rapidement a I'insuffisance des formules angli- 
 canes, ayant un peu trop vite admis une difference substantielle entre ces prieres et 
 celles des formes catholiques ' ; p. 58. 
 
326 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 tacitly contained no less than three assumptions, every one of which 
 is gratuitous and inadmissible. The first is (as always) that ' the 
 Church ' and ' Rome ' are simply synonymous terms. He goes on no 
 doubt to examine the Ordinals of many ages and of many countries. 
 But he examines them on the basis of their having been authorized or 
 acknowledged by Rome. And for this reason he of course, by hypo- 
 thesis, omits the Anglican. This means at once that between him 
 and Anglicans there is no real community of ground. 
 
 The second assumption is that the essential ' forma ' in Ordination 
 is one single separate prayer, which can be and must be detached from 
 that whole service of prayer of which it forms part ; so that it is, and 
 the service as a whole is not, before God and man, the devotional and 
 interpretative accompaniment of the laying on of hands. If St. Paul 
 laid hands on Timothy in a service of prayer which lasted (say) half 
 an hour, it was not the uplifting of heart through that half hour in 
 Godward aspiration and request — it was the words of some one single, 
 short, separate moment of prayer, in immediate juxtaposition with the 
 manual act which, taken quite apart and alone, constituted in that case 
 the ' prayer ' which (as all theologians allow) must accompany the 
 lajing on of hands for Ordination. I am not now to discuss this point 
 in full, but must at least express my conviction that theologians (too 
 ready, as often, materially to externalize and logically to define !) have 
 been misled in their theories on this point by an analogy falsely drawn 
 from the sacrament of Baptism ; for in Baptism there is, as there is not 
 in any other sacrament or sacramental rite whatsoever, a single 
 formula (itself not in the shape, though with the implications, of a 
 prayer) which, because prescribed as a formula by the lips of the risen 
 Lord Himself, can and does stand alone and apart from everything 
 besides in the full ceremonial of Baptism. So completely, however, is 
 this idea of the technical ' forma ' detached by Boudinhon (as by many 
 others in their definition of sacraments) from the service of which it 
 can only at the most be a significant climax, that, when he has settled 
 which of the elements in the service is to be taken as the ' forma,' he 
 demands to have, within the limits of that one detached prayer, whatever 
 he has laid down to be essential for the ' prayer ' that shall accompany 
 and interpret the laying on of hands. 
 
 The third assumption is that the Ordinal ' forms ' which have ever 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 327 
 
 been used in the Church (i. e. recognized by Rome) have been in such 
 sense under Divine guidance as to warrant not only the negative con- 
 clusion — that nothing can be essential to ordination which they do not 
 all contain ; but also the much more doubtful positive — that nothing 
 can possibly have been present in fact in them all without being so 
 indispensable in the sight of God, that, if it were not mentioned, the 
 grace of Order would not be given. 
 
 It is obvious that M. Boudinhon is here on very dangerous ground 
 historically. We do not know all the forms which existed within the 
 area that Rome is not prepared to condemn ; at any moment a new 
 discovery might modify the received belief, and show that under this 
 rule forms had been condemned as inadequate which were really well 
 within the terms of the rule\ It is probable also that this third 
 
 ^ A striking illustration of the probabilities in this direction is supplied by Father 
 Puller [see Guardian for Sept. 30, 1896, p. 1474] : — 
 
 ' The Abbe Boudinhon, by a comparison of the various forms in his collection, 
 has put together all those elements which are common to all of them, and, 
 arranging them in the form of a prayer, he has thus composed a formula which 
 he thinks contains the minimum which can be admitted if a valid ordination is to 
 be secured. There is one point in his formula which seems to me to be open to 
 criticism, but I will first quote it as it stands in his treatise De la Validite dcs 
 Ordinations Anglicanes. It occurs on p. 50, and runs thus : — 
 
 ' " Deus qui . . . respice propitius super hunc famulum tuum, quem ad dia- 
 conatum {respective: presbyteratum vcl episcopatum sett summum sacerdotium) 
 vocare dignatus es ; da ei gratiam tuam, ut munera huius ordinis digne et utiliter 
 adimplere valeat." 
 
 ' Mgr. Gasparri {Revue Anglo- Roniaine, torn. i. p. 545) accepts this formula as 
 giving satisfactorily those elements which are common to all the recognized precatory 
 ordination forms. The point in the formula which I should criticize is the express 
 mention of the order conferred. Unfortunately M. Boudinhon did not take into 
 account the very old Roman rite given in the Canons of St. Hippolytus. If he had, 
 he would have noticed that in the prayer for the ordination of a deacon in that rite 
 there is no mention of the diaconate. The prayer runs as follows (Achelis' edition 
 of the Canons of St. Hippolytus , can. v. sections 39-42, pp- 66, 67) : — " O Deus, 
 Pater Domini nostri lesu Christi, rogamus te nixe [?enixe], ut effundas Spiritum 
 tuum Sanctum super servum tuum N. eumque praepares cum illis, qui tibi serviunt 
 secundum tuum beneplacitum sicut Stephanus; utque iHi concedas vim vincendi 
 omnem potestatem dolosi signo crucis tuae, quo ipse signatur ; utque concedas 
 ipsi mores sine peccato coram omnibus hominibus, doctrinamque pro multis, qua 
 gentem copiosam in ecclesia sacra ad salutem perducat sine ullo scandalo. Accipe 
 omne servitium eius per Dominum nostrum lesum Christum, etc. Amen." 
 Attention was called to this formula by Mr. Lacey, in the Supplementum to the 
 
328 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 assumption would be of no value to Boudinhon, except as read 
 in conjunction with the second. But even apart from the second, 
 and apart from the grave historical risks to which it exposes him, it 
 is necessary to insist that this third assumption — the very marrow 
 of M. Boudinhon's major premiss — is a mere assumption, more or 
 less reasonable, no doubt, for ordinary purposes, but of no real 
 cogency. 
 
 Proceeding, however, with his scrutiny upon this principle, M. Bou- 
 dinhon concludes that the ' prayer ' (which is to be recognized 
 detachedly as the ' forma ') must express three things, (i) petition to 
 God for grace for the ordinands (generally, but not always, expressed 
 as the gift of His Spirit to them) ; (2) the name of the order to which 
 they are to be ordained; and (3), (with great variety of detail) some 
 reference to the functions to be fulfilled and the endowments required 
 for their fulfilment, but nol necessarily any specification of the 
 powers conceived to be conveyed in the ordination (pp. 45-47). 
 By this last statement he pointedly overthrows the letter of the Dutch 
 Old-Catholics \ 
 
 He then finds — curiously enough ^ — that each of the three services 
 
 Be Hierarchid, and the Abbe Bondinhon, when reviewing the Sitpplementum, 
 frankly admits that, in view of this formula, his previous result must be modified. 
 It is evident that in this formula there is no mention of either deacon or diaconate, 
 and therefore it cannot be maintained that there is any necessity for the mention 
 of the order, which is being imparted, in the precatory form. No doubt, in some 
 way or other, the fact that the ordinand was going to be ordained deacon and not 
 priest was made manifest when the rite contained in the Canons of St. Hippolyttis 
 was performed ; but the ordination formula itself is simply a prayer that God 
 would pour out His Holy Spirit upon the ordinand, so that by his holiness and 
 learning he may draw many souls to salvation. The Abbe Boudinhon {Kevue 
 Anglo- Roniaine^ torn. ii. p. 674), speaking of this Hippolytean formula, says : — 
 
 ' " Neither the word ' deacon ' nor the word ' diaconate ' is found in it. The 
 fixing of the intention of the prayer [to the bestowal of the diaconate] is sufficiently 
 secured either by the allusion to Saint Stephen, or by the other prayers and 
 ceremonies, however summary they may have been at that primitive epoch, or even 
 simply by the will and intention of the bishop who was ordaining." ' 
 
 Father Pullej- adduces this as a modification, in detail, of M. Boudinhon's result. 
 It is, in fact, more than this. It is a striking illustration of the precariousness of 
 his principle. 
 
 ' ' C'est ce qui doit faire entierement rejeter I'opinion de R. P. Tournebize, 
 et des vieux catholiques de Hollande'; p. 50. 
 
 ^ ' Nous devons commencer par une tres curieuse observation' ; p. 51. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 329 
 
 of Anglican ordination possesses a prayer which contains these three 
 requirements. They are all adequate then ? Not at all. For he never- 
 theless rules — and we, in our turn, are inclined to see herein ' una ties 
 curieuse observation,' — that in each of the three services this pra} er 
 can neither itself be the ' forma,' nor even can contribute, in any 
 degree, to make the service as a whole into an adequate ' forma ' ; 
 because it is not sufficiently close to the laying on of hands. The 
 manual action is accompanied and interpreted only by that fraction of 
 the service which coincides with it (not quite indeed, for that would over- 
 throw most Ordinals, but almost) when measured by minutes or seconds. 
 The prayer then, which does fulfil all the conditions, being according 
 to this ruling — for purposes of a ' forma ' — exactly as if it were not in 
 the service at all, is there any prayer in juxtaposition with the manual 
 act which might serve for a forma ? There are indeed interpretative 
 words which accompany the action directly, ' Take thou authority,' &c., 
 ' Receive the Holy Ghost,' &c. But these again, being not in the 
 precatory but the imperative form, cannot be the 'forma'; and not 
 being the forma, cannot contribute anything whatever towards bringing 
 the total service into such a relation, of interpretation and supplication, 
 with the laying on of hands, as would be necessary to make that 
 laying on of hands effectual. So these also are — for the purpose — as 
 if they were not there at all. Once more, then, is there anything 
 which could possibly serve as a ' forma ' ? 
 
 In the Ordering of Deacons there is nothing left to suggest. Then 
 the Ordering of Deacons is hopelessly invalid. It is invalid, observe, 
 because there is laying on of hands with no accompanying or interpre- 
 tative form. It is a service of laying on of hands without 'prayer.' 
 Could anything be more external, more pedantic — to speak seriously 
 as amongst grown men, more childish ? 
 
 In the ordination of priests, there is a prayer at the required 
 moment ; but — when it is petitioning God it is not exactly for grace 
 to the ordinands, and when it is speaking to God about His grace to 
 the ordinands, the form of petition is transcended and translated into 
 the form of grateful adoration and praise \ and therefore it is uncertain 
 
 ' ' C'est une prifere, sans doute; il y est question des ordinands, sans doute 
 encore ; mais je n'y retrouve pas, du moins pas assez clairement, la trame et la 
 
33° 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 whether it is quite a prayer of the character required ; and therefore 
 — since of course all the contents of all the rest of the service put 
 together count for nothing as constituting, or as contributing to the 
 constitution of, a forma — the judicial conclusion must be ' que le 
 presbytdrat ainsi conf^r6 est douteux, sinon invalide'; p. 57. 
 
 It is a controversy full indeed of surprises. Perhaps few surprises 
 will be much greater, after the extraordinary processes by which the 
 diaconate and the priesthood have been practically disallowed, than to 
 find ourselves met with the astonishing phenomenon of an acquittal 
 in respect of the service for consecration of bishops : ' 11 faut avouer 
 qu'ici la trame de nos pri^res catholiques est fidelement suivie ' ; 
 ' r^piscopat ainsi confdrd, a ne considerer que le rite, peut bien etre 
 regarde comme valide'; p. 57. 
 
