■'^.^ 
 
LIBRARY 
 
 PRINCETON^ N. J. _-, 
 
 BV 640 .W'^isTS c.l 
 Taylor, Isaac, 1787-1865 
 Spiritual despotism 
 
 The Joliii I>I. Krebs Donation. 
 
SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM 
 
 Br THE AUTHOn OF 
 
 NATURAL HISTORY OF ENTHUSIASM. 
 
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 NEW-YORK: 
 
 LEAVITT, LORD & Co., 180 BROADWAY. 
 
 BOSTON : 
 CROCKER & BREWSTER, 47 WASHINGTON-STREET. 
 
 M DCCC XXXV. 
 

 ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 The Author has seen reason, the grounds of which 
 it is not important to state, for altering the order of 
 the volumes he has announced ; and in the stead of 
 Superstition, offers to the reader Spiritual 
 Despotism. 
 
CONTENTS, 
 
 SECTION I. FAGR. 
 
 The Present Crisis of Church Power 5 
 
 SECTION II. 
 General Conditions of Hierarchical Power , 27 
 
 SECTION III. 
 
 Sketch of Ancient Hierarchies, and that of the Jews 64 
 
 SECTION IV. 
 Rudiments of Church Polity 92 
 
 SECTION V. 
 First Steps of Spiritual Despotism 144 
 
 SECTION VI. 
 Era of the Balance of the Civil and Ecclesiastical Powers.. ..... 185 
 
 SECTION VII. 
 The Church Ascendant 222 
 
 SECTION VIII. 
 
 Spiritual Despotism supplanted by Secular Tyranny 262 
 
 SECTION IX. 
 
 Present Disparagements of the Ministers of Religion 279 
 
 SECTION X. 
 
 General Inferences. 304 
 
 Notes and Illustrations 319 
 

 
 SPIRITUAL, D£SPOTI8I?I 
 
 SECTION L 
 
 THE PRESENT CRISIS OF CHURCH POWER. 
 
 The alliance between Church and State is loudJj? 
 denounced as the source and means of spiritual des- 
 potism. But history shows that sacerdotal tyranny 
 may reach its height while the Church is struggling- 
 against a hostile civil power. No practical inference 
 therefore, professing to be drawn from the testimony 
 of facts, can be valid, unless what has been incidental 
 to hierarchical usurpation is clearly distinguished 
 from what was its essential principle. Otherwise, we 
 may unwittingly promote the very abuses we wish to 
 exclude ; and may be led moreover to spurn the most 
 important of all the axioms that should give law to 
 the social system. 
 
 Again ; the maintenance of the clergy through 
 the medium of a legal provision has, with as little 
 regard to the genuine lessons of experience, been as- 
 signed as a chief cause of the corruption of Christi- 
 anity. No allegation can stand more fully contra- 
 dicted by the records of antiquity than does this ; nor 
 can any thing be more easy than to disprove the as- 
 sertion. 
 
 1 
 
6 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 Once more : the arrogant and encroaching epis- 
 copacy of the early ages, from which the proper 
 counterpoise had been removed, has furnished a spe- 
 cious argument in modern times, bearing against that 
 form of church government which is strongly in- 
 ferred to have been sanctioned by apostolic practice, 
 which is approved by the common sense of mankind 
 in parallel instances ; and a form too which the spread 
 of Christianity at once demands, and insensibly in- 
 troduces. A main intention then of the present 
 volume is to point out to the candid reader the un- 
 soundness of certain popular opinions on the above- 
 named important subjects ; and to show the futility 
 of the arguments that have had any such assump- 
 tions as their basis. 
 
 While thus, at the thresliold of his argument, the 
 author explicitly declares his purpose and opinion — 
 an opinion he hopes to substantiate by proper evi- 
 dence, he must -not be misunderstood as wishing to 
 dogmatise where the wisest, the best, and the most 
 accomplished men have ranged themselves on oppo- 
 site sides. Not a little oppressed by the conscious- 
 ness that he must advance what none of our religious 
 parties will altogether approve, and what some of 
 them will vehemently distaste, he throws himself upon 
 he candour and generous sympathy of all, in every 
 communion, whose concern for Christianity is serious 
 and sincere. Disclaiming (as he has endeavoured to 
 repress) every feeling unbecoming the holy gospel 
 which he most earnestly desires to promote, he will 
 not believe that any who entertain the same para- 
 mount desire, will account him an enemy, even 
 though he may assail their fondest and their firmest 
 convictions. 
 
 This indeed should be confessed, that, to what- 
 ever general principle of church polity we turn, pro- 
 bable dangers present themselves, and serious diffi- 
 culties attend our course in giving them effect. The 
 
CRISIS OF CHURCH POWER. 7 
 
 candid and the well-informed will be always ready to 
 acknowledge, what they must so often painfully feel 
 — the many peculiar embarrassments that attach to 
 every scheme of religious association. Moderation 
 should spring from this feeling ; nor moderation 
 alone, but a manly resolution also, and unwearied 
 diligence in collecting information from all sides, and 
 in maturing opinions, such as may safely guide us in 
 the arduous course upon which it is now inevitable 
 that we should enter. 
 
 The religious interests of the British empire are 
 very unlikely much longer to repose where hitherto 
 they have rested : the powers of change that are 
 awake must be met and directed. Nor is it possible 
 that a greater stake should be at hazard among any 
 people; for the welfare of Britain, momentous as we 
 must think it, is not all that is in question, since, with 
 the religious and civil well-being of our own country 
 the moral and spiritual renovation of all countries is 
 involved. No national vanity is imphed in saying 
 so; for none can look at the course of events during 
 the last forty years, or anticipate those almost certain 
 movements of the moral world which await us, with- 
 out confessing that the brightest and the fondest 
 hopes we entertain on behalf of mankind at large, 
 hang upon the auspicious or the ominous aspect of 
 English Christianity. 
 
 In truth it has been the fate — we should rather say 
 the glory, of the British people, in the course of their 
 history, to have furnished practical solutions of the 
 chief questions of political science, for the benefit of 
 the civilized community. Nor have these problems 
 been worked at small cost. Let it be granted that, 
 as the forerunners of civilization in foreign adven- 
 ture and conquest, or as discoverers on the peaceful 
 paths of philosophy, or as masters of mechanic im- 
 provement and trade, the British laurels have been 
 won with immense and immediate advantage to our- 
 
8 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 selves. But in teaching our neighbours the princi- 
 ples of civil and religious liberty we have at once 
 purchased our honours dearly, and reaped the fruits, 
 if not sparingly, yet incompletely ; or as if wiih a 
 secret repugnance. 
 
 Nothing seems more probable than that now, once 
 again, England — the arena of Europe and theatre 
 of tlie world, should attract all eyes while she brings 
 about an amended adjustment of her religious polity. 
 Hitherto no country of the old continent, or of the 
 new, has placed its church establishments on a foun- 
 dation we can approve ; nor are we by any means 
 agreed in approving our own. We are called upon 
 therefore to exert afresh our ancient prerogative ; 
 and to furnish, for the imitation of mankind, the 
 model of a national Christian constitution. 
 
 The rights of conscience and the freedom of wor- 
 ship have already been fully established : none now 
 openly call in question those first truths (last learned) 
 which are the spring and reason of national pros- 
 perity, and the warranty of the many blessings they 
 introduce. Yet, and it is a singular fact, the disco- 
 verers and the masters of axioms so clear and so im- 
 portant have been more tardy than some of their dis- 
 ciples in bringing them to bear upon their institu- 
 tions. While other countries, inferior to ourselves, 
 if not in general civilization, at least in religious 
 feeling, have promptly availed themselves of the light 
 which England has shed, England herself has slowly 
 recognised her own truths. Thus (as some astrono- 
 mers suppose) the sun, while pouring from its upper 
 atmosphere the radiance that enlivens the universe, 
 itself remains shrouded in a sombre twilight. 
 
 What did any European people know of the prin- 
 ciple or practice of religious liberty until they had 
 learned the first, and seen something of the second, 
 in England ? And yet our admirers, or some of 
 them, have outstripped us, both in the public ac- 
 
CRISIS OF CHURCH POWER. 9 
 
 knowledgment, and in the application of the doc- 
 trine. Until very lately, even if it be not still so, 
 our profession of this not-controverted truth, has been 
 made, by one party with an ominous reservation ; and 
 by another has been so interpreted as to generate 
 endless divisions. Hence it happens that our insti- 
 tutions and our practices remain full of anomalies, 
 which either belie or dishonour our principles. In 
 like manner often, the field of a battle which, in its 
 issue, has restored peace and wealth to an empire, 
 itself long exhibits the desolations of the terrible en- 
 counter ; and is the last spot to be covered anew 
 with the harvests that were wen there for other 
 lands. 
 
 But it is far from being enough that we under- 
 stand and enjoy, did we even enjoy it in the com- 
 pletes! manner, religious liberty : this were but a 
 negative benefit. To be exempt from sacerdotal 
 usurpations is indeed an inestimable blessing; and to 
 be free from the terror of ecclesiastical tribunals is a 
 deliverance worth whatever it may cost. Yet it will 
 satisfy those only who would not care if left to forget 
 religion altogether. Such is far from being the mind 
 of the English people at large. It has not now be- 
 come, any more than it has ever been, the character- 
 istic of the British nation, either to rest in a profli- 
 gate indifferency toward religion, or with a servile 
 obsequiousness to bow to the childish pomps of a 
 despised superstition. The mass of the people, and 
 especially of the middle classes, are serious in their 
 belief (whether right or wrong in particular opinions) 
 sincere in their professions, and disposed to pay a 
 manly and religious respect to whatever in matters 
 of religion may seem to deserve it. Quite unlike 
 some of our neighbours, we shall not be found 
 boasting of atheism in one hour, and bowing to idols 
 in the next. The English ask for a religion, and it 
 must be a religion they can honestly cherish : or to 
 
 1* 
 
10 ^ SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 say all that need he said, in a word — Christianity is 
 our choice, and the Bible our rule. 
 
 This Christianity by the Divine favour we actu- 
 ally possess ; and this Bible we read and reverence ; 
 and if our national religion be looked at only in a 
 broad and indefinite manner, nothing seems wanting 
 except a continued and increased diligence, on all 
 hands, in diffusing and enforcing the heavenl}^ 
 benefit. But if the external profession of Christianity 
 be regarded under the actual conditions that attach 
 to it ; or if our national religion be thought of as a 
 bond of peace, and a prop of social order, it is found 
 to have become the subject of very serious, and, as it 
 seems, irreconcilable misunderstandings, such as at 
 once paralyse its spiritual energies, pervert its moral 
 influence, forbid its universal difiusion, enhearten its 
 adversaries, and throw a portentous shade over all 
 our institutions, civil as, well as ecclesiastical. The 
 divisions — now much exasperated, that exist among 
 us on questions belonging to the exterior forms and 
 the profession of religion, are of a kind that affect 
 the Christian with inexpressible grief, the patriot 
 widi shame and dismay, and the statesman with 
 hopeless perplexity. 
 
 The usual prelude of open hostility has actually 
 been gone through with ; namely, an exact num- 
 bering and comparing of forces among the combat- 
 ants. The muster-rolls of party strength have been 
 made up and read aloud ; — dismal sound in the ears 
 of the sons of peace ! Instead of its being inquired, 
 as it should among a Christian people. What are the 
 means at our command for making an assault upon 
 the irreligion of the world, upon its infidelity, and its 
 polytheism, the cry is. Are we, of this party, strong 
 enough to overthrow our brethren of that ? Chris- 
 tianity has in no age of her history offered a spec- 
 tacle more humiliating to her friends than the one 
 she now presents within her home, the British em- 
 
CRISIS OF CHURCH POWER. 11 
 
 pire. If the Gospel was disgraced by the supersti- 
 tions of tlie tenth century, those errors and follies 
 were palliated by the general ignorance of the times; 
 but the guilt and absurdity of the factions of the pre- 
 sent day are enhanced to a high pitch by the intelli- 
 gence that surrounds us. The light, the liberty, 
 the energy, that mark the current era, instead of 
 being interpretable, as they should, in an auspicious 
 sense, have of late become only so many omens of 
 ill ; inasmuch as they immensely aggravate the cri- 
 minality of our discords. 
 
 Shall we never learn to contemplate the religious 
 divisions of the country with that grasp of under- 
 standing and breadth of feeling that become vigor- 
 ous and vi^ell-ordered minds ? Both sides, in the 
 great controversy of the day, exult where they should 
 lament, and deplore what they should rejoice in ; 
 blame others for their own faults, and commend them- 
 selves where the praise, if any, belongs to tlieir op- 
 ponents. Instead of inveighing, with imbecile petu- 
 lance, against dissent, and instead of denouncing the 
 ' schismatics' as contemners of heaven, the Church- 
 man would do better modestly to consider that dis- 
 sent, widely as it has spread, affords a strong pre- 
 sumptive evidence of the existence of some capital 
 flaws, or at least errors of management on the part 
 of the Establishment. The alleged reasons of dis- 
 sent the Churchman may think insufficient ; but the 
 actual causes of dissent assuredly involve a heavy 
 blame, which must fall, eitiier upon the original con- 
 stitution, or upon the administration of the Church ; 
 and probably upon both. The Churchman, there- 
 fore, if wise, would, without losing a day of irreco- 
 verable time, inquire concerning these faults, and 
 apply the painful necessary remedy. 
 
 Again, if the Churchman possess the feelings of a 
 Cliristian and a patriot, instead of glancing at the 
 barn-roofed chapel and meeting-house with an evil 
 
12 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 eye and a grudge, he should loudly and ingenuously 
 rejoice that the saving elements of truth are scattered 
 so widely ; and that the insufficiency of his Church 
 are in some good degree supplied. What but a tho- 
 rough illiberality of spirit can prevent a Christian 
 man, on a Sunday morning, from exulting in the 
 thought that, instead of ten thousand Christian con- 
 gregations then assembling in the land, there are 
 fifteen or twenty thousand ? Some men surely have 
 much to learn, and to unlearn, before they are quali- 
 fied to join either in the chorus of philanthropy on 
 earth, or in the anthem of worship in heaven. 
 
 On the other side the Dissenter, too often, is not 
 less wrong in feeling and inference. Instead of re- 
 torting the accusation of schism upon the schismatic 
 conditions imposed by the Church, he should cover 
 himself with sackcloth when he recollects that dis- 
 sent, within itself, is divided by a dozen frivolous dis- 
 agreements, and that separation upon separation still 
 fails to satisfy that self-willed spirit which dissent has 
 cherished. If dissent were ONE, the charge brought 
 against the Church would come with irresistible force. 
 But it is not ; and there is reason with those who 
 say, " Although we were to remove the grounds of 
 nonconformity, we should do nothing that would in- 
 sure unitv, or relieve Christianity from its oppro- 
 brium. Though there were no Dissenters, there 
 would yet be, as in America, scores of sects." 
 
 Furthermore, the Dissenter, were he accustomed to 
 entertain comprehensive views of the national wel- 
 fare, and did he but cherish that modesty which the 
 especial difficulty of the subject should suggest, in- 
 stead of boasting the political strength of his party, 
 and of indulging factious hopes, founded on the em- 
 barrassments of the national Church, would endeavour 
 anxiously to avert convulsions whence good could 
 arise only remotely, and at a tremendous cost ; and 
 most especially, if ingenuous, and diffident (as a wise 
 
CRISIS OF CHURCH POWER. 13 
 
 man always is of theoretic principles) lie would ab- 
 stain from urging the popular passions toward demo- 
 lition ; and on the contrary, would lend all his in- 
 fluence to those proposed reforms in the Church 
 which must be fairly and consistently tried before it 
 can be known whether a church establishment is, in 
 principle, wrong and impracticable. To assail the 
 consolidated institutions of the land, and to throw a 
 brand into a vast machinery, which we might find 
 ourselves unable to replace, is not a course to which 
 the dictates of common sense, or of political wisdom, 
 or the spirit or precepts of the Gospel, give any 
 sanction. 
 
 These reciprocal faults, which, be it remembered, 
 attach much more to the leaders and organs of the 
 several parties than to the mass of the people on 
 either side, take effect especially upon the course of 
 the controversy as carried on through the press. The 
 opponents, neither of them deficient in ability, or in 
 a fair measure of sincere intention, and perhaps 
 genuine piety, yet, with some exceptions, want the 
 calmness and candour that considers and admits the 
 real strength of the adverse argument, and which 
 reckons at the full the merits of an antagonist. (We 
 say not here how lamentably both parties fall short 
 of that enlightened and expansive charity, and that 
 brotherly love which should recommend the Chris- 
 tian profession.) But in this controversy, as in so 
 many others, yet never more than in this, the oppo- 
 nents do not meet each other either in discussing ab- 
 stract principles, or in proposing practical measures. 
 When the former are brought forward, an unfair use 
 is immediately made of the actual and incidental 
 faults of the national Establishment ; and when the 
 latter are to be considered, every specific remedial 
 proposition is discarded by bringing up some sweep- 
 ing speculative doctrine, or some untried theory. 
 
14 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 As for example : the abstract question of the pro- 
 priety and utility of ecclesiastical establishments is 
 hardly ever left to its simple merits. The Church- 
 man will not so leave it, because he has an actual 
 Church to uphold — and this Church hotly assailed. 
 The Dissenter will not, because he dares not forego 
 the argumentative advantage he derives from the 
 abuses or imperfections of our Establishment. 
 Scarcely knowing how he might maintain his oppo- 
 sition if deprived of the sinister aid he draws from 
 this source, abundant as he finds it, and well suited 
 as it is to irritate popular resentment, he either blinks 
 the abstract question altogether, or mixes up with it 
 matters that are extrinsic and accidental : the Dissen- 
 ter clings to pluralities as tenaciously almost as the 
 pluralist himself. 
 
 Again, the Churchman, doubting whereto the as- 
 sault of the Church, if yielded to, might proceed, and 
 having his own prejudices, and perhaps interests, and 
 those of his friends and patrons to care for, takes his 
 stand, most inopportunely, upon advanced ground, 
 which is already sapped, and which must fall in with 
 him. The Church, with too many who make them- 
 selves her champions, means the Church untouched. 
 Thus it is that few, if any, seriously and in good faith, 
 inquire what our national Establishment, with its high 
 intrinsic merits, might become in the hands of able, 
 honest, and cautious reformers. Or, in other words, 
 few are willing to put the abstract question of a na- 
 tional establishment to the test of experience, by giving 
 or restoring every possible advantage to the one we 
 possess* This momentous problem demands, in truth, 
 to be referred to some, if they could be found, who 
 should be far more ingenuous and temperate, as well 
 as enlightened, than are any Dissenters ; and far more 
 free and disinterested than are any Churchmen. Be- 
 tween the factious vehemence of the one, and of the 
 
CRISIS UF CHURCH POWER. 15 
 
 timid ephemeral counsels, or the miscalculating pre- 
 judices of the other, the high welfare of the empire is 
 not unlikely to be shipwrecked. 
 
 The danger of such a catastrophe is not a little en- 
 hanced by the active interference of those who would 
 not deny that they are coldly affected, or even ill- 
 affected toward Christianity itself. The necessity of 
 applying epithets of opprobrious sound to any set of 
 men is a most unpleasant necessity; yet how can an 
 argument be conducted if apt designations must not 
 be employed f Renouncing then all offensive inten- 
 tion, as well as unkind feeling, it must be said that 
 there exists among us, and almost in the consolidated 
 form of a distinct faction, what may fairly be called 
 the infidel and atheistic party ; — a party powerful by 
 its intelligence, and by its extensive possession of the 
 periodic press (not to say its political influence.) 
 Fine distinctions and nice shades of opinion not 
 regarded, and amid the urgent affairs of life they can- 
 not be regarded, those must needs be called infidels 
 who, notwithstanding a ceremonious bow to the wor- 
 ship of the land, invariably array themselves against 
 every mode of positive religious belief : nor again, 
 can we scruple to call those atheists, who choose, on 
 every occasion, to display their singular ingenuity in 
 exhibiting the fallacy of whatever evidence is advanced 
 in proof of the being and perfections of God. Wri- 
 ters may say, " far be it from us to deny the existence 
 of an intelligent first cause; nevertheless this argu- 
 ment, and this, and tliis^ usually urged by theologians 
 in favour of the popular dogma, is manifestly incon- 
 clusive." A manly ingenuousness would assuredly 
 exchange so thin a disguise for a candid avowal of 
 disbelief. 
 
 Be this as it may ; the atheistic faction very natu- 
 rally takes part against the established Church in the 
 present season of her peril. Political tendencies, ir- 
 religious instincts, the prospect of triumph over things 
 
16 SPIRITUAL DEFOTISM. 
 
 and persons held sacred, the hope of seeing Christi- 
 anity, in one of her principal forms, levelled with the 
 dust and exposed to shame ; indefinite expectations of 
 booty, and a belief that, notwithstanding the zeal of 
 the sects, religion altogether would not long survive 
 the overthrow of a learned and respectable hierarchy 
 interested in its support ; these, and other kindred 
 motives, impel many, as well among the vulgar as the 
 educated, to mix in a controversy foreign to their 
 habits of thinking, and into which they bring no pre- 
 paration, either of knowledge or of sentiment, that 
 might lead them to a sound conclusion. 
 
 This irreligious interference in a religious contro- 
 versy cannot fail to be in itself pernicious; but it be- 
 comes more so when caught at and encouraged by 
 some who should know better how and where to choose 
 allies. The aid we receive in argument, at any time, 
 from persons between whom and ourselves there exists 
 an absolute contrariety of first principles, may well 
 be suspected, even if it ought not at once to be re- 
 nounced. Undoubtedly some capital sophism forms 
 the bond of that accidental connexion which makes us 
 one with men whom we must think in every sense 
 wrong. Let the infidel and the Dissenter join hands 
 in upheaving the Church, and before the ruins have 
 settled in the dust, the former will turn upon the latter, 
 as then his sole enem}', and his easy victim. 
 
 Those who, in this instance, have fallen into the 
 snare, would do well to mark the not obscure wishes of 
 their coadjutors. These, assuming it as probable that 
 the mass of mankind must always ask for a religion 
 of some sort, will be well content so long as the reli- 
 gion of the populace is of a kind which themselves can 
 easily hold in contempt. They are not forward there- 
 fore, as once, in the young days of modern scepti- 
 cism, to assail the fanaticism and sheer extrava- 
 gance of certain sects ; and moreover, impelled as 
 it seems by the same motives, they now actually 
 
CRISIS OF CHURCH POWER. 17 
 
 spread their shield over the enormities and follies of 
 Romanism; and, with surprising eagerness, slept in 
 to defend the good old superstition against any new 
 and vigorous assailant. The very same popery that 
 was furiously run upon by the sceptics of the last age, 
 is as zealously befriended by the sceptics of this. But, 
 assured as they are, that the papacy has lost its tusks, 
 and will never again command the sword of the state, 
 they would very cheerfully stand by and see the pic- 
 turesque pomps they may have admired at Brussels, 
 Antwerp, Madrid, or Rome, restored to our English 
 Churches, Cathedrals, and Squares. 
 
 The summer season of philosophic impiety is just 
 at that time when some degrading and gorgeous su- 
 perstition overawes the vulgar, decorates the frivolous 
 hypocrisy of the opulent, and thickl3' shades from all 
 eyes the serious verieties of religion. Such, nearly, 
 was the state of things with the pagan philosophers 
 when Christianity broke upon the world ; and such 
 was it with the French Encyclopaedists. Never shall 
 it be so with English unbelievers ; yet were this pos- 
 sible, these, more discreet than their predecessors, 
 would know better than to use any efforts for demo- 
 lishing the popular folly ; on the contrary, they would 
 give it the aid of their talents, and the mock homage 
 of their external reverence. What least of all this 
 party would promote is a wise Church Reform, which 
 it foresees would presently turn the balance of public 
 feeling to the side of rational piety; and so would 
 throw into contempt that scepticism which is now saved 
 from it only by the obloquies that attach to our pro- 
 fession of Christianity. It is a common occurrence 
 for perverse intentions to bring into conjunction the 
 most opposite parties; and so it is now that, in decry- 
 ing, or in denouncing, or in silently obstructing the 
 necessary revision of our church polity, the enemies 
 of all religion, and its zealous and most sincere 
 friends, the Dissenters, and the interested favourers 
 2 
 
18 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 of corruption within the church, are found conspiring 
 (though not in conspiracy) to prevent the pubhc 
 good ; each having his private reason for wishing to 
 aver what simple-minded and enlightened men most 
 fervently desire. 
 
 We have just said, that those inauspicious exaspe- 
 rations which at present obstruct the course of onr 
 national religious improvement, attach far more to 
 the leaders and organs of parties than to the mass of 
 the people. A distinction like this is to be observed 
 on most occasions of public excitement ; but in the 
 present instance a due recollection of it is of peculiar 
 importance, inasmuch as the press, and especially the 
 periodic press, has become almost the sole medium of 
 part}' warfare. The periodic press not merely governs 
 public sentiment, but it is from this that the actual 
 complexion of public sentiment is gathered, though 
 incorrectly. 
 
 Nothing, it must be granted, can seem more impru- 
 dent than for a writer to call in question those who. 
 under our present literary economy, sit as the masters 
 of his destiny. But the author (not, as he hopes, in 
 the spirit of arrogance) long ago fixed it in his pur- 
 pose to incur all hazards while discharging what he 
 thinks his duty. In the present instance he must not 
 conceal his opinion that what is needed, as prelimi- 
 nary to wholesome measures, is to disengage the pub- 
 lic mind (if it might be done) from the despotism of the 
 Periodic Press, and to loosen the yoke fastened upon 
 the neck of the people by our Newspapers, Maga- 
 zines, and Reviews. 
 
 The author on this occasion challenges the Pub- 
 lic ; and he looks too with confidence to the can- 
 dour and generous feelings of not a few of those to 
 whom, in their public capacity, what he has to say 
 may apply. Many there are connected with the pe- 
 riodic press who distaste their task, who disallow 
 
CRISIS OF CHURCH POWER. 19 
 
 much in which they are implicated, and who, in the 
 freedom of private intercourse, would not hesitate to 
 encourage the protest which the autlior is here bold 
 enough to make. He appeals then to readers ; and 
 to those WRITERS too whose employment has not 
 spoiled them as Christians and as men. 
 
 To deny, either the eminent ability with which the 
 periodic press of this country is conducted, or the 
 general benefits accruing from this modern system of 
 intellectual circulation, would be purely splenetic. 
 Our daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly journals, 
 diffuse light and life through the community to an ex- 
 tent that has no parallel. And under ordinary cir- 
 cumstances, and when political and religious interests 
 are running on in their wonted channels, and at an 
 ordinary pace, even the factious constitution of our 
 journals may perhaps have its convenience, and may 
 give rise to little mischief. But it is far otherwise 
 on those signal occasions when measures become 
 necessary which every faction, for its particular rea- 
 son, will oppose, and which, although approvable to 
 the quiet good sense and right feeling of the people, 
 are sure to be denounced and misrepresented by those 
 who think the point of honour of higher obligation 
 than the duty they owe to abstract truth ; and who, 
 accordingly, make it their rule to look, first to the 
 interests of their party, which it would be discredita- 
 ble to betray, and last to the welfare of the country, for 
 which they are but remotely responsible. 
 
 Men whose spirits are hurried and tempers irritated 
 by constant engagement with antagonists, and who 
 are called upon to take a part, and to give an opi- 
 nion, even on the most difficult questions, at the mo- 
 ment when the Press stands, and into whose habits of 
 thinking nothing that is cautious, deliberative, or 
 modest, may enter, how should such lead the public 
 mind upon new ground, and where every sort of em- 
 l>arrassment thickens around us ? We must even go 
 
20 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 further, and ask whether the qualities that usually eall 
 men into the service of our periodic literature are, a 
 genuine intelligence, and a high sense of duty and 
 principle ; or rather the mere faculty of ready compo- 
 sition, and the command of a spirited style, together 
 with that mental vivacity and those inflamed intel- 
 lectual passions which are seldom combined with 
 vigorous good sense, or with expansive views, or 
 with substantial acquirements; and never with hum- 
 ble and fervent piety. The very dispositions we 
 most need in difficult seasons, are those that ought 
 not in fairness to be looked for in that scene of flutter 
 and necessity — the editor's room. Our Reformation 
 from popery was not concocted or carried through in 
 any such temples of confusion. Great minds, care- 
 fully nurtured, came out from their retirements to 
 meet that great occasion. The press did indeed aid 
 the Reformation ; but the press was not then as now, 
 in a condition to distract it. The men who thought, 
 spoke, argued, and suffered, did not spend their 
 days and nights under the very roofs that shake with 
 the mighty throes of the printing engine. If the 
 same Reformation is to be carried forward to its 
 consummation, the band of editors and contributors 
 must wheel ofl* from the ground, and give room to 
 artisans of another order. 
 
 Hitherto it has not been found practicable to esta- 
 blish a journal which should be other than the organ 
 of a portion of the communit3^ Ruled, either by 
 immediate considerations of profit, or looked upon 
 as the means of upholding and furthering particular 
 interests, a philosophic impartiality can b}' no means 
 find place in works of this class. Whatever is great 
 or sincere, must pass under a censorship of a special 
 sort, and be questioned in its remotest bearings upon 
 every prejudice. Individually, the editor and his 
 coadjutors may have their enlargement of mind, or 
 their conscience ; but the door-way into their office is 
 
CRISIS OF CHURCH POWER. 21 
 
 narrow. The law and the policy of the journal is 
 to assail and to defend given interests ; — too often 
 Co assail and to defend individuals. 
 
 We have spoken of those circumstances which 
 render it highly unlikely thai, on peculiar and diffi- 
 cult occasions, the country should be wisely led by 
 our journals. But there is another, and a not less 
 important aspect of the subject. 
 
 We are too much in the habit, on all sides, of 
 forming our opinion of other parties, and even of 
 our own party, from the character and expressions of 
 the several journals that are tlie acknowledged 
 organs of those parlies. But this method of judging 
 of our brethren, and of thinking of ourselves, is at 
 once illusory, and fraught with pernicious conse- 
 quences. In doing so we look into a glass that 
 distorts whatever it reflects. Let us believe it — let 
 us believe it as well of our neighbours as of ourselves, 
 that we are much better men, and more wise, and 
 calm, and more christian-like, than the newspaper or 
 review that lies on our table represents us. The 
 violence and the bigotry which we read and sub- 
 scribe to, we inwardly loathe ; and what other men 
 undertake to say for us, we should abhor to say for 
 ourselves. Feeling this, each individually as we do, 
 we are bound injustice and charity to impute similar 
 feelings to our brethren of other communions. We 
 are all, in common, not only misled, but misrepre- 
 sented, if not slandered by the forward persons who 
 write in our name. The commencement of every 
 thing that is happy and good would be a general 
 and vivid consciousness, on the part of the people at 
 large, of the wrong done them by the journalists 
 whom they patronise. 
 
 The aim of the paper or the review (exceptions 
 duly allowed for, and there are exceptions) is not so 
 much to speak what its party feels, as to work up the 
 2* 
 
22 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 sentiments of the community to a necessary pitch, to' 
 give those sentiments a special direction, and to 
 throw a desirable colour of public spirit over factious 
 proceedings./ There is then always a measurable 
 interval, and often a wide one, between the journal 
 and its readers ; and nothing can, at the present 
 moment, be much more important than that this 
 DlFFEPv-ENCE should be understood, and calculated 
 upon in our projects of amendment. 
 
 An appeal is here made to the personal conscious- 
 ness of every Christian reader, and to his particular 
 acquaintance with the religious circle in tlie midst of 
 which he moves, while this broad affirmation is ad- 
 vanced — That the British people, and especially the 
 religious portion of it, is less factious and perverse, 
 is more docile, and more ready to approve of reason- 
 able conciliatory measures, than it appears to be 
 when judged of by the spirit and temper of our 
 newspapers, magazines, and reviews. The happy 
 tranquil intercourse of Christians in the walks of pri- 
 vate life belies the intemperance of the literary leaders 
 of party. Hence it will follow that certain schemes 
 of conciliation, which must seem utterly chimerical, 
 if looked at in ihe light reflected from their flushed 
 pages, and which editors and reviewers will surely 
 denounce as absurd, may deserve to be seriously 
 pondered ; and especially so if the means could be 
 found of bringing them to bear upon the public mind 
 apnrt from the intervention of sectarian writers. No 
 man could stand in a nobler or more auspicious posi- 
 tion than one who should be able to hold this inter- 
 ference at ba}^, and to work directly upon the better 
 nature of the christian public. 
 
 The interval, or moral diflerence, between readers 
 and writers to which we refer, is a capital circum- 
 stance, very necessary to be understood and allowed 
 for in reference to every age of Christianity. It is a 
 circumstance that has been far too little considered 
 
CRISIS OF CHURCH POWER. 23 
 
 by the compilers of church history ; and a new light 
 might be shed upon several eras merely by pursuing 
 those incidental intimations through which the actual 
 state of the community, as distinguished from the 
 temper' of the authors of the time, may be discerned. 
 At some moments, no doubt, this difference has been 
 in favour of the writers ; but more often in favour of 
 the people. At the present moment, it can hardly 
 be assumed as probable, that the intense excitements, 
 of every sort, that have borne upon the literary body, 
 have operated to turn the scale in the opposite 
 direction. 
 
 A just estimate of the character and influence of 
 the Periodic Press, considered in relation to those 
 great measures which the religious well-being of the 
 empire demands, has, then, in its first bearing, a dis- 
 couraging aspect ; inasmuch as this influence is not 
 easily to be stemmed, and runs vehemently against 
 whatever is not sectarian. But, on the other hand, 
 the unquestionable fact, that the Press does not truly 
 represent the religious community, opens an unex- 
 pected and most cheering prospect of possible im- 
 provements in our ecclesiastical condition, when once 
 the means shall be found of coming in contact with 
 the good sense, and kindliness, and piety of the 
 people. 
 
 The British christian commonwealth is not to be 
 despaired of. Disabused of illusions, and disen- 
 gaged from factious guidance, our country would be 
 great in religion, as she has been great in arts, arms, 
 and civil polity. It cannot be that the reason of so 
 reasonable a people should forever suffer depression ; 
 or that their sincere and fervent Christianity should 
 for ever be deformed by frivolous and acrimonious 
 disagreements. 
 
 The present crisis of ecclesiastical principles ought, 
 it is true, to be looked at by religious men in a re- 
 
24 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 ligious light ; and it behooves such to be constantly 
 on their guard against the tendency of controversies 
 such as these to sHde off to the lower ground of po- 
 litical interests. The best means, perhaps, for pre- 
 serving in our own minds this necessary distinction, 
 is to place clearly in view the utmost political bear- 
 ing of the Church question, that so, being relieved 
 at once from undefined terrors, we may the more 
 steadily give attention to what indeed deserves the 
 highest regard. 
 
 The crisis of the Church we hold then to be the 
 crisis of the Constitution. Renouncing entirely, and 
 even with contempt, those alarms which are made 
 a pretext of by the defenders of corruption^ who 
 would fain have us believe that to reform a single 
 abuse in the Church is the same thing as to draw out 
 the ties and pins of the framework of the State, it is 
 yet, as we assume, not to be denied that the feeling 
 and the principle which now threaten the Church of 
 England, threaten also, and not very remotely, those 
 civil institutions that stand as a fence against pure 
 democracy. The dissenting clergy, without being 
 theoretic republicans (the contrary is to a great ex- 
 tent the fact, and in the most decisive sense) have 
 gradually yielded to a doctrine, however much 
 softened in practice, that involves untempered de- 
 mocracy, and have recognised a sovereign power in 
 the people, over the clerical order, unheard of till of 
 late, and absolutely incompatible with the necessary 
 dignity of their office, and the free and efficient dis- 
 charge of their duties. This false step is not to be 
 retraced ; — relinquished power is not to be reco- 
 vered ; the tide is let out, and rolls on, and all that can 
 be done by the (dissenting) clergy in the way of re- 
 taining the influence that remains to them, is to ride 
 on the ridge of the wave, and to be loud and zealous 
 in favouring popular impulses, and to lead the way 
 onward still, where to stop is to fall. 
 
CRISIS OF CHURCH POWER. 25 
 
 In this very manner the general opinions, political 
 and ecclesiastical, of the dissenting communities have 
 already advanced very many paces during the last 
 few years. The great and accomplished noncon- 
 formists of the past age would startle at the princi- 
 ples now maintained in dissenting publications. The 
 same movement must, by the necessity of the case, go 
 on." We have not yet heard the whole of the theory 
 that is working itself into the light. The political 
 tendency of the times favours its developement ; the 
 Dissenter will find listeners in the crowd, and co- 
 adjutors in the senate, and will himself be borne on 
 far beyond his own first intentions. To affirm that 
 the Dissenters of the present day are either faint in 
 their loyalty, or loosely attached to the existing con- 
 stitution, is a calumny, and can never be believed by 
 any who are personally acquainted with their pre- 
 vailing sentiments. Rejecting this slander, which 
 we do in the most peremptory manner; we yet cal- 
 culate the elements of the orbit in which they are 
 moving : — we see the velocity, we feel the momentum, 
 and we well know what point the hyperbolic course 
 they are on must reach. 
 
 On a subject so nice as this no man will readily re- 
 ceive his opinion from another ; and none ought to 
 resent the opinion entertained by another. We are 
 not, be it remembered, imputing designs, or sounding 
 the alarm of treason and conspiracy ; but are indi- 
 cating oqly the natural tendency of principles ; and 
 we assume it as no extravagant surmise that, what- 
 ever hitherto the nations of Europe have admired, 
 and some of them emulated in the British constitu- 
 tion, will instantly sustain the unbroken impetus of 
 popular impatience should the English Church be 
 subverted. If indeed pure republicanism be the 
 highest political good, let us calmly watch the pro- 
 gress of the assault upon the Church. But if the 
 British Constitution be good, and if we desire 
 
26 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 to uphold and to perpetuate that form of llie social 
 S3^steni which used to be thought by Britons admi- 
 rable, and by the world enviable, then must we 
 anxiously inquire whether the Church of England 
 can, and will, admit that renovation of her powers 
 which may enable her to cope with the tinies, to sur- 
 vive the agitation of the moment, and to continue, as 
 she has been, the guardian of our national welfare. 
 First then for the sake of Christianity, and then 
 for the sake of the country, we should desire and 
 promote the restoration of the Church. May He who 
 in so many signal instances has put honour upon 
 England, and has sustained her amid the wreck of 
 nations, and has rescued her peace when it seemed 
 gone, and has kept alive within her the cordial pro- 
 fession of his Gospel ; may He now, in as great an 
 emergency as has yet befallen her, send the spirit of 
 wisdom and power, of moderation and charity, upon 
 gome who shall repair her desolations, and build her 
 up for ever I 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWEIt. 27 
 
 SECTION II. 
 
 GENERAL CONDITIONS OF HIERARCHICAL POWER. 
 
 The position and the claims of the ministers of re- 
 ligion, as a body in the social system, are not easily 
 to be determined. Difficulties that may be ex- 
 changed, sooner than avoided, attend every scheme 
 of church polity. These embarrassments spring 
 from the very nature of the interests in question ; for 
 until truth shall attain an ascendency in the world, 
 religion, as to its exterior forms, must stand as an 
 anomaly among the affairs of common life ; and the 
 ministers of religion inevitably sustain, in one manner 
 or in another, the disadvantages that arise from this 
 want of harmony between earth and heaven. 
 
 Conscious of the instability of their position, and 
 feeling as if their dues and their authority might at 
 any moment be brought into dispute, the clergy, in 
 almost every age, have been tempted to set themselves 
 at ease by means alike incompatible with their proper 
 influence and detrimental to the general welfare. 
 Hence have resulted, in the first place, Spiritual 
 Despotism, with its superstitions, its hypocrisies, its 
 fabrications, its follies ; and then those vehement re- 
 actions, that have ended, not merely in humbling the 
 priesthood, but in trampling upon religion. The 
 history of Christianity, from the second century 
 onward to the present moment, is the story of this 
 growth and overthrow of church power ; and more- 
 over, as the overthrow yet remains to be consum- 
 mated (for the papacy still lives) so does the reaction 
 wait to be brought back to its just point. Neither 
 the foundations nor the limits of sacerdotal authority 
 
23 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 have hitherto been satisfactorily ascertained in any 
 Protestant country ; and in England first principles 
 on this subject are matters of controversy. 
 
 If the ministers of religion are to retain power 
 enough to enable them to do good, they must be 
 allowed to wield, in the freest manner, and without 
 control, an indefinite influence — an influence not to 
 be circumscribed by statutes. Any attempt to de- 
 scribe and define this peculiar species of power in the 
 language of law, is not so much to curtail it, as to 
 deny its very essence. Again ; as the clergy draw 
 the motives of their calling (or should do so) from 
 reasons that are not commensurable with the induce- 
 ments of worldly conduct, they can hardly consent 
 to be dealt with on the ground of secular interests, 
 without some compromise of honour and principle. 
 At this point it has been found very hard to avoid a 
 jar and clash of heterogeneous principles. 
 
 Furthermore, as the influence of the clergy touches 
 the public mind at all points, and affects it in a silent 
 and intimate manner, such as the magistrate can 
 neither follow nor countervail, he can scarcely avoid 
 being troubled with suspicions, from which he natu- 
 rally seeks relief by tampering with the integrity of 
 the rival power, and by corruptly buying its favour. 
 If the Church sternly rejects these adulterous over- 
 tures, and maintains her high independence, she will 
 never be thought of by the State much otherwise 
 than as an eneni}' in the bosom. 
 
 It is in vain that we contend for the absolute non- 
 relationship of ecclesiastical corporations to the civil 
 power. Even if the Church were willing to maintain 
 such a refined doctrine, the State has not eyes nice 
 enough to discern it ; and will always reckon the 
 religious bodies it has to do with, as in a positive 
 sense, either its friends or its foes ; and will feel them 
 to be either its masters, or its subjects. If the 
 Church, in relation to the State, be co-ordinate and 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 29 
 
 irresponsible, a counterpoise exists, fraught with 
 anxiety, and tending always to change. If it be 
 subservient and obsequious, whatever renders reli- 
 gion efficacious or venerable is compromised. If it 
 be transcendent and supreme, a country is converted 
 into one vast dungeon of ghostly cruelty, of which 
 the chief magistrate is only the gaoler. 
 
 Those vvho look upon the evohitions of religious 
 principles solely or chiefly in a secular light, natu- 
 rally seek to evade difficulties of this sort by political 
 management. Some, for example, would endeavour 
 in all possible methods to lower and to divert the re- 
 ligious feeling of the community. By putting silent 
 contempt upon the customary public references to the 
 supreme Being and his providential government, and 
 by freely opening to the mass of the people those 
 sources of seductive pleasure which withdraw the po- 
 pular mind from seriousness and reflection, they would 
 dry up the springs of Church power, and wither at 
 the root the tree of piety. Only let the people, high 
 and low, be imbued with the spirit of sensual gayetj^ 
 and let the public mind admit no other stimulus than 
 what is drawn from physical science, and from com- 
 mercial eagerness, and then we shall effectually set 
 them free from the despotism of the priest ; and stop 
 too the course of religious agitations. Wiiat can be 
 better than such a method — if all religion be an 
 illusion f 
 
 Or another, and a less odious means of composing 
 jarring interests, and of averting religious convul- 
 sions, would be that of insidiously forcing or tempting 
 the clerical body, of all communions, into a condition 
 of absolute dependence upon the State, and then to 
 treat it, with much liberality of profession and much 
 impartiality, but with substantial contempt, as the 
 least esteemed, and the least important class of its 
 stipendiaries. Such an order of things being effected, 
 the public purse might always be trusted to as a cer- 
 3 
 
30 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 tain means of purchasing for the community just so 
 mucli religion as is indispensable for binding together 
 the social system, and for giving contentment to the 
 superstitious. This method, like the first, might be 
 eligible, if Christianity could be proved untrue. 
 
 Tliere yet remains a scheme that may recommend 
 itself to the politician ; and it is that of suffering the 
 active elements of religious sentiment to work as they 
 mav, only being so managed — now fanned, now 
 checked, now let loose in one direction, and now in 
 another, as that the dangerous force of the mass shall 
 always be consumed within and upon itself. Religious 
 parties, some ambitious, and therefore obsequious 
 to the State; some simply enthusiastic, and there- 
 fore blind and variable; some fanatical and malig- 
 nant, and therefore fit for imposing fear upon others, 
 might, it may be thought, be so played against each 
 other by skilful hands, as to maintain a general equi- 
 librium and tranquillity. Find us these skilful hands 
 in continuous succession, before such a scheme is 
 talked of as practicable. 
 
 It is easy to say, and it would be easy to prove, 
 that the religion of the Bible, generally diffused, and 
 siiicerely and fervently professed, would at once ob- 
 viate the difficulties we have mentioned^ as well as any 
 others we may have forgotten. Under the most faulty 
 churcii polity iliat has ever been devised, or without 
 any polity, every thi>)g would go on safely and well, 
 if Christianity took full effect upon most men's minds ; 
 and if it continued to do so from a<je to age. Love is 
 llie fulfilling of the law ; and Christian love, in its 
 perfection, would supersede, as well as fulfil, all law. 
 But we dare not leave the things of earth, even the 
 best things, upon this ground. Abandoned to the ef- 
 ficacy of those high sentiments, that are produced only 
 rarely, religious interests either evaporate, or give 
 to abuses, worse than the evils of too much legislation. 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 31 
 
 Civil government, in all its provisions, implies the 
 activity, and guards against the excesses of malign 
 and selfish passions. Church government must im- 
 ply and do the same. 
 
 Two opposite errors here take their rise. The first 
 is that of those who, disdaining, in religious matters, 
 to consider mankind such as they are, assume vastly 
 more than is ever realized ; and rearinj^: their ecclesi- 
 astical edifice upon ideal ground, make no provision 
 against real dangers ; and therefore leave the Church 
 open to the insidious advance of the worse corruptions. 
 The second error is that of secular and politic minds ; 
 and it consists in allowing too little scope to spiritual 
 motives in spiritual affairs : with overcaution estima- 
 ting motives of the lowest probable rate, it places re- 
 ligious offices upon what it deems the firm ground of 
 ordinary inducements. Under the influence of this 
 latter error, religion invariably dies away : under the 
 former it scarcely fails to become extravagant or 
 corrupt. 
 
 The early Church, as was natural, adopted the 
 lofty hypothesis which assumes that every thing which 
 is sacred is really pure, and will always continue so ; 
 and from it sprung, very soon, the system that ripened 
 into the despotism and dishonesty of the papacy. 
 Our modern dissentients from establishments place 
 themselves nearly on the same ground ; but their 
 progression in the same course is obstructed by exte- 
 rior causes. The opposite fault, and it is a most serious 
 one, has too far got ground in every one of those 
 national establishments which, at the Reformation, 
 displaced the Romish tyranny. The consequence, 
 throughout protestant Europe, has been, a general de- 
 cay of clerical efficiency, and a compromise of legiti- 
 mate spiritual power for worldly advantages. 
 
 At the present moment these same antagonist prin- 
 ciples are in a state of doubtful counterpoise throughout 
 Christendom. Among the continental nations the 
 
32 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 old superstition, or the doctrine of the immaculate 
 spirituality of persons, and infallibility of authorities, 
 and immediate supernatural efficacy of offices, involv- 
 ing, as it does, mighty influences over the human mind, 
 both on the side of hope and fear, and being in a 
 sense purified by its recent losses of secular power, 
 combats to advantage as well with the coldness of 
 Protestanism, as with the frivolity of the prevailing 
 atheism, and is actually drawing to itself almost every 
 thing that is genuine, fervent, and vital, around it. 
 Events more unlikely have come about than would 
 be the restoration of a refined (not a reformed) Ro- 
 manism, from end to end of Europe. 
 
 In England, the two principles we have mentioned, 
 stand on very difierent ground, and indeed are 
 strangely intermixed among our several parties. For 
 example ; in her devotions and in her sacramental and 
 other offices, the Established Church assumes the 
 highest ground of spirituality : her public worship 
 breathes the elevation of heaven, and speaks a sub- 
 limity — simple as sublime, which makes us forget the 
 imperfections of earth. Those of her services too 
 that have incurred the most blame, are to be defended 
 only on this ground, that the Church assumes every 
 thing within her precincts to be actually holy and 
 valid. The Church, in these instances, disdains to 
 suppose that any of her members may be false to their 
 profession. But on the other hand this same Church, 
 in her polity and external constitution, has embodied 
 far too much of the secular principle ; and is now 
 greatly endangered through the rude exposure of it 
 by her enemies. 
 
 The two incompatible elements — the hyper-spiritual 
 and the secular, or simply rational, are, with a like 
 inconsistency, commingled in the notions and practi- 
 ces of most of the dissident sects. These parties, in 
 their doctrine concerning the derivation of the Chris- 
 tian ministry, and still more so in the practical expo- 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 33 
 
 sition which ti)e congregational system gives of that 
 doctrine, take a very low ground — a ground not much 
 raised above the idea of a teacher, exercising his func- 
 tion at the pleasure of tliose who maintain him. And 
 yet these same persons, in their a;*gument with the Es- 
 tablished Church, when they roundly deny the lawful- 
 ness of a national religious polity, and when they 
 plead for throwing religious interests altogether upon 
 the variable impulses of the people from year to year, 
 seem to suppose such a semi-miraculous administra- 
 tion of the world's aifairs, or of the church's affairs, 
 as excludes or supersedes human forethought, and the 
 rationalemployment of ordinary means. In the view 
 they take of the sacraments, as well as of the priest- 
 hood, and in their opinions on secondary theological 
 questions, the Dissenters exhibit a decisive leaning 
 toward what is most simple and intelligible, and a cor- 
 responding backwardness to admit any thing that sa- 
 vours of mystery,* or which may not, in a few words, 
 be laid open to popular comprehension : a shrewd ra- 
 tionalism is the taste, if not the avowed principle of 
 theife bodies, in all but the higher truths of revelation. 
 Nevertheless, in what relates to the propagation of 
 the Gospel, or to its maintenance where it already ex- 
 ists, or to its safe transmission to the next age, no 
 class of Christians have gone so far in calculating 
 upon immediate interpositions of heaven; or at least 
 have been so jealous of those prudential arrangements 
 which secular discretion points to, as proper and ne- 
 cessary for securing these public interests. 
 
 One cannot but notice the fact, that, in those mat- 
 ters which human reason fails to grasp, and where as 
 well the means as the end are veiled in some obscu- 
 rity — to wit, the positive institutions of Christianity, 
 
 * The author must not be supposed to call in question the orthodoxy 
 of the great body of Dissenters : none are more steadily Trinitarian than 
 thev. 
 
 3* 
 
34 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 the parties spoken of reject, as superstitious and ab- 
 surd, whatever is not instantly intelligible. But, on 
 the contrary, in those affairs which, in their nature, 
 appertain to human agency, and in which the entire 
 subject lies within our view — for example, the mainte- 
 nance of public religion, in these they discard the sug- 
 gestions of secular wisdom, and prefer to rely upon a 
 succession of supernatural aids; or at least, act as if 
 the ordinary course of human affairs did not hold in 
 the history of the Church. 
 
 Those who are accustomed to view with calm and 
 serious impartiality the temper and principles of reli- 
 gious communities, will not deny that grave inconsist- 
 encies attach to all sides in the instances above allu- 
 ded to; inconsistencies that may readily be traced up 
 to the events of a past age. The Reformers wrouglit 
 a great deliverance for us ; but they did not ascertain 
 principles ; and since their time the Protestant com- 
 munions, having stumbled in their course over untrod- 
 den ground, have wrangled one with another about 
 the v/ay, to little purpose. A season of tranquillity 
 (should we enjoy one after the existing agitations have 
 subsided) may probably be employed in a charitable 
 and rational discussion of the rudiments of church 
 polity. 
 
 The path toward such a discussion might be a lit- 
 tle cleared by considering the principal extrinsic 
 causes that have affected hierarchical power, either as 
 enhancing or repressing it. At any rate, a brief re- 
 view of these causes belongs to our present subject. 
 
 The main circumstances, then, that appear to have 
 strengthened or modified the influence of the sacerdo- 
 tal order, are the following, namely, first. The qua- 
 lity of the religion whch it has had to administer : 
 secondly. The intellectual and moral character of the 
 people over whom this influence has been exerted : 
 thirdly, The position of the hierarchy in relation to 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 35 
 
 the civil authority : and lastly, though not of least 
 moment, The source of Church revenues. A word 
 or two for each. 
 
 I. The quality of the religion ; and when this is 
 spoken of as a cause, operating upon the clergy, we 
 must not overlook the many instances in which the 
 Priest has created the Religion, and has made it to 
 suit his purposes. To some extent, greater or less, 
 this backward order of causation has taken place 
 almost every where; — oftener than we may have sup- 
 posed, we shall find both the dogmas and the usages 
 of religious bodies bearing the marks of the priest's 
 moulding finger. Nevertheless, every religion has 
 had some elements, anterior to, and independent of 
 sacerdotal control ; and in most cases the clergy have 
 received their religion, much more than formed it. 
 
 It is an obvious fact that Fear holds the first place 
 among the passions excited by the idea of Unseen 
 Power. Fear has at once a more extensive opera- 
 tion, and a stronger power, where it does operate, 
 than any other religious emotion. Hence it will be 
 generally true, that the religion which, in its doc- 
 trines and usages, is the most superstitious, will be 
 the one that throws the greatest authority into the 
 hands of the clergy. Other kinds of religious ex- 
 citement afiect certain tempers only; but there are 
 very few minds that, while a dark superstition pre- 
 vails around them, can entirely free themselves from 
 its terrors. The most profane and the most sceptical, 
 the rudest and the most philosophic spirits, have been 
 seen at times subdued by religious fears, and so 
 yielding themselves to the guidance of the priest. As 
 well the mummeries as the solemnities of an elabo- 
 rate superstition subserve the purposes of spiritual 
 domination ; and thus the sacerdotal body has held 
 the people fast, at once by the brazen chains of in- 
 visible vengeance, and by the cobwebs of frivolous 
 ceremony. 
 
36 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 An enthusiastic religion, or a fanatical one, may 
 also become a fit engine of ghostly t3Tanny ; but yet 
 in a far less complete manner. Superstition enfee- 
 bles its victims; Enthusiasm, and still more Fanati- 
 cism, imparts to them a factitious strength ; and 
 therefore the priest has something personally to fear 
 in availing himself of the force they yield : the fa- 
 naticism of the people can promote his ends only so 
 long as he has the skill to direct it : his skill failing, 
 it may rend himself. The priest of su})erstition rides 
 an ass ; the priest of fanaticism a tiger ; and hence it 
 has happened that the leaders of enthusiastic sects 
 have almost always become proficients in that sort of 
 guile which their difiicult and perilous position de- 
 mands. 
 
 To avoid forestalling the subject of the following 
 Sections we abstain here from adducing specific in- 
 stances : but the practical inference should be no- 
 ticed, that, as a perverted or false religion favours 
 spiritual despotism ; so, wherever we find spiritual 
 despotism in fact, we may pretty safely assume that 
 the religious system it maintains is either false or 
 corrupt. 
 
 II. National temperament, in a very marked 
 manner, affects the extent of sacerdotal power. This 
 qualifying influence is to be separately observed in 
 relation to the clergy themselves, and in relation to 
 tiie people. A pertinent example under the former 
 head is furnished by adverting to the characteristic 
 difterence which very early became apparent between 
 the Greek and the Latin churches ; for while the 
 clergy of eastern Christendom displayed the national 
 propensity of the Grecian mind to theoretic refine- 
 ment, to logical subtilty, and to boundless specula- 
 tion, and made Christianity chiefly a matter of intel- 
 lect ; the clergy of the West, imbued with the Roman 
 passion for power, looked upon the same Gospel, 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 37 
 
 mainly, as opening a field of government ; and very 
 soon found in it, or added to it, whatever they 
 thought necessary for consolidating a vast spiritual 
 despotism. With the Greeks, the religion of Christ 
 came in the place of the spent philosophy of their 
 ancient schools ; with the Latins, it was a new en- 
 sign which they might rear on the site of the over- 
 thrown empire of the Caesars. In the East, clerical 
 power propped itself, partly upon asceticism, and 
 partly upon rhetorical accomplishments and learn- 
 ing ; but in the West, the hierarchy moved steadily 
 forward in their course of usurpation, until they 
 snatched at, and could firmly grasp, the effective 
 weapons of secular authority. 
 
 The diversities of national temperament, as affect- 
 ing the people — the subjects of church power, may 
 be exemplified in the instance of Spain, France, and 
 England, the relations of which with the papacy 
 have exhibited very strikingly the moral character- 
 istics of each country. The first, arrogant, gloomy, 
 yet indolent and acquiescent, has yielded herself 
 without reluctance; and without making conditions, 
 to the will of Rome, and has behaved herself as the 
 darling daughter of the Church. It would hardly 
 have been known what was in the heart of the 
 mother, if she had had no such child. But France, 
 while she has bowed, has stipulated for the national 
 honour ; and has treated the foreign usurpation with 
 some becoming spirit. Not strong enough in moral 
 force to shake off the oppression, she has yet carried 
 herself gallantly under it. England, from of old, 
 has been refractory : in every age she has impa- 
 tiently brooked the insults offered to her strong sense 
 and high feeling by insolent and rapacious Italian 
 priests ; and long before she actually broke the yoke, 
 behaved in a m.anner that gave Rome itself warning 
 of the events of the Reformation. 
 
38 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 A due consideration of the settled dissimilarity of 
 national character might suffice to invalidate those 
 inferences that are often attempted to be applied to 
 the institutions of one country from the example of 
 another. Although related by natural descent, and 
 in a hundred other ways, no two races of the civilized 
 world are perhaps more broadly distinguished than 
 are the English of Britain and the English of Ame- 
 rica. The very relationship of the two people has 
 formed a starting point, whence they have diverged. 
 The people of the United States exist in agitation, 
 and act from momentary excitement. The people of 
 England are jealous of excitement ; and though sus- 
 ceptible of agitation, gladly and quickly return to a 
 state of rest. The love of order is as strong on this 
 side the Atlantic, as is the disregard of it on the 
 other. Here (a party excepted) authority, and those 
 gradations of rank which are necessary to its stability, 
 are steadily looked at, and are approved of as good 
 and beneficial. There, from the domestic circle out- 
 ward to the political, natural sentiments of deference 
 are faint, and authority means very little beyond the 
 limits of actual force. Climate has done something, 
 the geographical conditions of the country have 
 done something, and the political circumstances of the 
 state more, to place the transatlantic English at the 
 antipodes of Britain. We shall not then draw our 
 models of government thence. No infatuation could 
 be more irrational. A certain order of things may 
 indeed be good in America ; or it may be the best 
 possible there, which is neither necessary, nor even 
 practicable, nor in any sense whatever good, for Eng- 
 land. England will no more import a church polity 
 from America, than she will import thence domestic 
 slavery, or the republicanism which favours and en- 
 dures it. Two very efficient causes preserve Ame- 
 rican Christianity from passing into some formof spi- 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 39 
 
 ritual despotism: the first is the spirit of faction, 
 which breaks the clerical body ; the second is the 
 spirit of trade, which has always been found in an 
 especial manner to repel priestly encroachments. 
 England assuredly may do better than take her les- 
 sons from those who as yet have so much to learn. 
 
 III. The power of a clerical corporation is of 
 course essentially affected by the relationship in 
 which it stands to the civil authority'. It is a dream 
 to suppose that a body of clergy can exist in any 
 country in so quiescent or obscure a condition as to 
 sustain no relationship whatever, as such, to the ma- 
 gistrate. He, at least, will never forget the ministers 
 of religion, even if they are willing to be forgotten. 
 The Christian ministry has never, not even in the era 
 of its greatest purity, so floated in the political at- 
 mosphere as an invisible element ; but has always 
 stood in a tangible form among, or over-against, the 
 powers of the state. If indeed all clerical persons 
 and all private Christians were as child-like and hea- 
 venly as some few are, the Church need never be 
 heard of at court ; but it is not, nor has it ever been 
 so : and there is some disingenuousness in propound- 
 ing schemes which can seem practicable only in idea, 
 and which the events of a year or a month must show 
 to have been founded upon illusory notions of human 
 nature. The only rational question is this. What 
 shall be the conditions of the alliance between Church 
 and State — friendly and harmonious, and well con- 
 certed; or defensive, and cautionary, and suspi- 
 cious ? 
 
 Some indeed seem to think that those who have the 
 care of souls need no more be regarded and dealt 
 with corporately, by the State, than those who have 
 the care of ihe body; and that the relationship of the 
 magistrate to the priest need involve nothing more 
 
40 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 than is included in his relation to the physician. But 
 this comparison is devoid of all real analogy. The 
 physician has to do with men individually, and apart : 
 the priest has to do with them in congregation, and 
 as combined under a system of powerful organiza- 
 tion. The physician is called upon when the mind 
 is occupied with the maladies of the body ; but the 
 minister of religion, both in his public and private 
 functions, has to do with MIND immediately, and he 
 treats it too in an excited state, or brings it into such 
 a state. No function of common life is in fact ana- 
 logous to that of the clergy, and no other presents it- 
 self as a counterpoise to the power of the magistrate, 
 none like this, therefore, demands to be well defined, 
 or at least well adjusted, within the social system. 
 The very reason on the ground of which it is alleged 
 that the state may overlook and leave to itself the 
 clerical body — ^namely, the spirituality of their ofKce, 
 and its independence of secular interests, might bet- 
 ter be urged as an imperative motive for employing 
 our best skill in arranging the relationship between 
 Church and State. It is because religion brings in 
 a power of a transcendent sort that we are called up- 
 on to guard against the abuse of it in the hands of 
 the fanatical or the ambitious. 
 
 It cannot be said that the Church, meaning the 
 clergy and their devoted flocks, has yet in any coun- 
 try or in any age stood precisely in that relationship 
 to the civil government which we can think the most 
 happy and safe. As for example, whatever good 
 may have resulted from it, none would choose to 
 place the Church on its primitive footing of oppres- 
 sion and persecution : — this may indeed at seasons 
 be best for it, but it is the Lord who must say when. 
 The condition which next followed was that of am- 
 biguous friendship, and douTjtful counterpoise; a 
 condition which, in the nature of things, could not 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 41 
 
 be permanent, nor is ever desirable. In fact it gave 
 way, and very speedily, to a bold usurpation on the 
 part of the Church, ending in the subversion or de- 
 gradation of the secular power ; and this was suc- 
 ceeded by a reaction and rescue, too vehement and 
 impassioned to observe the hne of reason. To each 
 of these states and stages we shall have occasion here- 
 after more distinctly to advert. At present we only 
 name the political relationship of the clergy as a 
 main condition of the influence they exert, whether 
 for the better or the worse. 
 
 IV. The source of church revenues, the mode of 
 collection, and the rule of distribution, are circum- 
 stances not always obtrusive in their influence ; but 
 always of the very highest moment, and of the great- 
 est difliculty. 
 
 Some general statement of this question is every 
 way indispensable to our prosecution of the subject 
 in hand. In truth the point of church revenues 
 comes little short of being the hinge of the whole ar- 
 gument. 
 
 And let the author here be permitted explicitly to 
 reject the imputation of entertaining any feeling illi- 
 beral in itself, or of holding any opinion derogatory 
 to the clerical character, or implying that this order 
 is in any peculiar sense interested or eager of lucre. 
 The candid reader undoubtedly will grant that the 
 general tendency and intention of the present volume 
 is not to assail, but to defend ; not to depress or ex- 
 clude, but to re-instate and corroborate ; not to vilify, 
 but to honour, the ministers of religion. Believing, 
 as he firmly does, that the influence of the sacerdotal 
 body at present labours under serious disadvantages 
 in all Protestant countries, and requires, for the pub- 
 lic good, to be brought up to a higher mark, the au- 
 thor claims to be interpreted, in whatever he may say, 
 4 
 
42 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 in a sense consistent with his general purpose, and 
 compatible with his professed feelings. 
 
 A peculiarity attaches to the working of those mo- 
 tives which take their spring from the natural desire 
 of worldly comfort and competency ; and it is this, 
 that while these motives are, generally, more steady 
 and efficient than any others, they are the least ob- 
 trusive or noticeable of any. It is on this ground 
 that we are liable to be the most impelled, yet with 
 the least consciousness of impulsion. Especially 
 when the conduct of bodies of men is in question, is 
 it true that the motive which, in the long run, actually 
 draws all others in its wake, is the one concerning 
 which the individuals (or most of them) might honest- 
 ly declare that it was not uppermost in their minds. 
 Many, through the entire course of their lives, have 
 followed a leading which has never spoken aloud, or 
 stood in the light. 
 
 In estimating the average influence of financial sys- 
 tems upon any order of men, it is idle to appeal to 
 the disinterested and generous sentiments that may 
 appear among them, or that may in some degree at- 
 tach to the whole body. Such sentiments afford lit- 
 tle or no security against a perverting bias of which 
 few or none are distinctly conscious. WherevTr, 
 either in the material or the moral world, several ac- 
 tive causes are combined, it is seen that the one which, 
 though it may appear the feeblest, is the most steady, 
 and which presses on always in the same direction, at 
 length gains upon all, and leads the way. So it is 
 in a crowd, urging their course toward a narrow pass : 
 some overpower their neighbours for a moment by 
 convulsive eflorts, or by superior strength ; and 
 others intimidate them by a noisy and arrogant de- 
 mand of precedence ; meanwhile there is one, per- 
 haps, short of stature, and silent, who quietly and 
 constantly presses onward ; husbands his strength, 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 43 
 
 improves every accidental advantage, slips in when 
 others give way or stumble; alarms no fears, and in 
 fact, penetrates the densest mass ; and while his com- 
 petitors are panting for life in the rear, clears his 
 passage, and smiles at his own success. 
 
 It is somewhat in this manner that considerations 
 of pecuniary interest take effect in our minds among 
 other motives, some of which may in fact, as well as 
 in semblance, sway our conduct, in single instances, 
 with a more sovereign power. The difficult and 
 perplexing occasions of life offer many ambiguous 
 cases, wherein high motives stand opposed : the real 
 and efficient power rests, in such instances, with that 
 neuter motive, be it Vt^hat it may, which is allowed to 
 have the casting vote. The riddle of a man's histo- 
 ry might often be opened by this key. In the mild 
 and reasonable form of a wish for competence, or in 
 the inflamed state of avarice, the desire of money de- 
 termines the current of life ; in this channel run the 
 mighty waters of the world's affairs. 
 
 But if this be true of the mass of mankind, is it so 
 of the ministers of religion ? Yes, true ; but not in 
 any sense that should throw upon them a peculiar 
 discredit. Nothing can be more illiberal than to 
 make those feelings a matter of reproach to any order 
 of men, which are common to our nature. There is 
 good room to affirm that the clerical body, take it in 
 what age we please, compared with other bodies, has 
 exhibited a fair superiority in disinterestedness and 
 purity of conduct. It must however be admitted that 
 the passion of avarice, like every other, is apt to be 
 sharpened by restraint; and it will be found that 
 those who, by the conditions of their office, are de- 
 barred from the open and healthy pursuit of fortune, 
 exhibit often a sort of petulent avidity when occasions 
 of gain are incidentally presented. 
 
 And we must advert once more to the important 
 
44 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 trntb, that bodies of men, moving in concert, act in 
 a manner that does not fairly indicate the personal 
 dispositions of the individuals. Individuals do wrong; 
 but bodies do mighty wrong; and do it without re- 
 morse : men singly have consciences ; but a corpo- 
 ration has no conscience. A rational morality would 
 indeed teach ns that, although a body is divided in 
 proportionate parts among the confederates, the guilt 
 of the wrong perpetrated attaches, undivided and en- 
 lire, to each of the accessories. But it is not thus 
 that men are accustomed to think ; and they rise from 
 a table of iniquitous consultation, calculating that 
 their share of the advantage is to be the measure of 
 their share in the blame. Church history, like com- 
 mon history, illustrates abundantly this sort of ca- 
 suistr}^ ; nor can we at all reconcile the proceedings of 
 hierarchies with the personal reputation of the men 
 who have acted under them, without making very 
 frequent use of the distinction we have mentioned. 
 The saints were saints in cloister, but not in con- 
 clave. 
 
 A balance of evils, and a compromise of advanta- 
 ges, has attached to every scheme of clerical mainte- 
 nance hitherto devised. If the provision has been at 
 once ample, and independent of the popular will, 
 sloth, pride, and secularity, have crept upon those to 
 whom mankind should look up for patterns of purity 
 and heavenly-mindedness. On the other hand, it has 
 always been seen, and the history of early Christianity 
 affords the most striking exemplification of the truth, 
 that when church revenues flow from the precarious 
 liberality of the people, and are altogether undefined, 
 exaggerations of doctrine, perversions of morality, su- 
 perstitions, mummeries, hypocrisies, usurpations, cru- 
 elties, gain ground, not always slowly, until priests 
 and people — the Church and the State, are thorough-^ 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 45 
 
 ly infected with the worst sort of corruption — reli- 
 gious corruption. 
 
 If we wish to see what is now vauntingly termed, 
 the Voluntary Principle, fully evolved, and ripened 
 under a summer heat, we have only to turn to the Pa- 
 pacy — the produce of the voluntary principle, with 
 its spiritual debauchery and its tyranny, its lying- mira- 
 cles, its lying mendicity, its lying sanctity, such as 
 we find it in the tenth century : the Gospel utterl}^ 
 darkened, the civil authority trampled in the dust, the 
 people bound in fetters of fear and ignorance, and the 
 clergy transmuted into swine, or into wolves : these 
 were the fruits of that system which leaves the priest 
 to set his own price upon the spiritual goods he dis- 
 penses among the people. 
 
 What has happened once, may happen again ; and 
 will do so under like circumstances. We need not 
 draw upon imagination in conceiving of the natural 
 course of events, and the operation of common princi- 
 ples. The Church, we may suppose, instead of being 
 befriended by the State, is barely tolerated, or per- 
 haps oppressed. The clerical body, including as it 
 may, many high-minded and disinterested individuals, 
 is yet, as a body (what body is not ?) actuated b}^ the 
 ordinary motives of our nature, and tends therefore, 
 with a silent and steady momentum, toward its corpo- 
 rate aggrandizement, its wealth, its ease, its credit, 
 and its secure enjoyment of special prerogatives. 
 Every corporation shifts itself, if it be possible, from 
 precarious ground, and moves toward that which is 
 firm. If then the State does not lend its aid in this 
 endeavour of the clergy to substantiate tiieir honours 
 and revenues, a resource will be found of another sort, 
 and the minds of the people will be worked upon with 
 a proportionate eagerness, in order to make sure of 
 their subserviency. Exaggerated doctrines will sup- 
 ply the place of legal provisions. 
 4* 
 
46 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 The spontaneous offerings of the people, we may 
 suppose, do not quite fill the measure of sacerdotal 
 avidity: nay, perhaps the real wants of the order are 
 inadequately supplied. Moreover, the church in- 
 come fluctuates, along with the fluctuations common 
 to all mundane afiairs ; and seasons occur in which 
 the clergy are exposed to vivid anxieties, or endure 
 actual privations. In such a state of things, while 
 the high-minded few will nobly suffer in patience, and 
 while perhaps many do so ; there will not be wanting 
 some of a more politic turn, who, with a mixed inten- 
 tion — partly honest, partly sordid, will labour to reme- 
 dy the inconvenience in the mode which naturally sug- 
 gests itself to such spirits. The claims of ^ God's 
 ministers will be asserted in a hyperbolic, yet insidious 
 style. The merit of the offering laid upon the altar 
 of the Church will be overrated in a manner that at 
 once enfeebles morality, and corrupts doctrine. Ge- 
 nuine virtue will be made to give way to fictitious vir- 
 tue. The just symmetry or relative magnitude of 
 duties will be enormously distorted. Superstition, 
 and her handmaid Farce, proffer their aid in this 
 work, and some accommodated articles of belief, or 
 certain special usages, which may have had another 
 origin, and may possess some shadow of reason, will 
 be converted to the purpose of levying incidental con- 
 tributions. By newly discovered or newly expanded 
 terrors, the conscience of the laity will be screwed up 
 to the necessary pitch in the matter of pecuniary aid ; 
 and what the designing and the interested had first set 
 a going, the sincere and fanatical will afterwards eager- 
 ly push forward as a sheer article of piety. In the 
 next age learned theologians may be seen wasting 
 their oil in confirming from Scripture, practices of 
 which knaves were the inventors. 
 
 And yet all tiiis while theyre is no compulsion ; there 
 is no tax-gatherer, or farmer of tithes ; no State al- 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 47 
 
 Hance, The voluntary principle is in its full trium- 
 phant course. Nevertheless a system of spiritual des- 
 potism, as cruel as it is foul, is fastening upon the 
 necks of the people. The sword of the magistrate 
 does not enforce the demands of the Church ; but yet 
 the widow's two mites are snatched from her hand 
 by pampered priests ; and orphans see their patrimo- 
 ny gorged by the bloated brotherhood of the monas- 
 tery. Why do any people submit to an unarmed ty- 
 ranny of this sort? nothing binds them to obedience 
 but sentiment and opinion : their goods would not be 
 distrained were they flatly to refuse their accustomed 
 quotas. Why do they submit? Ask the Christian 
 commonalty of the third or fourth century ; ask the 
 European nations of the ninth ; or, not to go so far, 
 ask our contemporaries and countrymen, the starving 
 inmates of Irish hovels. 
 
 In truth, what is called voluntary is often, in the 
 worst sense, compulsory ; while what, in common 
 parlance, we term compulsory, is, in a rational and 
 good sense, voluntary. Phrases caught at and ap- 
 propriated without thought, in the heat of controver- 
 sy, more often than not convey some gross misappre- 
 hensions of simple facts; it is thus in the present 
 instance. The voluntary principle, as the source of 
 clerical maintenance, in order to deserve the name, 
 and to be sound and safe, must take its course under 
 very peculiar and well guarded conditions ; or it will 
 inevitably either grind the ministers of religion, or 
 bring upon the people the worst sort of compulsion. 
 On the other hand, the compulsory system, as it is 
 insidiously called, needs only to be conformed, in its 
 mode of operation, to the analogy of good govern- 
 ment in civil aflJairs, and we can wish for nothing 
 more free or just. 
 
 Both the phrases in question, as used in the con- 
 
48 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 troversy of the day, refer to levies of money, made for 
 the support of the ministers of religion. In the one 
 case the fund accrues from the unprescribed contri- 
 butions of those who act, individually, under the 
 mere impulse of their personal feelings and opinions. 
 In the other case it flows, in an equable stream, from 
 the entire community, and at the immediate bidding 
 of the State ; which, moreover, exacts from each 
 citizen a sum regulated, as are other taxes, by his 
 ability, or by the scale of his general expenditure : 
 and this payment is enforced by the State, without 
 regard to private inclinations. Under the former 
 method it is always implied that, whoever chooses to 
 do so, may relinquish his interest in the common 
 benefit, and withdraw his contribution ; or he may, 
 at pleasure, diminish his quota. Under the latter, of 
 course, relief is to be obtained only in those modes 
 of legislative address for which room must be left in 
 all imposts : and under this latter method nothing 
 else can happen, let the tax be adjusted as it may, 
 but that individuals will be found who either disallow 
 the propriety and abstract fitness of the tax; or who, 
 from peculiar circumstances, are shut out from the 
 benefits it dispenses; or who are aggrieved by the 
 application of the general rule to their particular 
 case. No ingenuity in framing laws can absolutely 
 exclude incidental wrongs, or inconveniencies, of 
 this sort. The inestimable advantages of living in 
 society are unavoidably burdened with some partial 
 evils. 
 
 Nothing very chimerical is supposed when we 
 imagine the instance of a country, enjoying to the 
 full the benefits of a representative system of govern- 
 ment, and in which every question of polity is deter- 
 mined by the public will ; — such a country, we say, 
 great, and free, and wise, having become generally 
 religious in its opinions and habits, and, moreover, 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 49 
 
 having learned to worship Almighty God in harmony 
 and love, has embraced the opinion (whether it be a 
 just opinion or not) that the support of the clergy is 
 one of those matters which, from the very peculiar 
 conditions that attach to it, is more safely and effec- 
 tively provided for by a public and invariable impost, 
 than by the capricious liberality of a portion of the 
 people. Thus thinking, the country taxes itself for 
 the maintenance of religion ; and, far from grudging 
 a liberal support to its best friends and worthiest ser- 
 vants, it sees that its ^wn highest welfare is involved 
 in the comfort and independence of those who are at 
 once to teach, and to enforce, morality. The clergy, 
 tranquil in heart, and secured of a modest and rea- 
 sonable competency, and protected, each in his pri- 
 vate sphere, against the insolence of individuals ; 
 though not exempted from the salutary operation of 
 public opinion, exercise" their functions on the basis 
 of the motives proper to it ; and, at least, are free 
 from any temptation to work upon the credulity of 
 the people, or to pervert religion to sinister ends. 
 Such is our imagined instance. But it will be 
 said — " This is COMPULSION : this is a Church and 
 State alliance : this is religion by act of parliament ; 
 ■ — and what not." Be it so : nevertheless, it is a 
 compulsion we should choose, and a bondage we 
 should gladly sustain. Or, to compare it with the 
 voluntary sj^stem which history has actually realized, 
 the latter is a spontaneity we should shun, and a 
 liberty we should dread. 
 
 Theories apart, and the lessons of experience duly 
 regarded ; or, in other words, church history looked 
 into for practical uses, there appears reason to dis- 
 trust what is termed the voluntary principle in rela- 
 tion to church revenues, on the two opposite 
 grounds, of its inadequacy, and its exuberance ; or 
 
50 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 its sluggishness in some respects, and its extrava- 
 gance in others. During one and the same period, 
 and within one and the same circle, this mode of 
 maintaining the clergy has failed to propagate and 
 to support Christianity ; and yet has suffocated piety 
 by its profusion : it has been not less niggardly, than 
 prodigal. 
 
 If we desire, as undoubtedly we ought, to stimu- 
 late this power in a safe manner, and to turn it into 
 auspicious channels, we should form a sober and 
 exact estimate of its real efficiency, and of its neces- 
 sary limits. This estimate can be formed on no 
 other ground than that of experience ; and if the 
 hollow croaking voice of antiquity will not gain our 
 ear, we must turn to facts under our eye. These (as 
 we assume) make it evident that a capital, and, as it 
 seems, an irremediable defect attaches to the volun- 
 tary principle, first, in relation to the classes of the 
 community it affects ; and secondly, in relation to 
 the purposes to which it may be made to apply. 
 
 For the first. The voluntary principle, as hitherto 
 it has developed its powers, takes effect upon the 
 several orders of the community in no just propor- 
 tion ; or rather, in no proportion at all ; for while 
 the middle and lower ranks yield themselves to its 
 influence, the opulent and the noble are scarcely 
 touched by it. On all subjects of public interest, the 
 former are seen to be vastly more liable to be wrought 
 upon by natural excitements than the latter ; the 
 latter, indeed, hardly in any sensible degree, and it 
 must be confessed that the virtues of self-denying 
 sympathy, and substantial generosity, expand in a 
 much more vigorous and healthy manner among 
 those who themselves are every day contending with 
 the difficulties of a common lot, than among the 
 pampered children of pleasure and security. No 
 motive that has hitherto been brought to bear upon 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 51 
 
 human nature has availed to make the rich liberal 
 after the proportion of the poor. 
 
 It hence follows that, if the support of the minis- 
 ters of religion were left entirely to the spontaneous 
 feelings of the people, no equitable proportion of 
 ability would be observed between the wealthy and 
 the indigent. If the spiritual wants of a country are 
 to be fully supplied, a burden beyond endurance, and 
 fatal to the general prosperity, w ould be thrown upon 
 the middle classes, and upon the poor. It would be 
 the noble-spirited artisan, the liberal shopkeeper, the 
 generous yeoman, who would raise the minister's 
 fund; while just gold enough to save appearances — 
 a pepper-corn contribution, would be all that would 
 come from the heaps of the opulent. In the present 
 state of public sentiment, or in any state which the 
 world or the Church has hitherto exhibited, or seems 
 likely to exhibit, nothing less than an impost not to 
 be evaded, and which should in a fair manner dive 
 into the rich man's bags, will avail to throw the 
 maintenance of the clergy, in any just proportion, 
 upon the public wealth, or prevent its falling, with a 
 ruinous pressure, upon the industrious and the poor. 
 
 If we may take the actual working of this volun- 
 tary principle among the English Dissenters as our 
 guide in estimating its merits, we see it resting upon 
 the communities that use it with every sort of disad- 
 vantageous inequality. Not here to speak of those 
 ill consequences of this system which affect the 
 clerical mind and temper, we find the salaries of the 
 ministers (a few cases excepted) to be drawn chiefly 
 from the pious liberality and affection of the humble 
 and necessitous; while the opulent Dissenter satis- 
 fies his sense of justice by paying for as many inches 
 of pew-room as he and his family mathematically 
 have need of; and in doing so, calmly sees his chosen 
 spiritual guide — a man of piety, and of as much more 
 
52 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 sensibility as learning than himself, broken in heart 
 by the embarrassments of an insufficient income. 
 The enormous disparities and disproportions that at- 
 tach to this method of supporting the ministry, would 
 be enough to bring its eligibility into suspicion. 
 
 But again ; a disproportion of another kind at- 
 tends this same system ; for, inasmuch as Congrega- 
 tionalism insulates each chapel-society, and leaves 
 each to bear its burden as it may, it follows, that, 
 while the large congregations of great towns and 
 cities raise the salaries of their ministers with no diffi- 
 culty on the part of the individual contributors ; the 
 small congregations of lesser towns and of rural dis- 
 tricts, groan under a burden, often of the most 
 afflictive weight ; and yet, with all their generous 
 efforts, fail to afford to a worthy and esteemed pastor 
 the ordinary comforts of life. It is indeed by no 
 means desirable that the salaries of all ministers 
 should be of the same amount: this equalization could 
 not be effected without putting constraint upon the 
 natural course of things ; but unquestionably it is de- 
 sirable that the rate of contrihution should be, at 
 least in some degree, conformed to a rule of equity. 
 In every way a loss of fiscal power is sustained by a 
 community when one congregation is taxed at the 
 rate of only two per cent, upon its resources, and 
 another at the rate of twenty. The plainest dictate 
 of common sense would demand that the church 
 funds of a city or of a district, embracing, for ex- 
 ample, four or five large congregations, and a dozen 
 small ones, should be consolidated ; and then that 
 distribution should be made to the clergy of that dis- 
 trict according to their wants, their merits, or their 
 services. The clergy of a district, or diocess, draw- 
 ing their incomes from a general chest, would be set 
 at large from their dependence upon the managers 
 of single congregations ; and, at the same time, none 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 53 
 
 need be left to suffer in solitude the miseries of in- 
 digence. On a plan of this sort, the superabundant 
 wealth of cities would be let out to fertilize the coun- 
 try. In affairs of this kind, as in so many others, 
 John Wesley displayed his clear good sense, and 
 proved that he thought human reason, however at 
 fault in matters of faith, to be fully applicable to the 
 arrangement of secular interests : no religious theory 
 stood in the way to interdict his efficient and eco- 
 nomic constitutions. 
 
 In the second place, the voluntary principle, such 
 as it is seen in actual operation, fails in relation to the 
 OBJECTS to which it may be applied. Human nature 
 involves great and generous impulses ; but they are 
 far from obeying, ordinarily, the guidance of reason. 
 What is spontaneous, we may admire oftener than 
 imitate. The voluntary principle, as a source of reli- 
 gious funds, is indeed found to meet, and sometimes 
 to exceed the demand made upon it, where vivid ex- 
 citements can be brought afresh and afresh, to bear 
 upon popular feelings ; but in those instances which 
 yield no such excitements, and which involve a com- 
 prehensive regard to remote consequences, it almost 
 entirely fails, or leaves momentous interests to dwin- 
 dle or perish. The people — not even the elect of the 
 people, and it is the people we have to do with in re- 
 ligious affairs, the people will never care vividly and 
 affectively for what they do not instantly compre- 
 hend. But the maintenance, the diffusion, and the 
 safe transmission of religion, involve very many pro- 
 visions and measures of a sort that appears superflu- 
 ous, or even perhaps pernicious, to the half-taught 
 and unthinking mass of mankind. It is extremely disin- 
 genuous to affect to deny this. The few, and a very 
 feWf perceive the necessity of this order of means : i 
 is the few who must devise and arrange these mea- 
 sures ; and the few who must carry them into effect. 
 