 The italics in the last sentence are M. Boudinhon's own. But in 
 truth it is not quite easy to see what points, other than the rite, he 
 wishes to have considered. There are indeed two points more which 
 he proceeds to examine — the kind of intention which may be required, 
 and the heretical meaning which the Ordinal by its omissions is said 
 to imply; but on both these points he disallows the arguments of 
 objectors. As to ' intention,' he quotes a passage at considerable 
 length from the dissertation De hierarchia Anglicana by Messrs, 
 Denny and Lacey (which chiefly seems to have occasioned his second 
 brochure), a passage which goes very far beyond the contradictory 
 dictum of Mgr. Gasparri ; and he quotes it with apparent acceptance, 
 if not even with some degree of enjoyment of the directness with 
 which it refutes a position that Cardinal Vaughan had attempted to 
 occupy. It may be well to give it as quoted by M. Boudinhon : — 
 
 'La Disseriatio accumule des citations de th^ologiens catholiques 
 pour bien determiner la nature de cette "intentio generalis faciendi 
 quod facit ecclesia " dont parle le Concile de Trente (sess. vii. can. 2). 
 " Quod Ecclesia facit, dit d'abord Tournely, non quod Ecclesia intendit'.' 
 Et Bellarmin : " Non est opus intendere quod facit ecclesia Roinmia, 
 sed quod facit vera ecclesia, quaecumque ilia sit . . . non tollit 
 efficaciam sacramenti error ministri circa ecclesiam, sed defectus 
 intentionis." Et aprfes un long passage de Lehmkuhl, que j'ai repro- 
 
 construction des prieres catholiques, pour oser y voir ime forme valable d'ordination 
 au presbyterat ' ; p. 55. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 331 
 
 duit moi-meme pour la plus grande part, la Disseriatio cite des textes 
 absolument concluants de Liebermann et de Franzelin. Le premier 
 surtout est ad rem : " Non requiritur ut minister sacramenti effectum 
 intendat" . . . car les textes qui font autorit^ dans I'Eglise ne con- 
 tiennent aucune mention " aut finis quam minister sibi proponit, aut 
 effectus qui ex sacramento profluit." C'est ce qui a permis a I'Eglise 
 de tenir pour valide le bapteme conf^re par des h^retiques ou des 
 infideles " quamvis illi effectum sacramenti negarent, aut id tantum 
 intenderent facere quod sua, non quod Romana, facit ecclesia." Cette 
 conclusion peut etre corroborde par de nombreux textes des th^ologiens 
 et par de tres claires decisions romaines. J'en citerai deux seulement. 
 Innocent IV (comme auteur priv^ ; citd par Franzelin, Dissert, n. 145) 
 dit en parlant du bapteme : " Non est necesse quod baptizans sciat 
 quid sit Ecclesia, quid baptismus, vel unde sit, nec quod gerat in mente 
 facere quod facit Ecclesia, immo si contrarium gereret in mente, 
 scilicet non facere quod Ecclesia, sed tamen fecit, quia formam servat, 
 nihilominus baptizatus est, dummodo baptizare intendat." Une r^cente 
 decision du Saint Office est tout aussi explicite ; je I'emprunte a la 
 Collectajiea de la Propagande, n. 539. " S. C. S. Officii, 18 Decem. 
 1872 ; Vic. Ap. Oceani Centr. — In quibusdam locis nonnulli (haere- 
 tici) baptizant cum materia et forma debitis simultanee applicatis, 
 sed expresse monent baptizandos ne credant baplismum habere uUum 
 effectum in animam : dicunt enim ipsum esse signum mere externum 
 aggregationis illorum sectae . . . Quaeritur : utrum baptismus ab illis 
 haereticis administratus sit dubius propter defectum intentionis faciendi 
 quod voluit Christus, si expresse declaratum fuerit a ministro, ante- 
 quam baptizet, baptismum nullum effectum habere in animam? — R. 
 Negative; quia non obstante errore quoad effectus baplismi, non 
 excluditur intentio faciendi quod facit Ecclesia." ' 
 
 Such is the condition in which he is content to leave the statement 
 of the doctrine of intention, on the hypothesis that the form used is 
 adequate, and in such condition we may be content to leave it too. 
 For himself, he thinks that he has shown the inadequacy of the form. 
 But, if the form sufficed, he holds that no objection about intention 
 could invalidate it Nor, again, is he willing to allow that doctrinal 
 
 ' ' Les errenrs, les heresies, de Barlow ou de I'Eglise Anglicane, qu'elle qu'en soit 
 Tetendue ; la negation de la Presence reelle, et du pouvoir de consacrer, dut-on la 
 
332 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 omissions in the Ordinal itself, even on the assumption that their 
 motive and meaning was heretical, could invalidate the Ordinal, so 
 long as those facts of the Ordinal were still preserved, which had been 
 ruled to constitute the ' essentials.' To omit ' essentials ' is to destroy 
 the whole. But if the ' essentials' are maintained, their validity cannot 
 be invalidated by the omission, however wrong in itself, of points which 
 are admitted to be non-essential \ 
 
 Such is the position to which, after so mature a reconsideration, he 
 finally brings his argument upon these points. 
 
 Now how do we stand ? The position is surely a very curious one. 
 M. Dalbus had got rid of the prima facie objections to Anglican 
 validity, but had put forward two reasons nevertheless for disallowing 
 it. Both of these M. Duchesne put quietly aside, — implying that 
 there were no others to take their place, but that the matter waited in 
 simple dependence upon the unfettered discretion of the majesty of 
 Rome. The first M. Boudinhon pulled M. Dalbus' objections com- 
 pletely to pieces ; and with a somewhat solemn word to M. Duchesne 
 (' si I'Eglise pouvait accepter les Ordinations . . . elle devrait le faire ') 
 built up a fatal case against our Orders, which combined inadequacy 
 of form with inadequacy of intention — the inadequacy of the form 
 clinched by the ' heretical ' surroundings and purposes — the 'heretical' 
 
 regarder comme certaine, ne sont pas un obstacle a la suffisance de I'intention des 
 eveques anglicans, a commencer par Barlow. Et si, professant ces memes 
 heresies, ils avaient employe les rites de rordination catholique, il n'y aurait meme 
 pas lieu de poser la question : on leur appliquerait sans hesiter les regies de 
 la theologie relatives aux sacrements administres par les heretiques ' ; p. 64. 
 
 ' ' Une omission de cette nature modifie-t-elle la valeur d'une priere, en restreint- 
 elle la portee et l efficacite? II est permis de le nier. Le sens et Tintention 
 externe demeurent les memes, et de plus, comment une omission, meme coupable, 
 d'elements non essentiels, pourrait-elle etre nuisible ? Une omission est chose 
 negative ; si ce qui est omis n'est pas requis, pourquoi ce qui reste deviendrait-il 
 inefficace ? 
 
 ' Car I'intention personnelle des auteurs de I'Ordinal ne pouvait influer sur la 
 validite des ordinations que dans la mesure ou elle se produirait dans I'Ordinal 
 lui-meme. lis n'etaient pas, eux, les ministres de I'ordination, et c'est I'intention 
 du ministre qui est requise et pent compromettre Tordination, si elle est viciee ; 
 or, elle ne pent I'etre par une heresie de pretermission. 
 
 ' En resume, les arguments tires du defaut de I'intention de Barlow et des eveques 
 anglicans contre la validite des ordinations anglicanes ne sont valables que dans la 
 mesure exacte oil ils impliquent I'objection principale, I'insuffisance du rite'; p. 67. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 333 
 
 character of the surroundings and purposes made fatal in the fact of 
 unauthorized aUerations of form. The second M. Boudinhon (whilst 
 refuting by the way the Dutch Alt-KathoHks, and the English 
 Romanists in general, and Cardinal Vaughan in particular) knocks 
 quietly away all the substance of the argument of the first M. Bou- 
 dinhon, setting aside all arguments about ' intention ' or heresy — not 
 as untrue, but as irrelevant ; but trying instead to consolidate anew, by 
 means of a new major premiss (itself on examination quite untenable), 
 a case against the adequacy of the Anglican services as they stand. 
 
 Such phenomena are strangely significant. The writers are all able 
 men, and are all in earnest. But if not a shadow of a suggestion is 
 hinted against them, what do the phenomena mean 1 They mean 
 that these gentlemen, for all their ability and earnestness, are not free. 
 Consciously or unconsciously, they work with the fetters of certain 
 presuppositions — slender it may be in seeming but adamantine in 
 constraining force — upon their minds and consciences. It is the 
 working of the Nemesis which must follow upon submission, intellectual 
 and moral, to a primary untruth. They are paralyzed by the hypothesis 
 of the infallibility of Rome. 
 
 There is yet one more brochure that I wish to refer to. The 
 argument is taken up, still in 1895, by the Abbe Delasge. To begin 
 with, he cannot but be struck with this aspect of the controversy : ' Une 
 chose curieuse a noter, c'est que la question a souvent ^t^ ddplacde . . . 
 il est bien rare que les adversaires des ordinations anglicanes aient 
 donne, suivant les temps et meme aussi suivant les personnes, les memes 
 raisons d'invaliditd. On parait surtout s'8tre prdoccup^ d'une seule 
 chose, la non-validit^, sans trop se soucier de la valeur des preuves 
 fournies. Peu importait d'ailleurs la raison pour laquelle elles 
 seraient invalides, pourvu qu'elles le fussent. C'est ce qui explique 
 pourquoi on all^gua dans le pass^ tant de raisons diverses, s^rieuses 
 parfois, le plus souvent futiles ' ; p. 6. For himself he believes that this 
 overruling prejudice had its origin in mere errors, based on the proved 
 falsehood of the * T6te de Cheval,' and that no generation, until the 
 present, has been fully in possession of the data for a true decision. 
 In the very fact that opponents based their objections so long on an 
 incredible fable, he finds a proof that they dared not take up other 
 
334 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 ground. Driven from this at last, they began to raise doubts of. 
 Barlow's consecration. Such doubts he says never crossed the mind 
 of man so long as it was still possible to impugn the consecration of 
 Parker ; and for himself he treats them only with eloquent scorn. 
 
 There is some touch of scorn still in his treatment of objections on 
 the score of intention : ' Notons tout d'abord que I'intention requise 
 chez le ministre pour qu'un sacrement soit valide n'est pas I'intention 
 de faire ce que fait I'Eglise romaine, mais bien celle de faire ce que 
 fait la vraie Eglise et ce qic'a voulu Jesus-Christ en instituant ce 
 sacrement. Or, je ne crois pas que Ton puisse refuser aux dveques 
 anglicans I'intention de faire ce qu'a fait Jesus-Christ, lorsqu'ils 
 ordonnent des pretres ou sacrent des ^veques. Qu'on lise dans 
 rOrdinal d'Edouard les c^r^monies du sacre, et tous les doutes a ce 
 sujet seront certainement dissipds ' ; pp. 14, 15. ' Soutenir, en effet, 
 que les dveques anglicans n'ont pas I'intention d'administrer le sacre- 
 ment de I'Ordre parce qu'ils professent quelques erreurs relatives au 
 saint sacrifice de la messe, c'est dire que I'erreur du ministre, touchant 
 les effets du sacrement, ddtruit en lui I'intention de faire ce que fait 
 I'Eglise de Jdsus-Christ ' (p. 15). ... ' Si done Barlow a pris les moyens 
 de faire un dveque, pourquoi lui refuser I'intention d'atteindre le but pour 
 lequel il avait mis tout en oeuvre, et qui, d'ailleurs, ressortait le plus 
 naturellement du monde de la c^r^monie du sacre de Parker ? Peu 
 importe que le rite employ^ soit ou ne soit pas suffisant, cela ne saurait 
 nuire a I'lntenlion de faire ce que fait I'Eglise, et Barlow avait ceite 
 intention '; p. 18 
 
 He cites amongst other things, on pp. 17, 18, the decision of Dec. 18, 1872, 
 and the quotation from Cardinal Bellarmine, both given by M. Boudinhon above, 
 and offers them (as Boudinhon did) to Cardinal Vaughan : ' Un raisonneraent 
 bien simple nous permet d'appliquer au cas qui nous occupe cette decision de la 
 Propagande. Supposons, pour un instant, qu'au lien d'un calviniste administrant 
 le sacrement dn Bapteme et declarant qu'il ne croit point a I'acte regenerateur qu'il 
 accomplit, nous soyons en presence d'lm eveque anglican conferant les Ordres et 
 declarant au sujet qu'il n'en veut pas faire un pretre sacrifiant. Quelle difference 
 existe-t-il dans la maniere d'agir de ces deux personnages? Est-ce que Tun et 
 I'autre ne professent pas solennellement une erreur monstrueuse contre la vertu du 
 sacrement ? S'il existait une difference, elle serait certainement en fa\ eur du 
 dernier. Si done vous reconniissez a Tun I'intention de faire ce que fait I'Eglise de 
 Jesus-Christ lorsqu'elle accomplit un acte identique, pourquoi la refuser a I'autre 
 qui se trouve dans les memes conditions ? Si vous teuez pour valide le bapteme 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 335 
 