 5 
 
54 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 To throw religious interests, of every kind, upon po- 
 pular impulses, is nothing less than to abandon some 
 that are of prime importance. 
 
 The clamour which we now hear in behalf of the 
 voluntary principle, is in character with that principle 
 itself; and affords a proper specimen of its qualities ; 
 — it is unthinking, variable, and reckless of remote 
 consequences. A short time must suffice to bring 
 back men of understanding to the mean of common 
 sense on this subject. The voluntary principle, 
 or (to drop an ambiguous and ill-chosen phrase) 
 we should rather say, the generous impulses of the 
 mass of the people, are admirable in their sphere ; 
 but they have only their sphere. Let it be ima- 
 gined that a road were opened across the fields of 
 space to some planet of our system, more beclouded 
 than our own ; and that the proposition were made to 
 the Christian world to send thither the elements of 
 sacred knowledge. A river of gold would pour into 
 the treasure-chest of such an enterprise. But, instead 
 of this animating scheme of benevolence, let us un- 
 dertake the founding of a college, on a large, rational, 
 and efficient plan and such as should promise to 
 supply the Church, through a course of ages, with a 
 well-trained clergy : — the ear of the religious public 
 is not to be awakened by this chord. An Alfred, or a 
 Wolsey, may achieve such a work ; but never the good 
 folks that fill our chapels, or throng around our 
 platforms. 
 
 Nor is it objects of this unpopular sort merely, that 
 will be overlooked by the popular mind. While 
 amazing and highly commendable efforts are making 
 by the religious community to send the gospel 
 abroad, nothing like a proportionate exertion is made 
 to maintain and diffuse it at home. The one object 
 is rich in excitement ; the other appeals coldly to 
 conscience. The one, therefore, counts its gold by 
 thousands, the other by tens. 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 55 
 
 A degree of intelligence, and of steady consistent 
 principle, such as never yet has belonged to any 
 Christian people, must have become prevalent, and 
 permanently so, before it can be safe, or other than a 
 sheer infatuation, to throw ourselves altogether upon 
 popialar caprice, for the support of religion and learn- 
 ing. This would not be wise, even in framing new 
 constitutions upon new ground ; much less would it 
 be wise to permit the funds actually devoted by our 
 predecessors to the support of public worship and edu- 
 cation, to be invaded. In this country we are not 
 now called upon to compose afresh the bare elements 
 of the social system, or to discuss primary and abstract 
 political doctrines ; but to decide upon the practical 
 and very intelligible question of upholding our actual 
 and ancient institutions, and of defending them, 
 during an unquiet season, against popular restlessness 
 and factious intentions. We are not to found an Es- 
 tablishment ; — we possess one. We are not balancing 
 between untried schemes ; but are intrusted with the 
 care of institutions commended to us by our fathers, 
 and which we may not break up, or suffer to be broken 
 up, without incurring a heavier responsibihty than 
 we have the means of estimating: it is our sons who 
 will weigh our imprudence, arraign our treachery, 
 or contemn our cowardice. 
 
 The want of ingenuousness, and of intelligence, 
 too, that marks the present advocacy of the voluntary 
 principle, tends to bring into discredit a mighty 
 engine of Christian benevolence, indeed, the only 
 engine that can be relied upon for effecting the vast en- 
 terprises of charity which our hearts cherish on behalf 
 of mankind at large. 
 
 And let it be remembered that, while we call in 
 question this method of maintaining the ministers of 
 rehgion, and insist upon its insufficiency, its inequali* 
 
56 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 ty, and its unhappy, though concealed influence, a 
 high praise is, or ought to be secured, for the thou- 
 sands among us who, from moderate resources, cheer- 
 fully draw what they draw for the support of their 
 clergy. Those who feel more as Enghshmen than 
 as Churchmen, and more (may we say it) as philoso- 
 phers than as religionists, will exult in reflecting upon 
 the proof which English dissent exhibits of the liberal- 
 ity and of the generous elastic sentiment that be- 
 long to the national character. If any attribute these 
 great pecuniary eflJbrts mainly, or in any great pro- 
 portion, to the impulse of a factious zeal, they are 
 utterly uninformed of facts, as well as miserably sple- 
 netic. The church fund, raised yearly by the Dis- 
 senters of all classes, sheds a splendour upon Britain 
 brighter than the glitter of her arms : heaven thinks it 
 so, even if earth has no eye to see it. 
 
 Or, to look beyond the circle of dissent, the volun- 
 tary contributions raised in this country for religious 
 and benevolent purposes, by the middle and lower 
 classes, chiefly, may well fill every patriotic breast 
 with the warmest emotions of pleasure. Who is so 
 cramped by sectarian jealousies — who is so misan- 
 thropic — who so cold to the glory of his country, as 
 not to exult in what the heavily-burdened people of 
 England have been doing during the past thirty 
 years, and are doing, with unabated generosity? No 
 such mighty river of charity has before rolled upon 
 earth's surface ; and it swells every year : if hemmed 
 in or diminished for a moment, it bursts its banks 
 anon, and deepens its channel. Before God we do 
 not glory ; for we still do less than is our duty : but 
 before men — before all other nations, we may modestly 
 say, " Copy the pattern we set." 
 
 If there are those among us who allow themselves 
 to speak and think with contempt of the generous 
 religious enterprises and the noble contributions of 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 57 
 
 our several Christian communities, let them only 
 transport themselves in idea to a distant futurity, and 
 consider in what light this large religious benevo- 
 lence will appear to posterity. The men of that fu- 
 ture time may be vastly more munificent than our- 
 selves ; but certainly they will not forget us, their 
 predecessors, who have broke a path upon this field 
 of noble and expansive good-will. It is we who have 
 shown what kindly force there is in human nature 
 when warmed by Christianity: it is we who have 
 successfully made the economic experiment which 
 proves that, let taxation reach what height it may, 
 and let commercial perplexity lour over a people as 
 it may, neither the one nor the other, nor both in 
 conjunction, can repress the elasticity of Christian 
 benevolence. It is we who have given a lesson of 
 arithmetic to the world that will never be forgotten — 
 a new calculus, that will solve all problems of cha- 
 rity. 
 
 Should it be attempted to deduct from this praise, 
 on the ground of what some may deem the injudi- 
 cious direction that has been given to our zeal in 
 certain instances ; we reply, that this is to forget the 
 substance in the circumstance ; for what is the chafi 
 to the wheat f Even if our enterprises had been all 
 fruitless, they were not the less great in conception, 
 or sincere in intention. But they have been success- 
 ful ; and thousands have blessed England, and her 
 missionaries. Nay, if any portion of our praise is 
 set off because our success has not been greater, we 
 claim it back again, as due to us on another plea; 
 inasmuch as slender success enhances the merit of 
 perseverance, if the end be good. There were Greeks 
 in the age of Themistocles who had no eye, or ear, 
 or heart, for the glory of their country, when liberty 
 and civilization were saved at Thermopylae — Boe- 
 tians, born on the soil of Greece, but destitute of its 
 5* 
 
58 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 soul. Are there English who can fret in sectarian 
 vexation while their warm-hearted countrymen are, 
 with a costly zeal, diffusing liberty, and civilization, 
 and truth, over the world? 
 
 These happy and pregnant impulses, then, are 
 not to be repressed, but encouraged ; and are not to 
 be regarded with jealousy, but with hopeful exulta- 
 tion. Yet we must not so doat upon the voluntary 
 principle as to forget common sense, or to think it 
 applicable to every thing. No ambiguity, in fact, at- 
 taches to the course we should pursue ; for, while the 
 freest scope should be given to popular liberality, 
 and, while it should be invited to occupy as large a 
 field as it will ; we are unquestionably bound to hold 
 entire those more steady resources, actually existing, 
 the place of which the voluntary principle is not rea- 
 dy to supply, or for the supplying of which it does 
 not seem well adapted. 
 
 The question of coercive measures, -and of fiscal 
 enactments, as opposed to the spontaneous exertions 
 of the people, presents nearly the same conditions, 
 to whatever class of public services it relates. Few of 
 the institutions by which social order is maintained 
 might not be dispensed with if mankind generally 
 were good, just, and consistently reasonable. What 
 so easy or simple as the business of government, if 
 virtue and moderation were prevalent? Instances 
 have occurred, and others may readily be imagined, 
 in which generous and patriotic sentiments, strongly 
 excited by peculiar circumstances, have, for a time at 
 least, siiperseded the ordinary provisions of govern- 
 ment, and have remanded its compulsory forces. 
 Nothing absolutely forbids our looking forward to 
 an age when prisons shall crumble into ruin, the mi- 
 litary art be forgotten, the tax-gatherer lose his of- 
 fice, and the small residue of public expenditure be 
 
 \ 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 59 
 
 amply and securely provided for by the unprompted 
 ofierings of the people. 
 
 None could deplore such a change, or regret the 
 good old times of the sword and the chain. The vo- 
 luntary principle, fully expanded, and permanently 
 brought into action, would leave nothing to be wish- 
 ed for in our social condition, and little to be done 
 by senates, councils, or kings. Towards so happy a 
 state let us tend ; but tend prudently. Need it be 
 said that prudence does not allow the actual deve- 
 lopement of the spontaneous principle to be ii) any 
 case anticipated, or the existing mechanism of go- 
 vernment, with its coercive provisions, to be taken 
 down, until after it has become conspicuous and un- 
 questionable that they are no longer necessary. Mean- 
 while, we must endure law and its sanctions. 
 
 Nevertheless, long before the age of universal 
 wisdom and virtue arrives, there may be small cir- 
 cles within which the substitution of what is volunta- 
 ry for what is compulsory, may safely and advanta- 
 geously take place. Indeed there are services and 
 functions of so peculiar a sort that they must be dis- 
 charged voluntarily, or not at all. Most of the la- 
 bours of charity are of this kind ; and, at a first 
 glance, it would appear that the offices of reli- 
 gion pre-eminently ask to come under the opera- 
 tion of the freest sentiments, and must wholly exclude 
 whatever is not in the highest sense generous and ele- 
 vated. But in this, as in so many instances, theory 
 fails to be borne out by experience ; and we are com- 
 pelled to admit that the infirmity of human nature, 
 the many inconsistencies that attach to our opinions 
 and our conduct, and the waywardness and vehe- 
 mence of the passions, render necessary certain 
 modes of proceeding, such as our previous specula- 
 live notions would never have suggested. 
 
 The maintenance of the ministers of religion we 
 
60 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 assume to be a case in which experience and history 
 give their vote against tiiose lofty schemes which we 
 might have wished to entertain. Or taking the argu- 
 ment on the lowest ground, we must at the least affirm 
 that, where a legal provision for the clergy actually 
 exists, and has long existed, the voluntary system, 
 which never yet has been seen to cover any country 
 with the means of religious instruction, and which is 
 apt not to work favourably, cannot be allowed to 
 break up that provision. 
 
 Those who are always appealing to the efficacy of 
 the voluntary principle in the first ages of the Church, 
 should take care to be informed of the actual arrange- 
 ments under which it took place. The pecuniary po- 
 sition of Christian ministers during the first three cen- 
 turies was, in its essential points, and in its indirect 
 influence over priests as well as people, as unlike to 
 the one, as it is to the other of the two modes of cleri- 
 cal maintenance that prevail in this country. If the 
 system of tithes, and the legal enforcement of a de- 
 finite impost was then unknown ; so likewise was the 
 direct dependence of single ministers upon the will, 
 taste, and opinion of single congregations. No 
 such contempt of the sacred office was ever thought 
 of as is involved in the raising of a stipend for the 
 support of a particular teacher, elected by the contri- 
 butors, and removeable at their pleasure. Submission 
 to terms so humiliating was never asked of primitive 
 pastors or teachers ; and wherever it is yielded to, 
 nothing less than a high rate of personal character 
 suffices to secure a necessary pastoral authority, or 
 to preserve the integrity of Christian doctrine and 
 morals. 
 
 On the other hand, if a clerical body draws its 
 support from a legal provision, and is exempted 
 from pecuniary solicitude, and from immediate de- 
 pendence upon the people, it is manifest that there is 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 61 
 
 needed, and every well-informed and unprejudiced 
 mind will instantly admit it, some strong corrective 
 influence, some efficient counterpoise, such as shall 
 check the advance of a secular spirit, and disturb the 
 drowsiness of worldly tempers. A body of clergy, 
 at once exonerated of all solicitude, removed from all 
 dependence, and at the same time sheltered from the 
 salutary operation of public opinion, or at least so 
 shielded as to save the inert and negligent from real 
 alarms, such a body, we say, wants a stay to its vir- 
 tue which human nature may not safely dispense with. 
 Ministers of religion so seated under the hedge, may 
 look down upon others, beating the waves, and bless 
 their happier lot ; but all such boasting is vain ; the 
 congratulation of those who are at ease is often, and 
 assuredly it is so in this instance, a fatal delusion. To 
 rejoice that we are free from every invigorating ex- 
 citement, and to be glad that we are not permitted to 
 breathe the open fresh air, is the pitiable solace of a 
 crazed hypochondriac. 
 
 The Christian ministry, let us remember, may forfet 
 its dignity and its efficiency in more modes than one; 
 and if cashiered of its due influence and honour by 
 subserviency to democratic insolence ; on the other 
 side, it surrenders its vital power when what is spirit- 
 ual, divine, immortal, is treacherously bartered for 
 what is temporal and earthly. 
 
 People and priest ought to be connected by some 
 sort of effective reciprocity : let not the priest be the 
 slave of people ; nor stand in an obsequious relation 
 to a few individuals ; nevertheless, both parties 
 should feel that there is vitality in the bond of their 
 union. But we here touch upon matters that must 
 be more distinctly referred to in a fitter place. It 
 must now suffice to say that, in consenting to the ab- 
 solute exclusion of the mass of the people from every 
 kind of control over church affairs, the clergy inffict 
 
62 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 upon themselves a more serious injury, if it be possi- 
 ble, than that which is sustained by their flocks. The 
 clergy will regain a genuine influence on the same 
 day on which the people are restored to their natural 
 rights, and their christian privileges. In truth, both 
 clergy and people are the victims, in our English 
 Establishment, of LAY USURPATIONS, prescriptive 
 indeed, and DEAR TO A FEW, but such as must admit 
 correction if they are not to work its ruin. 
 
 We have thus briefly presented to view the four 
 main conditions that affect the power of hierarchies ; 
 namely, the quality of the religion, the national tem- 
 perament of the people, the political position of the 
 clergy in the state, and the source of church reve- 
 nues. Spiritual despotism, to reach its utmost height, 
 must be favoured by each of these conditions ; that is 
 to say, the religion which is the vehicle of it must be 
 fraught with superstition — the people must have sunk 
 into a servile and sluggish humour — the Church 
 must have got the better of the civil power, and the 
 wealth of the country must, without regulation or 
 control, be at the command of the clergy. Spiritual 
 despotism is necessarily redressed, or excluded — 
 when theology is reformed — when learning and com- 
 merce restore intelligence and liberty to the people — 
 when the civil authority resumes its functions and 
 rights, a friendly reciprocity being established be- 
 tween Church and State; and lastly, when the nice 
 matter of revenue is well defined, and is set clear of 
 the opposite liabilities to disorder that aflect it. 
 
 But there are evils that attend the reaction by 
 which spiritual despotisms are overthrown. These 
 take place — when the dread of church power, and 
 the jealous resistance of spiritual encroachments, 
 lead to a rejection, or a virtual exclusion of those po- 
 tent principles that impart to religion its practical 
 efficiency, and that invest it with a solemn and se» 
 
CONDITIONS OF CHURCH POWER. 63 
 
 rious dignity ; — when the growth of popular senti- 
 ments, and the republican feeling, operates to with- 
 hold from the clergy so much independent authority 
 as is indispensable to the faithful discharge of their 
 duties ; — when the magistrate, in his caution against 
 the insidious advances of clerical ambition, holds the 
 Church in subserviency to his immediate pleasure, 
 and gives it no leave to exercise its proper legisla- 
 tive and administrative functions ; and lastly, when 
 the rapacity pf Churchmen is guarded against in 
 either of those extreme methods of which the one 
 tightens too much the dependence of the clergy upon 
 their flocks, and the other snaps it. 
 
64 SPIRITUAL DEPOTISM. 
 
 SECTION III. 
 
 SKETCH OF ANCIENT HIERARCHIES, AND THAT OF THE JEWS. 
 
 The general subject of sacerdotal power, and the 
 abuses to which it is liable, cannot be treated with 
 reference merely to modern institutions, modern no- 
 tions, and immediate interests. Neither the guiding 
 principles which we have to seek for in the New 
 Testament, nor the real import of the allusions made 
 therein to the constitutions of the primitive Church, 
 can be understood without some knowledge of the 
 notions and usages of the times ; and these involve, 
 not merely Jewish but heathen opinions and prac- 
 tices. One cannot read a page of the ecclesias- 
 tical controversies of the sixteenth and seventeenth 
 centuries without feeling that the reasoning, on both 
 sides, is very often vitiated, either by the want of this 
 sort of information, or by the misuse of it. 
 
 A just conception of the Jewish church polity is, 
 we say, indispensable to an understanding of the 
 polity of the Christian Church ; and the former de- 
 mands at least a hasty glance at the contemporary 
 pagan systems. 
 
 Our modern European institutions, civil as well as 
 sacred, combine heterogeneous materials, of various 
 accidental origin, and often not so much composed, 
 as jumbled together by the revolutions of ages. On 
 the contrary, the ancient oriental politics suggest the 
 idea of homogeneous abstract conceptions, the pro- 
 ducts of single minds, or of a few minds in concert. 
 The former are accumulations, in the rearing of 
 which the hand of time is more apparent than the 
 
ANCIENT HIERARCHIES. 65 
 
 mind or purpose of man : but the latter are, or seem 
 to be, digested schemes, whereof the several compo- 
 nents stand rationally related one to the other. Might 
 it be said that the freedom of Europe has sprung, in 
 part at least, from the accidental construction of our 
 social systems ; while the despotism of Asia has been 
 the fruit (to some extent) of the creative purpose of 
 primeval autocrats ? 
 
 Those vast Asiatic structures, some of which have 
 weathered the storms of four thousand years, one 
 must believe to have been planned by comprehen- 
 sive minds, and moulded by hands strong enough to 
 depress or ennoble, ai pleasure, the several classes of 
 the community. This controlling power appears in 
 some instances to have been guided by motives of 
 religion, and in others to have been drawn from the 
 resources of secular authority. In truth the oriental 
 governments might well enough be classified ac- 
 cording as they seem to have sprung from the will of 
 the soldier, the sage, or the priest. Whenever the 
 latter was the founder of the state, every thing is 
 made to bear upon sacerdotal prerogative and dig- 
 nity : the nation exists for its priests ; not the priests 
 for the nation : religion, and it must be a religion of 
 the darkest colours, is the one reason of every law 
 and usage. The land is the property of the gods ; 
 the people are the slaves of the gods; and the priests 
 are the vicegerents of every kind of authority, and 
 the only absolute possessors of the goods of life ; 
 every title except theirs is precarious and conditional. 
 Such seems to have been the idea of the primitive 
 Egyptian polity. We should bear this in mind when 
 we contemplate the Mosaic institutions. The papacy, 
 at the height of its pride, went near to realize the 
 same conception : it was the ideal which the Church 
 placed before her, and toward which she pressed. 
 
 But happily there is a weakness inherent in this 
 sort of sacerdotal system. A polity founded upon 
 6 
 
66 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 religious dogmas does not fail to generate schisms; 
 then the prince, or the soldier, steps forward, cheer- 
 fully supported by the least fanatical portion of the 
 people, to arbitrate between the pope and the ortho- 
 doxy of Memphis, and the pope and the heterodoxy 
 of Thebes. The sacerdotal power once broken by 
 division is never restored ; the natural equihbrium 
 of society returns with force ; and the priests thence- 
 forward are left in possession of their bare mumme- 
 ries and their indolence. Yet the triumphant prince, 
 in thus gaining the mastery over superstition, still 
 keeps it in credit as a necessary prop of his own 
 authority. This seems to have been the course of 
 events in ancient Egypt. 
 
 The social structure of India was better devised 
 than that of Egypt; and in fact it has been immor- 
 tal. The Brahminical, like the Egyptian institu- 
 tions, must have been framed by and for the sacer- 
 dotal order; but with more skill and moderation. 
 Whatever might be the relative proportion between 
 priests and people in India and in Egypt, in this lat- 
 ter the undi&tinguished many stood together opposed 
 to the privileged few ; but in the other, the mass, 
 being distinctly severed into portions, was internally 
 balanced, part against part ; and the sacred caste 
 appeared rather as a mediator among the rest, than 
 as the obnoxious and exclusive possessors of every 
 dignity. The lowest caste looked to the one next 
 above it, rather than to the highest, with malign im- 
 patience; and the two intermediate orders, having 
 each its prerogatives to defend against a lower, would 
 naturally sustain the highest as its protector. The 
 Egyptian hierarchy was raised aloft as if on the top 
 of an obelisk; that obelisk received a shock, and 
 fell; but the wary Brahmin took his station on the 
 summit of a broad based pyramid, and there he has 
 securely reposed while every thing else mundane has 
 been upturned. 
 
ANCIENT HIERARCHIES. 67 
 
 It is in Thibet that the idea of a hierocracy has 
 been realized in the most complete manner. When 
 the Romanist compares his own system with this, 
 between which and his own the resemblance is too 
 remarkable to escape notice, he feels how much that 
 Asiatic despotism has the advantage over the Euro- 
 pean. For example, the one has had to deal only 
 with the inert and stupid Mongul and Tartar, while 
 the other has been contending against the native spi- 
 rit and energy of the western nations. Again, the 
 religion of Thibet has commanded, without control, 
 the boundless resources of error ; but the bane of the 
 Romish Church, and the occasion of most of its dif- 
 ficulties and its dangers, has been its connexion with 
 Christianity, and its possession of books of acknow- 
 ledged authority, which could neither be destroyed, 
 concealed, nor so interpreted as to consist with its 
 doctrines and practices. The Grand Lama has slept 
 upon his sofa, while his brother of Rome has been 
 racked with anxieties in repressing heresy after he- 
 resy. Once more, by boldly assuming the doctrine 
 of an actual indwelling of the divinity in the person 
 of the sovereign pontiff, and by keeping him close in 
 his closet, and sealing his lips, the religion of Thibet 
 has secured a far more profound submission and re- 
 ference from its votaries than could be challenged 
 by the mere Vicar of God. 
 
 China and Thibet stand opposed as extreme in- 
 stances in matters of religion : in the former the 
 secular spirit has gained the ascendency, and religion 
 is a mere appendage to the machinery of govern- 
 ment. All that is vital in the religion of China is 
 embodied in that sentiment of which the emperor is 
 the object, as the father of his people. 
 
 Druidism passed away, not only because it occu- 
 pied a soil destined to civilization ; but because it 
 brought sanguinary rites into northern latitudes, 
 where life bears a far higher value than it does within 
 
68 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 the tropics, and where cruelties are therefore so 
 much ihe more horrible. The religion of the um- 
 brageous wilderness could not but disappear very 
 soon after industry had begun to trench upon the 
 skirts of the forest ; and the axe that admitted the 
 light of the sun into sacred glooms frightened away 
 the murky divinity that had brooded in the shade. 
 Druidism took shelter under an oak, where it could 
 make no stand when the force of opinion failed 
 it ; but Brahminism — its parent, chose its home in 
 . palaces of marble, and in temples that served it as 
 fortresses. 
 
 But we do not reach the ground of rational com- 
 parison with things related to ourselves until we 
 come to those regions where genuine civilization has 
 taken root. Judaism excepted, nothing Asiatic 
 carries an inference practically applicable to our 
 European and modern interests. 
 
 Although the early history of Greece presents par- 
 ticular instances of what has been called codification, 
 or the entire modelling of the social elements at a 
 certain time, and by certain persons, yet the Grecian 
 politics and manners and religious system, taken at 
 large, were (like those of modern Europe) a various 
 product of very many accidental causes, modifying 
 the intellectual and moral character of the race. 
 This race was far too active and masculine in its 
 temperament to yield itself to the plastic hand either 
 of sage or priest, in any such manner as took place 
 among the Asiatic nations. The Greeks, especially 
 in the times preceding the Peloponnesian war, were 
 eminently a religious people : their religion entered 
 into every part of the economy of life, private and 
 public : nevertheless it did not place a despotic 
 power in the hands of the sacerdotal order. The re- 
 ligion was not devised or imposed for the sake of the 
 priests, or with any view to their advantage ; — they 
 
ANCIENT HIERARCHIES. 69 
 
 were its ministers, not its masters. On all occasions 
 the religion was more regarded than the priests : the 
 people preserved that sincere homage which they 
 paid to the gods, quite clear of any cringing to the 
 interpreters and servants of the divinity. The 
 priests — and this is a most important circumstance, 
 were not all in all, as mediators between heaven and 
 earth ; for their functions might be discharged by 
 others without sacrilege : the doctrine of an incom- 
 municable sacredness, and an inviolable prerogative 
 was not admitted. On emergencies, at least, the 
 highest offices of piety were performed by chiefs and 
 princes; and thus the chord of spiritual despotism 
 was cut. 
 
 If we look to the period previous to the diffusion 
 of a sophistical and sophisticating philosophy, and 
 while genuine sentiments were still prevalent in the 
 higher as well as the lower classes, we shall find that, 
 though the priestly order performed duties highly 
 thought of, and were themselves respected for the sake 
 of their office, yet the due performance of those duties 
 was not held to demand any very eminent personal 
 qualities or talents ; or, at any rate, not those particu- 
 lar accomplishments or virtues which were the objects 
 either of popular admiration or of philosophic esteem. 
 For examples of patriotic magnanimity and self-deny- 
 ing probity the people did not look to their priests, 
 any more than they did to their gods : for this pur- 
 pose their eye was directed not to the temple, but to 
 the senate or the field. Then, so far as religion was 
 considered in connexion with abstract truth, it belong- 
 ed altogether to the province not of the priest, but of 
 the sage : the servants of the gods were the last men 
 that were supposed to hold any commerce with great 
 and sublime principles, or with the precepts of uni- 
 versal morality. Again ; the educatioji of youth 
 was intrusted not to them, but to the professors of se- 
 cular arts — rhetoric and gymnastics. Even for fresh 
 6* 
 
70 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 and animating impressions of the ideality and the poe- 
 try of their religion, it was not to the ministers of re- 
 ligion, but to their poets, dramatists, sculptors, and 
 painters, that the Greeks had recourse. And to sum 
 up all, that personal sanctity which the ministers of 
 the gods were expected to possess, was by no means a 
 quality analogous to the virtues of common life : it 
 was not a perfection of the same order; nor could it 
 secure the regards of those among the people who as- 
 pired to goodness, temperance, and justice. The 
 sanctity of the priest, even when allowed to be fault- 
 less, could not recommend itself as exemplary; or it 
 was exemplary only within the precincts of the temple. 
 This holiness was symbolical rather than positive ; and 
 it conferred upon its possessors a distinction neither 
 envied nor sought after. As the young and emulous 
 Greek w^ould far rather have shone in glittering arms 
 and armour than clothe himself, if he could, in the 
 twinkling splendour of the stars, so would he choose 
 any praise sooner than covet the mortifying purity of 
 the ministers of heaven. 
 
 Sacerdotal power has ordinarily hinged upon two 
 functions of interpretation — namely, that of sacred 
 books, and that of futurity. But ihe Greeks had no 
 ancient canonical writings ; no written rule of belief 
 and duty. They were indeed intensely curious of 
 futurity, and this passion, among no people more 
 eager or universal, was largely provided for by the 
 numerous oracular institutions of the mother country, 
 and of hellenic Asia. Yet even in this instance the 
 influence which miglit have accrued to the priests was 
 much curtailed : first, b3' the opinion that the priests 
 and priestesses of the oracular temples were nothing 
 more than involuntary subjects of the divine inflation ; 
 and secondly, by the generally divulged secret of the 
 corrupt obsequiousness of the oracle to the will of 
 statesmen on special occasions. Much scepticism at- 
 tempered the popular infatuation on this subject ; and 
 
ANCIENT HIERARCHIES. 71 
 
 the luckless priest, whenever a tampering with him 
 was detected or supposed, sustained the whole of the 
 obloquy, which injustice should have been shared by 
 the chief who was the author of the sacrilege, and by 
 the god who connived at it. 
 
 The sacerdotal order, among the Greeks, although 
 thus circumscribed and shut out from the possibility 
 of effecting spiritual usurpations, was neither tram- 
 pled upon, nor exposed to humiliations and difficul- 
 ties of that sort which drives it to pervert religion for 
 base and selfish purposes. The priests received a 
 sufficient maintenance ; and in a manner neither pre- 
 carious to themselves, nor vexatious to the people. 
 
 What has been said of the Grecian worship and 
 priesthood, is, with some modifications, applicable to 
 the Roman. The religion was substantially the same, 
 though more serious and stern, and more barbaric, 
 and far less fraught with beauty and poetry. If the 
 greater gravity and intentness of the people, and the 
 strength and depth of their passions, might seem to 
 render them more fit subjects of ghostly influence than 
 were the Greeks, yet the greater energy of the race, 
 their eminent good sense, and constant attachment to 
 certain fixed principles of political expediency, fully 
 counterpoised any dispositions which the ministers of 
 religion might have turned to their advantage. It 
 was in conformity with the spirit of the political and 
 military economy of the Roman state, that the chief 
 magistrate was head of the Church (if we may borrow 
 the phrase.) This arrangement effectively excludes 
 spiritual despotism ; at least in its indefinite advances, 
 if not always in its single proceedings. 
 
 Yet it must be vain to look for an auspicious sa- 
 cerdotal institute where there are few elements of 
 truth in the religion of a people; on the other hand, 
 if in any quarter we meet with such an institute, we 
 ought to hold its existence as a strong presumptive 
 
72 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 proof of the excellence and genuineness of the reli- 
 gion. A full exhibition, in all its bearings, of the 
 Mosaic hierarchy, and a fair comparison of it with 
 the several contemporary religious polities of the na- 
 tions, would yield an argument in favour of the divine 
 legation of the Jewish legislator, not easily over- 
 thrown. Such an argument, however, is not to be 
 condensed within a narrow compass. Our present 
 subject demands only a brief notice of some main 
 particulars. 
 
 The fallacious and absurd use that has been made 
 of the instance of the Jewish hierarchy in the contro- 
 versy on church government, stands in the way of a 
 legitimate and profitable appeal to it. We must en- 
 deavour to forget, as well the unsound argument of 
 the upholders of high clerical pretensions, as the un- 
 sound reply to that argument, while we contemplate 
 what surely must at all times be an edifying object — 
 namely, a national religious polity, springing direct 
 from Infinite wisdom and beneficence. Grant that an 
 institution, established for a special purpose, and in a 
 particular country, must not be taken as a model for 
 analogous institutions in other ages and countries ; 
 yet, assuredly, a divinely originated economy must be 
 held to involve, at the least, some few universal prin- 
 ciples, convertible, with due modification, to other in- 
 stances. It will be strange indeed, if a combination 
 of religious and secular elements, moulded by the 
 very hand of God, should be found to yield to our 
 modern eyes no instruction, or none of practical im- 
 port. Far from admitting so irreverent a supposition, 
 we should boldly advance the principle that, the Mo- 
 saic sacerdotal institute, stripp'ed of whatever was 
 special and temporary, and reduced to its pure ideal, 
 or abstract value, would furnish the best possible 
 groundwork of a national religious polity ; and it 
 may readily be shown, that no permanent or univer- 
 
THE JEWISH CHURCH POLITY. 73 
 
 sal rule of the Christian dispensation prohibits the use 
 it might seem expedient to make of such a pattern. 
 
 It is not easy to form an adequate conception of 
 the happy aspect and actual beneficial operation of 
 the Mosaic sacerdotal institute. In truth, all our no- 
 tions of the Jewish commonwealth are received under 
 a disadvantage, from the circumstance of their reach- 
 ing us through the channel of inspired history. The 
 inflexible integrity of the record, and its comminative 
 intention, throws a dark colour over the general 
 scene. If we knew nothing more of a man than what 
 we might gather from the lips of his severe friend and 
 admonitor, we might think some of the most virtuous 
 of mankind to be the most faulty and unamiable. In 
 reading the history of other nations, we see the things 
 of the world in the world's light; but Jewish affairs 
 we look at in the light of heaven ; and what otherwise 
 might appear fair, stands forward only as reprehen- 
 sible. 
 
 Not one of the Jewish w^riters, whether historian or 
 prophet, is the eulogist of his nation, or speaks of 
 Israel as the Greeks of Greece, or the Romans of 
 Rome. How different would be our impressions of 
 the ancient people of Palestine, if some candid Hero- 
 dotus had left us a description of them, such as they 
 must have appeared to a stranger in the bright era 
 of their history, and when compared with their imme- 
 diate neighbours. There is good reason to believe 
 that, for diffused enjoyment and personal liberty, for 
 elevation of sentiment, and purity of manners, no 
 contemporary nation could offer any such spectacle 
 of popular felicity. 
 
 The extreme brevity of the inspired historians, 
 and the prominence given by them to single incidents, 
 operate to deprive us of what might be called our 
 chronological consciousness ; and we forget that, 
 while running over a few chapters, we have traversed 
 ages, and have leaped periods exceeding the duration 
 
74 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 of some mighty empires. Certain seasons of calamity 
 excepted, the Jewish commonwealth rested on the 
 soil, and diffused among a numerous people a large 
 measure of such felicity as earth admits of, during a 
 much longer track of time than has yet been granted 
 to British greatness ; and longer than can be claimed 
 for the splendour of Grecian liberties and arts ; and 
 longer than was allowed to the foreign power of 
 Rome. During at least seven hundred years, Pales- 
 tine was probably richer in human happiness than 
 any other spot upon earth has ever been. 
 
 Considered in their secular aspect, the character- 
 istic principle of the Mosaic Institutions was the pri- 
 vate good of the people. Whatever the form of the 
 polity might be, the spirit of it was, in the best sense, 
 popular ; since the security, the competence, and the 
 personal dignity, and the enjoyments of every son of 
 Abraham was the ruling intention of every enactment. 
 Redeemed from the furnaces of Egypt, and led into 
 a land flowing with milk and honey, the economy of 
 social life was so constructed, as to yield the greatest 
 possible amount of plenty and pleasure to every citi- 
 zen. Every man who had sprung from the loins of 
 Abraham was noble; and the forfeiture of that patri- 
 mony which enabled him to support the simple ho- 
 nours of his birth was a desperate calamity, guarded 
 against by extraordinary provisions. The motto of 
 the commonwealth was — " Every man under his vine, 
 and under his fig-tree ; none daring to makfe him 
 afraid." To eat the fat of the land, to make his heart 
 merry with the wine, and to render praise to God, du- 
 ty to the priest, and a generous portion to the father- 
 less, the widow, and the stranger, was the precept and 
 privilege of all. 
 
 Neither national aggrandizement, or conquest and 
 foreign empire, nor the accumulation of wealth by 
 trade, nor the cultivation of arts and philosophy, was 
 aimed at in the Jewish code ; but rather the tranquil 
 
THE JEWISH CHURCH POLITY. 75 
 
 happiness and the domestic integrity of every Israeli- 
 tish home. The Law was a blessing for the basket 
 and the store, for the bed and the table. God's po- 
 lity was like God's world, in the constitution of which 
 the greatest possible enjoyment of the greatest possi- 
 ble number is the sovereign rule. " Come and sit at 
 my table, and taste my dainties," was the invitation 
 of Jehovah to the people of his choice; and if they 
 had not perversely turned aside to snatch poisons 
 from the tables of demons, no happiness would have 
 been comparable to theirs. 
 
 In harmony with this scheme of beneficence, the 
 sacerdotal institute had altogether a benign aspect 
 toward the people. The priests, themselves secured 
 of the competency, and curtailed of no natural en- 
 joyment, had no motive, either for grudging the hap- 
 piness of others, or for trenching upon the common 
 liberties : on the contrary, their own wealth and ease 
 expressed, and flowed from, the prosperity of the 
 state. Among the Asiatic hierarchies, that of the 
 Jews occupied a middle ground; for it was neither 
 predominant nor degraded : the nation did not exist 
 for the priests; nor were the priests the obsequious 
 dependents, either of the monarch or the people. 
 
 In considering the position and influence of the 
 sacerdotal order in the Hebrew polity, we have, in 
 the first place, to take notice of the character of the 
 religion intrusted to its care, which aflbrded fewer 
 means of sustaining ghostly power than perhaps any 
 other system, ancient or modern. No scheme of be- 
 lief and worship has drawn so little upon the unde- 
 fined terrors of the invisible world ; none has said less 
 of futurity — an extra-mundane futurity. The views 
 it opens, the motives it urges, the hopes it awakens, 
 the fears it instils, are all terrestrial and temporary. 
 Whatever the Jewish nation might surmise or know 
 concerning a future life, and an unseen econom}^, 
 their laws and their worship did not rest upon any 
 
76 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 such foundation ; and their priests, as such, were not 
 empowered to wield the terrible weapons of spiritual 
 excitement. The priests did not stand before the 
 people as the privileged holders of impenetrable and 
 portentous mysteries, of which it was at their discre- 
 tion to deal out a portion or not. The clergy pos- 
 sessed no immeasurable superiority of knowledge over 
 the laity: what the priests knew, the people might 
 know, and ought to know from the priest. The one 
 party did not grasp the immortal destinies of the 
 other. The priest might adjudge to death, but not 
 to perdition ; and to death only in cases well defined. 
 
 Moses spoke of the Almighty as the Creator and 
 Governor of the visible world ; as the Giver of all 
 good things; as the righteous administrator of hu- 
 man affairs, immediately rewarding those who fear 
 Him and keep his commandments, and as punishing 
 the refractory, either on the spot, or in the persons of 
 their posterity. Every thing was marked out, cir- 
 cumscribed, and fixed in their theology ; and there- 
 fore it was an unfit material of spiritual despotism. 
 Nor should we fail to notice the singular fact, that 
 the prescience of future mundane events, a pretence 
 to which has. been so mighty an engine of priestly 
 power, was (so far as granted at all) conveyed 
 through the instrumentality of an extra-sacerdotal 
 class, namely, that of the prophets, who were indis- 
 criminately of every tribe, and who, even when of 
 Levitical origin, derived none of their special autho- 
 rity from the hands of the superiors of their own 
 order. 
 
 On insufficient grounds, and without staying to 
 consider actual facts, divines have affirmed, what in- 
 fidels have eagerly caught at, and are still repeating 
 now the hundredth time — namely, that the religion 
 of the Jews was severe and gloomy. Severe it could 
 not be, when temporal felicity was constantly held up 
 before the people as their portion, and as the imme- 
 
THE JEWISH CHURCH POLITY. 77 
 
 diate fruit of obedience. Severe it was not, while 
 the divine placability was proclaimed in every rite, 
 and while propitiation was the grand purpose of all 
 worship. Gloomy it could not be, abstaining as it 
 did from the terrors of the unseen world : yes, but it 
 was gloomy, as' the silvery dawn is gloomy when we 
 think of its shadows in comparison with the splen- 
 dours of noon. 
 
 Never has there been a religion, ancient or mo- 
 dern, under which a man might on easier terms live 
 piously and happily. No religion has afforded so 
 few excitements to vague despondency. If it has 
 been a not infrequent case for melancholic minds to 
 be seized with the frenzy of religious despair, we 
 doubt if ever such an instance occurred under primi- 
 tive Judaism. It was only when he entertained the 
 horror-fraught demonology of the Canaanitish tribes, 
 that the son of Abraham could become the victim 
 of moody terrors. This Judaism then was not the 
 system on which to build spiritual despotism. 
 
 Nor did the national temperament favour any such 
 usurpations. If we call the Jews — Orientals, we 
 must first exclude from the term the notions usually 
 attached to it, of indolent laxity, or of a cringing 
 servility of disposition. In reading the historical 
 books of the Old Testament, commencing with the 
 book of Judges, one gathers from the whole an im- 
 pression of a people high spirited and impassioned ; 
 yet sedate and firm ; dignified in manners, vigorous 
 in action, steady in purpose, rich in axiomatic good 
 sense, and terse in expression ; and especially warm 
 and true in domestic sentiment, and keen in every 
 feeling of honour. They took to themselves a mo- 
 narchical government; but their usages were demo- 
 cratic; they bore the burden of kingly rule, till it 
 reached a galling weight, and then the cry was al- 
 ways, "To your tents, O Israel." The antebaby- 
 7 
 
78 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 lonish Jews were not the plastic stuff an ambitious 
 hierarch would have chosen to work upon. 
 
 The position of the Jewish priesthood in relation 
 to the community, and in relation to the civil autho- 
 I'ity, deserves especial regard. 
 
 A main circumstance to be set off, in taking ac- 
 count of the duties, dignities, political influence, and 
 revenues, of the Levitical tribe, is that combination 
 of functions, civil and sacred, which they sustained. 
 The priests and Levites were not ministers of religion 
 merely. Besides discharging the various and very 
 laborious services of public worship, and besides im- 
 parting religious instruction to the mass of the peo- 
 ple ; the sacerdotal, and semi-sacerdotal orders, per- 
 formed the duty of an armed force, or garrison of the 
 temple, and of a body-guard to the monarch. Upon 
 them also, or upon them chiefly, devolved the admi- 
 nistration and interpretation of civil and criminal 
 law, and the business of courts of justice. More- 
 over, as it seems, the priests were originally the pro- 
 fessors of medicine, and, from a natural extejision of 
 the delicate oflices intrusted to them in several medico- 
 judicial instances, were compelled to acquire a kind 
 of knowledge which none can possess and remain 
 idle. The priests too, were the only depositaries of 
 general learning, and the copiers of books. Now, 
 if the exercise of so man}^ functions might appear to 
 place vast power in the hands of a single order, it 
 will be found, in the actual working of the social 
 machine, that this very multiplicity of labours, and 
 this intimate blending of the priests with the people, 
 in all the occasions of common life, operates much 
 more to break down and moderate, than to build up 
 and aggravate ghostly tyranny. The common peo- 
 ple have never been so thoroughly enslaved by any 
 priests as by those who affected an utter ignorance 
 of all mundane affairs, and who spent, or professed 
 to spend, their days and nights in seraphic abstrac- 
 
THE JEWISH HIERARCHY. 79 
 
 tion. The people should not then look with too 
 much jealousy at those engagements which make 
 their ministers one with themselves, and which with- 
 draw them a little from the closet and the conclave. 
 
 In calculating, therefore, the proportion borne by 
 the priests and Levites to the community, or the 
 amount of their revenues, we must not think of either 
 as we should if nothing more had been required of 
 them than to give attendance at the altar. Take 
 what example we please, of a civilized community, 
 and reckon all the learned professions in a mass, not 
 omitting the ministers of state, and the guards of the 
 palace, and we shall find the number to exceed, in 
 proportion, that of the Levitical tribe ; and the ag- 
 gregate revenues and salaries of all these professions, 
 vastly to surpass those of the Jewish clergy. The 
 entire instance fails then in applicability to the cir- 
 cumstances of any modern people. Nothing can be 
 more preposterous than the argumentative use that 
 has so often been made of the Mosaic institutions, in 
 this particular. Let a tenth of the rents and income 
 of any community be taken, and shared among all 
 the professions, the clergy taking only their propor- 
 tion of this tithe, and then the procedure will bear 
 some analogy to the Jewish tithe system. 
 
 No argumentative reference, moreover, to the Mo- 
 saic sacerdotal institute can fairly be made, until 
 after we have set off the capital circumstance that 
 the priesthood was hereditary, and therefore irre- 
 spective of personal qualities or qualifications (mere 
 physical integrity excepted.) None would pretend 
 that, in the case of the Christian ministry, individual 
 fitness for the office, together with all mental and 
 moral dispositions, should be so merged as is implied 
 in adapting the hereditary principle to the clerical 
 order. This circumstance indicates some essential 
 dissimilarity between the Jewish and Christian 
 schemes ; and should make us cautious in carrying 
 
80 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM- 
 
 inferences from the one economy to the other. Ne- 
 vertheless this dissimilarity must not be thought of 
 as if it involved a total want of analogy ; for we 
 ought to recollect that, as a wide circuit of various 
 employments devolved upon the Levitical tribe, and 
 the Aaronic family, there would naturally take place 
 an allotment or distribution of offices, according to 
 the talents and dispositions of individuals ; the more 
 intellectual and sedate assuming to themselves the 
 duties of religious teachers, while the more active 
 betook themselves to secular employments. To a 
 certain extent, therefore, it would still be true that 
 the ministers of religion would be such, not merely 
 by accident of birth, but by fitness of talent and 
 temper ; though certainly not in any case by popular 
 election. 
 
 Allowance made for the two above-named pecu- 
 liarities of the Jewish priesthood, the following main 
 conditions attaching to it seem to deserve attention. — 
 
 The first of these conditions is the important one^ 
 that, under this divine economy the ministers of re- 
 ligion, as related to the people for whom they were 
 to act on the part of God, and upon whom they were 
 to enforce the law, stood absolutely independent of 
 popular will and caprice, as well in regard to pecu- 
 niary support, as to appointment and removal. If 
 there be something that is special and accidental in 
 this arrangement, there is surely something of abstract 
 principle in it also. The original justice of the tithe 
 of produce, as an equivalent for a twelfth share of 
 the land due to the tribe of Levi, does not affect the 
 sort of inference which we deem it warrantable to draw 
 from the fact. Used as a rule of proportion, applicable 
 to the clergy in Christian countries, nothing (as we 
 have already said) can be more absurd. This nugatory 
 inference excluded, we yet seem borne out in assuming 
 that the abstract principle of a national establishment, 
 
THE JEWISH HIERARCHY. 81 
 
 involving a legal and defined provision for the ministers 
 of religion, and securing also their independence of po- 
 pular caprice, must not be spoken of as essentially 
 immoral, or as universally inexpedient, and incompa- 
 tible with those relative sentiments that should con- 
 nect the pastor and his flock. When the difficulties 
 that attend the general question of a provision for 
 the clergy are felt, what can be more natural on the 
 part of religious minds, than to turn toward a hea- 
 ven-descended economy ; and if restrained by pecu- 
 liar considerations from a close imitation of this pat- 
 tern, it will be strange indeed if we do not grant it 
 to be entitled to the smallest deference, while employ- 
 ed in working the abstract theorem of a church polity. 
 But it may be predicted that this divine example will 
 acquire a much higher authority than hitherto it has 
 possessed, when, on the one hand, it shall cease to 
 be any more distorted and abused in vindication of 
 tithes, and of certain despotic church maxims; and, 
 on the other hand, when the conceit which has been 
 entertained, that the Christian system stands posi- 
 tively opposed to any such arrangement, shall be dis- 
 sipated. It is surely a singular inconsistency on the 
 part of some who, while sternly affirming the autho- 
 rity of Mosaic institutions in certain points, abso- 
 lutely refuse permission to make any sort of use of the 
 great principle of the Mosaic economy in relation to 
 the ministers of religion. In all points ought we not 
 alike to drop what is special in the Jewish polity, and 
 to respect, and if practicable, to imitate, what ap- 
 pears to spring from some universal axiom f 
 
 Secondly. The independence and the compe- 
 tence of the Jewish priesthood being thus secured by 
 an endowment of lands and towns, and by imposts, 
 precisely defined, scope was yet given to the sponta- 
 neous afiection of the people toward their teachers, 
 and to their zeal also on special occasions, where no 
 danger was to be expected, and where public spirit 
 
 7* 
 
82 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 was likely to meet the demand made upon it. There 
 was an annual gratuity to the priest, left to the libe- 
 rality of the people ; and such as might give excite- 
 ment to pious regard toward them, and open the way 
 for reciprocal feelings on the part of the clergy. But 
 beside this, it was the usage of the Jewish Church, 
 following the example first set by Moses, to appeal 
 to the religious generosity of the nation whenever 
 the house of God needed extensive repairs, or was to 
 be re-edified. Without some such call upon the sen- 
 timents of devout patriotism, a people can hardly fail 
 to become indifferent to religion, and to its public of- 
 fices, which they do not feel to be in any active sense 
 their own. We may well observe, in the instance be- 
 fore us, the just appreciation it imphes of the ordinary 
 impulses of human nature. When an object of visi- 
 ble importance and happy aspect can be suddenly 
 presented to the public mind, there is no need to be 
 anxious for the result. A generous enthusiasm is 
 sure to be enkindled, and will probably overpass 
 the necessities of the occasion. So it was in repeated 
 instances with the Jewish people. The erection or 
 repair of sacred structures might, almost always, be 
 confidently thrown upon voluntary contributions. 
 The permanent support of those M'ho are to minister 
 within them involves greater difficulties. 
 
 Thirdly. A circumstance already adverted to is of 
 so much importance as to demand more explicit men- 
 tion : we mean that counterpoise of church influence 
 which sprung from the operation of the Prophetic 
 Function. It is the exclusive possession and the ir- 
 responsible control of all kinds of spiritual power 
 which enables a hierarchy to digest its plans of en- 
 croachment, and to achieve gradual usurpations. No 
 such exclusive domination was permitted to the Jew- 
 ish clergy. An unfailing succession of inspired men, 
 sometimes members of the Aaronic house, but more 
 often not, stood up as the immediate ministers of Je- 
 
THE JEWISH HIERARCHY. 83 
 
 liovah, dealing rebuke, with iiigh intrepidity, on all 
 sides ; and assailing the vices or the remissness, as 
 well of the priests, as of the princes, or the sovereign. 
 The high-priest could never call himself the viCAR 
 OF God, or the ultimate authority, from whose deci- 
 sions there could be no appeal. Whatever scheme 
 of aggrandizement for his order an ambitious hierarch 
 might meditate, he could never for a moment secure 
 himself against the thundering reproof of some extra- 
 sacerdotal voice, the pealing of which must have 
 shattered his devices. This counterpoise, or rather 
 corrective, forming as it did a permanent provision in 
 the Jewish church polity, deserves to be especially 
 noticed in its relation to the hereditary tenure of the 
 pontifical dignit3\ Into what condition, short of an 
 intolerable spiritual despotism, could any community 
 fall, among whom there existed an hereditary ponti- 
 ficate, not checked in some very efficacious manner ? 
 Or how much power would be left to the civil magis- 
 trate who should sway his sceptre under the shade of 
 an inherited prelacy ? A pope, the lineal descend- 
 ant of popes, and the progenitor of popes, would be a 
 despot such as the world has never seen. In this 
 sense it was well for Europe that the Romish clergy 
 condemned themselves to celibacy. It is worthy of 
 remark, that soon after the prophetic function failed 
 among the Jews, the pontifical dignity ceased to de- 
 scend from father to son ; or even to be held for life. 
 Lastly, we have to take account of that balance of 
 power, and that reciprocal corrective influence, 
 vvhich subsisted between the priesthood and the 
 monarchy, in the Jewish state ; each exerting over 
 the other a control, beneficial to each, and to the 
 community. Beside their proper spiritual authority 
 with the people, which naturally tempered the civil 
 and military power, the priests and Levites were the 
 aristocracy — the barons and the knights of the com- 
 monwealth. It was they who had an interest in the 
 
84 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 institutions of the country of a definite sort, and 
 which impelled them to resist innovations and en- 
 croachments, whether attempted by the people or the 
 monarch. A privileged order, accustomed to meet 
 in convocation, becomes inevitably, whatever its par- 
 ticular functions may be, the guardian of the state, 
 and the vigilant observer of all changes. Several 
 actual instances are recorded, and others no doubt 
 occurred, in which the constancy and patriotism of 
 the priests saved the state, and barred the way of a 
 tyrant. 
 
 On the other hand, the sacerdotal order itself 
 stood in awe of the monarch ; and on many remark- 
 able occasions, received from his hand a vigorous 
 treatment, necessary, and highly beneficial. The 
 lapse of time never fails to break down the purity 
 and integrity of a sacerdotal body. Secular motives 
 insensibly supplant high principles ; the earthly pre- 
 vails over the heavenly element. But a hierarchy 
 never reforms itself; — no corporation regenerates by 
 spontaneous energy ; it must be brought back to 
 duty and virtue by a hand from without. No pro- 
 vision of the Mosaic law had authorized this sort of 
 reform; yet it had become the salutary usage of the 
 state for strong-minded and pious sovereigns to do 
 for the Church, what the Church will not do for her- 
 self, and what the people either do not care to at- 
 tempt, or have no means of eflecting. A main cha- 
 racteristic of Jewish history is Church Reform, 
 again and again brought about by the civil power. 
 And never are such reforms recorded otherwise than 
 in terms of commendation ; never are they reservedly 
 mentioned, as happy, but illicit intrusions upon things 
 sacred. The inspired writers do not seem to have 
 come to the knowledge of the transcendent doctrine, 
 that corruptions and abuses are sacred, or can ever 
 deserve reverence. 
 
 Why the examples of David, Asa, Jehoshaphat, 
 
THE JEWISH HIERARCHY. 85 
 
 Hezekiah, and Josiah, should not be regarded as 
 imitable, as well as admirable, it is not easy to say. 
 Our notions of wisdom and public virtue must surely 
 be distorted when we deny that a monarch, alive to 
 the highest interests of the state, and to the welfare 
 of his people, acts laudably when he directs the public 
 force against glaring church abuses, and calls upon 
 the ministers of religion, in a tone they dare not 
 slight, to amend their ways, to forsake covetous- 
 ness, and to tend their flocks. Except for the piety 
 and zeal of several kingly reformers, the Mosaic in- 
 stitutions, and with them the knowledge and worship 
 of Jehovah, would in an early age have utterly dis- 
 appeared. 
 
 Whatever practical use we may choose to make of 
 this ancient model of ecclesiastical polity, we surely 
 cannot refuse it our admiration. Or if its actual 
 arrangements be adjudged altogether inapplicable 
 to Christian countries in modern times, at least those 
 general axioms upon which it was reared must de- 
 serve regard ; for it is impossible to admit the 
 divine origination of this scheme, and at the same 
 time to affirm that its fundamental principles are out 
 of harmony with human nature, and not in any sense 
 capable of extension from one people and age to 
 another. What then were these rudiments of the 
 Jewish church polity f We assume that they may 
 be reduced to the following articles, namely — The 
 independence of the priests in relation to the people; 
 — space and excitement for the sentiment of religious 
 public spirit; — a partition of religious influence be- 
 tween the hierarchy and some other party ; or, as 
 interpreted into a modern sense, a perfect liberty of 
 animadversion upon clerical conduct, exercised by 
 persons not of the clerical order ; — an efl^ective inde- 
 pendence of the clergy in relation to the civil 
 power ; — and lastly, a reciprocal authority in the 
 magistrate, exercised over the Church on occasions 
 of manifest necessity. We are bold to conjectqre 
 
86 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 ihat an ecclesiastical polity founded upon these con- 
 ditions would at once secure a just and necessary 
 authority to the ministers of religion, and preclude 
 spiritual usurpations; that it would contain within 
 itself the springs of periodic renovation, without 
 which no system, how perfect soever in its original 
 scheme, can float down the current of time ; and 
 that it would exert an effective and salutary influence, 
 not merely like our present systems, over portions of 
 the community ; but over the whole ; and would im- 
 part a religious character to public acts, both of the 
 legislature and the administration. 
 
 During the ages that elapsed between the building 
 of the second temple and its demolition, every thing 
 in the Jewish state had shifted position. Six hun- 
 dred years is a period that imparts a new character 
 to all but the most inert masses. Judaism was not 
 an inert mass, like the vast despotisms of Asia, nor 
 did even the sanction of the Divine authority pre- 
 serve it from change. Whatever has life has eras 
 and evolutions. Even Christianity has exhibited, 
 and will probably yet exhibit, this symptom of 
 vitality. 
 
 Passing over at a leap the gradual induction of 
 political, ecclesiastical, and moral changes, we find 
 firmly established among the Jews, in ihe time of 
 Christ and his apostles, what well deserves the appel- 
 lation of spiritual despotism. The common people 
 superstitious, fanatical, scrupulous, licentious, were 
 held in vilifying subservience to the arrogance, the 
 rapacity, the factious interests, and the whims of 
 their religious masters. The very people who pre- 
 posterously affirm that they had " never been in bon- 
 dage to any man," were, at that moment, bowing 
 down under the chains of a foreign domination, and 
 the yoke of a ghostly tyranny. 
 
 Besides other evidences of the fact, which are 
 abundant, we possess, on this point, the most explicit 
 
THE JEWISH HIERARCHY. 87 
 
 and unimpeachable testimony — that of our Lord. 
 His vehement arraignment of the Jewish rulers con- 
 veys the very idea of spiritual despotism. The be- 
 nign law of God was set aside by vain superstitions 
 and profligate expositions : — a boundless homage was 
 claimed from the populace by their teachers ; the ra- 
 pacity and debauchery of the ministers of religion 
 were cloaked by frivolous austerities : intolerable 
 burdens were imposed upon the people, and not 
 shared by the imposers; and a state of fanatical ex- 
 citement was kept up throughout the community, 
 such as placed a formidable force at the command of 
 the chiefs of the faction* . Each of these particulars 
 is distinctly affirmed, or is necessarily implied, in our 
 Lord's impeachment of the scribes, lawyers, and 
 priests ; nor has ever a public reprover employed 
 language more stern and reprobative. The Divine 
 Speaker, in these instances, does not invite the har- 
 dened Pharisee to repentance ; but consigns him to 
 perdition : instead of that under-tone of mercy which 
 pervades always his addresses to the profligate multi- 
 tude, we hear only the thunders of the day of wrath. 
 Well might it be, if whoever stands in the same place 
 of elevated hypocrisy, converting the solemnities of 
 religion into a disguise for interested purposes, and 
 employing the hand of heaven as an instrument of 
 extortion, would take a timely warning from the ter- 
 rible denunciation pronounced upon these, their pre- 
 decessors in sacrilege. 
 
 To trace the course of events which had conducted 
 the Jewish people over so large an interval from the 
 one condition to the other, would lead us very far. 
 Briefly we may notice the main circumstances that 
 appear to have distinguished the one from the other. 
 They are such as the following. — 
 
 The ecclesiastical and civil authorities, instead of 
 being amicably related and adjusted, one to the 
 other, as parts of the same polity, had become severed, 
 
88 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 in consequence of the subjugation of the country ; 
 and not only severed, but placed in jealous opposi- 
 tion ; and each cherishing towards the odier senti- 
 ments of profound, though repressed hatred. The 
 natural alliance which should subsist in a religious 
 community, between Church and State, and whicli 
 had formerly subsisted, had given way to such cor- 
 respondence as belongs to a truce between enemies. 
 The foreign power, embarrassed by its inabihty to 
 understand the principles or the temper of the sanc- 
 timonious yet profligate hierarchy it had to do with, 
 and justly holding in contempt men who, while pro- 
 fessing a purer religion than that of their neighbours, 
 surpassed all people in atrocity, could not w^ish to 
 interfere when they saw the priests and rabbis spend- 
 ing their malignity upon the luckless multitude. 
 
 On the other side, the religious chiefs, liable to 
 humiliations of national pride, insufferable if it had 
 been possible to avoid them, sought the relief of re- 
 venge by trampling upon the people ; and yet at the 
 same time flattered the worst passions of the popu- 
 lace by dealing out to them an immoral casuistry', as 
 the means of securing and extending their own pre- 
 carious power. The doctors and priests stood in 
 that very position of hostility toward the magistrate, 
 and of uncertain dependance upon the caprices of 
 popular feeling which afterwards corrupted the 
 ChrisUan ministry, and which has proved its ill con- 
 sequence in the instance of some modern clerical 
 bodies. The supremacy of the chiefs was on every 
 side in danger; and their behaviour naturally exhi- 
 bited that anxious intolerance, and irritation, which 
 are always the characteristics of unstable power. In 
 the primitive times of Judaism, the sacerdotal, the 
 prophetic, and the kingly authorities, counterpoised 
 each other ; but now, the prophetic being gone, and 
 the kingly exchanged for a foreign and idolatrous 
 power, the sacerdotal body — rabbis, priests, lawyers, 
 scribes, were in all religious matters, that is to say, 
 
THE JEWISH HIERARCHY. 89 
 
 in every affair beneath the notice of the Roman 
 governor, or not cognizable by him, irresponsible 
 and absolute ; and free to convert the malign reli- 
 gious sentiments of the nation to the worst purposes. 
 A special circumstance of the ecclesiastical con- 
 dition of the Jews, at the time now spoken of, was 
 this, that a principal portion of the religious influ- 
 ence and spiritual magistracy had been usurped, or 
 at least had insensibly passed into the hands of an 
 irregular order of men, who exercised an authority 
 not known either to the Mosaic code, or to the ante- 
 babylonish poHty. Whether these men dr^w reve- 
 nues from the gratuities of the people is not clear ; 
 but it is certain that they enjoyed a large share of 
 all such honours and powers as the blind obsequious- 
 ness of thie vulgar can confer. The chiefs of the 
 Pharisaic sect — and this sect commanded the popu- 
 lar mind, constituted an irresponsible and anomalous 
 body, the influence of vvhich, not springing from any 
 definite or legal provisions, was built up and main- 
 tained by the practice of those unworthy arts to 
 which despotic demagogues naturally have recourse. 
 And it is especially to be noticed that this self-consti- 
 tuted spiritual aristocracy did not act (as it might 
 perhaps have done beneficially) in the way of a 
 counterpoise to the hierarchy ; but it seems to have 
 purchased its lawless authority by lending support to 
 the priests in all their machinations. A confederacy 
 very similar in its elements, and of which the people 
 were the victims, afterwards took place in the Chris- 
 tian Church, between the parochial clergy and 
 bishops, and the monkish orders. For although, in 
 later ages, and on particular occasions, the two par- 
 ties were openly opposed, there was a long period 
 during which the ascetic bands played one and the 
 same game with the secular clergy, and both concur- 
 red in trampling upon those whom they were pleased 
 to designate tlie herd of mankind. It has always 
 8 
 
90 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 been found, as well within the Jewish as the Chris- 
 tian church, that such volunteers in the spiritual war- 
 fare have outstripped the main body in every enter- 
 prise of spoliation and extravagance. Better is it 
 always to be lawfully, than unlawfully oppressed. 
 
 Again : the ancient priesthood enforced and taught 
 the divine law in the vernacular tongue, and could 
 find little room for perverse and sinister interpreta- 
 tions ; but the expatriation of the people, and the 
 consequent change in the national dialect, sealed the 
 Pentateuch from the commonalty, and threw into the 
 hands of.the learned class an unlimited power of in- 
 terpretation. But the power to interpret a code of 
 law, without appeal, is essentially a legislative power ; 
 and when combined with the personal cure of souls, 
 it becomes administrative also, and leaves hardly 
 an}' thing to be added to the faculties of despotism. 
 It was thus that the Romish hierarchy held the key 
 of Scripture ; first, as locked up in the Greek lan- 
 guage, and afterwards in the Latin. This binding 
 and loosing of Moses by the Rabbi, was probably 
 the main means of the corrupt tyranny of which the 
 Jewish nation had become the victims. And it was 
 thus, afterwards, in the Christian Church. An irre- 
 sponsible right to interpret, is a right to enslave. 
 
 Once more : it must by no means be forgotten, 
 that the Pharisaic Judaism of the times of Herod had 
 gradually drawn toitself, or had insensibly developed, 
 several powerful elements of belief, either not known 
 to the people in the pristine ages, or not commonly 
 divulged and spoken of. Esoteric doctrines natu- 
 rally work themselves out, and get abroad in the 
 lapse of time : what once was a mystery, whispered in 
 sacred groves, comes at length into the mouth of the 
 populace, and is heard every day in the streets of 
 cities. The seeming deficiency in the Mosaic books 
 (considered as embodying a system of theology) had 
 been filled up — it is not easy to say from what 
 
THE JEWISH HIERARCHY. 91 
 
 sources ; but in fact, the future life, and future retri- 
 bution, formed a part of the popular creed, and 
 afforded to tlie doctors and masters of the people an 
 engine of terror, of which they availed themselves in 
 their own manner. 
 
 Thus it was that the Judaism which Christianity 
 came in to displace, differed in almost every thing but 
 names, rites, and the visible part of worship, from the 
 Judaism whereof David had gloried. The substance 
 had fallen away before the form was abrogated. This, 
 indeed, is the ordinary process of revolution in mat- 
 ters of opinion. The substance moulders slowly and 
 insensibly ; and then the crust drops in an instant. 
 
 To sum up our comparison between the ecclesias- 
 tical polity and religious sentiment characteristic of 
 the first temple and of the second, we may say, that 
 the religion of the first was gracious, happy, and in- 
 telligible; that of the second (in later times) was su- 
 perstitious, harsh, scrupulous, and immoral. The 
 ministers of the first enjoyed a tranquil and well- 
 defined competency, removing them at once from 
 temptations and solicitudes ; those of the second were, 
 by the position in which they stood, at once the in- 
 terested flatterers of the people and their cruel mas- 
 ters. During the continuance of the first temple, the 
 several powers of the State moved on in amicable 
 equipoise ; but in the times of the second, the Church 
 and the State had either no settled alliance or stood 
 in jealous opposition. 
 
 During the pristine era, the Jewish people enjoyed 
 a religion according to law ; but during later ages, 
 they were distracted by the uncertainties of religion 
 according to opinion. The early faith and worship 
 was a blessing for the people : the later was a benefit 
 for the priest and the rabbi. The first was liberty 
 and rule ; the second despotism and license. The 
 6rst was God's religion: the second man's. 
 
92 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 SECTION IV. 
 
 RUDOIENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 
 
 It is generally granted, that, in the Mosaic Insti- 
 tute there was something permanent, as well as much 
 that was temporary ; or rather, something universal, 
 as well as a greater mass that was local and national. 
 Few will deny that the converse is true of Chris- 
 tianity ; for to insist upon the unchanging univer- 
 sality and the perpetual obligation of every particle 
 of the religious economy left to the world by the 
 apostles, is to plunge into difficulties, both historic 
 and dogmatic, whence there can be no way of escape. 
 It is true that certain communions have laboured to 
 entrench themselves on this ground; but in doing so 
 they have staked the entire authoritj^ of Christianity 
 upon the determination of obscure antiquarian ques- 
 tions. Unless this ill-judged attempt is abandoned, 
 no hope can be entertained of effecting the peace of 
 the Church. 
 
 Judaism, although in fact it underwent extensive 
 modifications in the course of ages, had no yielding 
 property originally imparted to it ; because it was 
 adapted to the particular spot where it was actually 
 reared. But Christianity, because intended for all 
 places and times, was left, so far as relates to its ex- 
 terior forms and its social constitutions, in a plastic 
 state. Its doctrine and its morality none can ima- 
 gine to be variable, since they both spring from eter- 
 nal truths. But this power of accommodation in 
 things which, in their own nature are inconstant, 
 places the Gospel of Christ in contrast with almost 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITy. 93 
 
 every other relig-ious sj^stem ; and affords too a for- 
 cible, though silent proof, of the comprehensive de- 
 sign of Him who p;ave it to the world. The ancient 
 promise, that the Lord's Christ should inherit all na- 
 tions, is symbolized in what may be called the ap- 
 plicable quality of the worship and polity which he 
 consigned to his followers; for these adjuncts of his 
 religion are so left at large as to admit of needful 
 modifications, Christianity takes an elastic grasp of 
 human nature: Judaism held it as the solid mould 
 holds the metal that is poured into it. 
 
 Judaism is fifteen hundred years older than Chris- 
 tianity ; and if the ordinary rule of the inverse 
 amount of historic light, as we recede from our own 
 times, held good in this instance, much less obscurity 
 would attach to the circumstantials of the later, than 
 to those of tlie more ancient institution. But the 
 contrary is found to be the fact; nor can we be sur- 
 prised that it is so, when we remember that the one 
 was a system of circumstantials, to each and all of 
 which religious importance was attached : the other 
 not so ; for Christianity challenges tlie serious re- 
 gards of men in those things only which conscience 
 and reason confess to be momentous. 
 
 For the most part, it is easy to ascertain the usages 
 of the tabernacle and temple worship, and the Jew- 
 ish methods of ecclesiastical management. But no- 
 thing has been found more difficult than to determine 
 sntisfactoriiy what were the practices of the apostolic 
 Churches, even in some of tlie main articles of disci- 
 pline, government, or worship. This striking differ- 
 ence between the Jewish and tlie Christian econo- 
 mies speaks j)lainly enough, one might think, to 
 common sense, and should liave superseded many an 
 interminable controversy. In relation to certain 
 points of ritual or government, sound reason does 
 not ask any thing more to be said than this — namely. 
 That the primitive practice in such particulars, 
 S* 
 
94 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 clearly is not clear ; therefore our modern consciences 
 may be relieved of all solicitude on the subject. 
 Christianity is not a religion of immovable exterior 
 constitutions ; but of universal and unchangeable 
 truths. Because universal in its essential principles, 
 and universal too in its aspect, therefore plastic in its 
 forms : variable in its exterior, because invariable in 
 its substance. 
 
 Whatever, in the New Testament, relates to modes 
 of worship, and to ecclesiastical constitutions, is 
 couciied in general terms. Moreover, those allusions 
 to matters of fact, whence the apostolic practice might 
 be gathered, are slight and indistinct, and not seldom 
 ambiguous. Our inference is plain. — Facts so ob- 
 scurely conveyed m.ust not be taken as if propounded 
 to us jiuthoritatively. It is not in any such form 
 that Law has ever been promulgated ; no legislator 
 has so tortured the ingenuity of a people. It is true 
 that, in the lapse of ages, the phraseology of law 
 may become first obsolete, and then questionable ; 
 but still there was a time when no obscurity attached 
 to it. But that which never was formally and dog- 
 matically expressed, and which, apart from the aid of 
 traditionary knowledge, could not, even in an early 
 age, have been precisely determined, we may boldly 
 say was not intended as Law, and can never be so 
 employed without hurtfully entangling consciences, 
 and confounding what is really important in morals 
 with what is indifferent. To insist upon some sup- 
 posed primitive usage, known to us only through a 
 j)roccss of ambiguous inferences; and in doing so 
 trample upon the unchangeable and always intelligi- 
 ble rules of Christian charity, is to subvert reason 
 and piety, and to leave no vital force in either. 
 
 God does not confer common sense upon mankind 
 by miracle ; nor did he put in movement the vast 
 economy of revelation for the purpose of teaching 
 that which may otherwise be known, or of giving 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 95 
 
 decisions upon matters to which human reason is 
 fully competent. Our Lord's mode of popular in- 
 struction shows clearly what is supposed and expected 
 on the part of man, in listening to divine teaching. 
 He boldly expresses general principles in tropical 
 terms ; and these, such as convey either no moral 
 meaning, or none that would not be trite, frivolous, 
 or even pernicious, unless freely interpreted, as they 
 were intended, by sound common sense. The literal 
 version given of some of these instructions by the 
 fanatic would indeed, if generally prevalent, turn the 
 world upside down. Our Lord omits entirely those 
 explanations, cautions, and limitations, which are 
 superfluous where good sense is in exercise, and 
 which must be unavailing where it is wanting. 
 
 The apostles, in like manner, not only appeal in 
 particular instances to the good sense of their follow- 
 ers, but manifestly presuppose its competenc}^ to the 
 management of religious, as well as of secular affairs. 
 " I speak unto wise men ; judge ye what I say." 
 " Be not children in understanding." " Is there 
 not a wise man among you ?" Such is the style of 
 those who were commissioned to guide mankind, not 
 to enslave them. But despotism speaks a very dif- 
 ferent language; and it is its characteristic to leave 
 no room for discretion : it will push law and precept 
 into every corner of life, and obtrude specific direc- 
 tions where common reason and ordinary motives 
 need no aid. Despotism grudges to treat men as 
 men; but must always deal with them either as chil- 
 dren, or as wild beasts ; it will alwa}'? prescribe, and 
 measure out every movement; it will pronounce upon 
 the little as well as upon the great ; and is not con- 
 tent unless it makes itself felt and heard every mo- 
 ment, and in every place. Christianity takes its 
 station upon another ground, and is moved by ano- 
 ther spirit. Nevertheless, we may make the Apostles 
 despots, if we will thrust them into the iron chair of 
 
96 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 tyranny, and extort law from their lips, where in fact 
 they have uttered no decree. 
 
 Christians, of every successive age, are solemnly 
 enjoined to profess, to uphold, and to diffuse the 
 Gospel. But the discharge of this arduous duty, in 
 the amplitude of its meaning, involves many and 
 various measures, adapted to the ever-changing occa- 
 sions of human affairs, and of a sort not to be pre- 
 scribed in a code, but which must spring from the 
 intelHgent zeal and discretion of those who succes- 
 sively steer the helm of the Church. Human saga- 
 city and prudence (exalted and guided by heavenly 
 wisdom) here find their field. Now, in saying that 
 such and such courses of action belong to the sphere 
 of reason, we virtually exclude tliem from the pecu- 
 liar circle of revelation. Revelation comes in 
 wherever revelation is needed ; but it is not needed 
 where the means and the end lie within the grasp of 
 the human mind. God, who commands us to employ 
 the faculties he lias given us, will not at the same 
 time supersede their exercise: this were a glaring in- 
 consistency. Whatever reason sanctions, in things 
 appertaining to its domain, God virtually sanctions 
 by the voice, at once, of natural and of supernatural 
 theology. 
 
 On the ground then of these general principles, 
 we readil}' evade the superstition of the zealot, on 
 the one hand, who will hold no communion with us 
 unless we understand, as he does, some ambiguous 
 allusion to a matter of ritual or polit}'; and we reject, 
 on the other hand, for the same reasons, the arro- 
 gance of the despot who desires to inflict penalties 
 and to impose restraints upon those who do not ac- 
 knowledge his right to legislate where Christ has 
 promulgated no law. Furthermore, on the \e\y 
 same principles, we hold ourselves free to devise, nay, 
 more than this, bound in duty to devise, and to carry 
 into effect, whatever schemes or modes of procedure 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 97 
 
 may appear proper for promoting or for upholding 
 religious trutli in the world, and for transmitting it 
 to posterity; provided always, that such measures 
 accord with the spirit of Christianity, and do not 
 trench, either directly or remotely, upon any of its 
 explicit injunctions. The duty, individually, of con- 
 curring with aity such measures, and of yielding obe- 
 dience to those who enforce them, must be referred 
 to the broad principle which enjoins compliance 
 with, and submission to existing arrangements, 
 wherever conscience is not invaded. To resist or 
 obstruct public measures, without necessity, is always 
 immoral. 
 
 But whatever is devised or decreed, within the 
 Christian Church, or decreed concerning it, must 
 comport with certain rudiments of polity and wor- 
 ship which are to be gathered from the New Testa- 
 ment, and which stand there either explicitly deter- 
 mined, or reasonably involved in unquestionable 
 facts. What is most important of this kind may 
 conveniently be brought under the following articles ; 
 the first of which relates to the duty of openly pro- 
 fessing Christianity, and to the consequences of that 
 profession ; the second, to the exclusiveness of the 
 Christian profession ; the third, to the distribution 
 of functions within the Church; the fourth, to the 
 allotment of offices to individuals ; the fifth, to those 
 secular arrangements which this allotment makes ne- 
 cessary ; the sixth, to the source or derivation of 
 sacred offices ; the seventh, to the counterpoise of 
 the authority vested in the officers of the Church ; 
 and the eighth, to the gradations of rank among its 
 officers, or to their relative position and respective 
 spheres. 
 
 How much soever of learning and of dialectic 
 ability may have already been expended upon the 
 subjects involved in the above-named particulars. 
 
98 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 there may yet be room for a statement of them, in 
 that light in which lliey appear to common sense, 
 when no interests of party, or prejudices of education 
 are to be saved. 
 
 I. As matter of form, we must advance the preli- 
 minary axiom — That Christianity demands from its 
 adherents, without exception or evasion, an open 
 profession of their belief, and frequent public com- 
 munication, one with another, as well for purposes of 
 worship, as of mutual aid, instruction, and discipline. 
 This we assume as granted ; or as not standing in 
 need of the induction of proof. Christianity is 
 essentially social, and the public observances which it 
 enjoins involve, by necessity, not merely a casual in- 
 tercourse among its adherents; but some system of 
 organization and government. We had need to bear 
 it in mind that, as an incidental or occasional pro- 
 fession of our faith in Christ does not satisfy the 
 obligations we are under as his disciples ; so neither 
 does accidental association, prompted by personal 
 friendship merely, or by taste, fulfil the requirements 
 of church communion. 
 
 This first axiom of church polity is properly in- 
 sisted upon when we have to refute asceticism, and 
 mystic or abstracted selfishness ; whether in its an- 
 cient anchoretic garb, or in its modern guise of ]:>hi- 
 losophic eclecticism ; and this is an error not very 
 unlikely at present to gain some prevalence. Refuted 
 infidelity may probably take refuge in a mute admis- 
 sion of the truth of Christianity. Again, the same 
 principle stands opposed to the factious doctrine, 
 which allows to every Christian the liberty to sepa- 
 rate himself from his brethren on the pretext of his 
 particular opinions, on any point of belief or ritual. 
 Christ enjoins his disciples to assemble themselves 
 together in his name ; and his apostle explicitly for- 
 bids their parting into little companies, on the ground 
 
RUDIxMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. " 9y 
 
 either of doubtful questions, or of attachment to in- 
 dividual teachers and leaders. Sectarism contradicts 
 the first rudiment of Christian combination. 
 
 Moreover, a fair, and indeed an unavoidable ex- 
 tension of this same first article of church polity, in- 
 volves the duly of carrying out the Christian social 
 principle in every direction, and to the utmost extent 
 to which it will go. If all Christians residing within 
 a small circle or vicinage, are required to recognise 
 each other as such, and to institute a public and 
 visible communion, the Christians of a larger circle, 
 as of a city, or of a district, cannot be excused from 
 the same duty, so far as the conditions of that wider 
 sphere may admit. While Christian communion 
 within a small circle may be intimate and frequent, 
 within a large circle it can only be of a more general 
 sort; but the one is as much demanded as the other; 
 and both the one and the other must be systematic 
 and perpetual; not casual, loose, or merely sponta- 
 neous. Religious organization finds no reasonable 
 limit until it has spread itself out, from congregations 
 to cities, from cities to provinces, from provinces to 
 empires; nay, until the family of man shall present 
 itself to the pleased eye of Heaven, in harmony and 
 concert, as the one Household of Faith. Combina- 
 tion is the law of Christ: insulation and disunion 
 are essentially anti-christian ; nothing can more dis- 
 tinctly be anti-christian ; superstition is less so. 
 
 A national Church, well devised, and wisely ad- 
 ministered, may be considered as nothing else than a 
 reasonable expansion of the first rudiment of exter- 
 nal Christianity ; and as a virtual fulfilment of the 
 command — "Forsake not the assembling of your- 
 selves together." 
 
 n. Our first axiom, which is comprehensive in its 
 aspect, demands to be attached to our second, which 
 is restrictive. Christianity is the belief of certain 
 
100 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 alleged facts ; and it Is also a certain line ofconduct, 
 springing from the motives which those facts engen- 
 der. But all men do not profess this faith ; nor do 
 all that profess it maintain a course of conduct such 
 as must be reckoned necessary to the Christian 
 character. The Gospel therefore, if its peculiarity 
 and its power are to be preserved, brings in a dis- 
 tinction between man and man, even among those 
 who, in no other sense, as members of society, are to 
 be distinguished. Our alternative is either to lower 
 Christianity, and to convert the Church into a recep- 
 tacle of impurit}^, or to adhere to some rule of dis- 
 crimination ; nor can we use any other rule than its 
 own. The Church and the world must needs be 
 parted, until the Church shall have embraced the 
 world, and the world have yielded itself to the Church. 
 Christianity is a comprehensive cornbination ; but it 
 is also a special one. A power of judgment and 
 exclusion is therefore essential to the very existence 
 of a Christian Church. It is an after question, in 
 whose hands this power is to be lodged, and by what 
 regulations it is to be circumscribed. The two op- 
 posite errors that are to be guarded against on this 
 point are, first, that of negligence and license, by 
 means of which great truths are lost sight of, and 
 virtue is compromised ; and secondly, that of sancti- 
 monious or frivolous rigidity, and which is found, 
 seldom or never, to justify itself by a proportionate 
 internal purity. It is, for the most part, much easier 
 to live in societies so formed, than to get into them. 
 In the apostolic Churches, on the contrary, admis- 
 sion was easy, but the terms of continued fellowship 
 difficult ; or difficult to pretenders. The door of the 
 primitive Church stood open, but the Church itself 
 was kept clean. It is an equal fault for a Church 
 to have an open door, and a promiscuous assem- 
 blage, like a market; or a door bolted upon an 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 101 
 
 Augean stable. Morals are vitiated in the one 
 place as fatally as in the other. 
 
 III. Christian association does indeed bring to- 
 gether homogeneous, but yet not undistinguished 
 constituents. No sort of reciprocity of affection, or 
 community of feeling and purpose, can be more ab- 
 solute than that which should be characteristic of a 
 Christian Church. A Church is a family— a bro- 
 therhood, intimately blended together and firmly 
 compacted by immortal love. The welfare of one is 
 as important and as dear to all, as that of another ; 
 yet this equality in love, is an equality in nothing- 
 else. The members of a Church are on a level, as 
 are the members of a family. The one circle, as well 
 as the other, embraces all degrees of power, of know- 
 ledge, and of dignity ; and involves subordination, 
 supremacies, obedience. Broadly classified, the 
 Church consists of the taught and of the teachers, or 
 of the governed and the governing; it is at once a 
 school of knowledge, and a school of virtue; and 
 those vast disparities, as well in virtue as in know- 
 ledge, in judgment and in conduct, which actually 
 present themselves, become the source of confusion 
 instead of advantage, unless there be eflected and 
 maintained a sortinj2^ of persons, and an assignment 
 of functions, according to the abilities of individuals. 
 We assume that any idea of a Church at all ap- 
 proaching to the notion of a spontaneous club of 
 independent citizens, combining themselves for the 
 furtherance of a common interest, and installing and 
 removing their officers at pleasure, is essentiallv 
 at variance with the principle of a Christian Church. 
 We assume moreover, that a church polity, such as 
 we here represent it, can be consistently opposed 
 only by those who rely upon a constant supernatural 
 influence, imparting to each member, without human 
 9 
 
102 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 intervention, all the knowledge and virtue which 
 each is to receive. The practical explication given 
 of the general principles we are here advancing must 
 depend directly upon the notion entertained of the 
 CONSTITUENTS of a Church. For example : we 
 may think of it (and this is in fact a prevailing 
 opinion) as a purel}^ voluntary association of adults, 
 each in full possession of his personal course of 
 conduct, and liable to no more control than he may 
 please, from day to day. to submit to. This may 
 be termed the political idea of a Church. On the 
 other hand we may draw our notions of church 
 polity more from the analogy of the domestic eco- 
 nomy ; and then a Church is an assemblage of 
 persons enjoying various degrees of liberty, but none 
 the absolute liberty proper to the members of a club ; 
 and some of these persons, namely, the infants of the 
 Church, and its catechumens, who do, or who 
 ought to form a large proportion of the entire body, 
 are in no such sense personally free, nor are they 
 possessed of a voice and vote in the affairs of the 
 society. A Church, thus conceived of, implies, of 
 course, a sort of government, and a principle of 
 independent authority, such as the first named idea 
 does not admit. We assume that the latter concep- 
 tion comes much nearer to the apostolic and early 
 model of ecclesiastical combination than the former. 
 Existing controversies hinge, in a great degree, upon 
 this very point ; and we may be bold to add that, 
 when the Christian scheme, in its benign and com- 
 prehensive intention, shall be more fully expanded 
 than it is at present, and when its outstretched arms 
 shall be suffered to embrace the social system, the 
 notion of a Church will necessarily approximate to 
 the latter idea, and will utterly reject the former : 
 ihe first being secular and political, the second 
 spiritual and divine. 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 103 
 
 IV. We have said that, as the constituents of a 
 Church are naturally distinguished by the greatest 
 possible disparities of knowledge, virtue, and age, 
 and as the Church is both a school of learning, and 
 a school of practice, there is implied the existence 
 and exercise of functions as well of government as 
 of instruction ; and the possession of an effective 
 power for carrying forward these various purposes. 
 We now go on to allege, that these powers are not 
 to be exercised casually, or spontaneously, or inter- 
 changeably, by whoever may, from time to time, 
 assume them ; but that OFFICES are to be assigned 
 to OFFICERS, permanently (if not irrevocably) in- 
 stalled. 
 
 It has been affirmed, and even lately,* that, as it is 
 the common privilege of all believers to be " priests 
 and kings," a Church entire is a sacerdotal and royal 
 choir, excluding the distinction between clergy and 
 laity, which distinction contravenes, it is said, the 
 very essence of the sacred association. It is affirmed, 
 moreover, that the true ideal of a Church rejects any 
 sort of supremacy or authority, other than that which 
 a conclave of independent princes might, for conve- 
 nience, institute to-day, and abrogate to-morrow. 
 Do those who insist upon this idea of a universal 
 hierarchy forget that, in the very contexts where the 
 priestly dignity of all Christians is affirmed, spiritual 
 authorities are recognised, and the duty of submis- 
 sion to church rulers is affirmed, in unqualified 
 terms f It has been a frequent error to apply to the 
 existing orders of common life certain high affirma- 
 tions of Scripture, intended only, and true only, in 
 a purely spiritual sense. It was thus that the ancient 
 ascetics interpreted our Loru's injunctions, which 
 were meant to elevate natural principles, in a sense 
 
 * See Neander's " History of the Christian Religion and Church." 
 Passim. 
 
104 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 that altogether subverted the social system, and did 
 violence to God's own laws. 
 
 We here take it as a matter of history, not need- 
 ing formal proof, that apostolic practice and precept 
 established, in the primitive Church, offices assigned 
 to individuals, who permanently exercised the specific 
 functions of their places. If instruction was to be 
 carried on, there were to be teachers ; and if order 
 was to be maintained, there must be rulers; and 
 these, not casually instated, or removable at pleasure, 
 but firmly seated in their chairs, and removable only, 
 if at all, in extraordinary modes, and on signal 
 reasons. 
 
 Apart from the warrant of apostolic precept and 
 example, or if left without authoritative guidance in 
 this instance, a Christian society would reasonably 
 and necessarily take the course of instituting per- 
 manent offices, inasmuch as the common sense and 
 universal usage of mankind demands such a mode 
 of securing the general welfare. The rule which 
 requires functions to be assigned to persons, rises 
 always in importance, and in obligation, in propor- 
 tion to the difficulty and the value of the services to 
 be performed. Trivial or facile duties may well be 
 left to promiscuous agencies ; not so those which, in 
 a high degree, demand skill, experience, accom- 
 plishments, energy of mind, and specific qualities of 
 the temper. Now in these respects there are no 
 duties, whatever, equal in importance to those in- 
 volved in the diffusion and maintenance of religion. 
 No duties are at once so difficult, and so peculiar in 
 their conditions. If in any case the division of labour 
 is necessary and beneficial, it is so in this case. Bet- 
 ter leave the care of the public health, better leave 
 the business of civil government, to the promiscuous 
 ability of any who may offer their services, than so 
 to leave the care of souls. 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 105 
 
 If a confirmatory argument were needed to esta- 
 blish this point, we might derive one of a conclusive, 
 though inferential sort, from our Lord's formal enact- 
 ment, That " those who preach the Gospel should 
 live of the Gospel." In thus exempting the religious 
 teacher from the ordinary labours of life, and in 
 throwing upon the people the duty of shielding their 
 instructors from secular solicitudes, it must follow, 
 that certain persons are permanently devoted to the 
 service of the Church ; unless indeed we admit the 
 great loss and damage, both secular and spiritual, 
 which are consequent upon the taking up, and the 
 laying down of labours, barely compatible the one 
 with the other. Occasional services, remunerated by 
 an occasional stipend, could never be approved of, 
 as systematically the best and most economic mode 
 of obtaining such services. A practice of this kind 
 may, it is true, be justifiable under peculiar circum- 
 stances ; but can never be good as a universal 
 method. The very exception stated by St. Paul in 
 his own case, establishes the rule ; and with the less 
 room for mistake, inasmuch as, on this point, he 
 makes an explicit allusion, in confirmation of his 
 plea, to the Jewish sacerdotal institute, under which 
 the ministers of religion, as a permanent body, re- 
 ceived a revenue that was neither parsimonious nor 
 precarious. 
 
 Our inference may be stated conversely. — As the 
 preachers of the Gospel, by the express law of Christ, 
 are entitled to a comfortable maintenance from the 
 people ; so the people, by implication of rights, may, 
 so long as they afford this provision, claim the un- 
 divided services of their teachers. These duties are 
 correlative ; and the one may be assumed as the con- 
 dition of the other. If the people fail to support their 
 ministers in reasonable competency, these ministers 
 9* 
 
106 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 may hold themselves free to provide for their wants 
 in what other manner they may be able. 
 
 Here again we must say that, if we reject the cle- 
 rical institute, our alternative is the hypothesis of a 
 constant supernatural teaching, conveyed to the 
 Church, either silently, or in so sovereign and casual 
 a manner as to leave no room for the ordinary exer- 
 cise of the human faculties. The clerical institute 
 embodies the great principle, that God operates by 
 the medium of second causes, always, where such a 
 medium is naturally adapted to the end in view. 
 Even in the immediate exertion of his almighty 
 power, we find some attendant and ordinary instru- 
 mentality. 
 
 V. The train of our inferences leads us next to the 
 incidental, though very important point, of the mode 
 and conditions of that maintenance which the clerical 
 body may rightfully demand from the people. 
 
 This point involves some general principles of 
 extensive application. Not to go over the ground 
 touched upon in a preceding section, we have yet 
 to repeat the assumption, that Christianity implies, 
 and leaves room for the exercise of common sense in 
 all those matters which naturally and easily fall under 
 its cognizance. In things intelligible and secular, 
 revelation does not supersede reason, or interfere 
 with its exercise. On this path superstitious and 
 heated minds have entangled themselves in the most 
 serious difficulties. Looking for a hand from 
 Heaven, where Heaven says, "Help thyself," they 
 have lost at once the benefits of reason, and the aids 
 of revelation. 
 
 Now if there are at all any arrangements, con- 
 nected with religion, which may be granted to come 
 within the province of human prudence, pecuniary 
 arrangements certainly are of that sort. In these, 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 107 
 
 eminently, men are at home, and are competent to 
 the part assigned them. Again, if there be any por- 
 tion of the ecclesiastical economy which asks to be 
 specifically adjusted, in each instance, to places, 
 times, and popular habits, or if there be any portion 
 concerning which an irrevocable and universal enact- 
 ment would have been undesirable, or impracticable, 
 surely the matter of church revenues is such. 
 Nothing could more effectually have obstructed the 
 progress of the Gospel, nothing could have been 
 more at variance with its spirit, and intention, as a 
 religion for mankind, than the entailing upon the 
 Church, by apostolic authority, certain fiscal regula- 
 tions, every where and always obligatory. A system 
 may be practicable and beneficial in one age or 
 country, which is not so in another. Or there may 
 be a mode of maintaining the ministers of religion 
 decisively advantageous where Christianity is fully 
 recognised by a whole people, which could not have 
 obtained, and which could not even have been sug- 
 gested, at first, and under those circumstances of 
 opposition against which, for the accomplishment of 
 high purposes, the Church was to push its way. 
 
 All that ought to be expected from the apostles on 
 this subject, is precisely what we actually receive; 
 namely, a very distinct assertion of the general 
 PRINCIPLE, that those who devote themselves to the 
 religious instruction of the people, should live by 
 that means. The duty of the people and the claims 
 of the clergy, are, by the inspired writers, established 
 on the firm basis of an explicit enactment, as " from 
 the Lord ;" and an appeal also, confirmatory of both, 
 is made at once to common reasons of equity, and to 
 the pure and generous sentiments which the Gospel 
 brings into play. On no plea, except that of abso- 
 lute inability, through extreme poverty, can a Chris- 
 tian people evade their obligation in this behalf. No 
 
108 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 individual, professing any sort of submission to the 
 law of Christ, and no community publicly recognising 
 the Scriptures as divine, can be deemed at liberty to 
 save himself, or itself, the cost of a clerical institute ; 
 nor can the indifference of an}^ or their mistaken ap- 
 prehensions of what is becoming, excuse them from 
 bearing their part in this expense. God " commands 
 all men every where to repent, and believe the Gos- 
 pel ;" all therefore to whom this message comes are 
 liable to the charge thence accruing ; nor is there 
 any injustice in requiring men to fulfil a condition 
 necessarily connected with their own highest welfare. 
 
 In what particular mode the people shall fulfil their 
 obligation toward their religious teachers, is not 
 determined by the authority which enjoins it. The 
 ground here is open, and the subject, in all its 
 bearings, lies within the compass of common sense ; 
 we are free therefore to devise schemes, and to try 
 experiments ; and, for our guidance we may turn to 
 the lessons of experience. Nothing, in this matter, is 
 unlawful, which involves no injustice ; and we hold it 
 a most idle superstition to affirm that nothing is ab- 
 stractedly good, or Christian like, except that acci- 
 dental mode, which, from the peculiarity of the case, 
 was the only one whereby the first promulgators of 
 the Gospel could be maintained. In truth, no modern 
 religious community adheres to any such rule ; but on 
 the contrary, the very parties most vehement in their 
 advocacy of the voluntary principle, themselves care- 
 fully retain whatever corporate property may have 
 fallen into their hands ; and while they inveigh against 
 endowments, must be understood to mean, any endow- 
 ments but their own. 
 
 The first Christian teachers could be supported in 
 no other way than by the undefined gratuities of their 
 converts; nor, during the spring-time of zeal and af- 
 fection was this revenue likely either to be insufficient, 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 109 
 
 or injurious by its redundancy. The same means of 
 support must, of course, always be abstractedly 
 lawful ; and it may indeed be free from objection, so 
 long as some method of distibution is adhered to (as 
 in the first age of the Church) which cuts off the de- 
 pendence of individuals upon individuals. And yet 
 this simple plan will always tend toward a more com- 
 plex form. At a very early time it actually reached 
 such a form; for the Church possessed herself of a 
 chest ; that is to say, became mistress of a disposable 
 capital ; and availed herself of the powers and advan- 
 tages thence naturally arising. The stewards of that 
 chest, and those for whom they acted, were no longer 
 in an absolute sense dependent upon the people. No 
 imaginable provisions can exclude the possibility of 
 such accumulations. Moreover the Church, even in 
 its infancy, became the inheritress of property, real as 
 well as personal ; and often to a large amount. Were 
 these bequests (whether prudent and desirable or not) 
 were they essentially immoral and unchristian, and 
 such as should have been invariably renounced f 
 They are not so esteemed in our own enlightened 
 times ; nor are they rejected by the most stern and 
 self-denying of our sects. 
 
 Or we might ask, was it an immoral act, on the 
 part of Constantine, when he recognised and con- 
 firmed the then existing property of religious corpo- 
 rations, and so at once sealed and saved the vvealth 
 of the Church ? we do not so think it. The Church, 
 therefore, in the gradual, the natural, and the una- 
 voidable course of events, had moved from her ori- 
 ginal position, in relation to the people ; and though 
 no impo&t was levied, was yet sustained in a mode 
 essentially unlike the one that had prevailed in the 
 apostolic age. The voluntary principle was still in 
 full vigour ; but its bearing upon the clergy had be- 
 come complicated, and indirect ; and this had hap- 
 
110 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 pened in a manner not at any distinct stage of the 
 process to be either condemned, or arrested. 
 
 When at length the civil authority felt the necessity 
 of at once setting a bound to the superstitious pro- 
 fession of the people toward the Church, and of 
 stretching a controlling hand over the avidity of the 
 clergy, and when different methods of commutation 
 were introduced, or a definite impost was granted, in 
 the place of unbounded gratuities; can we affirm that 
 the change was from a better method to a worse ; or 
 that, in any sense, primitive purity was by this means 
 compromised in behalf of corruption and subserviency? 
 The very reverse is nearer to the truth. The system 
 of church taxation, and the restrictive testamentary en- 
 actments therewith connected, came in as A RELIEF to 
 the people, and as a check upon the clergy : it was a 
 dam, thrown across the swollen torrent that had been 
 Jong drowning the Church, and draining the State. 
 
 Nothing could be more natural than for those, 
 whether churchmen or statesmen, who wished to sub- 
 stitute a legal provision for the then voluntary prin- 
 ciple, and its enormous abuses, to look to the Mosaic 
 Institution, as their guide and sanction. — The in- 
 spired writers had given no warning that a system 
 which the Divine wisdom had established in one in- 
 stance, must be held inexpedient and unlawful in 
 every other; nay, they had virtually linked the 
 Christian to the Jewish clerical scheme by appealing 
 to the one as affording a reason applicable to the 
 other. The universal usage of mankind accorded, 
 in this instance, with that of the Jewish people; nor 
 did any thing stand opposed to it, but the accidental 
 practice of the primitive Church, which practice had 
 itself, as was natural, fallen into a disorderly and per- 
 nicious course. 
 
 In truth, to preserve, for any length of time, and 
 in its absolute simplicity and purity, the principle of 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. Ill 
 
 clerical support, by the immediate and undefined 
 gratuities of the people, is what no communion has 
 been able to effect : nor can we even imagine the 
 means of doing so. But when once this pristine 
 simplicity has given way, as it soon must, in part, or 
 entirely, to a financial systEx^i, and has admitted 
 accumulations, endowments, and corporate posses- 
 sions, then a very fair question presents itself, namely, 
 whether an irregular and anomalous method, open to 
 undefined abuses, may not, with high advantage, as 
 well to the people as to the clergy, be exchanged for 
 a legal provision. To oppose such an exchange on 
 the pretext of primitive purity and abstract principle, 
 must be deemed equally disingenuous and illogical, 
 when the objection comes from those who make no 
 scruple of accepting bequests, of retaining endow- 
 ments, of accumulating funds, or of renting the area 
 of a chapel. To demand payment for so many 
 square inches of a bench or pew, is a practice as little 
 apostolic as to demand a tithe. 
 
 It is however quite manifest, and ought always to 
 be in the most explicit manner acknowledged, that 
 where, unhappily, Christianity has sunk down into 
 several irreconcilable, or unreconciled forms, and 
 where faction and political interests have firmly en- 
 cased theological controv^ersies, there, some special 
 provisions are called for by bare justice, and by the 
 principle of religious liberty, to prevent a public 
 church tax from resting unfairly upon portions of the 
 community. True indeed it is that no arrangements 
 which take their necessity from what is abstractedly 
 evil, can be, in themselves, abstractedly good: — 
 abstract evil proves itself to be evil, at whatever 
 point it comes in contact with our welfare : nothing 
 can avail to make it work well ; and our best inge- 
 nuity and best intentions still are bafiled. Now re- 
 
112 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 ligious divisions are the greatest of abstract evils ; 
 and they therefore trouble and distract and disparage 
 every community that is affected by them. So long 
 as religious divisions continue, it is vain to hope for 
 an absolutely prosperous and happy condition, either 
 of the Church or the State. Meanwhile every pos- 
 sible endeavour should be made to avert, or to re- 
 move those occasions of exasperation which keep 
 alive faction, and put in peril the whole frame-work 
 of society. It may indeed be wise and expedient to 
 support, or to abstain from removing, an existing 
 form of religion ; although it be a form disapproved 
 of by a portion of the people ; but in this case the 
 acquiescence of the dissidents should be mildly urged 
 on the general grounds of public utility ; not de- 
 manded on high and arrogant principles ; and in 
 such a case these dissidents would indeed entitle them- 
 selves to great praise could they rise to the patriotic, 
 Christian-like, and generous feeling, of consenting 
 to a state of things confessedly not abstractedly the 
 best possible; but yet the best which can be effected 
 under the embarrassing circumstances that surround 
 us. This perhaps is too much to expect from the 
 infirmity of human nature ; and if so, it will only 
 remain for us to alleviate, in every practicable man- 
 ner, the galling burden that rests on some of our 
 fellow-citizens and Christian brethren. 
 
 VI. We have assumed, that the Church, as it has 
 its offices, must have its officers ; and these a class 
 of persons permanently devoted to religious services. 
 We assume moreover, that the particular mode in 
 which this class is to receive its pecuniary support is 
 a matter fully open to the determination of the com- 
 mon sense of mankind ; and that therefore any 
 method is lawful, which is found to be expedient. 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 113 
 
 But the question which next presents itself is of 
 the highest moment, and involves almost every other 
 consideration, connected with church polity. Our 
 question is this — Whence does the clerical function 
 and power arise ; or in what manner is it transmitted 
 from hand to hand; or under whose control does it 
 rest ? 
 
 In simply stating his opinion on this capital point, 
 the author must not be supposed either unapprized of 
 the vast controversy of which it has been the subject; 
 or as presuming to dogmatize where the wise are dif- 
 fident ; but he yet feels that, as the question has sel- 
 dom hitherto been treated except by partisans, and 
 never without an anxious regard to some existing in- 
 terests, there is room for considering it in the light of 
 common sense, and as it appears to minds divested of 
 sectarian predilections. 
 
 The clerical function and power may then, in the 
 first place, be imagined to be derived, in each in- 
 stance, immediately from Heaven, by impulses and 
 irresistible convictions on the mind of the individual 
 who challenges to himself the right to exercise eccle- 
 siastical authority. Such was the prophetic function 
 of old; and such, essentially, is the idea of the Chris- 
 tian ministry entertained by the Quakers ; and in 
 measure too by some other modern sects. We do 
 not here deem it necessary to entertain this supposi- 
 tion, as worthy of argument: in truth, by its very 
 nature, it exempts itself from the range of reason : 
 its only ground is that of perpetual miraculous 
 attestation. 
 
 In the second place, sacerdotal authority may be 
 affirmed to spring, by perpetual derivation and tra- 
 dition, from itself. Thai is to sny, the clerical body, 
 in each successive age, may be held to be empowered 
 to deliver to its sus'cessors, called and installed by 
 10 
 
114 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 itself, the entire authority which, in a like manner, it 
 received from its predecessors. This doctrine is the 
 fundamental article of the Romish Church, (yet it is 
 a doctrine quite separable from the usurpations and 
 errors of that Church,) and it has been inherited and 
 embodied by the Church of England, and other 
 episcopal communions. 
 
 In the third place, all powers of government and 
 instruction, within the Church, may be alleged to 
 originate with the will of those for whom such powers 
 are exercised : that is to say, of the people, as dis- 
 tinguished from their clergy, and who may elect and 
 remove their teachers and rulers at pleasure. 
 
 Or lastly, there may be imagined a sort of com- 
 promise between clergy and laity, such as shall leave 
 a power of calling and ordaining with the former, 
 and of electing and instating with the latter. This 
 last method prevails among most of our modern 
 sects, but under circumstances that produce diiferent 
 practical results. Presbyterianism, attempered in 
 an effective degree by lay influence, presents this 
 scheme in perhaps its most favourable aspect, and at 
 once confers a substantial and necessary power upon 
 the clergy, while ihe people have the means of 
 securing themselves against tyranny and encroach- 
 ment. The congregational communions, while they 
 attribute a semblance of special authority to their 
 clergy, in the instance of ordination, (wliich however 
 is now very commonly confessed to amount to nothing 
 more than a paternal or fraternal recognition of the 
 people's sovereign act,) do substantially devolve all 
 power, not indeed upon the Church ; — for a Church, 
 by universal admission, is a body, consisting of people 
 and ministers ; but upon the laity, as acting apart 
 from the clergy, and as considered competent to de- 
 cide in the most important of all affairs, without their 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 115 
 
 rulers, and indeed while they have none.* Moreover, 
 by the absolute insulation of each chapel society, 
 and by the immediate dependence of each minister 
 upon the single congregation which he serves, all 
 forms and semblances of clerical authority, be they 
 what they may, are virtually held in abeyance. He 
 who must depart when those who support him no 
 longer wish for his services, exercises no power such 
 as can avail in those very instances where power is 
 needed — namely, to enforce discipline against sturdy 
 delinquents, and to maintain truth and morality in 
 opposition to the caprices or the lax desires of the 
 people. This is a theory of church government 
 which, much as it may recommend itself to our 
 modern republican sentiments, must be denounced as 
 subversive of all religious authority, (whether for good 
 or ill,) and as broadly and essentially distinguished 
 from the apostolic model. 
 
 In making a choice among the above-named prin- 
 ciples, and especially if we were to do so apart from 
 apostolic precepts or precedents, it would be very 
 natural to have recourse to the analogy of civil life; 
 and, as under a free government, all public functions 
 return, immediately or remotely, to their source — the 
 will of those for whose benefit they are exercised, the 
 inference would be, that religious functions should 
 obey the same rule ; and that the selective and elec- 
 tive powers, including necessarily the power to revoke, 
 and to repel pastoral authority, should reside in the 
 people. This sort of reasoning from secular principles, 
 acquires peculiar force when applied to religious com- 
 munities in modern times, breathing as they do the 
 inspiriting atmosphere of democratic independence. 
 
 * Let it be remembered, that though a Congregation may be des- 
 titute of a minister, a Church, in the primitive sense of the word, is 
 never destitute of her pastors. The severest persecutions did not reduce 
 nny ancient Church to absolute widowhood. 
 
116 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 Certain modes of government might, it may be said, 
 be tolerable or good in times or in countries where the 
 popular mind had not been kindled, and where silent 
 submission to irresponsible authority has long; been 
 the settled habit of the people ; but the same modes 
 become wholly inapplicable to societies unaccustomed 
 to endure any species of restraint beyond what is felt 
 by all to be indispensable. It may, we say, seem as 
 if a scheme of church government which involves sub- 
 stantial clerical powers, even though proved to be 
 apostolic, could not find room upon modern ground. 
 
 Then again, when the constant tendency of privi- 
 leged orders, and especially of sacerdotal orders, to 
 encroach upon the public liberties, is considered, we 
 must feel strongly the danger of giving place to a self- 
 derived, and independent religious authority. With 
 the evidence of history before us, and the common 
 impulses of human nature in view, every dispassion- 
 ate mind reluctates to admit a principle that seems 
 so pregnant with mischief. If at last compelled to 
 grant that our Lord actually left his Church on this 
 foundation, we are placed in a position that demands 
 the most vigilant regard ; nor can we do less than 
 bestow an extreme care upon the duty of maintaining, 
 in its full efficiency, that counterpoise to spiritual 
 despotism, or rather that safeguard against its ad- 
 vances, which we find to have been in play within the 
 apostolic societies. 
 
 In the present instance argumentative equity re- 
 quires us to premise a caution of the following kind : 
 — while speaking of the maintenance of the clergy, 
 we rebutted an inference too hastily drawn from the 
 practice of the first Churches, as if it were to be bind- 
 ing upon ourselves, by saying that, as, in the nature 
 of the case, no other method of supporting the preach- 
 ers of the Gospel than that of the free contributions 
 of the people could then find room, it will not follow 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 117 
 
 that the same method was intended to be every where 
 adhered to, when the external j)osition of Christianity 
 in the world should come to be materially altered. 
 Now the analogy of reasoning demands that we should, 
 at the least, hesitate a while before we regard the 
 conduct of the Institutor of a NEW Religion in ap- 
 pointing his ministers, or even their method of proceed- 
 ing in naming their successors, as absolutely conclusive 
 in favour of the same method, in after times; inas- 
 much as no other plan of appointment can be ima- 
 gined as proper or practicable, at the commencement 
 of a new order of things: yet some other plan may 
 be both possible and elegible when this same economy 
 has run on through a tract of time. It would be a 
 solecism to talk of the popular election or installation 
 of the teachers of a new faith. Let then this preli- 
 minary caution be kept in mind ; and although it may 
 be found that we search the Gospels, the Acts, and the 
 Epistles in vain for any precept, precedent, or fair 
 inference, such as might warrant the popular creation 
 of the ministers of religion, or a popular control over 
 them, when created, in the way of election, removal, 
 or dispossession of clerical character, nevertheless we 
 must abstain from positively concluding that no such 
 democratic control may be lawful in our own times. 
 In fact, though not to be traced in the canonic writ- 
 ings, the popular voice and suffrage in the election of 
 the bishop, unquestionably obtained a very early pre- 
 valence ; and those who absolutely exclude the will of 
 the people in the choice of their pastors, although 
 not reprovable by letter of Scripture, yet oppose one 
 of the most ancient and universal of ecclesiastical 
 usages. 
 
 A curious inconsistency has attended the modern 
 controversy on the source or origin of clerical 
 power, inasmuch as the opponents have mutually 
 exchanged positions. Those, on the one side, whose 
 
118 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 rule and practice it ordinarily is to pay a profound 
 regard to ancient authority, and who, not in a few 
 instances, are accustomed to eke out a scanty scrip- 
 ture proof by the testimony of the Fathers, and to 
 lean on the arm of tradition, shut their ears on this 
 point against the clear and undoubted voice of vene- 
 rable antiquity, and stiffly adhere to the express 
 apostolic practice. On the other hand^ — and we 
 cannot but note the strange casualties incident to 
 theological warfare, those who, on almost every 
 other question, if not on every other, take their 
 immovable stand upon the explicit authority of 
 Scripture, and who will do neither more nor less 
 than can be made good by text upon text, these very 
 persons, in defending the main article of their eccle- 
 siastical polity, namely the popular call, appoint- 
 ment, election, and removal, of pastors and teachers, 
 are left without warranty of Scripture, (some torturing 
 of terms excepted,) and without the sanction of a 
 single apostolic instance; and are compelled to sup- 
 port the practice they adopt on the lower ground of 
 expedienc}', or of the natural rights of men, or of 
 the example of the early Church, as reported by 
 ecclesiastical writers. Thus does the characteristic 
 practice of these parties stand contradicted by their 
 characteristic principle. We would be careful not to 
 overstate facts, and yet can say nothing less than 
 this. That the sovereignty of the people in church 
 affairs, their competency to act without their pastors, 
 the dependence of single pastors or teachers upon 
 single congregations, the validity of a popular call 
 to the work of the ministry, the election of each pas- 
 tor by his flock, and the power to remove him at 
 pleasure; or, in one word, the doctrine of unmixed 
 church democracy, is zealously professed, and reso- 
 lutely acted upon, by those who affirm that our Lord 
 left his Church, as well in its polity as its doctrine 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 119 
 
 and morals, such precisely as he willed that it should 
 continue; and that whatever is not of express 
 Divine appointment is a corruption, and an affront 
 to his supremacy ! 
 
 The strangeness of this inconsistency has in fact 
 imposed upon the Christian world ; for it has been 
 assumed as incredible that the rigid advocates of the 
 sufficiency of Scripture in matters of polity and 
 worship, should themselves have laid, as the founda- 
 tion-stone of their ecclesiastical structure, a practice 
 that is destitute of apostolic precept and example. It 
 is not without some amazement that we find a con- 
 gregational Church, on the modern scheme, pro- 
 ceeding in the momentous act of creating, or of 
 electing to itself a pastor and teacher, without being 
 able to allege, from the New Testament, any law or 
 license to that effect, or any example of an unam- 
 biguous and satisfactory kind. Whether this prac- 
 tice may now be expedient and lawful, is not the 
 question ; but is it formally enjoined ? are the people 
 instructed by the apostles in what manner to acquit 
 themselves of so difficult and peculiar a duty? or is 
 any one of the apostolic societies exhibited in delibe- 
 ration on the occasion of calling one pastor to their 
 service, and of discharging another ? On secular 
 principles nothing can be more simple or reasonable 
 than that those who pa^' should command ; and in 
 the present temper of mankind, especially in certain 
 circles, it may be nearly impracticable to secure sub- 
 mission to any other law. Nevertheless, the serious 
 question returns upon us — Is this the law, or this 
 the principle recognised as the basis of church 
 polity in the New Testament? We are compelled 
 to answer — it is not. 
 
 That our Lord, in a sovereign manner, elected 
 and empowered every one of those who were to pro- 
 
120 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM* 
 
 mulgate bis religion is not questioned. The apos- 
 tles assume the same irresponsible authority in re- 
 lation to such as they acknowledged in the character 
 of religious teachers ; and while tiiey freely admitted, 
 and indeed invited, the popular concurrence on all 
 occasions where common or secular interests were in- 
 volved, and especially in every pecuniary transac- 
 tion, yet reserved to themselves the power to create 
 spiritual officers. For aught that appears in the CA- 
 NONICAL WRITINGS, no other mode of appointment 
 found room in the Church; and the assumption that 
 the apostles exercised this power in virtue of their 
 extraordinary commission, and on the ground of their 
 miraculous knowledge of hearts, is purely gratuitous. 
 So it may have been ; but we have no evidence in 
 support of the allegation. 
 
 The apostolic epistles abound, as well in exhorta- 
 tions addressed to the people, urging the duty of sub- 
 mission to their spiritual rulers, as in admonitions 
 given to the officers of the Church, and pressing upon 
 them the temper and conduct, the fidelity, the purity, 
 the impartiality, and the meekness, which become 
 their station. We find also, in the three clerical 
 epistles of Paul, addressed to two of the individuals 
 whom he had empowered to set in order, and to keep 
 in order the Churches, specific instructions concern- 
 ing the appointment and government of spiritual 
 officers, both higher and lower. All this accords well 
 wiih the supposition that the clerical authority and 
 function springs from within itself, and is irrespective 
 of the popular will. But if the congregational and 
 democratic theory, or any principle allied to it, be 
 the true one, or if any such principle had been con- 
 templated as what was to succeed to the then extraor- 
 dinary apostolic authorit}', we cannot but expect, on 
 so capital and momentous a subject, that necessarjr 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 121 
 
 instructions, and a formal warranty too, would have 
 been very distinctly conveyed to tlie parties who were 
 to exercise powers so extensive, so delicate, and so 
 difficult. On various questions of discipline, christian 
 societies, at large, are addressed by St. Paul, and in- 
 structed what course to pursue : the Brotherhood 
 is told how it should act. But what article of dis- 
 cipline can be compared in importance with the seri- 
 ous duty, devolving so often upon our-modern con- 
 gregational Churches, of looking out for themselves 
 and of instating their bishops ? Again, can a Church, 
 at any time, be called to discharge a part so serious 
 as is that of dismissing, and perhaps of degrading its 
 bishop? yet, for the acquittal of none of these per- 
 plexing duties, does a Church receive one word of 
 guidance, or one syllable of authentication, from the 
 inspired writings. Let it be atlirmed that all neces- 
 sary instructions on svrh points may be gathered by 
 fair inference from the general spirit of Christianity. 
 Be it so ; only let it then be clearly understood, that 
 the first principle of modern Congregationalism rests, 
 not on scripture precept and precedent, but upon ge- 
 neral and vague inferences. 
 
 If the apostolic writings aflford a single particle of 
 evidence, direct or indirect, in favour of tlie doctrine 
 of the popular origination, or popular control of the 
 clerical office, let it be produced. If not, even if we 
 should admit by accommodation, the propriety of 
 some sort of popular influence in this behalf, we must 
 do so manifestly in contradiction to the principle of 
 the sufficiency, and the sole authority of Scripture 
 in matters of church polity. The two principles of 
 modern democracy in church affairs, and of an un» 
 bending adherence to the letter of Scripture in what 
 relates to worship and government, are abhorrent, 
 the one of the other. 
 
 Meanwhile, calm and well informed men, indif- 
 11 
 
122 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 ferent to actual interests, must halt on the threshold 
 when summoned to enter the Church, if the ultimate 
 power therein is alleged to rest with a sacerdotal or- 
 der, self-evolved, and irresponsible. Will human 
 nature well bear to be so far trusted ? Does even 
 Christianity afford any safeguard against the natural 
 abuses and encroachments that attend insulated and 
 undefined spiritual authority? These proper and 
 anxious inquiries lead tiie way to our next rudiment 
 of Church Polity, and which presents an adequate 
 balance to sacerdotal powers. 
 
 VII. Christianity, assuredly, is neither despotic in 
 its spirit, nor could it generate despotisms, in any 
 case, if allowed to retain that rudiment which, in the 
 primitive Churches, operated as a natural counter- 
 poise to clerical authority. This counterpoise was 
 the participation of the people — the 7rx^6og, in church 
 deliberations, and church acts ; and especially the 
 scope allowed to popular agency in every punitive 
 exercise of discipHne. An effective check is this to 
 what might otherwise be formidable in sacerdotal 
 power. So long as it is fully and freely admitted 
 clerical authority may safely reach a high and salu- 
 tary point ; but remove or restrict it, and then our 
 alternative is either to give room to the pride and ar- 
 rogance of priests, or to cashier the ministers of reli- 
 gion of all dignity and power (as an order) and to 
 deny them the greater part of their useful influence. 
 The presence and active operation of this popular 
 element in church affairs is not a whit less necessary 
 as the guarantee of the power of the clergy, than as 
 the safeguard of the liberties of the people. 
 
 As the primitive Churches knew nothing of that 
 ministerial subserviency which belongs to our modern 
 congregational communities, so neither did they ad- 
 mit that fatal separation between clergy and laity 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 123 
 
 which destroys all effective reciprocity betvveea the 
 two, leaves to the former a perilous, nay ruinous 
 irresponsibility, and treats the latter as the passive, 
 or rather the dead subjects of clerical operations. On 
 this point almost every existing Christian communi- 
 ty has moved far from the foundation on which alone 
 the Church can be securely reared : — some, throw- 
 ing the sovereign power into the hands of the 
 people ; while otiiers have left it, unbalanced, with 
 the clergy. Christianity may be expected to regain 
 its energy when, to the clergy is restored that inde- 
 pendent authority and dignity, as the ministers of 
 Heaven, with v/hich they may safely be intrusted, 
 so long as they yield to the apostolic counterpoise of 
 popular influence. 
 
 In every age it has been by gathering themselves 
 into clusters, apart from the people, by sitting in 
 conclave, with the doors barred against the laity, and 
 by concerting measures, not in the church, but in 
 chambers and closets, that the ministers of religion 
 have converted the Gospel into a system of tyranny 
 and an engine of crueltyo The history of Spiritual 
 Despotism hinges upon this divulsion of the elements 
 of Church Power. An impious and fatal divorce of 
 what God had joined — a divorce craftily effected by 
 the clergy, was the principal means of introducing 
 and of establishing all corruptions and all usurpa- 
 tions. 
 
 The people, whether in mass, or by representa- 
 tion, being present, and taking a share in church 
 proceedings, and being allowed a real, not a nominal 
 agency in chmch acts—knowing whatever is pro- 
 posed, and concurring in whatever is determined, 
 there will no longer be danger in granting to the 
 clergy as high and free an authority as Christian 
 men could wish to exercise, or safely to themselves 
 sustain. 
 
 The apostolic societies were, in the fullest sense of 
 
124 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 the word. Communities ; not indeed chaotic assem- 
 blages, liable to the contusions that attend unrestrain- 
 ed democracy, but organized bodies, constituted of 
 head, and lieart, and members, concurring, accord- 
 ing to their several powers, in the same acts, and 
 bound together by a vital sympathy. The principle 
 of apostolic cluirch polity would, as we assume, have 
 been violated in an equal degree, either by any at- 
 tempt of the people to bring their pastors into a sub- 
 servient condition, as their stipendiaries ; or by any 
 endeavour of the clergy to sustain and extend their 
 prerogatives by secret conspiracy. The two great 
 rudiments of ecclesiastical polity, namely, the sacer- 
 dotal origin of sacerdotal powers ; and the presence 
 and concurrence of the people in acts of discipline, 
 and in tlie enactment of regulations, and especially 
 in the management of pecuniary affairs, are corre- 
 lative, and the worst evils arise from parting them, 
 or from practically nullifying either. The one is 
 not worth contending for, apart from the other; and 
 the one is essential to the complete operation of the 
 other. Whichever parly aims to compromise the pri- 
 vileges and rights of the other, is blind to its own. 
 
 We have already spoken of the first of these two 
 principles : and nothing is easier than to establish 
 the second. As matter of '^istory the fact of the con- 
 currence of the mass ot the Church in deliberations 
 and decisions stands on the face of the apostolic wri- 
 tings, The multitude came together, and took their 
 part in the most important consultations : to the mul- 
 titude was referred the election of officers charged 
 with the secondary affairs of the community : the 
 brethren held up the hand, although they did not la*y 
 the hand : the %f<^oroy/i« was allowed them, where 
 the ;t;fi/)o^fe-/o6 was reserved to the presbyters and 
 bishops. Public business was indeed arranged, pro- 
 pounded, and carried through by Public Persons ; but 
 still it was carried as public business. The niachi- 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 125 
 
 nation in closets of interests that ought to be openly- 
 discussed, is a treason against the community ; nor 
 was any such secret management admitted even by 
 the divinely commissioned apostles. 
 
 But the tenor and the terms of the apostolic epistles 
 afford the most satisfactory evidence on the point of 
 the liberal and open constitution of the first Churches. 
 These epistles, fraught with various and specific ad- 
 vices on questions of discipline and government, are 
 addressed comprehensively and directly to the mass 
 of believers ; — not to the people through the medium 
 of their rulers. The pastors are indeed mentioned, 
 but this mention of them distinctly implies that the 
 writer, in each instance, had his eye immediately 
 fixed upon the people. Were then the people — the 
 believers at large, the mere subjects of church power ? 
 did they constitute an inert mass, upon which sacer- 
 dotal functions were to be exercised ? Common sense 
 is insulted by any such supposition ; historic evidence 
 is outraged by afl[irming it to have been the fact. 
 The Church, with its teachers and pastors, was one 
 living body, various in its functions, but full of energy 
 and action. 
 
 The course recommended or enjoined, on various 
 occasions, by St. Paul, and the public measures which 
 he advises to be pursued, were plainly supposed to 
 issue from the breadth of the Church ; and not to 
 be promulgated from the closet of an ohgarchy. Our 
 inference in this instance has precisely the same 
 strength as that which we draw in favour of the in- 
 dependence of the clerical function from the fact, that 
 all the instructions bearing directly and explicitly 
 upon the appointment, investiture, character, and 
 behaviour of the rulers of the Church, are conveyed 
 to INDIVIDUALS (uot to Churches) and these beings 
 such as had received an irresponsible authority, from 
 an irresponsible source. 
 
 11* 
 
12^ SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 There will be no end to the nice distinctions and 
 the subtei fuges resorted to by interested controvertiets ; 
 nor must \ 'e expect to convince such persons. But 
 men who respect themselves, and who have learned 
 to exercise i vigorous common sense, in common 
 affairs, will hold it certain, in all cases, that those 
 who are ine tructed how to perform particular duties, 
 are actually the parties looked to for the discharge of 
 such dutiei. Exhortations and commands are not 
 cross-direcled by plain and upright men. A and B 
 are not told in what manner X and Z should acquit 
 themselves of their parts. But in the apostolic epistles 
 it is the people at large who are instructed on what 
 principles to exercise church discipline, and how to 
 arrange the secular interests of the society. At the 
 same time it is not the people at large, but two indi- 
 viduals of high ecclesiastical rank, who are charged 
 with whatever relates to the selection, investment, 
 and control of teachers and rulers. Even those offi- 
 cers in the choice of whom the people exercised a dis- 
 cretion, are classed with purely clerical persons in 
 these instructions, inasmuch as it was not without the 
 ^etpoha-U and approval of the primate that they 
 were to be instated. 
 
 We conclude then, that a cordial and effective 
 admission or the people — meaning, the members of 
 congregaticns, to a participation in the management 
 of church affairs, and especially in the infliction of 
 chastisements, and in the control of pecuniary inte- 
 rests, is an essential and most important rudiment of 
 church polity. 
 
 In relation to the source and derivation of the cleri- 
 cal function, we have been compelled to charge the 
 dissenting communities of this country with a capital 
 and very serious departure from apostolic principle 
 and practice. We are now bound, in justice to our 
 argument (and for the approval of our impartiality) 
 
RUDIiVtENfS OP CHURCH POLITY. 127 
 
 to assert the equally important fault of tlie English 
 Church, in excluding its members at large from that 
 just influence which the same apostohc practice and 
 principle allows to them. 
 
 Vin. We have then before us the constituents of 
 a chi rchj and their reciprocal influence. It only re- 
 mains to inquire, what shculd be the relative position 
 of those who exercise the various public functions of 
 the body. The following considerations seem pro- 
 per to be premised to such an inquiry. 
 
 1st. It should be admitted that the informatioQ 
 furnished in the writings of the New Testament con- 
 cerning the forms of government prevailing in the 
 apostolic Church is scanty, incomplete, informal, to 
 some extent ambiguous, and such, in a word, as ex- 
 cludes the supposition that any definite polity was 
 intended to be authoritatively conveyed to the Church 
 universal. Or let it be granted that the few who are 
 fully and familiarly conversant with ecclesiastical 
 antiquity, may arrive at a clear conviction that such 
 and such was the economy of the first churches, or 
 of most of them ; yet the Scripture Evidence 
 alone, and unaided by learned researches, can never 
 be so presented to the mass of Christians as to com- 
 mand their assent to this or that system, as apostolic 
 and unchangeable. 
 
 2dly. The information we gather, in part from the 
 incidental allusions of the canonical writers, and in 
 part from the extant remains of early Christian 
 literature, suggests the belief (in itself probable) that, 
 under the eye, and with the approbation or permis- 
 sion of the apostles, diflferent modes of church govern- 
 ment prevailed in different countries. It is, we say, 
 perfectly credible, and pretty nearly established as a 
 fact, that a certain ecclesiastical constitution which 
 might well accord with the national sentiments and 
 
128 SPIRITUAL DESPOTfSM. 
 
 civil usages of the Christians of Syria, or Persia, or 
 the provinces of Hellenic Asia, might be altogether 
 repugnant to the feelings of the Churches of Greece 
 proper, of Italy, Gaul, or northern Africa. That sort 
 of superstitious, servile, and despotic inflexibility 
 which is characteristic of the arrogant churchman of 
 later ages, assuredly was not the temper of the first 
 promulgators of the Gospel. St. Paul, especially, 
 had learned that high wisdom which is at once im- 
 movable in principle, and compliant in circumstan- 
 tials. The whole analogy of his behaviour, and of 
 his sentiments, contradicts the supposition that he 
 went about, carrying an iron model of ecclesiastical 
 government, from country to country. 
 
 3dly. We must be especially aware of those fal- 
 lacies in argument that arise from placing reliance 
 upon either the etymological import, or the after- 
 wards acquired and specific sense of certain terms of 
 oflfice ; since it is manifest that these terms are used 
 convertibly throughout the New Testament, and are 
 interchanged with a latitude and a freedom that does 
 not at all accord with the definitions and assumptions 
 of modern controvertists. Modern controversies, on 
 church government, have been rendered indecisive 
 by the fault, common to all parties, of contending 
 for and against names ; instead of inquiring con- 
 cerning facts. What avails it, for example, to prove 
 that the pastors of single and small congregations 
 were called bishops ? The only question of signifi- 
 cance is this, whether, when there were ten, fifty, or 
 a hundred congregations in a city, each was an in- 
 sulated and independent Church, having its bishop, 
 and its exclusive organization, or whether they did 
 not, m all such cases, constitute one Church, go- 
 verned by a single president (call him what we 
 may) who bare rule over all the clerical persons 
 ministering to those several congregations 1 If we 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITV. 129 
 
 find in fact at Jerusalem, at Antioch, at Ephesus, at 
 Alexandria, at Rome, some -such economy as this, 
 and always one Church, comprisins^ many con- 
 gregations, directed by one angel, or chief, those who 
 choose may argue the question — what was his 
 title ? 
 
 The apostles evidently employ terms of office rather 
 in the power of their abstract meaning, than as the 
 fixed and conventional designations of established 
 functionaries. The apostles call themselves presby- 
 ters and deacons too. Our Lord is declared to be 
 both Bishop and Deacon. Presbyters are bishops ; 
 and bisbops are teachers and helpers; and a Primate 
 is exhorted, in one place, to do the work of an evan- 
 gelist, and in another, fully to discharge the office of 
 a deacon. There can be no conclusiveness in an 
 argument that assumes a fixed appropriation of titles 
 when no such appropriation had taken place. 
 
 What is highly important to observe, is this, that 
 the liquid or convertible state in which we find the 
 designations of office in the New Testament, indi- 
 cates clearly the yet undefined condition of the func- 
 tions to which such titles are, in that promiscuous 
 manner, applied. It is true, in relation to civil, as 
 well as to sacred dignities, or public duties, that the 
 interchangeable application of titles, affords a sure 
 guide to the circumstances of the community within 
 which it prevails, A steady and exactly defined 
 constitution of offices never fails to be quickly follow- 
 ed by a well marked usage, assigning certain desig- 
 nations to certain functionaries ; to disturb which 
 becomes an affi'ont to dignities, and is instantly re- 
 sented. Not even the most heedless writers, in any 
 age, fail to pay respect to such verbal den^.arcations 
 of honour. The name of office is known to be an 
 important preservative of the frerogatives of office ; 
 and when once such prerogatives have come to h© 
 
130 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 settled and distinctly ascertained, the several names 
 that mark the gradations of rank cease to be con- 
 vertible. On this rule we conclude, with some de- 
 gree of assurance, that, during the apostolic age, 
 forms of government and the distribution of public 
 services, were still open to many variations and ano- 
 malies. No writer of the age of Cyprian uses the 
 words oishop, presbyter, and deacon, so indetermin- 
 ately or so abstractedly as do the apostles. 
 
 From these premises we draw an inference decisive 
 against all high and exclusive pretensions, on which 
 side soever they may be advanced ; and against ar- 
 rogance and dogmatism, whatever model of pohty it 
 may profess to maintain. Nevertheless, it may be 
 true that the concurrent testimony of Christian anti- 
 quity preponderates largely on the side of a certain 
 system ; and moreover, that this same system proves 
 itself, if we might so term it, to be the spontaneous 
 form of external Christianity, whenever the natural 
 course of tilings (during a prosperous condition of the 
 Church) is not interfered with by special opinions or 
 prejudices. 
 
 We have said that a certain model of church go- 
 vernment presents itself as the spontaneous form of 
 external Cljristianity, where Christianity flourishes, 
 and spreads ; and we trace the development of na- 
 tural and universal causes in the following man- 
 ner : — 
 
 Christianity is in an enfeebled or a corrupted state, 
 or it must be labouring under extraordinary external 
 difficulties, in every case, where it fails to diflfuse it- 
 self on all sides from the centre where it may first be 
 planted. Wherever it does not so spread, inquiry 
 ought to be made for the cause of obstruction ; and 
 doubtless it may be discovered. The Gospel, in the 
 hands of its first promulgators, did so spread ; and it 
 may fairly be assumed, that the miraculous powers 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 131 
 
 at the command of the apostles and their colleagues, 
 did not much more than counterbalance the external 
 opposition it had to encounter. In all the large cities 
 of the Roman world the converts to Christianity 
 were numerous, and in some amounted to several 
 thousand persons ; and even in smaller cities and 
 towns they were more than could assemble in any 
 one synagogue, or chamber of a private house. In 
 all such cities or towns there were therefore several 
 congregations, statedly rssembUng for public worship 
 in such places as converiencs might dictate. 
 
 This question then presens itself, and must needs 
 be determined — What v/as tiie rule and principle of 
 the relationship subsisting among these congrega- 
 tions, and what the system cf organization, if any, 
 which combined the clergy oBciating in these assem- 
 blies ? This question, or these two questions, are in 
 no way to be evaded ; and the determination of them 
 carries, substantially, the question of ecclesiastical 
 polity. The spirit and precepts of the Gospel de- 
 mand, and its diflfusion and maintenance as an ex- 
 ternal constitution require, that all Christians within 
 the walls of a city, or within the circuit of a district, 
 should recognise each other, as such, and should co- 
 operate to promote their common welfare. They are 
 in fact related by juxta-position ; it is impossible that 
 they should be ignorant of each other's existence, as 
 Christians: they are therefore bound to maintain 
 fellowship ; or if they neglect to do so, nothmg can 
 preserve them from running into rivalry and faction. 
 Unless molten into one mass, and unless commingled 
 in every possible manner, by interchange of offices, 
 the strong natural tendency to jealousy and division 
 among separate corporations, will quickly and cer- 
 tainly come into play, to the infinite damage of all, 
 and the dishonour of religion. 
 
 The span of a roof, or the number of sittings be- 
 
132 SPIRITUAL, DESPOTISM. 
 
 tween one wall of a chapel and its opposite, are acci- 
 dental r.nd inconsiderable circamstanceSj altogether 
 unworthy lo be taken any account of when we are 
 estimating the force and compass of those motives 
 which should give life to Christian association. No 
 rule can be more whimsical or arbitrary, and none 
 much more injurious or illiberal, than that which 
 measures a Church by the size of a chamber or a 
 chapel. The energy and expansiveness of Christian 
 love disdains and resents any such mathematical re- 
 striction. A Church is the organized Christianity of 
 a certain circle or district, within which actual com- 
 bination and intercourse may take place. The tem- 
 per and the usages generated by Congregationalism 
 have greatly obscured the glory of the Gospel, as a 
 principle of extensive fellowship. 
 
 Whatever may be the advantages, or the enjoy- 
 ments, or the duties that attach to religious combina- 
 tion as subsisting within the walls of a chapel, attach 
 also to religious combination, such as it may subsist 
 within the walls of a city ; and again, within the 
 boundaries of a province. On the other hand, what- 
 ever evils accrue from the admission of partial inter- 
 ests and factions within a single society, accrue also, 
 and even in a more fatal degree, from the rivalry 
 and insulation of neighbouring societies. Moreover, 
 as incidental acquaintance and casual friendship is 
 not church communion among individuals ; so nei- 
 ther does the unorganized and ungoverned corres- 
 pondence of neighbouring societies satisfy the condi- 
 tions, or secure the advantages of church order. 
 The principle, both of love and of order, which ap- 
 pUes to three hundred Christians, applies, by the 
 game reason, and with the same force, to thre3 thou- 
 sand, or to thirty thousand Christians. 
 
 Christianity tends always to, and demands, social 
 organization. Where there is no organization there 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 133 
 
 is no Christianity ; where organization is imperfect 
 or casual) there Christianity is feeble or factious ; and 
 if there be good reason for securing any order, or for 
 instituting any government, on religious grounds, 
 there is the same reason for effecting the most per- 
 fect order, and for establishing the most finished 
 system of goverment possible. Dangers, it is true, 
 attend all systems of combination ; but still greater 
 dangers attach to the want of con'bination. Evils 
 are not averted, but only exchanged, by foregoing 
 the benefits of an extensi/e economy, or polity. 
 Christianity is not merely lov^and peace, but a bond 
 of love and peace. To profess the love, and to reject 
 the bond, is deemed, in all cases, a subterfuge. 
 There are those who say, '' May we not have the 
 affection and the sanctity of marriage without the 
 knot?" No such license is permitted in any well 
 ordered community. Whoever refuses to be bound 
 to a good and virtuous condition, harbours contempt 
 of the principle which sanctions the obligation. 
 
 We assume then that Christians, near to each 
 other, are not to constitute many Churches, but one 
 Church — let the chapels in which they happen to 
 assemble be five, or five hundred. As a matter of 
 history, no question can be raised respecting the com- 
 bination of Christians in cities and districts, during 
 the primitive ages. We hear little or nothing of the 
 unimportant circumstance of the particular buildings 
 or chambers in which congregations met ; but we 
 know, beyond doubt, that, untiljhe seamless vesture 
 of Christ was rent by angry spirits, the brethren of 
 of every city, and its suburbs, formed one communion, 
 and ate of one loaf, and were led and ruled by one 
 staff. There was one centre and one circumference ; 
 or rather, one fold and one shepherd. Our modern 
 chapel-economy, which makes each congregation a 
 church, with its bishop, assuredly was not known at 
 Jerusalem, at Caesarea, at Antioch, at Carthage, at 
 12 
 
134 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 Alexandria. There were indeed the Churches of 
 Galatia ; and there was a Church in a house, where 
 that house could contain all the faithful of the vici- 
 nity ; but not so where converts were reckoned by 
 thousands or myriads. Congregationalism, in the 
 modern sense of the term, had place wherever Chris- 
 tianity was hemmed in, or wherever it had become 
 inert ; but not where the word of the Lord " ran 
 and was glorified ;" or where " believers were added 
 to the Church daily — multitudes, both of men and 
 women." 
 
 But how did the primitive combination of Chris- 
 tians, within cities and districts, affect the relation- 
 ship and internal organization of the clergy ? or how 
 must such a combination, necessary and proper as it 
 is, affect churcli government in any age? The 
 clergy are, by such combinations, brought into society 
 as a body, and nothing can then avert (nor should 
 we wish it to be averted) the establishment of some 
 species of hierarchical subordination. An incidental, 
 xnd yet highly important consequence of this muni- 
 cipal organization, in the ancient Church, was the 
 interchange of the services of teachers among the 
 congregations of a diocese. It was not imagined that 
 the talentt' and accomplishments of a single mind, 
 even of the most gifted, could supply sufficient move- 
 ment and instruction to the same people, week after 
 week, and year after year. Our modern usages, in 
 this behalf, involve a very serious practical error. 
 To leave a congregation submerged in the stagnant 
 pool of a single mind, for half a century, can never 
 consist with its progress in knowledge, or with its 
 vitality. Nothing perhaps has more benumbed Chris- 
 tianity, or prevented its extension. 
 
 Again ; this same municipal association of the 
 people and clergy, effectively cut off the dependence 
 of the clergy, individually, upon the leaders of single 
 congregations. The church fund did indeed accrue 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 135 
 
 from voluntary contributions ; but it arose from a 
 broad surface ; and it reached indirectly those who 
 received it. The people had no opportunity given 
 them to modify doctrine, to soften morality, or to 
 avert discipline, by the tacit efficacy of their power as 
 the paymasters of their teachers. 
 
 Once more ; the same economy broke up, in great 
 degree, that too natural tendency of things, which 
 places the clergy of a vicinity in opposition, the one 
 to the other, as chiefs of companies, and as rival can- 
 didates for popular favour. Wholly to preclude this 
 most unhappy tendency is indeed impracticable on 
 any scheme ; yet we should certainly avoid a system 
 which, in a direct and powerful manner, stimulates 
 personal ambition. Neighbouring congregations, 
 founded on the congregational principle, hardly avoid 
 grudges and disagreements, transmitted often from 
 one generation to another, like the feuds of Arabian 
 hordes. Then again, the spirit of this system, irri- 
 tated by a false jealousy on the subject of the rights 
 of conscience, impels division and separation, often 
 on trivial grounds. Dislikes or predilections, per- 
 sonal bickerings, and family discords, lead to out- 
 bursts of independency ; and thus a sect propagates 
 itself, not always by natural growth or offset, like a 
 tree ; but by bisection or rending, like certain orders 
 of the animal kingdom. 
 
 Congregationalism, a modern scheme altogether, 
 sprung, as a reaction, from arrogant prelacy, and 
 the despotism of national churches. It was the in- 
 evitable product of evil times — the child of oppres- 
 sion, and the nurseling of persecution. But, desti- 
 tute as it is of permanent reasons, and unsupported 
 by ancient authority, and incompatible, as it must 
 always be, with the just and necessary influence of 
 the ministers of religion, it will give way when the 
 accidental causes to which it owes its origin are re- 
 moved. Deprived of the invigorating disadvantages 
 
136 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 of political depression, Congregationalism will slide 
 into some form of comprehensive polity. When the 
 mass ceases to be agitated, crytallization will com- 
 mence. That this system should prevail, and be in 
 favour, where democratic sentiments and tastes are 
 rife, can be no matter of surprise ; but the fact of its 
 prevalence, under such circumstances, surely must 
 not be urged abstractedly, in its recommendation, or 
 as a presumption that it is apostolic. 
 
 The historical evidence to the contrary is so 
 abundant and conclusive, that no advocate is now 
 likely to take up the argument on the ground of 
 ancient practice. On any other giound of expedi- 
 ency, let it be defended, and adhered to by whoever 
 is so minded. 
 
 Excluding then the arbitrary theory which in- 
 sulates each congregation, and makes it a church ; 
 and assuming that the communion and organization 
 of neighbouring congregations necessarily involves 
 some species of hierarchical combination, we have to 
 make a choice between those two schemes which 
 (small distinctions overlooked) embody the only 
 general principles we can well have recourse to, that 
 is to say, presbyterianism and episcopacy. 
 
 To decide between the two on the ground of the 
 ancient usage of the Church, might seem an easy 
 thing to those who are conversant with the Christian 
 literature of the first three centuries. The broad con- 
 current evidence which favours the episcopal form of 
 government may indeed (like every other kind of 
 evidence on every sort of subject) be excepted against 
 in particulars, or be evaded, or rendered seemingly 
 ambiguous, by cross circumstances. But still, those 
 who read church history purely as history, and 
 who care little what present interest it may favour, 
 will not, we imagine, hesitate to conclude that, nine 
 out of ten of the churches of the first century were 
 episcopal ; or that nineteen out of twenty of those of 
 
RUBIMEJNTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 137 
 
 the second century, and almost all of the third, ac- 
 knowledged this form of government. The ortho- 
 doxy of the great mass of Christians in those ages, 
 and their episcopacy, are two prominent facts, that 
 meet us, directly or implicitly, on almost every page 
 of the extant remains of those times. The same 
 method of quotation, and the same misrepresentation 
 of evidence, which enabled the ingenious author of 
 the " History of Early Opinions" to throw a shade 
 over the first of these important facts, may enable an 
 opponent of episcopacy to put us in doubt concerning 
 the second. But no method sanctioned by truth and 
 honesty will do it. 
 
 On the other hand, if a choice were to be made 
 between two actual forms of presbyterianism and 
 of episcopciv;^ , whereof the first admits the laity to a 
 just and apostolic place in the management and ad- 
 ministration of the Church, while the second abso- 
 lutely rejects all such influence, and at the same re- 
 tains, for its bishops, the baronial dignities, and the 
 secular splendour, usurped by the insolent hierarchs 
 of the middle ages ; then indeed the balance would 
 be one of a difficult sort ; and unless there were room 
 to hope for a coi rection and reform of political pre- 
 lacy, an honest and modest Christian mind would take 
 refuge in the substantial benefits of presbyterianism. 
 
 The two systems may however very properly be 
 put in comparison on abstract ground ; and then the 
 condition of the two schemes will appear to be very 
 nearly the same as those which belong, in questions 
 of civil government, to the monarchical principle, as 
 compared with any of those oligarchical or republi- 
 can constitutions that are resorted to as safeguards 
 against despotism. 
 
 Monarchy and episcopacy may be considered as 
 the forms into which the social system will spon- 
 taneously subside : republicanism (in any of its 
 modes) and presbyterianism, are those forms in which 
 12* 
 
138 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 we stop short, when we do not think it safe to com- 
 mit ourselves to the former. The latter is a caution- 
 ary proceeding, in which certain acknowledged ad- 
 vantages are foregone, on account of the dangers 
 that attend the enjoyment of them. But could we 
 find the means of averting those perils, we should 
 then no.longer scruple to embrace the benefits of the 
 more natural and efficient method. A limited mon- 
 archy, and a well counterpoised episcopacy, would 
 probably engage the suflfiages of the majority of 
 mankind, rather than any modification of the aris- 
 tocratic, oligarchic, republican, or presbyterian prin- 
 ciple. 
 
 Could the highest wisdom and virtue be found in 
 individuals, even absolute monarchy might well be 
 preferred to any of the operose systems that come in 
 its room. The sternest repubhcan might grant that 
 monarchy is the ideal of perfection in government; — 
 assuming only the competency and the disinterested- 
 ness of him who is to wield the sceptre. We refiain 
 from this simple and efiicient mode, only because we 
 can no where find the man to whom so much power 
 might be confided. Or, if we could find one such 
 man, we could not hope to secure him a successor. 
 The cumbrous machinery of senates, councils, minis- 
 ters, conventions, representatives, is all so much pre- 
 caution — not abstractedly good, yet indispensable on 
 account of the imperfect virtue and the imj>erfect 
 wisdom of men, singly. 
 
 Those general motives which would lead to a pre- 
 ference of monarchy, do indeed hardly come into play 
 where the interests in view are of a very simple kind. 
 Commercial projects and pecuniary advantages may 
 be well enough managed by a committee ; but it is 
 not so where energy, promptitude, and secrecy are 
 peculiarly demanded ; and still less so, where high 
 sentinienis are involved. In these instances, mon- 
 archical government is not to be renounced without 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 139 
 
 incurring some serious, or perhaps fatal disparage- 
 ment. We may think ourselves safe from despotism 
 in the hands of a committee ; but we aie safe to no 
 purpose. An army is confided to the head and hand 
 of a single captain, not merely that its movements 
 may have the celerity and the consistency of purpose 
 which spring from a single mind ; but because the 
 feeling and the soul that are to propel the mighty 
 mass, demand a centre, in the person of the chief, 
 and would never, in an equal degree, converge upon 
 a council of war, or a directory. 
 
 So long as a nation's welfare is held to turn upon 
 nothing but its sheer arithmetical interests, a com- 
 mittee, or a senate, ma}^ properly have the charge of 
 them. But if regard is had to those higher and more 
 impulsive principles of national greatness which are 
 in no way to be reduced to mathematical computa- 
 tion, then it is found, and especially so in extensive 
 empires, that monarchy, with its attendant splen- 
 dours— moiiarchy, vivified by the free exercise of large 
 prerogatives, and reared on the shoulders of an illus- 
 trious nobihty — monarchy, not born yesterday, and 
 the creature of the populace, but the child of time, 
 and the favourite of history — such a monarchy forms 
 a centre of feeling, and imparts movement to senti- 
 ments of tije highest importance, and which have 
 little play within the dead machinery of a republic. 
 
 One class of sentiments being substituted for an- 
 other, and then the analogy will hold good in relation 
 to the Church. That system which places a living 
 centre as the personal object of reverence and love in 
 the room of a presbytery, or a convocation, secures 
 an advantage which, so long as human nature re- 
 mains what it is, ought to be esteemed of the highest 
 price. It is granted indeed that ecclesiastical busi- 
 ness may be in an aged efliciently, and economically, 
 and equitably, by a presbytery ; but it is affirmed, on 
 the strength of the known motives of our nature, that 
 
140 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 such a management foregoes benefits of a refined 
 sort, which spring up around a patriarchal chair. — 
 Let all the abuses and corruptions belonging to the 
 history of proud prelacy in all ages be summed 
 up, and they will fail to invalidate the assertion that 
 a paternal sway vivifies the system over which it is 
 exercised in a manner not to be attained by the go- 
 vernment of a corporation. All we have to do is to 
 place the monarchical power under reasonable limi- 
 tations. 
 
 If sentiments of the higher sort are important in 
 tilings secular, they are vastly more so in things 
 spiritual. Christianity is not a system of palpable 
 interest, to which cold calculation is applicable ; but 
 a -scheme of elevated emotions. Whatever calls forth 
 and gives play to sentiment, is presumptively more 
 Christian-like than that which, with a dry caution, 
 merely guards against abuses. But we may go fur- 
 ther, and affirm, that Christianity, fully brought to 
 bear upon human nature, and allowed to draw into 
 its service all gifts, and talents, natural and divine, 
 will spontaneously tend to the episcopal model. 
 
 The current of popular opinion may indeed set 
 against this cr that general principle ; and yet na- 
 ture (we should say the Divine Providence) goes on 
 in its course, notwithstanding the temporary infatua- 
 tions of mankind. Often have the purest enjoyments, 
 and the most solid advantages, been renounced by 
 the proud iin patience, or the sheer caprices of com- 
 munities — by absurd and vicious fashions, or sophis- 
 tical opinions. Popular distastes then, afford no pre- 
 sumption whatever against the system Vvhich they 
 repugnate. Episcopacy may be abstractedly good, 
 although all the world were to scout it. 
 
 Now any number of religiously gifted persons 
 being taken promiscuously, we shall not fail to find 
 among them those marked inequalities of natural 
 power; and those decisive diversities of temper and 
 
RUDIMENTS OP CHURCH POLITY. 141 
 
 accomplishment, which sjieak loudly (as loudly as 
 Nature ever speaks) in favour of a corresponding dis- 
 tribution of services, and gradation of employment 
 and dignities. To assign to all the same duties, and 
 to reduce all to the same level, is to affront reason 
 and nature in an egregious manner. The Church 
 needs services to be performed, not of one kind, but of 
 many ; and nature actually provides persons adapted 
 to that diversity of service. Among fifty or a hun- 
 dred clerical persons, some will be found whose bold 
 and ardent zeal calls them into the field of labour 
 and danger in carrying the Gospel upon new ground ; 
 some, whose taste for intellectual pursuits, and whose 
 faculty of acquisition, mark them for the closet, or 
 for the chair of catechetical instruction : some, whose 
 powers of utterance and flow of soul challenge them 
 for the pulpit ; some, whose gentleness of spirit, and 
 whose placid skill, fit them for the difficult task of the 
 personal cure of souls ; some, whose philanthropy and 
 self-denying love forbid them to be happy any where 
 but among the poor and wretched ; and some, more- 
 over, although it be a few, whose calmness of judg- 
 ment and temper, whose comprehensiveness of un- 
 derstanding, whose paternal sentiments and personal 
 dignity^ declare them, without mistake, to be destined 
 to the throne of government. We may decry epis- 
 copacy ; hut the Lord sends us bishops, whether or 
 not we will avail ourselves of the boon. 
 
 The Church hasgreatneed to use a much more wise 
 economy of the various talents committed to her trust 
 than any existing religious community exercises. On 
 all sides, there is a most wasteful neglect of diversified 
 abilities. Systems which, for the saving of some fond 
 hypothesis, confound all natural distinctions of tempei* 
 and power, and enforce an equality of rank, and an 
 identity of employment upon all official persons, ob- 
 struct the common benefit, and hinder the progress 
 of the Gospel, in a degree not to be calculated, The 
 
142 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 economy of powers, and the division of labour, is no 
 where more imperatively needed than within the 
 Church. The stagnant condition of Christianity in 
 countries where no external opposition has stood in 
 its way, may, in great measure, be attributed to this 
 same prodigal disregard of the dictates of nature and 
 common sense. To take a band of gifted persons — 
 gifted in as many different ways as there are persons, 
 and to compel each to be a bishop, and every thing 
 else, within his little sphere, is an infatuation not 
 matched in any other department of human affairs. 
 The men of this world are indeed wiser than those 
 children of light who adhere to so marvellous a prac- 
 tical error. 
 
 A youth, for example, whose blooming talents 
 might, in a proper and subordinate sphere, be highly 
 serviceable to the Church, and who, after a long 
 training under his superiors, might rise to greater 
 things, is snatched, from his academic themes, is 
 made teacher of what he has barely learned, and con- 
 stituted ruler of affairs he cannot grasp, is pronounced 
 bishop — and apostolic church order is deemed to have 
 been realized ! 
 
 Whatever may be ambiguous in the PauUne 
 epistles, this surely is prominent, and unquestionable, 
 that the apostle — always remarkable for his prompt 
 good sense, and his respect for the actual constitu- 
 tions of nature, recognises the diversity of gifts and 
 powers, and supposes that this diversity, which 
 springs from the Sovereign Wisdom, is to be turned 
 to the best account possible in promoting the great 
 and various purposes of the Gospel. We need ask for no 
 other argument in favour of episcopacy. Many have 
 the gifts requisite for the ordinary duties of a Christian 
 teacher; not a few may beneficially administer the 
 interests of a small circle ; but it is only a few — yet 
 there are such, who can sustain the burden of exten- 
 
RUDIMENTS OF CHURCH POLITY. 143 
 
 sive government. The several parts of our argument 
 converge here upon our conclusion. — 
 
 If the Christians of a city or district are nume- 
 rous, and constitute many congregations, these con- 
 gregations must be combined under some fixed sys- 
 tem of organization. 
 
 An organization of many congregations includes 
 the association and co-operation of all clerical persons 
 within such a circle, or diocese. 
 
 The combination of clerical persons, their concord, 
 the distribution of services, and the apportionment to 
 the highest advantage of their various talents, de- 
 mands a centre of control, and an efficient adminis- 
 trative authority. 
 
 We may, it is true, stop short in a government by 
 a council, or committee, or presbytery. But we do 
 better in following the indication of nature, and the 
 analogy of civil affairs, and in placing the supreme 
 administrative power in the hands of a Father and 
 Shepherd. 
 
 Such, as we cannot doubt, was the practice of the 
 primitive Churches. 
 
SECTION V. 
 
 FIRST STEPS OF SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 After excepting the changes that distinguish the 
 later from the earher Judaism (referred to in a pre- 
 ceding section) it may be affirmed, that Christianity 
 is the only rehgion known to history which has un- 
 dergone and survived extensive and essential altera- 
 tions. Other systems have had their season, and 
 then have been swept away, leaving hardly a wreck 
 behind. But the religion of the New Testament, 
 after passing, by insensible degrees, into a condition 
 which scarcely retained a point of resemblance to its 
 primitive state, has returned upon itself, and has re- 
 newed its youth like the phoenix. 
 
 Four inferences, and each of them important, may 
 properly be drawn from the fact of the corruption 
 and renovation of Christianity : the first is an infer- 
 ence confirmatory of its truth ; inasmuch as it is 
 truth only that is liable to corruption; and truth only 
 that possesses an intrinsic vigour, enabling it to re- 
 gain its pristine purity. The second of these infer- 
 ences is of a serious sort, and compels us to admit 
 that the religion of Christ, although true and divine, 
 has not been exempted, by the interposition of Hea- 
 ven, from the operation of common causes; but has 
 been left to be corroded, broken down, and adulterated, 
 in every way which the passions and folly of man- 
 kind have prompted. The third, leads us to attribute 
 the corruption of Christianity to its real causes — the 
 bad passions and errors of its adherents, which were 
 at work upon it from the first moment of its birth ; 
 and should preclude the mistake of fixing upon cer- 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 145 
 
 tain special events, in the external history of the 
 Church, or upon the agency of individualsj as in any 
 high degree efficient in producing tliat corruption. 
 Our last inference should inspire every Christian mind 
 with a salutary fear, lest that which has happened 
 once, and whi.'h the great principles of the Divine 
 government did not prevent, should happen again. 
 No sympton, perhaps, would be more ominous of the 
 recurrence of a seaso i of decay and perversion, than 
 a prevailing coniideni e that it is impossible it should 
 take place, and that it is idle and absurd to suppose it 
 in any degree probabl). 
 
 Christianity received upon itself, at length, the full 
 impression of the evil influences which k came in to 
 remed}^ ; — in a word, it became such as human na- 
 ture would have it. In this perverted condition we 
 find it at the end of five hundred years, if not earlier. 
 In attempting to trace the perversion backwards, from 
 its mature to its incipient state, we meet with no 
 marked stations, where we might stop short, and say 
 — at this point truth gave way, and error took its 
 start. Nothing decisively arrests our progress ; and 
 it becomes inevitable to conclude, in the language of 
 Scripture itself, that the hidden mischief did '• alread}^ 
 work," while yet the apostles were planting the Gos- 
 pel. 
 
 We hold it then quite impracticable to mark, with 
 any precision, the eras of the growth of superstition, 
 and its attendant despotism. In truth, the practice 
 of apportioning the revolutions of time into epochs, 
 is very delusive, and always proceeds upon the 
 ground of some hypothesis, for the elucidation and 
 establishment of which an arbitrary and artificial 
 form is imposed upon the course of events. Such 
 distributions are seldom, if ever, in a just sense philo- 
 sophical,, and ought, if resorted to at all, to le ad- 
 vanced with due notice, as mere arrangements, made 
 13 
 
146 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 for convenience' sake, in compiling- history, and for 
 the ease of ihe reader's memory. 
 
 It is in this way only that we now propose to mark 
 out stages and eras in the history of spiritual des- 
 potism ; not as if its advances were in fact w^ell de- 
 fined ; but because, without some sort of classifica- 
 tion, a subject so vast and various is not to be re- 
 viewed ; and certainly not to be spoken of in the 
 cursory manner which our present plan demands. 
 
 Our first broad era is that during which church 
 power was making its preparations, and consolida- 
 ting its means, and tending towards a position 
 whence tlie transition was easy to the acme of un- 
 bounded despotism. This period commences, it 
 must be admitted, in the apostolic age ; and may be 
 carried down, indefinitely, into the fifth century. A 
 greater error can hardly be fallen into than that of 
 fixing upon the date of the edict of Milan, as the 
 initial point in the history of church power, as if 
 usurpations and corruptions tlien took their start; or 
 as if the story of sacerdotal ambition then opened its 
 first chapter. Popularly speaking indeed, the con- 
 version of Constantine, and of Ihe imperial court, 
 presents itself as an era in the liistory of the Church, 
 and was no doubt an event of signal importance. 
 But when we look intimately at the state and pro- 
 gress of sentiments, and the condition of the several 
 orders within the Church, it is found that the eflii- 
 cient causes of the perversion that was going on, 
 were very slightly aftected by the political change 
 that had happened ; nor can we perceive that the 
 advance of any corruption was, in consequence, sen- 
 sibly accelerated. 
 
 The second epoch is that which is characterized 
 by the critical oscillation of spiritual power in coun- 
 terpoise with the civil authority ; — the Church, awak- 
 ing to a consciousness of its strength, yet feciiriiT^ its 
 need of support, and alternately crying for succour, 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 147 
 
 accepting favours, and making trial of its indepen- 
 dent power to resist or to subjugate the secular 
 authority. On the atlier hand the emperors, em- 
 barrassed by their fruitless endeavours to compose 
 the feuds of the Church, and baffled in their attempts 
 to bring the new and mysterious power into har- 
 mony with the movements of government, pursued a 
 devious course, undeterminded by any fixed princi- 
 ples, and therefore tending, by its very ambiguity, to 
 favour the steady advances of the Church. This 
 period may be assigned its termination when the 
 breaking up of the western empire left the Roman 
 hierarchy to entrench and extend itself at leisure over 
 the wide field of desolation. 
 
 The third period, commencing with the acknow- 
 ledged supremacy (or at least independent rights) of 
 the Church, reaches through a track of seven hun- 
 dred years, and might well be designated the dog 
 days of spiritual despotism. The scorching heat 
 was at its height in the eleventh century. 
 
 The fourth period embraces the time through the 
 course of which a reaction was taking place within 
 the social system, ending in the expulsion of the old 
 despotism from several of the European nations, its 
 mitigation in others, and in the substitution of that 
 mixed spiritual and political tyranny, which has, at 
 length, given way before the advance of just and 
 liberal opinions on the subject of religious liberty. 
 
 After taking a hasty view of these several eras, it 
 will remain to notice certain refined modern forms of 
 religious intolerance ; and also to make good the 
 allegation. That the proper and salutary influence of 
 the ministers of religion is at present labouring under 
 serious disadvantages, and requires to be restored to 
 a firm foundation, and to be raised to a higher 
 stage. 
 
 A century occupies a small space in a chart of 
 
148 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 three thousaDd 3^ears ; but it is a long period in re- 
 lation to human affairs. A century completely sub- 
 stitutes one set of men for another ; and it may wit- 
 ness, if not a total change of manners and usages, 
 yet an opposite direction given to the current of opi- 
 nion, and a new chaiacter impartedlo the sentiments 
 of mankind. The century commencing with the 
 death of the apostle John, and ending with that of 
 Ireneeus, included great changes in the condition, 
 temper, and usages of the Christian community. — 
 These changes wc find to have actually taken place ; 
 but we are destitute of the means of clearly tracing 
 them to their causes, and of following them in their pro- 
 gress. It is here that the church historian is at fault; 
 it is here that we have to regret the loss, or w^ant, of 
 materials which, did they exist, would probably fur- 
 nish more practical instruction than is presented in 
 the history of the five centuries following. It is easy 
 to understand the march of evils when once in full 
 course; tlie mystery is in their rise. 
 
 After this first century, the history of the Churcti 
 is not obscure ; and it is almost indifferent what date 
 we fix upon, between the acession of Trajan and the 
 death of Diocletian, as a point of view, whence to 
 contemplate the general condition of the Church. — 
 In truth, if a much later time were included, we 
 should not find it distinguished from the earlier era by 
 any such decisive characteristics as might be supposed. 
 
 In reviewing this first period, we must have re- 
 course to the aid of some classification of topics, and 
 consider — 1st. The relative position of clergy and 
 laity : 2d. The relative position of the several orders 
 of the clerical body : 3d. The relation between the , 
 Church and her internal opponents ; or heretics and 
 schismatics of every name : and 4thly. The relation 
 between the Church and the world — that is to say, 
 the mass of mankind, and the civil power speci- 
 fically. 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS 149 
 
 First, then, for the relation which appears to have 
 subsisted within the Church, between the ministers 
 of rehgion and the people at large, or, as we say, clergy 
 and laity. 
 
 At a first glance it might seem as if popular influ- 
 ence had been extended and confirmed rather than 
 diminished in the interval between the apostolic age 
 and that (for instance) of Cyprian, inasmuch as the 
 voice of the people in the election of their bishops and 
 presbyters was then admitted in a way of which we 
 hear nothing in the canonical records. But this ad- 
 vantage was not substantial ; or was more than 
 balanced in other modes. We do not insist upon 
 those reasons which may lead us to think that the 
 popular suff"rage had been commonly reduced to a 
 mere matter of form, or that, like the power of the 
 mob in our modern elections, it had no existence except 
 during a few tumultuous days, and was merely the 
 hurricane of an hour. Be this as it may, it is clear 
 that religious opinions had undergone an insensible, 
 though important charige, and such as threw into the 
 hands of the clergy a power not thought of by the 
 simple minded apostles, or their immediate coadjutors 
 and successors. 
 
 The political usages of a community are of far less 
 significance than the notions that pervade it ; now 
 if the usages of Church, in the third century, had 
 become more democratic, its sentiments and opinions 
 favoured spiritual tyranny in an immensely greater 
 proportion. Those great and consolatory truths on 
 which all stress was laid by Paul, John, Peter, and 
 James — truths of rational import, and of elevating 
 influence, though not denied or forgotten, had sunk 
 into a secondary place in favour of notions which 
 attributed unutterable value, and a mysterious efficacy 
 to the Christian ceremonies. Here we trace the first 
 footmarks of clerical encroachment. The adminis- 
 13* 
 
150 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 Iration of the sacraments was the inviolable pr<?ro- 
 gative of priests ; and these symbols, rather than the 
 great principles they held forth, were insisted upon 
 as of vital energy: it was upon touching, tastings 
 handling, the material elements, or upon being duly 
 touched and handled by the dispensers of the " mys- 
 teries," that eternal life depended. Not to be washed 
 in the laver of regeneration, not to eat of the divine 
 flesh, not to drink the blood, not to be anointed with 
 the oil of remission, was to perish everlastingly. — 
 Salvation and perdition turned, not upon the condi- 
 tion of the heart in God's sight ; but upon having 
 a share of the consecrated fluid or solid matter which 
 the priest might bestow, or might refuse. 
 
 That transition of sentiment, or of doctrine, which 
 obscured the great and rational truths of the Gospel, 
 and which magnified the mere symbols of those 
 truths, we have no satisfactory means of following ; 
 but the result, after a little while, is most conspicuous, 
 and its effect operated, all in one direction, to enslave 
 the spirits of the people and to place the clergy in a 
 position where every thing was at their command. — 
 The maturing of spiritual despotism wants little more 
 of means and instruments, than it finds in this sub- 
 stitution of superstition and ceremony for vital tiuth, 
 which had taken place while yet the Church was 
 bleeding under the hand of imperial persecutors. 
 
 Having many other points in view, our limits for- 
 bid our prosecuting, what indeed would be an in- 
 structive inquiry, concerning the rise and advance of 
 these superstitions ; but it is proper here, in the most 
 distinct manner, to point them out as the -suflficient 
 springs of that extensive despotism which at length 
 fastened itself upon the western nations. If there are 
 those who allow themselves to believe that the politi- 
 cal triumph of Christianity in the fourth century, and 
 the alliance between Church and State, then effected, 
 were the causes, and the initial means of the papal 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 15l 
 
 usurpations, let them do theuiselves the justice of 
 looking into the writers of the third century, among 
 whom they will find the most abundant evidence of 
 that corruption of sentiment which, wherever it pre- 
 vails, plants the foot of the priest upon the neck of the 
 people. We must in charity impute extreme ignorance 
 to those who have professed to think that the poHtical 
 establishment of Christianity was the cause of its 
 corruption. 
 
 In examining the writers of the succeeding age, 
 and at a time when the ministers of the Gospel sat 
 in the high places of worldly power, we meet with 
 tlie same superstitions, and in that gradually matu- 
 ring state which might be expected. But there are 
 few, if any indications of a ripening or expansion of 
 them, hastened by the altered external circumstances 
 of the Church. For aught that appears, Ambrose of 
 Milan, Cyril of Jerusalem, and Martin of Tours, 
 would have magnified the superstitions of their 
 times with as nuich zeal and success if the emperors 
 had continued pagans, as they did while court favour 
 shone upon their heads. 
 
 So long as the great duty of Christian ministers 
 was to teach and .enforce principles of belief, 
 which all are alike to enjoy and to imbibe, and 
 which, when once received, are (at least so far as the 
 teacher is concerned) an unalienable possession, these 
 teachers stand upon a ground of reasonable equality 
 with the people. But the relative position of the two 
 parties is at once, and essentially changed, when the 
 priest pretends to have something, and something 
 mysterious, to bestow^ from day to day, as well as 
 something to teach ; and when he may, at discretion, 
 bestow or withhold the inestimable and indispensable 
 boon. This essential change of position we find to 
 have taken place long before Constantino comes upon 
 the stage. Spiritual despotism had already laid the 
 broad foundation of its power when the blood of Cy- 
 
152 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 prian stained the sands without the walls of Car- 
 thage. 
 
 Every superstition, as well as that relating to the 
 sacraments, had the same tendency to throw into the 
 hands of the clergy a power which continually 
 widened the interval between the people and their 
 ministers ; and in observing the rapid growth of some 
 of these errors, it is hard to resist the belief that they 
 were wittingl}^ promoted, and craftily sustained, by 
 the clergy, with an express view to the enlargement 
 and consolidation of their influence. The natural 
 growth of superstition is like ivy on the wall ; but 
 the superstitions of the early Church ran like the 
 gourd upon the ground, and we must needs suppose 
 that their spread was hastened by artificial means. 
 
 Of this sort were — the oblations for the dead — 
 the festivals of the martyrs — the doctrine (and the 
 practices consequent upon it) concerning demoniacal 
 possession, and the principles and spirit of asceticism, 
 each of which, as might easily be shown, secured for 
 the priest, in one manner or another, a discretionary 
 power, and a cringing reverence, altogether unlike 
 any thing claimed by apostolic pastors. All this 
 while every thing, within the Church, was purely 
 spontaneous : the ministers of religion were doing 
 nothing but what the ministers of the mostobscure and 
 independent sect n)ight do. The tendencies of human 
 nature were taking their own course. 
 
 And yet no scheme of encroachment advances far 
 without meeting with some cross influence, or unman- 
 ageable force, that disturbs its measures. So it was 
 in the early Church. I'he clergy, by flattering the 
 spiritual vanity of the ascetics, and by exaggerating, 
 in the most fulsome terms, the merit of celibacy and 
 maceration of the flesh, had brought over to their side, 
 pretty generally, the monkish bands; and these, non- 
 sacerdotal as they were, rendered the most important 
 aid to the cleigy, in relation to the people, by impo- 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 153 
 
 sing upon the latter a humiliating sense of their own 
 spiritual inferiority, as implicated in the defilements 
 of common life. So far all went well. 
 
 But by a mere accident of the times, there sprung 
 up another non-sacerdotal class, wdiich was not to be 
 brought into subserviency to the clergy, and which, 
 in fact, proved itself refractory to an extent that con- 
 vulsed the whole fabric of the Church. This class 
 consisted of the Confessors, or those who, in the re- 
 current seasons of persecution, had manfully sus- 
 tained, and had survived, tortures ; and who, on the 
 ground of the incalculable merit they had won as 
 the Lord's triumphant champions, assumed to them- 
 selves an irregular and unlimited privilege of contra- 
 vening the established discipline of the Church, of re- 
 versing sentences of excommunication, and especially 
 of restoring to communion those who, under the 
 same fiery trial, had fallen and renounced the faith. 
 The authority of the most highly esteemed, the most 
 politic, and the most powerful prelates, and this au- 
 thority stretched to the utmost, was, in many instan- 
 ces, defied and overthrown by the insolence of these 
 spiritual Athletse. The ascetics were, ordinarily, 
 men of a sluggish or timid temper, and yielded readi- 
 ly to the hand of power ; not so the confessors ; for 
 the very resolution of spirit, and the physical hardi- 
 hood, and immobility of nerve, which, often, had 
 enabled them to conquer in the hour of pain, rendered 
 them afterwards equally sturdy and invincible in as- 
 serting and maintaining the pernicious influence they 
 had gained. 
 