 He goes on to speak in much the same tone of objections to the 
 rite : ' II serait bien facile en effet d'affirmer que le rite employ^ est 
 insuffisant — et d'ailleurs on I'a dit — mais dire aussi en quoi consiste 
 cette insuffisance, et surtout la corroborer de preuves indluctables, est 
 certainement moins aisd.' ' Quant aux raisons, elles varient selon les 
 auteurs. Les uns afRrment que I'unique fait d'avoir modifi^ la formula 
 du Pontifical remain suffit pour enlever toute efficacite sacramentelle 
 k la formule tir^e de I'Ordinal anglican. Pour d'autres, la raison n'en est 
 pas la : elle se rencontre dans la porrection des instruments supprim^e 
 par les rdformateurs du Pontifical. D'autres invoquent le sens herd- 
 tique de la formule. D'autres, enfin, pensent que le rite employ^ 
 est simplement trop court'; pp. 19, 20. Every one of these reasons 
 is, on examination, set aside. He thinks of course that the Reformers 
 spoilt the beauty and dignity of the Pontifical but he denies that 
 they touched the essentials ; and as for the objection of ' heresy,' those 
 who make it do not understand what heresy, in a form of ritual, means. 
 ' Pour qu'une formule soit h^retique, il est necessaire qu'elle contienne 
 une erreur nettement exprimee et non seulement sous-entendue: Dum- 
 modo error non exprimitur in formula tanquam explicita vel implicita 
 conditio, non excludere intentionem faciendi quod facit Ecclesia, ac 
 proinde non obstare validitati sacramenli V P- 25. He not unnaturally 
 demurs to the widdi of IM. Dalbus' phrase, which had appeared to 
 require for the 'forma ' of ordination anything, whatever its irrelevancy 
 of context, which could be said to be a prayer; but on the other 
 
 administre par les protestants, pourqnoi rejetez-vous, comme invalides, les 
 ordinations des anglicans? II y a la un manque de logique que je ne puis 
 admettre, une partialite choquante qui ne merite pas notre credit' ; p. 17. 
 
 ' ' lis I'ont bouleverse . . . ils I'ont decouronne. ruine, renverse, pour mettre a sa 
 place quoi? une formule seche, qui ne parle plus au coeur, qui n'a plus cette 
 attirance mysterieuse, si goutee des fideles,' &c. ; p. 21. This is M. Delasge's 
 opinion. 
 
 * Quoting Gury de Sacram. He adds in a note, ' Non seulement il faudrait 
 que I'erreur fut exprimee dans la formule en termes non equivoques : il faudrait de 
 plus que son auteur en ait fait la condition sine qua ?ion de I'intention du ministre 
 (toujours d'apres Gury): condition qui devrait ctre explicite ou implicite. La 
 condition serait explicite si la formule disait en propres termes qu'elle cntend en 
 faire la condition de I'intention. Elle serait implicite si (I'erreur etant nettement 
 exprimee) la formule laissait facilement comprendre qu'elle a voulu faire de cette 
 erreur une condition sine qua non. Dans I'un et I'autre cas, I'erreur doit etre 
 exprimee en loutes lettres et non seulement sous-entendue'; p. 26. 
 
336 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 hand has no difficulty in accepting, as essentially adequate, any such 
 .prayers as express and interpret the purpose to ordain. He therefore 
 concludes, without reserve, that Anglican ordinations are not invalid. 
 
 What then are we to say of the Abb^ Delasge ? There is much 
 indeed about the whole atmosphere of his argument which is un- 
 usually cogent, as it is unusually bold. Can we, in view of this, be 
 called upon to unsay what has been said about the limitations which 
 imprison and disable Roman controversialists ? Does he disprove 
 them ? Or rather, though he may illustrate them in a different way 
 from his more guarded compeers, does he not in the total result, 
 passively, if not actively, illustrate them ? 
 
 But in justice to M. Delasge, it must be remembered that his 
 admissions, at their most, are strictly limited. He began by dis- 
 tinguishing between 'lawfulness and 'validity': and if he wished to 
 admit the validity, he of course denied the ' lawfulness ' of Anglican 
 ministries. To him, as to his brethren, Anglicans were never better 
 than schismatics, who, holding heretical opinions upon many points of 
 essential doctrine, had, of heretical pravity, disfigured and destroyed 
 the venerable beauty and mystery of the Pontifical. If he thought on 
 the whole that these heresies and disfigurements just did not, while 
 most of his brethren thought that they just did, make the transmission 
 of orders impossible to Anglicanism, the distinction between them 
 herein was not, after all, so considerable as it might appear to be. In 
 either case Anglicans were contumacious and schismatical ; in either 
 case their Orders were unlawful and irregular ; in either case they 
 were without jurisdiction. 
 
 The discussion, then, has not carried us very far. Could it carry 
 us further ? Has it not, upon its hypothesis, gone already as far, or 
 more than as far, as was logically possible to it Was there ever, from 
 the beginning, any reality in the question whether Anglican Orders 
 could be admitted upon the Roman hypothesis .? If ' the Roman 
 hypothesis ' merely meant the technical Roman teaching on such 
 points as ' materia ' and ' forma,' then all might have been simple 
 enough ; but those who boldly set out, upon ideas like these, to carry 
 conviction to Romanists that they ought, on their own hypothesis, to 
 acknowledge English Orders, forgot how much the 'Roman hypo- 
 thesis ' involved. They forgot that, in fact, ' the Roman hypothesis ' 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 337 
 
 includes the whole circle of Roman theory, includes, above all, the 
 postulates — first, that Rome is herself the only and the whole Church, 
 in the sense, at least, that Roman acknowledgement is the one and 
 only test of even the most precarious kind of membership in the 
 Church; and secondly, that whatever at any time Rome has really 
 done or said is in such sense absolutely right, that any deliberate 
 criticism of her doctrine, or intentional divergence from her ways, 
 whether it be more pardonable or less, must be. in every case, 
 absolutely wrong. Be it in things of graver or of lesser moment, 
 she has never by exaggerating or by minimizing, made a mistake. 
 No one, therefore, who has differed from her judgement, ever has 
 been, or can ever be, justified. 
 
 But at this point discussion is superseded by the action of the 
 Papal authority itself. And it is impossible not to feel that the inter- 
 vention of the Papal authority at this point — in a spirit, apparently, of 
 devout piety, Christian love, and fervent yearning for unity— as in any 
 case it had an interest strangely dramatic, so was calculated to raise 
 in thoughtful minds aspirations, at least, if not expectations, which 
 transcended the barriers of difficulties, momentary and technical, in 
 a longing for the vital realities of Divine truth. What could this 
 authority effect if it would ? — what would this authority have the 
 heart or the will to desire ? Considering the nature of the barriers by 
 which private Romanists were bound, it was clear, at the least, that, 
 whether by authoritative explanation, or authoritative direction, the 
 supreme authority could itself do much more if it had but the heart 
 and the will — than any other but the supreme authority could dare to 
 attempt. 
 
 No wonder that unusual feelings, of interest and of kindliness, were 
 aroused. Whilst, from across the Channel, there comes back the 
 memory of almost the final words of Boudinhon : ' L'attitude de la 
 curie Romaine, qui laisse librement discuter le problfeme, est a son 
 tour un indice pratique que ces conclusions ne sont pas tdm^raires'; 
 and of Delasge. ' Au lieu de se cantonner dans les prdjugds in- 
 justifiables d'un cot^ et de se retrancher dans une indifference quelque 
 peu d^daigneuse de I'autre, les catholiques et les anglicans ont certes 
 mieux \ faire : c'est de r^pondre k I'appel paternel que L^on XIII 
 
 Z 
 
338 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 nous adressait nagu^re lorsqu'il nous conviait tous a la pri^re ' ; and 
 of Duchesne, ' Rien n'empeche de croire que, par la suite des temps, 
 cette opinion se corrige, et que I'autorite ecclesiastique elle-meme n'en 
 vienne a modifier son attitude ' : in England it is of historical interest 
 to recall the sort of feeling to which Mr. Gladstone gave his own free 
 and sanguine utterance ^. ' It is to the last degree improbable that 
 a ruler of known wisdom would at this time put in motion the 
 machinery of the Curia for the purpose of widening the breach. . . .' 
 ' The information which I have been allowed through the kindness of 
 Lord Halifax to share, altogether dispels from my mind every 
 apprehension of this kind, and convinces me that if the investigations 
 of the Curia did not lead to a favourable result, wisdom and charity 
 would in any case arrest them at such a point as to prevent their 
 becoming an occasion and a means of embittering religious con- 
 troversy. . . . "When therefore it came to be understood that Pope 
 Leo XIII had given his commands that the validity of Anglican Orders 
 should form the subject of an historical and theological investigation, 
 it was impossible not to be impressed with the profound interest of the 
 considerations brought into \iew by such a step, if interpreted in 
 accordance with just reason, as an effort towards the abatement of 
 controversial differences. . . . What courage must it require in a Pope, 
 what elevation above all the levels of stormy partisanship, what 
 genuineness of love for the whole Christian flock, whether separated 
 or annexed, to enable him to approach the huge mass of hostile and 
 still burning recollections, in the spirit, and for the purpose of peace ! 
 And yet that is what Pope Leo has done. ... Be the issue what it may, 
 there is in my view no room for doubt as to the attitude which has 
 been taken by the actual head of the Roman Catholic Church in 
 regard to them. It seems to me an attitude in the largest sense 
 paternal. . . .' 
 
 But if, in any such ways, the situation seemed at the time to be rich 
 with the sense of untried possibilities, — what was it, in fact, which the 
 supreme authority in the Roman Church did ? There are, I conceive, 
 two strains of description, by no means obviously identical, yet both 
 alike true, which may be applied to the Papal action as a whole. 
 
 ' In a letter published by the Archbishop of York in the Guardian of June 3, 
 1896, p. 873. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 339 
 
 The Pope, it may be said, adopted in effect no new decision : he only 
 made articulate what the whole previous history and circumstances 
 implied ; he only formally expressed as conclusion, what was un- 
 mistakably contained, on their most natural interpretation, within the 
 premisses. This is true. But that it should be true is the heart of the 
 pathos. It is the very admirableness of the protagonist, it is the moral 
 excellence of his purposes coupled with what seems the logical 
 inexorableness of a perverse setting of preassumptions or preconditions, 
 which is the familiar secret of living tragedy. For on the other hand, 
 it would be no less true to pronounce of the Papal action as a whole, 
 that, basing itself upon the lines of a warped continuity of tradition and 
 theory, it reaffirmed every disproportion of the older conception, 
 re-emphasized every externalizing and materializing tendency, and 
 deliberately riveted, on the struggling intellect and conscience, every 
 paralyzing fetter afresh. At a moment singularly rich with possibilities 
 for the future, it made after all no new effort ; it saw no glimpse of 
 newly harmonizing or interpretative insight ; it simply sank back — as 
 it were exhausted and defeated— within the rigidities which had 
 suited, which perhaps had sufficed for, a cruder and a rigider age. It 
 was all most human, and most natural. It is just how tragedies 
 happen, for lack of the transcendently creative genius — shall I say the 
 divine inspiration — of some great master-mind. It is no case for 
 censure — hardly even for disappointment ; but it is infinitely sad. Not 
 as a blow to ' Anglicanism ' — for that, in flxct, it is not — but as a blow 
 to human effort of love and insight into Truth ; as a blow, above all, 
 to the identification with divine working of love and divine insight 
 into truth of the organization of the Roman communion, it is strangely 
 sad to read this last utterance of authoritative Romanism. 
 