 Whenever persecution broke out anew, a fresh 
 band of confessors started up to trouble and beard the 
 clergy. No provision could be made against these 
 invasions ; no means taken to avert the mischief they 
 effected. Nor were these mischiefs temporary ; for 
 the controversies on the principles and practices of 
 discipline which thence arose, gave birth to schism 
 
154 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 after schism ; and occasioned most of those internal 
 disorders that distracted the western Church through 
 several centuries. 
 
 Clerical power was, we say. at first, obstructed and 
 thwarted by these means ; and yet the remote conse- 
 quence was to enhance it. Nothing more effectually 
 promoted, after a while, the encroachinents of the 
 hierarchy in the west, than the resistance it had had 
 to encounter from the confessors, and their adherents. 
 The bishops, feeling on these occasions that they 
 still wanted much more powder than they possessed, 
 for the purpose of carrying their measures, and of 
 overruling opposition, set themselves deliberately to 
 the work — a work which the holders of power easily 
 persuade themselves is a holy and beneficial one, of 
 consolidating their authority in every possible mode. 
 The rapid advances of spiritual despotism we might 
 date from what is termed the seventh persecution, and 
 the episcopate of Cpyrian. 
 
 We should not foil to mention the very important 
 influence which the custom of holding provincial and 
 general councils had in affecting the relative position 
 of the clergy and laity. To this subject we must 
 revert when speaking of the relative dignity of the 
 several orders of the clergy ; but the first and most 
 marked result of the practice of transferring every 
 considerable controversy, whether doctrinal or eccle- 
 siastical, from the Church where it originated, to a con- 
 vention of bishop?, was, of course, at once to cut off 
 the people from all control over such discussions, and 
 virtually to deny them the right of entertaining a free 
 opinion on the subject of debate. The holding of a 
 council, or the establishment of a representative sys- 
 tem, must not be reproved as in itself improper or in- 
 expedient ; but the spirit and practice of apostolic 
 Christianity imperatively demanded, in such cases, 
 that the laity, by their own representatives — that is, 
 by some of themselves, and in a due proportion of 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 155 
 
 numbers, should have been called to attend the con- 
 vention ; and when there, should have been allowed 
 to exercise some efficient powers. The sending of 
 the bishop alone, or the bishop and some few of his 
 clergy, to represent the Church in the council, and 
 thence to bring home canons and decrees, not to be 
 discussed, but obeyed, was an innovation and a usur- 
 pation, fatal as well to the[liberties ofthe people, as to 
 the purify and spirituality of religion. The laity, if 
 not often qualified, by theological accomplishments, 
 for taking an active part in debate, are at least quali- 
 fied for swaying decisions after hearing of arguments, 
 by that vigorous and untainted good sense, and by 
 that fervent and simple piety, in both which the clergy 
 are too often lamentably deficient. 
 
 If there had been no other cause at work to give 
 rise to spiritual despotism, this alone would have been 
 enough : we must assign the commencement of its 
 operation to as early a time as the middle of the second 
 century. There can be no security, no liberty, and 
 scarcely any purity or vitality, in a Church which 
 says to the laity, in mass, — " You have nothing to do 
 with theology, but to receive what we teach you ; 
 and nothing to do with rules of discipline, or laws of 
 administration, but to yield them obedience." Under 
 any such state of things we find the very essence of 
 spiritual despotism ; whether or not it be fully ex- 
 panded. 
 
 It was only the natural consequence of the several 
 causes we have mentioned, that the dignity and pre- 
 rogatives of the clerical character should, at the same 
 time, have been exalted and affirmed in turgid lan- 
 guage. Nevertheless these exaggerations, and the 
 measures that attended them, were preparatives only 
 to that matured state of things which gave to the 
 sacerdotal order, at length, an absolute and undefined 
 power over the mass of the people. What concerns 
 us to observe is not so much the actual progress made 
 
156 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 in the early time of which we are speaking, toward 
 spiritual despotism, as the fact — unquestionable as it 
 is, that the preparation was really commenced, and 
 was carried to a great length, long iDefore the Christian 
 community, within the Roman Empire, had received 
 any kind of favour or support, beyond a transient and 
 precarious indulgence from the State, and before the 
 chiefs of the Church could have entertained a hope 
 of the revolution that was at length to occur. 
 
 We have next to notice the changes which, during 
 the same early period, gradually took place in the 
 relative position, dignities, and prerogatives, of the 
 several orders of the clerical body. 
 
 It is easy to mistake the accidental form of a tyran- 
 nical system, for the substance and principle of it. — 
 This error has very commonly been fallen into by 
 those who have reviewed the history of the earl}^ 
 church. True indeed it is, that hierarchical en- 
 croachments were pushed on by the immediate 
 agency, and at the impulse of the episcopal order : but 
 episcopacy was the form only, not the essence of the 
 spiritual despotism of the times. Oligarchies and 
 aristocracies have been, to the full, as oppressive as 
 monarchies. Yet it may be granted that despotism 
 leans towards the monarchical form, and that under 
 this form, though not always so, its advances are 
 likely to be more steady and consistent than under 
 any other. 
 
 The spiritual despotism which had reached a 
 height in the fourth century was indeed episcopal in 
 its model ; but if is an illusion to suppose, either that 
 episcopacy was its cause or reason, or that it would 
 not have found place, if some other scheme of church 
 government had prevailed. Episcopacy did prevail, 
 not because it was selected as more conducive than 
 any other system to the consolidation of church 
 power ; but because it had come down, with the 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 157 
 
 auihorit.y of universal tiaditionj as the ancient, if not 
 apostolic constitution of the Church. 
 
 No one conversant witii the remains of Christian 
 literature can think of affirming that the clergy, in 
 tliat age, when it had lost its simplicity and become 
 ambitious, deliberately formed itself upon the episco- 
 pal model, with a view to the move effectual and 
 speedy attainment of its ends. Fix as early a date 
 as we can, wilh any reason, for the commencement 
 of such a machination, and we still find the Cliurches 
 every where episcopally governed. Let us imagine 
 that a stern conviction of the divine authority of the 
 presbyterian form, and of the absolute equality of 
 teachers and rulers, had prevailed among the clergy; 
 or let us suppose ihat the temper of the times had 
 favoured this system, and had excluded any other ; 
 can we believe that, other tljings being the same, 
 and the laity, in the one case as v.'ell as the other, 
 being excluded from conclaves and councils, (he 
 presbyteries of Carthage, of Rome, or of Milan, 
 w^ould have shown themselves less arrogant, and less 
 eager to accumulate lionors and \i'ealih, than were 
 the actual bishops of those sees? We are mucli 
 inclined to tliinlc the very reverse, and can easily 
 imagine that, whereas the episcopal authority, in 
 those places, was mitigated often by the personal 
 mildness of individual bishops, and so the advance 
 of usurpations was retarded ; on the contrary, a per- 
 petual corporation would have known no intermis- 
 sions of ambitious encroachment, and would, widi a 
 remorseless intensity, have followed up every step; by 
 a step still more bold. 
 
 Ecclesiastical writers, and even those personally 
 attached to episcopacy, have, with a view as it seems 
 to approve their impartiality, been forward to repre- 
 sent and to denounce the pride and the secularity of 
 the bishops of the third and fourth centuries. This 
 might be well ; but the exposure of these evils should 
 14 
 
158 SPIRITUAL DESPOtrSM. 
 
 surely Imve been accompanied by tlie distinction to 
 which we have adverted ; and so, while bishops were 
 blamed, episcopacy should have been cleared. 
 
 Fiirtliermore, it is quite necessary, for the purpose 
 of ridding the argument of all that does not belong 
 to it, to set off from our account of the hierarchical 
 changes that took place, such of ihem, or such of 
 their attendant circumstances, as followed in the 
 INEVITABLE COURSE of things, and which were by 
 no means in themselves culpable, whatever might be 
 the consequences that in the end flowed from them. 
 For example: although it does not certainly appear 
 that the actual number of ofFices" distinguished by 
 specific terms, was much greater at the commence- 
 ment of the fourth century, than it had been at the 
 close of the first ; nevertheless these various officer 
 had, in the lapse of time, naturally settled down into 
 a permanent form, so that services which, at the 
 earlier period, had been interchangeably performed, 
 or at least had not been rigorously assigned to indi- 
 viduals, had, at tlie later period, come under a regular 
 and carefully defined system of distribution ; and had 
 drawn to themselves severally their specific import- 
 ance, and their relative dignity. Nothing could have 
 prevented this sort of systemizing of functions : it 
 results from the very nature of tilings, and must in 
 all cases attend the handing down of a social econo- 
 my from one age to another. 
 
 The change therefore from an imfixed to a fixed 
 constitution of offices and ranks, although its ten- 
 dency was to favour the advance of the growing 
 despotism, is in itself no proper object of blame; and 
 in any parallel case, instead of indulging a morbid 
 and fruitless jealousy against the consolidated and 
 various offices of a hierarchy, the wiser course would 
 be to bestow our pains upon the proper means of 
 counteracting, or of balancing the despotic principle 
 that may be so embodied. It is not five orders, or 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 159 
 
 twenty, that makes a Churcli despotic ; but rather 
 '.he distribution among those orders, whether few or 
 many, of irresponsible and uncorrected powers. 
 
 Again, the government of the Church being epis- 
 copal, whether by apostolic authority or not, nothing 
 else could happen, under the actual ciicumstances of 
 the infant and struggling sect, but that powers of all 
 kinds should gather round each episcopal chair ; 
 and especially round those in the great cities. Ea- 
 gerly was the bishop appealed to as arbiter among 
 the brethren in adjusting their secular differences ; 
 gladly was he made the depositary of family secrets, 
 and the guardian of orphans. None so proper as he 
 to be the treasurer of public funds, and to his hands 
 was often intrusted private property, in unsettled 
 times. 
 
 Our own circumstances, surrounded as we are by 
 every sort of legal provision, and public security, 
 hardly admit of our properly allowing for that un- 
 avoidable course of affairs which, in the ancient 
 Church, threw at the feet of bishops much more in- 
 fluence and wealth tlian consisted, generally, with 
 the simplicity, humility, and sanctity becoming their 
 of!ice. These dignitaries were, in a sense, the victims 
 of the existing condition of the Christian communi- 
 ty ; and in fact we find not a few of this order la- 
 menting the secular embarrassments by which they 
 were oppressed, and sighing, though in vai!), for 
 liberty to devote themselves, without distraction, to 
 their spiritual functions. In other instances men, 
 eminently qualified by learning and piety for the 
 government of the Church, earnestly and even pas- 
 sionately resisted the wishes of the people to raise 
 them to that dignity, and pronounced the nolo epis- 
 copari in a tone that could not be thought insincere. 
 It is extremely inequitable and uncandid to incul- 
 pate the bishops of the ancient Church, without dis- 
 crimination, on the ground of that accumulation of 
 
160 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 secular nnd spiritual influence, and that influx of 
 wealth, which none of them could have prevented, 
 even if so inclined, and which many of them heartily 
 deplored. 
 
 These distinctions and exceptions duly admitted^ 
 it yet remains certain, that the gradual influx of 
 power and v/ealth upon a few ecclesiastical centres, 
 nd the consequent acceleration of the natural growth 
 of authority, did in fact raise (he metropolitans and 
 patriarchs of the Christian world to r p. elevation not 
 compatible, human nature being such as it is, with 
 the meekness and humility of the Gliiistian temper. 
 Man has not virtue enough to resist incitements so 
 many and so efficacious. The best will probably 
 become at length insolent, sensual, avaricious, in- 
 tolerant. Nothing could happen but that corruption 
 and profligacy, impudent hypocrisy, and knavery, 
 should spread through the clerical order, when its 
 cliiefs occupied a station beset by every sort of se-^ 
 duction. 
 
 The wealth and power attached to the principal 
 sees thoroughly vitiated the Christianity of the times, 
 flrst, by widening so far the interval between the 
 dignitaries of the Church and the mass of the people as 
 to intercept all reciprocity of feeling between the shep- 
 herd and the flock ; and secondly, by so widening the 
 interval between one order of clerical persons and 
 another, as imposed upon the lower a servile feeling, 
 and imparted to them a cringing habit, and dissipa- 
 ted that sentiment of virtual equality, as brethren in 
 Christ, wiiich is, in the most absolute sense, neces- 
 sary and proper among the ministers of the Gospel. 
 A hierarchy is indeed the bane of piety, and a curse 
 to a community, when its distinctions of rank are of 
 such vast compass as to vilify the humbler clerical 
 orders, and to compel them to shrink in conscious 
 meanness from before the splendours of ecclesiastical 
 dignity. 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 161 
 
 Though it was neither the cause, nor itself the 
 substance of spiritual despotism, we must yet arraign 
 the exaggerated greatness of the episcopal order, and 
 especially of the metropolitans (compared with the 
 inferior clergy) as a principal accelerating means of 
 maturing the tyranny that was at length to cover 
 the western world. 
 
 The effect of the practice of holding general or 
 provincial councils has already been mentioned in its 
 relation to the laity. It should be adverted to also 
 as it bore upon the several ranks of the clergy. 
 
 It appears then, that, although presbyters and dea- 
 cons attended those occasional synods that were con- 
 vened by bishops in their particular dioceses; it was 
 the bishops only who met their metropolitan in the 
 stated vernal and autumnal conventions ; and the 
 bishops only who were summoned to cecumenic 
 councils. As well the constant as the extraordinary 
 practice of the Church, therefore, established a broad 
 ilistinction between the first and the second orders of 
 the clergy ; and it was a distinction arbitrary and 
 impolitic in a high degree, as well as glaringly at 
 variance w'ith the usage of tlie apostolic Churcii. 
 Oharchmen must have renounced all respect for the 
 example and injunctions of the inspired founders of 
 Christianity, when they could exclude from dehbera- 
 tive assemblies, not the people merely, but the minis- 
 ters of religion, and their colleagues in office. 
 
 When the bishops returned from these aristocratic 
 conventions to their sees, bearing with them autho-. 
 ritative determinations of religious controversies, to- 
 gether with general rules of conduct, or canons, and 
 special decisions touching individuals ; what was 
 likely to happen ? Let us suppose that the clergy as 
 w^ell as the people obsequiously bowed to the wisdom 
 or the will of their superiors. This acquiescence in 
 most cases could take place only because clergy as 
 well as laity had already been so disciplined in ser- 
 14* 
 
162 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 vile and silent submission, that they knew no other 
 law, and no olher rule of right than the word of their 
 spiritual masters. Despotism must almost have 
 reached its height where the decrees of synods met 
 with no resistance. 
 
 But, on the contrary, we may imagine instances — 
 indeed such frequently occurred, in which freedom of 
 thought, or refractory impulses, induced some of the 
 inferior clergy to call in question the theological dog- 
 mas, or the ecclesiastical regulations, of the prelates. 
 This contumacy could not be winked at. The dissi- 
 dents were reported to the next synod ; the bishops 
 felt their official honour touched ; they of course sus- 
 tained each other, and defended their common aU' 
 thority. Already all substantial powers were in their 
 hands : opposition, after a struggle, was overcome, 
 and the audacious presbyter and his associates were 
 degraded. Yet this was not enough, for every such 
 struggle suggested anew the necessity of exalting 
 still more the divine episcopal prerogatives, of lifting 
 the throne a step higher, and of providing still more 
 ample means for preventing, or for crushing similar 
 revolts. 
 
 Thus it is always that despotic practices involve 
 the necessity of still more arbitrary proceedings. It 
 is not in the nature of things that any invasion of 
 the rights of men should stop at a point of compara- 
 tive moderation : if we wrong men, we must, in self 
 defence, goon to enslave tliem. The most horrible 
 excesses of tyranny are coiled in the egg that is left, 
 without noise or notice, to hatch in the sand by dra- 
 gon Pride, 
 
 The synodic system then, such as it prevailed both 
 in the east and in the west, is justly named as a prin- 
 cipal cause or means of the Spiritual Despotism which 
 so early grasped the Christian world. 
 
 From the extensive subject of the monkery of the 
 ancient Church we must abstain in the present in- 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 163 
 
 Stance, except so far as to point out, in passing, the 
 initial steps of that intimate and potent ghostly 
 tyranny which became at length a main stay of the 
 papal usurpations, and which took its rise from the 
 rules and practices of tiie monastery. Within the 
 religious houses, at a very early period, the doctrine 
 was generally maintained, that every member of the 
 fraternity was bound, as he regarded his salvation, to 
 expose his soul, with its inmost secrets, to the eye of 
 liis superior and spiritual father. Such was the 
 principle peremptorily insisted upon by Basil, the 
 great promoter of the monastic life. The usage of 
 confession, wdiicli suited well the habits and senti- 
 ments of those who had renounced all the ordinary 
 motives of human nature, w^as insensibly stretched 
 beyond the limits of the inonastery, and was made to 
 apply, first to the feeble and superstitious — to women, 
 and to men of inert and servile temperaments, in the 
 open world ; and at length to all, without exception. 
 But long before the time of this consummation of 
 church power, the clergy had got possession of a most 
 formidable and efficacious engine of government, by 
 penetrating into thr> secrets of families, and by having 
 at their command the alarmed consciences often of 
 official and prominent personages. 
 
 On this invisible ground priestly despotism had 
 gained a broad fooling before the era of the political 
 ascendancy of the Church ; nor were its advances, 
 on this ground, sensibly accelerated by that event. 
 For aught that appears, the practice of confession 
 would have gone on extending its sphere, and deep- 
 ening its hold of all minds, as rapidly and securely 
 through another century of persecution, as it did 
 during the era of security. 
 
 The preparations for extending and confirming 
 this same despotism were again hastened forward by 
 circumstances that arose out of the controversies car- 
 
164 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 ried on between the Church and the numerous here- 
 tics and schismatics who assailed her. 
 
 There is no doubt that tlie consciousness of having 
 at command the force of the State and the terrors of 
 the sword, tends to inflame the dogmatism of a domi- 
 nant religious body. But it is also true (although 
 the fact may be less obvious) that the very conscious- 
 ness of the destitution of any such means of enforcing 
 submission, naturall}^ operates with the chiefs of 
 such a party to induce them to invent, or to insist 
 upon abstract and transcendental notions of an in- 
 tolerant kind ; and thus to lay the foundations of 
 ghostly power even wider and deeper than otherwise 
 would have been thought of. So it is that we find 
 the champions of the papacy, in later ages, and when 
 the secular arm had been brought to be altogether 
 subservient to the Church, looking back to the pages 
 of Cyprian, for warranty in support of the lofty doc- 
 trines which then they had need of Cyprian and 
 his colleagues because unbefriended by the IState ; and 
 because they could prop their power only upon opi- 
 nion, had promulgated that very theory of intole- 
 rance which gave an appearance of reason and of 
 venerable authority to the practices of a despotism 
 that had all means at its beck. 
 
 We say the difficult part it had to perform in re- 
 butting the thousand heresies of the times, drove the 
 Church, almost involuntarily, upon despotic ground, 
 at least it must be granted, that nothing less tiianthe 
 general diffusion of the most enlightened principles — 
 principles only of late clearly developed, could have 
 preserved the chiefs of the Church from staying 
 themselves upon doctrines essentially intolerant. The 
 apostles iudeed (divinely guided as they were) drew 
 the line straight, between laxity and tyranny; but 
 to observe that line, plain as it is, has required more 
 simplicity of mind than any sect, in any age, has 
 hitherto possessed. We must not then severely blame 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 165 
 
 the early promulgators of intolerant sentiments. 
 They seemed to themselves to be pursuing the only 
 course on which thetmih of God could be secured; nor 
 could they forecast the horrible and sanguinary inter- 
 pretation tliat would in the end be put upon the lan- 
 guage they used. 
 
 The primitive Church, in truth, merits admira- 
 tion, not merely on accout)t of its constancy in main- 
 taining the Gospel against its pagan adversariee, and 
 through a fiery trial ; but on account of its steady, 
 consistent, and, on tlie whole, intelhgent adherence 
 to the great principles of Cliristianily, assailed as they 
 were in turn, sometimes by audacious impieties, and 
 gometimes by insiduous sopliisms. Scarcely had 
 some impudent and extravagant heresiarch been con- 
 futed, when a crafty and adroit impugner of the 
 faith started up, in the east or the west — at Alexan- 
 dria, or at Carthage, to seduce the unwary, and to 
 lead away the disaffected. 
 
 On these occasions, as the great works of the time, 
 still extant, abundantly tesiify, the champions of the 
 Faith did noi fail to allege the authority of Scripture 
 in opposition to the errors they had to refute. But, 
 as supplementary to this main argument, they ap- 
 pealed, and in a forcible manner, to the manifest and 
 unquestionable fact of a continued derivation of doc- 
 trines from the apostles, in the principal seats of 
 Christianity. This appeal was, in itself, fair and 
 conclusive; and under parallel circumstances would, 
 no doubt, be made by modern parties. In the third 
 and fourth century the line of tradition from the apos- 
 tles and their immediate successors was not so far 
 stretched as to have become attenuated, or unsafe to 
 be relied upon. The succession of a very few 
 elders, in each primitive Church, conveyed, orally, 
 the doctrine of the first age to the third and fourth. 
 Are we ourselves under any historical uncertainty as 
 to the doctrines held by the Reformers? and if thesQ 
 
166 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 opinions weie regarded as of ultimate authority, we 
 should naturally appeal to the copious traditionary 
 evidence which makes it certain what those opinions 
 were. But in this case, the line is much longer than 
 that which connected Dionysius, Origen, and Cyp- 
 rian, with Ignatius, Clemens, and John. 
 
 The appeal to tradition, in refutation of heretical 
 novelties, must not then he indiscriminately hlamed. 
 If we had found the early Christian w-riters abstaining 
 entirely from it, the uncomfortable inference would 
 have forced itself upon us, that they were themselves 
 conscious of a departure from the apostolic doctrine ; 
 or at least, that ail continuity of opinion had been 
 broken up. Yet, though allowable and proper, this 
 appeal to tradition, without the greatest caution in 
 the use of it, and the clearest distinction always 
 made between such proof, and that drawn from the 
 canonical writings, would inevitably open the w^ay 
 for a mode of argument essentially despotic. This 
 argument was much more easily wielded by inferior 
 minds than the scriptural evidence ; it was, also, 
 more to the taste of intemperate and dogmatic spirits ; 
 and it would therefore gradually supphuit the other 
 species of proof. Besides, as it was, even from the 
 first, indefmite and variable, or at least unfixed ; so 
 must it have become, in the lapse of time, incessantly 
 less and less trustworthy, and more and more open 
 to abuse. The consciousness of this augmenting in- 
 certitude would, by the principles of human nature, 
 lead to a more arrogant and noisy assertion of its va- 
 lidity. Thus, while its substance was inw^ardly 
 crumbling away, the argument from tradition would 
 be made to sustain, every year, a greater weight 
 But the very temper of despotism is generated, and 
 its lawless proceedings are extended, whenever a 
 power comes into the position to prop itself mainly 
 upon what it knows and feels to be a rotten founda- 
 tion, 
 
ITS JPIRST STEPS. 167 
 
 Here again we find a main pillar of the Romisli 
 usurpation, of which the basement at least had been 
 reared as early as the close of the third century. 
 
 Once more : after appealing, first to the Scriptures, 
 in confutation of heretics, and next to the traditionary 
 doctrine of the principal Churches, the leading cham- 
 pions of Chi istianity laboured strenuously, as well to 
 sustain the constancy and allegiance of the mass of 
 the faithful, as to inspire the contumacious with fear, 
 by insisting upon the Unity of the True Church, 
 and by representing, in the strongest language, the 
 sin and danger of separation from it. In this instance, 
 as in the preceding, we are called upon to use some 
 discrimination, and to check our rising censures. 
 
 The very expressions, and the identical arguments 
 which, as employed by the sanguinary champions of 
 the papacy, under Innocent III., excite our abhor- 
 rence and contempt, may be traced up to the well- 
 intentioned defenders of the faith in the third cen- 
 tury ; and if we will only take the pains to transport 
 ourselves, in idea, to that time, we shall see reason to 
 confess, that the position then assumed was one na- 
 tural for them to take, and not altogether unsubstan- 
 lial. 
 
 Few points, if any. are more strongly insisted upon 
 by our Lord and his apostles, as specifically charac- 
 teristic of the Gospel, than the union, communion, 
 and love, an^.ong its adherents, which should be a sign 
 to the world of its divinity. At the same time the 
 sin and peril of those who cause divisions is seriously 
 asserted. This doctrine therefore, and this commi- 
 nation could not be overlooked by those who knew 
 themselves to belong to the general body of the faith- 
 ful, and who had to deal with refractory parties. 
 But great care should have been taken in applying 
 this principle, and its sanction, to particular cases : 
 as for example. — 
 
 The unity of the Church, and the unbroken con- 
 
168 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 sent of the faithful, in tlie elementary matters of be- 
 lief, can apply to the Church only so long as the 
 word of Christ is freely ditfused among the people, 
 and his authority fully respected, in contravention of 
 human creeds. Moreover, it can mean only the ge- 
 neral concurrence of all believers (so respecling the 
 authority of Christ) in relation to the great principles 
 ofCiirislian faith ; and must by no means be mistaken 
 for the decisions of certain assemblies, or synods, or 
 of particular rulers, arrogating the right to speak in 
 the ruune of Christendom. Nor again, njust this 
 doctrine of the unity of the Church be urged in sup- 
 port of particular interpretations, concerning which 
 the best informed, and the most upright nuiy differ ; 
 nor in defence of special usages or ceremonies, not 
 enjoyed in Scripture, and imposed by those who may 
 happen to possess influence or power enough to carry 
 their measures. 
 
 St. Paul makes an express provision for granting 
 indulgence to th.use wiu), ihrougli weakness of faith, 
 or excessive sensibility of conscience, cannot con- 
 form to tiie general opinion ; and he secures the 
 substance of church harmony and uiiity, by leaving 
 ample room for that liberty of private judgment which 
 cannot be invaded without crushing the human 
 mind; and substituting the chains of despotism for 
 the bond of peace and love. 
 
 But with the early defenders of ecclesiastical 
 power, those we mean who belong to the pristine 
 era, now under review, the Unity of tlie Church 
 meant — that artificial concentration of actual infiu- 
 ence which converged upon Carthage, upon Antioch, 
 upon Alexandria, or upon Rome. It was not the 
 consent of all believers ; but the sense of Dionysius, 
 of Cyprian, or of Cornelius. The communion of 
 saints was not the atfectionate correspondence and 
 intercourse of all who held to tlie Head, and loved 
 each other as members of Christ ; but rather the 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 169 
 
 visible fact of ecclesiastical submission to this or that 
 metropolitan or patriarch. The form was taken for 
 the substance ; and those, in many cases, were 
 treated as aliens and enemies, whose only crime was 
 the caUing in question some arbitrary determina- 
 tion of a self-constituted and irresponsible authority. 
 
 Strange it was that these bishops and reverend 
 Fathers, removed only by two hundred years from 
 the apostolic age, should forget the illegality (if we 
 may use the term) of the pretext on which they de- 
 manded the submission of their adversaries. The 
 first Churches received decrees from two sources, 
 namely — the lips of the apostles, whose absolute 
 power as the Lord's commiss oners was not question- 
 ed ; or from councils, in whi^h the brethren at large 
 had their place and vote. But these bishops and 
 metropolitans, although they still convened the peo- 
 ple in their parishes, and left them a semblance of 
 their primitive liberty, yet concerted every important 
 measure, and discussed all controversies in synods, 
 from which the greater part of the clergy even, as 
 well as the people, were excluded. For a few of the 
 Rulers of the Church to judge between themselves 
 and their opponents, and to roll thunders over the 
 heads of whoever resisted tlieir authority, was nothing 
 less than an outrageous usurpation. And yet it had 
 not been by a bold thrust, or a leap, that this point 
 of despotism had been reached ; but by insensible 
 degrees : and especially under favour of an incon- 
 siderate application of genuine principles to particular 
 instances. 
 
 " Out of the Church there is no salvation." Let 
 this be granted ; but who is out of the Church? 
 Is it those whom Hilderbrand may have excommu- 
 nicated, or whom Gregory the Great may have 
 cursed, or whom Syricius may have condemned, or 
 whom Lucius, or Stephen, or Sixtus, may have de- 
 nounced as heretics and schismatics? We must 
 15 
 
170 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 refuse to admit this rule, as well in its earlier, as in 
 its latter applications ; and the sentence of eternal 
 damnation, if impiously despotic when pronounced 
 by a pope that was master of the world, was so, not 
 the less, when uttered by a pope who the next day 
 might be called to exchange the mitre for a martyr's 
 crown. 
 
 A man must stand firm indeed who is neither 
 drawn nor driven from his position by a fierce assail- 
 ant. The early defenders of the faith did not so 
 know their proper standing, or so adhere to it, as to 
 maintain the ground where they mi;.rht at once have 
 saved themselv^es, and the truth, wiihout detriment 
 to the liberties of mankind. In fact they hastened 
 to entrench thmselves within the lines of absolute 
 despotism. The operation of the several controver- 
 sies, whether doctrinal or ecclesiastical, that were 
 carried on previously to the holding of the council 
 of Nice, may very readily be traced, first, in bring- 
 ing to maturity general arbitrary principles of church 
 government, and then in inducing Churches of 
 the west, and of northern Africa, to yield themselves 
 to the pretensions of the bishop of Rome, as St. 
 Peter's successor, and the rightful arbiter of Chris- 
 tendom. The doctrine of the unity of the Church, 
 so necessary in rebuking schismatics, seemed to 
 demand a visible concentration of all Churches 
 upon some one point ; and there was no centre so 
 naturally looked to as Rome. If the rise of the 
 papal tyranny is to be sought for, assuredly we must 
 not stop short either in the acts of Theodosius, or 
 in the concessions of Justinian ; or in the machina- 
 tions of this or that holder of the keys ; nor, in fact, 
 any where, till we reach those bold and ambitious 
 sentiments of the third century, which may be found 
 covertly expressed in the tract, " De Unitate Ec- 
 clesiae," andin the epistles of its author — the fervent 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 171 
 
 and pious Cyprian, and in those of several of his 
 episcopal contemporaries and colleagues. 
 
 Although there were no evidence of another kind, 
 we should yet have, on this ground, what is ample 
 and conclusive in proof of the assertion, that, long 
 before the era of the political triumph of Christianity, 
 and while all the movements of the Church were as 
 purely spontaneous as can be imagined, ecclesiasti- 
 cal power was condensing itself upon a centre, and 
 had made great progress in digesting those arrogant 
 principles, and in establishing those servile and su- 
 perstitious usages, which the papacy of the twelfth 
 century brought fully to bear upon the constitution 
 of society throughout Europe. 
 
 It now remains, and in the last place cursorily to 
 review the position of Christianity, or shall we say, 
 the Church, in relation to mankind at large, and to 
 the Roman government, during the early period of 
 which we are speaking. 
 
 But, indeed, though concerned in this section with 
 the first three centures of Christian histor)^, especially, 
 it is impracticable, in reference to a matter so inde- 
 finite as is the general temper and the intellectual 
 and moral condition of mankind, to mark off eras 
 with any precision, or to say whence a certain dis- 
 position of the minds of men took its rise, or when 
 it give place to another. Facts of this class, al- 
 though in a broad sense conspicuous and unquestion- 
 able, are not to be traced in lines and colours upon a 
 chart of history. 
 
 Our present topic, although by no means new to 
 histwical inquiry, has not perhaps been duly and 
 impartially considered. The spiritual power which, 
 taking its spring from Christianity, availed itself of 
 those mighty forces which nothing but truth can 
 supply, spread its scorciiing beams over the world, 
 and rose to the zenith, because the heavens — politi- 
 
172 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 cal as well as intellectual, had been deserted, and 
 did, as one might say, ask to be again occupied and 
 ruled : there was a vacuum ; and the Church filled 
 it. From the age of the Antonines (not to name an 
 earlier time) and onward, in slow but regular pro- 
 gression, 'as far as to the depth of that night which at 
 length covered Europe, the humon mind, in every 
 sphere of its exercise, was failing, and decaying, and 
 collapsing. During the same time, and no doubt 
 under the influence of many of the same causes, the 
 life of the vast political system of the western world 
 sunk apace, and its coherence became every year 
 more feeble. Church Power, therefore, stepped into 
 the room of all other kinds of power ; it inherited the 
 strength and the honours of every expiring supre- 
 macy ; and in turn, as every authority, and as every 
 virtue died away intestate, without leaving a natural 
 successor, the church came forward to administer 
 to the effects of all ; she grasped all ; and became at 
 length the sole mistress of whatever she thought 
 worth possessing. 
 
 Now it would be easy to maintain, consistently 
 with many facts, two or more opposing theories on 
 this subject ; as for example : one might very plausi- 
 bly trace the degeneracy of the human mind, and the 
 decline of the empire, the extinction of science, the 
 corruption of manners, and the fall of the state, sever- 
 ally to those various political and natural causes that 
 are known to have borne upon the social system dur- 
 ing this period of universal declension ; and then it 
 might be alleged that the Church, and we must mean 
 especially the Romish Church, came in, as well to 
 rescue, to preserve, and to transmit, no small amount 
 of intelligence and of learning, and to hold the western 
 nations in some sort of coherence, and to prevent the 
 frightful anarchy, and to mitigate the utter barbarism, 
 that must otherwise have prevailed. It may be said, 
 and with some reason, nor have the apologists of the 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 173 
 
 papacy forgotten to affirm, that the Church, during a 
 long era of disorder and general ignorance, stood as 
 the guardian of manners, the preserver of literature, 
 the just mediatrix between the strong and the weak; 
 and, in a wurd, as the stay and refuge of whatever 
 was salutary and important, and which, without her 
 aid, must inevitably have perished. All this may 
 fairly enough be advanced. 
 
 On the contrary, those who contemplate the revo- 
 lutions of opinion from an opposite position, may al- 
 lege, and may make itappear credible, that the general 
 decay of intelligence, and the decline and fall of the 
 empire, although hastened by other causes, were 
 mainly brought about by the spread of a rehgious 
 system that quelled all the active and energetic pas- 
 sions, that suffused through the social body, an effe- 
 minate and desponding temper, that overlaid both 
 business and pleasure with gloom and idle supersti- 
 tions, and which, in a word, transferred to priests and 
 monks the influence that heretofore had been exer- 
 cised by soldiers and statesmen. A great part even 
 of this allegation may be made good ; but, as those 
 who have advanced it have generally been impelled 
 by a feeUng more hostile to Christianity than to su- 
 perstition, the distinction necessary to be observed be- 
 tween the two they have designedly neglected ; and 
 thus have thrown a capital fallacy into their argu- 
 ment. 
 
 The one of these theories, as well as the other, if 
 advanced in a categorical manner, is open to serious 
 exception ; or, at least, may so far be confuted as 
 suffices for despoiling its advocates, severally, of the 
 inference they would draw from it. Thus the Ro- 
 manist can by no means make good his apology for 
 his Church, inasmuch as he cannot disprove the 
 chargcj standing against her, of using her power for 
 the worst purposes, and of exercising it iu the w^orst 
 spirit. If indeed the Papacy were inherently the pro- 
 15* 
 
174 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 tectress of humanity, and the patroness of know- 
 ledge, and the guardian of civil liberties, why, when 
 the nations began to reclaim their liberties, and to 
 awake to the calls of reason, did she so strenuously 
 labour to quash both, and to maintain the ancient 
 empire of ignorance ? We conclude that the benefi- 
 cial agency she had at one time exerted, was acci- 
 dental, and altogether foreign to her proper views and 
 general femper. 
 
 On the other hand, in rebutting the inference of 
 sceptics, we readily grant that the r^Tiied superstition 
 favoured by the Church from the third century, and 
 onwards, had a very powerful influence in bringing 
 on the degeneracy of the nations, and in accelerating 
 the fall of the Roman empire. But then, we ask — 
 was this superstition Christianity? When the affirm- 
 ative is proved, we may feel ourselves interested in 
 the question. 
 
 This subject ought not to be pursued on any sup- 
 position that assumes a single and exclusive cause. 
 Fix on what general principle we may, we shall find 
 it to have been both cause and effect ; or rather it will 
 appear that causes and effects were intimately blend- 
 ed, and that they mutually affected one the other, in 
 a manner that should preclude those simplifications of 
 which theorists are fond. 
 
 To attribute the decline of taste and intelligence, 
 and the decay of the Roman patriotism and power, 
 to the influence of Christianity, abstractedly, is a 
 calumny easily rebutted, on several distinct grounds. 
 For, in the first place, this decay and decline, and es- 
 pecially the disappearance of those high sentiments 
 upon which national greatness depends, had become 
 conspicuous long before Christianity had gained any 
 such ascendency as to enable it, in a visible manner, 
 to affect the opinions and behaviour of the mass of 
 mankind ; and certainly not the upper and the edu- 
 cated classes. If Grecian and Roman philosophy 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 175 
 
 and literature, and if the pristine republican energy 
 and virtue had preserved their force and brightness 
 to the time of Constantine, and then had suddenly 
 waned, there would indeed have been reason to sup- 
 pose that the new faith was the main cause of such 
 a revolution. But the scholar well knows that, in 
 regard to Roman literature, the Augustan splendour 
 had long before been dimmed, and that, in relation 
 to that of Greece, false taste, and a nugatory philo- 
 sophy, had come in the place of Attic vigour and in- 
 telligence. Moreover, the historian knows equally 
 well, that public and political virtue had, at the same 
 time, and on both sides the Adriatic, been succeeded 
 by the thorough corruption, and by those servile sen- 
 timents which are characteristic of extensive military 
 despotisms. To throw the blame of this moral, men- 
 tal, and political ruin upon Christianity, is to assign 
 to it a retrospective influence, and to make the effect 
 precede the cause by a century and a half ! 
 
 Furthermore ; in casting the eye over a biogra- 
 phical chart of literary and scientific men, the fact 
 presents itself, beyond dispute, that, so far as learn- 
 ing, philosophy, and genius — eloquence and reason, 
 survived at all, either among the Greeks or Latins, 
 the Church might boast them mainly as her own — 
 Was Christianity indeed the leatliern cup that'brought 
 upon the human mind its sleep of ages? How hap- 
 pened if then that pagans were the first, and Chris- 
 tians the last — the last by two centuries, to exhibit 
 its stupifying influence ? Who are the pagan writers 
 that can be named as recommending the ancient 
 polytheism during that age when Chrysostom, Je- 
 rome, Augustine, Basil, and the Gregories wrote 
 and spoke ? In admitting the dechne of intelligence, 
 we must, in all equit}^, save the fame of these and 
 other illustrious men, of whom any age might be 
 proud : and having done so, may grant that, what- 
 
176 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 ever was not Cluistiaiij in that era, was, indeed 
 effete. 
 
 Besides : when we come down to a later and a still 
 more degenerate age, whatever influence the frivo- 
 lous superstition of the times might have in promo- 
 ting this decay, Christianity is clearly exempt 
 from the blame, inasmuch as it was no longer vir- 
 tually extant, or not so extant as to retain its soul 
 and power. 
 
 It is not then to any one cause, but to many, and 
 these intimately commingled, that we must trace 
 the gradual desolation, the withering, the blight, that 
 at length overspread the once civilized world. Most 
 of these causes have often enough been specifically 
 mentioned ; nor is it at all necessary to enumerate 
 them here. Might we add to the list the mere 
 hypothesis — it can be no more than a conjecture, of 
 a periodic physical 'development and withdrawment 
 — a rise and flill, of mental energy within the human 
 system ? It is at least diflicult to review the fortunes 
 of mankind, either on a great scale, or within par- 
 ticular spheres, without inclining to the supposition 
 that there are natural cycles of intelligence, disturbed 
 indeed by accidental causes ; at one time lengthened, 
 and at another shortened ; but still returning, at not 
 very irregular intervals ; and in obedience to which 
 the great community of nations, and nations indi- 
 vidually, advance or recede on the course of know- 
 ledge and virtue. 
 
 Be this as it may ; what we have to do with is the 
 broad fact tliat those nations that once were bound 
 together in the bundle of the Roman empire, did at 
 last fall into a state of anarchy and of degeneracy, 
 such as allowed and invited the spiritual power to 
 seize all kinds of authority, and to establish its usur- 
 pations on the firmest basis. This supervening 
 church tyranny was, undoubtedly, and in many 
 senses, a benefit to mankind. During the dismal 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 177 
 
 nights and days of that general flood, the Church 
 was the ark in which were conserved the rudiments 
 of our modern Hberties, civilization and learning. — 
 This granted, we are then free to pass what judgment 
 we think fit upon the spirit and temper of the ascen- 
 dant power, and upon the conduct of the individuals 
 who in succession held its sceptre. 
 
 But besides the relation of the Church to the 
 moral and intellectual condition of the nations through 
 its early era, there was a specific relationship borne 
 by it to the Roman government ; and we must now 
 be understood to speak definitely of the second and 
 third centuries; or the period during which both par- 
 ties, that is to say, the Christian community, and the 
 imperial court, had a distinct consciousness of each 
 other as hostile powers. 
 
 We have already said that, whether persecuted or 
 tolerated, a religious community, numerous, every 
 where extant, internally organized, and sensitive 
 through all its members, can never be looked at with 
 indifference by any government. Let it be granted 
 that principles of peace and subordination pervade 
 such a body ; and moreover that, to-day^ its feeling 
 goes along with the government, and that its weight 
 is thrown into the scale of the existing administra- 
 tion. But to-morrow changes take place ; measures 
 are proposed, or effected, which the religious commu- 
 nity disapproves, or by which it thinks itself aggrieved, 
 or endangered. Will it abstain then from using its 
 conscious power? Will it refrain from implicit threats? 
 Spite of Christian meekness, spite of every motive 
 to the contrary, nay, on the very ground and pretext 
 of the highest motives, it will act as human nature, 
 in such circumstances, impels ; and the government, 
 seeing things only in a common light, will find that 
 it has to do with a powerful and an unmanageable 
 internal enemy. A well-adjusted church-and-statepo- 
 
178 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 lity recommends itself, in this special respect; not in- 
 deed as an infallible means of preventing collisions be- 
 tween the religious and the secular elements of the 
 social system ; but as an arrangement which pro- 
 vides against ordinary occasions of concussion, and 
 as immensely better than the -.leaving two potent 
 principles open to every caslialty that may throw 
 them rudely one upon the other. 
 
 The behaviour of the Christian community under 
 the outrageous violences of which it was so often 
 the victim, was, in most instances, unexceptionable 
 and admirable. So much meekness, so much re- 
 spect for authority, such abstinence from retahative 
 conduct and vindictive expressions, on the part of a 
 body, numerous and physically strong, and not 
 always destitute of influence at court, affords convin- 
 cing proof of the divine excellence and efficacy of 
 the motives which the Gospel conveys. 
 
 Yet in their remonstrances with their furious ene- 
 mies, the Christian apologists make a fair appeal to 
 the fact of ihe patience and submissiveness, under in- 
 tolerable wrongs, of a body of men numerous enough, 
 if they chose to stand upon the defensive, to convulse 
 the empire, if not to make their own terms. And 
 they well said, " If we were impelled by worldly and 
 common motives, we should certainly judge it better 
 to die sword in hand, than at the stake." 
 
 This quiet, but significant allusion to their physi- 
 cal force, and to their organized power, naturally be- 
 came more and more frequent and distinct ; and 
 whether openly spoken of or not, it was thoroughly 
 understood, and keenly felt too by the imperial go- 
 vernment. Perhaps indeed the pohlical power of 
 the Chiistians was rated higher by the court, that 
 justly feared it, than by the Church that would not 
 indulge the thought of actually using it. The cir- 
 cumstances of the Diocletian persecution (not to refer 
 to any other) afford indication enough of what were 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 179 
 
 the alarms, and what the desperate resolution of the 
 imperial cabinet. These fears, and this line of con- 
 duct, on the one side, must, in the end, have infused 
 a corresponding feehng into the Church. The two 
 powers were balancing and mutually measuring their 
 strength ; and if the conversion of the court itself had 
 not occurred when it did, nothing else seemed likely 
 to happen, at length, but an open collision, and a ge- 
 neral conflict. 
 
 How far this probable consequence was foreseerr 
 by Constantine, and how far a regard to it might af- 
 fect his decision, we must not surmise; but it may 
 be conjectured that he embraced the unconquerable 
 doctrine, and bowed to the triumphant cross, only in 
 time to prevent a universal convulsion ; and peihaps 
 an overthrow of the pagan ascendancy. 
 
 But what we have here to do with is that interior 
 and unuttered feeling, continually gathering force, 
 which must have worked in the minds of Christians, 
 and especially of their chiefs. The meekness of the 
 Gospel not forgotten, and the express precepts of 
 Christ and the apostles kept in view, it was yet ine- 
 vitable that the political weight of the Church should 
 be pondered, though in silence, and that the possi- 
 bility of advancing, and of maintaining too, a just 
 demand of tolerance, should be thought of " We 
 will 7iot use our power ; but if we were to use it, jus- 
 tice must be granted to us." Such was the language 
 natural to men so cruelly and unwisely maltreated. 
 
 Now the meditation of political strength directly pro- 
 motes its consolidation, and imparts to it a consistent 
 and nervous energy. The rulers of the Church were 
 the heads of a body, passive indeed in its principles, 
 and submissive in its conduct ; but yet conscious of 
 its powers, and provoked to try them. Let it be 
 granted that the habits of feeling, the sentiments, and 
 the schemes, generated by these circumstances, ac- 
 tually remained in a quiescent state up to the moment 
 
180 SPIRITUAL DESf OTISM. 
 
 of the accession of Constantine. But a deeply work- 
 ing, an intense preparation of feeling had been made, 
 which would at once expand and breathe, in a new 
 manner, when the fortunes of the body took a hap- 
 pier turn. The high tones, the arrogance, and the 
 intolerance of the Churchmen of the times of Con- 
 stantine, Jovian, and Theodosius, were the outbursts 
 of emotions, long pent up, and which had reached a 
 vigorous maturity when first they made themselves 
 heard in the open world. The gaudy and winged 
 creature of the fourth century, had had its long 
 chrysalis sta e in the third. 
 
 The part acted, the language used, the prerogatives 
 claimed, by the Church under the first Christian em- 
 perors, must not be thought of as having sprung up 
 fresh at the moment : this style was the product of 
 the anterior season of oppression. In the insolent 
 behaviour of certain ecclesiastics towards emperors 
 and persons of high secular rank, one cannot but read 
 the vindictive sentiment — " Now is our time come 
 for revenging the Church upon the State." From 
 its long schooling of persecution, the Church mani- 
 festly learned the ill lesson of intolerance, and in- 
 stead of abhorring the usage and principle of cruelty, 
 in religious matters, too soon desired to try the 
 force of it in its controversy with heretics. It is a 
 great illusion to suppose that the Christian commu- 
 nity, admirable as was its behaviour, came forth from 
 its three centuries of oppression and suffering, unhurt 
 and pure in its sentiments, as a poHtical body. If we 
 will not accept the open and active friendship of the 
 secular authority, and if we reject a cliurch and state 
 alliance, we must have, in its stead, an ominous jea- 
 lousy, and a murky turbulence (though repressed) 
 which, if it never breaks out in civil convulsions, will 
 not fail to nurse up a temper that will show itself 
 internally, as a spirit of rancour and insubordination. 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 181 
 
 It remains to recapitulate the heads of the present 
 section. 
 
 We have affirmed, and do not anticipate contra- 
 diction from those who themselves are conversant 
 with the existing documents of church history, that 
 the spiritual despotism, afterwards brought to a centre, 
 and made coherent in the papacy, had developed 
 every one of its essential principles before the time of 
 that political revolution which gave to the Church 
 the aids of imperial patronage; and while every move- 
 ment was purely spontaneous, or in other words, 
 while this power stood on the ground of spiritual mo- 
 tives, and stayed itself altogether on the fulcrum of 
 opinion. 
 
 During, and within the limits of this same pristine 
 era, we find the clergy to have gained upon the peo- 
 ple at large the means of carrying despotism to any 
 extent, by challenging to themselves the possession 
 of, and irresponsible control over, certain awful ele- 
 ments indispensable to salvation, and in no other 
 manner to be obtained but from the hand of the 
 priest. The people moreover had been thrust from 
 their place in the deliberative assemblies held by the 
 rulers of the society. These two important changes, 
 if there had been none other, were enough to open 
 the way to whatever actually followed. In this sense 
 the Church, in the age of Cyprian, was essentially 
 despotic. 
 
 Again ; by the gradual and inevitable aggrandize- 
 ment of the episcopal order, by the consolidation and 
 regular distribution of offices, and especially by the 
 exclusion of the inferior clergy from provincial and 
 general councils, a distance was interposed between 
 the several orders of the Church, such as at once 
 broke up the feeling of substantial equality that 
 should subsist among the ministers of Christ, and 
 gave the reins to the few, in a manner that could 
 issue in nothing else but usurpation and tyranny — a 
 16 
 
182 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 tyranny always advancing. This power of the su- 
 periors was, at the same time, making preparation 
 for further encroachments, within the monastery. 
 
 Furthermore ; the principles engendered, and the 
 practices resorted to in consequence of the perpetual 
 conflicts carried on between the Church and her he- 
 retical and schismatic opponents, placed her in a po- 
 sition essentially despotic ; and induced a feeling 
 which led her to catch at the first means that oc- 
 curred of sustaining her authority by penal inflic- 
 tions. 
 
 Lastly : these several preparations and advances 
 of despotism were made during a course of time in 
 which the vigour of the human mind was fast failing, 
 and while the political structure was splitting and 
 crumbling to its fall. Its ultimate ascendancy, there- 
 fore, was little less than an inevitable consequence of 
 the disappearance of w^hatever might have stood in 
 its way. i 
 
 Some few specimens of the evidence that might 
 be adduced in support of the above positions, will be 
 found at the end of the volume. But the author 
 feels confident that his allegations, in the main, will 
 not be called in question by any who are really qua- 
 lified to express an opinion on subjects of this kind. 
 It is indeed not unlikely that, from the pages of our 
 modern ecclesiastical writers and church historians, 
 sundry casual admissions and concessions may be 
 culled, of an import opposite to the author's represen- 
 tations. But of what weight are such testimonies, 
 in this instance ? The facts in question are — the 
 temper and condition of the Christian commonwealth 
 fifteen and sixteen hundred years ago ; whence then 
 should we seek our inforujation ? Is it from Tille- 
 mont, Baronius, Fleury, Cave, Usher, Burnet, Tay- 
 lor, Bull, Hooker, Mosheim, Gibbon ? These great 
 writers, or if there be a hundred more of equal cele- 
 brity, and whatever might be the depth of their erudi- 
 
ITS FIRST STEPS. 183 
 
 tion, drew their knowledge of ecclesiastical antiquity 
 from no other sources (there are no other) than those 
 remains of christian literature which are still extant, 
 and which now load our shelves, and are under our 
 hand. Do they quote a single ancient author who 
 has disappeared during the last two centuries ? If 
 not, we are to-day as favourably placed as themselves 
 for acquiring the only information that has in mo- 
 dern times, been within reach, or that is of any deci- 
 sive value. 
 
 In discussions of this order it should be held a 
 waste of time and labour, as it is an extreme imper- 
 tinence, to quote modern authorities at all ; and the 
 author must protest as^ainst every sort of evidence of 
 a secondary kind. What avails it, in such an argu- 
 ment, that Bellarmine, or Grotius, or Parker, or Stil- 
 lingfleet, er Barrow, or Bingham, or Warburton, or 
 Jortin, while intent upon some other question, or 
 while seeking a casual illustration of a different posi- 
 tion, have said and admitted so and so, concerning 
 the primitive Church? If such admissions are vague 
 and general, they are scarcely worth turning aside to 
 gather. If founded upon specific references to origi- 
 nal authorities, we have those authorities under our 
 eye, and do far better to peruse them for ourselves, 
 than to look at detached portions of them through 
 the chromatic telescope of writers of the seventeenth 
 century. 
 
 The time was when the Fathers were read super- 
 stitiously, and were regarded as our masters in the- 
 ology. They are now read intelligently, and as 
 authorities simply in questions of history. Our pre- 
 decessors (or some of then)) followed the Fathers for 
 guidance ; we follow them for warning. It is in truth 
 an auspicious omen of the present times, that an ac- 
 tive and searching inquiry is on foot concerning the 
 history of Christianity, in its early periods, and that 
 this inquiry stops short no where, but in the extant 
 
184 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 remains of those very ages. Let the ignorant, and 
 the indolent, and the frivolous, scout this diligence as 
 idle ; and let those whose opinions have long been 
 crystallized on every subject, resent it as importunate 
 or pernicious : but minds ardent and free in the pur- 
 suit of truth, will not, for a moment, be disheartened 
 by any such rebukes. Consequences of the most 
 momentous and extensive kind are not unlikely to 
 spring from this anxiety to know the real history of 
 our faith. It is by the aid of this sort of learning 
 that we are set at large from the thralls of temporary 
 and sectarian recensions of Christianity : it is from 
 this source that we draw an enhanced and profound 
 regard to the infallible authority of Scripture ; and it 
 is also from studies of this kind that we may derive, 
 if at all, sound and sober notions of those great prin- 
 ciples of the Divine Government which bear upon 
 the revolutions of religious opinion, and upon the rise 
 and decay, the alternate corruption and renovation^ 
 of the elements of piety. 
 
 The author makes an apology to the reader for 
 this digressive page. 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 185 
 
 SECTION VI. 
 
 ERA OF THE BALANCE OF THE CIVIL AND ECCLESIASTICAL 
 POWERS. 
 
 Although it may appear in fact, again and again, 
 that seasons of external prosperity have favoured the 
 advance of abuses, and have promoted a worldly and 
 ambitious spirit among Churchmen, we are by no 
 means compelled, on that ground, to grant that Chris- 
 tianity, in the nature of things, can retain its purity 
 only by the aid of sufferings and persecutions. In 
 direct contradiction of any such melancholic principle, 
 it is enough to allege the decisive and pointed in- 
 stance of the apostolic Churches, of which it is affirm- 
 ed, at a certain time, " that they had rest," in the 
 stead of persecution, " and were edified ; and walk- 
 ing in the fear of the Lord, and the comfort of the 
 Holy Ghost, were multiplied." Worldly ease has had 
 its evil consequences ; and so has persecution. If 
 there are certain abuses which we trace to the one, 
 in the history of the Church, there are abuses also, 
 and some of the most serious and fatal kind, that are 
 directly attributable to the other. Neither ease nor 
 affliction, prosperity nor persecution, is good abstract- 
 edly, in relation to truth and piety ; but both operate 
 for the better or the worse, according to the actual 
 state of the mind that comes under their operation. — 
 Far from being of opinion that religious prosperity, in 
 the best sense, is to be looked for only as the product 
 of storms, we allow ourselves to imagine, as not chi- 
 merical, a future era of spiritual life, and a general 
 triumph of truth, which shall take its start from a 
 smiHng morning of general peace, and mundane fe- 
 licity. 
 
 16* 
 
186 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 If indeed in any case, truth has aheady undergone 
 serious perversion, and if its edge has been turned 
 aside by immoral interpretations ; if schemes of en- 
 croachment and extortion have been devised, and put 
 in course, and if, in a word, the genuine simplicity 
 and spirituaUty of the Gospel have disappeared, then 
 no doubt it must follow that an exemption from 
 trouble, and a liberty and facility in giving effect to 
 such schemes, will hasten the advance of all that is 
 mischievous. This is obvious ; and such we find to 
 have been the effect of each of those seasons of re- 
 pose that were enjoyed under even the pagan empe- 
 rors. Rest was injurious to the Church, because 
 Christianity had lost its integrity. 
 
 The pernicious consequences that attended the im- 
 perfect and precarious prosperity permitted to Chris- 
 tians from year to year, during the period of poly- 
 theistic ascendancy, were not likely to be precluded, 
 or to lose their evil efficacy, in that far more settled 
 and genial summer time which followed the submis- 
 sion of the Roman Imperial Power to the Cross. 
 What had happened under Alexander Severus, un- 
 der Gordian, and under the Phihps, would naturally 
 happen also under Constantine and Theodosius. — 
 Superstition spread, debauchery among the clergy 
 became more flagrant, and ambition and venality 
 more impudent. But what is to be lamented or 
 blamed in all this, is not that the Church was in- 
 dulged with an exemption from trouble, but that it 
 should have been in a state such as made every ces- 
 sation of suffering dangerous and corrupting. 
 
 When we find these errors and unchristian prac- 
 tices increasing gradually, or even rapidly, after the 
 political triumph of the Gospel, we are not to incul- 
 pate the incidental means of those unhappy perver- 
 sions ; but rather should look to the inner springs and 
 reasons of them. Nor indeed was the growth of su- 
 perstition, and of corruption, and despotism, in the 
 
IN 'I'HE FOURTH CENTURY. 187 
 
 age of ConstantiaCj such as appears in certain strong- 
 ly-coloured statements of it. Or let it have been 
 what it might, it was balanced by the expansion of 
 talents and merits of a new and high order. Little 
 as the moderns may wish to take the divines of the 
 fourth century as their masters, none who have con- 
 versed with them in their writings will hesitate to 
 grant them, in the main, as high a praise as belongs 
 to any set of theologians, in any age. And in com- 
 paring the extant Christian literature of the fourth 
 century with that of the third, the advantage is very 
 far from being decisively on the side of the earlier 
 authors, on the ground, either of piety, or of doctrinal 
 consistency. The very reverse might readily be 
 maintained. 
 
 The illustrious and imperial convert — the first 
 Christian prince, behaved himself in his new rela- 
 tionship, as temporal bridegroom of the Church, in a 
 manner regulated, in part, by the existing usages 
 and principles of the Roman government ; and in 
 part by the usages and principles which he found pre- 
 vaihng wnthin the vast and mysterious comnaunity 
 to which he joined himself. He entered the awful 
 temple of the true God, sceptre in hand, and as 
 prince, conqueror, and patron : yet with a becoming 
 reverence, and a disposition to comply devoutly with 
 the orders and prescriptive modes of the system and 
 worship of the sacred precincts. Constantine set his 
 foot upon the threshold of the Christian Church with 
 a feeling perhaps, not very unlike that which had 
 belonged to certain chiefs of the pristine Roman arms, 
 who, in making their way as proud victors to the 
 fanes of a conquered nation, bowed to the humiliated 
 divinity of the place, and hastened to prove that they 
 approached the foreign altar, not as destroyers, but as 
 worshippers. 
 
 While considering the course pursued by Constan- 
 
188 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 tine, from first to last, in relation to the Churcbj we 
 are bound to keep in view, on the one hand, his habits 
 and maxims as a Caesar ; and on the other hand, the 
 existing sentiments, and the ecclesiastical economy of 
 the Christian commonwealth. If we are speaking of 
 his personal merits, in his public religious capacity, 
 nothing can be more inequitable than either to judge 
 him by the rule we should apply to a modern Euro- 
 pean prince ; or to assume, what is as far as possible 
 from being true, that the Church was then fresh in 
 her simplicity ; or that the mass of the people (within 
 the Church) were in possession of any substantial 
 liberties ; or that the political rulers of the body were 
 still in a state to be spoiled, and to be taught the bad 
 lessons they might learn at court, of ambition, intrigue, 
 and cupidity. 
 
 The abstract justice of the emperor's measures, or 
 their ultimate expediency, or their compatibility with 
 the spirit of the Gospel, is one thing ; but his personal 
 merits, fairly regarded in the light of his age (not in 
 that of our own) is quite another; and in this latter 
 view there is reason to admire, as well the vigour and 
 intelligence, as the moderation and equity of his pub- 
 lic conduct. In those instances where his general 
 consistency gave way, or his temper failed, we may al- 
 most always trace his fault to the insufferable perversi- 
 ty, or the violence and contumacy, of the parties that 
 opposed, or of those that advised him. He and his suc- 
 cessors cordially desired, and laboured to promote, the 
 universal ascendancy of Christianity, as the only true 
 rehgion. He and they, moreover, sought the peace 
 of the Church, and its good order and unity. They 
 felt that a religion, more potent in its influence over 
 the minds of men than any other, and at the same 
 time generating discords such as no other religion had 
 presented, and which convulsed and endangered the 
 state, demanded a watchful control, and needed the 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 189 
 
 most vigorous measures to prevent its bringing about, 
 at once, its own destruction, and that of the empire. 
 
 To reduce this vast system into a state of analogy 
 with the machinery of government, to estabhsh a 
 good understanding between the civil and ecclesias- 
 tical authorities, and especially to repress, if possible, 
 tumultuous and violent contentions, must have 
 seemed to the Christian emperors their manifest 
 duty, and their interest. Nothing less than the 
 efl'ecting of these several objects, could consist with 
 the welfare of the vast society of nations for which 
 they had to care. A complicated system of spiritual 
 government they found already matured ; although 
 it was ill-organized, and in disorder, and a system 
 essentially despotic. The first Christian princes 
 (hke those of the Lutheran reformation) transferred 
 powers and authorities from one centre to another ; 
 but did not despoil the community of any liberties 
 then actually enjoyed. Constantine, or his sons and 
 successors, might indeed hold a chain, and tighten 
 it ; but they did not forge one. The chain of spirit- 
 ual despotism had been beaten and wreathed upon 
 the anvil (or altar) of the non-estabhshed, voluntary, 
 and afflicted Church of the third century. 
 
 Duly and equitably weighed, the public measures 
 of Constantine, and of the more enlightened and up- 
 right of his successors, are hable to little blame, and 
 may even challenge much praise. But the question 
 is altogether of another kind, when we come to in- 
 quire into the abstract policy, or mere justice and 
 lawfulness of these same proceedings. It has been 
 the practice of a certain class of modern writers, first 
 to assume theoretic principles in relation to external 
 Christianity (and principles of a very questionable 
 sort) and then to arraign the conduct of the Roman 
 prince as amenable to that hypothetic rule ; and 
 especially have such writers assumed that the Church, 
 at the moment of his conversionj was in the main 
 
190 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 free, pure, and unsophisticated. What more unfair 
 or unfounded ! 
 
 But we have done with the personal merits of 
 Constantine, and the succeeding Christian emper- 
 ors ; and turn for a moment to their measures, ab- 
 stractedly considered. Now even if it should appear 
 that these measures, or some of them, were essen- 
 tially impohtic and pernicious (which is more than 
 ought to be summarily granted) no such inference 
 will follow, as that no pubhc measures, or no state 
 policy whatever, in relation to the church, can be 
 good and lawful. What if Constantine, upon ground 
 so new and difficult, failed and went astray? Is it 
 therefore certain that no safe path may be found 
 over that ground ? we think not ; and must reject 
 every general conclusion, drawn from the conduct 
 and policy of the first Christian princes, against na- 
 tional ecclesiastical constitutions. If we reasonably 
 dechne to take these inexperienced princes as our 
 masters and guides, in matters of church polity, we 
 are, of course, exempted from every inference that 
 might be drawn from the ill success of their actual 
 measures. Our own may be better devised, and 
 may be more conformed to the great and now well 
 ascertained principles of political and religious liberty. 
 
 ''The things that happened aforetime, are re- 
 corded for our learning, upon whom the ends of the 
 world are come." If the first and the second grand 
 experiments for the adjustment of the religious inter- 
 ests of communities, have failed, the course sug- 
 gested, by such admonitory errors, is not to abandon 
 so reasonable and necessary a work, or to leave un- 
 controlled that which must quickly run into confu- 
 sion, if neglected ; but rather to turn the errors of our 
 predecessors to advantage, and to do better, what 
 they did ill. Sixteen or eighteen hundred years have 
 not run out, as it were under our .eyes, without yield- 
 ing some definite and practical instructions. There 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 191 
 
 is now no need that we should err, as our precursors 
 have done, for want of experience. If the task of 
 fitting the civil and religious machineries, one to the 
 other, has hitherto baffled those who have attempted 
 it, we may succeed better. We see the sources of 
 failure ; the false routes are laid down in our charts ; 
 and every kind of necessary information is fully at 
 our command. Although therefore the entire church 
 and state system, such as it subsisted in times gone 
 by, should be adjudged faulty, we do not conclude 
 that a churcl>and-state system is either undesirable or 
 impracticable. 
 
 But in what did the first political establishment 
 of Christianity under Constantine, and his immedi- 
 ate successors, actually consist ? This subject, mis- 
 understood and misrepresented as it often is, well 
 deserves a little analysis. It has not been unusual, 
 and especially of late, to talk of the Church, estab- 
 lished under Constantine, as if it were the same 
 thing, or nearly the same thing, as the Church es- 
 tablished in these realms, or in other Protstant coun- 
 tries. No supposition can be more incorrect, not to 
 say delusive : in truth, all reasoning from the one to 
 the other of two systems so dissimilar, must be un- 
 sound. The faults of Constantino's church pohty, 
 be they what they might, are not the faults of ours ; 
 nor did the precautions and limitations which attach 
 to ours, belong to his. And again, the peculiar diffi- 
 culties which, in the present times, and in this coun- 
 try, attend all ecclesiastical arrangements, had no 
 existence, and were not to be provided for in that 
 age. The very measures which, with the emperors, 
 were resorted to for the regulation of church power, 
 and which then must have been regarded as bene- 
 ficial in their aspect towards the people, would, 
 among ourselves, be denounced as either ineffica- 
 cious, or as intolerable. What might be defensible, 
 
192 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 or even praiseworthy, in the pohcy of Constantine, 
 or Theodosius, we justly condemn when imitated 
 by our Tudors and Stuarts, and should resolutely 
 resist if attempted in our own times. 
 
 Constantine's establishment of Christianity, in the 
 first place, consisted in reversing all those prohibitory 
 edicts of his predecessors which hitherto had armed 
 its enemies ; and in declaring it to be — a Lawful 
 Religion. 
 
 This preliminary measure of mere justice none 
 will now condemn ; and yet in fact, by far the larger 
 proportion of all the pride, profligacy and ambition, 
 which spread among the clergy in the fourth century, 
 may be directly traced to the inevitable influence of 
 this sudden and complete change of fortune, and this 
 start in their relative position. A long ten years of 
 the most cruel sufferings, had almost broken the 
 hearts of the Christian community. Multitudes had 
 lost their property, and their place in society ; many 
 had perished ; pastors and deacons were labouring in 
 the mines ; congregations were every where disper- 
 sed, the offices of religion suspended, and the sacred 
 books destroyed ; or if concealed, w^ere become the 
 most dangerous sort of possession. It might have 
 seemed not unlikely that the Church would now 
 actually fall and be trampled in the dust under the 
 feet of her determined foes. That happy revolution, 
 to which the doubtful fortune of arms gave effect, 
 could not have been distinctly, and perhaps not at all 
 anticipated. " When the Lord turned again the cap- 
 tivity of his people," they must have felt like those 
 who awake from a horrid dream to a bright reality. 
 
 The first emotions of all pious minds were no 
 doubt of a becoming and fervent sort. Aloud they 
 offered praise to Him who had '' turned their mour- 
 ning into dancing," and had given them " beauty 
 for ashes." But other feehngs wonld ere long claim 
 
ITS FIRbT STEPS. 193 
 
 their turn, and especially so with the many whose 
 piely was of a slight, or of a fenatical kind. In all 
 private circles, from side to side of the empire, in 
 every city and town, there would spring up the ex- 
 ulting and half-vindictive sentiment, natural to the 
 wronged, when the tables are turned upon their op- 
 pressor?. The bounds of modesty and meekness 
 would not always be observed in the triumphant joy 
 of the now emancipated sect. In fact, we catch dis- 
 tinctly enough, in tlie extravagant harangues pro- 
 nounced at the tombs of the martyrs, the couched 
 resentment of the Church toward her fallen adversa- 
 ry : the feeling — and how natural a feeling is it, 
 and how difficult to repress, which heaves the bosom 
 in the recollection of cruel injuries, continues long 
 to mingle itself intimately with all the sentiments of 
 religious sufferers ; and is even transmitted from age 
 to age. Not a few of the pernicious observances of 
 later times sprung immediately from feelings of this 
 semi-vindictive sort. 
 
 Then again, the mere toleration of Christianity, 
 and the favour and countenance it of course enjoy- 
 ed at court, apart from any of those measures by 
 which its political establishment was effected, instan!- 
 ly acted, like a sudden breaking forth of a sultry sun 
 in a humid day, upon all ambitious and secular 
 spirits. What were the ideas that crowded into the 
 minds of metropolitans and bishops, nay, of the 
 worldly clergy of every grade, who already had made 
 great progress in effecting their schemes of aggran- 
 dizement ? Such, or at least all whose position 
 favoured their desires, turned their foces toward the 
 quarter of sunshine ; and at the earliest opportunity 
 brought tliemselves individually under the imperial 
 eye. The most rigid and mortified of our modern 
 sects might perhaps, in parrallel circumstances, be 
 seen to furnish not a few clerical persons, equally 
 ready to enjoy the genial temperature of a palace, 
 17 
 
194 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 and to deck themselves in the unwonted finery of a 
 court. 
 
 It could not be otherwise than that the now Chris- 
 tian emperor should surround himself with Christian 
 bishops, and put himself, in religious matters, under 
 the tutelage and direction of those whom he might 
 judge qualified lo inform him in what related to the 
 Church — its doctrine and its government. Without 
 any positive establishment of Christianity, and while 
 nothing was done which, in the nature of things, 
 could be avoided — if the Gfospel was to take the 
 place of the ancient idolatries, it would yet inevitably 
 happen, that very powerful excitements should be 
 put in activity, to stir whatever elements of ambition 
 might lurk in the bosom of the Christian communi- 
 ty, and especially of its clergy. To receive these 
 excitements well, and to use them moderately, the 
 Church was not, in its actual state, prepared to do ; 
 and the sober common-place feeling that belongs to 
 persons of high ecclesiastical rank, within an old 
 establishment, who in mixing with statesmen and 
 princes, are conscious of no elation, could not gene- 
 rally attach to the Christian bishops and clergy who 
 flocked around the throne, and thronged the impe- 
 rial court of Constantine. 
 
 Instead then of repeating the vague and illusive 
 allegation, that the political establishment of 
 Christianity spoiled the spirituality of the Church, 
 and rendered it ambitious, proud, and secular, let us, 
 with a more exact regard to facts, be content to say, 
 that, so far as ambition, pride, and secularity, really 
 appear to have advanced in the Church of the fourth 
 century, as compared with the Church of the thirdj 
 this unhappy deterioration resulted from the sudden 
 change of its condition, and from those new circum- 
 stances of ease, security, and favour, which unavoid- 
 ably attended the revolution of opinion at the impe- 
 rial court. 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 195 
 
 If nothing had been attempted by Constantine in 
 church affairs, beyond what the most rigid modern 
 advocates of the non-establishment principle might 
 approve, or in other words, if he had simply tolerated, 
 and personally favoured Christianity, there is no room 
 to think that the danger to the simplicity and purity 
 of the Church would have been much less than ac- 
 tually it was. The mitred chiefs of Constantinople, 
 Antiochj Alexandria, and Rome, would not, any the 
 more, have paused on the course upon which already 
 they had gone so far. The clerical body, generally, 
 would not have receded to the point of apostolic hu- 
 mility and disinterestedness. The church chest would 
 not have been shut against the further liberality of 
 the people. No profitable superstition would have 
 been exploded, no mummery laid aside. The ghostly 
 temple of tyranny, to which the Gregories, the Ur- 
 bans, and the Innocents of after times put their mas- 
 ter hands, would yet have gone on, slowly and se- 
 curely rising to the heavens, upon the broad founda- 
 tions laid in tears and blood by the martyr-bishops of 
 the pristine ages. 
 
 The first of Constantine's measures, in regard to 
 the Church, was, as we see, one of mere justice; and 
 so was the second ; nor can either be made to bear 
 the blame of those ill consequences which, in the ac- 
 tual state of the Christian community, were their na- 
 tural results. At the time of the issuing of the terri- 
 ble edict of Nicomedia, the Churches, in all the more 
 opulent parts of the Roman empire, were in posses- 
 sion of great wealth — the fruits of the voluntary prin- 
 ciple, and which consisted, not merely in money, 
 plate, jewels, spices, and costly vestments, but in 
 houses and lands. The revenues of this wealth, toge- 
 ther with the copious and perpetual stream of offer- 
 ings, laid weekly upon the altar, and which consisted, 
 as well of money, as of provisions of every kind, ena- 
 
196 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM; 
 
 bled the bishops and metropohtans not only (o sup- 
 port large establishments, but to retain around (liem, 
 one might say, swarms of ecclesiastics, of every grade : 
 and moreover to make distributions among the poor 
 to an extent thaf, no doubt, liad great influence in 
 swelling the numbers of tbe Church, and that formed 
 a silentj but efficacious counterpoise to tlie occasional 
 dangers and sufferings incident to a Christian profes- 
 sion. 
 
 Unlike as were these religious corporations, in 
 most respects, to any tbing heretofore seen in the Ro- 
 man world, their property would, in tlie eye of the 
 law, be at once regarded as analogous to the posses- 
 sions and revenues of the pagan hierarchies and tem- 
 ples. Nor could a question arise, on the point of ab- 
 stract justice, concerning the right of the holders or 
 trustees of this wealth. The amount of it might in- 
 deed be highly prejudicial to the religious well-being 
 of the Church; the motives of those wbo received^ 
 and the conduct of those who bestow^ed it, might be 
 liable to the most serious exceptions ; and no doubt, 
 in some instances, the worst sort of influence had 
 been exerted to obtain that, in the granting of which 
 creditors, orphans^ or relatives, w^ere grievously 
 wronged. But with considerations of this sort the go- 
 vernment had nothing to do. Law did not apply to 
 abuses of this order ; nor could it, on any principle, be 
 required of the emperor that he should, in relation to 
 funds already accumulated, inquire into the particular 
 sources whence they had flowed ; or ask whether 
 they had most benefited or injured the community. 
 
 It was, we say, a measure of mere justice to au- 
 thenticate the titles and possessions of religious corpo- 
 rations; that is to say, of the Christian Churches. 
 Nor was it much more than just to insist upon the 
 restitution of houses and lands which, during the late 
 years of cruel persecution, had been wrenched from 
 the hands of the bishops by their rapacious pagan 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 197 
 
 fellow citizens. This measure, in itself equitable, was 
 moreover recommended to the approval of all, by the 
 liberality of the emperor, who met the difficulty that 
 arose in instances where such properties had passed 
 into other hands, by fair purchase ; and where the 
 spoliator could not be found, or be made to refund. 
 
 On grounds of general equity and the usage of 
 civilized nations, this main act of Constantino's reli- 
 gious administration cannot be condemned; nor are 
 the principles or practices of any existing religious 
 parties such as may entitle them to blame it. And 
 yet, this same measure of justice did, in its actual ef- 
 fect upon the Christian commonwealth, by suddenly 
 restoring to the Churches large possessions, by secu- 
 ring to them, in the fullest manner, what they had 
 preserved, and by opening and fencing, for the clergy, 
 the broad road of cupidity and spiritual fraud, pro- 
 duce very ill consequences, and facilitate the advance 
 of every superstition and every solemn mockery. 
 
 The pure voluntary principle, as applied to the 
 maintenance of the clergy, had, at the close of the 
 third century, reached a point at which, as well for 
 the good of the communit}^, as for the preservation 
 and honour of tlie Church, it needed some effectual 
 check. Such a check, drawii from motives of good 
 sense or piety, was not available ; and nothing could 
 have taken hold of it but a vigorous interference on 
 the part of the State ; or in other words, the bringing 
 to bear upon the abused and superstitious prodigality 
 of the people, the Church and State principle ; not 
 indeed by peremptory prohibitions (except in the mat- 
 ter of bequests) but by substituting a definite and 
 well regulated, for an indefinite and grossly deranged 
 system. 
 
 There is not a despotic machination, there is not 
 
 an encroachment upon the natural or religious rights 
 
 of mankind, there is not a perversion of doctrine, or 
 
 a superstition, or a farsical usage of a later and 
 
 !?• 
 
198 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISWy 
 
 darker age, which may not, directly or indirectly, be 
 traced to tlie license and encouragement given to the 
 sacerdotal body to work upon the religious prodigality 
 of the people — as well the dying as the living. It 
 may indeed be imagined that the Church, in the 
 time of Constantine, had sunk into a condition past 
 remedy, or past any remedy which the State had the 
 power to apply ; yet this is not certain ; and some- 
 thing remedial might have been attempted : but then 
 that something must have consisted in bringing for- 
 ward the Establishment Principle in a way 
 not then thought of, and which we may well sup- 
 pose the clear-sighted chiefs of the then voluntary 
 Church would by no means have submitted fo. — 
 Bishops, and their clergy, understood their interests 
 far too well to have accepted even a munificent de- 
 finite maintenance, in lieu of the free offerings of 
 their flocks, and on the condition of declining those 
 gratuities. 
 
 We are perpetually hearing from certain quarters^ 
 of the first political establishment of Christianity as 
 the fatal blow which brought the true Church to the 
 ground, and laid her celestial honours in the dust. — 
 A mistake indeed ! Beside that Christianity was then 
 already deeply stained with earthly impurities, it 
 may, on the most substantial grounds be affirmed,, 
 that it was the want of a well-devised church-and- 
 state system — the want of an Establishment, which 
 made the revolution at court in favour of Christianity 
 extensively and lastingly injurious to the Christian 
 commonwealth. Adhering still to the line of proba- 
 bihty, we may easily imagine a system which would 
 have given a new turn to the fortunes of the Church 
 (if the phrase may be allowed) would have arrested 
 the papal usurpation, would have broken up the con- 
 centration of spiritual powers, would have starved the 
 monastery (a discipline which the professors of ex- 
 t4reme abstemiousness ought to have meekly received) 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 199 
 
 would have destroyed the marketable quality of su- 
 perstilion, and, in a word, would have reduced church 
 corruption and ambition within some limits of mo- 
 desty and reason. 
 
 The imperial catechumen might indeed be permit- 
 ted to summon oecumenic councils ; and migfit be 
 allowed, when they were convened, to occupy a 
 humble stool on the floor of the hall, in the midst of 
 the mitred fathers; and he might find leave too to 
 utter his opinions on points of theology : but it may 
 well be doubted if he was at any time so firmly seated 
 in the chair of ecclesiastical supremacy — although by 
 his adulators styled " chief bishop of the Church," as 
 would have enabled him to give eflfcct to reasonable 
 and necessary restrictive financial measures. But let 
 it be supposed that so much power was actually at 
 his command, what then were those measures which 
 sound policy and a just regard to the interests as well 
 of the Church as of the empire demanded ? 
 
 In the first place, a provision of the most peremp- 
 tory sort was needed, not less in regard to the ultimate 
 welfare of the clergy, than for the sake of the com- 
 munity at large, against the corrupt influence exert- 
 ed by the former over feeble, and guilty, and alarmed 
 consciences, in obtaining bequests to the Church. — 
 On high tlieoretic grounds, indeed, and if it be 
 held always an outrage for the magistrate to come in 
 between the souls of men and the priest, any statute 
 aimed against alienations in mortmain must be con- 
 demned. A man, whether ill informed in theology 
 or not, is actually of opinion that his soul will fare 
 the better in the next world, in consequence of his 
 robbing his children, and bequeathing his estate to 
 the Church ; is it not then, it may be asked, a grie- 
 vous infringement of religious liberty to deny him the 
 opportunity of doing so? The wisest communities, 
 in modern times, have thought otherwise; nor have 
 they scrupled to interdict, at least the worst excesses 
 
200 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 of this pernicious superstition. If some such prohibi- 
 tion could have been effected (and we may well doubt 
 its practicability) nothing, probably, would have had 
 a more beneficial and extensive influence in staying 
 the advance of religious abuses. Simply to have 
 declared null and void every bequest, whether made 
 in the article of death, or previously, in favour of 
 religious corporations, would have given a new aspect 
 to church history. 
 
 Then again a reasonable extension of the very 
 same legislative principle should have been made to 
 touch the monastic system in a capital article of its 
 polity. Had those establishments been forcibly 
 brought to stand upon the ground of the motives 
 professed by their inmates, the entire system of far- 
 sical poverty would instantly and permanently have 
 been reduced to its natural dimensions : nor could 
 the folly have gone on, as in fact it did, to swallow 
 up the wealth of Christendom. The papacy, de- 
 prived of its monkish cliampions, could never have 
 reared its despotism to the skies. Now, be it re- 
 membered, that the fundamental principle of the 
 monastic-life — the principle stiffly insisted upon, and 
 boasted of by its earliest promoters, was that of a 
 death to the world, to its possessions, its relationship, 
 its hopes, its pleasures, and its duties. In the eye of 
 others, and by his own avowal, the monk stepped 
 into his grave when he entered his cloister : the law 
 then should have taken him at his word ; and should 
 have put his lofty professions to the reasonable test 
 of requiring him to bequeath his goods to his rela- 
 tives. The statute of mortmain (had such a statute 
 been in operation) should have attached those who 
 announced themselves to be civilly and socially 
 defunct ; and instead of their being allowed to throw 
 their fortune, whatever it might be, into the chest of 
 the religious house, which was to be their sepulchre, 
 they should have been compelled to divide it among 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 201 
 
 the living. A measure of this sort, though at vari- 
 ance with the doctrine of religious liberty, as inter- 
 preted by some, might have saved Europe a thou- 
 sand years of superylition. 
 
 It might seem too bold an assertion to say that 
 the master-spring of the religious system of the 
 fourth century was, the command which the clergy 
 had then got of the sources of wealth ; or, in other 
 words, the play they had contrived to give to the 
 voluntary principle. INo revision of theological dog- 
 mas, no new canons of discipline, no ecclesiastical 
 sumptuary laws, would probably have done so much 
 toward bringing back the purity and disinterested- 
 ness of Christian practice and principle, as might 
 the simple establishment of an efficient financial sys- 
 tem, such as should have superseded, or gradually 
 have turned off, the unbounded profusion of the peo- 
 ple toward their clerg}^, and have introduced a defi- 
 nite and moderate, yet a sufficient public provision 
 for their maintenance. From the days of Trenaeus, 
 the clergy had been making frequent references to 
 the Levitical institution. They might then fairly 
 have been required to accept for themselves an ana- 
 logous system. The then existing property of the 
 Church being secured to it, would have afforded a 
 revenue fully adequate to the support of a proper 
 episcopal splendour, and to the defraying of inciden- 
 tal charges. Beyond this, an impost, equitably asses- 
 sed upon real property, might, without being felt as 
 oppressive, have yielded a reasonable competency to 
 so many of the ministers of religion as were actually 
 employed in useful services : and then a vast bene- 
 fit would have been done to the Church, and to the 
 community, by turning adrift the hundreds of sur- 
 pliced idlers that swelled the episcopal pageant in all 
 the great cities. 
 
 Those who please may insist upon abstract doc- 
 trines. Meanwhile, looking at simple facts, in a 
 
202 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 commorij and not a theoretic light, we venture to 
 affirm it as probable, that, if Constantine's Christian 
 EstabHshment had indeed been such, in the modern 
 sense of the term, and had inckided a just and uni- 
 form financial system, displacing the abused volun- 
 tary principle, and leaving the clergy nothing to hope 
 for, beyond a reasonable competency, and nothing to 
 think of, but their proper duties ; if this could have 
 been done, civihzation and Christianity might both 
 have been saved. 
 
 The church economy, modelled by Constantino, 
 and his immediate successors, in the next place, in- 
 cluded certain arrangements, distributions, and con- 
 centrations of the existing ecclesiastical supremacies, 
 such as seemed necessary, or at least desirable, for 
 bringing the newly associated and powerful religious 
 body into analogy with the civil polity of the empire. 
 Some authorities, of ancient date, were confirmed ; 
 some transferred ; some were extended, and others 
 made subordinate, until the one vast machine — the 
 spiritual, fitted into the movements of the other — the 
 secular. 
 
 These new arrangements, whatever they might 
 involve in their details, did by no means originate 
 either the principle or the practices of an extensive 
 church polity, and of a broad based hierarchy. They 
 merely induced a new and more regular form upon 
 that great economy of provincial government, and of 
 oecumenic relationshipj which had already spread 
 itself over the Roman world. The only novelty of 
 principle^ on this occasion, was thivS, that such ar- 
 rangements should be effected by the civil author- 
 ity. Whoever is so minded may call in question 
 the abstract lawfulness of this interference of the 
 magistrate. But here again, as in the preceding 
 instance, while we waive theoretic and interminable 
 arguments^ we are content, on plain and practical 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 203 
 
 grounds, to assume the probability that this new 
 modelling of the external Church, and the bringing 
 it into correspondence with the civil mechanism of 
 the empire, was for the better, rather than the worse ; 
 and that its tendency was to check, more than to 
 promote, the excesses of clerical ambition. 
 
 Nor can we stop at this point ; but must candidly 
 profess to think, that the error of the imperial regene- 
 rator and rector of the Church, if any, was, not his 
 assuming to effect a more regular polity than that 
 which the accidents of time had brouglit about; but 
 that it wasj on the contrary, his not carrying these 
 arrangements considerably further than he did: and 
 so reducing the oscumenic hierarchy to a counter- 
 poise, and a harmony, such as should have preclu- 
 ded the then fast advancing usurpations of the 
 bishop of Rome. Whether Constantine's power 
 was really adequate to any such reform is doubtful, 
 probably it was not ; for already the opinion that fa- 
 voured the pretensions of St. Peter's successor had 
 gained great strength, and was widely diffused. 
 
 It was not, we say, less of the establishment prin- 
 ciple, but 7?iore of it, that was needed when first the 
 Church came under the wing of the State. Whether 
 the superstition that sustained the throne of the Ro- 
 mish hierarch could then have been sifted and dis- 
 pelled, is not certain ; but there is little room to doubt 
 that an easy appeal to natural motives in the minds 
 of the Patriarchs of Antioch, Alexandria, and Con- 
 stantinople, and the bishops of northern Africa, would 
 have enabled the emperor to place the several centres 
 of church government on such a level, and to bring 
 their correspondence under such regulations, as must 
 have barred the ambitious course of the papacy. 
 
 At the moment of Constantine's conversion, the 
 relative importance of the eastern, western, and Afri- 
 can Churches, was such as well admitted of a re- 
 dressing and permanent adjustment of their respec- 
 
204 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 live strength: and if human sagacity could have 
 foieseeti the consequences that were to flow from the 
 withdrawmetit of the court, and of the imperial vigi- 
 lance from Italy, and the leaving there a house, 
 empty, swept and garnished, to be occupied by the 
 demon of ghostly despotism — tlie most vigorous 
 measures would have been adopted for keeping the 
 Romish prelate in due subordination. No such pre- 
 cautions were used ; and Rome a second time made 
 herself mistress of Europe. 
 
 The modification and belter adjustment of the 
 ecclesiastical polity of the empire was not etrected by 
 Constantine without some due regard to the distinc- 
 tion between the external and the internal concerns 
 of the Church. " We ourselves," says his biographer 
 and friend, " heard the emperor use such expres- 
 sions as ihese, one day, when entertaining an epis- 
 copal party at the royal table ; ' To you indeed is 
 comiviitted by God the oversight of whatever belongs 
 to the interior of the Church ; and to me, what re- 
 lates to its external interests : — by God's appoint- 
 ment, 1 am bishop of these alTairs.' " Constantine 
 was not a Tudor or a Stuart ; and if the perversity 
 of some with whom he had to deal, had not gradu- 
 ally^ moved him from his position, there is reason, to 
 think b.e would have restrained his interference in 
 religious matters within very reasonable bounds. 
 
 Even apart from the incidental difficulties that 
 arose in the course of his administration, it was not 
 likely, in (hat age, that the due line, which separates 
 theological and purely spiritual affairs from the secular 
 or political interests of the Church, should have been 
 well understood ; or if understood, consistently re- 
 garded : in fact, it very soon came to be entirely 
 overlooked ; and w4jile bishops w^ere allowed still to 
 exercise jurisdiction of a civil sort, which, now that 
 the State had become Christian, should have been 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 105 
 
 altogether removed from their hands, the emperor, 
 on his part, was importuned by the bishops to arbi- 
 trate in rehgious controversies, and in questions of 
 disciphne. In this article of the new system, there- 
 fore, although the rule avowed by Constantine might 
 be valid, the practice which gained ground is certainly 
 not to be imitated. 
 
 We say the rule was good ; and if expressed 
 more at large, it amounts to this — That, while re- 
 hgion, in its primary and more momentous import, 
 regards the condition of souls, individually, in their 
 relation to God, and to the future life, it is also, 
 though in a secondary, yet not an unimportant sense, 
 an interest of the present life, and a main element 
 of the social well-being of mankind. In its first 
 sense, religion comes under the control and direction 
 of the ministers of religion — the clergy ; and any 
 intrusion of the magistrate, as such,, within this 
 sacred circle, or any endeavour to bring the senti- 
 ments proper to it under the constraint of law, is a 
 usurpation that ought to be resisted, even to death. 
 But in its second sense, or as a fulcrum of order, and 
 a cement of public peace, and as a rule of manners, 
 and a sanction of civil virtue, religion not only may^ 
 but must be cared for, and be uplield, and be regu- 
 lated by the State. How much soever the magis- 
 trate, in any instance, may desire to relieve his 
 hands of this burden, he finds he cannot do so with- 
 out an abandonment of his duty. What is not sus- 
 tained, will decay ; what is not kept in order, will 
 fall into confusion. 
 
 On points of this sort, men of the closet — those 
 who are as fond of theory, as they are inexperienced 
 in the affairs of real hfe, and who hold in contempt 
 any dictates of prudence which they do not know 
 how to connect with abstract principles, will never 
 grant us their acquiescence. Meanwhile, if intrust- 
 ed, directly or indirectly, with the serious interests of 
 18 
 
206. SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 a community, we must advance, with or without a 
 theory, on the safe ground of common sense. The 
 morals of a nation are to be guarded ; sentiments of 
 awe toward the Divine Majesty are to be cherished ; 
 the instruction (and, to be etiicacious, it must be a 
 religious instruction") of the people, far from being 
 abandoned to the efforts of precarious zeal, must be 
 secured on a broad foundation ; and more than this, 
 those extensive interests of the Church, and those 
 modifications and adaptations, made necessary by 
 the revolutions of time, which no individuals, pri- 
 vately, are in a position to superintend, and which, 
 moreover, the Church itself is often tardy in attend- 
 ing to, demand a vigilant regard ; and must, at in- 
 tervals, receive a vigorous impulse from the magis- 
 trate or the legislature. 
 
 Certain modern refinements of opinion, which 
 would restrain a prince, or a legislature, from taking 
 thought of the most important of all the earthly in- 
 terests of a people (we say earthly, for we here ex- 
 clude what is strictly spiritual) never, we may be 
 sure, occurred to the mind of Constantine ; and we 
 find him, without scruple, legislating and issuing 
 edicts in conformity with those higher and purer 
 principles of morality which he had learned from the 
 Gospel. The expediency, or even the justice of cer- 
 tain of his measures may be questioned, or may be 
 denied ; and especially we must condemn his intru- 
 sions, though they were not frequent, upon purely 
 theological ground. We must also, and without a 
 doubt, reprobate those few acts — they were but few, 
 in which, at the instigation of the clergy, he used 
 severities against schismatics. But it is an error to 
 suppose, as some appear to do, that Constantine's 
 personal temper and conduct, toward the Church, 
 were dogmatical and cruel ; or that the leading prin- 
 ciple of his polity was intolerant. 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 207 
 
 A careful consideration of the circumstances of the 
 times, and a knowledge of facts, are requisite, before 
 a sweeping censure should be passed upon the course 
 pursued by the first Christian emperors toward their 
 pagan subjects. This course was indeed far from 
 being always consistent with the principle whence 
 professedly it sprung ; nor was the principle itself 
 altogether such as our modern notions of religious 
 liberty will approve. The principle avowed was, that 
 the worship of false gods, and all customs therewith 
 connected, were to be, by all means — not excluding 
 the most extreme, suppressed, as immoral and impi- 
 ous. But while severities were resorted to in some 
 instances, a connivance was admitted in others, which 
 brought into suspicion the imperial sincerity, and 
 operated to protract the adherence of the upper classes 
 to the ancient idolatries. 
 
 Polytheism has never been otherwise than grossly 
 impure, and horribly cruel in its practices. Both 
 these characteristics belonged to it in a high degree, 
 such as it had come down to the age of the Christian 
 emperors. The Egyptian rites, perpetrated constant- 
 ly, and in open day, on the banks of the Nile, were 
 insufferably obscene : so, though in a less offensive 
 degree, were many of the usages of the Grecian and 
 Roman worship. Horrid and sanguinary rites pre- 
 vailed among the less civilized and outskirt nations 
 of the empire ; and indeed, without looking so far, 
 the bloody shows of the amphitheatre, although not 
 strictly a part of the old religion, had become firmly 
 connected with it, and had come under its patronage, 
 and their enormity was boundless and shameless. — 
 These various abominations could not consist with 
 the public profession, or with the maintenance and 
 spread of Christianity, Christianity might indeed 
 endure them while she was herself depressed and 
 bleeding ; but she could no longer bear the offence, 
 
208 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM 
 
 when calmly seated at the right hand of the secular 
 power. 
 
 To talk of the rights of conscience, in relation to 
 cruelties and obscenities — called religious, is a ridi- 
 culous affectation. Those who choose so to amuse 
 themselves, may deny the right of the magistrate to 
 interfere in any case with the worship and belief of a 
 people ; but assuredly a sound-minded prince will not 
 hesitate a moment, when once he finds himself able 
 to prohibit pious murders, and pious prostitutions ; or 
 to suppress any system of oppression and knavery, 
 which may take the mask of devotion. Thus felt 
 Constantine, and his successors ; and they actually 
 effected the removal and extinction, throughout the 
 empire, of many of the worst practices of heathen-' 
 ism : — the reform was great and important. 
 
 But it would be unfair to expect that the distinc- 
 tion between those religious practices which are in- 
 compatible with the maintenance of pubhc morals, or 
 with the security of life, and what is strictly matter 
 of opinion and religious sentiment, should, in that 
 age, have been understood and respected, either by 
 emperors or by their clerical advisers. In truth, it is 
 found, even now, an affair of considerable practical 
 difficulty to draw the line safely when we have to do 
 with the usages of a corrupt superstition. If the ad- 
 ministration of our Indian possessions presents many 
 perplexing instances of the collision of theoretic prin- 
 ciples with the maxims of government, it is no wonder 
 that the first Christian princes often erred, as well in 
 principle as in their measures, when called upon to 
 deal — inexperienced as they were, with the abomi- 
 nations of polytheism. To have given no check to 
 the sanguinary rites practised under their eye, and 
 to have connived at the pollutions of the Phoenician 
 and Egyptian temples (not to mention others little 
 less atrocious) would infallibly have brought their 
 sincerity into question, in the view, as well of their 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 209 
 
 pagan, as of their Christian subjects ; and must have 
 rendered nugatory all their endeavours for the fur- 
 therance of the Gospel. 
 
 And yet, in taking the only course which they 
 could think open to them— namely, that of authori- 
 tatively proscribing the grosser and the more cruel 
 usages of Paganism, and in actually employing the 
 public force for the extermination of these evils, the 
 emperors advanced upon ground, and brought the 
 Church with them upon the ground, where nothing 
 could happen but that both should learn the bad 
 lessons of religious intolerance. The sword, drawn 
 against polytheism, would, in the next moment, be 
 turned upon heretics and schismatics. Considering 
 the spirit and notions of the age, we ought to wonder 
 rather that this was done so seldom, than that it was 
 done at all. In truth, Constantino exhibited an ex- 
 treme reluctance to the use of compulsory measures, 
 and ordinarily stopped short in breaking up the con- 
 venticles of those who separated themselves from the 
 Church. Nevertheless the fatal precedent of Chris- 
 tian PERSECUTION was formally given, and sanc- 
 tioned ; and the Church, through a long course of 
 ages, went on to wade, without remorse, in a path 
 sodden with Christian tears and Christian blood. — 
 We should commiserate, as much as condemn, those 
 whose unfortunate position, in a manner, compelled 
 them to take steps upon a slippery descent, where the 
 human foot could hardly secure a standing. 
 
 One other article of Constantino's ecclesiastical 
 polity (already adverted to in passing) remains to be 
 more distinctly spoken of; and here again, w^hat we 
 have to blame, is not the carrying the church and 
 state system, and the establishment principle, too far ; 
 but tlie not carrying them far enough. The Church, 
 or we should now say, the episcopal chiefs, had not 
 only accumulated great wealth, but had drawn to 
 18* 
 
210 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM; 
 
 themselves very extensive judicial powers, stretched^ 
 by various pretexts, from a narrow circle, until ques- 
 tions and controversies of almost every sort were 
 brought witiiin their sphere. The bishops' daily em- 
 ployments, in the larger sees, were more secular than 
 spiritual ; and he was seen oftener, and listened to 
 more eagerly, on the bench, dividing inheritances, 
 than in the pulpit, teaching piety. 
 
 This enormous evil — whence sprung the worst 
 usurpations, and whicli furnished occasions to clerical 
 rapacit)^, and was the principal means of throwing 
 into the hands of the Church a power that enabled 
 her, in the end, to vanquish and trample upon the 
 civil authority — this great mischief should doubtless 
 have been altogether removed. The original plea 
 on which, by the apostolic sanction, secular differ- 
 ences among the faithful were to be referred to an ar- 
 bitration within the Church, namely, the shame to 
 the Gospel implied in exposing the discords of Christ- 
 ians before the unbelieving world, was nullified when 
 the bishop's hall had become as public a place as the 
 courts of civil law: and when the principles of Christ- 
 ian equity were respected in the one judicature as 
 much as in the other ; and when, moreover, the cus- 
 tom of appeal to ecclesiastical authority had reached 
 an extent absolutely incompatible with the discharge 
 of the spiritual functions of the bishops. 
 
 With the highest advantage to all parties, this ill 
 practice might have been brought to a close. There 
 could be no consistenc}^, and little validity, in the pro 
 ceedings of civil courts, while such an intermingling 
 of jurisdictions continued : it was at once a rottenness 
 in the State, and an ulcer in the bosom of the Church. 
 But how apply the remedy ? Notwithstanding the 
 adulation addressed to the emperors by tonsured and 
 mitred sycophants, there is little reason to think they 
 ever jiossessed power enough over their ambiguous 
 spiritual consort to effect a reform of this kind. The 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 211 
 
 Church, demure in mien, and abject in tongue, knew 
 very well what was substantial in the prerogatives 
 she had acquired during her days of depression ; nor 
 wag she at all likely to surrender, in the summer 
 time of favour and prosperity, what she had won in 
 the winter of her sorrow. 
 
 Even the people, perhaps, might have come for- 
 ward to sustain their clergy in resisting the abolition 
 of the episcopal jurisdiction. A propensity to resort 
 to vague, rather than to well-defined means of secu- 
 ring doubtful interests, belongs to human nature, and 
 especially among the uninformed classes. There 
 were hopes and chances, attaching to the bishops' de- 
 cision, which would not seem compensated by the 
 stern and well-regulated justice of civil courts. Be 
 this as it may, the dangerous and corrupting influence, 
 over common interests, over persons, and property, 
 long before obtained by the ministers of Christian- 
 ity, instead of being superseded, was confirmed by 
 the emperors. Here then we find one of the chief 
 engines of spiritual despotism — an engine constructed 
 and brought into play during the pristine era of the 
 Church, left in operation, because the Church had 
 already become too strong for the State. If the civil 
 authority had been able to effect an establishment, in 
 the modern sense of the term, and with a firm hand 
 had put the Church in her place, and had assumed to 
 itself its proper functions and prerogatives, the former 
 would have found her path of encroachment barred : 
 — she must henceforth have minded her duties. 
 
 Til was this fatal dereliction of its rights and func- 
 tions, on the part of the civil power, compensated by 
 the prerogative wliich the emperors reserved to them- 
 selves of convening oecumenic councils, or by the 
 right of investiture. The one was a power, the exer- 
 cise of which might be of doubtful expediency, and of 
 small practical value ; the latter was a usurpation, 
 not to be justified on abstract principles, and produc- 
 
212 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 live, in most instances, of fruitless and perilous con- 
 tentions between princes and prelates. This same 
 want of a clear and peremptory demarcation between 
 the spiritual and the temporal elements of power, and 
 this mutual intrusion of the two authorities upon 
 each other's duties, was the leading fault of those ar- 
 rangements that followed the public recognition of 
 Christianity. Had such a partition been effected by 
 Constantine, the result must have been the cashier- 
 ing the clergy of extensive powers and opportunities 
 of aggrandizement, which they had secured to them- 
 selves under the voluntary system, and by the means 
 of it. 
 
 But the auspicious season for bringing about a 
 well-defined national establishment, and for hemming 
 in spiritual ambition, was lost (that is to say, lost^ if 
 Constantine actually had the power to curb the 
 Church, as well as to favour it.) The sinews of the 
 hierarchical tyranny were left to it ; and while it 
 gained flesh and blood and beauty — corpulence and 
 complexion, from the nutriment of state patronage, it 
 did not, in any degree, lose its internal vigour, or be- 
 come less enterprising, or less bold and assiduous, 
 with its increase of bulk and marrow. At the era of 
 Constantine's conversion, Esther bowed and fainted 
 in the presence of Ahasuerus ; but i\.hasuerus forgot 
 his discretion as a prince ; and though he kept his 
 throne, and spoke as lord and sovereign, he allowed 
 the fair suppliant, in the end, to make her own terms, 
 and to secure her future ascendancy. 
 
 The several articles of Constantine's religious 
 polity, to which we have adverted, are chiefly of an 
 exterior and visible sort ; and in these it is manifest 
 that, whatever might be the submissive style of ec- 
 clesiastical leaders, and how magisterial soever might 
 be the tones of this imperial Rector of the Church, 
 every substantial advantage was left in her hands, 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 213 
 
 and the civil authority, far from havirig brought the 
 spiritual power into subserviency to itself, or even 
 into a position of permanent equipoise, in the man- 
 ner which we think of as proper to a national es- 
 tablishment, confirmed and secured to it the en- 
 croachments it had already made. All that had got 
 wrong in the working of the voluntary machine du- 
 ring the preceding two centuries, was set forward with 
 a new impetus, instead of being redressed by vigor- 
 ous enactments ; — enactments such as would have 
 amounted to wliat we intend and desire in an Es- 
 tablished Church. 
 
 The progress of Church Power, in regard to its 
 external conditions, and especially as concentrating 
 around the see of Rome, has been fully exhibited by 
 several eminent modern writers, and is a subject 
 famiUar to English ears. To go over this ground 
 anew, would be here superfluous ; and besides, in the 
 present volume, we keep our eye rather upon the 
 substance and occult principle of Spiritual Despotism, 
 than upon what may be called its political steps or 
 those circumstances and revolutions of which the 
 historian takes account. 
 
 We have then yet to make inquiry concerning 
 the not-obtruded spirit and feeling of the Church 
 (that is to say, of its chiefs) in the era now under 
 review, and while the open subjugation of the secu- 
 lar authority was only in preparation i during this 
 ambiguous period, she visibly bowed before the im- 
 perial throne, but really was mistress of affairs, 
 and seems to have conceived the idea of grasping 
 every sort of authority. 
 
 One cannot peruse the orations and epistles of the 
 time without perceiving that the clergy distinctly felt 
 their strength, that strength which they drew from 
 their intimate influence with a large class of the 
 people. No longer in dread of the open hostility 
 
214 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 which the principles of the Gospel forbade them to 
 oppose, they threw themselves upon the vast and 
 undefined means of their power, and spoke in a tone 
 such as the court could not fail to understand. The 
 force of Christianity over the popular mind (when 
 actually affected by it) is indeed incalculable ; and 
 this force had been rather enhanced than diminished 
 by the spread of superstition. Then the usage of 
 preaching, unknown to paganism, had brought the 
 mass of society under an influence analogous to that 
 which the orators of ancient Greece and Rome had 
 exercised. This influence, moreover, was, if we 
 might use such a simile, pulverized, and applied in 
 the most pungent and caustic form to the entire sen- 
 sitive surface of the Christian community, by the 
 practices of catechetical instruction, and of private 
 confession, and by that individual cure of souls to 
 which the clergy assiduously addicted themselves. 
 
 The dark cloud that passed over the Church du- 
 ring the short inimical reign of Julian, served to 
 bring to view the real temper of the leading men of 
 the times. — So, amid the dazzUng beams of a noon- 
 day sun, we do not distinguish the fires that have 
 been kept alive in a camp covering a distant plain ; 
 but if the heavens become suddenly overcast with 
 stormy volumes of vapour, we then instantly per- 
 ceive the smouldering heaps, here and there, which 
 glow and brighten, and which the huffing gusts of 
 the coming tempest soon fan into a flame. 
 
 The orations of Gregory Nazianzen, and two of 
 the epistles of Basil, not to look further^ afford indi- 
 cations enough of the feeling, or of the preparation 
 of feeling, working in episcopal bosoms, when the 
 christian body found itself again threatened with 
 hostility. A very great, and we may say, a very 
 improbable revolution in principles and maxims 
 must have taken place before Christians could have 
 thought of opposing force to force ; and happily, the 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 216 
 
 fall of their adversary very early broke up any me- 
 ditations (if actually revolved) of an unbecoming 
 sort. But this unexpected check served to exhibit 
 a consciousness of power in the Church, and deep- 
 ened it too. Accustomed as we are, in modern timesj 
 and notwithstanding the spirit of freedom that is 
 abroad, to respect the courtesies due to royalty de- 
 funct, our ears are startled by the harsh and rancor- 
 ous invectives heaped upon the name of the apos- 
 tate, by the Churchmen of the day. It might have 
 been supposed that, though the family of Constan- 
 tino had now no surviving avenger, the wearers of 
 the purple would have resented these insults to the 
 dead, as touching their own dignity. 
 
 The changing circumstances of the Arian con- 
 troversy, in its course through the fourth century, 
 elicited many portentous expressions of church feel- 
 ing, we do not say of church arrogance, in relation 
 to the imperial authority. Hilary of Poictiers, Mar- 
 tin of Tours, and Ambrose of Milan, as appears 
 from their writings, or from their reported speeches 
 and conduct, knew themselves to stand in a posi- 
 sition such as allowed them to measure forces with 
 the State. 
 
 But the spiritual energy of the spiritual despotism 
 of this period, was shown when at length occasions 
 arose calHng for the application of the wonted disci- 
 pline of the Church to imperial delinquents. Now, 
 when these instances meet us, we should by no 
 means hastily blame the bold impartiality of the 
 bishops who dared to reprove sin upon the throne ; 
 on the contrary, their intrepidity, and especially if 
 we could think it simple minded, claims admiration. 
 Yet it is highly improbable that these punitive 
 measures would either have been attempted on the 
 one side, or submitted to on the other, unless church 
 rulers had well understood the breadth and firmness 
 
216 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISMj 
 
 of the ground they then occupied, and unless princes 
 had understood it too. 
 
 The well known conduct of Ambrose toward 
 Theodosius, which indeed fell little short of that of 
 the popes of the twelfth century toward the princes 
 of their time, puts beyond reasonable doubt the asser- 
 tion that, though the civil and the ecclesiastical au- 
 thorities were then in a relative position, such as 
 apparently left the supremacy with the former, pub- 
 lic opinion had reached a point which allowed the 
 latter to say and do almost whatever its own discre- 
 tion might admit. It is well, in any age, when the 
 high pi inciples of christian morality are so regarded, 
 and have such force, that the mightiest monarchs 
 feel themselves compelled to yield obedience to church 
 censures. But this can happen only under two 
 conditions ; 'that is to say, either when genuine 
 Christian virtue so governs the sentiments of the 
 mass of mankind, as that discipline takes effect, as it 
 were, spontaneously ; or else, when clerical arro- 
 gance has reached a height that enables it to indulge 
 in the gratification of smiting a crowned and anoint- 
 ed head. Now we cannot contemplate the moral 
 condition of the Roman world in the age of Ambrose, 
 and believe that Theodosius bowed to the majesty of 
 public virtue. What he actually bowed to was, the 
 terrors and the pride of spiritual despotism. 
 
 This single instance, looked at by itself, or as a 
 scene in a drama, compels our admiration, and we 
 can do nothing but applaud the holy intrepidity of 
 the minister of heaven. Had the same courage 
 always, as in this case, been exerted on the side of 
 humanity, no reputation would have stood higher 
 than that of Ambrose. That he himself sincerely 
 regarded those great principles of religion and virtue, 
 to which he compelled his sovereign to do homage, 
 cannot fairly be doubted. But there were other 
 principles, and there was another object, inseparably 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 217 
 
 connected in his mind with purer motiveSj and which 
 swayed his conduct with at least aa equal force. 
 These principles involved the transcendency of church 
 power ; and this fond object Was the very same, 
 afterwards so boldly pursued, and at length achieved, 
 by the papal court, namely, the absolute subjugation 
 of the secular, (o the spiritual power. It is quite im- 
 possible to doubt the identity of purpose and of prin- 
 ciple, when the language used by the chiefs of the 
 hierarchy is traced backward, shall we say, from the 
 Decretals of Gregory IX. and thence to the epistles of 
 Innocent III. and thence to those of Gregory VII. ; 
 and again to the writings of Gregory the Great, and 
 of Si. Leo, and of Ambrose? Nay. our retrogres- 
 sive inquiry should not stop there ; for the very same 
 style and terms meet us, scarcely disguised, in the 
 pages of Cyprian. 
 
 During this long course of time, though at a first 
 glance we may think we see the Church, not merely 
 patronized and favoured, but governed by the State, 
 a very little attention to facts, and to the half-utter- 
 ed sentiments of ecclesiastics, is enough to convince 
 us that the real relative position of the two powers 
 was the reverse of what it appeared. On the one 
 side there Vv^as a growing consciousness of indepen- 
 dent authority, and on the other a feeling of virtual 
 subjection, poorly compensated by ilie forms of im- 
 perial rule, or by single exertions of power. The 
 church- and-state system (if s»<^h it can be called) 
 from the time of Theodosiuc, and onward, was, in its 
 essence, whether or not m its form, the opposite of 
 onr modern national establishments: and if we can 
 only imagine, what in truth seems unlikely, that an 
 entire community — its upper and its lower classes, 
 should come as fully under the power of arbitrary 
 relio-ious motives, as did the mass of the Christian 
 community in the fourth and fifth centuries, a non- 
 established bishop (or presbyter) of an English or 
 19 
 
218 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 American city, might copy the pattern of an Am- 
 brose or an Urban, and chastise and humiliate kings 
 and emperors. What renders the recurrence of any 
 such acts of clerical arrogance improbable, is not the 
 present feeble condition of ecclesiastical establish- 
 ments, but the decay and dispersion of those deep 
 feelings on which superstition founds its power. 
 
 Before we lose sight of the archbishop of Milan, 
 it may be proper to advert to circumstances which, 
 though they scarcely attract notice on the page of 
 history, are yet significant as showing the tendency 
 of church affairs. Again and again it happened, 
 when Theodosius visited his spiritual lord, coming 
 fresii from the oriental pomps of his Constantino- 
 politan court, and being surrounded by obsequious 
 Greeks, that he had to be schooled anew in the hard 
 lesson of the nothingness of earthly distinctions, and 
 the subserviency of the temporal to the spiritual 
 authority. At home, when attending the celebration 
 of the "sacred mysteries," courtesy assigned to the 
 emperor an elevated place, near the altar : but not 
 so at Milan ; for Ambrose could grant no precedency 
 to a mere layman, such as might seem to put him 
 upon an equality with the sacerdotal order. What 
 was the lustre of the purple when looked at in the 
 light of consecrated candles ! " My son, stand 
 among the people, without the rail." " When," re- 
 plied the childlike master of the world, '' when shall 
 I learn that an emperor is not a priest ?" Theo- 
 dosius in Italy had to lovg^et the Tiieodosius of the 
 eastern empire. The behaviour of Martin of Tours 
 to Maximus is quite in accordance with that of Am- 
 brose. The Western Church had^ at a very early 
 time after the conversion of Constanikie, and the re- 
 moval of the Court to Byzantium, gained so far 
 upon the secular power, as to be in fact, if not in 
 form, on the ascendant side. The two forces, it may 
 be said, were still in equipoise, because a nominal 
 
IN THE FOURTH CENTURY. 219 
 
 supremacy was accorded to the emperors; but the 
 leading prelates of the Latin Church, from the first, 
 breathed the soul of unborn popes. 
 
 The preparations for the papacy — that is to say, 
 the church ascendency of Italy and of Rome, its 
 centre, had already been carried very far, and almost 
 every changing fortune, as well of the eastern as of 
 the western empire, opened the path to its usurpa- 
 tions. So, when the waters of a flood are rising, 
 whether the swelling torrents are opposed and made 
 angry by firm embankments, or ingress is given to 
 them by the fall of barrier after barrier, still the issue 
 is the same ; — the tide rises, inch by inch ; hill after 
 hill disappears, and at length nothing but here and 
 there some signal of ruin breaks the waves of the 
 universal deluge. 
 
 But turning aside from the gradual advance of the 
 PAPACY, and bestowing our attention rather upon the 
 real springs of that spiritual despotism which the pa- 
 pacy inherited and employed, we find, during the 
 fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries, the rules and prac- 
 tices of church discipline reaching a state which left 
 almost every sort of encroachment upon the secular 
 authorit}^ open to the discretion of ecclesiastics. The 
 engine of this discipline was plied, or was stayed, in 
 particular instances, in accordance with the policy of 
 the moment, or the temper and courage of pontiffs 
 and their agents. It was a power — now held in abey- 
 ance — now produced and moderately worked, to in- 
 spire a necessary fear ; and now brought to bear 
 with all its terrors upon some unfriended delinquent. 
 
 The assumed grounds, and the chief points of this 
 church disciphne, will claim to be briefly considered 
 in the next Section. They were indeed all devised 
 and produced, and more or less put in force, during 
 that preliminary era which has now been under re- 
 view ; but they will be examined to best advantage, 
 such as we find them professed without reserve, and 
 
220 SP HUTU AT. DESPOTISM, 
 
 acted upon witliout scruple, from ihe pontificate of 
 Gregory the Great, down to the time of the Luther- 
 an Reformation. 
 
 In the east, the Church, at once patronized and 
 repressed by the immediate presence of imperial 
 power, retained, to the last, its seivihty, and existed 
 only as a pomp of tiie court. But in the west, sacer- 
 uotal ambition took a free course ; the difference of 
 jiational temperament favouring those accidental cir- 
 cumstances of the empire which gave it room. Dur- 
 ing the later years of (his era of counterpoise, it is 
 manifest, as well in relation to the east as the west, 
 tliough far more decisively with the latter, that the 
 occult motive of concession to secular authority, on 
 the part of the Church, was the need it still felt of 
 the imperial arm for the suppression of heresy and 
 schism. " Lend us your sword when we want it, and 
 we will call you inaster." This was the language 
 of patriarchs and popes, and this the reason of moder- 
 ation and obedience on the one side, and of the con- 
 tinuance of a nominal supremacy on the other. A 
 relative bearing not very unlike to this, and which 
 we must hereafter more distinctly advert to, subsisted 
 betv/een Church and State in England from the re- 
 formation to the revolution. Except for giving effect 
 to its sentences of banishment, confiscation, and death, 
 the Church wanted nothing which the Siaie had to 
 bestow. Already it had established its irresponsible 
 domination oyer the minds of mankind — it ruled 
 their hopes — it ruled their fears — it grasped their per- 
 sons, their wealth, their soub ; it claimed earth, it 
 disposed of heaven : none could speak or breathe, on 
 this mortal scene, without its leave ; none go out of 
 it safely, without its passport. The magistrate yet 
 held the sword — the public force was under his con- 
 trol, and for this sole reason, the Church did hin^ 
 homage. 
 
IN THE FOVRTH CENTURY. 221 
 
 Tiie era of the counterpoise of the secular and 
 spiritual powers was not the period of a church-and- 
 slate aUiance, in the modern, or in any proper sense 
 of the phrase; but of an ambiguous and changing 
 contest between two independent forcei, never really- 
 adjusted, never in harmony ; a contest marked by 
 the slow but sure advances of the insidious party, 
 and terminated by a prouder and more unhmited 
 triumph than itself had imagined. The moment of 
 the consummation of this victory we shall not attempt 
 to fix. 
 
 19* 
 
^221 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 SECTION VII. 
 
 THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 
 
 It might tend, not a little, to dispel some delusive 
 impressions, common to the piotestant world, if a 
 phrase could be found which, while characteristic of 
 the superstitious and despotic system that, from the 
 second and third centuries supervened, and displaced 
 Christianity, should cleady separate it from its acci- 
 dental connexion with the papacy, and the Romish 
 hierarchical tyranny. The popes occupied, and 
 turned to their particular advantage, this vast and re- 
 fined system of error and oppression ; but the system 
 itself has deeper roots, is more recondite, more intel- 
 lectual, and is more ancient than the usurpation of 
 the bishops of Rome. Nor is this all ; for the spiritual 
 essence of popery has outlived the overthrow of the 
 papal domination, or the proper power of Rome ; and 
 (which is a significant truth) it may survive the total 
 dispersion and final dissolution of that hierarchy of 
 which the pope is head and organ. 
 
 There is, then, some substantial and practical im- 
 portance in an inquiry concerning those theoretic 
 axioms to which the Papacy gave visible and audible 
 expression. What were the grasping principles that 
 imparted strength and vitality to popery, and which, 
 without supposing any thing chimerical, may start 
 forth afresh, and rule the world again, when popery 
 shall be found no where but on the page of history ? 
 
 Instead then of occupying our present narrow space, 
 us might easily be done, with graphic descriptions of 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 223 
 
 that state of society, and of that order of character, 
 which the despotism of Rome, while at its height, en. 
 gendered ; and instead of adducing striking instances 
 of the cruelties and the abominations that attended 
 its prevalence ; and instead of attempting an histori- 
 cal synopsis of the steps of its advance and decline ; 
 and instead of giving the reins to our emotions of in^ 
 dignation and abhorrence in the view of its tyranny, 
 perfidy, and corruption, we shall endeavour calmly, 
 and as concisely as possible, to set forth, in its several 
 leading articles, the theory of spiritual despotism, 
 6uch as it may be gathered from the church writers 
 of the times when it had reached its full proportions. 
 
 Some passing hints excepted, the author does not 
 here assume the task of refuting the principles he has 
 to exhibit. In truth, the most convincing refutation 
 of them we have always at hand, in the horrors and 
 the religious debauchery to which they gave support. 
 
 Let it be kept in mind, that, when speaking of 
 church despotism, as in the plenitude of its power, 
 we are thinking of the three or four centuries that 
 date their commencement from the pontificate of Hil- 
 debrand ; yet always remembering that those dog- 
 days of spiritual arrogance were distinguished from 
 the preceding era, more by the firm and digested con-^ 
 dition of its maxims, and by the bold avowal of them, 
 than by any real difference of principle. If the read- 
 er has been accustomed to think that the popery of 
 St. Dunstan, St. Becket, and St. Dominic, was the 
 popery of those times, distinctively^ he will do well 
 to take in hand the bulky folio that contains the De- 
 cretals of Gregory IX., where he will find the adult 
 popery of that pontiff's era set out in all its rules and 
 practices, even to the most minute points, and these, 
 often sustained by, or expressed in, the very words of 
 the great writers of the fourth and earlier centuries. 
 If any are not convinced of it, let them give the ne- 
 cessary diligence to learn the certainty of this truth — 
 
224 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 that the spiritual despotism which spoke ia the pope?^ 
 is now sixteen years old, and rather more. And more- 
 over, let it be understood, and maturely considered, 
 that the Lutheran reformation was an assauk, much 
 rather upon the Papacy, and upon its special errors 
 and superstitions, than upon the theory and princi- 
 ples of the spiritual despotism, of which the papacy 
 was the accidental form. 
 
 A second reformation, and it must be an extensive 
 one, remains to be attempted and achieved — by our 
 sons, such as shall bring the Church home to its rest- 
 ing-place upon the foundation of the "Apostles and 
 Prophets." 
 
 The THEORY of the spiritual despotism embodied 
 in the Romish superstition, and fully realized during 
 the middle ages, may conveniently be exhibited under 
 five articles, each of which makes itself felt in every 
 practice and principle of the Church ; and each is a 
 pillar, the removing of which would have brought 
 the whole edifice to tlie ground. These articles we 
 thus enumerate. — 
 
 L That inasmuch as religion is of supreme im- 
 portance and of infinite moment, whatever directly 
 or indirectly promotes or obstructs the spiritual v/ell- 
 being of mankind, carries a consequence immensely 
 outweighingeven the most important secularinterests. 
 The very least of those duties, or claims, or func- 
 tions, that are connected with God and eternity, is 
 therefore to be held greater than the greatest of the 
 things of earth ; nay, than all these temporal and 
 terrestrial affairs put together. 
 
 II. The spiritual well being of mankind, or, in a 
 word, the relations of man to God and eternity, are 
 placed under the control of a visible corporation — the 
 Church, and under a rectorship — that of its head, 
 apart from whose jurisdiction there can be no safety 
 here or hereafter. 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 225 
 
 III. This control and reclorsliip is, by the express 
 appointment of heaven, one ; nor in the nature of 
 things, can it be divisible: it is moreover unchanging 
 and perpetual. 
 
 IV. Every ordinary act and spiritual office, and 
 every decision or decree of this one rectorial authori- 
 ity, is infalhbly good, efficacious, and, in the estima- 
 tion of Heaven, valid ; and this notwithstanding 
 the frailty, or errors, or personal improbity, or impie- 
 ty, of the individual from whose lips and hands it 
 may at any tiine proceed. 
 
 Y. The function of this perpetual rectorial author- 
 ity includes three charges ; namely, the preservation 
 of truth, the preservation of morals, and the dispo- 
 sal of souls in the eternal state. 
 
 It will be proper to show the practical exposition 
 given of these articles severally, by the Romish 
 Church ; and in that exposition w'e shall find a 
 sufficient refutation of them. But let the reader 
 bear in mind, as we advance, the readiness with 
 which the principles as here stated, while viewxd in 
 an abstract form, might recommend themselves, even 
 to the most vigorous and upright minds, as excel- 
 lent and unexceptionable. Some of the greatest 
 and the best of men, in surrendering ihemselves, 
 body and soul, to the Romish Church, have step- 
 ped back from the particular practices of that Church, 
 and have taken their standing, as they thought im-. 
 movably, upon the theory of church power, such,, in 
 substance, as we have now to state it. The 
 thorough sincerity and virtuous intention of many 
 of the most zealous champions of the papacy may 
 well be admitted, Alas, the condition of humanity ! 
 How should we commiserate, and how tenderly 
 bear with each other, as the unconscious victims of^ 
 ten of illusions ! and how should each bring to the 
 severest test his own conduct and convictions ! The 
 legson of modesty and charity should indeed be 
 
226 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 gathered from the humihating pages of church his- 
 tory. The pious and the upright we find ; but 
 where find those who have been altogether exempt 
 from infatuations? 
 
 The rel!:^ious tlieory and polity we have now to 
 analyze could never have bejen imagined by minds of 
 that inferior class which, with a consciousness of tur- 
 pitude, pursues base ends by base means ; on the 
 contrary, vspirits of the loftiest order, and these in- 
 tensely affected by the most powerful motives which 
 human nature can admit, and accustomed to grasp 
 the largest ideas, were the authors of this vast 
 scheme of government. Nevertheless, it was a scheme 
 that could not have been brought to bear upon the 
 social system witliout the constant co-operation of 
 the cruel and tlie false. This indeed is the singu- 
 larity of the papal superstition (we must still use the 
 special designation, in want of one more proper and 
 comprehensive) that it has, in every age, brought 
 into close alliance the noblest and the most abomina- 
 ble natures. In the present instance we have to 
 think of it such as it has proceeded from the former, 
 and intend to review it in that light in which it haa 
 fascinated their regards. 
 
 I. The sublimity that attaches to the highest 
 truths surrounds the fundamental principle of this 
 mighty system. Christianity has thrown open to 
 man the portals of eternity : whatever heretofore 
 had been tliought great, and noble, or momentous, 
 now shrinks and disappears. The relation of the 
 human spirit to the Infinite Spirit, and its future 
 alternative of unbounded good or ill, involve what is 
 too vast to be placed for a moment in counterpoise 
 with even the weightiest earthly interests. These 
 objects, if once they command the soul, and are in- 
 wardly revolved, and become combined with the 
 moral sentiments, carry all ordinary motives in their 
 train} nothing, with reason, can come in to relax 
 
TTE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 227 
 
 their energy. It was on the strength of these very 
 motives that the first Christians "took joyfully the spoil- 
 ing of their goods," and that they amazed the world 
 by their readiness to meet tortures and fiery deaths^ 
 On the strength of these same motives the Christian, 
 individually, and in every age, if he be such in truth, 
 " counts all things as loss," and refuses to think the 
 sufferings of the present season, even at the worst, 
 worthy to be set off against the future glory. So 
 far all is well, and especially while, in each practical 
 application of this high and just principle, a careful re^ 
 gard is had to the explicit demauds of present duty. 
 The ascetic, though he rightly esteems the world as 
 lighter than a bubblCj if weighed against heaven, 
 forgets that, altiiough nothing else is substantial in 
 the present life, its duties are. 
 
 We have only now to ascend a few steps higher, 
 so as to reach a position whence the eye may com- 
 mand the spiritual welfare of mankind at large, or 
 that of great communities. Our individual interests 
 and relationship to God and eternity being dismis- 
 sed, or being duly secured, and done v^ith, we go on 
 to apply to others the rule we have applied to our- 
 selves. And this we may do, whether or not those 
 for whom we undertake to care are conscious of 
 their personal v/elfare in this behalf : nay, the less 
 they are themselves alive to what so much imports 
 them, the more urgent is the call of charity to care 
 for them. But this sovereign regard to the eternal 
 well-being of our fellows, involves many indirect, as 
 well as direct, methods of procedure. Those around 
 us, far and near, whom VvO reckon to be in danger 
 of perdition, are not to be reclaimed merely by per- 
 sonal entreaty and instruction ; but by the working 
 of a certain instituted machinery of moral and spi- 
 ritual meanst Our philanthropy must take the 
 course marked out for it, and no other. To depart 
 from that course, would be at once to spend our ef- 
 
228 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 forts in vain, and to provoke the displeasure of Him 
 who alone can render them efficacious. ' 
 
 We reach then, and in a form adapted to practical 
 application, the prime principle of the system before 
 us. A scheme of moral and spiritual means for the 
 benefit of mankind, having been permanently esta- 
 blished by the Author of Christianity, all the indivi- 
 dual labour?) and desires, and projects, in behalf of 
 their fellow-men, of those who profess fealty to Christ, 
 must flow in this one channel; or to change the 
 figure, must be made to converge upon this one centre, 
 and from that centre must again emanate. In other 
 words, tiie well-being of mankind can mean nothing 
 else but the well-being, the honour, the power, the 
 efficacy, and the enkirgement of the Church. How 
 circuitous soever may be the track our benevolence 
 pursues, it must (unless it be worse than useless) 
 come round to this home — the Church : not so 
 brought home, it is idle, fruitless, presumptuous, 
 impious. 
 
 Religion is granted to be of infinite moment. The 
 interests of the present life — its wealtli, honours, 
 pains, pleasures, taken at the highest rate, are only 
 of finite value ; and therefore^ according to the sound- 
 est rule of comparison, the smallest religious interest 
 immensely outweighs the largest earthly interest ; or 
 indeed, all earthly interests in mass. Sum up the 
 weal and woe of the entire human family, on this 
 mortal stage, and it is as nothing — ligliter than vanity, 
 when weighed against any single advantage or de- 
 triment that afiects eternity. Translate this sort of 
 arithmetic into the somewhat less abstract and more 
 technical symbols of the Church, and then it means 
 this— That the smallest advantage of the Church 
 should be held or more importance — immensely so, 
 than the highest secular good. 
 
 This potent and pregnant doctrine, demonstrably 
 sound as it appears, may be applied to individual in* 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 229 
 
 Stances, and it may lead us, with perfect coolness and 
 an untroubled conscience, to employ the assassin who 
 removes, without noise, an enemy of the Church ; 
 or to consign men to dungeons or the stake. We do 
 not indeed approve these pains and this bloodshed in 
 itself; but we desire the honour and integrity of the 
 Church ; and the end being of infinite moment, car- 
 ries all means, and makes all lawful. The only 
 doubt that can find any room for discussion in such 
 cases is this — whether, in the particular instance, the 
 welfare of the Church does really demand the san- 
 guinary deed. If it does, then the pang of a million 
 deaths ought not to affect our decision. 
 
 Or to apply this same principle to that control over 
 the affairs of nations which the papacy, during its 
 high summer season, claimed to exercise, and did ex- 
 ercise : — when once the Church had achieved its 
 supremacy over the entire European community, then 
 there could be no doubt that its wealth, its dignity, 
 its means of influence, its permanency, and its pros- 
 pects of extension, were, in the most direct manner, 
 connected with the course of national policy, with the 
 upholding of one regal family, the removal of an- 
 other, and the subserviency of all. The Church, 
 conceived of on this great principle, could demand 
 nothing less than to be recognised as the mistress of 
 the world — the disposer of crowns, and the supreme 
 authority, as well in secular as spiritual affairs. The 
 control of the spiritual would be of no avail, apart 
 from the control of the secular ; for the former could 
 be secured and promoted only by means of an absolute 
 command over the latter. 
 
 The churchmen and pontiffs of the middle ages 
 verily beheved the world and all its glories to be their 
 own, as the vicegerents of heaven. And in teaching 
 this lesson to haughty princes, an arrogance, propor- 
 tionate to the pride and obduracy of their pupils, be- 
 came them. The weapons of the spiritual warfare, 
 20 
 
230 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 when brought to bear upon the carnal weapons of 
 earthly power, must be wielded with so much the 
 more energy, to put the combatants on equal terms. 
 
 For installing spiritual despotism in the seat of 
 absolute and universal power, nothing, as it is mani- 
 fest, was needed but to apply the great truth of the 
 infinite importance of religion, to that visible au- 
 thority, or corporation, which claimed to be the 
 organ and depositary of religion. This application 
 was effected by the aid of the general, and almost 
 universal opinion, that allowed the bishops of Rome 
 to have inherited the supreme authority of St. Peter. 
 When once this link in the chain was filled up, and 
 fastened, tiie most sincere and ingenuous natures, as 
 well as the crafty and ambitious, gave themselves up 
 to promote the cruelties and oppressions of the Church, 
 and felt that they were sustained in doing so by all 
 the powers of eternity. 
 
 11. Church power rests upon the validity of the 
 connexion assumed between its first principle and its 
 second : this point being secured, every thing else 
 follows as a necessary consequence. The rehgious 
 welfare of mankind, supremely important as it is, has 
 not, it is alleged, been abandoned to accidents, or left 
 to be promoted by casual influences ; nor has it even 
 been consigned, independently of human instrumen- 
 tality, to the invisible operations of the Divine Spirit. 
 Christianity is not a mere matter of opinion, hke 
 those systems of philosophy which were taught and 
 talked of one year, and forgotten the next. On the 
 contrary, there is a visible and perpetual rectorial 
 power (wherever lodged) to which, by Divine appoint- 
 ment, is committed the duty of administering, of 
 preserving, of extending, and of transmitting the faith, 
 the oflnces, and the precepts of the Gospel. If the 
 Church be, in one sense, an invisible body, and if 
 this body be immortal, it is also, in another sense, a 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 231 
 
 visible body, and a perpetual one ; and moreover, if 
 the invisible Church be under the immediate guar- 
 dianship of the Lord, its Priest and King, so is the 
 visible Church (in the absence of the Lord) placed 
 under the control of an earthly, yet perpetual vicar. 
 The Lord being personally removed, if his followers, 
 like sheep without a shepherd, were left to their dis- 
 cretion, what could happen but that they should wan- 
 der, each in his own way, and all perish on the 
 jnountains, or become a prey to the wolf? If there 
 be then a visible institution for consenting the truth, 
 and if there be a shepherd of the flock, and a rector 
 of the Church, whose hand and lips may be looked 
 to, on every occasion, for guidance and instruction, 
 then it is manifest that the infinite importance of re- 
 ligion sustains and attaches to that power, to the care 
 of which religion is committed. 
 
 These two articles involve all that is needed to 
 serve as a broad foundation for the most absolute 
 spiritual despotism. What is then wanted, is to 
 bring them to bear upon some actual centre. In 
 pursuance of this intention, it is next alleged — 
 
 111. That this rectorial power is one and undivi- 
 ded ; that it is irresponsible to any earthly authority ; 
 that it is unchangeable, and shall endure while there 
 is a Church on earth. That it must be so, might be 
 inferred from the nature of things, inasmuch as a 
 divided authority, or several independent authorities, 
 put in trust with one and the same interest, are su- 
 perfluous so long as they perfectly agree, and de- 
 structive of each other's claims, if they fall into dis- 
 cord. Church authority, standing as the visible and 
 audible organ of the invisible Lord, is at once made 
 nugatory if it expresses itself ambiguously, or incon- 
 sistently and variously. Truth is one ; the will of 
 Heaven is one ; — the oracle of both therefore must 
 be one. 
 
232 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM- 
 
 But apart from the abstract statement of this third 
 principle of spiritual power, we turn to the tenor of 
 the Gospel, and tlie express enactments of Christ ; 
 and on this ground it must be admitted that every 
 sort of proof, direct and indirect, favours the doctrine 
 of the unity of the Church, and of its visible integ- 
 rity, as a manifestation, in the eye of the world, of 
 heavenly truth and virtue. The passages that bear 
 on this point need not be here adduced ; but we find 
 them, from the very first, forcibly urged and per- 
 petually repeated by the defenders of the general 
 Church. No communion — no piety : no unity — no 
 Church. A distracted Church must have forgotten 
 its glory, and broken its duty, and lost connexion 
 with its Head ; — in a word, it is no longer what it 
 calls itself. 
 
 If then there be one Church, and one centre and 
 source of authority, where is it found, and who is it 
 that rightfully holds the staff of power 7 This has 
 been the trying point in every age with the Papacy ; 
 and although it has made out a case which may 
 fairly satisfy all who were willing to be satisfied ; it 
 has never been able to convict its opponents. The 
 evidence is defective precisely in that part of the 
 chain of proof where the firmest coherence is needed. 
 If the supreme and transmissible authority of St. 
 Peter, as first Bishop of Rome, and rock of the 
 Church, had been intended by the Lord, in the sense 
 affirmed by the Papacy, the proof of so special and 
 peculiar an appointment, instead of being indistinct 
 and attenuated, and open to valid exceptions, at its 
 comnienceme7it^ should then have been clear and 
 uncontroverted. On the contrary, this doctrine, 
 though generally admitted, and stoutly affirmed in a 
 later age, is barely perceptible, ifatall, in the first 
 century, but dimly in the second ; and it comes out 
 in the third and fourth only as the consequence of 
 those political circumstances which made it the 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 233 
 
 interest of individuals and of Churches to admit and 
 maintain it. 
 
 Nevertheless the concurrence of many traditions, 
 and the general tendency of opinions and of usages, 
 was such as to leave the champions of the Romish 
 Church, from the time of Gregory I. and onwards, 
 in possession of what they felt to be firm ground. 
 The argument was strong enough for the binding of 
 wiUing consciences, if not for the breaking down of 
 an adversary : and this point being once conceded, 
 or leapt over, then the path was open for bringing in 
 all that remains to give to the occupier of St. Peter's 
 chair a command over the bodies and souls of men, 
 absolute, irresponsible, unlimited, and altogether un- 
 paralleled. Such they claimed, and in the boldest 
 language affirmed, and actually exercised, during a 
 long course of ages. The power thus assumed being 
 granted, it was, in the next place, necessary to give 
 it a specific and clear interpretation, as applicable to 
 the several departments over which it was to be 
 stretched. It was therefore a principle of the Romish 
 despotism — 
 
 IV. That every act of the Church, ordinary and 
 extraordinary, and every decision, in a word, what- 
 ever the Church did, and whatever it said, was ab- 
 solutely valid, true, and efficacious, in a divine and 
 spiritual sense ; and was so, irrespectively of the 
 merits or defects, the infirmities or the vices, of the 
 individuals who might administer its offices, or pro- 
 mulgate its decrees. 
 
 We form no consistent idea of the Papacy unless 
 we distinctly admit. into our conception of it this pre- 
 tension to a perpetual supernatural efficacy, 
 attending it in every step and act, and vivifying its 
 w^hole framework of offices, worship, and adminis- 
 trations. The very highest profession of spirituality, 
 and of immediate divine agency, and of continued 
 20* 
 
234 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 miraculous authentication and support, is the ground 
 which the Romish despotism assumes ; nor can it 
 defend itself a moment if this ground be abandoned. 
 Christianity in the hands of the papacy, is, through 
 and through, and at every moment, a heavenly 
 scheme, existing in the world only by the aid of 
 miracles, and embodying omnipotence and omni- 
 science. 
 
 Theinfallibihty of the Pope — the real presence in 
 the eucharist — the unvarying efficacy of the opus 
 operatwinoiihe Sacraments — the succession of mira- 
 cles, and powers of healing — the efficacy of the inter- 
 cession of the saints — the patronage of individuals 
 and of communities by the saints — the power of mass- 
 es for the release of souls — the priests' authority lo 
 remit sin and to bind it ; — and indeed every dogma 
 and practice of tlie Cliurch, is a portion and proper 
 consequence of the one doctrine, that the Church is a 
 divine institution, maintained and administered, from 
 age to age, by the very same almighty energy that 
 gave it birth. This doctrine, indefinitely convertible 
 as it is to all purposes of sacerdotal ambition, delivered 
 over the bulk of mankind, without relief or reserve, 
 and body and soul, into the hands of the ministers of 
 religion ; and we find it, not very obscurely advai:K:ed 
 by the Fathers of the third century, very distinctl}- 
 maintained by their successors of the fourth and fifth, 
 and in the loudest and most peremptory manner 
 affirmed by all churchmen during the dog-days of the 
 Romish spiritual despotism. 
 
 This doctrine is, in fact, the core of Popery: genu- 
 ine Protestantism is its opposite. Not indeed that 
 the reformers, personally, got themselves clear of its 
 infection. Luther especially, and the founders of the 
 English Church, while they rejected such portions of 
 the principle as had become the most oflensive, or 
 were the most flagrantly at variance with the Scrip- 
 tures, or were the least capable of extenuation on the 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 2S5 
 
 plea of apostolic tradition, yet fondly clung to as 
 much of it as they were not compelled to relinquish ; 
 they therefore left their ecclesiastical institutions in a 
 state that now demands — either some further refor- 
 mation ; or a candid and childlike return to the bo- 
 som of the ancient Roman Catholic Church, which 
 alone is harmonious in theory and practice. 
 
 The Church having established its claims to an 
 unbounded control over whatever may in the remo- 
 test manner affect ihe religious welfare of the human 
 race, and having made profession of its supernatural 
 power to administer, efficaciously, the absolute go- 
 vernment of the world, it only remained for it to ap- 
 ply its principles to the several duties which, in vir- 
 tue of its commission, it was called upon to discharge. 
 
 V. The Church then, through the organ of its su- 
 preme Rector, and in the exercise of its heaven-de- 
 rived authority, holds itself bound to take care of— 
 the preservation and propagation of Truth ; — the 
 preservation of Morals ; and the disposal of souls in 
 the future and unseen woilds. What is involved in 
 these several high functions must be specified. 
 
 1st. To theChurch,it is said, is intrusted the pre- 
 servation and propagation of Truth. The word of 
 Christ and his apostles, as contained in the Scrip- 
 tures, or as transmitted from age to age traditionally, 
 is acknowledged to be the ultimate standard of be- 
 lief and duty in matters of religion. But this word 
 needs interpretation, and needs it anew, as occasions 
 arise. The multifarious heresies that have sprung up 
 around the Church, and the endless diversity of opi- 
 nions that result from allowing to every Christian the 
 right to be his own interpreter of Scripture, and the 
 incompetency of by far the greater number of the 
 faithful to exeroise any sound judgment on questions 
 of theology, are, it is said, enough to demonstrate the 
 
236 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 necessity of a perpetual authoritative decision of points 
 of religious observance and belief. All difficulties, 
 and all diversities, and feuds, are summarily super- 
 seded, if once it is admitted that the Church is sove- 
 reign arbitress of controversy, and keeper of the 
 truth. 
 
 Now, in discharging her duty in this behalf, the 
 Romish Church is consistent both in principle and 
 practice. She professes to be always in immediate 
 correspondence with Heaven, to enjoy the superna- 
 tural and plenary aids of the Holy Spirit, and, in 
 consequence, to be infallible in her judgments. On 
 the contrary, the power assumed, and the penalties 
 inflicted, by Protestant Churches, must be deemed 
 despotic, presumptuous, and barbarous, in the high- 
 est degree, inasmuch as these communities admit at 
 the same time their own fallibility. Confessedly, 
 therefore, they might, and no doubt often did, decide 
 for error, and have inflicted pains, imprisonments, 
 and death, upon their opponents cruelly, unwarran- 
 tably, and in despite of truth. Measures of persecu- 
 tion resorted to by men acknowledging their own 
 liability to err, are indeed manifestly preposterous 
 and horrible. Not so when the same severe means 
 are employed by those who never err, and who 
 know themselves, in every particular, to be express- 
 ing the pure will of God. 
 
 We say the theory and practice of the Romish 
 Church are on this ground accordant, the one with 
 the other. The papal authority is distinguished 
 from all others on earth by being a supernatural au- 
 thority ; and therefore it may boldly pursue its ends, 
 and fulfil its duty, as guardian of truth, without 
 scruple, hesitation, or any weak and wavering re- 
 gard to considerations of mercy. Upon all those oc- 
 casions when the frailty of the human heart might 
 make the chastising hand of authority to trem- 
 ble, recurrence is to be had to that prime principle — 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 237 
 
 the supreme and infinite importance of religion : but 
 religion cannot exist apart from the truth, which is 
 its basis. Truth then must be preserved and defen- 
 ded, at whatever cost. Better, if necessary, or if no 
 milder remedy can avail, better that some liundred 
 thousand heretics should perish in the flames, than 
 thai heresy itself—immortal poison as it is, should 
 be permitted to infect the souls of men at large. 
 Better that an heretical prince should be deposed, his 
 kingdom placed under an interdict, and wasted, year 
 after year, by bands of faithful crusaders, ti)an that 
 Christendom should be exposed to a fast spreading 
 contagion, wliich carries eternal death in its train. 
 
 Not only tnay the Church resort to these, or to any 
 other extreme means for preserving the truth ; but 
 she is bound to do so : she has no choice : to profess 
 principles of toleration, in subserviency to the lax no- 
 tions of modern times, would be, on her part, to for- 
 feit consistency, and in the most fatal and traitorous 
 manner to abandon the high ground on which her 
 authority is reared. Unless indeed it be with a re- 
 served purpose, and with a faHhful falsity^ the 
 Church can never assent to those liberal political doc- 
 tiines which have got ground of late, even in Catholic 
 countries. If she does not now actually possess the 
 powder to enforce submission to her will, the least she 
 can do is loudly to protest against the violence done 
 her by her contumacious and irreligious sons. She 
 should revoke the titles of ^' most faithful," " most 
 catholic," and " most apostolic," wherever those su- 
 bhme distinctions are not merited by the employment 
 of the sword for the extermination of heresy. 
 
 The duty of using the most extreme means for the 
 preservation of truth, or in common protestant par- 
 lance, the practice of persecution, is a necessary ele- 
 ment of tljis church theory. Without it there is no 
 longer harmony in the scheme, consistency in the 
 
238 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 professions of its supporters, safet}^ to the institution, 
 nor any probability of its extension. 
 
 In the happy era of its unchecked and universal 
 domination, the Church very clearly understood what 
 became it ; and boldly put in movement the proper 
 engines of its power. While in this mind, and while 
 possessed of the means of effecting its purposes, the 
 inquisitorial scheme might be regarded as a mode of 
 mercy. Was it not an act of paternal tenderness, 
 and a wise and kind anticipation of evils, to institute 
 the most searching inquiries that might lead to the 
 instantaneous discovery of error, and to its removal 
 at the earliest moment? What faithful physician 
 would not, if he could, assail disease at its small 
 commencements, and effect at once a sharp but last- 
 ing cure ? The severest means are the most merci- 
 ful if they are efficacious, and if the malady be 
 mortal. 
 
 So thought the Romish Church in her best and 
 brightest days — the times of Innocent III., and for 
 giving the fullest effect to her measures she estab- 
 lished the maxim — a maxim expressed in the very 
 language of the greatest doctor of the fourth century 
 — " that he who only doubts concerning the faith, is to 
 be reputed an infidel." This rule, promulgated by 
 the Church, and urged upon all consciences, touched 
 the inmost recesses of the soul, and left no alternative 
 to the sincere and devout, but either to reject and 
 exclude from their hearts, instantly, the first sugges- 
 tion of scepticism, and never to ask for proof of any 
 dogma ; — or, to go over to the ranks of the reprobate, 
 and to plunge at one leap into perdition. The same 
 rule, acted upon by the judicial agents of the Church, 
 allowed them, without remorse, to visit the most 
 venial instances of aberration from the Catholic doc- 
 trine, with the severest chastisements. Strictly speak- 
 ing, there could be no degrees of guilt among those 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 239 
 
 who disputed, where the Church had decided : there 
 was no scale of heretical pravity. " He who only 
 doubts is an infidel ;" and the infidel must recant, or 
 be consigned to his doom. 
 
 But the cliurch was bound to propagate the faith 
 as well as to preserve it ; and in the performance of 
 this duty she might choose her means ; that is to 
 say, she might adopt the simple methods of instruc- 
 tion, by the agency of missionaries ; and in giving 
 them their commission, might allow them to make 
 what compromise they thought fit with pagan usages 
 and superstitions ; or she might take the more rapid 
 and glorious course of open conquest by force of 
 arms. If her warlike sons could be induced to serve 
 her with their swords, and shed their blood for her 
 honour and their own salvation, there could be no 
 doubt of the lawfulness, nay, of the benevolence, of 
 such enterprises. What philanthropy like that of 
 conquering empires for the Church? If "he that 
 winneth souls is wise," how wise are they who, in- 
 stead of the tedious process of individual conversion 
 by teaching and preaching, eflfect the salvation of 
 millions in mass, by a few days of bloody combat. 
 In her extermination of heretics, in her inquisitorial 
 procedures, in her crusades against infidels, the 
 Church still preserved consistency with her profes- 
 sions and her principles. If her theory be sound, her 
 practice has been good and wise. 
 
 2dly. The Church was the guardian of the morals 
 of the community ; and after taking care that her 
 children should be nurtured with truth, it was her 
 next duty to see that they brought forth the fruits of 
 faith ; or if not, to inflict needful chastisements. 
 Now, as the entire mass of the people in Christian 
 countries, those only excepted who impiously broke 
 away from the fold, were claimed as members of the 
 
240 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 Church, and liable therefore to its censures, and as. 
 moreover, every violation of law was a sin, every 
 such act of every individual within the pale of the 
 Church, came properly under the cognizance of its 
 ministers. The civil authority did indeed anticipate 
 the Church in its inquiries concerning certain offen- 
 ces ; but she nevertheless retained her right of spirit- 
 ual jurisdiction, in all cases whatsoever. Crimes of 
 every name were the fit objects of her maternal dis- 
 cipline : civil suits and controversies also on questions 
 of right and property appertained to her tribunal, in- 
 asmuch as the Church should arbitrate in the disa- 
 greements of her members. Thus it was that canon 
 law, if not actually stretched over all secular judica- 
 tures, was held to be capable of being so extended, 
 and was kept in abeyance only by the concession or 
 connivance of ecclesiastical rulers. 
 
 This universal jurisdiction or judicial right of the 
 Church, in civil as well as criminal causes, derived 
 from the acknowledged duty of a Christian society to 
 exercise discipline over its members, and to prevent 
 litigation, if possible, by amicably arbitrating between 
 them in their differences, may, perhaps, under some 
 future condition of the social system, demand to be 
 considered and adjusted in a manner not hitherto 
 thought of. Difficulties of a serious sort may here- 
 after present themselves on this ground. At present, 
 no Christian community, actually exercising a vigil- 
 ant, impartial, and effective discipline, has spread it- 
 self widely enough to give rise to those embarrass- 
 ments that attend the collision of ecclesiastical with 
 civil law. But we may readily imagine such a state 
 of things ; nay, we need not imagine it, for we have 
 only need to recur to the history of the fourth, fifth, 
 and sixth centuries, to find manifold examples of the 
 confusion and perplexity, the jealousies and the feuds, 
 that may spring from this source. 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 241 
 
 When church power, in the West, became ascend- 
 ant, it was clearly perceived that consistently with the 
 principles on wliich it rested, no lower ground could 
 be taken than that of afiirming the abstract univer- 
 sality of canon law, and the unrestricted range of ec- 
 clesiastical jurisdiction. The only question that need- 
 ed (o be discussed was one of exjjediency and policy 
 in particular instances, and in relation to the usages 
 of nations, and the personal teujper of princes — whe- 
 ther the Church should stretch her rod as far as she 
 claimed the right to do, or give way to the resolution 
 or the obduracy of the secular authority. In her profes- 
 sions, and to a great extent, in fact, the Papacy, during 
 its triumphant season, was absolute mistress of Chris- 
 tendom, in virtue of this her office, as guardian of 
 public morals. 
 
 Yet the Church took care to make her members 
 feel that her power was of an intimate and refined sort, 
 as well as public and juridical ; and that it was spiritu- 
 al moie than carnal. The magistrate could inquire 
 concerning overt acts only, and could punish nothing 
 but crimes. The Church, on the contrary, penetrat- 
 ed the bosoms of men, dived into motives, put secret 
 dispositions to the question, and dealt with men on 
 the ground of a divine discernment of hearts. She 
 professed to treat the subjects of her discipline not ac- 
 cording to evidence^ but according to truth itself. 
 Auricular confession, therefore, was not an accident 
 of this system of despotism ; but one of its indispen- 
 sable elements, and a chief means of its efficiency. 
 The connexion of inferences by wdiich this engine of 
 povvcr was compacted was very close ; — pardon is 
 lodged with tlie Church ; — the means of remission 
 by penance are also under the direction of the 
 Church ; but the priest, who in each instance ad- 
 ministers this authority, can do so only by knowing 
 the wdiole extent of guilt, and all its circumstances, as 
 well of aggravation ns extenuation. To expose the 
 21 
 
U2 
 
 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 bosom to the priest is, therefore, the only way in 
 which remission of sin can be obtained : whoever then 
 would escape punishment, must lay open to the 
 Church his entire consciousness. 
 
 The punishments, or penances, enjoined by the 
 Church (wherever she was actually in position to 
 give effect to her rules of discipline) were by no 
 means of a sort to be contemned. The conscience- 
 stricken culprit, who sought a restoration to hope and 
 to the consolations of reUgion, submitted himself often 
 to five, or ten, or twenty years of public humiliation 
 and private torture — bodily and mental. As much 
 of misery as human nature can sustain, was, as a 
 common thing, inflicted by the Church upon her 
 guilty sons and daughters. The penalties of modern 
 law are trivial, compared with those of the Church. 
 She was indeed " a terror to evil-doers." 
 
 3dly. The Church not only claimed and exercised 
 all power on earth, but stretched her tremendous hand 
 over Hades, and disposed of destinies in the future 
 world. She was sovereign of souls. Without this 
 awful prerogative her authority woidd have been at 
 once incomplete and insecure. The wretched objects 
 of her vengeance might have sought to hide them- 
 selves in the grave, or might have sighed and com- 
 forted themselves in expectation of that clemency 
 which the Divine tribunal admits. But there could 
 be no escape from the arm of the Church. The fires 
 of purgatory were blown or quenched at her beck; 
 her hand even delved into the cold sepulchre, and 
 reeked revenge upon the guilty dust of her foes : the 
 torments of eternity were heaped upon her enemies, 
 and the thrones of glory bestowed upon her friends. 
 Nothing which the human mind can imagine or 
 rest in, as an ideal solace, was free to be hoped for 
 without the leave of the Church; there was nothing 
 terrible which she might not inflict. Instead of its 
 being said to tl\e faithful at large, as it w^as by an 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 243 
 
 apostle — " all things are yours," the Church, that is 
 to say, its rulers, turned to the laity, and proclaimed 
 their own universal lordship; — "all things are ours, 
 whether life, or death, or things present, or things to 
 
 come, ALL ARE OURS." 
 
 That complicated system of observances and 
 superstitious notions which had reference, to the con- 
 dition of souls in the unseen world, was an integral 
 part of the great scheme of despotism, and was em- 
 ployed to sustain and extend it, in every way which 
 the idle or the well-founded fears of the people made 
 practicable, or which their corrupt inclinations invited. 
 The viaticum and extreme unction — the prayers for 
 the dead, and masses for the delivery of souls — 
 the intercession of saints — the practice of canoni- 
 zation, and the pronouncing of anathemas, were all 
 so many expressions or practical exhibitions of the in- 
 visible jurisdiction of the Church. From whatever 
 source these opinions and usages had at first sprung, 
 and most of them are of high antiquity, the Church, 
 of a later time, wrought them into her frame-work, 
 and they became indispensable to her security. 
 
 The power of the Church then, as keeper of truth, as 
 guardian of morals, and as disposer of souls, embraced 
 everything — provided for everything, and applied itself 
 to the entire surface of human nature, and of the social 
 system. This despotism was at once spiritual and 
 political, visible and invisible ; nothing could be more 
 refined, nothing could be more substantial : nothing 
 could better adapt itself to minds of the sensitive and 
 enthusiastic class; nothing grasp with a stronger arm 
 the sensual and audacious. In the highest meaning 
 which the terms will bear, the Romish tyranny was 
 universal and absolute. Men could not think or 
 inquire even concerning the processes of the material 
 world, and the laws of matter and motion, without 
 treading upon ground which the Church had preoccu- 
 
244 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 pied ; — all philosophy was either orthodox or hetero- 
 dox ; and a man might be burned for an opinion in 
 mechanics, as well as for an opinion in theology. 
 There could be no possession or enjoyment of the 
 goods of life, no marrying, no inheriting, no devising, 
 no ruling, no judging, no speaking, no feeling, no 
 thinking — there could be no dying without the leave 
 of the Church, or apart from her favour. 
 
 This well-compacted scheme was too complete, if we 
 might say so, in its theor}'^ and principles to be ever 
 fully brought to bear, without friction, upon the social 
 machinery. During the period which we designate 
 as the dog-days of spiritual despotism, it wanted in- 
 deed very little to make it practically, as well as theo- 
 retically entire. Yet, even then there was always, in 
 one quarter or in another, a resistance, a remonstrance, 
 and a voice of reason and humanity, to which it was 
 felt something must be conceded. But if the theory 
 of sacerdotal (yranny could not be absolutely realized 
 during ages of extreme barbarism, it is manifest that 
 it could never be maintained along with the expansion 
 of the human understanding, with the diffusion of 
 science and literature, or with the establishment of 
 free {x>litical systems. In fact, as every one knows, it 
 fell from its height at the moment of the revival of the 
 European mind, and has been sensibly declining from 
 that time to this. Rather than take wing, and leave 
 the earth for ever, Romanism may adapt itself to those 
 conditions of subordination and political insignificance 
 which are at present imposed upon it ; but every one 
 of these unwilling concessions is a stroke at its life — 
 an essential inconsistency, a dereliction of its professed 
 duty, and a surrender of the fundamental axioms upon 
 which its polity rests. 
 
 The intelligent members of the Romish Church will 
 not, nor can they affirm, that the doctrine, discipline, 
 polity, and usages of the Papacy, as expounded by 
 Innocent III. and Gregory IX., were not the genuine 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 245 
 
 elements of the religious system which had come down 
 to them from a higher age. It will not be pretended 
 that those pontiffs were innovators and originators of 
 a new order of things : on the contrary, they were 
 eminently faithful stewards of St. Peter's house. And 
 was not the Church in a condition then more consist- 
 ent with its theory and with its professed principles 
 than it has ever been since, or is at present ? This 
 must surely be granted : — the Church, in the twelfth 
 century, was herself : but now she can no longer 
 discharge her duties, or effect her will, or secure the 
 welfare of her members. To what sort of revolutions 
 then are the adherents of the Papacy looking, as likely 
 to bring about its restoration '^ Must not the European 
 commonwealth first forfeit political liberty, extinguish 
 the light of philosophy, blot out the discoveries of sci- 
 ence, and, in a word, drink of the cup of universal 
 forget fu Iness ? Is it thus, and at such a cost, that the 
 apostolic Roman Catholic Church is to regain its em- 
 pire ? Is this what we ought to mean and to desire, 
 when we speak of the future triumph of the Gospel, 
 and the millennium of human felicity? 
 
 The Papacy of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries 
 prepared its own fall, by openly encouraging, or by 
 conniving at, llagrant abuses, not warranted by its 
 maxims, and vidiich roused the indignation of princes, 
 and excited the contempt and abhorrence of the mass 
 of the people. It is thus that ancient structures meet 
 their ruin. Absurdly confiding in the strength which 
 immemorial prescription, and the steadfastness of po- 
 pular prejudices impart, their adherents fondly believe 
 that the most shameless excesses of official profligacy 
 will be borne with : — they scorn to suppose that any 
 will dare to assail, or will succeed in assailing, vene- 
 rable and entrenched corruptions. This illusion is the 
 last dream of pampered hierarchs. So well compacted, 
 and so accordant were the abstract principles of the 
 Romish tyranny, and so firmly and fully was it sanc- 
 
 21* 
 
^46 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 tioned in every one of its main articles of belief and 
 Worship, by the authority of the earlier ages, that it 
 may fairly be questioned whether the Reformation 
 would have been attempted at all, or could have been 
 Carried forward, if the Church had been provident 
 enough to remove the grosser scandals that attached 
 to her practices ; and had brought herself back, or 
 nearly so, to the ideal of her constitution. 
 
 Had not Rome made the yoke she imposed intole- 
 rable, princes would have been slow to hsten to the 
 argument which called in question the foundations of 
 the papal authority; and had not the vices and the 
 knavery of the monks and clergy reached an extreme 
 that rendered the Church the object of the people's ex- 
 ecration and derision, the Reformers might have found 
 it impracticable to disengage the popular mind from 
 its thraldom. 
 
 The authors and supporters of vast schemes of des- 
 potism are often wise and politic, but not wise enough } 
 or not wise enough to arrest the advances of arrogance 
 within limits of safety. If the Roman pontiffs had 
 conceded something to the Eastern Church, and to 
 the principal sees of the West ; if they had believed 
 that they should stand firmer, propped by the arms of 
 coUeas^ues and coadjutors, than reared aloft upon the 
 shoulders of vassals ; — if they had given way, with a 
 good grace, to princes on the question of investiture ;— 
 if they had drawn in the horns of canon law, and had 
 modestly declined to exercise any jurisdiction not ma- 
 nifestly pertaining to the spiritual interests of the 
 Church ; — if they had refused to protect atrocious cle- 
 rical culprits from the arm of the secular power ; — if 
 they had enforced the rules of religious houses, and 
 had brought monkery up to its owns professions ; and 
 if, moreover, it could have been found practicable to 
 repress heresy without massacres, crusades, and cruel- 
 ties ; — if all this had been done, we may imagine it as 
 at least possible that this mighty scheme of spiritual 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 247 
 
 empire would have continued, sound and unassailed, 
 to tlie present moment. 
 
 The want of so much prudence and moderation on 
 the part of the papal court, brought the system into a 
 po^!ition that demanded a course of procedure continu- 
 ally more and more outrageous and despicable, until 
 sentiments of indignation were suffused through all 
 ranks, and in almost all Catholic countries. So vehe- 
 ment and general was this feeling, that it seemed to 
 threaten the entire structure of the Church with in- 
 stants neous demolition. The Church was however 
 saved — and saved, not merely through the inveteracy 
 of the superstitions of the common people, nor by the 
 rescuing hand of individual princes ; and certainly 
 not by the personal merits and virtues of its sacerdotal 
 champions ; but by the interior strength of its theory; 
 and by the indisputable antiquity of every main arti- 
 cle of its faith, worship, and discipline. 
 
 As the Church fell (.^o far as it fell) by the means 
 of its accidental ahtises^ so was it saved (so far as it 
 was saved) by virtue of its abstract principles, and by 
 the high sanction of its creeds and ceremonies. Intel- 
 ligent readers of the story of the Reformation have 
 probably very often wondered why the mighty reform- 
 ing movement, which spread so far, did not spread 
 further, and have been amazed that the Papacy, cor- 
 rupt as it was, i-hould yet actually have withstood so 
 rude a shock. We must find a solution of (he natural 
 and reasonable question which this perplexing fact 
 suggests, by duly considering that, while on the one 
 hand, the Papacy had fallen into a condition which 
 rendered it vulnerable on every side, it was, at the 
 same time, strong both in principles, and in authori- 
 ties, to which the Reformers themselves paid homage. 
 Alter three centuries of free inquiry, deliberate reflec- 
 tion, and Biblical intelligence, it is much more than 
 we can say, that we have ourselves got clear of the 
 theory of the Papacy in every one of its articles ; and 
 
248 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 assuredly we are far from having as yet thrown off all 
 those superstitions that sprung up in the second and 
 third centuries, and which the Romish Church inhe- 
 rited and expanded. 
 
 Let us then candidly admit the serious truth, That 
 what stayed the downfal of the Papacy, three hun- 
 dred years ago, and what has given it a lengthened 
 life, was certain principles, not yet altogether renounced 
 by ourselves, and the retention of which has turned 
 aside the weapons of our protestant warfare. 
 
 Tl^e Lutheran Reformation was a glorious begin- 
 ning, that waits for its consummation. Had it indeed 
 been complete and consistent in principle and in prac- 
 tice, it would liave been universal in its actual spread. 
 The Papacy still hves, and it must live, until Pro- 
 testantism shall be reformed. 
 
 liittle difficulty would perhaps now be found in 
 thoroughly dispeUing what remains among us of the 
 theoretic portion of the ancient despotism ; but some 
 real perplexities attend the clearing away of those 
 notions and usages that have come down from the 
 times immediately succeeding the apostolic age. We 
 are still entangled in the snares woven in the age of 
 Irenseus, Justin Martyr, and Cyprian. The argument 
 for Popery is at present drawn from the authority of 
 those ancient errors ; and the weakness of Protestant- 
 ism comes from the same source. Romanism sucks 
 one breast of the pristine Church, Protestantism ano- 
 ther ; but the milk which nourishes the stomach of 
 the first, sickens that of the last. 
 
 Although the prosecution of our immediate argument 
 does not demand it, the author feels almost compelled to 
 turn aside for a moment, to coniemplate the " Great 
 Wonder" of the Papal Despotistn in the light in which 
 it appears in connexion with the truth of Christianity. 
 
 Let it then be calmly considered that the Papacy, 
 such as we find it in the age of its consummation, was 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 249 
 
 in no important sense the creation of that same age, nor 
 the product of the seven preceding centuries, during 
 whicli the Roman pontiffs had occupied a clear field for 
 eflecting their project of universal supremacy. Nor 
 dare Vv^e assign its commencement to the ambiguous pe- 
 riod of rather more than two hundred years, tliat inter- 
 venes between the conversion of Constantine, and the 
 pontificate of Gregory the Great. With the remains of 
 Christian antiquity before us, it is impossible in candour 
 to deny that the vast scheme of mingled superstition 
 and despotism which grasped the western nations in 
 the age of Gregory IX. differed from the Christianity 
 of the third century more in extent than in quality, 
 more in form than in substance, more in arrogance of 
 mouth, than in heart and disposition, more in power, 
 than in will : or in a word, that the one was hke the 
 other, as the full blown flower is like the bud. 
 
 By steps, too insensible and easy to admit of their 
 being now distinctly traced, the rehgious system profess- 
 ed in the Christian Church, had, in the course of two 
 hundred years, reckoning from the death of the last of 
 the apostles become capitally distinguished from the 
 Christianity of the apostles ; and from that time on- 
 ward continued to move, with a steady and uniform 
 progress, and always, straight forward, until it pre- 
 sents itself to view in the terrible sublimity of a mon- 
 strous tyranny unmatched in cruelty, perfidy, and pro- 
 fligacy. 
 
 With the New Testament in our hands, it is no diffi- 
 cult task to disengage ourselves, in succession from each 
 one of the popish superstitions. Taking the words of 
 Christ and his apostles as our sole and sufficient author- 
 ity in belief and worship, we spurn, without a doubt, 
 this long train of pernicious absurdities. — What have 
 we to do with the " tremendous sacrifice" of the mass, 
 Avith the adoration of the mother of God, with prayers 
 for the dead, or with prayers to them, or with the inter- 
 cession of saints, or with the seven sacraments, or with 
 
250 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 holy water, holy oil, holy vestments, and crossing of the 
 forehead; with the worship of images, pictures, and 
 relics; with penance, purgatory, auricular confession, in- 
 dulgences, and works of supererogation ; with monkery 
 and cehbacy, or with lying miracles? The modern 
 Christian, Bible in hand, throws off these follies and 
 abominations, as a man would rend from his shoulders 
 a fool's chequered coat, that had been forced upon him. 
 But in doing so, how little does he ordinarily recollect 
 that he is treating with contempt (a deserved contempt 
 indeed,) the sense, practice, and persuasion of the Chris- 
 tian community, almost from the first, and almost uni- 
 versally ? These very usages, these ceremonies, senti- 
 ments, opinions, sprung up, we hardly know how, in 
 the earliest times, obtained the approval, in long succes- 
 sion, of every leading and accomplished mind, of all 
 the Fathers, Doctors, and Rulers of the Church — of 
 confessors and of martyrs ! 
 
 Nevertheless, nothing else can be done, but to set at 
 nought this weight and universality of authority ; — w^e 
 must choose between the Scriptures and the Church ; 
 and we choose the Scriptures. This election is made 
 without anxiety. The Christianity of the Scriptures is 
 thus rescued ; and we enjoy and hold it fast ; but then, 
 when we turn back to think of the Christianity of the 
 Papacy, and recollect how broadly it was bottomed, 
 how abundantly it was sanctioned, and especially how 
 insensibly and involuntarily it became what at length 
 it was, and remember too that it has filled a vast space 
 of time, even while the millions of millions of fifty gen- 
 erations of men have gone through their term on earth; 
 when considerations such as these are vividly entertain- 
 ed, the mind sinks under its own sad and racking re^ 
 flections. What and where has been our Christianity 
 through these vast cycles of time ! 
 
 A sound mind, however, does not brood long over 
 depths it cannot fathom ; but rather turns to what is 
 certain, and practically clear and palpable. — The inde- 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 251 
 
 pendent evidences on which our faith rests are not any- 
 way touched by perplexities of this kind. We may 
 nevertheless reasonably make search, among these 
 evidences for some prophetic indications of what was in 
 fact to happen. How depressing soever may be the 
 thought of an apostacy of sixteen hundred years, yet 
 our faith is rather confirmed than weakened, if we find 
 this "fiiUing away" to have been pictured in its great 
 outlines and colours upon the pages of the inspired wri- 
 ters. 
 
 If the prophetic voice which was heard so often in 
 the times of the old dispensation speaks also in the new, 
 and if indeed the Papacy be what Protestants think it, 
 there will then be the strongest imaginable antecedent 
 probability that this great apostacy must find a promi- 
 nent place in the perspective of ages. If not, what are 
 we to conclude ? That the Papacy, after all, was com- 
 placently foreknown as the bright consummation of 
 Christianity? or that, being such as we deem it, cor- 
 rupt, mischievous, abominable, it nevertheless was light- 
 ly accounted of by Heaven, and regarded as an incon- 
 siderable accident of human affairs, and less worthy to 
 be pointed at by the finger of Omniscience, than the 
 fortunes of the Roman empire, the fate of battles, the 
 conquests of Saracens, the triumphs of Turks? This 
 is h<ird to admit. On the contrary, it is with a strong, 
 and even peremptory expectation that we turn to the in- 
 spired pages in search of what, if it stands there at all, 
 will doubtless wear no ambiguous colours. The pre- 
 monition of so mighty an object, and one marked by 
 characteristics so broad, will be conveyed in symbols 
 that shall arrest the eye, and command the convictions 
 of every plain and vigorous understandinir. After in- 
 genious sophisticated criticism has done its utmost to 
 put another meaning upon the prophetic passage, its ob- 
 vious sense, in all the freshness of truth, shall return 
 upon our minds ; and the more so, in proportion to the 
 exactness and familiarity of our acquaintance with the 
 
252 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 system which we assume to have been the antitype of 
 the prophecy. 
 