 First came the Encyclical, dated on St. Peter's Day. After much 
 that is true and beautiful on the subject of the Church, it passes on to 
 such teaching as this. 'From this text' (Matt. xvi. i8) it is clear 
 that by the will and command of God the Church rests upon St. Peter, 
 just as a building rests upon its foundation.' ' [God] invested [Peter] 
 therefore with the needful authority, since the right to rule is abso- 
 lutely required by him who has to guard human society really and 
 effectively,' . . . ' and since all Christians must be closely united in the 
 communion of one immutable faith, Christ the Lord, in virtue of His 
 
 Z 2 
 
34° 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 prayers, obtained for Peter that in the fulfilment of his office he should 
 never fall away from the faith.' ' It was necessary that a government 
 of this kind, since it belongs to the constitution and formation of the 
 Church, as its principal element — that is as the principle of unity and 
 the foundation of lasting stability — should in no wise come to an end 
 with St. Peter, but should pass to his successors from one to another.' 
 . . . ' For this reason Jesus Christ willed that Peter should participate 
 in certain names, signs of great things which properly belong to 
 Himself alone, in order that identity of titles should show identity of 
 power.' . . . ' For this reason the Pontiffs who succeed Peter in the 
 Roman Episcopate receive the supreme power in the Church Jure 
 divino! . . . ' But if the authority of Peter and his successors is plenary 
 and supreme, it is not to be regarded as the sole authority. For He 
 who made Peter the foundation of the Church also cJiose twelve whom 
 Be called Apostles (Luke \\. 13), and just as it is necessary that the 
 authority of Peter should be perpetuated in the Roman Pontiff, so 
 by the fact that the Bishops succeed the Apostles they inherit their 
 ordinary power, and thus the Episcopal order necessarily belongs to 
 the essential constitution of the Church.' . . . ' But since the successor 
 of Peter is one, and those of the Aposdes are many, it is necessary to 
 examine into the relations which exist between him and them according 
 to the Divine constitution of the Church. Above all things the need 
 of union between the Bishops and the successors of Peter is clear and 
 undeniable.'. . . 'It is necessary, therefore, to bear this in mind, \-iz. 
 that nothing was conferred on the Apostles apart from Peter, but that 
 several things were conferred on Peter apart from the Apostles.'. . . 
 ' From this it must be clearly understood that Bishops are deprived of 
 the right and power of ruling if they deliberately secede from Peter 
 and his successors, because by this secession they are separated from 
 the foundation on which the whole edifice must rest. They are, 
 therefore, outside the edifice itself, and for this verj' reason they are 
 separated from the fold^ whose leader is the Chief Pastor ; they are 
 exiled from the kingdom, the keys of which were given by Christ to 
 Peter alone.'. . . ' The Episcopal Order is rightly judged to be in com- 
 munion with Peter, as Christ commanded, if it be subject to and obeys 
 Peter ; otherwise it necessarily becomes a lawless and disorderly crowd. 
 It is not sufficient for the unity of the faith that the head should 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 341 
 
 merely have been charged with the office of superintendent, or should 
 have been invested solely with a power of direction. But it is abso- 
 lutely necessary that he should have received real and sovereign 
 authority which the whole community is bound to obey.' . . . ' It is 
 opposed to the truth, and in evident contradiction with the Divine 
 constitution of the Church, to hold that while each Bishop is indi- 
 vidually bound to obey the authority of the Roman Pontiffs, taken 
 collectively the Bishops are not so bound.'. . . ' As the Bishops, each in 
 his own district, command with real power not only individuals, but the 
 whole community, so the Roman Pontiffs, whose jurisdiction extends 
 to the whole Christian commonwealth, must have all its parts, even 
 taken collectively, subject and obedient to their authority. Christ the 
 Lord, as we have quite sufficiently shown, made Peter and his 
 successors His vicars^ to exercise for ever in the Church the power 
 which He exercised during His mortal life.' 
 
 Such are the statements which the Pope thought fit to re-emphasize 
 for the illumination of those who had ventured to discuss the validity 
 of Anglican Orders ; and of such nature, it must be added, are the con- 
 siderations which, in the face of an intelligent Christendom, he seriously 
 puts forward as proofs of his claim to a sovereignty unconditional and 
 absolute. The claim, thus sharply articulated, is indeed as hopelessly 
 irreconcilable alike with the theology of the Incarnation and even the 
 broad truth of the history of Christendom, as it is with the picture of 
 the Church community, the Apostolate in general, or St. Peter indivi- 
 dually, within the pages of the New Testament. But it is no part of my 
 present task to analyze either the assumptions or the arguments of the 
 Encyclical. That such teaching was really part of the Roman system 
 was, of course, known to all the world. That individual Romanists 
 could not venture to seem to contravene it was the main cause of the 
 unreality of the previous stages of the controversy. But that it should, 
 at such a moment, be re-emphasized to the world, with all its un- 
 measured exaggeration, and in sharp dogmatic trenchancy, was for 
 those who loved not the make-believe of the twilight but the openness 
 of the day, with its freshness, its light, and its truth — a most melancholy 
 symptom indeed. 
 
 There followed in the early days of September, the long-promised 
 
342 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 Bull. It is not particularly kind to the French theologians. After 
 reciting ' pre\"ious decisions/ the ' invariable practice of the Holy See,' 
 and, as specially crucial, the decree of Clement XI in the matter of 
 John Clement Gordon, it proceeds : ' Hence it must be clear to every 
 one that the controversy lately revived had been already definitely 
 settled by the Apostolic See, and that it is to the insufficient knowledge 
 of these documents ^ that -ne must perhaps attribute the fact that any 
 Catholic "vsriter should have considered it still an open question.' 
 
 Such a mistake, so far as infallibility can pre%-ent it, shall never be 
 made by a Roman writer again. ' We decree that these Letters and 
 all things contained therein, shall not be liable at any time to be 
 impugned or objected to by reason of any fault or any other defect 
 whatsoever of subreption or obreption or of Our intention, but are and 
 shall be always valid and in force, and shall be inviolably observed 
 both juridically and otherwise by all of whatsoever degree and pre- 
 eminence ; declaring null and void annhing which in these matters 
 may happen to be contrariwise attempted, whether wittingly or un- 
 wittingly, by any person whatsoever, by whatsoever authority or pretext, 
 all things to the contrary notwithstanding.' There is something 
 magnificent, if melancholy, in the pretension of this final clause, to 
 those who have any conception of what nature the ' all things to the 
 contrary ' will have to be. 
 
 Certainly no one can complain that the Pope has not been explicit. 
 ' Ordinations carried out according to the Anglican rite have been 
 and are absolutely null and void.' No ' Catholic ' ever ought to have 
 doubted this before. No ' Catholic ' ever shall make any question 
 about it again. 
 
 But ' these Letters and all things contained therein ' mean not only 
 
 ' It is possible that the phrase ' these documents ' in this context may be intended 
 to refer — not to the ' previous decisions,' &c., above recited, but rather to certain 
 ' documents of incontestable authenticity,' to which the Bull vaguely refere as 
 proving its contention that the decision of Clement XI about Gordon was wholly 
 uninfluenced by the [faulty] arguments put forward by Gordon himself. This, no 
 doubt, would soften the snub to the French divines. If there are such documents, 
 they would be of real, though certainly not decisive, interest. But as the two 
 Archbishops have pointed out, the Pope's reference to them is very uncertain ; and 
 they ' ought to be made public if the matter is to be put on a fair footing for 
 judgement.' 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 343 
 
 a decision, but an argument. As a mode of showing ' the greatest 
 consideration and charity,' the Pope has both re-examined and authori- 
 tatively restated the argumentative grounds upon which his decision 
 rests. We know exactly now on what Romanists are to rely. The 
 invalidating defects are entirely to be found in the Prayer Book. There 
 is no longer a breath of doubt about Barlow's consecration, nor about 
 Parker's either, if only the Edwardine form could have conferred con- 
 secration. The defect is in the Prayer Book wholly. 
 
 This defect in the Prayer Book appears to be described as twofold. 
 It is partly in ' form ' and partly in ' intention ' ^. Let us try to take 
 
 ' The section of the Bull in question stands, in full, as follows : — 
 ' In the examination of any rite for the effecting and administering of Sacrament, 
 distinction is rightly made between the part which is ceremotiial and that which is 
 essential, usually called the matter and form. All know that the Sacraments of 
 the New Law, as sensible and efficient signs of invisible grace, ought both to 
 signify the grace which they effect, and effect the grace which they signify. 
 Although the signification ought to be found in the whole essential rite — that is to 
 say, in the matter and form — it still pertains chiefly to the form ; since the matter 
 is the part which is not determined by itself, but which is determined by the form. 
 And this appears still more clearly in the Sacrament of Orders, the matter of 
 which, in so far as We have to consider it in this case, is the imposition of hands, 
 which indeed by itself signifies nothing definite, and is equally used for several 
 Orders and for Confirmation. But the words which until recently were commonly 
 held by Anglicans to constitute the proper form of priestly Ordination — namely, 
 " Receive the Holy Ghost " — certainly do not in the least definitely express the 
 Sacred Order of Priesthood, or its grace and power, which is chiefly the power 
 " of consecrating and of offering the true body ajjd blood of the Lord^' (Council of 
 Trent, Sess. XXIII, de Sacr. Ord., Can. i) in that sacrifice which is no " nude 
 commemoration of the sacrifice offered on the Cross" (Ibid. Sess. XXII, de Sacrif. 
 Missae, Can. 3). This form had indeed afterwards added to it the words "for the 
 office and work of a priest" &c. ; but this rather shows that the Anglicans 
 themselves perceived that the first form was defective and inadequate. But even if 
 this addition could give to the form its due signification, it was introduced too 
 late, as a century had already elapsed since the adoption of the Edwardine 
 Ordinal, for, as the Hierarchy had become extinct, there remained no power of 
 ordaining. In vain has help been recently sought for the plea of the validity of 
 Orders from the other prayers of the same Ordinal. For, to put aside other 
 reasons which show this to be insufficient for the purpose in the Anglican rite, let 
 this argument suffice for all : from them has been deliberately removed whatever 
 sets forth the dignity and office of the priesthood in the Catholic rite. That form 
 consequently cannot be considered apt or sufficient for the Sacrament which omits 
 what it ought essentially to signify. 
 
 ' The same holds good of Episcopal Consecration. For to the formula "Receive 
 
344 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 the alleged defect in ' form ' by itself first. It may be stated in these 
 propositions, viz. (i) ' The grace and power of ' ' the sacred order of 
 priesthood ' ' is chiefly the power of consecrating and of offering the 
 true body and blood of the Lord.' (2) This being what the sacra- 
 ment ought essentially to signify, must not be omitted in the form of 
 the conveyal of the sacrament. (3) This was omitted in the 
 Edwardine formula ' Receive the Holy Ghost : whose sins thou dost 
 forgive. . . . And be thou a faithful dispenser of the word of God, and 
 of His holy Sacraments.' 
 
 It is necessary to say a few words about these propositions. 
 
 As to the first of them, any one who has been able to read, with the 
 least sympathy, what was said above in the discussion upon the mean- 
 ing of priesthood, will anticipate the comment that must be made now. 
 The meaning of the proposition appears to be this, that the constitu- 
 tive essence of priesthood is to be described as the power of consecrating 
 and of offering the true body and blood of the Lord. (So far as the 
 word ' chiefly ' qualifies this statement, it apparently does so only as 
 reminding that the power of consecrating, &c. is not an exhaustive 
 account of all priestly functions, but not as meant to suggest that the 
 specific mention of other things is a sine qua non for ordination to 
 priesthood ; far less as modifying the importance of the definition by 
 
 ihe Holy Ghost" not only were the words "for the office and work of a Bishops 
 See, added at a later period, but even these, as we shall presently state, must be 
 understood in a sense different to that which they bear in the Catholic rite. 
 