 These very predicaments we hold to attach to the of- 
 ten cited passages in the PaiiHne epistles, and to certain 
 portions of the Apocalypse. True it is that there is 
 not a prophecy of the Old Testament, or of the New, 
 which erudite obliquity, or the affectation of originality 
 and of superiority to common prejudice, has not at- 
 tempted to turn aside from its obvious import. But if 
 every such attenuated criticism is to he respectfully 
 listened to, we shall do better to close the prophetic 
 Scriptures at once ; for it is manifest that, if so iian- 
 dled, the study of them can subserve no valuable pur- 
 pose. Nay, instead of furnishing invincible proof of 
 the divine origin of the writings that contain ihenij 
 these prophetic passages plunge us in difficulties not 
 to be evaded. 
 
 Did the apostles entertain the hope of a speedy and 
 triumphant spread of Christianity through the world? 
 It does not appear that they did. Whatever bright 
 dreams they might have indulged during the term of 
 their Lord's ministry, no trace of any such expectation 
 is to be found in their discourses or epistles. The an- 
 cient promise of the ultitnate, but remote prevalence 
 of truth, does but dimly illumine their pages. Their 
 immediate prospect, it is manifest, was altogether of a 
 different kind, and the fact of deliberately entertaining 
 such a prospect, on the part of the promulgators of 
 a new religion, has great weight in relation to the 
 genuineness of their testimony. They expected no- 
 thing better than bonds, imprisonments, and every 
 sort of hostility from the world. P3ut this is not all, 
 for tliey expected also heresies, corruptions, delusions, 
 to spring from the bosom of the Church itself. If this 
 anticipation be regarded as resulting simply from their 
 own sober estimate of human nature, and their know- 
 ledge of the ordinary course of human affairs, it atlbrds 
 a most conclusive evidence of their personal freedom 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 253 
 
 from extravagance and enthusiasm : or if we attribute 
 it to the divine prej^cience specially conveyed to them, 
 then the history of the Church comes in to illustrate 
 the prophetic forewarning, and so to estabhsh the 
 truth of Christianity. 
 
 But let us for a moment give attention to the terms 
 in which these melancholy anticipations are expressed : 
 we shall find that there is a progression from a style 
 of general and comprehensive intimation, to language 
 the most special and determinate. 
 
 " I know," says Paul, in addressing the elders of 
 the Ephesian Church, " I know that, after my depart- 
 ing, grievous wolves shall enter in, not sparing the 
 flock :" thiit is to say, merciless persecutors. And 
 also that, "from among 3^ourselves, shall some spring 
 up, who, for the purpose of making themselves the 
 heads of a party, shall teach a perverted doctrine."' 
 The mischiefs that were to arise from spiritual ambi- 
 tion are here anticipated ; yet this is only a half of the 
 caution which the apostle's prescience prompted him 
 to give. He foresaw what, in fact, proved to be the 
 main means of corrupting Christianity, namely — the 
 opportunity which the teachers of this powerful doc- 
 trine too soon found for converting it into an engine of 
 extortion ; — :not indeed by the aid of statutes, but by 
 the abuse of that voluntary system upon which, un- 
 avoidably, the ministers of religion were to be thrown. 
 He points these elders to the disinterestedness of his 
 own conduct; "I have coveted no man's silver or 
 gold ;" and concludes his energetic exhortations by 
 that maxim of the Lord, which, as he foresaw, the 
 heads of a voluntary society would most of all need to 
 keep in mind, namely — " That it is more blessed to 
 give than to receive." From certain passages of his 
 epistles it appears that he lived to sec his sad expecta- 
 tion realized, and that while he and his colleagues 
 were yet present in the Churches, there were those 
 who " made a gain of godliness," and, with the worst 
 22 
 
254 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 intentions, tickled the ears of the people with the flat- 
 tering sounds of a corrupted and corrupting Gospel. 
 So far, then, it is plain, that the chief occasion of 
 the early perversion of Christianity, namely, the natu- 
 ral, and almost inevitable abuse to which the volun- 
 tary principle is liable, was distinctly anticipated by 
 St. Paul. Though unable to place the Christian 
 polity on any other foundation, from the actual circum- 
 stances of its first promulgation, he was not bhnd to 
 what would be its consequences. 
 
 St. Peter, hkewise, we find to have had the same 
 clear (and no doubt divinely imparted) foresight of 
 these very evils. The abuses which began to work 
 in his own time, and which we trace regularly in their 
 increase from the apostolic age till the Papacy was 
 ripenedj he depicts in the most specific terms. "There 
 were false prophets among the (ancient) people ; even 
 as there shall be false teachers among you, who shall 
 insinuate destructive errors, .... and who, in their 
 rapacity, shall make a merchandize of you."' The 
 parallel passage in the Epistle of Jude presents the 
 same characteristics — the future corrupters of truth 
 would be such as " run greedily in the way of Balaam, 
 for reward." 
 
 Another portraiture of the corrupted Christianity 
 which was soon to prevail, though not given in pro- 
 phetic form, occurs in the Epistle to the Colossians ; 
 nor can we fail to catch the features of its specious 
 pietism, such as — the enforcement of arbitrary ob- 
 servances in relation to meats, and drinks, and festi- 
 vals — an affected dernureness — the veneration paid to 
 celestial beings— the rigid abstinence from things un- 
 lawful — the multiplication of canons and human con- 
 stitutions, and the false recommendation these errors 
 should receive from their apparent tendency to promote 
 self-denial, lowliness of spirit, and abstracted devotion. 
 It is remarkable that, in introducing his caution against 
 these flattering perversions, the apostle employs the 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 255 
 
 very term, "philosophy" — "vain deceit" as it was, 
 which, at a very early time, was adopted, and long 
 continued to be a cant phrase, and the conventional 
 designation of the system and the principle of monk- 
 ery. The meditative, abstemious, and solitary Hfe 
 was called the " divine philosophy:" so it is perpetually 
 described by its advocates in the third and fourth 
 centuries. 
 
 We come next to formal predictions : such is to be 
 reckoned that noted passage in the Second Epistle to 
 Timothy. In ever}^ age and country, mankind at 
 large have too nearly answered to the description 
 which the apostle there advances as specially charac- 
 teristic of a future era. There would therefore be no 
 significance whatever in a prediction of this sort, un- 
 derstood as being vaguely applicable to the open 
 world. But it acquires pertinence by being attached 
 to the Church, as distinguished from the world. In- 
 deed, this sense of the prediction is determined by the 
 closing phrase, in which those spoken of are said to 
 possess a form or semblance of religion, though they 
 reject what might render it efficacious. 
 
 " This know that (instead of the triumphant spread 
 of pure religion which might be expected to take place 
 in these last days) the coming era shall be difficult and 
 dangerous ; for (the professors of Christianity) shall 
 {as such) be interested, avaricious, boastful, high- 
 minded, impious in language, regardless of natural 
 relationships, ungracious, unholy, insensible to the 
 common charities of life, violators of their solemn en- 
 gagements, false accusers, intemperate, fierce, con- 
 temners of the good, treacherous, precipitate, inflated, 
 lovers of pleasure more than of God" (even while 
 professing a mode of life which renounces pleasure for 
 the sake of God.) 
 
 Now, whether or not we think these phrases to be 
 fairly susceptible of a close and specific application to 
 the church corruptions that were soon to prevail (and 
 
256 SPIRITUAL IJESPOTISM. 
 
 several of them are remarkably characteristic) yet the 
 passage, taken in its widest application, is proof that 
 the apostle distinctly anticipated an extensive and ex- 
 treme perversion of the religion he was aiding to set up 
 in the world. If we met with no other prediction, or 
 none more definite, this would be enough for our pre- 
 sent argument, and woukl alone reconcile the truth 
 of Christianity with the fact of its general and speedy 
 perversion. 
 
 "The first epistle to the same individual contains a 
 formal prophecy, announced in terms that should 
 command our most serious regard, when endeavour- 
 ing to fix their application. To whom then does this 
 prediction attach? Among all the parties that have 
 divided the Christian body, is there one whose cha- 
 racteristic usages or doctrines are here pointed to? Let 
 the passage be read as if for the first time, and before 
 we have heard it applied to one party or to another — 
 '^ But the Spirit distinctly announces that, in the latter 
 seasons (of the Church) some shall apostatize from 
 the faith ; for they shall give heed to deceitful spirits, 
 and to the teachings of daemons (or to doctrines con- 
 cerning daemons) under a false pretence uttering lies; 
 liaving their conscience cauterized ; — forbidding to 
 marry, and (enjoining) abstinence from meats, which 
 God haih created for our grateful use." 
 
 "When a description, such as this, meets us, divinely 
 authenticated, we are surely bound to observe a reli- 
 gious ingenuousness in expounding it on none other 
 than those broad and intelligible principles of com- 
 mon sense which are every where assumed in Scrip- 
 ture as the basis of God's communications with men. 
 But if a doubt remained, our part is again to compare 
 Scripture with Scripture. 
 
 Is then the fact of a great and fatal apostacy in any 
 other place predicted ? The noted prophecy which 
 presents itself in answer to this question should be 
 examined apart from its assumed apphcation to the? 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 257 
 
 Papacy, and after an independent analysis of its 
 terms, we should look abroad over the field of history, 
 as connected with Christianity, and fix where we may, 
 upon an archetype; — or if none appears that fairly 
 corresponds to the prediction, then conclude that the 
 whole yet remains to be fulfilled. 
 
 " Do not," says the apostle, '• so interpret any thing 
 I may have uttered, either orally or in my letters, as 
 that your minds should be agitated by an expecta- 
 tion of the immediate appearance of the Lord, and of 
 our gathering together to him. Let none delude you, 
 or distract your spirits, and divert you from your ordi- 
 nary duties, by any such supposition as that the day 
 of the Lord is at hand. I now repeat what you must 
 remember 1 said when T was with you, that it shall 
 not be until there first come The Apostacy, and 
 that sinful personage be manifested — who is consigned 
 to perdition, who places himself in opposition (to the 
 truth), who exalts himself to the seat of supreme reli- 
 gious regard, nay, above every other acknowledged 
 object of reverence, so that seating himself in the tem- 
 ple of God, he puts himself forth as a god . . . Calling 
 to mind what I said when with you, you v/ill not need 
 now to be told what restrains this (arrogant power) 
 and delays its manifestation, until the destined season. 
 And yet the mysterious (or now concealed) wicked- 
 ness, is actually at work, and only waits until the 
 restraining power shall be removed. Then the law- 
 less one shall be revealed, whom (at last) the Lord 
 Jesus shall destroy by the spiritual efficacy of his word, 
 and bring to nothing by the splendour of his appear- 
 ing ; — shall destroy him, I say, who exhibits himself 
 in Satanic energy, with might, and signs, and lying 
 wonders, and who, with all the knavery of wicked- 
 ness (maintains his influence) over the lost . . . ." 
 
 Now among all the persons, or powers, or corpora- 
 tions, hitherto manifested in the world, in connexion 
 with Christianity, our part is to choose the one, in 
 32* 
 
25S SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 whom, or in which, every characteristic of the joredic- 
 tion is fairly embodied. Is it Judaism 1 But Judaism, 
 as the antagonist of Christianity, was as fully revealed 
 in the apostle's time, as at any later period ; nor was 
 it the mark of Judaism to usurp divine honours, or 
 to profess miraculous powers. Can it be Julian, the 
 apostate? But Julian did not fall by the efficacy of 
 the divine word ; nor was his fall followed by the ap- 
 pearing of Christ ; nor was his adverse influence in 
 any imaginable sense at work three centuries before 
 his birth. Is it any noted heresiarch, or any separate 
 community, that has pretended to divine honours and 
 appealed to miracles ? — we know of none. Is it Mo- 
 hammed ? But in what sense was Mohammed, or 
 his system at work, or in preparation to work, in the 
 apostolic age ? nor did the Arabian prophet pretend to 
 miraculous powers : on the contrary, he distinctly dis- 
 claimed them : nor did he ever employ a blasphemous 
 style, such as should lead his followers to f<irget that 
 he was simply human ; — the very characteristic of 
 Mohammedism is its careful and jealous regard to the 
 honour of the only God. Is then the apostate or the 
 apostacy we are in quest of, yet in the womb of futu- 
 rity ? If so, whenever he, or it, appears, there must 
 be some ingenious sense in which a connexion may 
 be traced back from it or from him, to the apostolic 
 age, and it must, be fairly shown that the iniquity, 
 then at work^ was " held back" by some power then 
 existing, and which has continued to exist, and is 
 now extant, and in active operation. 
 
 Can we be satisfied to search among obscure and 
 hitherto uimoticed objects, persons, or powers, and to 
 haul out, by the aid of erudition, from the lumber- 
 room of antiquity, some long-forgotten personage that 
 may answer our challenge? This were an idle 
 industry: no lanthern, we may be assured, can be 
 needed to find St. Paul's Man of Sin." We conclude 
 that, after learning has done its utmost, either to clear 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 259 
 
 up the terms, or to turn aside their obvious apphcation, 
 the common sense of ninty-nine out of a Imndred im- 
 partial persons would lead them, without hesitation, 
 to name the Papacy as the intended archetype of the 
 prophecy before us ; and that they would confess the 
 exactness, and the special propriety of every one of 
 the designations which it presents, as so applied. 
 The spiritual despotism, and the fraudulent supersti- 
 tion, afterwards expanded in the Papacy, were ac- 
 tually making their preparations in the apostolic age; 
 the corruption, which in the next century stood out to 
 view, was then a cloked but active mischief. The 
 papal usurpation, which drew to itself, employed, and 
 patronized, all the superstitions of the earlier ages, was 
 held in check, and kept in obscurit}^, so long as 
 the imperial power retained its seat at Rome; 
 and it made its triumphant entry upon the world 
 when the western empire fell. The Papacy usurp- 
 ed divine prerogatives ; set itself above all law, 
 human and divine ; claimed worship, and actually 
 invaded the names and titles of Deity. The Papacy 
 erected its throne, and sat down in the temple of God — 
 the Church : it has swayed the nations with a satanie 
 pride, insolence, and energy, and has sustained itself, 
 mainly, by an appeal to miracles — miracles impu- 
 dently false. Finally, the Papacy has given w^y be- 
 fore the diffusion of the Scriptures — the spiritual effi- 
 cacy of the word of Cluist ; and by its own confession, 
 it can never stand where the Bible is allowed to remain 
 in the hands of the people. 
 
 Do we yet want reasons for believing that the Pa- 
 pacy is the apostacy predicted by Paul ? 
 
 It is not necessary to pursue, the argument as affect- 
 ed by the apocalyptic prophecies; nor indeed is the 
 evidence thence resulting susceptible of condensation. 
 It is enough, in reply to those difficulties that spring 
 from the melancholy fact of the long-continued per- 
 version of Christianity, that we are able to say — this 
 
200 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 fact, melancholy as it is, stands predicted and set forth 
 in its pecuHar characteristics, on the pages of the New 
 Testament. The book then is divine, whatever may- 
 have been, during some centuries, the fate of the re- 
 ligious system it contains. 
 
 The subject of this section must not be dismissed 
 without a monitory word. — The error of Protestants 
 has been the thinking and speaking of Popery as 
 the creature of the times of tlie Papacy ; whereas, it 
 is the creature of ahnost the earliest times to which our 
 materials enable us to trace the opinions and usages of 
 the Church. This mistake has not merely thrown 
 an advantage into the hands of our opponents, who 
 have exulted in being able to show the high antiquity 
 of their faith and worship, but it has stopped, or rather 
 precluded, an inquiry, than which none can be much 
 more important, namely, How far do we retain, or 
 are infected by the superstitions generated in the se- 
 cond and third centuries ? We have indeed discarded 
 the Papacy; but are we clean esca})ed from the popery 
 of Cyprian and Dionysius? A full exhibition of the 
 superstitions of the primitive ages is now what is per- 
 culiarly needed as preparatory to a though return to 
 apostolic Christianity. 
 
 In truth, our protestant Christianity of to-day, is 
 labouring under tlie inert residues, or lees, of three 
 grand perversions ; namely, the superstitious corrup- 
 tions, already mentioned, of the martyr Church — the 
 metaphysic and dialectic corruptions of the times of 
 the schoolmen — and the metaphysic and logical cor- 
 ruptions of the system-making theologians of the 
 seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It is well un- 
 derstood that our remedy, in each case, lies (under the 
 Divine guidance) in a diligent and wisely-conducted 
 process of biblical interpretation. Nevertheless, the 
 results of this process may be brought more forcibly 
 io bear upon existing errors, by exhibiting, historically, 
 
THE CHURCH ASCENDANT. 261 
 
 their rise and growth. Towards this latter necessary 
 work, the author desires to contribute wiiat aid he 
 may; and with this view proposes, in another vokime, 
 to convey the substance of his researches concerning 
 early superstitions, and especially such of them as 
 have survived in Protestantism. 
 
 In these errors all modern sects have, more or less, 
 been implicated ; — some directly, and others by anti- 
 thesis, or re-action ; and the author hazards the con- 
 jecture that it will be found an easier thing to effect a 
 disengagement from implications of the former sort, 
 than from those of the latter: — or, in plain terms, and 
 to come to specific instances, that the English Ciuuch 
 — pursuing those ingenuous researches that are on foot 
 among her accomplished clergy, will reject certain su- 
 perstitions of pristine origin, long before our dissidents 
 will be brought to reconsider the notions and practices 
 which their opposition to those errors has entailed upon 
 them. How worthy the ambition, should the English 
 Episcopal Church imbibe it, of taking the lead in a 
 return to primitive Christianity ! 
 
SECTION VIII. 
 
 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM SUPPLANTED BY SECULAR TYRANNY. 
 
 The compass and range of the understanding-, and 
 the quaUty of a man's lehgious sentiments, might be 
 judged of, not uncertainly, by the hght in which he is 
 accustomed to regard the Lutheran Reformation. The 
 protestant partizan, controvertist, and zealous polemic, 
 for example, delights to contemplate the giant energy 
 and moral valour of those champions of Truth, who, 
 in the strength of faith, of right reason, and of Scrip- 
 ture, ''subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, 
 stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence 
 of fire, waxed valiant in fight, and turned to flight the 
 armies of the aliens." — The partizan, we say, in his 
 admiration of what w^as effected by the reformers, 
 regards the reformation as a consummated work, 
 or very nearly so ; and having chosen his patron 
 saint from among the illustrious band, \\'hether it 
 be Luther, or Calvin, Bucer, Melancthon, Zuingle, 
 Knox, or Cranmer, tliinks of nothing beyond w^hat 
 he finds in that favourite doctor's theological system 
 and polity. 
 
 On the other hand, the plain-minded and devout 
 Christian thinks, and with great reason, of the Refor- 
 mation as God's interposition in behalf of his Church and 
 truth : he thinks of it as a rescue of the Scriptures, 
 as a recovery of the great principles of the Gospel, and 
 as the overthrow of satanic power ; — an overthrow that 
 will be followed, and in due time, by the universal 
 spread of pure and spiritual Christianity. This feeling 
 and view, as it is substantially sound, so is it always 
 proper. 
 
SUPPLANTED BY SECULAR TYRANNY. 263 
 
 But there is yet an opinion of the Lutheran Refor- 
 mation entertained by those, who, using themselves to 
 institute impartial comparisons of religious systems, de- 
 cline either to accept, or to reject, any particular recen- 
 sion of Christianity, in mass ; and especially, who anx- 
 iously desire to see Christianity freed from the bonds 
 of every peculiar version, and given to mankind in its 
 primitive energy. These, while they cordially join 
 with the devout Christian in his grateful celebration of 
 that divine goodness to which we owe our deliverance 
 from the horrors of the Papacy, are yet compelled to 
 grant that the Reformation, on very many points, and 
 on some of prime importance, was deeply affected by 
 the errors, ignorance, and vehement prejudices that 
 commonly attach to humanity. The Reformation 
 they think of as a mighty convulsion, favourable in the 
 main to truth and liberty ; but a convulsion which, as 
 it w^as violent in itself, so likewise subsided long before 
 necessary forms had been completed. Those who ad- 
 mit these views, therefore, cheerfully granting, as they 
 do, the deserved honour to the prutestant heroes and 
 martyrs, are very far from being content with what was 
 then effected ; and on the contrary, now direct their 
 hopes, and bend their endeavours, towards the achieve- 
 ment of a second reformation, scarcely less important 
 than the first. 
 
 With the faults of the iheological systems handed 
 down to us by the founders of our Protestant Churches, 
 we have nothing here to do. But of their notions of 
 church power and church polity it must be said that 
 they were, in almost every sense, and in an extreme 
 degree, confused and erroneous. The Reformers 
 brought into play principles from which, in the end, 
 the hberties we now enjoy naturally resulted ; but we 
 owe them few thanks on this behalf; they intended 
 no such thing as that spiritual despotism, in its sub- 
 stance, should be dissipated ; they meant indeed to 
 shift it from its old bottom ; yet to build it up anew. 
 
264 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 and, as tliey thought, on a better model. The eccle- 
 siastical consequences of the Reformation have an ana- 
 logy with what has frequently followed civil contests 
 between rival pretenders to a crown, when the one 
 party, and generally the assailant party, having called 
 to its aid the middle classes, and having, as a bribe, 
 conceded large privileges to them, popular rights and 
 liberties have been permanently secured. Nothing else 
 could happen but that the Reformation should, in the 
 end, bring about the establishment of religious liber- 
 ty ; yet such was not either its purport, or its principle. 
 Speaking at large, and particular exceptions allow- 
 ed for, the reformers inherited from the Papacy, and 
 retained, its intolerance, its gloomy sternness, and very 
 mucli of its superstition. But the papal intolerance 
 was a proper element of the theory on wliich it was 
 founded ; and however cruel in ftict, yet it drew its 
 reasons from intelligible grounds. The Church being 
 infallible, never incurred the hazard of intlicting its 
 chastisements upon the innocent; and being super- 
 naturally empowered to maintciin and defend the 
 truth, had nothing to think of but faithfully and eflec- 
 tively to perform its duty. On tiie contrary, the Re- 
 formers, by renouncing infallibility, and by disclaiming 
 miraculous attestations of their ministry, left them- 
 selves open to the heaviest possible imputation of arro- 
 gance, and of cruelty, while they employed the sword 
 and brand against their opponents. 
 
 If popish intolerance counts many more victims than 
 protestant intolerance can pretend to, that of the latter 
 is, on every ground, less justifiable ; or, we should say, 
 less susceptible of palliation, than the former: it was 
 practised under a fuller light of scriptural knowledge, 
 it was essentially inconsistent with the principles on 
 which the Reformation proceeded, and it wanted that 
 specious pretext of supernatural guidance and infalli- 
 bihty, which might appear, even to the most upright 
 members of the Romish Church, conclusive and suffi- 
 cient. 
 
SUPPLANTED BY SECULAR TYRANNY. 265 
 
 None who consider the intimate connexion that 
 binds the various elements of religious systems, can 
 suppose that the circumstances of our having received 
 our theology and our polity from men fatally wrong 
 on the great question of religious liberty and the rights 
 of conscience, can have failed to place us in a highly 
 disadvantageous position ; it has. in fact, entangled us 
 in very serious (if not hopeless) embarrassments. To 
 this source, in great measure, may be traced the pre- 
 sent disparagements and perils of our national estab- 
 lishment ; and, again, it is to their having stood in op- 
 position to a polity embodying the errors of the reform- 
 ers, that the several classes of Dissenters in England, 
 owe, at once, their strength, and the exaggeration of 
 their theoretic principles. Every error repeats itself in 
 the antagonist opinion to which it gives rise ; and it 
 usually happens that grievous practical faults generate, 
 as their reverse, hypothetic principles proportionably 
 extravagant. If the Dissenters of the present day 
 would but apply to their own case, with a manly im- 
 partiality, those general maxims that result from a 
 wide survey of religious history, they would acknowl- 
 edge it to be certain, that their own ecclesiastical sys- 
 tem, inasmuch as it sprung by re-action from the intole- 
 rant notions and practices of the Reformers, has been 
 thrown far from the centre of truth and reason. What- 
 ever we hold as an inheritance from ancestors of the 
 sixteenth century, whether it has come to us directly, 
 or circuitously, should now be calmly reconsidered and 
 reformed. Nor is such a revision likely to be less need- 
 ed on the one side than on the other, of our religious 
 parties. 
 
 The principle of the spiritual despotism maintained 
 and exercised by the Papacy broke in upon protesJant 
 establishments, under ihe most preposterous conditions 
 that could be imagined ; and if the grand corrective of 
 the diffusion of the Scriptures had not contained an an- 
 23 
 
266 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM 
 
 tidote for every evil, the church-and-statej or, we ought 
 rather to say, the king-and-church tyranny that sup- 
 planted the tyranny of Rome, would have proved itself 
 by far the more insufferable and cruel of the two. 
 
 In the protestants countries, and especially in Eng- 
 land, the people at large, and the native secular clergy, 
 at the era of the Reformation, lost a protector, and 
 found a despot in their sovereign. Heretofore the 
 kings of England, for their own sakes, and for the 
 public good, had meditated with Rome ; they had re- 
 sisted encroachments, and had stood as the guardians 
 of the realm, repelling and excluding so much of the 
 spiritual despotism of the Papacy as could be resisted 
 without openly renouncing allegiance to St. Peter's 
 representative. The history of Europe during the 
 two, or even three centuries, that precede the Lutheran 
 Reformation, turns very much upon this one point of 
 the struggles — and, to a great extent, the successful 
 struggles of the civil authority with the spiritual, and of 
 its endeavours to reduce the latter within proper hmits. 
 
 Those very usurpations and encroachments upon 
 secular affairs, which the Church of the fourth centu- 
 ry had carried far, and which the series of popes, from 
 Gregory I. to Boniface VIII. effected, were, at the pe- 
 riod of the Council of Constance, generally felt through- 
 out Europe to be insufferable, and seemed likely to be 
 resisted. The Pragmatic Sanction of the Gallican 
 Church, the Statute of Praemunire in England, and 
 the opinions boldly maintained abroad, and uttered in 
 the Councils of Constance, Basle, and Bourges, all in- 
 dicated a rapid advance of the public mind, such as 
 made the ultimate reduction of the Papacy inevitable. 
 The intrigues of the cardinals did indeed successfully 
 turn aside the direct course of reformation ; but in each 
 instance ground was really gained by the vanquished 
 party, and as really lost by the conquerer. This is the 
 ordinary course of events when the redress of old abu- 
 ses is in progress — the partizans of corruption go on 
 
SUPPLANTED BY SECULAR TYRANNY. 267 
 
 triumphing to their fall. A little more, and that sort 
 of church-and-state-system, or clear separation of spi- 
 ritual and secular interests, and well-defined adjust- 
 ment of the two, which Constantine and his successors 
 had failed to effect, would have been brought about in 
 France, Germany, and England, if nowhere else. 
 
 The breaking forth of the Lutheran Reformation 
 gave a counter direction to this movement within the 
 Romish Church, and saved the Papacy. The Coun- 
 cil of Trent sealed Romanism in its actual condition, 
 and shut out every hope of reform, except that which 
 open hostility might effect. This new turn of church 
 affairs none can regret ; for, although external abuses 
 might probably have been remedied, there was little 
 probability that the theology or the superstitions of the 
 Church would have undergone correction at the same 
 time. In these latter respects Rome was not to be re- 
 formed, but overthrown. Yet, so far as relates to the 
 temporal power of the Papacy, its exactions, and its 
 cruelty, and its insolent interference with national in- 
 terests, there was an emancipation in prospect, for all 
 the European nations, which the Lutheran Reforma- 
 tion prevented, and which, the secular welfare of man- 
 kind only being considered, it did but partially com- 
 pensate. 
 
 By a sidelong influence the Reformation set wrong 
 that which had been getting right. Statesmen and 
 nobles, and the more enlightened of the clergy, and 
 even the people at large (we are now thinking espe- 
 cially of England) were fast coming, or had come, to 
 a pretty well-defined conception of the important dis- 
 tinction between secular and spiritual power, and were 
 prepared for measures which could have reduced the 
 papal authority, out of Italy, to a thin ether, visible to 
 none but the clergy. The king, having a foreign in- 
 terference to repel, would have stood in his natural 
 place, as the guardian of the wealth of the country, 
 from the fingers of Italian legates, as the patron of the 
 
268 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM 
 
 native clergy, in opposition to Romish intrusions, and 
 as the protecior of tlie persons and property of the peo- 
 ple against the inquisitorial cruelty of the Church in 
 matters of imputed heresy. 
 
 But the fatal error of throwing into the hands of the 
 civil authority both species of church power, namely, 
 the purely spiritual, as well as the secular, at once made 
 a tyrant of him who just before had stood in front of 
 his people as guardian and deliverer. Every thing 
 was confounded, and every thing was lost in the doc- 
 trine of the royal supremacy in matters of religion. 
 The advancing tide of opinion was vehemently thrown 
 back ; and no choice was left to the intelligent portion 
 of the community but to hold to the Papacy, with all 
 its superstitions ; or, for the sake of a purer theology 
 and worship, to cast themselves at the feet of the irre- 
 sponsible, anomalous, capricious, and fierce tyranny of 
 kings and queens. 
 
 Even during the hottest season of papal despotism, 
 the people had possessed an important advantage, in 
 well knowing the conditions and the meaning of the 
 power to which they had to submit. The faith and 
 discipline of the Church were fixed, its maxims and 
 policy were, for the most part, uniform and steadily 
 adhered to : — one pope indeed was more despotic than 
 another ; but the differences of personal disposition 
 did not extensively affect the administration of the 
 system toward the mass of the people. The severity 
 of a tyranny is much assuaged by this sort of consis- 
 tency and uniformity: only bow to a known, a long 
 established, and an invariable authority, and you are 
 safe. 
 
 But the inconstancy of the spiritual tyranny exercis- 
 ed by the Tudors and the Stuarts rendered it not more 
 oppressive than horrible. Believe and worship with 
 the monarch to-day, and you might be burned for do- 
 ing so to-morrow, perhaps by himself, or if not by him- 
 self, by his successor. The Church, the clergy, and the 
 
SXIPPLANTED BY SECULAR TYRANNY. 269 
 
 people, trembled in suspense from hour to hour, on the 
 changeful whims of the royal theologue. Christen- 
 dom hitherto had seen nothing at once so cruel and 
 so ridiculous as was the usurpation of purely spiritual 
 authority, by the kings and queens of England. The 
 persecutions of the pagan Roman emperors tried the 
 constancy, but did not rack the consciences of the suf- 
 ferers. The same may be said of the persecutions 
 carried on by the Papacy. But the capricious barbari- 
 ties perpetrated by the English sovereigns of the six- 
 teenth and seventeenth centuries, exhibited spiritual fe- 
 rocity under the most appallingof its forms, that namely 
 which it puts on them, when, although its savage 
 heart may be known well enough, its will and purpose 
 none can certainly foretel. Those only could be se- 
 cure whose determination was, to veer with the royal 
 faith as steadily as the vane with the wind. 
 
 The fault — it might almost be called the treason — 
 of the Fathers of the English Reformation, in surren- 
 dering the spiritual portion of Church power, along 
 with the secular, to the monarch, may be extenuated 
 on the plea, that, in the distracted state of the country 
 on matters of opinion, they had no other fulcrum but 
 the throne on which to rest the lever of reform. It 
 was also their unhappiness, not their fault, to have to 
 do, on so difficult an occasion, with a family the char- 
 acteristic of whichwas an unbounded wilfulness, match- 
 ed only by its preposterous pedantry. Constantine and 
 his successors had entertained a sincere reverence for 
 Christianity, and for its ministers ; and indeed the er- 
 rors of their religious administration resulted, in great 
 part, from their superstitious tenderness toward the 
 clergy. But our English monarchs were animated 
 by that w^orst sort of reli ;ious sentiment — the thorough- 
 ly sophisticated pietism which belongs to an old cor- 
 rupt worship, and which inspires an immensity of zeal, 
 but no virtue, no fear, no modesty, no humanity. 
 
 Besides, at the era of the Reformation, princes had been 
 23* 
 
270 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM 
 
 lotig learning to suspect, to contemn, to hate, and to 
 oppose, the clergy. Eminently learned, holy, and sin- 
 cere, as were many of the reforming ministers, they 
 belonged to a class that, for three centuries, had been 
 every day more and more the objects of aversion or con- 
 tempt. These ministers now approached the throne, 
 entreating protection and aid, and the peculiar difficul- 
 ties of their position led them to offer an incense to the 
 monarch, which maddened his brain. The mischiev- 
 ous influence of this adulation continued to afflict the 
 country a hundred and seventy years ; and it still 
 bears upon the Church with a serious disadvantage. 
 To the present day the English Establishment has 
 not relieved itself of the humiliations that resulted from 
 the surrender it had first made of its independence to 
 the civil magistrate. 
 
 " His Majesty's Declaration," prefixed to the Thirty- 
 nine Articles, and the thirty-seventh of those Articles, 
 breathe an anxious ambiguity in every line. There 
 is no want indeed of despotic purpose ; but there is a 
 consciousness, poorly concealed, of the utter incompa- 
 tibility of the several principles assumed as the founda- 
 tion of the new ecclesiastical government. Popes had 
 bound consciences, and had forbidden dissent and dis- 
 cussion : but they had done so on clear ground ; and 
 they had pursued a course rationally adapted to their 
 professions and their principles. But the head of the 
 English Protestant Church, with a cruel liberality, al- 
 lowed and promoted the diffusion of the Scriptures, 
 sent abroad zealous preachers, who, in assailing the old 
 superstitions, constantly stayed themselves upon "God's 
 word," and urged their hearers to "search and yee if 
 these things were so." And, all this while, the nation 
 was solemnly told that, although the Church had 
 power to decree rites and ceremonies, and had authori- 
 ty in controversies of faith, nevertheless "it was not 
 lawful for the Church to ordain any thing that is con- 
 trary to God's word written, neither go to expound one 
 
SUPPLANTED BY SECULAR TYRANNY. 271 
 
 place of Scripture that it be repugnant to another." 
 Who, then, was to decide between Scripture and the 
 Church ; or, what mediate power was to satisfy the 
 minds of those who might suspect such and such 
 things to be unlawfully ordained ? Was the Church 
 to be the arbitress in her own cause? This were ab- 
 surd indeed. But were the people to judge for them- 
 selves? So one might fairly suppose from this an- 
 nouncement of the limitation of church authority, and 
 from the implied meaning of the authoritative diffusion 
 of the Scriptures in the vernacular tongue, and from 
 the appeals made to them by their new teachers. Yet 
 this could not be when "the least difference" 
 from the articles of religion was strictly prohibited, 
 when " any varying or departing, in the least degree," 
 therefrom was not to be " endured ;" when, more- 
 over, it was enjoined that " all curious search" concern- 
 ing the meaning of tbe articles should be " laid aside;" 
 and when, to seal religious discussion with the terrors 
 of absolute power, it was declared that " Christian 
 men may be punished with death for heinous and 
 grievous offences." 
 
 It was then " His Majesty," or " Her Majesty," 
 alone, who was arbiter of truth, and sovereign lord, as 
 well of the lives and goods, as of the souls and con- 
 sciences of the people. So far this absolute spiritual 
 despotism was in harmony with what the Church 
 had long admitted. The only innovation consisted 
 in transferring irresponsible church power from spirit- 
 ual to secular hands. But this important substitution 
 assumed a character of the most wanton cruelty, and 
 of the most enormous inconsistency too, when it came 
 to be conjoined with the Protestant practice of render- 
 ing the Scriptures into the vernacular tongue, and of 
 referring the people to them as the rule of faith. The 
 page of history presents no parallel instance of fright- 
 ful and ingenious tyranny. Had the framers of this 
 atrocious anomaly no knowledge of the laws and im- 
 
27'2 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM 
 
 pulses of human nature? You may indeed stupify 
 the minds of men, and you may shut out every ray of 
 light, and exdude every stirring excitement • and, 
 having done so, then the despotism which forbids 
 them to think or to speak is at least consistent with 
 itself, and is in a sense merciful. Such lias been the 
 despotism of Rome. But to bring the minds of the 
 people under the most intense religious excitements, 
 wittingly to inflame them, and to inform them, to 
 urge them, in thunders of eloquence, to think for 
 themselves, to open upon their consciences all the 
 powers of the future world ; to tell them they w^ere to 
 stand singly at the bar of God, as responsible individu- 
 ally for their opinions and practices in religion, and 
 then, after completing this mighty preparation, to pro- 
 hibit, upon pain of dealh or imprisonment, the '-least 
 difference, or varying of belief," and '' all curious 
 search concerning doctrines," and actually to sustain 
 these prohibitions with the sword, the brand, the pil- 
 lory, and the rack — this was, indeed, an intensit}^ of 
 malice never before matched upon earth ; in exchange 
 for it we must crave the inquisition of St. Dominic, 
 and the crusades of Languedoc. 
 
 The despots — one might ahnost wish their names 
 to be blotted from tlie page of English history, — the 
 Protestant despots wlio were the authors of this bar- 
 barity, foresaw, as it appears, the impracticability of 
 their own measures ; and their language conveys all 
 the incertitude and alarm that usually belong to the 
 perpetrators of an atrocity which it is felt may proba- 
 bly be reflected upon its contrivers and agents. There 
 is a dignity and calmness in the papal persecuting 
 edicts, which is not at all found m tlie ecclesiastical 
 declarations and the proclamations of the Tudors and 
 Stuarts. Happily for England, and for the world, the 
 monstrous inconsistencies involved in the measures of 
 these princes were such as made the total defeat of 
 them inevitable ; and although at the cost of thou- 
 
SUPPLANTED BY SECULAR TYRANNY. 273 
 
 sands of executions and imprisonments, the proper 
 issue at length came about. The Bible, put into the 
 hands of the people, took possession of the hearts of 
 very many; and the horrid tyranny fell into the pit it 
 had duL!^ for the nation. Religion's liberty was won for 
 tlie British kingdoms, and a family incurably despotic 
 forfeited a crown. 
 
 But although the arbitrary measures of our reforrna- 
 tion-piiiices have now been long obsolete, we are far 
 from having, as yet, escaped from the evil consequences 
 that have thence accrued. These may readily be 
 enumerated ; well were it if they could be spoken of 
 as likely soon to be removed ! 
 
 In the first place, the preposterous despotism out of 
 the midst of which our English Reformation arose, 
 has stained and tainted the Established Church, ever 
 since, with an intolerance that lingers in the tempers 
 and upon the tongues of some of its ministers. True 
 it is, that every clergyman whose good sense entitles 
 him to any regard, discliiims, with abhorrence, Lhe 
 practices and principles of persecution. Nevertheless, 
 so numerous a hierarchy will include more than a few 
 whose inferiority of understanding, and whose perver- 
 sity of spirit, lead them to be blowing the embers of 
 church pride and cruelty. The fire, therefore, is not 
 extinguished; and not only are the smouldering fumes 
 a great present annoyance, but they even trouble our 
 feeling of security : it is impossible to say what acci- 
 dent may yet putf them into a flame. It would, in- 
 deed, be satisfactory if the Church, in a formal man- 
 ner, were to step forth before the world, disclaiming, 
 in so many w^ords, the maxims of intolerance ; and, 
 as an indication of sincerity, expunging every otfensive 
 phrase by which her formularies are still blackened. 
 This purgation concerns the honour of ihe Established 
 Church much more than it concerns the welfare of 
 the nation. The former may indeed talk errors a 
 century longer, if she pleases ; but the latter will listen 
 
274 
 
 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM 
 
 at ease to such idle thunders. Impotent threats, harm- 
 less as they are to the objects of them, are really inju- 
 rious to those who repeat them. When the Established 
 Church shall become, in fact, the Church of the em- 
 pire — and God grant this may at length happen — she 
 must speak another language. If religious hberty is 
 actually to be enjoyed within these kingdoms, not a 
 phrase must remain among the offices, or the declara- 
 tions, or the articles of the Church, which either openly 
 insults that liberty, or which bears an ambiguous in- 
 terpretation with respect to it. 
 
 In the next place ; the early intolerance of our Eng- 
 lish Reformation — an intolerance that necessitated and 
 justified the noble resistance made to it, first by the 
 Puritans, and then by the Non-conformists — has trans- 
 mitted to modern dissent a harboured grudge and ex- 
 asperation of very evil consequence. As the Church 
 still fans its obsolete intolerance, so does dissent fan 
 its resentments. Brother against brother ; Christian 
 agahisi Christian ; such is the shame of our present 
 religious condition ; nor is it unlikely that the faults 
 of the Fathers may be visited upon their descendants 
 of the fifth generation ; for the Established Church 
 may yet have to regret her backwardness in disclaim- 
 ing the despotic principles of her founders ; and the 
 Dissenters, not able to attain Christian greatness of 
 mind in this behalf, may be impelled by their cherished 
 recollection of wrongs, to promote measures which, if 
 effected, themselves would soon repent. A special 
 motive for an oblivion of past injuries, were it wanted, 
 might surely be found in a consideration of the fact, 
 that the intolerance and cruelty of the Episcopal 
 Church was the intolerance and the cruelty of almost 
 every sect in the same age. 
 
 Again ; the accidental circumstances of political dis- 
 advantage amid which the English Protestant Church 
 took its rise, and which led its foundeis at once to flat- 
 ter the monarch, and to encourage his despotic endea- 
 
SUPPLANTED BY SECULAR TYRANNY. 275 
 
 vours to secure uniformity, involved a hitherto unheard- 
 of surrender of each of the most important and pecu- 
 har rights of a Christian community. The moment 
 has at length, though late, arrived for the Church to be 
 made to feel the error of her founders in this instance. 
 Too long she has consented to be mocked with the 
 empty forms of independence ; and is now so placed 
 that she must assert and regain her lost prerogatives, 
 or fall lower still. The assembling in Convocation, 
 efFectivel}^, at her own discretion, and for the exercise of 
 substantial functions, the unprompted election of her 
 bishops, and the absolute annulling and exclusion of 
 lay encroachments upon ecclesiastical property, are ob- 
 vious points of that Church Reform which the course 
 of events demands ; — or we should rather call them, 
 the necessary preliminaries of Church Reform. 
 
 Lastly, but by no means of least importance, the rise 
 of the English Church Establishment from the midst 
 of the atrocious despotisms of the Tudor and Stuart 
 princes, has operated to throw a misunderstanding and 
 an obloquy, perhaps not now to be removed, upon the 
 notion of a Church-and-State system. We are bold to 
 mention this as the great disadvantage of our present 
 position. There seems hardly a hope of dissolving, in 
 the public mind, the ancient and firm association of 
 ideas which connects a church, by law established, 
 and a church adjusted to the civil institutions of the 
 country, with an assumption of control over the con- 
 sciences of men, or with endeavours to compel or to 
 bribe men to conformity ; in a word, with the despotic 
 feelings, language, and measures of the seventeenth 
 century. 
 
 All parties seem to concur, although in nothing else, 
 yet in the unhappy endeavour to strengthen the above- 
 named association of ideas, and to confuse and con- 
 found their own and others conceptions of a Church- 
 and-State alliance, and here it must be plainly 
 confessed that the clergy of the Establishment, and 
 
276 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM 
 
 its leaders and spokesmen, do not appear, as yet, so to 
 have discharged from their own minds the arrogant 
 prejudices of the age gone by, as to impel them, in an 
 ingenuous and explicit manner, to renounce certain 
 ecclesiastical maxims, theories, and doctrines, now no 
 longer to be endured. The champions of the Church 
 are not, as their present interests should prompt them 
 to be, zealous in holding up to pubHc view the ideal of 
 a national Church, absolutely purged of the leaven of 
 despotism. 
 
 But if the Church does not use perspicuous lan- 
 guage on this subject, and if the party whose welfare, 
 nay, existence, is mainly concerned herein, is blind to 
 its safety, it is not to be expected that any of the oppos- 
 ing parties should endeavour to set it right. As well 
 the irreligious and atheistic faction, as the dissidents, 
 favour the impression that a national Church is neces- 
 sarily a despotism ; and they, one and all, avail them- 
 selves eagerly of every morsel of illiberality and in- 
 tolerance that may happen to be showered from the 
 Church press, in proof of the assumption, that an 
 ecclesiastical establishment is, and must always be, ar- 
 rogant and bigoted. To whom can we look, on any 
 side, as willing, in good faith, to consider those mea- 
 sures which are now requisite for placing the Chuich 
 in perfect accordance with the great principles of reli- 
 gious and civil liberty ? 
 
 None who are accustomed to think, and are ac- 
 quainted with history, can need to have it proved to 
 them that, in the present condition of the British em- 
 pire, and in the actual state of public opinion, in this 
 and other countries, a Church which professes and 
 retains, or which does not utterly throw off, the insuf- 
 ferable and preposterous ecclesiastical principles of the 
 Reformers, can have any other fote than (hat of work- 
 ing itself on to worse and worse ground, and of be- 
 coming every year and day, feebler and more obnox- 
 ious. Neither statutes, nor the power of the aristocracy, 
 
SUPPLANTED BY SECULAR TYRANNY. 277 
 
 nor the favour of kings — no nor the power of Heaven 
 itself, can prevent the decay and fall of a Church that 
 in the present day, advances, as its preliminaries, max- 
 ims essentially despotic. Whatever communion or 
 corporation, within the bosom of a free country, takes 
 its stand upon sectarian ground, although 7ioiu it may 
 he the largest, the most opulent, the most learned, and 
 the most powerful of all sects, will never be more, or 
 other than a sect ; and almost certainly will go on 
 narrowing its circle, until it has become as inconsider- 
 able as any of its competitors ; and, perhaps the most 
 inconsiderable of all. t'Sects may be sectarian, and 
 yet, in a certain sense, may thrive; but to a nation- 
 al Church sectarianism must be fatal. At a time 
 when the free discussion of all opinions, and the agita- 
 tion of all interests, tends to bring every thing to find 
 its real level, a sectarian national Church must suffer 
 vastly more in the collision of parties than any other 
 party can do; other bodies may have something to 
 hope for, and to gain, but the estabUshed party has 
 every thing to fear, and to lose. 
 
 It is easy then to trace that connexion of causes 
 which entails upon us, at the present moment, con- 
 sequences of the most uigent and momentous kind, 
 from the spiritual despotism of ages long gone b}^ 
 The ghostly tyranny of the Papacy, taking its rise 
 from almost the earliest age of the Church, reached a 
 height that made it the dread mistress of the world. 
 This tyranny was first resisted and then transferred 
 to another ground, by the Lutheran reformers. Such 
 was the origin of our own national Establishment. 
 Since the age of its foundation, although all reasona- 
 ble men's minds have come to an opinion abhorrent 
 of intolerance, nothing has been done or said by the 
 Church, as such, to disengage herself from the practi- 
 cal and theoretic errors of her polity in this respect. 
 Parliaments have repealed despotic statutes ; but the 
 Church yet stands liable to all the obloquies and sus- 
 24 
 
278 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 picions that attach to her history. For aught the na- 
 tion knows, or can be sure of, the Church, (circum- 
 stances favouring) would say again what once she said, 
 and do again what once she did. No disadvantage 
 can be more serious than that of lying open to such 
 jealousies. An intolerant sect may indeed be left to the 
 contempt and obscurity it deserves ; but a national 
 Church — intolerant, must be watched, and tied, and 
 humiliated, if not rejected, by a people reasonably 
 alive to their liberties and welfare. 
 
 If then the national Church is to be maintained, 
 certain measures are indispensable, which shall place 
 her at a broad distance, as well from the spiritual des- 
 potism of the Reformation, as from that of the 
 Papacy. 
 
SECTION IX. 
 
 PRESENT DISPARAGEMENTS OF THE MINISTERS OF RELIGION. 
 
 The well-being of a community, and by eminence, 
 of a religious community, demands two conditions in 
 relation to those who serve and govern it ; namely, 
 that they should personally be able and worthy, and 
 that, for the discharge of their functions, they should 
 occupy the most advantageous ground possible. 
 
 There have been times when the ministers of reli- 
 gion, and even the people, have thought of the latter 
 of these conditions only, and have been almost indif- 
 ferent concerning the former. No error can be of 
 worse consequence than this. To attribute every 
 thing to the official prerogatives and dignity of the 
 functionary, while we care little or nothing about the 
 intellectual and moral qualities of the man, is the last 
 and lowest illusion of superstition. How frivolous and 
 degraded must the minds of those have become who 
 are accustomed to look at nothing in God's ministers 
 but their frocks ! These absurd notions, we may hope 
 are nearly obsolete. 
 
 But on the other side, it is an error, and it is the 
 characteristic error of modern times, and of Protestant- 
 ism, so to regard the personal accomplishments and in- 
 dividual worth of the christian minister as hardly to in- 
 quire, or to care, whether the position in which he 
 stands is such as to give his talents and virtues all the 
 advantage they ought tocommand. In ages gone by 
 the great damage of the church was a general want of 
 worthiness in its ministers : in the present age, its hurt 
 comes from the disparagements under which its able 
 and upright ministers have to labour. 
 
280 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 It is true that brilliant qualities of mind, in single 
 instances, or an unconquerable energy, or an eminent 
 degree of faith and holiness, may so surmount every 
 disadvantage, as that it may be thought there were 
 none to be encountered. From such instances a very 
 delusive argument is often drawn, of this sort — 
 "You find fault with our'ecclesiaslical economy ; but 
 look at such and such men, and see how well it 
 works in able hands ; — we want nothing but many 
 of the same stamp, and all would be right." No rea- 
 soning can be more futile than this. Who shall set 
 forth, in full view, the struggles of these same emi- 
 nent men with the disadvantages of their position ? 
 or who tell us what it has cost themselves, and the 
 Church, to counteract and vanquish those disadvan- 
 tages? But this is an incidental and inconsiderable 
 part of the argument ; for it is an extreme folly in 
 estimating the influence of systems to take rare in- 
 stances as our rule : we should consider always the 
 mass and the many. Is it asked, what are the 
 merits of a certain polity ? ask again, what is its 
 operation upon ordinary minds ? 
 
 The three principal species, or successive develope- 
 ments of spiritual despotism, have passed away ; 
 namely, that of the pristine Church, that of the Pa- 
 pacy, and that which supplanted the Romish tyranny 
 at th£ Reformation. It might indeed be easy to point 
 out particular examples of an analagous kind, here 
 and there around us ; but we regard such instances 
 as barely worthy either of formal notice ; they are 
 single instances only, or they are likely to become 
 every day less and less frequent. The whole ten- 
 dency of public feeling and opinion, and the current 
 of aflfairs, sets in the opposite direction. The re-action 
 from spiritual despotism has gone very far ; the 
 clerical order is, in many modes, suffering depression, 
 and is in danger of still greater humiliations. The 
 endeavours of every considerate supporter of public 
 
DEPRESSION OP THE CLERICAL ORDER. 281 
 
 religion should therefore be directed toward a contrary 
 point. Instead, then of hunting out from its corners 
 the poor and scattered remains of sacerdotal pride, 
 we propose succinctly to state the most prominent 
 causes and occasions of those disadvantages that, at 
 the present moment, depress the ministers of religion. 
 This might be done within the compass of a page, 
 if it were not so often, that what demands to be 
 named as a serious evil and a humiliation, has come 
 to be regarded by those who suffer from it in a false 
 light, as a valuable prerogative, or as an honour. Ex- 
 planations therefore are necessary for the purpose 
 of showing the grounds on which it is alleged that 
 what has been cherished and pertinaciously main- 
 tained, ought rather to be abandoned and disclaimed, 
 Of all parties it is more or less true that they cling- 
 to their loss, and glory in their discredit. 
 
 Whatever there is that must be named as an ob- 
 stacle, or as a dishonour, affecting the Christian 
 community at large, may properly be pointed to as, in 
 an emphatic sense, a disparagement to the clerical 
 order : and it may be such, partly as the misfortune, 
 and partly as the fault, of the ministers of religion. 
 For example ; every private Christian of serious and 
 ingenuous temper, feels, in an oppressive manner, 
 the reproach of the enemies of our feith. who ask, 
 "Why does not Christianity, now that it is freed from 
 external opposition, command the assent of all men, 
 and universally prevail?" A reply may be given 
 to such a taunting question : nevertheless, there re- 
 mains a certain degree of force in the opprobrious 
 question ; and the only way in which it can be turn- 
 ed aside, so as not to attach to Christianity itself, 
 is for Christians to take it upon themselves, and to 
 say, " It is altogether our fault that the religion of 
 the Bible does not now triumph universally." 
 
 If the private Christian should make such a reply 
 24* 
 
282 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 to such a reproachful inquiry, it cannot be denied 
 that the ministers of religion must do the same in 
 a special and emphatic manner. That Christianity, 
 in their hands, does not rapidly spread, and does not 
 command the reverence and submission of the mass of 
 mankind, is indeed a humiliation, full of anxiety and 
 discouragement. While the Gospel was struggling 
 with external hostility, and contending for its very ex- 
 istence against power and malice, its ministers acquitted 
 themselves of all blame in bearing a courageous tes- 
 timony to its truth, and in enduring extreme suffer- 
 ings for its sake. But their responsibility reaches 
 much further, and is of a more serious sort, when, in- 
 stead of encountering opposition from the civil powers, 
 or from the world at large, they receive favour and 
 aid, when the field of labour is opened before them, 
 and they are invited to occupy the ground ; and when 
 nothing hardly remains to be done or desired, except 
 that which they nxust themselves effect. 
 
 At the present moment, and in this country (if no 
 where else) Christianity stands on open ground, and 
 may exhibit its proper strength. It has all reason 
 and argument on its side, it has the voice of con- 
 science in the bosoms of men to sustain it : it has 
 no adversary to fear, and no visible obstacle to bar 
 its progress. Under such favouring circumstances, 
 merely to maintain its ground is substantially to suffer 
 defeat. Not to advance with a rapid acceleration, 
 is to incur dishonour and suspicion. This dishonour, 
 then, where falls it? — not on Christianity. After 
 every reasonable palliation has been admitted, there 
 will remain a weighty discredit, which not merely 
 implies some fault on the part of those whose special 
 duty it is to promote religion ; but which stands in 
 their way as a disparagement, and as a hindrance; 
 and it is as such that we here name it. 
 
 Two or three periods might be referred to in w^hich 
 religion, though much mingled with superstition^ 
 
DEPRESSION OF THE CLERICAL ORDER. 283 
 
 afiected tlie mass of society far more extensively, and 
 moreintensely too, than it does at present, and when its 
 ministers commanded the homage of all classes — the 
 high as well as the low. In what manner they availed 
 themselves of this submissiveness of the people is ano- 
 ther question ; but we ought to desire nothing less than 
 that, in an age of good sense and reason, those who wield 
 the powers of Christianity — freed from superstition 
 and fraud, should possess an influence equally exten- 
 sive, and equally efficient. Christianity should either 
 be oppressed and persecuted, or it should be trium- 
 phant, aiid universally honoured ; a middle state is, 
 to a religion so sanctioned, an ambiguous state ; and 
 while it thus wavers and halts in its course, its official 
 advocates stand in a false position, and one of very 
 peculiar disadvantage. The authority they might 
 wish to exercise for the mainlenance of morals, and" 
 for the enforcement of church disciphne, finds no 
 steady fulcrum in public opinion. The plain rules? 
 of virtue, of temperance, justice, truth, charity, take 
 effect indeed upon the docile, but possess no restrain- 
 ing terror in relation to the bold and wilful. The 
 ministers of religion, unhappily, in protestant coun- 
 tries, have learned to expect no submission — except 
 from the submissive ; and hence, naturally reluctant 
 to draw upon themselves the expressions of contuma- 
 cy, they avoid that style of asserting morality which 
 would only provoke insults, and fail to produce obe- 
 dience. The entire method of teaching morals from 
 the pulpit betrays a conscious w^ant of power to 
 carry home these principles in ecclesiastical practice. 
 We hear the letter of Christian moralit}^, but feel 
 scarcely any thing of its energy. There is little tone 
 in our church and chapel ethics: and why, but be- 
 cause the teachers of morals are mere lecturers up- 
 on abstract principles : as an order, they are not in 
 authority. The clergy are the instructors of that 
 quiet minority of the community that is pleased to 
 
284 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 attend public worship; they are not God's ministers to 
 the people at large. Let this principle be considered 
 as it deserves, That Christianity can display its pow- 
 ers, only when it is persecuted ; or when it has be- 
 come paramount. 
 
 Again ; the grand opprobrium of our modern and 
 Protestant Christianity — that which at once enfeebles 
 and obscures it, and which bars its progress, namely — 
 its factious condition, while it presses upon Christians 
 generally, bears with a peculiar force upon the clerical 
 body. Why do the ministers of religion enjoy so little 
 honour, and exercise so little power ? — it is because 
 they are divided among themselves. To a certain 
 extent only, do they sustain one another, and are 
 sustained in common, by the broad meaning of Scrip- 
 ture. To as great an extent they diminish the influ- 
 ence one of another ; they stand before the world as 
 the rivals and antagonists one of another ; and they 
 make their appeals to the word of God, not only for 
 strengthening their general and salutary power, but 
 for defending their particular position. AH this is ma- 
 nifestly incompatible with any high degree of spiritual 
 authority. 
 
 Few, if any, seem to have their eyes open to the 
 immensity of this disadvantage. It is the infatuation 
 of the times to be blind to it, or to labour to palliate it. 
 Every age has been insensible of its principal and most 
 glaring fault, and assuredly the present age is no ex- 
 ception to the rule. Let but the ministers of religion 
 distinctly imagine what would be their honour, what 
 their just and beneficial influence, what their means 
 of pastoral government, what their opportunities for 
 bringing Christianity to bear upon the outcast portions 
 of the community, high and low, and for making it 
 embrace, as it ought, the entire population, were they 
 themselves one in mind and one in communion. 
 Hitherto we have not known what Christianity might 
 
DEPRESSION OF THE CLERICAL ORDER. 285 
 
 effect, because its ministers have never been willing to 
 combine their strengtli, or to concur in their measures, 
 or to agree in faith and counsel. The force of religious 
 motives is half of it turned in upon the Church, and 
 there evaporates : let but the whole of it flow forth as 
 a liver from its springs, and nothing could resist it. 
 
 The official disparagement that results from this 
 cause is much aggravated by the use of certain viliiy- 
 ing arguments, resorted to by vulgar and secular minds 
 for the purpose of excusing, or even of recommending, 
 religious divisions. Often does it happen with those 
 who are capitally in fault, that their own apology seals 
 their condemnation. Thus there are some who do 
 not blush to assure us that it is only by motives of 
 rivalry that the ministers of religion can be stimulated 
 to perform their duties with a necessar};^ zeal ; or that 
 nothing but division among the clergy can prevent 
 those dangerous combinations whence hierarchical 
 despotism takes its start ; or that, in religion, as well 
 as in common affairs, the pubhc is the gainer by an 
 open market, and competition among venders. 
 
 All this grossness would be true, if Christianity were 
 not true ; and, indeed, it is true, while Christianity is 
 treated and thought of as little better than other sys- 
 tems of national worsbip: but each of these pretences 
 is impiously false when made to attach to the Chris- 
 tianity of the Scriptures. That is only half believed 
 which is believed as the alternative in a controversy ; 
 and at presant all our religious convictions are subject 
 to a deduction of this sort. The great principles of 
 the Gospel, thought of as the subjects of discord among 
 the teachers of religion, ore not firmly lodged in our 
 minds; — nor in their minds. Conscious of this low- 
 ered or shattered confidence, affecting as well the 
 teachers as the taught, the deficiency of genuine assu- 
 rance is supplied whence it may, and various second- 
 ary motives are admitted to give their aid in sustaining 
 our profession, and in buoying up our zeal. But no 
 
286 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 such unworthy accessories would be needed, or indeed 
 tolerated, if the genuine force of faith itself were not 
 broken down by disputation. 
 
 Fully we may grant that those who slenderly be- 
 lieve the great verities of the Gospel may need to be 
 provoked to diligence in their spiritual functions by the 
 rivalries and jealousies of faction ; and certain it is 
 that where high motives languish, the deficiency may 
 be supplied by the personal ambition of those who are 
 striving to outshine competitors. It is also true, while 
 our church politics on the one side are purely demo- 
 cratic, and on the other side are purely hierarchical, 
 that faction among the ministers of religion operates 
 as a preservative against both popular and clerical 
 tyranny. But none of these degrading precautions 
 or secular and vulgar incentives would find place, if 
 once the paramount and elevating motives of Chris- 
 tianity took full effect. It is nothing but faction itself 
 that renders the impulses deriv^ed from faction need- 
 ful. Faction laid aside, and we should no more want 
 the artificial stimulus it may supply. Their divisions 
 among themselves discarded, and the ministers of the 
 Gospel would instantly stand possessed of an autho- 
 rity that would neither ask extrinsic aids, nor need 
 humiliating counteractions. Little can be hoped for 
 in relation to Christianit}^, until its ministers remove 
 from themselves the dishonour of their feuds. 
 
 It ought not perhaps to be deemed proper to look at 
 subjects of this serious sort, even for a moment, in the 
 light of wordly prudence ; but if this might be per- 
 mitted, one must be amazed at that want of discern- 
 ment of their common credit and interest, as an 
 ORDER, which allows the ministers of religion so to 
 divide and to subdivide their corporate strength. And 
 never have such divisions been more inexpedient or 
 dangerous than at the present moment, when the 
 democratic element, throughout the social system, is 
 gaining rapidly upon all powers of government and 
 
DEPRESSION OF THE CLERICAL ORDER. 287 
 
 principles of authority ; when legitimate feehngs of 
 reverence, along with questionable prejudices, are dis- 
 appearing ; and when sentiment of almost every 
 kind is becoming faint and feeble. At such a time 
 the clerical influence must be regarded as standing 
 exposed to extreme peril : what then is likely to be its 
 fate if it be internally broken by disagreements, and 
 alienated, part from part, by fixed aversions ? How 
 are those to defend their common prerogatives who 
 will not recognize each other as claimants of the joint 
 privilege, or even meet under the same roof? 
 
 But let these inferior and secular considerations be 
 altogether dismissed. Surely those must have a faint 
 sense of their responsibility who can think themselves 
 free to indulge their resentments, to entertain their 
 prejudices, and to adhere to their bigotry — at the peril 
 of the salvation of mankind. Yet it is the factions, and 
 the jealousy> and the animosities, of the ministers of 
 Christianity, that at the present moment is sealing the 
 perdition of the world. It is this that is condemning 
 the millions of our British population to ignorance and 
 atheism : it is this that is snatching from us the lately 
 entertained hope of the conversion of Mohammedans 
 and Pagans : it is this that is scattering the sighs and 
 prayers of the Church for the prevalence of truth and 
 goodness : it is this — it is the disgraceful, the ground- 
 less, and the obstinate discords of the ministers of 
 religion, that now baffles the benevolence of Heaven, 
 and throws the wretched human family forward upon 
 another cycle of satanic illusion. The methods of 
 the Divine government, inscrutable as they are for the 
 most part, yet make themselves legible, very often, in 
 the terrible retributions they involve. So it may prove 
 in the present instance. Every sort of motive and 
 incidental advantage has, during the current period, 
 combined to invite a reconsideration, and an abandon- 
 ment of our hereditary religious divisions. This has 
 been the Lord's special call to his ministers of the pre- 
 
288 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 sent age. But it has not been listened to ; it has been 
 heard — and contemned. Yet the guilty will go in 
 peace to their graves, and the pubhc punishment be 
 reserved to descend with ruin upon the heads of their 
 less culpable successors. Let it be believed that, in 
 the actual tendency of opinions throughout Europe, 
 and not less so in England, the clerical institute and 
 order is altogether in jeopardy. Weakened a little 
 more, and disgraced a little more by internal discords, 
 and it may be trampled under foot by its adversaries. 
 
 At what cost was it that the clergy of the third cen- 
 tury promoted superstition, and pursued their selfish 
 ends? or at what cost did those of the fifth and sixth 
 centuries bear down, and put to silence, the few re- 
 monstrants who called upon them to return to apostolic 
 simplicity? — it was at the cost to the world of the- 
 delusions and corruptions of twelve hundred years. 
 Heaven did not interpose to stop the natural course of 
 evil. The Church was left to go on in the path it had 
 chosen : the clergy enjoyed the fruits of their treason 
 against their Lord : Judas held his thirty pieces of 
 silver, and lioted without remorse in his gains. The 
 treason of our own times is of a different sort ; but we 
 know not that it is less pernicious ; and assuredly it is 
 aggravated by a more abundant knowledge of right 
 and wrong; nor is there any ground of just confidence 
 that its proper consequences will be averted by extraor- 
 dinary interpositions of Divine power and mercy. 
 
 Tlie part of the junior members of the clerical or- 
 der (of all communions) is to convince themselves of 
 the error of their fathers in this behalf, and to resolve 
 that, so soon as they come upon the stage of public 
 life, they will remove the unwarrantable and perni- 
 cious discords that have so long stayed the course of 
 Christianity, and brought its ministers into contempt. 
 Union, if once cordially intended and promoted, would 
 not be obstructed by any serious obstacles : the diffi- 
 culties that stand in its way would appear to be what 
 
DEPRESSION O^ THE CLERICAL ORDER. 2$^ 
 
 they are, trivial pretexts only, or misunderstandings 
 which good sense and charity would presently sur- 
 mount. So far as the present pleas of faction aie of a 
 political kind, they must at once be condemned as im- 
 piously criminal : so far as they relate to diversities of 
 usage or opinion in worship and government, a bet- 
 ter understood principle of church polity and commu- 
 nion, together with that sentiment of love and forbear- 
 ance which the Gospel supplies and demands, would 
 secure to every man his personal persuasion, without 
 allowing him to break company with his brethren ; 
 and so far as our parties take their orio^in from theo- 
 logical disagreements, a pious and diligent prosecution 
 of biblical interpretation, such as is at present in pro- 
 gress — biblical interpretation opposed to the dialectic 
 and the metaphysic method of compacting systems, 
 would soon bring into substantial accordance all sin- 
 cere men. In one word, a restored manliness of feel- 
 ing among religious folks — a renovated good sense, 
 and, above all, an invigorated piety and profound con- 
 viction of the truth of the religion we profess, would 
 dispel, as in an instant, the shame and folly of our fac- 
 tions. 
 
 The above-named heavy disparagements, under 
 which the influence of the ministers of religion is at 
 present labouring, attach in common, and nearly in 
 equal degrees, to the clergy of all parties. There re- 
 mains however to be mentioned certain causes of de- 
 pression which specially affect the ministers of different 
 communions. The most considerable of these have, 
 in the preceding Sections, been cursorily adverted to, 
 but it is proper here distinctly to bring them forward ; 
 yet a copious argument on subjects so familiar cannot 
 be necessary ; nor d ;es the author intend to take into 
 account certain minute diversities, that distinguish our 
 various denominations. 
 
 The Wesleyan Methodists and Moravians excepted, 
 the great body of our English Dissenters have fallen 
 25 
 
290 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 from Presbyterianism to Congregationalism, and in 
 consequence of renovated party feelings, have been led 
 of late to defend that form of government with warmth. 
 At the very same time the evils and impracticability 
 of this system have been so strongly, though silently, 
 felt, as that several important deviations from it have 
 been attempted. In truth, v.henever Christianity is 
 in an expanding state, a polity essentially (though not 
 by name) episcopal, takes place ; as for example, in 
 missionary stations, and at hoirie too, where a pastor 
 is of episcopal character, and is eminently assiduous 
 and zealous, so as to extend his labours beyond the 
 walls of his chapel. The very pattern of primitive 
 episcopacy might be pointed to in some of our rural 
 distiicts, wdiere a mother congregational Church has, 
 under the laborious care of its pastor, surrounded itself 
 with dependant chapels, scattered over a district of 
 seven or ten miles diameter. All that is wanting in 
 such cases is ingenuousiiess enough not to inveigh 
 against the nanie— bishop, while episcopacy is actually 
 used. 
 
 Again ; conscious of the fault of their principles, in- 
 dividuals among the congregational dissenters have 
 laboured, time after time, to establish some sort of or- 
 ganization of the body, for the management of their 
 common interests. But neither ministers nor people, 
 generally, are as yet prepared to yield what is indis- 
 pensable to the rendering such unions — unions in- 
 deed, or for making them effective, in any considerable 
 degree. Beside, it is little more than the political well- 
 being of the body that could come under the cogni- 
 zance of a uietropolitan committee ; and even in rela- 
 lation to these, wide disagreements prevent the con- 
 centration of the will of tlie bod}^ The very princi- 
 ple of these communities repels organization, and so 
 strong a feeling of jealousy tovvard every species of e.r- 
 tended authority jjervades them, tliat no sooner is any 
 scheme advanced which might ripen into an efficient 
 
DEPRESSION OF THE CLERICAL ORDER. 291 
 
 general government, than it draws upon itself univer- 
 sal dislike. 
 
 Considered in its relation to the pastors, individually, 
 the congregational system is, in one word — the peo- 
 ple's polity, framed or adhered to, for the purpose of 
 circumscribing clerical power within the narrowest 
 possible limits, and of absolutely exxluding any exer- 
 tions of authority, such as the high English ten»per 
 could not brook. The minister of the meeting-house 
 or chapel is — one against all. His neighbouring 
 brethren may listen in sympathy to his complaints, 
 but they can seldom yield him succour : to attempt to 
 interfere miglit be to dislodge liim at once from his po- 
 sition. No adjustment of ecclesiastical powers can 
 leave a smaller balance in the hands of the pastor. 
 
 The instances that would probably be pointed to in 
 proof that these averments are only theoretically true, 
 and not practically so, we should single out as really 
 confirmatory of them. It is a universal principle that, 
 to abridge excessively the powers of a ruler, is to place 
 him under a sort of necessity to become a despot. 
 Feeling that the prerogatives formerly assigned to him 
 are altogether insufficient for the free and beneficial 
 discharge of his functions, no alternative is left to him, 
 but either to succumb, and to sustain a mere mockery 
 of authority, or to usurp (we must call it usurpation) 
 such powers as he can ; and by personal address, or 
 by the force of his temper, or the momentum of his 
 talents and character, to render himself absolute. 
 Nothing tends so rapidly to despotism as pure democ- 
 racy. The cases, be they as many as they may, in 
 which congregational ministers exercise a real and un- 
 restrained power, concur along Vv^ith the frequent cases 
 of an opposite sort, in which the minister is the crea- 
 ture of the people, and both support the general asser- 
 tion that, to insulate congregations, and to leave a sin- 
 gle stipendiary teacher alone, to manage as he can, 
 the popular will, is a system that must almost always 
 
292 SFIRITtTAL DESTOnSM". 
 
 end, either in compromising the liberties of the people^ 
 or in annihilating the independence, the salutary 
 power, and the personal comfort, of the minister. 
 
 High-minded and faithful men (we use the terms 
 in the best sense) and there are many such among 
 the Congregational Dissenters, may be prompted to 
 deny with indignation the allegation of their infelici- 
 tous position. Such should however, as well in jus- 
 tice to themselves, as to their own and other bodies, 
 consider, not so much their particular and exclusive 
 case, but rather that of the many among their breth- 
 ren, less energetic in temperament, less skilled in the 
 arts of government, and less advantaged by talents, or 
 perhaps by property, than themselves. And another, 
 and a more recondite inquiry should also be made, 
 concerning the secret, silent, and universal operation of 
 the popular will, through a course of time, over theo- 
 logical systems, and over moral principles and senti- 
 ments, as taught from the pulpit, and as carried into 
 effect upon the people. Men are not always conscious 
 of how far they have been carried from their suppos- 
 ed longitude, by a tranquil current, into the course of 
 which they have steered. 
 
 The eagerness of congregational misisters in de- 
 fending a system so disparaging to themselves, and 
 so incompatible with the dignity, security, and sereni- 
 ty, proper to their office, may seem a riddle to by-stand- 
 ers : it is however susceptible of some explication. 
 The events of the time have thrown all parties upon a 
 partizan-like assertion of their peculiarities ; and it has 
 been felt that any show of misgiving or doubt, as ta 
 sectarian principles, would be caught at and unfairly 
 used by opponents. Besides, it is \vell understood 
 that the dissenting laity, generally, are as far as possi- 
 ble from being in a mood to relinquish any portion 
 of their acquired sovereignty, and would abandon tlie 
 most distinguished of their preachers who should open- 
 ly controvert popular doctrines. Nor ought we to 
 
DEPRESSION OF THE CLERICAL ORDER. 293 
 
 leave out of tlie account the unfeigned convictions of 
 many, perhaps of most, of these respectable men, who 
 have persuaded themselves, or have been persuaded, 
 that their poHty is essentially the same as that of the 
 apostolic churches.* Having had the baronial prelacy 
 of the middle ages to contend with, and having fallen 
 into the almost universal error of fighting for and 
 against names, they have believed themselves to oc- 
 cupy an impregnable position, because they have seen 
 their opponents standing in one that is indefensible. 
 It has been the misfortune moreover of the dissenting 
 clergy, to derive their knowledge on ecclesiastical ques- 
 tions much more from our English reformation-writers, 
 and from their own puritan and non-comformist di- 
 vines, than from original sources. Very few of them, 
 and manifestly not those who at present figure in ec- 
 clesiastical polemics, are familiarly conversant with the 
 Greek and Latin Church writers. The diffusion 
 among them of this sort of learning (proper as it is to 
 a divine) would infallibly lead to some considerable 
 modifications of opinion. Unhappily, at present, the 
 prejudice prevails which prevents its being seen that 
 ancient books, perhaps intrinsically undeserving of pe- 
 rusal, may nevertheless claim attention, in a perempto- 
 ry manner, as the sources and materials of history. 
 Uninformed of the history of Christianity, we are the 
 creatures of that recension of Christianity which hap- 
 pens to be current in our times. 
 
 It is always extremaly difficult to state the defects of 
 religious systems without conveying, to those who are 
 uninformed in such matters, an injurious or an exag- 
 gerated impression of facts. The author, in this in- 
 stance, formally cautions the general reader against 
 the misinterpretations or extensions to which his aver- 
 ments may be open. He would commit his pages to 
 the flames, much rather than seem to associate him- 
 
 ♦ See Appendix. 
 25* 
 
294 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 self vvilh the virulent calumniators of the Dissenter?, 
 He well knows the Dissenters ; — he knows thatChristi- 
 anity is among them in an efficacious form ; he knows 
 their zeal, their abundant labours for the promotion of 
 the Gospel, their disinterestedness, their liberality (un- 
 matched and unlimited) and their private and personal 
 worth and piety ; and although they may scout his 
 praise, he will still praise them. But their opposition to 
 the Established Church has deeply injured them ; — it 
 has set them wrong, very far, in polity and principles; it 
 has infected them in no small degree, with a politico-reli- 
 gious fanaticism ; and especially it has fixed them, al- 
 most universally, in a blind confidence of being, on all 
 points, " in the right," a confidence which precludes a 
 modest and wise consideration of principles, and leaves 
 scarcely a hope of their entertaining those serious and 
 momentous inquiries concerning the general eonditioQ 
 of our modern Christianity, which are now called for. 
 But we must not pass on without noting, and fully 
 admitting, that material alleviation of the evils of Con- 
 gregationalism which has incidentally resulted from 
 modern missionary exertions, of the several dissident 
 communions. The various evangelic schemes and 
 labours which have been on foot these last forty years, 
 and especially the last twenty years, have in fact ope- 
 rated to give the dissenting clergy a corporate exist- 
 ence, and to secure for them, in relation to their con- 
 gregations, strength and importance, both individually 
 and as an order. The great movements to which 
 Christian zeal has given rise, place the ministers be- 
 fore their flocks in a position of disinterested exertion, 
 and self-denying labour, such as stimulates affection, 
 and secures respect ? in a word, augments their proper 
 influence. These enterprizes, moreover, involve mea- 
 sures, private and public, which induce habits of busi- 
 ness and government, habits applicable to other pur- 
 poses, and highly important to the pastoral character. 
 Again, (nor is this of least account,) our modern 
 
DEPRESSION OF THE CLERICAL ORDER. 295 
 
 evangelic societies bring the pastors into frequent con- 
 sultation among thennselves. or in conjunction with 
 the most resjiectable of the laity. In some degree, 
 therefore, Congregationalism is Congregationalism no 
 longer. Ministers are now a body ; they work in 
 with extensive organizations ; they are members of 
 broad systems of government ; they go and come from 
 their spheres of labour with hearts relieved of the 
 pressure of private cares, by the excitement of public 
 cares. They are not, as once they were, the spirit-bro- 
 ken and deplorable anchorets of the study and the pul- 
 pit. They are of more importance at home, and of 
 more importance abroad, than were their predecessors. 
 They have made proof, in a signal and peculiar man- 
 ner, of the truth of the axiom — that " Mercy is twice 
 blessed." The missionary spirit, and its practices and 
 movements, have redeemed congregational dissent 
 from decay or extinction ; and have brought to bear 
 upon it a corrective, so efficacious, as almost to hide its 
 capital faults. In the beneficial change that has thus 
 taken place, the congregational laity have not indeed 
 relinquished any power ; but their clergy from a for- 
 eign source, have acquired power, and so the balance 
 is a little righted. 
 
 Nevertheless, this incidental remedy falls very short 
 of those measures that are requisite for placing dissent- 
 ing ministers in the position which the ministers of 
 religion ought always to occupy, and in which the 
 personal merits and accomplishments of many of 
 them would well fit them to stand. The same men 
 organized under an episcopal system (wisely balanced 
 and invigorated by lay influence and set free from im- 
 mediate dependance upon single congregations, and 
 upon individuals, would soon draw to themselves the 
 mass of the population. Did but the several denomi- 
 nations of orthodox Dissenters understand their inter- 
 ests, well enough to dismiss their internal disagree- 
 ments — to renounce Congregationalism, the meeting- 
 
296 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 house economy, iti principle and in fact — and to 
 organize themselves throughout the country, not in- 
 deed by the medium of precarious and powerless 
 committees, but under a firm and vigorous ecclesias- 
 tical polity — it might then be superfluous to talk about 
 the reform of the Established Church ; for the Estab- 
 hshed Church must soon give way before a phalanx 
 of this sort, even if left in possession of all her endow- 
 ments. But this will not happen : dissent is not likely 
 soon to be otherwise than discordant and chaotic. 
 Our part therefore must be, while careful not to trench 
 in any manner upon the rights of the sects to look to 
 the Episcopal Church, and to strive by all calm and 
 reasonable means, to redress its most urgent faults, 
 and to secure for it permancy, and the means of gra- 
 dual amendment and extension. 
 
 John Wesley's Church of-Englandism, and his res- 
 pect for episcopal orders, involved, incidentally, his ad- 
 mirable system in an embarrassment which now 
 threatens the integrity of the whole, and is actually 
 dividing it. Compelled in the prosecution of his great 
 objects, to break away from the reach of the crosier, 
 he nevertheless refused to consider his irregular 
 preachers as clergy : this dignity belonged onl}^ to 
 himself, and the few of his companions who had re- 
 ceived a university education, and episcopal ordination. 
 His legislative and administrative assembly therefore, 
 the Conference — was, in his view, a mixed convoca- 
 tion of clergy and laity; — the latter being predomi- 
 nant in numbers. But this arbitrary and artificial 
 distinction — a mere canonical fiction, necessarily grew 
 fainter and fainter every year; and soon completely dis- 
 appeared. Yet the silent change was of vital conse- 
 quence ; for thenceforward the society fell into the des- 
 potic form of a purely hierarchical polity. The 
 preachers — the clergy^ no longer pretending to call 
 themselves laymen, managed affairs, apart from, and 
 
DEPRESSION OP THE CLERICAL ORDER. 297 
 
 to the exclusion of the people. This might last while 
 the personal authority of several of the venerated col- 
 leagues of the founder was at hand to check resistance ; 
 but the removal of these respected men was the signal 
 ofrebeUion. In the temper of the present times, an 
 unmixed and irresponsible hierarchy will not be en- 
 dured. The Wesleyan leaders should long ago have 
 discerned the growing danger, and have prevented 
 the schisms (hat have actually happened, by render- 
 ing the Conference what Wesley intended it to be — a 
 convocation of clergy and laity. Disinterested specta- 
 tors cannot but grieve to see a system, so excellent ori- 
 ginally, and which has effected so much good, break- 
 ing up, and generating feud upon feue. — scandal upon 
 scandal, the consequence of which must be a loss of 
 genuine influence over the people, and a lowering of 
 the ministerial character in that communion. Sliall 
 the Established Church, with a noble and a Christian- 
 like concession to the circumstances of the times, em- 
 brace Wesleyan Methodism, leaving to it its vitality 
 and its independence ; and so, while it loses a formid- 
 able opponent, gain an efficient ally ? 
 
 We do not then find any where, among the dissent- 
 ing communities, a system susceptible of universality, 
 or much deserving to be thought of as likely to super- 
 sede the Episcopal Church. Each of them is attached 
 to certain prejudices— called "great principles," which 
 keep them sectarian in practice and feeling. Private 
 liberly and personal preferences are too often set above 
 considerations of public utility ; the necessity of conces- 
 sion, of compromise, and of submission to authori- 
 ty, is not admitted : especially the Christian duty 
 and solemn obligation of preserving union, is but 
 faintly seen. The sin of schism stands indeed in 
 the catalogue of vices, for the Apostles have placed 
 it there ; but an instance hardly ever occurs in 
 which the guilt of schism is allowed to be imputed 
 
298 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 to separatists. Any reason is deemed reason enough 
 for splitting- a society, and for founding a rival 
 Church under the eaves of the mother Chapel. 
 Congregationalism puts forth its shoots with a too 
 ready exuberance ; and our country towns in very 
 many instances, present, what we are required to 
 believe, is the apostolic spectacle of Christian societies, 
 within gun-shot of each other, and differing in no- 
 thing but their grudges, yet preserving little or no 
 fellowship. Bodies acting upon principles of this 
 sort have to learn the rudiments of Christian order. 
 The Established Church is deformed indeed by 
 many blemishes, and urgently needs revision ; yet 
 it may become the national form of Christianity. 
 
 This is not the place for treating of Church Reform; 
 what belongs to the completion of our present argu- 
 ment is briefly and plainly to state those special dis- 
 paragements under which the clergy of the Estab- 
 lished Church are now labouring. 
 
 We have already adverted to that fatal surrender 
 of its spiritual prerogatives to the court, which the 
 Protestant clergy made in their season of need. 
 Most of the disparagements we here name are the 
 consequences of that false step — might we call ittrea^ 
 son / Combined with the principles and the prac- 
 tices of lay spoliation, and the shameless abuses that 
 have grown out of the custom of patronage, the sub- 
 jugation of the Episcopal Church to secular control 
 presses upon every clergyman with a weight that ex- 
 ceedingly diminishes the influence his personal merits 
 would command. 
 
 The people will not, do not see it ; nay, the clergy 
 themselves do not alvva3^s or generally feel it, that the 
 English Episcopal Clergy are under the foot of lay 
 despotism, and are the victims of aristocratic rapacity. 
 But in the popular eye the clergy bear the opprobrium 
 of these usurpations. Acquiescing in them, and im- 
 
DEPRESSION OF THE CLERICAL ORDER. 299 
 
 mediately benefitted, in single instances, by the exer- 
 cise of these encroachments, they are regarded as the 
 prime parties in the wrong, which, in reaUty, is Bene- 
 ficial, not to the clergy at large, but to secular men 
 in office, and to the aristocracy. 
 
 Nothing proper to a church-and-state system de- 
 mands the subserviency of the Church to the Stale; 
 much less an obsequious dependance of the former, 
 from day to day, upon the ever-changing personages 
 of tlie administration. Would the Church lose power, 
 or «'a//i it, by resenting this humiliation? Unques- 
 tionably gain power ; and not merely gain it for the 
 episcopal order, but for every incumbent and curate, 
 in liis private sphere, throughout the land. The 
 people would at once see their ministers in a new 
 ligbt ; and if, at the same time, the glaring abuses of 
 patronage were corrected, and the whole system 
 brought under the operation of a gradual amendment, 
 such as should concede something to the people, and 
 absolutely exclude the merchandize of souls — (he 
 people would yield to their ministers a cordial leve- 
 rence and submission, at present hardly granted to the 
 most euiinent personal worth. 
 
 Much that is felt and thought by the people, in rela- 
 tion to their ministers, is never uttered, or is not utteied 
 by the discreet and moderate, whose opinions deserve 
 respect ; and of that which is uttered, a very small 
 portion at any time reaches the ears of the parties con- 
 cerned. If the heavily beneficed pluralist — we will 
 stippose him mainly well-intentioned and respectable 
 (in a low sense of the terms) could but, as he makes 
 iiis way, on a Sunday morning, to the desk, penetrate 
 the bosoms of his flock, and read the involuntary 
 thoughts, not of the profligate and impudent, nor of 
 the illiberal and vulgar, but of the intelligent and 
 right-minded of his parishioners, he would hide his 
 face in his sleeve, or shrink out of view, never again 
 
300 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM* 
 
 to meet the glance of his silent reprovers. While cer- 
 tain passages of Scripture are on the iips of the minis- 
 ter, how pungent a feeling of his inconsistency per- 
 vades all minds ! Even children, if acquainted with 
 facts, are alive to the enormity of the oifence of him, 
 who, calling himself Christ's servant, and professing 
 to deny himself daily, and to take up his cross, and 
 solemnly renouncing the love of this world, and the 
 eagerness of gain, nevertheless loads himself, to suffo- 
 cation, with unearned church emoluments ; and trails 
 after hi in, as he goes, a long purse, crammed with the 
 price of souls. 
 
 A minister of the Gospel can labour under no disad- 
 vantage heavier than that of an imputation of being 
 mainly impelled by molives of cupidity and worldly 
 ambition. This disgrace would be fatal to the influ- 
 ence of the highest talents, and the most laborious 
 zeal : how fatal then is it to the influence of those who 
 do not belie it by any zeal, or any spontaneous la- 
 bours ! But the incalculable injury occasioned by such 
 instances of sacrilegious selfishness, is by no means, 
 confined to the single cases in which it actually ap- 
 pears : if it were so, we might bear with some patience 
 the particular wrong ; but in truth, these flagrant ex- 
 amples (too numerous, alas) affect the popular mind 
 toward the Church at large, and weigh against the 
 clergy in mass. The clergy — at least the beneficed 
 portion of them, whether or not they be sharers in the 
 guilty emoluments, are sure to have their part in the 
 shame and obloquy thence arising. They are sup- 
 posed to acquiesce in these enormities ; they are known 
 to associate with their culprit brethren ; and they are 
 thought to be themselves ready to accept a portion of 
 these flagitious gains. Who shall calculate the amount 
 of that deduction from the general salutary influence 
 of the Established Clergy which is constantly to be 
 set off on the score of these abuses ? 
 
lDElf»RESSION OF THE CLERICAL ORDER. 301 
 
 Let interested casuists spend their last grain of wit 
 in excusing pluralities — the sale of advowsons — epis- 
 copal translations, and those ecclesiastical customs, of 
 every sort, which have one simple motive — the love of 
 money ; — let these apologies be carried a little further; 
 it can be only a little — for the common sense and 
 strong feeling of the nation already condemns them 4 
 Heaven will declare itself in anger against them; 
 and their abettors will sink confounded in perpetual 
 shame. 
 
 The actual constitution of society, the natural diver- 
 sity of talents and accomplishments, as well as the dif- 
 ferences of official rank, properly involved in a church 
 polity, render unavoidable (nor should we think it ab- 
 stractedly an evil) some considerable inequalities of 
 dignity and emolument among clerical persons. But 
 there must be a limit at both extremities of the scale 
 of ecclesiastical rank ; reason, and the spirit and rules 
 of the Gospel, demand it. All ministers of Christ are, 
 spiritually, on a footing ; and they must never so stand 
 relatively one to the other, as to render the cordial fel- 
 lowship of brethren impracticable, or undesired, as 
 well by the depressed as by the elevated members of 
 the order. If alive to her honour and interests, the 
 Church would take prompt means for rescuing any of 
 her ministers from the cruel privations and humiliat- 
 ing embarrassments of absolute poverty. The Church 
 is even more disgraced by the penury of many of her 
 worthiest ministers — her poor curates, than she is by 
 the excessive wealth of some of her dignitaries. 
 
 In a country so opulent as this, no minister of 
 religion should be suffered to want a modest compe- 
 tence. This, when it happens among the Dissenters, 
 arises partly from the real inability of the people, in 
 particular stations, to raise the requisite funds ; and 
 partly from the want of a better contrived system of 
 collection and distribution. The aggregate wealth 
 26 
 
302 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM* 
 
 of the Dissenters, properly taxed, and equitably shared, 
 would afford respectable nnaintenance to all their mi- 
 nisters. But the poverty of the curates of the Esta- 
 blished Church is the sheer sin and shame of the 
 wealthy clergy ; and as it might readily be relieved, 
 so ought it to be relieved, by the strong hand of the 
 law. This obviously is an instance to which the 
 beneficial energy of a church-and-state system should 
 be made to apply. 
 
 The diffusion of Christianity, in this country, and 
 its hold of the mass of the people, may perhaps be 
 obstructed by some recondite causes, hitherto not 
 regarded, or suspected. May these soon (if there are 
 such) be discovered and removed ! Meantime, are 
 we not solemnly bound to apply ourselves, with a 
 religious assiduity, and in good faith, to the removing 
 of hindrances upon which no obscurity rests, and con- 
 cerning which it cannot for a moment be doubted 
 that they are sustained by secondary and immoral 
 motives ? Do we, indeed, desire to see Christianity 
 triumph? let then its ministers be placed in a position 
 to promote it without impediment. The Romish 
 clergy commanded great advantages; but they wrought 
 a corrupt system. The Protestant clergy have in their 
 hands a far purer doctrine ; but they are themselves 
 borne upon by various and heavy disparagements. 
 We possess the " sword of the Spirit ;" but the hilt has 
 fallen from the blade, and the heavenly weapon is of 
 little efficacy in our hands. 
 
 Our various evangelizing societies declare our zeal, 
 and this zeal is unquestionably sincere, as well as libe- 
 ral ; but it wants consistency; it wants reason and 
 CONSCIENCE. We are prompt to save heathens ; but 
 will not listen with humility or patience to the re- 
 hearsal of our own faults. Christianity, w^e know, 
 can be promoted with effect, only by those w^ho tiiem- 
 
DEPRESSION OF THE CLERICAL ORDER. 303 
 
 selves are governed by its motives, who, in a word, 
 fear God, and hate contention and covetonsness, and 
 who meekly consider their own ways, and turn their 
 feet into the path of truth. This, then, should be the 
 beginning of missionary enterprizes. The reform of 
 our domestic Christianity is the work we are bound to 
 set about when we. would convert the world. 
 
SECTION X. 
 
 GENERAL INFERENCES. 
 
 Genuine piety has existed under aliTiost the worst 
 forms of Christianity ;— such is the divine efficacy of 
 truth, that its vivifying power is hardly to be destroyed 
 by superincumbent errors. But Christianity does not 
 spread, except in its purest state, and under the most 
 favourable conditions. The first of these facts we are 
 apt to lose sight of when employed in reviewing the 
 religious corruptions that have prevailed in ditTerent 
 eras. The characters and the sentiments which 
 occupy the attention while making researches of this 
 sort, produce upon the mind, unless we carefully and 
 constantly guard against it, a melancholy impression, 
 and a false one too, as if virtue and goodness had, at 
 certain times, entirely forsaken the earth ; the con- 
 trary might be proved concerning even the darkest 
 ages, by abundant evidence. The particular course 
 of inquiry pursued by the author, especially demands 
 a caution on this head : lie would not be always re- 
 peating this necessary hint ; but yet would wish his 
 readers never to forget it. 
 
 This same principle — the existence of genuine piety 
 amid serious errors, is forgotten, or rather rejected, by 
 certain illiberal minds — the bigots of exclusive eccle- 
 siastical hypotheses, who, in maintaining, that, " out of 
 the Church there can be no salvation," would have us 
 understand that there is none out of their own, or 
 apart from ih^t jure divino pohty to which they ad- 
 here. This has been the ground taken in every age 
 by the Romish Church, and hence she has drawn the 
 reasons of her intolerance. But the same stern theo- 
 
GENERAL INFERENCES. 305 
 
 retic pride has passed into our Protestant communions, 
 and, strange to say, is maintained, sometimes openly, 
 and often indirectly and insidiously, by staunch 
 Churchmen, in this enlightened age. " Episcopacy 
 is a divine institution : — the whole efficacy of the Gos- 
 pel, and the saving virtue of its sacraments, has been 
 formally attached to this institution ; those therefore 
 who reject it, reject the conditions of salvation ; and 
 we dare not tell them they can be saved." In plain 
 words, all separatists from the Episcopal Church, what- 
 ever piety they may seem to possess, are destined to 
 perdition. 
 
 Vulgar and malignant spirits, it is true, must have 
 their food ; and if we rend from them one venomous 
 superstition, they will seek and soon find another. 
 Reason is not to be addressed to beings of this order ; 
 but there are minds of a middle sort, which get entan- 
 gled in the same sophisms, and yet are capable of en- 
 tertaining more charitable views ; and perhaps would 
 gladly do so. At the present time, if we pass through 
 the rural, remote, and less enlightened districts of the 
 country, we shall hear not a little of this pernicious 
 bigotry, rung in the ears, Sunday after Sunday, of 
 clownish farmers and peasants, much to their hurt, 
 and immensely to the injury of the Established Church, 
 by men in many senses respectable. In cities and 
 large towns it is very little understood to how great an 
 extent the Church, throughout the country, is putting 
 the whole of her credit and future influence in jeopardy, 
 by the inconsiderate and ill-timed arrogance of some of 
 her clergy. As a means of frightening the common 
 people from the meeting-house, it proves almost entirely 
 unavailing, wherever dissent actually gets a footing ; 
 for the people quickly learn to treat with the contempt 
 it deserves so insufiferable a want of charity. Episco- 
 pal charges, whatever topics they omit, ought to contain 
 pointed cautions against this mischievous illiberality. 
 
 Let those who entertain this high church intole- 
 26* 
 
306 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM, 
 
 tin. e, consider that, in the actual application which 
 they must make of it, the most serious danger imagin- 
 able is incurred, and the greatest possible violence is 
 done to the dictates of good sense, and to the genuine 
 impulses of Christian love. It is no trivial offence, we 
 may be sure, and no slight peril, to miscall God^s 
 work, and Satan's. This was, in substance, the very 
 sin of the Pharisees, which our Lord branded with the 
 mark of unpardonable blasphemy. The bold bigotry 
 that does not hesitate to assign millions of Christ's 
 humble disciples to perdition, makes the pillars of 
 heaven tremble. Better had it been for the man who 
 dares to do so, that a millstone should have been hung 
 aroimd his neck, and he cast into the sea. 
 
 We say, let such arrogant Churchmen consider the 
 violence they do to common sense, as well as to every 
 genuine sentiment. There are certain affirmations 
 which, though wholly destitute of evidence, may yet 
 be accepted as true, without surrendering reason ; but 
 there are others that are to be entertained only so long 
 as we can force upon ourselves a sort of temporary in- 
 sanity. For illustration, let us suppose ourselves stand- 
 ing in front of a temple or palace ; and that we are as- 
 sured by one who professes a more than human 
 knowledge of the invisible constitution of things, that 
 each of the columns of the portico, though apparently 
 nothing more than marble, and though cold and hard 
 to the touch, is actually informed with animal and ra- 
 tional life ; that it sees, hears, feels, and thinks, like 
 ourselves ; and, in a word, is very man, while to the 
 eye, a pillar, and to the touch, a stone. This, we say, 
 marvellous as it is, may be believed ; all we want is a 
 reason for giving so much credit to our informant. 
 But now, let this same person, emboldened by our sim- 
 plicity, in the first instance, go on still further to try 
 our powers of faith, and to affirm that those whom we 
 take to be men and women, ascending the steps, and 
 entering the building, and w hom we fancy we hear 
 
GENERAL INFERENCES. 307 
 
 conversing one with another, and with whom we our- 
 seh^es have just before conversed, are not, as they seem, 
 human beings, are not living, are not rational ; but 
 are mere stones or statues, and might, without con- 
 sciousness of pain, or effusion of blood, be shivered by 
 the chisel or mallet. 
 
 At this point, surely, the most credulous must stop, 
 leaving the mad only to believe. But now this exam- 
 ple has a real analogy with the insensate intolerance 
 of those, who, after conversing wiih Christian men, 
 and beholding their good works and consistency, and 
 after being compelled to admit that they bear all the 
 semhlmices of piety, will yet call them children of the 
 devil, and heirs of perdition, because, forsooth, they are 
 out of the pale of episcopacy ! Transubstantiation is 
 a credible dogma ; but this enormity insults reason 
 quite as much as it does despite to pious benevolence, 
 and actually breaks down the mind that submits to it. 
 What can a man be worth, either in reason or in feel- 
 ing, after he has thus been trodden in the dust, and 
 made sport of by bigotry so preposterous ? It might 
 indeed seem altogether frivolous to advert seriously to 
 extravagances of this sort, if it were not very true ihat 
 they pervade the Church, and, under different forms 
 and pretexts, infect the clerical order to a degree that 
 involves the Establishment in an extreme danger. 
 Church Reform may help us, but the Church must 
 look well to herself, and purge out thoroughly the old 
 leaven of popish intolerance, or no reform will save her. 
 Let the common people, throughout the country, hear 
 Methodists and Dissenters spoken of from the pulpit, 
 frequently and freely, as Christian brethren ; not a hat 
 the less would be doffed in the porch on a Sunday : on 
 the contrary, so nuich frank truth and charity, utter- 
 ed by the clergy, would immensely benefit the Church 
 at the present crisis. Whatever may be the faults or 
 errors of the Separatists, they themselves, very many 
 of them, are Christians, and as good Christians as 
 
308 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 Churchmen ; and to deny this, or to be reluctant to 
 confess it, is not to injure tlieni, but ourselves : nay, it 
 is an impudent impiety, such as a wise and good man 
 must shudder to think of, and will never patiently 
 bear. 
 
 A parallel instance of the revolting uncharitableness 
 that results from a rigid adherance to an ecclesiastical 
 hypothesis, presents itself among the sects : in truth, 
 the entire range of church history, whether ancient or 
 modern, does not furnish a more surprising example of 
 the force of perverted rehgious notions in holding 
 men (often kind-hearted men) to a position where 
 they can do nothing else but set at naught every 
 Christian feeling, as well as common sense. A safe 
 method of trying the validity of any general princi- 
 ple is to carry it out to its utmost extent, and then to 
 see to what it leads us. For example, we might 
 readily judge, in this manner, of the principle which 
 impels a small party of Christians, by no means out- 
 shining their brethren in solid Christian virtues, or in 
 amiable and heavenly dispositions, to shut themselves 
 up in their liltle munition and spiritual pride — a city 
 walled up to heaven, and there to unchristianize, or 
 at least to unchurch, all Christendom. This sort of 
 ultra sectarism renders itself absolutely ridiculous, in 
 the refinement to which it is carried ; for not only will 
 not these good souls eat of the Lord's loaf in compa- 
 ny with the unclean and unimmersed commonalty 
 of professed Christians ; but not even with such of the 
 immersed as may have contracted defilement, at any 
 time, by eating with the unimmersed ! nay, they will 
 not eat with any one who does not bring with him a 
 clean bill of health, as having never, in the act of 
 communion, come near the sprinkled ! Instead of 
 arguing, as St. Peter does, that it is irreligious to call 
 any man unclean whom God has cleansed, by his 
 grace and the knowledge of his truth, these immacu- 
 late anchorets find that, to treat the mass of Christians 
 
GENERi^L INFERENCES. 309 
 
 as Christians, would be to break up their own ecclesi- 
 astical theory ; in a word, they could not doso, without 
 surrendering the first principle of their polity. Herein 
 they stand precisely on the ground taken by the 
 Church of Rome, and by high Church- of-England- 
 men ; for many of the pious and amiable members of 
 these communions, when their better nature was upon 
 them, have sighed to embrace their heretical protes- 
 tant brethren, and to call Christians, Christians • but 
 how could it be done ? not at all, without excluding 
 themselves from their Church, and ranging with here- 
 sy and schism. 
 
 Few are more to be pitied than are those whose 
 consciences have become ensnared by mischievous ab- 
 surdities of this order. The infatuation scarcely ad- 
 mits a cure: there is a certain degree of violence 
 which, if it be once inidergone by the moral and ra- 
 tional faculties, destroys (niay we so speak ?) the in- 
 tellectual organization : the mind no more works ac- 
 cording to its natural mechanism ; it still lives and 
 heaves ; but is not spontaneous. The first impulse of 
 Christian feelings is to treat these instances of ecclesi- 
 astical lunacy with silent pity ; and so assuredly we 
 should do, if it were not that errors so disgraceful to 
 Christianity, are perpetuated, and obtruded upon the 
 world, and are made in some sense important, by the 
 misplaced indulgence shown them by men of sense. 
 Apart from this sort of countenance and support, di- 
 rect or indirect, the "strict communion" sect must long 
 ago have ceased to be the opprobrium of the respectable 
 body in the bosom of which it takes shelter. But that 
 body, in its opposition to certain superstitions of the age 
 of Cyprian, has rendered its testimony nugatory by 
 the wild intolerance of its ecclesiastical theory. The 
 doctrine of the liberal party among the Baptists, is a 
 happy practical incoiisistency ^ which still leaves 
 their theory uncorrected. 
 
 But at what cost is indulgence shown to the shame- 
 
310 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 less bigotry of zealots ? at the cost of the honour of 
 Christianity — at the cost of the perdition of thousands 
 around us. While Christianity is made odious and 
 ridiculous by some, and while others encourage those 
 who do so, both parties wonder that their preaching 
 and teaching, and the distribution of the Scriptures, 
 produce Httle effect upon the mass of mankind. The 
 mass of mankind, let us be assured, are gifted with 
 common sense ; they would indeed listen to the Gos- 
 pel, and ever have listened to it, when presented to 
 them in its genuine dignity ; but they will not be in- 
 duced to kiss the dust before monstrous superstitions, 
 and absurd intolerance. 
 
 This most momentous principle Christians very im- 
 perfectly discern, that, although piety will exist under 
 almost any pressure of errors and follies, Christiani- 
 ty ITSELF WILL NEVER SPREAD whilo SO encumbcr- 
 ed. The modern missionary zeal is a strenuous en- 
 deavour on the part of the spiritual Church — an en- 
 deavour thoroughly sincere in its primary motive, and 
 in its substance altogether commendable, to contravene 
 this principle, and to carry the Gospel out, bearing all 
 the weight which the prejudices of ages have heaped 
 upon it. Our various sectarian missionary societies are 
 now wresthng with Omnipotence on this very point. 
 The experiment is being tried whether the nations at 
 large may be converted by the unamended and discor- 
 dant Christianity which we inherit from the Lutheran 
 Reformers. 
 
 In the privacy of Christian circles, there are mul- 
 titudes, who, with the utmost intensity of feeling*, 
 and with a zeal that, in Scripture phrase, " eateth 
 them up," desire the conversion of Popish, Pagan, 
 and Mohammedan nations, as well as that of their 
 irrehgious countrymen. — Multitudes, we say, who, 
 with alacrity, would do any thing, and surrender 
 any thing, the doing or the sacrifice of which might 
 promote the religious welfare of mankind ; genuine 
 
GENERAL INFERENCES. 311 
 
 philanthropists, counting all things as dross for Christ. 
 But these simple-minded persons act only as they are 
 led, informed, and reined in, by men more politic 
 and cautious than themselves ; by men, honest, in- 
 deed, in their endeavoiTis to spread Christianity ; but 
 too cool and keen-sighted to pursue this great object 
 at whatever cost. They love the Gospel imfeigned- 
 ly, but love it under a condition. The form of 
 things in which they have been trained, and which, 
 as a point of professional honour, they are pledged 
 to uphold, and especially in this present season of 
 unsettled counterpoise of parties, must be silently, 
 yet effectually, taken care of. ''Let the Gospel spread 
 — no damage being done to us or our polity." 
 
 The very same half-hidden feeling, on the part 
 of the foremost men of the Church, we may find 
 examples of in every age. And it has been this 
 feeling, and this occult discretion, that have again 
 and again turned off the current that might have 
 watered the nations, and made the wilderness to blos- 
 som as the rose. 
 
 Allowance made for the mere tenacity of habits 
 and tastes, the feeling that has so fatally affected 
 the minds of ecclesiastical leaders, in every age, and 
 which now, on all hands, impedes improvement, and 
 obstructs the progress of Christianity, is this — that cer- 
 tain necessary reforms would derogate from the honours, 
 or invade the interests, of (he clerical order. Such 
 a fear may, indeed, have been no illusion when vast 
 powers and wealth were in the keeping of the 
 Church ; but, in our own times, the position of the min- 
 isters of religion, in every communion, is on the op- 
 posite side, and Church Reform (we now apply the 
 phrase, without distinction, to all denominations — 
 for all need it alike) involves, not the reduction, but 
 the re-instatement of the clerical order; not its diminu- 
 tion, but its enlargement, its advancement, its honour, 
 its just power, and its independence of popular con- 
 
312 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 tumacy, and of lay rapacity. The natural reluctance, 
 therefore, which, in the instance of all corporations, 
 civil and sacred, resists amendment, is, at the present 
 time, misjudging and impolitic. If we look at re- 
 ligious communities separately, or at the Protestant 
 Churcli at large, it is true that every considerable 
 alteration we miglit wish to see effected would in- 
 volve an augmentation of comfort and of credit to 
 the ministers of religion. 
 
 The fact cannot escape an inteUigent spectator 
 of the present critical struggle of religious parties, 
 that the crown of pre-eminence hangs at the goal, 
 ready to be carried off by that party, be it whicii it 
 may, that, with a manly ingenuousness, and honest 
 zeal, and a Christian conscientiousnessj shall under- 
 take ITS OWN REFORM. Its reform in theology, in 
 modes of worship, and in polity. There would be 
 little hazard in saying that this prize might now 
 be won even by the least considerable of our various 
 denominations which should resolutely strive for it, 
 and which, while its several competitors are absurdly 
 commending their peculiar notions and usages, and 
 assailing those of others, should unsparingly examine 
 its own, and apply boldly the remedies which good 
 sense and scriptural principles suggest. A religious 
 body thus acting, would quickly outstrip its rivals, 
 would command the respect of the people at large, 
 would draw to itself men of sense and talent from 
 all parties, i^nd soon would imbibe all, and embrace 
 all. 
 
 If conjectures were admitted as to the party most 
 likely (if any be so) now to awaken itself to this 
 •honourable ambition — the ambition of leading the 
 way in a return to leason and genuine Christianity, 
 it would be necessary to exclude those who distin- 
 guish themselves by a loudly-uttered confidence of 
 being in the right and of needing no reform. This, 
 
GENERAL INFERENCES. 3l3 
 
 we cannot deny, seems to be too much the temper 
 of the several dissenting bodies. It has so long 
 been their part to protest against certain glaring 
 fliults in the national Church, that it has grown 
 upon them to think their neighbours utterly wrong, 
 and themselves, in the same porportion, faultless. 
 None so blind to their own defects, as the habitual 
 reprovers of others. It has become a sort of adage, 
 among the D lessen ters — "no acts of parliament pre- 
 vent our reforming ourselves, if reform were needed." 
 This consciousness of liberty has silently generated 
 the persuasion that a reform, which might at any 
 time have been eflfected, has never been really need- 
 ed. But those who so reason, forget that acts of 
 parliament are much more pliable things than old 
 prejudices ; and that it is, at any time, easier to ob- 
 tain either the rescinding of statutes, or the enactment 
 of statutes, than to dissipate vulgar errors, to dissolve 
 theological theories, or to recover from the popular 
 grasp the lost and just prerogatives of authority. 
 
 Meantime, it is certain that a modest and hopeful 
 consciousness of the necessity of various revisions 
 and reforms is entertained by the intelligent mem- 
 bers of the Established Church. The cour^--e of 
 events tends in the same direction, and must speedily 
 place the national hierarchy on a path where it will 
 be much more safe to advance spontaneously and 
 courageously, than to stand or to l3e driven forward. 
 Every thing disastrous may be feared if the Church — 
 we mean here tlie clergy, will yield to nothing but to 
 impulses they cannot resist. Every thing happy 
 might be hoped for, if they would anticipate and 
 direct the changes that are to take place. 
 
 Three questions of pr;ictical significance meet us in 
 connexion v.'ith this mon^entous subject: the first is — 
 Can the Church, with safety, be touched at ail in the 
 way of reform ? — the second is this, Is the present 
 position of the Cliurch such, that the clergy have 
 27 
 
314 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 much to lose, and little to hope for, from the changes 
 that are likely to be effected, or the reverse ? and the 
 third, Shall these changes, if indeed they are to be 
 effected, be thrown upon the discretion of the laity, 
 or be guided and governed by the ministers of re- 
 ligion, ingenuously giving their hearts and talents to 
 the work ? 
 
 Now we must consider the first of these questions 
 as altogether superseded by the advance of public opin- 
 ion, and by the avowed opinion and intention of 
 public men of different parties. It is, we say, su- 
 periiuous to discuss the problem of Church Reform, 
 upon this preliminary ground. The Church ivill be 
 touched — whether it be safe and wise to do so or not. 
 It would be well, indeed, if the forlorn hope of resist- 
 ing reform could now be abandoned by those, who, 
 in clinging to this poor chance, forfeit irretrievably 
 their own influence over the coming changes. 
 
 On the second of the above named questions, it 
 seems that much illusion — an illusion natural to the 
 timid, prevails. The great and gradually induced 
 disparagements under which the protestant clergy 
 of all communions are suffering, are not duly consi- 
 dered, or it \\'ould be seen that a new adjustment of 
 clerical influence, effected in a country where religion 
 has so strong a hold upon the people, and where 
 what is fair and just is sure, at length, to recom- 
 mend itself, is likely, not to depress, but to elevate 
 the order. So far as mere secular interests are con- 
 cerned, the opinion and feeling of the sound part of 
 the English people has been very distinctly expressed 
 to this effect — that the aggregate income of the 
 Church is not excessive, that it shall not be invaded; 
 and that it wants nothing but a more beneficial and 
 equitable system of distribution. Then again, the 
 peculiar and critical position of the Established 
 Church, in relation to the Separatists, must be very 
 obscurely perceived by her clergy, or it would be 
 
GENERAL INFERENCES. 315 
 
 forcibly felt that the moiTients ought not to be lost 
 in which it is yet possible for them to take the lead, 
 to regain pre-eminence, and to occupy the only 
 ground that can be safe to a national Church. If the 
 Church does not quickly draw toward herself the 
 faltering hearts of the people, and if she does not 
 hold out to the country cheering expectations, some 
 one of the dissenting bodies — or perhaps all combined, 
 will seize the advantage, step in, and teach the 
 established Church — too late, a lesson she does not 
 dream of. Separation having reached the bold 
 height at which now it stands, it would be an unut- 
 terable imprudence, on the part of the clergy, to show 
 to the nation a sullen frown, or to bid public opinion 
 defiance. Most true it is, that Reform, carried by force, 
 and in resentment against clerical obduracy, would 
 leave to the clergy a miserable prospect of progressive 
 humiliations. 
 
 But the answer that is to be given to our second 
 question turns upon the reply that must be made to 
 the third — namely, who shall guide and govern 
 Church Reform ? or, who are to be the architects and 
 the workmen in restoring the ecclesiastical edifice? 
 The clergy themselves must furnish us with a solu- 
 tion of this problem. There is not a doubt that, if 
 men of their own body, wise, accomplished, and pious 
 and masters of public esteem, were to stand forward, 
 and to challenge the w-ork as their own, and were to 
 give some early and unquestionable evidence, as well 
 of their sincerity as of their skill — there is we say, no 
 doubt, that room would instantly be made for them, 
 deference shown them, and a field left to them as 
 clear and as ample as they could desire. What is the 
 alternative ? — that Church Reform should be concert- 
 ed by secular men, and carried forward, as it may, 
 amid the distractions, and liable to the interested mo- 
 tives, that attend political measures. Such a reform . 
 may perhaps be beneficial to the country ; but rather 
 
316 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 in a civil than a religious sense, and whatever useful 
 provisions it may contain, it must on the whole, tend 
 to seal anew that degradation of the liierachy, as the 
 creature of the State, which, in protestant countries 
 has already gone much too far. It is this very humili- 
 ation which the clergy should promptly prevent ; and 
 it can be prevented in one manner only, that is to say, 
 by themselves leading Reform. — With the clergy it 
 now rests to scive their order, and our Episcopal, 
 Liturgical and Endov/ed Church. 
 
 Whether it shall please God to connect the preser- 
 vation and extension of Christianity in this country, 
 and at large, with the re-establishment of our National 
 Church, is what none ought to affirm with that con- 
 fidence which has been too common with Church- 
 men ; and it is what, assuredly, none should think 
 themselves at liberty to deny. The purposes and 
 intentions of Heaven do not come within the range 
 of our calculations ; but happily the course of duty 
 is not at all overshadowed by the cloud that rests 
 upon the ways of the Divine Providence ; or it is so 
 overshadowed only by our own fault, when we 
 allow presumptuous anticipations of what w^e fondly 
 think God w^ill certainly do, or ought to do, to regu- 
 late our conduct, in the stead of the plain principles of 
 ectitude and prudence. 
 
 Adhering religiously and modestly to unquestion- 
 able maxims of good sense and of Christian inte- 
 grity, we can hardly be in doubt as to the course to 
 be pursued on the present momentous occasion. 
 Men free from factious motives will not for a mo- 
 ment entertain the thought of demolishing, or of 
 sulfering to be demolished, our ecclesiastical institu- 
 tions, on the ground of any mere hypothesis of 
 church polity. These institutions must be fairly 
 tried, and tried for a length of time, freed from abus- 
 es and perversions, before we can listen to the aver- 
 
GENERAL INFERENCES. 31f 
 
 ment of theorists — that tiiey are essentially perni- 
 cious. 
 
 On the other side, we hold it as certain, that none 
 but the most infirm, or the most selfish and corrupt, 
 will plead for stopping the course of all reform. With 
 Bucli, if there be such, we have nothing to do. On 
 the question, how far shall reform proceed? we again 
 find relief from pressing perplexities in the safe rule 
 of following the track of universal pubUc feeling. 
 What all men exclaim against as flagitious, inequit- 
 able, and unchristian, ought to be removed — for that 
 reason alone. Can a Church be efficient or prosper- 
 ous, which is condemned and contemned, in many of 
 her practices, by the mass of the people ? 
 
 Again, in regard to the revision of the forms, arti- 
 cles, and worship of the Church, an adherence to ac- 
 knowledged rules of discretion might carry us clear of 
 difficulties. The question is not — Whether tJds sys- 
 tem of theology, or tliat^ condemns or approves certain 
 ambiguous phrases? but it is this — Have certain phra- 
 ees been from ago to age, an occasion of contention 
 among all, and of ofTence and distress to pious and 
 humble spirits? — If so, remove them without a scru- 
 ple. Nor can it be difficult to fix the finger upon such 
 obnoxious terms. Let none be expunged but such as 
 have actually become notorious as the text of contro- 
 versy. We do not, in these instances, listen to cap- 
 tious and frivolous objections ; but to the testimony of 
 history ; — a testimony liable to uncertainty. 
 
 Once more, we presume that practical and impar- 
 tial men will not hesitate to give their aid in restoring 
 to the Established Church that Independence, and 
 those vital functions, which Christianity demands for 
 her ; and without which she will not be able, hence- 
 forth, to compete with communions possessing such 
 functions ; and which are absolutely necessary to pre 
 vent convulsive and perilous reforms, demanded at 
 27* 
 
318 SPIRITUAL DESPOTISM. 
 
 shorter and shorter intervals, and always in a louder 
 and still louder tone. Deprived by the progress of just 
 and liberal opinions, of that power which at first she 
 exercised, after the example of the Spiritual Despotism 
 of the Papacy, the English Church is now, in almost 
 every sense destitute of authority, and lies at the mer- 
 cy of her foes — and of her friends. To be qualified 
 to exert a more general and beneficial influence, the 
 Church must breathe with her own lungs, speak with 
 her own mouth, and show the energy of a pulse and 
 a heart — her own. 
 
 This necessary restoration to her just prerogatives 
 the Church will not expect to receive (nor should she 
 desire it) without at the same time, admitting that due 
 leaven of popular influence, without which, in fact, 
 there can be no vitality in any Church, and apart 
 from ^vhich, church power will never te any thing 
 else but a Spiritual Despotism, 
 
NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 
 
 Page 94. — Very early it was admitted that the apostolic writings 
 afford general principles, rather than formal enactments for the regu- 
 lation of worship and church government. Thus, Tertullian, little 
 more than a century after the death of the apostles, after reciting 
 various religious usages, generally prevalent in his time, says, ' Ha- 
 rum et aliarum ejusmodi disciplinarum si legem expostules Scriptu- 
 rarum, nullam invenies; traditio tibi pretendetur auctrix, consuetu- 
 do confirmatrix, et fides observatrix.' — De Corona. Unhappily the 
 Church abused the indeterminate constitution of Scripture in mat- 
 ters of worship, by adding superstition to superstition without end. 
 This process must certainly have commenced simultaneously with 
 Christianity itself; otherwise it could not have happened that the 
 numerous observances mentioned by Tertullian, as generally preva- 
 lent in his time, and as already established by lo7xg custom, should 
 have come to be so regarded throughout the Eastern, Western, and 
 African Churches. It is more than matter of curiosity to note Avhat 
 these ceremonies were : among them we find, the three immersions 
 in baptism — the milk and honey of peace — oblations for the dead, 
 and the crossing of the forehead at every moment, on going out, and 
 on returning home, in dressing, and putting on the shoes, at tlie 
 bath, at table, at lighting of lamps, at lying down, at sitting, and, in 
 a word, at every separate act of common life. Those who appeal to 
 the testimony of these early writers in support of certain observan- 
 ces, ought to admit it also when urged in favour ofother usages equally 
 prevalent in the same age. Researches into Christian antiquity are 
 indeed highly important ; but the fair result, we may feel assured, 
 will not be to afford a triumph to any one existing party over others; 
 but rather a conviction, on all sides, of the folly and sin of breaking 
 communion with our brethren on account of practices or forms never 
 to be authoritatively determined. 
 
 Page 100. — The readiness with which baptism was adininistered 
 by the apostles, and admission into the society of the faithful grant- 
 ed, stands on the face of St. Luke's narrative. A professed desire to 
 receive baptism, as a believer in the Messiahship of Jesus, was the 
 sole quaUfication. Many, no doubt, thus entered the Church, quick- 
 ly to be expelled from it, on proof of their unworthiness. We hear, 
 
320 APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 
 
 in the Acts, of no scrutiny of the heart; how, indeed, should any 
 such difficult process have been attended to, when tliousands were 
 initiated in a day? It may not be impertinent here to remind the 
 reader that the clause, which stands in the received text, and is put 
 into the mouth of Philip, as addressed to the Ethiopian eunuch — "If 
 thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest," is deemed, on good 
 reasons, to be an interpolation. As we advance toward the second 
 and third centuries, we find the process of admission into the Church 
 to have become continually more and more complicated, until, at 
 length, all the pomp and mystery, the artificial delays, and the af- 
 fected tardiness that belonged to the heathen initiations, had been 
 transferred to the Christian Church. This one point of the terms 
 and mode of admission might be well taken as a criterion ot religious 
 simplicity, or of sophistication — conjoined always with a reference 
 to the efficiency of discipline in the same society. Easy admission^ 
 along with easy discipline, proves very litile in favour of a Church. 
 
 Page 103. — Several of those confirmed disagree^ments that now di- 
 Tide the Christian commonwealth, relate immediately to the much- 
 obscured question concerning the extension or the restriction of ec- 
 clesiastical privileges, as intended by the apostles. This difficulty 
 cleared up, the way would be open for consolidating two or three of 
 our parties. The Church of England, borne out by the unquestion- 
 able practice of the earliest tim^s to which existing evidence extends, 
 takes the broadest ground ; but the terms in which she does so, in- 
 volve almost the certainty of serious misunderstandings on the part 
 of the people; and they demand revision. The testimony borne by 
 the Baptists against certain superstitions of the age of Cyprian, has 
 failed to command the respect to which, abstractedly, it was entitled, 
 in consequence of the offensive dogmatism of that party in relation to 
 points not now to be decisively determ.ined ; and especially have the 
 Baptists disgusted men of intelligence, by the absurdity of attaching 
 prime importance to the sort of ablution which constitutes Christian 
 Ijaptism, and by the bigotry of the practices resulting from that error. 
 It is as certain as any thin;^ of the kind can be, that several modes of 
 performing the rite of baptism were in use in tlae apostolic age. The 
 Baptists would not merely serve themselves, but the Christian world 
 at large, and in an important manner, by frankly giving up their ill- 
 judged pertinacity on the question of immersion. A copious aflfu- 
 sion would abundantly satisfy, not only common sense and every 
 general principle of analogy, but all the evidence which can now be 
 adduced on the subject. 
 
 Page 103. — St. Peter, who tells Christians that they are universal- 
 ly the members of a "royal priesthood," recognizes, in the same 
 breath, the function and authority of the ruling and teaching elders 
 of the Church ; and in giving to these a caution against the tyrannic 
 exercise of their power, he plainly implies that power was actually 
 in their hands. On the same principle, when these elders are warned 
 not to assume the episcopal office for "filthy lucre's sake," we inevi- 
 tably infer that these official persons were th«n receiving a salary of 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 1^21 
 
 Stipend, on account of their services ; even as the Lord had appoint- 
 ed. If not, what pertinence was there in the admonition? St. Peter 
 acknowledges a governing class, or order, supported by the contri- 
 butions of the society. Of what value then, in relation to ecclesiasti- 
 cal controversies, is that argument against the distinction between 
 clerg)'- and laity, which has been drawn from the priestly dignity of 
 (dl believers ? Neander's learned book will be read with respectful 
 attention ; but it is every where indistinct, and unsatisfactory in 
 
 Page 105. — Notliing can be more full or conclusive than the in- 
 ferences resulting from St. Paul's expostulation with the Corinthi- 
 ans, 1 Cor. ix., on the subject of his own behaviour among them in 
 pecuniary matters. Impelled by special and personal motives, he 
 had abstained from using for his own benefit an unquestionable au- 
 thority, or official right, to demand maintenance, as a person devoted 
 to the religious public service of the Church. To this maintenance 
 all such persons were entitled, not merely on grounds of general 
 equity, but by the Lord's formal enactment ; and this enactment is, 
 moreover, explicitly referred to the analogy of the Jewish sacerdotal 
 institute. In latter times, the mode of applying this analogy might 
 be open to objection ; but how can we consider the employment of it 
 as altogether unwarrantable, when we find it thus suggested to us 
 by the inspired apostle? The clerical institution, that is to say, the 
 Betting apart an order of men as religious teachers and rulers, involv- 
 ing tlieir i-ight of maintenance, is the best defined and most clearly 
 established of all the external parts of Christianity. 
 
 Page 107. — The silence of the apostles on certain important sul> 
 jects, such for example as slavery and polygamy, and their indistinct 
 reference to the observance of a seventh day, is of a piece with theif 
 leaving the maintenance of the ministers of religion to be adjusted by 
 communities in the mode which circumstances might render expedi- 
 ent. That they say nothing of endowmen's, or of national estaljlish- 
 ments, aflfords no presumption whatever against any such means or 
 measures, when apparently beneficial. How can those employ such 
 a presumptive argument who are always telling us that Christ and 
 the apostles did not foibid slavery, because, in the then actual state 
 of society, it could not have been abolished? Christianity gives us 
 principles, which good sense is to apply to the varying occasions of 
 life. 
 
 Page 109. — The apparent force of the appeals made at present to 
 the pecuniary economy of the apostolic churches, consists in an ex- 
 treme misapprehension of f >cts relating to those primitive societies. 
 The Church of a city, as of Jerusalem, Antioch, Alexandria, or 
 ■Rome, was constituted of many more believers than, on ordinary 
 occasions, assembled under one roof The Church was served also 
 by many, or by several clerical persons, ministering among the con- 
 gregations in rotation. The contributions of the people passed into 
 a common fund, whence distribution was made, first to the poor, and 
 
322 APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 
 
 then to the officers of the Church, according to the need or merits of 
 each. The ministers therefore, although dependent, as a body, Upon 
 the gratuities of the people at large, were individually wholly inde- 
 pendent of single congregations, and of the opulent leaders of such 
 congregations. Although the community of goods which obtained 
 in the Church at Jerusalem during the first flow of zeal and affection 
 was soon discontinued, it served to give apostolic sanction to the 
 practice of holding a fund, and of accumulating contributions. — 
 Henceforth no Church could deem this practice to be either unlawful 
 or inexpedient: in fact, it universally prevailed; and when com- 
 bined with the plurality of clerical persons attached to each Church, 
 placed them individually in a position essentially unlike that of a 
 modern congregational minister. 
 
 The process by which very considerable funds came into the 
 hands, and remained under the control of the bishop, in each Church, 
 was very simple. Apostolic precept, as well as the spirit of the Gos- 
 pel, impelled the Christian societies to provide for all their poor 
 members; but to do so was found to demand permanent resources, 
 and especially in seasons of persecution, when many were stripped 
 of their property, or Avere rendered incapable of pursuing their ordi- 
 nary callings. Moreover, some became chargeable to the Church, 
 who, on becoming Christians, had abandoned immoral occupations, 
 and were not able entirely to maintain themselves in any other man- 
 ner. The leaders of the Church, therefore, soon found themselves 
 liable to a weighty responsibility, which naturally went on increas- 
 ing, until, in fact, a large number of the sick, the aged, the young, 
 and the imbecile and idle, looked to them ddily for bread. All this 
 was irrespective of the maintenance of the ministers of religion; but 
 both the poor and the clergy drew from one and the same purse. 
 The most urgent reasons, and the dictates of common prudence, im- 
 pelled those who stood liable to these various demands, as well to 
 accumulate a fund, as to keep alive the liberality of the opulent, and 
 to encourage the practice of making large occasional donations to the 
 Church, and of enriching it by bequests. Besides the weekly obla- 
 tions, from which none but the paupers of the Church were excused, 
 incidental gifts, sometimes of great value, flowed into the bishop's 
 chest. "Honourable women not a few," were, from the first, num- 
 bered with the faithful ; and these, with that pious generosity in 
 which the softer sex has always outshone the other, ofren bestowed 
 their entire fortune, or a large part of it, upon the Church. The 
 established custom of securing treasure — gold, silver, and precious 
 Btones, by dedicating it in rlie temples, was adopted substantially by 
 Christians, (see the sixty-fifth of the Canons of the Apostles; Cote- 
 lerius, tom. i. p. 446,) and so it happened that the Church plate, in 
 the principal cities, was frequently of great value, and constituted a 
 fund available on occasions of distress, and was not seldom employed 
 for the redemption of captive brethren. 
 
 Now, of these large funds the bishop was trustee and distributor, 
 at discretion. The deacons Avere his collectors, his accom plants, and 
 his almoners ; but not, as they should have been, the people's agents 
 or representatives, watching over and controlhng it for the common 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 323 
 
 benefit. Indeed, a gradual transition, highly injurious in its conse- 
 quences, very early rendered the deacon's office, as tribune of the 
 people (if we may so style him) nugatory, and made him one with 
 the clerical body. Inferior as he was, in relation to the presbyters 
 and the bishop, he was numbered with ecclesiastics — he participated 
 in their feelings, promoted their interests, and shared in their advan- 
 tages. It was thus that the real and effective counterbalance of 
 powers was lost, and lost earlier than we have the means precisely 
 of ascertaining. It was of litile or no avail that the people were 
 allowed to hold up their hands on certain occasions : this suffrage 
 gave them, indeed, a choice of masters, but no control over their mas- 
 ters. The people looked up to a sacerdotal body, including several 
 gradations of office, and in occupation of large funds, which they 
 held and distributed irresponsibly. In the apostolic intention and 
 practice, not only did the people elect those who were to mantxgethe 
 pecuniary interests of the community, but these officers acted for the 
 people, and for the ministers, with an independent power. The silent 
 movement of these officers toward the one party, and away from the 
 other, was alone enough to annul the liberties of the one, and to spoil 
 the simplicity and integrity of the other. 
 
 It does not require to be formally proved that the position of a 
 modern minister of a chapel, insulated and dependant upon the will 
 and wishes of those who raise his salary, and who receives that salary 
 from deacons — laymen, in fact and in feeling, does not bear compa- 
 rison, in any sense, with the circumstances of the clergy in the ancient 
 Churches. Even the smallest society had, like that of Philippi, ita 
 " bishops and deacons," that is to say, several clerical persons, who 
 stood together, and consulted for their common welfare ; and this 
 college, moreover, had the administration of an ample revenue. — 
 These two positions, instead of being nearly the same, are extremes; 
 and both must be condemned as faulty. The circumstances of modern 
 times, which allow of, and indeed demand, the entire separation of 
 clerical and eleemosynary funds, would make the adjustment of what 
 relates to the former so much the more simple and easy. Even if the 
 voluntary principle were adhered to for the maintenance of the minis- 
 ters of religion, there can be no need that it should be left to operate 
 in that unpropitious form which Congregationalism gives to it. Let 
 but a few congregations — whether of a city or district, be molten 
 together asaChurch, and the funds of all consolidated, and equitably 
 distributed, and then the general dependence of the clergy upon the 
 people is rendered so far circuitous as serves to abate the importance 
 of the latter, and to relieve the former from personal humiliations, 
 and cruel anxieties. 
 
 There is much involved often in the selection of phrfises. The 
 goods of the Church soon came to be called yrrayi^^iy.oi, — the poor's 
 fund, out of which the bishop was to take the necessary charges of 
 the clergy, and his own expenditure: thus the canons of the council 
 of Neo-Csesarea; icvpiocit^ ;^5/)75^«rot Tcruxty-ct Xey erect, and of the 
 bishop's discretion, in regard to this fund is it said, y-a^ uvsKXaycr- 
 Tei* e^'ivcTlocv e^atrtv oi iyricncoTroi . . . 
 
 On the important point of the subserviency of the deacons to the 
 
324 APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 
 
 bishops, and the entire abrogation of their ])o;ju?ar character^ abundant 
 evidence may be produced from all sides. The Apostolic Constitu- 
 tions are admissible in relation to the prevailing usages of the times 
 preceding that in which they were in part collected, avid in part fabri- 
 cated : — the second book contains many passages bearing on this 
 subject. " Let the deacon report every thing to the bishop, even as 
 Christ to the Father ; yet himself manage what he can, having 
 received his authority, to this effect, from the bishop, as Christ from 
 the Father. In a word, let the deacon be the bishop's ear, the bishop's 
 eye, the bishop's heart, the bishop's soul, so that he maybe lightened 
 of all cares, but such as are chief." lib. ii. cap. 44. The deacons dis- 
 tributed the elements to the people (Justin Martyr, Apol. 2) but were 
 not considered as competent to " preside over the mysteries ;" they 
 m ght, however, on occasions of necessity, administer baptism ; in- 
 deed, we find this rite to have been performed sometimes by persons 
 altogether secular, and even by military men (see, among other evi- 
 dence, the mosaics coUecLed by Ciampini). I'hey were also the 
 receivers of oblations, &c. but not the trustees of church property. 
 Whatever was substantial, as a means of power, had passed from 
 the control of the people at a very early period. The usage of speech 
 in reference to these officers varied, the deacons being sometimes 
 called clergy, and sometimes not. 
 
 Page 115. — As well in relation to the election of presbyters or 
 bishops, as to the maintenance of both, and their dependence upon 
 the people, the argument has been rendered nugatory by foigetting 
 the total dissimilarity of the circumstances of a modern and an ancient 
 congregation. Useless learning has been employed to prove that 
 Tery many of the early Churches were very small, and not more 
 numerous than might conveniently assemble in one building; and, 
 moreover, that the pastors of such single congregations were called — 
 bishops. But let it be proved (rare instances, if indeed there are any 
 such, excepted) that primitive Churches generally, like our modern 
 congregations, were served by a solitary clerical person. This can 
 never be done : the bishop, or the principal pastor, how humble 
 soever his state, and how narrow soever his circle, had his colleagues — 
 his presbyters, and his deacons ; not to mention the neighbouring 
 bishops, and one very important occasion recourse might be had to 
 a sacerdotal college, wherein affairs were discussed and arranged. 
 On the death of the bishop himself, or of a presbyter, whatever the 
 mode of appointing a successor might be, it was not the people alone 
 that acted, but the Church, guided and controlled by its surviving 
 leaders. Here then is an essential difference between the ancient 
 church polity, and that of modern Congregationalism. 
 
 Page 121. — On general grounds it is desirable that the argument 
 concerning the source of the authority vested in the clergy should 
 first be treited as a ptii'ely biblical question ; and then dis inctly, as 
 a point of ecclesiastical antiquity. But this separation of the two 
 lines of argument has a peculiar importance in relation to tlie Prin- 
 
AlPPENDIX TO SECTION IV. B25 
 
 •ciple professed by some, that the New Testament is the only law, 
 and the sufficient law, as well in matters of church polity, as iii 
 matters of faith and morality. Let then the whole bibhcal evidence, 
 bearing on the subject of the clerical function be reviewed, at the 
 same time dismissing the recollection of facts, the knowledge of which 
 is drawn from other sources than the Scriptures. Our question then 
 is this — according to the letter of the apostolic writings, or according 
 to any fair and clear inferences, thence to be derived, are the people 
 warranted in assuming to themselves the power of calling to the 
 ■vv'ork of the ministry, or of electing and dismissing their particular 
 religious teachers? 
 
 It does not seem equitable, or at lea^t, it cannot be deemed conclu- 
 sive, to adduce our Lord's appointment of his immediate agents as 
 pertinent to this inquiry; for it will not follow from his calling and 
 ordaining whom he would, that, after he had left his Church, these 
 same persons should, in the same sovereign manner, appoint their 
 successors. It is to the precepts and the practice of the apostles, after 
 their Lord's ascension, that we must look for our guidance in this, as 
 in other instances. We turn, therefore, at once to St. Luke's narra- 
 tive of the first years of the Church. 
 
 Whether or not it belongs directly to our question, the instance of 
 the appointment of a successor to the fallen apostle should be ad- 
 verted to. The part taken by the little company of the Lord's imme- 
 diate friends in filling up the number of the twelve, was merely to 
 ■look out from among themselves such as were qualified to stand in 
 the room of Judas, by the fact of their having constantly consorted 
 with Jesus, from the veiy commencement of his personal mhiistry, 
 until the close of it. Two were found Avho had done so (beside the 
 eleven) and these, being placed before Him, who "knoweih all 
 hearts," were solemnly subjected, by lot, to the Lord's decision ; and 
 having given their lots, the lot fell on Matthias, who thenceforward 
 was reckoned with the twelve : he thus became the Lord's KX-^po^ 
 one of the Lord's clergy. " Nam et cleros et clericos hinc appellatos 
 puto," says Augustine (referring to the appointment of Matthias), 
 This instance rnay be regarded as an extension only of Christ's direct 
 agency, in constituting the apostolic college ; and, therefore, not con- 
 clusive in relation to our question ; but we cannot but think that it 
 affords a natural and simple explanation of the origin of the term 
 clergy, as applied specially to the ministers of religion. 
 
 The transaction reported in the sixth chapter of the Acts, may or 
 may not be regarded as the origin of the deacon's office. In substance, 
 the duties committed to these seven stewards were the same as those 
 aftei wards discharged, in all the Churches, by the deacons. The 
 seven were men commended by their eminent personal piety, and 
 general good fame, to the confidence of all, and they were entrusted 
 with the funds of the society, and with the distribution of them._ The \ 
 several parts of this transaction are very clearly distinguished in the 
 narrative ; — the proposition to relinquish the secular afit\irs of the 
 Chinch came from the apostles, who had power to retain, if they had 
 thought proper, that charge. It was the apostles, also, who com- 
 mitted this trust to the seven ; but it was the multitude^ the mass of 
 
 28 
 
326 APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 
 
 believers, wlio chose these officers, and chose them " from among them- 
 selves." This instance ought, assuredly, to be considered as indi- 
 cative of a GENERAL PRINCIPLE, and a very important one, or shall 
 •we say of two principles, namely, that the ministers of religion do 
 well to discharge their hands wholly of pecuniary affairs ; and that 
 the choice of trustees for the management of these interests rests 
 with the people at large. An effective adherence to these principles 
 •would have precluded a very great proportion of all the abuses and 
 corruptions that stain chui'ch history from the first age to the present. 
 The X^'P<>'^o^'^ of the people, and the X>^ipoh<!-icc of the apos- 
 tles, are plainly exemplified in the appointment of these seven church- 
 ■wardens. That Philip, one of the seven (if the same Philip) is found 
 (chap. viii. 5) " preaching the woi-d," does not make him other than 
 a layman ; for it is manifest that the believers at large, as well 
 as the deacons, in the first age, used the liberty of preaching and 
 teaching. 
 
 The sending Paul and Barnabas on a special mission, and by the 
 immediate indication of the Holy Spirit (xiii. 2) does not bear upon 
 our subject. We refer to it only to exclude it. In passing, -we may 
 note the allusion to John (Mark) Avho attended Paul and Barnabas, 
 •we might say as their deacon, wT';^f7J5$, the term very early, if not 
 from the first, employed interchangeably with oiukqvo^ '. so Cle- 
 mens Alex. Strom, lib. vii. "^iT* yTy/^sT/xj^y h, el ^lUKOvet, 
 speaking of the species cf service performed severally by presbyters 
 and deacons. 
 
 XetpoTovjicrccvTei J^e ctureTs JCficr' sjcjcAjjc/atv TrpeT^vTepevq, 
 (Acts xiv. 23,) " ordaining for them ciders in each congregation." But 
 •who was it that stretched forth the hand, in electing and appointing 
 these eiders? the construction leads us without doubt to say, Paul 
 and Barnabas. Besides ; the democratic sense of the term, as im- 
 plying the voting of the people, is balanced by its frequent use on 
 occasions when an absolute appointment by an individual authority 
 is intended. — " Sed etiam, absque suffragiis eligere aliquem." — 
 Schleusner, and see Suicer, m voc. The word therefore being open 
 to both meanings, we follow the manifest sense of the passage ; or if 
 no% some direct evidence must be produced in opposition to that 
 sense. Apart from such evidence, this passage has no weight on 
 the side of the popular election of church rulers. 
 
 Though relating to another article of church polity, the account of 
 the Council of Jerusalem (cha}). xv.) should be adverted to as proof 
 of that open and popular constitution of the apostolic societies, apart 
 from Avhich it can never be sate to grant to the clergy the indepen- 
 dence and the high prerogative that may justly be claimed for them. 
 " Then it seemed good to the apostles and to the presbyters, with 
 THE WHOLE CONGREGATION, to Send men," &c. The decrees decided 
 upon ill this council were sent forth as determined " by the apostles 
 and presbyters," yet vrith the knowledge and consent of the multi- 
 tude. 
 
 An allusion to the popular appointment of bishops and presbyters, 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 327 
 
 if there had been any such usage in the Church of Ephesus, might 
 naturally have found a place in St. Paul's address to the rulers of that 
 Ciiurch (Acts XX.) We would not however lay stress upon the ab- 
 sence of it; only observing, that the phrase actually employed, di- 
 rectly favours the supposition that these officers had received their 
 authority irrespectively of the popular will. "Look to yourselves, 
 and to all the flock, in the which the Holy Spirit has set you, bish- 
 ops, to tend the congregation of the Lord.". . . . Certainly this pas- 
 sage contains nothing that avails the popular argument. 
 - We have thus reviewed, and it is soon done, the canonical record 
 of the first years of the Christian Church, and have found a few inci- 
 dental phrases, only, that at all relate to the appointment or election 
 of teachers and rulers. Of these few phrases, one is etymologically, 
 of ambiguous import, and therefore abstractedly indecisive ; but it is 
 thrown to the side of authoritative ordination by the grammatical 
 construction of the passage. We are compelled then to say that the 
 doctrine of the popular creation and election of church officers (dea- 
 cons excepted) receives no reasonnble support, director indirect, 
 from the inspired history of the first promulgation of the Gospel. Ifj 
 in fi\ct, presbyters and bishops were, from the commencement, cho- 
 sen by the people, and were removeable at their pleasure, and if this 
 popular power be, as it is alleged, the main pillar of church polity, 
 and the most importantand precious of all the privilegesof Christians, 
 in their social capacity, it is impossible not to feel astounded at find- 
 ing that it is neither affirmed, nor exemplified, nor alluded to, by the 
 writer who has furnished us with almost all we can know of the con- 
 stitution of the primitive societies. It is next to be inquired, if the 
 apostolic epistles supply, in this respect, the deficiency of the narra- 
 tive of St. Luke. 
 
 The very structure of the apostolic epistles contradicts the doc- 
 trine of the Romish Church, that no discretion is left to the laity in 
 matters of religion ; for it is to the faithful at large that these letters, 
 appealing to their judgment and conscience, are addressed. Q,ues- 
 tions of theology, and of discipline, are laid before the people with- 
 out restriction. At the same time, these epistles, very frequently, 
 and very distinctly, recognize the authority of church rulers; yet no 
 where affirm, or suppose that this authority was of popular organiza- 
 tion, or that it was, in any way, under popular control. 
 
 The Epistle of James docs not afford evidence bearing on our ques- 
 tion, unless we so consider the allusion, chap. v. 14, to the presbyters 
 of the Church, and to the efficacy of their official services in restoring 
 the sick. The First Epistle of Peter goes a little further, yet only a 
 little. The advice, chap. iv. 10, 1 1, determines nothing, and supports 
 no inference ; but>the direct admonition addressed (chap, v.) to the 
 presbyters, is pertinent in proving, as we have already said, it it need- 
 ed to be proved, the existence of a ruling order, possessed of power 
 ample enough to expose them to the temptation of using it despotical- 
 ly ; and also that this governing class received a remuneration for 
 their services, and had opportunity to enrich themselves in a manner 
 incompatible with the Christian profession. Moreover, it is impHed 
 that there might be some, called upon to discharge episcopal duties, 
 
328 APPENDIX TO SECTION TV, 
 
 who would seek to excuse themselves from the burden, and to escape 
 the personal danger often attending this distmction in times of perse- 
 cution. Such are exhorted to perform their parts not reluctantly, or 
 from compulsion, but with a ready mind. These advices, one might 
 have thought, would include some instructions addressed to the peo- 
 ple, on the important subject of the election of their pastors, or of 
 tlieir removal when necessary, if indeed any such powers actually rested 
 with the people. The subject of the false teachers, predicted in the 
 Second Epistle, we have had occasion to mention, and here again it 
 seems natural to look for a caution against precipitancy in the choice 
 of teachers. 
 
 In the times of St. John, the Christian societies were open to the 
 intrusion of false teachers — probably self-constituted, who laboured 
 to establish another doctrine than that of the apostles. These were 
 to be rejected, according to the rule given chap. iv. 2. This advice 
 recognizes, therefore, a power of discrimination, lodged with the peo- 
 ple, and it furnishes a corrective of the abuses thati^ight result from 
 the absolute irresponsibiUty of pastors. In whatever way the people 
 received their teachers, they were not required to accept from them 
 d6ctrines subversive of Christianity itself. It deserves to be noted 
 that these false prophets appear to have been itinerant preachers, 
 •who, destitute of credit and authority at home, nevertheless found 
 the means abroad, and where they were unknown, to recommentl 
 themselves to the simple. We must gather this also from St. John's 
 Letter to the Elect Lady. "If any one come among you, and does 
 not bring with him this doctrine, show him no hospitality, neithef 
 hail him as a friend ; for whosoever does so, becomes a sharer in his 
 evil deeds." The Epistle to Gaius affords direct evidence of the early 
 abuse of church authority. Whether the ambitious and despotic 
 Diotrephes were bishop, deacon, or merely an opulent manager of 
 the congregation, cannot be known ; if the former, which is the most 
 wobable, why not advise the Church to remove him from his place ? 
 This sort of indistinct evidence does not sustain positive conclusions 
 on either side; and certainly does not yield what we are in search 
 of; namely, an indication of the popular creations o^f bishops and 
 presbyters, in the time of the apostles. 
 
 The Epistle of Jude adds some weight to our conjecture, that the 
 early Churches were troubled and perverted, chiefly by wandering 
 teachers, eio-repeq frXa,\xTcci, men scouted and condemned at home, 
 yet artful enough to gain a hearing, as they passed from city to city* 
 St. Jude seems in haste to overtake some of these pernicious itinerants, 
 and to caution the Churches against them. He felt himself compell- 
 ed, he says, to write " with all despatch," to forewarn the brethren of 
 certain men who were slipping themselves into the Churches, Avith 
 the worst intentions, and who, wherever they came, began by revil- 
 ing oroppo5ingthe constituted authorities. Lascivious in their man- 
 ners, and licentious in their principles, they openly professed to con- 
 temn the established powers, nor scrupled to blaspheme dignities. 
 St. Peter says to the presbyters, ft'?'^' oi><i KecruKvpievevre^ rut 
 xhiUfOiV, St. Jude, speaking of these contumacious men, affirms that 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 329 
 
 they set at naught fcv^ioTijTcc. There was then a lordship, or 
 masterly authority in the Churches, which the one apostle forbids to 
 be abused, and which tiie other forbids to be despised. In conckision, 
 St. Jude gives us anotlier mark of tliese troublers of the common 
 peace; they were such as had "distanced themselves," or broke 
 away from their connections ; 6i u'roS'topfi^ovrei. It does not seem 
 that errors and abuses had ordinarily arisen from those whom the 
 apostles had themselves ordained, in every city ; but from strangers 
 — from self-constituted teachers, or those whom the people had gath- 
 ered to themselves: eavroig eTritrcu^evTovTi h^c(,(rx.uMvq. 
 
 Copious and various as are the Epistles of St. Paul, and full as 
 they are of allusions to ecclesiastical proceedings, we may fairly ex- 
 pect to obtain from them some recognition of the popular appoint- 
 ment of teachers, if that had actually been the practice of the Church- 
 es which he founded. 
 
 Several of the exhortations that fill the twelfth chapter of the Epistle 
 to the rtomans, bear upon the discharge of public religious functions. 
 A diversity of offices, founded upon the natural, or supernatural di- 
 versity of gifts, is implied: includnig preaching and teaching, minis- 
 tering, (as the deacons) distributing alms, and presiding over the 
 Church ; but nothing is added concerning the appomtment of indi- 
 viduals to such offices. We ought, however, to mark the care with 
 which the apostle enjoins the general rule of submission to constitut- 
 ed authorities ; and the caution he gives against the authors of fac- 
 tion (chap. xvi. 17;) and the teachers of plausible novelties. The 
 same caution expanded, and still more earnestly enforced, nieetsus 
 again and again, in the two Epistles to the faulty and chaotic Corin- 
 thian Church ; where, as it is evident, the democratic feeling had a 
 strength against which the whole weight of the apostolic authority, 
 miraculously sustained, had to bear. The formal warrant of minis- 
 terial maintenance (1 Cor. ix.) has already been referred to. The 
 right of the teacher is not, as we see, made to rest vipon the claim in- 
 volved in a popular election, which would have been natural, had 
 such been the method of appointment to office. " Did you not call ! 
 and choose your ministers, and ought you not, therefore, to maintain 
 them?" The apostle does not thus reason. 
 
 The remarkable passage (1 Cor. xii. 28) in which the ranks and 
 offices of the Christian body are enumerated, including, as it does, 
 ordinary and permanent, as well as extraordinary and temporary 
 functions, would have seemed a fit place for inserting, or for allud- 
 ing to, the important principle of the popular election of officers. 
 The absence of such an allusion is not indeed conclusive; but it 
 leaves us still unwarranted in exercising the power. Again a speci- 
 fic instance presents itself at the close of the epistle, in which the 
 want of the evidence we are searching for amounts to presumptive 
 evidence on tlie other side. The family of Stephanus had given 
 themselves up to the service of the Church. " I beseech you," says 
 the apostle, " that ye submit yourselves to such." Yet even an 
 apostle does not claim a despotic power over the opinions of the peo- 
 ple. "Not as if we were lords over your faith," (2 Cor. i. 24.) 
 
 28* 
 
330 
 
 APPENDIX TO SECTION^ IV. 
 
 Thus we find power, and power springing not, as it seems, from 
 the people ; but yet not a power which might be carried beyond the 
 bounds of reason and love. 
 
 The instance adverted to, (2 Cor. viii. 19) is one of several, show- 
 ing the common practice of the Churches — a practice carefully ad- 
 hered to by St, Paul, of entrusting contributions to persons chosen 
 and commissioned by the contributors. This equitable and neces- 
 sary usage should never be lost sight of The apostle was highly 
 sensitive in pecuniary matters, and scrupulously avoided placing 
 himself in any position which might lay him open to ungenerous im- 
 putations. In a word, he well understood, and never forgot, the dis- 
 tinction between spiritual and secular affairs ; it has been by med- 
 dling with the latter, that church rulers have rendered themselves 
 unAvorthy of the control tliey should possess over the former. 
 
 Another allusion to false teachers (2 Cor. x\. 4) strengthens the 
 belief that they were commonly of the travelhng sort. " He that 
 Cometh unto you, preaching another Jesus ; " and these itinerants, it 
 appears, behaved themselves, where they came, in the most inso- 
 lent, despotic, aiKl rapacious manner (verse 20.) These two Epis- 
 tles then, ecclesiastical as they are in their topics, do not furnish a 
 particle of evidence, direct or indirect, of the kind we are seeking. 
 
 The Epistle to the Galatians touches our question only remotely, 
 and in one point, where it enjoins the maintenance of the teachers 
 by the taught (Chap. vi. 6) that to the Ephesians contains a pas- 
 sage parallel to one already referred to, which enumerates the seve- 
 ral classes of church officers, of whom it is affirmed, that they were 
 "given to the church by the Lord himself; " and this list includes, 
 not merely "apostles, and prophets, and evangelists," but also "pas- 
 tors and teachers;" through what instrumentality given, we are 
 not informed. Hitherto therefore, we have made no progress to- 
 ward the establishment of the popular right, in the appointment of 
 teachers. The address of the'^Epistle to the PhiHippians has been 
 before adduced, as attesting the important fact of the plurality of 
 clerical persons, in the apostolic Churches. That those of the upper 
 class are styled " bishops," in common, is a circumstance altogether 
 insignificant, except in relation to the trivial controversy about the 
 names of office, whether these I'^io-kottci all ruled with equal 
 power, or submitted to the guidance of a senior or president, we are 
 not told. 
 
 " Say to Archippus, look to the ministry (the deaconship) which 
 thou hast received in the Lord, that thou fulfil it." This is all we 
 gather from the Epistle to the Colossians, touching church officers ; 
 except the epithet bestowed upon one and another,, of "faithful minis- 
 ters in the Lord." The Epistles to the Church at Thessalonica recog- 
 nize that right of maintenance which St. Paul and his companions 
 waived in their own case (1 Thess. ii.6,and 2 Thess. iii.9.) "We be- 
 seech you, brethren, that ye know (recognize in their official capacity) 
 those that labour among you, and preside over you in the Lord, and 
 that admonish you ; and that ye render to them the very highest re- 
 gard and affection, on account of their work." (1 Thess. v. 12.) 
 Such is the apostolic exhortation ; but it is not qualified by any re- 
 ference to popular control over these officers.. We are still at fault. 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 331 
 
 then, and pass to the Epistle to the Hebrews; which contains two 
 passages only, that touch on our subject (chap. xiii. 7, and 17) and the 
 first very slightly. " Bear in mind your rulers, who have spoken to 
 you the word of God," &c. There were then governors, ajid these 
 were preachers as well as presidents. Yield obedience, to k; rjyov- 
 fC£V6iq vf^av^ to your governors, and submit yourselves; for 
 they (as those who are to render an account) watch for your souls." 
 This unqualified advice demands grave consideration. To whom 
 .•were these rulers to render their account — to their constituents, or to 
 the Lord ? assuredly to the latter ; and their independence of the 
 people might, not unfairly, be inferred from this reference to their 
 higher accountability. But, waiving this implied reference, there is 
 room to ask whether this naked statement of the duty of submission 
 to pastors and bishops, unaccompanied by any allusion to the sove- 
 reignty of the people in constituting and removing them, suggests 
 the belief that such a sovereignity was actually recognized, or in 
 any way contemplated by the writer? The contrary must in all 
 candour, be granted. If the absolute style in which submission to 
 secular rulers is elsewhere enforced by the apostles is adduced as a 
 parallel instance, and as showing that the absence of the qualifying 
 phrase must not be assumed as conclusive in favour of non-resistance 
 to intolerable despotisms, it should be remembered that it was not 
 the province of the apostles to teach principles of civil government, 
 which men are to digest for themselves, and that they looked no fur- 
 ther than to the immediate duty of Christians — as such, and not as 
 citizens. But the pi-inciples of church government came directly 
 within their sphere ; and in these matters it is to them we must look 
 for our guidance and warrant. If the apostles, in commanding obe- 
 dience to pastors, say nothing of the people's sovereignty, we are 
 not at hberty to assume that they admitted any such sovereignty. 
 The admonition before us, would naturally have drawn with it the 
 counter caution ; or, if not, it would somewhere else have found a 
 place. 
 
 It only remains to advert to the three personal and clerical Epis- 
 tles of St. Paul. If these Epistles, just as they are in substance, had 
 been addressed to Churches — to "all the faithful in Christ Jesus," 
 at Rome, or Ephesus, or Antioch, it would have been strenuously, 
 and indeed, not unfairly argued, that it was the believers at large 
 who were to discharge the ecclesiastical duties to which the instruc- 
 tions they contain relate. But it is not so, and the presumption is 
 strong that the selection and appointment of Church officers rested 
 mainly, if not exclusively, with the individuals to whom the general 
 superintendence of the Churches had been committed. We possess 
 indeed some direct evidence in favour of the popular election of dea- 
 cons, at least when these officers acted as the trustees of church re- 
 venues ; nevertheless, as they were not, in the first instance, (if it be 
 an instance in point) installed without apostohc ordination, so were 
 they subject, afterwards, to the approval and control of the primate 
 — Timothy. 
 
 One cannot but forcibly feel that, if the election of pastors by th« 
 people had been an element of primitive Christianity, or if it had 
 
332 APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 
 
 been prospectively intended by the apostles to take effect after their 
 own demise, some allusion to it would have found a place in these 
 ecclesinstJcal letters, or, as we may call them, decretals. The so- 
 lemn charge committed to Timothy was, to repress the insolence of 
 false teachers, and generally, to preserve order in " the house of 
 God." That this supremacy was altogether an extraordinary and 
 temporary extension of apostolic authority, is a gratuitous assump- 
 tion, not to be admitted until proof is adduced in support of it. 
 
 We find it admitted as lawful, nay, praiseworthy, that a man 
 should "desire the episcopal dignity," nor does St. Paul give any 
 countenince to the affected reluctance of the nolo episcopari. Yet 
 none were to be admitted to this office but such as were recommend- 
 ed by their personal fitness ; and the same of the deacons, in regard 
 to wliom the qualification must include their wives. 
 
 "Rebuke not a presbyter" (youth as thou art) but rather "en- 
 treat him as a father." Timothy ihen was so placed as to be called 
 upon to urge the elders to the diligent and faithful discharge of their 
 duties. He had, moreover, the superintendency of ruling elders, 
 and of some who were rulers merely, and not teachers and preach- 
 ers also. These, when they combined both kinds of service, were 
 to receive " a double stipend, for the labourer is worthy of his re- 
 ward." "Admit not an accusation against a presbyter, unless sus- 
 tained by two or three witnesses." Timothy then exercised a high 
 jurisdiction over the conduct of the pi-esbyters. Do not let us style 
 him, archbishop; nevertheless his functions were precisely those of 
 a bishop of bishops; for presbyters are bishops. If all this be not 
 "written for our learning," peremptory and conclusive reasons must 
 be furnished to the contrary. Until they are produced, we shall 
 calmly conclude that the principle of a hierarchy is recommended 
 to us by apostolic practice and precept. 
 
 " Lay hands suddenly on no m-Mi : " the power of ordination then 
 rested with Timothy. This power, implied in the first Epistle, is 
 distinctly affirmed in the Second. " That which thou hast heard 
 from me, among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful 
 men, who shall be qualified to teach others." This is nothing less 
 than a f )rmal announcement of the process of ecclesiastical creation 
 but it includes not the most distant allusion to the part to be taken 
 therein by the people. How far this omission is to be regarded as 
 conclusive against popular interference in this matter we shall not 
 affect to determine. In relation to our present inquiry it cannot es- 
 cape our notice that the approaching times of religious degeneracy 
 were, by the apostle, expressly designated by the circumstance of 
 the wilfulness of the people in spurning the sound doctrine they had 
 heretofore received, and in " gat'iering to themselves teachers," who 
 would consult their licentious tastes. This prophetic indication, at 
 least, does not favour the practice of the popular election of religious 
 instructors. 
 
 The Epistle to Titus is in harmony with those to Timothy, on 
 the point before us. Titus had been left in Crete, with supreme 
 power to regulate church affiiirs, and to " set up," or appoint, pres- 
 byters in each city of the Island. Why not add — "such as the 
 Churches shall select and approve? " " A bishop," that is, such as 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 
 
 333 
 
 these ruling presbyters, " must be blameless." &c. The authority 
 of Titus, like that of Timothy, was of no precarious or despicable 
 «ort ; — it was authority, (chap, ii, 15.) 
 
 We have then gone through the apostolic Scriptures, noting every 
 passage that seems to bear upon the subject of the appointment or 
 the powers of church teachers and rulers ; and iK>t so much as one 
 of these passages gives support, directly or indirectly, to the alleged 
 right of the people to elect, appoint, and remove their pastors. Yet 
 let it be fully understood that we are not now labouring to over- 
 throw the popular influence in this instance; but are only showing 
 that, if admitted in fact, it must be justified on some other ground 
 than that of scriptural precept and example* 
 
 Certain bodies loudly say — "our principle is a strict adherence 
 to the word of God, as well in matters of polity, as in articles of 
 faith and rules of duty. What the Bible knows nothing of, we 
 know nothing of: our Churches are purely apostolic, so far as we 
 can understand the apostolic writings. Traditions we reject; the 
 practice of the ancient Churches is not our guide ; the Bible, and 
 tlie Bible alone, is the religion of Protestants." Yet these very par- 
 ties maintain the right of the people to choose their ministers, a» 
 the pnme and most precious article of their church polity. Can 
 these two professions consist? and is there not room for calling upon 
 those who avow doctrines so incompatible, to reconsider the princi- 
 pies of their ecclesiastical system ? 
 
 Page 123. — It has been common to inveigh against the distinction 
 made between clergy and laity, which is assumed as having been 
 the origin of spiritual despotism. This misdirected objection ha^ 
 put out of view the real evil, namely, that disjunction of clergy and 
 faity which the former contrived to effect, and in great measure by 
 embracing the deacons, as clerical persons, and so depriving the peo» 
 pie of their agents and representatives. The author has already re* 
 ferred to the Apostolic Constitutions on this point: he would not be 
 misunderstood in quoting that curious collection. There is littli 
 doubt it embodies a considerable portion of the most ancient tradi- 
 tions and usages of the Church, mixed up with the compiler's fabric 
 cations. Altogether, it affords good evidence concerning that stat« 
 of things which was prevalent, or which was becoming so, in the 
 third century, or which then needed a little help to give it authority 
 and universality. These Constitutions every where bear testimony 
 to the fact of the exclusion of the laity from all real influence io 
 church afl[airs. Here we find a most serious departure from apos- 
 tolic practice, and the learned writers who have so vainly laboured 
 to show that the distinction between clergy and laity was of late ori- 
 gin, might better have spent their time in exhibiting the rise nnd 
 progress of the abuse which was superadded to the distinction. The 
 genuine epistle of Clement to the Corinthians, one of the earliestof 
 the extant uncanonical writings, shows that the terms clergy and laity 
 were used in his time, as we find them in a latter age : o ^cttKOi 
 '^i^peiTo^ Toti XoClfcoi^ TrpoTTccyfi-XTiv ^eoercti. To the same 
 effect Ignatius, ad Smyrn,; and Tertullian in many places : one of 
 
334 APPENDIX TO SECTION IV. 
 
 these is so full in the evidence it affords of the fixedness of hierarchi- 
 cal distinctions in that early age, that it may well be quoted. The 
 writer, de Prcescripl. Hcereticorum is inveighing against tlie disorder- 
 ly practices of the heretics, and their contempt of that dignity and 
 authority which the Catholic Church maintaijied. What the Church 
 was, we here learn from the contrast implied between it, and the 
 separatists. In primis quis catechumenus, quis fideUs (who is ini- 
 tiated and who not) incertum est: pariter adeunt, pariter audiunt, 
 pariter orant: .... omnes tument, omnes scientiam pollicentur. 
 Ante sunt perfect! catechumeni, quam edocti. Ipsce mulieres hcere- 
 tic?e, quam procaces ! quoe audeant docerc, contendere, exorcismos 
 agere, curationes repromittere, forsitan et tingere (baptise). Ordi- 
 nationes eorum temerarioe, leves, inconstantes. Nunc neophytos 
 conlocant, nunc seculo obstrictos, nunc apostatas nostros, ut gloria 
 eos obligent, quia veritate non possunt. Nusquam facilius proficitur, 
 quam in castris rebellium, ubi, 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 
 injungunt. The contrary of all this was therefore the common and 
 long-established practice of the Church, at the close of the second 
 century. Again, the same writer de Fagain Persecutiotie ; Sed quum 
 ipsi auctores (chiefs) id est, ipsi Diaconi, Presbyteri, et Episcopi fu- 
 giunt, quomodo Laicus, &c. ; or again, ubi tres, ecclesia est, licet 
 Laiici. De Exhort. Castitatis. 
 
 Page 130. — " No writer of the age of Cyprian ;" in truth the earli- 
 est of the church writers, now extant, employ the terms of office in a 
 well-defined and technical manner. Probably, before the death of 
 the apostles, all these designations had been fixed in their artificial 
 sense, and had ceased to be convertible. So at least we find them in 
 the writings of the apostolic fathers; and in Irenaeus, often, if not 
 uniformly. 
 
 Page 133. — The first Christians attached great impertance to the 
 circumstance of partaking of one and the same loaf; or of bread con- 
 secrated at one table, in the celebration of the Eucharist ; and it was 
 the part of the deacons and deaconesses to carry the elements to 
 those members of the Church who could not personally attend where 
 the bishop presided; so we learn from Justin Martyr's Second 
 Apology. 
 
 Page 136. — A treatise, not a note, would be required for bringing 
 together the evidence which proves, what indeed none can well pro- 
 fess to doubt, namely — That, in the larger cities the Christians were 
 numerous enough to constitute several congregations, and that yet 
 (until divided by heretics) they formed but one Church, subject to 
 one administrative power, whether episcopal or presbyterian. The 
 difference between a municipal church polity of this sort, and our 
 modern Congregationalism, such as we find it in our English cities 
 and large towns, is essential, and of the highest practical importance. 
 The reader will not expect, in a volume which touches the question 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION V. 335 
 
 of the different forms of church government only incidentally, the 
 evidence that bears upon that question. The author's limits barely 
 admit of his adducing a small sample of instances, pertinent to his 
 proper subject. 
 
 APPENDIX TO SECTION V. 
 
 Page 151. — The ancient superstition concerning the sacraments, 
 and some other observances, may justly be named as the initial point 
 of Spiritual Despotism. It was on this stone that the hierarchy built 
 its towering edilice. But who shall say when this superstition took 
 the pi ice of apostolic simplicity? The most ambiguous expressions 
 (if indeed they are ambiguous) meet us in the earliest writers. These 
 could not be here introduced with advantage: the author reserves 
 what he may have to advance on this difficult and important subject 
 to its proper place in a work he has in preparation, and which he 
 will not forestah 
 
 Page 153. — The long-continued and anxious disagreements that 
 arose in the African Church from the contumacy or the irregular for- 
 wardness of the confessors in granting bills of reconciliation to the 
 lapsed, occupy a prominent place in the writings of Cyprian, and are 
 familiar to all readers of church history. These difficulties owed 
 their origin, in great measure, to the exaggerations that had been in- 
 dulged in concerning the merits of the martyrs; and then again, 
 these exaggerations flowed from that sophistication of the Gospel 
 which had early got ground. To do any damage to principal truths, 
 is to plunge into unlimited practical errors and inconveniences. In 
 Mr. Rose's translation of Neander, the English reader may see copi- 
 ous quotations from Cyprian, relating to tliis subject. On points of 
 this sort, often adverted to in Church histories, and well understood, 
 it could subserve no good purpose here to enlarge. 
 
 Page 154. — From the expressions used by Tertullian, in speaking 
 of the conventions of the Churches of Greece, de Jejuniis, c. 13, we 
 should gather, that such representative assemblies were not very 
 prevalent in his time. They grew more and more into use, as they 
 were found to facilitate the exercise of irresponsible authority, on the 
 part of the clergy. Ecclesiastical writers distinguish synods into 
 four soris, the first kind being those held by a bishop who summoned 
 the bishops of the neighbouring cities to assist him on some occasion 
 of difficulty. The second kind was that of the metropolitans, at stated 
 times convening all the bishops of their province. The third was 
 that of patriarchs, assembling, in like manner, all of the episcopal 
 order within their jurisdiction ; and the fourth was what has usually 
 
336 APPENDIX TO SECTION V, 
 
 been called cecumenic, or universal, in which the chiefs of the Chns- 
 tian world were drawn together, on extraordinary occasions, for the 
 decision of urgent controversies. On some occasions, indeed, presby^- 
 ters, deacons, and many of the people, obtained admission to synods; 
 but it was with the bishops alone that the decision rested. 'Cum in 
 unum Carthagini convenissent, Kalend. Septembris, Episcopi plu- 
 rimi ex provincia Africa, Numidia, Mauritania, cum presbyteris et 
 diaconis, prajsente etiam plebis maxima parte.' .... It was merely 
 as spectators, or perhaps as serving to give importance to the church 
 party in the view of the separatists, that the people gained admission 
 on this occasion. 'Prresente plebe,' is a frequent phrase in the epis- 
 tles of Cyprian ; and it seems that he wished to sustain himself by 
 the popular concurrence and favour; in truth, the fierce opposition he 
 encountered from some of his clergy, was of a kind that rendered it 
 necessary to court this aid. But we must by no means so interpret 
 such expressions as to suppose that any substantial influence was 
 accorded to the laity ; or any power beyond that which a mob often 
 exerts under the most absolute governments: the people had no co7i- 
 stitutional power. In opening the council of Carthage (An. 256) 
 Cyprian boldly and clearly affirms the independence of bishops one 
 of another ; but says nothing of the rights of the inferior clergy, or of 
 the faithful at large. 'Neque enim quisquam nostrum Episcopum 
 8e Episcoporum constituit, aut tyrannico terrore ad obsequendi ne- 
 cessitatem collegos suos adigit; quando habeatomnis Episcopus pro 
 licentia libertatis et potestatis sure, arbitrium proprium ; tamque ju- 
 dicari ab alio non possit, quam nee ipse potest judica re.' This is not 
 altogether the language of apostles, or of apostolic men. Tlie sen- 
 tences of these eighty-seven prelates might very aptly be adduced in 
 illustration of the high church style of the times — the times, not of 
 state patronage, but of persecution. 
 
 Page 162. — The councils of Ancyra, of Neo-Coesarea, and of An- 
 tiochjWere, like those of Africa and the West, episcopal assemblies; 
 and they exhibit the same practice of exclusion, in regard both to the 
 inferior clergy and the people. The thirteenth canon of the council 
 of Ancyra may be adduced in proof of the breadth of the distinction, 
 so early made, between the higher and lower clergy; a distinction 
 which excluded even the country bishops from the prerogatives 
 claimed by the bishops of cities: "It is not permitted to Chorepisco- 
 pi to ordain presbyters or deacons; nor indeed to the presbyters of 
 cities to do so, without a license from their bishop, to that effect." 
 These canons, throughout, imply a power on the part of the bishops 
 nearly absolute. The phrase employed by Eusebius, in reference to 
 the dignitaries, assembled at the council of Nice, well designates the 
 aristocratic constitution of that convention. "From all the Church- 
 es," says he, "of Europe, Africa, and Asia, there came together, 
 rav TOW Beoo Xeirovpyav ru a,y.poGiviu. A bishop, absent 
 on account of extreme age, was represented by his presbyters. A 
 very great number of the inferior clergy, and even of the laity, fol- 
 lowed in the trains of the bishops, and swelled the crowd that 
 swarmed around the imperial palace, during the session of the coun- 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION V. 337 
 
 cil. Socrates tells us that there were in attendance upon the reve- 
 rend fathers several laymen, ^ice.Xe7cri)cvi(i if4,7r£ipoi, professionally- 
 employed, or, as we may say, retained, to plead on difficult points, or 
 to assist in those incidental disputations that were always gomg on 
 out of doors. It was, as we suppose, at one of these unauthentic 
 conferences that, as this historian relates, after the learned wrangler's 
 had completely confounded, among themselves, all principles of piety 
 and common sense, a simjile-hearted layman, one of the confessors, 
 exclauiied, "Christ and the apostles did not deliver to us dialectic 
 and delusive subtilties, but yvf^viv y\icoy.riv to be kept in its 
 purity by faith and good works. 
 