 ' Nor is anything gained by quoting the prayer of the preface " Almighty God," 
 since it in like manner has been stripped of the words which denote the summum 
 sacerdotium. It is not here relevant to examine whether the Episcopate be a 
 completion of the priesthood or an Order distinct from it, or whether when 
 bestowed, as they say, per saltum, on one who is not a priest, it has or has not its 
 effect. But the Episcopate undoubtedly by the institution of Christ most truly 
 belongs to the Sacrament of Orders, and constitutes the sacerdotium in the highest 
 degree — namely, that which by the teaching of the Holy Fathers and our liturgical 
 customs is called the ^'summum sacerdotium, sacri ministerii summa.'" So it 
 comes to pass that, as the Sacrament of Orders and the true sacerdotium of Christ 
 were utterly eliminated from the Anglican rite, and hence the sacerdotium is in 
 no wise conferred truly and validly in the Episcopal consecration of the same 
 rite, for the like reason, therefore, the Episcopate can in no wise be truly and 
 validly conferred by it ; and this the more so because among the first duties 
 of the Episcopate is that of ordaining ministers for the Holy Eucharist and 
 sacrifice.' 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 345 
 
 ' sacrifice ' so far as to suggest that priesthood could, perhaps, be 
 otherwise conferred.) Assuming that this is what the proposition 
 means, I must submit that the proposition is a perilous one, — at once 
 true, and not true. It is true that the ' power of consecrating ' is the 
 outward sign which marks characteristically the distinction between a 
 priest and not a priest. It is not true that the priesthood to which 
 a man has been ordained can be summed up as the power to conse- 
 crate. The prerogative of sacramental leadership, august though it 
 be, is not so much the constitutive essence, as (rather) itself an effect 
 inhering in, and outflowing from, that representative status in the 
 body of Christ, that divinely authorized relation to souls, which is the 
 real core and heart of priestly ministry. In a merely external and 
 conventional sense, the proposition might pass for ordinary purposes 
 as true. But it is untrue if intended as a solemn definition of the inner 
 reality. It might pass as true in the sort of sphere in which it might 
 be said that a ' Bishop ' means ' one who can confirm,' or ' can ordain.' 
 But it is equally untrue with that statement if alleged in serious theo- 
 logical exposition. Again, as to say that Episcopate means the 
 ' potestas ordinandi ' might represent the truth (which, immediately, it 
 travesties) to those who could catch and spiritualize the implications 
 interpretatively contained in it ; so to say that priesthood means the 
 ' potestas offerendi ' might, to those who could interpret it spiritually with 
 a width of significance rarely dreamed of in controversy, symbolize the 
 wide truth which immediately it so narrows as, in fact, to belie. The 
 proposition is untrue, in short, as the basis of an argument like the 
 papal ; even while there is a popular kind of truth in its literal words, 
 and while that popular truth, spiritually reinterpreted, might be found 
 to represent the very conception which it now is designed to refute. 
 
 As to the second proposition, I must point out that two somewhat 
 diff'erent statements seem in it to be slurred. Does it mean that a form 
 which fully characterized the priesthood that it meant to convey, would 
 not omit the ' power of consecrating,' &c., or does it mean that any 
 (technically so-called) ' form ' for ordaining to priesthood which did 
 not specify the ' power of consecrating,' &c. would be ipso facto null 
 and void ? If it means only the first of these (or indeed if it means 
 anything less than the second) then the argument of the three proposi- 
 tions falls to the ground. But if it means the second, it is a proposi- 
 
346 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 tion which every (even Roman) theologian knows to be untenable ^. 
 As to the third proposition, whilst I shall of course admit, that neither 
 the Edwardine nor the Caroline Ordinal speaks explicitly of 'consecrating 
 and offering,' I shall no less certainly claim that they both do, by true 
 and necessary and direct and intentional inference, imply and involve 
 whatever is truly contained in the full doctrinal exposition of the •' Holy 
 Sacraments.' 
 
 As a real argument against the adequacy of the form of the Ordinal, 
 there is nothing here that can seem, for a moment, to be substantial. 
 The objection dissolves at a touch. It could only hold if priesthood 
 never could have been conferred without a formal conferring of the 
 ' power to offer.' 
 
 But of course I anticipate that a rejoinder will at once be ready to 
 this. It will be said that the papal condemnation of the Ordinal turns 
 on the fact that certain things were not only not emphasized but 
 ' deliberately removed,' ' utterly eliminated.' Quite so. But I wish 
 to point out that the argument in this shape, is not really so much an 
 argument against the ' form ' as against the ' intention ' of the Ordinal, 
 against the form, not in itself, but as at once the outcome and the 
 evidence of ' intention ' ; as the outcome of the vicious ' intention ' of 
 those who constructed it, and as an overt evidence of intention at least 
 inadequate in those who consent to make use of it. By all means let 
 us give full weight to the argument. But do not let us be deceived as 
 to the character of it. It is hardly correct, after all, to speak of the 
 argument as twofold. It is not an argument both against the form, 
 and the intention of the Ordinal. The real argument, and the only 
 real argument, is against Anglican ' intention.' It is this which vitiates 
 
 ' The statement that the words ' for the office and work of a priest,' &c. were 
 added because the ' Anglicans themselves perceived that the first form was defective 
 and inadequate ' is, no doubt, a very serious historical blunder. It is an evidence, 
 moreover, of the artificial and pedantic character of thought on the subject that 
 any one who was at all familiar with the service (of 1552) as a whole, should ever 
 have seriously imagined that the presence or absence of these words, apt and 
 solemn and desirable as they are, could have affected, in the slightest measure, 
 either the meaning, or the effect, of the total rite. Considering the resources at 
 the command of the Pope, that a slip like this should have been allowed to appear 
 in a document of such a character, and for such a purpose, is — quite apart from 
 ' infallibility ' — altogether surprising. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 347 
 
 the form. Apart from this it is not certain, after all, whether the form 
 is really condemned or no. The Bull is not guilty then of construct- 
 ing an argument against the form, by adopting outright the proposition 
 that ordination to ' presbyterate ' must specify ' sacrifice,' the proposi- 
 tion which every theologian knows to be untenable. But it must be 
 owned that the way in which the Bull is arranged does give a strong 
 prima facie appearance of this. And I have purposely taken first the 
 apparent argument against the form, without reference to intention, 
 for the purpose of making it transparently clear that the Bull, whilst 
 it seems to do so, does not really contain an argument against the 
 intrinsic validity of the form at all. M. Boudinhon, in his second 
 pamphlet, had essayed to prove that the Anglican form as it stood was 
 incapable of conferring priesthood. The Bull makes no such attempt. 
 All that it says about the form, even all that it says about the ' power 
 of consecrating,' becomes effective argumentatively only in proportion 
 as it emphasizes the inherently defective ' intention ' of Anglicanism. 
 If it is laid down in the Bull that ' that form consequently cannot be 
 considered apt or sufficient for the Sacrament which omits what it 
 ought essentially to signify,' we find, on second thoughts, that the whole 
 emphasis is upon * omits,' in the sense of omitting deliberately. For 
 ' omits ' in that sentence substitute ' does not express,' and you will have 
 a form of proposition upon which the Bull has not ventured. No, the 
 Ordinal is defective because of the 'spirit' which is behind it. History 
 is ' eloquent as to the animus ' of its authors. ' Every trace ' of ' the 
 sacrifice, of consecration, of sacerdotium,' was 'deliberately removed and 
 struck out.' Thus it is that ' a new rite has been initiated in which ' ' the 
 Sacrament of Orders is adulterated or denied,' and ' from which all idea 
 of consecration and sacrifice has been rejected.' And thus it is that 
 words which were valid before are now emptied of their validity — ' the 
 formula Receive the Holy Ghost, no longer holds good,' — because the 
 whole conception behind them is wrong. The very titles, bishop, priest, 
 to the spirit of Anglicanism ' remain as words without the reality which 
 Christ instituted.' All this is quite irrespective of any question whether, 
 on another hypothesis, the forms of the Ordinal might, or might not, 
 have been adequate. ' By this same argument,' says the Bull, ' is re- 
 futed the contention of those who think that the prayer Almighty God, 
 giver, &c. . . . might suffice as a legitimate form of Orders, even on 
 
3+8 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 the hypothesis that it might be held to be sufficient in a Catholic rite 
 approved by the Church'. These last words, which I have ventured to 
 italicize, conclusively show that — intention apart — the Bull makes no 
 real attempt to prove the inadequacy of the Anglican rite. 
 
 It is not indeed in itself any object to Anglicans to show that the 
 Bull does not try to prove the invalidity of their form. The con- 
 siderations against their form which the Bull does contain are so 
 manifestly inadequate for that purpose, that it could only serve their 
 cause to be impugned on such grounds. But unless the Bull wishes 
 to be interpreted as taking up a position notoriously impossible, it is 
 certainly not entitled to use the phrase with which section 9 begins, 
 ' with this inherent defect of form is joined the defect of intention which 
 is equally essential to the sacrament.' Unless the Papal authority is 
 prepared to maintain that, without mention of sacrifice, no ordination 
 to presbyterate ever has been, or could have been effectual, it has not 
 proved — has not even alleged — against the Prayer Book, anything 
 that can possibly be called an ' inherent ' defect of form. 
 
 But if the real weight of argument in the Bull is, as I must submit 
 that it is, exclusively against the general animus, or spirit of Angli- 
 canism, and against forms in detail as results or expressions of this, 
 it would seem to be important, for clearness of thought, to grasp the 
 significance of this fact \ 
 
 What is the nature or the evidence of this hopelessly invalidating 
 animus? There are two ways, if we may gather from the Bull, 
 in which it has expressed itself in the matter of the Ordinal. The 
 one is the fact that Anglicanism has presumed to alter the Roman 
 
 ^ ' The Church does not judge about the mind and intention in so far as it is 
 something by its nature internal, but in so far as it is manifested externally she 
 is bound to judge concerning it. . . . If the rite be changed, with the manifest 
 intention of introducing another rite not approved by the Church, and of rejecting 
 what the Church does, and what by the institution of Christ belongs to the 7tature 
 of the Sacrament, then it is clear that not only is the necessary intention wanting 
 to the Sacrament, but that the intention is adverse to and destructive of the 
 Sacrament.' The question-begging words which I have ventured to italicize, and 
 the introduction, in the preceding clause, of 'the [Roman] Church,' entirely 
 neutralize the words, apparently reasonable, which my citation has omitted, 
 ' When any one has rightly and seriously made use of the due form and the method 
 requisite for effecting or conferring the Sacrament, he is considered by the very 
 fact to do what the Church does.' These words therefore do not mean what they 
 seem to say. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 349 
 
 Pontifical, The other is the fact that, in altering, it has suppressed 
 the explicit mention of the ' potestas offerendi.' Now these two facts 
 show conclusively, — the one that Anglicanism ventures to challenge, 
 and does in fact, separate herself from, the precise proportions of the 
 Roman definition of priesthood ; — the other, that Anglicanism makes 
 overt refusal of obedience to the paramount authority of Rome. And 
 this is the whole matter. There is, as of course, not a thought of any 
 such question as whether, in criticizing or disagreeing with Rome, we 
 are affirming or denying the truth of God. There is no attempt to 
 justify the Roman definition which we criticize, or to show that the 
 premisses of our criticism are wrong. To criticize Rome is to swerve 
 from the truth of God. To adopt practices based on independence 
 of Rome is to take a position outside of the Church of Christ. Prin- 
 ciples like these are assumed as self-evident. The only argument 
 necessary is to show that Anglicans do so differ from the Roman — 
 which presumes to call itself the Catholic — Church. 
 
 This is all. We do not, in practice, implicitly obey, we do not, 
 in doctrine, perfectly symbolize with, Rome. Therefore we are out- 
 side the Church. Therefore nothing that we believe, define, or 
 practise, comes anywhere into the history, or the evidence, of what 
 has been practised, defined, or believed, within the Church of Christ. 
 Rather, therefore, our whole animus or spirit, being intentionally 
 antagonistic to ' the Church,' is so wrong as to vitiate in detail every- 
 thing, however inherently justifiable or effectual in others, which we 
 do or attempt. It is the naked claim, after all, to infallible perfectness, 
 and to absolute autocracy. 
 
 The real position, then, of Anglicanism, historical or theological, 
 is never for a moment so much as glanced at. It is, to the Bull, 
 unknown, or unimaginable. Possibly it may be said that this is 
 only a logical result of Romanism. The fundamental hypothesis of 
 Romanism may make, perhaps, any effort of approach to an indepen- 
 dent inquiry into the truth of Romanism — and therefore into the 
 truth of any position which challenges the truth of Romanism — little 
 other than an impossible contradiction. For the present, and on present 
 hypotheses, yes. This is but to say that, in the providence of God, 
 the time is not yet ripe, when any such independent eff'ort after truth 
 can be made with seriousness in the name of Rome. 
 
350 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 Let any one, even for a moment, make the mental effort to imagine 
 that, owing to a certain intellectual rigidity and hardness, the mediaeval 
 conceptions as to priesthood, though dealing with truth, had lost 
 something of the perfect symmetry and proportion of truth ; that they 
 leant over much to a materializing of the spiritual ; that their ' out- 
 ward ' was not quite perfectly harmonized as the outward of an 
 ' inward ' ; that to call a presbyter bluntly a ' sacrificing priest without 
 being literally untrue, was yet a coarse and grating representation of 
 what was only true, after all, in the sphere of things spiritual and 
 mystical : let him try to make all the mental effort necessary to such 
 a hypothesis, — and add to it a recognition of the bare possibility that 
 it may fiot be the ordinance of our Lord Jesus Christ that the Bishop 
 of Rome should wield despotic power over the consciences of man- 
 kind : and behold ! in a moment the whole of the alleged case against 
 Anglicanism and Anglican Orders has vanished into thin air. There 
 is absolutely not a shred of suggestion left. From end to end of the 
 Bull there is not one syllable of argument, or even of suggestion, 
 which is not wholly dependent, for very existence, upon the two 
 fundamental Roman assumptions, — that Roman definitions or practices 
 are infallibly right, and that the Roman autocracy is Divine. 
 
 Though, then, it takes the form of argument, it is not in any sense 
 
 ^ A form of statement in which Cardinal \"aiighan appears to revel. At the 
 beginning of Nov., 1896, if rightly reported in the daily papers, he shaped his 
 public challenge to the Anglican bishops thus : — ' Not one of them had dared 
 to say that he was a sacrificing priest, and that all the clerg}' of the Church of 
 England were sacrificing priests.' In commenting again in March upon the letter 
 of the Archbishops, he asked : ' Did they claim the power to produce the actual 
 living Christ Jesus by transubstantiation upon the altar according to the claim of 
 the Eastern and AVestem Churches ? ' He went on to argne that the Anglican 
 Eucharistic sacrifice ' was ' an essentially different sacrifice ' from the Roman, 
 because the Anglican priesthood ' claimed no miraculous, supernatural, sacrificial 
 powers such as were exercised by the Eastern and Roman Churches.' 
 
 I need not comment upon his reference to the Eastern Church. The Eastern 
 Church will, no doubt, take excellent care of itself. Meanwhile, the Cardinal 
 has certainly done his best, on behalf of Romanism, to make the two conceptions 
 of sacrifice ' essentially different.' He has done his best to reduce the spiritual 
 mysteries of Christian Eucharist and priesthood to the level of a merely vulgar thau- 
 maturgy ; and many a thoughtful Romanist must have writhed under the naive 
 recklessness of his polemics. Unhappily, since the Bull, it seems that even 
 Cardinal Vaughan is justified. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 really argumentative against Anglicanism. For argument between 
 me and another must rest on some better basis than the simple 
 assumption that I am inherently right, and that he, in precise propor- 
 tion as he differs from me, must be wrong. If it is to be argument, 
 it must, for the purpose, treat the case of either side as arguable, as 
 deniable, as needing to be made good by evidence. In this sense it 
 will hardly be said that the Bull is argumentative. 
 
 All this is much to be deplored. It will not, indeed, injure 
 Anglicanism ; for truth is not apt to be injured by insult or contempt ; 
 and Anglicanism herein represents the very spirit and truth of the 
 Catholic Church, untrammelled by concealing and distorting over- 
 growths. Anglicanism is Catholicit}', unperverted and rational. It 
 has not stereotyped, as a part of its vital faith, mediaeval rigidities or 
 misconceptions of spiritual truth. It has not woven itself in and in 
 with a polity — too obviously neither apostolic nor primitive — whose 
 impossible pretensions succeed only in opposing a barrier impassable 
 to every such generous yearning after wider truth, every such impulse 
 of conscientious and candid self-scrutiny, as might otherwise have 
 borne fruit in reform and recovery. The true Catholic spirit, the 
 spirit of the Apostolic and primitive Church, alive and expansive, 
 without fossilizing overgrowth, in Anglicanism, appeals to, consecrates, 
 and harmonizes, the whole nature of man. It is natural, not the less, 
 but so much the more consistently, because the ' natural ' for it, is of 
 one piece with, and is perfected in, the ' supernatural.' It is thoroughly 
 at home in all the complex workings of the history of man — which, 
 nevertheless, it has, in a perfectly real sense, revolutionized. It cannot 
 really fear, or be alien from, any truth of criticism or of science — 
 which are but subordinate aspects of itself. It is philosophical through 
 and through, while it is like nothing so little as a product of philosophy. 
 Because it is rational, reason can be wholly at home in it. Because it 
 is spiritual, reason can in it be transfigured — can learn to partake of 
 the nature of complete and divinely luminous intelligence. The Spirit 
 of Jesus, which is the life of the Church, the theology of the Incar- 
 nation, which is the ordered apprehension of the fundamental truths 
 of the Spirit in the spiritual intellect, is not alien from any of these 
 things, but includes and transfigures them all. 
 
352 
 
 MINISTERIAL PRIESTHOOD 
 
 The latest position of Rome M-ill not injure Anglicanism. But its 
 injury must needs be grave to the cause of truth and the rational 
 harmony of religion in the churches of the Roman obedience. The 
 impulse to be too crudely logical in definition and too bluntly material 
 in ceremony : the inherent tendency to externalize and to petrify 
 whatever is set to represent or consecrate the hidden movement of the 
 mysteries of the spiritual life ; to smother the inward by over-assertion 
 of outward ; to emphasize the objective and material till that imma- 
 terial subjective, which is its heart of reality, sickens unto death ; this 
 always has been a temptation naturally fascinating to the Western 
 mind. We know it very well among ourselves — often in the more 
 Roman form as exuberant externalism ; often in the correlative extreme, 
 as an attempt to trample on legitimate outwardness ; an attempt 
 which ends only in making of the ver)' negation of the outward, a new 
 fossil or fetish of outwardness — the outwardness of unauthorized 
 ministries, unseemly ill dress, and irreverent gesture and tone. But 
 the heart of Anglicanism is too conscious of mystery to be itself either 
 Puritanical or material. If some element of either peril is well-known 
 to us within — certainly neither is \ital to the being of — Anglicanism. 
 
 But it seems that the Papal authority has adopted without reserve 
 this spirit of rigid externalism, which the Western mind loves. The 
 full conception of realities hke Sacrifice and Priesthood, which, while 
 having an aspect indeed that is material and definable, are nevertheless 
 themselves large with the undefined mystery of spiritual life, is tightly 
 tied up and up into just what is most questionable, because most 
 clearcut, most dogmatic, most external, least living and large. The 
 universal jurisdiction and the infallibility of the Pope, the explicit 
 doctrine of Purgatory, and the direct work wrought by earthly Celebra- 
 tions upon souls therein, the technicalities of transubstantiation, and 
 the crudest statements about a sacrificing and a miracle-working 
 priesthood; all these, it seems, are to be necessary ingredients in the 
 ' Catholic ' meaning of the word, so that those who demur to any one 
 of these are, ipso facto, incapable of apprehending or believing in the 
 ' Priesthood of the Church.' That Rome should once more have 
 identified herself herein with the mental attitude about her own 
 mysteries, that is least large, or balanced, or rational, or true; and 
 should have re-emphasized with all her power the disproportioned 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 353 
 
 corollaries to which it has led in the past; cannot but be matter of 
 profound concern to those who desire the truth and peace of 
 Christendom. She has made, as it seems, one more supreme effort 
 of emphasis to stamp and perpetuate the identity of her very being 
 with ideas and methods such as can only serve to stereotype more 
 and more to the minds and consciences of her own most intelligent 
 children, the divergence — amounting to a contrast — between, on the 
 one hand, the truths of experience and intelligence, of reason and 
 love ; and on the other, the definitions and the practices, the expres- 
 sions and the theories, of (so-called) religious faith. 
 
 It might be feared that so tragic a failure as this would be likely 
 to expose Christian thought, at a terrible disadvantage, to the 
 reactionary prejudice of those who would cut short all mystery by 
 explaining away, if not by denying outright, such truths as the 
 Christian Sacrifice, and the Ministerial Priesthood, and the being and 
 order of the visible Church. But perhaps it is not for the first time 
 that the duty is laid by God's providence, on the Anglican Church, of 
 making manifest the true relation between ' inward ' and ' outward ' — 
 in this world where all spiritual is bodily, and all bodily meant to be 
 spiritual; and so of conserving that true harmony (rational at 
 once and mysterious) of spiritual realities, which the disproportion of 
 a materialistic overstatement, upon the Roman side, had overlaid 
 almost to death. 
 
 A a 
 
INDEX 
 
 Administration of the Holy Spirit (Dr. 
 
 Moberly), 69. 
 Agabas, 160. 
 
 Anglican Orders, Roman controversy 
 as to validity of, 300-353 ; technical 
 questions, 300 ; four requirements, 
 301 ; Roman claim, the real question, 
 304; recent writers on, 310-337; 
 Papal intervention, 337 ; the Ency- 
 clical, 339 ; the Bull, 342-349 ; grave 
 prospect on Romanist side, 351. 
 
 Anglican Ordinal, 220, 223; its aim and 
 merits, 286, 289. 
 
 Anglican Reformers, retain the priestly 
 title, 234. 
 
 Antinomians, 49. 
 
 Apostles, the, their method of propa- 
 gating Christianity, 8; their idea of 
 unity, 34 ; Christ's commission to 
 the Twelve, 100. 
 
 Apostolate, based on Christ's solemn 
 selection, 126; St. Paul's case, 127, 
 131-134; its fundamental character 
 and warrant, 127; its tremendous 
 authority and power, 128, 133; basis 
 and background of everything in the 
 Church, 135, 145 ; the Didaches 
 view of, 176. 
 
 Apostolic authority, a witness to unity, 
 31- 
 
 Apostolic Constitutions, 172, 225, 306. 
 
 Apostolic Fathers (Dr. Lightfoot), 202. 
 
 Apostolic men, or delegates, 146; in- 
 stance of St. James — persona ecclesiae 
 Hierosolymitanae, 146, 147, 150; 
 functions of Timotheus and Titus — 
 ruling, teaching, control, jurisdiction, 
 151-158. 
 
 Apostolic Succession, 113; Clement of 
 
 Rome on, 114 et seq. ; a question of 
 the immediate present, 123; its ab- 
 stract detachment, 124; how distin- 
 guishable from episcopacy, 1 24. 
 
 Aristotle's <fua€i ■noKniKov, 4. 
 
 Article XXIII, 113. 
 
 Ascension of our Lord, The (Dr. Milli- 
 
 gan), 72, 97, 129, 246, 248. 
 Ascension and Heavenly Priesthood of 
 
 our Lord, The (Dr. Milligan), -251. 
 Athanasius, 172. 
 