 Page 165. — The uninterrupted transmission of the great ar- 
 ticles of Christian faith in the mother Churches, throughout 
 Christendom, is an argument that finds a place in almost all 
 the catholic controversial wvilings of the early centuries. There 
 would be no end to adducing the instances. Irenoeus especially 
 insists upon this ground of authority; nor ought his appeal to 
 the consistent and harmonious traditions of the principal Churches 
 to be rejected as improper. — See contra Hrereses, lib. iii. cap. 3, 
 and lib. iv. cap. 26. Origan, by no means a favourer of Church 
 Despotism, calmly asserts the discriminative value of the tradition- 
 al faith of the apostolic Churches : — "Servetur vero ecclesiastica 
 prrcdicatio per successionis ordinem ab apostolis tradita; et usque 
 ad prresens in ecclesiis permanens : ilia sola credenda est Veritas, 
 quai in nullo ab ecclesiastica et apostolica discordat traditione." 
 Proif. de Principiis. Tertullian strenuously makes the same 
 appeal to the continued consistency of the mother Churches. 
 Constat proinde onaiem doctrinam, quoe cum illis Ecclesiis Apos- 
 tolicis matricibus et originalibus fidei conspiret, veritati deputan- 
 dum". . . . and again: "Hoc enim naodo Ecclesiae Apostolicoe census 
 suos deferunt : sicut Srayrnceorum ecclesia Polycarpum ab Jomne 
 conlocatum refert : sicut Romanorum, Clementem a Petro ordina- 
 tum itidem, perinde utique et cetera? exhibent quos ab apostolis 
 in episcopatum constitutos apostolici seminis traduces habeant. 
 Confingant tale aliquid h?eretici." There was reason and force in 
 this challenge when advanced so early as the close of tlie second 
 century, or the commencement oi^ the third. 
 
 Page 178. — A substantial defence of Christianity might be 
 grounded upon the temper exhibited in those admirable tracts 
 which were addressed to the P^oman authorities by the accomplish- 
 ed apologists of the faith, in the second and third centuries. The 
 spirit and maxims therein displayed and professed, and not only 
 professed, but practically adhered to, were immensely superior to 
 any thing the world hud hitherto seen, and ought to have con- 
 vinced the emperors and their advisers, that the new sect, if fairly 
 treated, would have formed the best support of the decaying 
 empire. In reading the learned, tranquil, manly, and yet meek, 
 Apology of Athenagoras, and in recollecting to whom it was 
 addressed, it is impossible not to feel that all truth and reason 
 
 29 
 
338 APPENDIX TO SECTION VI. 
 
 was on the one side, and an infiituated bigotry on the other. In 
 equity, we should reject the piiilosophic pretensions of Antoninus; 
 for what is .that philosophy worth which is found to avail nothing 
 with a prince, mildly entreated to protect thousands of his 
 suffering and innocent subjects from horrid cruelties? _ The same 
 spirit and principles meet us in the apologies of Tatian, Justin, 
 Clement of Alexandria, Minuiius, Felix, and Origen ; and indeed 
 in all the early writers of this class; and manifestly their mode- 
 ration was not that of individuals merely, but was the charac- 
 teristic temper of the body. The author will here take leave to 
 recommend strongly the perusal of these tracts to the intelligent 
 reader; and especially if his faith in Christianity is unfixed. The 
 later apologists approach, at times, a more sturdy style, and the 
 common emotions of resentment are to be traced in many of the 
 turgid orations pronounced at the tombs of the martyrs, after the 
 triumph of Christianity. The orations of Gregory Is'yssen, and 
 of Basil, would furnish examples of this sort; or it might be enough 
 to refer to Lactantius, de J)Iortibiis Persecntoruvi. The exultation 
 of the Christians over their fallen adversaries is indeed not more 
 than is natural, but it is somwhat more than is Christian-like. Clui 
 adversati erant Dio, jaceni; qui templum sanctum everterant, 
 ruina majori ceciderunt; qui justos excarnificaverant, ccelestibus 
 plagis et cruciatibus mentis nocentes animos profuderunt. Distuler- 
 at enim poenas eorum Deus, ut ederet in eos magna et mirabilia 
 exempla 
 
 But no evidence more explicit concerning the feeling of Chris- 
 tians, as a great and potent body in the state, can be adduced, than 
 that which is contained in an often-quoted passage of Tei-tuliian's 
 Apology, cap. 37, where he distinctly reminds his fellow-citizens 
 of the power of the Christians — a power they would not employ, 
 to right their own cause. There can be litile doubt that this elo- 
 quent and vigorous apology rung in the ears of the Roman authori- 
 ties, from the moment of its appeaiance, to the times of Diocletian ; 
 it might perhaps even serve to aggravate cruelties which were felt 
 to be, in the highest degree, dangerous to the perpetrators, unless 
 by such means the utter extinction of the sect could be effected. 
 
 To avoid retracing the same ground, or recurring to topics nearly 
 allied, some references and illustrations which might haA^e been 
 appended to the fifth Section, are reserved to find a place in those 
 attached to the sixth. 
 
 APPENDIX TO SECTION VI. 
 
 Page 187. — The author will not be misunderstood as speaking 
 literally of the behaviour of Constantine at church. Nothing 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION VI. 339 
 
 could be more reverential or decorous than his conduct on all oc- 
 casions of frequenting public worship, of which Eusebius and 
 Socrates report many instances. 
 
 Page 192. — Christianity had been declared, by Gallienus (An. 
 259,) a religio licita, and the Church had, in consequence of this 
 decree, enjoyed a long repose. But Constantine's toleration, as 
 it sprung from different motives, and was understood to issue from 
 his personal convictions in fovour of Christianity, soon placed 
 the Christians, throughout the empire, on ground they had never 
 heretofore occupied. Constantine's decree of universal toleration, 
 dated from Milan, as reported by Eusebius, Hist. Eccles. lib.x. cap. 5, 
 is worthy of the most enlightened times: it is simple in expression, 
 explicit, and ample. This same decree, which protects all subjects 
 of the empire from molestation on account of their religion, be it 
 what it may, naming especially the Christians, requires also a 
 restitution of the property of the churches, which had been lately 
 confiscated. " And moreover, as the said Christians are known 
 to have possessed, not only the buildings in which they ordinarily 
 assemble, but also other property, and which appertains net to in- 
 dividuals among them, but to the society, all such possessions, from 
 the moment of the promulgation of this our decree, you -vill com- 
 mand to be restored without question, to each corporation or 
 church." So much in the true spirit of toleration is this decree, 
 that the Romanist commentators upon Eusebius, instead of ap-j'i'xud- 
 ing, resent it, as an insult and an injury to the Ciiurch. — " \7hat! 
 shall the Catholic Church receive its liberties in common with ^ews, 
 Samaritans, and heretics?" In fact, this broad indulgence soon ex- 
 cited the jealousy of the emperor's episcopal advisr^.rs, and ha vras 
 induced to issue decrees, contrary to his inclination and fcstter 
 judgment, but more to the taste of arrogant Cliurchmen. Through- 
 out the history of Constantine's religious administration, we have 
 to notice the distinction between his spontaneous measures, and 
 those acts which sprung from the ecclesiastics to whose intemperance 
 and bigotry he thought himself compelled to give v/ay. In a sub- 
 sequent decree the property of the churches is incidentally specifi- 
 ed, as consisting in "gardens and houses." The rnoveaMe wealth of 
 which they had been plundered it was not possible to recover; yet 
 it was, in part, replaced by the liberal donations of tlis emperor, 
 and with these, and their actual funds, the Christians found them- 
 selves immediately able to construct spacious nnd splendid churches, 
 in the stead of the humbler edifices that had been destroyed during 
 the late persecutions. 
 
 Page 197. — AVe should by no means forget that, although Con- 
 stantine went some way toward endowing the ministers of Christi- 
 anity, by granting them certain parmanent revenues, fruits, and 
 customs, he left entirely unrestrained their command over the super- 
 stitious liberality of the people. There was, therefore, in this 
 system, the cost of an establishment without its benefits. The 
 Church was so much the more enriched ; but the welfare of the 
 community was not provided for. Beside the restitution of their 
 
$iQ APPENDIX TO SECTION VT, 
 
 corporate property, Constantine exempted the clergy from the 
 liability thev had hitherto stood under, as citizens, to discharge pub- 
 lic offices. " Eusebius, lib. x. cap. 7. This sort of exemption has 
 been approved of as fit and necessary in most civilized countries. 
 
 Page 199. — When first summoned to surround the emperor, and 
 to sit at the imperial table, many of the bishops, as we infer from 
 an incidental expression of Eusebius, de Vita Constant. lib. i. cap. 42, 
 were but poorly attired , they very quickly, however, learned to 
 accommodate themselves to the usages of a court, and this, not in 
 habiUments only, but in behaviour. Indeed, if we are to give 
 credit to Socrates— esteemed a trustworthy writer, the deference ex- 
 acted by the bishops from the emperor and his courtiers was as 
 great as the most arrogant hierarchs of later ages have demanded : 
 for example, the emperor, in entering the hall of his oivn palace, 
 where the Fathers of the Nicene council were convened, did not 
 presume to sit until he had received a nod from them, giving him 
 permission to do so : he then meekly took his seat on a golden stool, 
 as Eusebius tells us, placed in the open space around which the 
 bishops were arranged. Tjo-xott, rU evXu^stct, x,cct ul^Zq rav 
 tcvhcoVf rov ^ccTiXioc Kocrei^^sv. 
 
 Page 201. ^-Numberless are the monastic rules and canons directed 
 io the important object of securing to religious houses the personal 
 effects of those who entered them. For a monk to retain possession 
 even of a shilling, as private property, was deemed one of the most 
 serious crimes of which he could be guilty. A curious enactment, 
 on this subject, is found among the Decretals of Gregory IX. A 
 monk retaining private property, without the special permission of 
 his abbot (which was in certain cases granted) was not to receive 
 Christian burial : or, if the discovery were afterwards made of his 
 ■feavino- died possessed of clandestine effects, exhumation was to take 
 plg^ce— provided it could be done without causing great public scan- 
 dal • and his remains cast forth from the sacred precincts : that is to 
 say,' adds the commentator, if the bones of the guilty brother can be 
 distinguished from those of others. Decret. lib. iii. tit. 35. But the 
 same practice and principle is met with in the monastic writers of a 
 much earlier time. The text and profe^ssion of the system was, 
 ftoiotx^i «' <» '"fl y^ ycryii^a, ^tirav, f^a^vuxh oox. 'int. 
 But though the monk must be a pauper, the fraternity might become 
 as wealthy as it pleased ; such are the subterfiiges of spurious piety* 
 The epistles of Gregory I. contain several allusions to the wills of 
 monks; and it seems that different usages obtained in the different 
 orders in this i-espect ; some demanding the absolute surrender of all 
 personal property, while others allowed wealthy brethren to retain 
 and dispose of their fortunes. This same Pope grants express license 
 to certain abbots to bequeath their private property, Epist. 22, and 
 in other cases authenticates the surrender of a monk's property to the 
 monastery, lest the grant should be called in question by his lawful 
 hears. From the Justinian code, it appears that monks, in the sixth 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION VI. ^41 
 
 century, were generally allowed to dispose of their effects by will, 
 Jerome approves the practice observed in the monasteries of Egypt, 
 of buryiug, with a monk, any little savings he might have made 
 from the product of his labours ; — according to that Scripture, " Thy 
 moiiey perish v/ith thee." Epist. ad Eustochium. To the same effect 
 Basil ; Constitutiones Monaslicce,. 
 
 Page 202. — Nothing that can be deemed important, either in a 
 religious or ecclesiastical sense, appears to be connected with those 
 adjustments of Church polity which Constantine effected. He found 
 the Christian world already meted out under three or four suprema- 
 cies ; and he only brought these existing governments into conve- 
 nient conformity with the new arrangements which he established in 
 the civil constitution of the empire. His error was, the not discern- 
 ing the dangerous ambition of the Roman pontiff, or not providing 
 against what he might have foreseen would be the course of events, 
 when the bishop of Rome was left lord of Italy and the Western 
 Church. Whether a complex hierarchical system be good or bad, it 
 was fully established and digested, at the time of the imperial con- 
 version. This f ict there can be no need to support by formal evi- 
 dence ; the proof of it meets us every whei'e. Let the reader look 
 through the Apostolic Constitutions. 
 
 Page 204. — It is pretty certain that Constantine would gladly have 
 left to the chiefs of the Church the control of all spiritual affairs; but 
 the endless disagreements that prevailed among them, and in the 
 course of which he Avas appealed to, sometimes by the weaker, and 
 sometimes by the stronger party, involved him unavoidably in con- 
 troversies and disputes of all kinds, and left him no liberty to observe 
 that line which at first he had marked out for himself. The feuds of 
 the clergy, although he could not but see that they threw power into 
 his hands, gave him sincere uneasiness ; and his earnest remonstrances 
 with them, on this head, put it beyond reasonable doubt that his de- 
 sire of concord and unity prevailed altogether over his love of influ- 
 ence. Gladly would he have embraced the respectable separatists 
 of the time in the arrangements which he laboured to bring about; 
 but his good intentions were frustrated, as well by the unyielding 
 tempers of the non-conformists, as by the haughtiness of the Catholic 
 bishops. Vv^e learn from Socrates, lib. i. cap. 10, thai, with the view 
 of comprehending, if possible, the existing parties, the emperor sum- 
 moned Acesius, aNovatian bishop, to the council of Nice, with Avhom 
 he amicably conferred. " Why," asked the emperor, "do you sepa- 
 rate yourself from the communion of the Church ?" Acesius replied 
 by stating the origin and the grounds of the Novatian dissent, upon 
 hearing which Constantine exclaimed — " Good man, set a ladder 
 then, and climb up to heaven alone." Again and again, in reading 
 the history of the times, we have to regret that the imperial nursing 
 father of the Church did not oftener lean upon his own sound judg- 
 ment and honest intentions, rather than yield to the wishes of his 
 ecclesiastical advisers. On one occasion, nothing but the vigorous 
 cood sense of a monk — Paphnutius, saved the Church from aianati- 
 
 29* 
 
342 APPENDIX TO BKCTION VI, 
 
 eal attempt of the bishops to impose celibacy upon the clergy. Thi-s 
 interposition, says the historian, Socrates, was the more remarkable, 
 because Paphnutius himself had, from his youth, maintained the 
 strictest continence. Whatever opinion we may form, if indeed we 
 should attempt to form any, of the personal character of Constantine, 
 or of his religious sentiments, it is unwarrantable to call in question 
 the sincerity of his professions, in relation to the religious welfare of 
 the empire. He regarded, with awe, the Divine Providence, in the 
 course of public affairs : he devoutly wished to propitiate the Divine 
 favour on behalf of the State : he felt that Christianity was the reli- 
 gion of order and humanity, and he earnestly desired to see it every 
 where prevalent. The candid reader of Eusebius and Socrates, 
 while he may disallow certain measures, and while he makes a due 
 deduction from the encomiums of partial writers, will receive, alto»- 
 gether, a favourable impression of th« conduct of this first Christiasi 
 prince. 
 
 Page 207. — . . . "donee sub Constantino Imperatore," says Jerome, 
 after mentioning the licentious rites of the Grecian Avorship, " Christi 
 evangelio coruscante, et infidelitasuniversarum gentium, et turpetudo 
 deleta est." Comment, en Esaiam, cap. 2. If this reformation be here 
 too largely stated, it was nevertheless very great and extensive, and 
 attended with the highest benefits to the community. So vast a 
 revolution could not, however, have been effected without the most 
 vigorous and peremptory measures. Much as the minds of men, in 
 that age, were inclined to consider visible prosperity, and especially 
 if it attended a prince or public person through life, as an indication 
 of the Divine favour to the individual, a strong impression, corrobo- 
 rative of the Christian doctrine, must have been made upon the Ro- 
 man world, by the mere ftict of the impunity with which the first 
 Christian emperor suppressed the worship of the gods, and put con- 
 tempt upon their ministers. It was manifest that the gods were 
 destitute of power to avenge themselves upon this, their bold enemy. 
 ISTay, in splendour, happy success, and long-continued tranquillity, 
 Constantine greatly surpassed any of his predecessors. Augustine, 
 de Civitate Dei, appeals to the instance, on this very ground. Nam 
 bonus Deus, ne homines qui eum crederent propter reternam vitam 
 eolendum, hos sublimitates et regna terrena existimarent posse ne- 
 minem consequi, nisi daemonibus supplicet, quod hi spiritus in talibus 
 multum valerent,Constantinum imperatorem non supplicantem dae- 
 monibus, sed ipsum verum Deum colentem, tantis terrenis implevit 
 muneribus, quanta optare nullus auderet .... Diu imperavit, uni- 
 rersum orbem Romanum unus Augustus tenuit et defendit ; in- 
 administrandis et gerendis bellis victoriosissimus fuit ; in tyrannis 
 opprimendis per omnia prosperatus est; grandajvus a^gritudine et 
 senectute defunctus est, filiis imperantes reliquit. Lib. v. cap. 25. 
 Eusebius more than once advances the same argument, which, from 
 the frequency with which it was employed, we may infer to have 
 been found efficacious. " With loud voice," in the instance of the 
 emperor, "the true God spake to all men, calling upon them to 
 adcnowledge him as. the o^^Ly God^, and to turn away from those 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION VT. 343 
 
 that were no gods." We may well suppose that Constantine was 
 himself confirmed in his faith by his own prosperity, and was, per- 
 haps, in the same manner emboldened to assail the ancient supersti- 
 tions of the empire with the more vigour. Sentiments of this sort 
 appear in several of his epistles and speeches, as reported by Euse- 
 bius, De Vita Constantin. lib. ii. cap. 24, 25, et passim. 
 
 Neque ab idololatriae distare haereses, quum et auctoris el 
 
 Operis ejusdem sint, cujus et idololatria, says TertuUian ; and the 
 church writers of the age of Constantine expressly affirm heresy and 
 Bchism to be greater evils than polytheism. It is no wonder, there- 
 fore, that the severities resorted to for the suppression of the latter, 
 should, without scruple, hare been directed against the former ; yet 
 it was chiefly in the following reigns that extreme coercive measures 
 against either idolatry or heresy, were employed. Constantine's 
 mode of proceeding in suppressing the pagan worship is described 
 by his biographer ; Vita, lib. iii. cap. 54, et seq. Against heretics and 
 schismatics he issued reproofs, vehement sometimes in style, but he 
 seldom went further than to prohibit their conventicles, and to con- 
 fiscate their oratories or chapels to the Catholic Church. Vita, lib. 
 iii. cap. 65. The language attributed to the emperor in these in- 
 stances indicates, as we think, an inward conflict between the mild- 
 ness and moderation of his personal dispositions, and his sense of 
 duty, as suggested to him by his episcopal advisers. His successors 
 were far less scrupulous. 
 
 Page 209. — The writings of Augustine andof Chrysostom, not to 
 mention others, abound in passages attesting the immensity of the 
 cares and labours of a judicial kind, in which a bishop was involved, 
 as arbitrator of secular interests ; (see especially Chrysostom, de 
 Sacerdotio, lib. iii.) nor was this evil of recent origin : as a cnstcm it 
 takes its date from tlie apostolic times ; as an evil, from the age in 
 which worldly ambition had generally tainted the minds of the 
 clergy ; and this happened long before the political triumph of 
 Christianity. On the subject of episcopal jurisdiction, what it in- 
 cluded, and in what manner exercised, m the third and fourth cen- 
 turies, the Apostolic Constitutions aiford various information: the 
 second book relates chiefly to this part of the bishop's duties, and 
 may be referred to as sufficient evidence of the extent of the authority 
 vested in him, and of the almost unlimited influence which, as arbi- 
 trator and judge, he exercised. The fact not being matter of dispute, 
 to adduce quotations would serve no useful purpose. The English 
 reader may find, in Hallam's Middle Ages, chap. vii. a concise account 
 of this branch of ecclesiastical power. 
 
 Page 214. — The third oration of Gregory Nazianzen, entitled 
 crTJ7A<T5yri)c<7g, and the foixrih, exhaust the eloquence of that 
 accomplished churchman, and indeed seem to spend all the resources 
 of the copious language he employed in the expression of indignant 
 sentiments. But though the Greeks must bear the palm as orators, 
 it is to the Latin Fathers we must look for the indications of the real 
 ascendency of the Church, in the fourth century. The Greeks were 
 
344 APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 
 
 the best preachers, orators, and writers; but the Latins were the 
 best and the boldest promoters of church authority. Among these, 
 Ambrose of Milan, holds no mean place ; it is from his writings that 
 we may the most readily derive an idea of the ecclesiastical system, 
 practices, and spirit of this time ; and especially from his epistles. 
 
 APPENDIX TO SECTION YII. 
 
 In seeking for evidence concerning the spirit and practices of the 
 Romish Despotism, we should observe two rules, both clearly etjuit- 
 ablc and necessary ; the first is to look to the pages of those writers 
 who have occupied high stations in the Church, and whose decisions 
 are its law ; and the second is to confine ourselves to those times dur- 
 ing which the Church was in her prosperity, and enjoyed an unre- 
 stricted authority. The breaking out of the Reformation gave a 
 new, and an exasperated character to all the acts and expressions of 
 the Papacy. From that time forward the Church spoke in refe- 
 rence to, or in tacit recollection of, her new and formidable adversa- 
 ries. She was no longer purely spontaneous. The difference of 
 style and feeling occasioned by the Lutheran schism, is very clearly 
 perceptible in the Romanist writers of all classes; for while the bold 
 and intemperate are far more extravagant and impudent than were 
 their predecessors of the same stamp, the reasonable, the conciliato- 
 ry, and the philosophic, labour with the utmost diligence and ingenu- 
 ity to soften the features of the Romish tyranny, to excuse his intole- 
 rance, to recommend, on general grounds, its superstitions, find to 
 bring it, as far as possible, into accordance Avith the spirit of Christi- 
 anity, and with the feelings and usages of modern times. But as 
 we are bound, in fairness, to reject the exaggerated Romanism of the 
 one class of modern writers, so should we pass by, as unauthentic 
 and spurious, the novel liberality, and the spirituality of the other. 
 We do not ask Fenelon, or Pascal, or the Jansenists, or Dr. Doyle, 
 or Mr. Butler, what Romanism is, any more than we put that ques- 
 tion to certain infimious Spanish Jesuits of the seventeenth century; 
 but to turn to the popes and the authentic doctors of the middle ages. 
 The principles avowed by these high authorities, and the practices 
 founded upon those principles, are consistent one with another ; are 
 necessary parts of the great ecclesiastical theory ; and are such as 
 must, in every age, be professed and followed by the Romish Church, 
 where she enjoys full liberty, and is not compelled to adapt herself to 
 political necessities. Protestantism annihilated, and princes once 
 more brought down to their place, as the obedient sons and champions 
 of the Church, and then this Church would be, and rnnsl be, the very 
 same in spirit and in practice that it was in the twelfth and thirteenth 
 centuries. In truth a modern catholic country, as for example, Spaiu, 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 345 
 
 Ireland, or Belgium, would altogether gain, as much as it would lose, 
 in exchanging iji/ra-Lutheran, for*wp-a-Lutheran Catholicism. That 
 which makes modern popery more tolerable, and in some respects 
 less pernicious to a people than ancient popery was, is precisely that 
 admixture of better notions which it has furtively obtained from Pro- 
 testantism. But all such mitigations and corrections the consistent 
 Romanist must regard as adulterations, and must wish to exclude 
 and repel. The Romish Church can never admit the maxim — " fas 
 est ab hoste doceri." 
 
 The author will now present to the reader some few promiscuous 
 passages from authors who, if any, are to be deemed aiithoriiies in 
 Romanism — Romanism in its best times. We take three illustri- 
 ous churchmen, contemporaries, and the most noted and honoured of 
 the papal champions ; two of them popes, and one the spiritual father 
 of a pope, namely. Innocent III., Gregory IX., and St. Bernard. (In 
 quoting the Epistles of Innocent III., the author takes the Paris edi- 
 tion, 16S2, of S. Baluzius : for Gregory IX. — the Decretals, Leyden, 
 1584, ad exemplar Romanum diligentur recognitae: for St. Bernard 
 — Mabillon's edition, Paris, 1690.) 
 
 The expositors of prophetic symbols have ordinarily assumed that 
 the secular authority was typified by the sun, and the ecclesias- 
 tical by the moon ; but Innocent III. reverses these emblems. Sicut 
 universitatis conditor Deus duo magna lummaria in firmamento ccefi 
 constituit, luminare majus, ut prasesset diei, et luminare minus, u6 
 nocti prreesset ; sic ad ifirmamentum universalis Ecclesia;, quae coeli 
 nomine nuncupatnr, duas magnas instituit dignitates, majorem, qu© 
 quasi diebus animabus prreesset, etminorem, quae quasi noctibus prr^ 
 esset corporibus : qu?e sunt pontificalis auctoritas, et regalis potcstas. 
 Porro sicut luna lumen suum a sole sortitur, quce re vera minor est 
 illo quantitate simul et qualitate, situ pariter eteffectU; sic regahs 
 potestas ab auctoritate, pontificali sure sortitur dignitatis splendorem; 
 cujus conspectui qiianto magis inhreret, tanto minori lumine decora- 
 tur, et quo plus ab ejus elongatur aspectu, eo plus proficit in splen- 
 dore. Utaque vero protestas sive primatus sedem in Italia meruit 
 obtinere, quse dispositione divina super tmiversas provincias obtinuit 
 principatum. Et ideo licet universas provincias nostrae provisionis 
 aciem extendere debeamus, specialiter tamen Italia? paterna nos con- 
 venit solicitudine providere, in qua Christianre religionis fundamen- 
 tum extitit, et per apostolicoe sedis primatum sacardotii simul et regni 
 prreminet principatus. — Tom. i. p. 235. 
 
 This point of the superiority of the sacerdotal and pontifical dig- 
 nity, as compared with the secular and regal, this pope urges in a 
 similar style upon the Emperor Alexius, who had imposed certain 
 humiliations upon the patriarch and clergy of Constantinople, and 
 had presumed to make clerical persons amenable to the civil au- 
 thority. Gluod autem sequitur (1 Peter ii. 13) Regi tanqiiam pr^cel- 
 lenti, non negamus quin praecellat in temporahbus Imperator, illis 
 dumtaxat qui ab illo recipiunt temporalia. Sed Pontifex in spiritu- 
 Rlibus antecellit, quae tanto sunt temporalibus digniora quanto corpo- 
 ri est anima prseferenda. It was thus that, on the ground of the in- 
 finite superiority of religious interests, the Papacy reared its claim 
 
346 APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 
 
 to exercise a paramount authority on earth, and actually trampled 
 on the neck of kings. Innocent goes on to convict Alexius of his er- 
 ror in presuming to touch clerical criminals with the secular sword ; 
 and his method of expounding Scripture might make one believe that 
 he had leai-ned theology in the school of the Rabbis, duod autem 
 sequitur ad vindictum malefactorum, laudem vero bonorum, intelligen- 
 dum non est quod Rex vel imperaior super omnes et bonos et malos 
 potestatem acceperit, sed in eos solummodo qui utentes gladio, ejus 
 sunt jurisdictioni commissi, juxta quod Veritas ait: omnes qui accepe- 
 rint gladium, gladio peribunt. Non enim potest aut debet quisquam 
 servum alterius judicare, cum servus suo domino, secundiam Aposto- 
 lum, stet aut cadat. Ad id etiam induxistiquod licet Moses et Aaron 
 
 secundiim carnem fratres extiterint, &c Dictum est etiam in 
 
 lege divina ; Diis non detrafies, et principem populi tui non maledices. 
 Ctuae Sacerdotes Regibus anteponens, istos deos et iilos principes ap- 
 pelavit. Praeterea nosse debueras quod fecit Deusduo; — and here 
 follows the same same illustration, as above, drawn from the two ce- 
 lestial luminiaries .... Hoc autem si prudenter attenderit imperato- 
 ria celsitudo, non faceret aut permit teret venerabilem fratrem Patri- 
 archam Constantinopolitanum, magnum quidem et honorabile mem- 
 brum Ecclesiae, juxta scabellum pedum tuorum in sinistra parte se- 
 dere, cum alii Regcs et Principes Archiepiscopis et Episcopis suis, 
 sicut debent, reverenter assurgant, et cis juxta se honorabilem sedem 
 assignent. Nam et piissimus Constnntinus quantum honoris exhi- 
 buerit Sacerdotibus, tua sicut credmius prudentia non ignorat. This 
 is much in the style in which Ambrose of Milan was wont to school 
 Theodosius. We m;\y mention, in illustration of the grievance of 
 which, as it seems, theConstantinopolitan Patriarch had complained, 
 that the illuminated Greek codices of the tenth and following centu- 
 ries, not unfrequently represent the emperor on his throne, receiving, 
 with condescension, a copy of the book from a bishop or presbyter, 
 who reverentially inclines his head in offering it to the imperial hand. 
 This sort of obeisance and submission, on the part of the clergy to- 
 wards monarchs, was found only in the eastern empire; or very 
 rarely in the west. 
 
 Innocent, who thus asserts the rights of his brother of Constanti- 
 nople, when the general credit of the priesthood is involved, vehe- 
 mently assails the same brother on the point of the supremacy of 
 Rome, and calls upon him, as he values his s:\lvation, to submit to 
 the chair of St. Peter. So in his letter (353) to the Greek Emperor, 
 and in the one which follows to the patriarch. Rcprobata quondam 
 propter ingratitudinis vjtium perfidia Judeeorum, el oblato synagogae 
 (quia non cognovit tempusvisitationis suce) libello repudii, unam sibi 
 Ecclesiam ex gentibus congregatam,non habentem maculem neque 
 rugam, Dominus noster elegit, juxta quod legitur in Canticis Canti- 
 
 corum, Una est electa mea, sponsamea, imwaculalamea Hoca u- 
 
 tem Graecorum populus non attendens, aliam sibi confinxit Ecclesiam 
 (si tamen quae prreter unam est, Ecclesia sit dicenda) et ab Apostoli- 
 cce sedis unitate recessit, necconstitutonem Domini nee Petri magiste- 
 rium imitatus, et inconsutilem vestum Domini, cui crucifixorum ma- 
 nus in aliarum vestium divisione pepercit, scindere usque hodie, lic^t 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 347 
 
 frustra, conatur; non attendens quod una tantum extitit area, intra 
 quam sub uno rectore quicunque tuerunt, leguntur in cataclismo sal- 
 vaLi : qui autem extra ipsam inventi sunt, omnes in deluvio perierunt 
 Cluia igitur id in scandalem nostrum et fidei Chrislianie redundat 
 dispendium, nee jam possumus vitare clamores Ecclesiae generalis 
 quaj nosei proedecessores nostros negliagenlffi ac tarditatis redarguit 
 monemus frat. tu vm et exhor. in Domino, per Apostolica tibi scripta 
 mandantes, quatenus omnimodam solicitudinem et efficacem operara 
 intcrponas, ut Graicorum luiiversitas redeat ad Ecclesiae unitatem, 
 et ad matrem filia revertata, et fiat juxta verbum Dominifunum ovile, 
 et unus Pastor To all tliis the patriarch replies with spi- 
 rit and humility : — Et indulge mihi, saeerrime Papa si nunc primo 
 hunc patriarchalem sacrum chronum me ascendentem, nondum de 
 tali hoc dubiatatione diligentum solutionem addiscere accidit .... 
 Bat his argument, which indeed exhibits much good sense, is met by 
 Innocent with manifold reasons, of which the following may serve as 
 a specimen ; — Petro non soliam universam Ecclcsiam sed totum reli- 
 quit seculem gubernandum. Cluod ex eo etiam evidenter apparet, 
 quia cum Dominus apparuisset in littore discipulis naviganiibus, 
 sciens Petrus quod Dominus esset se misit in mare, ac aliis navigio 
 venientibus, ipse sine beneficio navis ad Dominum festinavit. Ciim 
 enim mare mundum designet, juxta verbum Psalmistre dicentis. Hoc 
 mare magtium et spatioswn, illic repWia quorum non est nmntrus ; per 
 hoc quod Petrus se misit in mare, priviligum expressit pontificii sin- 
 gularis, per quod universum orbem svTsceperat gubernandum; cete- 
 ris Apostolis ut vehiculo nivis contentis, cum nulli eorum uoiversus 
 fuerit orbis commissus, sed singulus singulre provincice vel Ecclesiae 
 potiijs deputatae. Iterum etiam ut se unicum Christi Vicarium de- 
 signaret, ad Dominum super aquas riiaris mirabiliter ambulan- 
 tem et ipse super aquas maris' mirabiliter ambulavit. Nam cura 
 aquce multre sint populi multi, congregationes que aquarum sint ma- 
 ria, per hoc quod, Petrus super aquas maris incessit, super universos 
 populos se potestatem accepiisse monstravit .... Sane cum per 
 navem Petri Ecclesiafigurelur, tunc Petrus juxta prreceptum domi- 
 nicum navim duxit in altum, laxans prsedicationis retia in capturam, 
 ciim ibi posuit Eccles.ie principatum ubi vigebat secularis potentiae 
 altitude et imperialis monarchia residebat, cui fere singulee nationes 
 sicut flumina mari tributa solvebant certis temponbus constituta. 
 Much of the same sort follows; and the paternal epistle ends with a 
 peremptory and threatening summons, requiring the Conslantino- 
 politan patriarch to attend a general council, to be holden at Rome, 
 and there to do homage to St Peter's chair. 
 
 Frivolous as we must think the arguments of Innocent, his conclu- 
 sions were full of a tremendous meaning, and while he spoke as a 
 lamb, he ruled the world as a lion. Indeed, apart from the comment 
 whicli history furnishes upon documents of tnis sort, one might im- 
 agine some of these haughty and sanguinary Pontiffs to have been 
 patterns of humility and gentleness. Even those bulls and edicts 
 ■which, in their effect, deluged kingdoms with blood, are moderate in 
 languagp, and breathe a placid and sci-ip:ural fervour. In making our 
 acquaintance with certain illustrious and zealous churchmen, ^irsf, 
 
34S APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 
 
 through the medium of history, and afterwards by consulting their 
 extant writings, a Uvely surprise is felt in finding that men, whose 
 hands we know to have reeked blood, were, in their Epistles and 
 their homilies, so honey-mouthed and saint-like. Every reader of 
 history knows what practical interpretation Innocent put upon the 
 simple fact of Peter's leaving his fishing tackle and dragging his boat 
 ashore, and that it meant nothing less than that his successors, turn- 
 ing away from purely spiritual cares, might make themselves 
 universal lords of the bodies as well as souls of men. This abso- 
 hite secular sovereignty is an essential element of the papal theory. 
 It is only as universal despot that the Vicar of Christ can fulfil his 
 functions, and effectively rule the household of faith. Modern con- 
 cessions on this point are only so many inconsistencies, that must be 
 redeemed and obliterated when the time comes for building up anew 
 the tabernacle of St. Peter. 
 
 Innocent III. well knew that, although in some of his measures he 
 might go beyond the line of his predecessors, he did not a whit trans- 
 gress in principle and doctrine, what they had uniformly professed. 
 The unbounded and absolutely irresponsible authority of the pope 
 had centuries before, been maintained in the most explicit terms. 
 Culpas (Papae) redarguere praesumit mortalium nullus; quia cunc- 
 tos ipse judicaturus a nemine est judicandus. Boniface the Martyr, 
 Et ex annalibus Francorum, ex Anostasio, et ex sacris rilibus Ro- 
 mance Ecclest proditum est in concione quam Romoe convocavit 
 Carolus Magnus, Rex Galliarum, ad examinanda objecta in Leo- 
 nem Poutificem Maximum, A rchiepiscopos, Episcopos, et Abbates 
 unanimiter dixisse; nos sedem Apostolicam, quoe est caput omnium 
 Dei Ecclesiarum, judicare non audemus, nam ab ipsa omnes et vica- 
 rio suo judicamur , ipsa autem a nemine judicatur. 
 
 In his procedens, (that is in gems and silks,) says St. Bernard, 
 addressing his pontifical son and pupil, Eugene III., tectus auro, 
 vectus equoalbo, stipatusmilite, circumstrependibus septus iiiinistris, 
 successisti non Petro, sed Constantino. Consulo toleranda pro tem- 
 pore, non affectanda pro debito. Ad ea te potius incito quorum te 
 scio debitorem. Etsi purpuratus, etsi deauratus incidens, non est 
 tamen quod horreas operam curamve pastoralem pastoris, non est 
 qnod erubesces evangelium. Gtuamquam si volens evangelizes, inter 
 apostolos quidem etiam gloria est tibi. Evangelizare pascere est. 
 Fac opus evangelists et pastoris opus implesti. Dracones, inquis, 
 me mones pascere et scorpiones, non oves ; propter hoc, inquam ma- 
 gis ajrgredere eos ; sed verbo, non ferro. Gluid tu denuo usurpare 
 gl?vdium tentes, quem semel jussus es ponere invaginam? Cluem 
 tamen qui tuum negat, non satis mihi videtur attendere verbum Do- 
 mini dicentis ; converte gladium tuum in vaginam. Tuus ergo et 
 ipse, tuo forsilan nutu ; et si non tua mami evaginandus. Alioquin si 
 nuUo modo ad te pertineret, et is dicentibus apostolis ; ecce gladii 
 dure hie ; non respondissit Dominus ; Satis est ; sed, nimis est. Uter- 
 que ergo Ecclesice et spirituvdis scilicet gladius, et materialis, sed is 
 quidem pro Ecclesia ; ille vero et ab Ecclesia exerendus est. Ille 
 sacerdotis ; is militis manu ; sed sane ad nutum, sacerdotis, &c. — 
 De Consideratione. 
 
 Here was this seraphic monk, and we must believe him to have 
 
Al>PENDlX TO SECTION VII. S4^ 
 
 feeeYi a good man, giving warrant for that nod at which kings and 
 barons drew their swords — the sword of the Church, and which was 
 not to be sheathed until rivers of blood had sodden the soil, both of 
 the East and the West. The hoirors which history has connected with 
 the pontificate of Innocent being put out of view, one might be 
 amused with the ingenuity of his perversions of Scripture. The 
 severities put in force against the French heretics having compelled 
 them to conceal their Bibles and their meetings, with the utmost care, 
 this pope enjoins the clergy of the infected districts to beware of such 
 works of darkness. The study of holy Scripture is, indeed, he says, 
 in itself commendable ; but not the profanation of Scripture by its 
 coming into the hands of the common people ; — *' it was not for beasts 
 to touch the mount of God." Unde recte fuit olim in lege divina 
 statutum ut bestia cpire montem tetigerat, lapidetur ; ne videlicet 
 simplex et indoctus prresumat ad sublimitatem Scripturffi sacrre per- 
 tingere, vel earn aliis prredicare. It appears that certain of these 
 heretics (Albigenses) having got possession of the Scriptures in their 
 own tongue, and become fomiliar with apostolic Christianity, had 
 presumed to hold disputations with some of the Catholic clergy, and 
 had confounded these unlearned clerks. This was an evil not to be 
 endured. Non est tamen simplicibus sacerdotibus etiam a scholasti- 
 cis detrahendum, cum in eis sacerdotale ministerium debeathonorari. 
 Propter quod Dominus in lege prsecepit, Diis non detrahes, sacer- 
 dotes intelligens, qui propter excellentiam ordinis et officii dignitatem 
 deorum nomine nuncupantur. These and other evils having been 
 mentioned and reproved, Innocent lovingly entreats those to wliorn 
 he writes to forsake all such fUse ways, and concludes— Q.uia nisi 
 correctionem nostram et admonitionem paternam receperitis humili- 
 ter et devote, nos, post oleum infundemus et vinum, severitatem 
 ecclesiasticum apponentes ; ut qui noluerint obedire spontanei, 
 disc ait acquiescere vel inviti. — Tom. i. p. 434. 
 
 The epistle which follows the one just quoted, exhibits far more 
 moderation than our historical notion of this pontiff would lead us to 
 expect; indeed, this comparative miidness, as we have already said, 
 pervades most of his betters. It is to the fundamental principle and 
 theory of the Papacy, rather than to the individual ferocity of popes, 
 that we are to attribute the sanguinary measures by which, from age 
 to age, it has been sustained Very many of these epistles, which, 
 in f\cr, carried fire and sword into provinces, contain little but what 
 might be looked for in the pastoral advices of some mild and enlight- 
 ened Irish Catholic bishop of the present day. A reference to these 
 epistles, and to other Avritings of the same class, is to be made, not 
 because Ave may thence draw startling and characteristic specimens 
 of turgid comminations and thundering anathemas ; but rather on 
 accouiU of the suavity, the calmness, and the pateiaial dignity and 
 solicitude Avhich they display. Read the melancholy story of Ray- 
 mond, Count of Toulouse, and then turn to the epistUs of Innocent 
 III., and from a comparison of the one with the other, learn what is 
 th i't system which, while it breathes soft whispers of love, slips the 
 doGS of cruelty to gorge on human flesh. 
 
 iX^evertheless, when the occasion was urgent, Innocent so expressed 
 
 30 
 
$50 APPENDIX TO SECTION VII, 
 
 his meaning as to leave no room to doubt what were his intentions. 
 The readei- may take a specimen of this son ; it occurs in the epistle 
 that was carried by Rainerius and Guido to the bisliop and nobles 
 of Languedoc. Inter quos (hojreticos) in provincia vestra quosdam, 
 qui Vaidenses, Catari, el Paterini dicunlur, et ahos quoshbet qui- 
 buscunque nominibus appeilatos, in tantum jam accepimus pullu- 
 lasse, ut innumeros populos sui erroris laqueis inetieiini, et fermento 
 coi-rui^erint folsitatis. Cum igitur ad copiendas hujusmodi vulpes 
 parvulas, quce demoliuntur vineam Domini f^abaoth, species quideni 
 habenles diversas, sed caudas ad invicem colligatas, quia de vanitate 
 conveniunt in id ipsum, utvergaMoysi maleticorium phantasmata 
 devoret, dilectum filium fratrem, Rainerium, virum probaise vita3 et 
 eonversationis honesiBs, poteniemdivino muncve in opere et seimone, 
 ac cum eo dilectum filium fratrem Guidonem, virum Deum timen- 
 tem, et slvidentem operibus charitatis, ad partes ipsas duxerimus 
 deslinandos ; fraternitati veslrte per apostolica scripta mandamus, 
 et dislricte praecipimus quatenus eos benigno recipientes et tractan- 
 tes affectu, taliter eis contra haireticos asLisiaLis, ut per ipsos ab er- 
 rore viae suae revocentur ad Dominum ; et si qui forte converti non 
 poLerant, ne pars sync era trahatur, de veslrJs finibus excludantur ; 
 ut terra vestra hujusmodi minisiris Sathanag penitus eifugatis, ver- 
 bum praedicationis vestrae gratanter recipial, et erit fructuni tempc- 
 ribus suis .... Ad haec, nobilibus viris Principibus, Comitibus, et 
 universis Baronibus et Magnatibus in vestra provincia constitutis 
 proecipiendo mandamus, et in remissjonem injungimus peccatorum, 
 ut ipsos benigne recipitntes pariter et devote, eis contra hasreticos 
 tam viriliter et potent er assisla)it, ut ad vindictam malefactorum, 
 laudem vero bonorum, potestalem sibi traditam probentur laudabili- 
 ter, exercere, et si qui heereticorum ab errore suo ccmmoniti nolue- 
 rint resipiscere, postquam per piaedictum fratrem Rainerium fuerint 
 excommunicationis senteniia innodati, eorum bona confiscent, et de 
 terra sua proscribant. Et si post interdictum ejus in terra ipsorum 
 praesumpserint commorari, graviiis animadvertant in eos, sicut decet 
 Principes Christianos, ut area foederis praecedente cum tubis, ac 
 Josue sequente cum populis, utrisque pariter conclamantibus, muri 
 corrunnt Jericho, fiatque perpetuum anathema ; ita quod si quis de 
 illo vel regulam auream furari praesumserit, cum Achan filio Carmi 
 lapidibus obruatur. Dedimus autem dicto fratri R. liberam faculta- 
 tem ut eos ad id per excomnmnicationis sententiam et interdictum 
 terrae appellatione remota compellat : neo volumus ipsos aegre ferre 
 aliquatenus vel moleste si eos ad id exequendum tam distincte com- 
 pelli praecipimus, ciim ad nil amplius intendamus uti severitatis judi- 
 cio, quam ad exterpaiidos hasreticos qui non nobis substantiam tem- 
 poralem sed spiritualem vitam surripere moliuntur. Nam qui fidem 
 adimit, vitam furatur. Justus enim ex fide vivii.— Tom, i. p. 51. 
 
 This is the genuine logic of the Pvomish Church, and from which 
 it can never depart without flagrant inconsistency. " The just shall 
 live by faith ;" to rob a people, then, of their faith, is to rob them of 
 life—life eternal ; and these plunderers and destroyers of souls, the 
 heretics, ought, without mercy, to be extirpated. Nor the heretics 
 tliemselves only, but Avhoever favours, shelters, or pities them. Con- 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 351 
 
 tra defensores, rcceptatores, fautores, et credentes haereticorum, Inno- 
 cent promulgates his edict of excommunication, confiscation, banish- 
 ment, deprivation ; declaring all such hearers or receivers of heretics 
 to be incapable of public offices, incompetent to bequenth their effects, 
 or to inherit, to give evidence in courts, or to sue others for their 
 right, or to defend themselves from wrong or violence. Pity shown 
 to such was treason against the Lord ; ciim longe sit gravius reternam 
 quam temporalem Ifcdere majestatem. The modern apologists of 
 the Papacy, who pretend that these severities belonged to the times, 
 not to the system, should show that they are inconsistent with that 
 system, and that the doctrines advanced in the worst ages, in rela- 
 tion to the enemies of the Church, have not been professed uniformly 
 by the Church. The contrary is most certainly true ; for there is 
 nothing in the Epistles of Innocent IIL, which may not be sustained 
 by the language of all eminent churclmien of the seven or eight pre- 
 ceding centuries. 
 
 The Decretals of Gregory IX. embody the principles of the Pa- 
 pacy, and the decisions of the most eminent of the pontiffs ; and they 
 present, in a compact form, as well the spirit as the usages of the 
 Romish Church, such as it was in its briglitest era. The very words 
 of Augustine, and other distinguished fathers, of Leo I., Gregory I., 
 Gregory VII., and of the Urbans, Adrians, and Innocents, are here 
 adopted and incorporated, so as to form a consistent mass of autho* 
 ritative rules, for the guidance of the Church Universal. It is to this 
 collection, much rather than to the writings of modern Romanists, 
 that we should look for the idea of the papal superstition. These 
 Decretals exhibit the Christianity of Europe, such as it was from tho 
 time of the withdrawment of the Imperial court from Italj'-, until the 
 breaking out of the Lutheran Reformation ; and such as it is in all 
 ages and countries, and must be Avhile its fundamental principles are 
 adhered to. Romish Christianity has stooped to conquer in India, 
 it has stooped in China, it has stooped in France, and it stoops in 
 Ireland ; but Romish Christianity is itself unaltered and unalterable; 
 nothing can be more idle than to talk of it as essentially amended. 
 
 A very few specimens from the massive volume of the Decretals 
 may be enough for the reader ; and we may take them promis- 
 cuously. 
 
 Towards Saracens and Jews, the Church often showed a degree 
 of tenderness ; and professed that their error was far less virulent 
 than that of Christian heretics. The Decretals of Gregor)'- contain 
 many provisions in favour of the Jews, and in fact secure to them 
 what might be called — toleration. Heretics were to be dealt with in 
 a different manner. Excommunicamus itaque, et anathematizamus 
 omnem hreresim, extollentem se adversus banc sanctam., orthodoxani 
 et Catholicam fidem, quam superius exposuimus; condemnantes hse- 
 reticos universDs, quibuscunque nominibus censeantur ; facies qui- 
 dem diversas habentes, sed caudas ad invicem colligatas, quia de 
 vanitate conveniunt in id ipsum. This general ana'hema is, under 
 the same head (Titulus VII. de Hcereticis) drawn out and expounded, 
 and applied to various cases and occasions, so as best to secure the 
 purgation of infected districts. The maxims laid down at the com- 
 
3i2 APPENDIX TO SECTION VI f. 
 
 mencement are sucli as these — Dubius in fide, infidelis est. Ne.c eis; 
 omnino credendum est qui fidem veritatis ignorant : and, Clui alios, 
 eura potest, ab errorenon revocat, seipsum errore demonstrat : and, 
 Clui auteminventi fuerint sola suspicione notabiles, nisi juxta consi- 
 derationem suspicionis qualitatem personae, propriam innocentiam 
 congrua purgatione monstraverint,. anatliematis gladio feriatitur, et 
 usque ad satisfactionem condignam ab omnibus evitentur ; ita quod 
 si per annum in excoramunicatione perstiterint, ex tunc velut haj- 
 retici condemnentur : it is moreover as a principle affirmed that, 
 Dominus Papa principem secularera deponere potest, propter 
 Aasresim. 
 
 I'his power of deposing kings may now be disclaimed , but the ar- 
 gument by which, in an epistle to the French king. Innocent main- 
 tains it, involves no assumption whatever which the consistent Ro- 
 manist can disown. The infinite importance of religious interests, 
 and the universal pastoral authority of the pope, and the sacred obli- 
 gation he is under to uphold and preserve the true faith, at whatever 
 cost or peril, leave him at no liberty to do otherwise than depose (if 
 he has the power to do so) an heretical prince. To refrain from ex- 
 erting this power would be to partake of the sin, and to share the 
 damnation of the heretic. If popes do not noAv depose heretical 
 princes, it is for the simple reason that heretical princes will not now 
 be so deposed. 
 
 These Decretals reject indignantly the allegation that popes are 
 subject, in any sense, to the decrees of councils: — Cluasi Romance 
 Ecclesise legem concilia ulla pr?efixerint : cum omnia concilia per Ro- 
 mance Ecclesire auctoritatem et facta sint, et robur acceperint, et in 
 eorimi statutis Romani Pontificis patenter excipiatur auctoritas : and 
 in the same style they exclude the interference of princes in church 
 affairs. Porro cum laicis nulla sit de spiritualibus concedendi vel dis- 
 ponendi facultas; Imperialis eoncessio quantumcunque generaliter 
 fiat, neminem potest a solutione decimarum eximere, quae divina con- 
 stitutione debentur. After the annointing of bishops at their conse- 
 cration has been described, and the reasons and the scriptural autho- 
 rity of every pai-t of the ceremony has been given, it is added — Unde 
 in Veteri Testamento non solum ungebatur sacerclns, sed. etiam rex 
 et propheta: sicut in libro Regum, Dominus prnecepit HelitC .... 
 Sed ubi Jesus Nazarenus (quem unxit Deus Spiritu Sancto, sicut in 
 Actibus Apostolorura legitur) unctus est oleo pietatis, prae consorti- 
 bus suis, qui secundum Apostolum est caput Ecclesire, quoe est cor- 
 pus ipsius, principls unctio a capite ad brachium est translata ; ut 
 princeps extunc ungatur non in capite, sed in brachio, sive humero, 
 velinarmo: in quibus principatus congrue designatur, juxta iilud 
 quod legitur: factus est principatus super humerum ejus, &c. Ad 
 quod etiam significandum Samuel fecit poni armum ante Saul, cui 
 dederat locum in capite ante eos, qui fuerunt invitati. In capite vero 
 pontificis sacramentalis est dolibutio conservata; quia personam ca- 
 pitis in pontificali officio repraesentat. Refert autem inter pontificis. 
 et principis unctionem: qui caput pontificis chrismate consecratur, 
 brachium vero principis oleo delinitur- ut ostendatur quanta sit difX 
 ferentia auctoritatem pontificis et principis potestatem^. 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 353 
 
 The pontifical superiority herein, and in many other of these De- 
 cretals, claimed over secular princes, is not a prerogative stretched, 
 or a dignity usurped; but a necessary consequence of the character- 
 istic principle of the Papacy, and it is involved in what we have 
 stated as the first element of its theory, namely, the infinite import- 
 ance of whatever relates to religion ; and by inference, the subordi- 
 nation of whatever is temporal and earthly. A very large portion 
 6f this collection of decisions lays down the law concerning that con- 
 trol oTer persons, property, and ciril privileges, which the Church 
 assumed to exert, on the ground of her cognizance of morals. The 
 canon law, as here exhibited, touched, directly or remotely, almost 
 every interest and every transaction of common life; nothing was 
 actually exempted from sacerdotal interference ; the Church was not 
 merely the highest authority on earth, but ihe only authority, so far 
 as she chose to express and exert her will. Of the power assumed by 
 the pontiffs, as guardians of truth, the Decretals concerning heretics 
 afford evidence enough that it extended to the inmost movements of 
 the soul, and that it sustained itself by the right to inflict, at discre- 
 tion, the most extreme penalties, affecting the posterity of the guilty, 
 as well as themsclvfe, and including the subversion of any govern- 
 ment that opposed itself to the pajDal will. Let it be remembered 
 that this absolute despotism of the Church, in the twelfth century, 
 •was nothing more than the digested and fully expressed despotism, 
 the origin of which we must look for among the records of almost 
 the earliest times of the Church. 
 
 But it remains to adduce a few passages from that eminent and 
 eloquent champion of the Church, St. Bernard, whose personal in- 
 fluence, in his times, and whose spirited and impassioned writings, 
 contributed more than the influence or writings, perhaps, of any 
 other individual whatever to animate, invigorate, and recommend 
 the papal tyranny and the Romish superstition. 
 
 One passage we have already quoted : in quoting another which 
 may properly follow it, we owe to St. Bernard the justice to say that, 
 though included in his works, its genuineness is questioned by his 
 learned editor. Quamtam dignitatem contulit vobis (pastoribus) 
 Deus, quanta est pvrerogativa ordinis vestri! Prtetulit vos Deus re- 
 gibus et imperatoribus ; prretulit ordinem vestrum omnibus ordini- 
 bus, immo (ut altius loquar) prretulit vos angelis et archangelis, 
 thronis ct dominatiouibus. Sicut enirn non angelos, sed semen Abra- 
 ham apprehendit ad faciendam redcmptionem : sic non angelis, sed 
 hominibus, solisque sacerdotibus, Dominici corporis et sanguinis 
 commisit consecrationem. Omnes enim, sicut ait Apostolus, &o. 
 Sed longe excellentius est offlcium vestrum, quod admirabile est, et 
 non solum in occulis vestris, sed etiam angelorum. 
 
 The following is from his undisputed epistles; and is part of a let- 
 ter of affected surprise and remonstrance, on learning that his pupil 
 had been elected pope: it is addressed. Ad totam Curiam Romananft, 
 quando elegerunt Abbatem S. Anastasii in Papam Eugenium. , 
 
 Cluid igitur rationis seu consilii habuerit, defuncto summo Ponti- 
 fice, repente irruere in hominem rusticanum, latenti injicere manus, 
 ct excussa e manibus securi et ascia vel ligone, in palatium traherc, 
 
 30* 
 
354 APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 
 
 levare In catliedram, induere purpura et bysso, accingere gladic ad 
 faciendam vindictam in nationibiis, increpationes in populis, ad alli^ 
 gandos reges eorum in compedibus, el nobileseoruni in manicis fere- 
 is? Sic non erat inter vos sapiens eL exercitatus, cui potius ista con- 
 venfrent? Ridiculum profeclo videtur, pannosum homuncionem as- 
 sumi ad praesidendum Principibus, ad imperandum Episcopis, ad 
 regna et imperia disponenda. Ridiculum, an miraculum? Plane 
 unum horam. Non nego, non diffido posse fuisse hoc eliam opus 
 Dei, qui facit mirabilia magna solus: prresertim cum audiam usque- 
 
 queque ex ore multorum, quaniam a Domino factum est istud 
 
 Ita inquam, ita et de nostro Eugenio in beneplacito Domini potuit 
 contigisse. 
 
 In the epistle which follows, to his sp'rftual son, and now his 
 ** Father and Lord," St. Bernard says he had waited, expecting a 
 messenger who should have conveyed the authentic tidings of his 
 elevation, saying — "Joseph, thy son, liveth,and is become lord of all 
 the land of Egypt." Congratulations and wai-nings are added, and 
 the pious wish that his son might fulfil the desires of the Churchy in 
 the plucking up of spurious plants. Ad hoc enim constiiutus es super 
 gentes et regna, ut evellas, et destruas, et cedi%es, et planles. On 
 what principle the pontifical authority was to be exercised he soon 
 finds occasion to declare; Et ut planius quod loquimur fiat, peremp- 
 toriam dare sententiam ad depositionem Episcoporum, solius Roma- 
 ni pontificis noscitur esse, pro eo nimirum quod etsi alii multi vccati 
 sunt in partem solicitudinis, solus ipse plenitudinem habeat potesta- 
 tis. Solus proinde, si dicere audeam, in culpa est si culpa non feri- 
 tur, quoe ferienda est ; et eo impetu, quo fuerit fenenda. duo auteni 
 impetu, non dico ferienda, sed fulminanda fuerit prcedicti Eboracen- 
 sis culpa, vestrae conscientise derelinquo. Ceterum quod factuin non 
 est, vobis credimus reservatum, ut Lii eo experiatur Eccksia Dei, cui 
 ipso auctore prreestis, fervorem zeli vestri, potentiam brachii vestri, 
 et animi sapientiam : et timeat omnis populus sacerdotem Domini, 
 audiens sapientiam Dei esse in illo ad facieiidum judicium. 
 
 In giving various advices to his pontifical son, St. Bernard reminds 
 him that there is " none on earth iireater than himself," and that one 
 must go out of the world to find any thing that does not, or that 
 ought not, to come under his control. Ego enim reor, quod sicut 
 illic Seraphim et Cherubim, et ceteri quique usque ad angelos et 
 archangelos, ordinantur sub uno copite Den ; ita hie quoque sub uno 
 summo pontifice primates vel patriarchs, archiepiscopi, episcopi^ 
 presbyteres, vel abbates et reliqui in hunc mcdum. And yet what 
 was the actual character of the seat and centre of this heaven-de- 
 scended and spiritual hierarchy ? Hear St. Bernard, writing to a 
 pope. Scio ubi habitas; (is this an allusion to Rev. ii. 13?) increduli 
 et subversores sunt tecum. Lupi, non oves sunt: talium tamen tu 
 pastor : and ofthe ecclesiastics of the papal court; Sed nee tuta tibi 
 tua bonitas obsessa malis, non magis quam snnitas, vicino serpents 
 .'. . . . Sed sive levent, sive gravent, cui rectius imputandum quam. 
 tibi, qui taltes aut elegisti, aut admissisti. Non de omnibus dico; 
 nam sunt quos non elegisti, sed ipsi tc To wit— the college of car- 
 dinals* 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 355 
 
 St. Bernard is always labouring with the vast idea of the Romish 
 hierarchy — a supernatural scheme, embracing all things, and stand- 
 ing as the means of immediate connexion between heaven and earth — 
 the chain between time and eternity. To bring the reality up to the 
 ideal, was the fond object of his fervent endeavours. With this view 
 he aimed at several great purposes, namely : — to re-animate the 
 Church generally, by a new infusion of elevated and impassioned 
 sentiments ; and his writings are indeed admirably adapted to effect 
 such a renovation: — to reform the pontifical character, and the papal 
 court; or, as we may say, to cleanse the Augean stable of Rome: — 
 to recover the Holy Land for Christendom, as a means at once of re- 
 moving the infidel power from the vicinity of the Church, and of em- 
 bracing the Greek Church within the arms of that of Rome : and — 
 to remove from the universal fold the scandal and contagion of here- 
 sy. In pursuit of this last object, St. Bernard's conviction that, un- 
 less secured, every other measure was useless, carried him to fright- 
 ful extremities. While following him on this ground, we lose all 
 trace of the Christian, and see only the fiery, we might add, the san- 
 guinary zealot. But his penetrating and politic spirit discerned clear- 
 ly that there v/as no alternative: like Ximenes, and many other il- 
 lustrious Romanists, he felt, in the clearest and most forcible man- 
 ner, the utter inconsistency of any sort of toleration with the first 
 principles of the papacy. To stand by inertly, while the souls of 
 men were catching the contagion of eternal death, or not to arrest 
 the infinite mischief by the most severe means, was the ijreatest ima- 
 ginable sin, on the part of those to whom the spiritual welfire of 
 mankind was entrusted. Twenty passages from St. Bernard niighi 
 soon be adduced in which this sentiment, under different modifica- 
 tions, is expressed; and it is an inseparable element of the papal 
 theory. The great Churchmin of the 12th century knew their 
 ground, and stood upon it boldly : our modern Romanists have sur- 
 rendered every thin^, in disclaiming principles of intolerance. 
 
 In addressing Innocent II., concerning the opinions (heresy) of 
 Peter Abelard, St. Bernard thus writes: Veruni tu, o successor Pe- 
 tri, judiciabis, an debeat habere refugium sedem Petri, qui Petri 
 fidem impugnat. Tu, inquam, amice Sponsi providebis, quomodo 
 liberes sponsam a labiis iniquis, et a lingua dolosa. Sed ut paulo 
 audacius loquarcum domino meo, attende etiam tibi ipsi, amantissi- 
 
 me Pater, et gratise De qua? in te est Suscitavit Deus furorcm 
 
 schismaticorum in tuo tempore, ut tuo opere contererentur Et 
 
 in schismate quidem jam, ut dictum est, Dominus probavit te, et cog- 
 novit te. Sed ne quid desit coronae tuee, in hsereses surrexerunt. 
 Itaque ad consummationem virtutum, et ne quid minus fecisse inve- 
 niamini a magnis Episcopis antecessoribus vestris ; capite nobis Pa- 
 ter amantissime, vulpes quae demoliuntur vineam Domini donee par- 
 vulse sunt; ne, si crescant et multiplicentur, quicquid taUum per vos 
 non fuerit exterminatum, a posteris desperetur. Gluamquam non 
 jam parvulae nee pauculae, sed certe grandiusculae et multae sint, nee 
 nisi in manu forti vel a vobis exterminabuntur. 
 
 Much of the same sort is scattered through his letters and sermons ; 
 the general principle being this, that schismatics and heretics, aftei 
 
356 APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 
 
 resisting argument and persuasion, were, by the aid of the secular 
 power, to be pursued to death, in whatever way might seem the 
 most sure and safe. 
 
 We may here quote, as it occurs, a paragraph from an Epistle of 
 Innocent II. to St. Bernard, who quotes Marcianus : Licet laicus, 
 christianissimus tamen Imperator, calholicee fidei amore succensus, 
 prEedecessori nostro sanctissimo Papae Johanni scribens adversuseos 
 qui sacra mysteria profanare contendunt, inter cetera sic loquitur, 
 dicens ; Nemo clericus, vel militaris, vel alterius cujuslibet conditio- 
 nis, de fide Christiana publice tractare conetur in posterum. Nam 
 injuriam facit judicio reverendissimEe synodi, si quis semel judicata 
 et recte disposita revolvere, et iterum disputare contendit: et in con- 
 temptores hujus legis, tanquam in sacrilegos, paena non deerit, Igi- 
 tur si clericus erit, qui publice tractare de religione ausus fuerit, con- 
 sortio clericorum removebitur. 
 
 Who is not reminded of a passage in "his Majesty's Declaration," 
 prefixed to the Thirty-nine Articles? It is surely not noAv too soon 
 to blot from our national formularies expressions and sentiments pro- 
 per enough to popery, but a scandal to protestantism, and insulting 
 to the feelings and practices of the times. What is there that may 
 be called obsolete, if the arrogant language of spiritual despotism is 
 not so? Obstinately to adhere to what is obsolete, is ourselves to 
 become obsolete ; and nothing else can follow but that we should be 
 left in the rear, and forgotten. 
 
 Page 260. — "A full exliibition of the superstitions of the primitive 
 ages." 
 
 While sending this Appendix to press, the author has received a 
 copy of the learned and very important work of Mr. William Os- 
 burn, jun., on the "Doctrinal Errors of the Apostolical and Early 
 Fathers" — a work than Avhich none could be much more seasonable, 
 or possess a stronger claim to the attention of the clergy of the Estab- 
 lished Church. The author does not take upon him to recommend 
 a book which may well be left to recommend itself; but he avails 
 himself of the opportunity thus to mention it to any of his readers 
 under whose eye it might not otherwise fall. Mr. Osburn and the 
 author have been travelling over the same ground, and each alike 
 has carried with him, not the solicitudes or the prepossessions of a 
 theologian, but the free notions of a Chric;tian layman: — they have 
 moreover reached, on several points, the same general conclusions, 
 and have even happened to express their opinions, more than once 
 or twice, in a phraseology remark:ibly coincident. Mr. Osburn and 
 the author are alike deeply impressed with the melanchol}^ fact of 
 the early and extensive. corruption of Christianity ; both feel the ab- 
 surdity of talking of the purity and spirituality of the pristine 
 Church, and the utter error of dating that corruption from the time 
 of Constantine. Again, both would strongly urge the importance, 
 at the present moment, of learned and ingenuous inquiries concern- 
 ing those false notions and superstitions which, having had their 
 birth in the second century, or sooner, were permitted to live in our 
 reformed Churches ; but which now encumt^r our practical Chris* 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 357 
 
 tianity, confuse our theology, and generate interminable disagree- 
 ments among the clergy. Finally, Mr. Osburn and the author agree 
 in fervently desiring the welfare and perpetuity of the Episcopal and 
 Established Church. 
 
 The author finds however that he would have to except against, 
 or to qualify, some of Mr. Osburn's representations — not indeed as. 
 altogether unfounded, or substantially erroneous; but as being^ 
 either too strongly expressed, or as excluding certain considerations 
 essential to an impartial apprehension of the subject. It is the ele- 
 venth chapter only that the author has yet read (on Ecclesiastical 
 Polity and Persons) and he must profess to think that, in this chap- 
 ter the clerical authority, as asserted by the apostles, is set at too low 
 a mark, or is too vaguely stated; while the clerical assumptions of 
 the Apostolical Fathers — Clement and Ignatius especially, are re- 
 prehended with too little regard to the circumstances of the times. 
 
 The passages cited by Mr. Osburn (or most of them) have again 
 and again been adduced in modern controversy, and are perhaps as 
 familiar tr) general readers as any portion of ancient Christian litera- 
 ture. But what probability has there been that in a controversy 
 such as the one which has rent the church on the subject of clerical 
 power, a perfectly fair use should have been made of them? appealed 
 to on the one side, and the other with a fixed purpose, and with ex- 
 asperated feelings, the evidence has meant any thing and every thing, 
 Mr. Osburn has set this evidence free from certain misrepresenta- 
 tions, but (as the author thinks,) has not well secured it against per- 
 versions of another sort. 
 
 The author (of Spiritual Despotism) has not made the use which 
 might have been expected of the epistles of the Apostolical Fathers,. 
 in exhibiting the rise of church tyranny ; and the sight of Mr. Os- 
 burn's book leads him to explain, briefly, the reasons of his not hav- 
 ing adduced them distinctly, m the fifth Section. In the first place 
 then he must acknowledge a degree of diffidence in relation to the 
 text of certain parts of these venerable remains; — a diffidence per- 
 haps unjustifiable ; but yet such as would make him hesitate in 
 Uirowing the stress of an argument upon particular phrases. This 
 is not the place for critical discussions, and the author simply avows 
 the shade of doubt that rests upon his mind; and he will take occa- 
 sion to express a Avish that some modern scholar, competent to the 
 task, would employ his leisure in so collating analagous passages 
 (and there are many) in the Epistles of the Apostolical Fathers, and 
 in the Apostolic Constitutions, as should serve to render the one as 
 well as the rtiher available, in a satisfactory way, on questions of 
 Christian antiquity. 
 
 But this suspicion, concerning the text of these Fathers, has not 
 been the author's principle reason for not adducing their epistles in 
 illustration of the rise of spiritual despotism. The passages cited by 
 Mr. Osburn are indeed (like almost every thing else in early church 
 literature) liable to serious exceptions; but, in the first place, just- 
 tice demands (justice to these martyr bishops) that we should not 
 read them in the light of the church history of later times. The au- 
 thor is bold to say, that the apparent oflfensiveness of the passages in 
 question results, in a great degree, from a tacit and involuntary as* 
 
358 APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 
 
 sociation of ideas, connecting these same unguarded and too lofty 
 assertions of spiritual authority, with the preposterous sacerdotal 
 arrogance of the bishops of the third and fourth centuries, and of the 
 pontiffs of the tenth and twelfth. Entirely disjoined from this men- 
 tal assimilation, the language of Ignatius is at once lowered several 
 degrees in its import, and is fairly liable only to a moderate repre- 
 hension. Throughout our researches on the field of Christian an- 
 tiquity, this same difficulty o{ setting offfvom the opinions and senti- 
 ments of the men of each age, the ill comment or the abuse which 
 the history of the following times has, in our minds connected there- 
 with, besets us. The author must frankly confess that it has been 
 more than he has been able always, or often to effect, to read the 
 Fathers with the feeling, and in the light of a contemporary, and as 
 if he knew nothing of the history of the age next following that of 
 each writer. 
 
 Furthermore, the author can by no means go so far as some have 
 done, or so fir as Mr. Osburn goes, in attributing the reprehensible 
 language of the Apostolic Fathers to sacerdotal ambition. That 
 this feehng entered into their minds we must not deny ; but yet 
 should fully consider the circumstances of the times before judg- 
 ment is given against them. In what position then did these pas- 
 tors stand ? They had received their appointment from the very 
 hands of the apostles, or the companions of the apostles. There 
 was no room for them to be diffident of their own personal author- 
 ity. To maintain this authority, and to exert it (in the spirit, and 
 Avith the humility of their predecessors) was not merely lawful, but 
 was their solemn duty. At the same time, in many of the Grecian 
 cities, where republican sentiments were rife, the disposition to resist 
 constituted authorities was vehement. The Churches moreover, 
 were set upon by itinerant fanatics of every stamp, Jewish zealots, 
 Platonic dreamers. Gnostics, and philosophists, eastern and western, 
 and the people were but too prone to give ear to these pestilent dis- 
 turbers, and to turn away from those who insisted upon the plain 
 and practical principles of the Gospel. The times predicted by St. 
 Paul had actually come, when men would no longer endure sound 
 doctrine ; but would court those who would tickle their ears with mis- 
 chievous novelties. How should these disorders be composed, or how 
 this tide be rolled bnck ? The apostolic pastors must have felt that 
 every thing was in jeopardy, and the Gospel itself so far as human 
 means were involved, not unlikely to be overpowered and lost. 
 
 In this extremity, for such it must have seemed to them, these pas- 
 tors, no longer furnished, or not ordinarily so, with the weapons of 
 miraculous power, leaned upon authority, rather than upon the 
 direct reasons and motives with which the apostolic writings would 
 have supplied them. It was not strange that they did "so; they 
 could not foresee that they were by this means laying the first stones 
 of the papal pandemonium. The terms in which they affirmed their 
 own powers, and urged the people to implicit submission, though 
 not to be altogether defended, may fairly be exempt from severe 
 blame. Our Lord in addressing his ministers says — " Verily I say 
 unto you whosoever receiveth you, receiveth me ; and he that re*' 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION VII. 359 
 
 ceiveth me, receiveth him that sent mc" — and tlie converse. St. 
 Paul had declared that the Church was "built on the foundation of 
 the apostles and prophets," &c. — a foundation that was to have a 
 superstructure. Now these apostolic pastors rested on the founda- 
 tion as the very next layer of the building ; and they were the men 
 next to those to whom the highest powers had been assigned by the 
 highest authority : they were sent by those whom the Lord had sent, 
 they were those upon whom hands hud been laid, in obedience to 
 St. Paul's instructions — " What thou hast received commit to faith- 
 ful men, who shall be able to teach others also." In what light then 
 must tbey have regarded their own position, and their cause, as op- 
 posed to the pretensions and the seditious endeavours of the false 
 teachers? It is easy to see that they must have felt themselves 
 fully justified in the endeavour to bring back the people to obedience 
 to rightful authority. Every thing was at stake — themselves van- 
 quished by the virulent agitators, and what was likely but that the 
 truth of God should have fallen with them? 
 
 St. Paul, indeed, rejoiced in the preaching of Christ, even by the 
 contentious ; but St. Paul enjoyed the serenity and the assurance 
 proper to an inspired and a miraculously endowed person. Ignatius 
 on his way to martyrdom, had no such tranquillity ; and he felt that 
 he was leaving the field open to wolves and foxes. He was racked 
 by a genuine anxiety for the fate of the Churches. Say, that his no- 
 tions of sacerdotal power were exaggerated, and say, too, that the 
 language he employed v/as of a kind which his less worthy and 
 more ambitious successors would be sure to abuse. Let all this be 
 granted, and yet we dare not hale the martyr to the tribunal of mo- 
 dern notions, as the guilty originator of spiritual despotism. 
 
 The author well knows he might have made a great show in the 
 section on the First Steps of Spiritual Despotism, with the epistles 
 of Ignatius and Polycarp ; but he has refrained from doing so ; and 
 must leave it to his intelligent and competent readers to decide whe- 
 ther he has herein betrayed and impoverished his argument, or only 
 shown a deserved indulgence to the companions of the apostles, and 
 the martyr-bishops of the first age. 
 
 The author may take this opportunity to state why he has not ad- 
 duced a specimen of the many striking instances of sacerdotal arro- 
 gance that might be gathered from the apocryphal writings of the 
 third and fourth centuries. The Apostolic Constitutions he has, 
 indeed, referred to reservedly ; but has not brought forward the 
 Canon'' of the Apostles, the Recognitions of Clement, or the Clemen- 
 tine Homilies. It is not that these compositions do not contain an 
 abundance of available evidence ; but to make use of it safely is an 
 affair of no small difficulty. Critical and historical inquiries of the 
 most intricate sort, ought to precede any such appeal to them ; and 
 the author is far from professing himself master of this branch of 
 learning. Moreover he is of opinion that these suspicious works 
 may be appf aled to with more certainty in relation to the theological 
 opinions and superstitious notions and practices of the times when 
 they were composed, than in reference to questions of church polity, 
 and the prei-ogatives of the clergy ; inasmuch as these were the 
 
360 APPENDIX TO SECTION VII, 
 
 «ery points most likely to have been distinctly kept in view by th« 
 wriicis, as tlie main, though unavowed, objects of their spurious 
 labours. In following, therefore, the progress of superstition, these 
 apocryphal remains may lend an aid, which we do not seek for from 
 them in stating the rise of spiritual despotism. The author, 
 moreover, begs tlie reader to remember that not a few fads which 
 ought to have found a place in the present volume, had it stood alone, 
 are well omitted in a work which is one of a series. Spiritual Des- 
 potism and Superstition are, indeed, intimately connected, and it 
 may be doubted which of the two should be regarded as the leading 
 theme. Perhaps the claims of the two are evenly balanced : but both 
 have an immediate and highly important bearing upon the religious 
 movements of our own times: — the first (chiefly) because a mis- 
 placed jealousy of clerical power is tending to the further depression 
 of an influence which needs rather to be restored : — and the second 
 (chiefly) because our modern Christianity is, in more modes than 
 one, and among all p.irties, affected by those perversions and cor- 
 I'uptions which we are compelled to assign to the first century. It 
 may boldly be afiirmed that popery will not be refuted, nor the Re- 
 formation consummated, until the superstitions of the martyr Church 
 are thoroughly explored, and popularly understood. Every writer 
 overrates the importance of the particular theme he undertakes. 
 This natural and common prejudice allowed for, the author Avill yet 
 assert the high praciicAl significance of the line of inquiry in which 
 he is now eng iged, and especially in reference to the present posi- 
 tion of the Established Church. Happy will he be to find that, on 
 the path he pursues — a path not strewed with roses, he has compa- 
 nions and competitors. The work now to be done needs every ad- 
 vantage of co-operation, and of generous rivalry ; yes, and of Chris- 
 tian and mannerly opposition. The author must deem every man a 
 brother who loves Christianity, and who labours to promote it. In- 
 terests vastly surmounting all personal considerations are now at 
 stake ; and whoever presumes to put a hand to the great movements 
 of the day, should come forward thoroughly prepared to count all 
 things as dross which have reference simpl)^ to himself. To be 
 known, or to be unknown, on the theatre of literary emulation, of 
 what importance is it ? To have been inconsiderately lauded, or to 
 have been illiberally contemned, by this journal, or by that, of what 
 significance ? Assuredly the motives which would lay a man open, 
 very sensiiively, to influences of this sort, are of a kind that must 
 fail to bear him through the oppressive labours of remote historical 
 research. Well would it be if both writers and critics could more 
 const-i.tUly bear in mind the plain but momentous considerations of 
 the brevity and precariousntss of the season through which, indivi- 
 dually, our opportunity of doing any good extends, the account to be 
 rendered of our personal agency, and the infinite consequences, to 
 our fellows, that attach often to the part we take in religious revolu- 
 tions. If the author, in his first section, has appealed from the tribu- 
 nal of our periodic literature, to the better judgment of the public, he 
 has done so under the serious and strong impression that, from the 
 peculiar circumstances attending this species of writing, it hardly 
 
APPENDIX TO SECTION VIII. 361 
 
 ever, if at all, comes under the control of those high motives, apart 
 from which great religious controversies should never be touched. 
 
 To revert for a moment to the point from which he set out, the au- 
 thor must further anticipate the exceptions of those who may think 
 that certain flaming affirmations of the dignity of the Christian 
 Priesthood, made by the florid orators of the fourth century, should 
 have filled a prominent place in the present volume : for instance, 
 the enormities of spiritual inflation that abound in Chrysostom's 
 Treatise on the Priesthood. Earth trembles under this churchman's 
 magniloquence ; but the real value of it, in relation to our immediate 
 subject, entirely turns upon the decision of a preliminary question, 
 namely, that concerning the sacraments, or " mysteries of the 
 Church." If Chrysostom's doctrine, on these points, be jtistifiable 
 and sound, the pretensions he advances, and the prerogatives and 
 dignities he challenges, are justifiable also. If popery be Christianity, 
 Chrysostom spoke only the words of truth and soberness when he 
 sought to rear the priest to the third heavens. The treatise we have 
 mentioned is liable to the charge of promoting sjDiritual despotism 
 only when the doctrine it assumes has been disproved. The same 
 must be said of a hundred pages of the ecclesiastical rhetoric of the 
 fourth and fifth centuries, 
 
 APPENDIX TO SECTION VIII. 
 
 Page 263. — " Sed et ut multa alia ille (Lutherus) reliquit, ita 
 etiam hoc negotium posteris tradidit, ut quos reddiderat fontes, his 
 uti melius discerent, ipsamque doctrinum, ex illis fontibus haustam, 
 ab omnibus humanornm opinionum commentis magis magisque libe- 
 rarent. Gluod non ab ipso Luthero confectum esse nemo mirabitur; 
 quanquam in illo tale ingenium fuit, ut, nisi aliorum laborum gravis- 
 simorum multitudo virum ab eo otio, quod antiquarum hterarum stu- 
 diura quum maxime exposcit, avocasset ; vera librorum N. T. inter- 
 pretatione superior omnibus aequalibus futurus fuisse videatur : sed 
 post tria fere secula, post tantosque virorum summorum labores, 
 nondum certis legibus compositum esse artem interpretandi N. T. id 
 tam mirum videri debet omnibus, ut, nisi illius artis difficultates, et 
 vitiorum, quibus ea etiamnum laborat, causas norint, vix credituri 
 sint." Titmann. 
 
 What is true of the system of interpretation, and the theology of 
 Luther and his illustrious companions, is true of his ecclesiastical 
 notions, and of theirs. Every thing we inherit from these great men 
 demands to be reconsidered. 
 
 Page 275, — " A church-and-state system." Even if his proper 
 subject, and his space, might admit it, the author would be reluctant 
 
 31 
 
362 APPENDIX TO SECTION VIII. 
 
 to advance any thing upon the abstract question of a church-and- 
 state polity ; and especially for this reason, that speculative argu- 
 ments of this sort tend to distract the public mind from those more 
 important and urgent questions that relate to the renovation and im- 
 provement of our ACTUAL ESTABLISHMENT. We are not about (it 
 may be ho])ed) to melt down the entire mass of our institutions, and 
 to cast them anew ; but to correct and amend, to purify and to in- 
 vigorate, what we possess. Theories which assume nothing as ex- 
 isting in fact, are properly entertained, cither in new countries, where 
 the rude elements of society have to be combined ; or in old coun- 
 tries, where every thing that exists is too desperately corrupt to ad- 
 mit of amendment. England, we presume, is as remote from the one 
 of these conditions, as it is from the other. 
 
 Page 278. — Every man of sense and right feeling, who cares for 
 the Established Church, and desires its welfare, must be pei^iCtrated 
 Avith sorrow and humiliation in hearing the insufferable languoge and 
 doctrines of the times of Charles II. repeated, up to the present hour, 
 by certain of the clergy. It is more than can well be expected from 
 human nature that the Dissenters should listen to this outrageous 
 bigotry in magnanimous silence. On the contrary, it exasperates, 
 not merely the intemperate and factious, but the moderate and re- 
 spectable. Does the Church then think herself so strong that she 
 may, in safety, insult and revile some millions of the people ; and not 
 the least intelligent or powerful portion of them ? This is an illusion 
 not unlikely to be dissipated. But where is the Christian temper of 
 a Church that deals in, or that authenticates calumnies and curses ? 
 or where is episcopal authority, that does not visit the offenders with 
 grave and public rebukes? Clergymen may know what will suit the 
 taste and temper of their order; but they do not always know^ (or 
 appear to know) the taste, temper, and tacit sentiments of the laity. 
 At the present moment it is not a few of the laity of England whose 
 good-will and active friendship it would be wise to conciliate : — not 
 a fev/ there are, well informed, even in matters of religion, temperate 
 in opinion, well inclined to sustain our Ecclesiastical Constitutions ; 
 some of them, perhaps, possessed of influence over the public mind, 
 and ready to employ this influence, wdiether more or less extensive, 
 for the support of the Church : but it is expected from them that, in 
 doing so, they should join hands with Sacheverels, or with some who 
 had better have lived in the twelfth century than have disgraced the 
 nineteenth ? There is a singular want of tact and discretion on the 
 part of those who, by giving countenance to zealots, fix a deep dis- 
 gust in the minds of the intelligent laity. It is not a day too soon for 
 the Established Church to put away from herself a mode of behaviour 
 which she cannot maintain, and hold at the same time the hearts and 
 reverence of the better portion of the English people. 
 
363 
 
 APPENDIX TO SECTION IX. 
 
 Page 292. — The author believes he shall not go beyond the limits 
 of his actual knowledge of the state of opinion among the dissenting 
 clergy, in affirming that, in reference to questions of ecclesiastical 
 polity, the body is by no means accordant; for while the majority 
 (perhaps) is actively and warmly attached to extreme principles, 
 and is thoroughly democratic and congregational (democratic in ec- 
 clesiastical affairs) there is a considerable and a highly respectable 
 party among whom the suspicion has been long growing that their 
 polity is unsound in principle, and inexpedient in fact. This would 
 be the very moment for these intelligent men ingenuously to avow 
 their discontents. Dissent would not be weakened but strengthened 
 by their doing so : — or what is far better, a path would be cleared of 
 conference and conciliation, which might open at length upon a fair 
 field of Christian peace. May Heaven in its infinite goodness so 
 lead forward the minds of the Avise and sincere among us, as shall 
 issue in thwarting the designs of the factions, in healing every divi- 
 sion among those who love the same Lord, and in securing the .per^ 
 manent religious prosperity of the empire I 
 
 THE END, 
 
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