 Bampton Lectures (Dr. Hatch), 9, 68, 
 
 112, 257 ; (Dr. Moberly), 69 ; (Canon 
 
 Curteis), 55. 
 Baptism, Hooker on, 62 ; the Didache 
 
 on, 171. 
 Barnabas, 16, 140, 178. 
 Basis of Ministry — Divine Commission, 
 
 99-125. 
 Bellarmine, Cardinal, 334. 
 Bishop and Presbyter, interchangeable 
 
 terms, 142, 144, 179; the Didache's 
 
 view of, 175. 
 Bodily, and spiritual, unity, 31, 35, 39, 
 
 57- 
 
 Body, the method of Spirit, 39 ; Church 
 of Christ, is the, 66 ; oneness of the 
 whole, 67 ; its specific actions through 
 specific organs, 68 ; a fallacious in- 
 ference, 69. 
 
 Boudinhon, A. {litude th^ologique stir 
 les ordinations anglicanes), 319. 
 
 Bucer, Martin, 236. 
 
 Bull, the Papal, 342. 
 
 Bulletin Critique, 315. 
 
 Burnet's Records, 235. 
 
 Catharin, 311. 
 
 A a 3 
 
356 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Celebratio Ordinnm (Sarum), 220. 
 XapifT^a, 103. 
 
 Christ, His high-priestly prayer, 7 ; His 
 commission to the Twelve Apostles, 
 100 ; priesthood in the Church of, 
 220-299 ; His priestly sacrifice, 244- 
 248 ; His priesthood, 249 ; is the 
 Church, 251. 
 
 Christian and Levitical offerings — a 
 parallel, 273, 274. 
 
 Christian and saint, one personality, 38. 
 
 Christian Creed, unity of the, 2, 21. 
 
 Christiajt Ecclesia (Dr. Hort), 22, 24- 
 29. 
 
 Christian Ministry (Dr. Lightfoot), 
 criticized, 43 et seq. ; his initial posi- 
 tion, 46. 
 
 Christian Ministry, its conceptions de- 
 pendent on Church unity, i ; Dr. 
 Lightfoot's view of, 43 et seq. ; ac- 
 cording to the Didache, 173 ; priestly 
 executive privilege and pastoral self- 
 devotion — two aspects of one reality, 
 285 ; objections answered, 290-299. 
 
 Christian ordinances, efficacy of, 60. 
 
 Christian Year, quoted, 84. 
 
 Christians, the corporate ideal, 9. 
 
 Church, The, universally inclusive, 6 ; 
 Militant and Triumphant, 36, 37 ; the 
 visible body of, is the spiritual, 40-42 ; 
 a Temple and a Body, 66 ; of Christ, 
 priesthood in, 220-299; Christ is, 
 251. 
 
 Church and the Ministry, The (Canon 
 Gore), 19, 71, 90, 112, 119, 129, 170- 
 172, 266. 
 
 Church and Dissent, The (Canon Cur- 
 teis), 55. 
 
 Church Quarterly Review, 235, 237, 
 310. 
 
 Church Unity, Nature of, 1-29 ; its con- 
 ceptions and meaning, i, 6, 9; its 
 ideas and forms, 2 ; outward circum- 
 stances, abstract conception, theo- 
 logical idea, of, 3-8 ; its theory, 
 human and politic, 4, 8 ; transcen- 
 dental and divine, 6, 8, 34 ; Dr. Hatch 
 on higher and lower conception of, 1 1 ; 
 only spiritual? 31; St. Paul's struggle 
 for, 32 ; apostolic conception of, 34. 
 
 Clement of Alexandria, 40, 83, 85, 257, 
 280. 
 
 Clement of Rome, on Apostolic Succes- 
 sion, 114 et seq.; authority and 
 character of his Letter : its contrast 
 
 with the Didache, 1 79 ; its silence 
 about prophets and prophecy, 180; 
 his position episcopal, 184; his view 
 of presbyters, 185 ; Dr. Lightfoot's 
 translation of his Letter, 186 ; supple- 
 mented by Hermas, 209, 211, 214; 
 on the Eucharist, 273. 
 
 Clementine writers. The, 49. 
 
 Corinthian Church, The, 180, 275. 
 
 Council of Florence, 228. 
 
 Coimcil of Trent, 223; regarded as a 
 Roman Reformation, 231. 
 
 Cranmer, Archbishop, 234. 
 
 Curteis, Canon {The Church and Dis- 
 sent), on George Fox, 55; on means 
 and end, 56. 
 
 Dalbus, Femand (Z« Ordinations 
 Anglicaties), 310. 
 
 Dale, Dr., 265. 
 
 Delasge, Abbe, 333. 
 
 Diaconate, 1 36 ; Dr. Lightfoot's view 
 of, 136-139; its secular work: its 
 spiritual character, 137; according 
 to the Didache, 175. 
 
 ZioLKovos, meaning of, 140. 
 
 Didache {Sidaxrj), 108 ; its Jewish char- 
 acter, 171 ; on Baptism and the 
 Eucharist, 171, 267,272; its question- 
 able authority, 172 ; on Church unity, 
 173; on Church polity, 175; like 
 and unlike the New Testament, 177 ; 
 its limited insight, 178; contrasted 
 with Clement of Rome's Letter, 1 79. 
 
 Dissertations on the Apostolic Age (Dr. 
 Lightfoot), 118, 119, 239. 
 
 Diversity and Unity, their relation, 31. 
 
 Divine Commission— the basis of minis- 
 try, 99-125; essential to the priest- 
 hood, loi ; see also 
 
 Divine Designation — three alternatives: 
 — (i) Individual aspiration — argu- 
 ments against, 106 ; three points for, 
 107-109. (2) Church appointment, 
 110; denies ministerial principle. Ill ; 
 must be established by history, 112. 
 (3) Apostolic succession, supported 
 by 23rd Article, 113; Clement of 
 Rome a strong witness, 114; its 
 crucial importance, 116. 
 
 Divine Love, 247, 248. 
 
 Divine Unity of the Church, 34. 
 
 Docetic Judaism, according to Dr. 
 Lightfoot, 198. 
 
 Docetism, 190, 198. 
 
INDEX 
 
 357 
 
 Doctrina Eomanensium, 221. 
 Duchesne, Abbe, 315. 
 Dunstan's Pontifical, 223. 
 
 Ebionism, 49. 
 
 Ecclesia (Dr. Hort), 22, 127, 140, 156. 
 Ecclesiastical Polity (liodkti), 103, 238, 
 239- 
 
 Egbert, Archbishop, Pontifical of, 223. 
 
 Encyclical, The, 339. 
 
 End, and means, 56. 
 
 Episcopacy, how distinguishable from 
 Apostolic Succession, 124; Dr. Light- 
 foot on, 216. 
 
 «mcrKoiTos,Clement's Letter on, 182 ; and 
 trpea^vTepos, interchangeable terms, 
 141, 144, 175, 179. 
 
 Essential, and of the Essence, 58-60. 
 
 Estcourt, Canon, 234, 288, 309. 
 
 Etude theologique sur les ordinations 
 anglicanes \)A. Boudinhon), 319. 
 
 Eucharist, The, Dr. Lightfoot on, 77; 
 Justin Martyr on, 87, 278; the Di- 
 dache's liturgy of, 171 ; sacrifice of, 
 231, 232, 279, 284, 290; when, how, 
 and by whom administered, 267 et 
 seq. ; writers of the Didache on, 267, 
 272; Clement of Rome on, 273; 
 Ignatius' views, 276. 
 
 Eucharistic leadership, the culmination 
 of the priestly aspect of the ministry, 
 261, 263. 
 
 Eugenius, Pope, 228. 
 
 Eusebius, 172. 
 
 Evangelists, a missionary term, 163. 
 Excommunication, a witness to unity, 
 31- 
 
 Expositor, The (Prof. R. Harris), on 
 Montanism, 47 ; (Dr. Sanday), 142. 
 
 Florence, Council of, 228. 
 
 Fox, George, his central aspiration, 55. 
 
 Gasparri, Mgr., 321. 
 
 God, Unity of, what it is, 6. 
 
 Gore, Canon, his theory of the Church, 
 2 ; Church and Ministry quoted, 19, 
 71, 90, 112, 119, 129, 170-172, 266 ; 
 quotes Dr. Milligan, 34 ; on relation 
 between ministry and laity, 71 ; on 
 TertuUian's Montanism, 80 ; on 
 Origen, 83 ; on the universal priest- 
 hood, 95; imvoyLTjv, 115; on the 
 apostolic office, 119, 122. 
 
 Gradations of Ministry, in New Testa- 
 
 ment, 126-169; in sub-apostolic 
 
 times, 1 70-219. 
 Grapte, 209, 211. 
 Guardian, The, 327. 
 Gury, M., 335. 
 
 Harris, Professor Rendel, on Montan- 
 ism, 47. 
 
 Hatch, Dr., his theory of the Church, 
 2 ; iiis Bampton Lectures, 9, 68, 112, 
 257 ; on higher and lower concep- 
 tions of unity, 11 ; his arguments for 
 Ignatian Epistles, 11, 17; on Chris- 
 tian faith and practice, 12 ; on 
 Christian failure, 14-16, 20 ; refuted 
 by Dr. Hort, 22; on Montanism, 47, 
 51-54, 74; relation between ministry 
 and laity misconceived by, 73-75 ; his 
 protest, 94 ; on methods of ordaining, 
 112. 
 
 Hegesippns, 189, 216. 
 
 Hermas, Shepherd oi, 15, 172, 184; on 
 Church unity, 206 ; on ministerial 
 grades, 207-210; true and false pro- 
 phets, 210, 212; his own position, 
 211 ; date of his work, 214; supple- 
 ments Clement of Rome, ibid. 
 
 Hooker, on Baptism, 62 ; his Ecclesi- 
 astical Polity, 103, 238, 239. 
 
 Hort, Dr. {Christian Ecclesia), 22 ; on 
 apostolate, 127, 135 ; on diaconate, 
 138, 140; on 'elders,' 187; on Timo- 
 theus' designation for consecration, 
 156. 
 
 Ignatian Epistles, the, 11, 17, 49, 190; 
 value of unity, corporate and sacra- 
 mental, 193 ; a bishop's position, 
 193 ; bishop should be silent and 
 modest, 194; Roman Church a model 
 of Christian eminence, 196 ; refer- 
 ences to author's martyrdom, ibid, 
 contrasted with Polycarp's Letter, 203. 
 
 Ignatius, his chief aim, 1 1 ; doctrine of 
 unity, 17 ; his vehement appeals, 49 ; 
 on Eucharistic unity, 276; see also 
 above. 
 
 Incarnation, vital fact of the, 106. 
 Individual inspiration, 107-109. 
 Individuality, conditions of, 4. 
 Introduction to the New Testament, 
 
 (Dr. Salmon), 170, 180, 214. 
 Inward and outward, relation between, 
 
 30-63- 
 
 Irenaeus, 86, 213, 216, 280. 
 
358 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Jerusalem, St. James, first Bishop of, 
 150- 
 
 Judaic Christianity, 32 ; its bearing 
 
 on St. Paul's ideal of unity, 35. 
 Justin Mart)T, 87, 257, 278. 
 
 Keble's Christian Year, quoted, 84. 
 Kingdom of Heaven, the, 37. 
 
 Lacey, Rev. T. A., 307, 327. 
 Laity and mlnistr)-, relation between, 
 64-98. 
 
 Latham, Mr. {Pastor Pastoruni), 127. 
 
 Law, Mosaic, 244, 265 ; Levitical, 245. 
 
 Layman, spiritual dignity of the, 98. 
 
 Levitical Law, 'blood means life, not 
 death,' 245. 
 
 Le\ntical and Christian offerings — a 
 parallel, 273. 274. 
 
 Liddon, Dr. ( University Sermons), on 
 the universal priesthood, 96 ; an 
 apostolic office, 119. 
 
 Lightfoot, Dr. (Bishop of Durham), his 
 Christian Ministry criticized, 43 et 
 seq. ; his initial position, 46 ; on ^lon- 
 tanism, 48 ; on means and end, 56 ; 
 essence and essential, 58-60 ; his 
 basis of Church polity, 71 ; on Sacer- 
 dotalism : his misconception, 76 ; on 
 the Eucharist, 77 ; his misuse of Ter- 
 tullian, 80 ; of Origen, 82 ; of Cle- 
 ment of Alexandria, 83; on Irenaeus 
 and Justin Martyr, 86 ; on delegates 
 and representatives, 90 ; his imper- 
 fectly Christianized Gentile, 93 ; ejri- 
 HOirqv, 115, 116; ignores question of 
 apostolic succession, 117-121 ; on 
 the diaconate, 136-139 ; on St. James 
 as principal presbyter or bishop, 146, 
 149 ; on Clement's episcopal position, 
 184 ; his translation of Clement's 
 Letter, 186-190; his translation of 
 Ignatian Letters, 191 ; Docetic Juda- 
 ism, 198 ; Polycarp's Letter, 202 ; 
 his Apostolic Fathers, ibid. ; Hennas, 
 213; on episcopacy, 216 ; his Disser- 
 tationso7i the Apostolic Age, 238, 239 ; 
 mistalces sacrificinm and sacerdo- 
 tium, 240 ; his interpretation of Ovata- 
 OTTipiov, 269 ; quotes Justin Martyr, 
 278; misled by false antitheses, 280. 
 
 Man, his individuality, 4 ; his person- 
 ality, 5 ; flesh and blood : a spiritual 
 being, 39. 
 
 Maskell, 224. 
 
 Mason, Canon {The Relation of Con- 
 
 firmcUion to Baptism), 93. 
 Mass, sacrifice of the, 221, 229. 
 Means and end, 56. 
 
 Media, di^one use and moral indispens- 
 ableness of, 57, 61, 64; Naaman's 
 leprosy an instance of God's essential, 
 60-62. 
 
 Methods, see Media. 
 
 Milligan, Dr., The Resurrection of our 
 Lord, 34 ; The Ascension of our Lord, 
 72, 97, 129, 246, 248; on Church's 
 prophetical office, 72 ; on priestly 
 function, 97 ; Christ, the Prophet, 
 251. 
 
 Ministerial authority, must proceed 
 from God, 100, 102 ; evolved or de- 
 volved, 120. 
 
 Ministers, not delegates if representa- 
 tives, 90. 
 
 Ministr)', relation between laity and, 
 64-98 ; how and why indispensable, 
 65 ; is it a sanctified intermediary ? 
 ibid.; Divine Commission the basis 
 of, 99-125; gradations of, in New 
 Testament, 126-169; gradations of, 
 in Sub-Apostolic times, 170-219; see 
 also Church Ministry, and Priesthood. 
 
 Missale Fra7Uorum, 225. 
 
 Missionaries, evangelists were, 163. 
 
 Moberly, Dr. (Bishop of Salisbury) 
 {Administration of the Holy Spirit), 
 69. 
 
 Monsabre, Pere, 312. 
 
 Montanism, its spiritual aspirations, 47- 
 
 49; Dr. Hatch's view of, 47, 51-54, 
 
 74; Professor R. Harris on, 47 ; Dr. 
 
 Lightfoot on, 48 ; its effect on Ter- 
 
 tulUan, 79. 
 Morinus, 230, 233. 
 Mosaic Law, 244, 265. 
 Mozley, Dr. {Ruling Ldeas in Early 
 
 Ages), no. 
 
 Naaman, his leprosy an instance of 
 God's essential media, 60-62. 
 
 Nature of Church Unity, 1-29. 
 
 New Testament, Gradations of Ministry 
 in the, 126-169 ; compared with the 
 Didache, 175 ; 'sacrificial' language 
 of, 268-272. 
 
 Nicene Creed, its assertion of unity, a, 
 20. 
 
 Old Testament prophecy, 107. 
 
INDEX 
 
 359 
 
 Ordinal, for candidates for priesthood, 
 I02 ; Anglican, 220, 223, 286, 289; 
 Sarum, 220. 
 
 Ordination, even what is divine in it con- 
 ferred through the Church, 89. 
 
 Origen, 81, 83. 
 
 Pastor Pastorum (Mr. Latham), 127. 
 
 Pastoral Epistles, the, 142, 152. 
 
 Pearson, Bishop, 119. 
 
 Personality of man, 5. 
 
 Philip the Evangelist, 138, 164. 
 
 Philippian Church, the, 200, 205. 
 
 Xb/tviuiTiKa, 160. 
 
 Polycarp, Letter of, 184; silent about 
 episcopate, 200 ; Dr. Lightfoot on, 
 202 ; its episcopal character : con- 
 trasted with Ignatian Epistles, 203. 
 
 Pontifical, Dunstan's and Egbert's, 223 ; 
 Sarum, 220, 223, 224; Roman, 224, 
 226. 
 
 Praeparatio Evangelica, 9. 
 
 Prayer Book, revision of the, 236. 
 
 HpfcPvTcpos and fnlcrKoiros, used inter- 
 changeably, 141, 144, 175, 179. 
 
 Presbyterate, its institution unnoticed, 
 140 ; titles presbyter and bishop 
 interchangeable, 141, 142, 144 ; pres- 
 byter must be of blameless life : 
 ruling, teaching, deeper implications, 
 141-145 ; a local leadership with the 
 background of apostolate, 145 ; a 
 local community, 163; the Didache 
 on, 175, 182 ; Dr. Lightfoot's view 
 of, in Clement's Letter, 182, 186-190 ; 
 Ignatian Epistles on, 193. 
 
 Priesthood, of the Ministry, does not alter 
 personal character or right and viroiig, 
 92 ; of a layman, ibid. ; vicarious 
 ideas of, 93 ; Gore and Liddon on 
 the universal, 95, 96 ; in the Church 
 of Christ, 220-299; exaggerations 
 and extreme tendencies of sixteenth 
 century, 221 ; work of Reformation, 
 222 ; Tridentine definitions of, 223 ; 
 Sarum Pontifical, 224; Missale 
 Francorum, 225 ; developed in one 
 direction, 227; Council of Trent, its 
 caution and failure, 228-233 > Angli- 
 can Reformers retain priestly title, 
 234; jealousy as to title, 239; Dr. 
 Lightfoot mistakes sacerdotium and 
 sacrificium, 240 ; what it is, 254 ; 
 specializes and personifies priesthood 
 of the Church, 257; its inwardness 
 
 and outwardness, 260 ; inseparable 
 from priesthood of the laity, 262. 
 
 Prophecy, an inspiration rather than a 
 ministerial status, 161, 166. 
 
 Prophets, and teachers, who and what 
 they are, 1 59 ; two notable passages, 
 160; a personal endowment, 161, 
 166 ; three pertinent inferences from 
 St. Paul's picture of, 164; not an 
 ' Order,' 167 ; summary of arguments, 
 167-169. 
 
 Puller, Father, 327. 
 
 Puritans in sixteenth century, 222. 
 
 Quakerism, 54. 
 
 Relation , between Inward and Outward, 
 30-63 ; unity only spiritual ? 30 ; 
 spirit and body, 31 ; always a con- 
 trast, 35 ; between Ministry and Laity, 
 64. 
 
 Relation of Confirmation to Baptism 
 
 (Canon Mason), 93. 
 Resurrection of our Lord (Dr. Milli- 
 
 gan), 34. 
 
 Roman controversy as to validity of 
 Anglican Orders, see Anglican Orders. 
 
 Roman Pontifical, 224, 226. 
 
 Romans in sixteenth century, 221. 
 
 Ruling Ideas in Early Ages (Dr. Moz- 
 ley), 1 10. 
 
 Sabatier, 171. 
 
 Sacerdotalism, according to Dr. Light- 
 foot, 75, 240; discussed, 263. 
 
 Sacerdotium, 130; Dr. Lightfoot's mis- 
 taken relation to, 240. 
 
 Sacrifice (sacrificium), 228, 230 et seq. ; 
 Dr. Lightfoot on, 240; its true cha- 
 racter, 247-249. 
 
 Saint,the, one personality in imperfection 
 or in beatitude, 38. 
 
 St. Cyprian, 281. 
 
 St. James, 131; persona ecclesiae 
 Hicrosolymitanae, 147 ; his relations 
 to the Apostles, ibid. ; ' the Lord's 
 brother,' 148; probably first Bishop 
 of Jeriisalem, 1 50. 
 
 St. Jerome, 95 ; his ' sacerdotium laici,' 
 262. 
 
 St. John, 8, 133, 177, 183, 189. 
 St. Jude, 14. 
 St. Matthias, 126, 130. 
 St. Paul, his struggle for corporate 
 unity, 32 ; consequences of his en- 
 
360 
 
 INDEX 
 
 thnsiasm, 49; on the Eucharist, 71 ; 
 his theor)' of inspiration, 107 ; on the 
 apostolate, 127, 131-134; on the 
 diaconate, 138; presbyters, 140; 
 Timothy, deacon and evangelist, 157, 
 158; on 'apostles, prophets, and 
 teachers,' 161 ; his protest against 
 selfish indiwdnalism, 162 ; on excel- 
 lence of prophecy, 164; preaches 
 self-restraint, 165 ; on St. James, 147, 
 148 ; warns the Ephesus elders, 267 ; 
 his hieraticlangnage, 271 ; his words 
 as an exhortation to all candidates for 
 priesthood, 287. 
 
 St. Peter, his claim as a presbyter, 121 ; 
 working of God's judgement in, 133 ; 
 his message to St. James, 147 ; a holy 
 priesthood, 252. 
 
 Salmon, Dr. [Introduction to tJie New 
 Tesiame7tt), 170, 180, 214. 
 
 Sandaj", Dr., 142. 
 
 Samm Ordinal, 220, 223, 227. 
 
 Scripla Anglicaiia (M. Bucer), 236. 
 
 Sixteenth centur}-, Anglican Ordinal 
 dates from, 2 20 ; Roman and Puritan 
 excesses in, 221, 222. 
 
 Socialism, 4. 
 
 Solidarity of humanity, 4. 
 
 Speaker s Commentary, 116, 
 
 Spirit, the, and the Body, 39-41, 57, 58, 
 106 ; character of the Church as, 42. 
 
 Spiritual, and bodily, unit)', 31, 35, 39, 
 57 ; Church of Christ the Body, 66. 
 
 Sub-apostolic times, gradations of 
 ministry in, 170-219. 
 
 Taylor, Bishop, on Episcopacy, 83, 1 70, 
 172. 
 
 Tertullian, his exaggerations, 48, 49 ; 
 his false inferences, 78 ; a result of 
 his Montanism, 79 ; layman and 
 priest, 112. 
 
 Tetzel, 221. 
 
 Qvaiaai-qpiov, 266 ; Dr. Lightfoot's 
 
 interpretation of, 269. 
 Timotheus, 134, 142 ; at Ephesus — his 
 
 functions, 151-158; his 'ordination,' 
 
 157 ; deacon and evangelist, 158. 
 Titus, 134, 142; at Crete, 151; his 
 
 functions, 151-158. 
 Trent, Council of, 223, 231. 
 Tridentine, definitions of priesthood, 
 
 222 ; Canon de Sacramento Ordinis, 
 
 229. 
 
 Truth, grades of, 38. 
 
 Unity of Spirit — unity of Body, their 
 contrast not scriptural, 31 etseq., 56. 
 University Sermons (Dr. Liddon), 96. 
 
 Vaughan, Cardinal, 330, 334, 350. 
 
 Westcott, Bishop, 116, 183, 246, 248, 
 269. 
 
 THE END 
 
 oxford: HORACE HART, PRINTER TO THE VNTl-ERSITY